Atheism or Theism

As much as it pains me to not be able to reply to Pro's final round, we agreed that this last round would focus on defending our own arguments from the cross examinations of Round 3.Defending TAGReading Pro's rebuttal to TAG shows that while he seems to understand the argument at first, his rebuttals tend to ignore the fundamental approach. TAG is not reasoning toward a worldview. TAG starts with competing worldviews and eliminates the irrational worldviews over the more rational ones. There are certainly many worldviews, but since this debate focuses on atheism vs. theism, it is enough to compare just these worldviews.Pro' s ObservationsMy opponent offers three reasons why we should immediately reject TAG, all of which are completely erroneous.First, the characteristics of God absolutely can be determined, for they are defined within the worldview in question. In fact, the presuppositions of God's attributes are an essential part of TAG when showing the Christian worldview to be more rational than say the Islamic worldview. God's attributes are presuppositions, and those presuppositions will determine whether or not the worldview can account for human experience.Second, TAG absolutely can determine if there is only one God. The Christian worldview presupposes one God, and the Greek Mythology worldview presupposes many gods. I could easily show how the Greek Mythology worldview fails to account for moral absolutes—given the gods' capricious and varied natures—but that is not necessary in this debate. My opponent should focus on refuting theism in any form if he wants to uphold the resolution.Third, TAG absolutely can tell us who God is, because God is a presupposition. The Christian worldview presupposes who God is, and from there, we use the 3 Criteria I set forth in Round 2 to see if those presuppositions hold up. If they do, then we do know the characteristics of God and who he is.It's hard to believe that Pro would consider these observations to be so threatening to TAG when all three of them completely ignore the presuppositional conflict of worldviews, especially since he agreed that there is such a conflict when he directly stated, "I have no qualms with what my partner has pointed out in this round. We do all have bias and we all indeed have conflicting worldviews. I concede this point."Laws of LogicMy opponent's first objection to this part of TAG is to say, "What's the connection?" Really? I spent four paragraphs explaining the necessary preconditions of logic and how an immutable, immaterial, and universal God meets those conditions. His response is not a rebuttal but an admission of not comprehending the argument.He does, however, attempt to account for logical laws within the atheistic worldview by simply stating that they are necessary. That's it. So, given the two worldviews, we have the following:KRFournier: The Christian worldview accounts for the necessary preconditions of logic by presupposing an immutable, immaterial, universal, rational mind, i.e., God.Microsuck: The Atheist worldview accounts for the necessary preconditions of logic by presupposing the necessity of logic.Accounting for the preconditions of logic is what I am specifically challenging here. When I say, "Account for logic," and the answer is "I don't have to because logic is necessary," is to beg the question I asked of him. Pro is effectively saying, "Trust me, logic is just reliable." In other words, Pro has no answer to my challenge. Thus, when it comes to accounting for logic, the Christian worldview provides a more reasoned explanation than Pro's bare assertion.Uniformity of NaturePro borrows from Michael Martin's TANG to refute Christianity, which is unfortunate, because if he'd done his research, he would have found that Martin's main blunder—which my opponent repeats—is to imply that the necessary precondition for science is absolute uniformity of nature. Such a view on the uniformity of nature does not permit any randomness in nature whatsoever, and thereby renders many scientific endeavors, such as quantum fluctuations, unscientific. In fact, Michael Martin conceded as much when he later responded to John Frame's rebuttals to TANG by stating, "Frame has argued correctly that science does not presuppose the absolute uniformity of nature, but I do not suppose that it does." [1]Science does require that nature is regular rather than entirely chaotic and random, and the Christian worldview accounts for this, even with the presupposition of miracles. In rebuttal of TANG, Michael Butler writes, "Under Dr. Martin's definition, all events are miraculous. The Christian view of miracles is that they are events God causes to come about in a different way from His regular pattern for directing events. Thus when humans die they usually stay dead. But in the case of Jesus, God raised Him up. In doing so God did not violate a natural law, but rather departed from His regular pattern of action." [2] In other words, my opponent's view on miracles is a straw man of the Christian worldview, for such a view describes a universe that is complete chaos.Note how my opponent's only recourse is to misrepresent the Christian worldview, for atheism cannot account for the regularity of nature. He did quote Richard Carrier in an attempt to show that Christians suffer the same fate, but that quote completely sidesteps the argument I am making, which is comparing presuppositions. When dealing with presuppositions, circular reasoning only occurs when one refuses to account for the necessary preconditions for human experience, which Christianity does not do. The Christian worldview presupposes God is reliable enough, powerful enough, and intelligent enough to maintain regularity in the universe. The atheist's only recourse is to say, "I don't have to provide an account for the uniformity of nature. Trust me, science is just reliable." Again, Pro is relying on bare assertion to convince voters that atheism is more rational.Moral AbsolutesPro's approach here is the same as Michael Martin's, which is to argue a false dilemma: that either good comes from God or God comes for good. The Christian worldview adheres to a third option: God defines good by his character, and since he cannot deny himself, he cannot ever change his mind and decide that cruelty is suddenly good. With the Christian worldview properly understood, Pro's case falls flat.So why choose the Bible over the Quran, Book of Mormon, etc.? Simply put, because the Christian worldview presupposes the truth of the Bible and the Christian worldview is superior to the Islamic or Mormon worldview. Now, that's just a bare assertion on my part, but why should I defend those worldviews when either of them would still render atheism as false? Is my opponent trying to do my work for me?Once again, note how my opponent doesn't actually attempt to account for moral absolutes. His only recourse is to mischaracterize the Christian worldview in an attempt to show it as wrong. This hardly helps his case, as it leaves the atheist worldview twisting in the wind.ConclusionRecall that TAG uses three criteria to show that the Christian worldview is more rational than the atheist one. In so doing, it challenges both worldviews to account for logic, science, and morality. I showed how the Christian worldview accounts for these things and defended it from Pro's straw man attacks. I also showed how atheism cannot account for these things and we received nothing in response beyond the equivalent of someone saying, "Trust me, atheism works." When considering which debater performed more admirably in defending their position, I think it acceptable to vote for Con.Resolved: on balance, theism is more reasonable than atheism. Sources http://www.infidels.org... http://www.reformed.org...