Ex Nihilo Blog Posts Come...

A New Post!

We are still alive! It's been longer than I would like, but I've finally made time to put up a fresh post. There are a variety of reasons for the delay between this and my last post, which I won't bore you with here. I've been thinking for some time that I wanted to do a series of posts on arguments for the existence of God. As I've researched this subject (religion, that is) I've discovered a vast number of arguments and counter-arguments for the existence of God. If you have an idea for a future topic, please post it in the comments.

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Ex Nihilo Nihil Fit: From Nothing, Nothing Comes.

I think that this is the only apologetic for the existence of God which I was every presented in a sermon, Sunday school class, or Bible study. The existence of God was always assumed. I recall it specifically because the Sunday school teacher that taught about this concept wrote the phrase for us in latin. I took latin in high school (nerd that I was) so I my interest was piqued. I filed away the information, and I had a neat little unquestioned justification for the existence of God. I say unquestioned because once I had a single justification for that belief, I was comfortable moving along to other issues without stopping to make certain that this justification was good. So what happened when I did stop to study my justification?

This argument for the existence of God is flawed, weak, and, in my opinion, self refuting. It is a sort of cosmological or first cause argument for the existence of God. The argument goes like this: The universe did not exist; it does now; nothing comes from nothing, ipso facto God exists (or rather, something exists outside of, or existed before the universe--let's call that thing "God").

First, there's a flaw in the initial statement, "the universe did not exist." I am not a physicist, but I am reasonably certain that the current understanding of Big Bang cosmology makes no claim as to the state of the universe prior to the Big Bang. Thus it's equally incorrect to say with certainty "before the big bang there was nothing" as it is to say "before the big bang all the matter in the universe existed." However, being rather fond of Thermodynamics, I'm inclined to assume that the universe has always existed. Matter and energy are always conserved--counterclaiming this fact at the beginning of the universe seems to be a form of special pleading. This argument also creates a problem with terminology. If the universe is defined to be inclusive of everything, then it must include God (if he is something, anyway), thus if there was a time when the universe did not exist, then God also must not existed at that time.

Next, the argument is weak. If you cede that the form of the argument is acceptable, you're left with a very ill defined God. God is whatever was before the universe, and whatever cause the universe to exist. I don't think that there is a good argument to connect this being to the personage described in the Bible (or any other holy book, for that matter). It's an argument for a deistic god--not a personal loving God.

Thirdly, I think that the argument is self refuting. Simply asking "where did God come from?" sends you into an infinite regression of beings and creators of beings, who must themselves have been created.

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Thanks for reading--and please comment!

_Scott

Expanding upon my last post...

My last post might have come across like I have already made up my mind and even seemed as if I am only looking at one side, so I want to expand on it some. One of my biggest fears in all of this is coming across as arrogant. I do not think I am more intelligent than others because I "know" the truth. I do not and will not pretend like I know the truth. I think this will ultimately be a life long search - in my opinion it must be. I think we owe it to ourselves to always question - no matter what.

1. Feeling more at peace with my search.

When I say I feel more at peace with my search I mean a couple things:

a) it is very comforting learning that others have gone through this time of questioning and came to the same conclusion I feel I am heading towards - even pastors.

b) i have found a new confidence during my search. By this I mean I am confident that whatever I do decide I can honestly say I came to the conclusion through extensive research and thought.

2. As to my comments about why would I serve such a god. Those were not meant as declarations, simply as thoughts running through my head.

I know there is supposed to be a "loving" side to god, but I ask you this - why trust in something so unpredictable? Bad things happen to christians just as they do to atheists and visa versa. Why strive for the chance of that love? Why isn't the love of our family and friends enough? How is god's love more dependable?

In my 26 years of existence never has that love really been proven. I do not mean that in a "woe is me" way. I simply mean that the love I have in my life can easily be chalked down to being because of who I am. Scott loves me - not because of the chance for wealth or title for sure - but because of the person I am. My daughter loves me because I take care of her. As she grows older this love will change as she learns trust and dependability. Why can't that be enough? Why do we feel the need to add a whole other layer?

I understand that everyone has a different life and they may feel differently about this - again these are just my personal thoughts.

I'll leave you with some other thoughts going through my head:

1. How is raising a child in a fundamentalist christian environment any different that the plot of M. Night Shyamalan's The Village?

2. Why do we feel the need to be loved and accountable to a supernatural being?

Sincerely,
Camille ~*~

Update as to what I'm thinking...

Here is where I am today in my search. 1. More confused than ever; 2. More at peace with the search itself.

Right now I am reading Godless by: Dan Barker. Dan Barker is a former preacher who became an atheist. It is a very interesting book and one I can relate to on many levels. Mr. Barker was "saved" extremely young and lived his childhood, teenage and young adult years absolutely immersed in his walk for Christ. Then it all changed.

The more books I read, podcasts/debates I listen to, etc. the more confused I am. Not confused in a "why am I questioning" sense...but in a why would anyone consciously choose to be a christian? Now this might sound extremely harsh and offensive and I sincerely do not mean it that way - however, Scott and I are determined to be completely honest on this blog.

I am realizing that so much of christianity depends on "faith"... Faith seems like a reason not to question - a cop out if you will. There are many discrepancies with the bible, with Jesus' story and the historical timeline of it all. I am not comfortable going into specifics as I am still learning and researching them myself. I challenge you to google "discrepancies of the bible" and just take a minute to read a few.

I am hearing a lot of defenses of the bible and it's discrepancies and they seem to all revolve around taking bits and pieces of it and ignoring other parts. If this book is truly the word of god and is to be held as a holy item then why is it not taken in it's entirety? Who are we as humans to pick and choose what is applicable and what is not?

Another issue I am dealing with is with god himself - why would I consciously choose to serve someone who is jealous, mind changing and violent? Who himself is the very definition of an oxymoron if you will...

If we are supposed to live our lives as upright, righteous people (which I was taught this entailed following the ten commandments) and a person makes a concerted effort simply because it is right - not to obey a god, why does that person deserve to go to hell? Ultimately wouldn't he be one doing "right" things for the right reason?

Scott and I were discussing hell the other day and he really drove the point home when he said "what kind of a god would send my precious 10 month old daughter to hell if she were to die tomorrow." Now Catholics believe in limbo and I have heard pastors talking about children not going to hell, but if you want to get down to the nitty gritty of it - no where in the Bible does it actually say that children who die won't go to hell...there is no age of accountability given that I know of. Why would I serve a god like that?

My quest continues ...

Until next time,
Camille ~*~

How do you slice a banana?

This blog grew out of a couple posts which Camille made on her "everyday" blog. We started by asking two questions:

What do you believe about god?

Why?

I'm very interested in getting more responses to these questions in our comments. On the other blog, we got a variety of comments, most of which dealt with the first question, but there were only two commenters that really dealt with the second.

We had one commenter said that he was a Christian because it "just made sense." I posted a response to his comment asking him to outline how he arrived at that conclusion, because, frankly, I don't think that it makes sense. I have heard Christians (Chuck Colson, I think) defend the faith by saying that it is so nonsensical that it could not have been fabricated by a man (thus proving its divine inspiration). Indeed, it seems that a large part of "the point" is that the Christian proposition is so far-fetched that we must have faith to accept it. Thus, I'd ask a third question for the people reading this:

What is faith?

Another commenter said that she believed in god because of personal experiences. Many Christians have "heard the voice of the Lord" or felt his guidance. Growing up in a evangelical and fundamentalist environment, I was raised with an ironic healthy disdain for "religion." Christianity wasn't to be a "religion," it was all about the personal relationship with Christ--that is, it was about experiencing god (I think that I still have a book by this title somewhere in my basement). The obvious problem with this idea is that Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, and many many others experience this connection with the divine or the supernatural. Does anything about the Christian experience suggest that it is true, while the others are delusions? Does the fact that other religious people (with other deities) experience god mean that all gods exist, or none? Could all supernatural experiences be a creation of the human mind?

I think most people have had dreams at some point which seemed real while they were occurring. Yet when I wake up, I discover that I am not superman, nor do I own a Ferrari, and I have definitely not been walking on the ceiling. Merely experiencing these dreams does not make them true--they're a product of my subconscious mind acting while I sleep. Experience is not evidence.

Now to explain this posts title:

Until this year, I have always used a butter knife to slice a banana. Seriously. I have an entire drawer full of really sharp knives, but I reflexively reached for a dull butter knife anytime I wanted to slice a banana. I never gave it any thought--a butter knife was just "the tool" to use when a banana needed slicing. Early this year, when during an early morning pre-caffeine haze I was preparing a bowl of cheerios when Camille asked: "Why are you using a butter knife to slice that banana?" Of course I did not have a good answer, so I took a sharp knife out of the drawer.

Here's my hypothesis for how I reached the age of 25 with the unquestioned belief that a butter knife was the appropriate tool (indeed, the only tool) for slicing a banana: Bananas are one of the first foods which you begin to prepare for yourself, or at least they were for me. I suppose that I began to need to slice bananas long before I was dexterous and trustworthy enough to use a proper knife. Thus my parents would have entrusted me with a butter knife to accomplish this chore. I might have even been reprimanded for suggesting that there was a better tool for slicing a banana. My parents may have even used butter knives to provide a good example for me. When you're 5 or 6, it doesn't take long for slicing a banana with a butter knife to become something that you never question. It's not worth expending the mental effort--it's just how it's done.

Please comment:

What do you believe about god?

Why?

Sincerely,

Scott

Continuing On...

Before I continue - I'm going to back up a little...

As I mentioned before, I still considered myself a Christian even though I wasn't attending church regularly. I just had a bit of a "whatever" attitude towards the whole religious thing...

I didn't actually start questioning God until I was 23. After years of dealing with "female problems" I was finally diagnosed with endometriosis and told that I may or may not be able to have children. Now my inner drama queen (who is generally very well controlled) immediately jumped on the "not" part. All I had ever truly wanted in life was to be a wife and a mother. How could God do this to me? I thought He was a loving god? I thought He took care of his people? Had not going to church regularly for 3 years of our my entire life really warranted something so cruel?

This was when my eyes were really opened to what a terrible state our world is in. If Jesus dying on the cross in the New Testament was to provide forgiveness for all the world's sins and God loves us, then why is the earth in shambles? Why are there children dieing daily from starvation, unclean water, and violence?

Then my inner christian spoke up "How dare you ask such questions?!" "Where is your faith?!" "Look at all the good He has done." "I'm sure there is a reason - I just can't see it." So I quit asking those hard questions. After all, who was I to ask such things? Now I look back on that attitude with disbelief.

Anyways, I digress, needless to say when I got the diagnosis my heart was broken. I felt like defective goods. I had surgery to remove the growth and S & I decided to not - not try to get pregnant.

Each month I would hope, each month I would be disappointed, and each month I would question "why me?" and my inner christian would answer "why not me?" "there is a reason in everything" and yet, unlike before in my life - I found absolutely no peace in this. I only found anger and resentment.

Finally after almost a year - the test was positive. (note - I do not mean to sound all boo hoo here - my heart goes out to all those couples who have tried for years and years - I am simply sharing my story) My inner drama queen finally shut up. I was pregnant! Now what? Oh yeah - breathe.

I think I was about 6-7 months along when it hit me that we were about to bring a little person in to this world. One whom we were responsible for. One whom we would make decisions for - including religious ones - at least when he/she was young.

How in the world can I make that decision when I didn't know for myself? I told myself that I had time...then Bam! Rose was here - after my c-section and her visit to the NICU - she was in my arms. This beautiful, perfect little person. My inner christian then started screaming - "there must be a God!"

The first couple of months I didn't have time to think about anything outside of sleep schedules, nursing and changing diapers. Then my friends who had babies at the same time I did started talking about their children's baptism ceremony.

Hello?! Were we going to have R baptized? This simple yet loaded question brought it all back to the forefront. Time? There is never enough time. R is now 10 months old and I'm still searching. More in earnest than ever. My little girl is one of the most important people in my life - I am privileged to be her mom and I want to be the best that I can be.

I have to be careful though - I will admit that I am a very impressionable person ... my first response is to trust and believe... (ironic, isn't it?) S and I have agreed to read books, listen to debates, etc from both sides - not just agnostics or atheists.

At this point - I am more confused than ever. I know how I feel about organized religion (i.e. church) but that's for another post. I am reading things that contradict the bible. That truly bring it into question. I am reading things that bring Jesus' story into question... So how does faith play into all of this? If God wanted us to blindly believe anything would He have given us a brain? Would He have given us the ability to think about something critically?

Above all I am striving to make an informed decision. So that brings you up to date. What's next? I'm going to read Godless (Dan Barker, a former pastor).

Love,

Camille ~*~

Until Now...

When we first discovered that we were expecting, it was a tremendous surprise. C took 5 pregnancy tests in 2 days-- such was our state of shock. We shouldn't really have been surprised. We had been "not-not-trying" to get pregnant for almost a year when we finally succeeded. Very few things have the capacity to alter your outlook on life like discovering that you're going to be a parent.

Very few things, that is, except for actually becoming a parent. Our pregnancy seemed to go by at a frenetic pace. There were prenatal appointments, birthing classes, showers, and the domestic preparations (painting, repainting, re-repainting, etc). During this time, we still devoted a great amount of effort and thought to our religious views. Foremost in our minds were questions about how we would raise our daughter. We quickly ran out of time, and on the last day of July 2008, our lovely daughter, Rose, was born. It is an astounding and deeply moving thing to look into the eyes of your child, just moments after her birth. Whatever the outcome of my spiritual journey, I know that the memory of the first time I held my daughter will be one of the most profound moment in my life.

Having a new child is exhausting. For several months after we brought R home, I was happy and content to ignore the looming religious questions. Our pediatrician advised us to avoid toddlers (or, as he referred to them, bioterrorists) for several months, to shield R's immune system from undue stress. C and I interpreted this as carte blanche to avoid church. By avoiding church, we avoided the drives and the talks which had been common before R.

After six or eight months, we reemerged, visiting several churches, including the one which I attended during high school. Not surprisingly, I felt the same way that I had before we had R. I no longer had the emotional connection to worship that I think I once had. The teaching seemed vapid, or vacuous, or blatantly self-evident ("common sense sermons"). I felt nothing. Church was an uncomfortable exercise, where people around me felt enraptured by something I could not connect with.

The fellowship I once felt evaporated. We met some genuinely good people who we enjoyed spending time with, but our human interactions were often constrained. This constraint was the self-righteousness, smugness, faux-superiority that so many "good christians" exhibit toward unbelievers. It was also the hypocrisy--the transparent smile worn by greeters, the woman reading the magazine during the sermon, the teens gossiping, and the middle aged man sending emails on his blackberry. (I should note here that I do not put all Christians who attend church into these narrow categories; many of you are good people who I'd like to know better). Overall, the constraint was principally that church was not for sinners. There was an unacknowledged pressure to be "good" people in church. No one didn't smile, no one intimated that they were unhappy in their marriage, no one let themselves seem stressed about their finances. It all seemed unbearably fake.

Looking back, I think this is the point where I lost "faith" (here borrowing the Sunday school definition of "belief in something you can't see"), though I am not certain how I would have phrased it then.

My progression from religious certainty to where I am now has been gradual, but there have been several points where there were critical changes to my beliefs. When my daughter arrived, it became evident that permanently waffling between some type of liberal Christianity and a lazy agnosticism was not a viable option for me or my family. I doubt that I will ever attain the same unquestioning belief I held for so many years, but over the course of the past 10 months, I've committed to making a decision.

Sincerely,

Scott

My History ...

So it's my turn to give you my background and try to explain how I got to where I am now.

My Background:
I am one of 7 children and was raised by my mother and my step-father. Both of my parents were strong Christians, definitely fundamentalists. I have great respect for my upbringing. I definitely believe that it played a part in who I have become. I think I was your typical homeschooler ... my life revolved around my family, school, and books. Since both my parents worked the younger children were my responsibility - I learned early on how to teach, nurture, cook, clean and corral. I attended church every time the doors were open and took lengthy notes through out the sermon.

What happened?
I moved out of my parents house when I was 20. I couldn't deal with it any more. I had stayed as long as possible to be a buffer for my younger siblings, but there came a time that I had to admit I couldn't deal anymore. To the outside world we were the happiest family there was - the "perfect" Christian family - a prime example to the world - when in actuality life sucked. My step-father didn't know how to be a father or a provider. My mother was taught to submit to her husband, regardless. There was never enough money. They were in perpetual conflict, and both had tempers. Put these things together and you have a living hell.

Please don't get me wrong - I would NEVER say that my life was worse than anyone else's - I know that there are people who have gone through WAY worse things than I have.

Anyways - back to point...when I moved out I stopped attending church regularly. Scott moved to Mississippi for school at the same time. I didn't agree with the doctrine of the church my parents were attending and didn't feel comfortable attending the church S's family went to without him. S and I discussed my dwindling faith and he really encouraged me to read Grace Unknown (R.C. Sproul) and re-evaluate. We even started doing a bible study together regarding world views. I would attend church and other religious activities with S when I visited him in MS, but still didn't attend on my own.

As S mentioned in his post he moved back here and we got married. We visited several churches off and on, but never really found one that we felt comfortable at. It seemed that there were not many young people in our stage of life that attended church. Because of that it was really hard to "fit in" and form new friendships. We discussed church and religion often, but it just sort of slipped away in my opinion. I unknowingly settled into a "whatever" attitude. I felt guilty for not going to church, but not enough to actually change my habits. I still considered myself a Christian.

Then we found out we were pregnant - and oh goodness did this change EVERYTHING. We started talking in earnest about what we believed - it's one thing to have a "whatever" attitude when it is just yourself, but I don't think it's acceptable when you have a small person coming into the world that is your responsibility.

So that brings me to the same place where S ended his post - rougly a year ago. More soon!

Love,
Camille ~*~

"History" Or perhaps, "How we got here"

First, I should explain that Camille and I live in what may be the reddest of red states, yet I think that my upbringing was still relatively unusual, even for the area we live in. My parents are good people--really. I deeply love my parents and siblings, and I don't harbor any ill will toward them for raising me in congruence with their beliefs.

My parents are evangelical Christians, and I was raised in a strongly fundamentalist environment. I shared their views (almost entirely) until my third year of college. I was active in student ministries and I regularly attended services either in my home town, or in the town where I attended college.

After two years of college (and, not incidentally, two years of dating C), C and I got engaged and I decided to transfer to my hometown's well respected engineering school. Shortly after I transferred, C and I married.

Between our ridiculous workloads (academic and professional) and our newly-wedded bliss, C and I relaxed our habit of regular religious services. Nothing changed overnight, but over the next several years, I slowly slipped into agnosticism.

It's very hard to pinpoint exactly what drove me to that point, but I think it occurred in a piecemeal fashion. Bit by bit, my views on homosexuality, evolution, and politics broke with what I had been raised believing. Having had a thorough Christian education I had dogmatic explanations for what I believed, that is, homosexuality was a sin against God and nature, the Genesis account of creation was accurate, and God loved Republicans. I held these views sincerely and without ever having critically questioning them. Any time I "challenged" my beliefs I turned to theological books which shored up beliefs that I already had.

In retrospect, it is odd to me now that I persisted believing these things without really challenging them. I am an engineer by trade, a profession that suits me because of my analytical nature. I consciously try to think about everything I do, right down to determining the most efficient ordering of the coffee-making process. My lovely wife says I'm a delightful mix of The Big Bang Theory's Sheldon and Leonard.

So what happened?

One of my best friends came out of the closet. I was forced to critically examine what I believed about his sexuality and to square this longtime friendship with his supposed eternal damnation. The friendship won. I now support equal marriage rights for gay couples. I think it's ironic that some religious communities will simultaneously condemn premarital sexual relationships, and yet seek to prevent homosexual people from "legitimizing" their relationships through marriage. It's equivalent to encouraging promiscuity, but only for gays.

Next, I took a real interest in politics, and reevaluated the red-state mentality that I was raised with. I consider myself politically independent-- a radical departure from my family, which generally votes the GOP party line without question.

Finally, after some consideration, it occurred to me that for evolution to be completely false that there must be an incredibly vast world-wide conspiracy. The scale of such academic repression required for this to be true renders such an idea ludicrous.

[As a sidebar: In my Christian high school biology class, we actually had a debate between "creationism and "evolution-ism." We divided on opposite sides of the classroom and exchanged arguments (conveniently presented in table form within our Christian textbook) for creationism (things like: "the Grand Canyon is evidence for Noah's flood") and against evolution-ism (such as: "so-and-so had a doll radio-carbon dated and the results showed that the plastic was millions of years old, thus radio-carbon dating isn't accurate, and the earth is 6000 years old).]

With my thinking altered on these three ideas, I slowly moved on to bigger issues. This loosely considered agnosticism is roughly the state of my belief about a year ago. At that time, I still considered myself a Christian, and from time to time, C and I would visit a church. These visits were generally followed by lengthy drives in the countryside (or lunch at a cheap restaurant). During these drives, C and I would dissect and rehash everything about that morning's service.

So that is where I was, circa early 2008. I'll post again soon to document the changes wrought by this last year-- there have been many of them.

Sincerely,
_Scott.