The Telegraph has noticed the Richard Dawkins has declined to debate with William Lane Craig this Autumn:
"I have no intention of assisting Craig in his relentless drive for self-promotion,” he said.
Some of Prof Dawkins’s contemporaries are not impressed. Dr Daniel Came, a philosophy lecturer and fellow atheist, from Worcester College, Oxford, wrote to him urging him to reconsider his refusal to debate the existence of God with Prof Craig.
In a letter to Prof Dawkins, Dr Came said: “The absence of a debate with the foremost apologist for Christian theism is a glaring omission on your CV and is of course apt to be interpreted as cowardice on your part.
“I notice that, by contrast, you are happy to discuss theological matters with television and radio presenters and other intellectual heavyweights like Pastor Ted Haggard of the National Association of Evangelicals and Pastor Keenan Roberts of the Colorado Hell House.”
Prof Craig, however, remains willing to debate with Prof Dawkins. “I am keeping the opportunity open for him to change his mind and debate with me in the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford” in October, he said.
Prof Craig will be using his UK tour to analyse The God Delusion and to present his own “strong rational grounds” for belief in God.
His tour will include a London conference on the defence of Christianity and a debate in Manchester with the atheist, Peter Atkins, Professor of Chemistry at Oxford University, on the existence of God.Read the whole thing here
In this video clip from two years ago Dawkins explains why he refuses to debate William Lane Craig:
I would also heartily encourage you to read Cranmer's take on the CV of Richard Dawkins. Whilst I cannot write a blank cheque for everything that is written in the blogs that I link to, I will say that Cranmer never fails to provide stimulating analysis and a model of how to write with style.
Here is a clip of William Lane Craig and Peter Atkins in debate:
"The Reasonable Faith Tour with William Lane Craig" is being sponsored by Premier Radio, UCCF and Damaris.
Provisional Schedule
The details of the tour are still being arranged, and the schedule below will be updated as events are finalised.
17th October 2011 at 7.30pm
Westminster Chapel, London
Premier Christian Radio Debate on the existence of God with a well-known atheist (TBA)
19th October 2011 at 7.30pmCambridge
Public lecture on Stephen Hawking's The Grand Design
22nd October 2011 from 9.30am - 5.30pmWestminster Chapel, London
Bethinking National Apologetics Day Conference
Opening and closing lectures from William Lane Craig. Further lectures from Gary Habermas, John Lennox and Peter J. Williams
25th October 2011 at 7.30pmSheldonian Theatre, Oxford
Lecture "Is God a Delusion?" A Critique of Dawkin's The God Delusion
26th October 2011 at 7.30pmManchester
Debate "Does God Exist?" with Dr Peter Atkins
"Why isn't there more of this kind of thing being preached from church pulpits? If there were, I'd go more often and I'd stay awake during the sermon!"Comment from a self-confessed irregular churchgoer during the 2007 Reasonable Faith Tour.
For more details, and to book, go here
13 comments:
William Lane Craig has an excellent article on why children had to be killed at Craig speaks
William Lane Craig is an idiot who is a Molinist. He believes that reason leads to faith. In other words, we don't begin with Scripture but with reason. Clue number one: unassisted reason always leads to atheism. Craig is simply a sophisticated version of Dawkins himself since Craig's basic view is that a sovereign God is inherently unjust.
Craig is an enemy of the doctrines of grace and a semi-pelagian. After watching the debate Craig held against the atheists in Mexico or wherever it was, I had to ask myself, "WHAT?" Craig's answers were just rationalistic arguments out of then air. The ONLY arguments that mean anything are arguments from revelation in God's Word, Holy Scripture.
Charlie
thin air, that is.
Does the Universe Have a Purpose?
From 'Reasonable Faith'
"May I suggest that, fundamentally, the way that we know Christianity to be true is by the self-authenticating witness of God's Holy Spirit?" (p. 31)
"Thus, although arguments and evidence may be used to support the believer's faith, they are never properly the basis of that faith. For the believer, God is not the conclusion of a syllogism; he is the living God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob dwelling within us. How then does the believer know that Christianity is true? He knows because of the self-authenticating witness of God's Spirit who lives within him." (p. 34)
My word, Charlie. You seem to frequently post in a lot of blogs I frequent. Maybe you should consider simply reading in silence rather than embarrassing yourself. Seriously, when you open with, "So and so is an idiot..."
Ha, I liked that video of Craig and Atkins. Especially since I haven't seen Craig with a beard before.
"William Lane Craig is an idiot who is a Molinist."
Good luck spreading the gospel by picking on trivial, in-house fights.
For those of you who are interested in the REAL debate (or lack thereof), this viewing should be useful:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1ldYmg0lpE
William Lane Craig would eat Dawkins' lunch! Dawkins knows it, and I suppose we can say his only hope of "surviving" and making himself falsely appear to be the "fittest" is to run from the debate. He's terrified of Craig, so he resorts to mocking as a cover.
The best comment was, "Put that in your pipe and smoke it." LOL.
I've seen several debates by Lane Criag on Youtube and it seems to me he just restates common Christian arguments for God and the problem of evil etc that have been rehashed a million times, in fairly articulate manner. But I don't find what he says especially interesting or original or convincing and neither is he very witty or entertaining. I expect Dawkins and Toybee just feel bored at the prospect and I am a bit bemused if this kind of stuff is sufficient to get you touted as the world's greatest Christian apologist. I can't see his talks convincing anyone but the already converted.
Two comment: 1) One of the problems with internet atheists like anonymous is that they watch some debates with Craig and then judge his entire scholarship based upon this. It seems that they are unaware of the fact that in debates there is not enough time for Craig to even scratch the surface of his published works. But they don't care since they are often too lazy or do not have the intellectual wherewithal to dig into the scholarly material. 2) If Dawkins's real reason for not debating Craig is that he would be "bored" as someone said, why does he continually change his excuse for not debating? And why does he give excuses that demonstrate his deep ignorance of Craig and his work?
As a freethinker, I think Dawkins just did it right not to debate William Lane Craig. Hmmmm, because if Dawkins did debate William Lane Craig, Dawkins would lose very badly; just a thought.
Sandy from scie cloche pour carrelage
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