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Ignosticism or igtheism is the theological position that every other theological position (including agnosticism and atheism) assumes too much about the concept of God and many other theological concepts.

It can be defined as encompassing two related views about the existence of God:

1. The view that a coherent definition of God must be presented before the question of the existence of god can be meaningfully discussed. Furthermore, if that definition is unfalsifiable, the ignostic takes the theological noncognitivist position that the question of the existence of God (per that definition) is meaningless. In this case, the concept of God is not considered meaningless; the term "God" is considered meaningless.
2. The second view is synonymous with theological noncognitivism, and skips the step of first asking "What is meant by 'God'?" before proclaiming the original question "Does God exist?" as meaningless.

Some philosophers have seen ignosticism as a variation of agnosticism or atheism,^[1] while others have considered it to be distinct. An ignostic maintains that they cannot even say whether they are a theist or an atheist until a sufficient definition of theism is put forth.

The term ignosticism was coined in the 1960s by Sherwin Wine, a rabbi and a founding figure of Humanistic Judaism. The term igtheism was coined by the secular humanist Paul Kurtz in his 1992 book The New Skepticism.^[2]

Relationship to other views about God[link]

Ignosticism and theological noncognitivism are generally synonymous,^[3] but the relationship of ignosticism to other nontheistic views is less clear. While Paul Kurtz finds the view to be compatible with both weak atheism and agnosticism,^[4] other philosophers consider ignosticism to be distinct.

In a chapter of his 1936 book Language, Truth, and Logic, A. J. Ayer argued that one could not speak of God's existence, or even the probability of God's existence, since the concept itself was unverifiable and thus nonsensical.^[5] Ayer wrote that this ruled out atheism and agnosticism as well as theism because all three positions assume that the sentence "God exists" is meaningful.^[6] Given the meaninglessness of theistic claims, Ayer opined that there was "no logical ground for antagonism between religion and natural science",^[7] as theism alone does not entail any propositions which the scientific method can falsify.

Like Ayer, Theodore Drange sees atheism and agnosticism as positions that accept "God exists" as a meaningful proposition: atheists judge it to be "false or probably false" while agnostics consider it to be inconclusive until further evidence is met.^[8] If Drange's definitions are accepted, ignostics are neither atheists nor agnostics. A simplified maxim on the subject states "An atheist would say, 'I don't believe God exists'; an agnostic would say, 'I don't know whether or not God exists'; and an ignostic would say, 'I don't know what you mean when you say, "God exists" '."

Although a self-proclaimed atheist, Sam Harris has expressed frustration with being labeled an atheist and often employs ignostic arguments criticizing the ambiguous and inconsistent definitions of "God". Harris finds the label and concept of atheism as extraneous as needing to label oneself a non-racist or a non-believer in Zeus.^[9] In this sense, Harris finds debating about the existence of God to be both absurd and ascientific yet still an inconvenient necessity when speaking in defense of reason and science.

Ignosticism is not to be confused with apatheism, a position of apathy toward the existence of God. An apatheist may see the statement "God exists" as insignificant; yet they may also see it as meaningful, and perhaps even true.^[10]

[edit] Dependence on a particular view concerning the word God

Drange emphasizes that any stance on "Does God exist?" is made with respect to a particular concept of what one claims to consider "God" to represent:

Since the word "God" has many different meanings, it is possible for the sentence "God exists" to express many different propositions. What we need to do is to focus on each proposition separately. … For each different sense of the term "God," there will be theists, atheists, and agnostics relative to that concept of God.^[8]

As god means very different things to different people, when the word is spoken, an ignostic may seek to determine if something like a child's definition of a god is meant or if a theologian's is intended instead. A theistic child's concept generally has a simple and coherent meaning, based on an anthropomorphic conception of god.^[11] Many philosophers and theologians have rejected this conception of god while affirming belief in another conception of god, including St. Augustine, Maimonides, St. Thomas Aquinas, Baruch Spinoza, and Søren Kierkegaard.

See also[link]

Look up ignosticism in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• Epistemology
• Scientific method
• Verificationist
• Theological noncognitivism

References[link]

Sources[link]

• Armstrong, Karen (1993). A History of God. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. ISBN 0-679-42600-0. 
• Ayer, A. J. (1952) [1936]. "Critique of Ethics and Theology". Language, Truth and Logic. New York: Dover Publications. ISBN 0-486-20010-8. LCCN 52860. 
• Conifer, Steven J. (June 2002). "Theological Noncognitivism Examined". The Interlocutor 4. http://www.sewanee.edu/philosophy/Journal/Archives/2002/Conifer.htm. Retrieved 2007-05-24 
• Cousens, Myrna Bonnie, ed., "God", Guide to Humanistic Judaism, Society for Humanistic Judaism
• Drange, Theodore (1998). "Atheism, Agnosticism, Noncognitivism". Internet Infidels. http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/theodore_drange/definition.html. Retrieved 2007-03-26. 
• Hanisch, Helmut (2002-10-21). "Children's and Young People's Drawings of God". http://www.uni-leipzig.de/~rp/vortraege/hanisch01.html. Retrieved 2007-04-26. 
• Kurtz, Paul (1992). The New Skepticism: Inquiry and Reliable Knowledge. Buffalo: Prometheus Books. ISBN 0-87975-766-3. 
• Rauch, Jonathan (2003). "Let It Be". The Atlantic 291 (4). http://www.jonathanrauch.com/jrauch_articles/apatheism_beyond_religion/index.html. Retrieved 2007-05-24 
• Spiegel, Irving (1965-06-20). "Jewish 'Ignostic' Stirs Convention; Dropping of 'God' in Service Deplored and Condoned". New York Times. p. 62. 

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This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (May 2010)

The Basics
The Basics at the Oxford Art Factory, 2010
Background information
Origin	Melbourne, Australia
Genres	Rock
Years active	2002–present
Labels	Independent, Albert Records
Associated acts	Gotye, Down Hills Home, Dog With Wheels, Blood Red Bird
Website	The Basics Official Website
Members
Wally De Backer Kris Schroeder Tim Heath
Past members
Michael Hubbard
Notable instruments
Lead guitar, drums, bass guitar.

The Basics ( /ˈbæzɪtʃ/ BAZZ-ich) are a three-piece band from Melbourne, Australia, formed by Wally De Backer and Kris Schroeder in 2002. Their style has been described as anything from 'indie-pop' to 'rock'n'roll' to 'pop-rock', though their records show they span a wide range of genres, including reggae, ska, country, and electro-pop. They are "recognised as one of Australia's hardest-working bands".^[1]

With close to 1000 shows in their ten-year career, their live performances are well-known for their sense of humour and energy.^[2]

Formation[link]

The Basics were formed after Kris met Wally at a party in Melbourne.^[3] The event was to see off the young aspiring producer, who was about to depart for Los Angeles, and together with a number of musician friends, the two jammed on some blues-rock standards. Later that night, they bonded over a mutual love of The Beatles, 70s and 80s cartoon theme songs and old Sierra adventure games.

Initially, they played around Melbourne as an acoustic guitar/drums combo, starting at The Opposition in Frankston and the House of Fools in Footscray, where in late 2002 they met Michael Hubbard and later invited him to join them on electric guitar.^[4] Though lacking any real experience with the instrument, Kris willingly purchased his first bass guitar, and the trio was born. During this time, the group start performing songs with more complicated three-part harmony.

During late 2002 and early 2003, The Basics recorded and released an album called Get Back through MGM Distribution. They began what was to become regular tours of the East and West coasts of Australia.

2004-2005: Current lineup[link]

Tim Heath joined the group in June 2004, after Michael decided to pursue his solo career, which has included being one half of Down Hills Home.^[4] Tim was reportedly the only person to reply to an advertisement in Melbourne's Beat Magazine looking for a new guitarist. Tim apparently answered the advertisement - which said the applicant "must have a love of 50s and 60s rock'n'roll" - thinking that he would be meeting "a couple of old guys to play with on the weekends over some beers". They soon recorded For Girls Like You.

The Basics in 2005 continued to tour and play small festivals, and after releasing For Girls Like You through MGM Distribution, they departed for a national tour of Australia, which lasted for two months and took them to every Australian state and territory. Stuart Padbury, a young Melbourne sound engineer, joined them on much of this tour. On returning, the band began demonstrating songs for a new album.

2006-2009: Touring and soundtracks[link]

In 2006, The Basics began recording what was to become known as Stand Out/Fit In. Taking several months, it was not completed until the end of the year, despite intentions to have it released in June. Instead, they held a successful 'album preview', where each of the tracks was demonstrated in 'rough form' accompanied by a music video for each (produced by Melbourne photographic artist James Bryans). The band also talked about the origins of the songs. This event brought a lot of attention to the band for the idea's originality. They pre-released a radio single 'Just Hold On' from the album. The band were invited to play the hugely popular Homebake Festival in Sydney, where they received a great response, after being introduced onto the stage by a short stocky Asian guy with big calves ("one of the highlights" wrote The Daily Telegraph).

In 2007, the band departed on a tri-state residency which saw them play Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane every week for the month of April - a bold move which brought further attention to the band for its original idea.^[5] Riding on the wave of this tour, Schroeder, De Backer and Heath departed on their first overseas tour which saw them performing 26 shows around Japan, Norway and the United Kingdom.^[6] They also toured twice more up the East Coast, one of which was with popular Japanese band The Bawdies. Their song 'Rattle My Chain' was used in a series of commercials for Volvo Australia. The song 'Hey There!' featured in the British film The Bank Job - starring Jason Statham - and was used as the backing for a February 2007 short film directed by Tim Longhurst called The Rip. Their song 'Better' was featured in a surfing documentary about the invention of the shortboard in 1967.

In 2008, the band appeared on Australia's Channel 9 for Australia Day celebrations, performing two of their songs - 'Just Hold On' and 'Hey There!' - to an estimated audience of 2 million. Securing an Australian Government grant, they embarked on a two-month tour of Australia, specifically targeting "culturally underprivileged groups" in rural and regional schoolchildren and Indigenous communities. The programme had them holding masterclasses and performing alongside Indigenous groups in the remote Northern Territory and Queensland.^[7][8] Their initiative also had them raising money for the charity Lifeline^{[disambiguation needed ]}, their contribution to which was recognised with a plaque at the end of the tour. Season two of Californication starring David Duchovny featured their cover of the classic 'Have Love, Will Travel', most famously covered by 'The Sonics'.

In 2009, The Basics for the first time enjoyed the support of Australian radio network Triple J, which had reportedly snubbed the band's previous material.^[9] The singles 'With This Ship' and 'Like A Brother' were added to the station's playlist, and momentum carried The Basics overseas for a second tour of the United Kingdom and Norway, and also a series of shows in Dublin, Ireland. They were joined by the longtime front-of-house engineer Stuart Padbury, who had been mixing them since 2005. The band was often seen in the Grafton Street Mall in Dublin, busking to promote their concerts there. Their second show in Oslo, Norway, saw the band perform with Hot Tub, one of the members of the Norwegian boy band "Boyzvoice", in his first performance for several years. Season Eight of Scrubs featured the song 'Lookin' Over My Shoulder'.

Despite all this promise, the band's album Keep Your Friends Close - produced and part-recorded by Peter Cobbin at London's Abbey Road Studios - though enjoying many favourable reviews,^{[10][11][12][13]} failed to impress Richard Kingsmill, music director of Triple J. This effectively ended the band's apparent upward spiral and the resulting album launch tour was reportedly "trying".

2010: Hiatus and live album[link]

In 2010, following the band's fourth stint at the Tamworth Country Music Festival, and the recording of a yet-unreleased live album, an indefinite hiatus was announced on the band's websites. This was in part due to the impending release of a new album produced by Wally for his Gotye project, and also to reported tensions within the band following the previous year's disappointments.

However, this hiatus was soon broken with a two-month residency at the Northcote Social Club in Melbourne, which saw an apparent return to form.^[14] The band's EP "Wait For You" enjoys airplay on Triple J.^[15] The Basics also played a one-off show at Sydney's Oxford Art Factory.^[16]

On 20 August 2010, The Basics released their fourth LP /ðəˈbæzɪtʃ/, available free and exclusively from their website for digital download^[17]. The band had reportedly moved to expand their listenership through this free giveaway, though 300 "Deluxe" CD/vinyl versions have been printed. /ðəˈbæzɪtʃ/ was recorded at the Northcote Social Club on 6 February, "in front of a live studio audience", and like the previous record, was mixed by Peter Cobbin at Abbey Road Studios. Technically a self-titled album, the phonetics spell out the accurate pronunciation of the band’s name. Kris Schroeder: "For years we’ve worked at bringing our live energy into the studio and thus far it’s been a bit hit-and-miss. Our trick this time was to pull a switcheroo and bring the studio to us instead; the result is the best and closest to us we’ve sounded yet."

Melbourne thespian and Dog With Wheels bassist David Bramble - friends with Heath from university days - has occasionally joined the band on tour, playing keys, often while sporting a large moustache. Other guests have included Jake Mason (saxophone), also of Cookin' on 3 Burners and The Bamboos^{[disambiguation needed ]}, Gideon Brazil (saxophone, flute), Simon Imrei (guitar and vocals) and Monty MacKenzie (saxophone).

Covers have often made an appearance from various sources: to date, some of the bands covered have been Cream, The Kinks, The Rolling Stones, The Police, Neil Young, Bob Dylan, New Kids on the Block, Richard Berry, Sonny Curtis and The Crickets, JJ Cale, Harry Nilsson, Bill Scott, Ryan Adams and The Coasters (via The Beatles for their cover of Three Cool Cats).

Members[link]

Current

• Wally De Backer - drums, vocals (2002-present)
• Kris Schroeder - bass, vocals (2002-present)
• Tim Heath - guitar, vocals (2004-present)

Former

• Michael Hubbard - guitar, vocals (2002-2004)

Discography[link]

Albums[link]

• Get Back (15 January 2004)
• Stand Out/Fit In (5 May 2007)
• Keep Your Friends Close (25 September 2009)
• /ðəˈbæzɪtʃ/ (20 August 2010)

EP[link]

• For Girls Like You (11 July 2005)
• Lookin' Over My Shoulder (10 February 2007)
• Like A Brother (5 June 2009)
• Wait For You (21 May 2010)

Singles[link]

• Call It Rhythm & Blues (20 August 2004)
• Just Hold On
• With This Ship (22 February 2009)

Upcoming projects[link]

The band is taking a three year hiatus, with an announced return to the stage together in early 2014. Wally De Backer launched Making Mirrors under his Gotye act in August 2011, Tim Heath will be touring and recording with Blood Red Bird, and Kris Schroeder recorded a solo EP titled, Patience in the Face of Control, before leaving Australia to work with the Red Cross in Kenya for a two year sabbatical.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official Website
• Myspace Website

William Lane Craig

Born	(1949-08-23) August 23, 1949 (age 62)[1] East Peoria, Illinois[citation needed]
Era	21st-century philosophy
Region	Western philosophy
School	Analytic philosophy
Main interests	Philosophy of religion, natural theology, philosophy of time, Christian apologetics
Influenced by Alvin Plantinga, Francis Schaeffer, Edward John Carnell, Stuart Hackett, John Hick, Wolfhart Pannenberg
Influenced J. P. Moreland, Francis Beckwith
Website	reasonablefaith.org

William Lane Craig (born August 23, 1949)^[1] is an American analytic philosopher, philosophical theologian, and Christian apologist.^[2] He is known for his work in the philosophy of religion, philosophy of time, and the defense of Christian theism.^[3] One of his most notable contributions to the philosophy of religion is his defense of the Kalām cosmological argument, which is the most widely discussed argument for the existence of God in contemporary Western philosophy.^[2][4] In theology, he has also defended Molinism and the belief that God is, since Creation, subject to time.^[2][5][6]

Craig has authored or edited over 30 books, including The Kalām Cosmological Argument (1979), The Cosmological Argument from Plato to Leibniz (1980), Theism, Atheism, and Big Bang Cosmology (with Quentin Smith, 1993), Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview (with J.P. Moreland, 2003) and Reasonable Faith: Christian Truth and Apologetics (3d edition, 2008).

Academic background[link]

Craig received a Bachelor of Arts degree in communications from Wheaton College, Illinois, in 1971 and two summa cum laude master's degrees from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois, in 1975, in philosophy of religion and ecclesiastical history.^[1] He earned a Ph.D. in philosophy under John Hick at the University of Birmingham, England in 1977 and a Th.D. under Wolfhart Pannenberg at the University of Munich in 1984.^[7]

From 1980 to 1986 he was an assistant professor of philosophy at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. He briefly held the position of associate professor of religious studies at Westmont College in Santa Barbara, California, from 1986 to 1987. From 1987 to 1994 Craig pursued further research at the University of Louvain, Belgium. Since 1996 he has held the position of research professor of philosophy at Talbot School of Theology, Biola University in La Mirada, California.^[7]

Work[link]

Philosophy of religion[link]

Craig's primary contribution to philosophy of religion is his revival of the Kalām cosmological argument. In The Kalam Cosmological Argument, he formulates the argument in the following manner:

1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause of its existence.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause of its existence.^[8]

He defends the second premise by arguing that actual infinities and the formation of an actual infinite through continual addition are metaphysically impossible. Although he recognizes that axiomatized infinite set theory is logically consistent he maintains that the existence of actual infinities in the real world would lead to absurdities. For example, David Hilbert's famous "Hilbert's Hotel" thought experiment demonstrates how a fully occupied hotel would still be able to accommodate an infinite number of guests. Craig modifies the thought experiment by introducing operations such as subtraction and shows that subtracting identical quantities from identical quantities would have non-identical remainders.^[9] Since we have no evidence of such things in the actual world, Craig maintains that actual infinities are, for all intents and purposes, metaphysically impossible. Craig also argues that the thermodynamic properties of the universe and its expansion provide more evidence in support of premise two.^[10]

Craig also develops an a posteriori argument against actual infinities which rests on the A-theory of time. He gives Bertrand Russell's example of Tristam Shandy, who writes his autobiography so slowly that it takes him one year to write down the events of one day. A similar temporal sequence would have occurred in an eternal universe. No matter how long it takes, an eternal universe would still not be 'actually infinite' and must have begun to exist.

Craig has also contributed to the problem of divine foreknowledge (the compatibility of God's omniscience with human freedom). He analyzes current discussions of time travel, retrocausality, special relativity, and Newcomb's Paradox and brings them to bear on theological fatalism (most often supported by strongly Augustinian theologies, particularly Calvinism).^[11] Rejecting fatalism^[12] he defends the middle knowledge view (also known as Molinism).^[13] According to this solution, prior to actualizing a possible world, God knows everything that does or will happen as well as how free creatures would act if placed in any particular circumstance. Craig considers that this also provides the answer to the question of how God foreknows future contingents.^[14]

Philosophy of time[link]

Craig is a presentist and defends the A-series of time. He rejects J. M. E. McTaggart's famous argument against it, describing it as "an engaging and recalcitrant brain teaser that no one takes seriously," but also argues against hybrid A-B theorists because they are all refuted by McTaggart's paradox.^[15] He argues that McTaggart's objection does not succeed as it employs an incoherent combination of a B-theoretical ontology with A-theoretical temporal becoming.^[16] According to Craig, if one adopts a neo-Lorentzian interpretation of special relativity, the A-theory can be reconciled with the theory of relativity.^[17]

In terms of God's relationship to time, Craig argues that God must exist in time if he is to be regarded as a causal agent. He rejects the view that God could exist timelessly with creation as he did sans creation on the grounds that nothing outside time could have temporal interactions with the world. Critics such as Paul Helm maintain that Craig’s objections against divine timelessness is itself incoherent because "There can be no temporal 'and then' for a timelessly eternal God."^[18] Craig responds to this charge by arguing that God's timeless and temporal phases are not related to each other as "earlier" and "later."^[19]

Apologetics[link]

Craig has written a number of works of Christian apologetics.^[20] Fellow Evangelical apologist Robert M. Bowman, Jr. (writing with Kenneth D. Boa) described his Reasonable Faith: Christian Truth and Apologetics as "one of the best recent textbook introductions to the subject of apologetics."^[21] Catholic Cardinal Avery Dulles has described Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview (with J.P. Moreland, 2003) as "monumental," but pointed out that Catholics will not necessarily agree with it.^[20]

Craig's work as a New Testament historian focuses on a defense of central Christian doctrines, specifically Jesus' resurrection from the dead.^[20] In books such as The Historical Argument for the Resurrection of Jesus, he reviews the historical debate and provides a critical analysis of David Hume's arguments against testimony of miracles, examines New Testament material dealing with the resurrection, and concludes that the resurrection is the most plausible explanation of the historical data.^[22][23] Craig uses the Shroud of Turin as part of his case.^[20]

Other views[link]

Craig is a critic of metaphysical naturalism^[24] and New Atheism^[25] as well as a defender of Reformed epistemology.^[26] He believes that scripture does not condemn homosexuals per se but does prohibit all homosexual acts, which he considers as “sacrilegious” as well as “self-destructive” to the same degree as heroin addiction or chain smoking whether engaged in by a homosexual or a heterosexual person.^[27] Craig maintains that the theory of evolution is compatible with Christianity.^{[28][page needed]} Although he does not fully endorse intelligent design,^[29] he thinks it may be a viable alternative to evolution.^[30] He is a fellow of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture^[31] and a fellow of the International Society for Complexity, Information and Design (ISCID).^[32]

Debates[link]

Craig has publicly debated atheists Richard Carrier, Robert M. Price, Sam Harris, Antony Flew,^[33][34] A. C. Grayling,^[35] Lawrence Krauss,^[36][37] Victor Stenger,^[38] Peter Atkins,^[39] Walter Sinnott-Armstrong,^[40] and Christopher Hitchens,^[41] as well as liberal theologian Gerd Lüdemann,^[42] and prominent Muslims such as Shabir Ally and Jawal Badawi.^[43] Prominent atheist Richard Dawkins has refused a rigorous debate with Craig (accusing him of self-promotion and of being an “apologist for genocide"),^[44] although Dawkins participated in a six-person discussion which included Craig.^[45]

The debates with Antony Flew, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, and Gerd Lüdemann have been published in book form.^{[40][42][46][47]}

Bibliography[link]

• The Kalām Cosmological Argument. London: MacMillan. 1979. ISBN 1-57910-438-X / ISBN 978-1-57910-438-2
• The Cosmological Argument from Plato to Leibniz. London: MacMillan. 1980. ISBN 1-57910-787-7 / ISBN 978-1-57910-787-1
• The Son Rises: Historical evidence for the resurrection of Jesus. Chicago: Moody Press. 1981. ISBN 978-1-57910-464-1 / ISBN 978-1-57910-464-1
• Apologetics: An Introduction. Chicago: Moody Press. 1984. ISBN 0-8024-0405-7
• The Historical Argument for the Resurrection of Jesus during the Deist Controversy. Toronto: Edwin Mellen. 1985. ISBN 0-88946-811-7
• The Only Wise God: The Compatibility of Divine Foreknowledge and Human Freedom. Grand Rapids: Baker Bookhouse. 1987. ISBN 1-57910-316-2 / ISBN 978-1-57910-316-3
• The Problem of Divine Foreknowledge and Future Contingents from Aristotle to Suarez. Leiden: E.J. Brill. 1988. ISBN 90-04-08516-5 / ISBN 978-90-04-08516-9
• Knowing the Truth About the Resurrection. Ann Arbor: Servant. 1988. ISBN 0-89283-384-X / ISBN 978-0-89283-384-9
• Assessing the New Testament Evidence for the Historicity of the Resurrection of Jesus. Toronto: Edwin Mellen Press. 1989. ISBN 0889466165/ ISBN 978-0-88946-616-6
• Divine Foreknowledge and Human Freedom: The Coherence of Theism I: Omniscience. Leiden: E.J. Brill. 1990. ISBN 90-04-09250-1 / ISBN 978-90-04-09250-1
• No Easy Answers. Chicago: Moody Press. 1990. ISBN 0-8024-2283-7 / ISBN 978-0-8024-2283-5
• Theism, Atheism, and Big Bang Cosmology (with Quentin Smith). Oxford: Clarendon Press. 1993. ISBN 978-0-19-826383-8
• The Tensed Theory of Time: A Critical Examination. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers. ISBN 0-7923-6634-4 / ISBN 978-0-7923-6634-8
• Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up? A Debate Between William Lane Craig and John Dominic Crossan. Grand Rapids: Baker Bookhouse. 1998.
• God, Are You There?. Atlanta: RZIM. 1999. ISBN 1-930107-00-5 / ISBN 978-1-930107-00-7
• The Tenseless Theory of Time: A Critical Examination. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers. 2000. ISBN 978-0-7923-6635-5 / ISBN 978-0-7923-6635-5
• God, Time and Eternity. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers. 2001. ISBN 978-1-58134-241-3 / ISBN 978-1-58134-241-3
• Time and The Metaphysics of Relativity. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers. 2001. ISBN 0-7923-6668-9
• Time and Eternity: Exploring God's Relationship to Time. Wheaton: Crossway. 2001. ISBN 978-1-58134-241-3 / ISBN 978-1-58134-241-3
• What Does God Know? Atlanta: RZIM. 2002. ISBN 978-1-930107-05-2
• Hard Questions, Real Answers. Wheaton: Crossway Books. 2003. ISBN 978-1-58134-487-5 / ISBN 978-1-58134-487-5
• God?: A Debate Between a Christian and an Atheist(with Walter Sinnot-Armstrong). New York: Oxford University Press. 2003.
• Philosophical Foundations for a Christian Worldview (with J.P. Moreland). Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press. 2003.
• Creation out of Nothing: A Biblical, Philosophical, and Scientific Exploration (with Paul Copan). Grand Rapids: Baker Bookhouse. 2004. ISBN 0-8010-2733-0
• Reasonable Faith. Wheaton: Crossway. 1994. rev. 3rd ed. 2008. ISBN 0-89107-764-2 / ISBN 978-0-89107-764-0
• Einstein, relativity and absolute simultaneity. London New York: Routledge. 2008. ISBN 0-415-59166-X. 
• On Guard: Defending Your Faith with Reason and Precision. Colorado Springs: David C. Cook. 2010. ISBN 1-4347-6488-5 / ISBN 978-1-4347-6488-1

See also[link]

Biography portal

• List of American philosophers

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: William Lane Craig

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: William Lane Craig

• Reasonable Faith William Lane Craig's personal website
• Faculty webpage
• Comprehensive Debate list
• Interviews from the program Closer to Truth
• Works by or about William Lane Craig in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• Audio files at bethinking.org

William Lane

William Lane (6 September 1861 – 26 August 1917) was a journalist, advocate of Australian labour politics and a utopian.^[1]

Early life[link]

Lane was born in Bristol, England, eldest son of James Lane, from Ireland a Protestant Master Gardener, and his English wife Caroline, née Hall.^[1] When Lane was born his father was earning a miserable wage, but later his circumstances improved and he became an employer. The boy was educated at Bristol Grammar School and showed ability, but he was sent early to work as an office boy. Lane's mother died when he was 14 years of age, and at age 16 he migrated to Canada, then to the United States, where he worked first as a printer, then as a reporter for the Detroit Free Press (1881), there meeting his future wife Ann MacGuire. In 1885 they migrated to Brisbane, Australia, where Lane immediately got work as a feature writer for the weekly newspaper Queensland Figaro, then as a columnist for the newspapers Brisbane Courier and Evening Telegraph, using a number of pseudonyms ("Lucinda Sharpe", which some consider to be the work of Annie Lane, William Wilcher and "Sketcher").

A life-long abstainer from alcohol, in 1886 he created an Australia-wide sensation by spending a night in the Brisbane lock-up disguised as a drunk, and subsequently reporting the conditions of the cells as "Henry Harris". Lane's father was a drunk who impoverished the family.^[1]

With the growth of the 7-2 labour movement, "Sketcher"'s columns, especially his "Labour Notes" in the Evening Telegraph, increasingly promoted labourist philosophy, and Lane himself attended meetings supporting all manner of popular causes, speaking with his "American twang" against repressive laws and practices and Chinese immigrants.

After becoming the de facto editor of the Courier, Lane departed during November 1887 to found the weekly The Boomerang, "a live newspaper, racy, of the soil", in which pro-worker themes and lurid racism were brought to a fever-pitch by both "Sketcher" and "Lucinda Sharpe". He became a powerful supporter of Emma Miller and Women's suffrage. A strong proponent of Henry George's Single Tax Movement, Lane became increasingly committed to a radically alternative society, and ended his relationship with the Boomerang due to its private ownership.

In May 1890 he began the community-funded Brisbane weekly The Worker, the rhetoric of which became increasingly threatening towards the employers, the government, and the British Empire itself. The defeat of the 1891 Australian shearers' strike convinced Lane that there would be no real social change without a completely new society, and The Worker became increasingly devoted to his New Australia utopian idea.

The Workingman's Paradise, an allegorical novel written in sympathy with the shearers involved in the 1891 Shearer's Strike, was published under his pseudonym John Miller in early 1892. In the novel Lane articulated the belief that anarchism is the noblest social philosophy of all. Through the novel's philosopher and main protagonist he relates his belief that society may have to experience a period of State socialism to achieve the ideal of Communist anarchism. Mary Gilmore, later a celebrated Australian writer, said in one of her letters "the whole book is true and of historical value as Lane transcribed our conversations as well as those of others".

New Australia Colony[link]

Contriving a division among Australian labour activists between the permanently disaffected and those who later formed the Australian Labor Party, Lane refused the Queensland Government's offer of a grant of land on which to create a utopian settlement, and began an Australia-wide campaign for the creation of a new society elsewhere on the globe, peopled by rugged and sober Australian bushmen and their proud wives.

Eventually Paraguay was decided upon, and Lane and his family and several hundred acolytes from New South Wales, Queensland and South Australia departed Mort Bay in Sydney in the ship Royal Tar on 1 July 1893.

New Australia soon had its crisis, brought on by the issues of inter-racial relationships (Lane singled out the Guarani as racially taboo) and alcohol. Lane's dictatorial manner soon alienated many in the community, and by the time the second boat-load of utopians arrived from Adelaide a year later, Lane had left with a core of devotees to form a new colony nearby named 7-2.

Eventually Lane became disillusioned with the process, and returned to Australia in 1899.

Later life[link]

Lane then went with his family to New Zealand. After initial melancholia, he soon refound his old verve as a pseudonymous feature-writer from 1900 for the newspaper New Zealand Herald ("Tohunga"), only this time as ultra-conservative and pro-Empire. He had strong racial antipathy toward East Asians, and during World War I he developed extreme anti-German sentiments. He died on 26 August 1917 in Auckland, New Zealand, having been editor of the Herald from 1913 to 1917, much admired, having lost one son Charles at a cricket match in Cosme in Paraguay, and another Donald on the first day of the ANZAC landings (25 April 1915) on the beaches of Gallipoli.

References[link]

This article cites its sources but does not provide page references. You can help to improve it by introducing citations that are more precise.

• Gavin Souter's account of Lane and New Australia in his A Peculiar People
• Peter Bruce's thesis (Univ Sydney) The Journalistic Career of William Lane.
• Larry Petrie (1859-1901) - Australian Revolutionist? by Bob James
• Whitehead, Anne (1997) Paradise Mislaid — in Search of the Australian Tribe of Paraguay University of Queensland Press, St. Lucia
• Serle, Percival (1949). "Lane, William". Dictionary of Australian Biography. Sydney: Angus and Robertson. http://gutenberg.net.au/dictbiog/0-dict-biogL.html#lane1. Retrieved 7 September 2009. 

External links[link]

• Workingman's Paradise at Project Gutenberg
• Workingman's Paradise, Pdf at University of Sydney

Gary Robert Habermas (born 1950) is an American evangelical Christian apologist, historian, and philosopher of religion. He is a prolific author, lecturer, and debater on the topic of the Resurrection of Jesus. Habermas is considered to be one of the foremost experts on the resurrection.

Biography[link]

Habermas is Distinguished Professor of Apologetics and Philosophy and chairman of the department of philosophy and theology at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia. He holds a Ph.D. (1976) from Michigan State University in the area of History and Philosophy of Religion and an M.A. (1973) from the University of Detroit in Philosophical Theology. He has specialized in cataloging and communicating trends among scholars in the field of historical Jesus and New Testament studies. Habermas has authored or co-authored 35 books on religious and philosophical subjects, contributed to over 60 chapters or articles in books, and published over 100 articles and reviews in peer-reviewed journals.^[1] He continues to do research, publish popular and academic papers, give debates, and he frequently appears on television.

In 1985, Dr. Gary Habermas and Antony Flew debated the question of Jesus' resurrection as a literal and historical/physical event, before a crowd of 3000 people. Five philosophers and five professional debate judges judged the debate. Of the philosophers who judged on the content of the debate, four voted that Habermas won and the other was undecided. Of the debate judges who voted on debate technique, three voted for Habermas while two voted for Flew.^[2] The debate was published as a book under the title Did Jesus Rise from the Dead? The Resurrection Debate (Harper & Row).

In 2004, Habermas conducted an interview with Antony Flew published in Biola University's Philosophia Christi journal, in which Flew reversed his long-standing espousal of atheism by endorsing deistic theism.^[3] The interview has been the source of some minor controversy, centering on claims made in the interview's preface regarding the scope and nature of Flew's beliefs, and his subsequent contradictory statements endorsing atheism, the latter being a misnomer, for Flew clearly no longer supports the inference or verdict of atheism, but rather the evidential method or route by which one may secure such a verdict, i.e., the "Presumption of Atheism" is default, nullified only on the condition that the degree of proof is met. ^[4]

Bibliography[link]

• Why is God Ignoring Me? (Tyndale House Publishers, 2010).
• with John Thomas What's so God about Feeling Bad?, (Tyndale, 2008).
• with Jerry Walls & David Baggett C.S. Lewis as Philosopher, (InterVarsity, 2008).
• Resurrected? : An Atheist and Theist Dialogue, (Rowman & Littlefield, 2005).
• with Licona, Michael The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus, (Kregel, 2004).
• with Moreland, J.P. Beyond Death: Exploring the Evidence for Immortality, (Crossway, 2004).
• The Risen Jesus & Future Hope, (Rowman & Littlefield, 2003).
• The Thomas Factor: Using Your Doubts to Draw Closer to God (Broadman & Holman, 1999).
• The Historical Jesus: Ancient Evidence for the Life of Christ (College Press: Joplin, MI 1996).
• Ancient Evidence for the Life of Jesus: Historical Records of His Death and Resurrection
• Dealing With Doubt (Moody Press, 1990)
• Gary R. Habermas and Antony G. N. Flew, Did Jesus Rise from the Dead? The Resurrection Debate, ed. Terry L. Miethe (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987; Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2003).

References[link]

External links[link]

• Gary Habermas — personal website
• Gary Habermas on Theopedia
• Why I Believe The New Testament Is Historically Reliable by Dr. Gary Habermas
• Explaining Away Jesus’ Resurrection: The Recent Revival of Hallucination Theories by Gary R. Habermas
• Jesus' Resurrection and Contemporary Criticism: An Apologetic (Part I) - PDF File
• Jesus' Resurrection and Contemporary Criticism: An Apologetic (Part II) - PDF File
• Interview with Dr. Gary Habermas on the implications of Near-Death Experience science for Christian theology.