The NoPE Argument (Negation of Presuppositional Enlightenment) - Refuted

This is my refutation to 'the NoPE Argument' by 'Negation of P' found in the video above.

The NoPE argument attempts to refute Presuppositional Apologetics, and in doing so is attacking the authority of the Bible.

Negation of P also gets to #3 on the charts of the video "Top 10 ATHEISTS of 2013" for his admission that he didn't know if anything existed outside of his own consciousness, including his own wife! He also said that he "cannot give definitive evidence for anything" - and yet here he is trying to give definitive evidence for something! (*See bottom for transcription including that admission)

I've summarised negation of P's argument and put it in bold inside // marks. My responses are below those statements.

//This is a stand-alone argument – so please address the argument and not the person presenting it.//

Unless the argument is being claimed to be divine revelation then it can’t stand alone. In order to know that it is true, and in order to even formulate the argument you’ve had to use your reasoning. So the question ‘How do you know your reasoning is valid?’ is still very much a massive and insurmountable problem for you and anyone else who would reject God. The argument was devised by you and thus cannot be separated from you in terms of the validity of the argument and the validity of your reasoning.

//God’s plan could include erasing individuals from existence without us knowing it.//

No it could not. This would be equivalent to lying and God cannot lie. God can destroy people, but he has never and will never do this in a deceptive way where this happens and no one knows about it.

//Until someone demonstrates why God could not or would not erase individuals without us knowing it, the NoPE argument in my opinion is both sound and valid//Well I'm doing just that by refuting your argument which is neither sound nor valid. It is indeed merely your "opinion" and an incorrect one at that. In contrast, I know some things for certain by revelation from God, such as God's existence and the truth of the Bible.

//The NOPE argument in a nutshell – if the universe exists as a presuppositionalist would have us believe, there are no fundamental properties governing the universe rendering everything subjective and unknowable. Absolute knowledge is therefore not possible.//

God cannot change and does not lie. He upholds the universe in a logical and consistent way because this is His nature, and he has promised to do so. Therefore the NoPE argument is a strawman.

//Naturalism enables us to have knowledge via scientific testing and data gathering.//

However science does not give us truth. Science is based on the fallacy of hasty generalisation, and it’s also based on the uniformity of nature – which can be accounted for with God, but not without Him.

//Science doesn’t give certain knowledge, but if correct the theories themselves would be true.//

But this is begging the question. If you can’t be sure that any theories or knowledge is absolutely true then how can you be sure to ANY degree? Guesswork does not bring us truth.

//Absolute knowledge is attainable.//

If you have no way of knowing if it’s true – then no it’s not. Absolute knowledge presupposes the biblical God.

//Miracles mean that God is suspending the laws of the universe, therefore there is no absolute knowledge of the universe.//

This is the black or white fallacy. God performing miracles in no way hinders us from knowing absolute truth. God has revealed things to us with certainty – such as His existence.

//Presuppositionalism Implodes - Another video presents this argument with Matthew4nineteen, BibleThumpingWingnut, and Colin Pearson.//

According to your presuppositions you’re declaring yourself the ‘winner’ but how can you know that? I’ve watched the video ‘Presuppositionalism Implodes’ and it was painful because you kept bringing up irrelevant issues and things that in your worldview you can’t know, and then claiming that because they interrupted you that this meant they were avoiding the issues. They weren’t avoiding the issues – you were playing the martyr.

So what do I say to the NoPE argument by way of summary? Am I impressed? Nope. Is the NoPE argument valid? Nope.

The NoPE argument is the kind of absurdity that people resort to in order to deny the God they know exists but are in rebellion against. If you are not a follower of Christ I pray that you would stop denying God and that you'd repent and trust in Jesus.

* Transcription from Top 10 Atheists - Negation of P (NoP) on BTWN Show

NoP: To anyone outside my own consciousness I cannot give definitive evidence for anything.

Colin: How do you know that anything exists outside of your consciousness?
NoP: I don’t, and in the same way that I know I exist, that feeling is real to me. Now let's be clear – it doesn’t mean my wife exists.

Colin:  So you say you have a loving relationship with someone who might not exist?

NoP: Exactly.
Len: You can’t know of anything that exists outside of your consciousness. You believe that?

NoP: Absolutely.
Len: Are we even holding this conversation outside of your consciousness?

NoP: I don’t know.

Colin: Ok. And how do you know that your reasoning is able to bring you to proper conclusions?

NoP: Well... I never claimed that it could.

Atheists Stupid Statements #6 (Exposing the self-refuting nature of the NoPE argument)

Theoretical BS (TBS) “Slick” Logic - Refuted

I’ve summarised TBS’s argument and made it bold inside // marks and responded below. My responses are below each of TBS's argument.

//Logic – descriptive and prescriptive.//

But why does the universe act in a logical way?

//Things just behave the way they do.//

But why? This is begging the question.

//Logic is man-made.//

I think this is what he is saying. If that is what he believes then the question is - could the universe have existed and not existed at the same time and in the same way BEFORE people existed?

// Christians can’t prove that the law of non-contradiction is absolute.//

But we can! God cannot lie (Hebrews 6:18), and is logical by His very nature. God cannot deny himself (2 Tim 2:13). God cannot contradict himself because contradictions amount to lying.

//Christians can’t account for why God exists//

God exists for His glory, and we don't need to know why or how something exists to know that it does exist. If you mean though why God does God exist in terms of what caused him to come into being - God is eternal and has always existed. His existence is the necessary presupposition to make sense of anything.

//God is not accounted for.//

Not true. See my website www.godorabsurdity.com for proof God exists, and proof that you can't know anything without God.

//I (TBS) can’t account for logical absolutes.//

That’s right! You can’t because you’re denying God.

//God’s existence, qualities and nature are assumed by the Christian//

They are not assumed – they are known by the Christian with certainty by revelation from God.

TBS either does not understand or does not want to understand that absolute Laws of logic make sense in the Christian worldview – Logic is immaterial, universal, and does not change. Likewise God is immaterial, universal, and does not change – so laws of logic make sense in the Christian worldview but not without God. TBS is also assuming the reliability of his senses and the uniformity of nature – both of which he has absolutely no basis for without God.

Is the Sinner's Prayer Biblical?

Is the sinner's prayer biblical? Some wise words here http://carm.org/sinners-prayer.

Personally I think it's best to allow a person to repent when they are good and ready, rather than rush them into making a decision on the spur of the moment and then having them either backslide and turn away from God, or worse still have them remain in a situation where they think they are a Christian but they have never really repented. God can still use the sinner's prayer, but it needs to come from the heart of the person in a natural way as a result of the working of the holy spirit in that persons life.

Also related to this topic is that of follow up. While some follow up of Christians and discipleship is biblical, if we have to be exerting a huge amount of effort to get the new Christian to read their Bible and come regularly to church then it could be that they aren't really saved and as Ray Comfort said they could just be "a still-born baby" - i.e. a false convert.

In my many discussions with Atheists I've found that many of them say that they were once Christians who said the sinner's prayer and went to church for a while, but eventually they turned away from God. In those situations it's possible that they were saved, but it's also possible (and quite likely?) that they were never really a Christian at all.

1 John 2:19 says, “They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us.”

In relation to those who say that they were once Christian but now they're unbelievers Sye Ten Bruggencate says "Your reasoning was never submitted to Christ – if it was you wouldn’t have been able to reason your way out of Christianity.What was the foundation of your reasoning then? What is it now?" 

If the foundation of your reasoning in the past was not the Word of God then it is likely that you never were a true Christian.

More Than Dreams / Islam

Did you know that many Muslims have been having dreams and visions of Jesus? All over the world men and woman have been coming to Christ through dreams and visions of a man in white who says he is the way, the truth, and the life. Check out this website - (If you can't open the link it may be because your country has blocked it because they don't want you to know the truth - I know that some Muslim countries have blocked this website). www.morethandreams.org.

To find out more about why the Bible is true and why the Qur'an is not the Word of God see here http://godorabsurdity.blogspot.co.nz/2013/12/what-about-other-gods-by-sye-ten.html.

There is also more information on Islam at my website page here
http://www.godorabsurdity.com/islam.html.