This week I will look at the fallacy of false cause and in particular the post hoc, ergo propter hoc fallacy. These fallacies occur when one conflates the fact that two things occur at the same time or in close succession with the conclusion that one caused the other. Post Hoc, Ergo Propter Hoc This […]
Tags: Fallacy Friday · False Cause · Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc · West Wing
Today I want to look at two fallacies, the fallacy of composition and the fallacy of division. These two fallacies are related in that they both mistakenly confuse what is true of the parts with what is true of the whole. The Fallacy of Composition The fallacy of composition involves mistakenly reasoning that what is […]
Tags: Fallacy Friday · Fallacy of Composition · Fallacy of Division
Last week I looked at the Straw Man Fallacy, today I want to explore the tu quoque fallacy. In latin tu quoque (too kwo-kwee) means “you too”; in fact, the phrase “you did it too” is a good, succinct account of this fallacy. A tu quoque occurs when one rebuts a particular criticism of one’s own position by […]
Tags: Fallacy Friday · Osama Bin Laden · Tu Quoque
In my last Fallacy Friday I covered the The Genetic Fallacy, the error of arguing that an idea is false on the basis of where it originated from. Today I want to look at what’s known as the “straw man” fallacy. Origins of the Name This fallacy takes its name from a practice common in the […]
Tags: Fallacy Friday · Straw man
A fallacy related to the one we looked at last week (the Ad Hominem fallacy) is the genetic fallacy. One commits the genetic fallacy if one argues that a proposition is false on the basis of where the idea originated from. Like the ad hominem, this fallacy invokes a kind of psychological transference where one transfers one’s […]
Tags: Fallacy Friday · Genetic Fallacy
In last week’s post, Fallacy Friday: What is an Argument?, we established that an argument is a set of reasons (or premises) offered in support of a conclusion. We noted that arguments always have two components: premises and conclusions. We also observed that premises sometimes can be implicit or unstated. Of course knowing what an argument […]
Tags: Aristotle · Fallacy Friday
A common objection to belief in the God of the Bible is that a good, kind, and loving deity would never command the wholesale slaughter of nations. In the tradition of his popular Is God a Moral Monster?, Paul Copan teams up with Matthew Flannagan to tackle some of the most confusing and uncomfortable passages of Scripture. Together they help the Christian and nonbeliever alike understand the biblical, theological, philosophical, and ethical implications of Old Testament warfare passages.
Today's New Atheists proclaim themselves our culture's party of reason. It is a claim they cannot sustain. Reason is the New Atheists' weakness, not their strength and in fact, the Christian faith is a far better place to look for True Reason. Making their case accessible to the first-time inquirer as well as the serious student, this top-flight team of writers presents a sound defense and a strong introduction to the true reason uniquely found in Christianity.
The book begins by examining foundational philosophical approaches to the Bible as well as the methodological challenges those philosophies create for interpreting the Bible. It then addresses textual and historical challenges and how to deal with them. Finally it looks at ethical, scientific, and theological challenges demonstrating the Bible's moral integrity in relationship to contemporary moral emphases.
Many philosophers have considered the strengths and weaknesses of a virtue-centered approach to moral theory. Much less attention has been given to how such an approach bears on issues in applied ethics. The essays in this volume apply a virtue-centered perspective to a variety of contemporary moral issues.
The challenge of a seemingly genocidal God who commands ruthless warfare has bewildered Bible readers for generations. A range of expert contributors engage in a multidisciplinary approach that considers this issue from a variety of perspectives: biblical, ethical, philosophical and theological.
The nineteen essays here raise classical philosophical questions in fresh ways, address contemporary challenges for the church, and will deepen the thinking of the next generation of apologists. Packed with dynamic topical discussions and informed by the latest scholarship.
While New Atheists like Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and others proclaim loudly their rationality, clear thinking, and incontrovertible scientific arguments, others are beginning to wonder how genuinely rational they are. Have they proved anything? Have they argued convincingly? Have they pinpointed any real challenges to the credibility of Christian faith?