God exists. You can't escape it. (TAG debate)

As this is seen primarily as a clarification round, I will do my best to sketch out a rough road map of my position at this point, and to answer Pro's questions present at the end of his post. In my opening round, I will try to clarify the aims of the debate, and to build on what Pro has begun already by presenting a more formal approach to the issue of TAG, in order that we can best identify where we find common ground and to allow us to focus on areas of conflict. I should also perhaps state my own personal aim in the debate. I am not arguing against presuppositionalism as a position per se. Indeed, I think Pro is in the majority of Christians who believe “properly basically” i. e. . without reference to arguments for the existence of God, and I have no problem with this in itself. I would even go as far as to say that I actually think a justified evidential case can be made for Christianity. Where I differ from Pro is that although I find no problem here with presuppositionalism as basis for Pro's own belief, it is not a compelling reason for others to believe, and this is where the tension lies. In the debate, I will defend 2 basic contentions:1. There are good reasons to think that TAG is flawed.2. There are better alternatives to TAG which are compatible with atheism. Definitions and clarificationGod - I would simply add that God is an "omni" being of the type typically described. Atheism - "the lack of belief that there exists a God" (1)I would argue that this definition is far more typical of atheism and how it applies in my own case. I reject the idea that atheism is a worldview because it seems to me that there are several "worldviews" which encompass atheism (forms of Buddhism, naturalism, materialism and so on. Also, while I am not a naturalist myself, I don't foresee a problem in defending it in this context, as it seems to me to be compatible with the position I will hold in the debate. I stress this not to shirk any burden of proof, but to make clear my own position. I will, as best I can, argue for the naturalist position, as far as I agree with it, but I think it should be pretty clear that I seek to present a pretty substantive case of my own anyway, so there is no need to fear an undue BoP. TAG and epistemic justificationPro, it seems, will argue on 2 distinct fronts with TAG - epistemology and logical absolutes (or laws). Firstly, he will try to show that the best epistemic justification is reformed epistemology (RE). Regarding my own case, I will defend the classical foundationalist account of knowledge, which is, after all the primary target of Plantinga’s conception of reformed epistemology. By defending such a position, I will fulfil (if successful) both debate contentions. Most obviously, I will be presenting an alternative to TAG, but also, if CF is more plausible than RE, then its criteria for epistemic justification should be favoured over Pro’s , and thus TAG will be superseded in this way as well. Evidentialism will thus be way to justify the belief in God (2), and the resolution would be negated. FoundationalismFoundationalism is a position (like RE) which tries to justify how we know (3). It does this by distinguishing between beliefs which are basic (foundational) and that which is built on this bedrock (non-foundational beliefs). Basic beliefs are typically either self-evident (e. g. simple mathematical, logical or conceptual truths), evident to the senses or introspective (what appears to be the case and cannot be doubted). Therefore:"A belief is epistemically justified only if (1) it is justified by a basic belief or beliefs, or (2) it is justified by a chain of beliefs that is supported by a basic belief or beliefs, and on which all the others are ultimately based. "(4)We can now formalise how this meets the first debate contention in the following way:P1 - If CF is more plausible than RE, then belief in the existence of God must be justified evidentially in order to be a rationally held belief. P2 - CF is more plausible than REC - Therefore, the existence of God must be justified evidentially in order to be a rationally held belief. Obviously, the above paragraph goes some way to justifying P2, as does the criticisms I plan to give of Pro’s RE in the next round. Notice, however that Pro himself admits that RE is circular! Given this, the burden in justifying P2 is decidedly low, given that all that is needed to justify P2 is a position which is not fallacious and somewhat plausible. As for P1, this is true given that evidentialism is implied by CF, and the argument obviously undercuts TAG by concluding that God must be justified evidentially in order to be rational, and since TAG seeks to avoid this, we should conclude that TAG is flawed . TAG and Logical absolutes/laws (LA) (5)His second argument seems to regard the laws of logic. Typically, the argument takes this form:P1 - If God does not exist, logical absolutes (LA) do not exist. P2 - LA do existC - God existsI will criticise this argument more directly in the next round, but if I am successful in this round in providing a plausible account for LA, then as we will see, the argument will be more or less refuted anyway. It should also be clear that if CF is true, then LA would be foundational beliefs anyway. In the above syllogism, which should be treated as a rough guide, rather than Pro’s argument (he doesn’t specifically lay out like this, but this is a fair approximation of the TAG argument generally), we have to distinguish between what I call conceptual LA and LA as the nature of existence. Now conceptual LA are the statements of logic themselves; the symbols, language, and framework. Now clearly these concepts are contingent not just upon human minds but on particular persons throughout history (mainly Aristotle), and do not exist without a sentient mind which follows our linguistic process to conceive of them. They are always conceptual by nature and are used as the founding principles of logic. Now, obviously accounting for these would require a historical approach, not a philosophical one , so TAG must refer to LA as laws which govern the nature of existence. LA as the nature of existence would be what statements like they law of identity REFER to (that something is what it is, and not what is not) - the consistency of existence to behave in a particular way. Now, clearly the nature of existence is not contingent upon anything, it behaves the way it does regardless of what anyone thinks or does, so is transcendent, and does so seemingly in all time and places. But crucially, it is not conceptual. We can conceive of it, but the statements we use (the logical laws) are not laws which govern the universe, but symbols we use to the way things consistently behave - the nature of existence. The laws are conceptual; what they refer to is not (in the same way as the word "apple" is conceptual, but what it refers to is not). ConclusionIn order to carry the debate resolution, Pro will have to show that his version of TAG can resist criticisms, and that it is more plausible than any alternative offered in the debate. Given the admission Pro makes about how flawed the TAG case already is, and the additional challenges I will seek to throw at it, Pro will show and that TAG is still viable at that it somehow outperforms alternatives in whatever capacity Pro decides to use it. This really is a steep hill to climb, and I invite Pro to make his case. Sources1. S. Blackburn (2005), Oxford Dictionary of philosophy, OUP, P27.2. . http://en.wikipedia.org...3. . http://en.wikipedia.org...4. ibid5. Theoretical Bullsh! t youtube videos "Slick Logic" and "Matt/Matt" series