Really good video, very easy to follow his thought process, which many of us have difficulty articulating, but sense deeply and are intuitively bothered by it when trying to make sense of atheism, and when seriously considering the possibility of atheism being the case. That aside, I agree with another commenter that this did seem more like apologetics, the 1st minute is really the only part that kind of/sort of answered the question posed in the title of the video. Would like to see more.
why start apologetics at 01:00? why not study atheism as a a beliefsystem and a social phenomenon from its own perspective without judging one way or the other?
Because these are the most important questions a person can ask and to reduce it to a sociological exercise is to absolutize the dullest and most unhealthy tendencies in the modern academy.
Something very interesting in the stats here. Cunningham has been interviewed numerous times on this forum, with a few thousand views for each interview in various videos; nothing bewilderingly huge; a few comments pro and con get posted, again without much discussion in the youtube comboxes, thought with some interesting comments pro and con here and there. But now, suddenly - I'd estimate in the last three months - *this* video in particular has received over ten thousand views, and has gotten a huge majority of dislikes: 292 as of my writing here. Yet the number of comments is still only twelve, none of them particularly negative or even especially interesting. Whence this sudden onslaught? Despite this flurry of "thumbs down" evaluations, not a single one of the detractors has made any comment on this video - as it stands, no one has articulated the slightest objection to it, nor to Cunningham's work in general. There has been no similar "thumbs down" to single one of his other videos. which all appear as of this posting to be fairly ordinary in terms of likes/dislikes. What happened is pretty obvious: this video was tagged in some fundamentalist atheist circle or other as a "target," since it it critical of atheism from the perspective of a theologian - so, then, a bunch of these fundamentalists got rallied enough around it to "dislike" it. Without listening to it, without relating it to anything else - like bots, pawns in a machine, intoxicated by giddy disdain for any notion of truth but their own little game. Like followers of Fox news, like supporters of Trump.
I love this man! “do you believe in life after death?” “That’s pants! Pants!” 😆Very amusing but highly intelligent thinker. I’d love to take his classes 🤓🙏
I wonder what this guy thinks of the Euthyphro dilemma. He seems to think that god is the floor of all understanding and balks at atheists for thinking they don't need a floor, but what sort of ground does his floor sit on? My experience tells me he'd think "Everything needs a floor, but the floor is special and doesn't have to follow that rule."
Dude, the Euthyphro dilemma is well known and been the subject of extensive discussion by theologians and philosophers. That you really thing he would lack any response but to drool and say "duh" shows your own ignorance. That you think Cunningham would have nothing to say only reveals your own failure to apprehend the possibility that others might actually be able to teach you something. You posted this comment seven years ago, so you may well have moved on or changed your view. I imagine that your experience only tells you that because you approached others' answers with the same lack of recognition you approached this video. They were very likely giving an internally coherent reason why qualities intrinsic to the idea of God distinguish it from other sorts of things and thus allow it to be the final ground of being, beauty, and ethics- that is, it is not an arbitrary ending point, but an ending point which is rationally grounded, for it explains why divine qualities entail its being the ending. You mistook that for arbitrary logic because you did not understand it within the first few minutes of reading it and assumed that they were speaking nonsense rather than you having something very significant to learn.
I'm pretty sure that he's using a hard definition of atheism here that there is no spirituality. Most of the "new atheists", who have appropriated atheism more or less wholesale, ascribe to that notion. I think you're being a bit too excessive with him.
I'm sure a lot of theologians are intelligent people. But their study is inherently empty. Cunningham is very wrong in viewing ethics and free will as depending on theism. Ethics is possible without religion and so is the concept of free will.
who didn't practice? the christians? egyptians? jews? sorry, but so many people didn't practice through history that I'm not sure who you are talking about
The ancient Egyptians - I was responding to your comment. Ancient/Pharaohic Egypt was a slave culture that was, by any modern standards, barbaric. So much so that 'do as you would be done by' can hardly be said to bear any relation to their actual modes of polity and socialisation. The 'golden rule' - or affirmation of reciprocity (what the Egyptians understood as 'Maat') - was applied only within discrete, privileged social groups so can hardly be called 'the golden rule' as such at all. The golden rule proper requires a concept of egalitarianism that animates the whole of society; a concept as foreign to ancient Egyptian society as microwave ready meals. Such a concept of social organisation - where every human life is of equal value regardless of class or caste - is a legacy of the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth; it appears no where else in ancient history and is a genuine revolution (perhaps the only genuine revolution) in the whole history of human thought.
I`d say that our values come from our intellects and interaction with our intellectual peers. The most famous refutation of radical skepticism is "cogito ergo sum", not "Deus ergo sum" And where does that come from? Dunno. Maybe God. Maybe not. But I`m going to go out on a limb here and say that even if you remove the threat of eternal damnation, most people wouldn`t go out there killing puppies. So just chill, dude
Really good video, very easy to follow his thought process, which many of us have difficulty articulating, but sense deeply and are intuitively bothered by it when trying to make sense of atheism, and when seriously considering the possibility of atheism being the case. That aside, I agree with another commenter that this did seem more like apologetics, the 1st minute is really the only part that kind of/sort of answered the question posed in the title of the video. Would like to see more.
why start apologetics at 01:00?
why not study atheism as a a beliefsystem and a social phenomenon from its own perspective without judging one way or the other?
Because these are the most important questions a person can ask and to reduce it to a sociological exercise is to absolutize the dullest and most unhealthy tendencies in the modern academy.
Something very interesting in the stats here. Cunningham has been interviewed numerous times on this forum, with a few thousand views for each interview in various videos; nothing bewilderingly huge; a few comments pro and con get posted, again without much discussion in the youtube comboxes, thought with some interesting comments pro and con here and there.
But now, suddenly - I'd estimate in the last three months - *this* video in particular has received over ten thousand views, and has gotten a huge majority of dislikes: 292 as of my writing here. Yet the number of comments is still only twelve, none of them particularly negative or even especially interesting.
Whence this sudden onslaught? Despite this flurry of "thumbs down" evaluations, not a single one of the detractors has made any comment on this video - as it stands, no one has articulated the slightest objection to it, nor to Cunningham's work in general. There has been no similar "thumbs down" to single one of his other videos. which all appear as of this posting to be fairly ordinary in terms of likes/dislikes.
What happened is pretty obvious: this video was tagged in some fundamentalist atheist circle or other as a "target," since it it critical of atheism from the perspective of a theologian - so, then, a bunch of these fundamentalists got rallied enough around it to "dislike" it. Without listening to it, without relating it to anything else - like bots, pawns in a machine, intoxicated by giddy disdain for any notion of truth but their own little game.
Like followers of Fox news, like supporters of Trump.
Dislike.
I agree with what you say. Except that I didn't understand what you meant by the last two sentences.
I love this man! “do you believe in life after death?” “That’s pants! Pants!” 😆Very amusing but highly intelligent thinker. I’d love to take his classes 🤓🙏
Wow, you have spoken kindly of my beloved angelic brothers, Truth, Goodness, and not to be forgotten Beauty. Thank you.
I wonder what this guy thinks of the Euthyphro dilemma. He seems to think that god is the floor of all understanding and balks at atheists for thinking they don't need a floor, but what sort of ground does his floor sit on? My experience tells me he'd think "Everything needs a floor, but the floor is special and doesn't have to follow that rule."
Dude, the Euthyphro dilemma is well known and been the subject of extensive discussion by theologians and philosophers. That you really thing he would lack any response but to drool and say "duh" shows your own ignorance. That you think Cunningham would have nothing to say only reveals your own failure to apprehend the possibility that others might actually be able to teach you something. You posted this comment seven years ago, so you may well have moved on or changed your view.
I imagine that your experience only tells you that because you approached others' answers with the same lack of recognition you approached this video. They were very likely giving an internally coherent reason why qualities intrinsic to the idea of God distinguish it from other sorts of things and thus allow it to be the final ground of being, beauty, and ethics- that is, it is not an arbitrary ending point, but an ending point which is rationally grounded, for it explains why divine qualities entail its being the ending. You mistook that for arbitrary logic because you did not understand it within the first few minutes of reading it and assumed that they were speaking nonsense rather than you having something very significant to learn.
Not believing in supernatural creator of the universe is a life style choice ???
Yes there is.. life after death.. or at least something.. I am around death all the time I am a Cna
I'm pretty sure that he's using a hard definition of atheism here that there is no spirituality. Most of the "new atheists", who have appropriated atheism more or less wholesale, ascribe to that notion. I think you're being a bit too excessive with him.
I'm sure a lot of theologians are intelligent people. But their study is inherently empty. Cunningham is very wrong in viewing ethics and free will as depending on theism. Ethics is possible without religion and so is the concept of free will.
AnonymousIntellectual Which 'ethics' would that be?
+Paul Handley the golden rule for example, comes from the ancient Egypt, if not before
Really? It's a shame they didn't practice it isn't it?
who didn't practice? the christians? egyptians? jews? sorry, but so many people didn't practice through history that I'm not sure who you are talking about
The ancient Egyptians - I was responding to your comment. Ancient/Pharaohic Egypt was a slave culture that was, by any modern standards, barbaric. So much so that 'do as you would be done by' can hardly be said to bear any relation to their actual modes of polity and socialisation. The 'golden rule' - or affirmation of reciprocity (what the Egyptians understood as 'Maat') - was applied only within discrete, privileged social groups so can hardly be called 'the golden rule' as such at all. The golden rule proper requires a concept of egalitarianism that animates the whole of society; a concept as foreign to ancient Egyptian society as microwave ready meals. Such a concept of social organisation - where every human life is of equal value regardless of class or caste - is a legacy of the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth; it appears no where else in ancient history and is a genuine revolution (perhaps the only genuine revolution) in the whole history of human thought.
I`d say that our values come from our intellects and interaction with our intellectual peers. The most famous refutation of radical skepticism is "cogito ergo sum", not "Deus ergo sum"
And where does that come from? Dunno. Maybe God. Maybe not.
But I`m going to go out on a limb here and say that even if you remove the threat of eternal damnation, most people wouldn`t go out there killing puppies. So just chill, dude
All heresies help the Church purify the faith.