Counter Apologetics

Is there any moral clash between the depiction of Yahweh and Jesus Christ?  Catholic Answers recently responded to a question I had originally asked when I was 19. On Twitter, I’d recounted an experience I had with Frank Turek when I was struggling to hold onto my faith:  “I remember asking Frank Turek in person during a Q&A how he reconciled the portrayals of God in the OT & NT, since it seemed like there was a personality change. He said, “There wasn’t one. Next question.” Anyway, I deconverted a week later.” Joe Heschmeyer, writing for catholic.com, made a much more respectable and empathetic attempt to answer the question, which we’ll be taking a (critical) look at today.  God’s Personality Change? – Catholic Answers  Good God? – David Bentley Hart  Slavery in the Bible – Counter Apologetics Transcript of this episode Subscribe on YouTube here Consider supporting the show on Patreon here or Walden Pod here Listen to our sister show, Walden Pod here Follow me on Twitter @waldenpod For those who are curious, I asked Frank Turek the question in August 2014 in Manitou Springs, Colorado. I attended a two-week apologetics camp called Summit.  linktr.ee/emersongreen

I was recently invited on Thoughtful Faith’s channel to share my thoughts about why LDS theology may have a few philosophical advantages over more mainstream versions of Christianity. For example, Mormons reject perfect being theism in favor of a limited god, which opens up new avenues in responding to arguments from evil that are not available to other Christians. Rather than forwarding creation ex nihilo, Mormons believe the universe is eternal. God is a part of nature rather than outside it; he organized our universe from pre-existing material. Latter-day Saints also reject the standard, logically incoherent view of the trinity. Strikingly, they reject the notion of eternal conscious torment for the vast majority of non-Christians. Universalism (or something like it) is the default view in the LDS Church. This is not “Christianity plus implausible stuff” – this is Christianity minus implausible stuff. Unless, that is, you consider eternal conscious torment, creation ex nihilo, and the baffling notion that our world was created by a perfect being to be valuable aspects of Christianity that somehow increase its plausibility. The original clip on Thoughtful Faith’s channel Why would a loving God create a place of ETERNAL torment? (feat. Emerson Green)  Full conversation with LDS Philosophy and Thoughtful Faith My Linktree

Philip Goff and Dustin Crummett debate psychophysical harmony, God, axiarchism, pan-agentialism, natural teleology, and explore some neglected terrain between theism and the hypothesis of indifference. What are our options in explaining the fine-tuning of consciousness? Subscribe on YouTube Twitter @waldenpod @Philip_Goff @dustin_crummett Dustin’s Channel Mind Chat Consider supporting the show on Patreon here or Walden Pod here Listen to our sister show, Walden Pod here Music by ichika Nito & Whalers. Used with permission. linktr.ee/emersongreen

Dr. Randal Rauser discusses his book 'The Doubter's Creed' and delves into topics like doxastic voluntarism, prudential reasons to hope Christianity is true, the dispute between William James and W.K. Clifford, universalism, eternal conscious torment, religious disagreement, and whether non-Christians can be saved.

Should we address popular versions of theism? Or should we address the best, most defensible versions of theism?  To pursue the question of God’s existence, we must engage with the best forms of theism, not the worst. As Michael Huemer put it, “Who cares if you can refute the craziest version of a view? … The way to learn is to address the most interesting defensible views, not to spend our time discussing trivially false ideas.” Even if those trivially false ideas are widespread, wield lots of influence in the world, and are positively dangerous, they’re still trivially false. At worst, it’s deeply dishonest to refute the worst version of an idea, stop there, and act as if the entire idea has been refuted.  Depending on one’s goals, however, addressing the strongest forms of theism might seem like a waste of time. If you’re primarily concerned with atheist activism, helping others, and reducing the harm brought about by religion, why spend any time on things that have no significant influence in the world? The activists are generally more concerned with attacking the truth of influential beliefs that make the world worse. Philosophers are generally more concerned with addressing the best versions of each side, since that’s the best way of figuring out whether we should be theists, atheists, or agnostics. Though both are valuable and worthwhile projects, the main issue with the activist crowd is that they seem to think they’re the best at both, despite never engaging with the strongest versions of the view they reject.  Subscribe on YouTube Consider supporting the show on Patreon here or Walden Pod here Listen to our sister show, Walden Pod here Music by ichika Nito & Whalers. Used with permission. Transcript Follow me on Twitter @waldenpod linktr.ee/emersongreen

Friendly debate between three miracle skeptics and a theist. linktr.ee/emersongreen Subscribe on YouTube Listen to our sister show, Walden Pod here Music by ichika Nito & Whalers. Used with permission. Follow on Twitter @waldenpod Consider supporting the show on Patreon here or Walden Pod here

Ben Watkins of Real Atheology joins me to discuss the meager moral fruits argument, a few objections to the argument, and why we’re interested in it in the first place. Subscribe to Real Atheology on YouTube and on iTunes  Follow us on Twitter @waldenpod @RealAtheology @SpeedWatkins  Subscribe on YouTube Listen to our sister show, Walden Pod here Support the podcast at Patreon.com/counter linktr.ee/emersongreen / Timestamps / 00:00 Housekeeping 1:41 To the Christians in my life 3:43 Introducing Ben from RA 6:06 Why I’m interested in the MMFA 9:49 The Meager Moral Fruits Argument 42:51 Open Hangout

Dr. Brian Cutter joins me to discuss his paper, ‘Psychophysical Harmony: A New Argument for Theism‘, coauthored with Dr. Dustin Crummett. After talking about epiphenomenalism and why William James’ argument against it works against all views in philosophy of mind (with the lone exception of Type-A materialism), we explain why psychophysical harmony seems so improbable. We also discuss what I consider to be one of the weirder features of physicalism – the metaphysical impossibility of inverts, zombies, disharmony, and so on – and why one’s views about metaphysical modality won’t help you escape the argument from psychophysical harmony. In addition to touching on a few objections, we also talk about the underdetermination of the data, and why psychophysical harmony may be equally good evidence for some hypotheses of those who exist in The Nagel Zone.  Subscribe on YouTube Consider supporting the show on Patreon here or Walden Pod here Listen to our sister show, Walden Pod here Music by ichika Nito & Whalers. Used with permission. Follow me on Twitter @waldenpod linktr.ee/emersongreen

The participation theodicy holds, reasonably enough, that it would be good to create an ideal world. Since it would be good for God to do so, it would also be good for us to do so (as well as any other beings). The goodness would only be multiplied through our participation and contribution to the creation of an ideal world. The defender of the participation theodicy doesn’t deny that God could’ve created a much better world than ours — or even created us in heaven — and that this would be a good thing. Rather, they compare the goodness of creating a heavenly world ex nihilo to the goodness of creaturely participation in the creation of the same heavenly world. A unilateral divine act of ex nihilo creation would preclude the creative activities of other creatures. To quote my guest today, “The best sort of thing God could do would be to create the very best type of world for creatures to inhabit. But for creatures to be spontaneously generated in an ideal state of the world would be for them to miss out on helping God bring about that ideal world. So God, being generous, would have good reason to initially create creatures in a non-ideal state of the world, so that they could contribute towards bringing about its idealization, so that they too could do the very best type of thing that they could have done.” Subscribe on YouTube and watch the interview here Consider supporting the show on Patreon here or Walden Pod here Listen to our sister show, Walden Pod here Music by ichika Nito & Whalers. Used with permission. Follow me on Twitter @waldenpod and John @WriterJohnBuck linktr.ee/emersongreen

I’m joined by Counter Apologist and Ryan from Real Atheology to discuss eternal conscious torment. First, we take a closer look at the views of William Lane Craig, who famously denies the possibility of an actual infinite in the context of the kalam, yet seems to argue that the guilt of those who reject God is an actual infinite. As he says, finite sins only merit finite punishment. But since the guilt of those who reject a relationship with God is infinite, their punishment in hell is justified. We also touch on free will, postmortem salvation, the rejection of God, religious diversity, universalism, and David Bentley Hart’s case that everlasting torment is morally indefensible. Watch the video here Clarification: I used the words “ignorance or limitations/imperfections” several times (e.g., “No one would reject a relationship with a being of perfect love without some ignorance or imperfection”). “Ignorance” in this context would include lack of knowledge of God’s existence or his exact nature. “Imperfection” or “limitation” was usually intended to refer to our rational faculties. So if a person is rejecting a being of perfect love, I think that person must be lacking information or ability to assess that information, most likely. As David Bentley Hart argues, “no rejection of God on the part of the rational soul is possible apart from some quantum of ignorance and misapprehension and personal damage.” Subscribe on YouTube Consider supporting the show at patreon.com/counter or patreon.com/waldenpod Listen to our sister show, Walden Pod here Music by ichika Nito & Whalers. Used with permission. Follow me on Twitter @waldenpod linktr.ee/emersongreen