<quote>

Reason is human effort to know and understand truth. But reason can be sound or unsound. Sound reasoning can find truth while unsound reasoning only creates the illusion of knowing. Unsound reasoning can’t find truth. But while this difference is simple, the lies leading to unsound reasoning create a fog, confusion, and complexity. We’ll explore this fog, confusion, and complexity as we continue our journey through the many differences between sound and unsound reasoning.

We’re coming to understand fallacies that blur the distinction between truth and error to make us all lose touch with reality occasionally. Defining the word “fallacy” as we’ll use it, a fallacy can be any deceptive method, tactic, statement, or way of thinking. And fallacies can be confusing, so we’ll look into a simple way to think about fallacies. We’ll try to clear away the smoke as we sift through how to think critically and inquire into how to evaluate every claim.

</end quote>

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The Next Right Thing: A Simple, Soulful Practice for Making Life Decisions by Emily P. Freeman
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I found this book comforting since I often feel disappointed with the way I seek the leading of God and yet have topsy-turvy results at times. Emily’s book points to the One Peron Who knows all things and has all wisdom. It gives us examples of His realness, His voice of leading, and the flow of His wisdom rather than telling us that He’s real and knowable.

This is very important to me. I want to know Him better. I want to know Jesus and learn to discern His voice from all others. I want that level of maturity. I don’t want to one day come before Him and hear Him say, “Depart from Me. I never knew you.”

Emily brings Jesus Christ out of theory and into practical decision-making, planning, and living life in an orderly way. That’s where Jesus should be. He should be in our daily lives. The human mind functions in a confused cloud without Jesus and His leading. In His presence, I do often struggle with the jumble of thoughts in my fleshly mind, and I could relate to the admonition of enjoying the silence, the white space, and making time for it.

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<quote>

The divide is stark between revelation and made-up stuff, which is why we take our journey. Before we finish our great quest, we’ll comprehensively explore why assumptions are make-believe. We’ll also thoroughly investigate why we can’t trust assumptions. We’ll also analyze the ways ungodly thinkers claim that basing thought on made-up stuff is sane.

As we’ve seen, the great ongoing debate throughout the world is about reason and how to interpret observations and experiences, and it’s about the sound basis for thinking. It’s about how to detect the difference between good and evil, truth and error, or reality and make-believe. And the fundamental question is, should we make up stuff or should we ask God to give understanding of reality and listen to Him?

</end quote>

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<quote>

Considering that Bill’s interpretation of scientific observation rests on human assumptions, assumptions are necessary for understanding origins history from Bill’s perspective. Therefore, Bill uses assumptions as a starting point for thinking. From the other point of view, Ken trusts what’s written in the Bible because God reveals reality to Ken through the Bible, and Ken trusts God, while Bill trusts assumptions.

</end quote>

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<quote>

Bill Nye referred to a “body of knowledge,” and his beliefs are part of this “body of knowledge,” so the ungodly historical stories are part of what Bill calls “the body of knowledge.” With bravado, Bill defined “science” as a method plus this “body of knowledge,” so, in his mind, no one dares to challenge his beliefs. The “body of knowledge” confirms his beliefs. By his definition, the “body of knowledge” is science, so this definition means that Bill’s beliefs are science.

Consider how Bill’s logic works. He assumes big bang, billions of years, no creation, no worldwide Genesis Flood, and no way to know God personally. Then, he adds those assumptions to the body of knowledge. He then labels this body of knowledge “science.” Then, what he is now calling “science” proves his original assumptions. He says that “science” proves big bang, billions of years, no creation, no worldwide Genesis Flood, and no way to know God personally. But what’s really happening? His assumptions are proving his assumptions. It’s circular reasoning.

On the other side of the debate, Ken Ham said that he knows God, and he said that everyone who seeks Christ finds Christ. That means we can know Christ, and we can test this truth. Therefore, we don’t have to take Ken’s word for it since anyone with an open mind can test it. Built on this foundation, Ken said God reveals the history of the universe through the Bible.

Ken and Bill agree that Bill bases the historical part of this “body of knowledge” on assumptions. Ken brought it up, and Bill made a statement defending the basis of his thinking. They disagree on whether assumptions are a trustworthy way of knowing. Bill believes that assumptions are a trustworthy way of knowing everything and Ken believes that assumptions aren’t a trustworthy way of knowing anything.

Ken’s interpretation of scientific observation rests on what God reveals to him through Scripture since he knows that revelation is necessary for understanding origins history, and scientific observation confirms what God reveals through Scripture. Because of this knowledge, Ken uses the divine revelation in the Bible as a starting point for thinking.

</end quote>

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<quote>

While it seemed like Ken Ham and Bill Nye debated Creation versus evolution, they really debated revelation versus make-believe. However, Bill would highly object to anyone calling his made-up assumptions “make-believe.” Also, both men became aware of the revelation-versus-make-believe debate. Both addressed it. Ken defended revelation. Bill defended assumptions. So the debate was (and is) about how to reason and how to know the truth, and it wasn’t (and isn’t) about Creation versus evolution.

</end quote>

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<quote>

The observations are the same for both men [Bill Nye and Ken Ham], but ungodly thinking interprets observations using assumptions, while godly thinking interprets observations using divine revelation. Therefore, the question is, should we interpret observation based on assumptions or divine revelation? Every other question is a smokescreen distracting from the real issue.

</end quote>

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<quote>

Bill Nye feels certain that “science” proves what he believes.

He believes that the Genesis Flood didn’t happen.

He believes that Noah couldn’t have built the Ark.

He’s also convinced that there was a huge bang billions of years ago that created everything from nothing.

He thinks this bang caused the stars to form.

He’s certain that those stars made all the other elements and that natural causes formed the earth.

He’s convinced that lifeless molecules turned into living organisms.

He claims to know that those living organisms evolved into human beings.

Bill also feels sure that no one can know God.

Ever confident, Bill admits that his proofs for his opinions consist of assumptions, but he insists that those assumptions come from experience, so he feels justified in using the assumptions to “prove” all his interpretations. In other words, all of Bill’s evidence ultimately rests on assumptions.

</end quote>

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<quote>

In their two debates, Bill Nye and Ken Ham agreed on many things. For example, they agreed that natural laws exist and have probably stayed the same over time. They agreed about the observations, and they agreed on the facts. They only disagreed on certain interpretations of the facts. So both Bill and Ken use the same scientific observations to come to their different conclusions. On the one hand, Ken said the following:

Creation is the only viable model of historical science confirmed by observational science in today’s modern scientific era.

Ken is saying observations point to the Creation event and the worldwide Flood event. On the other hand, Bill argued that observations point to a big bang, billions of years, and molecules turning into people without God. Since their conclusions conflict using the same observations, we conclude that something weird happens between observations and conclusions, and the debate was about this weird thing that happens.

Now we’ve discovered that this weird thing that happens is interpretation, and the two men came into conflict during the process of interpretation. They disagree about the conclusion since they disagree on how to interpret observations. They would agree with each other if they could agree about how to interpret observations. But Bill insists that assumptions are the key to interpreting observation, while Ken insists that revelation is the key to interpreting observation.

As part of his argument, Bill Nye claimed his assumptions “come out of experience.” However, Bill oversimplifies it. Assumptions don’t come directly out of experience. However, Bill is right to say that assumptions don’t come from nowhere since they come from worldviews, and we’ll explore this truth more fully in a coming trip of our journey, “The Problem of Worldviews.”

</end quote>

Keep in mind that God speaks to us through the Bible, and it’s by divine revelation that we know God speaks to us through the Bible. God supplies the truth by revealing it, and God supplies the discernment between His voice and all others. Our part is to listen, receive, submit, and obey.

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