Dawson Bethrick has returned with a rather interesting analogy about Presuppositionalism.
He claims that Presuppositionalism is analogous to a drug addiction. But of course, Dawson’s analogy is simply an attempt to poison the well. He wants to connect drug addiction (bad) with Presuppositionalism, therefore causing you to think Presuppositionalism is also bad.
Guilt by association.
But in this case there’s another analogy that we can use: food. That’s right, food (good) is something that we need to use to survive. We cannot go without it. Presuppositionalism is like food; it provides a healthy lifestyle for the one who eats of it.
Unfortunately, Dawson’s post is long on analogy, short on argument. This is not unexpected. What’s more interesting than Dawson are the comments to that blog post.
For instance, Dawson in his own comments section states:
In the 1980’s, I remember seeing religious tracts with the slogan “Get high on Jesus.” Even Christians themselves sensed the parallels between their god-belief and chemical intoxication. They even used the similarity between the two as a luring device. So in a way, a Christian who condemns drug use is just another hypocrite. Go figure.
Of course, here’s another attempt by Dawson to employ guilt by association. Remember, he is speaking in the original post about Presuppositionalism. Did a Presuppositionalist ever say, “Get high on Jesus”? Can Dawson find one who did so? Off the top of my head, I can’t think of any. No, typically the people who said there were Charismatics. Charismatics have nowhere near the same philosophical approach as Presuppositionalism does.
So Dawson yet again attempts to link things which are not linked.
In any case, beepbeepitsme offered the illustration of various “bubbles” we all live in. He concluded:
One could make the case that we all do this to varying extents. But the examples seem more obvious when the filter is one of religious faith.
Actually, I would argue that “the examples seem more obvious when the filter is someone else’s instead of our own.” The reason that atheists see “filters” in action more easily in other worldviews is because everyone blinds themselves to their own filters to some extent.
All this, however, is mere introduction. Openlyatheist starts the philosophically important point when he writes:
It is a parallel I have made many times before. The brain is a chemical machine. When a dog is trained to obey a command for the sake of a treat, then becomes well trained enough to obey in the absence of a treat, it is because the ‘treat’ is actually the feeling of satisfaction produced by it’s brain. In philosophical terms, I often see apologetics as a sort of addiction to concept-stealing; like kleptomania, if you will.
Here, openlyatheist offers an argument that utterly refutes Dawson’s own position without either of them realizing it. If the brain is just “a chemical machine” then that is true for the atheist as well as for the Christian. The atheist can not trust his own chemical brain any more than he can trust a Christian’s chemical brain. The atheist only believes what he believes in this theory because certain chemicals reacted a certain way.
He does not believe any truth concept because the concept is itself true; he only believes what his brain allows him to believe.
In other words, if the brain is simply a chemical factory, argumentation is nothing more than an attempt to cause certain chemical reactions in another person’s brain. This reduces arguments to mere chemical stimulants–a far more striking analogy to drug addiction than Presuppositionalism is.
In other words, openlyatheist as much as admits it is the atheist position that reduces to drug addiction. But every atheist ought to know that Christians–and we can get more specific and state: Presuppositionalists–do not believe the brain is only a chemical factory. Dawson’s argument, as openlyatheist tacitly admits, is based on this chemical concept of the mind. It is the atheistic position, not the Presuppositional position, that Dawson is critiquing.
Dawson is the one who argues: “Believe what I say because it will make the chemicals in your brain grant you pleasure.” Presuppositionalists, on the other hand, are saying: “Believe what I say because it is TRUE.”
Of course, this is not simply a position held by openlyatheist. Beepbeepitsme accepts that view as well, writing:
I have often thought also that religious meetings resenble in form, nature and effect, those of a rock concert or a nuremberg rally.
People elicit strong chemical responses in some of these situations. The experiences is so enjoyable that they wish to repeat it, kind of like the high an athelete gets from running.
So, they all work themselves up into a lather of emotional responsiveness; the “feel good chemicals” in the brain are going ape[expletive] - and so are they.
Believers claim, of course, that they are “high on god” and that it is god which is touching their lives in wonderful and miraculous ways. Whereas, I think they are just getting off on the idea of a god, and their brain chemistry is responding accordingly.
In other words, beepbeep just swallowed the same hook openlyatheist did. His own view is merely him “getting off on the idea of [no] god” and it has no bearing on what is actually, objectively true. He only believes what he does because his chemical receptors are responding.
It remains to be seen whether Dawson will notice this trap or not.
