Tag Archive for: Wintery Knight

Cdc Reports Std Rates Hit All-Time High For The Fourth Straight Year

Cdc Reports: Std Rates Hit All-Time High For The Fourth Straight Year

By Wintery Knight

 

Preliminary CDC numbers for STDs in 2017

Preliminary CDC numbers for STDs in 2017

 

I’ve been blogging about skyrocketing rates of sexually-transmitted-diseases for the last few years, and particularly how it impacts high-risk groups, e.g., men who have sex with men. The attitude that the culture is taking towards this is to not make any moral judgments, but someone is going to have to pay for all the health care that is required to “fix” this problem.

Fox News reports on the latest numbers:

Sexually-transmitted diseases continue to hit all-time highs in the U.S. with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reporting a 10 percent spike for chlamydia, gonorrhea, and syphilis in 2017. The federal health agency said in a report released Tuesday that the numbers, which include nearly 2.3 million new cases of the aforementioned diseases, reflect a “steep, sustained increase” in STDs since 2013.

“We’re sliding backward,” Jonathan Mermin, director of CDC’s National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD and TB Prevention, said. “It is evident the systems that identify, treat and ultimately prevent STDs are strained to near-breaking point.”

The data, which was presented at the 2018 STD Prevention Conference, found a 67 percent increase in gonorrhea diagnoses, which officials sounded alarmed over due to the growing threat of untreatable strains.

The CDC gives us the numbers well enough, but like all government agencies, their attitude is not to tell the selfish adults to behave morally. They blame “stigma and discrimination” for the rise in STDs, and recommend more government as the solution. I.e., they think that people who disapprove of sex outside of marriage are to blame for the skyrocketing rates of STDs. If we all stopped making the irresponsible, reckless people feel bad with our ignorant moral judgments, then the STD problem would immediately be solved.

Anyway, here is an article that talks about untreatable strains of gonorrhea in particular:

Scientists have found a “superbug” strain of gonorrhea in Japan that is resistant to all recommended antibiotics and say it could transform a once easily treatable infection into a global public health threat.

The new strain of the sexually transmitted disease — called H041 — cannot be killed by any currently recommended treatments for gonorrhea, leaving doctors with no other option than to try medicines so far untested against the disease.

[…]Gonorrhea is a bacterial sexually transmitted infection and if left untreated can lead to pelvic inflammatory disease, ectopic pregnancy, and infertility in women.

British scientists said last year that there was a real risk of gonorrhea becoming a superbug — a bacteria that has mutated and become resistant to multiple classes of antibiotics — after increasing reports of gonorrhea drug resistance emerged in Hong Kong, China, Australia and other parts of Asia.

Now, I know it’s tempting (for some people who like tolerance) to say that we should let people do whatever they want to do, and not judge them. After all, we can just take some money from the wealthy in order to solve these problems without making anyone feel bad. I hear this a lot from the “don’t judge” crowd. But this time, it looks like no amount of money is going to solve this problem, and maybe the judgers were right to warn.

Syphilis is also a problem in certain high-risk groups:

The sometimes-deadly disease syphilis is exploding in the United States, with most of the increase since 1995 among men who have sex with men (MSM), according to a new report from the Atlanta-based Center for Disease Control (CDC).

As recently as 2000, researchers believed the total elimination of syphilis was within reach. The recent dramatic increases in infections, coupled with the observation that syphilis closely tracks with other diseases like AIDS, have the medical and scientific community deeply concerned. The CDC report considers “the increase in syphilis among MSM is a major public health concern.”

According to the report, “During 2005-2013, the number of primary and secondary syphilis cases reported each year in the United States nearly doubled, from 8,724 to 16,663; the annual rate increased from 2.9 to 5.3 cases per 100,000 population.”

The report also says that “men contributed an increasing proportion of cases, accounting for 91.1% of all primary and secondary syphilis cases in 2013.” Most of the increases came from men who have sex with men, which were responsible for 77% of cases in 2009 but 83.9% in 2012, what the report calls “the vast majority of male… syphilis cases.”

HIV is also a problem for this same group:

A fact sheet released at the end of June by the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) warns that HIV rates, already at epidemic proportions, are continuing to climb steadily among men who have sex with men (MSM).

“Gay and bisexual men remain at the epicenter of the HIV/AIDS epidemic,” says Jonathan Mermin, the director of the CDC’s division of HIV/AIDS prevention.

The CDC notes that while homosexual men make up only a very small percentage of the male population (4%), MSM account for over three-quarters of all new HIV infections, and nearly two-thirds (63 percent) of all new infections in 2010 (29,800).

“Men who have sex with men remain the group most heavily affected by HIV in the United States,” the fact sheet states.

We do have certain segments of the population who think that normal sexuality means having sex with dozens, hundreds and even thousands of partners. Just on the grounds of “they’re hot.” And naturally, these people are at higher risk for STDs.

 

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2wZZkSJ

/by
William Lane Craig’s Secret Weapon Is His Amazing Wife Jan

William Lane Craig’s Secret Weapon Is His Amazing Wife Jan

,

Podcast: Play in new window

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | Android | iHeartRadio | Blubrry | Email | TuneIn | RSS

By Wintery Knight

I want to draw your attention to a talk on “Vision in Life” given by Dr. William Lane Craig. Dr. Craig is the ablest defender of the Christian faith operating today. He has done formal academic debates with all of the best-known atheists on major university campuses in front of thousands of university students.

It turns out that he owes a lot of his success to his amazing wife Jan.

The MP3 file is here. (32 minutes)

This talk was Dr. Craig’s chapel address to Biola University students.

About 11 minutes into the talk, Bill describes what happened after he finished his Bachelor’s degree at Wheaton:

And so I joined the staff of Campus Crusade for Christ for 2 years and was assigned to Northern Illinois University. And that was where I met my wife Jan. She was a graduate of the University of North Dakota where she had come to faith in Christ. And she had a similar vision for her life of evangelism and discipleship.

And as we worked at NIU together, she with gals and I with the guys, leading students to Christ and discipling them to walk with the Lord, we fell in love. And we decided that we would be more effective if we joined forces and became a team.

So their reason for getting together was because they thought that they would be more effective in evangelism and discipleship if they worked as a team.

It is at this point in the talk where Bill begins to explain just how Jan molded him into the lean, mean debating machine that travels the world striking terror into the hearts of atheists.

Bill’s first story about Jan occurs early after their marriage while he is working on his first Master’s degree at Trinity:

And it was also at that time that I began to see what an invaluable asset the Lord had given me in Jan. I remember I came home from classes one day and found her at the kitchen table with all the catalogs and schedules and papers spread out in front of her and she said, “look! I’ve figured out how you can get two Masters degrees at the same time that it would normally take to get one! All you have to do is take overloads every semester, go to all full-time summer school and do all these other things, and you can do two MAs in the time it takes to do one!”

And I thought, whoa! Are you sure you really want to make the commitment it takes to do this kind of thing? And she said, “Yeah! Go for it!” And it was then I began to see that God had given me a very special woman who was my supporter – my cheerleader – and who really believed in me. And as long as she believed in me, that gave me the confidence to dream bigger dreams, and to take on challenges that I had never thought of before.

In an article on his website, he talks about how Jan encouraged him to do his first Ph.D.:

As graduation from Trinity neared, Jan and I were sitting one evening at the supper table in our little campus apartment, talking about what to do after graduation. Neither of us had any clear leading or inclination of what we should do next.

So Jan said to me, “Well if money were no object, what would you really like to do next?”

I replied, “If money were no object, what I’d really like to do is go to England and do a doctorate under John Hick.”

“Who’s he?” she asked.

“Oh, he’s this famous British philosopher who’s written extensively on arguments for the existence of God,” I explained. “If I could study with him, I could develop a cosmological argument for God’s existence.”

But it hardly seemed a realistic idea.

The next evening at supper Jan handed me a slip of paper with John Hick’s address on it. “I went to the library today and found out that he’s at the University of Birmingham in England,” she said. “Why don’t you write him a letter and ask him if you can do a doctoral thesis under him on the cosmological argument?”

What a woman! So I did, and to our amazement and delight, Professor Hick wrote back saying he’d be very pleased to supervise my doctoral work on that subject. So it was an open door!

And in the same article, he explains how Jan encouraged him to get his second Ph.D.:

As Jan and I neared the completion of my doctoral studies in Birmingham, our future path was again unclear to us. I had sent out a number of applications for teaching positions in philosophy at American universities but had received no bites. We didn’t know what to do.

I remember it like yesterday. We were sitting at the supper table in our little house outside Birmingham, and Jan suddenly said to me, “Well, if money were no object, what would you really like to do next?”

I laughed because I remembered how the Lord had used her question to guide us in the past. I had no trouble answering the question. “If money were no object, what I’d really like to do is go to Germany and study under Wolfhart Pannenberg.”

“Who’s he?”

“Oh, he’s this famous German theologian who’s defended the resurrection of Christ historically,” I explained. “If I could study with him, I could develop a historical apologetic for the resurrection of Jesus.”

Our conversation drifted to other subjects, but Jan later told me that my remark had just lit a fire under her. The next day while I was at the university, she slipped away to the library and began to research grants-in-aid for study at German universities. Most of the leads proved to be defunct or otherwise inapplicable to our situation. But there were two grants she found that were possibilities. You can imagine how surprised I was when she sprung them on me!

Both of these Ph.D. experiences are also described in the talk. And the talk concludes as follows:

I am so thankful to be married to a woman who is tremendously resourceful, tremendously talented and energetic, who could have pursued an independent career in any number of areas, but instead, she has chosen to wed her aspirations to mine, and to make it her goal to make me the most effective person I can be, for Christ. And she has been like my right arm in ministry over these many years. And it is a tremendous privilege to be a team with a person like that.

And you young men, I would encourage you, if you marry, to find a gal who shares your vision, not some independent vision, but who is interested in aligning herself with you, and pursuing together a common vision and goal that will draw you [together], so that you will avoid the growing separateness that so often creeps into marriages.

And now you know the rest of Bill’s story. The person you marry will have an enormous influence on the impact you will have for Christ and his Kingdom. It is up to you to decide whether that influence is going to be positive or negative, by deciding if you will marry and if you do marry, by deciding whom you will marry.

You may also be interested in this talk given by William Lane Craig, entitled “Healthy Relationships” (National Faculty Leadership Conf. 2008) (audio here) In that talk, he offers advice to Christians who want to have a marriage that is consistent with their Christian faith.

 

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2OVxCwV

/by
How The Discovery Of The Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation Falsified Atheism

How The Discovery Of The Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation Falsified Atheism

,

By Wintery Knight

Prior to certain scientific discoveries, most people thought that the universe had always been here, and no need to ask who or what may have caused it. But today, that’s all changed. Today, the standard model of the origin of the universe is that all the matter and energy in the universe came into being in an event scientists call “The Big Bang.” At the creation event, space and time themselves began to exist, and there is no material reality that preceded them.

So a couple of quotes to show that.

An initial cosmological singularity… forms a past temporal extremity to the universe. We cannot continue physical reasoning, or even the concept of spacetime, through such an extremity… On this view, the big bang represents the creation event; the creation not only of all the matter and energy in the universe but also of spacetime itself.

Source: P. C. W. Davies, “Spacetime Singularities in Cosmology,” in The Study of Time III, ed. J. T. Fraser (Berlin: Springer Verlag).

And another quote:

[A]lmost everyone now believes that the universe, and time itself, had a beginning at the big bang.

Source: Stephen Hawking and Roger Penrose, The Nature of Space and Time, The Isaac Newton Institute Series of Lectures (Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press, 1996), p. 20.

So, there are several scientific discoveries that led scientists to accept the creation event, and one of the most interesting and famous is the discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation.

Here’s the history of how that discovery happened, from the American Physical Society website:

Bell Labs radio astronomers Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson were using a large horn antenna in 1964 and 1965 to map signals from the Milky Way when they serendipitously discovered the CMB. As written in the citation, “This unexpected discovery, offering strong evidence that the universe began with the Big Bang, ushered in experimental cosmology.” Penzias and Wilson shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1978 in honor of their findings.

The CMB is “noise” leftover from the creation of the Universe. The microwave radiation is only 3 degrees above Absolute Zero or -270 degrees C,1 and is uniformly perceptible from all directions. Its presence demonstrates that our universe began in an extremely hot and violent explosion, called the Big Bang, 13.7 billion years ago.

In 1960, Bell Labs built a 20-foot horn-shaped antenna in Holmdel, NJ to be used with an early satellite system called Echo. The intention was to collect and amplify radio signals to send them across long distances, but within a few years, another satellite was launched, and Echo became obsolete.2

With the antenna no longer tied to commercial applications, it was now free for research. Penzias and Wilson jumped at the chance to use it to analyze radio signals from the spaces between galaxies.3 But when they began to employ it, they encountered a persistent “noise” of microwaves that came from every direction. If they were to conduct experiments with the antenna, they would have to find a way to remove the static.

Penzias and Wilson tested everything they could think of to rule out the source of the radiation racket. They knew it wasn’t radiation from the Milky Way or extraterrestrial radio sources. They pointed the antenna towards New York City to rule out “urban interference,” and did an analysis to dismiss possible military testing from their list.4

Then they found droppings of pigeons nesting in the antenna. They cleaned out the mess and tried removing the birds and discouraging them from roosting, but they kept flying back. “To get rid of them, we finally found the most humane thing was to get a shotgun…and at the very close range [we] just killed them instantly. It’s not something I’m happy about, but that seemed like the only way out of our dilemma,” said Penzias.5 “And so the pigeons left with a smaller bang, but the noise remained, coming from every direction.”6

At the same time, the two astronomers learned that Princeton University physicist Robert Dicke had predicted that if the Big Bang had occurred, there would be low-level radiation found throughout the universe. Dicke was about to design an experiment to test this hypothesis when he was contacted by Penzias. Upon hearing of Penzias’ and Wilson’s discovery, Dicke turned to his laboratory colleagues and said: “well boys, we’ve been scooped.”7

Although both groups published their results in Astrophysical Journal Letters, only Penzias and Wilson received the Nobel Prize for the discovery of the CMB.

The horn antenna was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1990. Its significance in fostering a new appreciation for the field of cosmology and a better understanding of our origins can be summed up by the following: “Scientists have labeled the discovery [of the CMB] the greatest scientific discovery of the 20th century.”8

It’s the greatest scientific discovery of the 20th century.

In the New York Times, Arno Penzias commented on his discovery – the greatest discovery of the 20th century – so:

The best data we have [concerning the Big Bang] are exactly what I would have predicted, had I nothing to go on but the five books of Moses, the Psalms, the Bible as a whole.

Just one problem with the greatest scientific discovery of the 20th century: atheists don’t accept it. Why not?

Here’s a statement from the Secular Humanist Manifesto, which explains what atheists believe about the universe:

Religious humanists regard the universe as self-existing and not created.

For a couple of examples of how atheistic scientists respond to the evidence for a cosmic beginning, you can check out this post, where we get responses from cosmologist Lawrence Krauss and physical chemist Peter Atkins.

You cannot have the creation of the universe be true, AND a self-existing, eternal universe ALSO be true. Someone has to be wrong. Either the science is wrong, or the atheist manifesto is wrong. I know where I stand.

Positive arguments for Christian theism

 

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2OyLGNv

/by
Los siete errores fatales del relativismo moral

Los siete errores fatales del relativismo moral

Por Wintery Knight

El relativismo moral es la opinión de que no existen valores morales ni los deberes morales en la realidad, sino que solo existen opiniones en las mentes de las personas. Cuando le preguntas a un relativista moral de donde viene la creencia de que robar es malo, él puede decirte que es su opinión, o que se trata de la opinión de la mayoría de la gente en su sociedad. Pero no puede decir que robar está mal independientemente de lo que la gente piense, porque la moral (en el relativismo moral) es solo una preferencia personal.

Entonces, ¿qué hay de malo en ello?

Encontramos esta lista de los siete defectos del relativismo moral en el sitio Australiano Faith Interface.

Aquí está el resumen:

  1. Los relativistas morales no pueden acusar a los demás de mala conducta.
  2. Los relativistas no pueden quejarse del problema del mal.
  3. Los relativistas no pueden culpar o aceptar la alabanza.
  4. Los relativistas no pueden hacer acusaciones de parcialidad o injusticia.
  5. Los relativistas no pueden mejorar su moralidad.
  6. Los relativistas no pueden mantener discusiones morales significativas.
  7. Los relativistas no pueden promover la obligación de la tolerancia.

Aquí está nuestro error favorito del relativismo (# 6):

Los relativistas no pueden mantener discusiones morales significativas. ¿De qué podemos hablar? Si la moral es totalmente relativa, y todos los puntos de vista son equivalentes, entonces no hay una forma de pensar que sea mejor que otra. Ninguna posición moral puede ser juzgada como adecuada o deficiente, irrazonable, aceptable, o incluso cruel. Si los conflictos éticos solo tienen sentido cuando la moral es objetiva, entonces el relativismo únicamente puede ser vivido consistentemente en silencio. Por esta razón, es raro encontrar un relativista racional y coherente, ya que la mayoría de ellos se apresuran a imponer sus propias reglas morales como “Es malo imponer tu propia moral sobre los demás”. Esto pone a los relativistas en una posición insostenible — si hablan sobre temas morales, ellos están renunciando a su relativismo, y si ellos no hablan de estos, ellos están renunciando su humanidad. Si la noción de discurso moral tiene sentido intuitivamente, entonces el relativismo moral es falso.

A veces nos hacen muchas críticas los ateos que se quejan de que no dejamos que ellos hagan declaraciones morales sin preguntarles primero en apoyar la moralidad en su cosmovisión. Y eso es porque en el ateísmo la moralidad no está racionalmente fundamentada, así que no pueden responder. En un universo accidental, solo se puede describir las preferencias personales de la gente o las costumbres sociales, que varían según el tiempo y el lugar. Todo es arbitrario — como tener discusiones acerca de cuál es la mejor comida o qué ropa es mejor. La respuesta siempre va a ser “depende de”. Depende de la persona que está hablando, porque es una afirmación subjetiva, no una afirmación objetiva. No hay una manera objetiva  según la cual debemos comportarnos.

El punto del ateísmo es perseguir el placer sin las ataduras de la moral — no hay otra razón alguna para hacer algo en el ateísmo, excepto por el placer que te da. Haces cosas aceptables para sentirte bien y recibir elogios de los vecinos, y haces cosas que no lo son en privado para sentirte bien y esperar que nadie que esté en una posición de poder que te pueda hacer responsable de ello, se entere. No fuiste creado para ser de cierta manera.

 

Blog Original: http://bit.ly/2LVWabj

Traducción por Jorge Gil

/by
Terrell Clemmons Interviews Nancy Pearcey About The Impact Of Secularism

Terrell Clemmons Interviews Nancy Pearcey About The Impact Of Secularism

,

By Wintery Knight

Salvo magazine is my favorite magazine for the discussion of issues related to the Christian worldview. They focus on the most interesting topics; sex and feminism, intelligent design and evolution, marriage and family, abortion and euthanasia, etc. One of their writers, Terrell Clemmons, has just about the best Christian worldview I’ve ever encountered. She interviewed well-known Christian writer Nancy Pearcey in Salvo magazine.

The first part of the interview has Nancy explaining what happened to her when – as a teen – she asked her family and church and Christian leaders for reasons why she should take Christianity seriously. She ended up having to construct her entire worldview herself. She spent an entire year and a half reading nothing but Christian apologetics books. And from that, she moved on to connect Christianity to every other subject that you can possibly imagine.

The part of the interview I liked best was when Terrell asked Nancy what the consequences would be in real life to the popular secular ideas that the universe is an accident, that human beings are just robots made out of meat, that there is no free will and no way that humans ought to be objectively.

Excerpt:

What do you see as the greatest threat to the next generation?

The greatest threats are the issues covered in Love Thy Body because they involve the family—and children who grow up without a secure, loving family do not do as well in any area of life, including their spiritual and intellectual lives. Practices like contraception, abortion, and artificial reproduction are already creating an attitude that having a child is merely a lifestyle choice, an accessory to enrich adult lives and meet adult needs. The hookup culture is destroying people’s ability to form the secure, exclusive relationships they need to create stable, happy families. Porn is decimating a generation of young people who are literally being trained to objectify others for their own sexual gratification. When they marry, they are shocked—shocked—to discover that they are unable to experience a sexual response with a real live person. They are only able to respond to pornography. Homosexuality and transgenderism are both creating a gender-free society by denying the value and purpose of biological sex as the foundation for gender identity and marriage.

We are often told that these issues won’t affect anyone else, but that is not true. As the law changes, we are all affected. In a free society, certain rights are honored as pre-political rights. That means the state does not create them but only recognizes them as a pre-existing fact. For example, the right to life used to be a pre-political right—something you had just because you were human. But the only way the state could legalize abortion was by first deciding that some humans are not persons with a right to legal protection. The state now decides who qualifies for human rights, apart from biology. That is a huge power grab by the state, and it means we are all at risk. No one has a right to life now by the sheer fact of being human, but only at the dispensation of the state.

In the same way, marriage used to be a pre-political right based on the fact that humans are a sexually reproducing species. But the only way the state could legalize same-sex marriage was by denying the biological basis of marriage and redefining it as a purely emotional commitment, which is what the Supreme Court did in its Obergefell decision. The state no longer merely recognizes marriage as a pre-political right but has claimed the right to decide what marriage is, apart from biology.

Gender used to follow from your biological sex. But the only way the state can treat a trans woman (born male) the same as a biological woman is by dismissing biology as irrelevant. That’s why public schools are enforcing policies telling teachers whom they must call “he” and “she,” regardless of the student’s biological sex.

Same-sex activists say the next step is parenthood. In a same-sex couple, at least one parent is not biologically related to any children they have. So the only way the state can treat same-sex parents the same as opposite-sex parents is by dismissing biology as irrelevant and then substituting a new definition of “parent” (perhaps based on emotional bonds). You will be your child’s parent only at the permission of the state.

And what the state gives, the state can take away. Human rights are no longer “unalienable.” These issues are sold to the public as a way of expanding choice. But in reality, they hand over power to the state.

You can see examples of the state stepping in to “fix” the problems caused by the decline of lasting, stable marriages. Divorce courts control a man’s salary and his rights to communicate with and visit his children. Civil rights commissions bully anyone who doesn’t celebrate they LGBT agenda. Universities punish men for real or imagined bad treatment of women without any criminal investigation or criminal trial. And we are all on the hook for the costs of the breakdown of the family, which results in more crime (for fatherless boys), and more unwanted pregnancies (for fatherless girls). In 2008, it was $112 billion per year, no telling what it is up to now when the out-of-wedlock birth rate is now up to 42%.

Although the secular left’s new view of the body and sexuality seemed to be all goodness and happiness – at least to them –  it’s actually caused a lot of problems, and increased the intervention of the state into our affairs.

 

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2zqWutv

/by
Robin Collins And Atheist Peter Millican Discuss The Fine-Tuning Of The Universe For Life

Robin Collins And Atheist Peter Millican Discuss The Fine-Tuning Of The Universe For Life

, ,

By Wintery Knight

You might remember Peter Millican from the debate he had with William Lane Craig. I ranked that debate as one of the 3 best I have ever seen, along with the first Craig vs. Dacey debate and the second Craig vs. Sinnott-Armstrong debate.

Details:

Science has revealed that the fundamental constants and forces of the cosmos appear to be exquisitely fine-tuned to allow a universe in which life can develop. Is God the best explanation of the incredibly improbable odds of the universe we live in being a life-permitting one?

Robin Collins is a Christian philosopher and a leading advocate of the argument for God from cosmic design. Peter Millican is an atheist philosopher at Oxford University. They debate the issues.

From ‘Unbelievable?’ on ‘Premier Christian Radio,’ Saturday 19th March 2016.

The debate:

As usual, when the atheist is an expert, there is no snark or paraphrasing in the summary.

Summary

Brierley: What is the fine-tuning argument?

Collins: the fine-tuning is the structure of the universe is extremely precisely set to allow the existing of conscious, embodied agents who are capable of moral behavior. There are 3 kinds of fine-tuning: 1) the laws of nature (mathematical formulas), 2) the constants of physics (numbers that are plugged into the equations), 3) the initial conditions of the universe. The fine-tuning exists not just because there are lots of possibilities, but there is something special about the actual state of affairs that we see. Every set of laws, parameters and initial conditions is equally improbable, but the vast majority of permutations do not permit life. The possible explanations: theism or the multiverse.

Brierley: How improbable are the numbers?

Collins: Once case is the cosmological constant (dark energy density), with is 1 part in (10 raised to a 120th power). If larger, the universe expands too rapidly for galaxies and stars to form after the Big Bang. If smaller, the universe collapses in on itself before life could form. Another case is the initial distribution of mass energy to give us the low entropy we have that is necessary for life. The fine-tuning there is 1 part in (10 raised to the 10th power raised to the 123rd power).

Brierley: What do you think of the argument?

Millican: The argument is worth taking very seriously. I am a fan of the argument. The other arguments for God’s existence such as the ontological and cosmological arguments are very weak. But the fine-tuning argument has the right structure to deliver the conclusion that theists want. And it is different from the traditional design argument tended to focus on biological nature, which is not a strong argument. But the fine-tuning argument is strong because it precedes any sort of biological evolution. Although the design is present at the beginning of the universe, it is not visible until much later. The argument points to at least deism, and possibly theism. The argument is not based on ignorance; it is rooted in “the latest results from the frontiers of science” (his phrase).

Brierley: Is this the best argument from natural theology?

Collins: The cosmological argument makes theism viable intuitively, but there are some things that are puzzling, like the concept of the necessary being. But the fine-tuning argument is decisive.

Brierley: What’s are some objections to the fine-tuning argument?

Millican: The argument is based on recent physics, so we should be cautious because we maybe we will discover a natural explanation.

Brierley: Respond to that.

Collins: The cosmological constant has been around since 1980. But the direction that physics is moving in is that there are more constants and quantities being discovered that need to be fine-tuned, not less. Even if you had a grand unified theory, that would have to be the fine-tuning pushed into it.

(BREAK)

Millican: Since we have no experience of other laws and values from other universes, we don’t know whether these values can be other than they are. Psychologically, humans are prone to seeing purpose and patterns where there is none, so maybe that’s happening here.

Brierley: Respond to that.

Collins: It is possible to determine probabilities on a single universe case, for example using multiple ways of calculating Avogadro’s number all converging on the same number makes it more probable.

Millican: Yes, I willing to accept that these constants can take on other values, (“principle of indifference”). But maybe this principle be applied if the improbability were pushed up into the theory?

Collins: Even if you had a grand theory, selecting the grand theory from others would retain the improbability.

Brierley: What about the multiverse?

Millican: What if there are many, many different universes, and we happen to be in the one that is finely-tuned, then we should not be surprised to observe fine-tuning. Maybe a multiverse theory will be discovered in the future that would allow us to have these many universes with randomized constants and quantities. “I do think that it is a little bit of a promissory note.” I don’t think physics is pointing to this right now.

Brierley: Respond to that.

Collins: I agree it’s a promissory note. This is the strongest objection to the fine-tuning argument. But there are objections to the multiverse: 1) the fine-tuning is kicked back up to the multiverse generator has to be set just right to produce universes with different constants, 2) the multiverse is more likely to produce a small universe with Boltzmann brains that pop into existence and then out again, rather than a universe that contains conscious, embodied intelligent agents. I am working on a third response now that would show that the same constants that allow complex embodied life ALSO allow the universe to be discoverable. This would negate the observer-selection effect required by the multiverse objection.

Brierley: Respond to that.

Millican: I don’t see why the multiverse generator has to be fine-tuned since we don’t know what the multiverse generator is. I’m not impressed by the Boltzmann brains but won’t discuss. We should be cautious about inferring design because maybe this is a case where we are seeing purpose and design where there is none.

Brierley: Can you negate the discoverability of the universe by saying that it might be psychological?

Collins: These things are not psychological. The selected value for the cosmic microwave background radiation is fine-tuned for life and discoverability. It’s not merely a discoverability selection effect; it’s optimal for discoverability. If baryon-photon value were much smaller, we would have known that it was not optimal. So that judgment cannot be explained by

Millican: That’s a very interesting new twist.

Brierley: Give us your best objection.

Millican: I have two. 1) Even if you admit to the fine-tuning, this doesn’t show a being who is omnipotent and omniscient. What the fine-tuning shows is that the designer is doing the best it can given the constraints from nature. If I were God, I would not have made the universe so big, and I wouldn’t have made it last 14 billion years, just to make one small area that supports life. An all-powerful God would have made the universe much smaller, and much younger. 2) The fine-tuning allows life to exist in other solar systems in other galaxies. What does this alien life elsewhere mean for traditional Christian theology? The existence of other alien civilizations argues against the truth of any one religion.

Brierley: Respond to those.

Collins: First objection: with a finite Creator, you run into the problem of having to push the design of that creature up one level, so you don’t really solve the fine-tuning problem. An unlimited being (non-material, not composed of parts) does not require fine-tuning. The fine-tuning is more compatible with theism than atheism. Second objection: I actually do think that it is likely that are other universes, and life in other galaxies and stars, and the doctrine of the Incarnation is easily adaptable to that because God can take on multiple natures to appear to different alien civilizations.

Other resources (from WK)

If you liked this discussion, be sure and check out a full-length lecture by Robin Collins on the fine-tuning, and a shorter lecture on his very latest work. And also this the Common Sense Atheism podcast, featuring cosmologist Luke Barnes, who answers about a dozen objections to the fine-tuning argument.

 

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2kN27rF

/by
Tactics The Worst Mistake A Christian Can Make When Doing Apologetics

Tácticas: el peor error que un cristiano puede cometer cuando hace apologética

Por Wintery Knight

Tengo la clave que resolverá un confuso misterio.

Así que, esto es solo una publicación de asesoramiento para hacer apologética.

Aquí hay tres situaciones que he encontrado haciendo apologética en el último mes.

Primera situación. Estaba conversando con una señora que es atea. Tenía en mi mano una copia de “God´s Crime Scene” (La escena de crimen de Dios), y ella me preguntó sobre él. Le dije que fue un libro escrito por el sujeto que resolvió el caso de homicidio que le pedí que viera en Dateline (programa de Tv). Ella lo recordó — era el especial de dos horas sobre la mujer que fue asesinada con un garrote. Señaló el libro y dijo: “¿Qué hay ahí?”. Le dije, contiene 8 piezas de evidencia que encajan mejor con la cosmovisión teísta que la atea, y algunas de ellas científicas. Su respuesta fue –literalmente– “¿A qué denominación quiere que me una?”.

Segunda situación. Estaba conversando con una amiga que enseña en una escuela católica. Me estaba contando que tuvo la oportunidad de hablarle a sus estudiantes sobre Dios, y se enteró que algunos de ellos no eran ni siquiera teístas, y muchos tenían preguntas. Entonces les pidió las preguntas e hizo una lista. Esta lista incluía muchos temas difíciles, como “¿Qué hay acerca de la Biblia y la esclavitud?”, y “¿Porqué los cristianos se oponen al matrimonio gay?”. Y cosas por el estilo.

Tercera situación. Hablando con una estudiante graduada sobre la existencia de Dios. Dándole mis argumentos científicos, esperando por la revision de los documentos para cada descubrimiento. Llegué al documento de Doug Axe sobre las probabilidades de plegamiento de proteínas, y levantó la mano. Una pregunta: “¿Me iré al infierno?”.

Así que piense acerca de esas tres situaciones. En cada una el oponente esta tratando de rechazar el cristianismo saltándose hasta el final del proceso. Cuando haces apologética cristiana, no muerdas el anzuelo saltando hasta el final del proceso lidiando con los detalles esenciales hasta que hayas presentado el núcleo de la cosmovisión cristiana usando tu evidencia mas  sólida. Déjame explicarlo.

Así que, tus evidencias mas sólidas como cristiano son los argumentos científicos, junto con el argumento moral. Esos incluirían (para principiantes) lo siguiente:

  1. Argumento cosmológico Kalam.
  2. Ajuste fino del universo.
  3. Habitabilidad galáctica y estelar.
  4. Origen de la vida / ADN.
  5. Máquinas moleculares / complejidad irreducible.
  6. El argumento moral.

El problema que veo hoy en día es que los ateos están rechazando debates acerca de la evidencia porque creen que en todo lo que estamos interesados es en que se conviertan en cristianos. Y bueno, sí. Quiero que te conviertas en cristiano. Pero sé perfectamente bien qué es lo que implica –implica un cambio de prioridades en la vida. Dos de las mujeres con las que hablé están viviendo con sus novios, y los niños en la escuela católica solo quieren divertirse. Ninguno de ellos quieren creer en un Dios que requerirá autonegación, autocontrol y autosacrificio. Nadie quiere que Dios esté en esa posición de líder en sus vidas. El cristianismo es 100% opuesto al espíritu de esta era que busca lo suyo, que es aventurero, que busca lo divertido y emocionante, y que teme perderse algo.

Entonces, ¿cómo responder a todas estas preguntas que buscan saltarse hasta el final? La respuesta es sencilla. No respondas ninguna de esas preguntas hasta que la persona con la que estés hablando considere los ampliamente aceptados datos en tu lista. Estas son cosas que tienen que ser aceptadas antes de que pueda presentarse cualquier discusión sobre asuntos de menor importancia como la de un ángel o dos ángeles en la tumba vacía. Cuando debatimos todos los temas básicos donde la evidencia es la mas fuerte, entonces podemos continuar debatiendo temas donde la evidencia es debatible,  entonces finalmente, en las últimas partes antes de que termine, podemos discutir estas otras clases de preguntas.

¿Cómo explicarle a la persona que hace preguntas específicas sobre temas de menor importancia que se debe seguir este proceso? Simple. Puedes explicar que tu objetivo no es que se conviertan en cristianos ahora mismo. Que quieres dejarlos creer cualquier cosa que ellos quieran. Así es. Ellos pueden creer cualquier cosa que ellos quieran creer. Siempre y cuando lo que ellos crean sea consistente con la evidencia. Y lo que voy a hacer es darles evidencia, y así ellos puedan creer cualquier cosa que ellos quieran —siempre y cuando sea consistente con la evidencia.

Entonces, por ejemplo, voy a darles 3 piezas de evidencia para el comienzo cósmico del universo: el universo expandible (corrimiento al rojo – redshift), el antecedente cósmico de radiación de microondas, y la abundancia de elementos ligeros. Esa es la ciencia convencional que muestra que el universo existió de la nada, un tiempo finito en el pasado. Y les voy a pedir que no crean en ninguna religión que asuma que el universo siempre ha estado aquí. Por ejemplo, el mormonismo está desacreditado, ellos creen en la eterna existencia de la materia. ¿Vez como funciona? Oye, Sr. Ateo. Puedes creer lo que quieras. Mientras lo que creas sea consistente con la evidencia.

Creo que este enfoque de no dejarlos que te apresuren de llevarte al final desde el comienzo es importante por dos razones. Primero, podemos iniciar una conversación que sea interesante para todos, en un ambiente de no estrés. Todos pueden hablar de evidencia tranquilamente. Segundo, mostramos que mantenemos nuestras creencias porque simplemente dejamos que la evidencia establezca los límites sobre lo que se nos permite creer.  No podemos creer en el no-cristianismo, porque el no-cristianismo no es consistente con las evidencias. Y puedes empezar con la evidencia mejor respaldada y eliminar cosmovisiones que son falsificadas por la evidencia que está mejor respaldada. El ateísmo en realidad se descubre como falso bastante rápido, por la evidencia científica.

Entonces, este es mi consejo. Tuve un amigo llamado William que intentó esto hace como una semana. Fue así como sucedió:

William a mí:

Este chico que conozco me mensajeó y empezó a fanfarronear por un rato acerca de cómo él podía desmantelar el cristianismo. Dijo: “Preséntame el evangelio así como tú lo entiendes. Simplemente te haré preguntas para demostrarte que tu creencia no vale la pena”.

WK a William:

Primero que nada, él no tiene permitido a solo sentarse allí y hacer agujeros en tu caso; él tiene que presentar un buen caso para el ateísmo. Segundo, no debatas el cristianismo con él hasta que primero debatas la evidencia para el teísmo – empieza con la buena evidencia científica.

Y Willian escribió esto a su amigo:

La manera en que estoy programado es que proceso todas las teorías competitivas y me quedo con la mejor. Haciendo un análisis comparativo de cosmovisiones me doy cuenta que la teología cristiana explica mejor la mayoría de cosas  acerca del mundo en el que me encuentro.

Estoy bastante seguro que existe un Dios de algun tipo por la evidencia científica para el origen del universo y el ajuste fino en la física. Desde ahí lo encuentro bastante intuitivo que si un Dios pasó por la dificultad de crear y ajustar un universo para la vida, este Dios probablemente tiene un interés en él y que se ha revelado Él mismo a la humanidad de alguna manera.

Desde ahí puedo ver a las religiones más grandes del mundo y compararlas para ver cuál explica mejor el pasado y el presente. El cristianismo fácilmente queda en el primer lugar.

Y luego unos días después, obtuve esto de William:

Finalmente logré que el agnóstico me dijera qué es lo que piensa acerca del origen y del ajuste fino. Cuando comencé a señalar que sus puntos de vista no eran científicos, enloqueció, me llamó deshonesto y me dijo que ya no quería seguir debatiendo más sobre el tema.

Y ahí es donde quieres estar. Corta toda discusión donde el retador intente saltarse hasta el final y llevarte a discutir las últimas etapas de tu caso. Presenta la evidencia más fuerte para tus afirmaciones principales, y llévalo a explicar su evidencia dentro de su propia cosmovisión. Dirige la discusión con evidencia pública y comprobable. Toda guerra depende de elegir el terreno, las armas, y las tácticas que te permitan unir tus fuerzas contra las debilidades de tu oponente.

 

Blog Original: http://bit.ly/2HKFu54

Traducido por Italo Espinoza Gómez.

Editado por María Andreina Cerrada.

/by
Tactics The Worst Mistake A Christian Can Make When Doing Apologetics

Tactics: The Worst Mistake A Christian Can Make When Doing Apologetics

By Wintery Knight

I have a key that will unlock a puzzling mystery

So, this is just an advice post for doing apologetics.

Here are three situations I’ve run into while doing apologetics in the last month.

First situation. I was talking with a lady who is an atheist. I had a copy of “God’s Crime Scene” in my hand, and she asked me about it. I told her that it was a book written by the guy who solved the homicide case that I asked her to watch on Dateline. She remembered – it was the two-hour special on the woman who was killed with a garrotte. She pointed at the book and said: “what’s in it?” I said, it has 8 pieces of evidence that fit better with a theistic worldview than with an atheistic one, and some of them scientific. Her reply to me was – literally – “which denomination do you want me to join?”

Second situation. I was talking with a friend of mine who teaches in a Catholic school. She was telling that she got the opportunity to talk to her students about God, and found out that some of them were not even theists, and many of them had questions. So she asked them for questions and got a list. The list included many hard cases, like “what about the Bible and slavery” and “why do Christians oppose gay marriage?” and so on.

Third situation. Talking to a grad student about God’s existence. I’m laying out my scientific arguments for her, holding up the peer-reviewed papers for each discovery. I get to the Doug Axe paper on protein folding probabilities, and she holds up her hand. One question: “Am I going to Hell?”

So think about those three situations. In each case, the opponent is trying to reject Christianity by jumping way, way ahead to the very end of the process. When you do Christian apologetics, you do not take the bait and jump to the end of the process dealing with nitty-gritty details until you have made your case for the core of the Christian worldview using your strongest evidence. Let me explain.

So, your strongest evidence as a Christian is the scientific arguments, along with the moral argument. Those would include (for starters) the following:

  1. kalam cosmological argument
  2. cosmic fine-tuning
  3. galactic and stellar habitability
  4. origin of life / DNA
  5. molecular machines / irreducible complexity
  6. the moral argument

The problem I am seeing today is that atheists are rejecting discussions about evidence because they think that all we are interested in is getting them to become Christians. Well, yes. I want you to become a Christian. But I know perfectly well what that entails – it entails a change of life priorities. Both of the women I spoke to are living with their boyfriends, and the kids in the Catholic school just want to have fun. None of them wants to believe in a God who will require self-denial, self-control, and self-sacrifice. Nobody wants God to be in that leader position in their lives. Christianity is 100% reversed from today’s me-first, fun-seeking, thrill-seeking, fear-of-missing-out travel spirit of the age.

So, how to answer all these late-game questions? The answer is simple. You don’t answer any late-game questions until the person you are talking with accounts for the widely-accepted data in your list. These are things that have got to be accepted before any discussion about minor issues like one angel vs two angels at the empty tomb can occur. When we discuss all the basic issues where the evidence is the strongest, then we can go on to discuss issues where the evidence is debatable, then finally, in the last bits before the end, we can discuss these other kinds of questions.

How to explain why this process must be followed to the person who asks specific questions about minor issues? Simple. You explain that your goal is not to get them to become a Christian right now. That you want to let, them believe anything thing they want. That’s right. They can believe anything they want to believe. As long as what they believe is consistent with the evidence. And what I am going to do is give them the evidence, and then they can believe whatever they want – so long as it’s consistent with the evidence.

So, for example, I’m going to tell them 3 pieces of evidence for a cosmic beginning of the universe: the expanding universe (redshift), the cosmic microwave background radiation, and the light element abundances. That’s mainstream science that shows that the universe came into being out of nothing, a finite time in the past. And I will charge them not to believe in any religion that assumes that the universe has always been here. For example, Mormonism is ruled out, they believe in eternally existing matter. See how that works? Hey, Ms. Atheist. You can believe anything you want. As long as what you believe is consistent with the evidence. 

I think this approach of not letting them rush you to the end at the beginning is important for two reasons. First, we can get our foot in the door to talk about things that are interesting to everyone, in a non-stressed environment. Everyone can talk about evidence comfortably. Second, we show that we hold our beliefs because we are simply letting evidence set boundaries for us on what we are allowed to believe. We can’t believe not-Christianity, because not-Christianity is not consistent with the evidence. And you start with the most well-supported evidence and eliminate worldviews that are falsified by the most well-supported evidence. Atheism actually gets falsified pretty quickly, because of the scientific evidence.

So, that’s my advice. Had a friend of mine named William try this out about a week ago. It went down like this:

William to me:

This guy I know messaged me and bragged for a while about how easy he can dismantle Christianity. He said: “present the gospel to me as you understand it. I’ll simply ask questions to demonstrate it is not worth your belief.”

WK to William:

First of all, he isn’t allowed to just sit there and poke holes in your case; he has to present a positive case for atheism. Second, don’t discuss Christianity with him at all until you first discuss the evidence for theism – start with the good scientific evidence.

And William wrote this to his friend:

The way I’m wired is that I process all competing theories and go with the best one. By doing a comparative analysis of worldviews I find that Christian theology easily explains the most about the world I find myself living in.

I’m pretty sure that a God of some sort exists because of the scientific evidence for the origin of the universe and the fine-tuning in physics. From there I find it quite intuitive that if a God went through the trouble of creating and tuning a universe for life that this God likely has some sort of interest in it and has revealed Himself to humanity in some way.

From there I can look at the major world religions and compare them to see which one explains the past and the present the best. Christianity easily comes out on top.

And then a few days later, I got this from William:

I finally got the agnostic to tell me what he thinks about origin and fine-tuning. When I started pointing out that his views were unscientific, he blew a gasket, called me dishonest and told me he didn’t want to discuss anything further.

And that’s where you want to be. Cut off all discussions where the challenger tries to jump to the end and get you to debate the very last steps of your case. Present the strongest evidence for your core claims, and get him to account for this evidence within his own worldview. Lead the discussion with public, testable evidence. All warfare depends on picking the terrain, weapons, and tactics that allow you to match your strength against your opponent’s weakness.

 

Original Blog Source: http://bit.ly/2HKFu54

/by