Philosophy, Part 2: Are we just moist robots?
The arguments for God · Lesson 2 of 2 · About 30 minutes · Grades 1–5
The Evidence for Jesus · A lesson for grades 1–5The arguments for God
Big questionAre we just moist robots?
By the end, kids can
- Tell what Francis Crick said you are, and why the biologist J. B. S. Haldane said believing it is “sawing away the branch on which I am sitting.”
- Tell the difference between a reason and a push: you believe “Socrates is mortal” because the first two lines make it true, but a domino falls only because it was pushed.
- Say the Christian answer: your mind can know what's true because it was made by a Mind, and you were made to love God with all your mind.
- Fill in the memory verse with two words missing: Matthew 22:37 (grades 3–4: Romans 2:15; grade 5+: 1 John 1:9).
You'll need
- This part's one-page worksheet for each child's level (grades 1–2, 3–4, or 5), handed out at the start
- Pencils and crayons
- A wind-up toy (or any toy that runs on a spring or batteries) and a calculator for the warm-up; a row of dominoes or books on end, if you have them
- A screen with sound and internet: the clips come from the video “Are We Just Moist Robots?”
Before you teach
This lesson plays one of Philosophy's video lessons in clips. Its page makes the same case for teens and adults, with every source written out: watch it to prepare, or use it with older kids and youth groups. Click a part to go to its slide:
- Are we just moist robots? The mind · In class: What you'd be, Sawing off the branch, More than molecules, Made by a Mind, Going deeper · Grades 3–5, A person, not a robot, Good news
The lesson
- 2 min Warm-up: can a toy think?
- 2 min Memory verse: fill in the blanks
- 3 min What you'd be: watch (1¼ minutes), then talk
- 4 min Sawing off the branch: watch (1¼ minutes), then reasons or pushes
- 3 min More than molecules: watch (half a minute), talk, and the worksheet
- 3 min Made by a Mind: watch (1¼ minutes), then talk and the worksheet
- 3 min Going deeper (grades 3–5): fair questions (1¼ minutes)
- 3 min A person, not a robot: watch (1 minute), then talk
- 1 min A quick check
- 3 min Good news: watch (1 minute), then made to know him
- 3 min Memory verse from memory, talk, and pray
Worksheets
Print this lesson's one-page sheet for each child, at their level. They fill it in as you go: the ✎ Worksheet sticker on a slide says which part goes with it.
Send it home
After class, share the one-minute Short with families, to watch together and talk about this week:
Answer key
The worksheets don't print their answers. Here they all are, and on the slide before the credits.
Grades 1–2
- Draw it! Drawings and writing will vary.
- Matthew 22:37: heart, mind
Grades 3–4
- Who said it? 1-C · 2-D · 3-A · 4-B
- Romans 2:15: law, hearts
Grade 5+
- Think it through: chemistry, reason, branch, Mind
- 1 John 1:9: confess, faithful, forgive
Presenting
Each part opens with a ▶ Watch slide that plays a clip of the 10-minute video “Are We Just Moist Robots? If There's No God, Can You Trust Your Mind?” right on the slide: read the two questions, then click (or press →, or use a clicker) to play the clip. The slides wait while it plays and stops by itself; click twice to stop it early. Then click to show the answers. The clips need an internet connection.
Click the slide, or press → or Space (a clicker works too), to show the next thing; ← goes back, even while a clip plays. F presents full screen (Esc leaves it). P opens the presenter view, a second window with your notes, the next slide, and a timer, that moves with the slides: put it on your laptop and the slides on the projector. N shows the notes under the slides.
Your script
The arguments for God
Say: Last time we found a law written on every heart: we all know some things are really wrong, and a law like that points to a lawgiver.
Say: Today is Part 2, the last of our two Philosophy lessons. If there's no God, what are you? Just molecules in motion? And if you were, could you even trust your own thoughts?
Can a toy think?
Do: Wind up the toy and let it walk across a table. Ask: Did it decide to walk that way? (No. The spring pushed it.)
Do: Ask a child to work out 7 × 8 in their head. (56.) Ask: How do you know it's 56? (I worked it out. I know my times tables.)
Say: When you work something out, you have a reason. The toy doesn't have reasons. It just gets pushed.
Ask: So are you more like the toy, or more like someone who can think? Today's video asks that question, and the answer matters more than you'd guess.
Clicks: 1. the line “A calculator says 7 × 8 = 56. Does it know it's right? Do you?”
Sources: The argument from reason
Memory verse
Do: Say it together with the motions from last time, filling in the two missing words: “heart” (hand on heart), “soul” (arms around yourself), “mind” (tap your head).
Answers: heart, mind.
Say: Jesus said this is the greatest commandment. Listen at the end of today's video: it quotes this verse. God gave you a mind so you could love him with it.
Older kids: Grades 3–4 fill in Romans 2:15 and grade 5+ fills in 1 John 1:9.
Clicks: 1. the missing word “heart” · 2. the missing word “mind”
What you'd be · Watch: Just molecules?
Say: Here's what some famous scientists say you are, if there's no God. Listen closely.
Do: Read the two questions out loud, then click (or press →) to play the clip. It's about 1¼ minutes and stops by itself.
Ask after: What did Crick say you are? What does Turek call it? Click once for each answer.
Prepare: Before class, watch the video lesson this clip comes from, with every source written out: “Are we just moist robots?”
Clicks: 1. play the clip (it stops by itself) · 2. the answer to 1: A huge crowd of nerve cells and their molecules. · 3. the answer to 2: A “moist robot.”
Sources: Francis Crick, The Astonishing Hypothesis (1994), chapter 1 · Richard Dawkins, River Out of Eden (1995), pp. 131–132 · Frank Turek, Stealing from God (2014), chapter 2, “Reason”
Dancing to DNA's music?
Say: Francis Crick helped discover the shape of DNA. He wrote that “you,” your joys and sorrows, your memories, and even your free will, are “no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules.”
Say: The Oxford biologist Richard Dawkins put it even more bluntly: “DNA neither knows nor cares. DNA just is. And we dance to its music.” Like this puppet on strings.
Say: And if there's no God, they're right: there's nothing else for you to be. Frank Turek calls that picture a “moist robot.”
Ask: If you were a puppet, would your thoughts be part of the dance too? (Yes. Every one of them.)
Clicks: 1. the line “Richard Dawkins: “DNA neither knows nor cares. DNA just is. And we dance to its music.””
Sources: Francis Crick, The Astonishing Hypothesis (1994), chapter 1 · Richard Dawkins, River Out of Eden (1995), pp. 131–132 · Frank Turek, Stealing from God (2014), chapter 2, “Reason”
Sawing off the branch · Watch: Sawing off the branch
Say: A British biologist saw a big problem with that picture nearly a hundred years ago. Watch the man on the branch.
Do: Read the two questions out loud, then click to play the clip. It's about 1¼ minutes.
Ask after: What was it like, Haldane said? Why does each domino fall? Click once for each answer.
Prepare: Before class, watch the video lesson this clip comes from, with every source written out: “Are we just moist robots?”
Clicks: 1. play the clip (it stops by itself) · 2. the answer to 1: “Sawing away the branch on which I am sitting.” · 3. the answer to 2: The one before it pushed it. True and false never come into it.
Sources: J. B. S. Haldane, Possible Worlds and Other Essays (1927), pp. 209–210 · The argument from reason
A reason, or a push?
Say: In 1927, J. B. S. Haldane wrote that if his thoughts were only atoms moving in his brain, he'd have no reason to think his beliefs were true. Believing it, he said, would be “sawing away the branch on which I am sitting.”
Say: Here's a simple argument: All people are mortal. Socrates is a person. So Socrates is mortal. You believe that last line because the first two make it true. That's a reason.
Do: Stand up a row of dominoes (or books) and tip the first. Say: Each one falls because the one before pushed it. Is the last one “right”? (It isn't right or wrong. It just fell.)
Say: If your mind is only molecules, every thought is a push like that. Pushes can still land on the truth, but only if something lined them up with it. So what lined up yours?
Ask: If nothing did, could you trust the thought “I'm only molecules”? (No. That thought would just be another push.)
Clicks: 1. the line “A domino falls only because it was pushed. If your thoughts were only pushes, why trust any of them?”
Sources: J. B. S. Haldane, Possible Worlds and Other Essays (1927), pp. 209–210 · The argument from reason
More than molecules · Watch: A strawberry and a hug
Say: Reason isn't the only thing that doesn't fit the robot picture. Watch for a strawberry and a grandma.
Do: Read the two questions out loud, then click to play the clip. It's about half a minute.
Ask after: What can't the map tell you? What does Turek ask? Click once for each answer.
Prepare: Before class, watch the video lesson this clip comes from, with every source written out: “Are we just moist robots?”
Clicks: 1. play the clip (it stops by itself) · 2. the answer to 1: What it's like to taste the strawberry. · 3. the answer to 2: Are they nothing more than “biological sacks of chemicals”?
Sources: The hard problem of consciousness · Thomas Nagel, “What Is It Like to Be a Bat?” The Philosophical Review 83 (1974) · Frank Turek, Stealing from God (2014), chapter 8
More than a sack of chemicals
Say: Philosophers call it the hard problem: how chemistry could ever add up to what it's like to be you, tasting, laughing, missing someone.
Say: Frank Turek asks about the people you love: “Do you really think that they are nothing more than biological sacks of chemicals?”
Ask: Do you? (No!) Nobody could love their grandma and really believe that.
Worksheet: Grades 1–2 draw someone they love: a person, not a robot. Grades 3–4 draw a line from each thinker to what he said. Everything is in the clips you've watched.
Worksheet answers: Grades 1–2, Draw it!: Drawings and writing will vary.
Worksheet answers: Grades 3–4, Who said it?: 1-C · 2-D · 3-A · 4-B
Clicks: 1. the line “Look at the people you love. Are they just “biological sacks of chemicals”?”
Sources: The hard problem of consciousness · Frank Turek, Stealing from God (2014), chapter 8
Made by a Mind · Watch: Made by a Mind
Say: So why can your mind know what's true? Here's the Christian answer.
Do: Read the two questions out loud, then click to play the clip. It's about 1¼ minutes.
Ask after: What else does logos mean? What did God breathe into the dust? Click once for each answer.
Prepare: Before class, watch the video lesson this clip comes from, with every source written out: “Are we just moist robots?”
Clicks: 1. play the clip (it stops by itself) · 2. the answer to 1: Reason. · 3. the answer to 2: The breath of life.
Sources: John 1:1 · Logos in John's Gospel · Genesis 1:27 · Genesis 2:7 · Frank Turek, Stealing from God (2014), chapter 2, “Reason”
Dust that God breathed into
Say: Your mind can know what's true because it was made by a Mind. John's Gospel opens, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” John's word is logos: word, and also reason.
Say: And Genesis says God made us “in his own image.” Turek puts it simply: “our minds work because they are made in the image of the Great Mind.”
Say: The Bible doesn't deny the chemistry. You really are made of the stuff of the earth. But God breathed into the dust, and the man became a living being. You're dust, but dust that God breathed into.
Ask: The video said, “You're using it right now, to weigh this video.” What's “it”? (Your mind. You can trust it, so the best answer is that your mind comes from a Mind.)
Worksheet: Grade 5+ fills in the steps of the argument now; the words are in the word bank.
Worksheet answers: Grade 5+, Think it through: chemistry, reason, branch, Mind
Clicks: 1. the line ““The Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground” and “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life.””
Sources: John 1:1 · Logos in John's Gospel · Genesis 1:27 · Genesis 2:7 · The argument from reason
Going deeper · Grades 3–5 · Watch: Fair questions
Say: Here are two fair questions people ask, and the answers. Listen for a calculator and a piano.
Do: Read the two questions out loud, then click to play the clip. It's about 1¼ minutes.
Ask after: Why is the calculator right? What about the broken piano? Click once for each answer.
Say: Be honest about this one: in 1954 Haldane himself took his argument back, because a computing machine follows physics and still keeps the rules of logic. But the philosopher Karl Popper, an agnostic, answered: a computer works by logic because minds built it to. So a working calculator points back to a mind that built it. Christians say the same about you.
Say: And when the brain is hurt, the mind changes. Christians agree: God made us body and soul together, and your brain is how your mind works in this world. Break a piano and the music changes. That doesn't mean there was never a pianist.
Prepare: Before class, watch the video lesson this clip comes from, with every source written out: “Are we just moist robots?”
Clicks: 1. play the clip (it stops by itself) · 2. the answer to 1: Its makers designed it to follow the rules of arithmetic. · 3. the answer to 2: No.
Sources: Karl Popper and John Eccles, The Self and Its Brain (1977), section 21 · Karl Popper · J. B. S. Haldane, Possible Worlds and Other Essays (1927), pp. 209–210
A person, not a robot · Watch: Robots don't do wrong
Say: The video puts all the clues together, and then asks about choosing. Watch for a lost wallet.
Do: Read the two questions out loud, then click to play the clip. It's about 1 minute.
Ask after: Who really chooses, if it's all physics? Why do people do wrong? Click once for each answer.
Prepare: Before class, watch the video lesson this clip comes from, with every source written out: “Are we just moist robots?”
Clicks: 1. play the clip (it stops by itself) · 2. the answer to 1: Nobody. Not the person who keeps a lost wallet, and not the one who gives it back. · 3. the answer to 2: Because people choose.
Sources: The argument from reason · Francis Crick, The Astonishing Hypothesis (1994), chapter 1 · Isaiah 53:6
A person, who chooses
Say: Put it all together: a universe that had a beginning, dials set just right for life, a code written in every cell, a law written on every heart, and a mind that can know what's true. Someone is there. He has a mind, and he made yours.
Say: Nobody lives like a robot. We weigh things and decide, and we hold each other responsible, as if we really could have done otherwise.
Say: That's the hard side of being a person. A robot can't do wrong. But we can, and we have: “We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way.” We've used the very minds God gave us to go our own way instead of his.
Ask: Why does it matter that you really choose? (You're a person God made, not a machine, and what you choose matters to him.)
Clicks: 1. the line “Robots don't do wrong. People do, because people choose. “We all, like sheep, have gone astray.” Isaiah 53:6”
Sources: Francis Crick, The Astonishing Hypothesis (1994), chapter 1 · Isaiah 53:6
True or false?
Do: Read each one and have kids stand up for true and sit down for false. Click to stamp each answer.
Answers: 1. True. 2. False. 3. False. 4. True.
Clicks: 1. the answer to 1: True. That was his “astonishing hypothesis.” · 2. the answer to 2: False. It falls because it was pushed. · 3. the answer to 3: False. That's the hard problem. · 4. the answer to 4: True.
Good news · Watch: The Word became flesh
Say: We've gone our own way. So what did the one who made our minds do about it?
Do: Read the two questions out loud, then click to play the clip. It's about 1 minute, and it ends with a prayer you can pray along with.
Ask after: Who became flesh? What did Jesus come to do? Click once for each answer.
Prepare: Before class, watch the video lesson this clip comes from, with every source written out: “Are we just moist robots?”
Clicks: 1. play the clip (it stops by itself) · 2. the answer to 1: The Word, Jesus, who made your mind. · 3. the answer to 2: “To give his life as a ransom for many.”
Sources: John 1:14 · Mark 10:45 · Hebrews 2:14–15 · 1 Corinthians 15:3–4 · Matthew 22:37 · 1 Corinthians 6:19–20
Made to know him
Say: The Word who made your mind became one of us: “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.” Jesus said he came “to give his life as a ransom for many.”
Say: By his death he broke the devil's power, to “free those who all their lives were held in slavery by their fear of death.” And on the third day he rose. The one who made your mind is alive, and he wants you to know him.
Say: And if you come to him, you belong to him: “You are not your own; you were bought at a price.”
Say: You could pray, “God, thank you for making me, mind and heart. I've used them to go my own way. Thank you that Jesus gave his life to set me free, and rose again. I want to know you. Make me yours, and I will follow you.”
Ask: What would you like to say to the God who made your mind?
Clicks: 1. the line “You weren't made to dance to your DNA's music. You were made to know God and love him with all your mind.”
Sources: John 1:14 · Mark 10:45 · Hebrews 2:14–15 · 1 Corinthians 15:3–4 · Matthew 22:37 · 1 Corinthians 6:19–20
Say it from memory
Do: Say the verse together with the motions, filling in the missing words. Then try it with eyes closed. Who can say it alone?
Answers: heart, mind (the same words as the grades 1–2 sheet).
Worksheet: Everyone fills in the missing words of their own memory verse and colors a star each time they say it.
Worksheet answers: Grades 1–2, Matthew 22:37: heart, mind
Worksheet answers: Grades 3–4, Romans 2:15: law, hearts
Worksheet answers: Grade 5+, 1 John 1:9: confess, faithful, forgive
Clicks: 1. the missing word “heart” · 2. the missing word “mind”
Talk and pray
Do: Talk about one or two of the questions, then pray together. Kids can repeat the prayer one line at a time.
Do: Send the worksheets home, with this part's one-minute Short for families. The link is in your guide, under “Send it home.”
Say: That's the end of the Philosophy lessons. Someone is there, and he made you to know him.
Clicks: 1. the prayer
Answer key
Do: Show this when kids check their work, or keep it on your laptop in the presenter view. The worksheets don't print their answers, so this is the key.
Pictures and Scripture
Every picture on these slides, with its credit, license, and a link to its source.