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Archive for the ‘Philosophy’ Category

Scripture or Science?

Posted in Philosophy, Theology, tagged , , , , , on 8 October 2009 | 6 Comments »

A commenter (Keith) on my earlier post on the historicity of Adam poses a good question:
Can you comment on the broader theological/hermeneutical/epistemological issues here?
Let’s assume the following for the sake of discussion: (a) there are strong textual (referring to the whole Bible) reasons in favor of a historical Adam; (b) the textual evidence isn’t a [...]

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The Arminian Cause

Posted in Philosophy, Theology, tagged , , on 13 August 2009 | 5 Comments »

This post serves as a follow-up to my last post, in response to the comments that my new Arminian friend posted here (on-site) and then here (off-site). (Since he goes here by the username ‘Arminian1′, I will use that name below.) I’m not going to respond point-by-point to his second set of comments, because (i) [...]

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Arminianism and the Paper Trail of Prophesied Prayers

Posted in Philosophy, Theology, tagged , , , , , on 6 August 2009 | 20 Comments »

This is a follow-up to my earlier post, in response to some comments.
To recap: on Justin Taylor’s blog, a commenter called ‘Arminian’ took issue with an article by John Piper by contending that Calvinism is incompatible with the claim that our prayers can be “genuine causes” of God’s decisions about how to answer those prayers. [...]

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Piper on Predestined Prayers

Posted in Philosophy, Theology, tagged , , , on 29 July 2009 | 11 Comments »

Uber-blogger Justin Taylor recently posted an excerpt from an online article by  John Piper in which he explains, by way of a fictional dialogue, how God’s foreordination of all things doesn’t imply that petitionary prayers are pointless. One commenter going by the moniker ‘Arminian’ took the opportunity to fire some shots over the fence. I [...]

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Fallacy Files #4: False Dichotomy in the Baptism Debate

Posted in Philosophy, Theology, tagged , , , , , , on 14 July 2009 | 4 Comments »

The informal fallacy of false dichotomy (or false dilemma) is committed when two options are mistakenly or misleadingly presented as the only two possible or viable options. George W. Bush famously declared after 9/11, “You’re either with us or against us in the fight against terror.” Whatever the rhetorical merits of his statement, it was, [...]

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TurretinFan Strikes Back

Posted in Philosophy, Theology, tagged , , , on 8 July 2009 | 5 Comments »

A couple of months ago, I offered some criticisms of an argument given by TurretinFan against the claim that there are irresolvable paradoxes. (As a side note, it’s worth mentioning again that this claim can be understood in several different ways.)  His argument was apparently aimed at paradoxes in general, not just theological ones.
TurretinFan has [...]

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TurretinFan on Paradoxes and the Christian Faith

Posted in Philosophy, Theology, tagged , , on 30 April 2009 | Leave a Comment »

The erudite and enigmatic TurretinFan has posted some thoughts on theological paradoxes in the context of the Clark-Van Til debate. He currently leans Clark-ward; I took a stab at straightening him out in the comments. (I failed, but it was worth a try!)

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A Biblical Epistemology?

Posted in Philosophy, tagged , , on 25 April 2009 | 5 Comments »

Is there such thing as a “biblical epistemology”? Van Tilian presuppositionalists are among those who insist there is. Christian philosophers in general, however, tend to be skeptical of the idea. They’ll suggest that it makes no more sense to say there is a biblical theory of knowledge than to say there is a biblical theory [...]

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