An Argument for Theism From the Laws of Logic

James Anderson and Greg Welty wrote a paper outlining an argument for the existence of God based on the existence of logical laws. If the laws of logic exist (and no atheist suggests otherwise), then so does a necessarily-existent, personal mind, argues Anderson and Welty.

While I appreciate the bone they throw Van Tillians at the end of the essay, I’m not sure Van Til would be happy with how they got to their conclusion, especially their “conceivability is a reliable guide to possibility”argument

Here’s the link:

http://www.proginosko.com/docs/The_Lord_of_Non-Contradiction.pdf

There’s a lot to digest here. I’m happy they’ve written such a well-sourced and clear argument. Even if it may not be as “Van Tillian” as we Van Tillians would like, it still promises to be a wonderful “go-to” resource.

The paper is about how logic (and logical arguments) ultimately presuppose God, (if the conclusion of the paper is true.)When someone argues that “God doesn’t exist”, they are being inconsistent since logic itself presupposes a god.  (Note: the argument doesn’t specifically prove the Christian God, rather like most natural-theology projects, it proves a generic, necessary mind of some sort.)

I don’t see how this argument would refute the Skeptic or the malicious solipsist; the Skeptic could simply argue that there may be a possible world where logical laws are not necessary.

(To counter this, Anderson / Welty argue that would defy the very definition of “possible world”. But the Skeptic would likely counter that and claim it’s question-begging! At most, it might be argued: logical laws are necessary for human experience, but nothing says that human experience holds in all possible worlds.)

The solipsist might argue that *his* mind is the source of the necessarily-existent propositions we call “logical laws;” that *he* is the source of thoughts about truths-about-truths.

In either case, the non-believer is left with an avenue of escape and has legitimate grounds to claim (contrary to Romans 1) that he had an excuse not to believe.

For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse.

Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.

Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.

Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves: Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.

What irks me about the paper is that the authors start on a philosophically neutral standpoint.

Anyone, regardless of presuppositions, would (ideally) be able to work their way through this discussion and arrive at the conclusion: “some sort of necessary, personal mind exists.”Anderson / Welty are trying to be philosophers instead of Christians.

What they should have done is admit at the outset that they were going to conduct an exploration of the laws of logic within a Christian theological framework.

Then they could have concluded that: “Outside the Christian view of the world, it would be impossible to account for logic, since the laws of logic themselves presuppose the Christian God.”

I’m not in academia and have no interest in earning a place at the table of ivory-tower folk, so my frank opinion is that James Anderson is so willing to court the Satanists that he’s set Van Til on the shelf of old-toys and moved on to bigger and better schools of thought.

What philosopher would argue that his own mind isn’t the key to saving the world? What philosopher would knowingly set aside his weapons and humble himself before God?

“No, no, no… God must need our help!”

Despite my wisdom on the matter, I gobble up new and trendy philosophical essays and day-dream about my own contributions to the field.

God forgive me!

More Atheist Tripe On “Miracles”

The guys at the “Free Thought Perspectives” blog have deleted my posts and (apparently) banned me.

Sure is a wonderful display of “Free Thought” aint it?

At any-rate, since they won’t publish my reply, I’ll post it here, with the eager hope that atheists come swarming to contradict me.

The blog in question (they’re all questionable) is called:  “Miracle – And the Abuse of Language” by Bernard Katz.

Shotgun Replies:

There is a common colloquial usage of the term “miracle” that the author of this article implies may be “metaphorical” and which, the doctor could legitimately be said to have employed, where as the Pope’s assertion would be a more technical, theological usage of the term “miracle.”

When the naturalist (of whatever stripe) denies that miracles are possible, he is saying that:  “any event in nature, no matter how odd, is, in final analysis, simply an event that occurred in nature.”

When so-stated, it becomes trivial and uninteresting.  Of course “miracles” then, would be nothing more than odd or unusual occurrences in nature which may illicit emotional or pleasantly-worded responses from doctors (even doctors who are also naturalists.)

So, while the naturalist can accept the colloquial usage of the term “miracle” (with the caveat that the term loosely refers to “odd and beneficial happenings in nature”) he dare not accept the Pope’s usage of the term, since to do so implies metaphysical truths that are contrary to naturalism.

Before being able to discuss the term “miracle” in the latter sense, then, it is necessary to become epistemologically self-conscious and aware of one’s own metaphysical view.

Something, I’m sorry to say, many Americans are unwilling to do.

An Atheotarded Argument

Is it un-Christlike to call Atheist “retards” ?

I’ll use the term “Atheotard” instead, and maybe spare myself an eternity in Hell, (or at least a lifetime of being harassed by pious Christians who’ve never debated anyone in their life.)

Someone may respond:  “but, aren’t Atheists usually presented as the brightest of the bright?  The intellectual “cream of the crop”?  Disagree with them all you’d like, it’s hard to say they’re stupid, right?”

Well, the following example from a recent debate I attended in Greensboro NC will burst that bubble:

When a naive young atheist is asked to present his “epistemological foundation” it is very popular for him to recall the Cartesian philosophical proverb:  “Cogito ergo sum” or, (for the un-initiated) “I think, therefore, I am!”

Of course, in the pre-debate discussions, the atheist will find that a presentation of the “Cogito” fails to impress the Christian, and furthermore, learns (perhaps for the first time in his life) that the “Cogito” not only fails to account for personal experience, but is terrible philosophy!

Turns out, it’s a classic form of question begging…(as most people who have any notion of the history of philosophy are brutally aware.)

“I think, therefore I am!”

Do you see how the word “I” is in that sentence twice?  That, my friends, is called:  “utilizing your conclusion as one of your propositions!”  The sentence should really read:

“Thinking is taking place…therefore, I exist.”

But, that doesn’t follow at all, does it?

When the naive (and philosophically ignorant) atheist is faced with this revelation, where does he turn?  Perhaps he turns to Bertrand Russell’s essay “Problems of Philosophy” to read exactly how this argument plays out?  Maybe he turns to a brilliant logician like Quine?  Or, since he has an almost god-like respect for all things “science” maybe he turns to Karl Popper or Thomas Kuhn?

No, no, no my friends.  He turns to Wikipedia.

And, in the Wikipedia article on “Cogito Ergo Sum” we find a wonderful (but short) little paragraph explaining how Soren Kierkegaard (a Danish philosopher widely held to be one of the first, truly existentialist thinkers, and also a Christian, though his orthodoxy is certainly suspect) has reformulated the argument in an attempt to avoid the blatant failure of Decartes’ original.

X thinks

I am that X

Therefore, I think

Therefore, I am.

Problem solved right?

That is apparently enough of a solution for the Atheist (who at this point, can rightly be called an atheotard).  In fact, he is so confident in this little argument that he decides to use it in a debate against the Christian hoping that this will provide for him some ultimate, epistemological foundation for all of his knowledge.

(What we mean by “epistemology” is a “theory of knowledge.”  How does the atheist know anything at all in life?  Well, apparently, according to our atheotarded friend, it is because, at the back of all propositions, is the ultimate argument that “x thinks, I am that x, therefore I think, therefore I exist!)

The only problem here is, this is an even worse argument than the one Descartes originally made, and to make matters worse for our atheotard friend, Wikipedia even admits that Kierkegaard didn’t intend for this to be a logical proof.

I quote from Wiki:

Kierkegaard argues that the value of the cogito is not its logical argument, but its psychological appeal: a thought must have something that exists to think it. It is psychologically difficult to think “I do not exist”. But as Kierkegaard argues, the proper logical flow of argument is that existence is already assumed or pre-supposed in order for thinking to occur, not that existence is concluded from that thinking.

So, in attempting to use Wiki’s representation of Kierkegaard’s argument in a live debate, our atheotard friend is being dishonest, since, Wiki itself admits that the argument (so formulated) is not meant to provide epistemic certainty, but is rather meant to form some sort of psychological assurance (which fits nicely with Kierkegaard’s overall philosophy.)

So, that’s strike 1.

Strike 2?  The argument is still utilizing the conclusion as one of the premises.

Think about it…it’s not that hard to see…(how many times was the word “I” used in Kierkegaard’s argument?)

Strike 3 was thinking that he could slip this by a room full of apologetically-minded Christians.

You’re out…

Atheotard!

Can the Existence of God be Disproven?

Jeffery Jay Lowder (formally of the infidels.org website) attempts to demonstrate that arguments for the NON-existence of God are possible (contrary to what many Christians as well as non-Christians have suggested).

See the article here:

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/ … negep.html

He attempts to answer 3 objections from the “right” or, that are generally offered by Christians.

I’ll briefly critique the first.

1. The un-provability objection.

Lowder says there are at least two ways to prove the non-existence of something. First, by doing what amounts to an internal critique, and pointing out self-contradictory propositions within the claim.

And, secondly, by offering a sort of “look-see” method of disproof.

The first method may work on systems where things like “logical consistency” make sense to begin with.  You cannot deconstruct a worldview from within if you insist on importing external presuppositions into the critique!

This raises an interesting point.  “Doesn’t Dr. Bahnsen advocate doing internal critiques of other worldviews to show that they are inconsistent with themselves?”  Yes, he does…and this is a valid method of critique…if, and only if logical inconsistency can be demonstrated to be a valid indicator of falsehood within the worldview being critiqued!

Pointing out that Buddhist’s system is self-contradictory could…in many cases, be a compliment to the Buddhist!  Of course…a person who readily accepts inconsistency cannot ever make any serious or authoritative claim in the arena of debate.  Granted.  However…if, as we Presuppositionalists would assert…the atheist (like Lowder) does not have a worldview by which logical consistency makes sense either…then doing an internal critique would be futile since he would be stuck with the assumptions of the worldview in question!  He would have to admit that it’s A-OK for the Buddhist system to be self-contradictory, and the self-contradiction wouldn’t act as a disproof.

Thus, Lowder’s appeal to an internal critique as a way to determine the falsehood of a religious belief is only a worthwhile critique for someone who has a worldview that provides for it.

This point is made very clear if you think about what Lowder’s internal critique of Christianity would look like.  Is it possible to deconstruct Christianity by doing an internal critique?  The very critique itself presupposes the TRUTH of Christianity! When you grasp this concept, you can see that Lowder’s attempt to internally critique other systems only works if the preconditions of rationality are not undermined by the critique.

This is what secular epistemologist Harry Frankfurt was getting at in his oft-cited quote:

The claim that a basis for doubt is inconceivable is justified whenever a denial of the claim would violate the conditions or presuppositions of rational inquiry…since inquiry is fundamentally an attempt to discriminate between what is to be accepted and what is to be rejected, nothing can rationally be conceived which involves denying the necessity for making these discriminations or undermining the possibility of making them.”

The second method Lowder presents is an appeal to naive empiricism. “If someone claims a rattle snake is right in front of you…and you don’t see one, then that is a refutation of the claim.” However, your sense faculties could be damaged, or the snake could be invisible, or any number of possibilities.

Lowder concludes his refutation of the “un-provability objection” by making a tu quoque logical blunder. Apparently, every one…Christians especially, make all sorts of universally negative claims. Therefore, they should not mind if people try disproving God, since they ask people to disprove universal negatives all the time!

This not only fails to save Lowder, it is also a straw-man. The Christian does not presuppose some ultimately impersonal environment, but rather makes universal claims by appeal to an authority who has the ability to make true statements about infinite facts. The atheist and the theist (more specifically the Christian) do not share similar epistemologies.

In the end…it is not possible to even argue against the Christian God without pulling the rug out from under your own feet…as I hope subsequent discussion will demonstrate.

Richard Carrier’s Bogus Epistemology

In his book “Sense & Goodness Without God,” Richard Carrier begins building his epistemology. (Starting on pg. 23)

He says this:

…anything you intend to investigate, or assert, first requires that you have some criteria on hand to distinguish the true from the false…

He provides 3 steps that we must take in order to do so:

1. We must have a sound idea of what we are asserting.

2. We must have a sound idea of how to discover if it can be asserted.

3. Once discovered, then follow through.

So,

At this point Carrier has asserted two things:

(1)He’s said that we must have a criteria to distinguish truth from false, and (2) he’s given us an actual 3-step criteria.

The question arises: “If assertion (1) is true, then what criteria establishes assertion (2)?

Carrier responds:

The real test will be its results in practice. But prior to this we must begin with some first principles that make sense on their own. Only then can we embark upon putting those principles to the test, in order to refine them by studying their results. How we arrive at those first principles is not important…so long as they first make sense to us, and then are vindicated by their results in practice. This is a little known secret of thinking like a genius…- page 24

So to answer the question I posed above, Mr. Carrier would respond by saying: “we know assertion (2) is true, because, even though it is arbitrarily asserted, it works out in practice.”

This, Mr. Carrier assures us, is a stroke of genius! It doesn’t MATTER where the ideas come from, as long as they work!

Much can be said in response to this.

1. Carrier asserts that “if something works out in practice, it must be close to what really is the case.” This is not a criteria that has been self-consciously arrived at using Carrier’s 3 steps.

2. “If something works out in practice, it must be close to what really is the case” is a non sequitur. Just because the librarian happens to stamp a book at the same time a loud BANG occurs, does not mean that the librarian’s act of stamping caused the bang! Indiana Jones could be in the next room looking for buried tombs!

3. Carrier flaunts his arbitrariness. In philosophy, arbitrarily asserting an epistemological foundation is not a mark of genius. For an example of what a serious philosopher describes as an epistemological ‘starting point’ listen to Harry Frankfurt’s statement:

The claim that a basis for doubt is inconceivable is justified whenever a denial of the claim would violate the conditions or presuppositions of rational inquiry…- Encyclopedia of Philosophy Vol 2 pg. 414.

In contrast to Carrier, Frankfurt attempts to transcendentally ground his epistemology by claiming that doubting an assertion is impossible if, through the very act of doubting it, rational thought itself is undermined. I’m sure Frankfurt would be surprised to learn from Carrier that this unique attempt is not genius because it is not out of the blue or arbitrary!

There is more that can be said. Carrier builds on the above and attempts to construct an epistemology.

But as Christ says…only a foolish man builds his house on sand!

Is Bald a Hair Color After All?

The snide Atheist is fond of drawing the following illustration:

“Atheism is a religion every bit as much as bald is a hair color!”

The Christian response should be as equally to the point:

Then why are you in the barbershop?

The first polemic I ever read for Atheism was George H. Smith’s book: “Atheism: The Case Against God.” Mr. Smith spends a lot of time in the opening chapters defining and establishing what he means by “atheism.” He describes different sorts of atheism and distinguishes these ideals from epistemological agnosticism. There is weak atheism, and there is strong atheism…and so on.

As far as I know, George H. Smith is the first to articulate these sorts of definitions, and as a Christian apologist, I’ve seen them pilfer down into colloquial language; talking points thrown about by arrogant Google scholars who have not invested intellectual capital in the arguments but merely pick them up from God-hating websites and lock them in position…keeping them cocked and aimed at the unsuspecting Christian.

All this is just as useless for the colloquial God-hater as it was for George H. Smith.

You see…every man, woman, child, invalid, and even the insane necessarily hold a metaphysical view. (I realize certain die-hard empiricists would cling to the Tabula Rasa of Locke and insist that babies are born without such views, but the majority of philosophers have realized the error of this reasoning. To prove this point is beyond the scope of this post however. At any rate, even the radical empiricists must admit that every rational animal has a metaphysical view, even if they disagree about when it develops.)

The moral of the story is…if you don’t have hair, then why stroll up into the barbershop and demand a haircut?

If you don’t have metaphysical views, then why argue with the Christian about the nature of reality, the origin of language, the preconditions of rational thought, objective laws of logic, etc?

They only argue because contrary to what their illustration implies, they do have a head full of hair…(and it’s time for Christians to get out their scissors!)

3 Reasons NOT to Believe in Natural Selection

Reason 1:

Various people have pointed out an epistemological problem with natural selection (I.E.: C.S. Lewis, and Alvin Plantinga). Supposing God uses natural selection to bring about states of affairs, then man’s thoughts are brought about by natural forces in accordance with survivability, and not in accordance with truth. It could always be arbitrarily asserted that God uses natural forces to bring about true beliefs, but this cannot be known with any certainty given the truth of the Natural Selection model. This is a problem for the secularist as well…especially since he cannot allude to God to try and escape the dilemma. Everything we know could simply be false beliefs that have helped select us for survival.

Reason 2:

Natural selection is completely trivial. Dr. Bahnsen points this out in his critique of Darwinism (during his lectures on the history of western philosophy). If all X’s are Y’s by definition, then we are forced to make the facts fit into the pattern. Dr. Bahnsen uses this illustration: If all cooks are also basketball players…then there can be no such thing as a cook who is NOT a basketball player. So, if one day, someone drags some guy up to us and says, “here is a great cook,” then we automatically have to assume he is a basketball player as well! But, this is trivial…and ultimately worthless bias: All animals that survive have been naturally selected. All X’s are Y’s by definition! This is nothing more than trivial bias…and the fact that it convinces people en mass is sad. It certainly can’t be called “Science.” (No one can empirically verify that all animals that survive are naturally selected…it’s an arbitrary belief.)

Reason 3:

In short: If God uses natural selection to bring about states of affairs, then mankind is no longer the responsible causal agent in nature…natural forces are. God would no longer be able to consistently punish man! Here is an illustration: no one drags bullets to court and tries them for murder, even though in reality, the bullets are ultimately responsible for the victim’s death. We could take it a step further and say that the bullets aren’t responsible either, but rather, the sudden appearance of holes and fissures within the victim’s vital organs, caused them to shut down. But, the organs are never blamed. Nor are the bullets…nor (usually) is the gun. Given natural selection…the man shouldn’t be to blame either…but rather the natural forces that brought the man to use the gun to fire the bullet that pierced the organs!

There is a hierarchy in nature such that man is sovereign over nature (not the other way around) making us the responsible causal agents within nature. That’s why Christ died for us! Natural selection destroys Christianity by making the death of Christ absurd.

Letter to an Atheist Friend…

Since it looks like we’re not going to mass-debate together, I thought a parting gift was in order. What sort of Christian would I be if I didn’t try to leave some bit of wisdom, or at the very least, condemn you to Hell a few times before parting? In lieu of a volley of Bible strikes I figured I’d give you this book by Cornelius Van Til.

Kant deconstructed the Ontological argument (sorry Plantinga)…David Hume demolished any form of the Cosmological argument (William Lane Craig be damned), and Darwin sufficiently neutered the Teleological argument, (Hugh Ross needs a tissue!) With all the traditional Christian arguments dealt with, how can an intellectual case for God be constructed? What would one even look like?

An unfortunate truth about the history of Christian thought is our propensity towards allowing secular philosophy to shape fundamental elements of our position. It is this weakness that causes the above listed arguments to fail. St. Augustine wasn’t immune to this either, though he did attempt to differentiate between the philosophy of Jerusalem, and that of Athens. What emerged was a truly Christian attitude often summarized in a famous statement:

I believe in order to know!

Unlike Thomas Aquinas, (who “knew in order to believe”!) St. Augustine saw faith itself as the foundation for all of our knowledge. This set the stage for later Reformed theologians, especially the Dutch reformers like Bavinck, Kuyper, Dooyeweerd and Vollenhoven to construct their reformed theology based on a transcendental principal. From Christ, to Paul, to Augustine to Calvin, to the Dutch reformers, a strong view of faith has been developed…finding the most clarity and coherence in the statement given by Cornelius Van Til, (the late professor of apologetics at Westminster Theological Seminary.)

Within this reformed theological context, the traditional arguments can be reformulated in such a way that the classic deconstructions of them are no longer valid. Many naïve Christians refuse to believe that the classic arguments are weak. Atheists become used to responding to the futile attempts of these Christians to hang on to the validity of the classic arguments. However, when an atheist is confronted with transcendental reasoning, and the solid (coherent) theology of reformed orthodoxy…they are often caught off guard.

I hope that doesn’t happen to you, and so…I’m giving you Van Til’s most popular work “Defense of the Faith.” He demonstrates why a correct understanding of the Christian concept of God should be a vital element in defending the Christian faith. Unlike Aquinas, who started his defense by assuming the mind of man as the ultimate interpreter of reality (and then worked up from empirical data to God), the Transcendental argument says that the empirical data of our experience cannot make sense unless the Christian God were true to begin with.

Anyway…if nothing else, at least you’ll have a new book to add to the shelf.

Been fun!

-

Scott Terry

A Formally Valid Argument for God!

Shotgun:

Perhaps when a truly fleshed-out Christian apologetic is presented to you, you’ll see your critiques, however relevant they may be towards some apologists, aren’t applicable to Van Til’s presentation?

SimpleLife:

Ok, I am open to learn, though I have yet to see a Van Til argument that works.
I only ask that you boil the argument down to a logical flow, and skip all the rhetoric. A good position doesn’t need to hide behind long paragraphs of obfuscation. Lets examine the logic.

Shotgun:

Mr. Simple,

It may be popular to treat Christ as if He is a syllogism, or Christianity as if it’s an argument, but that is unfortunate. I worship a real God that came to Earth as a real man, who really died, and was really resurrected! Since the Reformed system is the most coherent and consistent expression of life in terms of God’s existence, then apologetics becomes the consistent expression of Reformed theology.

I want to make a bumper sticker, or a T-shirt that says: “TAG: It’s not an argument, it’s an attitude!” with a picture of Van Til.  (That should go over well here in D.C.!)

How, then, can I condense the entirety of Reformed thought down into a syllogism for you? For a formally valid argument, we could try this:

If the Christian God of Reformed Orthodoxy is real, then existence (and everything that entails) is possible! (With God being the only sufficient condition of existence.) Since we exist and have rational and coherent experiences, then the God of Reformed Orthodoxy is real. Or:

If God**, then Existence. Existence, therefore: God.

Existence IMPLIES the Christian God! We don’t present arguments FOR Him…rather, we show why all argument is impossible WITHOUT Him! This is common sense to the Sunday School child…but the philosophers scratch their heads and wonder if the premises can be proven. “There MUST be some way to account for our experiences other than by appeal to the Christian God!” they cry! “There HAS to be!” Indeed, the unregenerate seek to replace the God of the above argument with lies! Lies like existentialism, monism, atomism, rationalism, Buddhism, Islam, Mormonism, and more.

In the end…all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are found tied up with this mysterious and controversial figure whose exploits are contained in some dust covered book on nightstands across the country.

**With God being the only sufficient condition of Existence, this becomes a formally valid argument. If this attribute of God were not noted, the argument would be guilty of affirming the consequent.

Autonomous Man Can’t Prove the Bible Exists!

Sometimes referred to as Aseity, or Infinity, this doctrine is one of God’s most important incommunicable attributes.

However, it is clear that some people compromise this doctrine in serious ways, even if they explicitly affirm it.

My goal in this post will be to quickly argue that a consistent theory of knowledge is impossible for them as long as they compromise on the doctrine of aseity, making it impossible to prove ANYTHING, let alone the existence of the Bible.

As Bavinck highlights: the doctrine of aseity means that God is! He exists in and of Himself. EVERYTHING else that exists, exists by virtue of His will. There is NOTHING out there that owes its continued existence to its own nature. Think of it this way: suppose you were to cut an apple in half; then halve it again, and again, and again. You eventually get down to the molecular level…then halve it again. At what point will you reduce the apple down to its most irreducible state? That grain of matter that exists completely on its own, without being composed of anything else? Not even this speck exists in and of itself. It is in a process of “being.” The word “exists” for this speck necessarily involves concepts of time, and change through time. This is not so for God. God is not in a process of “being.” He just IS.

In light of this, the only consistent conclusion is that everything ELSE must exist as solely contingent on God the creator. God didn’t reach into some natural realm, and create the apple only to leave it floating around out there on its own. God’s aseity wouldn’t allow for such a thing, else God wouldn’t be infinite. Any theology that says man’s thoughts, will, and constitution are original creations of man is a theology that denies the doctrine of God’s aseity.

Van Til has highlighted why a strong doctrine of God’s aseity is necessary for a consistently Christian epistemology. (See John Frame’s article on Aseity: http://reformedperspectives.org/newfile … getics.pdf ) In short (!) only a God whose nature is at once one and many, with the two being equally ultimate aspects, could create a world of facts that are similarly shaped with universal concepts (the one) being equally ultimate with random changing particulars (the many.) He has created man with the ability to think His thoughts after Him, and encounter the random factuality in the world in terms of unified abstract concepts.

If man’s will stood on it’s own and was not contingent (ultimately) on the overarching metaphysical structure presented by Protestant orthodoxy, then it would be impossible for him to prove anything.