Response to "William Lane Craig + Ben Shapiro Debunk Atheists"

Seth Garrett · 2021-08-30T00:10:09.073Z

William Lane Craig Debunks the Top Atheist Arguments 1. Problem of evil 1. The intellectual problem of evil 1. Apologist - "There is nothing inconsistent or improbable about an all-powerful God and the existence of evil - because we don't know the reasons." 2. Debunk - If God is truly all-powerful then there is no “reason” that cannot be overridden by his power. If the reason is “learning”, an all-powerful God would have enough power to teach lessons without using evil as a tool. The fact that he isn’t powerful enough to NOT rely on evil as a tool shows he is not fully all-powerful. 2. Bad morality in the Bible 1. Slavery 1. Apologist - “Not real slavery – indentured servitude. Not that bad, in fact kind of good – anti-poverty program.” 2. Debunk – God took his time to not only make 10 commandments (2 of which are honesty commandments, 2 of which are egoic protections for God’s self-esteem), he also made 603 additional commandments throughout the Torah. If God was so enlightened, you’d think he would care about human freedom enough to make it more of a priority in his commandments than murdering people for eating shellfish or working on the sabbath. If it looks like a caveman morality, it probably is a caveman morality. 2. Abortion 1. Ben Shapiro’s anti-abortion arguments – that which you do to a fetus could be done to an adult with a similar justifying condition. If it isn’t moral when done to an adult then it isn’t moral when done to a fetus. 2. Debunk – false equivalence fallacy – a human isn’t equivalent to a fetus. 3. Homosexuality 1. Apologist - Homosexual rules are eternal rules not temporary ones because they are repeated in strong terms in both the Old and New Testament. 2. Debunk – Pro-slavery doctrine is stated in strong terms in both the Old and New Testament, yet Christians don’t view that as a justification for saying that slavery is an eternal principle. 3. Objective morality 1. Apologist – “No objective morality outside of following God.” 2. Debunk – God-based “objective morality” smuggles in a subjective axiom in that “we ought to obey God”. The existence of a God does not objectively imply we should obey him. It is a mere subjective morality that we ought to obey a certain God. If theists are allowed to smuggle in subjective axioms to their “objective morality” than a secular morality can be equally objective by smuggling in one subjective axiom like, “we ought to value human wellbeing”.

Problem of evil
1. The intellectual problem of evil
  1. Apologist - "There is nothing inconsistent or improbable about an all-powerful God and the existence of evil - because we don't know the reasons."
  2. Debunk - If God is truly all-powerful then there is no “reason” that cannot be overridden by his power. If the reason is “learning”, an all-powerful God would have enough power to teach lessons without using evil as a tool. The fact that he isn’t powerful enough to NOT rely on evil as a tool shows he is not fully all-powerful.
Bad morality in the Bible
1. Slavery
  1. Apologist - “Not real slavery – indentured servitude. Not that bad, in fact kind of good – anti-poverty program.”
  2. Debunk – God took his time to not only make 10 commandments (2 of which are honesty commandments, 2 of which are egoic protections for God’s self-esteem), he also made 603 additional commandments throughout the Torah. If God was so enlightened, you’d think he would care about human freedom enough to make it more of a priority in his commandments than murdering people for eating shellfish or working on the sabbath. If it looks like a caveman morality, it probably is a caveman morality.
2. Abortion
  1. Ben Shapiro’s anti-abortion arguments – that which you do to a fetus could be done to an adult with a similar justifying condition. If it isn’t moral when done to an adult then it isn’t moral when done to a fetus.
  2. Debunk – false equivalence fallacy – a human isn’t equivalent to a fetus.
3. Homosexuality
  1. Apologist - Homosexual rules are eternal rules not temporary ones because they are repeated in strong terms in both the Old and New Testament.
  2. Debunk – Pro-slavery doctrine is stated in strong terms in both the Old and New Testament, yet Christians don’t view that as a justification for saying that slavery is an eternal principle.
Objective morality
1. Apologist – “No objective morality outside of following God.”
2. Debunk – God-based “objective morality” smuggles in a subjective axiom in that “we ought to obey God”. The existence of a God does not objectively imply we should obey him. It is a mere subjective morality that we ought to obey a certain God. If theists are allowed to smuggle in subjective axioms to their “objective morality” than a secular morality can be equally objective by smuggling in one subjective axiom like, “we ought to value human wellbeing”.