William Lane Craig vs Lewis Wolpert | "Is God a Delusion?" | Westminster

[Applause] [Music] well good evening ladies and gentlemen my name is Peter May I'm the chairman of the universities and colleges Christian Fellowship known as UCC F and we have organized this two-week tour where Bill Craig will travel around the country visiting several universities engaged in other lectures or debates tonight is the opening event of this tour and we're delighted that you've come out and brave the wet weather so it is fairly gray evening outside the last I saw of it and we look as though we have substantially filled the building I have taken the liberty of deciding that we won't have after the formal debate we won't have questions from the floor and the big groans where I suggested that but those of you who know John Humphrys will know that he asks good questions on behalf of the public seeming almost every the students may not know this because it's early in the morning of the today program but the older folk here know very well that John is always pitching in with the good questions even handedly asking them both ways and so the reason we have the three chairs set down here is for the latter part after the formal debate we're going to assemble our two debaters and John Humphries and they will have the best part of half an hour to tease out the issues further in a more conversational dialogue style John's already getting a bit uppity I suspect it'll be arouse I'm sure it's going to be a very gentlemanly conversation church historian David Edwards wrote this the gospel comes alive when it's being tested against needs and against rivals he wrote the Christianity grows strong in the open air and the whole thrust of this two weeks is to bring it into open forum where people can bring their own objections viewpoints disagreements and debate will form a very important part of it and question x will be a key feature of everything that we do so finally it remains for me to introduce our chairman for tonight I have already said yes it is interesting with celebrities like John and some of us feel we know him so well he comes into our home almost every morning those of you who are not up early enough will know him from mastermind which he regularly presents on BBC television besides his radio journalism and his television work he's also an author and a broadsheet journalists so I imagine that he is familiar to most of us and it is now my great pleasure to introduce who will then introduce our debaters tonight please welcome the mastermind presenter John Humphries thank you thank you very much I'm particularly grateful that you mentioned mastermind it has to be said because it's relatively new for me that I thought I wasn't going to try anything new ever again and then they asked me about three years ago where he was to do mastermind so I thought I'd give it a go and it's wonderful I dummy not necessarily the program I've never actually seen the program but it but but I can't tell you particularly since we're here in Westminster how wonderful it is because for all of my career and at most of my career I'd be in a hack for nearly 50 years mostly I'd been interviewing politicians and now I'm chairing a quiz and I'm talking to people who actually want to answer the questions the ultimate cultural shock I tell you do admittedly get some fairly bizarre answers to something we know we mainly you may know we do this celebrity mastermind thing and it has to be said that the people invited onto celebrity the mastermind are not necessarily not necessarily the brightest coins in the myth not not all of them anyway and we had one on I'm not sure whether they broadcast the program yet but we had one on where I yeah we always kick off with a couple of easy question you know to get him in the mood and all that and I asked one of them as the opening question what breakfast cereal do you associate with prison quite so yeah nobody said Cheerios hi there is a point to it isn't there you can see the inner maybe was just commenting on the government's policy towards RG anyway I don't know enough enough of that we want to get on to the debate I'm daughter hold you back from these two esteemed gents you know them of course otherwise you wouldn't be here at least I assume you wouldn't be here if you didn't know them you know Bill Craig William Lane Craig to give him his his time I'm not gonna run through his CV or any that's too boring for words and you know who he is what he's done what he what he believes in what you may not know and I discovered this this morning and he may deny this of course but too late now is is how he actually got to believe in God and and it it all has to do with a rather beautiful young redhead the age of 15 I mean who sat in front of him in class you know I go no further than that I'll leave it to him to see how much of that he's he's prepared to vouchsafe to you what can I say about Louis the regular fixer I'm delighted to say on the Today program he is he is a great adornment to our to the national scene indeed he's essential in my view to the national scene you know him well at least if you don't you should acquaint yourself with his work by his book six impossible things before breakfast because it's terrific what I think it's terrific but there we are he had a face until he was 15 he was do it what is you is caught you don't stop danger but he he practiced his faith until he was about 15 lived in South Africa left South Africa no longer believes as you know and no doubt he will tell us why however we're going to kick off with Bill and the deal is this they get twenty minutes each then there's a rebuttal ten minutes each then there's a rebuttal of the rebuttal seven minutes each and then there's a five minute sort of somebody so that's how it's going to work ten twenty minutes ten minutes seven minutes and five minutes that's that's the deal and then at the end of all that we will sit together the three of us and see if there are any other issues to explore or perhaps make it a little more personal and possibly even animated though I dare say they'll be perfectly animated while they're here the lectern so would you first welcome please bill Craig thank you and good evening I want to begin by expressing my thanks to you CCF for inviting me to participate in tonight's debate and I also want to say what a real privilege it is to be sharing the podium with dr. walpert this evening and of course I want to thank all of you for coming out to share this evening with us it's my hope that our discussion tonight will be a genuine practical help to you as you work through these issues yourself personally now in asking the question is God a delusion it's imperative right from the start that we clearly define our terms the dictionary definition of a delusion is a false belief or opinion therefore if professor walpert is to persuade us that belief in God is a delusion he must show that belief to be false accordingly in tonight's debate I'm going to defend two basic contentions first there's no good reason to think that belief in God is false and secondly there are good reasons to think that belief in God is true consider then my first contention that there's no good reason to think that belief in God is false now I'm going to leave it up to dr. Wolper to present arguments against God's existence and then I'll respond to them in my next speech but I want to simply note in passing that if he's to justify an affirmative answer to the question before us this evening then he does owe us such arguments so let's turn then to my second main contention that there are good reasons to think that belief in God is true however unfashionable it may appear I am actually convinced that there really are good reasons to believe that God exists and let me just sketch tonight briefly some of those reasons number one God is the best explanation of the origin of the universe have you ever asked yourself where the universe came from why anything at all exists instead of just nothing well typically atheists have said that the universe is just eternal and uncaused but there are good reasons both philosophically and scientifically to doubt that this is the case philosophically the idea of an infinite past seems absurd if the universe never had a beginning that means that the number of past events in the history of the universe is infinite but mathematicians recognize that the existence of an actually infinite number of things leads to self contradictions for example what is infinity minus infinity well mathematically you get self contradictory answers this shows that infinity is just an idea in your mind not something that exists in reality David Hilbert perhaps the greatest mathematician of the 20th century writes the infinite is nowhere to be found in reality it neither exists in nature nor provides a legitimate basis for rational thought the role that remains for the infinite to play is solely that of an idea but that entails that since past events are not just ideas but are real the number of past events must be finite therefore the series of past events can't go back and back forever rather the universe must have begun to exist this conclusion has been confirmed by remarkable discoveries in astronomy and astrophysics in one of the most startling developments of modern science we now have pretty strong evidence that the universe is not eternal in the past but had an absolute beginning about 13 billion years ago in a cataclysmic event known as the Big Bang what makes the Big Bang so special is that it represents the origin of the universe from literally nothing as the physicist PC W Davies explains the coming into the universe as discussed in modern science is not just a matter of imposing some sort of organization upon a previous incoherent state but literally the coming into being of all physical things from nothing the Big Bang the smarts the origin not only of all the matter and energy in the universe but a physical space and time themselves now of course alternative theories have been crafted over the years to try to avert the beginning predicted by the standard model but none of these has commended itself to the scientific community as more plausible than the Big Bang Theory in fact in the year 2003 Arvind borde Alan Guth and Alexander Vilenkin were able to prove that any universe which has on average been in a state of cosmic expansion cannot be eternal in the past but must have an absolute beginning the Lincoln pulls no punches I quote it is said that an argument is what convinces a reasonable man and a proof is what it takes to convince even an unreasonable man with the proof now in place cosmologists can no longer hide behind the possibility of a past eternal universe there is no escape they have to face the problem of a cosmic beginning that problem was nicely captured by Anthony Kenney of Oxford University he writes a proponent of the Big Bang Theory at least if he is an atheist must believe that the universe came from nothing and by nothing but surely that doesn't make sense out of nothing nothing comes such a conclusion is in the words of philosopher of science bailiff Connie tighter in head-on collision with the most successful ontological commitment in the history of science namely the principle out of nothing nothing comes so why does the universe exist instead of just nothing where did it come from there must have been a transcendent cause which brought the universe into being we can summarize our argument thus far as follows 1 whatever begins to exist has a cause - the universe began to exist 3 therefore the universe has a cause now as the cause of space and time this being must be an uncaused timeless spaceless immaterial being of unfathomable power moreover it must be personal as well why well first of all because this event must be beyond space and time therefore it cannot be physical or material now there are only two kinds of things that fit that description either abstract objects like numbers or an intelligent mind but abstract objects can't cause anything therefore it follows that the cause of the universe is a personal transcendent mind secondly how else could a timeless cause give rise to a temporal effect like the universe if the cause were an impersonal set of necessary and sufficient conditions then the cause could never exist without its effect if the cause were permanently present then the effect would be permanently present as well the only way for the cause to be timeless and the effect to begin in time is for the cause to be a personal agent who freely chooses to create an event in time without any antecedent determining conditions and thus we are brought not merely to a transcendent cause of the universe but to its personal creator number two God is the best explanation of the fine-tuning of the universe for intelligent life in recent decades scientists have been stunned by the discovery that the initial conditions of the Big Bang were fine-tuned for the existence of Intel life with a precision and delicacy that literally defy human comprehension this fine-tuning is of two sorts first when the laws of nature are given mathematical expression you find appearing in them certain constants like the gravitational constant these constants are not determined by the laws of nature the laws of nature are consistent with a wide range of values for these constants second in addition to these constants there are certain arbitrary quantities which are just put in as initial conditions on which the laws of nature operate for example the amount of entropy or the balance between matter and antimatter in the universe now all of these constants and quantities fall into an extraordinarily narrow life-permitting range where these constants or quantities to be altered by even a hair's breadth like a life permitting balance would be destroyed and life would not exist for example if the atomic weak force or the force of gravity were altered by as little as one part out of ten to the 100th power the universe would not have been life permitting now there are only three possible explanations of this extraordinary fine-tuning physical necessity chance or design now it can't be due to physical necessity because as we've seen the constants and quantities are independent of the laws of nature in fact string theory predicts that there are around 10 to the 500th power different universes compatible with nature's laws so could the fine-tuning be due to chance well the problem with this alternative is that the odds against the fine tunings occurring by accident are so in comprehensive league rate that they cannot be reasonably faced the probability that all the constants and quantities would fall by chance alone to the narrow life-permitting range is vanishingly small we now know that life prohibiting universes are vastly more probable than any life-permitting universe like ours so if the universe were the product of chance the odds are overwhelming that the universe would be life prohibiting hence we may argue as follows premise 1 the fine-tuning of the universe is due to either physical necessity chance or design 2 it is not due to physical necessity or chance 3 therefore it is due to design and thus the fine-tuning of the universe for intelligent life implies the existence of a designer of the cosmos 3 God is the best explanation of objective moral values in the world if God does not exist then objective moral values do not exist by objective values I mean values which are valid and binding independently of whether anybody believes in them or not and many theists and atheists alike agree that if God does not exist then moral values are not objective in this sense for example Michael ruse a noted philosopher of science writes the position of the modern evolutionist is that morality is a biological adaptation no less than our hands and feet and teeth considered as a rationally justifiable set of claims about an objective something ethics is illusory I appreciate that when somebody says love thy neighbor as thyself they think they are referring above and beyond themselves nevertheless such references truly without foundation morality is just an aid to survival and reproduction and any deeper meaning is illusory like professor ruse I just don't see any reason to think that in the absence of God the morality evolved by Homo sapiens is objective on the atheistic view some action say rape may not be socially advantageous and so in the course of development has become taboo but that does absolutely nothing to prove that rape is morally wrong on the atheistic view there's nothing really wrong with you're raping someone but the problem is that objective values do exist and deep down I think we all know it there's no more reason to deny the objective reality of moral values than the objective reality of the physical world actions like rape cruelty and child abuse aren't just socially unacceptable behavior their moral abominations reus himself admits and I quote the man who says it is morally acceptable to rape little children is just as mistaken as the man who says two plus two equals five end quote some things at least are really wrong similarly love equality and self-sacrifice are really good hence our argument can be summarized as follows one if God does not exist objective moral values do not exist two but objective values do exist and therefore it follows logically and inescapably that 3 therefore God exists number four the historical facts concerning the life death and resurrection of Jesus imply God's existence the historical person Jesus of Nazareth was a remarkable individual New Testament critics have reached something of a consensus that the historical Jesus came on the scene with an unprecedented sense of divine authority the authority to stand and speak in God's place he claimed that in himself the kingdom of God had come and as visible demonstrations of this fact he carried out a Ministry of miracle working and exorcisms but certainly the supreme confirmation of his claim was his resurrection from the dead if Jesus really did rise from the dead then it would seem that we have a divine miracle on our hands and thus evidence for the existence of God now most people would probably think that the resurrection of Jesus something you just believe in by faith or not but in fact they're actually three established facts recognized by the majority of New Testament historians today which I believe are best explained by the resurrection of Jesus fact number one on the Sunday following his crucifixion Jesus tomb was found empty by a group of his women followers according to Jakob Kramer an Austrian specialist in the study of the resurrection by far most scholars hold firmly to the reliability of the biblical statements about the empty tomb fact number two on separate occasions different individuals and groups saw appearances of Jesus alive after his death according to the prominent New Testament critic Gerald Needham on it may be taken as historically certain that the disciples had experiences after Jesus death in which Jesus appeared to them as the risen Christ these appearances were witnessed not only by believers but also by unbelievers skeptics and even enemies fact number three the original disciple suddenly came to believe in the resurrection of Jesus despite having every predisposition to the contrary Jews had no belief in a dying much less rising Messiah and Jewish beliefs about the afterlife precluded anyone's rising from the dead to glory and immortality before the end of the world nevertheless the original disciples came to believe so strongly that God had raised Jesus from the dead that they were willing to die for the truth of that belief empty right an eminent New Testament scholar has concluded that is why as an historian I cannot explain the rise of early Christianity unless Jesus rose again leaving an empty tomb behind him attempts to explain away these three great facts like the disciples stole the body or Jesus wasn't really dead have been universally rejected by contemporary scholarship the fact is that there just is no plausible naturalistic explanation of these facts and therefore it seems to me the Christian is amply justified in believing that Jesus rose from the dead and was who he claimed to be but that entails that God exists and thus we have a sound inductive argument for the existence of God finally number 5 God can be immediately known and experienced this isn't really an argument for God's existence rather it's the claim that you can know that God exists wholly apart from arguments simply by immediately experiencing him this was the way people in the Bible knew God as Professor John hick explains God was known to them as a dynamic will interacting with their own wills a sheer given reality as inescapably to be reckoned with this destructive storm and life-giving sunshine to them God was not an idea adopted by the mind but an experienced reality which gave significance to their lives now if this is the case then arguments for the existence of God could actually distract us from God himself if you're sincerely seeking God then God will make his existence evident to you the Bible promises draw near to God and He will draw near to you and therefore I think we have good grounds for thinking that belief in God is not a delusion thank you professor Lewis Wolpert 20 minutes well thank you very much I'm not sure that I really want to thank the organizers for asking me to do this it's quite a it's quite a complex issue and let me try and explain to you why the vast majority of you here we worked out something like 90 percent believe in God at a religious I am NOT against people being religious I think it helps you a great deal I'm against religion when it interferes in the lives of other people I'm very happy to discuss this on other words if you believe for example of the fertilized egg is really a human being which some people in religious organizations believe then I'm very hostile to you because it's nonsense this is one of my subjects developmental biology or if for example you're against contraception for religious region and therefore aids as it were can become more common so I'm not against people having a belief in God I do believe that their belief is false and I'm saved by the fact that whatever arguments I give you I have no illusion I have no delusion that I will persuade you to change your minds the leaves are like possessions and I ask you when did you really lost give up a basic belief or your partner royal parent or your child it's very hard to do so now just let me remind you a nice statement from Richard Dawkins in who's been mentioned already he points out that in talking about God there exists a superhuman supernatural intelligence who deliberately designed and created the universe and everything in it including us now if you believe that and many of you do believe that you feel better and that I regret to tell you is why you believe in it and that really is the origin of religion people who have religious beliefs are on the whole healthier not much healthier don't get it they don't get carried away by it but you do do better you on the whole you do better also belonging to a religious community there's no doubt about it can have great advantages I'm not saying I'm a it want to argue that religion is always good I don't want to get involved in religious wars and something like that but the real point is it provides an explanation of a very deep problem and that's why we are here at all now the problem about believing in God is looking for evidence I regret to tell you and we won't have a discussion with you later but I will later on there is zero evidence for the existence of God I'm terribly sorry that there just isn't now first of all just let me remind you that every culture in the world hundreds of them have gods of some sort you are focused on the Christian God but may I ask what's wrong with their gods I mean why do you think that your God and I assume the old Christian God why do you think your God is sort of better based and all than theirs and there's a very nice story from someone who works on religion and anthropologists called Pascal Boyer and he was at a dinner in Oxford maybe it was Cambridge doesn't really matter but a small to English place and he was telling them about a group he'd been studying in southern Africa who believed that there were witches who flew over the territory there and killed some of their cattle and the head of the college said how can people have such absurd ideas isn't it ridiculous and Pascal didn't have the courage to tell them that these people knew about Christianity and had often asked him why was it that the people in Christianity who was still suffering because a couple of their ancestors had eaten some fruit please don't think that your ideas about the nature of pain and suffering are all that different from religions in other part of the world now the other problem with actually finding evidence for God is to actually to give some evidence but the first problem is if God exists who created God and why is God got a human form you know I think God would be if they were a God I'm sure be much more imaginative than to be like one of us good Lord would he have backache yeah I mean that he should take on a human form is natural from a historical point of view because there are as I'll explain in a moment but to think that God who might have done all these things was human seems to me bizarre in the extreme and of course as zero evidence for it let me try and explain to you you went like at one bit as to why you actually believe in God first of all it makes you feel better you have someone to pray to and the historical origin of this really goes back to your ancient ancestors Oh a couple of million years ago a couple of million years ago humans our ancestors started making tools you know you all seen their little stone tools now making them animals can't do that please don't tell me how clever your dogs and cats are really they're not as clever as you think they are and I know there are repeated articles in the papers how good rulers and chimps are wonderful to makers they can actually take a stick and actually get some and sort of a tree but you know it's pretty limited but humans started making tools and in order to make tools you have to have a concept of physical cause and effect and what makes you human is not God but your causal beliefs you have a concept of physical cause and effect and that led to to making and technology and that is what drove human evolution and as someone pointed out to get a feel of the difference between you and animals imagine seeing a tree I'm sorry imagine seeing a wind blowing a tree and some fruit falling off you would perfectly well know that in order to get that fruit all you would have to do is to shake the tree we believe that no animal seeing that would have the foggiest notion that they shook the tree the fruit would fall off they could learn to shake the tree if they did it by accident but they could never actually intuitively do that it's a slightly controversial field but really what makes you human is the concept of cause and effect now when that happened and the advant I don't have to tell you the advantage of having tools there are all sorts of people that think that human evolution is really based upon humans understanding each other I think shrimpanzees and baboons have quite a good understanding of what's going on they're really quite a quite a reasonable society and can I just point out to you if you think of social relationships that really matter if you had to go into the jungle who would you roll what would you rather take with you a friend or an ex I'd take an ex if I were you however once people had a concept of cause and effect they wanted to understand other things they wants to understand why the Sun went around the earth of course it doesn't they wanted to understand why we got ill and particularly we want to understand why we died and in fact we want to understand everything now the one calls they were absolutely sure of was a cause made by another human being and that's why they invented gods with human characteristics and so I'm sorry to tell you you weren't like that it's not attractive that the origin of religion comes from to making it comes from a concept of cause and effect and those people who had such beliefs in religion appear stable had a great advantage first of all they no longer worried about many of these problems as you don't because you know why we here because God put us here and it provided explanations for ill health death the afterlife and and everything else and it had the other advantage you could pray to that God and prayer is very comforting even though it may not lead anywhere it nevertheless it's very comforting it does offer you something to do and I think that those people who became I think of those people who became religious survived better and I would like to argue quite persuasively that you have a bit not a God gene in your brain but a propensity to believe in religion is embedded in the neural circuits in our brain and controlled by our genes because those people who became religious survived better and my evidence my evidence that we do have that as the following first of all just can I remind you that many people have actually religious experiences a wonderful book is by oh gosh William James the varieties of religious experience in which he points out that many people have religious experiences which are as real for them as anything in their real life there are of course delusions but nevertheless they are real for them and these are I'm afraid in one's brain and maybe just tell you why I think these circuits are there if for example you that has just been isolated recently the active ingredient of magic mushroom and if you take a group of people who have some religious inclination and give them the active ingredient many of them afterwards have religious experiences or religious like experience and people do have mystical experience if you just I mean I'm not going to ask you to cook up your hands I would be absolutely amazed if something like ten percent of you have not had some strange experience certainly out of touch with the real world over the last year and that's what made survey show and you have to ask yourself why if you take LSD you know and if you if you have a look what Timothy Leary and people say and they believed actually where God they believed they were the universe it can't be this boring molecule that turns on these feelings it must mean that they're activating these circuits in your brain I'm sorry to tell you you and all human beings have quite a strong set of mystical circuits in your brain and it comes I will want to argue from the fact that there's people who believed in religion and mysticism survive better in our ancestors than those who did not so that's you know I think one way of thinking about the the about the origin of religion it's not easy I mean I can't guarantee you that all these things that I'm saying because I'm talking about things that happened tens of thousands hundreds of thousands maybe even a million years ago but at least I think it makes a plausible story because I think when one comes to the existence of God you have to ask once again who created God you see if you're going to go for causal effects so there's a God then you have to save it sorry where did God come from it's not a question I hear often answered God where did you come from not even God answers and it's bizarre to have a human like God who has no cause for his own creation and you really if you go to the Bible now must I really take seriously that women came from Adam's rib I'm terribly sorry I'm a developmental biologist and I am a biologist I want to tell you women is women a peculiar there's no question about that come here but they did not come from atoms through whatever their peculiarities are it's not because of the rib like nature of their ancestry that I continue I think you also have to remember and this is a slightly delicate area that the stories about and the Gospels about Jesus were written thirty to forty to fifty years after his death no one who wrote the Gospels actually observed any of the events that they are writing about that's my reading of the actual of the of the actual stories as I as I as I look at the literature and you don't have to worry too much about morals you see even chimpanzees are quite kind to each other they can cooperate and certain gorillas and you don't have to have a moral sense from some supernatural being whose creation we don't understand evolutionists have looked at this quite clearly people liked rivers and Hamilton have pointed out that we have in our genes know that our genes program us to behave really quite well particularly to those who share similar genes and there's also evidence that humans behave quite well if you're kind to me on the whole I'll be kind to you if you're nasty to me I'm afraid I'm going to turn against you and this makes for a perfectly reasonable a moral position without without any difficulty whatsoever and if you come to all the complexity and I mean I know the origin of life is a tricky issue but evolution evolutions really very clever now it's not level it's really very dim to put it bluntly but it achieves remarkable results randomness and selection can get you to remarkable positions this is not not the moment felucca for me to give you give you an elected lecture on evolution but just remember eeveelution proceeds very slowly and I think that anybody thinks that God created you what about all that evolution you didn't believe that you descended from apes just look at some of your friends aren't there but come on you know exactly what I mean you might be dotty not to think that I think from the moment let me then just sum up again I think the evidence for God is simply non-existent yes there's some evidence for God in the Bible but that was nearly 2000 years ago and I keep asking my religious friends could you please tell me what God has done in the last 2,000 years and there's a mumbling and a bumbling but no answer whatsoever thank you very much [Applause] built ten minute rebuttal you'll remember in my opening speech I said that I would defend two basic contentions in tonight's debate the first of those was that there's no good reason to think that belief in God is false now as I listened to that first speech by Professor Wolford I discerned basically three arguments that he gave to show that belief in God is false the first one is that people are religious because they feel better and that's why they believe in God or alternatively it is because of the human concept of causality that leads them to believe in God it may in fact be hardwired into their brain now the problem with this sort of argument is that if you say that because belief in God is occasioned or caused in this way therefore that belief is false you commit an elementary logical fallacy known to every intro to philosophy student called the genetic fallacy the genetic fallacy is trying to invalidate a point of view by showing how that view originated and the fact that beliefs arise through people's wanting to feel better or perhaps through causality or even being hardwired into the brain does nothing to prove that those beliefs are false which is what he must prove if it's to show belief in God as a delusion for example it's been shown by child psychologists the children have hardwired into them the belief that when an object they see disappears behind a screen and then reappears they believe that the object continues to exist when it goes out of sight it doesn't disappear from being and then pop back into being this is a hardwired belief in children and yet I think none of us would say therefore that belief is false now the fact is that some child psychology studies do indicate that children also have such an instinctive belief in God and I'm inclined to view this as God's provision now the skeptic like dr. Wolper thinks that this is a delusion but then if he's to justify his view he's also some argument to show that the belief is false otherwise he's committing the genetic fallacy see so the issue tonight before us in the debate is not how religious beliefs originated it is whether or not those beliefs are true or false now he does give a second argument designed to prove that God does not exist and that is that there's no evidence for God's existence well this is not a good argument frankly because in the words of a forensic scientist I once meant in Australia the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence just because there's no evidence that the butler was the murderer doesn't mean that the butler was not the murderer or to give a scientific example we have no evidence so far that there was an early inflationary era in the origin of the cosmos but what we did the cosmologists who says because we don't have any evidence of it therefore it did not exist absence of evidence is not evidence of absence he needs to give a positive argument against God's existence now his third argument that he offered was the simple question who created God well this is not at all difficult to answer a timeless eternal being cannot have a cause as Keith Ward points out in his book God chance and necessity if one asks what caused God the answer is that nothing could bring into being a reality which wholly transcends space-time and which is self existent to fail to grasp such an idea is to fail to grasp what God is moreover I have given an argument that there exists such a being namely my first argument based upon the beginning of the universe it leads us to the postulation of a timeless spaceless immaterial and uncaused eternal being so none of these arguments is any good that he's given us against the existence of God if he's going to answer affirmatively that belief in God is a delusion then we've got to see some better arguments in favor of that proposition now what about the arguments that I gave my first argument was based upon the origin of the universe and apart from the who created God question I saw no response to this argument in his first speech what about the argument based upon the fine-tuning of the universe again there was no response to that but let me reinforce this argument by dealing with a possible objection that often arises many times people will say well maybe our universe is just one of an infinite number of parallel universes a sort of world ensemble and by chance alone we appear somewhere in the ensemble and therefore we shouldn't be surprised at the fine-tuning of the universe the reason this objection does not work as pointed out by Roger Penrose at Oxford University is that if our universe were just a random member of a world ensemble of randomly ordered worlds then it is far far more probable that we would be observing a vastly different universe in what we do observe for example the chances of our you our solar systems forming instantaneously by random collision of particles is about 1 out of 10 to the 10 to the 60th now that number is an inconceivably large number but as Penrose says it is it is incomprehensible smaller than the improbability that the low entropy level of our universe which is fine-tuned for our existence should exist by chance therefore if we were just one of a randomly ordered world ensemble we should be observing a much much smaller universe the fact that we do not therefore disconfirms very strongly the world ensemble hypothesis which suggests that we are not here to due to chance rather as I said we're here due to design my third argument was based upon moral values in the world you remember I argued if there is no God than there are no objective moral values and many atheists agree with this for example Richard Dawkins in his recent book is quoted by professor Wohlford approvingly when Dawkins says there is at bottom no design no purpose no evil no good nothing but pointless indifference we are machines for propagating DNA it is every living object sole reason for living now the problem is that that is inconsistent with dr. Wolfe Byrd's own statements of moral value such as that religion should not interfere with the lives of others that is a moral judgment on his part so it seems to me is caught into contradiction on the one hand saying there are no objective moral values on an atheistic evolutionary view but on the other hand agreeing with me and I think with most of us that in fact there are objective moral values torturing a child for fun is objectively morally wrong and if you agree with that then I think you'll agree with me that God exists fourthly I spoke of the evidence for the resurrection of Jesus and here dr. Wilfred responded to my evidence for the empty tomb the resurrection appearances in the origin of the Christian faith by saying that the Gospels were written later and they're not based on eyewitness testimony I'm afraid that's just misinformed in the review of John Dominic Crossan book the birth of Christianity in the Journal of the American Academy of religion published in the fall of 2000 the reviewer writes the dominant and in my mind the likely view is that the passion narratives are early and based on eyewitness testimony specifically with regard to the empty tomb in the appearances NT Wright in his epical book the resurrection of the Son of God has concluded that the empty tomb and appearances have a historical probability so high as to be virtually certain like the death of Augustus in AD 14 or the fall of Jerusalem in AD 70 those are the facts the only real question is how do you best explain them and I have never seen a naturalistic explanation of these facts that is as probable or plausible as the resurrection of Jesus finally what about my argument based on the personal experience of God here dr. Wolford says well there are varieties of religious experience certainly there are and I would say that a person is justified in believing in the object of his religious experience unless he has an overriding defeater or reason for thinking that that experience is delusory the problem is in tonight's debate we haven't been given any good reasons for thinking that belief is delusory so it seems to me I'm perfectly rational to believe in God on the basis of my personal experience of God unless and until he can give me some good reason for thinking that that experience is delusory he says well what has God done the last 2000 years well for one thing he changed my life I've had a personal experience of God and I see no reason to doubt the verticality of that experience so the belief in the existence of God like the belief in the external world or the belief in the reality of the past is a rational belief to hold unless and until someone provides some sort of overriding objection so I think so far in tonight's debate we've not seen any good reasons to think that the belief in God is false we've seen the genetic fallacy we've seen red herrings and other inconclusive arguments on the other hand I think we've got five good reasons all of which point to the existence of a transcendent creator and designer of the universe who is the locus of absolute value who has revealed himself in Jesus of Nazareth and who can be personally known and experienced [Music] luis well thank you first of all can I deal with the genetic fallacy the fallacy is yours not mine you didn't understand my organist told my point about genetics was not - in order to explain whether God exists or not but I was trying to explain why people believed in God it wasn't evidence for or against the existence of God you totally misunderstood my my argument my argument against God's existence doesn't depend upon genes it's the absence of evidence and to use catch phrases the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence I mean that's philosophical bunkum I mean I'm terribly sorry if God exists you may actually go to find some real evidence I'm terribly sorry we scientists do base the way we think on evidence I mean if I say that I think that you're a kangaroo because I dreamt you were a kangaroo last night that is not evidence of the slightest importance I think you really really if you want to go look for evidence you've got to find evidence and when I say what has God done in the last 2,000 years and his flip reply his what he made me religious I'm terribly sorry if you really want to take that seriously you might as well say well almost everything you've done has been determined by God and I'm afraid that isn't evidence you've really got to find something more plausible that God has done in the last 2,000 years in order to be even in the slightest bit persuasive with regard to Jesus I'm slightly out of my depth on the scholarship the stuff I've read says it's totally unreliable and there are many books that actually argue that and I didn't find that very useful there's no reason if you go to many societies who have a stronger belief in God as Christians do how would you persuade them that their beliefs are false whether whereas yours are actually right and when we go back to the Big Bang and we want to explain how it occurred maybe the really true and reliable way to say is we no you know there's nothing immoral or unsacred in saying we just don't know I mean I don't think that that has really come in too many philosophers Minds we scientists by contrast do say sometimes terribly sorry we just at the moment don't know and may never know but rather than say that an affair believers invent this mythical creature who has no basis who what and when I say how was God created it's denied that this is he is so amazing at the he by the way in a human form he's so amazing he didn't need a creator the universe needed a creator yes but not God come on you can't take that seriously in any way whatsoever and as far as fine-tuning is concerned I'm terribly sorry it may be a very small probability but that's tough luck the fact that there is the probability at all is why we here they're all those constants put with the actual functioning of the universe that's the way it is yes it's very improbable tough luck you just have to live with it many things in life are very improbable and you have to live with them you can't say they don't exists just because you don't like how how improbable there are and once again when I come back tomorrow I've see our Katya moral moral values certainly could be genetically determined so I think what one really has to ask also again and again is you have to be reminded that all cultures believe in a God of some sort and yet and I say you Christians because I think most of you are Christians believe that your God is the true God and there's of course is a delusion I think it really lie in bed at night and being sure why are you so sure that your God is the true God and was not created by anybody the universe was whereas their gods are totally unreliable and really totally deluded I really cannot see and I repeat it again and again if the one is to believe in God one has to first of all go against an enormous amount of what we know about science in the world that you've got to go into the world of the supernatural which goes against everything we know about physics and biology and I'm terribly sorry I didn't see how you can possibly go that way thank you very much built this is a 7-minute rebuttal of the rebuttal of the rebuttal right well I was rather puzzled by that last remark that in order to believe in God you must go against modern science and the evidence since the only scientific evidence we've heard in tonight's debate has been the evidence I've presented in favor of the existence of God but what about those reasons to believe that belief in God is false we both agree that it's irrelevant barring the genetic fallacy on how belief in God originates so what about the argument based upon the absence of evidence for God well I said the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence he said well that's just a slogan the point is that in order to justify the belief that God does not exist you have to have some sort of evidence or justification for that otherwise it's possible that God does exist even if all of the arguments for God failed that wouldn't be evidence that God does not exist so that in order to provide some sort of justification for atheism for thinking that belief in God is false he needs to give some sort of arguments not just say there's an absence of evidence and in any case I have presented the evidence in tonight's debate what about the question well what caused God in his last speech professor walpert says well the universe needs a creator therefore God needs a creator as well not at all that doesn't follow remember the premises of the argument I gave everything that begins to exist has a cause something cannot come into being out of nothing but if something is eternal and timeless then it doesn't fall under that first premise it doesn't need a cause even atheists like Daniel Dennett recognize that if eternal verities exist like numbers or mathematical objects they don't need a cause because they never come into being they don't begin to exist and the concept of God is the concept of an eternal self-existent necessary being and therefore the answer is simply that God is uncaused he is self-existent so in tonight's debate we've not heard any good arguments to show that belief in God is a delusion that that belief is Falls have we heard some good arguments on the other side to think that God does exist well first I said God is the best explanation for the origin of the universe and here professor Wolford says what we just don't know what caused the universe I'm afraid that escape route isn't going to work remember the the theorem proved by board Vilenkin and Guth that showed that the universe had an absolute beginning at some point in the finite past it sprang into being out of nothing all of space and time that is all I'm using the scientific evidence for us to prove that statement that the universe began to exist that is a religiously neutral statement that can be found in any textbook on astronomy and astrophysics certainly my argument does not fall under his charge that it goes against science on the contrary the Christian who believes that the universe began to exist finds himself comfortably within mainstream science it is the atheist who wants to salvage an eternal universe who finds himself with the BET his back to the wall trying to find some way to avoid the conclusion of Big Bang cosmology and the board Guth phallanx Ihram so if you agree with me that anything that begins to exist has a cause and that the evidence indicates the universe began to exist and it just occurred to me don't forget the philosophical arguments I gave for that wholly apart from the scientific evidence I gave philosophical arguments for the finitude of the past then you'll agree with me that there is a transcendent personal cause what about fine-tuning here professor Wolford says well it's just chance it's just dumb luck again I don't think that will work because it's not just the probability or the improbability issue here it's the probability of having a life-permitting universe to give an analogy suppose Bob is given a car for his birthday and the license plate has on at CHT 4 to 71 now there are millions of license plate numbers and that number is highly improbable yet it would occasion no special interest but suppose bob was born on August 8 1949 and he finds on his birthday car the license plate b.o.b eight 849 he would be obtuse if he just shrugged this off and said oh well nothing to be explained about that any number is equally improbable and there had to be some number on the car but what makes this case different than the other it is the combination of high in probability with an independently given pattern that results in what designed there is called specified complexity and it is that that tips us off to the fact that this is not due to chance it is due to design so again the theist finds himself comfortably within mainstream science it is not I tonight who I'm challenging mainstream science are saying that its conclusions are doubtful on the contrary I think mainstream science goes to suggest that there is a designer of the universe the moral argument has never been addressed in tonight's debate I'm sorry to say and I think that if there are objective moral values then we are logically committed to God's existence as for the resurrection of Jesus professor walpert admits that this isn't his area of expertise but he says believe him when he thinks these are unreliable well why I I quoted from mainstream scholars saying that the majority the consensus view of New Testament historians today is that the empty tomb the post-mortem appearances and the origin of the disciples belief in Jesus are accepted facts about the historical Jesus just like his crucifixion so it seems to me that again I'm well within what the consensus of scholarship teaches on this he says well why should we believe in your God well it's not my god the question is why should we believe in the god revealed by Jesus of Nazareth and the answer is because Jesus claimed to be such a revelation of God and he rose from the dead in vindication of that radical claim and we've got good evidence for it finally as to the personal experience of God he says well God has to do something since the resurrection of Jesus in the last 2,000 years I think God does do things miraculously in the world I have no reason to think that God is not miraculously involved in the world but I'm basing my evidence on the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus and on my personal experience of God he's done in my life and that's enough for me to believe in him and insofar as I have no good reason to think that belief is delusory or not veridical I am entirely within my rational rights to believe that the God I experienced and know is in fact real so for all of these different reasons I think the person who believes in the god revealed by Jesus of Nazareth is fully rational in doing so in fact I would venture to say that Christianity as a worldview stands intellectually head and shoulders above any other ism or philosophy of life that you might care to enunciate and for that reason I find myself enthusiastically a Christian theist well we really have a problem about evidence say I say to you and I think it's partying Richard Dawkins his book I believe there's a teapot going around the earth very fast I don't know any evidence against that so do you think the teapot is really going around the earth so there's the absence of evidence that the teapot is going around the world not going around the earth so therefore the teapot is going around the earth I think once in a bit of a fix here if you want to say that the teapot is going around the earth you really require some evidence that there really is a teapot there well say that I imagine or I tell you that I've seen fish that can talk very good off recons I'm South African Museum and they speak the dialect is not that good but they speak very nicely we do not like a little evidence for this and the absence of evidence surely would make you doubt it so when we come to God is not a question the absence of evidence that there is no God the absence of evidence that there is a God there's not the slightest indication of evidence of the kind that we would use in science in our day to day lives or the existence of this supernatural being again I mean you keep on saying if I may say that you need a creator for the universe but you refuse to allow that God himself should have been created I find that I find that that very weird and when you say oh this all fits with science beautifully I'm terribly sorry you then tell me about the science that God used to create the universe all the science that was used to create God so I think this is all supernatural if I were to be very rude I would say mumbo jumbo you went like that I'm terribly sorry these ideas are really no different than to homeopathy or what you see we're looking at the Stars and astrology and and and all and all these things it's really not using one's hard based evidence to look at what the real facts are and I keep on coming back that if there's a cause for the creation of the universe there also has to be a cause for the creation of God and that God should take on this human fall once again is very difficult to put it mildly and as goes against everything that we know in science and if we come back to Jesus I'm sorry this is something that happened 2,000 years ago it's a wonderful story and I think but I think the actual real evidence for someone coming back from the dead because against absolutely everything we know about the nature of life and therefore I regret to say I do not take it seriously sorry thank you and our final five minutes apiece in if they wish it they don't have to have it but if they do off you go hmm five minutes to round it up before we have our discussion all right let's try to draw together the threads of this debate in my closing statement you remember I said I was going to defend two contentions tonight first that there's no good reason to think that belief in God is false and I don't think that we've heard any good arguments against the existence of God tonight what about this claim that in the absence of evidence for God you're justified in thinking there is no God and it gives the example of the kangaroo and the teapot you see the failure of those illustrations is that the reason we don't believe that I'm a kangaroo is not because of the absence of evidence that I am a kangaroo rather it is the presence of evidence that I am NOT a kangaroo we have good evidence that I'm Homo sapiens similarly but the teapot example also fails because the reason we don't think there's a teapot in orbit around the earth it's not because of the absence of evidence for such a teapot it's because we have good evidence that no such a piece of China has been launched into space by us or that extraterrestrials have put it there so it is the presence of contrary evidence but tonight we've heard no contrary evidence against the existence of God and so this is just an elementary logical point a proposition is not shown to be false by the absence of evidence for it the proposition could still be true in the absence of evidence for it we just wouldn't know if it's true now I've tried to fulfill my share of the burden of proof tonight and give evidence for God's existence but all dr. walpert is offered against God is that God needs a creator I don't think I need to repeat the argument here everything that begins to exist has to have a cause but a timeless necessary self-existent being cannot be caused it would be incoherent logically to say God has a cause so I think we've got good arguments tonight for the existence of God the fine-tuning and the universe objective moral values just because the resurrection of Jesus occurred 2,000 years ago doesn't mean the evidence is unreliable what is crucial is not the time gap between the evidence and today good evidence doesn't become bad evidence just by receding into the past what is crucial is the time gap between the events recorded and the first records of them and as long as that time gap is short it doesn't matter how far they are from the past good evidence doesn't become bad evidence simply by receding into the past he says well it goes against science not at all what science tells us is what lies within the natural capacities and of nature and it is certainly naturally impossible that someone should rise from the dead that is to say if Jesus rose from the dead it must have been a miracle and that's why I say it's evidence for the existence of God finally let me conclude by saying just one more thing about the personal experience of God I want you to know that I myself wasn't raised in a Christian home or even a church-going family but when I became a teenager I began to ask the big questions in life why am I here what's it all about and I began to search for meaning in life and as I did so I began to read the New Testament and I was absolutely captivated by the person of Jesus of Nazareth there was a ring of truth about his words that I had never encountered before and an authenticity about his life that was just undeniable and after a period of about six months of the most intense soul-searching that I've ever been through I just came to the end of my rope and I cried out to God and I've experienced this tremendous infusion of joy and God became a living reality to me a reality that I've walked with now day by day year by year for over 30 years a reality that I believe you can find - if you will simply seek Him with an open mind and with an open heart so I'd encourage you if you're here tonight and you're seeking to find God as a personal reality in your life do what I did pick up a New Testament begin to read it and as you go home this evening you're lying in bed awake before you fall asleep ask yourself could this really be the truth could the truth about reality more wonderful than I ever dreamt her imagine could there really be a God who loves me and has given his son for me that I might know him don't miss that if that is true it is the greatest news ever announced so I would encourage you to do the same thing I did begin to search begin to look and and ask God to reveal himself to you I believe that it can change your life in the same way that it changed mine as I said when I started I'm slightly nervous about trying to persuade you to give up your belief in God not that I have any illusions that I will be able to do that because I think it really does help you and I think that the basis for your belief is the comfort that it actually does provide you with nevertheless as a scientist looking at the world where must never be frightened to look at the world as it really is and when it comes to miracles which we haven't really spoken about and the only philosopher that I take seriously and that's David Hume and remember what David Hume said about miracles no miracles should ever be believed in unless the evidence was so strong and so miraculous that it would be a miracle not to believe in it and I'm afraid that isn't the case with regard to the resurrection of Jesus and I can understand completely was it just being said about the comfort and the pleasure of believing in God in fact that's my total argument I think it gives enormous comfort of people to have these beliefs but that doesn't actually make God real I'm terribly sorry about that I'm terribly sorry that I didn't want to go back all the way back to evidence again but you really have to say that when someone says oh yes God really helps with love well that's very good I think Christianity has done very good things has also done some terrible things historically so all I would really say is please examine your evidence with care and really think that if you really want to believe that God created the world then you must give up your scientific beliefs because you're actually into the supernatural world for which is absolutely no evidence whatsoever thank you very much indeed good all right come and come and join us no I'm not because it's like being at Wimbledon Centre Court Plus you'd have to have your back to the audience and you're more important than I am right tell me something bill if and clearly this didn't happen at least on making an assumption here if Lewis had succeeded in demolishing your arguments I mean I make the assumption that you didn't from your perspective you understand leave that to other people to make the judgment if he had succeeded in demolishing your arguments would your faith have remained intact yes both because my faith is not ultimately based on arguments but also because I've got other arguments it's I'm not tempted to console b demille to you you know asked about his principles he's a gentleman those are my principles if you don't like them I got sincerely in twenty minutes you can only share a limited amount and and I do think their other sound arguments for God is good 20 minutes more son you had about 40 minutes but there we are alright alright 40 minutes but but but the fact is it wouldn't matter what its in short it wouldn't have mattered what he had said your faith would have remained intact yes so what's the point of the argument then well it's not Lois and I aren't here tonight to try to persuade each other to try to to make this available for the public and I think there are people out there who are searching and trying to find the meaning and purpose of life in the same way that I was and it's it's the public that we're interested in in bringing this and let me reverse the question to you Lewis though it's more difficult obviously in the case of somebody who doesn't believe and that is are you capable of believing in a supernatural God that's to say and it's a terribly difficult one of course but if bill had succeeded in demolishing your argument might you is it conceivable that at the end of evening you said yeah maybe you got a point I'll go and I'll do what you said I'll read that New Testament again I'll study the life of Jesus and the resurrection of Jesus and you knows tomorrow I might be in your argument would have mattered but certain events could change my mind a few miracles would certainly make me reconsider [Laughter] I would have to I feel a few more resurrections for example how many will certainly undermine a great deal of my beliefs what would one do one would be a very good beginning is yeah and anybody in mind in particular that yeah which takes us to the Pascal wager I suppose all right what what did he say absolutely nothing tonight to not shake yourself no see you're not shaken there's no gob did that pointless question did he say anything at all tonight that made you think wow there's something there I didn't think these were very good arguments that we heard let me do my bit then yes he asked you endlessly to answer his question about what came before God you tell us that God without a shred of evidence if I must say as an independent or chairman here you tell us that God created the universe you give an argument for that well you gave an argument for it you produce Nerva dense forests clearly because you've got anyway alright put that to one side but what he wanted to know was who therefore created God well to answer that question again but God is by definition a self existent timeless necessary being so if there is the study be yes if there is a God let's just we'll talk about possibilities if there is a God there cannot be a cause of such an entity any more than there can be a cause of the number-7 or the property of being blue but things that begin to exist that come into being have causes but something that's eternal and so God was always there and at some point de l'eau good line although there was no time then so clearly I can't say at some point exactly very good that's right which makes it mildly more difficult to pursue this but nonetheless that's right yeah at some point God decided that he'd created this whole thing brother I would say not that he decided but at some point he did create the whole thing what presumably dissin welcome yeah all right he created the whole thing you haven't got a better explanation of why the universe kabadi you don't know you said sorry there's nothing to be ashamed about admitting ignorance I didn't understand the Big Bang I vaguely you know I discussed it with people and that there are things that we didn't understand we just have to say we don't know what is you don't have to invent mystical creatures in order to do it and you don't have to invent mystical creatures so hidden you don't have to invent mystical creature oh I don't think you do I just think you have to say you didn't and keep on trying to find out and maybe we'll never find out yeah then if you found it was a supernatural being oh I'd be absolutely shocked but I would change my mind that I did what to think a tiny bit of evidence would be a very good beginning he's offered you evidence no that's not ever thoughts certainly there's more than a tiny bit of it but know that that's total speculation well the astronomer royal Martin Rees would beg to differ with you what he can big if he wishes and I like Martin in his book just six numbers martin rees says yes well and he says that the modern cosmology is firmly established two sciences the geology of the earth this is not a matter of airy-fairy speculation I just know we're now we're back into the constants again and you know this is Big Bang not fine-tuning we're talking about his book was on fine-tuning but he makes this statement in the course of what the big day must have been caused by someone know that the miss he doesn't know he doesn't know what an agnostic attitude as far as I know what what iam what he hasn't said what what margin Aries actually does as far as I can tell and above most of us mere mortals I think so this about me anyway is he speculates on this possibility of the multiverse right and do the the idea of what's that ghastly film in which we're all just in a computer the matrix isn't it right and he says we just could be kind of players in them a we you and I argued this morning about the chest we use an analogy that eventually ran into the sand of my fault and it was no personality to begin with but the but the matrix one isn't bad and he conjectures that this this designer is kind of playing a computer game really and we're at one of a million and billion a trillion universes and it just kind of happens that way as far as I consider are you I've read a bit of what he said call him saying God did all that oh no no not at all I certainly didn't get into Jesus's no no certainly not I was simply saying that this is not a mere matter of speculation that there's more than a tiny bit of evidence on the tip but it's he says for what evidence for a beginning of the universe we know that nobody disputed well that's what I'm offering in this first argument yes apply ago it does it the first premise is true that whatever begins to exist has a cause it logically follows but the calls haven't got to be good well remember I gave an argument for thinking that this causes timeless spaceless immaterial enormous ly powerful and person I think it's a computer well that wouldn't computers are designed by people I know no this is a self designing computer aha timeless timeless well that's a contradiction in terms why the tile most contradict you about it a computer has to function it takes no this is a special computer yeah but it has to be logically coherent oh it's logically coherent yes yeah no this is amazing no besides it would have to be as I said a personal being no and a computer is a physical not this comes up oh okay see what you're doing is you're actually what you're calling a computer is really God a non-physical not it's just it's just another word if you rob it of all the attributes that make it a computer surely Gates is God come on my computer I'm really saying he's got a point when he says before if what you're saying that I don't know what caused it and he claims he doesn't know what caused you but he's saying more than that he's saying you've got to prove no I don't have to prove I have to admit ignorance well if you admit ignorance and he hates knowledge as if well but he believes he has knowledge oh if that's the nature of belief if we if we have two people one of whom says I don't know let's go God on our they hate these all these examples but I go to two doctors right one of them then I've got a pain in my wherever it is and the first doctor says I've no idea what's causing it clear off and the other one says actually it's because you've got a pimple in your thingy well you know and and moreover because this is what is God does and moreover I can cure it I'll go for the second no but it's not saying a pimple in this thing he's saying there's a really special you're unwilling to accept the idea of anything that exists beyond nature yes well that is begging the question in favor of atheism that just is presupposing that atheism is true and that's what the deal presupposes that God is true no not at all I'm giving arguments for God's existence what I'm looking for is arguments for atheism and this isn't I mean lots of atheists give arguments for their view you know the problem of evil and suffering in the world no that's a terrible argument well I noticed that's what Richard Dawkins says to Dawkins doesn't use that art that is a Jo Mackey of Oxford he used that argue it made it may Louis be a terrible argument but it's a pretty powerful argument when you're arguing against a Christian God who's supposed to be all merciful is neat what there's a fatal and suffering so you mean we must blame God for all the suffering in the world I don't think that I'm saying that atheist Sahu God offer arguments before atheism and this would be an example the Atheist can't get off the hook here he he's making a knowledge claim but how does not exist see that's a knowledge claim it's the agnostic who makes no knowledge like that God does not exist I say there's no evidence for God all right well then that's mere agnosticism know that no we a theist say we do not believe that God exists well that's compatible with God existing you see that's mere agnosticism atheism says that God does not exist which is a claim to know something and therefore requires justify this a theist doesn't say this he just says there's no evidence for God all right well how would you differentiate yourself then from an agnostic agnostic since I'm clueless as to whether God exists or not and I'm a car to try and make up my mind well that's perjorative the directive and I'm being it to be pejorative all right what about the non cowardly agnostic like Bertrand Russell say who says I don't know whether God exists I don't know whether God does not exist agnostic yes well that's what you are know then give us if you're not if you're not that then you need to give us some warrant for the belief that there is no God otherwise I know that no evidence or any reason to believe in God whatsoever this is a supernatural being for which I know of no evidence and he's done nothing that I know of in the last two thousand years why did you lose your faith me we know why we know why it's shameful when I was young used to pray to God to help me with various things my prayers weren't answered so it was purely pragmatic I gave it up sorry no I bit bills was a redhead beauty in the front row at least I may be slightly simplifying what you don't exaggerate possibly even listen there is one base you may have basic laws for gotten things and there's a basic law of journalism and we all observe it I promise you this first simplify then exaggerate you know I hold to that so where we are and I mean you you use much of your book to to deny the circularity of your argument what you've been trying to do tonight forgive me if I've got this wrong Lewis's prove that it is in fact entirely a circular argument yes yes tell him why David why it's a circle yeah why the circular look if you want to but you want to believe you need an explanation for things that you don't understand back why the universe exists and you're too frightened to admit that you don't know that's not the definition of what a circular argument is well it's circular is no a circular argument is when your only reason for believing a premise is that you already accept the conclusion that's what you're doing when you say there's nothing beyond nature there is no supernatural that's presuppose that because they have to be created therefore the Creator had to be God no I gave an argument no no but I think that argument city folks well then what do you want to do we don't want to go professor walpert is then to identify the false premise in the argument because the logic is valid the conclusion follows from the premises so you have to show me which of the premises is false the premise is that there had to be a personal creator of the universe okay and then what if you're going to argue that that's false then you'll need to refute the two arguments that I gave for the personhood of the creator oh yes there's no evidence for the personal well I gave two well what the moral one is absurd because there's reality you don't believe that's not a strong one what's the oh no I think well that wasn't the argument for the personhood though the other arguments actually do give you a personal creator and designer the arguments were about that timeless and spaceless being and therefore cannot be physical or material and the only things that we know of that can fit that description are either minds or abstract objects and abstract objects don't cause things the number-7 can't cause anything therefore because of the universe must be a mind I'm very suspicious of anything that's timeless and spaceless well you may be suspicious but that's not really an argument or a refuge I know I'm not a good physicist all right let's get into the bent of them the moral bit yes because you Louis offered us various illustration of illustrations you various arguments as to why we can become arrived in a moral state and effectively what you're saying as I understand it and you'll tell me I'm wrong I'm sure effectively you're saying we do these moral things because over a long enough period we have concluded that they're in our interest to do them absolutely right why do people do those things that are not in their selfish interest but are clearly decent and good why do they sacrifice themselves in the cause of something from which they will benefit we're into the hell calm about people's behavior how the brain works about sociology about mental illness there are all sorts of complication have you never looked at somebody have you never met anybody and it might be a man gonna figure yes or it might be a mother teresa figure or it might be an atheist and said actually I don't know this person turned well don't they were told or anything about his medical background whatever but it's a good guy good person don't have to go to there's great people I can get my partner you can you can say they're good people why are they good people because they helped me a great deal and I like them well quite you in the case of Manziel isn't that is that the basis of your moral system because they help you that then help other people to you okay okay so it's their behavior there is nothing that you don't then go the extra step and say why are they doing that even though it may not be in there let me clear that we don't really understand how people behave or why they've been offering you an explanation what by a god oh come on what about don't shout at me it was his argument sorry I can't behave badly at I'm sorry to do all sorts of terrible things we don't fully understand why they do all those things and some you know people have breakdowns they do all sorts of strange things sure could I clarify please do about the argument because I think this is apt to lead to misunderstanding my argument is not that belief in God is necessary in order to do good or live a moral life or be a decent chap the argument is nothing to do about belief in God the argument is that without God there isn't any absolute standard of right and wrong and therefore what we call moral values are just the spin-offs of sociobiological evolution altruism like you mentioned self sacrificial behavior and mother rushing into a burning door specifically not a mother to save a child because there's a 50 good reason for the mother saying well if you think if you say that see then again you're still misunderstanding my argument what I was going to say is that on the social biological point of view that kind of altruistic behavior is just the selfish gene wanting to perpetuate itself and it's the same kind of behavior you see in a troop of baboons where you see what looks like altruistic behavior or even in an ant-heap where fighter ants will sacrifice themselves for the good of the heap my point is that on the atheistic view that's all moral values are it's not right let's clear I would like to is there any difference literally you come back in one second but let me just ask Lewis whether there is any difference between the altruistic behavior of the human being somebody who may sacrifice him or herself for a cause which will bring there no particular benefit and and a baboon in a troop there are occasions where there are groups of animals where there's someone who will will scream when danger comes their thing so these can be biologically determined but also there's the whole complex of the nature of the sociology of the society and how different societies behave and that's got nothing to do with God that's complex sociology and biologic impose the complex body where did that come from evolution evolution right yeah we're back to the old well see that's my argument that is all that moral values are on unny theism and that therefore as I say rape child abuse these are you socially inconvenient but or theist I'm not a rapist you're misunderstanding my argument of course you're not you're misunderstanding the argument if I'm not arguing that to be it be a good person you have to believe in God what I'm arguing is that without God there is no absolute moral values no absolute moral duties we are like advanced primates and what we call moral values are just these ingrained sociobiological patterns that's exactly what they are ok so that is your view I was I was not sure that well then you see when you make these moral judgments yourself you're you're acting inconsistently with your own worldview when you make moral judgments like everyone has the right to believe whatever he wants so long as it doesn't interfere with others where do these words this notion of rights suddenly come from that's just history and says she all right just sociologically in his behavior so the the pedophile or the rapist or the psychopath or the person who wants to be a religiously intolerant persecutor is just acting out of fashion he's like the person who does it Emil wasn't acting out of fashion which other people objected to right but there wasn't anything morally wrong with what he did right on your view of course there was it well it was just it was just contrary to the patterns of sociobiological behavior that have been ingrained into the human species not to kill each other off why was what he did objectively wrong cuz it made it killed many people and made people unhappy alright but now that goes on all the time in the animal kingdom right no other animal does not well when a lion kills a zebra oh they're lion kills a zebra kills it later what about when you kill you all your your day or your turkey begin with turkeys or Sumerians yes well fine use use that example on atheism these are all morally neutral acts because there isn't any standard of right and wrong there isn't okay so what Hitler did there wasn't you've lost me a bit here I confess you because you you do seem to be saying that that if you're an atheist you do you you're an immoral person I mean what is listen to the argument again if God does not exist then objective moral values do not exist lewis agrees with that yes there are no external all right define what you mean by an external moral value coming from outer space precisely exactly so but what what you do believe is that within us there is a moral misrepresent him a bit I think not because if you were to rerun this film of evolution and quite different creatures might have evolved having quite a different set of moral values right and and if that were the case there would be no way that one of them could say our values are writing your values are wrong or or even among cultures why how can you say that National Socialist Germany was wrong and that the liberal democracies are right it's it's right according to our point of view according to them it's right according to their you you everything becomes relative you Lewis is it your contention that these that this moral framework under which we operate whether with respect whether we are atheists or agnostics or theists the moral framework under which all societies I think it's true to say that all is it true to say that all human societies have some form of moral framework may be different from ours yes but but they have one I mean cannibals presumably think it's okay to eat each other because what it's okay to eat each other I suppose I don't think cannibals to each other do they don't any longer I think this yeah I think they prefer McDonald's but it's according to Prince Charles today is even worse I think but I don't want to be quoted on that necessarily but but but but where did it come from what the the the thing that is inherent in us that you tell us is in here in tennis where did it how did it arise from evolution there's certainly altruism came from evolution that you certainly wanted to help there's with the similar genes to yourself and also from reciprocity in other words if you were in a society where if you behaved well then the other people would behave when people learned that that you could do much better if you behave well to them why why then do we I can see why would that help others with the same genes why we get big I'm out of my depth then I don't think we under that the big sociology and politics or my question was going to be wide why do we care about the the mistreatment of kittens or for the kittens because they've got big eyes I suppose but I don't know ugly animals or something because we identify with them with animals yes we are an animal after all and that's it I mean the idea that God created us quite separate from all other animals it's absurd do you know how animal we are alike I have a dog at all animals are not moral agents when a lion kills a zebra it kills it but it doesn't murder it when a hawk steals a fish from the talons of another Park it takes the fish but it doesn't steal the fish none of these have any moral dimension to them and it's the same with human behavior on this atheistic view we're just relatively advanced primates there really isn't any objective right or wrong it's just evolution good yes yeah and I submit that's morally abhorrent why why why is that now that's interesting why why morally apparent because torturing a child for fun is wrong but he's not saying it isn't yes he is he saw all he is saying is that it goes against the patterns that have been ingrained into Homo sapiens into this herd morality by evolution but there isn't any objectivity to that animals kill their young all the time infanticide goes on all the time in the animal kingdom and we're just animals well I beg to differ I mean many animals will kill their own young what fool I I'd leave that to a biologist to explain sorry most animals did not kill the Renea they might where did you see a dog killer puppy I haven't seen that but I have seen mice do this with you know pet pet mice do this kind of thing it was very awful maybe you should have I was going to say maybe you should have fed them but now that yeah that's probably about all right look we've got we've got three minutes left there is clearly nothing that either of you can say to persuade each other as to your beliefs yes is there is there any ground that you both occupy is there anything this is the the despair this is the most difficult debate you can chair because there is simply no you're aren't starting because our concept of science is I was thinking where I thought you were going to ask where is the common ground I thought well at least my well good I thought at least we're both committed to the value of logic and science neither of us is some kind of wacky postmodernist who denies the objectivity of science and logic I would say to you oh well you would be mistaken you would be mistaken and and anybody who thinks that doesn't understand contemporary cosmology what do you say to your cremeens to the rise of wage I agree with you on Earth Creationism I don't think it's taught in the Bible and I don't think it's scientifically tenable so you so this is a very substantial section of the Christian community in the United States who has simply got it wrong I think so why might you not be wrong in exactly the same way that they are all well because I think that when you look at Genesis chapter 1 it's an it's a much more subtle theological document than what young earthers tend to but little quoting the Bible knows though it was some peer-reviewed science didn't know what I what I'm saying is that I said I thought they were both wrong in interpreting the Bible to believe that the world was created ten thousand years ago in six literal days and that's a question of exegesis and I'm saying I think their interpretation though possible isn't the most plausible but then the second I think there's just overwhelming scientific evidence for the geological time table and the astronomical age of the universe so what about evolution of human beings and things I mean I'm I'm open to the evidence on that I honestly am I'm not persuaded not yet I think there are some probably don't believe any volution no but I don't disbelieve it either I am genuinely agnostic about that I think that microevolution is well-established but the extrapolation from micro to macro evolution is a huge explenation that doesn't have very if any compelling evidence for it and there's some very good evidence against it so I am I'm genuinely open-minded to be convinced on this I don't I think it's a Christian I can be more objective than Louis on this court because I can follow the evidence where it leads but for the naturalist you see evolution is the only game in town so no matter how improbable he's got to believe it Laura I don't have to believe that the evidence is excellent do you believe in intelligent design at all then yes the argument that I gave based on fine-tuning is a form of the intelligent design argue so you other creations in the sense that I believe that God created the universe yes but I'm not what is called earth creationist which is the way that term is often understood that under use but you then think that evolution could have created human beings by random atoms I'm agnostic about that I I'm rather inclined to the view that God has intervened periodically in the process of micro evolutionary development to bring about changes that nature left to its own devices wouldn't have produced if there are 10,000 beetles God has his hand there I say that but I for example that sponges and bats would have a common ancestor is so enormous ly improbable that are you ignorant well the sponges sponges and bats have both evolved by random mutation and natural selection from a common ancestor is an extrapolation that goes so far beyond the evidence and it is so improbable that the Sun would have probably cease to be a main-sequence star and would have incinerated the earth before it occurred I want to say that I fundamentally disagree with you that the evidence would precisely that is excellent all right we're not going to agree on that the final I think that's I'm taking a wild guess here the final the final thought from you Lewis evidence of your eyes is a couple of thousand people in here many of them young most of them I think probably quite young all of them most of them Christian maybe all of them bright well let the divers going to come to that right at the very end there at university most of them that intelligent people have given this a lot of thought I assume and they have come to a different conclusion from you yes I don't think they have given it a great deal of thought I think they I don't think they're given up the great deal of thought along the lines that we've been discussing here and I think that has helped him a very great deal so it all comes down in the end to a comfort lion little boy he's got his little comfort blanket with it yes that's it it's a comfort blanket yes sorry yes sorry I think that's probably the last word gentlemen thank you both and thank you all very much indeed you

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Length: 107min 46sec (6466 seconds)

Published: Mon Apr 30 2012