have already explained <\/a>why this challenge is irrelevant so far as my main criticism of Sye\u2019s original proof is concerned. Sye still has not responded to that criticism, by the way.<\/p>\nBut still, let\u2019s investigate Sye\u2019s accounting-for-logic challenge further. Just for fun. Despite the fact that my criticism of Sye’s argument places me under no obligation to do so.<\/p>\n
An atheist world view, is, as I said, simply a world view that excludes God<\/span>. That\u2019s it. There\u2019s no requirement that it be materialist, let alone crudely reductive materialist. Atheists are free to be substance dualists, property dualists, idealists, etc. They can allow for a Platonic heaven of abstract entities, etc.<\/p>\nSo atheism, as such, has no particular problem with making room for the existence of laws of logic. Its tent is easily big enough.<\/p>\n
Simply asking:<\/p>\n
\u201cBut how can there be both laws of logic and no God? How can your God-free universe contain them? Explain!\u201d<\/p>\n
is a bit like asking:<\/p>\n
\u201cHow can there be both horses, but no unicorns? How can a unicorn-free world contain horses? Explain!\u201d<\/p>\n
If we are simply being asked how this is possible, without being given any reason why it shouldn’t <\/span>be possible, the question is bizarre. There simply is nothing to explain here (perhaps beyond pointing out that one without the other involves no logical contradiction). For we have been given no obstacle to overcome<\/span>.<\/p>\nStill, that won\u2019t satisfy Sye.<\/p>\n
Sye\u2019s challenge seems to be: \u201cBut what, on your atheist world view, makes<\/span> the fundamental laws of logic hold? What underpins<\/span> and explains<\/span> them?\u201d<\/p>\nSye\u2019s point is, I think, that, unless the Christian God exists to do this job, the laws won\u2019t be absolute and necessary. Which they are.<\/p>\n
There<\/span>‘s the obstacle Sye has set us: we must identify what explains and underpins the laws of logic, without appeal to the Christian God.<\/p>\nIs that right Sye?<\/p>\n
If so, here are two opening observations:<\/p>\n
1. We could atheists could just say “We don’t know<\/span> what explains and underpins the laws of logic”. This is not a problem, in fact. Just because I cannot explain the mysterious new dents in my lawn, whereas you, with your theory that a flying saucer landed on it last night, can, provides us with very little reason to suppose you are right.<\/p>\n2. We atheists have rich resources at hand, even if we can’t now answer the question. We are NOT lumbered with the crude reductive materialism that Sye seems to want to foist on us. Our options include:<\/p>\n
(i) the laws of logic exist and are themselves intrinsically necessary, and are not underpinned by anything. They are themselves bedrock (after all, all explanation has to stop somewhere – so why not here? Why add on a further necessary thing: God? I’m thinking Hindus, elephants and turtles.)<\/p>\n
(ii) rejecting the question (e.g. in the style of the later Wittgenstein). There may be something wrong with the question<\/span>: “What makes<\/span> the laws of logic necessary?” (as there is with the question “What makes<\/span> all the vixens female?”). In which case, the question doesn’t need<\/span> an answer.<\/p>\nThere are countless other options we might pursue. The one option I am not much tempted to pursue is:<\/p>\n
(Sye’s answer) The laws of logic are explained and underpinned by the Christian God.<\/span><\/p>\nAfter all, we possess overwhelming evidence that there is no such being, don’t we? See my “God of Eth”.<\/p>\n
Even if I was<\/span> to go for a “necessary being” type explanation, it certainly wouldn’t be Sye’s all-powerful and all-good Christian God. This last answer seems about as plausible as that the laws of logic are underpinned by my evil God (in the “God of Eth”). And how plausible is that<\/span>?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sye is still pressing the question (paraphrasing): \u201cBut how do you atheists account for the laws of logic? As a Christian, I can. But you atheists can\u2019t explain (or have not explained) how you account for them.\u201d I have already explained why this challenge is irrelevant so far as my main criticism of Sye\u2019s original […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[68],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sinner-ministries-proof-of-the-existence-of-god"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/believingbullshit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/believingbullshit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/believingbullshit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/believingbullshit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/believingbullshit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=818"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/believingbullshit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/818\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/believingbullshit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/believingbullshit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skepticink.com\/believingbullshit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}