Ironically, it seems that our days have been to castigate faith to solely the means of being a feeling based orientation within the world. By all means, however, what could be said for a blind faith that wishes for dinosaurs to be in existence today, or in the future? For Ironically, an invisible pink unicorn would declaratively be of no more mere importance, thus rationality need not be abandoned in the face of religion. On the contrary, it is not possible to affirm the existence of ANYTHING without declaring something of its Essence in the process, and thus faith and reason may not be mutually exclusive in nature. For to have faith in anything, one must at least be able to reason that faith is possible. And if this said faith is possible, then, that faith must also be provided in order to trust our reason in the first place. Thus, it becomes quintessentially the basis of all thinking, that logic may not exist without a reasonable faith, hence since logic must exist, a reasonable faith is by nature necessary. Declaratively speaking, it becomes self evidently deduced, and represents itself as self evident. Now, if the Reasoners in the Age of Enlightenment might get this wrong, it would be abominable to think that much of anything else said by them could be potentially correct. We must instead of relying on mere emotion and an individualistic mode of thinking, rely not on a methodology of getting to heaven. This entails as a benefit, as Blaise Pascal's wager Everything to Gain and Nothing to Lose. Could this alone serve as a reason to belief in Jesus Christ? No, one could not consistently believe in Jesus, by believing only in him as a gateway to heaven.....and this amounts to our nonsensical pluralistic society of today. There must be a MetaNarrative in life by necessity, and this MetaNarrative can only make sense in the light of the Bible. Can one eliminate the experiences of life in any sense? I say, Fatalism itself is fatal to the soul and must not eliminate the possibility of being fatal to itself as a position. One can not experience life, but in like manner, it must not be expressively thought that experience is self-interpreting, for we must interpret experience to be self-interpreting in the light of it being self interpreting...thereby making it interpretative, and the position is false. It must be interpreted through the viewpoint of the worldview holder, in a like manner in such a way that it is through a self-determined structure of reality we must live by. In deterministic fashion, to state that nondeterminists ought to be deterministic is self defeating nonsense. And to declare that they should not be determinists would thereby undercut the inherent consistency within Determinism or lack thereof. The heart, is much more than a thing utilized to exhibit emotion, but rather, the heart is intuitional, and cognitive based. Logical Dualism is the only structure of reality that is sensible in like regards. It is not sensible to state that All is One when that statement involves more than one word. And to declare only one word is with the intent of it having meaning in itself is inherently nonsensical in nature. Logical Monism is false. And then we turn to Logical Behaviorism, the view that our minds are born a Tabula Rasa. The mind starts from nothing and through human behaviors, acquires the means to be able to think rationally. Unfortunately, there's a problem here with this view. Nonbeing can not create being, unthought could not create thought, and it is necessarily false to make this claim. A false cause and effect. Secondly, Logical Behaviorism equates to Determinism. Determinism claims that all behavior, thoughts and feelings are determined by the individuals. Unfortunately, this meets grave consequences: There are several problems with this argument. First, the argument misinterprets self determinism as teaching that human acts cause themselves. Self determinists, for example, do not believe that the plays in a football game cause themselves. Rather they maintain that the players execute the plays in a football game. Indeed it is the players that choose to play the game. Thus the cause of a football game being played is to be found within the players of the game. Self determinists would not deny that outside factors, such as heredity, environment, or God, had any influence. However, they would maintain that any one of the people involved in the game could have decided not to play if they had chosen to do so. Second, the argument for determinisim is self defeating. A determinist must contend that both he and the nondeterminist are determined to believe what they believe. Yet the determinist attempts to convince the nondeterminist that determinism is true and thus ought to be believed. However, on the basis of pure determinism "ought" has no meaning. For "ought" means "could have and should have done otherwise." But this is impossible according to determinism. A way around this objection is for the determinist to argue that he was determined to say that one ought to accept his view. However, his opponent can respond by saying that he was determined to accept a contrary view. Thus determinism cannot eliminate an opposing position. This allows the possibility for a free will position. Third, and finally, if naturalistic determinism were true, it would be self defeating, false, or be no view at all. For in order to determine whether determinism was true there would need to be a rational basis for thought, otherwise no one could know what was true or false. But naturalistic determinists believe that all thought is the product of nonrational causes, such as the environment, thus making all thought nonrational. On this basis no one could ever know if determinism were true or not. And if one argued that determinism was true, then the position would be self defeating, for a truth claim is being made to the effect that no truth claims can be made. Now if determinism is false, then it can be rationally rejected and other positions considered. But if it is neither true or false, then it is no view at all, since no claim to truth is being made. In either case, naturalistic determinism could not reasonably be held to be true. Self Determinism is the only view that could make sense. For a view that held no contradictory positions would henceforth derive itself to be contradictory when exposed to a position contrary to itself. Henceforth we are left with reason, and logic, our means of communication through the inherency of words given by our Creator God. Our pipeline to God is reason, and this reason need not be destroyed, but rather, utilized in responding to what God wishes for us. Is there ever a word or emotion unexpressed by a word? If such a thing could take place (which it can't, since this is a cause-effect relationship), it has yet to be seen. The absolute truth about Casey Ryan Powell: "Lack of interest in philosophy is lack of interest in truth/wisdom or life in general. Only the ignorant could say such a thing. For this would be an interest in at least THIS Philosophy in itself." "To say that philosophy is not truth in any respect is simply an absurd lie. This serves as a truth about Philosophy." "If you believe that anything can be argued against, think again. You must first argue against that position." "The only real absolute eternal truths in life and the afterlife are Jesus Christ, as the object of a reasoned faith, (3 in 1, Father (Creator), Son (the Bible) and the Holy Spirit (essence)). They are all infrangible regardless of ANYBODY'S opinions and can never be changed, and in essence become proven facts :)." "Jesus Christ is God and is the only way to heaven." Hey yall, my name is Casey, I am 24. I'm a Christian first and foremost in life and believe that my personal relationship with Christ is to be valued more than anything else in life. Personal relationship you ask....what is that? Its any means of worship that we perform to Christ. My means of worship is studying the word of God, and studying our Metaphysical environment in regards to God. I believe in facts, and take absolutely nothing on blind faith, and in sticking to the facts found in the Bible alone. I value facts over opinions. We have decisions to make with our OWN personal lives..regardless of our circumstances, and we only gets one shot, so make the right one. Our minds are predisposed to truth. The ultimate truth rests in God the father, in Jesus Christ/the Bible and our Holy Spirit, the three persons in one entity. My quote of the day: Women are beautiful creatures and deserve to be treated with respect. "At the center of the Christian faith is the affirmation that there is a God in the universe who is the ground and essence of all reality. A Being of infinite love and boundless power, God is the creator, sustainer, and conserver of values....In contrast to the ethical relativism of [totalitarianism], Christianity sets forth a system of absolute moral values and affirms that God has placed within the very structure of this universe certain moral principles that are fixed and immutable." Martin Luther King Words of Wisdom 2. Static/Entropic - Fundamentalist religions are very reactive to change. They want things to stay the same. They fear modernity and they cannot be comfortable with ambiguity. They must slow the world down and simplify thinking to the point where it will fit on a bumper sticker. Fundamentalists are not sophisticated thinkers. They have primal anxiety reactions to change and to complicated, uncertain thinking. By contrast, Paul Tillich, the preeminent protestant theologian of the twentieth century, became known as the ‘Apostle to the Intellectuals’ because his intellectual quest was to communicate the Christian faith to humanistically educated skeptics. To quote Paul Tillich, “Doubt is not the antithesis of faith. Doubt is an essential element of faith. Without doubt there is no faith, there is only dogma.” That describes a living faith, and is the opposite of an entropic religion.
In part, source from Norman Geisler:
http://mb-soft.com/believe/text/determin.htm
