Henke Still Can't Read - Or Hasn't Done so To Lewis

Second Round essays: Henke Can't Read · Henke Can't Argue Philosophy Very Well Either · Henke Still Can't Read - Or Hasn't Done so To Lewis · To Reaffirm "Earliest Known Audience" · The Philosophy of History of Henke : Given without References, Refuted without References · He Applies It · (Excursus on William Tell and Catholic Saints) · Continuing on Section 5 · We're Into Section 6!

More Reading Issues:

"2.5. Mr. Lundahl Suggests Demons Assist Magicians with Stage Tricks"

No, I don't. I did suggest that could be the case.

"Yet, as shown in the two quotations from Lundahl (2022a) in Section 2.3, Lundahl (2022a) injects the absolutely bizarre and unnecessary suggestion that demons are helping David Copperfield or other stage magicians."

Henke misread that. He is unable to read in English what someone is really saying. I was on the hedge and really did not want to go into which explanation was the true one, just that neither of them requires Frick's law of surface tension to be broken.

"In my February 15, 2022, 8:03 pm US Eastern email to Mr. Lundahl,"

That would be the number XI on Correspondence with Gutsick Gibbon (Erika) and with Kevin R. Henke which for Paris time is marked as 2/16/2022 at 2:03 AM.

In my answer, number XII on the post, I stated:

But here we don't have a story, we have an enactment ... and the complaint would be real good publicity, so a thing he would be likely to invent. The Dimond Brothers are obviously right that some preternatural and demonic things point to the reality of the Gospel indirectly (as against Atheism), but I think they are wrong to assume Bian lian is done by demons.

I can now with some confidence add David Copperfield to the list too, but simply having sat on the fence about it (which was the case) involves no burden of proof on my part, relating to Copperfield.

"Lundahl (2022a) also speculates that demons can give the false impression of violating the laws of physics. Once more, Mr. Lundahl presents no evidence for the existence of demons or what they supposedly can or cannot do. He simply expects his readers to accept whatever he says about demons just because he, the Bible or the Church says so. Before Mr. Lundahl can make any claim, he has the burden of evidence to demonstrate that the claim is true."

In a debate with a man like Henke, I am constantly being forced to step away from actually proving what I need to prove in order to counter some misunderstanding or simply provide for his lack of understanding. The explanations of the doctrine the Church and I have about demons should not be confused with my arguing these doctrines true, which I actually do argue. Like, you know, referring to historic texts known to be such by "first known audience" taking them for that.

Henke keeps up a fiction, very awkward for Christians, that they are all the time engaging in proving their belief, and people like himself just asking questions about the proof. In fact they are also giving objections, and the answering of objections falls under explanation, not under proof.

"Here, Mr. Lundahl speculates on a timeline about demons and angels, and the origin of humanity (130 years ago???) that does not make any sense or have a shred of evidence."

I have not stated humanity originated 130 years ago. Angels and demons were created within a week back from Adam's creation, 7200 years ago. Each individual human person living now is however, perhaps above 120 years, but certainly under 130 years.

I check the quote he provided, and lo and behold, I had not forgotten "we are each" it is he who didn't notice the each.

they were created over 7200 years ago and made their mature decision for eternity right after creation, we were each created less than 130 years ago (I presume) and as long as we live, we have time to change, and some do so in the last moment, for better or for worse.

Let's be clear. An angel living now or a demon living now, each of them is a few decades more than 7200 years old. They are immortals, and they do not procreate forming more angels and demons, whether they did or did not procreate forming nephelim before the Flood. A young angel or a young demon doesn't exist.

A man or woman living now was born later than 130 years ago. If I had been rambling in my classic fashion, I would have rambled on, and said "though as to age, not nature, the odds were more even between Adam and any tempter, since he was not much younger than they and lived to 930 years, but even so, due to superior nature, they could do some stuff beyond him to figure out.

Mr. Henke pounces again on the initial sentence of mine : “God and angelic beings can do things with bodies that physics doesn't provide their ability for.”

"How is this not an admission by Lundahl (2022a) that God and angels use magic and aren’t restricted to the laws of physics? If physics cannot explain how God and angels can do things with physical objects, then those actions are outside of and inconsistent with the laws of physics. This is not “adding” to the laws of physics as Lundahl (2022a) claims, but nullifying the ability of the laws of physics to explain the actions of these supernatural beings."

Well, to be blunt, by adding, I mean precisely that physics doesn't account for the action as such. But I also mean, this doesn't nullify all physical laws around it, everything apart from such actions, even in the miracle, follow physical laws. It was outside the normal laws of astronomic movement (whether you consider them as physical necessity or as conventions God impose on own daily action and on periodic actions of sun and moon angels) when Joshua stopped Sun and Moon in their courses. However, it was according to normal laws of optics that they could be observed as standing still for "the time of a whole day" (12 or 24 more hours before they set).

I have already dealt with how Henke misunderstood the point on "adding to, not breaking" ...

I fully admit that I’m no expert on consciousness. Contrary to what Lundahl (2022a) and Lewis (1960, his chapter 3, etc.) indicate in this quotation, our thoughts are electrical and our brains are matter. Lewis (1960, chapter 3, etc.) questioned the ability of humans to rationally understand our surroundings through naturalism and he argued that we should seriously consider that miracles occur. However, Lewis (1960) had the burden of evidence to demonstrate his claims for miracles and he failed to do so.

Let's break this down.

I fully admit that I’m no expert on consciousness.

Are you quite sure you want to admit that?

Contrary to what Lundahl (2022a) and Lewis (1960, his chapter 3, etc.) indicate in this quotation, our thoughts are electrical and our brains are matter.

According to the expertise of Henke? Not any, according to own admission.

According to common and obvious, undisputed experience? Not any, since he brought up experts, and the common experience is really not on the side of equating thoughts with electric currents in brain matter.

According to expertise of neurologists? Ah, perhaps ... but would the things they are expert on not work quite as well if thought was accompanied by electric currents in the brain? C. S. Lewis actually considered it possible acts of consciousness usually were electric currents and only direct acts of reason and moral judgement (and freewill) were added onto this. I differ, due to the "hard problem of consciousness" - I have less trust in brain surgeons when it comes to philosophy of consciousness than both Henke and Lewis. But I have equal trust in them when it comes to what parts of the brain can be damaged if certain quirks in the consciousness show up.

Lewis (1960, chapter 3, etc.) questioned the ability of humans to rationally understand our surroundings through naturalism

No, he totally refuted the ability of humans to rationally understand anything beyond our surroundings, if naturalism is true about what the human understanders are. It is not a question about an understander being hampered by naturalism as a method he uses. It's about an understander, beyond surroundings and survival necessities, being hampered by being mere nature.

and he argued that we should seriously consider that miracles occur.

Not in chapter three, no.

However, Lewis (1960) had the burden of evidence to demonstrate his claims for miracles and he failed to do so.

Oh, he failed to present a case for the Gospels and the Resurrection? Those were actually his claims for miracles, in the end chapters of the book. Let's see what Henke has to say about that.

Now, investigators are still looking for miracles at revival meetings, among psychics, at supposedly haunted houses, and elsewhere, and not finding any evidence for them.

Psychics and haunted houses would not be miraculous in the sense here considered, and CSL considered most of them phoney. One way where I differ from him is, he considered most Roman Catholic claims of miracles going on into the present day as phoney too. Certainly, finding a second best thimble after a prayer to St. Anthony is not what is usually meant by a "miracle" but it is a providential find which can be safely considered as a hearing of the prayer. Something I think CSL later admitted in his posthumously published epistolary novel "Letters to Malcolm, chiefly on prayer."

But where exactly is Henke going to adress what C. S. Lewis had to say about the Miracles of Christ in the Gospels, which were his go to for historic miracles?

Looking at the following paragraphs, he is not going to adress that. While Miracles, by C. S. Lewis, was a reference I did bother to give, did not give in the Chicago format, and he finally found it out, between 15th of March, when I finished a few prequels to the final essay, and 15th of May, when Henke responded, he did not in fact take the time to read that reference. His freedom ... but if he didn't read it, he might have been wiser to not comment on it so much.

If I were to grade him on C. S. Lewis, Miracles, I'd have to give him a P - a big phat phail.

Who we are, including our reason and moral values, arise from interactions between our brains and our surroundings. We observe, test and confirm with the help of others our conclusions about events in nature. Our brains, thoughts and surroundings are all ultimately controlled by the laws of chemistry and physics. That is, we can imagine what it would be like to be able to magically levitate objects only using our thoughts, but the laws of chemistry and physics don’t actually allow us to do it.

And the point of Miracles is, neither do these laws allow us to reason, as reasoning is conceived of in philosophy. But stating that "[o]ur brains, thoughts and surroundings are all ultimately controlled by the laws of chemistry and physics" is going beyond survival necessary conclusions of a provisoric and tactic nature, like "there is probably a fire over there, I see light in the night, I'll be warm" which is about as much as evolutionary factors would actually favour (supposing Evolution had as good prospects as Henke and back then Lewis think). It is in fact the kind of philosophy which only access to universally valid logic would warrant.

I don't think it is too wise to hope for Putin's death, or any man's, unless one meet in clean battle or condemn someone to be hanged to death. In self defense one is not hoping for someone's death, but for the cessation of someone's aggression. Sometimes that coincides with someone's death, sometimes not. But the question at hand is not whether cerebral electro-chemistry can have, if the true explanation for the human mind, momentuous consequences, the question is, whether it can be an apparatus for discovering objective and universally valid truths, both on physical and principled planes (like logic and morality). Henke is not even close to trying to refute C. S. Lewis' chapter 3. It is obvious he prefers ignoring it over reading it, or hopes to have others ignore its actual contents. Perhaps his way of informing himself was to go to a Masonic lodge, hear their gossip about it, and reproduce it here. I do not owe the Freemasonry the kind of reverence that would warrant me just taking that sauce from Mr. Henke. Or perhaps the gossip came from a more informal circle, closer to his academic surroundings, same observation there.

Our morals and reasoning abilities arise in response to our surroundings, including how we interact with other humans. By getting confirmation from our fellow humans and doing experimental testing, we can make reliable discoveries about our environment.

If this were all, how could they be reliable, when going beyond our environment?

We can send spacecraft to Moon, understand why severe earthquakes occur in certain areas and not others, and we understand what causes influenza, etc. The supernatural is not needed to explain these discoveries.

Since Henke has so far failed to understand how chapter three links reason to something beyond nature, I do not feel inclined to take his word for it. Yes, we have made discoveries. But this does not prove that the we - plural instances of I - doing discoveries is brain chemistry. The question is not whether the supernatural is in the explanation, but whether it is required to explain the explainer's ability to make even a completely naturalistic explanation.

No gods, angels, demons or a Bible are also needed to figure out how people should try to function in our environments. We should develop rules (morality) through reason and not Biblical dogma so that we can live peacefully with each other and our environment.

The morality is here said to be rooted in reason. Now, the question is not whether an agency external to our reason is needed to enlighten it - it may be the case, and as Christians, both Lewis and I believe after the fall each has some kind of need of that. The questions are rather:

• where do universally valid rules of reason come from?
• does reason deal with any moral rules prior to its own developing of moral rules?

The point of chapters 3 and (I think) 4 is, the laws of chemistry and electronics and physics and the constraints of evolution do not put us into the reach of discovering what is universally valid. For our reason to do this, we need to be more than that. The sentence "[o]ur brains, thoughts and surroundings are all ultimately controlled by the laws of chemistry and physics," needs to be false, at least if implying "and nothing else."

We should also recognize that not all brains function well. Mental illness and deficiency are real. As rational research shows, chemicals, traumatic experiences and genetics can certainly cause mental illness. Demons aren’t required.

Part of CSL's point. When nature controls our minds, he would also add drunkenness, sleep, we are not considered as being rational. By the way, while mental illness is very probably real, even apart from demons, though rarer than pushed by DSMH V, the Biblical cases of demonic possession cannot be reduced to known mental illnesses, whether real ones or exaggerated claims meant to discourage certain behaviours socially.

Hans Georg Lundahl
Paris
King St. Eric of Sweden
18.V.2022

Upsali, in Suecia, sancti Erici, Regis et Martyris.