Truth Decay part 1

Part 1 of 2 of a lecture entitled "Truth Decay" by Dr. Doug Groothuis, Professor of Philosophy of Religion at Denver Seminary.

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• Denver Seminary
• Doug Groothuis
• philosophy
• religion
• truth
• ccu

[DougGroothuis]

For more on this topic, see chapters six and seven of my book, Christian Apologetics (InterVarsity Press, 2011).

[DougGroothuis]

For more on my thinking on this topic, please see my book, Truth Decay (InterVarsity Press, 2000). I do not ignore criticisms of my views or simply presuppose Christianity. I give a full-orbed defense of Christianity in my next book, Christian Apologetics (InterVarsity Press, August, 2011).

[erlybird3122]

Doug, "Dr." Groothius...of course your "philosophy" will stand up to "criticism" if you IGNORE the criticism.

Your first criteria (and first mistake) for anything to be "true" is that is qualifies as "biblical". Climb out of the painted box you live in and join the factual world.

[Entropy56]

Further, Doug said Van Til taught, "There is no epistemological common ground [between the Christian and non-believer]."

But Van Til did teach that the "point of contact" is that all humans are made in the image of God and thus have an innate knowledge of God. The natural man suppresses that knowledge.

From "Testing Worldviews:

Defending Christian Faith, September 21, 2004"

Doug needs to go to the woodshed and learn his chops and quit misrepresenting people with whom he differs.

[Entropy56]

Doug misrepresents Cornelius Van Til by saying,

"[Van Til] is whacky on this; he thought the law of non contradiction was a human construct and didn't really relate to God."

However, what Van Til actually said was that the use of logic is inconsistent and subject to limitations in finite man, but the laws of logic do exist consistently and necessarily in God himself.

From "Testing Worldviews:

Defending Christian Faith, September 21, 2004"

[Entropy56]

Doug is not a presuppositional apologists, even though he presupposes some basic truths as part of his apologetic foundation. But the Bible is not one of them.

He said, "The Bible is a hypothesis."

He said, "I think there are good and sufficient reasons to believe in a creator who designed the universe who is the source of the moral law without appealing to the Bible, as the Bible being the foundation."

Defending Christian Faith, September 21, 2004; Truth and Knowledge by Doug Groothuis

[Entropy56]

37:35 Doug quotes some Atheist saying, "Language cannot communicate objective truth." But not all Atheists say that. The question is how language can communicate transcendent truth. Transcendent truth is by definition not objective, so Doug has to rely on revelation - which is subjective. The Van Tillian apologist has to ultimately justify his subjective faith in God by showing the "impossibility of the contrary." Van Til and Greg Banhsen knew they were also in the same box as the Atheist.

[MDMEsq]

One of the best young teachers today. This is one of his better talks.