Theistic Implications of Big Bang Cosmology - Stephen Meyer

Evidence of God in Creation: Dr. Hugh Ross

David Chalmers on Consciousness

The Moral Argument for the Existence of God

This article was originally published on AllAboutPhilosophy.org.

The moral argument for the existence of God refers to the claim that God is needed to provide a coherent ontological foundation for the existence of objective moral values and duties. The argument can be summarised in the following syllogism:

Premise 1: If God does not exist, then objective moral values and duties do not exist.
Premise 2: Objective moral values and duties do exist.
Conclusion: Therefore, God exists.

Since this is a logically valid syllogism, the atheist, in order to maintain his non-belief in God, must reject at least one of the two Premises. By “objective” morality we mean a system of ethics which universally pertains irrespective of the opinions or tastes of human persons: for example, the holocaust was morally wrong irrespective of what Hitler and the Nazis believed about it, and it would have remained morally wrong even if the Nazis had won World War II and compelled everyone into compliance with their values. This view, known in philosophy as “moral realism,” contrasts with “moral relativism” which maintains that no-one is objectively correct or incorrect with respect to their moral values and judgements.

Most people want to uphold premise 2 of the moral argument. After all, if there are no objective ethics, then who is to say that Hitler was objectively morally wrong? Humans have an intuitive sense of right and wrong. The moral argument requires only that at least some actions are objectively right or wrong (e.g. torturing children for pleasure is objectively morally wrong). Premise 1 relates to the perfect standard against which everything else is measured. God, being the only morally perfect being, is the standard against which all other things are judged. Moreover, in the absence of theism, nobody has been able to conceive of a defensible grounding for moral values.

Collision - The Movie

This is a must watch for those interested in the God debate, from whatever side of the fence you reside you'll enjoy Hitchens at his best and find someone in Doug Wilson who can give as good as he gets. They both seem to genuinely disagree with each-other but seem to forge a real friendship which is a great example for all of us. We can disagree agreeably.

Let us know your thoughts.



The book that came as a result if their interactions is available here.

Dr. Frank Turek on the Evidence for Christianity

A Rebuttal to Malin Freeborn on the Moral Argument

[Note: This is a continuation of a conversation involving atheist philosophy graduate Malin Freeborn and myself (Jonathan McLatchie) regarding the moral argument for the existence of God. This is my response to part 1 of Malin's rebuttal. Part 2 of Malin's response (which will touch on my objections to his arguments from Scripture) will be released subsequently. For Malin's first guest post, see here. For my response, see here. For his first rebuttal, see here.]

Revisiting Euthyphro's Dilemma

Malin writes,

The problem [with the moral argument] is twofold.  Firstly, we can derive morals without this argument.  Secondly, this argument does not in fact give us a solid foundation for morals.  Yahweh may be unchanging, but even if he existed, this would not be enough.  Imagine for a moment that I find a rock and carve into it a set of injunctions - this rock now contains ‘Do not steal’, ‘Do not kill’, ‘Do not put anchovies nor pineapple on pizzas’, ‘Do not disrespect the rock’, et c.  Now imagine that the rock is timeless and unalterable - it will never change.  Is it a good foundation for ethics?  Certainly not, because it is arbitrary.

So we must ask - why should the character of a god be a good source for ethics?  You might say that it is because god is good.  But what is good?  How do we know that the character traits of Yahweh are in fact good?  Simply because they are Yahweh’s traits?  Because Yahweh simply is good?  It doesn’t really answer the question.

This is known as the Euthyphro dilemma, and there is no way around it because it is an exhaustive divide - if something is good and X shows it to be good, then it is either good with or without X, or it is good because of X.  We cannot escape it by saying that Yahweh’s ‘character’ rather than his words make it good.  We cannot escape it by saying that Yahweh is perfect, because we then have to ask, ‘Perfect in regards to what?’, and if the answer is ‘Perfect in regards to everything, including morals’ then we are back at square one.

Gods, if they existed, could aid our moral epistemology, but never our moral ontology.  Without gods, not everything is permitted - and this is precisely the point."

Traditionally, euthyphro's dilemma is concerned with right action, not with good simpliciter (though if that is your concern I can address that too). The question is posed this way: Is x the right thing to do because God commands it, or does God command it because its already the right thing to do? I take the former option. Normally, the problem with accepting the horn is that there is a presumption that the commands in question from God are arbitrary (i.e. God could have commanded that we ought to lie). But that's just false. The theist wants to say that God is essentially loving, honest etc., and therefore, in all worlds at which God exists, his commands are going to be consistent with his nature. And therefore, in all worlds, he will disapprove of lying. 

Hugh Ross vs Lewis Wolpert on Evidence for God

I had the great pleasure yesterday of attending the debate "Does the universe show evidence for a creator?" at Imperial College, London. Arguing in the affirmative was astrophysicist Hugh Ross of Reasons To Believe,  a science-faith think tank from the USA; arguing the negative was Lewis Wolpert, Emeritus Professor of biology and British Humanist.

Before the debate, however, I had the privilege of meeting the participants. Hugh Ross and his wife Kathy were a delight. Kathy remarked that the weather was hotter here than in California! I made sure she appreciated how rare an occurrence this is (have to say, I've been loving it! I can walk down the streets of London in shorts and t-shirt at 9pm)!

Then Lewis Wolpert showed up! A really nice guy! Winsome and congenial. He seemed to get on very well with Hugh and Kathy. I discovered that his son Matthew appears three times a week on the comedy circuit in Leicester Square, so that's an act I definitely need to check out! We also had a great talk about the fascinating complexity of the cell, which Wolpert happily admits is truly mindboggling.

But, onto the debate itself! A good turn-out. The lecture theatre was packed. It was hosted by Imperial College's Christian Union, but a decent number of atheists and sceptics showed up too - which is quite something given that AC Grayling was giving a lecture in the next room (he passed by me earlier as I was editing my latest Dawkins-critical video on my laptop... I don't think he noticed)!

This is where it gets interesting. Hugh Ross went first, and outlined for 20 minutes his Creation Model, arguing that the Bible - and only the Bible - contains consistent, scientifically accurate predictions about the cosmos, the empirical data for which is only being discovered recently in the modern age. His case is essentially that the more we discover about the universe, the more the evidence for design and a transcendent creator piles up and confirms what the Bible has been telling us for the past thousands of years. Of particular note were passages from Jeremiah and Romans, which Hugh claims tell us about the expansion of the universe and the law of entropy. Alongside we have the opening of the Bible, that in the beginning God created the heavens and the Earth - the Big Bang is this beginning. When this was discovered, a great many scientists were reluctant to accept it, fearing that an absolute beginning of space and time gave too much leverage to those who believe in theistic creation.

It was fascinating also to hear Hugh cite an article written by atheist physicists called "Disturbing Implications of the Cosmological Constant". In this article, its atheist authors were forced to concede that this particular cosmological constant left them no choice but to invoke a transcendent causal agent. Their solution? To "do a Daniel Dennett": conclude that this cosmological constant must, therefore, surely be false (!)

Before moving on to Wolpert's response, I cannot help but also comment on the audience. Well, specifically, the students in front of me. They were clearly "sceptics"! Though not just sceptics, rather restless sceptics. The kind I can remember being while I was at university and convinced of my own immortality. There was an evident aggression and desire for peer-approval in the way they increasingly shot each other smirks and disapproving glances as Hugh spoke (one seemed to think it especially important that his lady friend understood unequivocally that this religious nutter wasn't going to sway his opinion one jot)!

It was a touch depressing how superficial some of their reactions were - one questioner claimed to "understand what it's like to be arrogant" before accusing Hugh Ross of being so for claiming that the universe was designed (I don't think that guy actually does understand arrogance). Another student was taking numerous notes while shaking his head. I've no problem with critical note-taking, but I found it curious that one of his bullet-points read "where the f*** did that graph come from". Why the expletive? Where does this extra infusion of hostile energy come from? Why not just write "where did that graph come from"?

Onto Lewis Wolpert's rebuttal. Now, I've seen and heard quite a bit of Wolpert in debates on the existence of God. Indeed, one of my earliest memories of discovering apologetics was watching his 2007 debate against William Lane Craig. His arguments back then were pretty weak, so I wondered what he'd produce this time, five years on...

Exactly the same arguments! Specifically:

1. "Who made God?"

2. "We believe in God because we evolved an over-active sense of cause and effect".

3. "Absence of evidence is evidence of absence"

4. "Why is your religion any better than the thousands of other religions out there"?

I was astonished! Craig had addressed and exposed all these arguments as completely fallacious during their debate in Westminster:

1. Asking "who made God?" has nothing to do with the question of whether the universe shows evidence for a creator (it's a secondary question, and makes the same anti-scientific demand Dawkins does: of "who designed the designer?" leading to the requirement of an infinite regress of explanations in one go, so no explanation could be accepted). This is not to speak of the fact that God is uncaused, which is precisely the position Lewis Wolpert would have to hold about the universe (i.e. his objection is special pleading).

2. The second argument commits the genetic fallacy: of trying to invalidate a view by explaining how someone comes to hold it. Imagine if I walked up to an atheist and said, "you deny God because you have a bad relationship with your father, so you can't stand the idea of a bigger authority figure behind the universe". Even if that were true, would it mean therefore that atheism is false and that God exists?! Clearly not. Why has Wolpert not come to terms with this fallacy, especially given that it has already been pointed out to him?

3. As for evidence of absence, this was something I took upon myself to point out to Lewis during audience Q&A: that it's logically fallacious to rely upon absence of evidence. Having no evidence, say, that there's a person lurking in the corridor outside the lecture theatre, does not mean that we therefore do have evidence there is nobody outside!

4. As for asking "what makes you think your religion is truer than any other"? I can understand this having rhetorical appeal to those who are already sceptical of the idea of God. However, at the end of the day, it's not even an argument. It's a question. And the answer to that question would be... in Hugh's opening speech!

Now, as for those specific arguments Hugh laid out, to show that there is evidence for the Christian God, Wolpert responded:

"There isn't any evidence for God, and you certainly can't get it from physics."

...wasn't that the very title of the debate? About whether or not the physical universe shows evidence for God? So, essentially, Wolpert used up his time recycling fallacious arguments, which had nothing to do with Hugh's presentation, and dismissed the presentation itself in a single sentence consisting of a mere question-begging assertion. In fact, the most telling moment was when he said "I'm not a physicist, I don't understand any of it, but I'm sure that even if I did... it would still not be evidence for God"!

What he did do, which I have to admit was quite a clever tactic, was to divert the audience's attention away from Hugh's astrophysics to biology. Evolution! "Do you think we evolved"? "Did Eve come from Adam's rib"? This manoeuvre set the tone for the lengthy cross-examination and Q&A which was to follow, as Ross's views here certainly aren't in line with the popularly accepted interpretations of evolutionary development (though one cannot be left in any doubt he's comfortable offering evidence for them).

There were no rebuttal rounds after those opening speeches. The rest was cross-examination and audience Q&A, which went on for quite a while and allowed many questions to be raised from the floor. I had to admire Hugh's stamina: he'd only recently come off the plane, must have been jet-lagged, but calmly carried on simply providing answers to the many questions which came his way (and kept doing so for two hours solid after the event had finished). Indeed the questions were very Hugh Ross-heavy. At one point it seemed to be simply a "grill Hugh" session, with Wolpert only becoming involved for the occasional extra point of view. You could almost forget he was there sometimes. He didn't seem to be trying. I wonder if Hugh Ross gave him something new to think about?

Much, much more could be said, but I reckon I can leave it here. Doubtless the recording will be released soon and you can go through it all in greater detail (I'll link it in this post when it's out). Some students appeared unimpressed with Hugh's case, expressing that it was too vague and vulnerable to differing biblical interpretations. Others were coming out with remarks of surprise and interest, admitting they'd not expected to encounter a Christian scientist who was prepared to answer all their questions in such depth. Only time can tell what ripples these events cause.

Speaking of which, you do know how God created different dimensions of time and exists in a time dimension all of his own, don't you? If not, you will soon!

Calum Miller vs. Peter Atkins "Does God Exist?" Debate - Oxford 2012

A Guest Response from Malin Freeborn on the Moral Argument (Part 1 of 2)

[Note: This is a continuation of a conversation involving atheist philosophy graduate Malin Freeborn and myself (Jonathan McLatchie) regarding the moral argument for the existence of God. This is part 1 of 2 of Malin's rebuttal. Part 2 of his response will touch on my objections to his arguments from Scripture. For Malin's first guest post, see here. For my response, see here.]

Seeking a Definition for Transcendental

In the previous post I requested a definition for transcendental.  I hold that the word is generally used simply for writers to hide behind,  but I’m willing to work with any definition, and a definition was given.  So here’s the new challenge, as given by Jonathan - we must find an objective standard of ethics.  An action or behaviour[1] must be wrong or right regardless of people’s opinions.

I know that objective morals, in the required sense, do in fact exist.  However, I disagree with the statement that gods exist and disagree that any god can make ethics objective which would not be objective without the god.

          
At this point, more ambiguous language is used.  Morals are ‘grounded in the moral character of God’ or have an ‘ontological foundation in god, themselves being a reflection of God’s character and attributes’.  I know how to ground a house or how to ground a lightning rod, but of course that is not what it meant.  So what is meant?  I think I see what is being pointed at, but whether or not I understand the position (or indeed, if anyone really does) this is not a good way to show that ethics are objective.

The presuppositional theists’ story seems to be something like this:

For morals to be transcendent, they must be objective.  If they are to be objective, they have to be unchanging - not simply jumping around as different cultures arise and fall, each with their own values.  We already know that we can look back in time to ancient Rome or across the seas, to different cultures, and find that they did things which are objectively wrong.  Therefore we need an account of this.  This account is that Yahweh holds certain attributes.  While I like arbitrary things like my own family and certain foods, Yahweh empathises with people (that is,  he is compassionate) and he gives things to people (that is, he is generous).  Yahweh will not change his mind, nor his attitudes - he is, in this sense, timeless.  Therefore, we can now say ‘That practice is wrong’, and when an ethical relativist says ‘Wrong in regards to what?’, we can say ‘In regards to god’s perfect moral character’, which is the standard by which we judge actions.

The problem is twofold.  Firstly, we can derive morals without this argument.  Secondly, this argument does not in fact give us a solid foundation for morals.  Yahweh may be unchanging, but even if he existed, this would not be enough.  Imagine for a moment that I find a rock and carve into it a set of injunctions - this rock now contains ‘Do not steal’, ‘Do not kill’, ‘Do not put anchovies nor pineapple on pizzas’, ‘Do not disrespect the rock’, et c.  Now imagine that the rock is timeless and unalterable - it will never change.  Is it a good foundation for ethics?  Certainly not, because it is arbitrary.

So we must ask - why should the character of a god be a good source for ethics?  You might say that it is because god is good.  But what is good?  How do we know that the character traits of Yahweh are in fact good?  Simply because they are Yahweh’s traits?  Because Yahweh simply is good?  It doesn’t really answer the question.

This is known as the Euthyphro dilemma, and there is no way around it because it is an exhaustive divide[2] - if something is good and X shows it to be good, then it is either good with or without X, or it is good because of X.  We cannot escape it by saying that Yahweh’s ‘character’ rather than his words make it good.  We cannot escape it by saying that Yahweh is perfect, because we then have to ask, ‘Perfect in regards to what?’, and if the answer is ‘Perfect in regards to everything, including morals’ then we are back at square one.

Gods, if they existed, could aid our moral epistemology, but never our moral ontology.  Without gods, not everything is permitted - and this is precisely the point.[3]

A Response to Malin Freeborn on the Moral Argument

Here at Apologetics UK, we seek to promote objective dialogue and constructive criticism as much as possible. Our attitude is that, if Christianity is true, it ought to be able to withstand any criticisms that are made of it. Similarly, if an argument we make is sound, it ought to be defensable. On the flip side of the coin, if Christianity is false, we don't want to adhere to its tenets anyway. It is for this reason that we are encouraging the occasional postings of guest articles by critics of Christianity, from a range of perspectives, in order to stimulate thought and critical reflection.

A couple weeks ago, I published an article by atheist philosophy graduate Malin Freeborn on the subject of the moral argument. His article was specifically a response to a lecture presented by Christian philosopher Stephen Meyer as part of the TrueU series.

Freeborn's article was disappointing in several respects, most notably his apparent conflation of moral ontology and moral epistemology, and his prolonged tangential detour into an irrelevant subject. I have dealt with Freeborn's arguments from Scripture in two appendices following the main text. Let's turn our attention to what he has to say.

William Lane Craig vs Peter Atkins: "Does God Exist?", University of Manchester, October 2011

A Guest Post From An Atheist On The Moral Argument

[Note: In the interests of promoting objective discussion and constructive criticism, we will be inviting the occasional guest post by a critic of Christianity. Our position is that, if Christianity is true, it should be able to withstand any criticism; if Christianity is not true, we don't want to believe it anyway. This piece, written by atheist philosophy graduate Malin Freeborn, concerns the moral argument for the existence of God. It is written as a response to this lecture presented by philosopher Stephen C. Meyer as part of the TrueU series. I invite reader participation in the comments thread and will be responding with a follow-up article in due course.]

Meyer’s Position

A god exists ⇔ objective moral standards exist

Meyer’s position is that we all live our lives as if we believed in real and objective ethical principles. He claims that the only way objective ethical principles could exist is if a god also exists. Meyer has a wishlist of things which a moral system requires, and claims that all of these require a god. So far so good - students of logic will note that the argument is valid as long as he claims that each of the items on the list require a god and all of them are required for morality. So, with this in mind let’s see the list:

The Wish List for an Ethical Framework

● There must be transcendental standard/ an objective standard of values.

● Humans must have free will.

● We need a reason to see humans as valuable & ‘qualitatively different’ from other forms of life.

The first on the list was a little ambiguous, as Meyer first states that he wants ‘transcendent values’ and secondly that he wants an objective standard of values. The two will have to be treated separately. As to ‘transcendent values’, the word ‘transcendent’ is ambiguous in the extreme. One definition is ‘beyond experience’, another is that it refers to a non-normal or supernormal property. Wikipedia alone gives 14 different areas in which the word is used. After a degree in Philosophy, including a good deal of Metaphysics, I still do not know what this word refers to, but suspect that it is one of many filler words, an empty word which refers to nothing at all. However, if the reader wishes a more charitable reading, they are free to use one and perhaps say that morality cannot be experienced in the manner which sunlight and music are experienced. If this is the case, then I agree, but of course if this is the case then it will not take much to give an account of morality as including transcendent values, if it contains any values at all. Nobody has ever claimed that morality is given by a normal sense.

Another reason to be suspicious of this statement is that Meyer so often slips in prepositions to his Philosophy. In this case he once requests that we have a transcendental standard of values ‘above us’. The man in the clouds has been rationally rejected, but he remains yet in the flavour of the language. If the reader finds me unfair then I request a translation of ‘above’ in reference to ‘transcendental values’.

The Ontological Argument for the Existence of God

The ontological argument is widely thought to have been first clearly articulated by St. Anselm of Canterbury, who defined God as the greatest conceivable being. Anselm’s reasoning was that, if a being existed only in the mind but not in reality, then a greater being was conceivable (a being which exists both in the mind and in reality). The famed seventeenth-century French philosopher René Descartes utilised the ontological argument. The ontological argument was revived by Norman Malcolm in 1960. Variants of the ontological argument have been supported and defended by contemporary philosophers such as Alvin Plantinga (who bases his argument on modal logic) and William Lane Craig.

The ontological argument was first criticised by Gaunilo of Marmoutiers, a contemporary of Anselm of Canterbury. He argued that the ontological argument could be used to demonstrate the existence of anything, utilising an analogy of a perfect island. The argument was also criticised by the famed Catholic philosopher Thomas Aquinas and also by David Hume and Immanuel Kant.

The Ontological Argument: Possible Worlds

To properly understand the ontological argument, it is necessary to specify what philosophers mean when they talk about “possible worlds.” A “possible world” refers to a counterfactual – a state of affairs that could have been true. For something to exist in a “possible world” simply means that its existence is logically possible.

The ontological argument for the existence of God refers to the claim that the very logical possibility of God’s existence entails his actuality. The ontological argument begins with the claim that God, by definition, is infinitely great. Thus, no entity can surpass God’s greatness. God, in other words, is the greatest conceivable being (if one could conceive of a greater being, then that would be God). Being infinitely great entails existence in every possible world since a being that existed in merely some possible worlds would be superseded in greatness by a being that existed in every possible world. Moreover, a maximally great being is one that possesses the property of necessary existence. Thus, if a being of maximal greatness exists in some possible world, then it exists in every possible world. If an infinitely great being exists in every possible world then that being must exist in the actual world. Since God is an infinitely great being, therefore, God must exist.

The Ontological Argument: The Premises

The conclusion of the ontological argument, as formulated by Alvin Plantinga and others, depends on a form of modal axiom S5 (which contends that if the truth of a proposition is possible, then it is possible in all worlds). This axiom also contends that, if it is possible that a proposition is necessarily true (that is to say, it is necessarily true in some possible world), then it is necessarily true in all possible worlds.

The logic of the ontological argument is formally summarised by philosopher Alvin Plantinga as follows:

1. A being has maximal excellence in a given possible world W if and only if it is omnipotent, omniscient and wholly good in W; and

2. A being has maximal greatness if it has maximal excellence in every possible world.

3. It is possible that there is a being that has maximal greatness. (Premise)

4. Therefore, possibly, it is necessarily true that an omniscient, omnipotent, and perfectly good being exists.

5. Therefore, (by axiom S5) it is necessarily true that an omniscient, omnipotent and perfectly good being exists.

6. Therefore, an omniscient, omnipotent and perfectly good being exists.

The Ontological Argument: Is It Sound?

While the ontological argument has been the subject of fierce criticism by many contemporary philosophers, many of the criticisms of it result from a failure to properly understand the argument.

The ontological argument is clearly logically valid – that is to say, the conclusion necessarily follows provided that Premises 1 to 5 are true. The crucial Premise, therefore, is Premise 3, namely, that it is possible that a maximally great being exists. To refute this Premise, one would need to show that the very concept of an infinitely great being is somehow logically incoherent – like a “married bachelor”. Since no argument to that effect has been forthcoming, however, it follows necessarily and inescapably that “Therefore, a maximally great being exists.”

This article was cross-posted from AllAboutPhilosophy.org.

Morality Presupposes Theism: Stephen C. Meyer

This is part 1 of 4. For complete lecture, see:

Part 2; Part 3; Part 4.

Can Morality Exist without a God?

 Please note, first of all, that the question I pose is not: can people who don’t believe in God be moral?

 I ask rather that if a God does not exist (irrespective of belief in him) then can we really talk about objective morality, can something be described as being right or wrong; good or evil?

First if God does exist then we define good and evil, right and wrong, in terms of what God is and what he desires of us. If something tries to go against God’s will or is opposed to his character then it is by definition bad. Whilst if something is in God’s character and desire for us then by definition, it is good. In this world view, the basis of morality is a being above us. We do not define what is good or evil, rather we try and understand and learn what is good and what is evil, from what we innately feel and our observations of the world around us.

All are insights (in different ways) from the being who imposes the morality, the one who decides what is good and what not. If there is not a God than how is a morality constructed, for something can no longer be inherently good or evil? Good and evil, right and wrong now become constructs of humanity and the society within which we dwell. The moral code itself must be built from the bottom up, rather than existing and waiting to be discovered. So in the constructed morality we think about how we’d like to be treated, how to protect others and how to ensure the best outcome for the most people there (assuming in your morality that all people are equal, a rather recent assertion).

We thus come up with statement such as it is wrong to kill another. Over time the statements are refined: except in defence of life. Thus a moral code is created. As a society we then impose these morals on those around us who don’t agree – or don’t have the ability to work out what is the best thing to do in any situation. This imposition, in fact becomes a moral imperative itself. It’s very well me not killing anyone but if I have decided it is wrong, not in the best interests of society then I must stop other people killing as well. All well and good you say.

My question is this, what if someone’s understanding of what would be best for society is ‘better’ than yours? In their eyes they must have the moral imperative to impose their morality upon you. What if there are people who are cleverer than us or morally superior (in our own eyes), surely we should follow their moral code, even if it’s different to ours? To my eyes this building up of morality must lead to a person, or collection of people who understand the dilemmas of morality better – who then have a moral obligation to impose their ideas of right and wrong upon the rest of the population. Thus as a general person in the population you would have a morality imposed from above (from those you view as morally superior beings – those you seek to emulate with your life). To you, there is once again objective morality.

The only difference seems to be that you have created/elected your god/gods!

This article was provided by Chris Knight.

Centre for Intelligent Design Lecture 2011 by Stephen Meyer on 'Signature in the Cell'

William Lane Craig: The Evidence for God

This lecture was live-streamed on October 18th, 2011, from Imperial College in London. It was the second day of Bill Craig's UK Tour. The live-stream was captured and uploaded onto youtube (as one would expect) but here we have the official, high quality cut from The Reasonable Faith Tour. In particular, what you get is the audience Q&A, which was not live-streamed (with a little philosophical fumbling from yours truly, I might add)!

It was quite an experience to see Bill give his presentation, in the flesh, in an english lecture theatre! I was glad that he didn't hold back in presenting the Ontological Argument... that one really blew some minds out of their english chairs (I recall a small group sitting infront of me, half laughing, half bewildered: "he actually used that argument")!



And here we have some bonus footage for you, shot on my iphone! After the session had ended there was still time for discussion, in which Bill explained to a small group the ineffectiveness of "expand-contract" universe models for explaining away the fine tuning, appealed to in the teleological argument:

Dinesh D'Souza V John Loftus - Does the Christian God exist?

The Nature of Human Beings and the Question of their Ultimate Origin: Richard Dawkins vs. Rowan Williams