If anyone wants to see my next response to Dan McClellan (since he responded to this) you can see it here: instagram.com/reel/C4vtq7SLVB6/?igsh=NWh3bTRwc2Z1Z3Q5
Ay inspiring philosophy Dan mcclean made a new video talking about “Gods Father” I know you won’t see this but I was wondering if you could make response on it
What good would even that do if he already said words do not need to be coherent.....which under the normal definition of the term coherent it would mean words do not need to be align with the law of identity so A can be B.....which makes all communication and language and thought itself unintelligible.
I'm a Christian but I'll call myself an atheist from now on. Don't you dare to commit the True Scotsman fallacy on me and tell me that my belief in Jesus excludes me from being an atheist and that only true atheists claim that God doesn't exist.
@@unamusedmule I'm mean I called McClean because it's just faster to pronounce I just think that wasnt really relevant instead of just saying "Dan made an error"
The entire matter was lost for Mr. McClellan when he said words don't need to have a coherent meaning. If there is no meaning, there is no communication, and no rational act can follow in discourse without real communication. It marks him as an absurdist. PS: Words without coherent meaning aren't even words. They're just sounds.
Totally disagree. Definition of veganism is straight i.e you can't eat animal products but there are so many unspecific verses in Bible which is why 100s of denominations exist in Christianity. Liberal Christians does enormous interpretation of bible to make it compatible with modern secular moral philosophy. Most undeniable definition of Christianity is to accept the divinity of Jesus Christ and bible. But when it comes to discuss of morality that bible allows slavery and even violence,a liberal Christian will do enormous gross interpretation of his text to make bible compatible with modern values.
I've noticed many atheists fall for rhetorical invocations of the word 'fallacy' without actually critically thinking it through. Probably an issue with people writ large though, to be fair.
@@Archeidos-Arcana it's kinda false analogy because you cannot compare veganism to Christianity. Christianity is not only about accepting Jesus as a god but to follow the moral codes prescribed in bible
Yeah seems pretty straightforward. Are these people intentionally trying to be obtuse with stuff like this or are they hopelessly lost. Like how can you even think this is circular reasoning lol what
Totally disagree. Definition of veganism is straight i.e you can't eat animal products but there are so many unspecific verses in Bible which is why 100s of denominations exist in Christianity. Liberal Christians does enormous interpretation of bible to make it compatible with modern secular moral philosophy. Most undeniable definition of Christianity is to accept the divinity of Jesus Christ and bible. But when it comes to discuss of morality that bible allows slavery and even violence,a liberal Christian will do enormous gross interpretation of his text to make bible compatible with modern values.
Yes, they are being obtuse. They want to be part of the "in group" without making the necessary changes in themselves, so are trying to argue about what the in group "really" includes.
@@itsoblivion8124different groups having different definitions that they use to distinguish their beliefs is not circular reasoning lol, do you even know what circular reasoning is. It is valid for group A to believe set x and group B to believe set y while both referring to x and y by the same label, and exclude each other via their different definitions as long as the discrepancies are not arbitrary. Neither is committing circular reasoning or no true Scotsman in this scenario.
Likewise, many christians do not understand their own theology and when asked what the trinity is, they explain modalism instead. I guess to you those individuals (who would certainly identify more with being evangelicals than mormons) are not christians either.
@@carlosjosejimenezbermudez9255More like cultural Christians aka "Christians by name only". Yes, I don't consider them Christians when they get basic facts wrong, let alone the gospel. Which is basically most Americans, sadly. No wonder the morals of that country are deteriorating. Not that other countries don't have those issues too.
So, if Hitler defined being a Nazi as don't kill anyone and yet Nazis did exactly the same things as they did in our timeline would you still say that nazism doesn't have any blood on their hands, that it is unfair to point out that Nazis were mass murderers because Hitler said in order to be a Nazi you must not kill anyone? Would we be ok with people telling they are Nazis because after all, no true Nazi did anything wrong, no true Nazi killed any Jews as Hitler said Nazis are banned from killing anyone?
@@carlosjosejimenezbermudez9255 it depends if they are strongly committed to that view, or if they can be corrected by the Bible and Christian teaching.
It seems like there's a movement in society, where people see that other people use words to demonstrate errors in thinking and instead of addressing those errors they say, "I no longer recognize words as having meaning."
I know Jesus gives me strength and I would not be here 🙏 if not for him this I'd kids stuff faith and I don't belive I know and a don't care what any of you think I know if not for him I would not be smoking a cigarette and thank you Jesus you are only only one that is always there praise Jesus! I have messed up spelling and everything else !!!!
@@InspiringPhilosophy Totally disagree. Definition of veganism is straight i.e you can't eat animal products but there are so many unspecific verses in Bible which is why 100s of denominations exist in Christianity. Liberal Christians does enormous interpretation of bible to make it compatible with modern secular moral philosophy. Most undeniable definition of Christianity is to accept the divinity of Jesus Christ and bible. But when it comes to discuss of morality that bible allows slavery and even violence,a liberal Christian will do enormous gross interpretation of his text to make bible compatible with modern values.
@@reyis_here945 No true Scotsman is a fallacy when you accepted a single interpretation of your belief and rejects other interpretations despite many people holds different interpretations of same belief. For example when Catholics commits crime then as a Protestant,you can't say he's Catholic so he's not real Christian becauseand vice versa.
Pointing out something a Christian wouldn't do isn't a no true Scotsman fallacy. That's like accusing an athiest of no true Scotsman fallacy because they said no true athiest believes in God. So no it's not a fallacy to point out something a real Christian wouldn't do if it goes against their beliefs. Great response Ip keep up the good content
I find the claim that a real Christian wouldn't do something that goes against their beliefs problematic. Because even from inside the Christian world view and according to the Bible Christians still sin all the time, and sinning goes against their beliefs as Christians. If a real Christian doesn't do things that go against their beliefs, then based on what the Bible says there are no real Christians. If you are saying that a real Christian wouldn't believe things that go against their beliefs, that is just circular. Mormons don't believe things that go against their beliefs. The only way to use this criteria to determine a real Christian by comparing beliefs is to see whether one Christian's beliefs go against another Christian's beliefs, and then declare one of them the correct authority and the other a heretic.
@@matthewnitz8367Mormons don't believe that go against their beliefs" that the native Americans where white people prior to coming over to the Americas... Is that heretical or just inaccurate... and kind of racist
@@matthewnitz8367 I never claimed that a real Christians won't sin or that they would do things that go agaisnt their beliefs. I'm simply pointing out that when a Christian does something that contradicts what the God of the bible commands us to do they aren't acting as a Christian and it wouldn't be a fallacy to say so this doesn't mean their no longer Christian but no acting as a Christian would. And also the second paragraph of your response doesn't make sense you wouldn't call someone a Christian if they believed something else at that point they would be labeled an Athiest or something else.
4:14: Dan himself commits a question-begging fallacy (i.e. flagrant circular reasoning) by invoking "all people who identify as Christian." But what is the definition of Christian? He's either getting the logic completely backwards or just projecting.
Dan: a Christian is someone who identifies as a Christian IP (walsh): ok so what is a Christian? Dan: someone who identifies as a woman. IP Walsh: ok but what does that mean!? DAN: words don’t have coherent meanings outside of the groups who use them. IP Walsh: that doesn’t make any sense!? How else could we communicate? Dan: that’s a logical fallacy!!! IP Walsh: what? Dan: yet another fallacy!!! IP: I’m so confused!!!! Can you explain why you think that at least? Dan: no I’m good. Leaves… shits on the floor on the way out. IP Walsh: looks around confused at what just happened.
So, if Hitler defined being a Nazi as don't kill anyone and yet Nazis did exactly the same things as they did in our timeline would you still say that nazism doesn't have any blood on their hands, that it is unfair to point out that Nazis were mass murderers because Hitler said in order to be a Nazi you must not kill anyone? Would we be ok with people telling they are Nazis because after all, no true Nazi did anything wrong, no true Nazi killed any Jews as Hitler said Nazis aren't banned from killing anyone?
This feels like Dan's rhetorical strategy for everything be doesn't like. If he doesn't like it, it means nothing, because words don't have meaning. But if he does like it, words can only mean precisely what he wants them to mean.
“Words have to have a coherent meeting” Dan: “No they don’t.” Really can’t say anything more critical than Dan himself. The arguments basically make themselves.
To steelman Dan - the problem is in the phrase, "have to have". We strive for words to have coherent meaning, we endeavor for words to be coherent, but that doesn't mean we actually succesfully achieve this result. You see this all the time in real life when there is a misunderstanding between two people - Person A thought their words were coherent to Person B, but this was not the case in actuality. So it is clear from this that words do not, "have to have" coherent meaning, and in fact words often do not have coherent meaning. That is the charitable interpretation of what he says, and I would expect IP to at least address the steelman version, if he disagrees. I do agree with IP, of course, when he points out the obvious, that defining Christianity in a manner which excludes Mormonism, does not constitute a fallacy, and that there is no fallacy when Dan makes a definition which includes Mormonism as Christian. The task of the honest truth seeker is to look at both definitions, understand why the wortds were definited the way they were, and to make as close possible an unbiased and objective assessment of the positions each side puts forth.
@@JacquesduPlessis11 I won't bring up the fact that he said "words don't have meaning" (somehow excluding that specific statement addressing it) Or the fact that he himself used circular reasoning fallacies in his video as a result of that... So let's get the question of whether or not it's a No True Scotsman fallacy to exclude Mormons
Totally disagree. IP use false equivalence logical fallacy to prove himself. Definition of veganism is straight i.e you can't eat animal products but there are so many unspecific verses in Bible which is why 100s of denominations exist in Christianity. Liberal Christians does enormous interpretation of bible to make it compatible with modern secular moral philosophy. Most undeniable definition of Christianity is to accept the divinity of Jesus Christ and bible. But when it comes to discuss of morality that bible allows slavery and even violence,a liberal Christian will do enormous gross interpretation of his text to make bible compatible with modern values.
Totally disagree. Definition of veganism is straight i.e you can't eat animal products but there are so many unspecific verses in Bible which is why 100s of denominations exist in Christianity. Liberal Christians does enormous interpretation of bible to make it compatible with modern secular moral philosophy. Most undeniable definition of Christianity is to accept the divinity of Jesus Christ and bible. But when it comes to discuss of morality that bible allows slavery and even violence,a liberal Christian will do enormous gross interpretation of his text to make bible compatible with modern values.
What a fucking joke. Do you have a Ph.D in the study of the Hebrew Bible and ancient Near Eastern literature? No. Can you read and speak in Ancient Greek, Hebrew, Latin and Aramaic? No. Have you published any peer-reviewed academic papers? No.
@@itsoblivion8124 actually the reason the domination exist is result of liberalism... Going all the way back to Lutheranism That is true and their objectively wrong for doing that This is derivative to the previous statement you made
I actually have a suspicion that he isn't even a real Mormon. His views are way too Post-Modern to be consistent with what the LDS Church has historically taught. I don't know how he can espouse the Progressive views that he does without rejecting the church's official teachings.
Dan is very much cultured enough if you listen to his disquisitions on Hebrew and Greek translations - it is just that it is all in service of his own personal preferences and beliefs if you listen long enough and read the comments he attacts below
@@ethanhocking8229 Dan has never revealed any of his religious beliefs whatsoever in any way shape or form of any kind at all, so accusing somebody of not being a real Latter Day Saint despite the fact that he’s worked and is still currently working at a Latter Day Saint scholar institution, is bullshit.
I absolutely love these videos so much, because it gives me not only proper ways and sources to practice apologetics, it gives me such relief that faith in Christ isn't merely blind belief like so many (mainly non-believers) claim it is, but instead trust based on evidence and reliability.
Dan McClellan frequently and repeatedly presents himself as a pseudo-intellectual with a degree. He's educated. His rhetoric is strong. But when you really break down what he is saying - especially when you apply it to the standard he himself applies - you find that it is often nonsense. The absurdity that words don't have to have meaning creeps into every aspect of his videos, and it prevents him from actually engaging intellectually on any argument. He simply runs away with, "Ah, but your presuppositions/definitions are wrong because I don't agree!" Certainly, you can do this on every aspect of life. But this level of deconstruction applied everywhere is entirely unhelpful and devoid of anything useful. Thank you for posting this. God bless you, IP.
It's simply true that words don't HAVE to have a coherent meaning. We DESIRE them to have a coherent meaning. But just witness someone from the South asking a person in the Midwest for a coke and getting a coca-cola instead of being asked "what kind" and you will see that words don't have INHERENT meaning. Words are given meaning by how we use them, and that usage is what we use to determine the definition of the word we are using as a symbol to evoke some set of concepts. It is useful to be able to agree on a definition. But it is problematic when a person claims they/their group have the authority to set the definition of a word and everyone else using it in a different way are wrong. And this is Dan's disagreement with Michael. Dan is not saying Michael's definition is wrong because he doesn't agree with it. He's saying Michael's definition is wrong because it does not fit the usage either in America in general, or even among Christians specifically. Unfortunately Michael failed to show probably the most important part of Dan's video, but at the end Dan showed that the majority of Christians in America, and indeed the plurality of every single group of Christians surveyed besides white evangelicals, say that Mormons are Christians. So not just in America, but even among most Christians in America, when someone says "Christian" they are including Mormons. This is where Michael gets into his circularity, because he would have to say that true Christians, being Christians that have the correct doctrines/beliefs, are the ones that get to define Christian. And according to him those true Christians would say that Mormons are not Christians. But that means that over half of Christians in the US aren't true Christians, because they say Mormons are Christian, and the true Christians that determine the criteria for being Christian don't believe Mormons are Christian. Now your criteria for true Christians has excluded not just Mormons, but also anyone that believes Mormons are Christian as well. There's simply no non-circular way to claim that this is the official definition some authoritative "we" has decided on for being Christian.
@@matthewnitz8367 and the Mormons that to say "were not Christians" are excluded from the conversation because of acceptance in that fact... Or because of the number of people saying this?
@@InspiringPhilosophysir youre undoubtedly one of the most formidible apologists haha i was a hater when you shot down the emerald tablets of thoth but i quickly gained respect for you and yoour work. I think i agree with dan but your material is still really good. Keep trashing islam and billy carson please haha that fraudulent pos
In my experience most people don't understand how logical fallacies work, and when they are violated. I advice people to try not to include fallacies in your argumentation because most people will get them wrong.
Is Dan Mcclellan gay? Not an attack, just genuinely wondering because I saw him wearing a rainbow flag watch, and all his videos trying to make the bible say it doesn't say homosexuality is a sin and his defense of all things LGBT would make sense...personal interest
He’s a clown that makes an effort to look intellectual in all of his videos + that aura of arrogance around him. He speaks a lot but says nothing, he has no impact at all
Lik je OK, ali nije u pravu ovdje. On definira da krscanin mora vjerovati u trojstvo sto nije tocno i nije definicija krscanstva. Krscanin je onaj ili neka grupa koja vjeruje da je Isus Bog. Nista vise nista manje. U tome i je filozovska pogreska u njegovom zakljucku. On mjenja definiciju iz Krscanin u Pravi krscanin koja je neodredena i koju on definira sam. I onda zakljucuje kako mormoni nisu krscani jer nevjeruju u trojstvo. I to je filozovska pogreska jer bi onda moga uvijek i u svakoj raspravi se pozvat da netko nije pravi ili istiniti krscanin itd. Jedina definicija je da krscanin vjeruje u Isusa kao Boga i po tome mormoni spadaju u tu grupu. On se onda poziva kako “mi” necemo prihvatiti npr mormone kao krscane. Ali to “mi” nije definirao. Tko mi, katolici, protestanti, pravoslavci, mormoni? Tek onda definicija krscanina nebi imala smisla jer bi netko morao odredivati tko je a tko nije krscanin. Rijec krscanin je upravo to, rijec, koju mozes naci u leksikonu i vidjeti njenu definiciju, neovisno o necijoj teologiji ili tumacenju biblije ili prosudbi. U tome je filozovska pogreska u argumentiranju. LP
Dan's snarky nature actually helps confirm a lot of scripture. It's almost like the harder he tries to destroy core Christian doctrine, the more God uses his negativity to draw strong contrast between light and dark. Not related to any substantive argument, but I have to say you can just feel the unhappiness and negativity oozing from that guy. He's great with words and appealing to his crowd, but he still can't seem to hide the shadow he lives in.
@@reyis_here945he accuses everyone else( Christians) of renegotiating all Biblical texts : but that is Exactly what Dan's minimalist scholarship does in attacking the Bible.
This guy is right, the boundaries have been drawn since the 1st century AD, he and everyone else better figure out their table in their own final destination before deciding to sit with us or not.
Not sure it was that early given that so many heresies remained common place LONG after the 1st Century, the only thing that was settled after the 1st Century was that there were gospels written, no creeds existed at the time. I suppose early christians weren't christian after all because they had no creeds to focus on...
As soon as someone says words don’t need to have coherent meanings their opinion can be rejected. Imagine arguing about how to define something and, during the course of the argument, you say nothing needs to be defined a certain way. He can’t see that’s self-defeating?
@@Call_Me_Rio right. It’s dangerous to let getting offended cloud your logic to such a degree that you try to delegitimization language as a concept. I don’t think this is someone I could trust to give me an objective opinion on anything.
@@Holden-uf7and a minimalist scholar from a fully Secular Religious studies PhD program. They teach there is no supernatural authority to the Bible and only look at the Bible as a man made book. Dan's already admitted he's trying to debunk any authority the Biblical writers claim for the Bible as the Word of God. So, his PhD program just adds to his progressive Mormon views about the Bible and the Book of Mormon. His minions don't realize there are other Biblical scholars that don't agree with his views of the Bible. Dan's Data is just his Dogma : so nothing to see( "let's see it" ) besides his redaction and renegotiating the ancient Biblical text from a liberal 21st century century denial of anything special about the Bible. Exactly what he accuses modern Historical Christianity of doing.
Mike, I'm a big fan, but I noticed all the definitions you cited called the act of redefinition arbitrary. They did not call the feature arbitrary, as I think you said around 2:43
Dan is the most arrogant & misleading creator I’ve ever seen. Progressive, mormon, has degrees. He thinks he is the arbiter of truth. He re-invents definitions & denies historical truths to make a fallacious point
IP: “Words have to have a coherent meaning”. Dan: “No they don’t” If words don’t have to have coherent meaning, then the words “no they don’t” don’t have to have a coherent meaning, so I am justified in saying that when Dan says “no they don’t” it’s the same as saying “yes they do”.
And in any case, the Fallacy Fallacy states that just because something is fallacious doesn’t mean it’s automatically untrue, so even if Dan proved it, your point remains
Dan MacClellan does put some interesting content out, and I often enjoy listening to what he has to say. I subscribe both to his channel and to this channel.
@@igorlopes7589Marxists believe in personal property i.e, property for living a life, like a house or car or a toothbrush but don't believe in *Private* Property or as they call it "Capital Goods"(like a business or a bank). I have Marxists in my family and they live very simple lives, never beyond the necessity. Many argue that while in the end, when you reach the Communist goal(Stateless, cashless, Propertyless Eutopia, or as they call it, the Dictatorship of the Proletariat) there will be no Private Property, right now, in the Capitalist Society since money is necessary to survive- it's permissible to own property so that you don't starve but earn money .
I think maybe Dan is a post-modernist and talking or debating with him using reason and logic is a waste of time since communication for a PM is about power rather than reason or understanding.
Good point. I hear he has done a response video. Dan is a joke, really. All he does is make these asinine videos attempting to find fault with evangelical faith.
>If all people who identified as Christians had a seat at the table and had a hand what the criteria and methodologies were going to be for drawing the boundaries around what a Christian is… Well, Dan has figured out what an ecumenical council is.
We're all Dans. Unless every Dan sat down at a table and discussed the criteria and methodologies of drawing the boundaries around what a Dan is, it's wrong to say that no one is a true Dan. Therefore, simply saying "no true Dan is named something other than Dan" is inadequate to exclude alternative first-name Dans from the Dan group.
Dan just likes to be contrarian. His twitter is him just quote tweeting theists all day going "Um no actually" I enjoy his work, but everything else about him is so insufferable.
@@darthzackariusnickthenamethede lol it's late when I first saw your reply I thought it was someone wanting three regerence sources for a point I made somewhere else.
Another way to illustrate why he's wrong. Person D says All dogs are mammals. Person E says my parakeet is not a mammal. Person D says your parakeet is not a real dog. Has Person D committed the fallacy? What if the parakeet identifies as a dog? The point here is that dogs, Christians, vegans all have OBJECTIVE definitions. A counter example that does not fit that objective definition is not a valid counter example. It's more about objective vs subjective - he's claiming subjective definitions should control, but I think it's fine to require OBJECTIVE definitions.
Dan is constantly criticizing people saying “if you don’t have a phd in near eastern study’s you can’t call me wrong” then he tries to correct a creator who have a degree in philosophy when he himself doesn’t have that same credential is blatant hypocrisy.
Dan Mclellan used to bother me so bad, but in one video you have broken his power, because no one this flagrantly illogical and dishonest can be taken seriously. Thanks!
My kid is Dan's son. If he draws arbitrary distinctions like "paternity" or "never having ever met me or my son before" then he's commiting the NTS fallacy. His family doesn't get to define who his family is by being in his family. I'll be awaiting my child support, Dan.
Dan is definitely a circular reasoning guy. He redifnes words alot and uses arguments from silence and or barely credible/non credible sources to make his points. Dan is basically a modern day gnostic with a degree that twists words to try and confuse the flock. No offesne to him but 90% of his points are based on pontification, leaps in logic/assumptions and VERY weak evidence and sources and or bad greek/hebrew translation.
Former Mormon, now Trinitarian Christian. Thanks for this. It's hard talking to LDS just because we use completely different definitions for basically everything...so LDS think we believe basically the same things because they frequently don't understand that we are using different definitions for "God," "Son of God," "eternal life," "gospel," etc.
Dan sucks for many reasons, but christians like you who exclude others from christendom are also a problem too. Creeds didn't make the early christians christians, belief in Christ did. Creeds did not exist and were not given by Christ or any of his early apostles for that matter, they came from trying to make scripture consistent, something which you can do in many ways, regardless of whether you uphold the creeds or not. The main points you make is the idea of the trinity (a creedal belief) being superior to belief in Christ as the Messiah, which to me sounds like putting the cart before the horse. There are plenty of heresies that can be disproven with scriptural consistency, but creedal belief does not a christian make. Almost every evangelical christian I know personally doesn't understand the trinity, instead explaining it as modalism or the idea of the trinity meaning 3 individuals. Does that make them not christian too because they are not theologically literate enough to know what their own beliefs are supposed to be?
1.) It's not a credible belief if it's in the Bible 2.) Joseph Smith, Native Americans being a white... is incredibly inaccurate (historicallly an ontologically) from, and has no relation to the Bible
@@reyis_here945 My point is the double standard that traditional christians use to defend this point (not the fallacies point, that point given by Dan was idiotic), their own members get a free pass because the divinity of God is a mystery, but other groups with devotion to Christ (regardless of creedal adherence) do not get such a free pass because... tribalism? To me it doesn't make sense why some of you guys are so hung up on this. Muslims recognize Christ, but not as the Messiah, there is a strong distinction there to not consider them christians, and they do not consider themselves christians either. You could even say the same with Jehovah's Witnessess maybe (note the maybe here) due to their alterations to the Bible with little justification and their differences in understanding of Christ's role. But when getting to 7th Day Adventists and LDS/Mormons (which I am part of), those objections fall flat because there is a strong belief in the role of Christ as the Savior and his resurrection being very important. If you can, because of theological reasons, say that mormons are not christian, you inarguably have to say the same about those christians who do not understand their theology enough that they end up explaining modalism (something considered a heresy) instead. That, or you have to be more flexible with your definition of "christian". I am fine with not being considered a traditional christian, I am not (not a liberal either, don't mix politics into this), but to say that my belief in Christ is any less than many other christians is something I consider insulting and un-christlike when hearing that from other believers.
For those who are interested, I’ve pointed out in the video at the following video how IP has fundamentally misunderstood both the fallacy & the sources they’ve cited: ua-cam.com/video/SgYoE0Kpu3Q/v-deo.html
@@TheEagleChristian Debates are performative identity politics & I don't have any idea what deleted comment you're talking about. I don't delete comments.
@@maklelan Literally everything anyone does is performative. Being unwilling to engage in actual debate just shows you are using a more popular content creator to boost your own analytics.
According to Dan's definition given at around 3:15, any attempt at categorization at all could be considered a NTSF. By what criteria would anyone be allowed to mark Christianity as a category? Simply by accepting that calling one's self a Christian makes it so?
Mormons are not Christian. "As man is God was, as God is Man shall become". You cannot reconcile this with message of Christ and his Apostles. I spent much of my life living in SE Idaho, when I was a kid Mormons were adamant they weren't Christians. It's only been in the last 15 years they have started trying.
You can identify as a particular religion all you want, but if you don’t hold to the basic tenets of the religion, you aren’t actually a member of that religion.
- “Words have to have a coherent meaning” - “No they don’t” Well… that’s a self-defeating statement because whatever comes next ought not have meaning by the same logic. Unless we all agree that it’s gibberish, which it is, then the meaning here is meaninglessness!
Nice respectful and reasoned response, unusual for an apologist! Sad to see that really every commenter is a fan boy of you or Christianity, so you are preaching to a choir of sycophants. The important point is that McClellan is a strong and often brilliant scholar, and you are providing a decent response--thx.
Thank you, IP! I know Dan won't debate, but I'd LOVE to see your responses to video's of his like the "bearer of the divine name" theory (undermining the divinity of Jesus, saying that an angel also bears YHWH's name in Ex. Ch. 3, and that's all Jesus is doing), or his videos denying the univocality of Scripture. A longform video getting to the heart of his methodology, or the methodology of scholars like him would really help me a lot personally. Thanks for all the hard work man. God bless you!
I am glad he has been addressed. He himself is a Mormon. Although he claims his scholarship is unbiased, for those that know the aspects of Mormonism, it just so happens to fit nicely
@@TheKingdomWorks I don't know of many, but Jacob Hansen from Thoughtful Faith does. I'm not a huge fan of his content either, but he's made a few videos criticizing Dan. I think Ward Radio has also done some, but I'm not 100% sure on that.
Both you and Dan make good points and both have interesting points of view. I need to try and watch more of your videos, but at the end of the day, i contemplate each view instead of picking one and try and form my own view
That last comment really sealed the deal for me, you did a great job throughout the whole video, but what I’ve learned from the wise disciple UA-cam channel is that if you refuse to engage with your opponents argument, you concede the entire debate. Let’s work on this!
Curious then how you feel about the fact that IP left out what I would consider the most important part about what Dan was saying at the end of his video, and didn't even make it clear in his video that he left part of Dan's video out? While I think it may have been worthwhile for Dan to make a short comment about why he didn't consider the last portion of Michael's video worth commenting on, it was at least clear to me that there was something further in IPs video that quoted from a philosopher that Dan did not think was worthwhile to address or possibly irrelevant to his field of expertise. But had I not watched Dan's video, I would have had no idea the end had been left out of IPs reply.
@Tylerstrodtman Sure, I think this should link to the time stamp right at the beginning of the comment in the video IP did include, before the final section with the actual data that wasn't included: ua-cam.com/video/QuM41YMkNaQ/v-deo.htmlsi=WlPz-sPhywhsfXOf?t=5m44s
@@matthewnitz8367 It didn't go straight to the time stamp, but I did find the part you were referring to I think. Is it where it says that Jones is actually incorrect because the majority of Christians do consider Mormons to be actual Christians?
So basically, words are subjective. To commit the No True Scotsman Fallacy, you have to think that your definition of a certain word is *absolute*, as if it serves 'importance' or a "literal definition", while the other sees the same word but *in his own context*; so you deny his own definition and proclaim it to be 'invalidated'.
All lawyers have to pass the Bar. My uncle is a lawyer and he didn’t pass the Bar. Only true lawyer pass the Bar. Would layers commit this fallacy? After all they create a circle who makes the definition and then limit who can be a true lawyer by their definition.
I'm not a Christian in any sense, but the hypocrisy of these guys that keep calling out fallacies is so annoying. It's like a degeneration of the analytic school of thought, thinking that you can just win an argument by calling out fallacies when many times there are perfectly valid contextual reasons for reasoning in a specific way (like drawing social boundaries to define who has the authority to make legitimate claims, not implying that outgroup claims are false as such, but giving reasons why these boundaries make sense and are useful).
Isn't what you consider "meaningful" also arbitrary? You're saying you can apply the same structure described by Dan and it wouldn't be a fallacy as long as the reason for excluding the example is meaningful to you. And yes, the words like vegan or bachelor are easy examples since they literally exclude certain things in their definitions, but in most cases it's not a clean cut and you have to resort to arbitrary distinctions that may be meaningful to you and even your community/culture.
Dan talks boldly and confidently about content he doesn’t fully understand😮 Not good rhetorical qualities! Having everyone take a seat at the table to define what x is defined as has never been the method for defining terms. Common usage is a part of that method. When definitions are tied to a founder such as platonism or Aristotelian thinking or Buddhism, Confucianism, Marxism we see that the following attributes apply: 1 - adhering to originators views or teachings 2 - Agreement with generally accepted truths (E.G. doctrinal creeds) that flow from original teaching but were not part If those teachings Given those uncontroversial definitional guidelines (there are others but those two will suffice), we can easily see why Christ, his early followers recording his teaching, his later followers in 7 ecumenical councils, the so-called “Church Doctors” in the Catholic Church, there theological counterparts in the Protestant and various orthodox teachings would all reject liberal denominations, Jehovah Witnesses, Mormons, Unitarians, as Christian due to there rejection of Christ’s teaching, The nature of Christ, work of Christ, Fundamental doctrine of same, as well as their rejection of most Christian doctrinal truths coming form all other sources across a near 2000 year written record!!
CS Lewis had an insightful definition of Christianity in Mere Christianity, paraphrasing, “you can call someone a bad Christian or a good one, but to deny that they worship Jesus is going too far”. Jesus already told us how to judge, John 13:34 “A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. 35 By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.”
@@rockweirdo8147 They may be interpreting Psalms 82 and Jesus quotation of said verse “ye are gods” incorrectly in your view. Maybe they are incomplete or misdirected, but it is evident that their focus is loving one another the way Jesus did.
@@GregorianRants - No, anyone who does not believe in one God, is not a Christian, anyone who believes they will be gods, is not a Christian, anyone who adds to the bible in with non-canonical and contradictory cultish beliefs of a man (AKA joseph smith) is not a Christian. Christians are followers of Christ, if you betray the teachings of God, then you are not following Him. They can identify as Christians, but all Christians ought to separate themselves from them, as they are against Christian doctrine.
quite right, Desperate Dan is very very fluid with his terms when it suits him - if he cannot give his definitions he fails to communicate, not winning any argument because it never gets that far into meaningful communication to create an argument. His massively subjective approach is equivalent to having a private language where he mainly talks to himself
@@byrondickens that isn't accurate at All. The Council of Nicea was prior to the lift of Christian persecution. John's Gospel clearly lines Jesus as God.
@@joshuatrott193 Uh huh. Four and five centuries after the fact by the self-appointed gatekeepers who gained power through political wrangling and violence.
As per my comment on the last video, I think the creator has a point despite your correct counterpoint. The issue is that NTS is an A or B case but the two events are very different in application. His usage is what we generally are referring to in everyday life when we point this out. It's about moving the goal posts for arbitrary reasons. Your usage falls under the other usage and is more formal. It's kind of the difference between how in everyday English we say "or" even though we logically mean "xor" and interpret "or" as "xor" unless we're in the technical mindset. After that initial point though, he runs into the problem of classifying atheism: a) a religion is a combination of elements we call 'rituals' (or whatever label floats your boat) b) atheism has none of these elements; it's empty c) the set of all possible combinations of elements in set S is known as the Powers Set of S e) the empty set is an element in the power set of 'rituals' f) Therefore, atheism is a religion QED This can be fixed by simply saying that a religion is a non-empty combination of 'rituals', but now the question is if that rewriting of the definition by an atheist is a NTS fallacy. Requiring something be non-empty is not a ridiculous or ad hoc restriction. However, since he started listing off adjectives as stand in for "true", that means he's more focused on the reason _why_ something is being rewritten. And fair enough but nothing is solid the first round. I think the way to address the fallacy is buried in the philosophers you quoted with "arbitrary". Arbitrary just means you are choosing instead of reasoning. Thus, I think the strategy would be to concede the point, revisit your definition, and then revise it for the next debate. Changing definitions in the middle of a discussion is the issue here. We do this all the time, such as with prime numbers.
There has to be a name of the fallacy that Dan abuses but I’m not sure what it would be called. He makes a claim, then when you dissect his claim to refute it he tells you “That wasn’t the point of my original claim” or “That isn’t what this term means”. He constantly moves the goalpost so that you can’t progress to your point because he keeps trying to make it seem like you are incapable of understanding his original claim lol For instance his claim could be: A: “All birds have the ability to fly” B: “you said all birds have the ability to fly but a penguin can’t.” A: “my conclusion had nothing to do with penguins” B: “But you said all birds can fly” A: “ No my point is that all birds have the ability to fly. Not that they will certainly fly” You can never progress to the point of the argument because he won’t allow you both to agree on the same meaning on anything that he says. Other than blatant gaslighting. Is there a logical term for that?
I don't know what it is either, despite being blatantly obvious (whatever it is). Dan is just a postmodern snake. He keeps himself in the perfect shade of ambiguity to get his botched ideas across (regardless of how the internal logic works or affects his other ideas), while being able withhold his actual views and motivations to avoid having to explain himself or his arguments (it would explain why he avoids debating).
Another example: Person who just watches UA-cam videos: "I'm a scientist." Actual scientist: "What do you study? How have you used the scientific method? What educational background do you have? What research papers have you published and in what journals?" Person who watches UA-cam: "I don't, my definition of scientist doesn't require doing any of that stuff." Are we forced to take that person's definition of what it means to be a "scientist" seriously?
Messianic Jews say they are Jewish, but Jewish people say they are not. Each side has the right to define Judaism as they want to define it. You can't be required to believe what you don't want to believe.
I'm not sure that's an appropriate example for fluid definition of terms, because in this context "Jewish" can mean two things: Ethnically Jewish and/or theologically Jewish. Messianic Jews are ethnically Jewish but not theologically. Orthodox Jews are both.
@@Zancarius Messianic Jews say they are ethnically Jewish and theologically because they claim that Jews always believed in a trinity. That is part of the debate between Judaism and Messianic Judaism.
@@Zancarius One guy said that Mormons are not Christians and the other guy said they are. Somehow that led to the argument about the True Scotsman fallacy. I was just saying that people of different religions define their own religions, in a way, so a Christian can say Mormons are not Christian. A Mormon can say he or she is a Christian. In the same way, Messianic Jews say they are ethnically and theologically Jewish based on a lot of Biblical quotes that they claim are Messianic prophecies or Trinitarian proof quotes. I don't agree with them, but that is their version of truth. They can call themselves Jews and their leaders rabbis, etc. I was just trying to say that when it comes to many religions, you can't force people to accept your belief, so they can claim anything. There are many people nowadays who say that Jews are not really the Jews. They say that the real Jews are black people, Hispanics, and native Americans. That is life today.
@@kennethgreifer5123 I see where you're coming from, and I can agree. The trouble I have is when the terms we use become too fluid to be meaningful. Which, somewhat ironically, is one of the issues that Michael Jones brought up with one of Dan McClellan's other videos where the latter suggested words mean only what we intend them to mean. Words have meaning, generally agreed upon by society over a long period of time, and this sort of variance is problematic because it creates relativistic truth. I'm not confident that this direction in which our society is heading is especially useful (or good), because if words become too malleable and their meaning too variable then language is effectively useless. That said, I know of at least one Messianic Jew who has come to our church and she identifies as a Christian-and I think many of them do. I would imagine it's a relative minority who claim to be both ethnically and theologically Jewish, but I have to wonder if the reason they're muddying the linguistic waters is less over relative truth and more a consequence of manipulating the argument somewhat in the favor of Christ. That is, they're claiming to be the "real" Jewish people (or the "real" Israel) because of the fulfillment of prophecy through Christ, which they acknowledge. In this view, those groups we consider theologically Jewish would be considered an aberration or heretical by the Messianic Jews who believe themselves the true Israel/remnant. In a sense, they're not wrong *per se*, but biblically it's an untenable position because they hold the dubious distinction of being ethnically Jewish and theologically Christian while the majority of the Jewish people still have a hardness of heart that causes them to reject Christ. At least, that's my stance on the issue. It may be wrong.
He is arguing against how language works for most of the video. We don't have a coherent system for the majority of people to use 5 different criterion to describe who part of a group. In philosophy they can spend most a paper clarifying definitions they will be using but society works through majority usage. 'Christian Nationalist' doesn't mean just being both words when used now. It has a definition based on the groups that use the term.
If anyone wants to see my next response to Dan McClellan (since he responded to this) you can see it here: instagram.com/reel/C4vtq7SLVB6/?igsh=NWh3bTRwc2Z1Z3Q5
Pro tip: drop this before he does. It's crazy he's still doubling down. Be the bigger person.
Remember dont get too wrapped in these arguments bro, the Bible itself denies mormonism, so anything Dan says has an agenda attached to it
No bro @@luthlexor123
Ay inspiring philosophy Dan mcclean made a new video talking about “Gods Father” I know you won’t see this but I was wondering if you could make response on it
Mb I should of said please
"You can't define a term unless literally EVERYONE agrees with it" - Dan, basically...
What good would even that do if he already said words do not need to be coherent.....which under the normal definition of the term coherent it would mean words do not need to be align with the law of identity so A can be B.....which makes all communication and language and thought itself unintelligible.
@@davidryan8547 I agree. I think his argument fails because it rips the foundation out from under itself.
You cant have a coherent conversation if you have conflicting defintions for the same word being used. Like that atheist christain guy lol
I'm sure I can invent a definition of "define" that makes his argument even more ridiculous, but it's not worth our time.
I'm a Christian but I'll call myself an atheist from now on.
Don't you dare to commit the True Scotsman fallacy on me and tell me that my belief in Jesus excludes me from being an atheist and that only true atheists claim that God doesn't exist.
The problem with that... is that you just made a claim... and arguble bold one
well , can you tell him that he iswrong?
@@reyis_here945 I was trying to caricature the issue and the mistake the McCain guy or whatever made
@@unamusedmule I'm mean I called McClean because it's just faster to pronounce
I just think that wasnt really relevant instead of just saying "Dan made an error"
I’m confused
The entire matter was lost for Mr. McClellan when he said words don't need to have a coherent meaning. If there is no meaning, there is no communication, and no rational act can follow in discourse without real communication.
It marks him as an absurdist.
PS: Words without coherent meaning aren't even words. They're just sounds.
You can't just say words and give a speech, and then proceed to say communication isn't real...
Thats reductive
Totally disagree.
Definition of veganism is straight i.e you can't eat animal products but there are so many unspecific verses in Bible which is why 100s of denominations exist in Christianity.
Liberal Christians does enormous interpretation of bible to make it compatible with modern secular moral philosophy.
Most undeniable definition of Christianity is to accept the divinity of Jesus Christ and bible.
But when it comes to discuss of morality that bible allows slavery and even violence,a liberal Christian will do enormous gross interpretation of his text to make bible compatible with modern values.
I've noticed many atheists fall for rhetorical invocations of the word 'fallacy' without actually critically thinking it through. Probably an issue with people writ large though, to be fair.
Mr. McClellan is a Bart Ehrman wannabe.
@@Archeidos-Arcana it's kinda false analogy because you cannot compare veganism to Christianity.
Christianity is not only about accepting Jesus as a god but to follow the moral codes prescribed in bible
Yeah seems pretty straightforward. Are these people intentionally trying to be obtuse with stuff like this or are they hopelessly lost. Like how can you even think this is circular reasoning lol what
I have no clue, beats me.
I never thought that if you define something, that it's now circular reasoning.
Totally disagree.
Definition of veganism is straight i.e you can't eat animal products but there are so many unspecific verses in Bible which is why 100s of denominations exist in Christianity.
Liberal Christians does enormous interpretation of bible to make it compatible with modern secular moral philosophy.
Most undeniable definition of Christianity is to accept the divinity of Jesus Christ and bible.
But when it comes to discuss of morality that bible allows slavery and even violence,a liberal Christian will do enormous gross interpretation of his text to make bible compatible with modern values.
Yes, they are being obtuse.
They want to be part of the "in group" without making the necessary changes in themselves, so are trying to argue about what the in group "really" includes.
@@itsoblivion8124different groups having different definitions that they use to distinguish their beliefs is not circular reasoning lol, do you even know what circular reasoning is. It is valid for group A to believe set x and group B to believe set y while both referring to x and y by the same label, and exclude each other via their different definitions as long as the discrepancies are not arbitrary. Neither is committing circular reasoning or no true Scotsman in this scenario.
I just want to underline "other people can call themselves Christian, but we don't have to agree"
They aren't *true* Christians.
Likewise, many christians do not understand their own theology and when asked what the trinity is, they explain modalism instead. I guess to you those individuals (who would certainly identify more with being evangelicals than mormons) are not christians either.
@@carlosjosejimenezbermudez9255More like cultural Christians aka "Christians by name only". Yes, I don't consider them Christians when they get basic facts wrong, let alone the gospel. Which is basically most Americans, sadly. No wonder the morals of that country are deteriorating. Not that other countries don't have those issues too.
So, if Hitler defined being a Nazi as don't kill anyone and yet Nazis did exactly the same things as they did in our timeline would you still say that nazism doesn't have any blood on their hands, that it is unfair to point out that Nazis were mass murderers because Hitler said in order to be a Nazi you must not kill anyone?
Would we be ok with people telling they are Nazis because after all, no true Nazi did anything wrong, no true Nazi killed any Jews as Hitler said Nazis are banned from killing anyone?
@@carlosjosejimenezbermudez9255 it depends if they are strongly committed to that view, or if they can be corrected by the Bible and Christian teaching.
It seems like there's a movement in society, where people see that other people use words to demonstrate errors in thinking and instead of addressing those errors they say, "I no longer recognize words as having meaning."
You transferred from "i made an error in my writing"... To "Well words have no meanings" real quick
Sorry he
like he or she?
I know Jesus gives me strength and I would not be here 🙏 if not for him this I'd kids stuff faith and I don't belive I know and a don't care what any of you think I know if not for him I would not be smoking a cigarette and thank you Jesus you are only only one that is always there praise Jesus! I have messed up spelling and everything else !!!!
Glad to See Christians finally addressed Dan.
And lost.
I appreciated the examples you used IP. They were clear and concise illustrations.
Great video as always IP
Thank you
@@InspiringPhilosophy Totally disagree.
Definition of veganism is straight i.e you can't eat animal products but there are so many unspecific verses in Bible which is why 100s of denominations exist in Christianity.
Liberal Christians does enormous interpretation of bible to make it compatible with modern secular moral philosophy.
Most undeniable definition of Christianity is to accept the divinity of Jesus Christ and bible.
But when it comes to discuss of morality that bible allows slavery and even violence,a liberal Christian will do enormous gross interpretation of his text to make bible compatible with modern values.
@@InspiringPhilosophy you used false equivalence
@@itsoblivion8124 elaborate your claim please
@@reyis_here945 No true Scotsman is a fallacy when you accepted a single interpretation of your belief and rejects other interpretations despite many people holds different interpretations of same belief.
For example when Catholics commits crime then as a Protestant,you can't say he's Catholic so he's not real Christian becauseand vice versa.
Pointing out something a Christian wouldn't do isn't a no true Scotsman fallacy. That's like accusing an athiest of no true Scotsman fallacy because they said no true athiest believes in God. So no it's not a fallacy to point out something a real Christian wouldn't do if it goes against their beliefs. Great response Ip keep up the good content
Essentially you can't use words to make the sentence "words arent just sounds that arent relevant to meaning"... and then proceeded to say that
I find the claim that a real Christian wouldn't do something that goes against their beliefs problematic. Because even from inside the Christian world view and according to the Bible Christians still sin all the time, and sinning goes against their beliefs as Christians. If a real Christian doesn't do things that go against their beliefs, then based on what the Bible says there are no real Christians.
If you are saying that a real Christian wouldn't believe things that go against their beliefs, that is just circular. Mormons don't believe things that go against their beliefs. The only way to use this criteria to determine a real Christian by comparing beliefs is to see whether one Christian's beliefs go against another Christian's beliefs, and then declare one of them the correct authority and the other a heretic.
@@matthewnitz8367Mormons don't believe that go against their beliefs" that the native Americans where white people prior to coming over to the Americas...
Is that heretical or just inaccurate... and kind of racist
@@matthewnitz8367 I never claimed that a real Christians won't sin or that they would do things that go agaisnt their beliefs. I'm simply pointing out that when a Christian does something that contradicts what the God of the bible commands us to do they aren't acting as a Christian and it wouldn't be a fallacy to say so this doesn't mean their no longer Christian but no acting as a Christian would.
And also the second paragraph of your response doesn't make sense you wouldn't call someone a Christian if they believed something else at that point they would be labeled an Athiest or something else.
@@reyis_here945I have no clue what you are talking about
4:14: Dan himself commits a question-begging fallacy (i.e. flagrant circular reasoning) by invoking "all people who identify as Christian." But what is the definition of Christian? He's either getting the logic completely backwards or just projecting.
Dan: a Christian is someone who identifies as a Christian
IP (walsh): ok so what is a Christian?
Dan: someone who identifies as a woman.
IP Walsh: ok but what does that mean!?
DAN: words don’t have coherent meanings outside of the groups who use them.
IP Walsh: that doesn’t make any sense!? How else could we communicate?
Dan: that’s a logical fallacy!!!
IP Walsh: what?
Dan: yet another fallacy!!!
IP: I’m so confused!!!! Can you explain why you think that at least?
Dan: no I’m good. Leaves… shits on the floor on the way out.
IP Walsh: looks around confused at what just happened.
*woman is wrong should be Christian
@@HenryLeslieGraham "Dan; no I'm good, leave... s*** on the floor the way"... where the f*** did that come from?🤣
@@HenryLeslieGraham I don't know I think it makes a joke funnier
So, if Hitler defined being a Nazi as don't kill anyone and yet Nazis did exactly the same things as they did in our timeline would you still say that nazism doesn't have any blood on their hands, that it is unfair to point out that Nazis were mass murderers because Hitler said in order to be a Nazi you must not kill anyone?
Would we be ok with people telling they are Nazis because after all, no true Nazi did anything wrong, no true Nazi killed any Jews as Hitler said Nazis aren't banned from killing anyone?
Very well done. McClellan has an agenda he is trying to push. It's not about thinking accurately for him.
Basically McClellan's video boils down to: "Nothing means anything."
This feels like Dan's rhetorical strategy for everything be doesn't like.
If he doesn't like it, it means nothing, because words don't have meaning. But if he does like it, words can only mean precisely what he wants them to mean.
Like all good post-modernists.....
" nothing means nothing! Nothing means nothing means....nope, no more, im talking about all the way to the top"
@@davidryan8547... post-modernists cross pollinating with relativists. Brrrrr!
Actually that seems to be the theme of much of his work.
Proof that having a degree in biblical studies doesn’t make you intelligent in philosophy.
Scientists are even worse about it
“Words have to have a coherent meeting”
Dan: “No they don’t.”
Really can’t say anything more critical than Dan himself. The arguments basically make themselves.
To steelman Dan - the problem is in the phrase, "have to have". We strive for words to have coherent meaning, we endeavor for words to be coherent, but that doesn't mean we actually succesfully achieve this result. You see this all the time in real life when there is a misunderstanding between two people - Person A thought their words were coherent to Person B, but this was not the case in actuality. So it is clear from this that words do not, "have to have" coherent meaning, and in fact words often do not have coherent meaning. That is the charitable interpretation of what he says, and I would expect IP to at least address the steelman version, if he disagrees.
I do agree with IP, of course, when he points out the obvious, that defining Christianity in a manner which excludes Mormonism, does not constitute a fallacy, and that there is no fallacy when Dan makes a definition which includes Mormonism as Christian. The task of the honest truth seeker is to look at both definitions, understand why the wortds were definited the way they were, and to make as close possible an unbiased and objective assessment of the positions each side puts forth.
@@JacquesduPlessis11 Dan is anything but steel in this outing
Nice wordplay, but one should always try and take on the strongest form of an opponent's argument.@@reyis_here945
I hope he merely misspoke, or at least he is not clear enough that we misunderstood his point, regardless of context.
@@JacquesduPlessis11 I won't bring up the fact that he said "words don't have meaning" (somehow excluding that specific statement addressing it)
Or the fact that he himself used circular reasoning fallacies in his video as a result of that...
So let's get the question of whether or not it's a No True Scotsman fallacy to exclude Mormons
Dan should abandon both biblical criticism and philosophy.
Or at least bothered debating his opinions
Totally disagree.
IP use false equivalence logical fallacy to prove himself.
Definition of veganism is straight i.e you can't eat animal products but there are so many unspecific verses in Bible which is why 100s of denominations exist in Christianity.
Liberal Christians does enormous interpretation of bible to make it compatible with modern secular moral philosophy.
Most undeniable definition of Christianity is to accept the divinity of Jesus Christ and bible.
But when it comes to discuss of morality that bible allows slavery and even violence,a liberal Christian will do enormous gross interpretation of his text to make bible compatible with modern values.
Totally disagree.
Definition of veganism is straight i.e you can't eat animal products but there are so many unspecific verses in Bible which is why 100s of denominations exist in Christianity.
Liberal Christians does enormous interpretation of bible to make it compatible with modern secular moral philosophy.
Most undeniable definition of Christianity is to accept the divinity of Jesus Christ and bible.
But when it comes to discuss of morality that bible allows slavery and even violence,a liberal Christian will do enormous gross interpretation of his text to make bible compatible with modern values.
What a fucking joke. Do you have a Ph.D in the study of the Hebrew Bible and ancient Near Eastern literature? No. Can you read and speak in Ancient Greek, Hebrew, Latin and Aramaic? No. Have you published any peer-reviewed academic papers? No.
@@itsoblivion8124 actually the reason the domination exist is result of liberalism... Going all the way back to Lutheranism
That is true and their objectively wrong for doing that
This is derivative to the previous statement you made
Dan the Mormon is not cultured enough to appreciate philosophy
Wait he is mormon? Checks out.
I actually have a suspicion that he isn't even a real Mormon. His views are way too Post-Modern to be consistent with what the LDS Church has historically taught. I don't know how he can espouse the Progressive views that he does without rejecting the church's official teachings.
Dan is very much cultured enough if you listen to his disquisitions on Hebrew and Greek translations - it is just that it is all in service of his own personal preferences and beliefs if you listen long enough and read the comments he attacts below
@@ethanhocking8229 Dan has never revealed any of his religious beliefs whatsoever in any way shape or form of any kind at all, so accusing somebody of not being a real Latter Day Saint despite the fact that he’s worked and is still currently working at a Latter Day Saint scholar institution, is bullshit.
I'm not so sure he's a member anymore. He left Brigham young and does almost all of his podcasts/videos with other atheist
You are the perfect counter to Dan's whole demeanor. His attitude is arrogant and he severely overestimates his own intellect.
I absolutely love these videos so much, because it gives me not only proper ways and sources to practice apologetics, it gives me such relief that faith in Christ isn't merely blind belief like so many (mainly non-believers) claim it is, but instead trust based on evidence and reliability.
Dan McClellan frequently and repeatedly presents himself as a pseudo-intellectual with a degree.
He's educated. His rhetoric is strong. But when you really break down what he is saying - especially when you apply it to the standard he himself applies - you find that it is often nonsense.
The absurdity that words don't have to have meaning creeps into every aspect of his videos, and it prevents him from actually engaging intellectually on any argument. He simply runs away with, "Ah, but your presuppositions/definitions are wrong because I don't agree!"
Certainly, you can do this on every aspect of life. But this level of deconstruction applied everywhere is entirely unhelpful and devoid of anything useful.
Thank you for posting this. God bless you, IP.
It's a sign of post-modernism being taught at universities. Post-modernism is against definitions, meanings, objetive truths and so on.
It's simply true that words don't HAVE to have a coherent meaning. We DESIRE them to have a coherent meaning. But just witness someone from the South asking a person in the Midwest for a coke and getting a coca-cola instead of being asked "what kind" and you will see that words don't have INHERENT meaning. Words are given meaning by how we use them, and that usage is what we use to determine the definition of the word we are using as a symbol to evoke some set of concepts. It is useful to be able to agree on a definition. But it is problematic when a person claims they/their group have the authority to set the definition of a word and everyone else using it in a different way are wrong.
And this is Dan's disagreement with Michael. Dan is not saying Michael's definition is wrong because he doesn't agree with it. He's saying Michael's definition is wrong because it does not fit the usage either in America in general, or even among Christians specifically. Unfortunately Michael failed to show probably the most important part of Dan's video, but at the end Dan showed that the majority of Christians in America, and indeed the plurality of every single group of Christians surveyed besides white evangelicals, say that Mormons are Christians.
So not just in America, but even among most Christians in America, when someone says "Christian" they are including Mormons. This is where Michael gets into his circularity, because he would have to say that true Christians, being Christians that have the correct doctrines/beliefs, are the ones that get to define Christian. And according to him those true Christians would say that Mormons are not Christians. But that means that over half of Christians in the US aren't true Christians, because they say Mormons are Christian, and the true Christians that determine the criteria for being Christian don't believe Mormons are Christian. Now your criteria for true Christians has excluded not just Mormons, but also anyone that believes Mormons are Christian as well. There's simply no non-circular way to claim that this is the official definition some authoritative "we" has decided on for being Christian.
@@matthewnitz8367 the words "desire meaning and inherent" don't have inherent meaning?
@@matthewnitz8367 criteria for being a Christian is what exactly?
@@matthewnitz8367 and the Mormons that to say "were not Christians" are excluded from the conversation because of acceptance in that fact... Or because of the number of people saying this?
Mike just destroyed Dan. Well done.
No he didn't
@@dannyboyakadandaman504furl9 he most clearly did
@@dannyboyakadandaman504furl9 yeah, handily. Dan is completely wrong.
@@dimitris_zaha he didn't, see his original argument. You find out Mike is full of bullshit. In quite bit of videos.
@@dannyboyakadandaman504furl9 By your logic that atheist pastor in the United Canadian Church is a christian because she vaguely follows Jesus
I dont- Dan, what're you- what is he even- just....good work IP 👍
apologetics 😡
😂
Than the man is here.
Stings
@@InspiringPhilosophysir youre undoubtedly one of the most formidible apologists haha i was a hater when you shot down the emerald tablets of thoth but i quickly gained respect for you and yoour work. I think i agree with dan but your material is still really good. Keep trashing islam and billy carson please haha that fraudulent pos
I love how McLellan just declares things as if its scholarly consensus, but conveniently never cites his sources
Rebuke and refute Dan sharply!
In my experience most people don't understand how logical fallacies work, and when they are violated. I advice people to try not to include fallacies in your argumentation because most people will get them wrong.
Or at least look up examples of fallacies online
Most people don't even know what a fallacy really is
That chap would probably answer the question on “what is a christian?”, with “anyone who identifies as a christian” LOL
Is Dan Mcclellan gay? Not an attack, just genuinely wondering because I saw him wearing a rainbow flag watch, and all his videos trying to make the bible say it doesn't say homosexuality is a sin and his defense of all things LGBT would make sense...personal interest
He’s a clown that makes an effort to look intellectual in all of his videos + that aura of arrogance around him. He speaks a lot but says nothing, he has no impact at all
Thank you! Someone needs to tell Dan what’s what. You are the man!
God bless you and your work sir I.P. respect from Croatia Europe💙💙💙
Lik je OK, ali nije u pravu ovdje. On definira da krscanin mora vjerovati u trojstvo sto nije tocno i nije definicija krscanstva. Krscanin je onaj ili neka grupa koja vjeruje da je Isus Bog. Nista vise nista manje. U tome i je filozovska pogreska u njegovom zakljucku. On mjenja definiciju iz Krscanin u Pravi krscanin koja je neodredena i koju on definira sam. I onda zakljucuje kako mormoni nisu krscani jer nevjeruju u trojstvo. I to je filozovska pogreska jer bi onda moga uvijek i u svakoj raspravi se pozvat da netko nije pravi ili istiniti krscanin itd. Jedina definicija je da krscanin vjeruje u Isusa kao Boga i po tome mormoni spadaju u tu grupu. On se onda poziva kako “mi” necemo prihvatiti npr mormone kao krscane. Ali to “mi” nije definirao. Tko mi, katolici, protestanti, pravoslavci, mormoni? Tek onda definicija krscanina nebi imala smisla jer bi netko morao odredivati tko je a tko nije krscanin. Rijec krscanin je upravo to, rijec, koju mozes naci u leksikonu i vidjeti njenu definiciju, neovisno o necijoj teologiji ili tumacenju biblije ili prosudbi. U tome je filozovska pogreska u argumentiranju. LP
Dan's snarky nature actually helps confirm a lot of scripture. It's almost like the harder he tries to destroy core Christian doctrine, the more God uses his negativity to draw strong contrast between light and dark. Not related to any substantive argument, but I have to say you can just feel the unhappiness and negativity oozing from that guy. He's great with words and appealing to his crowd, but he still can't seem to hide the shadow he lives in.
He makes broad claims without backing anything up
@@reyis_here945he accuses everyone else( Christians) of renegotiating all Biblical texts : but that is Exactly what Dan's minimalist scholarship does in attacking the Bible.
I wish Dan would ditch the pettiness. It's uncalled for and unnecessary.
This guy is right, the boundaries have been drawn since the 1st century AD, he and everyone else better figure out their table in their own final destination before deciding to sit with us or not.
Not sure it was that early given that so many heresies remained common place LONG after the 1st Century, the only thing that was settled after the 1st Century was that there were gospels written, no creeds existed at the time. I suppose early christians weren't christian after all because they had no creeds to focus on...
As soon as someone says words don’t need to have coherent meanings their opinion can be rejected. Imagine arguing about how to define something and, during the course of the argument, you say nothing needs to be defined a certain way. He can’t see that’s self-defeating?
@@Call_Me_Rio right. It’s dangerous to let getting offended cloud your logic to such a degree that you try to delegitimization language as a concept. I don’t think this is someone I could trust to give me an objective opinion on anything.
Dan is so biased to the point where he’s not even reliable anymore.
Love this IP
Thank you
This dan guy is either dishonest ,not very bright or both.
I agree. I tend to lead to him being dishonest and a lot of his views proof it. And a lot of dogma that he claims to going against
Yep. Just because you have a phd doesnt mean you arnt an idiot. A degree cant teach you to be smart
@@Arshavin76Well he is a mormon. So he is simply just trying to destroy the Christian faith
@@Holden-uf7and a minimalist scholar from a fully Secular Religious studies PhD program.
They teach there is no supernatural authority to the Bible and only look at the Bible as a man made book.
Dan's already admitted he's trying to debunk any authority the Biblical writers claim for the Bible as the Word of God.
So, his PhD program just adds to his progressive Mormon views about the Bible and the Book of Mormon.
His minions don't realize there are other Biblical scholars that don't agree with his views of the Bible.
Dan's Data is just his Dogma : so nothing to see( "let's see it" ) besides his redaction and renegotiating the ancient Biblical text from a liberal 21st century century denial of anything special about the Bible.
Exactly what he accuses modern Historical Christianity of doing.
Mike, I'm a big fan, but I noticed all the definitions you cited called the act of redefinition arbitrary. They did not call the feature arbitrary, as I think you said around 2:43
Dan is the most arrogant & misleading creator I’ve ever seen. Progressive, mormon, has degrees. He thinks he is the arbiter of truth. He re-invents definitions & denies historical truths to make a fallacious point
has he even debated before?
@@DanteRedgrave-6492apparently he doesn't debate
@@DanteRedgrave-6492 I don’t think so. He’s probably too scared of other people with better degrees & actual intellectual integrity
IP: “Words have to have a coherent meaning”.
Dan: “No they don’t”
If words don’t have to have coherent meaning, then the words “no they don’t” don’t have to have a coherent meaning, so I am justified in saying that when Dan says “no they don’t” it’s the same as saying “yes they do”.
An in-depth response to Dan’s postmodernism would be extremely helpful
Good video! Would love to see more responses to Dan, especially on the Divine name possessor idea that he purports a lot.
And in any case, the Fallacy Fallacy states that just because something is fallacious doesn’t mean it’s automatically untrue, so even if Dan proved it, your point remains
Dan MacClellan does put some interesting content out, and I often enjoy listening to what he has to say. I subscribe both to his channel and to this channel.
Maybe... but this was just outlandish
Dan lost a lot of respect with me for dismissing a philosophical thought offhand without engaging with it.
Dan never seems to act in good faith.
He never does
I am a marxist who believes in private property
You know, this one happens in real life far more than you'd think. It's hilariously ironic
@@rad_lad_2715 Private property for me and not for thee, comrade!
Yap
@@igorlopes7589Marxists believe in personal property i.e, property for living a life, like a house or car or a toothbrush but don't believe in *Private* Property or as they call it "Capital Goods"(like a business or a bank).
I have Marxists in my family and they live very simple lives, never beyond the necessity.
Many argue that while in the end, when you reach the Communist goal(Stateless, cashless, Propertyless Eutopia, or as they call it, the Dictatorship of the Proletariat) there will be no Private Property, right now, in the Capitalist Society since money is necessary to survive- it's permissible to own property so that you don't starve but earn money .
When he says "words have no coherent meaning" then thank him for agreeing with you
I think maybe Dan is a post-modernist and talking or debating with him using reason and logic is a waste of time since communication for a PM is about power rather than reason or understanding.
Bravo! Acknowledging that there are non-arbitrary limits to the definition of Christianity is NOT a "no-true-Scotsman" fallacy at all.
Good point. I hear he has done a response video. Dan is a joke, really. All he does is make these asinine videos attempting to find fault with evangelical faith.
Please do more or point us to more content that counter Dan’s arguments.
So youre saying dans definitiom of the no true scottsman fallacy is no true definition of the no true scotsman fallacy?
>If all people who identified as Christians had a seat at the table and had a hand what the criteria and methodologies were going to be for drawing the boundaries around what a Christian is…
Well, Dan has figured out what an ecumenical council is.
We're all Dans.
Unless every Dan sat down at a table and discussed the criteria and methodologies of drawing the boundaries around what a Dan is, it's wrong to say that no one is a true Dan. Therefore, simply saying "no true Dan is named something other than Dan" is inadequate to exclude alternative first-name Dans from the Dan group.
Dan just likes to be contrarian. His twitter is him just quote tweeting theists all day going "Um no actually"
I enjoy his work, but everything else about him is so insufferable.
Okay, let's see it.
@@johnmcgraw3568nah I’m good
@@johnmcgraw3568 What does the data say about this?
@@darthzackariusnickthenamethede lol it's late when I first saw your reply I thought it was someone wanting three regerence sources for a point I made somewhere else.
Another way to illustrate why he's wrong. Person D says All dogs are mammals. Person E says my parakeet is not a mammal. Person D says your parakeet is not a real dog. Has Person D committed the fallacy? What if the parakeet identifies as a dog? The point here is that dogs, Christians, vegans all have OBJECTIVE definitions. A counter example that does not fit that objective definition is not a valid counter example. It's more about objective vs subjective - he's claiming subjective definitions should control, but I think it's fine to require OBJECTIVE definitions.
You two should have a debate. It would be entertaining to watch.
He doesn’t want to
@@InspiringPhilosophy How sad. Thanks for responding. I assumed he would agree since his motto is Data over dogma.
Dan is constantly criticizing people saying “if you don’t have a phd in near eastern study’s you can’t call me wrong” then he tries to correct a creator who have a degree in philosophy when he himself doesn’t have that same credential is blatant hypocrisy.
Dan Mclellan used to bother me so bad, but in one video you have broken his power, because no one this flagrantly illogical and dishonest can be taken seriously. Thanks!
My kid is Dan's son. If he draws arbitrary distinctions like "paternity" or "never having ever met me or my son before" then he's commiting the NTS fallacy. His family doesn't get to define who his family is by being in his family.
I'll be awaiting my child support, Dan.
Dan is definitely a circular reasoning guy. He redifnes words alot and uses arguments from silence and or barely credible/non credible sources to make his points. Dan is basically a modern day gnostic with a degree that twists words to try and confuse the flock. No offesne to him but 90% of his points are based on pontification, leaps in logic/assumptions and VERY weak evidence and sources and or bad greek/hebrew translation.
One who responds to the citation of sources to back up an argument with “Nah, I’m good.” should never be taken seriously.
Former Mormon, now Trinitarian Christian. Thanks for this. It's hard talking to LDS just because we use completely different definitions for basically everything...so LDS think we believe basically the same things because they frequently don't understand that we are using different definitions for "God," "Son of God," "eternal life," "gospel," etc.
Dan sucks for many reasons, but christians like you who exclude others from christendom are also a problem too. Creeds didn't make the early christians christians, belief in Christ did. Creeds did not exist and were not given by Christ or any of his early apostles for that matter, they came from trying to make scripture consistent, something which you can do in many ways, regardless of whether you uphold the creeds or not.
The main points you make is the idea of the trinity (a creedal belief) being superior to belief in Christ as the Messiah, which to me sounds like putting the cart before the horse. There are plenty of heresies that can be disproven with scriptural consistency, but creedal belief does not a christian make. Almost every evangelical christian I know personally doesn't understand the trinity, instead explaining it as modalism or the idea of the trinity meaning 3 individuals. Does that make them not christian too because they are not theologically literate enough to know what their own beliefs are supposed to be?
1.) It's not a credible belief if it's in the Bible
2.) Joseph Smith, Native Americans being a white... is incredibly inaccurate (historicallly an ontologically) from, and has no relation to the Bible
3.) That's because the Divinity of God is not meant to be understood by mortal man, only that it exists
4.) No... if anything that makes some of them liberals, at worst lazy
@@reyis_here945 My point is the double standard that traditional christians use to defend this point (not the fallacies point, that point given by Dan was idiotic), their own members get a free pass because the divinity of God is a mystery, but other groups with devotion to Christ (regardless of creedal adherence) do not get such a free pass because... tribalism?
To me it doesn't make sense why some of you guys are so hung up on this. Muslims recognize Christ, but not as the Messiah, there is a strong distinction there to not consider them christians, and they do not consider themselves christians either.
You could even say the same with Jehovah's Witnessess maybe (note the maybe here) due to their alterations to the Bible with little justification and their differences in understanding of Christ's role. But when getting to 7th Day Adventists and LDS/Mormons (which I am part of), those objections fall flat because there is a strong belief in the role of Christ as the Savior and his resurrection being very important.
If you can, because of theological reasons, say that mormons are not christian, you inarguably have to say the same about those christians who do not understand their theology enough that they end up explaining modalism (something considered a heresy) instead. That, or you have to be more flexible with your definition of "christian".
I am fine with not being considered a traditional christian, I am not (not a liberal either, don't mix politics into this), but to say that my belief in Christ is any less than many other christians is something I consider insulting and un-christlike when hearing that from other believers.
I dont get why people double down on bad arguments when theyre corrected. Nice work Michael
Dan always referring to IP as "The creator" Such a simplistic tactic to dehumanize him and make Dan seem to be right.
For those who are interested, I’ve pointed out in the video at the following video how IP has fundamentally misunderstood both the fallacy & the sources they’ve cited:
ua-cam.com/video/SgYoE0Kpu3Q/v-deo.html
Just have a debate already you coward
Debate, stop shielding on your desk.
Debate him one-on-one and don't delete my comment this time
@@TheEagleChristian Debates are performative identity politics & I don't have any idea what deleted comment you're talking about. I don't delete comments.
@@maklelan Literally everything anyone does is performative. Being unwilling to engage in actual debate just shows you are using a more popular content creator to boost your own analytics.
According to Dan's definition given at around 3:15, any attempt at categorization at all could be considered a NTSF. By what criteria would anyone be allowed to mark Christianity as a category? Simply by accepting that calling one's self a Christian makes it so?
Mormons are not Christian. "As man is God was, as God is Man shall become". You cannot reconcile this with message of Christ and his Apostles.
I spent much of my life living in SE Idaho, when I was a kid Mormons were adamant they weren't Christians. It's only been in the last 15 years they have started trying.
You can identify as a particular religion all you want, but if you don’t hold to the basic tenets of the religion, you aren’t actually a member of that religion.
- “Words have to have a coherent meaning”
- “No they don’t”
Well… that’s a self-defeating statement because whatever comes next ought not have meaning by the same logic. Unless we all agree that it’s gibberish, which it is, then the meaning here is meaninglessness!
Well done sir. Dan is full of fallacies and terrible conclusions. Glad you corrected this.
Lol cope
@zaybali
Dont need to cope with a laymen in philosophy who has 0 credentials and cites 0 sources .
" Trust me bruh"
Dan is the one coping here
Nice respectful and reasoned response, unusual for an apologist! Sad to see that really every commenter is a fan boy of you or Christianity, so you are preaching to a choir of sycophants. The important point is that McClellan is a strong and often brilliant scholar, and you are providing a decent response--thx.
Thank you, IP! I know Dan won't debate, but I'd LOVE to see your responses to video's of his like the "bearer of the divine name" theory (undermining the divinity of Jesus, saying that an angel also bears YHWH's name in Ex. Ch. 3, and that's all Jesus is doing), or his videos denying the univocality of Scripture. A longform video getting to the heart of his methodology, or the methodology of scholars like him would really help me a lot personally. Thanks for all the hard work man. God bless you!
Thank you for the donation. I’ll loo into that.
I am glad he has been addressed. He himself is a Mormon. Although he claims his scholarship is unbiased, for those that know the aspects of Mormonism, it just so happens to fit nicely
@@TheKingdomWorks It really doesn't honestly. Whatever issues you may have with Mormonism, his content isn't well liked by many of us either.
@@ijn2252 that’s interesting to know. Do you have a Mormon commentator that interacts with his videos?
@@TheKingdomWorks I don't know of many, but Jacob Hansen from Thoughtful Faith does. I'm not a huge fan of his content either, but he's made a few videos criticizing Dan. I think Ward Radio has also done some, but I'm not 100% sure on that.
Both you and Dan make good points and both have interesting points of view.
I need to try and watch more of your videos, but at the end of the day, i contemplate each view instead of picking one and try and form my own view
I consider this to be very wise and the best approach. Godspeed, traveler.
That last comment really sealed the deal for me, you did a great job throughout the whole video, but what I’ve learned from the wise disciple UA-cam channel is that if you refuse to engage with your opponents argument, you concede the entire debate. Let’s work on this!
Dan doesn't actually debate anyone
Curious then how you feel about the fact that IP left out what I would consider the most important part about what Dan was saying at the end of his video, and didn't even make it clear in his video that he left part of Dan's video out? While I think it may have been worthwhile for Dan to make a short comment about why he didn't consider the last portion of Michael's video worth commenting on, it was at least clear to me that there was something further in IPs video that quoted from a philosopher that Dan did not think was worthwhile to address or possibly irrelevant to his field of expertise. But had I not watched Dan's video, I would have had no idea the end had been left out of IPs reply.
@@matthewnitz8367 Yeah, I'd be open to listening to that part, do you have the link?
@Tylerstrodtman Sure, I think this should link to the time stamp right at the beginning of the comment in the video IP did include, before the final section with the actual data that wasn't included: ua-cam.com/video/QuM41YMkNaQ/v-deo.htmlsi=WlPz-sPhywhsfXOf?t=5m44s
@@matthewnitz8367 It didn't go straight to the time stamp, but I did find the part you were referring to I think. Is it where it says that Jones is actually incorrect because the majority of Christians do consider Mormons to be actual Christians?
Dan should never speak on Philosophy, every time he does it’s always a fail.
Amazing content as allways IP!
So basically, words are subjective. To commit the No True Scotsman Fallacy, you have to think that your definition of a certain word is *absolute*, as if it serves 'importance' or a "literal definition", while the other sees the same word but *in his own context*; so you deny his own definition and proclaim it to be 'invalidated'.
All lawyers have to pass the Bar.
My uncle is a lawyer and he didn’t pass the Bar.
Only true lawyer pass the Bar.
Would layers commit this fallacy? After all they create a circle who makes the definition and then limit who can be a true lawyer by their definition.
Dan is a heretic.
*YOU* are the heretic….
@@TEMPESTsonofThunder 😂😂😂You seem to have an are-you-my-mother syndrome. 😂 😂 😂
I'm not a Christian in any sense, but the hypocrisy of these guys that keep calling out fallacies is so annoying.
It's like a degeneration of the analytic school of thought, thinking that you can just win an argument by calling out fallacies when many times there are perfectly valid contextual reasons for reasoning in a specific way (like drawing social boundaries to define who has the authority to make legitimate claims, not implying that outgroup claims are false as such, but giving reasons why these boundaries make sense and are useful).
Isn't what you consider "meaningful" also arbitrary? You're saying you can apply the same structure described by Dan and it wouldn't be a fallacy as long as the reason for excluding the example is meaningful to you. And yes, the words like vegan or bachelor are easy examples since they literally exclude certain things in their definitions, but in most cases it's not a clean cut and you have to resort to arbitrary distinctions that may be meaningful to you and even your community/culture.
Dan talks boldly and confidently about content he doesn’t fully understand😮
Not good rhetorical qualities!
Having everyone take a seat at the table to define what x is defined as has never been the method for defining terms.
Common usage is a part of that method. When definitions are tied to a founder such as platonism or Aristotelian thinking or Buddhism, Confucianism, Marxism we see that the following attributes apply:
1 - adhering to originators views or teachings
2 - Agreement with generally accepted truths (E.G. doctrinal creeds) that flow from original teaching but were not part
If those teachings
Given those uncontroversial definitional guidelines (there are others but those two will suffice), we can easily see why Christ, his early followers recording his teaching, his later followers in 7 ecumenical councils, the so-called “Church Doctors” in the Catholic Church,
there theological counterparts in the Protestant and various orthodox teachings would all reject liberal denominations, Jehovah Witnesses, Mormons, Unitarians, as Christian due to there rejection of Christ’s teaching,
The nature of Christ, work of Christ,
Fundamental doctrine of same, as well as their rejection of most Christian doctrinal truths coming form all other sources across a near 2000 year written record!!
CS Lewis had an insightful definition of Christianity in Mere Christianity, paraphrasing, “you can call someone a bad Christian or a good one, but to deny that they worship Jesus is going too far”.
Jesus already told us how to judge, John 13:34 “A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another.
35 By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.”
Yeah, except mormons believe they're gods, so, yeah, not Christians and not followers of Christ.
@@rockweirdo8147 They may be interpreting Psalms 82 and Jesus quotation of said verse “ye are gods” incorrectly in your view. Maybe they are incomplete or misdirected, but it is evident that their focus is loving one another the way Jesus did.
@@GregorianRants - No, anyone who does not believe in one God, is not a Christian, anyone who believes they will be gods, is not a Christian, anyone who adds to the bible in with non-canonical and contradictory cultish beliefs of a man (AKA joseph smith) is not a Christian.
Christians are followers of Christ, if you betray the teachings of God, then you are not following Him. They can identify as Christians, but all Christians ought to separate themselves from them, as they are against Christian doctrine.
quite right, Desperate Dan is very very fluid with his terms when it suits him - if he cannot give his definitions he fails to communicate, not winning any argument because it never gets that far into meaningful communication to create an argument. His massively subjective approach is equivalent to having a private language where he mainly talks to himself
I've been waiting for this one. We aren't necessarily dictating the terms of Christian. Those terms were dictated long ago
By who?
@@byrondickens the creeds flushed these things out in detail.
@@byrondickens that isn't accurate at All. The Council of Nicea was prior to the lift of Christian persecution. John's Gospel clearly lines Jesus as God.
@@byrondickens the counsels had nothing to do with power, that's some Dan Browns Da Vinci code nonsense. They had to do with heresies
@@joshuatrott193 Uh huh. Four and five centuries after the fact by the self-appointed gatekeepers who gained power through political wrangling and violence.
As per my comment on the last video, I think the creator has a point despite your correct counterpoint. The issue is that NTS is an A or B case but the two events are very different in application. His usage is what we generally are referring to in everyday life when we point this out. It's about moving the goal posts for arbitrary reasons. Your usage falls under the other usage and is more formal.
It's kind of the difference between how in everyday English we say "or" even though we logically mean "xor" and interpret "or" as "xor" unless we're in the technical mindset.
After that initial point though, he runs into the problem of classifying atheism:
a) a religion is a combination of elements we call 'rituals' (or whatever label floats your boat)
b) atheism has none of these elements; it's empty
c) the set of all possible combinations of elements in set S is known as the Powers Set of S
e) the empty set is an element in the power set of 'rituals'
f) Therefore, atheism is a religion QED
This can be fixed by simply saying that a religion is a non-empty combination of 'rituals', but now the question is if that rewriting of the definition by an atheist is a NTS fallacy. Requiring something be non-empty is not a ridiculous or ad hoc restriction. However, since he started listing off adjectives as stand in for "true", that means he's more focused on the reason _why_ something is being rewritten. And fair enough but nothing is solid the first round.
I think the way to address the fallacy is buried in the philosophers you quoted with "arbitrary". Arbitrary just means you are choosing instead of reasoning. Thus, I think the strategy would be to concede the point, revisit your definition, and then revise it for the next debate. Changing definitions in the middle of a discussion is the issue here. We do this all the time, such as with prime numbers.
The more videos I watch of Dan McClellan the more I'm convinced that he's more interested in obfuscating than he is in enlightening.
Thank God! X
There has to be a name of the fallacy that Dan abuses but I’m not sure what it would be called.
He makes a claim, then when you dissect his claim to refute it he tells you “That wasn’t the point of my original claim” or “That isn’t what this term means”. He constantly moves the goalpost so that you can’t progress to your point because he keeps trying to make it seem like you are incapable of understanding his original claim lol
For instance his claim could be:
A: “All birds have the ability to fly”
B: “you said all birds have the ability to fly but a penguin can’t.”
A: “my conclusion had nothing to do with penguins”
B: “But you said all birds can fly”
A: “ No my point is that all birds have the ability to fly. Not that they will certainly fly”
You can never progress to the point of the argument because he won’t allow you both to agree on the same meaning on anything that he says.
Other than blatant gaslighting. Is there a logical term for that?
I don't know what it is either, despite being blatantly obvious (whatever it is). Dan is just a postmodern snake. He keeps himself in the perfect shade of ambiguity to get his botched ideas across (regardless of how the internal logic works or affects his other ideas), while being able withhold his actual views and motivations to avoid having to explain himself or his arguments (it would explain why he avoids debating).
If words dont have to a coherent meaning, then can i say an atheist is just someone who knows God exists but suppresses His truth? 🤔
Another example:
Person who just watches UA-cam videos: "I'm a scientist."
Actual scientist: "What do you study? How have you used the scientific method? What educational background do you have? What research papers have you published and in what journals?"
Person who watches UA-cam: "I don't, my definition of scientist doesn't require doing any of that stuff."
Are we forced to take that person's definition of what it means to be a "scientist" seriously?
Messianic Jews say they are Jewish, but Jewish people say they are not. Each side has the right to define Judaism as they want to define it. You can't be required to believe what you don't want to believe.
I'm not sure that's an appropriate example for fluid definition of terms, because in this context "Jewish" can mean two things: Ethnically Jewish and/or theologically Jewish. Messianic Jews are ethnically Jewish but not theologically. Orthodox Jews are both.
@@Zancarius Messianic Jews say they are ethnically Jewish and theologically because they claim that Jews always believed in a trinity. That is part of the debate between Judaism and Messianic Judaism.
@@kennethgreifer5123 they're theologically Christian. Jews reject Jesus as the Son of God.
Trinitarianism is orthogonal to the point.
@@Zancarius One guy said that Mormons are not Christians and the other guy said they are. Somehow that led to the argument about the True Scotsman fallacy. I was just saying that people of different religions define their own religions, in a way, so a Christian can say Mormons are not Christian. A Mormon can say he or she is a Christian.
In the same way, Messianic Jews say they are ethnically and theologically Jewish based on a lot of Biblical quotes that they claim are Messianic prophecies or Trinitarian proof quotes. I don't agree with them, but that is their version of truth. They can call themselves Jews and their leaders rabbis, etc. I was just trying to say that when it comes to many religions, you can't force people to accept your belief, so they can claim anything. There are many people nowadays who say that Jews are not really the Jews. They say that the real Jews are black people, Hispanics, and native Americans. That is life today.
@@kennethgreifer5123 I see where you're coming from, and I can agree. The trouble I have is when the terms we use become too fluid to be meaningful. Which, somewhat ironically, is one of the issues that Michael Jones brought up with one of Dan McClellan's other videos where the latter suggested words mean only what we intend them to mean. Words have meaning, generally agreed upon by society over a long period of time, and this sort of variance is problematic because it creates relativistic truth. I'm not confident that this direction in which our society is heading is especially useful (or good), because if words become too malleable and their meaning too variable then language is effectively useless.
That said, I know of at least one Messianic Jew who has come to our church and she identifies as a Christian-and I think many of them do. I would imagine it's a relative minority who claim to be both ethnically and theologically Jewish, but I have to wonder if the reason they're muddying the linguistic waters is less over relative truth and more a consequence of manipulating the argument somewhat in the favor of Christ. That is, they're claiming to be the "real" Jewish people (or the "real" Israel) because of the fulfillment of prophecy through Christ, which they acknowledge. In this view, those groups we consider theologically Jewish would be considered an aberration or heretical by the Messianic Jews who believe themselves the true Israel/remnant. In a sense, they're not wrong *per se*, but biblically it's an untenable position because they hold the dubious distinction of being ethnically Jewish and theologically Christian while the majority of the Jewish people still have a hardness of heart that causes them to reject Christ.
At least, that's my stance on the issue. It may be wrong.
yall are like beefing to this day 😭
Dan blocked Michael lmao
Dan McClellan got Schooled today!!
words have no meaning... except my words, so listen to me.
Thank you for that video! Perfectly and distinctly said! 🙏🏼
He is arguing against how language works for most of the video. We don't have a coherent system for the majority of people to use 5 different criterion to describe who part of a group. In philosophy they can spend most a paper clarifying definitions they will be using but society works through majority usage.
'Christian Nationalist' doesn't mean just being both words when used now. It has a definition based on the groups that use the term.