Evidence for God from Science

No Calvinist would ever say or believe that he is imposing a system onto Scripture. On the contrary, one of a Calvinist's largest concerns is usually taking verses out of context to fit theology (proper exegesis is the specialty of a Calvinist pastor who was very influential for me). To the non-Calv...

So you start with the term false believer and from that you infer that there are (true) believers, not the other way around. No. I'm just saying that a true believer is one who places his faith in Christ, and is saved, and has the indwelling Holy Spirit, and is eternally secure. I don't think I eve...

So Rick, you are saying- there is such a thing as false believers, false believers are those who those who don't actually believe. And from that we conclude that there are "true" believers, who are actually just believers. So you start with the term false believer and from that you infer t...

I used to kind of fret about this but I don't at all anymore. For one thing, doubt has been cast on Libet's experiments (which I find very interesting) from a great number of directions. Here is one article I read on this very recently- http://metacognizant.wordpress.com/2012/07/12/neuroscience-and-...

I think I'm coming to an understanding of your view (and whether I agree or disagree its still fun to "understand"). I've read MacArthur but don't know exactly what his view is, if that is his view than I certainly disagree with it. I have disagreements about what Calvinists (or at least I...

Assuming that you are correct that these various groups are both mistaken in their exegesis of Scripture and that they deny eternal security (plenty would deny both but that isn't the debate)- is salvation "trust Christ and you will be saved" or "trust Christ and believe in eternal se...

Okay so here's the standard :poke: question: Can a professed believer prove by word or deed that he was never a believer? This might be (ok, probably is) skirting around the issue you're addressing here, but hopefully this still constitutes an answer of some sort. I think the answer is yes. Let's s...

You kind of talk about Calvin as if he's some sort of demi-god in Calvinist circles and there's only interest in the man-made construct. Like Spurgeon said, Calvinism is just a nickname. They are preaching the sovereignty and conquering love of God, the gospel. Calvinists don't deny free will either...

I think we have to be careful of attributing causality to one factor just because of a correlation. Many times its just a matter of national identity and creating an us vs. them rather than an actual conflict over ideas. Look at football (soccer) in other countries. It becomes part of a person's ide...

I don't think the argument has to be taken as a statistical one though. It can be a simple inference to the best explanation or simple probability. We don't have to know prior probability or how much more probable it is, only that the fact that 80% of people answered A makes it a better choice to co...

Already arguing in circles, but how can you conclude that its unknowable to them? You can't, you only know that its unknowable (not even that, only unknown at the present time) to you. The very fact that such a strong majority picked A is prima facie evidence that they, as a collective whole, believ...

There's this assumption (and I've seen it here and other places in the past) that Calvinists don't actually believe what they're saying and are purposefully preaching a false Gospel. That we think that Calvinism is a man-made construct instead of what the Bible teaches. I'm just going to flat out de...

I don't have much more to say, but I just realized I said something misleading, the "50/50" comment. The argument wouldn't rely on prior probability at all. So saying that it makes the existence of God more likely than not, like you say it depends on what you believe the prior probability ...

I should add that the idea that we cannot know that god exists or cannot know the probability that a god exists is your presupposition or conclusion, not part of the scenario I laid out. Some believe(d) that it is impossible for there not to be a god... maybe they know something we don't know. But t...

Well if you don't buy it you don't buy it, but I know that more than one epistemologist would disagree with you. I will take your example though. If there's an equation with an unknown operator, you should pick the option that the majority pick because they may have information that you do not have....