Also on atheism, God, and science:
Prof John Lennox talks to Justin Brierley about the way science and faith fit together in his new book ‘Cosmic Chemistry’. They also talk about the evidence for God and Christianity and about his debates with leading atheists, including Richard Dawkins. Video shared with permission of Lion Hudson.
Hat tip: Ken Francis, co-author with Theodore Dalrymple of The Terror of Existence: From Ecclesiastes to Theatre of the Absurd.
In 2007 John Lennox debated Richard Dawkins on his book “The God Delusion”.
A book, as the name itself implies, in which Dawkin’s holds that Christians, and Theists in general, are suffering from a delusion.
In fact, in a NY Times book review, Dawkins went so far as to state, “It is absolutely safe to say that if you meet somebody who claims not to believe in evolution, that person is ignorant, stupid or insane (or wicked, but I’d rather not consider that).”
Well, to call Christians insane and delusional are obviously some pretty strong words. And seeing that I am a Christian, I was very much interested to see exactly what kind of scientific evidence evolution has going for it that it would make Dawkins so confident as to proclaim all Christians insane and delusional for believing in God.
My search for scientific evidence supporting Darwinian evolution was in vain. It turned out, after years of searching for evidence, that evolution has ZERO real time empirical evidence going for it.
In fact, Darwinists can’t even point to the origin of a single protein by unguided Darwinian processes that would substantiate their grandiose claim that life, and all the diversity therein, was arrived at unguided Darwinian processes.
As the late biochemist Dan S. Tawfik stated, “In fact, to our knowledge, no macromutations … that gave birth to novel proteins have yet been identified.”
To point out the obvious, and as Ann Gauger succinctly stated, “If enzymes can’t be recruited to genuinely new functions by unguided means, no matter how similar they are, the evolutionary story is false.,,,”
In fact, besides having no real time empirical evidence, Darwinian evolution also fails to qualify a testable ‘hard’ science in the first place since it has no realistic mathematical model that it is based upon. As Robert Marks stated, “Those hoping to establish Darwinian evolution as a hard science with a (mathematical) model have either failed or inadvertently cheated.”
Moreover, Dawkins’ claim that Christians are delusional and insane is a claim that turns out to be much more appropriately applied to Darwinian atheists themselves rather than being applied to Christians.
In short, if God is not held to be real and true, (i.e. to be ‘certain’), then nothing else can be held to real and true, (i.e. to be certain’) for the Darwinian atheist.
First off, if God does not really exist as a real person, but is merely an illusion as Darwinian materialists hold, then we ourselves do not really exist as real persons, but our sense of self is merely a ‘neuronal illusion’ that is somehow, inexplicably, generated by, and/or emergent from, the unconscious material particles of the brain.
In fact, Dawkins himself agrees with materialistic philosophers who claim that “consciousness is an illusion”.
The claim that consciousness, i.e. our sense of self, is a ‘neuronal illusion’, since it denies the objective reality of ‘self’, is, (to use Dawkins adjective for Christians), insane. As brain surgeon, and professor of brain surgery, Michael Egnor pointed out, “Materialist theories of the mind border on the insane. If a man walks into a doctor’s office and says “I never have direct access to my thoughts and I have no first person point of view,” the man will be referred to a psychiatrist and may be involuntarily hospitalized until it is established that he is not a danger to himself or others. If the same guy walks into the philosophy department at Duke University, he gets tenure.”
Moreover, the claim that consciousness, i.e. our sense of self, is a ‘neuronal illusion’, is self refuting in the most fundamental way possible. This is because it claims that the one thing by which we judge everything else to either be real of illusory, i.e. consciousness, is itself an illusion.
As David Bentley Hart succinctly stated, “Simply enough, you cannot suffer the illusion that you are conscious because illusions are possible only for conscious minds. This is so incandescently obvious that it is almost embarrassing to have to state it.”
And the ‘delusional insanity’ for Darwinian atheists in their rejection of God does not stop there.,
Thus, although Dawkins has called Christians insane and delusional, the fact of the matter is that it would hard to fathom a worldview that is more detached from reality, i.e. more delusional, than Darwinian evolution is.
Bottom line, without God to ground reality, then nothing turns out to be truly real in the atheist’s worldview. Not even the atheist himself turns out to be real in his materialistic worldview. Much less are beauty, meaning, and purposes for his life to be considered real in his naturalistic worldview. Darwinian atheism is, in fact, detached from reality, i.e. ‘delusional’ and ‘insane’, from top to bottom.
To call such a worldview ‘impoverished’ is an understatement. It is a vile, putrid, and rotting nihilistic philosophy which can’t even support rational thought, and/or science, in the first place, and which robs man of anything, and everything, that might give any semblance of real beauty, meaning, and purpose to his life. To use Dawkins adjectives, only the insane and delusional would ever hold, and/or hope, such a worldview to be true.
Thanks be to God that it is found to be an utterly false worldview.
BA,
have you see this one?
Noble vs. Dawkins … very new.
https://evo2.org/denis-noble-debates-richard-dawkins-full-video/
Thanks Martin, I will have to watch it later. Much appreciated.
Self referentiality gets you every time you appeal to grand delusion and project it to the other.