A friend of mine decided to take his required Logic class through a school other than Purdue for various time-related reasons. It was offered at a Christian school, and he’s an atheist. But that wasn’t the most interesting part: It frequently used supernatural Christian ideas as examples in class. And I mean proving them to be true, not debunking them. Yeah, excellent use of logic.
While we took a bit of glee out of his frequent brain-explosions during the semester, he was nice enough to share more information about the class now that his grade is safe. You can see a whole pdf of the class syllabus here.
Attached is the syllabus from my silly Philosophy class. You can read the introduction, its pretty funny. The rest of the course is boring except for Lesson 13, which is where he uses the resurrection of Jesus Christ to explain how to logically evaluate arguments. It’s [from page 14 to 17]. The whole course is pretty much about indoctrination — I guess by teaching these poor kids everything they know through religious lenses they have no capacity to think without it involving religion. Take away religion — and you’ve taken away their college education.
I took the course through Taylor University. They have this “life together covenant” thing where it outlines behavior for their students, both on and off campus. It’s hilarious. “Prohibited Behaviors: Certain behaviors are expressly prohibited in Scripture and therefore are to be avoided by all members of the community. They include theft, lying, dishonesty, gossip, slander, backbiting, profanity, vulgarity, crude language, sexual immorality (including adultery, homosexual behavior, premarital sex and involvement with pornography in any form), drunkenness, immodesty of dress and occult practice.”
I’m glad they never found me out because I would have been kicked out for doing probably all of them… in one Thursday night!
I’m kind of surprised a public, secular university accepted transfer credit from a place that is obviously more concerned with religious indoctrination than education. Just to give you a taste of their “logical evaluation” of the resurrection of Jesus:
3. We must look at explanations as sets. All of our explanations occur within total world views; every explanation carries many implications and prerequisites. Facts occur in context with other facts. Even if a single idea might be a potentially great explanation for an event, the baggage that comes with the idea might be too great for it to be acceptable.
Here we come, of course, to the liability involved in using the idea of a supernatural resurrection as an explanation for the empty tomb. In order for this explanation to be acceptable, we also need to be clear on the following:
a. there is a God;
b. this God is involved in human history;
c. miracles are possible;
d. miracles are knowable;
e. miracles are knowable from history;
f. the New Testament is historically accurate;
g. it is possible to get reliable information from historical sources;
and various other implications.These and other issues are all resolvable in a positive way. However, a Christian needs to be aware of the many layers of relevant concerns and not be surprised that simple arguments are oftentimes rejected by non-Christians, not because they cannot explain the data, but because of their implications for a theistic, supernaturalistic world view.
Oh, yeah, none of those things are problems at all. …If you want to read the whole argument, go here and start half way down page 114. I’m sure the document has other gems, but I’m not inclined to sift through it. Post any fun ones you find in the comments!
Reminds me, actually, of the “good” old days of the Middle Ages, when all the universities in Europe were owned by the Catholic Church and all the logic classes were like this, only Catholic rather than Evangelical. Clearly these people refuse to join the modern world…
“Right after we elected Smith, we experienced a downturn in the economy. Obviously we voted for the wrong person.” [page 113]Here we are committing the fallacy known traditionally as post hoc ergo propter hoc which is Latin for “after this, therefore because of this”.[page 114]”We begin with the fact that there was a tomb which was known as the tomb of Christ, and that tomb was empty. This is a safe asumption because Christianity from its very inception was based in the belief in the resurrected Christ; if Christ’s body had been in the tomb, this religion could never come about.” [page 115, emphasis mine]The author misplace the last paragraph, that was a perfect example of a post hoc fallacy. And I love a book that contradicts itself for a fallacy explained in the previos page.
Hey, I wonder if it’s at all possible that if, IF private religious schools got public funding, they’d have to stop teaching such nonsense?Probably not :(
So what grade did he get? I would’ve had a very hard time participating in class and suspending disbelief enough to drink the Kool aid.
What a trip down memory lane. I went to Taylor. I took this course…from the man who wrote the syllabus. He was actually one of my favorite profs…kind of a hippie-esque Christian who always wore print tees under a dress shirt, had a nervous tic, and spoke with a thick German accent. He was actually a very personable man & a campus favorite. Not because he was fundamentalist or dogmatic, but because he was a deep thinker, almost a skeptic. I often wondered if such a non-traditional, philosophical Christian such as Dr. Win was convinced of the resurrection, how could anyone with half a brain be convinced otherwise?I’ve since evaluated the faith thoroughly from about every field of knowledge, and the cornerstone of this particular course, the logical “proof” of the resurrection (based largely on C.S. Lewis’ “Trilemma”) and rejected it out-of-hand as not even worthy of an argument.I’ve often wondered what I would think of Dr. Win and his course (written some 30 years ago btw and still the cornerstone of the department I see) now. I’m sure I would still like the man as a very intriguing person, but his logic… My mind just gets dizzy thinking about it. I downloaded the syllabus. I’ll have to give it a read.One thing’s for sure. I’d never go back. I couldn’t do without my brain for another four years. And the covenant? I could never sign that again in good conscience. The girls were way-y-y to pretty…and believed in abstinence!!!
They have a biology department… Their 2009-2010 catalog hasPrinciples of GeneticsA majors core course: Fundamental principles of Mendelian inheritance, introduction to molecular genetics, along with quantitative and evolutionary genetics will be examined. Three hours of lecture and two hours of laboratory per week. Does not normally satisfy general education science requirement. Another talks of “the process of speciation”. My guess is they teach evolution but they try to avoid mentioning it directly in their catalog and try to steer non-bio majors away from it (does not fulfill general education science requirements, the second course has the first as a pre-req).And then there are the courses on “Issues in Science and Religion”
Oh, this will be the source of endless amusement with my friends.
Truly awful. I looked through that syllabus, and even if you ignored the religious components and judged it only on a pedagogical level it’s headache-inducing. One can only hope the in-class instruction makes up for the poor examples of concepts.This week, Rachel Maddow actually had a segment where she opined about the value of actively engaging with outside viewpoints; even if you remain at odds, it makes you better at forming a solid argument. Cloistering students for brainwashing and calling it a bachelor’s degree devalues that degree for everyone.
That’s logic? It nearly fried the circuits in my brain!!
Certain behaviors are expressly prohibited in Scripture and therefore are to be avoided by all members of the community. They include… sexual immorality (including … premarital sex and involvement with pornography in any form)Chapter and verse or it didn’t happen!
Particularly if you take into account the whole “Song of Solomon” thing. Erotic poetry is /right in there/. :P
“Even if a single idea might be a potentially great explanation for an event, the baggage that comes with the idea might be too great for it to be acceptable.”Translation: Something might be factually correct but at the same time unacceptable to admit as being true.Yeah, that’s why we call Christianity a delusion.
It sounds like there might be a first amendment violation in there. This should not have been accepted by a public university. I know when I got the computer sciences logic course substituted for the philosophy departments at the University of Delaware, I had to submit the syllabus ot the philosophy department chair. And that was just a substitution across different departments within one university. The review process should be at least as rigorous here.Unfortuntely, given my experience with philosophers, I am not supprised that they might see exactly what is going on here and accept it. I have been told, in complete seriousness, by multiple philosophers, that because Michael Behe is an inteligent scientist, therefor his ideas about irreducible complexity must be taken seriously in a university context. Philosophers have this idea that any bullshit, no matter how stupid, must be taken seriously, otherwise you are not respecting the person putting it forward. This is one of my big problems with philosophy.
I think it was an A. :)
“Social dancing is not permitted on or away from campus. However, acceptable forms of expression may include sanctioned folk dances, dances that are designed to worship God, dancing at weddings, and the use of choreography in drama, musical productions and athletic events” (from the “life together covenant”) Ahaha. Love it. Also the part about equality being embedded in scripture and the pro-life schpiel at the very end. That thing is a goldmine. I mean, it’s funny, but at the same time I can’t believe there are people in this country that would consider spending 4+ years in a university that has to specify which type of “expression” is acceptable. Makes my head spin.
Oops “spiel” not “schpiel”. I hate making spelling mistakes! lol
They chose to teach logic from a Christian point of view at a Christian School. How illogical. Not. He chose to go there and should have expected what he got. He also had the option to drop the class at anytime and take it at a secular school, but that wasn’t convenient for him.It’s okay to be atheist, but it’s childish to be rude about it.
I think it’s more the disconnect from actual, say, logic, that was perplexing. As a Christian (rather liberal, I’ll grant you) I was scratching my head over the whole thing as well.
Well, to be fair, in logic we learn thatFalse ——> True is a true statement because if you base your theories on false assumptions, you can prove ANYTHING.Behold, the principle of explosion!http://xkcd.com/704/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O…
Pointing out the logical fallacies in a logic class is not rude. It’s legitimate criticism.
a. there is a god. This is the point where my brain explodes.
I wonder if they realize how many folk dances came about as tributes to pagan gods.
There are many texts for this. Paul was very uptight sexually. He told people not to marry, but if they burned with desire it was better to marry than act out.
yes it is more of a New Testament issue.
You know why Baptist are against pre-martial sex?It leads to dancing.:-)
Well there is a big logical gap in this:”The point of an explanation is to illuminate, not toconfuse.An example of this criterion can be found in the context of the resurrection, as reported inMatthew 28. The authorities gave money to the guards and instructed them to say, “While wewere sleeping, the disciples came and stole the body.” Thus they were asking the guards togive testimony as to what happened while they were asleep. This is something that no humanbeing can do.”This is an example of working with two measures, the guards cannot be trusted to know what happened while they were sleeping but the apostles knew what happened even though they were not there.The tomb was sealed the next day, nowhere it says that they checked whether or not Jesus was there….
i got the impression he took it out of curiosity. we may not agree with how christians think, but dont you wonder… what makes them believe in this stuff? where do these crazy ideas come from, and how are they backing them up? i thought it was very interesting.
I think this pretty much explains things:
This kind of dark ages indoctrination is why one must travel all the way to Turkey to find a larger percentage of evolution deniers than is found in the U.S.
I’ve decided that whenever the adjective ‘Christian’ is applied to something, it means ‘fake’.Christian logic.Christian science.Christian rock.Christian love.
In Oz private religious schools get public funding (more $$ per head than public schools) and yes, they teach supernatural, imaginary crap.:(
Help me out though with some knowledge, cos here in the States public schools can’t teach religious material without violating the constitution. They can teach ABOUT such things, but can’t present it as fact.
Critically Evaluating the Logic and Validity of Informationhttp://academic.cuesta.edu/aca…
What an idiot! We know that all knowledge comes from the Qur’an! ;-)
It’s a simple problem, and one that can be fixed by rearranging the order in which the courses are taken. This logic class is a two hundred level class, but the engineering course were you build an irony meter and stupid detector is a three hundred level course. If they simply reverse the order of the two classes, so that the students can come to class with their irony meters and stupid detectors already built, this class would make a lot more sense.
dancing at weddings– So the hokey-pokey is allowed, even thou you put it in, and then you take it out and then the you shake it all about? Some times I just don’t understand…..
“They include theft, lying, dishonesty, gossip, slander, backbiting, profanity, vulgarity, crude language, sexual immorality (including adultery, homosexual behavior, premarital sex and involvement with pornography in any form), drunkenness, immodesty of dress and occult practice.”I’m glad they never found me out because I would have been kicked out for doing probably all of them… in one Thursday night!”I hope that’s not true becaue aside from the sex and alcohol part those are genuinely immoral acts. Dishonesty and backbiting in particular are offenses I kick people off my Facebook list for.
If there is any aspect of my religion I am really bothered by, it’s the current education system that trains our religious leaders. It’s almost shameful. Who am I kidding, it IS shameful.
I went to public school, but friendswho went to and teach at catholic schools tell me that creationism is taught as fact (through a dumbed down vesion of this logic-they are primary and high schools, not colleges) and evolution is just a theory. They pray daily, have onsite churches, and teach the bible. And get more funding than public schools to do it.In Oz we don’t have a ‘constitution”, although I’m not sure I’m sad about that.
Well it is nice to know that propositional logic can now be used to prove that god exists. I’m am truly relieved, because now (using logic) we can get back to finding all of the witches in town, and we can throw them in the closest body of water tied to a brick like the various (non-wiccan) gods intended.
I’m not sure you should assume these kinds of schools brainwash or cloister students any more than secular schools do. Before becoming an atheist, I attended and graduated from a Baptist seminary, and took numerous philosophy and logic courses. Even though I am not religious in the slightest, I still think I gained a lot of value from those classes, and we did in fact read Hume and Kant, and many, many non-believers of old and modern times. So we weren’t cloistered entirely, and we weren’t “brainwashed.” Most all of us there did believe what we believed of our own volition. I no longer believe it, but I am still offended by some atheists’ ad hominem brainwash assertion. It is simply unfair to call anyone brainwashed, because that assumes they are unable to make their own decisions. In fact, I to this day find that I was more exposed to atheist and other non-believer material while I was in seminary than secular students are exposed to material from religious philosophers. So, just because religious people come to the wrong conclusion, don’t entirely prejudge their courses or methodology, or you will be guilty of several logical fallacies.
It’s your fault for having such a tasty looking back. Om nom nom.
Clearly none of you paid attention in Logic class. From the blog post (I’m not going to follow the links. Screw that. I have things to do.), the professor is not blindly stating that his list of premises “a. there is a God; . . .” are true without arguing. On the contrary, he’s being fair to the atheist point of view by showing that there are numerous premises that you have to accept before the idea that Christ rose from the dead makes sense. By saying that the issues are “resolvable” he’s not saying that they’re all proven to be true. If he was saying that he’d say that they were ‘resolved.’ What he’s actually saying in the quote is that Christ’s resurrection as an explanation for the evidence we have rests on a large number of difficult premises. By saying that they are resolvable he tells us that even though they are difficult, an intelligent argument can still be made that they are true. I’m agnostic, personally, so don’t think I’m a theist spy or anything. Its just that I’d rather beat someone in a fair debate than set up a straw man.
I heard that about the Christian Reformed. Nothing like Calvinism to fuck up a life worth experiencing!
They’ve screwed up the whole argument for Jesus’s resurrection by just assuming that the New Testament is historically reliable and that there is a god. I’m sure they’re acting under the pretense that those have been established at some point, but I guess it wouldn’t dissuade them to point out that they’re mistaken.
That’s not what the professor meant. He was saying that even if an explanation thoroughly explains the state of events, we may still reject it because it is based on faulty premises (baggage).
profanity is immoral?
Are you sure? I thought that Catholics accepted evolution (and science in general) and were as embarrassed as hell and really really sorry about Galileo’s treatment.I know that I have a friend who is a Catholic monk as well as being a bio prof and he teaches good science! (And remember Mendel still made abbot!!)
Here’s a question: Why is this college accredited?
Fuck that.
So to clarify your point, what he’s saying is that non-Christians often reject the “simple” logical conclusions reached by Christians (e.g. if there is an empty tomb, then Christ was resurrected) because non-Christians do not accept premises that presume a theistic world view, correct? Well, like you, I’m not about to read 132 pages of syllabus, but right near the top of it in a section called “Integration of Faith and Learning,” the professor states that all learning is based on a foundation of logic, and then goes on to say:”With these thoughts in mind then, second, we can learn and understand more about God, His Word, Jesus Christ, the Church and our personal journey of faith by having a sound logical foundation. Logic actually helps us build our faith; it strengthens our faith-commitment. Third, as we learn a solid logical methodology we will also learn ways to better present our faith to others.”So all I can say is that I hope at some point in the course, the professor actually tackled a way to make those, as you put it, “intelligent” arguments for the premises themselves.
*clutches pearls*
I think that it is even more basic then a theistic or nontheistic worldview. One has to first subscribe to the premis of the supernatural. Moreover you have to also reject Occam’s Razor, at least in this case, as the explanation of someone stealing the body (which assumes that there was someone that knew of its location that had the motive, means, and opportunity to abscond with it) assumes a lot less than the Resurrection:a. there is a God;b. this God is involved in human history;c. miracles are possible;d. miracles are knowable;e. miracles are knowable from history;f. the New Testament is historically accurate;g. it is possible to get reliable information from historical sources;and various other implications.
I think you might be failing on the valid vs sound distinction. A valid argument in formal logic is one where the conclusions must follow from the premises (i.e. all of your steps are in order and you cannot get the opposite result from the application of the rules) and uses legitimate logical rules. A valid argument, therefore, can have false conclusions only if it has false premises. The argment 1) God exists 2) If God Exists, then he hates cheesecake. Therefore 3) God hates cheesecake is valid. It uses solid logical rules (A, If A then B, therefore B) and the conclusions must follow from the premises. What this argument is not is sound. A sound argument is an argument which is valid AND has true premises.Okay, sorry this is what several semesters of formal logic and a bachelor’s in philosophy makes your mind work like.
As someone who took several semesters of formal logic (in the philosophy department, which handles all intro to logic courses as well, including those done by science and math students), it surprises me that you would even need to discuss anything truly controversial (barring in field controversies like restricted vs unrestricted quantifiers). Formal logic is supposed to look more like this: AvB: not A: therefore B. The point of formal logic is to learn how to build up logic rules and apply them, the truth value of an example premise need not be discussed unless it is an example of self contradiction.FYI computer science logic superiority complex people, you are aware that philosophers designed your logic systems, aren’t you? Not just formal logic origionally (which they did) but computer programming logic specifically. The problem with philosophy isn’t that most actual philosophers don’t do serious work and have serious disputes, it is that every asshat who has read Sartre suddenly wants to call themselves a philosopher. They aren’t. Imagine how you’d feel if everyone who read a terrible elementary level science book or took an intro to bio class started calling themselves a biologist. It pisses us off, really.
If you took a course in Logic then you should realize that if the premise is false to start with then the conclusion will be valid if all the rules of logic are respected but still false.
FYI: There are some serious differences in the kool-aid flavorsRECLAIMING MIRACLESWe love miracles – at least the idea of miracles. Each of us wants to be touched or rescued by God in a way that is touch tangible, directly personal, and inexplicably wonderful. We know that not everyone gets to experience a miracle. We know people who are deserving, people who would benefit so much from a miracle. We know people who suffer so much and never receive a miracle. Miracles seem so rare and fickle. Rarity and randomness seem to be part of what constitutes a miracle.When studying the scripture and an act of divine intervention, a miracle, is found – it is of secondary concern, if not a red herring. The purpose and focus of the narrative is not the miracle.Miracles are prohibitively expensive. The cost of living in a universe that includes miracles requires a God who is capricious. Miracles require a Zeus or a Jupiter. Miracles require a God who is – unpredictably – either angry and onerous or calm and benevolent. It requires a God who is petty and arrogant and who has no qualms about interfering in, controlling, or playfully dabbling in the course of human events. This is a pagan god. This is not a theology that expands or promotes human understanding or raises the human condition. It is not a theology that enriches or informs the human experience. With a capricious God, our lives are a constant gamble and the universe is one big craps table.This is not the God we worship. We do not worship a capricious God. We worship a God who is consistent – consistently and constantly loving, present, and inviting. A God who is consistent (who is not capricious) does not engage in miracles – and, similarly, does not engage in acts of retribution. God neither intervenes nor condemns, neither saves nor punishes.Have you ever been in the presence of an excellent person? Someone who has a gift and who excels in the use of that gift? A trained gifted singer can raise the performance level of an entire choir. Just one knowledgeable competent person can raise the performance level of an entire office. It is not by their sole efforts. It is by their influence of excellence on others and by inspiring and enabling others to excel in their respective gifts.That is how God works. God is a presence – an influential guiding presence of excellence. God is not intrusive or manipulative, demanding or passive/aggressive. God is an influential guiding presence only to the extent that we make ourselves aware of it and learn to be sensitive to it. God imbues our being – our thoughts, emotions, choices, actions, our very life essence – only through our invitation and practice.In that context, in the presence and influence and guidance of an excellent God, there can be a miracle – the resurrection and transformation of the human spirit to a life of Good News. Such a resurrection of spirit and radical transformation of character deserve the respect and wonder and contemplation that have always been reserved for the miraculous.
I think she meant the empirically derived value of the premise, rather than what its logic-land assigned value was. Obviously whether you put “T” or “F” next to the premise is important. Formal logic doesn’t deal with what is actually the case though, it doesn’t matter if “Unicorns are green” is actually true or false. This is why mean logic professors put weird and false things into examples, to nail this point into your head. It’s why you use all those letters. Also, was anyone surprised that they didn’t learn truth trees or the formal proof system? I don’t know how Taylor’s course numbering system works but the introductory logic that I had covered it. We also did some modal logic which was the only point we talked about religion; the prof went through a few “God possibly/not exists” and “God necessarily/not exists” arguments to point out whether they were valid or not.
For me it’s personal experience of God. I ask, he answers; that sort of thing. When you’re a new Christian of course your natural (and not unreasonable) doubt kicks in: you would expect a proportion of prayers to be “answered” anyway, in that the outcome would have been in line with your request whether you asked or not. But as time goes on and more prayers are answered, the odds against start to stack up significantly. I think God knows we need proof and my opinion is that he has given me more than enough proof to satisfy me. None of this is ultimate proof that can be used to force people in, but God isn’t about this anyway (which we can deduce fairly directly from the fact that these discussions are possible, i.e. if God wanted to give you final undisputable proof, he could and would have done, but then you wouldn’t be “in” by choice but coercion, and the Bible says in a number of places “the righteous shall live by faith”, i.e. not by proof). My relationship with my wife is based on spending time together, listening to her, talking to her, reading stuff she’s written etc, and my relationship with God works along similar lines.What really surprises me about this “Christian” college is how many rules they have and how it all seems based more on the Old than the New Testament. Jesus paid the price for *all* sin: past, present and future, and not just of the church but of the whole world. Nobody will go to hell for being gay, or pre-marital sex, or theft, or murder or anything else. Jesus himself said he came to give life to the fullest extent and repeatedly bashed the religious establishment for weighing everyone down with so many rules that instead of being happy and free on their days off they couldn’t wait to get back to work for a rest from all their crazy religious obligations.
As with many things, miracles obey rules. God is not capricious. Before we discovered the rules that govern electricity, our only experience of it was rare and unpredictable lightning, but now we understand what makes electricity flow, and equally importantly what makes it not flow, we can control it and we have the ability for me to type this message. If you were to wire your house with wood instead of copper, maybe because it was cheaper, or looked better or whatever, electricity woodn’t flow. Is that the electricity company being capricious? No, of course not, you just haven’t followed the rules. Similarly miracles follow rules, and faith is to miracles as electrical conductors are to electricity. Unfortunately much of the the church has missed this, and instead of delivering miracles on an almost predictable basis they’re limited to those who have figured out the rules. God operates through people – that’s another rule. The recipient must have faith – that’s another (and why Jesus couldn’t perform many miracles in his home town – it wasn’t because he wasn’t operating in faith but because they weren’t). Gravity follows rules. If you jump off a tall building, you WILL go splat on the pavement, that’s not God being capricious but you misusing the rules. “I deserve to live, so I’m going to jump off this tall building and God will suspend gravity me” is just nonsense and would have major ramifications for all who are depending at that time on gravity. There are lots of people who deserve electricity – I’m thinking mud huts in Africa for example. But if they don’t have an electricity company or wires to their houses then they won’t get any. Their lack of electricity isn’t God being capricious. Our lack of infrastructure does not make God evil. Are you in darkness (i.e. lack of light)? Do you pray, fast, ask others to pray and fast, do good works, run marathons for charity etc etc etc, and still find yourself in darkness? Did you call the electricity company and get no help? Did you try flipping the switch?So do your people who are so deserving of a miracle deny God exists and refuse to have faith in him? If so, why would they expect to receive anything from him?
Dave,Your response is bothersome in at least two ways.1) You are setting up miracles, indeed our entire relationship with God, as a “quid pro quo” arrangement. It is not.2) You give the impression of being someone who has a lack of experience with life’s tragedies – if this is so, I hope you celebrate it and I would not want otherwise for you. The point being – there are many good and faithful people who suffer great hurt and loss and are not touched by miracles of life, healing, or protection from harm. I can assure you that faith has nothing to do with miracles. Faith is not a guarantee of an uneventful life or at least a life of no tragedy or harm or loss.If you would like to continue this conversation, I invite you to [D]mergent, specifically to an article “Reclaiming God” at http://dmergent.org/2010/07/15…
Really? Lev. 18:22, “You shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female; it is an abomination.”1 Lev. 20:13, “If there is a man who lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of them have committed a detestable act; they shall surely be put to death. Their bloodguiltness is upon them” 1 Cor. 6:9-10, “Or do you not know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, 10nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, shall inherit the kingdom of God.” Rom. 1:26-28, “For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, 27and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. 28And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper.”http://www.answersingenesis.or…As for premarital sex: http://www.christiananswers.ne…And pornography:Matt. 5:27, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery’; 28 but I say to you, that everyone who looks on a woman to lust for her has committed adultery with her already in his heart.”1 Cor. 6:18, “Flee immorality. Every other sin that a man commits is outside the body, but the immoral man sins against his own body.”Col. 3:5, “Therefore consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry.”Chapter and verse. Bam.