Dale offers the prompt “say hello to summer” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.
On my walks in the neighborhood one of my neighbors has an amazing flower garden. I often stop by to take a few photos.
Here are some of the many flowers in his garden.
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If one compares the chronologies of Genesis 5 and 11 as they appear in the Masoretic Text (MT) – which is what most of our bibles use for these dates – with those in the Septuagint (LXX), one finds roughly a 1500 year discrepancy.
The LXX (or Alexandrian) Inflation Hypothesis explains this discrepancy by saying that the Greek translators of the lost Hebrew text of Genesis of their time (called the Vorlage) inflated the dates in the 3rd century BC to better agree with Egyptian history. The Rabbinic Deflation Hypothesis explains this discrepancy by saying that the rabbis in the 2nd century AD deflated the numbers to discredit Jesus as the Messiah.
In the following interview Henry B. Smith Jr of the Associates for Biblical Research (ABR) argues for the Rabbinic Deflation Hypothesis. It is long, so I have commented on it section by section with links to each part.
The correct dates are important for both archeology and apologetics.
The Christian archeologist has to know what the original Genesis text said about the events following the flood. Apologists who accept the Bible as an historical document also need to be clear about what that history actually is. Attacks against any Christianity that has not been watered down to a new age belief system come from those who want to discredit the Bible as reliable history.
The following diagram compares the ABR chronology1 which prefers the LXX dates because it accepts the Rabbinic Deflation Hypothesis with James Ussher’s chronology2 which prefers the MT because it accepts the LXX Inflation Hypothesis.
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Philip decided to start a company that would produce deceptively engaging nonsense for video channels. He hired his colleagues from the University of Noital each a renowned Doctor of Nescience to build the content. Being congenitally unemployable they were surprised to find themselves suddenly working.
The company was so successful that after many years of faithfully rigging the books, Philip’s CFO reported that profits exceeded expectations for the tenth quarter in a row. However, when the CFO demanded a bigger cut of the faked profits Philip, who failed himself to get a degree in nescience, took the company to the next level by firing the entire board of directors.
That was when Philip realized that he had acquired enough expertise twisting stuff to pitch it all and trash the books himself.
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Denise offers the prompt word “pitch” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.
Dale offers the prompt “north, south, east, west” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.
Now, I can’t keep my lefts and rights straight so I hope what I label as north, south, east and west doesn’t get confused as well.
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Bob told everyone he followed the Bible as closely as the next guy. However, when he read something he didn’t like, on those rare occasions when he read the Bible at all, the muse guiding his philosophical wanderings soothed his mind with a strand of myth, mystery and misinterpretation.
Nonetheless God enjoyed listening to Bob, because when the muse ran Bob’s mouth God couldn’t stop laughing (I mean He could stop but – you know – why would He want to). When Bob died, God looked forward to meeting him so He could ask him some trick questions just to hear how his muse might respond.
Unfortunately, right at the last moment, just outside the Pearly Gates and in spite of all the warning signs, the muse guiding Bob’s philosophical wanderings led him to that omnivorous, omni-awesome black hole, so logically logical that even Lucifer could get used to living there. Then, as Bob gazed down, deep, and ever deeper into the bottomless pit, the mousetrap snapped taking Bob with it into that dark abyss where some say not even light can escape if there were any light down there to try.
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Denise offers the prompt word “strand” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories.
Arguments for the existence of God are responses to philosophical skepticism. If you have not been deceived by this skepticism to the point of refusing to see when you look, all you have to do is look around yourself for evidence that God is real.
Romans 1:19-20 KJV – 19 Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them. 20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
People who are willing to look and see – people whose minds have not been deceived – don’t need a philosophical argument for God. They already know He’s real. They might want to know more about Him, but the fact that He’s real is not a problem.
Furthermore, if they are born again Christians who follow where the Holy Spirit leads, they are sons of God. 1 The skeptic has no hope to convince such people. If you are one these people, you can skip the rest of this post. You are indeed blessed.
For those who are unsure, trust that the answers to any of your questions about God are in the Bible, but beware. Although you have passed the first level of deceivers, the skeptics, there are other wolves (or snakes) who would love to tell you what’s in the Bible like the serpent did to Eve.2
The existence of these wolves3 is as sure as the existence of God. I suspect most of them don’t even know they’re wolves. The Way is narrow4. Don’t let yourself be led astray by blind guides which would be a kind of persecution.5 Forgive them.6 Bless them.7 But move on.8
Skeptics of God’s existence
Philosophical skeptics about God are biblically referred to as fools. They love to run their mouths. If no one listened to them, they would only harm themselves.
Romans 1:21-23 KJV – 21 Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. 22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, 23 And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.
When skeptics talk they introduce doubt into the minds of their listeners and reinforce it in themselves. When they keep expressing this doubt it becomes a commercial selling speculative lies over and over again.
On the bright side, since skeptics are speaking falsehood, whatever they say will counterproductively spring back on them when people argue against their positions effectively. That defense is the only reason to make these philosophical arguments.
When listeners (including the skeptics themselves) realize that no one in his right mind wants what the skeptics are selling in their commercials, the defense will have succeeded.
Formalized propositional logic
There are many philosophical arguments against skeptics of God’s existence. The kind I am focusing on here is called transcendental arguments. Immanuel Kant began this type of argumentation to address the skepticism of David Hume.9
All I will be doing in this post is formalizing the logical steps that one needs to go through in propositional logic to make a transcendental argument. I will also use an online proof checker10 to validate these steps.
What that will do, hopefully, is make clear what the structure of a transcendental argument is and demonstrate that the structure is valid.
Presuppositions11
To get started I need a proposition, a statement of something obvious that no one would want to reject such as “I think”. Then I need to identify what that proposition presupposes. Following Descartes I might say that “I think” presupposes that “I am”.
Even though I might have to chain these presuppositions to get where I want to go, if I can reach a proposition that some unknown God12 exists, then it is game over for the skeptic. Because of that, I should not expect the skeptic to quietly agree with anything I have to offer. He will claim that I just asserted the presupposition without demonstrating it.13 To make sure that no one agrees with him, I need to make sure that I argue persuasively and clearly.
This is the hardest part of the argument. It is also the part that I’m skipping. All I want to show now is what is going on with such arguments by formalizing them as a propositional proof. I want to make sure that it is clear what these arguments are trying to show.
For an example of a specific transcendental argument, Parker Settecase showed how C.S. Lewis set one up.14
What is a presupposition?
A presupposition is the consequent of two implications where the antecedent of one is the negation of the antecedent of the other. If I say that A presupposes B I mean not only that A implies B but also that not A implies B. If the proposition A and its negation both imply the proposition B, then B is a presupposition of A or A presupposes B.
Although that might sound confusing, presuppositions are easy to find. Here’s an example:
Proposition: There is writing on the paper.
Presupposition: There is a piece of paper.
There is writing on the paper implies that there is a piece of paper.
There is not writing on the paper also implies that there is a piece of paper.
If you accept the proposition or its negation, it makes no sense to reject the presupposition.
Setting up the formalization
Let A stand for the proposition and let B stand for the presupposition. Next assume the two implications (which I would have to successfully argue for), namely, A implies B and not A implies B.
A → B as the first assumption
¬A → B as the second assumption
What I want to do is show that if I am skeptical and assume not B, then all I get is a contradiction. So, I will assume not B with the intent of deriving a contradiction. That is, I plan to push the skeptic into a corner.
¬B by hypothesis
Since I have assumed not B, I can use modus tollens on A implies B to derive not A. I can do the same to not A implies B to derive not not A. With that I derive the next two lines of the proof.
¬A by modus tollens from the hypothesis and first assumption
¬¬A by modus tollens from the hypothesis and second assumption
Note that those two lines together form a contradiction, not A and not not A. Since I derived a contradiction I can use reductio ad absurdum to reject the hypothesis as absurd. Given a presupposition B, if I hypothesize not B, all I can derive is B.
Proof checker validation15
Moral of the story
If you can show that a true proposition has a presupposition, that presupposition is a necessary condition not only for the proposition but also for its negation.
If the skeptic wants the proposition to be true, he has to accept the presupposition. That is the transcendental argument.
The goal of a transcendental argument for God starts with a proposition even the skeptic can’t reject. It identifies a presupposition of that proposition which leads to some unspecified, unknown God’s existence.
Having that unknown God is all I need. The philosophical step is over. The deception has been broken. The Bible and the Holy Spirit take over (although they have been guiding me all along this philosophical journey which wouldn’t have been necessary if I weren’t deceived in the first place).
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Dale offers the prompt “bridges” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.
Below are pictures of two bridges in Prague that I took last summer.
The first two show up close views of part of two statues on the Charles Bridge. The last shows another bridge in the distance with swans.
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Since the James K. Polk Site near Charlotte, North Carolina, is only four miles away and offers easy bike access to the Little Sugar Creek Greenway, I go there often.
Here are photos of the doors on the early 1800s style buildings. These aren’t the original Polk family buildings, but they are representative buildings from the area.
There are also guided tours through the buildings and a museum.
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Linked to Thursday Doors.
Poetry, Short Prose and Walking 