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Christianity and the Source of all Truth

I can tell you like philosophy Drew, I do too!

Anyways, I think definitions are important, I had to look up empiricism and here is what I got:

Empiricism - theory of knowledge emphasizing the role of experience in the formation of ideas, while discounting the notion of innate ideas.

Now I have to ask you Drew, do you really discount the notion of innate ideas, or do you just think experience plays a role?
 
Veritas said:
Now I have to ask you Drew, do you really discount the notion of innate ideas, or do you just think experience plays a role?
I think the closest characterization of my view is the following statement by Kant: "Experience without theory is blind, but theory without experience is mere intellectual play." In short, I think that both "innate" ideas and experience collaborate to give us knowledge of the world.
 
RED BEETLE said:
Drew said:
I said that the Scriptures should be our starting point on matters of faith, morality, etc (perhaps the etc is a little vague, I admit).
Forgive me for asking an epistemological question at this point, but HOW DO YOU KNOW THIS? Did you sense that the Bible is a religious book? Hey, William James might agree with you.
This is a very good question. I am afraid that my answer may seem a little vague. I read the Scriptures and felt that they had a "ring of truth" about them. This is a very subjective statement, I grant you. And although I suspect that you will object to this, I also came to believe that the Scriptures' teaching does indeed map to the "empirical data of life". In short, what the Bible teaches about life seems, to my mind, to be borne out by "experience". So at a certain point, I felt that the Scriptures had indeed "earned" my respect and I placed more and more faith in them as an authoritative guide to faith and practise. Does this mean I am denying the role of the Holy Spirit in "opening my eyes". Of course, not. I am merely explaining how I experienced my coming to faith in the Scriptures.

One what basis have you decided that the Scriptures are authoritative? Are you going to claim that no "judgements" or "evaluations" on your part were involved? That would be an interesting claim and we will see where it goes if it comes to that.
 
Drew said:
Forget my earlier questions and please consider this one: Is it possible that your position on any matter of Christian doctrine is mistaken (i.e. at variance with the factual truth)?

If someone asked me this question, I would answer yes.

What do you mean by “Christian doctrine?†It’s a fair question considering you and I really don’t have a common understand on “Christian†or â€Ådoctrine.â€Â

~JM~
 
JM said:
What do you mean by “Christian doctrine?†It’s a fair question considering you and I really don’t have a common understand on “Christian†or “doctrine.â€Â
I think that you are being evasive and this will not help the credibility of your position.

I will try a different question: Is it possible that any of the beliefs you hold about God - his nature, his knowledge, his relationship to man are mistaken - in other words at variance with the facts? Is is possible that you are mistaken in respect to one or more of your beliefs about God?
 
As I try to ascertain the question you’ve put to me, what do you mean by “variance?†Do you mean the fact, quality, or state of being, the fact or state of being in disagreement, or a deviation?

After all, it was you that reduced the Bible to words in which we may offer many opinions and possible interpretations of these words. The Bible is inspired and you have a theory of "possibilities", yet, you deny the possibilities I may read into your words. In the slight chance I may misunderstand the question, after all there are many possibilities to the words you use, I just want to be clear.


;-)
 
JM said:
As I try to ascertain the question you’ve put to me, what do you mean by “variance?†Do you mean the fact, quality, or state of being, the fact or state of being in disagreement, or a deviation?

After all, it was you that reduced the Bible to words in which we may offer many opinions and possible interpretations of these words. The Bible is inspired and you have a theory of "possibilities", yet, you deny the possibilities I may read into your words. In the slight chance I may misunderstand the question, after all there are many possibilities to the words you use, I just want to be clear.
I think we all know that you will not admit to the possibility of being mistaken. If I were you, this is not a position I would want to be seen as taking - no one will take seriously the opinions of someone who claims infallible knowledge.

And the reference to my "possible interpretations" is not relevant. All I have ever pointed out is that certain texts are consistent with different postions and that a less simple-minded approach than "argument by verse" is required. You are stretching credulity in claiming that the meaning of my question is not clear.

If you do not wish to answer a clear well-posed question, that is your right, of course.
 
Actually, I was perhaps a bit hasty in my previous post to JM. I certainly would not take seriously anyone who claims perfect and infallible knowledge of the nature of God. I should not have spoken for others.

However, I suppose it is a possible state of affairs that JM's beliefs about God are beyond the possibility of error. If the Scriptures are held to be inerrant and authoritative, their meaning is clear, and if God "over-rides" the human tendency to make mistakes and grants JM (and of course others) immunity from mental error, then I suppose it is possible.
 
Drew wrote:
In short, I think that both "innate" ideas and experience collaborate to give us knowledge of the world.

Seems reasonable to me.

I believe that God provides us with "innate" ideas, and that those ideas are intrinsic to Him. I also believe God works through the world and that is what I experience. After all, all creation sings His name...

Let the heavens rejoice, let the earth be glad;
let the sea resound, and all that is in it.

Let the fields be jubilant, and everything in them;
let all the trees of the forest sing for joy.

Let all creation rejoice before the LORD, for he comes
Psalm 96:11-13


I was disagreeing with you before on point 1 because when you said "living in the real world - is a valuable source of "information" on "how to live"." To me it seemed you thought the world (worldly people) had valuable information that God doesn't have, and better information. But, if you believe God is working through all things, and you are looking to that "in the real world" I really have no disagreement with you.
 
I'm not taking the bate Drew.



"'The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,....neither can he know them' (1 Cor. 2:14). He may have more insight into the things of the world than a believer, but he does not see the deep things of God. A swine may see an acorn under a tree, but he cannot see a star."

THOMAS WATSON
 
JM said:
I'm not taking the bate Drew.



"'The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,....neither can he know them' (1 Cor. 2:14). He may have more insight into the things of the world than a believer, but he does not see the deep things of God. A swine may see an acorn under a tree, but he cannot see a star."

THOMAS WATSON
Fine. Its your credibility that is at stake. By refusing to admit that to the mere possibility that you could be mistaken in respect to matters of Christian doctrine, you are sending a message that you have divine characteristic (infallibility) that the rest of we mortals lack.

I would, of course, not have the stones to make such a claim

Who else out there is infallible in matters of faith?
 
JM said:
I'm not taking the bate Drew.



"'The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,....neither can he know them' (1 Cor. 2:14). He may have more insight into the things of the world than a believer, but he does not see the deep things of God. A swine may see an acorn under a tree, but he cannot see a star."

THOMAS WATSON
It is difficult for those who are lacking spiritual eyes to see the truth that those who have been born of God have the mind of Christ, but fear not, God Almighty is in total control of each of our eternal destinies.
 
Drew vomited out:
I did study philosophy - at Princeton University as a matter of fact. Where did you study philosophy, my friend? Now, do you see how silly it is to play the game of "credentials". Credentials do not matter - good arguments do.

For those of you who have not studied logic, the above is an example of a man--who studied philosophy at Princeton--committing the fallacy of ad hominem, while accusing another person of doing the same.

The reason you don't know where I studied philosophy and logic at is because I never appealed to my credentials in the first place. You're too much! I want to thank you for making my evening so much fun.

For those of you who don't know, Princeton was started by Calvinists. That's right, poor Drew owes Calvinism more than he realizes. John Harvard started Harvard, and you guessed it, he was a Calvinist too. Brown University was started by Calvinistic Baptists like John Gill. Lou Dobbs is right, education has fallen to an all time low today. We need to get back to our Calvinist roots!


It might indeed be tricky to "prove" that men learn through their senses, and I do not pretend to be prepared to "prove" this.
I'm sure I'm not the only one who has noticed that this guy isn't prepared to do much more than talk trash.


It certainly seems obvious that we do.
Are we now appealing to "common sense?"
Don't you have to demonstrate empiricism before you claim it is just common sense to believe in it?

Information about the world enters our eyes and ears and we gain new knowledge - the sky is blue, liver tastes awful etc.
I thought it was light that entered through the eyes?
I thought it was vibrations that entered into our ears?
Can I taste the novel The Brothers Karamazov? Or would I just be tasting the paper it was printed on?
Can I smell the number two?
Do you think that pie would smell better? Wait, isn't pi a number? Maybe some numbers do smell better than others!
I was going to say Pi was a Greek letter we could taste, but I hate Greek food.

Usually, an empiricist will attempt to prove that light is somehow transformed into a sensation. From here, he needs to explain how a sensation is changed into a perception. From here, he needs to explain how a perception is changed into a conception.

One of the most famous empiricists, George Berkeley--I think I mentioned that he was a Calvinist on a previous post--refused to believe that sensations were to be found at all in the brain. He claimed that the brain itself is sensible. Anything that is sensible must exist inside, and not outside of the mind. For, if a sensation of the brain was outside the mind, then no one could ever know it existed! Contrary to modern science, which claims that the mind exists in the brain, Berkeley demonstrated that the brain must exist in the mind. Berkeley knew that no one could prove that the sensations in the mind actually represent independent things outside the mind. After all, how could you prove it? By showing me? That is just another sensation, one that must be in the mind before it can be known. Kant believed that there was an actual world outside the human mind, though we could never know if our senses accurately represented it, he called it the noumenal realm (doesn't that sound cool!). Kant, however, had to admit that the noumenal realm is unknowable.:crying:

Here is a philosophy joke:
There was a lost transcript found on Kant's epistemology.
It is titled:
"Trying To Prove That One Can Know The Noumenal World"
by
I. Kant

Amazing and Thank You!
I'm here all week.



At the end of the day, I am not sure this really matters.
I thought your interpretation of Scripture depended upon learning through your senses. Can't you SEE that you now have no ground to claim the world was not finished in 6 days.

On a serious note, let me recommend some books that may lead you to rethink your epistemic position. Here are the links:
1
http://www.trinitylectures.org/product_ ... cts_id=127
2
http://www.trinitylectures.org/product_ ... cts_id=101
3
http://www.trinitylectures.org/product_ ... ucts_id=63

Sola Scriptura
Red Beetle
 
RED BEETLE said:
Drew said:
I did study philosophy - at Princeton University as a matter of fact. Where did you study philosophy, my friend? Now, do you see how silly it is to play the game of "credentials". Credentials do not matter - good arguments do.
For those of you who have not studied logic, the above is an example of a man--who studied philosophy at Princeton--committing the fallacy of ad hominem, while accusing another person of doing the same.
I would have thought the meaning of what I wrote was obvious. Anybody who has been following this and other threads will have noted your continual condescension in respect to other posters. As an "empiricist", I like to back up what I say with "observations". And please bear in mind the following from RB as you read the documentary evidence:

RED BEETLE said:
I never appealed to my credentials in the first place. You're too much!

Here you go:

RED BEETLE said:
For those that have not trained in logic....."
RED BEETLE said:
If you have not read this book, then you should stop posting and go read it
RED BEETLE said:
You call your view the "plain reading". I call my view the "correct reading"
RED BEETLE said:
Contraries can both be wrong, but they can not both be right, you simply need to study logic.
And my personal favourite:
RED BEETLE said:
I think those of us who have studied logic do not find the concept of an 'enthymeme' to be at all confusing
This is also a classic:
RED BEETLE said:
On a serious note, let me recommend some books that may lead you to rethink your epistemic position.

Never appealed to credentials, eh? Maybe not explicitly, but....

My intent, of course, was not to curry favour with the posters by showing my academic background, but rather to point out to the readers that no one should flaunt their training - they should let their arguments speak for themselves.
 
This reader's position is that Red Beatle has far outdebated Drew, and from a Scriptural position, Red Beatle far outweighs Drew in being able to argue content.

From a non-calvinist more of an arminian believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.
 
RED BEETLE said:
Drew vomited out:
Now that the heat has subsided, at least for a while, ya gotta at least admire the creativity of the above, if not the spirit....... :D
 
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