Re: Story between Atheist Professor and Christian Student
Interesting story, but unbelievable considering the extreme intellegence of philosophy profs. I take it that the moral of the story is that scienece can be as dogmatic as religion, and it is quite true. However, arguments against the existence of God still hold despite the student's wisdom on these particular arguments. Here are a few fallacies I found in this story:
1) To say cold is the absense of heat is true. But to say heat is the absense of cold is equally true. Cold is the absense of the absense of cold and heat is the absense of the absense of heat. It is just language.
2) In response to the student attacking the prof for viewing God as fintie, it is impossible to describe God and not have Him be finite. Any attempt to describe his nature makes Him bound to the nature, and thus not infinite. For example, saying God is good makes God finite.
3) Using empiricism to prove the flaws of empiricism is a self-destructing argument.
No philosophy prof would like
Science is not flawed (which may be a reason why they are in philosophy) and
Science does not say that the prof does not have a brain because no one has seen it. But yes, scientists can be preachers.