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

IntroductionThe first thing to point out is that Pro essentially dropped 3 out of 4 of the areas for TAG, which leaves me with even less to rebut than before. This was always going to be inevitable, given the scope Pro gave TAG, essentially trying to take 4 topics each worthy of a debate on their own, and squeeze them into 1 debate. Having done this, it is incumbent upon Pro to defend all of these, and limited word count is no excuse, given that this is equally restrictive to me, and that the scope of TAG was decided by Pro in the second round.General criticismsFalse dichotomy - Firstly, the phrase “impossibility of the contrary” doesn’t even make sense:“Two propositions are contrary if only one of them can be true, but they may both be false.” (1)Indeed, it may be the case that no worldview can account for these things. It seems that in any case TAG still offers a false dichotomy. Second, Pro says that he is arguing any contrary to CW is false, yet he is still only engaging with one particular subset of unbelief in Christianity (atheism), which simply not enough to deduce CW is true, even if all his criticisms of atheism were justified. In reality, none of them seem to be justified.Argument from Ignorance - Typically with TAG, God is assumed to account for things like logic, morality and so on. But crucially, there is still an account of some sort. Pro, by contrast, has merely critiqued some aspects of atheism, and has not provided ANY sort of account for these things as of yet, which leads me to ask, where is TAG?Straw-manning - First, Pro caricatures naturalism to mean extreme materialism, by assuming it precludes belief in things like abstract objects. As Audi says,“(A) naturalist does not have to be a radical physicalist--taking the position that only physical phenomena are real, not even excepting such well-behaved abstract entities as sets” (2)Secondly, I did say that I would only defend naturalism “as far as I agree with it” in R1, and I certainly don’t agree in dismissing the possibility of abstract objects or the non-material, so again Pro is still straw-manning both me and naturalism in general.AtheismIf Pro really does accept my definition of atheism, then much of what he wrote is simply inapplicable. Assuming that atheists necessarily agree on morality, or that their worldview necessitates only matter existing is just false. Atheism is logically compatible with a wide range of views (e.g. moral realism, relativism, nihilism), so when Pro makes generalisations like “morality is reduced to subjective or arbitrary ideologies”, he is simply wrong, and guilty not just of straw-manning, but equivocating atheism (lack of belief) with something else entirely.MoralityOn the issue of morality, I think it simply a question of BoP. Pro has stated that atheistic moral realism (my position) is somehow inconsistent, yet has not demonstrated that this is so. It certainly seems to be the case, prima facie, that this view is unproblematic, given that there is no explicit logical contradiction, as well as secular ethics having existed for thousands of years. To return to my 3 points against TAG here:a) Here I argued that there were no good reasons I have encountered to believe that atheism cannot appeal to moral values. Pro rejects this on the grounds that Swinburne’s account is not representative of the view that Pro holds, calling him a “false authority”. The problem here is that this quote was used to characterise MY views, not Pro’s, and this was clear when I said:“Like Swinburne, I’ve personally never seen a reason that theism alone (much less Christianity) can account for moral values”Again, I am still waiting for Pro to substantiate this point - that there are insurmountable difficulties with atheistic moral realism, which he hasn’t even tried to do. Even then however, the Euthyphro dilemma would still be a problem for him: Is the good that which God commands, or does God command that which is good?b) Again, Pro just assumes that God accounts for morality, without even countering the possibility that these values don’t exist at all, and that there may be nothing to account for, which would be a particular thorny problem even if he established a).c) Here we see a shift in the BoP. All I would say is one can take any of the 3 major normative positions, and all of them would agree that certain basic things are wrong, even if why this is so (consequences, categorical imperative, virtue) differs. Such an example would be to say that torturing babies for fun is wrong, and this could be justified by whatever normative framework one adopts.Until Pro shows that he can account for morality through TAG and that atheism cannot, there is simply no case to answer.EpistemologyFoundationalismHere I just want to address a point about why God should not be considered a FB. Firstly, God doesn’t seem to meet the criteria for foundational beliefs in the first place, as I laid out in R1. Second, FB must be things which are, as far as possible, irrational to doubt. There is a clear difference between doubting LA and God, for example, because doubting LA is self-refuting, but also while LA are inconceivable to doubt, even in principle, God is not. The same can be said for incorrigible beliefs. It may be false that grass is green, for example, but the belief that it seems to me to be green is surely certain. Thirdly, unlike LA or incorrigible beliefs, there is ample evidence both for and against the existence of God, and it seems totally irrational to completely discard teleology, evil and so forth when we can use these things to justify our beliefs regarding the existence of God. Also, Pro has yet to respond to my defence of CF. Extend all arguments.Reformed epistemology (RE)I raised 3 points in my last post which were unaddressed:1. Conflict with evidentialism2. Great pumpkin objection3. Aggravation of the problem of non-beliefExtend all arguments. As well as this, RE is form of reliabilism (3). One of the problems with this is that a reliable process is not sufficient for justification, and we see this through things like optical illusions. LAPoints dropped by Pro:1. False dichotomy, argument from ignorance, straw-manning2. Accounted for by CF3. Problems of LA existing in the traditional sense4. God seems just as bound by LA, and so cannot account for them. Extend all arguments. Also, how Pro can know LA seems problematic. Where in the bible does it state the Law of Non-contradiction is true? Does Pro know LA by revelation? Uniformity of NatureI am still waiting to here ANY justification on this point, and until such time, I maintain that this simply an argument from ignorance. Moreover, arguments can be used to show, for example, that inductive skepticism leads to absurdity, or that the problem of induction results from linguistic confusion, either of which would solve the problem without God.ConclusionAlthough I have given specific criticisms, the real problems of TAG run much deeper. First, at least as Pro presents it, TAG simply points to problems in thought, and doesn’t make any attempt to solve them. It simply lists difficult problems, and demands an answer, lest TAG be vindicated. Second, the scope of TAG is far too ambitious, not only in such a restrictive debate, but also more generally as well. There is simply no way one can show all other views to be false, and the fact that Pro has barely attempted this with one view is a testament to that. Lastly, there simply is no limit to presupposing. Why can’t I just assume that atheism is necessarily true and that the theist has to account for even bigger problems, like the absurdity of quantum mechanics? If blind assertion creates problems for atheism, then surely the atheist can mirror such an approach, and be just as destructive.Sources1 S. Blackburn (2005), Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, OUP, P782 http://www.infidels.org...3. http://plato.stanford.edu...;