George and Darren (and Jeff)
George Lippert
Darren Bell
Round three took place on a quiet Monday afternoon, as George worked at his computer in St. Louis and Darren nodded off at his workplace in Philly. But just when things were starting to quiet down, my friend Jeff asked to read the conversation, and believing the conversation to be a part of an ‘all-in’ facebook thread, he intervened, and brought new life to the conversation. You can read parts 1 and 2 here and here.
Jeff Campbell (JC): This is Jeff Campbell. What an awesome go around. There’s a whole bunch of things I’d love to chime in on. But I think I’d like to muddy the waters in one quite specific way. I think this really applies to both of the positions I’ve seen lain out here.
The question (which I’ll admit is a wee bit loaded) for me is this:
In most of our relationships, we don’t wander around looking for propositionally sound logic. I don’t make any attempt to inductively or deductively prove my love for my wife.
Why does this appear to be our sole mode of discussion about God?
I’ll buy that some of this belongs– since George has never met my wife (Darren has) I might owe him some sort of scientific/mathematically sound argument to prove her existence.
I believe in Truth with a capital T but agnowledge I only percieve truth with a lower case t; I believe the whole thing is wonderously and glorioiusly subjective in this life…
Any thoughts?
Jeff Campbell
GL: Hi Jeff,
Just to try a quick stab at this: as you say, if I (for some reason) decided to deny that your wife exists, it would not be enough for you to tell me that she exists because you love her. I would require SOME sort of scientific, objective proof. While I myself am content that the Bible’s claims are true, that Christianity is the one way to God, etc, I respect the doubts of those who require more concrete, measurable evidence. In the case of your wife, you could merely point at her and say, “there she is,” case closed. Making the case for Christian belief with those who do not immediately except the inerrency of the Bible (or my subjective experience of it), etc, is a very different prospect.
Fortunately, I think the truth of Christianity can indeed be shown (although not conclusively proven) by historical, psychological evidence. As you know, many skeptics have approached the historical record with intention to disprove Christianity only to become converts themselves.
Thus, I am reluctant to merely state “Christianity is true because this is how it subjectively effects me”. The Truth is not true because I believe it. It’s true even if no one believes it. That’s what makes it Truth. I respect the doubter and the true skeptic enough to deal with the issue on their terms.
At least, as much as possible.
DB:
To Jeff:
There is consensus between you and your wife about your love. It is acknowledged by pretty much everyone as a subjective thing (love) and only effects a small amount of people. I think love should be rigorously looked at to ensure it is positive and not detrimental to yourself, your wife or the people you interact with, which all good people search themselves thoroughly before they let their loves loose on the world. How much more so for religion?
Basing a worldview on personal experience is fine so long as you don’t extend your worldview to other people, ’cause it might not be true for them. Unfortunately this is what religion does. My point was never that we cannot know anything, it was that we need to make better distinctions between what we know and don’t know and then let that distinction effect how we interact with other people. So that we don’t interact with them thinking we have knowledge that is more awesome or better then theirs.
The weird thing is I think Jeff is saying something that George will strongly disagree with. That it is not improper for religious belief to be based on subjective experience. That those subjective experiences express something just as true as rational thought.
Also I do try to frame everything in my life in terms of making propositionaly sound logic. I’m not denying that I love the things I love, and that to me certain of my desires are a priori in themselves without further reason, like love. But those things aren’t uncontrolled in my life, I think for a long time about my feelings and their sources, whether they are robust, whether they are going to be around tomorrow, how they effect people. I take my feelings and I put them in a larger framework. Same for God, I may love him, but don’t trust that love unless I can put some scope in it. Cause Darren’s love of God is meaningless unless God is God right?
Related posts:
George mixed up "accept" and "except", and "effect" and "affect". Duh.
I enjoyed reading that, thanks for posting it
I love what Jeff asks and how the conversation turns towards love. Sometimes (well a lot of times) love is misconstrued as altruism even in Christian circles. But when I think of the persecuted Church around the world it is not altruism that is pushing them into deeper persecution for the sake of the Gospel – it is love of God and love of the world by the Holy Spirit that spurs them on to continue to work steadfastly (a thought inspired by David Platt’s book “Radical”).
For Darren – I know that you’re pretty familiar with the command to preach the gospel to the world. So if someone believes they have the eternal truth why should it not be proclaimed to the world if it could even reach just one other person? For me it’s not about increasing church event attendance but about “spreading the love” – isn’t that what you’d want someone to do for you if you were on your deathbed instead of withholding the cure?
[...] 1part 2part 3 – with [...]
I like Jeff's questions. I also liked Darren's phrase about people "letting their loves lose on the world," although whether or not I agree with it might turn into a question of semantics.
I agree with George that Truth is True regardless of who (if anyone) believes it. I think the phrase "true for them," while fairly ubiquitous, is a little sloppy. I feel like Darren might better have said, "Basing a worldview on personal experience is fine so long as you don’t extend your worldview to other people, ’cause it might not be *part of their personal experience.*" I have a hard time with the idea of Truth being subjective and therefore not universally applicable. I can agree that Truth may not be KNOWN, or may be partially known or even (gasp!) incorrectly known, but if there isn't an objective Truth (whether or not we can actually BE objective about it), then the stuff we refer to as true or truth should be called something else. Like: personally experientially verifiable, or something like that.
As to Wesley's comment, I agree with that, too. There is a chance that I, as a Christian, am wrong about the truth, and there's a chance I'm right. But as the atheist Penn Jillette (of Penn and Teller) says, "If you really believe that there is eternal life and that someone might not get it . . . how much to you have to hate someone NOT to proseletyze?"
Wow! Penn said that? He's not generally the most pro-Christian of atheists.