Obfuscation Exposed

Obfuscate: to be evasive, unclear, or confusing (link)

I was invited on Catholic apologist Trent Horn's podcast recently to follow up on an email I sent to him challenging his reliance on philosophy in support of his Catholic faith and to clarify the obligation that atheists have regarding truth claims. 

Trent focused on defending his use of philosophy by interrupting me frequently with non-pertinent questions. When I attempted to present the value of science he cut me short without essentially addressing what points I was able to make. He stated that we must think "really hard." If this failure to listen "really hard" to another point of view is any indication, he has a long way to go to an open, inquisitive mind.

Here is the podcast (link). What do you think? I think it was a typical apologetic obfuscation.

(Here is the link I mentioned in the podcast.)

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FYI: The following were my notes I was going to use in support of my view but was not really allowed to do so:

*Philosophy:

From the Greek for ‘love of wisdom’ (common sense; judgement)<knowledge here is subjective

·       “Intuition and common sense can yield great insights, which must then be measured against objective evidence. The problem is that common sense is “commonly” subject to bias, and can often be warped by our limited experiences, our assumptions, our needs, our subjective values and our cultural norms.

·       “It makes absolutely no common sense to believe that the earth is round or revolves around the Sun. Our basic experience on a day to day basis tells us that the earth is flat, and the Sun comes up in the East as it spins around our world. Common sense tells us that the world is solid. But science tells us that in fact, solid matter is comprised mostly of empty space and energy. The atomic bomb, nuclear energy, astrophysics, particle science, and quantum theory are all based on the idea that our common sense belief about the world is wrong, and these theories are moving our world forward in ways that common sense cannot.

·       “Most of us go through life making decisions based on common sense, but we all know that important decisions need to be based on the most accurate information we have available.” ~ David J. Ley Ph.D. (Psychology Today)

Deductive reasoning(Top down logic) (certainty)

Every argument or syllogism for an interventionalist deity contains unsupported assertions (God of the Gaps)

No consensus nor agreed-upon methods to reach the Truth.

“Philosophy alone cannot establish facts.” ~Jerry Coyne

"Formal logic alone doesn’t prove anything. It often leads to false conclusions about the real universe. If we relied on formal logic we would not have science. We need to let the universe tell us how it behaves." ~Lawrence Krauss

*Science:

Came from philosophy (natural philosophy)

From the Latin for 'knowledge': some hold that it means 'true, justified belief'.

It’s NOT a Liberal Conspiracy.

Inductive reasoning (bottom up logic)(specific to general) (probable but uncertain)

·       Scientific results are not “certain” but are provisional, based on evidence and probability, and subject to modification and advancement with better evidence.

Plausibility important: have we seen this before in our reality?

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence

Consensus and agreed-upon objective methods to reach the truth through observation and/or experimentation.

·       If there is a claim without supporting evidence, “I don’t know” is the only honest response. The burden is always on the one making the claim.

Falsification: for something to be scientific it must be able to be proven false;

·       An example of an unfalsifiable statement is that “Invisible trolls that cannot be detected by humans live inside trees.” This statement cannot be proven to be correct or false. Therefore, it is not falsifiable and cannot be used in scientific inquiry. (“Trolls live inside trees and come out at night to pick berries and fruit.” IS falsifiable!!)

*Only two generations of methods to understanding reality:

Before science, philosophy was all we had to understand reality. Philosophy gave birth to science. The success of science in improving and understand our reality over the last 400 – 500 years is evidence that it works and is good.

·       Since the advent of science, there has been a steady decrease in violence and an increase in quality of life generally in the world.

·       However, the more religious US states and democratic countries are, the poorer quality of life (correlation does not equal causation but it points to society not needing religion to be prosperous.)

*Religion:

Can science evaluate all claims affecting our reality? Stephen Jay Gould’s Non-overlapping magisteria (NOMA/facts vs values) wrong!!

-          "We can consider the existence of god to be a scientific hypothesis and look for the empirical evidence that would follow. Many of the attributes associated with the Judaic-Christian-Islamic God have specific consequences that can be tested empirically. Such a God is supposed to play a central role in the operation of the universe and the lives of humans. As a result, evidence for him should be readily detectable by scientific means." ~ Victor Stenger (The God Hypothesis)

Occam’s Razor (William of Occam) has been around since the 12^th Century and still applies today:

·       “Of any given set of explanations for an event occurring, the simplest one is most likely the correct one.”

·       This principle is often called the principle of parsimony. It underlies all scientific modeling and theory building.

·       Assuming the event in question is from (known) nature rather than the (unknown) supernatural is probably the truth.

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7/10/09 UPDATE!!

Following are copies of followup emails to the host of this podcast. Please feel free to comment, positive and negative, as I am only interested in the truth.

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Tom Rafferty <thom.raff@gmail.com>	Jul 9, 2019, 5:23 PM (14 hours ago)
to Trent

Trent,

Thanks for the link to the podcast. However, in the following podcast when you were talking about our dialogue, you mischaracterized my tone of voice as "anger." I think this was unfortunate. I admit that at times I forcefully disagreed with you (justly, in my opinion) and was not comfortable with the frequent interruptions. You obviously did not absorb the main information I presented and I am sorry for that. I just hope you are more open and courteous to any other atheists you interview.

Tom

Tom Rafferty <thom.raff@gmail.com>	Tue, Jul 9, 10:07 PM (9 hours ago)
to Trent

I have been "Thinking Hard" for the last few hours and I am going to challenge your conscience. Below is the link I referred to in our dialogue. Read it IN DETAIL, including all of the links IN DETAIL, while you are "Thinking Hard." If you are honest, you will get back to me to have another dialogue. If you do what EVERY other apologist has done to me, you will stop communicating with me. Such inaction will simply further confirm that you guys are all hat and no cattle. The ball is in your court. You will never hear from me again unless you take up my challenge. Sleep well.

Tom

https://understandrealitythroughscience.blogspot.com/2019/07/a-letter-to-christian-apologists_18.html#more

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Trent Horn	12:48 AM (6 hours ago)
to me

Tom,

I'm sure I will engage the arguments in your letter in a future podcast, but I have no interest in having you on my show again.

My listeners have never had a negative response to a non-Catholic guest on my podcast until you're episode. They considered you to be rude and "hard to listen to." You can see their comments here:

https://www.patreon.com/posts/176-dialogue-god-28131568

I hope their response will motivate you to engage people more charitably in future encounters. Have a good day.

Trent Horn │ Staff Apologist

Catholic Answers

619.387.7200

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Tom Rafferty <thom.raff@gmail.com>	7:03 AM (32 minutes ago)
to Trent

The comments are just as I expected. They reek with confirmation bias. I know, I was where you and they are before I grew up.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias 

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