From unanswered questions and an active imagination that is often used in place of reason to solve problems.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvin_Plantinga#Evolutionary_argument_against_naturalism

Yurka, read something else. Like a different point of view.

Scientists have done studies on genetic code that is believed to make one more susceptible to a belief in the supernatural or mysticism or things not generally proveable based on the the body’s ability to produce certain sensations and emotions in given situations. The ‘tingles’, more or less.

So while we may get frustrated with Yurka’s apparent aversion to logic, it may be that his capacity to reason may be genetically inhibited by more “spiritual” markers.

But you cannot assume that. Survival-producing and true beliefs do not necessarily coincide. Plantinga once gave an example to illustrate the point: let’s say a rabbit saw a hungry wolf and desired to go towards the wolf, and also had the false belief that he would approach the wolf by running in the opposite direction. Then his false belief would have survival benefit. The point is that you CANNOT use evolution as a foundation for trusting your reason, since false beliefs can have survival benefit, and if reasoning is based on an evolved ‘mechanism’ that mechanism might produce nothing but false beliefs. But you do trust your reason. You also trust in the continuity of natural laws, but why, if those laws just popped into being out of nothing? Where does all this faith come from?

Yurka’s hero, Van Til, is infamous for his grand piece of idiocy, “If I’m using circular reasoning it’s OK, because I’m circling around God.”

No, what isn’t what…??? Sheesh, try to tie things together so you make a little sense.

If you trust that your minds produce rational thoughts, you ARE borrowing from the Christian world view.

Oh. How interesting. So the Greeks were borrowing from the Christian world view before Christ. Impressive. And before that I suppose no one thought they were thinking rationally.
And within the Christian world view what do you do with the refrain (which you’ve used) that we can’t entirely trust our minds since Satan is out there confounding us? Or with the Biblical idea that we are evil/sinful and our minds are corrupt?

As evolutionists, you will hopefully be honest enough to admit that evolution would select for *survival* promoting beliefs, but not necessarily *true* beliefs.

Completely right. I mean look at the plethora of religious beliefs that have existed in this world. If evolution selected for religious beliefs, it surely was selecting them for some survival benefit, ’cause they sure don’t reflect truth.