Stephen Law

This heavily edited video clip, drawn from this original , is interesting. In it I respond to the question "Why does the universe exist" by saying "I don't know" (I then left a pregnant pause which produced a round of applause - that's been edited out). The gist of the commentary is: "You, Stephen Law, don't know why the universe exists? Then you can't deny my God exists! I win! You're insane!" Unfortunately, this way of thinking is very deeply entrenched in the minds of some of Craig's more dimwitted followers (not all of his followers, of course - plenty of them will wince at this). The truth is an atheist might succeed in showing that Craig's God does not exist, whether or not that atheist knows the answer to the question "Why does the universe exist?", and whether or not they bother to refute Craig's Kalam cosmological argument. That's what I aimed to do in this debate, as I explained several times...

Yes, it's finally been posted up. Recorded last October in front of audience of 2,000 (largely, though not entirely Christian) at Westminster Central Hall. I usually watch any recording of myself with my head in my heads, cringing at what an idiot I am, but actually this went alright, I feel. I did wobble in my first rebuttal, partly because I forgot what I was going to say. But the rest of it goes OK. Especially the Q&A at the end. The point I make about evidence for the resurrection comes across fairly clearly on the video, to my surprise (I had suspected it was too quick to follow) - and I do think it a very strong point (and also original so far as I am aware). People have also previously complained that the audio recording was poor and I couldn't be heard, but I seem pretty audible on this. Still, I could certainly have done better. My debating skills are pretty poor compared to Craig's. There are also points I could have added that would have caused him ...

In the second half of Craig’s latest "Reasonable Faith" podcast , he talks about how, he supposes, atheists know that God exists, despite the fact that they assert that they don’t. I’d previously said in a post that Craig’s view would seem to have the consequence that atheists are lying about that, then. Actually, maybe that doesn’t follow. In the podcast, Craig denies his view is that atheists are lying when they deny they know God exists. We should accept that denial. However, Craig’s explanations for why atheists are not, then, lying when they claim they don’t know when they do is not, I think, very convincing. First he draws an analogy with someone who tries to rationalize away or suppress what they know. His example is of a married man who has an affair. The human psyche is so capable of rationalization and suppressing things that we find uncomfortable that I think it's very plausible to think that an atheist could somehow suppress the knowledge of...

Thinking a bit more... I suspect a real problem question for a Craig type Christian is, if the atheist knows God exists, and knows the penalty for denying God exists is infinite punishment, and the reward for acknowledging belief is infinite bliss, why does the atheist "suppress" their knowledge of, and deny, God's  existence? Motive? Sure, Craig thinks the atheist's denial is born of "wickedness". But that's not a motive . A wickedly selfish and self-serving person, when given an "offer they can't refuse" by a mafia boss, will take the offer, not refuse it. Craig's God gives us atheists a choice - admit what we clearly see and know to be true, and get a pass to heaven, or deny what we know, and receive infinite torment. Why do we freely and knowingly choose that latter? How does Craig make sense of that choice? Surely,  a selfish, self-serving person would choose the former? I'm genuinely interested.... when it comes ...

Craig (PS correction: one of Craig's Reasonable Faith guys) has said about that quote that Craig never meant that reason alone leads to atheism.  Go here . Thanks to the Uncredible Hallq . We should take Craig at his word of course, and put down what Craig actually said to an uncharacteristic lapse of clarity. Here by the way is another piece by Craig in which he maintains that atheists know God exists and, by the end of their lifetime, also the great truths of the Gospels. Notice that Craig talks below about how God reveals himself in nature, but also that nature provides "evidence". Is the idea that atheists can just see that God exists, as they look upon nature? Or is it that they should merely infer God's existence on the basis of evidence that nature furnishes? If the latter, then they don't necessarily know God exists - they may fail to spot the evidence or make the inference. And why is infinite punishment an appropriate penalty for failing t...

I r ecently noted that William Lane Craig takes the view, apparently, that atheists know in their hearts that God exists. It would seem to follow that atheists are liars when they claim not to know that God exists (assuming they know they knows God exists, and that to lie is to assert what one knows to be false). Theist Andy Everist, in an independent post , sees that this conclusion is implausible, and writes: The Bible claims all men (atheists and skeptics included) have a knowledge of God. Romans 1:20-21 states, “For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse. Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.” Many atheists find such a claim both wrong and offensive. This is because i...

I just put this comment as a reply to a comment made on the preceding post. As it's so long, and contains some details that may be of interest to others, I am also posting it here... Hi Brigadier The Evil God Challenge is supposed to be a challenge. The challenge is to explain why belief in a good god is significantly more reasonable than belief in an evil god. Craig tried to meet the challenge, but failed. I see you are coming close to admitting that he failed, as you are now attempting to bolster his arguments with additional arguments of your own. Do your arguments succeed? No. I said earlier about intuitions generally that: "you can't just drop them without adequate justification." You agreed, but said about our intuition that there’s more than enough empirical evidence to reasonably rule out an evil god: “Sure, but the point is that once you realize certain metaphysical/logical distinctions of which you were previously unaware, then you also realize that your in...

This response to my evil god challenge has recently appeared on William Lane Craig’s website , after our debate. It’s posted in full below. With my comments in bold. The post takes the form of Craig responding to a question emailed by a fan. Question: Dr. Craig this is a simple question in regards to your debate with Stephen Law. Suppose someone hypothetically argued for an Evil God that exists. Could one use the "Problem of Good" as an objection, just as Non-Theists use the "Problem of Evil" against theism? Would all the arguments such as Plantinga's Free Will Defense be flipped around, and actually work against the problem of good? So far, it truly does appear that Evil is a privation of good, and the arguments used to counter the "Problem of Good" against an Evil God do not work very well as a refutation. Cornell USA BTW notice Craig never responds re the comment on flipping Plantinga's free will defence (which applies only to the logical proble...

Apologies if I do not respond to every comment. There have been a lot. I'm genuinely grateful for all the feedback - positive and negative. I want to believe what's true, of course. So counter-arguments are to be welcomed - especially if they're good ones! Apparently I will burn in hell for all eternity for failing to believe in Craig's God, if he exists . So would prefer not to get this wrong. I'm in Sweden for a few days from tomorrow, so won't be posting much if at all. POSTSCRIPT I was asked to prepare some questions for Craig for the Q&A session at the end. In fact I was never given the opportunity to ask any. But I had prepared a couple. Here they are: NUCLEAR QUESTION You claim to just know in your heart, with utter certainty, that God exists and Christianity is true. I want you to imagine that you have become President of the United States. Imagine also that there’s a red button on the table. You know that pressing the button will bring about a nucle...

Here are my remaining notes prepared for the debate on God's existence with William Lane Craig. These anticipated Craig's likely responses to my attacks on hos moral and resurrection arguments. I didn't really use this stuff on the night, except a little in Q&A session at the end. Notice I was also ready for the ontological argument. 2. CRAIG’S POSSIBLE DEFENCES OF MORAL ARGUMENT IF NO GOD, THEN WE’RE NOT SPECIAL. WE’RE JUST ANIMALS, LIKE OTHER ANIMALS. THEY HAVE NO MORAL DUTIES TO EACH OTHER. SO NEITHER DO WE. It doesn’t follow from the fact that we are animals that we are not special. We can still be, and are, special in all sorts of ways. Unlike other animals we can write poetry, contemplate the great questions of philosophy, derive a profound sense of meaning and enjoyment from great works of art. We are rational agents capable of reflecting on the moral consequences of our actions. In fact, it’s this last difference between us and other animals that explains why th...

Some have said they struggled to follow my line of argument in the William Lane Craig debate. So here’s a brief overview (check my closing statement too) [post script - after presenting the evidential problem of evil ] I asked Craig to explain why belief in a good god is significantly more reasonable than belief in an evil god - given an evil god is absurd (and Craig agreed it is absurd). Most people will happily conclude there’s no evil god purely on the basis of the evidential problem of good (whether or not there are other reasons to reject the evil god hypothesis). So why isn’t the problem of evil similarly fatal to belief in a good god? After all, most standard methods of explaining away the evil can be reversed to explain away the good. E.g. appeal to an afterlife and playing the sceptical, God-has-his-ultimate-reasons-of-which-we’re-ignorant card. Now Craig, quite amazingly, actually chose to play that sceptical card on the night, endorsing the (highly counter-intuitive and, ...

Finally (having provided all my other notes in postings below) here are my notes prepared for whatever Craig might have said in response to the evil god challenge. You can see I prepared for a much wider range of moves than he actually made. In fact, this is where I was weakest. I floundered a bit. I did nail him on his silly "evil proves there is a god" move (which he later acknowledged is not really a good objection to the problem of evil). But I failed to nail Craig him on the "earthly happiness" move, despite having it down here. Nor did I explain clearly enough that even if Craig did accept (as he did, amazingly) that there's no observational evidence at all against an evil god or good god, he is STILL stuck with the challenge of explaining why belief in a good god is more reasonable belief in an evil god, the latter being absurd (all Craig had left were his moral and resurrection arguments, which I did then go on to demolish). I should also have picked up ...

From yesterday's debate with William Lane Craig. I removed a few phrases from the beginning. My opening statement and my refutations of Craig's moral and resurrection arguments are posted below. As we look back across the hundreds of millions of years of sentient life on this planet, we find suffering on a stupendous scale. For example, we humans have - over many hundreds of thousands of generations before before either Jesus or the idea of Prof. Craig’s god were known to us - had to watch a third to a half of our children die painfully in our arms. Immense suffering and horror are built into the fabric of the world we are forced to inhabit. My contention is this suffering constitutes powerful evidence against Professor Craig’s god. Even many Christians acknowledge it constitutes a very powerful intellectual threat to their belief. I’ve challenged Professor Craig to explain why, given this mountain of evidence, belief in his God is supported by the evidence and arguments. Why,...