the Naturalist has better reason for the assumption that nature is uniform then the Christian

It is very elucidating and provides me quite a challenge. The resolution is that the naturalist has better reasons for assuming that nature is uniform than the Christian. With this resolution in mind, let’s examine Brian’s opening statement. Brian states that in order to prove my thesis I must do two things, I must show that Naturalism provides reasons to believe in the UoN and I must also show that Christianity’s reasons are weaker than the Naturalists. I believe I have done this in my opening statement, with two reasons that support the Naturalist’s use of induction and two reasons that undermine the Christian’s confidence. Let’s examine those four reasons. Naturalist UoN: Contention 1: My first contention was that the naturalist is pragmatically justified in presupposing the uniformity of nature. In response to my contention, Brian’s attack is two-fold. First he attempts to target pragmaticism via amoral prescriptive rules and I confess that I do not see the relevance to my position here. My appeal to pragmaticism, or more specifically instrumentalism (as I stated in my opening)(1) is not a prescriptive appeal. I am not referring to morality, objective or otherwise. In order to get to his next attack, Brian lays out what the problem we consider actually is. He quotes Bertrand Russell, who outlined the problem with certainty and the uniformity of nature. Brian perceptively adds to Russell, by saying: “Or, if he were to argue that since assuming the UoN allows for induction and induction produces knowledge, that he ought to believe in the UoN, on what basis does he argue that induction will continue to produce knowledge. Or, if induction instead produces useful fictions, on what grounds does the Naturalist suggest that it will continue to produce fictions that are useful? Surely not induction! ” The problem with this response is that it surely misses the target. The naturalist’s appeal to instrumentalism does not entail certainty. What it entails is an actual reason to presuppose induction – namely, it works. When it fails to continue to work (if it does) then, and only then, is the instrumentalist not justified in presupposing induction. In the same work that Brian quotes, Russell makes clear what he is arguing against: “The most we can hope is that the oftener things are found together, the more probable it becomes that they will be found together, the more probable it becomes that they will be found together another time, and that, if they have been found together often enough, the probability will amount almost to certainty. ” (2) Russell’s target is that of certainty. He is not arguing that we cannot or should not trust that nature will remain uniform, only that certainty is not within our grasp. This is true no matter what position (theistic or atheistic) one takes (I will argue this below). To further drive home my point about instrumentalism, consider: “The perspective of scientific instrumentalism holds that the judicious interrogation of Proteus would be valuable even were the sea demon not to now truth but only knowledge that would help solve the problems of his interrogators. According to scientific instrumentalism, the aim of scientific theories is not to discover truth but rather to produce intellectual structures that provide adequate predictions of what is observed and useful frameworks for answering questions and solving problems in a given domain (Thagard, 2002; Van Fraassen, 2002). From this philosophical perspective, scientific theory represents convenient intellectual structures for predicting or describing in more abstract terms observable data, not actual structures in the world. ”(3) Contention 2: I have argued that a deterministic closed universe gives the naturalist prima facie support for trusting that nature will remain uniform because there is no outside force that could interfere with the uniformity of nature. It does not appear that Brian has actually presented any arguments against this contention. Until he does so, it would appear that this reason stands. Christian Justification of the UoN Contention 3: Brian contends that the Christian’s trust stems from God commitment to his creation – but surely does Brian not realize that this sort of justification begs the very same question he’s accusing the naturalist of? What basis does Brian have to assume that God will continue to keep nature uniform? Is it because he has done so in the past? Contention 4: Speaking of commitments, how does Brian know that God promised to uphold the UoN in the first place? For this Brian quotes Pythress: “By his word to Noah, he commits himself to govern the seasons. By his word he governs snow, frost, and hail” (3) It’s unclear how Pythress or Brian can possibly extend the governing of the seasons over the whole cosmos. This seems an unjustified assertion, especially considering that God supposedly interferes with the law of gravity after this point in order to aid Joshua! So clearly God is specifically referring to the seasons and only the seasons – let’s remember that all of my examples of God’s interference with the regularities of nature occur after Noah. Contention 5: In responding to my contention that miracles violate the uniformity of nature, Brian quotes CS Lewis, who says that the laws of nature tell you what happens when nothing interferes – but this is precisely why miracles undermine the confidence in the UoN. How is finite man supposed to know when, where, and for how long these interferences occur? Brian also provides an explanation of the difference between Divine Providence and miracles, I can accept this distinction as Brian has articulated it; miracles are the problematic feature of Brian’s worldview in this regard. So while miracles presuppose the UoN, their existence provides reason to doubt any regularity we might perceive. How do we know what is a regularity and what is a miracle? Is the moon’s orbit around the earth a regularity or a miracle which will stop tomorrow because the reason behind that miracle’s existence is no longer deemed necessary by God? Contention 6: Brian’s rejection of man’s ability to autonomously reason undercuts his entire worldview, throwing him directly into epistemic skepticism, his reason to trust any knowledge has evaporated. To this objection, Brian has not raised any rebuttals; instead he has doubled down, quoting Van Til who again says that we cannot trust ourselves. If we cannot trust ourselves, then how are we supposed to trust in God’s revelation? How are we supposed to know which revelations are from God and which are not? How are we supposed to know how to interpret it? If we can't trust our own reasoning, then we can't trust our interpretation of the Bible that God has commitment to the UoN! The quote from Kelly Clark in my opening only resonates stronger. Clark states: “Every take on Scripture is interpretation - and interpretation is a function (at least partly) of "autonomous" human reason. We may damn reason in some of its restrictive forms, but it is the best (and only tool) that intellectually free human beings have to discover the truth. ” (4) In conclusion it appears that I have added two more contentions to my original four. Brian’s obstacle has just become more difficult. References: (1) . http://en.wikipedia.org... (2) Russell, Bertrand. The Problems of Philosophy, Kindle Location 633 – bolding mine (it seems that Brian’s kindle and mine are not synced, location-wise as his quote appeared earlier in my kindle). (3) . http://psychology.uchicago.edu...: May-June 2004, American Psychologist, pg 217 (4) See Brian’s first note. (5) Five Views on Apologetics, Kelly James Clark, pg 262