Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Join us on our quest for the extraordinary!
Sam McKee (@polymath_sam) has 9 university qualifications across 4 subjects including doctorates in history and philosophy of science and molecular biology. He researches both at two British universities and contributes to both space science and cancer research. Meet fellow polymaths and discipline leaders working on the frontiers of research from all over the world. Be inspired to pursue knowledge and drive the world forwards.
Watch and share interviews with professors, lecturers, researchers, engineers, scientists and astronauts, right here! We talk to the most extraordinary people working on the frontiers for humanity, driving research forwards and changing the world that we live in. We dive deep with thinkers, academics and true icons - many of whom you won't yet have heard of.
Listen to us here and on podcast whilst you drive, exercise, do chores, and be inspired to pursue extraordinary in your own life.
www.sam-mckee.co.uk
Polymath World (00:01.54)
Hello and welcome to the Polymath World channel and today we're dipping back into philosophy and I am delighted and honored to be joined by a man who was once described to me as the Beyonce of philosophy of religion by a high school philosophy teacher. So it's an honor and a privilege to be joined with you today, Professor William Lane Craig. How are you?
Dr. Craig (00:23.178)
I am very well, thank you. I have never heard an introduction like that. That is a real corker.
Polymath World (00:30.818)
No one has ever compared you to Beyonce before in any way. No. Well, there's a first time for everything, So it's the Polymath World Channel. And we love exploring research and academia with people who've got a very deep and sometimes very broad background. And you're one of these rare guests we've had who's got two doctorates. So I was wondering if you could tell us a little bit about your academic journey.
Dr. Craig (00:34.83)
afraid not.
Polymath World (00:56.792)
And what was it that caused you to pursue PhDs in two different fields?
Dr. Craig (01:01.326)
As an undergraduate at Wheaton College in the United States, I took my senior year a course called Conflicts in Biblical Christianity with Professor Alan Johnson. And in the course of that study, I read this book, Introduction to Christian Apologetics by Edward John Carnell, and I was absolutely captivated.
by it. Carnell was raising and addressing the questions that I had, like what is truth? How do you test for truth? How do know that Christianity is true? And I was just completely smitten by Carnell's treatment of these important questions. And Carnell was an interesting man, especially for this age. He published this book in 1948. And
He had earned doctorates in philosophy from Boston University and in theology from Harvard University. And I thought, what a dream if one could do double doctorates in philosophy and theology, but I never imagined at that time that this would be realistic. Well, the unfolding of the decades, that opportunity came to me.
and I pursued doctoral studies in philosophy at the University of Birmingham in England and then in theology at the University of Munich in Germany.
Polymath World (02:41.262)
Yes, I very nearly did my philosophy of science doctorate at Birmingham. It's got a terrific reputation, particularly in philosophy of religion. there's some terrific people there. Joshua Siguarde has just become lecturer of philosophy of religion there. I've got some good friends there. It's really a fantastic place to study. So you traveled all the way across the Atlantic to do philosophy of religion there. What was the focus of your research and why did you pick Birmingham?
Dr. Craig (02:49.602)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (03:00.835)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (03:11.054)
I wanted to study the cosmological argument for the existence of God. My senior year at Wheaton, bought a book on the clearance table at the college bookstore called The Resurrection of Theism by Stuart Hackett. And after graduating, I read this book and
Again, I was stunned by it. In my theology classes at Wheaton, I had been taught that there are no good arguments for God's existence, that they'd all been refuted. And while that didn't seem right to me, I thought, well, surely these learned professors know much more than I do. They must surely be right. And therefore reading Hackett's book was just astonishing to me because here he was defending arguments for God's existence and
refuting every conceivable objection that one could raise against them. And the centerpiece of Hackett's case was this cosmological argument based upon the finitude of the past, the impossibility of an infinite temporal regress of events. And I felt that I just had to settle my mind about this argument. Was this really a sound
argument or not. In studying for the graduate record exam in philosophy for graduate school, I read Frederick Copleston's nine-volume A History of Philosophy and discovered the long history that this version of the cosmological argument had had in Western civilization. And I thought if I can ever go on to do a doctoral degree, I want to write on this
argument. Well at that time there was almost nowhere in the United States that one could do a doctoral thesis on this sort of subject and the prime place to do it seemed to be under the direction of John Hick at the University of Birmingham because Hick had been
Dr. Craig (05:30.837)
sympathetic at least to arguments for God's existence and had edited a couple of books on the subject. And so I wrote to Hick and asked if I might study under him on the cosmological argument. And he said, yes, come along. And the financing for this was miraculously surprised. And so we spent a few wonderful years in Birmingham studying with Professor Hick.
And out of that, those doctoral studies came three books. And this argument, the Kalam cosmological argument, which I have since used in presentations and debates on university campuses all over the world.
Polymath World (06:17.988)
Yes, and this is the work that you're most famous for. John Hick is a giant in philosophy of religion. must have been absolutely incredible studying under him.
Dr. Craig (06:28.05)
It was, and what was so wonderful was he was so fatherly to me. He wasn't imperious or cold and distant. After being there for several weeks, he said, let's drop this profess a bit. Call me John. And so we were on a first name basis with John and Hazel and picnicked with them in the countryside and just had a wonderful
experience working with them. And at the end of the time there, I said to him, I really appreciate how even-handed and objective you've been with me in supervising this dissertation, even though you yourself do not agree with the cosmological argument. And he replied, well, if we couldn't do that, we couldn't appreciate both human livenets, now could we? And I thought, what a wonderful attitude. So he was
A dream to work with, yes.
Polymath World (07:27.096)
Yes, no one has a bad word to say against him and his work lives on spectacularly today. In fact, the whole of the second half of the 20th century, philosophy of religion seemed to undergo something of a renaissance. You have this rebirth, you go from the J.L. Mackies of this world and it's sort of being something of a nonsense no-go place. There are more interesting things in philosophy to do.
Dr. Craig (07:34.146)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (07:42.891)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Craig (07:55.915)
Yes.
Polymath World (07:56.375)
But then you have Hick and you have people like Alvin Plantinga. It must have been a pretty exciting field to work in as the 20th century rolled on.
Dr. Craig (08:01.015)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (08:04.558)
Exactly. Yes, I finished my doctoral work in 1977 under Hick, and it was in 1974 that Plantinga published his groundbreaking book, The Nature of Necessity. So I had the privilege of being a young philosopher right in the midst of this tremendous renaissance of Christian philosophy in our age.
And I am committed to seeing that this revolution goes forward. And in my own work, I've sought to abet it and propel this movement forward.
Polymath World (08:45.114)
Well, I'd like to get into what modern philosophy of religion research looks like, but we have to talk about the cosmological argument first. As you've said, it's very old argument, and yet you've sort of brought it back in your own particular way. Could you describe how the growth and the movement of that argument that you brought?
Dr. Craig (09:09.048)
Well, inspired by Hackett's work, I wanted to look at the philosophical arguments against the impossibility of an infinite temporal regress of events. And it seemed to me that you could offer two really good arguments that it's impossible for the past series of events to be beginningless. One would be based upon the impossibility of the actual
existence of an infinite number of things. And the other would be based upon the impossibility of forming a collection of an actually infinite number of things by adding one member after another. And it seemed to me that both of those arguments were capable of being reformulated and defended in light of modern set theory and mathematics.
And then I also discovered in the course of my work at Birmingham that this thesis enjoys incredible empirical confirmation from contemporary astronomy and astrophysics, which also points powerfully to the finitude of the past and an absolute beginning of the universe. And so I was able to blend both the traditional philosophical arguments
with the very modern cutting-edge work in contemporary cosmology in defense of the crucial premise that the universe began to exist.
Polymath World (10:48.142)
Yes, the philosophical aspect of it seems very intuitive and is extremely robust. I wanted to ask you about the scientific side of things. I'm always personally very wary of anyone making inferences from modern science to belief in God because that's always a dangerous place to put your feet. We spoke to Lord Martin Rees on this channel recently and he was, you know, the heart of astrophysics during that
Dr. Craig (10:58.392)
Hmm.
Polymath World (11:17.316)
boom period of the later part of the 20th century, which happens to coincide with the boom in philosophy of religion, where you have the cosmic microwave background and the discovery of pulsars and all sorts of things that help ground it. But we have also spoken to Phil Howper about some of the more recent developments in astrophysics. In fact, I was driving around with a NASA astronauts last year.
Dr. Craig (11:19.309)
Yes.
Polymath World (11:45.624)
talking about the James Webb telescope and he just casually said to me, don't think the Big Bang is long for this world. What are the, there are always risks of basing arguments on modern science. How do you reframe and refocus and develop your philosophical arguments that have some scientific grounding?
Dr. Craig (11:53.934)
Hmm
Dr. Craig (12:08.672)
It is critical to understand that the scientific evidence is not being adduced to support the existence of God. Rather, the scientific evidence is being adduced to support the second premise of the argument that the universe began to exist. And that is a religiously neutral statement.
that you can find in almost any textbook on astronomy and astrophysics. It is very commonly discussed and the evidence for and against it is weighed. So this is not a religious claim, it's not God of the gaps reasoning, rather I'm claiming that the scientific evidence can provide significant support for a premise in an argument leading to a conclusion that then has theological significance.
but the premise supported by the evidence is theologically neutral. As for your astronomer's claim, he may have been talking about the standard model, which certainly is being modified. Often an inflationary era is added to the early universe. The expansion of the universe appears to be accelerating rather than decelerating.
But none of these revisions to the standard model have served to threaten, much less overthrow, the fundamental prediction of the finitude of the past and the beginning of the universe. There are no contemporary, mathematically consistent, physically realistic models of a universe that is infinitely extended into the past.
Polymath World (14:01.334)
Excellent, thank you. I want to move to your second doctorate here because one doctorate is not enough It seems for dr. Craig. So was that was that your first doctorate by the way the philosophy of religion?
Dr. Craig (14:15.66)
Yes it was.
Polymath World (14:17.178)
So you then go to do a second doctorate. Could you tell us about that?
Dr. Craig (14:22.508)
Yes, having developed this argument for the existence of God, I naturally thought, well, what reasons might be given for thinking that the Christian God exists? The Kalam cosmological argument is appealing because it has a broad intersectarian appeal. It has been propounded by Jews, Christians, and Muslims. And so the question then
arises, well, which of these great monotheistic faiths has the best claim to truth? And it seemed to me that the resurrection of Jesus provides dramatic historical confirmation of the radical personal claims of Jesus of Nazareth for which he was crucified. And so I wanted to see what good
historical grounds might be given in support of the event of Jesus' from the dead. And what I was absolutely stunned to discover in my work in Munich is that the principal facts undergirding the inference to that conclusion are accepted by the wide majority.
of New Testament historians today. These are not conclusions that are peculiar to conservative or traditional theologians. The broad mainstream of New Testament scholarship, including Jewish, secular, and Christian authors, is that Jesus of Nazareth died by Roman crucifixion during the Passover feast, that thereafter his corpse was interred in a tomb,
by a man named Joseph of Arimathea. We actually have his name, a member of the Jewish Sanhedrin that condemned Jesus. Thirdly, that that tomb was then discovered empty on the first day of the week by a group of Jesus' women followers, that thereafter, the original disciples suddenly and sincerely came to believe that God had raised Jesus from the dead.
Dr. Craig (16:46.978)
despite having every predisposition to the contrary, and that various individuals and groups of people experienced appearances of Jesus alive after his death. As I say, those facts are agreed to by the wide majority of New Testament historians who have written on these subjects. And so the only question is then, well, what's the best explanation? And that would be where the disagreement arises.
obviously secular scholars or those committed to historical historiographical naturalism will not allow a supernatural explanation. But if God exists, it seems to me that the best explanation of these facts is the one the original disciples gave, namely God raised Jesus from the dead. And so I think this gives plausible grounds for thinking that
Jesus was in fact the self-revelation of this creator God to mankind.
Polymath World (17:54.53)
I have a number of questions, before I get to those, I'm quite curious as to why you did this in Munich, why you decided to go even further into Europe.
Dr. Craig (18:02.51)
Once again, the key to doing this research is having a sympathetic supervisor. I had to work at Birmingham because of John Hick. I knew that he could supervise a thesis on the cosmological argument. Wolfhard Pollenbach in Munich is or was a Protestant theologian who had
left-wing German theology by defending the resurrection of Jesus from the dead historically. Pollenbach did not believe in the inspiration and authority of Scripture. He approached them as ordinary historical documents replete with contradictions and errors and so forth, but nevertheless argued that they contained sufficient historical information
to ground the conclusion that God raised Jesus from the dead. And so I thought if I could work with Pannenberg this would provide me the opportunity for researching this question in depth.
Polymath World (19:18.394)
Was this doctorate in theology or New Testament studies or biblical studies?
Dr. Craig (19:24.512)
It was technically in theology, but in Germany they didn't distinguish between those various sub-disciplines that you just mentioned. Much of my coursework was in biblical theology, but my main interest is in systematic theology, and so the degree is a, it's a D. Theol, a doctor of theology.
just as a PhD is a doctor of philosophy.
Polymath World (19:57.882)
So wondering if we could unpack this a little because my very first degree was in theology, but my wife did biblical studies at Sheffield under James Crosley, who's a very well-known, well-respected non-believing theologian. yes, of course you have. Lovely man. I'd love to talk to him sometime on this as well. And it did strike me how different studying
Dr. Craig (20:07.862)
Yes. Yes.
Dr. Craig (20:15.5)
Yes, I've debated him.
Yes.
Polymath World (20:27.588)
biblical studies at a British university was to my experience studying theology. And so could you unpack a little for us what the the tools of the trade are for doing historical research in antiquity like that? Were you doing textual criticism? Were you translating manuscripts? Were you doing archaeology? What did it look like?
Dr. Craig (20:34.211)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (20:52.094)
No, I was not doing textual criticism. I worked with the Greek text of the New Testament documents and any other relevant documents. Archaeology is peripheral, but it does enter the picture in that the descriptions in the empty tomb narrative of the way in which Jesus was buried is strongly supported by archaeological discoveries
concerning the kinds of tombs used by nobility like members of the Sanhedrin in the first century at the time of Jesus. And I believe there are actually four extant tombs from that time period with a disc-shaped rolling stone that could be rolled across the door or the doorway, just as you have described in the Gospels. So the Gospels do have
this kind of archaeological confirmation with respect to the burial and empty tomb narrative. But then for the most part it's going to be excavating our sources here by trying to find independent multiple early attestation for these various traditions regarding the burial of Jesus, the empty tomb,
these post-mortem appearances, what the first disciples actually believed, and how you would best explain that, the origin of that belief. That's the kind of work that I was involved in.
Polymath World (22:35.418)
fascinating. There's so many questions we could dig into just on that. It does seem, in fact a little anecdote just to illustrate this, between my undergraduate in theology and my masters in theology, Nazareth was discovered and excavated. I remember that being a really big deal coming back into masters research that there was so much modern new information.
It does seem like theology, biblical studies and New Testament studies are undergoing something of their own renaissance at the moment. Oxford, just down the road from me, there are so many still ancient manuscripts from the Dead Sea collection that still haven't even been translated and catalogued yet. And I'm aware of some technological breakthroughs with lasers and x-rays being able to
Dr. Craig (23:23.79)
Yes.
Polymath World (23:31.512)
read and access manuscripts that are too fragile to touch. So you can't turn the page without breaking it, but now you can use this technology to read manuscripts that are so old, but they would break if you touch them. Can you speak into a little bit about the modern state of these fields and what's exploding with them?
Dr. Craig (23:37.048)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (23:50.712)
Good.
Dr. Craig (23:54.935)
I think that what those studies provide is principally deeper insight into the sociocultural background against which the New Testament was written. It's highly unlikely that we are going to discover any further primary sources attesting to the resurrection of Jesus or the empty tomb or the post-mortem appearances. That just seems highly, highly improbable.
But these sorts of studies, as you say, provide very important background information, for example, about Jewish second temple beliefs concerning the afterlife, the resurrection of the dead and what they were looking for, and enables us to contrast with these typical Jewish beliefs, the disciples' belief in the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, which as I said,
contradicts their predispositions and their typical Jewish mindset, and that then requires or calls for some sort of an explanation for these differences. So the kind of studies that you describe, I think, are very, very helpful in illuminating these New Testament backgrounds.
Polymath World (25:18.618)
Now, would like to... there's so much skepticism around this field and this question of the resurrection of Jesus. I made the point in a recent debate on Premier Unbelievable that Christianity is falsifiable because in the New Testament the Apostle Paul says that if there is no resurrection we are to be most pitied, our beliefs are in vain.
Dr. Craig (25:35.15)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Polymath World (25:47.674)
The New Testament seems to be telling you not to believe it if Jesus didn't rise from the dead. And your doctorate is in this, and you've published a great deal on this. But we are dealing with history, and we are dealing with a miracle, and people were critical of me making that point, citing David Hume that you can't prove a miracle, it's the least probable thing. So I want to put to you here, Professor Craig, is Christianity in fact falsifiable?
Dr. Craig (25:56.547)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (26:03.522)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (26:19.244)
Well, yes, I think it is. For example, if you could show that the tomb of Jesus was not found empty, but that his corpse remained in the tomb and rotted away, that would falsify the belief in his resurrection. So it is falsifiable. It's grounded in the events of history. Now, it's very important that we distinguish in this respect
The two steps in a case for Jesus' The first step is compiling the facts to be explained. What does the evidence indicate happened following Jesus' crucifixion? What are the facts requiring explanation? The second step then is assembling and assessing the best explanation
those facts. And as I said a moment ago, there is little controversy with respect to the facts to be explained. As astonishing as it is, the wide majority of New Testament critics and historians do recognize those facts that I listed before. The controversy is with respect to the second step
what is the best explanation? And here, as you indicated, those who are committed to historiographical naturalism will not allow a supernatural explanation into the pool of live explanatory options. It's simply excluded a priori and therefore cannot be considered. And so one will need to, I think, challenge
that sort of historiographical naturalism, or what I often say is, look, I as a philosopher am not bound by the methodological constraints of a professional historian. If I as a human being and a philosopher want to draw this inference, there's no methodological constraint that prevents me from doing so, especially since I've got good reasons to believe that God exists. So I'm simply not bound by that methodological
Dr. Craig (28:41.56)
constraint that would inhibit many professional historians from drawing a supernatural inference. Finally, let me just say quickly that the argument of David Hume is recognized by philosophers today to be what Professor of Philosophy of Science John Ehrman at University of Pittsburgh is called an abject failure. And by an abject failure, what?
Professor Ehrman means is that it's irredeemable. It is an irreparable failure. It cannot be salvaged. The argument of Hume is mathematically demonstrably fallacious. And that's because, you see, at the time Hume wrote, around 1738, the probability calculus had not yet been developed. And so,
in Hume's analysis of the probability of the resurrection hypothesis, he omits some of the crucial elements of the probability calculus that would eventually be featured in the so-called Bayes theorem, where you have to weigh not only the prior probabilities but the likelihoods to establish or assess the probability of the resurrection hypothesis. So no one
needs to be troubled by Hume's argument anymore, and theologians need to be informed of this fact and wake up and smell the coffee.
Polymath World (30:16.281)
Yes, Bayes' theorem being applied to the resurrection has been done quite famously by a gentleman just down the road from us in Oxford, Richard Swinburne. I think David Hume, obviously his Against Miracles is very popular. Yeah, I like Hume a lot, but it's often overlooked that he had this deep admiration for one of the most famous
Dr. Craig (30:29.646)
That's right.
Polymath World (30:44.666)
Christian preachers of his time, George Whitfield. Legend is that there's an account from his life that he got up at 5 a.m. and walked 20 miles to hear Whitfield preach and was a huge admirer of him, spoke of his admiration of him. And he wrote one of the obituaries for George Whitfield when Whitfield died, which is extremely glowing. So, Hume's relationship with religious faith is certainly more complicated than...
Dr. Craig (30:48.322)
Polymath World (31:13.847)
that people acknowledge.
Dr. Craig (31:15.374)
Wow, well wouldn't it be something if we were to see David Hume in heaven? You know, Anthony Flew made a tremendous conversion late in his life, and he was a Humean for a time, so who knows?
Polymath World (31:30.766)
I'm glad you raised that because one of my favorite debates, not just of yours, but that I've seen was your 1998 debate with Dr. Flu. Could you give us some insight into that? I mean, it's really remarkable, but debates is something that you're very famous for.
Dr. Craig (31:42.51)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Craig (31:49.219)
Yeah, well, it was it was funny. had a dinner prior to the evening debate and you could tell that Anthony Flew was very nervous and he muttered at one point, says, my wife told me I should never have gotten into this. And when the debate began, he went up to the microphone and began to speak and his microphone wouldn't function.
it was somehow turned off. And so people began to yell from the audience, can't hear you, speak up. And I think he thought they were cat calls or something. And he became very rattled and began to stomp around the stage and said, well, if this isn't going to work, might as well call the whole thing off. And I was afraid he was going to storm off the stage and scuttle the whole debate, but they...
Polymath World (32:40.132)
Damn.
Dr. Craig (32:45.486)
managed to give him the microphone from my podium so that he could then give the remainder of his speech and the rest of the debate proceeded then as it was supposed to. But it was really a dramatic evening.
Polymath World (32:59.992)
Yes, yes, I'm based at the University of Reading now and he was professor of philosophy there for a while. So he's still very famous and revered on campus in the philosophy department. You've done so many debates and discussions. This seems to be more important now than ever. Modeling healthy disagreement in our era of cancel culture and echo chambers. Why do you
Dr. Craig (33:12.813)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (33:22.414)
Mm.
Polymath World (33:29.454)
Why have you chosen to do so many debates and can you speak into your own view as to why they're important and how they can be done well?
Dr. Craig (33:37.037)
I wanted to show university students that Christianity is an intellectually viable option for thinking men and women today. And the best way to do that is not to give a talk myself. The best way to do that is to have a debate with a passionate proponent of the opposing view and give both sides equal opportunity to defend
their case and to criticize the opponent's case. And this kind of level playing field, I think, really appeals to students because they want to hear both sides of the argument passionately defended and then be given the freedom to make up their own minds after it's over. And so I have found these debates to be just, I think, the forum for
doing this kind of defense of Christianity in the public arena today.
Polymath World (34:43.77)
Do you have any particular favorites or any that will always live long in the memory for you?
Dr. Craig (34:47.671)
Yes?
One that will live a long time in my memory was the debate we had at the Cambridge Union. I was partying with Peter Williams and it was against Arif Ahmed and the head of the British Humanist Society. I think James, I forget his last name, but it was a British.
Polymath World (35:11.51)
Andrew Copson?
Dr. Craig (35:16.074)
Yes, yes, I think that was it. Yes, Andrew Copson. And it was a British style debate, which I'd never done before. And so very different. And so during the time that you're speaking, students can stand up in the audience and raise a point of order. And you have to call on at least two of them and respond to their objections. And in the course of this debate,
The atmosphere was wonderful. was like the Houses of Parliament. And we were down in the well speaking. And then there were these galleries, you know, ascending to the ceiling on either side. And the head of the debating society was seated on a sort of throne, a sort of chair dressed in Scottish regalia. It was just wonderful. And it gave me the opportunity to walk back and forth in the well and address my opponent, speak to all.
hearts of the audience. It was so exciting. And I sensed that there was really a lot of hostility in that audience. They were, I think, partisans of Richard Dawkins. The subject of the debate was, God a delusion, based on Dawkins' book, The God Delusion? And so I thought, I have got to try to turn this huge ship
in such a way that it moves in a different direction. And so I could just sort of feel the audience just slowly turning like a great ship. And at the end of the debate, the way in which the students voted was you would exit through two doors. One was I and the other was nay, whether you supported the House position or opposed it.
And then we retired upstairs to the student bar to wait for the tabulation of the votes. And a girl then came into the bar with a brass bell ringing this brass bell. You know, hear you, hear you. And she announced the vote. And Peter Williams and I had won by something like 15 votes out of all the hundreds that were there. So it was just a wonderful victory. Really exciting.
Polymath World (37:40.738)
Yeah, there's so much history there that the Cambridge Union, it's a real honor and privilege, something to write on the tombstone and the obituary that someone has done that. Well, I hope you get the opportunity to do it again sometime. I notice you have engaged with senior academics like Anthony Flew, but also the young guns who are sort of coming through like Alex O'Connor, Stephen Woodford, both
Dr. Craig (37:44.792)
Yeah.
Dr. Craig (37:52.558)
Hmm.
Polymath World (38:09.71)
gentleman I'm familiar with, you seem to be happy to talk to anybody. So again, modelling this well.
Dr. Craig (38:18.242)
That's not quite true. That's not quite true. I do insist that my interlocutor or opponent be qualified in some way to engage in these debates. So there are a lot of internet infidel types that I simply will not appear on a platform with because I don't think they've earned it. I'm not going to provide them such a platform.
I've been quite happy to appear on Alex O'Connor's podcast. He is an excellent interviewer. And while I wouldn't want to put Alex into the position of having to defend atheism, I don't want to push him into that position. I'm very happy to dialogue with him in an interview setting. So I distinguish between a debate
where you have two opposing positions and a resolution and a dialogue or a conversation.
Polymath World (39:23.69)
Yes, that makes sense. I agree with that. Back to philosophy of religion, we talked about what modern research looks like in theology and biblical studies and New Testament studies. What does your week to week, month to month research in philosophy of religion look like?
Dr. Craig (39:35.757)
you.
Dr. Craig (39:43.501)
Yeah. The transformation in contemporary philosophy of religion is largely the child of analytic philosophy. It is not the product of continental philosophy such as you have on the continent in Europe, but it is the Anglo-American tradition of analytic philosophy. And this type of philosophy prizes
clear definitions, logical argumentation, a clear statement of premises and inferences, and this has proved to be tremendously helpful for explicating philosophical positions in Christian theology. And so I have, I, I,
For example, I'm currently working on the doctrine of the Eucharist. And so I'm examining issues like figuralism, consubstantiation, transubstantiation, and other views of the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist using the tools of analytic philosophy. So just today, for example,
I was exploring René Descartes' alternative account of transubstantiation, where he, rather than appealing to substance and accidents, appeals to primary and secondary sense perceptions. And then I began to work on the spatial location relations that have been identified by contemporary
philosophers of space and time and applying these to the body and blood of Christ in asking what does it mean to say that Christ's body and blood are located in the Eucharist? How should we understand this spatial occupation relation? So those would be examples of employing the tools of analytic philosophy to
Dr. Craig (42:04.424)
analyze and unpack very traditional theological questions.
Polymath World (42:12.118)
I have a really lovely relationship with Professor Peter Atkins, who's very well known for being a very, very strict atheist. He's probably the strongest atheist I've ever met. And I can hear his voice in my head right now, you know, shouting nonsense. know, it's not rigorous like the sciences. The criticism of the humanities in general, not just philosophy and theology, is that they lack the rigor of the sciences.
Dr. Craig (42:19.021)
Hello?
Yes.
Dr. Craig (42:25.87)
Hmm.
Polymath World (42:41.366)
So how would you answer that?
Dr. Craig (42:41.546)
Dr. Craig (42:45.218)
Well, you should listen to the two debates that I had with Professor Atkins. I've debated him more than once in Great Britain. no, pardon me. Once in Atlanta, Georgia at the Carter Center and then once in at the University of Manchester in Great Britain. And I think it was clear which way the evidence pointed in those debates. The fact is that by the application of analytic
philosophy to these traditional theological questions, there is a tremendous amount of rigor that is introduced to them because ambiguity, sloppiness are expelled through the use of analytic philosophy to clarify concepts, to identify premises, and to emphasize logical validity in
one's inferences and this has really made it very rigorous. And so I have to tell you that over and over and over again when I meet people who say, we've appreciated your work so much. It's really helped me. We say, what field are you in? And they say, engineering. Engineers love my material. And they tell me it's because
Polymath World (44:05.474)
Yeah.
Dr. Craig (44:12.734)
engineering prizes logical consistency and the sort of rigor that you talk about. You can't construct bridges and highways being sloppy and careless. So engineers prize these qualities and they see this, thankfully, in my work.
Polymath World (44:33.134)
Yes, University very much one of the hubs for analytic philosophy in present and historically. the layman doesn't always understand that analytic philosophy rooted in logic is a world of difference from continental philosophy and those sorts of things. I would like to get to your religious faith. Do you belong to a particular church tradition?
Dr. Craig (44:50.946)
Yeah, it is.
Dr. Craig (45:03.956)
wouldn't put it that way. We have typically attended a church in our local community that we find meets our spiritual needs, where we can worship God in a meaningful way. So, for example, when I was at the University of Birmingham, we actually attended a Brethren Church, which we had never done before. It was a church
that had no pastor, no paid minister. It was simply led by lay elders. And it was really wonderful. It was Duke Street Chapel in Sutton Coldfield. So that was our parish then. When we went to Munich, however, we attended the Evangelische Freier Gemeinde in the Goetheplatz, which is the
Protestant free church, not part of the state church like the Reformed and Lutheran, but it was a free church. And then since coming back to the United States, we've been attending a Baptist church here in our local community. So we switch around.
Polymath World (46:21.21)
That's got to be quite a rich experience. More than any guests that I've spoken to, are very outgoing and public about your religious beliefs and background. How do you manage the tension or the challenge that can come with being an academic, being a professor and publishing peer-reviewed research while also
Dr. Craig (46:24.739)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (46:43.79)
Mm-hmm.
Polymath World (46:49.154)
you know, being quite evangelistic in your work.
Dr. Craig (46:52.504)
I think what has been really important for me is taking to heart the words of Jesus to seek the praise of God and not men. I have to care for nothing. What my academic colleagues might think of me, whether they would mock my faith, that's less important to me than what the Lord thinks of me and whether or not I'm being faithful to Him and to my calling.
My goal is to be faithful to Christ, but to also do absolutely first-rate work in my discipline that cannot be ignored, and then just let the chips fall where they may. And I know that I've had mixed results to that. There has been respect and good interaction, but there has also been
discrimination and ridicule in some corners.
Polymath World (47:57.818)
Well, that's quite impressive because you've written a lot of textbooks, sit in charge of a few journals, I believe, as well. I mean, your textbook on philosophy of religion was part of the reading material for when I did my masters. Yeah, it's got a sort of reddish, red and white cover.
Dr. Craig (48:14.924)
The one with Edinburgh University Press.
Dr. Craig (48:21.132)
Yeah, that's it. said to them, that book had been turned down by some other publishers. And I said to the folks at Edinburgh University Press, why did you give me a contract for this book? It's very conservative. And they said, that's exactly why we wanted it. So they were looking for a voice from the other direction.
Polymath World (48:39.492)
Right.
Polymath World (48:44.876)
Excellent. Well, Edinburgh is one of the outstanding universities in Britain for science, philosophy and religion. Really, really quite terrific. And I have friends who studied there and loved every second of it. Yeah, well, that worked out for you and it worked out for me as well. But yes, when it comes to your faith and being out there as a public but well-recognized believing academic,
Dr. Craig (48:49.229)
Yeah.
Dr. Craig (48:57.134)
Hmm.
Polymath World (49:14.554)
What are the really great things about that and what are the biggest challenges of that?
Dr. Craig (49:21.528)
Well, I think that one of the biggest challenges is to make sure that your walk matches your talk. And what that requires is that I mind my marriage and my relationship with my wife. We've been married now for over 50 years, I'm pleased to say, and she has been my right arm in this ministry, or to change the metaphor, the wind beneath my wings.
And And
I'm just saying I want to try to live a good ethical life.
Polymath World (50:26.906)
Wow, that's an extraordinary answer. My own relationship with faith has been quite complicated. I went through something of a deconstruction about seven years ago. And I ended up, I mean, this is more personal than I'd normally be on the channel, but I ended up coming back to faith through having a very profound and unexpected religious experience when I was at Cambridge and in the lab. So not in a church or a...
Dr. Craig (50:37.964)
Dr. Craig (50:52.728)
Wow.
Polymath World (50:57.086)
or anywhere religious and certainly not in a religious meeting. It was during a practical experiment on green algae. And I've been through a lot of therapy about it, trying to unpack it, but it's just a really wonderful experience that I have no explanation for. But I say that because I was struck just how many religious believers there were in Cambridge, in the faculty.
Dr. Craig (51:06.104)
Goodness.
Dr. Craig (51:16.32)
Wow.
Polymath World (51:27.13)
as well as more so in the faculty than in the students. And I was in the sciences, still am in the sciences. But none of them are sort of quite as out there as you are.
Dr. Craig (51:27.565)
Mmm.
Dr. Craig (51:36.813)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (51:42.351)
Yes, my British friends have told me this about myself. They attribute it to my being an American. They say we Brits are more reserved about our personal religious beliefs and not so out there as you are. But I suppose it's just a personality difference.
Polymath World (52:05.658)
Well, I have to ask you here about apologetics because although I wanted to dig into your academic life, your biggest legacy apart from the cosmological argument will probably be in Christian apologetics. I think that's fair to say. Now,
I had never even heard of apologetics until Richard Dawkins. It seems that the new atheism seemed to sort of awaken this. I really think this, my friend Justin Briley has said this, that
Dr. Craig (52:36.472)
Really?
Dr. Craig (52:42.094)
Mm-hmm.
Polymath World (52:49.4)
New atheisms seem to sort of awaken an intellectual vein in the church that had been dormant. Now obviously you were very very involved before all that, but is that a fair summation of the situation do you think?
Dr. Craig (52:55.394)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (53:05.794)
Yes, I do think so. One of the things I noticed during the heyday of Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins, and Sam Harris and the rest was a tremendous interest among Christian laypeople in apologetics conferences where one would have, a three-day conference and you would bring in speakers to talk about
issues like evidence for the existence of God, the resurrection of Jesus, the problem of evil and suffering and so forth. And I think that the tremendous interest in these conferences among laypeople was in part sparked by the feeling of inadequacy that they had as a result of the attacks of the new atheists that they were uncertain how to respond to.
Polymath World (54:02.582)
There that we've talked about renaissance is going on quite a lot during this conversation Religious apologetics seems to have a great deal of interest in it That might be down to social media. Yeah Sorry
Dr. Craig (54:07.608)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Craig (54:15.846)
especially when you look at it in the long run, if you look at the discipline of Christian apologetics back when Carnell wrote, you know, in the late 1940s and 50s, there was nothing. There was almost nothing at that time. All you had was Gordon Clark and Cornelius Mantell. And what has happened with the Renaissance of Christian philosophy?
this has spurred this tremendous interest as well in Christian apologetics because it's so naturally related to it. And so compared to those days of the the 1950s and 60s, are, it's like night and day when you look at the interest there is today. And this is evident in publishing the books that are being published in
this area, they're just flowing out of the presses. Even Oxford University Press publishes books in Christian apologetics because they sell.
Polymath World (55:28.602)
I think in terms of, we've also talked about rigor. My concern as someone who does have faith again is that a lot of internet or social media or popular level apologetics could lack some of the rigor that comes from academia. And it seems like YouTube apologetics channels are a dime a dozen.
Dr. Craig (55:39.63)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Craig (55:50.348)
Yes.
Polymath World (55:57.69)
The danger for someone in your position if you're asked questions about science is not being a scientist. But you have authority in philosophy, have authority in theology, but you're going to have to answer questions about things that are not your field. How can the Christian world ensure that there's a decent level of rigor, but also respect for research?
Dr. Craig (56:26.104)
Well, certainly we need to encourage people to go into these sciences. And you mentioned that at Cambridge University there's a considerable number of Christians in these various fields. And for those of us who are scientific laymen like myself, we should make a concerted effort to try to understand the contemporary scientific view of the world. And so I have made a
a very strong effort to try to understand, for example, relativity theory, both special and general, and quantum theory. I've been doing a little dabbling in organic chemistry and origin of life studies, evolutionary biology. I want to understand responsibly the contours of the modern scientific worldview. And all I would ask
from my secular colleagues in the sciences is that they would make an equal effort to try to understand theology and philosophy rather than presuming to speak in areas of philosophy and theology without having made such an effort. You mentioned Sir Martin Rees. I met him several years ago on the way to Cambridge on the train.
from London on the way to do that debate that I mentioned in the Cambridge Union. And we got to talking about Stephen Hawking. And Martin Reese said, Stephen Hawking has had no training in philosophy and he knows even less about theology. And so just did not think a great deal of Hawking's claims to have eliminated the creator or
Polymath World (58:12.047)
That's
Dr. Craig (58:19.918)
or have to gotten rid of the grand design and things of that sort. So I appreciate how difficult it is to cross these disciplinary lines. And I would just ask people on the other side to make a real effort to understand philosophy and theology in the same way that I've made a sincere and concerted effort to understand the various sciences.
Polymath World (58:46.102)
Yes, that's outstanding. It's absolutely true. I love Martin so much. He's just a wonderful person. He's been very generous and kind to me and it's just always such an honor every time I get to meet him or speak to him. he's very interesting because he attends his local church but has no belief whatsoever. But he sees it as very important. In fact, he emailed me one of his sermons, which was just like reading one of Martin's books.
Dr. Craig (59:01.538)
Yes.
Dr. Craig (59:15.288)
Ha ha ha ha ha ha.
Polymath World (59:15.492)
sort of didn't really resemble any sermon I'd ever heard. Speaking personally again, I hold things a lot more loosely than I used to. sort of, I'm a lot slower to say that I know things with certainty. And perhaps that just comes from being, maybe that's just part of the life of a researcher. I wondered,
Dr. Craig (59:36.718)
Polymath World (59:44.322)
As someone who deals with, well, as someone who runs a program called reasonable faith, the jump from reason to sort of a Kierkegaardian leap of faith, you can present people with evidence, but particularly when you're dealing with history and dealing with the miraculous, how does, in your wealth of experience, someone go from the reasonable case of thinking through the evidence for belief?
Dr. Craig (59:49.506)
Yes.
Polymath World (01:00:13.732)
to then that Kick a Guardian leap.
Dr. Craig (01:00:17.218)
Yes, I wouldn't characterize the leap as Kierkegaardian. For Kierkegaard, the leap of faith was a blind leap into the dark. It was a criterion-less leap. And I want to say is that that step of faith is in line with where the evidence points. Truly, there is a step of faith and commitment that needs to be made, but it's not
without evidence, and it's certainly not contrary to the evidence. And so that's why I like the modesty of the phrase reasonable faith. It's not about certainty. It's saying that this is a reasonable thing for you to do, to have faith in Christ. And that modest conclusion, I think, is well established.
Polymath World (01:01:11.418)
Thank you. I'm conscious that I've already taken an hour here of your time, if people want to do tell us about anything that you're working on or any any new works you've released. Tell us about reasonable faith.
Dr. Craig (01:01:22.124)
Yes. Well you mentioned that my legacy would be in Christian apologetics, but I personally hope that it will not be that. I am currently writing a five-volume systematic philosophical theology that I hope will continue to influence contemporary philosophy and theology for generations to come.
I got the idea for this work from John Hick. I asked him one day standing in his office what he wanted to do next. And he said, I thought I'd write a systematic philosophical theology. And I thought, what a novel idea, what an undertaking. It seemed to me impossible to think of doing such a thing. But in recent years, my wife Jan has...
encouraged me to undertake this monumental project. And so five years ago when the COVID pandemic hit and I cancelled all of my speaking engagements and began to stay home, I began working on this systematic philosophical theology. And the first two volumes have now appeared with Wiley Blackwell in Oxford and other volumes are in the works.
and I'm currently working on the final volume five at this time.
Polymath World (01:02:51.766)
Is this in any way connected to the fact that it's probably been a century since Frederick Coppelston that you mentioned earlier? Didn't he write five volumes or six volumes? Nine volumes, wow.
Dr. Craig (01:03:01.826)
Well, he had a nine-volume history of philosophy that was monumental. I wouldn't think to compare myself with Frederick Copleston, but I do think that this work compares very well with the work of contemporary systematic theologians like Wolfhardt Pannenberg and Paul Tillich and others. These fellows did not have the advantage of
analytic philosophy in doing their work. And I think my ability to bring to the table analytic philosophy in analyzing traditional Christian doctrines will make a unique contribution in this work.
Polymath World (01:03:47.812)
Wow, yeah, what a legacy that would be. If people want to find out more about you or find your books, where should they go?
Dr. Craig (01:03:56.386)
Well we have a wonderful website, reasonablefaith.org, which contains hundreds of thousands of pages of material all available for free, as well as some really terrific animated videos on arguments for God's existence and on the attributes of God. So I would recommend folks take a look at the reasonablefaith.org website.
Wikipedia has an article on me that is a fair summary, at least it was until recently. I haven't checked it in recent years. You got to be careful with Wikipedia because anybody can edit it. And there have been some hostile edits. But the last time I looked at least, I thought that it was a good bio sketch of me.
Polymath World (01:04:46.852)
I've never had any guests here say, just look me up on Wikipedia. that's good. Thank you so much, Professor Craig. It's been a real honor to speak to you. I've really enjoyed it.
Dr. Craig (01:04:51.976)
Dr. Craig (01:04:59.19)
Well, I've enjoyed our conversation very much as well, and you've brought back many wonderful memories for me of my time in Britain and in Europe. Thank you.
Polymath World (01:05:10.094)
My pleasure. Hope to see you again.
Dr. Craig (01:05:13.091)
Bye then.