Tag debates

Stephen Law vs William Lane Craig Part 3

So, on to the rebuttals. Craig pointed out in several of his rebuttals that Law has not, and did not seem to want to, critique the cosmological argument. Craig does have some beef here as Law seemed to want to debate Craig’s version of God rather than the more fundamental argument over A God’s existence. Thus in true debate point-scoring, Law would take a hit here. However, as Law plainly stated, and I think this was a wise move, this would have broadened the scope too far and wasn’t important for discussing the moral character of Craig’s version of God (thus allowing Law to wedge in his evil God thesis).

What was one of my favourite moments, and it met with a good round of applause from the secularists in the audience (a clear minority), was when Law, whilst talking about his non-answering of Craig’s first (cosmological) argument, declared himself not to be an expert, and to say something like, “I don’t know, I mean I don’t know the answer to the question why the universe exist.”

Stephen Law vs William Lane Craig Part 2

So, on to Law’s opening statements. It’s probably better to get this from the horse’s mouth -http://stephenlaw.blogspot.com/2011/10/opening-speech-craig-debate.html. However, I will duly sum up. Law, much to his credit, claimed he was only interested in defending his position using only one argument, based on the Evidential Problem of Evil. That being, if God is omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent, then he is able, knows how and is loving enough to want to do something about all the evil in the world. Law went on to talk about some of this evil by pointing out the sheer quantity:

1) all the animal deaths resulting from carnivorousness from the beginning of animal history

2) all the human death, particularly the frequency of child death before the age of five – somewhere between 40% and 60%, historically, of all children born.

Stephen Law vs William Lane Craig Debate Review Part 1

Back in October 2011 I posted this review (and a couple of follow-ons) on my old-old site covering the debate between Stephen Law and William Lane Craig. Due to the fact that Stephen is now a co-SINner here with us, I would like to resurrect this review. It was a great debate, and Stephen, against a formidable opponent, did very well indeed, as you will see. There is now updated video of the debate.

Enjoy:

Last night, two friends and I went to the Stephen Law vs William Lane Craig debate at Westminster where the two philosophers were debating ‘Does God Exist?’ Craig’s Reasonable Faith tour has been hotly anticipated by Christians and non-Christians alike, and with the relative unknown of Stephen Law (in debating terms), there was a feeling of unpredictability thrown in to the usual wager that Craig would win.