Does Christianity give good answers to the questions of philosophers?

Philosophy deals with at least these three main questions:

1. What is it that really exists?
2. What should we do?
3. How can we really know anything for sure?

Philosophies that answer the first question are dealing in something called "metaphysics". The second question is dealt with in the area called "ethics" and the third in the area called "epistomology".

Every person answers these questions somehow. The way a Christian answers these questions is often radically different to the way someone who is not a believer will answer them. I think it is worth discussing what the alternatives are and whether the Christian viewpoint seems to be superior or inferior to other philosophies - and for what reasons.

If the Christian answers to the basic questions like "What is real?" are incorrect, then we should throw out the whole Christian system and find one that works. But I contend that the Christian system works extremely well and fits best with what we observe in nature and in ourselves. I will try to show that the materialist scenario does not fit with what we observe - and believing it requires enormous leaps of faith in what amount to "magical" powers of matter and energy which have never been shown to really exist. Not only that, but the materialist scenario, if seriously accepted, gives us no reason to suppose that our own minds are much more than a certain kind of chaotic random accident. Why then should we trust what our minds tell us?

Options in Metaphysics

What is it that really exists? "Materialists" want to assert that when you get down to it, all that really exists is matter and energy, which are really two different forms of the same thing. They would also perhaps add to this list "time" and "chance". Scientific materialists also believe in something they call "the laws of physics". They assert that these things "just are" or "always have been".

Others believe in a world of spirits that exists in parallel with the material world we can relate with by means of our five senses. True Christians and in fact adherents to most religions of the world would believe in this system of metaphysics. But subscribers to the Judeao-Christian worldview would further assert that there is an Uncreated Eternal God who is the Creator of all things seen and unseen. This would be denied by pagans and polytheists of various stripes, who nonetheless believe in the existence of a spiritual world.

Others believe in a world where "mind" or "Mind" has always existed in one form or another. In such systems, the material world might be believed to have a separate existence but in many the idea is there that matter is simply a product of "mind" - whatever that is. Some Buddhist systems of thought which actually deny the existence of a Creator appeal to ideas like this. They say that Mind is all there is. Philosophies like "zen" encourage people to turn inwards, abandon rationality and logical thought, and thus somehow achieve "enlightenment", whatever that is. Its hard to explain anything meaningfully when you believe that rationality itself is suspect.

Some view the whole universe as a kind of Divine mind. This is pantheism. The universe itself is a kind of "God" and everything in it is therefore in some sense "divine". A lot of Hinduistic thinking falls into this category. Most of the various gods of hinduism therefore are just a part of the system, not in any sense the creators of the system.

So we see there are different options in metaphysics.

On Materialism and Naturalism

Naturalism is the idea that everything can be explained in terms of certain things which were always just there in one form or another, and operate according to certain fixed principles. In naturalistic systems, the Universe is considered to be a Closed System - nothing acts on it from outside of itself. Naturalistic philosophers refuse to acknowledge the possibility of a Creator. They don't LIKE the idea of a Creator or beings that don't follow the laws of physics because they feel it would undermine the whole scientific enterprise. This is understandable perhaps in the light of the foolish and primitive superstitions which have existed over the centuries of man's recorded history, but just because the thought is understandable does not mean it truly holds as true. In fact, a careful examination of the history of science shows that it does not.

The hope of many scientists like Richard Dawkins is that they can "reduce" the study of complicated things like animals down to biology, then to biochemistry, chemistry and ultimately elementary particle physics, without recourse to belief in any kind of Designer or Creator. "Scientific" materialists hold that there is no spirit world, no God or gods and no "purpose" to any of the "apparent design" we see in nature. All such materialists are atheists. They believe that Darwinian evolution explains how progressively more complex forms come out of simple ones.

A lot of people today believe what these educators have told them. They simplistically believe claims that all serious scientists today are atheists or agnostics. They forget that mankind has a time honored tradition of telling LIES, and that scientists also are known to be part of the same mankind.

Perhaps the main attractiveness for many in the philosophy of naturalism is in believing that mankind is "autonomous" and can therefore pursue whatever else takes his fancy without needing to believe in or fear a mighty Creator or Judge who will one day call him or her to account. If that means he or she can live like a cat or some other sexually promiscuous animal without guilt or shame, that is seen as tremendously "liberating".

Concerning this, the Bible says:

"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them." (Romans 1:18,19)

Perhaps for some the attractiveness is in the idea that everything can be reduced in principle to something we can or will understand. The idea that we can one day "know it all" or work it all out certainly appeals to human pride. I remember thinking such thoughts as a science undergraduate student at the University of New South Wales many years ago. I was very disappointed when I found out that Godel (umlaut missing) had actually proved that in any sufficiently powerful formal system there are true propositions which CANNOT be proved by means of the axioms and rules of that formal system! Not even MATHEMATICS could be proven as consistent and reducible to simpler things, such as set theory or logic.

Whether it is the desire to indulge in sex, greed or pride that motivates it, "liking" a certain philosophy does not mean it corresponds to reality, the reality that One Day may come and BITE YOU BADLY WHEN YOU LEAST EXPECT IT.

Does the Hypothesis of a Creator God have Predictive Power?

One of the tests of the scientific value of a hypothesis is whether it has power to predict certain things which are unknown at the time the hypothesis is put forward, and which can be confirmed or proven wrong by subsequent experimentation, observation or research.

One of the successes of Einstein's theory was that it predicted the motion of certain planets more accurately than the Newtonian model. The experimental observations came after Einstein put forward his theory. If they had been different, they would have called into question the usefulness of Einstein's theory. But instead, the observations confirmed the value of the theory. This is how good science works. It can make predictions which are later confirmed by observation.

The Bible begins as follows: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Genesis 1:1). Now at the time Moses wrote this statement, no one had any theoretical scientific basis for knowing if the physical Universe had always existed, or whether it had a beginning. Genesis 1:1, if treated as a scientific hypothesis, could find support if there was solid theoretical and experimental data that supports the idea that there existed a time before which there was no physical universe here such as we know it. But if evidence was found that the Universe has pretty much always been there - that space, time, matter and energy have always existed pretty much as they do today, then Genesis 1:1 would seem to have little value as a scientific hypothesis.

It turns out that the red shift in the spectrum of light coming to us from the stars and Einstein's theory of relativity show that the Universe has ever been expanding, and that there was a time, 15 to 17 billion years a

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