Cliffe Knechtle’s Most Educational Debate (Does God Exist?)

you had a scientific question you would go to a scientist and I presume you would expect a rational answer and if you had a philosophical question you would go to a philosopher and perhaps less rational but still cogent you would expect an answer MH I have a religious question and I come to you as a religious Man to answer right here right now I'm not an atheist I can't equip myself with moral relativism I'm an agnostic and I envy your faith I want to know why I should believe it's more probable that there is a

God than there isn't you don't have to prove absolutely that there is one I just want to know that it's more probable that there is and that there isn't and I want you to show me this is easily Cliff's most educational debate where he presents his five reasons for God's existence all credit to Cliff and give me an answer for the clip used let's Dive Right In okay thanks for asking that honest question I appreciate it the reason that I believe that God exists is because of certain evidence first piece of evidence the order and

the design of the cosmos points me to some type of intelligent mind because my experience in life is in order to bring about order I got to work real hard and when I get sick I don't go running to a nefy when I get really sick I go running to a highly highly trained doctor who understands the order and design of the human body my experience in life is order demands an intelligent mind behind it it doesn't come about by chance second piece of evidence for me Life in my experience always comes from life I

don't care if it's plant life animal life human life you never get life out of non life in other words you never get the animate from the inanimate therefore is it more reasonable for me to believe in the beginning God or is it more reasonable for me to believe in the beginning matter and energy because I only see life come from life never life come from non-life it's far more plausible reasonable for me to believe in the beginning God third point the moral argument I think you've been standing here while I've been articulating it I

am convinced that although there not many there are at least a few moral absolutes although there's a lot of ethical gray probably more ethical gray than ethical black and white there at times is ethical black and white crystal clear moral absolute moral absolute so those those are the three reasons those are three order order Design coming from intelligent mind Life coming from life not from non-life moral absolutes fourth one love my experience of life is that love is crucial to my marriage my family my friendships love is a crucial motive in my life if it's

lacking life turns very sterile very empty the only way love can be real is if there is more to reality than matter and energy there's got to be some type of God who creates us with this innate ability to genuinely love if there is no God the Duke University student was correct when he said love is simply a biological drive to preserve the genetic pool and I said sir do you really think that's what motivates Mother Teresa to work among the dying in Kolkata India he said yes I have a fundamental disagreement with that my

experience in life is no Mother Teresa was motivated by love for the dying in Kolkata India that's why she did what she did not motivated primarily by a drive to preserve the genetic pool that's a fourth piece of evidence four right you mind if I asked some questions about go go right ahead order um I know a little about computer not a lot but a little and I know there are computer programs that write very complicated very ordered programs that do things extremely ordered but I would not go back and say that the program that

wrote it is a life or capable of Love or capable of thought in the way I think of [Music] thought I have seen order order that is caused by seemingly disorder or random occurrences I've seen order that doesn't necessarily come from a cogent willed source and I've seen order come from a cogent willed source that was very evil or you would Define evil so first of all I would contend that I've seen or think I've seen I think I've seen order from chaos and I know I've seen or at least I like to think of

seen order from what would you what you would dictate as evil so is it order from chaos and if it's order only from order why does that necessarily imply a good entity that created disorder okay I I have strong disagreements with one point and I strongly agree with your second point I think it's rather clear that a computer comes from an intelligent mind I've never met a computer that just came about by accident so that computer obviously was ordered by an intelligent mind so there's no problem with computers but I think you raise a tremendous

issue when it comes to evil I think you're absolutely correct I think it's totally possible that this intelligent mind is a warped Scrooge okay what's what was the second reason now just to get okay second thing is life comes from life not from non-life that one's harder for me um I'm not a biologist but I know that there's a lot of theories that say that given the right materials the right electric charge so to speak in the right atmosphere we can create uh proteins we can create enzymes we can create complex molecules and from that

this keep an eye on how Cliff tackles this question the student brings up a really thought-provoking point that many of us might be wondering about so there's a lot to learn from Cliff's response okay and my point would be I would not be shocked if scientists created life CU that's exactly what I believe intelligent mind creates life my point is you've got to have the intelligent mind there you don't just have Life coming out of non-life by accident you don't think it's possible even remotely possible even infantism remotely possible that in some primordial pool a

lightning strike struck a complex of of molecules that created an enzyme that then allowed us to evolve into this over billions of years anything is possible possible correct okay Anything is Possible statically the god exactly you see for me as for me as a thinking human being the question is what is most plausible in light of the evidence third point was third point was moral absolutes what wrong with I don't have a counter for that fourth fourth point was love that I don't understand um and and I'd really benefit if you could explain it to

me sure I don't understand what you mean by it and I've never experienced what you're talking about and I'm fairly happy with my life mhm all right what I'm talking about is in the 60s there was a riot at the sorun the French University in Paris and a young man walked up to a bearded man and said excuse me sir what are you rioting about the bearded man said I'm protesting this lot world the young man asked do you believe in God man said no I'm an atheist young man asked do you love anyone bearded

man lowered his head and said yes I love a woman by whom I've had a child and she's dying of leukemia young man said well if she's dying of leukemia why don't you ditch her and go out and get some other Fox who turns you on a little more bearded a man hauled back and almost hit the young guy young guy said excuse me sir you said there is no God well if there is no God there is no innate human ability to genuinely care for somebody else and if this woman is losing her ability

to sexually excite you CU her body's falling apart due to leukemia why don't you go out and get some other Fox who turns you on a little more and then the young man pulled out a Gospel of John where we read that there is a God and this God is love and when he created You and Me In His Image in his likeness he placed within you and me the innate ability to love so every atheist loves every agnostic loves every theist loves why because we're human beings not machines we're human beings created in the

image and likeness of God is that love the only emotion that God put in us or are all of our emotions from God no God gave us emotions but due to our sin we can twist those emotions the classic example is anger there's nothing wrong with anger confronted by evil God is angry confronted by evil I should be angry that's moral indignation that's righteous anger but in my selfishness in my sinfulness I twist anger and I lose my temper with someone because they step in front of me at the line at the airport don't they

know who they just stepped in front of and so I explode in a selfish type of anger and that's sinful we tie this with your creation X Neo argument creation from nothing had a counter to it everything here from God was there anything before God was there any before God God is eternal so there's nothing before God everything from God no not not everything from God because God has given you and me gifts of creativity obviously God did not make your jacket or eyeglasses obviously God did not build that building and obviously if I go

up to him and kick him in the jaw that's not God kicking him in the jaw or if I go up to and pull my wallet out and give him a dollar it's not God giving him a dollar so because God has given you and me gifts of creativity we can create and we do all the time so then some things from God some from man man used in a general sense male female yeah he's God's given us Gifts of creativity and as far as the moral absolutes go you say there's some okay where do

I find them two places first of all you go to your conscience and secondly you ask has God revealed a standard that I can measure my conscience against Jesus Christ claimed that he was that standard that his ethical teachings are that standard you can find them in The Sermon on the Mount Matthew 5-7 you can find them in Commandments Exodus 20 my conscience the First Source first one conscience right that troubles me my conscience guides my behavior very differently from what I would assume you would guide it as yourself that's right I'm extremely selfish and

almost exclusively act in my own interest that's right that is how my conscience guides me uh-huh well I dare say though that occasionally you experience guilt maybe not often but occasionally my point is guilt you've never experienced guilt not guilt I've regretted my actions in the sense that they didn't have the outcome I thought they were they weren't as beneficial to me as I thought they would be that's regret but not guilt all right speaking for myself at times I have experienced guilt which means I am convinced that what I did was wrong compared to

something other than your conscience well all I know is I experience guilt my conscience informs me of it okay and these four reasons that you've given you feel make it more probable that there is a God than that there isn't correct and then there's another one okay your agnosticism okay it is an intellectual option to me an agnostic it is a practical impossibility every day you have to make priorities every day you have to make ethical decisions and your priorities in life and your ethical decisions in life tattle show very clearly you're not agnostic you

believe something you believe in someone that has motivated you to set the priorities that you have I obviously don't know what those are what you believe in has obviously motivated you to invest your money the way you do your time the way you do so there are many people who can say I'm agnostic I don't know but practically the way you live your life shows that you believe something so then would it be more honest of me to say practically um I believe in me and I'm yes uhhuh correct then I may have misinterpreted agnosticism

I took it and have taken it to mean I don't know what's there I'm not going to make any decision about it I listen to whoever has something to say and see what I think right and I think intellectually you can do that but now you have to go out and live your life and the way you live your life shows whether you acknowledge God or not see that's the embarrassing thing about what we're talking about out here the embarrassing thing about what we're talking about here is it's not like do you like black leather

or brown leather jackets which is totally an issue of your own preference do you like Pepsi or Coke cuz you see it really does doesn't matter whether you like a brown leather jacket or brown or a black leather jacket whether you like Pepsi or Coke those are rather inconsequential issues but the issue of God's existence is not along the lines of Pepsi and Coke black and brown leather jackets it's an issue that goes right to the heart of human existence because it's an issue of what is the meaning and purpose of your life why do

you live your life ethically the way you do and what about life after death are you ever going to have to answer to anybody for the way lived your life you see so due to the grievously serious nature of the issues that are all wrapped up in God's existence although I can say I don't know whether God exists or not the way I live my life the meaning I attach to my life the ethical decisions I make in my life tattle will tell you what I believe about reality thank you so much for sticking around

until the end of the video in my opinion that debate was one of if not the most educational Cliff has ever had the Five Points cliff brings up offer a compelling perspective on the evidence for God intelligent design life from Life moral absolutes love and the universal belief in something or someone the students openness to Cliff's arguments made it a valuable learning experience for everyone involved did any of Cliff's points resonate with you I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below also if you enjoyed the video please take a moment to let me

know your favorite part or what you found most insightful once again I want to give full credit to Cliff and give me an answer for the clip used go check out their Channel thank you for watching and I hope you have a fantastic day