Podcast 5: How Should We Evaluate the Christian Worldview?

In Podcast 5, I briefly review some key points from Podcast 3 and Podcast 4, and then I discuss how to evaluate the Christian worldview:

http://thinkingcriticallyabout.podbean.com/e/podcast-5-how-should-we-evaluate-the-truth-of-the-christian-worldview/

Some key points in Podcast 5:

  • Religions are basically systems of religious beliefs.
  • The core of a system of religious beliefs is a worldview.
  • A worldview can be understood in terms of a general problem-solving scheme.
  • A worldview can be understood as the answers to four basic worldview questions.
  • Although there are many versions of Christianity, there is just one Christian worldview.
  • Critical Thinking involves analytic thinking.
  • Critical Thinking involves healthy skepticism and caution about wishful thinking and emotional bias.
  • Three classic historical examples of wishful thinking are:  the philosopher’s stone, the elixir of life, and panacea.
  • The Christian worldview presents Christianity as a panacea.
  • Because the Christian worldview can be analyzed into four parts, there are at least 16 different possible evaluations of Christianity (based on a truth-table analysis of four claims).
  • If just one of the Christian worldview’s answers to a basic worldview question is wrong, then the Christian worldview is a failure.
  • If just one of the Christian worldview’s answers to a basic worldview question is right, then the Christian worldview is partially true, and at least a few basic Christian beliefs would be true.
  • The four answers of the Christian worldview can be further clarified by being analyzed into four statements per answer, so that the Christian worldview can be understood in terms of 16 different claims or statements.

There is a PowerPoint (in a PDF) available with the content of the podcast:

http://thinkingcriticallyabout.podbean.com/e/powerpoint-for-podcast-5-pdf/

My previous podcasts are available here:

Thinking Critically About: Is Christianity True?