Short audio post: Common criticism, God cannot be known by the senses and therefore cannot be known

Maple Ridge, BC

A photo I took from just outside my complex. Within a year or so it will likely be my former complex.

I need to buy a better microphone. If I make the mix too loud there is a lot of noise. However, I need to have a reasonably high volume mix to make up for the mediocre quality microphone.

I would suggest the listener turn up the volume and turn down treble/bass settings if needed.

I admit there are different types of knowledge, and that God as Spirit (John 4: 24) is not known in the same way that one human being knows another, for example. Biblically God is personally known by regeneration via election (John 3, Ephesians 1).

However my audio post presents this basic argument but not in the exact same order or way:

Common criticism, God cannot be known by the senses and therefore cannot be known.

1. Natural theology/natural religion provides a type of knowledge about God as creator (Romans 1 does mention this but is not the only source for this concept which can be deduced).

2. Philosophy of religion and concepts of first cause can provide other somewhat related knowledge which can be deduced as being a parallel truth to the creator in Genesis, although the first cause is not necessarily the Biblical God.

3. Scripture provides God's supernatural revelation through prophets, apostles and scribes.

The conclusion being the empiricism should not be completely abandoned and has uses in science, for example, but should not be viewed as the only source of knowledge. God could never been known this way in a strict sense as Spirit. The critic should therefore have an open mind.

Thanks.

Short audio post

emp.mp3

BLACKBURN, SIMON (1996) Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, Oxford, Oxford University Press.

I did not cite these but kept concepts in mind. I have cited these in my recent PhD revisions and in blog posts.

HUME, DAVID (1779)(2004) Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, Digireads.com/Neeland Media LLC, Lawrence, Kansas.

KANT, IMMANUEL (1781)(1787)(1998) Critique of Pure Reason, Translated and edited by Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

KANT, IMMANUEL (1781)(1787)(1929)(2006) Critique of Pure Reason, Translated by Norman Kemp Smith, London, Macmillan.

KANT, IMMANUEL (1788)(1997) Critique of Practical Reason, Translated by Mary Gregor (ed.), Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

KANT, IMMANUEL (1788)(1898)(2006) The Critique of Practical Reason, Translated by Thomas Kingsmill Abbott, London, Longmans, Green, and Co.






Rotunda, University of Virginia