Are they? I had a really great discussion the other day with a delivery driver that came to my shop. He noticed I was listening to some Christian Apologetic lectures in the back ground and apparently the FedEx guys aren’t busy like the UPS drivers I watch that literally run packages to the door. My driver and I began kicking it around a little bit yesterday. He claimed to be an agnostic, but frankly, I don’t think he’d fully thought through what kind of genuine commitment to nothingness is required to truly carry yourself in agnostic fashion. So let’s just call him a kind pagan atheist and be done with the labels. Ha!
Warning. One Paragraph In And We’re Down the Rabbit Hole Again.
Agnostics and Atheists aren’t the same, while many assume they are. Atheists don’t believe in any God(s). They lack any belief in any God. They do not affirm a position you and I may hold that God, or in their description, at least one “God” exists. Agnostics assert not having any knowledge of God, or any “God” in the sense of commonly understood religious ideology or philosophy. So you see, Atheists believe there is no God, and Agnostics don’t know if there is a God or not.
The reason I quickly deduced my FedEx buddy wasn’t truly agnostic you ask? Simple. I asked him if he was sure there was no God and he affirmed. So instead of claiming he couldn’t possibly ‘know’ that or that he hadn’t been subject to proof in the affirmative or negative, he outright told me “NO” which means he already had made his mind up and believed there was no such thing. You have to work pretty hard at being Agnostic in my opinion. In order to truly remain in a state of flux, you have to deny nearly everything going on around you that are indicators and proof of God. Continual cluelessness is taxing on your psyche. As an Agnostic you literally have to witness the miracle of the birth of your child and say, “Ehh, hard to say if there’s a God. Dunno…” Whereas an Atheist already not only denied the indicators, but answered in the negative to the question. That’s the easy way out of Theology in my book… Insert the post-modern progressive propaganda “I don’t judge,” here…
Now Back to your Regularly Scheduled Blog Post
After we shared a couple chuckles he asked if I agreed with what Ed Feser was saying on the youtube video I had spooled up. He was referencing moral facts as superior in fashion to scientific fact. I said, “Yes, I know that to be true. Do you not?” That sent him into a headshaking, laughing, knee slapping tirade and when he was done giggling we began sparring a bit. It was light and jovial, but he kept wanting to avoid the questions and deflect or spin. This is common among people who truly haven’t thought through the issue and would rather argue and score points by doing harm, as opposed to uncovering things each of us hadn’t known or considered prior. When you run across a person that evades the questions, devolves to name calling, and/or quickly proclaims ‘victim status’ as I call it, you’ve got yourself a post-modern progressive that might not even know they’ve been bamboozled with hyperbole. I don’t always fault them. It’s normal to pick up the habits of those you’re near. In about half the cases in which I take notice, these folks never really considered their belief structure, but absorbed it via osmosis over a period of time. They’re a product of their environment in this instance. The key for them is to realize they have the free will to choose their environment. …And that’s not easy. Now back to the FedEx guy…
I asked of him if I could make some parallels. Of course he said yes. I cited Cain and Abel. History’s first murder. Did we know it was wrong to murder then? “Yes.” So we knew then, as now, murder was morally wrong, correct? “Yes.” That is a moral fact. That moral fact has been the same since day one. What about the Earth? Was it once a scientific fact that we were the center of the universe? “Yes.” Was it once scientific fact the Earth was flat? “Yes.” What it once scientific fact as a baby in my mother’s womb that I didn’t have a formed heart capable of heartbeat until 20 weeks? “Yes.” Scientific ‘facts’ change, do they not? “No.”
This is where you insert the “laugh out loud” emoji… He flat out denied the truth I had provided him. He agreed wholeheartedly to every premise I provided and adamantly said “NO” to the sole conclusion. So I had to circle back and explain it. What is science, in essence? Science produces a model of reality suitable to explain the data at present. When more data is unearthed, the model changes. As we learn more, and bring more data to bear, the ‘fact’ changes. Why? Because we know more. Thus, science evolves. When you think about it in those terms, just how solid are scientific facts? I made the remark to Pastor Steve some time ago that science is the attempt to seek out as much about the world as currently possible, without invoking God as the explanation. That’s truly what science is if you think about it. I love science. …But I don’t pretend it can explain everything. It cannot, because we don’t know everything.
I’d listened to Dr. John Patrick’s lectures on this subject and over the phone he once told me, “People incorrectly demand that science gets things right and morality gets things wrong. That’s an incorrect assessment. Truth and falsehood have been the same forever. They have never changed. About any event you can make a truthful or false statement. Thus, the moral universe is not expanding, while the physical (scientific) one is. The moral universe stretches from truth to falsehood, from love to hatred, from honor to dishonor, from justice to injustice, from fidelity to infidelity.”
The above is apologetic’s gold. I wish I was bright enough to have arrived at those conclusions myself, but I’m just not there yet. I’m trying diligently however…
Don’t assume that since a truthful or false statement can be made, and how they align with moral facts, that I can know the truth about everything. To make that claim would be the very definition of an arrogant ass. But, I certainly can know their is a truthful and false statement to be made about everything. It isn’t a stretch to show that moral facts apply. Knowing that, which should hold more weight with you? Moral facts or scientific facts?
I loved coming the understanding that moral facts proved to be static while scientific facts tend to be dynamic. That’s really what we’re saying isn’t it? No more, no less. Now… If you really want to get your noodle baked, ask yourself what morality is based upon? Morality is then defined by Whom? I’ll give you a hint. I capitalized the word “Whom” for a reason… But you should explore why morality is defined by God and Him alone, so you can know the facts and resist the ‘all truth is relative’ garbage being tossed in front you and yours daily. If you’re not armed with the basics of where morality originates and can’t prove it to others, you’re in trouble.
Romans 13:8-10 – Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. For this, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.
Whose law is Paul referring to above by the way?
Be delicious salt friends, and seek much light…
