 Everybody, today we are debating whether or not there is proof of Christianity and we're starting right now. We're at modern day debate. Our goal, our vision for this channel is that we would give everyone an equal shot to make their case on a level playing field. In other words, we're nonpartisan and we wanna be as fair as possible to all parties. And we are a nonpartisan channel. So in other words, we don't have any videos other than debates. It's all debates and we wanna let you know we hope you feel welcome no matter what worldview you come from, no matter what demographic, we're glad you're here and very excited. If it's your first time here, consider hitting that subscribe button as we have many more debates to come. We are very excited as David Smalley, the, you could say leader or the founder of Dogma Debate which has been around for a way longer time in modern day debate. He will be debating philosopher Randall Rouser. So that should be a good atheism versus Christianity debate next week. And with that, wanna let you know this one is gonna be a fun one, folks. We have tonight two very veteran debaters. These guys have been around in the game debating, collecting experience for a long time, collecting skulls that they just kind of like run through a rope and kind of carry along with them. So it's gonna be a lot of fun. Wanna let you know first, if you're listening and you're like, hmm, I like that. I wanna hear more. Well, you can hear more of both of these guys cause I put their links in the description box for you folks. And also wanna let you know today's format is gonna be fairly flexible. And by that, I mean, it's basically going to be like, you could say maybe 10 to 12 flexible minutes for opening statements followed by open conversation and then Q and A. So if you have a question fired into the old live chat tagging me with at modern day debate and then super chat is also an option. And if you do super chat, you can not only ask a question, but if you'd like, you can make a comment toward one of the speakers that they of course would get a chance to respond to. And then it'll also push your question or comment to the top of the list for the Q and A. So we're very excited gentlemen, just wanna say thanks so much for hanging out with us. Matthew and Mr. Batman, it's a true pleasure to have you, just thanks for hanging out with us. Thank you. Thank you very much. Absolutely. And so with that, we will get the ball rolling with Mr. Batman, taking time for his opening statement. The floor is all yours. Thank you, sir. Appreciate it, James. Again, my name is Jim as well, but everybody knows me as Mr. Batman. I've been a Batman collector for well over 50, well, 40 years, almost 50 years now. My wife's name really is Robin. So it is a sickness of mine, I must say. So together we are Batman and Robin. Now I am what's called a Torah observant Christian. I'm a proclaimer of the Messiah and a destroyer of false worldviews. This is what Mr. Batman do. See, I understand that the word of God is the perfect and near and inspired word of our creator to us, his creation, so we can know things to be true. You see, this also gives us a foundation for science because I love science. I'm a teacher and I love to teach the very basic fundamentals of the scientific method. In order to have the basic fundamentals of the scientific method, you must have things such as the uniformity of nature. The uniformity of nature is the fact that all of the physical world works under uniform law-like patterns. We call these uniform law-like patterns natural laws, like laws of gravity, magnetism, thermodynamics, and many, many more. These can only be explained by an eternal universal and unchanging lawgiver God. His name is Yahuva Yahweh. You might know him by his Greek name, Jesus. Now, I'm gonna point out that we all have different areas where we have faith in our life. Now, I'm gonna use a particular definition of faith. That particular definition of faith is, faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. This would be Hebrews chapter 11 verse one. That type of faith cannot be had without the God of the Bible. I'm also gonna point to the fact that in order to know anything to be true at all, then you must have the Messiah. You must have Jesus in your life. The reason being is because in John 14.6, Jesus declares himself, he says, I am the way, that is the direct article, the truth, truth by its very nature is exclusive, and the life, there is no life without him and no one comes to the Father except through him. Now, also we have to understand that he is actually quoting the Old Testament when he does this. When he's saying this in John 14.6, he's actually quoting Psalm 119 verse 160 and other places where it says the sum of, that would be all of it, the sum of your word is truth and all of your righteous rulings endure forever. And this is why we can have natural laws in the physical world that do endure forever. Now, some of the other things that we're gonna allude to, by again, looking to science is the fact that we have life. Life itself comes from a living creator God. God is eternal, universal, non-changing. He's also a living God and he created us to know him. Knowledge is another thing that cannot be justified without the God of the Bible. Now, I don't know how much time I've used so far, but that's pretty much the whole crutch of the situation is that without God, without the Christian God alone, you cannot know anything to be true. You cannot do science. You cannot justify the real world in real time. You can't justify where matter, time, space, any of those things come from. You bet. Thanks so much, Mr. Batman. We will kick it over to Matthew Steele. As I mentioned, folks, both these guys, tons of debate experience. Matthew Steele, you've been around since, would it be fair to say you've been in the debate world and probably both of you actually, since the olden days of like Potholler and like G-Man and Nephilim Free when they were like the big dinosaurs on YouTube debating these things. The way that Mr. Batman explains that he's been debating for practically the entire time that I've been alive. So I am definitely relatively speaking a spring chicken in comparison, but I have been in the YouTube. Did you just call me old? Relatively, relatively speaking. You know, I am an atheist, so it's relative, right? So I've been around for about eight years, nine years, something like that in the community. Back and forth a bit more active other times than not. So I will say that Mr. Batman and I had a good call on discord, I believe it was last week when we were discussing what we would have this debate about and between that conversation and Mr. Batman's opening statement, I think I have a good grasp of where he's coming from and given that he does his best to spread the gospel and spread the good news every chance that he gets and the fact that I live in the South and I've heard it all many more times than I can count. I have heard the good news. I have heard the gospel. I have had preachers sit me down with them in private in their own church, take my hands and deliver me the good news directly. I have however been an atheist since I was old enough to tie my shoes. And that's I think the real sticking point here where we start out. Now, one of the things that Mr. Batman said was that for anything to be true in your life, you have to have Jesus. Now, I understand that the Trinity, the idea of the Trinity, how you have three but one at the same time is still nebulous and falls well within the range of God works in mysterious ways. And the mystery of his nature is not something that he needs to share with us according to Christianity. However, my understanding of the reconciliation between the Old Testament and the New Testament is that the covenant that Jesus brought provided a way for people to ascend to heaven, to sit with him and be with God and not separated from God. Now, for that to work, we would have to be born with some aspect of knowledge of the world around us before we are able to reconcile our own image in a mirror. So if we are able to understand something about the world around us before we hear the good news, that implies that we have the ability to have knowledge before the good news. Now, that doesn't mean that our worldviews are justified. That just means that as a baby, as someone who is two years old, say, who has never heard or understood the word Jesus, they are able to have knowledge. Now, they have to grow up and figure out how to justify their worldview just like everybody else. And Mr. Batman argues that the only way to eventually do that is through the Bible. I think that's fair to say. Can you just give me a head nod if you would agree with that, Mr. Batman? Yes, sir. Okay, good. So that's where I start from in my position. So taking this, and I appreciate that you're a teacher and both my parents were teachers, my wife used to be a teacher, my best friend, negation of P is also a teacher. So I'm going to use this as a prop to help explain my separation, if you will, from the way you see things. Okay, so I bought this just for you, by the way, Mr. Batman. I bought a magnet of Mr. Batman just for Mr. Batman. So we're going to start on this side right here with Mr. Batman, just for you. And here I am, Hydra, the evil atheist, on the other side. All right, so so far, as I was just saying, we're starting out before the good news, both of us having positions. Now, you add the good news of Jesus to that. And that is with the addition of the Bible, the full reconciliation of the Christian worldview. So my problem with this is there are too many unjustified presuppositions in that position for me to accept. Now, an unjustified assumption is how I define a presupposition, it's something that is intrinsic to your argument, whether or not it's spoken in the premises, it is still present in what you're assuming. So from Mr. Batman's position, atheists are assuming things like the uniformity of nature, logic, mathematics, all of these things that are necessary to our comprehension of reality, they're all necessary for us to make sense of the world around us. So why do they make sense? According to the Christian, it's because of the Bible. However, there are two main presuppositions that I contend you have to make and hold which cannot be justified without assuming them arbitrarily. One, dualism, that the mind is separate from the body, that we are not the same thing as our body, that we have to start with a separation of the self from the world. So where does that start? If we are an infant that is just learning to walk and just looking in a mirror, they have something called the lipstick test where the infant turns into a toddler and eventually around 18 to 20 months, they are then able to reconcile that they are themselves in the mirror because they see that is on me. They're no longer reaching at the mirror, they're reaching at themselves, they recognize that is me. So up until that point, they are not able to recognize themselves as an individual entity, which leads me to believe that is a clear chain of evidence that without other evidence of a separate quality of humanity, we are still literally the universe. We are not separate from it, inhabiting it, we are the universe. Therefore, there is no separation of how do you establish knowledge because we are the universe knowing itself. That's what we do, that's our function on this earth and that is what makes us special as people. Now, the other presupposition that's being made and this one's a little tougher because it's a little more detailed, but it's Platonism, abstract entities existing wholly independently of the mind. Now, it's one thing for them to exist as concepts that we can refer to, numbers in mathematics because one of the things that we discussed in our Discord call, Mr. Batman, was this, Godel's incompleteness theorems. Now, there are two of them and I'm surprised that she didn't bring that up in your opening statement because you said that it is foundational to your position, to the justification of your position. Now, I understand that that isn't necessary for expressing what you believe, but it is necessary for justifying what you believe. Now, for us to be able to conceptualize that there is a sum total of all that exists and there is something which can exist outside of everything that exists materially, we have to assume that there can be something immaterial, that it can exist without material. So for that to be possible, logically possible, we would have to be able to say with some degree of certainty that there is an end to all that exists in reality. All that we have access to in our universe is space, time, and our observation of it and our cognitive faculties. Now, we don't know what's past that. We cannot say that our universe is all that exists and we cannot say that it's not all that exists. We can say that we know that it exists because we are the universe. There's no separation between us and it. It is the same thing. We are the same thing arranged in such a way that we identify as individuals in it. So we are basically allowing the universe to create points of reference for itself to identify and navigate and we individuals are unique in that ability. And that I would argue is such an important quality of the universe that it is inherently important for the universe providing an origin for value. And that's my position. Radical, thank you very much. And one thing I will mention just before we go into the open conversation is if you, let's see, if you happen to have ear plugs, Matthew, so sorry that I didn't mention this beforehand. If you don't, it's not a big deal. Oh, you've already got them in. That's the thought we were hearing in Echo, but maybe it's even my imagination. With that, let's jump into the open conversation. Thank you guys so much for being here. The floor is all yours. Okay, super. And I wrote down some notes of some of the things you were talking about and we'll go back to the gospel part of it because I would really like to get your understanding of what the gospel is because having been a Christian for nearly 40 years, most people don't understand it the way they really should. Now, you actually did bring up Godel's and completeness there. I mean, yes, it is a very important tool, but it's not the foundation. The foundation of the entire argument is truth. Jesus is the truth. Now, in order to know things to be true, you need to have certain aspects of the physical world. Truth is that which comports with reality. Truth is that which is real in the real world in real time. That being said, in order to know anything to be true, then you have to have time, space and matter. That's how we know things to be true because that's where we witness these truth statements going on is inside of time, space and matter. But not only that, but you have to be able to identify what something is that you are trying to declare as truth. And that requires laws of identity, non-contradiction and excluded middle. Now, these laws are very important to us and they must not change over time. The law of identity states that A is A, something is what it is and it cannot be what it is not. It has unique and exclusive properties that make it uniquely, exclusively and immutably what it is. So if we have these laws and these laws are not only necessary for our, hmm, I watched this one off, not only necessary for our mental capabilities, but it's also necessary, a prerequisite for the physical world to have functionality because without the law of identity, this is why I love science. Without the law of identity, you don't get very important things in the physical world, like classifications of things, categories and labels. So when we're thinking about classifications of things, in order for your senses to work, in order for you to be able to proceed the external world around you, you must have these classifications of things like a photon, that's a classification of thing. And that, if you don't have classification of thing, that means you don't get to have some very important thing called laws of cause and effect. Now, when we look at this, the classification of thing called a photon affects another classification of thing called a retina, sending another classification of thing called a signal to the fourth classification of thing called your brain. Now, without the law of identity preexisting the physical world, then guess what? The physical world doesn't work because it has to be there before any of these things will function. Not only that, but we can prove that the laws of logic actually pre-exist the physical world, that's why they're called metaphysical laws, the least of which, not the least of which rather, would be the fact that in the beginning of all times, based on the matter, in the beginning of the cosmos, the cosmos could not have both existed and not existed at the same time in the same way. See, this would violate the law of non-contradiction. So we know that, again, that law must pre-exist the physical world. We also know that everything, and again, this is the second law of thermodynamics known as entropy. We also know that everything in the physical world is decaying over time. Everything's going from a state of order to disorder, from workable usable energy to no workable usable energy. This is also called thermal equilibrium. So, since everything in the physical world is decaying over time, it's dying, then the physical world cannot be the cause or the source of these laws that the physical world needs in order to function that do not decay or change over time. So, my question would be, where do these laws come from? What causes them to be? Now, not only do we have laws of logic, which is the necessary precondition for intelligibility, reason, and functionality in the physical world, but you'll also have other cosmological constants. These cosmological constants are such things as the strong and weak nuclear force, the force of gravity and the force of magnetism. These particular constants are finely tuned within one billionth of one degree of accuracy in order to allow functionality in our physical world. If they are not tuned to exactly where they are, then functionality in the physical world doesn't happen. Not only that, if they ever change over time by any degree of accuracy whatsoever, then functionality ceases to be. So, once again, these laws prove that there's an eternal, universal, and unchanging lawgiver God. Now, you also mentioned knowledge. Okay, go ahead, sir. Yeah, I just wanted to take that in a segment. Sure, go ahead, Nick. All right, there are only a couple of things in there that I think need a response, aside from my opening statement. The second law of thermodynamics applies to a closed system, does it not? Actually, it works equally well with a closed or open system, because in any system whatsoever, the second law of thermodynamics works. Now, if you have a closed system, then what you have is you must have a pre-existing system in place. Or excuse me, if you have an open system, rather, you must have a pre-existing system in place to harness that energy to put it to use. Let me go ahead and give you an example. If you have an open system, such as, let's say, our planet is an open system taking in energy from our sun, if you have that energy coming into that open system and you don't already have a system in play that can harness that energy and put it to you, such as plants use chlorophyll and photosynthesis to actually turn that sunlight into sugars so they can grow, then all that's gonna do is cook your matter. But even in an open system, energy is still decaying over time. There are certain systems that can overcome entropy for short periods of time, but even those systems inside the closed system will, even in an open system, will decay over time. Now, you also have to agree, since you've already mentioned, that we do not know what is outside of our physical universe. Then by definition, our physical universe, the entirety of it would be a closed system unless you're gonna say something's coming from outside of the physical universe into it. I don't need to say that something is coming outside of it. I only need to point out that we don't know what its limits are and therefore we can't state definitively whether it is an open or closed system. So bringing up the second law of thermodynamics doesn't really apply with what we know about the physical universe. Yes, it works within the system that we know, but we obviously are just finding out a lot of the aspects of cosmology that explain how our universe works in the area where we are, but even the Big Bang determines what happens to what exists after it explodes. It doesn't have anything to do with where it came from. Therefore, where it came from is something that may very well be beyond our ability to comprehend. Yes. What exploded to give you the Big Bang? A tightly compressed, compacted, basically everything that exists in our observable universe in a small area because what we consider to be solid is actually mostly empty space. So when that empty space is not there, you can put an incredible amount of mass into the same small area. So where that came from, we're not able to determine and that is where the science comes in, but this still, yes. You said we are not able to determine, sir. That's actually an argument from ignorance. I would request that you don't do that. You can say you don't know, but you have no clue what I know. As a matter of fact, I know the living God. The living God tells us that in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Everything works under a cause and effect relationship. Now, since we know, and again, what you're talking about is something called a singularity. And the reason we have this particular theory called the Big Bang is because Edwin Hubble discovered the expansion rate of our universe in 1929. And when he did that, Einstein actually had proposed something called the steady state universe because he didn't like the thought of a beginning. So the fact of the matter is, we do have all this evidence that we see around us. Science, actually that word there means knowledge. It doesn't deal in what we don't know. It deals in what we do know. Science is a methodology to test the things in the real world in real time. It's called operational science. Now, the reason that they had to come up with this is because now they've got this information of all this matter of the universe expanding outwards in all directions simultaneously. Now, again, if you extrapolate that backwards and you go backwards in time to the distant past, then you have what's called the singularity where everything comes into a single dense point of mass. Okay, but wait a minute. The first law of thermodynamics states that matter and energy cannot be destroyed. Go ahead, sir. No, that's actually the second law of thermodynamics. But however, that says nothing about the total state of all that exists that says something about the system in which we can perceive that we exist. System. Yes. Okay, the system that exists. That system that exists, time, space and matter. Yes. We exist inside of that system. That system functions in a particular way. In the beginning, again, this is Genesis 1.1. Again. James, Jim, can I just say that I'm perfectly happy to let you witness to me. If you could just wait until the end of the discussion to do that, I would appreciate it because we're short on time and I will stay and listen for as long as you like. But sir, I'm not just witnessing. I'm actually validating my position. I know, but I'm still trying to respond to the first point that you made 15, 10, 15 minutes ago. So you're still by saying that there must be a lawgiver outside of the universe, outside of all that exists. You're stating that we can comprehend that there is an all that exists. We might not be able to do that. They theorize in quantum mechanics that I understand and I'll be happy to respond to that in just a moment because the problem is you just drew that circle and why did you draw that circle? Because it is your comprehension of what could be the case that does not justify what is the case. That is what could be the case if you could draw a circle around it. You have not justified how you could do that. Okay, sir. Once again, Godel's incompleteness term. We're gonna look at the circle of everything that is time, space and matter. And we're gonna put time, space and matter in our little circle. And we're gonna explain everything that's in the circle while staying inside the circle. Now, if you can stay inside the circle and explain time, space and matter and everything that makes it work, how it got there, why it works the way it does and what it's contingent upon and guess what? You have natural causes and you're done but you know what? You can't. In order to explain time, hang on a second, sir. Hang on a second. Do you agree that time, space and matter had a beginning? No. Okay. What about the second law of thermodynamics? It tells us that everything is decaying over time. It's called thermal equilibrium. Have you ever heard of the term called heat death? Yes. What do you think about that? That applies very well to the system. The universe as, okay, maybe I should clarify because it seems to be something that we're not. I should have just stated this at the outset. By universe, I mean the totality of all that exists and can be demonstrated to exist anywhere. Cosmos. Not just 14.5 roughly billion years ago, everything that exists everywhere in any matter, in any way that does not in any way limit to space and time and matter. How do you know that? That also includes quantum particles. Are you talking about these quantum particles that come into and go out of existence? Quantum mechanics does not limit itself to space and time. I'm sorry, James, did you say one second? I just wanted to be sure that Matthew got to finish this point and that promise will come right back to you, Mr. Batman, just because there's a lot of context for him to try to rebut. Right, I'm just saying that space, time and matter are not the totality of all that exists materially. And nor can we say that they are just because they're all we observe about reality. Dark matter, for example, we do not observe. We observe as absence. There is clearly much more to what exists materially than we can say we know. Therefore, we can't rationally draw a circle around all that exists and then justify something that is outside of that. That is two steps away. And besides, we are the universe. Therefore, we are part of this cosmos, just to refer to the observable universe. We are it. So we are eventually going to die a heat death, but that doesn't mean that the matter, space and time that we observe is a closed system by itself. If I may, I believe you said that I started off with some unjustified presuppositions. I have that here in my notes. As a matter of fact, I would have to say that you have quite a few unjustified presuppositions. Would you agree? I do have, I think to be fair, everyone has presuppositions. The point of my position is to minimize them as much as possible and remove them whenever possible. Okay, but if I may, you're actually using unjustified presuppositions in order to say that the science doesn't work. Now, we witness the second law of thermodynamics. We witnessed the first law of thermodynamics that matter and energy cannot be created nor destroyed, it can only change form. Now, wait a minute, since we know that everything is dying over time, everything in our physical world that we observe. Now, sir, I don't care about what you don't observe and I don't care about quantum because guess what, I've discussed that as well. The fact of the matter is, things do not pop into and out of existence. They pop into and out of, they pop into and out of your perception. That's it. Again, it's called the observer problem. But once again, you're still using unjustified presuppositions by stating that everything just is. Now, wait a minute, if you're saying that we are the universe, now in the second law of thermodynamics, everything's going from a state of order to disorder. What caused the atoms in this universe to conglomerate into a particular irreducibly complex system called human beings? We don't have a theory for that. Oh, I do. You have a presupposition for that, but not a theory for that. Actually, I do have a theory for that. And I can prove that using science because we have what's called irreducibly complex systems. These irreducibly complex systems include our circulatory system. I happen to know a little bit about mine because I've had a heart attack. Don't recommend that for anybody. But anyway, the heart is a very amazing thing. It's a pump made of meat and it actually pumps your blood through your veins and arteries every single year to the tune of 700,000 gallons a year. Now, guess what? This thing runs on pop tarts and donuts. We wish we could make something like that. So excuse me, not only is the heart irreducibly complex, but you have the heart, you have the veins and the arteries, and you have the blood. The blood itself is also irreducibly complex. So what evolved first? If, again, you've got this system here, the heart, the blood, the veins and the arteries. Which one of those things evolved first and how do you know? Okay, so you're trying to determine or help show me where my particular unjustified assumption is, my presupposition. And okay, so let's just, for the sake of brevity, we've both been doing this for a long time. You can ask me directly, make the point that you want instead of trying to leave me with questions in a sporadic way. Let's just condense the debate then and state outright what you think my specific presupposition or presuppositions are that I cannot, according to your view, justify. You can't justify anything. Okay, then that's because you're assuming that knowledge is immaterial. No, sir, knowledge is a justified true belief. In order to know anything, you must have the material world. Knowledge is a justified true belief. You could believe that there's pink unicorns on the dark side of the moon. That doesn't make it knowledge. It must be true and it must be justifiable. If I was to tell you the road outside of my little apartment here, the speed limit is 35 miles an hour, but I could be wrong. Do I know it? Okay, so I think this, it behooves me to remind you that according to the Bible, we all are born with knowledge. And according to you, the way that you've been arguing and the way that we've been discussing, as far as you're concerned, everything that I say to justify my own position is basically me suppressing my knowledge of God in favor of my unrighteousness. So you are already granting me knowledge. You say that I have knowledge. What you don't like is that I don't agree with this. No, sir. What I don't like is your lack of justification, your unjustified presuppositions. But I do have knowledge according to you. Yes, sir, you do. But you can't justify that knowledge. Just like you can't justify morality. Just like you can't justify where laws of nature come from. These are unjustified presuppositions on your part. Now, once again, we're talking about the biological system of the human body. And we talked about the circulatory system, the circulatory system in its own right. Each part of it is irreducibly complex. And I apologize about the train. Again, not only is the circulatory system itself irreducibly complex, but here's another part of the problem for you, sir. And this actually points to a loving, living, logical creator God. And that is that circulatory system is interdependent on other irreducibly complex systems. Because in order for that circulatory system to work, you must have the respiratory system. That's where the oxygen comes from and the carbon dioxide goes out. In order for that respiratory system to work, you must have the muscular system. In order for that to work, you have to have the skeletal system. In order for that to work, you got to have the nervous system. And I can go on and on and on. The fact of the matter is the entirety of our physical body proves a loving, living, logical, lawgiver God. Which again, you're trying to use unjustified presuppositions to say there's no such thing and know how no way do I need no God. That question was just to establish that you acknowledge that I do have knowledge. Oh, yes, sir, you do. Everybody does. Everybody knows that. Let me go ahead and say something real quick to justify that. I'm gonna justify my position with scripture. For what can be known about God is plain to them. Who, you and me, everybody, for what can be known about God is plain to them. Why? Because God has shown it to them. Namely, His eternal power, His divine nature. Hold on to this one. His invisible attributes have been clearly perceived, clearly seen ever since the creation of the world and everything that has been made. So the you, sir, have no excuse. This is Romans chapter one, starting at verse 18 through 22. Now, again, great. I'm glad you do because this is my foundation for everything. Jesus is that foundation. Go ahead, sir. Just to truncate all of this. In your position, I have knowledge. In my position, I have knowledge. You are not going to agree with my justification because you have more or different presuppositions than I do. I'm not going to be able to convince you. I'm not gonna be able to convince you. And my standard of which is a better explanation is a limitation of unjustified presuppositions. I fully acknowledge that I am presupposing as an axiomatic belief that I am the universe. I am made up of the same things as everything else. Therefore, I am not acknowledging and knowing something else. I am knowing myself. Therefore, I exist. So are you dying over time? Yes. Great. The universe dies over time. Everything in the physical universe dies. Now, sir, what caused you to be, what caused you to be alive? See, we have another one of these pesky natural laws that never change over time. It's called the law of biogenesis. All life only comes from previous life and it only reproduces according to its kind. What caused the first life, sir, and how do you know it? See, if you're gonna appeal to the universe, you are automatically appealing to evolution. Did I mention I'm a science teacher and I'd love to demonstrate to you how that doesn't work? I don't see what anything of this has to do with me being the universe. Why do I have to justify myself to myself? I exist. Yes, you do exist. But we see that everything decays over time. Everything's going from a state of order to disorder. That means you started off in a state of least entropy. That's the whole universe did. Started off in the state of least entropy possible. And now it's winding down to the state of maximum entropy. Again, this is called heat death. You agreed with this. So once again, since everything is changing over time and it's going from that state of order to disorder, then you've got to justify what caused everything to be. If you're gonna declare that we simply are and that you're just a pile of atoms that happen to miraculously, you believe in magic, miraculously come together and make you multiplicity of systems that function the way they do. Well, I've got a question for you. Where's your evidence for that? Where's your science for that? Because see, I love science. And the Bible gives me the ability to do science. You said you have unjustified presuppositions. Yes, you do. I don't, sir. I'm not a presupposition list. I think we talked about this in our little talk before. I'm what's called a covenantal apologist. I don't simply presuppose things and start there arbitrarily speaking. You're an atheist. You can start anywhere, but I don't do that. I have a covenant with the living God. And you matter of fact, you mentioned that earlier and I'd love to talk to you more about what a covenant is. Go ahead. Okay. I just like to reiterate that the covenant with Christ the absolution of sin is not a prerequisite for knowledge. Would you agree with that? No, sir, I didn't say that. You didn't say that. I know, I'm just asking if you agree with that statement. That's all. I'm not asking, this is not a true question. You do not agree that it is necessary for a thinking person. No. Okay, so you're saying that a thinking person has to know Christ personally to have knowledge? No, sir. You already know Christ. You are built in with that knowledge. Okay, sir. Here's the problem. Here's the problem with that. You don't understand what a covenant is. A covenant is a promise from God. That covenant is Genesis 8, verse 22, Hebrews chapter one. It talks about how God promises us things such as the uniformity of nature. In Genesis eight, it says there will be seasons and summer and winter and all these things are going to continue on until God brings everything through to its fruition. Again, that's Hebrews chapter one. Now, I know why things are going to work the way they do because God promises us these things. Now, when you said you understood the gospel, it's obvious that you don't, sir, because the gospel is not simply except in Jesus in your mind and you get to go to heaven. No, sir. No, it's repentance that the original Greek there is Metanoia. The Hebrew is Teshuvah. It is actually knowing that you are a sinner and that knowledge only comes because of your relationship with two types of revelation. There's general revelation, which everybody has and that's the entirety of the physical world. You know the physical world and because you know the physical world, you have no excuse but knowing that there's a creator for the physical world. You know that you had a beginning and whatever caused you to be must be a living being himself. I wanna, all right, so let's give maybe like a few minutes for Matthew just to be sure that plenty of time to try to address as much as possible. So I will repeat. Okay, just for one, just I wanna repeat, respond to the irreducible complexity idea. If you have a system that has many, many, many moving parts, many, many, many interconnected parts that make a greater system. You're assuming that the point of all of those parts is to create the end system. If you take away one or two of the parts, it makes a different system. That is not as complex but still a system. Say you take away 90% of those parts, you have a much less, no, you have, with all due respect, Jim, you have talked much more in this debate than I have. Okay, I will gladly see that back in just one minute. Sure. The fact that you don't, okay, so we started out both of us as children. We, according to what you just said, we started out as children with knowledge of the natural world, which then needs to be justified to have a consistent belief system, which you believe leads directly back to the Bible. Now, we know for a fact that Jesus, if he was exactly who he says he is and exactly who the Bible says he is, only lived 2,000 years ago. If he only lived 2,000 years ago, what about the people who lived before him? They knew different versions of theology because we are problem-solving creatures. And the way we think and the way we reflect on what we observe leads us to hope that there is a larger explanation for everything. And that is why we come to different conclusions about it. So the only way to narrow down those conclusions to the correct one is to use as you unjustified beliefs as possible as a tool of critical thinking. Yes, sir. And I'm not using any unjustified beliefs, sir. I have a justification for every statement that I make. This is why I love Jesus because he is the truth. Now, once again, sir, you said if you take out one part of the system, the only thing you have is a less functional system. We were talking about the circulatory system. No, I didn't say that. I said you have a different system. Okay, let me ask you a question then, sir. If you were talking about the circulatory system and you take out the heart or the blood or the veins in the arteries, does that system function anymore? I have no reason to believe in a system like that would ever develop. Great, sir. Then what caused it to be to begin with? So your only concern is ontology. No, sir. My only concern is science and your unjustified presuppositions. I'm pointing out that these systems must be there and complete or you don't have the ability to have life in the body that you claim happens to be made up of the universe. And we don't disagree on that. Okay, sir. So once again, you're saying, I don't know. Is that correct? No. So you do know where these things come from. What do you mean, these things? Where does these irreducibly complex systems like the circulatory system, the respiratory system, the nervous system, what caused them to be? Sir, where do they come from? Because sir, we see that these things decay over time. Are you familiar with a term called genetic entropy? Because not only does entropy work on our physical world, it works in our genetic world as well. With each and every generation, we pass on mutations to our offspring. Those mutations build up over time and every mutation is a reduction of information and functionality. Now, I would love to get you to answer me this, sir. Is what powers this evolutionary process that gave us these irreducibly complex systems to begin with, where did they come from? Because sir, this is the whole point. I'm pointing out that in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. That's a scientific equation that we were not even aware of until the late 1920s. So what causes life? What causes these irreducibly complex systems? Because we know that they don't happen by themselves. We have these laws of nature called the law of biogenesis that states that all life only comes from previous life and that life only reproduces according to its kind. Since we are temporal life, that is, we had a beginning and we had an end, whatever caused us because of the law of cause and effect, we're in effect and every effect must have an adequate cause. Whatever caused us temporal life must be eternal and a living being. So again, just looking at cause and effect, we can look at time, space, and matter. Whatever caused time, space, and matter to begin to exist the way it does is a timeless, faceless, immaterial, all-powerful, all-knowing, loving, living, logical, lawgiver, God. His name is Yahuva, Yahweh, Yeshua. You might know Him by Jesus. I understand and all of that is founded on the presuppositions that I've already mentioned. No, sir. It's actually founded on evidence, evidence in the real world in real time. Now you have presuppositions, unjustified ones at that. Now, I would love to talk to you more about this necessity. You said, these things are necessary. Now would you agree that these systems that exist in our bodies, such as the circulatory system, the respiratory system, and the nervous system, they are absolutely necessary to our functionality, not least of which would be in our brain. In our brain, we have more communication systems than there are stars in the Milky Way galaxy. You have the transmitter neuron, the receiver neuron, and the synapse in which the signal is sent across. Which one of those evolved first, and how do you know? I would be remiss if I didn't point out that this is starting to appear more and more like a Gish Gallup presentation. I'm sorry, sir. I'm just pointing out that I'm staying on the biological function of the body and how it was created by a loving, living creator God. Because these irreducibly complex systems do not increase in complexity over time. They decrease in complexity over time. That's called genetic entropy. You might want to look that up. Okay, we'll give Matthew a few minutes, and then we'll kick it back over. I would just say that I've spent a long time starting with the assumption that I'm guilty of a lot of things, a lot of the problems in my life, a lot of the mistakes that I've made. I even typically take on the guilt of what others have done rather than assign them blame for what they've done. It's not in my nature as a person to shirk responsibility that I actually hold. If I thought for one minute that any of what Mr. Batman is saying about the Bible and the Jesus that he describes, if I thought for one minute that was coherent, I would admit it. I would accept it. I would have accepted when I was eight years old and I was asking questions that the pastors could not answer. But I've been looking ever since, and all I find is people who have presuppositions that are unwilling to acknowledge them and therefore remain believing what they believe. Although my position has changed, especially since I've been talking to Christians more times than I can count, and will continue to become more accurate, but until the idea that something can exist intelligently outside of the material justifiably, rather than just simply as an assertion is presented, my position is more reasonable than Christianity. Okay, sir. If I may, you said guilt, responsibility. These would be moral claims, moral statements. Where does morality come from? The value of the individual mind. Okay, sir. Let me ask you a question. Is it always going to be wrong to be a liar? No. Okay. How about being a pedophile, sir? Is it always going to be wrong to be a pedophile? This is again derailing the discussion. Actually, no, it's not, sir. It is actually, yes. Okay. Look, the thing is, you and I can, we can talk about the core issue. You and I are experienced debaters. You can just get to the direct issue instead of asking over and over side issues. You say you're getting to it. Why not just do it? I am, sir, because I'm pointing out that every single thing that I've asked, you said, well, I'm just presuppositing, I'm starting with a presupposition. Your presuppositions are unjustified. Every single thing I've asked, the basic question, the answer to the questions I pose, you said, I don't know. Now I'm asking you about morality. You said it's not always wrong to be a liar. Where does that knowledge come from? Because I'm gonna tell you that we are, it's always wrong to lie. It's always wrong to steal. It's always wrong to be engaged in sexual immorality, such as pedophilia. Now, again, sir, where does your morality come from? How do you get a moral ought or not from just the universe of physical world? So you're saying that I can't derive an off from an is? That's correct. So you're saying also that there ought to be a mind behind everything. When we're three or four or five years old, you figure there ought to be a mind behind everything. Therefore, there is a mind behind everything. And that makes the Bible align with what you believe instead of accepting that you have unknowns, you can't explain. I can't explain them, sir. I don't have a problem explaining them. Not correctly. Again, I'm actually, oh, I'm sorry, sir. How did you know that? Because you cannot even tell me where your morality comes from. You can't even tell me where the functionality of the physical body comes from. Now, you can't tell me where time, space, and matter comes from, even though you acknowledge everything is decaying over time and you had a beginning and you will have an end. So something costs all these things. I'm sorry, no, it's actually pointing out that everything in the Bible is true. Christianity is true. Truth by its very nature is exclusive. I can't help it, sir. That's just the way it is. Now, the fact of the matter is, if you're gonna say that we are nothing more than a conglomeration of atoms, we're just molecules in motion, then what difference does it make? If one pile, and again, if you're gonna declare that we got here by evolutionary process, that means we're nothing more than evolved pond scum. What difference does it make if one pile of evolved pond scum eats, kills, or rapes another pile of evolved pond scum, no matter how old it is? Again, sir, it doesn't matter in your worldview. You have no basis for morality. It's called subjective morality. Based on you, the subject, you could change your mind at any time. You might actually think it's wrong to be a pedophile today, but you could change your mind and be a pedophile tomorrow. Now, sir, this is called subjective morality. I can show you scientifically, even when I was an atheist, I had a reason why it's always wrong to be a homosexual, a pedophile, a necrophile, or a bestial file. I'm sorry, I would tell you when my magic eight ball says better not tell you now. It literally says that. Yes, sir, I know that. But in order for you to see that, you'd have to use the law by identity, which you can't justify where that comes from, either. The law by identity, non-contradiction, and exclusive middle. Yes, I can. Please, are you trying to uniting laws of law? Yes, I can. Let's hear from Matthew on how we can. Yes, let's hear that. How we can is that those laws are descriptive of that which exists by minds that exist within that which exists. You have to demonstrate that a mind can exist outside of that which exists, the full extent of which you can't justify. Therefore, your position is not justified. You hold presuppositions you will not acknowledge. Actually, no, sir. In order for you to actually make that claim, in order to actually make that claim, sir, you would have to say that those laws of logic come from your mind. Do they come from your mind? I don't have anything else to add, James. I've already said all I need to say. Okay, well, I'll add one last thing. Yeah, I'm sure you will. Because if the laws of logic come from a mind, then they must come from an eternal, universal, and unchanging mind. Because those laws of logic are eternal, universal, and unchanging. So guess what? You've just made my point for me that these abstractions of a mind must come from the mind of the living God, which you know and reject, sir. Now, I'm also gonna point out to you that you don't understand the gospel. The gospel is not simply just believing in Jesus. Just forgive me if we can come back, I promise. It's just that there are a lot of points that, just to be sure that Matthew, if you felt like you've had enough time to address each. Everything that has been brought up by Mr. Batman, every objection by Mr. Batman, it's hard to explain the full scope of Platonism for someone who doesn't adhere to it. Because for Mr. Batman, this means it's him, but it's not. It's just a magnet that matches his name. That is not Mr. Batman, that's a magnet. This is a magnet. That's not me. This is just a magnet that I bought. I bought all of this on Amazon just for this debate. All of this stuff represents our discussion. It is not our discussion. It describes our discussion, just like the laws that you're talking about, describe that which exists. So the laws of logic are only descriptive. Is this correct? Yes. Excellent. So if the laws of logic are only descriptive, can you create a one-ended stick or square circle or a married bachelor? I can state those things, even though they're incoherent and don't match. Of course I can't create them. Things that exist have not... Then guess what? Then they're not simply descriptive. Because if these laws were only descriptive, then guess what? You should be able to create anything your little heart contends and then be able to get these laws to describe them. But that, yes it is. I mean, your whole argument is incoherent, sir, because you're using laws of logic which are eternal, universal, and unchanging to say, guess what? These laws of logic are not eternal, universal, and unchanging. You're using air while saying there is no such thing as air. Do you see a problem with that? My source to say no. And actually you're using that magic eight ball while you're actually using the law of identity to identify that eight ball, using the law of non-contradiction to actually compare and contrast it with the things that are not on that little board behind you. I'm sorry you wasted your money on those magnets, sir. Oh, I didn't. I'm gonna use them. I didn't waste any money. I wouldn't have bought it if I thought I wasn't gonna use them. I actually like Batman a lot. And I think this is awesome because I love Cthulhu. Cthulhu is one of my favorite fictional characters, just like Batman. I'm glad, sir. Outlook good. I'm good, James, whenever you wanna go to questions. Gotcha. With that, given that, so out of curiosity, just to flesh this out, well, I suppose Matthew, if you're feeling good, we can go to the Q and A if you'd like. So we will jump into these questions, folks. Wanna say thanks for your questions? I will mention as we are transitioning into the Q and A that if you haven't heard, modern day debate is invading the podcast world. And so if you haven't looked for us on your favorite podcast app, hey, feel free. And if you can't find us on your favorite podcast app, let us know. We'll work to get on there. We, I think, I have to find out if we're on Pandora yet, but we've been working hard to get on every app that we can. And so with that, thanks for your questions, folks. We are going to jump right into this. Let me just pull this up. So wanna mention, as I had noted before, each of our speakers' links are in the description in case you didn't know that. That way, if you're listening and you wanna hear more, you easily can hear more by clicking on those conveniently placed links. So thanks for your super chat. First one comes from nasty guy, Steven Steen, says, James looking crisp tonight. Thank you. Is that the new slang? I don't know. I guess. Nelogical, plausible, soyable. Thanks for your question. Says, don't miss the after show on Smokey Saints channel. We will link, ideally we always ask guys before the Q&A, but we will link anybody's after show. If they ever have an after show, whether they be atheist, Christian, agnostic, you name it, just let us know. iPhone music. I'd be happy to debate any of those guys, but it's gonna have to be at least two or three at once because they, if I'm gonna take that much smugness at once, I just wanna be prepared and just hit it all at once. And all of their arguments sort of need to be addressed at once. So, three or four of them at once would be good. If you wanna set that up, James, that'd be good. Me or negation at P is happy to debate like at least three or four people at once. Maybe, well, one thing, we used to do like what we called lion's den debates where it would be like one on three or one on two. We haven't done it in a while. We're like, ah, I don't know. Chat, what do you think? Chat, if you wanna give us feedback on whether or not we should bring back those lion's den debates. I would love that. Handicap matches we've also called them. Otherwise, another possibility is maybe a tag team, maybe with Smokey and Mr. Batman or Smokey and Maddox against Matthew Steele and negation of P. That could be a cool one too. So, thanks for your question. Thanks for your support, by the way. Nicholas Whitmire says, hit that like button. Appreciate that support and your positivity. Next, iPhone musings, thanks for your super sticker. Appreciate the support. Nicholas Whitmire, thanks for your super chat, said, abstracts exist. We are subject to them. Mere concepts can be manipulated, but factual abstracts cannot. They cannot be manipulated because they exist. I don't know who that's for. By the way, yeah, Mr. Batman, I know you're new here. I always put some stink on these super chats as I read them. So I promise I do it, I'm so good. I'm happy to address that. There's nothing wrong with abstracts existing in a system where minds exist to communicate them. You just have to justify that a mind exists outside of such a system. Then if an abstract can still exist outside such a system, you've got something. Otherwise, there's still just descriptions of that which exists. Ah, and that's why I say what I say, that again, these abstractions of a mind must come from an eternal universal and changing mind. That's why these laws of logic don't change over time. That's why laws of morality don't change over time. This is evidence, again, being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. I'm certain of these laws of logic. I'm certain of where they come from. And that's why I wanna introduce you to Jesus when we're done here. Gotcha. And thank you for your question. This one comes in from logical, possible, soilable. Says, I think James is getting jacked on soyroids. I think he's calling me a beta. T-Torch and thanks for your question says, missing science knowledge, therefore God is a leap. I think that's for you, Mr. Batman. They're saying that you're using the God of the gaps. Actually, there is no gap. In order to have knowledge, you must have a justified true belief. Justification is your chain of evidence and you must have something that founds that ultimacy of reality. That ultimacy of reality is God himself, the God of the Bible. It says, the sum of your word is truth and all of your righteous rulings endure forever. This is why we have laws that endure forever and do not change over time because they come from a law giver God. Without that law giver God, you don't have natural laws so you can have cause and effect, physics, mathematics, logic. That's not a leap of faith. That's just observing the evidence, time, space and matter had a beginning. So that means a timeless, spacious, immaterial creator God. Gotcha. And thank you for your question. This one comes in from Jungle Jargon. It says, Matthew Steele, are you aware that we're all dying and we all need a savior? Are you aware that only your maker can remake you again? I am aware that many people believe that, yes. Gotcha. Negation. I am aware that we're all dying. Yes. Gotcha. And negation of Pee, your twin brother, Matthew. The man who introduced us to Matthew, you guys remember negation of Pee's and on a number of times also goes back to the. He actually officiated my wedding last year. Are you sure? Really? Oh, that's so cool. Wow. Okay, you guys really are close. Negation of Pee stoked to hear from you. He says, could you please state all the laws of thermodynamics? By the way, I'll double my donation to James if you can name them in less than 30 seconds. They're putting the pressure on you. They're trying to freeze you, Mr. Batman. So, there you go. No, I don't teach ultimate science. I teach just elementary science. And so I just need to know the basic laws of thermodynamics, the first law of thermodynamics to say it's a matter of energy cannot be created or destroyed or the second law of thermodynamics, which all times, space and matter is going through that. Everything is going from order to disorder. Yes, I understand that there are four, but those are the two basic ones that we see. They're the most well-established fundamental basic laws that we have, besides cause and effect, of course. You could have pulled up Wikipedia. He would have doubled the superjet. Okay, just kidding. Bob LeBlanc, thanks for your question. He says, Mr. Batman needs to stop gish galloping. Looks weak. Oh, well, I'm not gish galloping. Everything in the physical world is evidence for a loving living logical law giver God. So if I go from one position to another, it's because that is more evidence for God. There's nothing you can point at in the physical world or how the physical world works that doesn't prove the God of the Bible. Gotcha. And I love that with all of these, all of these offensive, not offensive, but you can say direct super chats. Mr. Batman, I can see it just like water off the duck's back. You were not easily flustered. You've been in the game a long time. So thank you for your question. This one is from T. Torchon. Thanks for your question. It says, everything you say about your God can justify any God of any religion. Actually, no, it couldn't because there's only one truth. Truth by its very nature is exclusive. Jesus said he is the way, the truth in the life. Since we know that truth by its very nature is exclusive, then guess what? There's only one law giver God. That's the God who created. That's the God who redeems. That's the God who promises us things in his scripture. That's the one that gives us prophetic natures such as we know things in advance. Do you know the name of God? Yahweh, the Yod-Heh, Vav-Heh, and Hebrew literally means behold the hand, behold the nail. That's 7,000 times in our scripture before they knew about crucifixion. Behold the hand, behold the nail in the name of God. Gotcha. Thank you. Next, thank you for your question. Nasty guy, Stephen Steen, he's back. He says, second Hezekiah three, two through seven, answers all of Matt's arguments. I will have to read that. It's been a long time. Because I'm not familiar with that section. I'm pretty sure that's a made up. I don't think there is no second Hezekiah. I was beginning to wonder about that myself. I'm like, am I that old? Did I forget something? Let's see. I don't have all of the books memorized, but I was pretty sure that I wasn't familiar with that one. So that makes sense. I think that was right next to second opinions. There we go. Hey, that was good, OK. Stupid whore energy strikes again. She is in the house. That's her moniker on YouTube. That is not my name for it. She says, the simplest animals don't have hearts. More advanced organisms have various kinds of pumping organs. Brains probably evolved first, then the meat pump. Oh, that's interesting. Did you know that bacteria is the simplest life form that we're aware of? Even bacteria is irreducibly complex, because bacteria must be able to use the law of identity to identify its food source, comparing contrast it with things that are not its food source, like its own body mass. That would kind of be a problem if it turned on itself and ate itself. Then it also has to be able to know, or to be able to have a system in play to remove the waste from that system, from gathering the energy in. And then it has to have enough knowledge to know when it has enough energy stored up so it can go through a process called mitosis and reproduce. So if you don't have all three of those systems in play, at the same time, you don't have living bacteria game over. Gotcha. Thank you. And I love it. What's the name of your cat, Matthew? I don't think that's, well, he goes by Louie as an actual name, but I don't think I ought to repeat what I usually call him. We appreciate that. Next up, thank you for your question. Again, stupid horror energy says corals and jellyfish don't have brains either. Neither do bacteria, but they still able to use the law of identity to identify their food source. They also have chemical reactions and chemical compounds. These are laws of chemistry. Where do those come from so these bacteria can identify their food source and actually process the energy to make it useful energy? Next, T. Torjahn, thanks for your question, says cause and effect. Who created God's special pleading? Actually, time, space, and matter had a beginning. So just looking at that evidence of time, space, and matter, whatever caused time, space, and matter to begin to exist did not need time, space, and matter to cause time, space, and matter. So that, by definition, means that whatever caused it is timeless, spaceless, immaterial, all powerful, all knowing, a loving, living, logical, lawgiver God who doesn't change over time. And I can prove each and every one of those scientifically. Next up, Bob Loblong, thanks for your question, says, Mod, you're doing a bad job stopping the gish gallop. I guess he thinks I'm a beta. This tree, thanks for your question, says, how does Mr. Batman know this timeless, spaceless, immaterial being uses the he, him pronouns? Oh, that's good, because that comes from scripture. You see, God is the Heavenly Father. He sends us the prophet that we must hear and obey. This is again, Deuteronomy chapter 18, and we call him the son. It says so in Psalms, the very first part of Psalms, it says, you better not mess with the son, you better kiss him or he's gonna send you straight to hell. The fact of the matter is, the God of the Bible is a loving, living, logical God, and love is sacrificial. Love sacrifices its own desires and wants for the benefit of the other. See, this is another thing you cannot explain without a loving, living, logical, lawgiver God. Where does love and communication come from? Because love is other person focused. Communication is other person focused. And we already mentioned the brain and how many communication connections there are in the brain. I just like to say that the idea of God getting offended because somebody presumed his gender is just ridiculous. Gotcha. And thank you for your question. Negation of P says, LOL in all caps, exactly as I predicted. Mr. Batman, if you are going to use something you might want to at least be able to state the law. Here's another 10, just because James is awesome. Appreciate that kind support. Mr. Batman, you have a critic. Negation of P is coming after you. Thank you. I'm glad that he's helping you out in the process. That's what it's all about, my friend. But the fact of the matter is, if I can't state all the laws, I'm gonna go ahead and tell you, I've had a brain injury and my brain injury causes me to forget things all the time, but I can still identify laws that don't change in the physical world over time, such as laws of thermodynamics, laws of logic, laws of mathematics, laws of chemistry, laws of physics. These laws are necessary in our physical world and they must not change over time because if they do, then we're not gonna be here to complain about it. Where do those come from, Mr. Negation of P? I would love to hear your answer on that. Next. Oh, that's right. Gosh, sorry. For some reason I was thinking of Matthew as negation, but Billiards, thank you for your question. If we have consistent laws in God, huh? He didn't like being called negation of P, dare you? Oh, dare you. Yes. So you got Mike Billiards, thanks for your question, says if we have consistent laws and God makes the law, what happens when God changes her mind? Sounds like Mr. Batman can't rely on laws of reality. Oh, actually, you cannot justify where miracles come from without an eternal universal and changing lawgiver, God. There's certain laws that God created, such as laws of biology, such as laws of entropy. God created those laws of physics to dictate how the physical world works. And this is something that we need to have. Now, in order to have a miracle, you have to have the ability to set that law aside, such as a miraculous birth or somebody coming back from the dead. This is God setting aside a law he created in order to make himself known to the physical world. That's not a problem in my worldview. But what God cannot do is he cannot violate his own nature. These would be laws of logic. God cannot violate the laws of logic because they are his attributes or his properties, as we mentioned in Romans chapter one, starting at verse 20. Gotcha. And thank you for your question. I had missed this earlier. Adam Albilia says, please tell Mr. Gish Gallup to stop batmaning his interlocutor. I like that. Well, me being Mr. Batman, I'll tell you right now, Mr. Batman is the world's greatest detective. This is why I love science. But Mr. Batman has no qualms with beating people up either. Like you, Mr. Matthew. Next up. Spear itself. Thank you for your super title says, James still keeping sexy alive. I appreciate that. That's as I always say, Bob the Postman from Alabama. He's a tremendous guy. So Spear itself also says, Mr. Batman's overuse of sir is a crutch. Actually, it's me coming from Eastern Kentucky. At least I'm not talking like the rest of my kin down there, dude. Like Steve and Steve, I know what you're talking about. Next up. 24, thanks for your super chat. That Batman, if God acts in accordance with his nature, how can he claim with certainty that his reason and logic weren't granted by a more supreme being? Because he's the only being that it does exist in that realm, that eternal realm. See, God exists in unity, in diversity. This is why we can justify such things as love and communication. God does not need a justification for his knowledge, but we need that ultimate justification. God knows all truth propositions. God's attributes are eternal, universal and changing. That's why laws of logic are eternal, universal and changing. So once again, God is the only God that exists in that particular format. Gotcha. And thanks for your question, Brian Stevens. Missed out on this earlier. He said, for Mr. Batman, you mentioned the quote, law of biogenesis unquote, given this is a law, what scientists or scientists created this law? Please give me names and citations, preferably. Absolutely, certainly. That was actually discovered, it wasn't created. Laws are not created by man, they're discovered by man. This particular law was discovered by Louis Pasteur. Louis Pasteur gives us something that we like a lot, if you like milk, it's called pasteurization. He actually came about this particular law by trying to disprove something called spontaneous generation. All that's on Google, Google's your friend. Gotcha, next up, thank you for your super chat. This comes in from Kent Hovind's CPA. I don't know if that's his real CPA, but says $100 to Mr. Batman, if he can prove he has a four year degree to teach school in the United States. Well, I don't. Gotcha. I'm what's called auto-didactic. I'm completely self-taught. Now, I passed all the requirements for teaching in the state of Indiana, and you can check that out yourself. The fact of the matter is I'm completely self-taught. Gotcha. And Ms. Tree, thanks for your question, says, love and communication come from he slash him pronouns. Got it. I think they're being sarcastic. Mmm, probably so. Next up, Phillip Sirvaniak. Thank you for your question, he said, can both of you steel man the other person's argument? What is steel man? Like, represent it in the strongest way you can. It's the opposite of a straw man. Ah, gotcha. Would you like me to go first or do you wanna go first? Please do, I need a demonstration. Oh, it's very simple. You've already stated opposition that is true. So if your position is true and everything does come from the Bible, and I am indeed a sinner who is doing everything they can to suppress the truth of the Bible and knowledge of God, in either consciously or subconsciously, the interpretations differ, but I am doing that in one way or another because of my free will, and it's because I can't help but sin. And that means that you're right. So that's how I steel man your argument. Okay, and my steel manning the argument, I've learned something new every day, even old turkey like me. Anyway, steel manning your particular argument would be stating, okay, if your particular position was correct, then we should be able to see life coming into existence from non-living matter, and that life actually increasing in complexity over time, and we don't. Gotcha, and Red Knight 821, oh, go ahead. I just wanna say that that's not actually steel manning. Okay, I'm not explaining. It just means you're not finding holes in the other person's position until you state it that it is correct. Not trying to find out that it's correct, but start from the position that it's correct and then go from there. See, I just can't do that. Sorry. That's Red Knight 821. Thank you for your question or statement. It says, thank you Batman for the Yahweh name origin tool, and thanks James for these debates. By the way, passing the thanks forward to the speakers, they are the lifeblood of the channel, we appreciate them. With that, they asked, what seems better, a meaningless existence or a loving God? I think that they're challenging you, Matthew. What seems better? I think that depends on your values. It depends on what you value, and I think it would be better if there was a loving God. I think that would be great. I think that would really be satisfying and fulfilling for there to be a loving God. Gotcha. And Brian Stevens says, please Google, biogenesis is a belief, not a law. Oh, great. Since we actually, again, I mentioned, I'm from Eastern Kentucky, I've been around farms. We've never witnessed life not coming from previous life. We've never witnessed anything reproducing according other than its kind. So if you're gonna say that that is not the case, show me its contradiction. Gotcha. And awesome. AL360 says, that's before the Bible, where did we get knowledge? Mm, knowledge only comes from God. All the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden in Yeshua Hamashiach alone, that's Jesus the Messiah. It says, again, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge. That's Old Testament and New Testament. The Old Testament is the New Testament concealed and the New Testament is the Old Testament revealed. They validate one another. Gotcha. And thank you for your question. This one comes from dearest friend, see, David Langer. Thank you for your question says, for Mr. Batman, did God have a choice in how the universe was created? Yes, he did. He chose to create it good. And no matter, in fact, when he looked around his entirety of his creation, he said, it's very good. So he chose to create it that way and he chose to create us in a particular way in his image. That doesn't mean we look like God. I know I'm that good-looking people think that I am God, but please don't mistake me for that. The fact of the matter is we are created in his image to know things, to have knowledge, to have free will. God chose to make us so we could choose to obey him. Jesus said, if you love me, then you will obey the commandments. That's an if, this, then that statement. That's logic. Can I just add that if God is good and created everything very good, then everything that exists is good? It was. Everything. It was. If something could be created that isn't good, in which case he wouldn't have done it because it doesn't reflect his nature. So everything that exists has to be good unless somebody else created it. Not anymore. Because see, when you look at the Bible, it actually tells us that when God created everything good, he gave us the ability to choose to obey him and he gave us every good thing. This is in the book of Genesis. And then Adam and Eve chose to disobey the loving living God that they knew intimately. And you know what? Why do we call it the sin of Adam and not the sin of Eve since she was the one that supposedly did something wrong? It's because Adam was standing right there and didn't stand up for his wife. And as a matter of fact, God even says, because you listen to your wife, so men don't listen to your wives, because you listen to your wife, I'm gonna curse this planet, an entirety of the universe actually. I wasn't, what I'm saying is that everything that's happened serves God's will and is therefore good. Everything has happened according to his plan. Therefore everything that has happened has served his will and is therefore good. Everything is under God's control. There's his permissive will and his prescriptive will. Now, God permits you to be a sinner, but that's not good, sir. It's not good for you to be a sinner. God wants you to not perish, but all to come to everlasting life. So again, sir, this is your choice. And matter of fact, God gives us whole chapters on this how what good is, good is to obey the commandments. God says, I'll bless you going in, bless you coming out, bless your kids, bless your house, bless every place your foot lands, if you'll keep the Torah, if you'll obey the commandments. He also gives us a whole chapter on what'll happen if you don't. He'll curse you going in, curse you going out, curse your family, curse every place your foot lands. The fact is, sir, you cannot define good without looking at the Bible and its laws because the Torah is our school master, says so in Romans. Oh, I wasn't disagreeing. Just to be sure, let's see. With that, next question, appreciate it coming from Awesome A1360, says, for Batman, how can you demonstrate God caused the singularity? Oh, he didn't cause a singularity, sir. I don't believe he caused everything at a certain point and it all expanded outwards and then we all evolved from that. That's theistic evolution. God created everything in a specific format. Now, again, he created that. It says in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. This is a scientific equation that's in the beginning time, God, the agent behind the creation, created the heavens, that space and the earth, that's matter. Now, that's really cool, but guess what? You look at verse two and it says, the spirit of the Lord was hovering over the surface of the deep. This is another one of those deep dive studies. If you look at that word hover, that's actually the word brooding and we don't understand what that is because it's a farming term. It's what hens do to their eggs when they lay them. So in verse one, God creates all time, space and matter and in verse two, he gives it all spin because brooding is what hens do to their eggs. They warm them and spin them, warm them and spin them. So again, God gave everything spin in verse two. You don't know that unless you do this deep dive study and this is the way God created. Gotcha. And thanks for your question. This one comes in from Matthew Edelstein, says, here's a question for Mr. Batman. Do you have any reason for why your God is more probable than some supernatural force of nature that provides for all things? Oh, I love that one. Cause you know what? Now we're going to look at both the first and the second law of thermodynamics together because since matter and energy cannot be created nor destroyed, they can only change form. But we know that all matter and energy is decaying and we will have something called heat death. Everything's going to end at a certain point. That means that something caused everything to be and then stopped its active creation. If all you had was an impersonal cause we should see matter and energy coming into existence all the time because then you can only have an impersonal effect. But we don't see that. We see that God caused everything to be and then he stopped his active creation. He created everything in six literal 24 hour periods. We call those days. He rested on the seventh literal 24 hour period. We call that Sabbath. We call that conglomeration of days a week. So this proves a personal loving living logical lawgiver God from the first and second law of thermodynamics. Gotcha. And Andrew Gapps, thanks for your questions. Can we see your education degree, Mr. Batman? I've already said I don't have one. Gotcha. I'm autodidactic. Fear itself, hopefully I'm pronouncing that right says it's Earl the postman, James. Thank you for reminding me. Oh man, but he looks like a Bob. I don't know. All right, thank you so much. Want to mention, before we do wrap up folks, couple of things. One, as I mentioned, both of our guests are linked in the description. So if you'd like to hear more, you can. Also, very excited folks, as we have a lot of big debates coming up, right now we are in talks with a number of people including Dr. Hugh Ross, from Reasons to Believe, possibly coming on for an alien, basically a debate on, is there anything to alien abductions? So that should be an interesting one. Also Erika Gutsick Gibbon, YouTube's favorite daughter. We were expecting her to come back this Friday and I'm currently, we've almost got her new opponent. Originally it was gonna be Maddox, but we might actually have a new opponent for her. And I promise this new opponent, we haven't had them on a very long time. It's going to be a treat. I'm really excited for that. So with that though, want to say thank you so much, Matthew and Mr. Batman. It's been a true pleasure to have you guys. We really appreciate you coming on. And yeah, just thanks so much for being here. Thank you very much. And I want to say thank you, Matthew. It's been a very interesting discussion. And I know it would be when we had our little talk on Discord. Thank you very much again. And thank you James for having me on. I really appreciate this. My pleasure. So let me just quick check. Otherwise I will get, I will get totally lashed and beaten if I miss any of the super chats that might have come in while I was speaking there for that last minute. So peaking and want to say absolutely thank you. And we have caught up with all the questions. So thanks folks. Tomorrow night we will be having, oh, this is going to be a juicy one. Whether or not there is systematic anti-white racism. So Armin Navabi, the CEO of Atheist Republic, the biggest atheist group on Facebook on the planet will be here. He'll be debating Brenton. So that should be fun. So I want to say thanks one more time. We hope you guys keep sifting out the reasonable from the unreasonable and take care everybody.