Transcription
Hello and welcome. Today we're going to look at three really important debate moments from college students talking to Dr. Frank Turk. They are seeking to debunk Christianity, to disprove the Bible. And man, Frank in these videos has an answer for everything that is worth listening to. These interactions get increasingly more intense. I also want to see if you guys can spot a common thread that runs through the mind of each of these students. So, let's dive into this first interaction, which ends in an amazing moment where the student has actually worked through some of their cognitive dissonance, is actually thinking, you can see, and then they realize where they had gone wrong. But the way that Dr. Turk incrementally walks them towards that place is really an amazing thing to watch. So let's get into it.
Hello. I'm Nathaniel. Nathaniel. No. So you make three specific arguments for the existence of God. A creative argument, an argument for design, and an argument for morality. I already like this guy. I first off would like to try and take down the argument on morality. Go ahead. Because it's not an actually an argument for the existence of a god. It's the argument for the fact that we should have an idea of an existence of a god because otherwise there would be no moral basis from which we could sit on. And I disagree with that because I feel that humans are inherently altruistic and moral.
Okay. All right. Stop there for just a second, Nathaniel. What do you mean by altruistic and moral? We are giving and we care about each other. Why is that good? Why is that good? Because it helps our species survive. Why is it good to survive? Because then we can propagate and move on as a species and continue to exist. So why is that a good thing? Who said? Why is that a good thing? Yeah. Because that is what it is. Well, that's an is. That's not an ought though. Stalin would say, "Fine, Nathaniel. I'm going to survive by killing you and taking your stuff." Why is he wrong? Because Stalin would have the initial urge not to. He would feel that the inherent urge of humans is to be caring for one another. There are situations where humans will not be caring about one another and those are exceptional. But because humans are inherently altruistic, his first urge would be to take care of the person or try and help them. But if he has some motivation against that, then he would no longer have that urge and he would decide that he wants to kill them because he has a reason to. Well, again, you're I think you're begging the question as to what altruism is. Why is taking care of others a good thing if there is no God? That's your opinion. Is there an external reference, an authoritative unchanging reference that you're getting that opinion from which makes it objective or is it just something you feel? Humans. Um, so if you take it from the stance that this is something that is consistent throughout humanity, that we care about one another, then we could superpose that as a moral impulse that we have.
Okay, let me agree with you. I think we do have a moral impulse. And that's exactly what CS Lewis said in the abolition of man when he looked at all the diverse cultures and he said they agree on basic morality. Now, how do you explain that basic morality? Well, there's a maybe different ways to explain it, but some will say that's because God has written it on our hearts. But the issue isn't how we know it. The issue is why is altruism, as you put it, or caring for one another a good thing. Who said it's not necessarily that who said it is what is. We are altruistic. There is no need for someone to say that it is a good thing. It is what we are. But if Hitler or Stalin comes along and says, I don't want to be altruistic. I want to be selfish and take everything for myself and if I have to kill you to do that, I'm going to do that. Why is that objectively wrong? Because he is not taking care of other people. Who said it's where you getting this standard to objective this objective standard that you ought to take care of people? Where does that come from? if there's no God. So, I'm just going to talk about a little example that I know of and some others. So, um there's three different points I'd like to make. First off, we still exist. If we did not take care of each others as a social species, we would have very very limited capabilities of still existing. We need to band together. We need to take care of each other. We need to be friendly to one another. Presupposing that survival is a good thing. Why is it a good thing? And why us surviving? Why not roaches or analopee or black widow spiders? Why do you need the concept of good there? We're still surviving and we're being nice, kind to each other. We are being caring for one another. Is wouldn't forgive me, Nathaniel, but you're stealing the standard of goodness from God's universe to try and make your worldview work. But if there is no objective authoritative moral standard beyond us, then atheism doesn't work.
You know, I think you're right. There is something to that. The the idea of good and evil is in a lot of ways a religious concept. This is such a rare and beautiful moment of cognitive dissonance giving way to actual thought. And you can see his gears turning in this moment as he realizes that the idea of good and evil is, as he puts it, a religious construct. But if that's true, then so are the ideas that he's putting forth about kindness and altruism. He's realizing in this moment that his assumptions are actually predicated and and actually require there to be some sort of an objective reality that exists outside of any individual's interpretation or any society's implementation. You can see him realizing in this moment that the second that you acknowledge objective morality that is again above and beyond culture or society. You're also acknowledging the idea of of a moral lawgiver and as you acknowledge that you're you're acknowledging the idea of God himself. This is why the moral argument is so compelling and I love that you see it landing home in this moment.
My question to you is one that I ask to anybody when I'm talking about religion. Um, and it's it's to address a a huge paradox I see that that nobody seems to worry about. Um, so you are presumably very confident in your views. You are not at all concerned that you might be wrong. Well, I could be wrong. That's why I continue to read and continue to search and I'm not God. I could be wrong. You are still you are still very confident in your ideology and your belief system. You are very conf I mean I'm I'm assuming since you're up here on a stage, you've written a book. Um, if I walk into any given room, maybe not this one, I will find people that follow Islam. I will find people that are um, Jewish. I will find people that follow Hinduism. Uh, a number of religions, and there have been something like over 500, probably way more religions in history that have all come and gone. Um each each of these followers of these various religions is utterly confident that they are correct that their book has the the word the final word the word of the creator and they will all point to you know in my book this is something that actually happened this is something that actually happened uh this is something that actually happened so therefore everything is correct my book is right I know I'm right all of these people in the same room are utterly confident that they're correct and the other people are wrong uh and to me it seems like a blatant paradox because I'm assuming you would agree that only one religion can be correct. Well, if they're Would you agree with that? If they're contradictory, only one or the other is right or neither are right. Okay. Yes. All right. So, my my question to you is how do you address that that paradox that every all these followers of different religions including yourself are are very very confident with in their views enough to enough to be able to assert that people in other belief systems are wrong.
Well, it's it's not a paradox, Nick. It's just the way truth works. No, it is a paradox in that in that all these people, they're not willing to address the fact that the the other people across the table are equally confident. They're equally certain. What do you mean by paradox? Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you mean by that. You mean that only five people at a table, each of them has a book. They're all saying, "I'm the one that's right because my book said so." How do you how do you address that? Well, you look at the evidence. That's what you do. That's what we're trying to do here. Just like if I were to say uh 4 * 4 equal 15 and you said well Frank um 4 * 4= 16 rather than 15. You would be right and I'd be wrong. And if everybody else thought it was some other number than 16, they would be wrong too, right? Okay. Yes, that's correct. But so so what what types of information then do you use? Again, I'm not familiar. I haven't read your book. Have Have you been in here for this presentation? I have not. I came in late. I'm just curious if Oh, well. So, I mean, yeah. I mean, that's probably what the presentation was about. Hey, you guys want to hang out another 70 minutes, huh? All right. I mean, that's fair. Nick, you came in really late, brother. Hey, I'll tell you what. Um, what we just did is we went through four questions. Does truth exist? Does God exist? Are miracles possible? And is the New Testament reliable, particularly about the resurrection of Christ? If truth exists, in other words, there is truth. And you would agree with there's truth. Uh if God exists, if there's a being beyond the world who created and sustains the world, if miracles are possible, and we said they were because the greatest miracle has already occurred, the creation of the universe out of nothing, then if Jesus rose from the dead after he predicted it, if he really did rise from the dead, then what we call mere Christianity, CS Lewis would call it, the basic essentials of Christianity are true. And that's what we were talking about here tonight.
Okay. Um, I mean, I'm sure I I'm sure we would disagree on a lot of those former points, but I did miss a lot of the presentations. So, I'll tell you what, we if I were to give you a book, would you read it? If you would read a book if I would if you would read one of my suggestions, too. I'm not going to. If we could trade books and and you'd read one of my recommendations, yeah, I would be absolutely be down. I'm I'm giving you my book, not a recommended book. Of course, you'd give me your book. A book that my mom would recommend. Your mom would recommend it because she would recommend my book. Would you My mother would recommend all my papers I've written as well. I'm telling you if you want to ask me to read a book, I will give you a book as well. And if you want What book will you give me? I would give you The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. I've already read it. Okay. And I'm Okay. Now, now let me ask let me ask you a question, Nick. Nick, can I ask you a question? Yes, absolutely. Richard Dawkins believes there is no God. Right. Yes. And he believes everybody who disagrees with him is wrong, just as you believe anybody who doesn't. So, what's the paradox? The paradox is that only one of these people at the table can be correct. True. I I mean that you're saying that Richard Dawkins is right. I'm saying he's wrong. I'm saying that my view is closer to the truth than his. And the other significant difference in that situation though is that Richard Dawkins is not making an affirmative claim. He's not saying that something exists. Oh, sure he is. He's not he's not Richard Dawkins is saying is saying that materialism is true, that macroevolution is true, that there are no objective moral values. You're you're pulling me into other areas of of Richard Dawkins uh belief systems. I'm only here to discuss whether or not there is a divine creator, a god. You can talk about all these things that Richard Dawkins has said or believes in. Right.
Let me just pause really quick right here to say that I think that the reason that they're missing each other at this point in the conversation is that it seems to me that Nick sees religious truth claims as subjective truth claims. Whereas Frank Turk is saying that no, what religions mean with the type of truth claims that they put forward are of an object an objective nature. So to highlight this point, I'm going to play a really quick less than one minute clip from my documentary where Jay Warner Wallace perfectly lays out this distinction and really the problem with viewing religious truth claims as subjective. Here's what that sounds like. Well, what are the claims about God really? Are they just really an expression of our subjective opinions like your favorite cookie or your favorite soda or your favorite movie? Because if that's the case, there's no point in us like getting all fussy about making a case for why I think Diet Coke is better than Diet Pepsi. But the issues related to God's existence are different because they aren't subjective claims. Our opinions can't change whether or not God exists. Do we think that Christianity is the true description of the God of the universe? Now, I can be wrong about this, but it's not a matter of my opinion. In the end, it either is or it isn't. And it's based not in Jim's opinion, but in the truth claim that's rooted in the object called Christianity. So, it's an objective claim about God's nature. And it can be objectively false. It could also be objectively true. So, either Jesus did or did not die on the cross. Either Jesus did or did not rise again. It's of an objective nature. And I think that that is something that's being a little bit missed here by Nick. With that being said, let's go ahead and dive back in.
Uh the reason the way I can pull atheism out of that paradox is by saying that all these people at the table, the the metaphorical table I'm describing are claiming that something exists. Something that is mutually exclusive with everything else at that table. Um someone like Richard Dawkins would say that there is no reason to believe in any of these claims being made. Not that um for example I was speaking with somebody earlier and and one common argument I use people will say how can you be so confident that there is no god how like they'll ask me that you know you you're saying this but you're saying there is no god it's not necessarily that there I'm saying that there cannot be one right do you believe in leprechauns can I ask you for an answer I haven't seen any evidence for leprechauns so you don't believe in them no I don't okay do you believe incept fairies you don't believe in those right Nick but you see the god of the bible is not like a being inside the universe like a fairy or a or Thor. It's not about whether it's a a being or it's about the fact that it's a claim, right? It's a truth claim, right? You don't believe in these things because there is no sufficient sufficient meaning uh stands a test of logic. Um okay, hold on. Nick, hold on. Hold on. Okay. Whether fairies exist or not is not a logical claim. It's an onlogical evidentiary claim. Okay. Same thing is true with God. It's totally logical that fairies and leprechauns could exist. Has nothing to do with logic. It has to do with there. Are there is there evidence that such things exist? It might be a semantic error I'm making. Okay. Yes. So, Richard Dawkins says uh at a scale of one out of one to seven with one being I know there's a God and seven I know there's no God. He says I'm a six and a half. To his credit, he says that he's not absolutely certain that God doesn't exist. Just like I can't be absolutely certain God does exist. I could be wrong. Okay. But he is saying that everybody who disagrees with him in his view is wrong. He's saying the same thing everybody is saying when they make a truth claim. It's not a paradox to make a truth claim. If you are subtracting God from the equation, you are also implicitly making affirmative statements that need to be supported just like everybody else at the table if you will. So if you're saying God doesn't exist, I don't believe that God exists. You are also then putting forth a godless materialistic model of explanation for everything because God people say God of the gaps but God actually explains morality, human dignity, the comprehensibility of the universe, the level of complexity in everything from the cell to the vastness of the cosmos. An intelligent, immaterial creator explains so many of these realities. If you take him out, you're now on the hook to explain those things in other ways. And so this sort of I've said this before in other videos, but sort of this privilege of the skeptic position where you think that you're not making an affirmative statement by subtracting God. You're just saying, "I don't know. I just don't believe in God." You actually are. You're actually on the hook to support the truth claims that you're implicitly putting forward by subtracting God from the equation.
As I understood that you've argued that a painting or a creation to use the term painting implies a painter or a design implies a designer. But I must ask who designed God? And if no one designed God, if God is timeless, spaceless and immaterial, and he existed eternally in an uncaused fashion, then why can't nature exist in the exact same way in an eternal, uncaused, faceless, timeless, immaterial fashion? Good question. Why can't our uncaused origins be as marvelous and precise as God but be natural causes? Excellent question, Carter. That's a very good question. You're right that we have two options here. Either the universe is the uncaused first cause or something beyond the universe is the uncaused first cause. Agree. The problem is is that all the evidence points to the fact that the universe is not the uncaused first cause. And I didn't have time to go through that evidence tonight. That was part one. But I'll I'll give it to you very briefly in an acronym. Surge. S u r g- e. S stands for the second law of thermodynamics which says that the universe is running down. Well, if it's running down, somebody must have wound it up. We'd have no energy left right now. If the universe was eternal, the U stands for the fact that the universe is expanding. Edwin Hubble detected that back in 1929 and shows that everything came from a single point, a point actually of infinite density, the singularity which is actually nothing. So the universe had a beginning. The R in Surge stands for the radiation afterglow. That's the remnant heat discovered by Pensas and Wilson in 1965, which is literally the smoking gun to the big bang. There's heat, remnant heat from the big bang still out there, which shows that the universe had a beginning. The G in surge stands for the great galaxy seeds, which were very fine temperature variations in that radiation afterlow that allowed the galaxies to form in the early universe. And the E stands for Einstein's theory of general relativity, which shows that time, space, and matter are co-relative. That they came into existence together. That spaceime and matter literally had a beginning. Einstein knew this in 1916. Then observational evidence beca behold discovered the expanding universe in 1929. and then on to the radiation after glow in the great galaxy seeds after that. So the evidence points to the fact that the universe is not the uncaused first cause. So there must be something beyond the universe that is and that thing that's beyond the universe must be spaceless, timeless and immaterial. And if you're timeless, do you have a beginning? No. No. So that God is not he didn't have a beginning for his cause. And look, Aristotle, Plato, they all knew this. They knew there had to be an unmoved mover. Um, I believe that you're drawing a false dichotomy because we do not know that the original cause was God. There is no reason to say that an intelligent designer was the first cause, the uncaused first cause that caused everything else. I do not have the training or expertise to refute such science. And in fact, I accept your conclusion that the big bang had a beginning in spaceime and matter came into existence from a point of origin. But we do not know that this point of origin is God. calling in God is to make a false assumption. Another reason for the existence of everything might simply be that other dimensions have the power or and the marvelousness and complexity to create a situation where existence could where the big bang could be brought into existence and spacetime and matter could begin to exist without an intelligent designer having a hand.
I got to say really quick before we get to Frank's response, I love this guy's humility and I love his honesty and I love that he basically is saying like I don't have answers to the scientific acronym that you just laid out. Um, so he's granting that rather than just trying to double down or feel like he has to like win the debate, win the argument, come up with something on the fly. He conceds that point. And then I love actually the philosophical point that he's making here, which is how do you make the jump from whatever could have caused the universe. He's saying like some sort of other dimensional winds or something that could have birthed this universe, which is an interesting question. I have thoughts, but let's let's let Frank Turk uh let's hear let's hear his answer here.
Well, Carter, what you just described there is what we would call God. God is in another dimension that has the ability to bring these dimensions into existence. So, if you want to call it another dimension, you can call it that. But that's exactly what we mean by God. But then why is there a theology? Why do we worship God if he could easily be called an Excellent point. You don't have to worship God. In fact, Aristotle never worshiped God. In fact, the Greeks never got their theology and philosophy together. They knew that there had to be an unmoved mover, but they never put the two together and worshiped the unmoved mover. So, you don't have to worship the unmoved mover. You don't have to. You can do whatever you want. That's why you have free will. God loves you enough to give you free will. You can love him or reject him. That's up to you. But on that point, we do have the free will to accept or reject God. But the obvious conclusion is that the rejection of God will lead to eternal damnation in hell. So in reality, we do not really have the choice to accept or not to accept God. We must ultimately accept God assuming we choose to avoid predition. Well, if you want to avoid Good question. Well, let me back up for a second. There's only two possibilities. If God exists in eternity, you're going to be with him or you're not going to be with him. Right? That's logically the only two options. If you want to be with him, you will seek him out and be with him. If you don't want to be with him, God will not force you into his presence against your will. In fact, let me make the objection stronger than what you're making it. You're very polite, but I debated an atheist who was a little bit more direct. And let me tell you, this man was he's a good man. I like him. His name is Eddie Tbash. He's an attorney from Beverly Hills. We debated University of Michigan a number of months ago. And he looked at me during the Q&A and he said, "Frank, my mother was a survivor of the Holocaust. She lived an awful life. Somebody presented her with the gospel and she rejected it. Is she in hell right now?" Whoa. I said, "Eddie, I don't know where your mother is. I don't know if she made a profession of faith in her last moments, but if she didn't, then God will not force her into his presence against her will. God is too loving for that. And I ask the audience this question. In fact, I'll ask you as an audience this question. Ladies, is there anybody in here who's ever had a man pursue you and you did not want that man to pursue you? You did not want to date him? Anyone in here? Of course. In fact, some of you are going, "Yeah, he's sitting right next to me right now. He won't leave me alone." I said, "Okay, ladies, suppose this man continues to pursue you and continues to pursue you." And you say, "Look, I only like you as a friend." Ladies, why don't you just take the knife, stick it in, and turn it? Because every man in here has heard this. I like you, but only as a friend. Well, suppose he continues to pursue you. continues to pursue you and he gets to the point where he says, "Look, I love you so much, I'm going to force you to love me." Can he do that? No, he can't do that. Love by definition must be freely given. So, if he truly did love you, what would he do? He would leave you alone. That's exactly what God does. He keeps sending us cards, letters, and flowers while we're here. And if we keep rejecting him, keep rejecting him, he gives us up to our own desires. And that ultimately what hell is ultimately what hell is. Hell is separation from God. So you're free in hell. You can continue to reject God in hell, but you're confined to hell. In fact, hell is a quarantine of evil. That's what it is. And heaven, of course, is being in the very presence of God. God loves you too much to force you into his presence against your will. Thanks, Carter.
If there is some uncaused first cause of the universe, an unmoved mover, why does that necessarily mean that he's worthy of our worship? And that is such good question because it is not just in the isolation of the modality of science that we understand who who God is. That's really just a stepping stone. all all these conversations about God as the creative force behind the universe, the intelligent designer of the universe. That's that's literally just like square one. That's a step a stepping stone that you have to step on in order to get further down the path. But it's only that it's only a beginning point once you understand that logically there must be a uncaused first cause of the universe like Frank Turk said and that obviously that can't be the universe itself. Matter doesn't create matter. It takes an intelligence to create matter. It takes this idea of God to create matter. But let's get past that for a second because I know some people get hung up there. It's this cumulative case for Christianity that compounds upon itself and becomes more and more and more compelling. And ultimately, it gets down to something that is incredibly personal. In fact, in the New Testament, Jesus's disciples asked him, "Why do you use parables?" And he explained to them that he uses parables as his mechanism of communication because he's actually graciously and mercifully concealing information from people who don't have ears to hear, from people who are actually going to be resistant to his message. He actually doesn't want to incur on them a greater judgment. But if you do have ears to hear, if you do have eyes to see, if you if you want to know the truth wherever it leads, then you take a step towards the the possibility of God. And when you do that, God takes a step towards you. That's what it says in the Bible. It says, "Knock and the door will be open to you. Seek and you will find." Everyone who knocks receives an answer. Everyone who seeks finds. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. There's this there's this mysterious way in which God graciously conceals the full revelation of who he is from those with hard hearts. I know I'm using Christianes here, but he leans into those who actually want to know who he is. And so my challenge for someone watching this video is don't get locked up inside of the box of science where your only epistemology, if you will, which means just way of knowing, is through science. And if I can't put it under a microscope, then I can't possibly know if it's true or not. You don't actually do that when things go to the more personal level. I don't know that my wife, for example, loves me based on something that I can put under a microscope. I know that uh spiritually, emotionally, psychologically, and holistically at the deepest level of who I am because I actually have a relationship with her. And it's the same thing with God. I actually have a relationship with God. He um he walks with me. He talks with me. He is my friend. He reveals himself to me in scripture. He has forgiven my sins. That's the entire point of the incarnation is that God gave uh he he presented himself to us in a way that is knowable. He has been given a name. His name is Emmanuel, which is God with us. Jesus Christ is the image of the invisible God. You look to the life and ministry and death and resurrection and ascension of Jesus in order to answer the question of what is God like? What is his personality like? What are his motives? What does he care about? What is he for? What does his kingdom look like? What is his mission? You look to Jesus to answer those more personal and specific questions that this unmoved mover abstraction will never really get you to. So anyway, I digress. I ramble on. I hope you guys enjoyed it for some of you that are still listening. And um yeah, that's it. I just wanted to speak a little bit more from the heart because these conversations about God shouldn't just be theorizing. They shouldn't just be in this realm of the abstract. they should be we we should be able to talk about this properly, which is to say personally. So anyway, that's it for this video. I'll see you guys in the next one. Don't forget to like, subscribe, ring the notification bell, all of the things that tell the YouTube algorithm that this content is quality, which I hope that you find that it is. And if you do, then do those things. And I'll see you guys in the next video. Thanks a lot. Peace. Bye. [Music]