From owner-freebsd-chat Tue Sep 3 14:57:16 2002 Delivered-To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.FreeBSD.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 97E7837B400 for ; Tue, 3 Sep 2002 14:57:13 -0700 (PDT) Received: from directvinternet.com (dsl-65-185-140-165.telocity.com [65.185.140.165]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 170F943E3B for ; Tue, 3 Sep 2002 14:57:13 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from nwestfal@directvinternet.com) Received: from Tolstoy.home.lan (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by directvinternet.com (8.12.5/8.12.5) with ESMTP id g83LvCGd085151; Tue, 3 Sep 2002 14:57:12 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from nwestfal@directvinternet.com) Received: from localhost (nwestfal@localhost) by Tolstoy.home.lan (8.12.5/8.12.5/Submit) with ESMTP id g83LvBMu085148; Tue, 3 Sep 2002 14:57:11 -0700 (PDT) X-Authentication-Warning: Tolstoy.home.lan: nwestfal owned process doing -bs Date: Tue, 3 Sep 2002 14:57:11 -0700 (PDT) From: "Neal E. Westfall" X-X-Sender: nwestfal@Tolstoy.home.lan To: Dave Hayes Cc: Terry Lambert , Subject: Re: Why did evolution fail? In-Reply-To: <200209021141.g82Bf7157514@hokkshideh2.jetcafe.org> Message-ID: <20020903144201.Q66978-100000@Tolstoy.home.lan> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.org On Mon, 2 Sep 2002, Dave Hayes wrote: > >> What about those questions which cannot be dealt with rationally? > > > > What questions which cannot be dealt with rationally? > > "Is there a God?" "Why are we here?" "What is the one difference > between a sacred being and an evil being?" Some questions are proven from the impossibility of the contrary. If a particular worldview does not provide the preconditions of rationality, it should be rejected. For example, the fact that naturalism undermines the ability to know whether one's views are true or false eliminates naturalism as a viable worldview. In fact, if naturalism is false its opposite, supernaturalism must be true. Moreover, not just any supernaturalism will do. It must provide the preconditions for rationality, ethics, science, human dignity, freedom, intellectual disagreements, etc. Basically, its not that "God" cannot be rationally proven as much as the fact that without God, nothing could be proven at all. Hence, God is proven from the impossibility of the contrary. It is unreasonable to reject that which is the foundation for everything else. Cheers, Neal To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message