Part 2 - Is Faith actually a form of Knowledge?

One of the ideas that has been ingrained in us is the idea that faith happens in the absence of knowledge. Alvin Plantinga quotes Mark Twain "faith is believing what you know ain't true". We talk of a 'leap of faith' and easily accept that faith is the opposite of reason.

And what has been the result? A contempt from the intellectual and scientific community towards those who have faith in God. If I understood that faith walks hand in hand with ignorance and was divorced from reason, I wouldn't want it either. But what if the opposite is true?

Certainly Alvin Plantinga argues the point.

He contends that "if naturalism were true, ....there would be no such thing as knowledge. That's bad enough, but there's worse to follow...(I'm going to put it in my own words here)...He (the naturalist - the atheist, the evolutionist, etc) can't trust his brain and thinking ability to actually hold true beliefs." (BTW, if you want the actual quote - I'll put it as a footnote)

I love it. Basically he's saying that whether or not theism actually is true, at least it allows for belief, for knowledge, for truth itself and warrants faith. One might say it doesn't disprove itself...but is reasonable.

And by contrast, explaining things like belief, knowledge, and truth without God is actually unreasonable and does not warrant faith - really in anything at all!

from page 1 - "I'll argue that the naturalist is committed to the sort of deep and debilitating skepticism according to which he can't trust his cognitive faculties to furnish him with mainly true beliefs; he has a defeator for whatever he believes, including naturalism itself. And I'll argue that naturalism, insofar as it implies materialism about human beings, has no room for the essential features of our mental life, including in particular belief." - Alvin Plantinga, Knowledge of God

Part 1 - discussion from "Knowlege of God"

Really, there are very few systems of thought out there... but lots of variations on them. And it seems we cannot move past the question of origin in forming the basis of how we look at life. The prevailing intellectual thought in our day is that there is no God and that our origin is a chance happening - we might call this naturalism. It involves explanations like evolution to explain our origin but the basic premise is that all can be explained by science or empirical evidence.

So what happens if we leave God out of the equation? What happens to our view of human life...to our view of ourselves?

One of Alvin Plantinga's first arguments is this: "if naturalism were true, there would be no such thing as proper function, and therefore also no such thing as malfunction or dysfunction." (pg.1)

I can look around this office and see many things that have a proper function - telephone, computer, my guitar, coffee mug, pens. And there is something common to all of these things...they were designed for a purpose. And inherent in that is the possiblity that they could break, or become unusable for the purpose they were intended for. But if my pen were not designed as a tool to write, who is to say that when it runs out of ink, that it is malfunctioning.

That is the start of our discussion...if we were not designed by God...the alternative is that we were not designed at all and with that goes any expectation of what we could be or what we ought to be, etc. If I take this a step further, than anyone who says there is no God, really should not be talking about disasters, sickness or any other kind of 'malfunction' or 'dysfunction' in our natural world.

That's a very interesting thought because some of those most vocal about things like "global warming", "social injustice", and "world poverty" are those who also do not believe in God. What is it then that gives them the idea that things should be (or even could be) any different?!!

Are you up for a little philosophy?

If anyone thinks people of faith aren't thinking people, they ought to try reading someone like Alvin Plantinga. I enjoy the challenge of trying to understand his philosophical arguments.

One thing is for sure: Understanding the different philosophies are important because they are what shapes whole generations of thinking. And we've got a whole generation of young people who have a hard time reconciling faith to their philosophy and the world views so prevelant today...and many time it's faith that seems to get booted to the curb.

So I thought I'd share a few things I'm learning along the way. Any maybe by sharing it with you, it'll clarify my own understanding.

The book I'm reading is actually a written debate between Alvin Plantinga and Michael Tooley titled "Knowledge of God".

So, I'll post as I go along and see how it goes.

My Page - Worship The Rock

My Page - Worship The Rock

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