Now that we have addressed platonic forms and how our minds interact with them there is a critical line we need to draw what is the difference between the inner space of our thoughts and the outer space of things that are being simulated in the physical world. In objective idealism we all share the same inner space and outer space this is due to the fact that we are all in Gods mind and so anything we think or do will also happen in Gods mind since both the inner space and outer space are hosted in Gods mind.

Now I will draw the line first lets start with the “outer space”. The outer space is the physical world being generated by Gods mind. The device your using right now to read this blog is in the outer space. This is the world that exist independently of our minds now its not mind-independent matter since its still in Gods mind but it is independent of our mind. This is the place where space-time, matter and energy exist. It is the world you see every day when you wake up, go to work and live out your life. This would be considered the natural world now the inner space is also the natural world but it would be located outside space-time which we will go over next

The “Inner space” is the more fundamental reality which the “outer space” emerges from. This inner space is the world where our thoughts, emotions, archetypes, platonic forms and there egos, symphonies, colors and the imagination exist. This inner space can be modeled Hilbert space, the same space that space-time (outer space) emerges from. Donald Hoffman a cognitive scientist theorizes that space and time emerge from consciousness and he has papers on conscious agent dynamics which you can check out here. http://www.cogsci.uci.edu/~ddhoff/PhysicsFromConsciousness.pdf http://cogsci.uci.edu/~ddhoff/HoffmanTime.pdf

So that is the difference between inner space and outer space. I wanted to make this distinction since many people get confused on the difference between our thoughts and the world that exist independent of our minds. Now it turns out you already knew this since if you have a thought in your mind that thought is not physical but mental. Think about (Part 1) of this series when we talked about qualia. Qualia is not a physical substance and cannot be reduced to physical processes so then the thought is outside of space and time. If you study the brain you wont find the color red or the number 2 but yet they exist. Now some materialist will argue we can map out the thoughts but those only show correlations and not causation and given the fact that both the inner space and outer space are mental then this is not a problem at all since the physical world is really just mental. The ideas from which a dream emerges from are not in the dream environment itself. When you have a dream and realize your dreaming its the ideas in your mind that are more real than the objects in the dream. Well it turns out that same concept is true for our world as well. Your imagination and the ideas, thoughts, emotions and everything within your inner space is more real than physical objects.

Now before I conclude this part of the series I want to discuss the natural and supernatural. It is often argued that the supernatural doesn’t exist because well it is just magic. Well this idea is false since if you get rid of substance dualism and adopt idealism then the line between natural and supernatural fades away and in reality they are both the same. So then naturalism is true but yet God still exist. And what is real in the natural world is what matter reduces to at its most fundamental level and our best sciences tell us what this fundamental reality is like and quantum gravity has shown space-time is emergent. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/294168574_Emergent_Spacetime_for_Quantum_Gravity

So whatever is “real” is the realm that exist beyond space and time and what space and time reduce to. The realm that includes the inner space which has your thoughts, emotions, platonic forms, egos, symphonies, and the imagination. In other words what is real is the mind and non-physical things that exist in the imagination. The imagination would be more real than physical objects. Now of course this doesn’t give us the power to create anything we want and put it into the outer space since we dont simulate the outer space only God does but those things still exist in the imagination just like we ourselves are in the imagination of God and are in his day dream.

Neoplatonism is the new form of classical Platonism which says there are platonic forms that exist outside of space and time. Another name for Neoplatonism is divine conceptualism where platonic forms exist eternally in Gods mind.

The world of the forms would be the world that is more fundamental than the physical. So ideas are more fundamental than physical objects. The idea of a sphere is a platonic forms outside of space-time and is more real than a basketball. What we see in the physical world is only the shadow of the platonic world of real forms so the analogy of Plato’s cave is important here.

If we say platonic forms don’t exist then we either have to say knowledge is not possible (Violates law of non-contradiction) or that things can be justified independently (Violates Godels theorem) but of course choosing either one of these would destroy epistemology so for knowledge to be justified platonic forms must exist since knowledge is intrinsic and Platonic forms are intrinsic knowledge.

Now we have shown before how physical reality is a mental construct generated from an immaterial reality and this immaterial reality would be where the platonic forms exist. Our minds would be in-between the platonic world and the physical world. We will discuss this difference in (Part 6) so I don’t want go into detail.

Next is how our minds would work between the brain and mind. We already concluded the universe is a simulation so then our brains would be a part of that simulation. In idealism there is the mind the the experience of the physical world (simulated world) and so if you damage the brain you will damage the experience in that simulated world since the brain and mind are the same substance (Mental substance). And it will change the way we behave in the simulation. And as we discussed in the last part of this series quantum cognition models our thoughts outside of space-time so then we can interact with platonic forms

Free will is the ability to chose between different outcomes and that an agent can start a chain of events and that chain can also effect other future choices that an agent (mind) will make in the future. Under idealism free will would be true and people would not be predetermined by prior causes. Next we will be looking at inner space vs outer space and what the difference between the two actually are in objective idealism.

Note that this part was only about platonic forms and we will get more in detail in the next part of this series about the fundamental distinction about inner space and outer space.

 

This blog is a response to this video:  https://youtu.be/B9Rn3mHw6QU 

So derezzed 83 has made a video about why he does not favor quantum idealism so me and Johanan Raatz have teamed up and made a response to him. The first part will be Johanan Raatz criticism with a few points that I built on then I will provide my own criticism.

Johanan Raatz criticism with a few points built on:  

• At the beginning of the video Derezzed says that I use the delayed-choice quantum eraser as evidence for idealism. I actually do not. However I do use it as evidence against materialism as it is intrinsically non-realist. Of course non-realism strongly suggests idealism but it is not even the best evidence suggesting idealism. For that we would have to look to emergent spacetime, wherein the physical spacetime realm of matter emerges from immaterial information outside of spacetime. Given that information is uniquely mental in nature, this would entail idealism.
  
  Secondly the delayed-choice quantum eraser is simply not compatible with Bohmian mechanics as stated in the video, as otherwise the experimenters choices would be determined years in advance, and that is not compatible with either the practice of science or the existence of free-will.
  
  Thirdly, even though one could perhaps say the delayed-choice quantum eraser is compatible with dualism this has three problems:

1.) It does not explain the non-realism in the delayed-choice quantum eraser (and idealism does) as such dualism does not predict the delayed-choice quantum eraser even if it is compatible with it. (which is dubious itself)

2.) It explains less (it does not account for non-realism) and uses more assumptions to do so (dualism assumes two substances whereas idealism only assumes one).

3.) Though the delayed-choice quantum eraser does not prove idealism itself, it does eliminate the second substance held by dualists, namely matter. So the question I would ask to Derezzed is, if you are a dualist, and matter has been falsified as a possible substance, what is your second substance?

4) Dualism contradicts all the evidence we have for a simulated universe and contradicts quantum gravity research since all of the evidence points toward a simulated universe.(Read my other blog where I lay out some of that evidence) https://christianidealism.wordpress.com/2017/08/20/understanding-objective-idealismpart-3-quantum-gravity-and-the-simulated-universe/

• Now when we come to the first critique Derezzed gives of the philosophic case we find that it is based on two misunderstandings. Derezzed argues that the Chinese Room refutes the idea of quantum information being consciousness.
  
  In response, the information processing in the Chinese room is purely syntactic. However no one said that the quantum information needed to be purely syntactic. In fact I, and others such as Penrose, hold that it is semantic as well. Secondly, you are confusing an activity (information processing) with a thing (information). We did not claim information processing comprises consciousness, but that the information itself (such as ideas and percepts) is (bits of) consciousness.

 

• As for the second critique of the philosophic case given. The position critiqued is simply my position.It’s an entirely different position Derezzed has apparently mistakenly assumed to be mine, which he then critiques:
  
  He argues that “information about quantum events is insufficient to deduce information about mental experiences.”
  
  This is not my position. I never said information about quantum events (assumed to be third person here it seems) provides or allows one to deduce first person subjective experiences, nor in any of my videos (Johanan Raatz videos) did I say anything about “information about quantum events.” What I’m saying is the quantum information is the first person subjective experience itself. This is evident in such things as von Neumann chains terminating in subjective perceptions. The product of the collapse is the subjective perception itself. Here, Derezzed should also note that this would even be true on the dualistic view of wavefunction collapse that he holds to.

 

• As Derezzed’s critique of how properties are defined in the interaction problem, that is just how properties are defined in science. Charge as a property for instance is a rigid designator to denote the interaction between electrons and protons and other particles. You may say that this is a scientific definition and not a philosophical one. However insofar as electrons and protons also have ontological substance they are also philosophical objects as well as scientific ones. Thus properties they have are philosophic as well as scientific.
  
  Taking this line of reasoning further, if on a dualistic view of the world an immaterial soul were to interact with a material electron, we could measure the effect it has on the electron, and thus deduce from that interaction the electric charge the soul must have. However now you have a conundrum. The soul has a property that has traditionally been ascribed only to physical objects. So if that is the case then there is no way to tell if say an electron is a physical object or a non-physical one, if other objects that are non-physical such as souls have properties like electric charge as well. And as we have said before if the universe is a simulation then dualism is false since matter would not really exist as a mind-independent thing anyway.

 

• Next Derezzed references red as a property that does not entail interaction. This is an equivocation fallacy though. Yes red is a property, however it is not the kind of property we are referring to when we speak of things interacting. Furthermore, even so on the paradigm of dualism, immaterial objects would not have properties such as redness. So you’re using that as an example would only further illustrate that the red objects are both of the same physical substance, even if they are not interacting.
• Next Derezzed makes the following statement:
  
  “…there’s not one shared property we can point to which is required for causation to occur…”
  
  This is simply false. We know of plenty of properties that are required for various interactions; mass, charge, color charge etc. As for him citing entanglement as an example of propertyless causation, entanglement does not actually produce instantaneous causation but instantaneous correlation. If it did entail instantaneous causation it would transmit information faster than light in violation of relativity. Rather in entanglement, the collapse of a joint wavefunction happens instantly for both particles, and the correlated states of both are then simultaneously determined. Furthermore, even if it was instantaneous causation, treating the intervening space as though it was not there, this wouldn’t make sense in a dualistic mind-independent reality where space is a real thing either.
• Lastly Derezzed raises a theological objection that is easily resolved by the Energies/Essence distinction. He argues that if God’s mind contains other minds with evil thoughts, that that then makes God evil.
   
  This does not follow though. God’s mind (His essence) containing other minds with evil thoughts (in His energies), does not make God evil anymore than Tolkien’s mind containing Sauron, makes Tolkien evil.

Main Blogger’s criticism: I will now present my criticism of his video.

The first point is the delayed-choice quantum eraser and if it favors idealism. Well I would first agree that idealism and some forms of dualism do favor it over materialism but the plot wave theory you mentioned can be ruled out by violating relativity and failing as a potential candidate for quantum gravity. You can see other problems with plot wave here http://settheory.net/Bohm

Also as I have been doing my series on understanding quantum idealism I show how and why idealistic interpretations are the only logical way forward. I’m not done with the series yet but so far if you check other post from this blog you will see why idealism is the only way forward. So your claim that we lack scientific evidence is refuted by the evidence. And there are some versions of bohmian mechanics that are compatible with idealism.

The second point is a misunderstanding. Classical information cannot be semantics but quantum information can be since qubits can hold more information than classical bits. And not only that but integrated information would be consciousness and not just information processing. I agree consciousness is more than just information processing but it would be integrated information.

Next your response to the interaction problem is not good. If there are two substances and if they interact then one of them must have a property that can logically relate to it. Also the color red is purely mental so using an analogy only shows mental substance and not physical substance. You never actually see, taste, smell or hear matter or physical substance only its perception so then there your objection against the interaction problem doesn’t work .

Finally with privatio boni evil would exist as an absence of good and not be a thing itself so this objection does not work since evil would be a distortion of the creation rather than an actual thing that exist. And you logically cannot deny privatio boni without saying good and evil don’t exist so if good and evil do exist then evil would be an absence of good.

P1) It is logically impossible for someone to be evil just for the sake of being evil

P2) If it’s logically impossible for someone to be evil just to be evil then it’s logically impossible for evil to exist in its own

C1: Evil cannot exist eternally on its own

P3) If it’s logically impossible for evil to exist on its own then evil is a perversion of good

P4) If evil is a perversion of good then only good can exist on its own

C2) Only good can exist eternally on its own

Final conclusion: Therefore evil is the absence of Good (which implies privatio boni)

Now of course the only way to refute the argument would be to somehow refute the first premise but it is logically impossible for someone to be evil just for the sake of being evil in reality we have no experience of someone being evil just to be evil the closest we can get is cruelty but in reality people are only cruel to gain something. Such as power, pleasure or safety but these are not evil they are good to have the evil comes from pursuing them in the wrong motives or in the wrong way. When you examine it evil is nothing more than the pursuit of something good in the wrong way. Now unlike evil you can be good just for the sake of being good you can do a kind act even if it gives you no pleasure simply because it is the right thing to do but no one can be cruel just for being cruel or be cruel without gaining something good. Let’s have C.S. lewis explain “In other words, badness cannot succeed even in being bad in the same way in which goodness is good… Goodness is so to speak itself: badness is only spoiled goodness. And there must be something good first before it can be spoiled.” -C.S. Lewis.” so we can see that the first premise is true and to argue otherwise will result in logical absurdities thus the conclusion is inevitable.  

Note to readers: The author no longer believes integrated information theory to be a viable model of consciousness

Since we have shown how quantum gravity necessarily leads to objective idealism and the simulated universe we are going to move on from physics and go into cognitive science. Currently the most successful model of consciousness is called integrated information theory (IIT). This theory is based on what subjective experience is like and how consciousness reduces to integrated information. This theory doesn’t tell us about the nature of the mind so it is compatible with all positions in philosophy of mind such as materialism, substance dualism and neutral monism. However it is pointed that according to (IIT) quantum entanglement and integrated information are informationally one. http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.2307/25470707

This is due to the fact that entangled information is always integrated. If (IIT) is true then the entangled information that spacetime emerges from is in fact consciousness itself. And we know from physics that spacetime emerges from entangled information http://www.preposterousuniverse.com/blog/2015/05/05/does-spacetime-emerge-from-quantum-information/

Now (IIT) applies to information in general and not just entangled information we would need something else to show how there is quantum cognition in the brain. And if fact we do have a field its called quantum cognition and quantum biology. Now a popular objection to quantum cognition and quantum mind theory is that the brain is too warm and wet for quantum computation to occur however these objections are invalid. First the objection is based on a miscalculation assuming the superposition needed to be much larger than what quantum cognition and quantum mind theory predicted Miscalculated size 24 nano-meters. Second there was hydrophobic areas that excluded water so there is no interference and third this is challenged by how quantum coherence has been experimentally confirmed in biological organisms. https://www.quantumlah.org/media/thesis/CQT_120507_Elisabeth.pdf http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110615/full/474272a.html https://phys.org/news/2014-06-quantum-biology-algae-evolved-coherence.html https://arxiv.org/abs/1006.4053

There is much evidence that microtubules are quantum system and exist in the brain http://journals.sfu.ca/jnonlocality/public/journals/1/PREPRINTS/microtubulesqcoh.pdf https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1505/1505.00774.pdf

So we have evidence for quantum biology and quantum cognition. Now materialist will get around this by saying that the brain is only being modeled quantum and not necessarily actually quantum. And so in reality the brain is really classical and not quantum we just have to model it quantum since classical models of cognition don’t work. Well I’m going to show why this simply cannot be the case and saying the brain is only modeled quantum and not actually quantum is as ridiculous as saying the earth is modeled a globe and not actually a globe.

1. The Qubit unpacking problem: If your going to say the brain is behaving as a quantum system but not actually a quantum system then you would have to unpack all the superposition’s in cognition into classical positions and this would eat up processing power to where our brains wouldn’t be able to work. Well we know the brain works and so if the brain acts quantum then it must be quantum
2. Explanatory parsimony: There is no good reason to say there is some unknown mechanism that behaves quantum mechanically but isn’t actually quantum when we already have a quantum mechanical mechanism that exist (Wave function collapse)
3. IIT and binding: We have IIT and the binding problem. According to IIT entangled information is integrated information we already talked about this before so I’m not going to go into detail. Next we have the binding problem where there is no place in the brain that combines the color and shape of an object and any classical solution to this problem will fail since classical systems are disassembled into separate pieces so the only way to solve the binding problem would be entangled information being integrated into an object with both its color and shape.
4. The observer effect: We have shown how the conscious observer is already quantum mechanical and is needed to collapse the wave function. Now of course materialist will object that there are other interpretations however we have already completely refuted that argument in (Part 2) and (Part 3) of this series since realist interpretations cannot account for the evidence from quantum gravity and are riddled with other problems that rule them out. So appealing to other interpretations will not work.
5. The Cartesian requirement: Like we have shown before space-time is emergent and thus is an illusion so the mind cannot be in space-time since then it would also be an illusion. But if you say the mind is an illusion then all knowledge is destroyed. So then the “I” is outside space-time and non-local. So then quantum cognition is also non-local.
6. Non-spatial platonic forms: If quantum cognition is modeling our thoughts as entangled information and if entangled information is outside space-time then our thoughts are also outside space-time. Now of course materialist will argue that we can map out our thoughts by studying blood flow in the brain however those only show correlations of thoughts and not the actual thoughts. Another objection materialist will use is that in computers we can see pictures and so those are the computers thoughts and thus our thoughts are also in space-time however computers are not conscious and are really P-zombies and only have the storage of memories and not consciously aware of there own thoughts but we have memories in our brains but the memories can break off into quantum entanglement into the non-local mind. And it turns out quantum entanglement is what holds our memories together and since entanglement is outside space-time then our thoughts and memories are also outside space-time. This is how the binding problem is solved https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18371-brain-entanglement-could-explain-memories/

So when all is said and done there is no reason to say quantum cognition is not literally quantum and in fact it would have to be quantum. This concludes that our thoughts and minds are located outside of space-time and not bound by it. In the next part of this series (Part 5) I will explain in more detail how our minds relate to Neoplatonism and we may be explaining how free will works. I want to again thank Johanan Raatz and Inspiring philosophy for there commitment in this subject and the videos they have done much of there material was included in this series.

Now that we have shown how quantum mechanics shows idealism true and that the conscious observer is necessary to collapse the wave function we will now look into quantum gravity and how it relates to objective idealism and a simulated universe. Like we said in the beginning of this series objective idealism says that the universe is a simulation. So then the outside world is still independent of our minds but it depends on a much larger mind we would call God. Now some might be confused because in (Part 2) we discussed quantum mechanics and how the conscious observer is needed to collapse the wave function and this seems to contradict objective idealism. Well let me tell you now it doesn’t because our consciousness only creates the physical appearance of reality and not reality itself. So our consciousness does not create reality only its physical appearance. The mind that simulates or creates all of reality would be Gods mind and he would be the simulator or dreamer of reality. We will discuss this more in (Part 7) so for now lets move into quantum gravity.

Quantum gravity is still in development and there is no agreed on theory about what quantum gravity actually is. Like I said in the last part quantum gravity seeks to combine quantum mechanics and general relativity. Right now general relativity and quantum mechanics are fundamentally incompatible. General relativity violates the uncertainty principle and quantum mechanics violates causality. So many physicist and scientist are working to make an ultimate quantum gravity theory. Whatever the ultimate quantum gravity theory is it must account for all the forces in nature and must be based on certain interpretations of quantum mechanics and general relativity.  So then certain interpretations will have more credibility and evidence than others. I bring this up since one of the favorite arguments against idealism is that there are different interpretations of quantum mechanics that are compatible with realism and materialism. Well when we apply quantum gravity we see why this argument not only fails but in fact the realist interpretations fail at the start. This is because according to realism or materialism the world is objectively real and doesn’t require anything outside of it to explain it. In other words the universe is not some simulation but we are living in the “real” universe and matter is eternal and exist independently of itself.

Well it turns out Brian Whitworth has written a paper that explores this topic and takes what we know from physics and compares the materialist hypothesis (Objective “real” reality hypothesis) and the idealist (Virtual reality hypothesis) and sees which hypothesis better fits the data and evidence. I will lay out what these facts and and what conclusion he drew from these facts.

1. Virtual reality creation:  A virtual reality usually arises from “nothing”, which matches how the big bang theory proposes our universe did arise
2. Maximum processing rate. The maximum speed a pixel in a virtual reality game can cross a screen is limited by the processing capacity of the computer running it. In general, a virtual world’s maximum event rate is fixed by the allocated processing capacity. In our world, the fixed maximum that comes to mind is the speed of light. That there is an absolute maximum speed could reflect a maximum information processing rate
3. Digital processing. If a world is virtual, everything in it must be digitized, and so discrete at the lowest level. Plank’s discovery that light is quantized (as photons) could then generalize not only to charge, spin and matter, but also to space-time. Discrete space-time avoids the mathematical infinities of continuous space-time, as loop quantum gravity theory argues
4. Non-local effects. The processing that creates a virtual world is not limited by the space of that world, e.g. a CPU drawing a screen is no “further” from any one part of the screen than any other. All screen points are equidistant with respect to the CPU, so VR processor effects can ignore screen distance, i.e. be non-local. If our universe is a three-dimensional “screen” it’s processing is “equidistant” to all points in the universe, so the non-local collapse of the quantum wave function could be such an effect.
5. Processing load effects. On a distributed network, nodes with a high local workload will slow down, e.g. if a local server has many demands a video download may play slower than usual. Likewise a high matter concentration may constitute a high processing demand, so a massive body could slow down the information processing of space-time, causing space to “curve” and time to slow. Likewise, if faster movement requires more processing, speeds near light speed could affect space/time, causing time to “dilate” and space to extend. Relativity effects
   could then arise from local processing overloads.
6. Information conservation. If a system inputs no new information after it starts, it must also not lose the information it has or it will “run down”. Our universe has not run down after an inconceivable number of microscopic interactions over 14+ billion years, so if it is made of information it must conserve it. If matter, energy, charge, momentum and spin are all information, all the conservation laws could reduce to one. Einstein’s transformation of matter into energy (e=mc2) would then be simply information going from one form to another. The only conservation law VR theory requires is that of information conservation.
7. Algorithmic simplicity. If the world arises from finite information processing, it is necessary to keep frequent calculations simple. Indeed the core mathematical laws that describe our world are surprisingly simple: “The enormous usefulness of mathematics in the natural sciences is something bordering on the mysterious and there is no rational explanation for it.” [28] In VR theory physical laws are simple because they must actually be calculated.
8. Choice creation. Information arises from a choice between options [29]. A mechanical or predictable choice is not really a choice in this sense. Einstein never accepted that quantum events were truly random, i.e. no prior world events could predict them. That a radioactive atom decays by pure chance, whenever “it decides” was to him unacceptable, as it was a physical event not predicted by another physical event. He argued that one day quantum random effects would be predicted by as yet unknown “hidden properties”. Yet if the source of quantum randomness is the VR processor, which is outside the physical world, this predicts that no hidden variables will ever be found.
9. Complementary uncertainty. In Newtonian mechanics one can know both the position and momentum of objects, but for quantum objects Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle means one cannot know both at once. Knowing one property with 100% certainty makes the other entirely uncertain. This is not measurement “noise”, but a property of reality, e.g. measuring particle position displaces its momentum information, and vice-versa. In a similar way virtual reality “screens” are typically only calculated when they are viewed, i.e. when an interaction occurs [12]. If complementary object properties use the same memory location, the object can appear as having either position or momentum, but not both at once.
10. Digital equivalence. Every digital symbol calculated by the same program is identical to every other, e.g. every “a” on this page identical to every other one because all arise from the same computer code. In computing terms, objects can be “instances” of a general class. Likewise every photon in the universe is exactly identical to every other photon, as is every electron, quark, etc. While the objects we see have individual properties, quantum objects like photons seem all pressed from identical moulds. VR theory suggests that this is so because each is created by the same digital calculation.
11. Digital transitions. When one views a digital animation it looks continuous, but in fact it is a series of state transitions, e.g. a movie is a series of still frames run together fast enough to look like a continuous event. Yet if the projector is slowed down, one sees a series of still pictures. Quantum mechanics describes quantum interactions in similar terms, as state transitions. These transitions could explain quantum tunneling, where an electron at A suddenly appears at C without moving through the intervening area B which is impenetrable to it. While this is strange for an objective reality, in VR theory all object movement would be expected to be by state transitions.

These are the facts that Brian Whitworth presented in his paper and I present here so my readers dont have to go to the original paper. He concludes his point by saying

“Individually none of the above short points is convincing, but taken together they constitute what a court might call circumstantial evidence, favoring virtual reality against objective reality. When coincidences mount up, they present a plausibility argument if not a proof. More powerful evidence is provided by cases which a VR theory explains easily but which OR approaches have great difficulty with. Two such cases are now given in more detail.” – Brian Whitworth page 10 of (The physical world as a virtual reality) https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/0801/0801.0337.pdf

So then idealism has far more evidence in its favor than materialism or dualism have since if its true we live in a virtual reality then objective idealism would entail. And this is not all the evidence. In a search for quantum gravity physicist have discovered the holographic principle something physicist now know is essential for any theory of quantum gravity and both string theory and loop quantum gravity have this its the idea the 3D universe emerges from information processing on a 2D surface. https://arxiv.org/pdf/hep-th/0203101.pdf

The evidence I presented in (Part 2) of this series on how a conscious observer is necessary to create the physical appearance of reality fits with the simulation theory since thats how video games work in computer games. When you leave a room the physical appearance of that room is gone until you go back to the room well that is true for out world as well. So all the physics is pointing to the fact that our world is a simulation and many quantum gravity researchers and scientist have taken the simulated universe seriously and why competing quantum gravity models have all reached the same conclusion about our world being a simulated world. The evidence is overwhelming and we can reach the conclusion that the world is a simulation by what we know from quantum gravity so far.

We have not even mentioned the simulation argument an argument created by Nick Bostrom that shows how we are more likely living in an objective idealism simulated universe than a real objective materialist universe. Now of course Bostrom believes we are being simulated by future humans something I will be addressing in (Part 7) of this series and providing a strong probability argument for the existence of God using the simulation argument. But when we combine all the data we can see how the conclusion is unavoidable our universe is a simulation weather or not you believe we are being simulated in a computer or the mind of God the point is that no madder who we think the simulators are objective idealism is true in both cases. For those interested in the simulation argument you can check here https://www.simulation-argument.com/

Now one could just dismiss all this evidence but that would be irrational since it would defeat our best chance of finding a theory that combines quantum mechanics and general relativity. But even if one did the evidence cannot be ignored and the results from quantum mechanics infer the same implications as what we would expect if the universe were a simulation. So even if materialist want to argue there are other interpretations of quantum mechanics that argument doesn’t work because of all this other evidence we see from quantum gravity research that show how the universe is a simulation and not an objective material world. So then materialism would thus be incompatible with science and be totally debunked and if you reject that conclusion that’s fine but it doesn’t change the conclusion or the science that points to it.

 

Now that we have presented the problems for materialism, substance dualism, property dualism and neutral monism in this next part we will be learning about the discoveries from quantum mechanics and how it relates to idealism and the role for the observer. Quantum mechanics is one of the two major theories in explaining how the universe works and is one of the most confirmed scientific theories known in science. Currently physicist are trying to make quantum mechanics and general relativity compatible so we can have a theory of quantum gravity that can explain the fundamental forces in nature.  This theory of quantum gravity is often called “The theory of everything” since its combining quantum mechanics (The theory that explains the very small) and general relativity (The theory that explains the very large) into a theory that can explain everything in-between the very small and very large. Right now quantum mechanics and general relativity are fundamentally incompatible but yet they both are the best theories in explaining nature and are accepted by physicist and scientist. We will discuss quantum gravity in the next part and how it connects to idealism but for now we will stick with quantum mechanics.

Now like I said before quantum mechanics describes the very small and when it was first proposed there were experiments done for it. The famous double slit experiment showed how subatomic particles existed as a wave of energy and not tiny bits of matter and even sending one particle through at a time it still spread out like a wave but when one sets up a measuring apparatus the particles acted as tiny bits and not waves. So the conclusion was that a measuring apparatus collapsed particles into one definite position. So independent of observation the particles existed as a wave function which is a series of potentialities rather than an actual object. It showed how the physical appearance of matter didn’t exist independent of observation which is what debunked materialism.

“The waviness in a region is the probability of finding the object in a particular place. We must be careful: The waviness is not the probability of the object being in a particular place. There is a crucial difference here! The object was not there before you found it there” The quantum Enigma page 81 https://www.amazon.com/Quantum-Enigma-Physics-Encounters-Consciousness/dp/0199753814

Now because this experiment has been confirmed hundreds of times and is now at the core of quantum mechanics many science like Einstein proposed a paradox to refute quantum mechanics. They said if you placed two particles in a joint superposition (or put them together) and then separated them by a great distance an observation of one should effect the other which Einstein called “spooky action at a distance” the idea was an observation of one couldn’t effect the other instantly since information couldn’t go faster than the speed of light which didn’t seem possible at the time so they proposed local hidden variables that was effecting them instead of our observation and that the physical appearance of matter existed independent of observation thereby resurrecting materialism from its grave. However John bell began to test this paradox and propose an inequality and if this inequality was shown to be false then local hidden variables would be debunked thereby sending materialism back to its grave. This inequality was put to experimental test in the 1980s and the results confirmed bells predictions that the inequality was violated and this confirmed quantum entanglement and debunked the local hidden variable theories and the paradox that Einstein proposed showing that quantum mechanics was correct from the start and that local realism was false. http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v446/n7138/full/446866a.html?foxtrotcallback=true

Now physicist today propose non-local hidden variables and many interpretations of quantum mechanics today have non-local hidden variables. A class of non-local hidden variables were falsified in 2007 by Anton Zeilinger and his team http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v446/n7138/full/nature05677.html

These results send shock waves and many saying this says goodbye to reality and farewell to reality. http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/2007/apr/20/quantum-physics-says-goodbye-to-reality  http://www.nature.com/news/2007/070416/full/news070416-9.html

Next there is the delayed choice quantum eraser experiment and I will try my best to explain it. Modifying the original double slit experiment instead of placing the detector at the slit it is past where the particles land but just before the particles hit the film the camera pulls away and captures its results after they go past the slit. If its a wave it went through the double slit as a wave meaning a just adding measuring device doesn’t collapse the particles. But if they collapsed to a state of particles at the moment of detection then even tho it went through the slit unobserved and should produce a wave pattern the very act of observing transforms it into particles. So then a back history is loaded up so particles go though the slit instead of a wave and this would display particles where observation creates the physical appearance of particles and loaded up a history so it went through the double slit as particles. So particles do not exist unless there is an observer https://arxiv.org/pdf/quant-ph/9903047.pdf

Now materialist have tried to avoid this by holding to naive realism where reality exist independent of observation just that our perceptions are just a representation of something actually there but not a perfect representation. But this was falsified by confirming the Kochen-Specter theorem where the outcomes of reality depends on the measurements of the time and cant be predicted prior to that something essential for naive realism. https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1106/1106.4481.pdf  http://www.equinoxomega.net/files/studies/quantenphysik_Handout.pdf

Now for those still not convinced that naive realism has been totally debunked there was an experiment the non-local quantum eraser experiment which concludes ” No naive realistic picture is compatible with our results because whether a quantum could be seen as showing particle- or wave-like behavior would depend on a causally disconnected choice. It is therefore suggestive to abandon such pictures altogether.” https://arxiv.org/abs/1206.6578

Thus the conclusion is inescapable that reality as we know it is dependent on observation that we create the physical appearance of reality something that should not be true for materialism but is true for idealism. Now if one wants to dismiss this and be a science denier then go ahead but then your no more different than flat earthers or young earth creationist in science denialism. Now if you dont want to deny science then you can either accept the conclusion or you can take the quantum Randi challenge and show local realism and naive realism true but until then dismissing all this science that points in the opposite direction is nothing more than science denialism https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1207/1207.5294.pdf

Now others have tried to argue for other interpretations of quantum mechanics or that the macro-world and micro-world are separate. Well despite trying to find a quantum gravity theory that puts the micro and macro world into one the idea the two are separate was falsified by the violation of the Leggett-Garg inequality https://arxiv.org/abs/1602.00041 http://www.pnas.org/content/108/4/1256.full https://www.nature.com/articles/srep00101

So the conclusion is that you cannot separate the micro-world and macro-world. And quantum effects do happen on macro objects. Now the last stand many materialist have proposed is that there are other interpretations of quantum mechanics like the many worlds interpretations or bohmian mechanics or any interpretation that doesn’t have a causal role for the observer or has non-local hidden variables. However there are many criticisms of these interpretations which I will link and show below.

I dont want to go into much detail regarding the different interpretations that people hold to in order to save realism but the two biggest realist interpretations are Bohmian mechanics and the many worlds interpretation which I will include links below. These criticisms dont necessarily rule out these interpretations but it makes them unable to compete with idealist interpretations like Copenhagen and quantum information theory.

Criticisms of many worlds: https://youtu.be/_42skzOHjtA  https://arxiv.org/pdf/gr-qc/9703089.pdf http://www.robkoons.net/media/3d211414d9a8a675ffff80bcffaf2815.pdf

Criticisms of Bohmian mechanics: http://settheory.net/Bohm  https://arxiv.org/abs/1410.2014

Note: Some versions of Bohmian mechanics are compatible with idealism when the plot wave is in Hilbert space. 

These are not all the sources that criticize the two interpretations but I will leave this here as a general understanding for my audience on why these interpretations dont really work. We may talk about interpretations when we speak about quantum gravity in (Part 3) but for now these are my responses to those interpretations. Any additional objections that people have will be addressed in part 9 of this series so I will now move on to talk about the measurement problem

The measurement problem is a problem in quantum mechanics as to how particles collapse from a wave function to an actual object and there are many different interpretations of quantum mechanics to how this is solved and its the main reason why there are many interpretations of quantum theory. In the Copenhagen interpretation the practical way this is solved is through a particle or a system of particles that is already collapsed where one can measure a particle with the use of a measurement apparatus and interact with it and this will cause collapse through interaction since the state of the particle has been disturbed and this is known as a decoherence effect but if one particle is used to collapse another what was used to collapse the original particle and so on and so on.  The wave function of a particle cannot be unentanged from that what is used to measure it so then all particles would share the same wave function. So then you would need a measuring apparatus to collapse the particles but then the measuring apparatus themselves must also need to be collapsed so this creates a chain of material objects in a superposition of measuring known as a von neumann chain and since all quantum laws describe material objects some particle is needed to collapse the next one. This happens until you get to something non-local and outside the material system that escapes this chain and not bound by the same physical laws which is argued to be a conscious observer. So the decoherence theory fails in solving the measurement problem and many scientist have admitted this fact that dechoherence doesn’t work. https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0112095

We ask with the Heisenberg choice and nature returns an answer, known as a Dirac choice. So nature determines where the particle is, we do not. Once a particle is measured another observer cannot change that fact about the universe. Only the observer has the ability to “choose” (give a Heisenberg choice) between possibilities and non-conscious measuring devices cannot do that which is why the conscious observer is necessary https://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/9905054

So the conclusion from the best interpretations of quantum mechanics is that objective idealism gives a true description of reality and next we will be looking into quantum gravity research and how it also relates to objective idealism and our universe being a simulation. 

 

 

Philosophy of mind is a branch of philosophy that studies the nature of the mind. There are many different positions in philosophy of mind which I will define soon but all positions have one goal that is to solve the mind-body problem. The mind-body problem is the question for how the body and mind interact and many different positions have different solutions to this problem. The two main forms of philosophy of mind are branched into two positions, dualism and monism. In dualism there is substance dualism and property dualism. Substance dualism says there are two separate independent substances in nature, the physical and the mental and these substances interact. Property dualism moves slightly away from this saying that although there is only one independent substance (The physical substance) There are two properties in this substance, physical properties and mental properties. The other form is monism and there are three forms of it. The first is called materialism (or physicalism) which says there is only one substance the physical substance but that the mind is not a property of physical substance but actually is physical substance. Basically that the mind is emergent from matter and is an illusion of brain chemistry and that matter is indestructible, eternal and exist independent of anything else and that matter is fundamental. The second branch of monism is called neutral monism which says that there is only one substance in the world but this substance is neither physical or mental but instead is “neutral” where its not physical or mental. The third branch of monism is called idealism and this is the view we will be learning about in this blog series. According to this view there is only one substance and this substance is mental and physical substance doesn’t actually exist and that matter is emergent from the mind and that the mind is fundamental and matter is emergent from the mind.

These are all the various positions of philosophy of mind. There are many subgroups in idealism and materialism but we wont go over those in this series. I may address certain positions in future blogs but this series we will be primarily understanding objective idealism. Objective idealism says that there is one mind that creates everything and that all other minds emerge or depend on the one ultimate mind. This position is also called theistic idealism where God simulates the entire universe like a computer game or a day dream within his mind and that we the beings inside his mind are interacting with the dream environment. So then the world we see is still objective and is independent of OUR minds but is still dependent on Gods mind. We will talk about this more in (Part 7) but that’s what objective idealism is and what objective idealist like me, Johanan Raatz and Inspiring philosophy hold to.

Now that I have explained Objective idealism and the various other positions of philosophy of mind I am going to discuss the many different arguments used against physicalism, substance dualism and property dualism.

First we will be presenting whats called the hard problem of consciousness. The hard problem of consciousness says that when we look at the human body we see a machine and not the first person perspective. So the brain is an objective 3rd person perspective not 1st person subjective experience. The reason is that science only studies things from a 3rd person perspective. All the branches of science are 3rd person. Now these 3rd personal physiological states are correlated to 1st person experience. If you open up the brain you dont find the feeling of satisfaction or first person existence of the color blue all you see is blood flow and correlations of brain and mind but not the mind itself. So the properties of the mind are not that which matter can have this can be seen in the difference between mental properties and physical properties. Feeling pain and an electrical signal to the brain are they the same? No since an electrical signal to the brain can happen without the feeling of pain and what we experience is a correlation between the electrical signal and the feeling of pain but one can see the concurrence of a possible world where one experiences pain without the need for an electrical signal.

“…If a mental event really is a physical event and nothing else then by physical event by itself once its physical properties are understood should likewise be sufficient for the taste of sugar or the feeling of pain, or whatever it is supposed to be identical with. But it doesn’t seem to be it seems conceivable for any physical event there should be a physical event without any experience at all. Experience of taste seems to be something extra contingently related to the brain state- something produced rather than constituted by the brain state. So it cannot be identical to the brain state in the way water is identical to H2O”- Mind and cosmos page 41

The idea is that Qualia is not a physical substance and what we experience is mental substance (Qualia) but we assume it comes from physical substance. But a mental substance like the taste of sugar does not exist with the physical substance they are nothing more than the mental experience and all we really can know. In other words we never actually touch, taste, smell, see or feel matter only the mental substance of it. But we assume it correlates to physical substance with no proof that physical substance actually exist. So mental properties and physical properties are conceptually detached and no amount of introspection can ever reduce to the chemistry of the brain. Since we know mental experience is not a necessary property of physical substance then the mental substance is a separate substance and mental substance is all we truly experience and we never never experience physical substance. Now some materialist will argue that the brain needs more complexity to produce consciousness however adding a few more neurons just increases correlation and doesn’t explain qualia. No madder how much we know about the brain from a 3rd person perspective it will never equal a subjective perspective and your never going to come across enough chemical processes to produce any kind of first person experience or qualia. Consciousness us irreducibly subjective and qualia is an irreducible mental substance. This is known as the hard problem of consciousness and there is no solution to it and probably never will be a solution since any attempt would be a non-sequatar because of the objective/subjective gap.

Next will be the Mary thought experiment. Mary is a scientist who possesses complete physical knowledge of the color red. The catch is she has never seen the color red. So she knows everything about the wavelengths and frequencies but has never seen red. Then one day she leaves the room and learns something new: The experience of the color red. So since she had a complete knowledge about the color red but learned something new about the experience of red so the knowledge of red is immaterial and mental and thus the mind cant be reduced or emerge from physical substance since the mind would be a mental substance and not emerge from the physical.

Next is the P-zombie argument. This says we can conceive of a material body (a P-zombie) that behaves exactly conscious but isn’t. Thus whatever consciousness is, it is something additional to the material body and cant be reduced to brain processes so consciousness is not material and so materialism is false. To make it simple the P-zombie argument shows how science cannot deal with consciousness since it can only study the material brain from a third person perspective and only has access to the machine and no access to inner subjectivity.

Moving on from materialism and the philosophical arguments and problems against it we are now going to present the interaction problem in substance dualism. According to substance dualism there exist two substances the physical and the mental however the problem arises with the interaction. If the immaterial mind can interact on the material body it should interact with the body on a material force since to move a material object that requires a material force but if the mind is not material then it cant move material things but the mind can move the physical body. If the mind can interact with the physical then they have a shared property and are not separate substances after all and if they are the same substance then substance dualism is refuted.

The next issue I want to bring up is property dualism. Which says that only physical substance exist but there are two properties in this substance, physical properties and mental properties. So then there would be no interaction problem between the mental and physical and so this bypasses the problem that refutes substance dualism. However there is also an argument against this view that rules it out.

P1) If solipsism is conceivable, then the universe could exist such that only mind exist in a possible world

P2) Solipsism is conceivable

C1) Thus the universe could exist with only the mind in it

P3) Universes can not only consist of properties or processes, but must also include entities and things for the properties to glue themselves onto

P4) There is no difference between a solipsistic mind and a mind in the actual world

C2) Thus the mind cannot be a property or a process but rather must be an entity

I go more in detail about property dualism in a separate blog which viewers can check out here https://christianidealism.wordpress.com/2017/08/16/why-property-dualism-is-absurd/

But lets move onto neutral monism. Neutral monism says that there is only one substance in the world but this substance is neither physical or mental but instead is “neutral” where its not physical or mental. So then under this view there is still some type of emergence from the neutral substance so I will present an argument against emergence.

P1) Emergent things are only comprised of syntactical things

P2) The mind is more than syntax

C1) Therefore the mind is not emergent

Defense of P1) A house is the syntax of fundamental building materials since the house is emergent from the building materials that make up the house so this same analogy can be used for the mind

Defense of P2) The Chinese box experiment shows how AI will not become conscious because they will have no understanding of there knowledge so computers work by syntax and not semantics so then when we apply this concept to the mind then the mind cannot be emergent from the brain

Now keep in mind this is just one argument against emergentism there are other arguments but I will just leave a link so my readers can check them out.  http://cogsci.uni-osnabrueck.de/~acstepha/Armchair_Arguments_Erkenntnis_46_(1997).pdf http://www.owl232.net/emergenc.htm

The hard problem of consciousness I explained before is also an argument against emergence but other arguments like the house analogy I mentioned can work against neutral monism.

So we have mentioned most of the philosophical arguments against materialism, substance dualism,property dualism and neutral monism. To conclude (Part 1) of this series I want to thank Inspiring philosophy and Johanan Raatz for there commitment to this topic as well since they are the ones that converted me to idealism in the beginning. Next in (Part 2) we will be looking into quantum mechanics and how it relates to objective idealism.

 

 

In this series I will be writing a series of blog post that is intended on educating a layman audience of what objective idealism is in philosophy of mind. Instead of a series of defending objective idealism or proving objective idealism or providing a case for objective idealism it will be on understanding objective idealism. The reason for this series is so that everyone can have a good understanding of objective idealism so they don’t make straw man arguments against it. One common misconception is that idealism automatically means solipsism. That is a complete misrepresentation of what objective idealism is since solipsism is the extreme skeptical form of idealism and idealism itself is broken off into many different branches so idealism doesn’t just include solipsism but it includes other forms like subjective idealism, and transcendental idealism. In this series we will be focusing on objective idealism and how it relates to God and the universe. The series will include the following

Understanding Objective idealism: (Part 1) Philosophy of mind

Understanding Objective idealism: (Part 2) Quantum mechanics

Understanding Objective idealism: (Part 3) Quantum gravity and the simulated universe

Understanding Objective idealism: (Part 4) Integrated information theory and quantum cognition

Understanding Objective idealism: (Part 5) Our minds and Neoplatinism

Understanding Objective idealism: (Part 6) Inner space vs outer space

Understanding Objective idealism: (Part 7) The mind of God

Understanding Objective idealism: (Part 8) Existence vs non-existence

Understanding Objective idealism: (Part 9) Refuting common objections

Understanding Objective idealism: (Part 10) Final thoughts, summary and conclusion

This is what will be in this series and I hope that it can make sense to a layman audience on this subject. The main goal of the series is to accurately represent what objective idealism is and show the evidence that supports it while also cleaning out misconceptions about it. We will go more into detail on the next blog post of this series but this post was just an introduction into the series. In (Part 1) I will be defining objective idealism and other positions on philosophy of mind and showing the problems that other philosophies face like the hard problem of consciousness in materialism and the interaction problem in substance dualism and basically providing the foundation for what the rest of the series will be about.

This post is going to be another one of those long ones because I actually wrote this a while back but wasn’t able to post it on a blog at the time. But now I have a place where I can post it. In future blogs I may be addressing specific things (The problem of evil) but here i just wanted to post my detailed thoughts on these problems. So enjoy reading 🙂

General Introduction

As a christian I’ve been in many debates with skeptics and these 4 arguments are the best arguments that skeptics use against christianity. In fact they are so strong that some of these arguments have de-converted many christians into atheist and leads people away from the faith. These arguments are critical to skeptics because if these argument fail then skeptics have no case against Christianity. 99% of my debates with skeptics always brings up one of these arguments at one point or another. These are the top arguments against christianity

 

• The problem of religious pluralism

• The problem of evil

• The problem of God’s hiddenness

• The problem of unanswered prayer

 

In this document we will refute these 4 arguments and prove that these are arguments that simply cannot be used against christianity. I will first start with #4 then move my way up to #1. Now i will explain what each argument says

 

#4.The problem of unanswered prayer: This argument says that if god exist why can’t we tell if prayers are answered and why would a good god not allow certain miracles to happen Ex: (why won’t god heal amputees?), (Why won’t God heal physical diseases.) etc.

 

#3. The problem of God’s Hiddenness: This argument says that if god exist why can’t we see him? Why won’t he reveal himself to us in person so that everyone can confirm that god exist.

 

#2. The problem of evil: This argument says that if an omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent god exist why is there so much evil in the world and why won’t god stop the evil. And why does god also allow natural evil to exist

 

#1. The problem of religious pluralism: This argument says that if god exist which god is it? Or in other words what religion is true and are any of the religions true?

And does god even exist in the first place? And with all the different religions in the world how do i know that christianity is correct?

 

Each argument will have different parts as I address it and I might provide links so that you can get accurate information on this so no one thinks I’m just making stuff up. Now before I begin the 4th argument I first want to first explain what the christian god is and what the origins of christianity are. Christianity started in 1st century AD by a man named Jesus Christ that preached his ministry in israel then was later crucified and 3 days later came back from the dead. The foundation of christianity lies on the resurrection of jesus that’s because if the resurrection happened then christianity is true but if it didn’t happen then christianity is false, simple as that. A falsification of christianity would happen if archeologist were able to find the actual bones of jesus christ since it would prove that the resurrection never happened thus destroying the foundation of the christian faith. However every alleged bones of jesus have been proven to be a hoax or simply false or pseudo-archaeological evidence. So there is simply no evidence that jesus is dead. Now i will explain the christian god, the trinity is a central teaching in the bible and its god existing as 3 persons in one being. God the father, god the son, god the holy spirit. The christian god is also a palamite panentheism god, which means that god is all powerful, all knowing and all loving but that creation is contingent and distinct from god, but wholly dependent on him still. Creation is not part of god’s essence but it is also not separate from him and creation emerges from the divine energies of god and this is important as we deal with the problem of evil and the problem of religious pluralism. For more information of christianity and panetheism watch this video on the topic https://youtu.be/_xki03G_TO4

So now that we have addressed on what christianity is and what the christian god is and have shown what we will be addressing in this document i think it’s ready for us to start addressing the problem of unanswered prayer.

#4: The problem of unanswered prayer

Introduction

The skeptic claims that if god exist then prayer should be obvious to us and we should be able to empirically test it and observe it happening but since we don’t then this must mean that 1. God never answers prayers or 2. God doesn’t exist. Now some apologist have responded by saying that when god deals with prayer the answer to god is 1. Yes 2. No 3. Wait. Now some skeptics have made a new argument against prayer that attempts to disprove prayer and attempts to show that prayer is 100% psychological without god actually answering the prayer the argument goes like this “instead of praying to god you pray to a jug of milk. The jug of milk answers your prayer with a yes, no or wait. Assume you ask it for $1,000 and they ask you to wait, in the first scenario (yes) and they say se the jug of milk answered your prayer. 2nd scenario(wait) and then in a week you get 1,000 dollars and they say see you just had to wait. 3rd scenario (no) if you ask why they say we have to trust that the jug of milk knows best” the skeptic claims that this argument proves that prayer can happen to any object and thus making prayer irrelevant to God and that prayers can psychologically be answered without them being answered in the first place.  Some skeptic have also claimed that there was a long in-depth study done on prayer and that the study found no positive effect from prayer for patients who have been prayed for and those that were not prayed for. And that people who knew they were being prayed for had more complications after surgery than those that did not. This the skeptic claim is irrefutable proof that god either doesn’t answer prayer or god doesn’t exist. In this document we will examine the massive problems with the argument from unanswered prayer and will ultimately prove that it is false. So let’s get started

Part 1: Understanding prayer

To start off both skeptics and most christians have a wrong understanding of prayer. They assume that god must always answer prayer the verses they use to support this is from Matthew 21:22

Matthew 21:22 King James Version (KJV)

22 And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.

However a literal interpretation of this verse won’t work since if that was the case then we must assume that Mark 6:23 is also literal

Mark 6:23 King James Version (KJV)

23 And he sware unto her, Whatsoever thou shalt ask of me, I will give it thee, unto the half of my kingdom.

Notice it says “half of my kingdom” if this was literal then the girls immediate answer would be that she would want the north half of the kingdom but of course we don’t see this in the text. The key here is that to offer someone’s half possession was a favorite expression. It simply meant that the person was exceedingly grateful and with to give a generous award. At the same time it’s the same with what jesus said so we know the passage is not literal. So when jesus speaks of being able to move mountains with prayer (Mark 11:23), no one took this to mean literal permission to overturn the topography. The phrase “moving mountains” was a jewish metaphor for accomplishing what was difficult or virtually impossible, and thus indicates hyperbole is being used. In jesus day only the “super pious” were depicted as having a “blank check” with prayer and their piety meant they only asked for what god willed and the super pious wouldn’t go around asking for anything. The precondition of god’s will was always a “given” when it came to prayer. It is only stated explicitly as an instruction in (1 John 5:14-15) which is written to a gentile readership that would not share this jewish presupposition. Also notice (Matthew 6:11)

Matthew 6:11 King James Version (KJV)

11 Give us this day our daily bread.

Notice the objects of each prayer basically daily staples not a rois well or wealth not even being spared suffering or ill health. Now given those parameters do you really think the promises by jesus was offered a chance of unlimited ligest. Or do you suppose they might suggest a more humble approach.  Within the context of an ancient patronage relationship one in which god the father is patrian and believers are clients jesus acts as a broker for prayers in such situations no client expected unlimited granting request and likely many of them wouldn’t be granted however submitting request was a proper and honorable way of recognizing authority of the patreon that’s also why persistence prayer is represented as a model. One was expected to continue recognizing the patreons authority even when prayers were not answered properly. To sum it up prayer is sort of like a legal formality.

Patronage relationship:

 

• Clients (christians) could make request of the patron (god the father) via brokers (like jesus)

• A client would hardly presume to impose on the patreon to an unlimited extent

• Persistence could honor the patreon by recognising the patrons authority but proper piety recognised this was only for pious request

• Luke 18 specifically talks about prayers for god’s justice to be delivered, and connects it to Jesus, advent of son of man (cf. Matthew 25:31-46)

 

So the problem of unanswered prayer fails to account for:

 

• The semantics of making of pledges (particularly the use of hyperbole and dramatic language)

• The social dynamics of patronage

• The role of god’s will, and personal piety in the making of supplications

 

So prayer is not as simple as asking god for anything you want it is a complex concept that needs to be properly understood. And we as we have examined the problem of unanswered prayer fails since it misrepresents how prayer really works.

Part 2: Refuting objections to prayer

In this part we are going to refute popular objections to prayer that skeptics of Christianity have used over the years. These including objections like “Why won’t God heal amputees?” Or “Why won’t God answer all prayers?” Etc. So we are going to refute the objections that are made

 

Objection 1: If god is all loving why won’t he just answer all prayers?

 

This objection to prayer fails since we showed in part 1 that God is not obligated to answer everyone’s prayer. Only the super pious were able to have all prayers answered and they wouldn’t ask God for anything either. And not only that but they had a “blank check” and ONLY ASKED of what God already willed in the first place. So this objection falls apart once we understand the patronage relationship (see part 1 “understanding prayer”)

 

Objection 2: Thinking that God answers prayers is committing the logical fallacy of (Post hoc ergo propter hoc) meaning it came after and therefore was caused by (blank). You can’t say that something was caused just based on the sequence of events.

 

This objection to prayer fails since it assumes that all prayers have to be answered. Ya some christians might commit the post hoc fallacy but when we properly understand the patronage relationship we can see why this objection fails. Like we discussed in part 1 God is not obligated to answer all prayers and it was important for the christians to understand God’s authority. No christian is given unlimited amount of request when it comes to prayer. Christians are expected to honor god’s authority even when prayers are not answered. Most of the request would not be granted anyway mainly because people today pray for stupid stuff like (Praying for car keys) or (praying to get a touchdown) because God doesn’t care about those things too much. However way you look at it, once you put the patronage relationship into the mix the objection fails.

 

Objection 3: How do you know that your prayer was answered by your God? And not by Allah or krishna or any other God?

 

This objection basically uses the Religious pluralism argument which i will address later when i refute the problem of religious pluralism so this objection will have to wait before i refute it later in this document.

 

Objection 4: Prayer is observational bias since since christians always focus on the prayers that were answered and ignore the ones that were never answered.

 

Like i have said many times before god is NOT obligated to answering prayers and given the context of a patronage relationship no one was expected to give god unlimited request. So the objection once again fails when we take into context the patronage relationship.

 

Objection 5: If god is all powerful and all loving why won’t he heal amputees?

 

This objection is the biggest objection against prayer in fact there is an entire anti-christian website on it http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/

However this website once again completely ignores the context of a patronage relationship but anyways if you want scholarly sourse on weither or not miracles take place today including medical ones i will leave this sourse https://www.amazon.com/Miracles-Credibility-New-Testament-Accounts/dp/0801039525

It shows evidence of the miracles described in the new testament and shows evidence of medical miracles taking place today so the claim that we have no evidence for miracles in the new testament is wrong but anyways i will answer the question. To start off, amputees are serious but they won’t kill you like cancer does also with the patronage relationship god is not obligated to heal anyone, nor does it anywhere say he does so “on demand” like a gumball machine. So once again when we put into context the patronage relationship the objection fails.

 

Those were just the top 5 objections to prayer and we have seen why they all fail. Skeptics will continue to make more objections like “Why won’t god heal everyone’s cancer?” or “Why can’t we empirically observe arms growing back?” or “Why won’t God give me more money?” Etc. But when you take into context the patronage relationship it refutes virtually all the objections against prayer.  Now of course there are other objections like “Why won’t God feed all the starving children?” and we will deal with those when we address the problem of evil. But for now i think it’s safe to say that the problem of unanswered prayer fails.

Part 3: Summarising the refutation of (The Problem of unanswered prayer)

In part 1 we had a short lesson understand how prayer really works and shown the importance of the patronage relationship. And in part 2 we showed why virtually all the objections against prayer fail once you take into account the patronage relationship. In the introduction there was the “jug of milk” argument but with the patronage relationship put into place we can see why that argument fails. So we can conclude that the problem of unanswered prayer fails and it cannot be used as an argument against christianity. We will next deal with the problem of God’s hiddenness and show why the argument fails.

 

#3: The problem of God’s hiddenness

Introduction

For years skeptics of christianity have repeated this argument hundreds of times and it is the 3rd biggest argument against christianity. The argument says that if god exist why won’t he reveal himself to us why can’t we empirically confirm that he exist. This argument is very popular among skeptics so we are going to prove why it’s wrong

Part 1: The nature of God

In this part we will discuss what the christian god is like. To start off it should be noted that god is timeless,spaceless,immaterial,all powerful and all knowing God (according to christianity) so if God is immaterial then he is not made of matter like most greek mythology gods are (Ex. Zeus) so we shouldn’t expect him to show himself to us. Another issue is that God is holy and perfect we are sinners and since we are imperfect then god’s perfection would overpower us causing us to immediately die. So now that we have addressed what the nature of the christian God is then in order for us to solve this problem we will have to prove that God is good.

Part 2: Proof God is Good

Now before i give my proof i just want to say that my proof is not from intuition so i’m not going to be saying stuff like “God is good because he loves us” or “God is good because his son died for us” because those arguments don’t prove that God is good it just gives you a reason for why God is good. However my proof is much different since it’s logically necessary for it to be true.

Proof God is Good

P1: It is logically impossible someone to be evil just for the sake of being evil

P2: If it’s logically impossible for someone to be evil just for the sake of being evil then it’s logically impossible for evil to exist on its own

P3: If it’s logically impossible for evil to exist on its own then evil is a perversion of good

P4: God is changeless

P5: Since god is changeless and since evil is a perversion of good then god can’t change from good to evil

Conclusion: Therefore it is logically impossible for god to be evil and its logically necessary that god is good

 

We should all agree that the first premise is true since i have already proven this point before so i will just quote with what i said before “ It is logically impossible for someone to be evil just for the sake of being evil in reality we have no experience of someone being evil just to be evil the closest we can get is cruelty but in reality people are only cruel to gain something. Such as power, pleasure or safety but these are not evil they are good to have the evil comes from pursuing them in the wrong motives or in the wrong way. When you examine it evil is nothing more than the pursuit of something good in the wrong way. Now unlike evil you can be good just for the sake of being good you can do a kind act even if it gives you no pleasure simply because it is the right thing to do but no one can be cruel just for being cruel or be cruel without gaining something good. Let’s have C.S. lewis explain “In other words, badness cannot succeed even in being bad in the same way in which goodness is good… Goodness is so to speak itself: badness is only spoiled goodness. And there must be something good first before it can be spoiled.” -C.S. Lewis.” so we can see that the first premise is true and to argue otherwise will result in logical absurdities. Premise 2 is also correct since we have proven that it’s logically impossible for someone to be evil just for the sake of being evil thus it follows that it’s logically impossible for evil to exist on its own. Premise 3 is correct since if premise 1,2 are true then evil is always a perversion of good. Premise 4 is true since god is changeless and god is changeless since he is eternal. Now premise 5 is the one with the most objections it’s questionable if god is good to start but we have proven that good CAN exist on its own without the need for evil. And since evil is a perversion of good and since god is changeless then it logically follows that god was good before evil and since god is changeless then he can’t change from good to evil. This is irrefutable proof that it’s logically impossible for god to be evil and that it’s necessary that god is good. Thus this is even stronger proof that god is good.

Part 3: The love of God

Since we have proven that God is good then it logically follows that God is a God of love and NOT a God of evil. Now the skeptic might ask if God loves us so much then why won’t he reveal himself to us. Well he HAS revealed himself to us it’s through the bible now of course the skeptic will then say “How do you know the bible is true?” well that’s a question we will answer later when dealing with the problem of religious pluralism so that objection has to wait. But for now let’s assume the bible is in fact the word of God ok fair enough but then why won’t God appear in front of us. Well let’s see if he did we would first off have to be sinless since sinful beings can’t go into heaven. The thing that makes heaven heaven is the fact that God is there so he would have to make us sinless then we would all be forced to worship him without having a choice. Now we all know love is defined as when someone freely chooses to be with someone thus the viewpoint that God must make mindless robots worshiping him would be incompatible with a good god since only an evil god would do that. And since we have proven that God can’t be evil then this analogy actually works. So in order for mankind to freely chose to follow God and God not immediately kill them because of his holiness then he would have to communicate to his creations through prophets that would later write books to spread the word of god (it can’t be done through the internet since it wasn’t around 4,000 years ago). So we have seen that if god is all loving then this would in fact be the case that God communicates with his creations through prophets and not directly to his creations.

Part 4: The Bible

So now that we have seen that if God exist and if he is all loving and wants everyone to freely chose to follow him then it logically follows that he communicates through prophets then how do we know the bible was written by who they claim to be written by? Well it turns out that both the old and new testament are both historically reliable and they were in fact written by the prophets that claimed to have written them. For more information see these sources https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1mr9ZTZb3TW70EEo4e2onJ4lq1QYSzrY

https://books.google.com/books/about/On_the_Reliability_of_the_Old_Testament.html?id=Kw6U05qBiXcC&source=kp_cover&hl=en

 

Now i cant possibility lay out the mountains of historical evidence proving the bible reliable here so i’m leaving those 2 sources that should convince any rational person that the bible is historically reliable and was written by the people that claimed to have written them.

Part 5: Refuting skeptic counter-arguments

Since we have shown that if god is all loving and wants everyone to freely follow him some skeptic have made a counter argument. The argument goes like this.

 

“If God wants to hide from his creation to make them freely chose to follow him then why didn’t he hide from the angels when they chose to follow him?” -Skeptic

 

Well it should first be noted that nowhere in the bible does it say that the angels ever saw God before they chose to follow him. It should be considered that right now every angle is sinless and every demon is sinful. It’s quite possible that before God created humans he made angels so that they can have the freedom just like we do now but that they chose God so they became sinless and those that rejected God like lucifer and the demons became evil and wicked. This is similar to mankind those that follow god become sinless in heaven while those that don’t serve god face punishment. It just so happens that god is going to judge, humans, angels and demons on judgement day so this counter argument fails.

 

“If God won’t empirically prove himself because he doesn’t want to violate our free will then why did lucifer rebel against god if he knew god exist?”-Skeptic

 

This counter-argument fails since lucifer still used his free will to rebel against God because of pride this is why simply believing God exist won’t get you saved we are saved by grace through faith not simply believing in a creator. Besides theism is natural so it turns out everyone already has the intuition to believe in God now i’m not arguing that it proves God’s existence but it shows that everyone has a natural belief in God. So the Counter-argument is fallacious

“If God doesn’t want to empirically prove himself because he wants us to understand why he loves us then why does God want us to fear him?”-skeptic

 

He wants us to fear him because we need to stay obedient to his teachings. You need some kind of fear so that people can repent and turn away from their sins otherwise the people will have no reason to follow christ and thus it would defeat the entire purpose of us freely choosing God in the first place.

Part 6: Summary and final thoughts

To conclude our position on the problem of God’s hiddenness we are going to summarise what my entire refutation of this argument is. To start off we have proven that God must be logically Good and that it’s impossible for him to be evil which gives us only a few options.

1. (Sinful beings)God empirically proves himself and kills all sinful people since the holy cannot be with the unholy (Free will) (no love)
2. (Sinless beings) God empirically proves himself but since he doesn’t want to kill everyone then he creates sinless beings without their choice to follow him. (No free will) (no love)
3. (Sinful beings) God doesn’t empirically prove himself but instead communicates with his creations through prayer and prophets (Bible is written) which also allows those creations to freely choose God (Free will) (love)  
4. (Sinful beings) God empirically proves himself but people get too fearful and will never understand why God loves them (No love) (Free will)

If it’s option 1 sin would exist and people would have free will and god would empirically prove himself but god wouldn’t have any love since he would just kill everyone without giving them the chance to repent. If it’s option 2 sin wouldn’t exist and people wouldn’t have free will but god wouldn’t be loving since love is by definition a free choice so it can’t be option 2. In option 3 god wouldn’t empirically prove himself but instead would communicate through prophets and prayer and a holy book would be written and sin would exist and free will would exist and god would be loving as well. In option 4 sin would exist and god would empirically prove himself but people would also get too fearful and god wouldn’t be all loving since those creations would never understand why there overlord master loves them. Thus god wouldn’t be all loving in this option. It turns out in all these possible worlds in order for God to be truly all loving he wouldn’t empirically prove himself so option 3 would be the most logical one which in fact is in the world we live in right now. So we have examined why the problem of God’s hiddenness CANNOT be used as an argument against christianity and we have seen why it fails completely. Next we are going to address the problem of evil and why why it fails.  

#2: The problem of evil

Introduction

The skeptic claims that if christianity is true and if God is an all powerful, all knowing all loving being then their shouldn’t be evil in the world and that he should be able to put an end to all evil at once yet evil exist. This is what is considered the problem of evil however it presupposes the existence of a deity that is all powerful,all knowing all loving so to begin our examination let’s start by presupposing the existence of God. We will also be dealing with the problem of natural evil in a later part.

Part 1: God, the universe and everything.

It is said that God is the greatest conceivable being and if a God like this exist then it gives us some predictions on the insights of reality as well. To understand what i mean let’s compare the concept of God to the concept of (The All) if God is not (The All) then their is a being greater than God namely the system of God plus that part of (The All) which is not God. But then God would not be the greatest possible being and therefore not God at all. Thus if God really does exist we must conclude that God is the same thing as (The All) however God is also a mind so if God is a mind and (The All) then the statement “(The All) is a mind” is logically valid. So if God exist then monistic idealism would have to be true. But since the universe is within (The All) you may ask “Isn’t the universe made of matter” well in physics this is actually not true at all. The universe is a hologram and their is much evidence supporting this in physics, https://arxiv.org/pdf/1607.04878.pdf

https://phys.org/news/2017-01-reveals-substantial-evidence-holographic-universe.html

https://youtu.be/QiZLlpqAQ7U

https://youtu.be/v2Xsp4FRgas

https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/0801/0801.0337.pdf

https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1602/1602.07258.pdf

I dont have the time to go over the overwhelming evidence showing that the universe is a hologram so i left those sources so my readers can check them out. It turns out that the “Matrix” movie was right in that we in fact live in a virtual reality and that our universe is not fundamental but emerges from something else. With this in mind the universe being simulated in God’s mind seems very plausible. That’s because from us we are inside a virtual reality which is what our best physics tell us about the universe. With this understanding of God and the universe we have come to interesting conclusions about the nature of reality itself but what you may ask does any of this have to do with the problem of evil?.  

Part 2: The Goodness of God and the Euthyphro’s Dilemma

If God is the greatest conceivable being then God would have to be identical to the platonist conception of God as the Good. Anything less than the Good would have to be less than the greatest conceivable Good and thus not the greatest conceivable being. This however appears to make the problem of evil worse if God is (The All) since evil would then be inside God however this can be fixed with this solution. Evil would have to exist in the same way that shade or coldness exist as an absence of Good and not a thing itself. This is explained when evil is defined a perversion of Good, things would be Good in so far they exist completed as evil exist incomplete. It is logically impossible for someone to be evil just for the sake of being evil in reality we have no experience of someone being evil just to be evil the closest we can get is cruelty but in reality people are only cruel to gain something. Such as power, pleasure or safety but these are not evil they are good to have the evil comes from pursuing them in the wrong motives or in the wrong way. When you examine it evil is nothing more than the pursuit of something good in the wrong way. Now unlike evil you can be good just for the sake of being good you can do a kind act even if it gives you no pleasure simply because it is the right thing to do but no one can be cruel just for being cruel or be cruel without gaining something good. Let’s have C.S. lewis explain “In other words, badness cannot succeed even in being bad in the same way in which goodness is good… Goodness is so to speak itself: badness is only spoiled goodness. And there must be something good first before it can be spoiled” -C.S. Lewis. So that proves that Evil is the absence of Good. Now moving on to Euthyphro’s Dilemma skeptics will often use this argument in response to a Good God.

1. The Good is greater than God. Therefore God is not the greatest possible being
2. God is greater than the Good. Therefor the Good is determined by God from outside The Good (implying relativism)

My response to this argument is that GOD IS THE GOOD. But how do we know that the Good is Good for us, might it be that the definition of the Good is irrelevant to human standards of Goodness. The palamite panentheistic God definition of (The All) resolves this problem as well. If God is (The All) and God is a mind then (The All) is a mind. This concludes that from Gods perspective there is only one mind God’s (himself). All other minds even if they are unaware of it are subsidiaries to God’s mind. So God being (The All) would have no reason to harm any other mind anymore than him hurting his own body.

 

Part 3: The Existence of evil and the tree of knowledge (Adam and eve)

Evil would exist if the minds within the virtual reality would know the knowledge of evil. However there is a catch we determined earlier that Evil is the absence of Good and that evil cannot exist on its own. Thus for evil to exist Good must exist as well thus for evil to exist in the virtual reality the minds in the virtual reality would have to know Good as well or in other words they would have to know the knowledge of Good and Evil. What would it be like knowing good and evil? Well everyone should have experienced this since no one is perfect in the world. If God exist then evil exist not because God won’t stop it but rather because adam and eve choose to ate the forbidden fruit thus they knew the knowledge of Good and evil.

Part 4: The solution to evil

We have concluded that the evil in the world can be explained by a conscious state in God’s mind choosing to know the knowledge of Good and evil. Let’s refer to this part of God’s mind as “Primal man”. Individual minds would then exist as subdirectories of primal man, all of these minds would then know the knowledge of Good and Evil and be corrupted by it. However evil being an absence of Good could not be fixed within the corrupted construct. It would be the same as trying to fix a car with only half of its parts. The car couldn’t be fixed doing this. This is the reason why religions that require good deeds and works to be saved is illogical and thus cannot be true. There is only one religion in the world that don’t require Good works to be saved it is christianity. We will discuss this more when i deal with the problem of religious pluralism but for now let’s move on. The only way to fix evil would be to have someone from outside primal man showed up inside the corrupted construct yet was not corrupted by it. Let’s refer to this second hypothetical figure as “second man” and by integrating into second man individuals from primal man would lose the corruption and be saved from the construct of Good and evil. This “second man” is Jesus christ that died on the cross for our sins and came back from the dead. Every other religion on earth teaches that the construct must be fixed from the inside however it’s obvious that it’s logically impossible to do that and it requires someone from outside the construct to fix it. Christianity can be the only logical position to hold when solving the problem of evil. Now we are going to explain the free will defense and give the case for it.

Part 5: The free will defense

The most common response to the problem of evil is the free will defense. The free will defense answers the problem of moral evil by saying that God doesn’t stop evil because he wants everyone to have free will and doesn’t want mindless robots. It says that their is evil because people chose to do evil things and that its mankind’s fault for the evil in the world. The free will defense however does not answer the problem of natural evil something that we will address later in the document but for now let’s give the case for free will

Part 6: The case for free will

The debate for the existence of free will has gone on for centuries between determinists and libertarians. In this part we are going to give the scientific evidence for free will and later refute determinist objections and refute all supposed evidence for determinism. Before i begin my case i want to define what i mean by free will. Free will is defined in the basic understanding that people can chose to have moral responsibility it doesn’t mean that you can chose your past, gene’s, character or place of birth. Another misconception of free will is that it means that nothing is determined by prior causes, this is false what free will is about is this concept of agent causation that the agent can start a new chain of events that are not predetermined before the agent’s choice. The agent chooses self-deterministically which is another word for free will but they are both defined in the same way. So now that i have cleared out some common misconceptions let’s begin with the evidence. To start off John H. Conway and Simon Kochen have developed what’s known as the free will theorem in quantum physics.http://www.ams.org/notices/200902/rtx090200226p.pdf  

Which states that we can only have free will in an idealist, indeterministic universe. At the quantum level particles behave probabilistically this is shown through the uncertainty principle http://www.iitg.ernet.in/physics/fac/charu/courses/ph405/uncertainty.pdf

What this evidence concludes is that actions of the observer cannot be determined by prior causes as determinism states. Remember determinist claim that we can know the exact position of every particle based on how the laws of nature work. But the evidence shows that we cannot predict the future using these laws. So it seems that science refutes hard determinism and shows that free will exist.

Part 7: Refuting determinist objections

In this part we are going to refute determinist objections to free will. So let’s begin with the objections

Objection 1: if quantum mechanics is truly random then our actions are just being caused by random events we are still not free just determined by random events.

 

Response to objection 1: Libertarians never say that since quantum mechanics is random then we have free will and neither does our argument. The indeterminacy of quantum mechanics speaks of our ability to not know an outcome until an observer is making a measurement not that random events cause everything. Libertarians don’t say things are not determined we just say that they are determined by the choices of agents which causally affect other things, this is known as agent causation which is how free will works. Outcomes are determined not by prior events or random events but by agents that exist outside of physical reality. So this objection fails

 

Objection 2: The universe is deterministic and since mind states are brain states and since brain states are biological states and since biological states are physical states and since physical states are deterministic then free will is an illusion

 

Response to objection 2: i actually agree with this objection except the first and last 11 words. The universe is not deterministic this is shown in the uncertainty principle. And mind states are not brain states either this is shown in neuroscience and when philosophers face the hard problem of consciousness.This objection also presupposes physicalism being true. For evidence against physicalism here is a playlist. http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/uncer.html

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1mr9ZTZb3TX_4LthrdGqACsqIWKd2gs-

 

Objection 3: The bible teaches predestination so free will is an illusion

 

Response to objection 3: This is in my opinion the worst objection to free will since it’s just plain wrong. It’s true that the bible teaches predestination but that in no way implies determinism. God’s middle knowledge of creaturely freedom fixes this issue very well The doctrine of divine middle knowledge holds that God knows what free choices individuals would make in whatever circumstance they might find themselves. This is also known as “What…If…” statements and it is shown all throughout the bible. This allows people to have free will while God still being in control over his creation so no free will is not an illusion.

 

Objection 4: It wasn’t your decision that caused an action it was the reasons behind your decision that caused it because you cannot chose your desires

 

Response to objection 4: This objection creates paradoxical conclusions since for example what if i have good reasons to enjoy a piece of pizza and good reasons to reject pizza and favor a healthier choice. Which reasons cause the outcome now of course you could say the stronger desire wins but what or who decides which is the stronger desire since these are non-physical desires which one has more power? Their is no physical event that causes this and they are purely mental so we cant study the physical structure of them and figure out which one is stronger and if they are mental then it follow that the mind decides which is the stronger desire and if the mind decides then that’s what free will is in the first place so this objection fails.

 

Objection 5: Belief and love is not a choice so free will is meaningless

 

Response to objection 5: I agree that belief is not a choice however simply believing God exist won’t get you into heaven the devil believes in God and he won’t be going to heaven so the “belief is not a choice argument” is irrelevant. As for love yes it’s a choice and in psychology it’s been shown that love is a choice and not simply an emotion. https://www.amazon.com/Love-Choice-Definitive-Unhealthy-Relationships/dp/0785263756 so the objection fails.

 

Part 9: Refuting the case for determinism

One of the strongest alleged proofs for determinism is that back in the 1980 the libet experiments and similar experiments that take place today proves that free will is an illusion because he had subjects hooked up to a machine to measure brain activity while they were asked to randomly decide to press a button. The subjects were asked to know when they consciously decide to press the button. He then found that prior to them becoming consciously aware of when they decided to press the button there was a buildup of brain activity later titled the readiness potential later studies with the similar experiments saw this buildup 7 to even 10 seconds prior to a counscous decision http://www.rifters.com/real/articles/NatureNeuroScience_Soon_et_al.pdf

The determinist claims that from these studies free will is an illusion since the brain makes a decision 7 to 10 seconds before you’re consciously aware of it and that it proves determinism true. However there are many problems with this claim that determinist are making since later research demonstrated the “readiness potential” was present even when subjects did not make any conscious decisions. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19736023

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24394375

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.844.3664&rep=rep1&type=pdf

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23535835

if the supposed “readiness potential” is present even when decisions are not being made then it couldn’t be a cause of conscious decisions. This was confirmed in several separate studies that i cited above thereby debunking the idea that readiness potential was causing conscious decisions. In one 2008 study subjects were told they had to press a button when they saw a cube among many other distractors such as a circle, triangle hexagon, etc. simultaneously their brain activity was measured it was found that the readiness potential was present even before the stimuli appeared on the screen. In other words the readiness potential was present even before the stimuli appeared and when subjects did not make a conscious intention to move. It says quote “Benjamin Libet has demonstrated that the readiness potential precedes the time at which participants consciously decide to perform an intentional motor act, and suggested that free will is an illusion. We performed an experiment where participants observed a stimulus on a computer monitor and were instructed to press one of two buttons, depending on the presented stimulus. We found neural activity preceding the motor response, similar to Libet’s experiments. However, this activity was already present prior to stimulus presentation, and thus before participants could decide which button to press. Therefore, we argue that this activity does not specifically determine behaviour. Instead, it may reflect a general expectation. This interpretation would not interfere with the notion of free will.” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18096261

So this is proof that the brain doesn’t actually make a decision before you do which debunks the determinist claim. However it gets worse for the determinist since even if it was causing brain activity libet responded to his own work as he still held to a belief in free will. He suggested from later research of his own the brain activity would act on its own but the mind had the ability to interfere and veto the buildup or the readiness potential from carrying out a decision. In other words the brain would run on autopilot and carry out task but the mind/self has the ability to interfere by preventing the activity from being carried out. Sort of like how in everyday life we sometimes do things without thinking also think of the analogy comparing the brain to a CD the brain would continue to play on its own until the mind stops it. Libet suggested that there exist couscous cerebral cortex activity that may be blocking or vetoing the volitional process so that no actual motor action occurs. This is called the mind’s ability to “free won’t” and control brain activity by preventing it from going forward. Researchers tested people with OCD and had them engage in mindful attention which over time changed the chemical pathways in the brain and reduced OCD symptoms. The mind had the ability to causally affect the change in the brain. Which is the same thing libet concluded from his own research. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8629886

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9829025

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9709826

https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/db9d/465608bdbf44e1cb2be1704fc80902a4d107.pdf

If the brain was actually causing decisions to be made through the readiness potential (And the supposed evidence for it doesn’t hold up) one could still argue from the research of libet that the mind has the ability to interfere and produce real changes in the brain as a final confirmation on if a decision is to be carried out or stopped. So that refutes the case for determinism and we have proven that free will exist and that determinism is false.   

Part 10: The problem of natural evil

Now that we have addressed the problem of moral evil we are going to deal with the problem of natural evil or in other words evil that take place from natural disasters or infectious diseases. To start off it should be understood that evil takes place when a conscious agent decides to do something bad. So in the case of natural disasters there is no agent doing the “eviling” so it’s necessary to define what we mean by this. If there is no agent doing the “eviling” then it must be something else that is causing it. Well its nature that is causing these natural disasters and diseases. These processes are no more different than gravity and the laws of physics (things that are necessary for our survival) so it would seem that at least some of the natural disasters are necessary to happen for the sake of the planet and life itself and not just humans. Humans are not the only species on the planet and before humans had souls ( before adam and eve showed up) in order for life to develop their were many natural disasters that took place. One example is the dinosaurs when they went extinct because of an asteroid. One other is the cambrian explosion that killed lots of life but ironically without that explosion we wouldn’t be here right now. Without natural disasters the evolution of humans would have been impossible. Another issue is when the skeptic brings this point up they are presupposing metaphysical objective moral values something that is incompatible with atheism. For example if a tsunami hit the state of hawaii and killed all humans on it, it would be wonderful for the marine life since they would have all the food they need since under atheism humans would be no more valuable than animals. The question of pain-causing agents is a much different question. It includes questions like:

1. why would a good god make/allow hot viruses?
2. why would a good god make/allow cancers?
3. why would a good god make/allow hearts that eventually ‘wore out’?
4. why would a good god make/allow mosquitoes?
5. why would a good god make/allow predators (e.g. wolves, bacteria, humans)
6. why would a good god allow humans to make surgical instruments, which have been know to be used as instruments of torture?
7. why would a good god make/allow humans that could turn into agents of destruction and torture?
8. why would a good god make/allow human friendships that can go sour and hurt us so?
9. why would a good god make/allow families, in which so much damage can be done?
10. why would a good god make oxidation processes that, when speeded up, become combustion–fire?
11. why would a good god make electricity, that kills people every year through electrocution?
12. why would a good god allow the 2nd law of Thermodynamics to be (e.g. “things run down”)–(even though it is required for friction to work–such as we use in walking)
13. why would a good god make anything at all–anything of which could be used to do damage to anything else?

 

The insightful person will already see the answer present in the above list–evil is parasitic. It occurs ONLY among the good, and it presupposes a vast amount of good.

The vast majority of things in the universe we already know the ‘reason for’, but there are things that have yet escaped our ‘analysis’. (E.g. we are not omniscient!!!). Decades ago, we did not know the purpose of the spleen or appendix. We branded them ‘vestigial organs’–and causes of ‘unnecessary suffering’ when they went bad on us. We know better today–they contribute vital functions and hormones.

We do not know the reason for hot viruses (and maybe not for mosquitoes), but we must be much less dogmatic and arrogant that we have in the past about these issues.

The net here is that (1) we have a strong need for predictability in biological processes and an ‘early warning system’; and (2)we do not have adequate basis for describing ANY pain as being ‘unnecessary’. Another issue is that death by old age is considered “natural” so is that evil also? Also what about pain itself? Consider the following situations that, taken in isolation from the pattern in which they occur, might be considered painful.

1. muscle soreness after exercise
2. injection of anesthetic before local surgery
3. confusion over a job offer
4. adolescent self-discovery confusion
5. toddler frustration over hand-eye coordination development
6. stress over a difficult work project/school assignment
7. embarrassment, with which the peer or social structures have ‘taught us’ (through censure) not to perform some socially destructive act
8. misunderstanding the words of a loved one (and being ‘hurt’ thereby)

 

How many of these are we willing to call ‘suffering’ although they manifest the same “family resemblances” to the ‘standard’ forms of suffering we have been discussing? If we were to eliminate ‘suffering and pain’ of the ‘standard’ forms, these would disappear too–but these are endemic to our general human progress and state.

My point is simply this: “suffering” is too complex and fuzzy a concept to use harshly as theistic objections. It is so broad that any ‘rules’ we might make would also have negative consequences…it is just not that simple and clear how to turn this into a meaningful objection (without making tons of questionable assumptions and definitions).

So the problem of natural evil once thought through is a failed anti-theistic argument that sadly has been tossed around like it’s an issue. For more information on natural evil here are a few sources (i don’t want to be called a plagiarist so i’m citing my sources of information whenever my words are not my own.) http://christianthinktank.com/natevl.html

http://coldcasechristianity.com/2013/why-would-a-good-god-allow-natural-evil/

So to sum up my refutation of natural evil its good to understand that there are things in nature that need to happen for the survival of human beings as a whole. Some diseases can be caused by humans also like smoking being out in the sun too long, type 2 diabetes caused by too much sugar, obesity etc. in fact most modern day diseases are man made ones. So most of the time when someone got a disease it’s someone’s fault for it so it’s not necessarily agent-less pain. But that’s only for preventable diseases not all disease as a whole. So that ends our examination of natural evil.

Part 11: Summary and conclusion

We have examined the problem of evil by explaining where evil came from, what its solution is and its implications. We have defended the free will defense and proved that humans have free will. We have showed why an all powerful all knowing all loving being can coexist with evil and we have dealt with the problem of natural evil. So the problem of evil CANNOT be used as an argument against christianity and that when you look at God and the nature of reality it’s a weak fallacious argument that fails. Next we are going to tackle the greatest argument against christianity it’s the problem of religious pluralism.

 

#1: The problem of religious pluralism

Introduction

The greatest argument that is a threat to christianity is the problem of religious pluralism. It states that with all the different religions and traditions in the world how do i know that my religion is true and are any of the religions true. This is the skeptics greatest argument and it has caused more christians to leave the church than any other argument. In this document we are going to examine this argument and show why christianity is true, note that i’m not going to be using common arguments that most laymen christians use in answering why christianity is true. That’s because most of the arguments are weak for example some christians will claim that the bible is true because of its prophecies however other religions have prophecies as well thus it does not solve the problem. One thing that i agree with skeptics on is that most religion is completely man made that’s because in their fundamental teachings they all contradict one another so logically most religions are false. We will be looking at the religions God’s, teachings and see if they can fit what we know about reality. For example is it logical for a god to create the universe yet not be all powerful is it logical for pantheism to be true even tho the universe is a hologram. Before i begin keep in mind that we are going to be viewing all beliefs the same and this includes philosophical worldviews as well such as materialism and idealism. We will also be discussing the existence of E.T (extra terrestrials). So join us as we examine this problem philosophically, historically, scientifically, logically and rationally.

Part 1: Are all religions the same?

The obvious answer to this question is no since all religions have different traditions. There is polytheism,monotheism, and deism. Polytheism is belief in multiple Gods, monotheism is belief in one God and deism is belief in a God that is not a part of any religious belief. One of the biggest issues with the problem of religious pluralism is that whenever the skeptic brings this argument up they fail to understand that their are similarities in these beliefs. For example if polytheism can be shown to be illogical and false then all polytheistic religions are also false. So there is a method we can use to determine which belief is most likely true. Keep in mind this document is not attempting to prove beyond all doubt that christianity is true but it’s going to show why christianity is the most logical position to hold to and prove beyond all reasonable doubt that christianity is true. Notice the keyword “Reasonable” so since we have cleared that up let’s begin. All religions have this one thing in common that is that their is something wrong with mankind although different religions have different names for this in christianity this problem is called “sin”. And every religion claims to have a solution to this problem. However in closer examination religion that requires just good deeds and works to get saved and the idea that salvation has to be earned by works alone has philosophical problems. I said earlier in this document on the problem of evil part 4 (The solution to evil) quote “Every other religion on earth teaches that the construct must be fixed from the inside however it’s obvious that it’s logically impossible to do that and it requires someone from outside the construct to fix it. Christianity can be the only logical position to hold when solving the problem of evil.”  i mentioned this because the goal of every religion is to accomplish this salvation and be free from sin (or whatever other name they have for it) but as we can see the only religion where salvation is a free gift from God is christianity and is the only one where the problem is fixed from outside the construct. I will explain this more near the end but now let’s move onto God’s attributes and the nature of reality.

Part 2: The nature of reality and God

  The universe is a hologram and their is much evidence supporting this in physics, https://arxiv.org/pdf/1607.04878.pdf

https://phys.org/news/2017-01-reveals-substantial-evidence-holographic-universe.html

https://youtu.be/QiZLlpqAQ7U

https://youtu.be/v2Xsp4FRgas

https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/0801/0801.0337.pdf

https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1602/1602.07258.pdf

I dont have the time to go over the overwhelming evidence showing that the universe is a hologram so i left those sources so my readers can check them out. It turns out that the “Matrix” movie was right in that we in fact live in a virtual reality and that our universe is not fundamental but emerges from something else. With this in mind the universe being simulated in God’s mind seems very plausible. That’s because from us we are inside a virtual reality which is what our best physics tell us about the universe. With this understanding of God and the universe we have come to interesting conclusions about the nature of reality itself. Now the skeptic might objection that “if the universe is a hologram then it disproves God since we would be in a computer”. well this objection does not work for this simple reason. If we are being simulated by a computer then their world would have to have the same features as ours and be based on qubits and this would imply that they are also simulated and using leibniz law of indiscernibility of identicals it would have to follow that they are also a simulations https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/identity-indiscernible/

If there world needs outside processing then they would need a simulator and so the cycle would go on for infinity but that’s an infinite regress and infinite regresses are illogical. But what if one of the higher levels is not a quantum world but an actual objective world based on classical physics? Well this solution creates more problem than it solves. For a quantum world like ours to be simulated in a computer all of the qubits would have to be unpacked into classical bits and this would require a computer hard drive bigger than the universe itself which would be absurd to postulate and impossible to build and since our universe is expanding then the hard drive would have to expand even more than the universe. This leads us to a different alternative the universe is being simulated in a mind, given the problems for being simulated in a computer one could make a simpler explanation that our universe is being simulated in a mind. A mind has elements of integrated information states and also processes information. And physics in a dream environment would emerge from information processing and therefor look identical to the conditions to our world. A mind does not require matter to exist and in fact matter seems to need mind since this is what quantum mechanics tells us mind is necessary to collapse wave function for matter to exist.  http://www2.mpq.mpg.de/~jkofler/Files/Publications/pnas_110_1221.pdf

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v446/n7138/abs/nature05677.html  

So given the options the universe logically has to be simulated in a mind. Now skeptics will respond that this doesn’t prove the universe is a simulation since we can just postulate the many worlds interpretation however this objection fails since there are many criticisms of the many worlds interpretation since it does not explain the recent discovery of the holographic universe. https://youtu.be/_42skzOHjtA

https://phys.org/news/2017-01-reveals-substantial-evidence-holographic-universe.html

https://arxiv.org/pdf/gr-qc/9703089.pdf   So now that we have addressed this let’s move on to see if the universe is being simulated by one mind or many minds.

Part 3: Refuting polytheism and atheism

Now that we have shown that the universe is simulated in a mind there is an important question we need to ask is the universe being simulated by one God, many Gods or should we just take the position of atheistic idealism. Well the answer is that entanglement and information integration is relative to one’s perspective to demonstrate it will be useful to examine the this famous thought experiment. http://www.iflscience.com/physics/schr%C3%B6dinger%E2%80%99s-cat-explained/ Let’s say we put a cat in the box and a vile of poison in the box we add an atom of radioactive uranium. If the uranium decays it releases the poison and silently kills the cat. Before we open the box and look we can’t actually know whether the uranium killed the cat since its a probabilistic quantum event. Here is the question is the cat dead or alive? Well in quantum mechanics the dead neither nor alive but the sum of the two states. Nothing is certain until a conscious agent makes the measurement since consciousness determines existence. Now here is another question how do i know that i’m alive? The cat and me we are part of the same universe if i don’t know if the cat is alive how do i know i’m alive well in order to avoid infinite regress you have to reach a point where the entire universe is simulated in a single conscious state and their is a way we can know for certain if there is a reference frame which the entire universe is entangled then from that frame everything else must share the same quantum state. The mathematical description physicist use to describe the quantum state but is their a wave function for the entire universe? Well yes their is its the Wheeler-deWitt equation http://aeneas.ps.uci.edu/wheeler_new.pdf

http://aeneas.ps.uci.edu/wheeler.pdf  this defined the wave function of the universe in the process they discovered the universal wave function must have two curious properties firstly it must have an energy value of exactly zero and it must be timeless given that these properties are unique to this equation they provide a way to test the wave function of the universe if timeless is found to cause entanglement then time wouldn’t be fundamental it would emerge from a timeless quantum state entangled by a single universal wavefunction and even if the equation was inaccurate (Since their are some criticism of it) https://cds.cern.ch/record/324729/files/9704061.pdf  this would not be a threat to monotheism since the state would be connected since from the cat experiment there would have to logically be a cosmic consciousness so It would still simulate the entire universe and this proves that the universe is simulated in an omniscient, omnipotent mind. The objection to this is that if God is looking down at everything than the strange rules of quantum mechanics should have never been verified since it’s being observed by God however this objection is a misunderstanding. God is not separate from us since space and time are illusions so there would be no where in space for God to go to so what else would God observe then what we see, consciousness is what is fundamental and it would be dependent on God. God would be observing us having a experience of the physical world so there would be nothing else except the wave function. This destroys polytheism since it’s logically impossible to have two omnipotent minds mainly because one God can create unicorns and the other destroy unicorns which results in logical absurdity and the cat experiment shows that there can only be one quantum state not many so polytheism is incompatible with these results and polytheism is also a huge violation of occam’s razor. And it refutes atheism since atheistic idealism is incompatible with these conclusions from quantum mechanics since the universe would be in one state and not many so this proves monotheism true. After the falsification of atheism and polytheism questions still remain if monotheism is true then which God is the true living God and what about E.T? We will address these issues later but what we know for certain is the old lifeless notion of material atoms and the void is dead replaced by the mental universe.

Part 4: The necessary attributes of God

In this part we are going to examine the concept of God and show that palmitate (weak) panetheism is true and that pantheism, strong panetheism and deism is false. That’s because their are different types of God that have different attributes so we need to show that the God simulating the universe is the God with these attributes. Sources: http://physics.mq.edu.au/~jcresser/Phys301/Chapters/Chapter3.pdf

https://phys.org/news/2015-10-zeno-effect-verifiedatoms-wont.html

http://www.ams.org/notices/200902/rtx090200226p.pdf

https://arxiv.org/pdf/hep-th/0310148.pdf

https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1602/1602.07258.pdf   

Omnipresence– The wave function is everywhere and since it extends throughout all of space then it’s by definition omnipresent

Omnipotence– The self-collapsing wave function can skew its own probabilities via the zeno effect, this is when it can chose its own outcome self-deterministically yet not be predetermined (This is how free will works and it’s the proof for free will), so free will applies to the wave function as well (This also proves that the universe is simulated in a mind) and since the wave function includes all possible outcomes for everything it can cause any outcome it wants at will and therefore it would be omnipotent

Omniscience– To understand omniscience it good to understand that collapse is never complete and when it does become complete we get blackholes now wait doesn’t this prevent omniscience? NO since the bekenstein bound correlates the information content and this gives us the holographic principle and allows us to see all information content derived from what is collapsed and since information exist and is observed by the wave function then God would be omniscient since he would know all the information.

Eternality– Aside from the fact that if God were not eternal then someone or something else would have created him it good to understand that in the Wheeler-DeWitt equation the wave function is timeless and eternal.

Timeless,spaceless and immaterial– Space, time and matter are not fundamental and emerge from the spaceless, timeless, immaterial wave function.

Omnibenevolent and personal– God has to be morally perfect because evil cannot exist on its own and is always a perversion of Good so God must be a God of love for him to exist or create anything. (P1: It is logically impossible someone to be evil just for the sake of being evil

P2: If it’s logically impossible for someone to be evil just for the sake of being evil then it’s logically impossible for evil to exist on its own

P3: If it’s logically impossible for evil to exist on its own then evil is a perversion of good

P4: God is changeless

P5: Since god is changeless and since evil is a perversion of good then god can’t change from good to evil

Conclusion: Therefore it is logically impossible for god to be evil and its logically necessary that god is good

 

We should all agree that the first premise is true since i have already proven this point before so i will just quote with what i said before “ It is logically impossible for someone to be evil just for the sake of being evil in reality we have no experience of someone being evil just to be evil the closest we can get is cruelty but in reality people are only cruel to gain something. Such as power, pleasure or safety but these are not evil they are good to have the evil comes from pursuing them in the wrong motives or in the wrong way. When you examine it evil is nothing more than the pursuit of something good in the wrong way. Now unlike evil you can be good just for the sake of being good you can do a kind act even if it gives you no pleasure simply because it is the right thing to do but no one can be cruel just for being cruel or be cruel without gaining something good. Let’s have C.S. lewis explain “In other words, badness cannot succeed even in being bad in the same way in which goodness is good… Goodness is so to speak itself: badness is only spoiled goodness. And there must be something good first before it can be spoiled.” -C.S. Lewis.” so we can see that the first premise is true and to argue otherwise will result in logical absurdities. Premise 2 is also correct since we have proven that it’s logically impossible for someone to be evil just for the sake of being evil thus it follows that it’s logically impossible for evil to exist on its own. Premise 3 is correct since if premise 1,2 are true then evil is always a perversion of good. Premise 4 is true since god is changeless and god is changeless since he is eternal. Now premise 5 is the one with the most objections it’s questionable if god is good to start but we have proven that good CAN exist on its own without the need for evil. And since evil is a perversion of good and since god is changeless then it logically follows that god was good before evil and since god is changeless then he can’t change from good to evil. This is irrefutable proof that it’s logically impossible for god to be evil and that it’s necessary that god is good.) (I made it small to save space since i’ve already proved this point before)

Since we know that God is all Good then he is also personal because a good God would want to have a relationship with his creation (something that conflicts with deism since the deist God doesn’t want a relationship with his creations). So deism would be false.

Triune– A triune God is a God that is one being in multiple persons and i argue that since God is all loving then he has to be triune since love is expressed by 2 people or more and a triune being has multiple persons in it while still staying one being. So in order for God to logically exist he has to be triune.

After examining all the attributes we have shown that the God that simulates the universe has to logically have all these attributes and the ONLY religion on the planet that possesses all these attributes is christianity and more specifically christian denominations that accept the trinity. These conclusions refute non-triune monotheistic religions (islam, judaism, etc.) since some of these attributes are not taught in those religions. And we have refuted deism since its logically inconsistent with the data (And also the fact that their is no evidence supporting deism). Next we will examine privatio boni and understand why it necessarily shows christianity as the only logical explanation in accomplishing the goals that all religions try to complete.

Part 5: Privatio boni

Privatio boni is the idea that evil is the absence of Good and we have proven that it is true before so i don’t feel the need to go over on why it is true but what does this have to do with the problem of religious pluralism? Well as more proof that out of all the world religions christianity can be the only logical one to hold to. Like i said earlier in the document “We have concluded that the evil in the world can be explained by a conscious state in God’s mind choosing to know the knowledge of Good and evil. Let’s refer to this part of God’s mind as “Primal man”. Individual minds would then exist as subdirectories of primal man, all of these minds would then know the knowledge of Good and Evil and be corrupted by it. However evil being an absence of Good could not be fixed within the corrupted construct. It would be the same as trying to fix a car with only half of its parts. The car couldn’t be fixed doing this. This is the reason why religions that require good deeds and works to be saved is illogical and thus cannot be true. There is only one religion in the world that don’t require Good works to be saved it is christianity” “The only way to fix evil would be to have someone from outside primal man showed up inside the corrupted construct yet was not corrupted by it. Let’s refer to this second hypothetical figure as “second man” and by integrating into second man individuals from primal man would lose the corruption and be saved from the construct of Good and evil. This “second man” is Jesus christ that died on the cross for our sins and came back from the dead. Every other religion on earth teaches that the construct must be fixed from the inside however it’s obvious that it’s logically impossible to do that and it requires someone from outside the construct to fix it. Christianity can be the only logical position to hold when solving the problem of evil.” So as i have said before evil cannot be fixed from inside itself it must be fixed from outside itself and this is the fundamental problem with all religions (except christianity) is that you have to earn your salvation. Now skeptics will argue that isn’t it illogical for God to simply give us free salvation without us working for it? Well the problem with this objection is that when trying to fix something like evil it’s the absence of Good so it can’t be fixed from inside itself it must be fixed from the outside and not only that but people that try to become sinless (or whatever goal their religion tries to solve) naturally will become self-righteous meaning that they will be sucked in their own pride and think they are better than everyone else because they follow their religious teachings. For example in almost all eastern religions they follow this term it’s called asceticism

əˈsedəˌsizəm/

noun

1. severe self-discipline and avoidance of all forms of indulgence, typically for religious reasons.

This includes things like meditation, abstinence from certain things, certain diets even flogging oneself, basically what most people think when they think of religion. The concern with this however is that using this method of achieving salvation (the reason why the religion is successful in the first place) is that even if you did all the practices as good as you possibly could would it actually solve the problem of sin (or whatever name you have for the thing you want to destroy or overcome) in other words what’s the success rate? Do any of these religions actually achieve their goals? Well their is no solid evidence that any of the eastern religious people have achieved their goal of become the “enlightened ones” or something like that. Even among buddhist, hindus and others that have similar religions have disagreements and uncertainties on if anyone has achieved the goals. If this is true then their is no point in following any eastern religion that makes you do these traditions and practices. In islam there is no method where you can achieve salvation and it requires constant repentance and even muhammad himself (The prophet of islam) did not know if allah would accept him into heaven. In judaism also their is no method of achieving salvation although you could receive forgiveness of sins in the form of animal sacrifices. In christianity however it’s different since you don’t earn salvation it’s a free gift from God and good works is the result of being saved by God. So works come in after salvation not before it. So then evil would be solved from someone outside evil and fixing it from the outside. This means that christianity not only has the highest success rate but is also the only logical position to hold because God would be doing something for his creations and would love them so much that he died for them so they could have eternal life. So now that we have addressed this issue let’s deal with E.T

Part 6: Would E.T challenge my religious beliefs?

E.T is defined as extra terrestrial or another word people use is alians. Now i don’t know if aliens exist and i’m not going to say they dont and im not going to say they do but what i know is that if aliens exist it would be evidence against atheism since most evolutionary biologist agree that the evolution of intelligent carbon based life is so improbable that it probility didn’t happen on other planets. So the best hope of their being aliens in the first place is theism because God could create them but on atheism we are probably alone. However since i do believe in God i think it’s very plausible that there exist aliens that are more advanced than us (given the age of the universe). Now since i’ve already falsified atheism and deism i think it’s more plausible that if aliens exist they are religious. Now the skeptic will claim that if aliens are religious then their would be billions of different religious and thus that would make mine far more implausible and it would turn the problem of religious pluralism into the super problem of religious pluralism since instead of a thousand religions their would be billions if not trillion of religions in the universe. Now before i answer the “super problem of religious pluralism” it good to understand my viewpoint. Many christians solely believe on faith and dogma as such aliens might seem like a challenge now my own answer lies in theosophy no not the beliefs Helena Blavatsky and Henry Steel Olcott but rather theosophy with a small “t” by theosophy i’m referring to a comprehensive ontology in metaphysics based on reason to make sense of theological notions. Mainly i no longer base my beliefs solely on faith, growing up i grew frustrated with the lack of reasoning behind what people around me believed. And i’m sure the skeptics and atheist reading this can understand where i’m coming from. I had many questions but weak or most of the time no answers. I almost became agnostic because i had no reasons to believe in christianity and i was going to de-convert and call religion irrational and foolish and so i tried to make sense of it all. After rejecting dualism, accepting idealism and studying christian scholarship and apologetics i succeeded. How can i be so sure that christianity is true even if trillions of religions exist in the universe? Well i can derive my christian beliefs from my theosophy mainly the concept of original sin, sin itself (the curse), the knowledge of good and evil, salvation by grace (saved by grace through faith) the need for an external savior all of it can come from these simple things i discussed earlier. The things i discussed in the attributes of God (Part 4) and privatio boni (Part 5) and some of the other things i discussed in this document. And finally the simple fact that the resurrection of jesus and the events described in the bible has overwhelming historical evidence to back up its claims. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1mr9ZTZb3TUYymBPce08oyuhnHLLkR_B

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1mr9ZTZb3TW70EEo4e2onJ4lq1QYSzrY

http://www.eerdmans.com/Products/0396/on-the-reliability-of-the-old-testament.aspx

Now skeptic will respond that maybe aliens caused the supernatural events in the bible however there is no evidence for that hypothesis and i’ve already addressed why God would have to exist and have the attributes i mentioned earlier so this counter-argument is bogus. And not only that but their is no evidence that aliens out their have the same exact beliefs as christians and even if they did it’s possible that it’s the same God just different planets or something like that. But either way we cannot use that hypothetical scenario as an argument against the truthfulness of christianity.  

Concepts in christianity in why there is evil

 

• “Primal man”= Adam

• “Knowledge of Good and evil” = Da’at

• “Corruption of the individual”= Yetzer-hara (“evil Impulse?Internal manifestation of Da’at)

 

The bottom line is that my beliefs are not threatened by “super problem of religious pluralism” i know why i believe what i do and those reasons are not contingent on a lack of E.T and/or other religions beliefs and claims that are not part of christianity.

 

Part 7: Conclusion

We have examined the problem of religious pluralism and shown why christianity has to be true and that all other worldviews fail to account for the nature of reality. We have even addressed the existence of aliens and shown that it doesn’t threaten christianity. We have given the evidence for a God and given evidence of its attributes and shown why religions without any of these attributes have to be false. Now as i said in the beginning i’m not proving beyond all doubt that christianity is true im proving beyond all reasonable doubt that it’s true.  Meaning that it’s reasonable to believe it’s true but i’m in no way saying we can know for absolute certainty that it is true. So that concludes the problem of religious pluralism

 

Final conclusion

In the document we have shown why the problem of unanswered prayer, the problem of god’s hiddenness, the problem of evil and the problem of religious pluralism CANNOT be used as arguments against christianity. So when all is said and done do skeptics have any more excuses? I think that we have cleared out most if not all objections to the truth of christianity. Now like i said before this is not absolute proof of christianity as absolute proof would bring no purpose to free will and other issues. Just think about it and have an open mind about this document because i know that it will change people’s thoughts and beliefs. Have you accepted jesus as your savior? I hope you have and if you have not then please do that before it’s too late. Their is a God that loves you a God that is triune and unique and you will have reasons to believe in your new faith. For Jesus Christ is the truth and he died for you just think a God the creator of the universe died for you there is no greater love than that for nothing is greater than God. Anyways thanks for reading and i hope that you open your heart out to jesus christ.

John 14:6 King James Version (KJV)

6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

 

One of the positions on philosophy of mind is property dualism. This is somewhat in between substance dualism and materialism since it says that although there is one kind of substance (The physical kind) the mind is a separate property from physical property. So to make it simple only physical substance exist but there are two properties in this substance, physical properties and mental properties. So then there would be no interaction problem between the mental and physical and so this bypasses the problem that refutes dualism. So I am going to show why property dualism is absurd and respond to some defenses that property dualist have made in the past

The first problem is that it still faces the problem of what I call true scientific knowledge. Basically if our perceptions want to logically relate to an outside world then the outside world science studies must also be defined in mental terms and thus science can only be logically possible if idealism were true. Under property dualism the outside world is still material and so it cant be studied scientifically since we can only study science through our mental perceptions since everything we interact with is on a mental level only and you never see material objects themselves only the qualia or feeling of material objects which can only be mental if you want to study the outside world. So then in order for science to be possible the outside world must be mental and if the outside world is mental then idealism is true. Its basically a bare assersion to say material or physical things exist if its impossible to ever verify their existence and like i said before for science to work our perceptions must logically relate to an outside world and that is only possible under idealism so then property dualism is completely ad hoc and we can explain the world without any physical substance.

The second problem is that if we were to assume property dualism there must be some epistemic link between material and mental properties nut both of these things are disconnected because of the subjective/objective gap so this basically is similar to the interaction problem but instead of physical interacting with the mental the properties are interacting on the subjective/objective epistemic level.

The third problem will be a direct argument against property dualism that I was able to get from Johanan Raatz and inspiringphilosophy

P1) If solipsism is conceivable, then the universe could exist such that only mind exist in a possible world

P2) Solipsism is conceivable

C1) Thus the universe could exist with only the mind in it

P3) Universes can not only consist of properties or processes, but must also include entities and things for the properties to glue themselves onto

P4) There is no difference between a solipsistic mind and a mind in the actual world

C2) Thus the mind cannot be a property or a process but rather must be an entity

Now someone named Eclectic media on YouTube (a property dualist)has made some defenses (or objections) which i will address here

Defense/Objection 1: P1 is false because conceivably doesn’t entail possibility.

Response: This objection doesn’t work because its logically possible for solipsism to be true so then its true in some possible worlds. To refute P1 you would need to show why solipsism is logically impossible in all possible worlds but this cannot be done.

Defense/Objection 2: The universe cannot exist with only a mind since a possible world could be actualized and can only exist in fact and fact is objective but the mind is subjective

Response: This objection also doesn’t work since a mind can be objective if its the only thing that exist. Thats why we have objective idealism where there exist an objective mind. And besides we can know for absolute certainty that our minds exist objectively because of Rene Descartes “I think, therefore I am” since we can doubt everything except our own minds so we know for absolute certainty that our minds exist objectivity even if we cant know if anything exist beyond our minds.  And as I’ve mentioned before in order for our senses to logically relate to an outside world the outside world must be mental. So once again the objection fails since we cannot doubt that our minds exist.

So property dualism is totally absurd and is not a smart alternative to idealism. I may talk more about property dualism in future blogs to address objections or defenses that property dualist have made but that will be for later.