Seeing is believing?

[Athanasius]

That's interesting. Would we take failure to exterminate the Jewish people as evidence for the promise?

[Fenris]

That's interesting. Would we take failure to exterminate the Jewish people as evidence for the promise?

I would. But I think this is one of those pieces of evidence that is more personally compelling than that of a proof that would convince another person.

Similarly, we have God's promise to Abraham that "through your descendants will the entire world be blessed." (Genesis 22:18)

In my personal opinion this is objectively true.

Evidence: Jews make up less than 2/10 of 1% of the world's population. Less than one person in 500 is Jewish. It seems like this should be a people one never hears of. And yet. If we look at Nobel prizes, which are given on a yearly basis to excellence in diverse fields as medicine, physics, chemistry, economics, literature, and so on, we would expect very few Jews to have won. Just by mere statistics. And yet Jews, who make up such a tiny minority, have won around 25% of Nobel prizes. A people numbering less than 1 in 500 winning 1 in 4.  I personally see this as an actualization of that blessing, these are all topics that have made the world a better place for everyone.

Christians I have shared this with have found it less than compelling, for their own (obviously theological) reasons.

[RabbiKnife]

I don’t have any difficulty seeing the tremendous blessing to the world through the achievements of Jews through t the millennia

Of course, I personally find a remarkable accomplishment in one Jesus bar Joseph, so there is that

[Fenris]

I don’t have any difficulty seeing the tremendous blessing to the world through the achievements of Jews through t the millennia

Of course, I personally find a remarkable accomplishment in one Jesus bar Joseph, so there is that

Good example of the rational on one hand and the personal on the other.

[Oscar_Kipling]

Christianity seems to me to be one of a few special propositions where the importance of collecting evidence, investigation, falsification and most other mechanisms that people commonly use to get at the truth is minimized or altogether dismissed.

Not in Christianity proper, but most Christian practice isn't 'Christianity proper'. Think of this similarly to how a lot of Christians affirm a belief in the doctrine of the Trinity, but then provide arguments in favour of Modalism. There are differences between affirming a believe in X, Y or Z, explaining the belief that's affirmed, understanding what's believed, and so on.

When it comes to faith, it's of course important to: collect evidence, investigate, falsify, and so forth. But it's equally important to keep perspective. Faith isn't about propositions like 2 + 2 = 4 and is substantially metaphysical. It's theological, and it's philosophical. But it's also existential. How do engage in what sounds like a scientific endeavour of faith? Just as there are no definitive proofs of God's existence, there's nothing to definitively defeat the proposition that God exists, even if we determine that it's not A, B or C god that exists.

And it's frustrating to grow up in a tradition that emphasises feelings, downplays the evidence of this-or-that, or suggests ludicrous theology or beliefs that are clearly at odds with what we know of the natural world. But as with anything, there are bad conceptions and there are good conceptions, and the good conceptions aren't going to run away from those things.

To be fair i've encountered other self proclaimed Christians that claim to believe that there are arguments and proofs for God that rely on evidence and reason (I believe WLC has made such assertions). I've also encountered those that will insist that undeniable proof of God is all around us and/or is written on the hearts of every human.

It is, but the paradox is that you won't believe so until you believe so. WLC and others can make the case that belief in God is rational, but they can't argue that it's rational therefore you should believe it. You simply can't be compelled in that direction. You can't choose what you find compelling or what you believe.

If you believe that Christianity is inaccessible to science then I do not find it difficult to imagine that there are plenty of interpretations that would suit those conditions. I have run across several of those and they effectively parameterize God right out of science's grasp, however frequently those interpretations display the hallmarks of having been constructed as a means to reconcile faith with the steady accumulation of knowledge about the world. Often when Christians have taken the time to explain the metaphysical and theological material provided by something like genesis 1 for instance, I have found it not at all dependant on any apparent factual claims that bring it out of alignment with the sequence , mechanics, scope and/or time-scales we've come to know regarding the formation of the universe, our planet or biological life. IOW the bible can accommodate/tolerate some arbitrary changes to apparent factual claims while remaining metaphysically/theologically intact, and if this is true I think its fair to question why it wasn't written that way in the first place. Of course none of this is a problem if one decides to invoke God's mysteriousness or it could be argued that It only seems to not matter metaphysically/theologically that birds come before insects or whatever. I'm not certain, but I bet if a person wanted to they could systematically go through the bible and create this sort of rationale for every instance of an apparent factual claim that is at widdershins with science, arguing that every instance is literally false but philosophically/ theologically/ metaphysically perfect. This is what I would call torturous gymnastics, but others may call it sophisticated interpretation. I tend to land on my side of the fence because this byzantine trajectory more closely matches things that we know are made up than it does the circuitous trajectory of say our understanding of Gravity. You assert that evidence, investigation and falsification is important, but in science these things are the mechanism of change that is verified through observation, but in Christianity it is the mechanism of change that is verified through an internally consistent interpretation and the goal is to end up with something that is consistent with any observation. For instance an interpretation of Genesis 1 that transposes its claims outside of the realm of science is impervious to any observations about the order of appearance of organisms. There are no observations that necessitates a move in any of it's ideas or the interpretation in any way because even though it is ostensibly about the universe, it is divorced from anything we might see in the universe that it purports to superficially reference. It merely needs to find a way to not be internally inconsistent and not meaningfully describe or be described by anything in reality. This seems difficult, and this seeming difficulty is another thing that is used to praise its divinity, but it's actually orders of magnitude easier than describing something simple like the trajectory of a baseball because any description of baseball physics is limited by what can be observed, which is a strict set of things that must also generalize to golf balls and rocks as well...when compared to the expansive field of things that cannot be observed and have no need to comport with reality or account for the behavior of anything that is observable it is easy to see why this method works just as well for christianity "proper" as it does for Yoga hucksters, Crystal healers, Qi Gong "masters" and Mormonism, which as Sam Harris amusingly likes to point out is just Christianity plus some very stupid ideas.   


I don't remember how you initially presented the Plantinga's argument against naturalism years ago, but I did notice that most recently you treated it as merely useful to challenge a person's thinking. From out here it seems that this must be the absolute height of what the very finest Christian argument can accomplish, whereas as Fenris pointed out through mathematics I could create (or really just reproduce) a proof that a machine could be built that could compute anything that is computable while only using a single instruction. You would be right to point out that these arguments are directed at fundamentally different questions, and while I agree I propose that if you cannot be as definitive as the latter then your conclusion should be uncertainty. This is why I cannot agree that WLC, Plantinga or anyone else are actually making the case that a belief in God is rational, at best they can construct arguments that cannot be definitively refuted. For my money this means that all that is ever being done is constructing very impressive and entertaining speculations and then claiming that since this speculation holds together and cannot be outright refuted that accepting this speculation as truth instead of rightly admitting that you have not made a single step away from ignorance is actually a rational position. You should believe that apples grow on apple trees because apples actually do grow on apple trees, It should be a problem that they cannot make a similar claim because the tree is a macchanation and its fruits are conjecture.

[Oscar_Kipling]

That's interesting. Would we take failure to exterminate the Jewish people as evidence for the promise?

I would. But I think this is one of those pieces of evidence that is more personally compelling than that of a proof that would convince another person.

Similarly, we have God's promise to Abraham that "through your descendants will the entire world be blessed." (Genesis 22:18)

In my personal opinion this is objectively true.

Evidence: Jews make up less than 2/10 of 1% of the world's population. Less than one person in 500 is Jewish. It seems like this should be a people one never hears of. And yet. If we look at Nobel prizes, which are given on a yearly basis to excellence in diverse fields as medicine, physics, chemistry, economics, literature, and so on, we would expect very few Jews to have won. Just by mere statistics. And yet Jews, who make up such a tiny minority, have won around 25% of Nobel prizes. A people numbering less than 1 in 500 winning 1 in 4.  I personally see this as an actualization of that blessing, these are all topics that have made the world a better place for everyone.

Christians I have shared this with have found it less than compelling, for their own (obviously theological) reasons.

Most Nobel prizes have gone to Americans, Is that because we mention God on our money? Are Americans even more chosen by God than even the israelites? As a proportion of population the Faroe Islands has the highest per capita nobel prize winners, are they the actual chosen people? Israel is actually 11th per capita in Nobel prize winners behind The Faroe Islands, Luxemburg, Switzerland, Sweden, Iceland, Austria, Norway, Ireland, Denmark & the UK , shouldn't they be  #1? It could be argued that Jewish people are the reason that nuclear weapons exist and have proliferated, what does it say about their blessed status that they arguably cursed humanity with the means to destroy itself?

I feel that because antisemitism is so rampant that I need to clarify that I don't blame the Jews for nukes and If i'm entirely honest I have frequently thought about how impressive the scientific accomplishments of Jewish people have been, however my point is that picking out exceptional metrics and then drawing conclusions is a game that anyone can play regarding any group and frequently people do it to reinforce some racist point about the jewish people, so the obvious flaw in this thought process should be obvious.

[Fenris]

Most Nobel prizes have gone to Americans, Is that because we mention God on our money? Are Americans even more chosen by God than even the israelites?

Abraham Lincoln said that  America was the "almost chosen people". So you may be on to something there. But it's one thing to say that Western Civ (America and Europe, primarily) wins a lot of Nobel prizes. Near universal literacy combined with a culture of scientific inquiry will yield dramatic results. It's another thing entirely to explain how a tiny group of people who have historically been persecuted and excluded from society manages to win one out of every four. In an idle moment I have wondered how many Einsteins and Freuds perished in the gas chambers. Their loss was a loss for all of humanity.

Israel is actually 11th per capita in Nobel prize winners behind The Faroe Islands, Luxemburg, Switzerland, Sweden, Iceland, Austria, Norway, Ireland, Denmark & the UK , shouldn't they be  #1?

I didn't say Israel though. I said Jews.

Economics is a particularly weird one. If you look at winners who have at least one Jewish parent (and are not necessarily Jews according to Jewish law) they make up almost 50% of people awarded the prize. 

It could be argued that Jewish people are the reason that nuclear weapons exist and have proliferated, what does it say about their blessed status that they arguably cursed humanity with the means to destroy itself?

Yes because until nuclear weapons were discovered, mankind lived in a universal brotherhood of peace and harmony.

I feel that because antisemitism is so rampant that I need to clarify that I don't blame the Jews for nukes and If i'm entirely honest I have frequently thought about how impressive the scientific accomplishments of Jewish people have been, however my point is that picking out exceptional metrics and then drawing conclusions is a game that anyone can play regarding any group and frequently people do it to reinforce some racist point about the jewish people, so the obvious flaw in this thought process should be obvious.

One would think that a tiny minority as productive as Jews are would be protected and cherished. Instead they are hated. The world is a weird place.

People don't hate Jews because they accomplish many things, or because they don't. People don't hate Jews because they're rich, or because they're poor. People don't hate Jews because they dress differently from everyone else, or because they assimilate and it's hard to know that they're Jews. People don't hate Jews because of anything that Jews do.

People hate Jews because they're Jewish.

[RabbiKnife]

Some subset of all people hate Jews.
Some subset of all people do not hate Jews.

Some subset of all people hate any number of other subsets of all people simply because haters hate.

 And mean people suck.

[Fenris]

Some subset of all people hate Jews.
Some subset of all people do not hate Jews.

Some subset of all people hate any number of other subsets of all people simply because haters hate.

And this is one of the "personal pieces of evidence" that speaks to me specifically. Antisemitism is, to me and many other Jews, a unique phenomena that is different from other forms of racism. It has endured for a very long time, more than 2,000 years; it has changed in form to always be "justified" according to the leading values of the day; and people who hate Jews hate them because they are Jews and for no other reason.

Let's have a look at Numbers 10:35 So it was, whenever the ark set out, Moses would say, Arise, O Lord, may Your enemies be scattered and may those who hate You flee from You.

Medieval Jewish commentator Rashi asks a very logical question. Why does it say "Your enemies" and not "our enemies"? And then he answers it by saying that Israel's enemies are God's enemies. What does Rashi mean? Why are they one and the same? It seems to me that bad people hate the idea of a God Who judges them and expects them to behave in a moral manner. But they can't reach God to harm Him. But they can reach His representatives in this world, the Jewish people. And they have.

Using this interpretation, Christians can find themselves being hated for the same reason. Unfortunately, Christians have also been on the side of the haters. I guess that's one way to decide if someone is a real Christian. 

[RabbiKnife]

As my old Sunday School teacher used to tell a classroom full of rowdy 12 year olds, "If people don't hate you for being a real Christian, then you aren't doing something right."

[CadyandZoe]

What did Kierkegaard say about the ditch?

[Athanasius]

What did Kierkegaard say about the ditch?

Nothing that won't get him accused of being a subjectivist/relativist

[ProDeo]

How would one attempt to falsify Judaism?

The core belief of Judaism is that God made a perpetual covenant at Sinai with the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Furthermore, God promises multiple times in the bible that the Jewish people will never cease to exist.

Some examples

Lev 26 "Yet in spite of this, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not reject them or abhor them so as to destroy them completely, breaking my covenant with them. I am the Lord their God. "

Jeremiah 30:11 For I am with you to save you, declares the LORD. Though I will completely destroy all the nations to which I have scattered you, I will not completely destroy you.

Jermiah 31 This is what the Lord says, he who appoints the sun to shine by day, who decrees the moon and stars to shine by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar— the Lord Almighty is his name:
“Only if these decrees vanish from my sight,” declares the Lord, "will Israel ever cease being a nation before me.”

Deut 4:31 For the LORD your God is a merciful God; He will not abandon you or destroy you or forget the covenant with your fathers, which He swore to them by oath.

2 Kings 13:23 And the LORD was gracious unto them, and had compassion on them, and had respect unto them, because of his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and would not destroy them...


2 Kings 14:27 and since the LORD had said that He would not blot out the name of Israel from under heaven, He saved them by the hand of Jeroboam son of Jehoash.

etc etc.

How is Judaism falsifiable? If these statements are ever proven wrong, then Judaism will have been proved false. How could these statements be proved wrong? If the Jewish people, the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, cease to exist, then God's word as transmitted in the bible will be disproved.

Good point.

Jesus made a similar statement.

18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
20 teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

I can not remember one leader / founder of a religion who spoke similar words and became the biggest religion of the world, for centuries.

Also an example is God's timing sending Jesus. Okay, I am a bit biased here. AD70 IMO is no accident with the "terrible day of the Lord" in mind, you might disagree here, I realize.

And it's not like people haven't tried to do that.

Absolutely. Usually people who immigrate are completely assimilated after a century or so. Jews kept their identity, habits, religion for almost 2000 years by now after the big Diaspora in AD 70.

[ProDeo]

If you believe that Christianity is inaccessible to science then I do not find it difficult to imagine that there are plenty of interpretations that would suit those conditions. I have run across several of those and they effectively parameterize God right out of science's grasp, however frequently those interpretations display the hallmarks of having been constructed as a means to reconcile faith with the steady accumulation of knowledge about the world. Often when Christians have taken the time to explain the metaphysical and theological material provided by something like genesis 1 for instance, I have found it not at all dependant on any apparent factual claims that bring it out of alignment with the sequence , mechanics, scope and/or time-scales we've come to know regarding the formation of the universe, our planet or biological life.

Speaking of Genesis chapter one, it's obviously written in a Jewish framework (For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.) and symbolic language to make it understandable for all generations as it doesn't make sense for ancient people to talk about the first bacteria and how it came to life in water.

And yet - let's have a look at the order of biological life.

11 And God said, “Let the earth sprout vegetation, plants yielding seed, and fruit trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind, on the earth.” And it was so. 12 The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, each according to its kind.

20 And God said, “Let the waters swarm with swarms of living creatures, and let birds fly above the earth across the expanse of the heavens.” 21 So God created the great sea creatures and every living creature that moves, with which the waters swarm, according to their kinds, and every winged bird according to its kind.

24 And God said, “Let the earth bring forth living creatures according to their kinds—livestock and creeping things and beasts of the earth according to their kinds.” And it was so. 25 And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good.

26 Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

------------

How could the ancient author be right of what we only know since 100-150 years ago?

[ProDeo]

That's interesting. Would we take failure to exterminate the Jewish people as evidence for the promise?

I would. But I think this is one of those pieces of evidence that is more personally compelling than that of a proof that would convince another person.

Similarly, we have God's promise to Abraham that "through your descendants will the entire world be blessed." (Genesis 22:18)

In my personal opinion this is objectively true.

Yep Jesus a descendant of King David, Savior of the world.

Evidence: Jews make up less than 2/10 of 1% of the world's population. Less than one person in 500 is Jewish. It seems like this should be a people one never hears of. And yet. If we look at Nobel prizes, which are given on a yearly basis to excellence in diverse fields as medicine, physics, chemistry, economics, literature, and so on, we would expect very few Jews to have won. Just by mere statistics. And yet Jews, who make up such a tiny minority, have won around 25% of Nobel prizes. A people numbering less than 1 in 500 winning 1 in 4.  I personally see this as an actualization of that blessing, these are all topics that have made the world a better place for everyone.

Or just an evolutionary survival case? Because of all the persecutions Jews had to be smart in order to survive?

Christians I have shared this with have found it less than compelling, for their own (obviously theological) reasons.

Yes, Jesus as first and dominant reason. Nevertheless your interpretation of Gen 22:18 could be true as well.