“Can’t agree with that. While we will overcome in the end, Scripture is very clear that in this world we will have tribulation, and Satan is working to bring about his own end to things.” A friend of mine forwarded this to me. It is a response to my article previous week, “The True and [...]
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As Christians who intend to engage in online discussion, debate, comments, feedback, criticism, etc., we owe it to ourselves and each other to uphold the principles of Christian ethics. When we don’t, we disgrace the name of our Lord, His Word, His Body, and we diminish His witness in society. And there is far too [...]
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“[T]he English students at Harvard University once insisted on the Boston telephone book being placed on the reading list alongside the works of Shakespeare as . . . there is no greater merit in the one than the other. Good and evil are, therefore, totally relative to the society in which these values are held [...]
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I long since stopped blogging on atheism, deeming it often a waste of time and occasionally counterproductive. Sometimes, however, the issue merits revisiting. After rereading some old classics, I find the following quotation worth sharing: When one gives up the Christian faith, one pulls the right to Christian morality out from under one’s feet. This [...]
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(From the author’s Biblical Logic: In Theory and Practice) An Appeal to Peer Pressure uses the emotional and psychological feeling of inclusion in or exclusion from a group as a means of pressuring its victim to adopt a position. Crude examples say, “Everyone else is doing it. You won’t be cool if you don’t,” or [...]
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If marriage is a civil bond, man can define it any way he wants. Ted Olson has borrowed ideas from the Declarataion of Independence to support gay marriage, but then by his own reasoning discredits the Declaration. When man chooses his own morality over God’s anything goes, and nothing is truly based on logic or [...]
Full Story » One of the “Fallacies of Cause” I address in my book Biblical Logic is one that confuses simultaneity for causation. In other words, just because two things occur at or near the same time, someone may fallaciously assume that one caused the other. We call this Cum Hoc Propter Hoc, which is Latin for “With this, because of this.” The same exposure of folly as the After This Fallacy applies here to the With This Fallacy: a myriad of possible causes exist – many we may not even see or know of – for every given occurrence. This creates a high probability for false causes, even for events that seem to concur in time. Correlation in time cannot guarantee a causal link.
Full Story » Many Christians balk at the mention of critical thinking. They associate the phrase with skepticism and “criticism” of the Bible and of religion in general; thus, they want nothing to do with it. “Critical thinking” gets taught at colleges and places where they use reason and logic to lure children away from the faith their parents taught them. While university professors have often stolen away children in the name of “critical thinking,” the unbelieving skepticism promoted by these types does not deserve the label: it is not “critical” in the least bit, at least not in the biblical sense of the term.
Full Story » In the New Testament, the Greek word for "authority" is sometimes translated as "power." Even though there is a separate Greek word for power, the concepts of power and authority are so intimately connected in the Western mind, that modern translators often view them as synonyms. But translations aside, there is a biblical distinction that should be made between authority and power.
Full Story » Having just finished my book Biblical Logic: In Theory and Practice, I have grown more sensitive at spotting logical fallacies all around. Not that I take pride in doing so – it just happens. Since I just spent the better part of nine months writing sections on dozens of informal fallacies out there, I am kind of in “fallacy detective” mode, sniffing out disturbing claims left and right.
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