I've read through a couple of these posts and I think both sides are slightly confused what what a presupposition acually is. The dictionary give a sort of general definition so I'll try and define it in my own words and see if you guys agree. A presupposition is a statement which you not only believe to be true, but believe must be true. For example, the law of non-contradiction would usually be recognized as a presupposition. The statement "two opposing statements cannot both be true" is something that we believe must be true, for it can only be proven transcendentally. By that I mean, it proves itself; e.g., if one was to think the the opposite of the law of non-contradiction was true, and the law was false, he would already be assuming that the law was true to say say his view was true and the law of non-contradiction must be false. My point is, presuppositions are those statements which we assume to be true before comming to an argument, and don't look for proofs of them. However, it is very true that other presuppositions aren't as neat and universally accepted as the law of non-contradiction. Indeed, most people hold presuppositions that may be false, or that they may have just been taught and indoctrinated into by their parents or schools.
All people have presuppositions and infer all their positions from them in one way or another. In this sense we are bound by them. Yet, we may also change our presuppositions because they can be false. So in this sense, we are not bound.
Now that we've gotten through that defining of our terms, and we won't all equivocate any longer, let's get to the meat of the subject: What are our presuppositions? Certainly they differ for each person, even though a small few are neat and universal. Some people assume Theism, some assume Materialism, and they base everything from those. However, some infer Theism and some infer Materialism, from even deeper presuppositions. What we must guard ourselves from doing is stereotyping. Not all Creationists assume Theism, and not all Darwinists assume Materialism. Though granted, some may in either party, and if they do they tend to argue with others with a completely closed mind and the argument never gets anywhere. So back to my previous point without running off on a tangent, what we must do is find out each person's true most basic presuppositions, see if those hold up, and see if their beliefs necessarily follow logically from those presuppositions. Don't you all agree?
The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them.
-Mark Twain
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