Visitor Questions on Jeff Durbin and Formal Debates with Apologists

A visitor to this blog recently left a question in the comments of this entry and I thought I’d share it in a dedicated post in case other readers had some insights to offer. Readers are invited to post any thoughts in the comments.

Barry asks:

1. Do you ever formulate responses to "internet" presuppers like Jeff Durbin? 

2. I'm finding it impossibly difficult to get in contact with Christian apologists so as to issue them a challenge to formal debate. My responses on their websites are never answered, and I get banned from their YouTube channels if I post a rebuttal to their YouTube Videos that has more substance than sheer gossip. Must I know somebody on the inside to cause an actual live debate to actually happen?

In regard to the first question: I am unfamiliar with Jeff Durbin and aside from a couple mentions by readers in comments on my blog, I don’t think I’ve ever heard of him. While I have interacted with numerous presuppositionalists over the years, since I am unfamiliar with Jeff Durbin in particular, I cannot say definitively whether I have formulated responses to anyone like Jeff Durbin. That being said, I would not be surprised if Durbin’s particular debating points, if they stem from presuppositionalist inclinations, are similar in many respects to those of apologists with whom I have interacted. Perhaps he has a unique bent on presuppositionalism that I’m unfamiliar with?

 I did a web search of Jeff Durbin and found this brief bio of him here:

Jeff Durbin is Pastor/Elder of Apologia Church in Tempe since it was founded in February of 2010. He worked for many years as a hospital chaplain. Jeff is a popular speaker for camps, conferences, churches & schools across the nation. He has participated in outreach to various religious organizations nationwide and has even engaged in public debate against Atheism. Jeff was featured on a series for the History Channel, “The Stoned Ages” which reviewed the Christian approach and philosophy concerning drug and alcohol addiction. Jeff co-hosts Apologia Radio and Apologia TV, both of which garner followers throughout the US and internationally. Both shows are available via Apologia Studios. He also leads Apologia’s ministry, End Abortion Now, whose goal is to criminalize and end abortion through the work of the local church and state legislation. 

Jeff is a World Champion martial artist with 5 Black-Belts. He starred in popular video games, movies and tours. He played Michelangelo and Donatello for the “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” franchise as well as Johnny Cage in “Mortal Combat” the world-tour. Our younger followers may have even seen him as a fighter in MTV’s “The Final Fu”. Jeff has been married to his bride, Candi, for over 20 years. They have 5-children: Sage, Immagin, Saylor, Stellar, and Augustine.

Here is a link to Apologia Radio, and here’s one to a YouTube channel. – neither of which I have listened to. Maybe some readers of this blog have? If so, please feel free to share your reaction in the comments.

If there’s anything in particular that Jeff Durbin argues that readers might want to consider, feel free to use the comments.

As for the second question, if apologists are not responding to direct challenges, I really have no suggestion other than perhaps to contact individuals who have arranged formal debates between apologists and their opponents in the past. It may be that people’s schedules are just full right now and they don’t have time – something I can fully appreciate. They may also already have a list of persons they’d be willing to debate and will consider formal exchanges only with them. One can only speculate if silence is all that is returned.

Speaking for myself, while I have not sought out formal debates (such as a televised performance), I have observed that many apologists seem reluctant to engage in actual discourse without a sympathetic audience cheering them on, especially if they find that they’re being called to defend their position. This seems ironic because apologetics as such is typically characterized as a defense of the faith. On the contrary, apologists seem most enthusiastic if they can maintain offensive postures, putting spoilsport atheists on the defensive and making them look ridiculous publicly. In years past here on this blog, we’d see the occasional Christian challenger post in the comments. That hasn’t happened in a long time now. 

Earlier this summer in several comments on this blog (see for example here), Robert Kidd shared some of his recent experiences interacting with an apologist, I believe in a YouTube video comments sections. The experiences he described are not unlike many that I have had. One gets the impression that many apologists do not actually want a dialogue, but rather a monologue in which they can just regurgitate assertions they’ve picked up from other apologists. Very often they’ll evade your direct questions, rely on stock caricatures of your position to do their heavy lifting, and ignore Christianity’s own glaring failure to address the very questions they insist non-believers answer with air-tight precision. 

In my experience, it’s not uncommon for apologists to refrain from acknowledging their own blatant gaffs. They have a hard time taking ownership of their own positions and tend to make excuses when called out on statements they’ve made that are clearly incoherent or self-contradictory. A particularly noteworthy example of this can be found here, but many more can be found right here on my blog.

Over the years I’ve come to the conclusion that it does not seem worthwhile to seek intelligent conversation, let alone formal debate, with someone who asserts his position as truth along with what are effectively disclaimers saying, “don’t hold me to this.” Coming from a representative a belief system that's supposed to be "divinely inspired," that doesn't go down well. The claim to be in possession of "revealed truths" is not matched by the kind of confidence in those supposed truths on the part of the apologist that one would expect to observe, were such a claim itself to be true. And no, the arrogance one will observe in a Sye Ten Bruggencate should not be confused with authentic confidence. Bullies are always cowards hiding beneath a guise.

Moreover, I find that apologists are in frequent need of being reminded that their own bible does not address many of the issues which presuppositionalists raise as debating points in their exchanges with non-Christians. Where, for example, does the bible discuss the foundations of logic, of induction, of truth, of values, of rationality, etc.? It doesn’t. I don’t even find the terms ‘logic’, ‘induction’ or ‘rationality’ in any of my copies of the Christian bible, let alone in-depth explorations of their philosophical bases. The bible provides no informed discussion of the nature of the relationship between consciousness and its objects or the relationship between perception and concepts; it provides no principles by which a thinker can reliably distinguish between what he imagines and what religion calls one to believe is “invisible”; it provides no guidance on clarifying the distinction between faith and wishing. On the contrary, the power of biblical teaching hinges integrally on the believer never coming to the realization that his imagination is fully engaged when he reads about Moses conversing with a burning bush, Jesus calming a storm with commands, or the Apostle Peter converting thousands of Jews in Jerusalem just weeks after Jesus had been arrested for and convicted of sedition. The believer is to immerse himself in the Christian fantasy, never becoming wise to the fact that he is merely fantasizing. As such, religion provides a successful formula for losing touch with reality as an inherent aspect of its devotional program. In this way, “worldview” is a misnomer when applied to Christianity in that its entire portrait of reality is delusional.

But readers may have some other thoughts to share on these questions.

by Dawson Bethrick