Reddit mentions of Five Views on Apologetics

> There's absolutely no burden of proof on the theist.

gupol - a typo? If not, the first full bullet point is non-coherent.

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So .... the fallacy of presuppositionalism is what you, OP, gupol, consider evidence for the existence of God? Damn, I am getting dizzy from going round and round on this merry-go-round of the faculty of fallacious reason.

And what do we say about the crapfest of presup?

As much as it pains me to agree with William Lane Craig, I will have to go with what this Great Christian Apologeticist god (lower case 'G'), who has said regarding Christianity (but is applicable to other Theist belief systems):

"...presuppositionalism is guilty of a logical howler: it commits the informal fallacy of petitio principii, or begging the question, for it advocates presupposing the truth of Christian theism in order to prove Christian theism....It is difficult to imagine how anyone could with a straight face think to show theism to be true by reasoning, 'God exists. Therefore, God exists.' Nor is this said from the standpoint of unbelief. A Christian theist himself will deny that question-begging arguments prove anything..."

Source: Five Views on Apologetics by Steven B. Cowan, page 232-233

Or we can go with Drs. John H. Gerstner, Arthur W. Lindsley, and R.C. Sproul ....

“Presuppositionalism burns its evidential bridges behind it and cannot, while remaining Presuppositional, rebuild them. It burns its bridges by refusing evidences on the ground that evidences must be presupposed. “Presupposed evidences” is a contradiction in terms because evidences are supposed to prove the conclusion rather than be proven by it. But if the evidences were vindicated by the presupposition then the presupposition would be the evidence. But that cannot be, because if there is evidence for or in the presupposition, then we have reasons for presupposing, and we are, therefore, no longer presupposing.” (source: Classical Apologetics: A Rational Defense of the Christian Faith and a Critique of Presuppositional Apologetics)

> There's absolutely no burden of proof on the theist. This is nothing more than the postmodern slogan-speak of the atheist in the gaps fallacy.

Post modern huh? Damn those postmodern 16th century dead-language speaking time-traveling lawyers: "semper necessitas probandi incumbit ei qui agit" ("the necessity of proof always lies with the person who lays charges"/"The claimant is always bound to prove, [the burden of proof lies on the actor.]")

> theists are not beholden to the presumptuous and arbitrary constraints of the materialist's metaphysics regarding what does or does not constitute justified true belief.

"True belief" - an imagination or conceptual possibility artificially elevated to a positive probability to absolute (or near absolute) certain based upon feelings, appeal to emotion based on confirmation bias, the ego-conceit that highly-subjective mind-dependent qualia-experience of self-affirmation that what "I know in my heart of hearts represents Truth" supports a mind-independent actually credible truth or fact value. Got it. Super. And I bet you vote OP.

In Christian apologetics there are competing viewpoints. One is classical apologetics which has a two step process [1) prove God of theism exists and 2) prove Christianity is the religion that the God of theism is speaking through]. Evidentialist apologetics on the other hand, tries to argue that Christianity is true, mostly using apologetics concerning the Resurrection. This is a one step model, because the assumption is that if the Resurrection is true, and the Gospels reliably document it, then it would prove Christ's claims to be true.

You'd probably want to look into Evidentialist Apologetics. I don't know of any big names, the only one I vaguely know about is Gary Habermas, but I only know his name because I read "Five Views of Apologetics" and he was the one who wrote about Evidentialism.

I love Ravi Zacharias and Timothy Keller.

I've read this book that gives five different views on appologetics:

http://www.amazon.com/Five-Views-Apologetics-Steven-Cowan/dp/0310224764

Here are the 5 apologists from the book:

William Lane Craig (PhD, University of Birmingham, England) is research professor of philosophy at Talbot School of Theology, Biola University and lives in Marietta, GA.

Gary Habermas (PhD, Michigan State University) is distinguished professor and chair of the department of philosophy and director of the MA program in apologetics at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia.

Paul D. Feinberg, (ThD, Dallas Theological Seminary) was professor of biblical and systematic theology at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School.

Dr. John Frame serves as J.D. Trimble Chair of Systematic Theology and Philosophy at Reformed Theological Seminary in Oviedo, Florida.

Kelly James Clark (PhD, Notre Dame) is associate professor of philosophy at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

It's not a good apologetics book. It's a good encouraging read if you are a believer, and are talking to other believers who have a worldview rooted in the 1950s; they will think it's great!

But it's a bad apologetics book because it requires that both you and the person you are attempting to convince of the faith have a certain worldview even before the discussion happens--modernism.

McDowell's form of apologetics is called "evidentialism" because it seeks to overwhelm objections with answers, and seems to think that if you give enough right answers, you win.

(Many of his answers are satisfying to Christians and particularly older Christians. So don't get me wrong, this book can be encouraging to some and useful.)

But with postmodernism and more radical doubts about sense perception, this all plays into another apologetics method that's actually biblical and effective; presuppositionalism.

A great starter for you would be Five Views on Apologetics:

https://www.amazon.com/Five-Views-Apologetics-Steven-Cowan/dp/0310224764

Then read Richard Pratt's Every Thought Captive--easy reading, and gives you the basics of Presuppositionalism.

https://www.amazon.com/Every-Thought-Captive-Defense-Christian/dp/0875523528/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1499447338&sr=1-1&keywords=pratt+every+thought+captive

Then read Dr. John Frame's deeper look at the topic:

https://www.amazon.com/Apologetics-Justification-Christian-John-Frame/dp/1596389389/ref=pd_bxgy_14_2?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1596389389&pd_rd_r=ME8D58N4T49Q53W9FBQM&pd_rd_w=RvQkE&pd_rd_wg=bXNAh&psc=1&refRID=ME8D58N4T49Q53W9FBQM

When you see the different views, you may want something other than presup--totally understand. But you hopefully won't pick Evidentialism. It's only useful today in certain parts of the world, like Eastern Europe, ex-Soviet areas, they seem to really gravitate to Evidentialism.

Yeah, the counterpoints series is a GREAT introduction on each of the five major apologetic approaches.

Five Points

Return to Reason by Kelly James Clark is a fantastic book on the virtues and methodology of Reformed Epistomological apologetics

Return to Reason

If you've noticed my username, you'll see I'm a proponent of Presuppositional apologetics. For a great introduction to it, I recommend Matrix of the Atheist by James D. Lashley

Matrix of the Atheist

and for a more in depth review and understanding of both the negative (deconstruction of a non trinitarian worldview) and positive (construction of the trinitarian worldview) argumentation I reccomend Greg Bahnsen's book Always Ready

Always Ready

If you or anyone else who happens upon this and doesn't have the means to purchase either one of the presuppositional books, PM me with your address and I'll gladly have one or both shipped to you (though they may be used).

Hope you enjoy!

Jason Lisle - The Ultimate Proof For Creation - a great starter book on the subject and easier to read.

Then you have anything by Greg Bahnsen (Read/Listen to "The Great Debate" with Gordon Stein) or Cornelius Van Til (father of presup.).

5 Views of Apologetics is good as well - http://www.amazon.com/books/dp/0310224764