To B or ¬ To B, that, Matt, is the question

Firstly I want to say for the record that this is probably the fifth or sixth post I have written on this general subject, I just never actually got around to posting the other ones for one reason or another. Anyway, over the weekend I watched a video on Youtube posted by Dr Alex Malpass in which he had a chat with Christian apologist Matt Slick on the subject of logic. This is the second time that Alex has engaged in such a conversation with Matt, and, as with the previous one, the vast majority of the conversation was Alex explaining to Matt over and over why his version of the transcendental argument for the existence of God (TAG – see appendix for details) doesn’t work, and Matt failing to understand over and over again.

Anyway I wanted to run through Alex’s main arguments here in an attempt to make it as easy to follow as possible, even for those like Matt who seem determined not to get it. Now I must say I can’t really take any of the credit for this, as all the hard work was done by Alex, with the rest coming courtesy of Dave S. This is just my presentation of their hard work. So let’s get on with it shall we.

Matt likes to start his argument by saying something along these lines (Note: I’m going to put these bits in quotes even though they aren’t exact quotes from Matt, I do this to make things easier to follow and not to imply Matt has said things he didn’t):

Either God exists or God does not exist, these are the only two options. God or Not God.

This first part is entirely correct. This is what is known as a dichotomy, in that these two options represent the only two possible options. The thing and the negation of the thing. In a logical argument it would generally be represented like this:

God or Not God
P or ¬P

The problem occurs in the next part, when Matt says something like this:

Therefore if we look at something like the transcendental laws of logic we have only two possible explanations for them, God or Not God.

Ok Matt, I’m gonna stop you right there. Now while this may at first glance appear like the same type of argument, and I genuinely believe Matt thinks it is, it is in fact a fundamentally different argument to the dichotomy mentioned above. Firstly when Matt says “Not God” in this argument he does not mean the same thing as he meant by “Not God” in the first argument. Let me explain.

In the first argument we are talking about the existence of God. God either exists or he doesn’t. God or Not God. Here the term “Not God” is being used as a shorthand for “God does not exist” or “the nonexistence of God”. So let’s plug that definition into the second argument and see how it works:

Either God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic, or the nonexistence of God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic.

Now does that even make sense? How can the nonexistence of God, or anything for that matter, account for anything else? It can’t, it makes absolutely no sense at all. So why would Matt make an argument like this? Well he isn’t, and that is because in this second argument he is using the term “Not God” to mean “Something other than God”.

Either God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic, or something other than God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic.

Now this makes more sense, and, as previously stated, is a fundamentally different argument to the previous one. In the first argument Matt is staying this:

God or Not God
P or ¬P

But in the second one he is saying this:

God or Not God
P or Q

It is not the same argument and does not have the same logical structure. As such Matt cannot use the rules that apply to a dichotomy for this part of the argument. It is not enough for him to just rule out one of the options, in this case the all encompassing “Something other than God” option. No, instead he needs to actually prove the truth of his premise because what he is offering here is in fact a false dichotomy, meaning that there are actually more than just two options. In fact there are four.

1) P alone accounts for the laws of logic
2) Q alone accounts for the laws of logic
3) P and Q account for the laws of logic
4) Neither P nor Q account for the laws of logic

It is not enough for Matt to rule out option 2, which would automatically rule out option 3 as well, but he also needs to demonstrate, not just assert, that the laws of logic can in fact be accounted for and that God is what can account for them. He doesn’t do that, instead he just rules out option 2 and calls it a day.

Ok, some of you may be saying, what if we just reword his argument a bit so that if fits the criteria of a dichotomy? If we do that then all we need to do is rule out one option and then it will logically follow that the other one is correct, right? Well, sort of, maybe. Let’s start by rewording the argument.

It is either the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic, or it is not the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic.

Ok, so that is a dichotomy, P or ¬P. Well then, let’s follow the argument through.

1) It is either the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic, or it is not the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic.
2) It is not not the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic.
Conclusion) Therefore it is the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic

Or, to put it another way:

1) P or ¬P
2) Not ¬P
Conclusion) P

So that is all well and good then, right? Well no, and the problem is with that second point. You see logically speaking “Not ¬P” means exactly the same thing as P. “It is not not the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic” means exactly the same thing as “it is the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic”. As such the argument becomes:

1) It is either the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic, or it is not the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic.
2) It is the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic.
Conclusion) Therefore it is the case that God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic

Or to make it even simpler, seeing that first premise is no longer needed:

1) God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic.
Conclusion) Therefore God accounts for the transcendental laws of logic

Well ok, so technically there is nothing wrong with that logic, but it is not a very convincing argument, in fact it is not an argument at all, it’s an assertion. And at the end of the day those are the options Matt is left with. He can either actually explain how he knows that a) the laws of logic can be accounted for, b) that God can account for them, and c) why no other option can. Or he can simply assert that God can account for the laws of logic and not expect to convince anyone because he isn’t actually making an argument.

One last thing. Matt, in case you are reading this, you keep asking what is the right way to present the argument you are trying to make. Well, there is a way, but I don’t think you will like it. It looks like this:

1) It is the case that either God alone can account for the laws of logic, something else alone can account for the laws of logic, both God and something else can account for the laws of logic, or neither God nor something else can account for the laws of logic
2) It is not the case that something else alone can account for the laws of logic
3) It is not the case that both God and something else can account for the laws of logic
4) It is not the case that neither God nor something else can account for the laws of logic
5) It is the case that God alone can account for the laws of logic
Conclusion) Therefore God alone can account for the laws of logic

Good luck defending that Matt.

APPENDIX – Matt has presented his TAG argument in the following way and this is the argument that I am addressing here:

So one of the things I would do is offer them a principle – what’s called a disjunctive syllogism. If you only have two possibilities to account for something, and only two, and not three or more, but just two – if one of them is negated then the other is necessarily validated as being true. So we have God and not-God – so that’s call a true dichotomy, God either exists or it is not the case that God exists. We have the thing and the negation of the thing.

We have for example the transcendental laws of logic – and so we have the no-God position and we have the God position. Let’s take the no-God position, can the no-God position account for the transcendental laws of logic?

And the ultimate answer is no it cannot so therefore, because it cannot, the other position is automatically necessarily validated as being true. Because, you cannot negate both options out of the only two possibilities; that’s logically impossible.