Tag Archives: Philosophy

Commentary

Opening speeches from the Flannagan-Bradley debate on morality

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Details of the debate.

Raymond Bradley and Matthew Flannagan will debate the topic “Is God the Source of Morality? Is it rational to ground right and wrong in commands issued by God?”

Bradley is an Emeritus Professor of Philosophy with areas of specialty in Philosophical Logic, Metaphysics, Logical Atomism; he has previously debated William Lane Craig, Edward Blaiklock and many other Christian scholars and describes himself as an older generation “new atheist”.

Matthew FlannaganFlannagan is an Auckland based Philosopher and Theologian with areas of specialty in Philosophy of Religion, Ethics and Theology; he has previously debated Bill Cooke, Zoe During and, of course, writes for this blog.

Matt posted both opening speeches on the MandM blog.

Opening speech by Ray Bradley.

Excerpt:

I’m going to indict God on four categories of charges. Each category has scores, if not hundreds or thousands of instances. If God is guilty of even one of these instances, that alone would be grounds for his conviction. Drawing upon evidence provided by God himself in his so-called Holy Scriptures, I hold that he’s guilty of them all.

  • Crimes against Humanity
  • War Crimes
  • Licensing Moral Mayhem and Murder
  • Crimes of Torture

Matt went second and responded to this argument.

Opening speech by Matthew Flannagan.

Matt defends a divine command theory of morality and he has 3 responses to Ray:

  • The theist can deny that the Biblical record of what God did is infallible
  • God’s moral duties are for humans, they are not necessarily binding on God
  • Ray misinterprets the meaning and applicability of the Bible stories he cites

I recommend reading the two opening speeches now so you’re ready for when the full video comes out. Brian Auten of Apologetics 315 tells me that he has asked for the video and it should be posted soon. I will link to the video when it comes out.

Flannagan is awesome and you need to start to get familiar with him even though he is in New Zealand. He’s basically the William Lane Craig of New Zealand, and probably that whole area of the world. I don’t know any Australian scholars who are as capable as Matt. I must mention though that I do disagree with him on annihilationism, the view he articulates in this debate.

UPDATE: The audio has now been posted. (H/T Jason from Thinking Matters NZ)

Further study

And here is a blog post on Ray Bradley written by another New Zealander, theistic philosopher Glenn Peoples. Glenn’s post is short and to the point – he excerpts the main argument from a post by Bradley against the moral argument and shows why it has no force.

And you can read more about William Lane Craig’s debate with Ray Bradley on Hell, too.

Podcasts

Podcasts from William Lane Craig, William Dembski and Scott Klusendorf

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William Lane Craig vs Victor Stenger

Debate report on the recent re-match debate at Oregon State University.

The MP3 file is here.

Craig argued his standard case, except he added the ontological argument and the contingency argument and removed the fine-tuning argument. Stenger defended the Hartle-Hawking cosmology from over 25 years ago, and made an argument that the universe we see does not fit with what Stenger expects that God ought to do, if he existed.

Their first debate is here. (MP3 file)

Bill also talked briefly about some other recent events, including his events at Harvard and MIT.

William Lane Craig vs Michael Tooley

Debate report on the recent re-match debate at the University of North Carolina – Charlotte.

The MP3 file is here.

This starts with a discussion of how Stenger responded to the ontological argument (blech!). Tooley offers a very strong statement of the evidential/probabilistic/inductive problem of evil. He was very well prepared for the debate – maybe too prepared. He didn’t really respond to Bill Craig’s arguments in the debate – he seemed to read FOUR prepared speeches! The debate included discussions about what counts as evil, and also whether we are in a position to know that God has no reason for permitting a particular instance of apparently gratuitous evil.

Their first debate is here. (Transcript)

I’ve actually met Michael Tooley at a conference, and he’s a really nice quiet guy – but he supports infanticide.

William Lane Craig in South Africa

Debate report on the 4-man debate on the resurrection of Jesus with two South African atheists who have started a kind of liberal “Jesus Seminar” in South Africa. The debate was about how people should understand the text of the New Testament. Bill debated with a partner – Mike Licona.

Bill and Mike defended two contentions: 1) The resurrection was a literal historical event. 2) There is no good reason to deny this historical event. Paul argued from 1 Cor 15, the early sermons in Acts, and empty tomb that is talked in the gospels. One of the professors argued the “history of religions” view – that the New Testament is fiction that borrows from pagan mythology. Craig also argued that the pre-supposition of naturalism is not warranted given the state of the evidence from natural theology (science, etc.).

The MP3 file is here.

Bill seems to be doing a lot of travel around the world lately, which is just awesome!

Commentary

The logical contradictions in Richard Dawkins’ worldview

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From Uncommon Descent. (H/T ECM)

Excerpt:

In River out of Eden : A Darwinian View of Life Richard Dawkins wrote:

The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference. As that unhappy poet A.E. Housman put it: ‘For Nature, heartless, witless Nature Will neither care nor know.’ DNA neither cares nor knows. DNA just is. And we dance to its music.

In a 2007 New Scientist/Greenpeace Science debate, Dawkins said:

Far from being the most selfish, exploitative species, Homo sapiens is the only species that has at least the possibility of rebelling against the otherwise universally selfish Darwinian impulse . . . If any species in the history of life has the possibility of breaking away from short term selfishness and of long term planning for the distant future, it’s our species. We are earth’s last best hope even if we are simultaneously, the species most capable of destroying life on the planet. But when it comes to taking the long view, we are literally unique. Because the long view is not a view that has ever been taken before in whole history of life. If we don’t plan for the future, no other species will . . .

Well, which is it? Is there right and wrong or isn’t there? Are we selfish or aren’t we? Do we have free will or don’t we?

Is this why Dawkins refuses to debate William Lane Craig? Is his schtick just about selling books to gullible atheists who don’t understand the laws of logic?

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