Good Without God?

This post originally published in March of '09. I have added links to similar posts. 

Its been quite interesting to see how many atheists there are who believe that objective morality exists. Actually, I would say that the majority believe in objective morality. However, objective morality is inconsistent with the atheist worldview; they don't have a foundation for acting in a "moral" way versus an "immoral" way. I'm not saying that atheists can't be moral; they can. I'm just saying that they can't justify it. Here's why.

Morality implies "oughtness". How something ought to behave. That implies that you understand that that thing (that ought to behave in a certain way) was designed to behave in the expected way. Example: A watch ought to keep time. It is designed to keep time; therefore, it ought to. If it were not designed to do anything, it ought (is expected) to do nothing.

Can You Trust Your Senses and Reasoning?

This is quite the interesting question. If we can't trust our senses and/or our logic then we're in deep trouble. We would not be able to trust anything that we experience (not to mention the entire scientific enterprise), nor would be able to trust that we would be able to find any form of truth.

I'm going to look at three different worldviews and what they say about this. (Due to the desire to be brief, this post is in no way a comprehensive or nuanced understanding or treatment of these worldviews or the challenges I raise.) Let's start with the eastern worldviews.

The Importance of Learning to Communicate

This post was originally published in Feb 2009:

Communication is key to any kind of interaction with people. It helps us accomplish common goals, empathize with each other, or persuade of another opinion. Communication also informs people around us who we are and what we think.

Communication is an awesome tool, but it can do much damage if not used properly. This holds true in all types of situations.

As (hopefully) everyone knows, communication is a two-way street for the parties involved. If you are attempting to communicate with another person, you convey information, and they convey information. The key is for each of you to accept the conveyed information. I'm not talking about just "hearing" or "seeing", but interpreting and understanding. If one of you interprets the information incorrectly, it could result in something as small as a simple misunderstanding or as large as an personal insult (that does lasting emotional damage).

Who's in Control? Part 2

This post was originally published in Jan 2009:

In Part 1, I proposed a dilemma. Who's in control: Us or God? I showed that both beliefs have biblical support and that believing either way would undermine biblical inerrency. In Part 2, I will provide a possible answer that preserves biblical inerrency, God's sovereignty, and human free will.

I want to start by discussing God's omniscience a bit. The Bible clearly teaches that God knows all things (see Part 1 for references). He also knows our hearts (Ps 44:21; 139:1-4). I would like to propose that, based on this, God knows how every person will react freely to any and all circumstances that may be presented to them before He created them. This is referred to as "middle knowledge". (For more information about the doctrine of God's omniscience, including His middle knowledge, I will refer you to William Lane Craig's podcast Defenders. You will want the episodes on the Doctrine of God.)