Atheism and Agnosticism

1. EXPLICATING THE CONCEPT OF REFLECTION (under review) -/- To understand how ‘reflection’ is used, I consider ordinary, philosophical, and scientific discourse. I find that ‘reflection’ seems to refer to reasoning that is deliberate and conscious, but not necessarily self-conscious. Then I offer an empirical explication of reflection’s conscious and deliberate features. These explications not only help explain how reflection can be detected; they also distinguish reflection from nearby concepts such as ruminative and reformative reasoning. After this, I find that (...) reflection is not obviously limited to only practical or only theoretical reasoning. The chapter ends with reasons to prefer ‘unreflective’ and ‘reflective’ to dual process theorists’ labels about systems or types. -/- 2. BOUNDED REFLECTIVISM & EPISTEMIC IDENTITY (in Metaphilosophy) -/- Reflection features centrally in philosophy (e.g., Korsgaard, 1996; Rawls, 1971; Sosa, 1991) and psychology (e.g., Pennycook, 2018). Bounded reflectivism is an empirically adequate model of reflection that explains reflection’s capacity to either help or hinder reasoning—e.g., reflective equilibrium vs. reflective polarization (e.g., Kahan et al., 2017). One innovation of the model is epistemic identity: an identity that involves particular beliefs—e.g., religious and political identities. When we feel that our epistemic identity is threatened, we can reflectively defend its beliefs rather than update our beliefs according to the best arguments and evidence. The solution, I argue, is not to suppress epistemic identity but embrace it by appealing to shared, superordinate epistemic identities. -/- 3. ALL MEASURES ARE NOT CREATED EQUAL (under review) -/- A bat and a ball cost $1.10 in total. The bat costs $1.00 more than the ball. How much does the ball cost? “10 cents” comes to most people’s minds immediately. However, upon reflection, we can realize that “5 cents” is the correct answer. There are many reflection tests. Each has its limitations. Some reflection tests are mathematical—like the bat-and-ball problem (e.g., Frederick, 2005) and others are logical (e.g., Janis & Frick, 1943). So there are concerns that reflection tests track logical and mathematical competence rather than reflection per se. Also, some psychologists assume a priori that correct answers are reflective and lured answers are unreflective. New evidence raises additional concerns about the plausibility of these assumptions. I argue that think aloud protocols (Ericsson & Simon, 1998) and process dissociation (Jacoby, 1991) can assuage some of these concerns. -/- 4. GREAT MINDS DO NOT THINK ALIKE (in Review of Philosophy and Psychology) -/- Two large studies (N = 1299), one pre-registered, found that many correlations between reflection and philosophical beliefs among non-philosophers replicated among philosophers. For example, less reflective philosophers preferred theism to atheism and utilitarian rather than deontological responses to the trolley problem (Hannikainen & Cova, in prep.; Pennycook et al., 2016; Reynolds, Byrd, & Conway, forthcoming). However, philosophical judgments were sometimes better predicted by factors like education, gender, and personality than by reflection test performance. So although some relationships between reflection and philosophy were robust, there is more to the link between reflection and philosophy. Normative implications are also discussed—e.g., how we can infer the quality of philosophical views from their correlations with reflective or unreflective reasoning. -/- 5. WHAT WE CAN (AND CAN’T) INFER ABOUT IMPLICIT BIAS (in Synthese) -/- Contrary to some philosophers and psychologists, I argue that implicit bias is probably associative. However, I also argue that debiasing is not thereby entirely unconscious and involuntary. Indeed, strong evidence suggests that reflection can change implicitly biased behavior—e.g., conscious and deliberate counterconditioning. This has implications for the science and morality of implicit bias—e.g., evidence suggests that we can reform biases; so. intuitively, we can be responsible for biases. (shrink)

In this address, Leslie Allan shares his early experiences and how they shape his humanist outlook today. He then outlines what he considers to be the three core principles underlying the humanist world view and illustrates their application with historical and contemporary examples. He concludes by drawing upon each of these principles to tease out what it means to live a good life; a life of meaning and purpose.

Henry More was an expounder of Cambridge Platonism, as he largely relied on a Platonicinspired standpoint in pursuing his aims: the demonstration of the immortality of soul, the critique of atheism and religious enthusiasm. He maintains that soul emanates from God (being therefore not created and pre-existing body) and argues for the existence of a spirit of nature as means to explain natural phenomena, which cannot be accounted for only in mechanical terms. Moreover, he argues for the extended nature of (...) God and spirits, as only in this way they can act on the world. Accordingly, More rejects Descartes’s theory of immaterial substance, but relies on his ontological argument provide a demonstration of the existence of God. His critique to enthusiasm (especially that one characterizing Neoplatonic mysticism) is medical, as he distinguishes between a rational, religious inspiration, and a melancholic one. (shrink)

It’s constitutive of classical theism that there is a necessarily existent personal god who is also the creator of the universe, where the latter claim includes at least the following three theses: (i) God is wholly distinct from the natural world; (ii) God is the originating or sustaining cause of the natural world; and (iii) God created the natural world ex nihilo, i.e., without the use of pre-existing materials. Call this tripartite component of classical theism the classical view of creation. (...) In this paper, I offer a new argument against classical theism. In particular, I argue that creation ex nihilo is prima facie impossible, and that since the doctrine of creation ex nihilo is constitutive of classical theism, classical theism is false. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that, following from the work of Bultmann and Ricoeur, traditional apologetic approaches to the Bible fail as they neglect the existential nature of the text and, thus, fail to recognize the decision of the non-believer as legitimate. By the same token, however, the "refutational atheist" responses to believers fail to recognize the legitimacy of the “yes” answer to the existentiell decision the Bible poses. Though it is a difficult position to stake out in current religious (...) discourse, I conclude by offering a sketch of what it would mean to approach the Bible with the openness that allows for accepting the legitimacy of either answer to the existentiell decision of the Bible. (shrink)

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Volume 104, Issue 3, Page 676-695, May 2022.

According to Thomas Aquinas, what distinguishes the theological from the cardinal virtues is the nature of their object: the latter aim at the natural excellence of humans, while the former direct us beyond ourselves to focus on the Divine. This paper considers the cinematic work of Drew Goddard — in particular, his 2018 film _Bad Times at the El Royale_ — as a post-religious response to Aquinas, insofar as it retains and re-presents Faith, Hope, and Love as valuable elements of (...) the human experience itself, even in the absence of a supernatural vector of their application. After the fashion of Caputo’s Derrida, I offer a religionless interpretation of each of the three theological virtues and show how _Bad Times_ itself deconstructs the roles of ‘god’ and ‘human,’ interchanging them in a way that manifests a “religionless religion” wherein the theological virtues can remain vibrant, even without the theological structure that might be expected to undergird them. In short: _Bad Times at the El Royale_ demonstrates how even if God is dead, Faith, Hope, and Love are not. (shrink)

This book is an attempt to make sense of the tension in Nietzsche’s work between the unashamedly egocentric and the apparently mystical. While scholars have tended to downplay one or other of these aspects, this book shows that the two are not only compatible but mutually illuminating. Supporting both of these aspects of Nietzsche’s philosophy is a conception of the one and the many that develops from the thought of Goethe. Goethe is not typically given a lot of attention in (...) Anglophone philosophy, and this is the case even in Nietzsche studies. This is a severe limitation as Goethe had an immense influence on many subsequent thinkers, and this is especially true of Nietzsche. Goethe’s conception of the relationship of the one to the many is unique - as Cassirer wrote, such a view “can hardly be found elsewhere in the history of philosophy or of natural science”. Nietzsche as Egoist and Mystic shows how this “Goethean” conception of the one and the many was further developed by Nietzsche, and how it helps to illuminate Nietzsche’s complex and much disputed religious thought. This book is a mediation between Nietzsche and major currents in mystical thought both East and West which shows how previous interpretations fail to adequately account for crucial aspects of Nietzsche’s thought, including his egoism. (shrink)

Knowing someone personally centrally involves engaging in various patterns of affective response. Inasmuch as humans can know God personally, this basic insight about the relationship between personal knowledge and affective response also applies to God: knowing God involves responding to him, and to the world, in various affectively toned ways. In light of this insight, I explore how one particular practice might contribute to human knowledge of God: namely, engaging with sacred music – in particular, sacred music in the Western, (...) classical tradition. In investigating this topic, I tackle an issue at the interface between the philosophy of religion and aesthetics: sacred music’s capacity to arouse religious emotions. I use as a springboard Peter Kivy’s view that ‘music alone’ can only arouse emotions about itself. This view, I argue, has a counterintuitive consequence: the music in sacred works would play no part in arousing emotions with religious objects. In contrast, I develop an account of how music combines with religious factors to arouse religious emotions. I then draw out two consequences for how music can facilitate understanding between religious and non-religious outlooks. The upshot of all this, I suggest, is that by expanding the listener’s religious-emotional landscape, sacred music can enrich her knowledge of God – and that this is possible whether or not the listener subscribes propositionally to God’s reality or to any other religious doctrines. (shrink)

Antitheodicy objects to all attempts to solve the problem of evil. Its objections are almost all on moral grounds—it argues that the whole project of theodicy is morally offensive. Trying to excuse God’s permission of evil is said to deny the reality of evil, to exhibit gross insensitivity to suffering, and to insult the victims of grave evils. Since antitheodicists urge the avoidance of theodicies for moral reasons, it is desirable to evaluate the moral reasons against theodicies in abstraction from (...) the intellectual reasons for and against them. It is argued that the best known theodicies such as those based on soul-making and free will are guilty of moral faults as alleged. But Leibniz’s best of all possible worlds theory, often thought to be the most morally offensive ‘Panglossian’ theodicy, is morally blameless because it excuses God by the absolute impossibility of his choosing any world better than the present one. Theodicy should not be conceived of as a search for greater goods which may excuse God’s permitting evils. From the divine point of view, creation is an upfront choice between scenarios—in modern parlance, a Trolley problem rather than a Transplant problem. In cases of forced choice among scenarios, it is morally improper to criticize one who chooses the best. (shrink)

In this essay, I propose two arguments from Thomas Aquinas’s reflection on theism and faith to rebut Schellenberg’s claim that divine hiddenness justifies atheism. One of those arguments, however, may be employed so as to re-propose Schellenberg’s conviction, which is crucial to his argument, that there are ‘non-resistant’ or ‘inculpable’ unbelievers. I then advance what I call the suffering unbeliever argument. In short, the unbelievers mentioned by Schellenberg are expected to suffer because of their non-belief, which—as Schellenberg says—prevents them from (...) achieving the greatest possible well-being. If they suffer, however, they cannot consider themselves unbelievers, since one cannot suffer from not having been given a certain good if one believes that the good in question has never existed. If they do not suffer, on the other hand, there is simply nothing for which they can consider themselves inculpable. (shrink)

My essay will take as its point of departure the paragraph from Gershom Scholem’s “Reflections on Jewish Theology,” in which he depicts the modern religious experience as the one of the "void of God" or as "pious atheism". I will first argue that the "void of God" cannot be reduced to atheistic non-belief in the presence of God. Then, I will demonstrate the further development of the Scholemian notion of the ‘pious atheism’ in Derrida, especially in his Lurianic treatment of (...) Angelus Silesius, whose modern mysticism emerges in Derrida’s reading as the ‘almost-atheism’. The interesting feature of this development is that, while for Scholem, the ‘void of God’ is a predominantly negative experience, for Derrida, it becomes an affirmative model of modern – not just Jewish, but more generally, Abrahamic – religiosity which, on the one hand, touches upon atheistic non-belief in the divine presence here and now, yet, on the other, still insists on commemorating the ‘withdrawn God’ through his ‘traces.’ What, therefore, for Scholem, constitutes the ultimate cry of despair, best embodied in Kafka’s work – for Derrida, reveals the more positive face of the modern predicament in which God has absented himself in order to make room for the creaturely reality. And while Scholem envisages redemption as the full restoration of the divine presence – Derrida redefines redemption as the ‘pious’ work of deconstruction to be undertaken in the ‘almost-atheistic’ condition of irreversible separation between God and the world. (shrink)

John Schellenberg presents an argument for atheism according to which theism would be easy to believe, if true. Since theism isn’t easy to believe, it must be false. In this paper, I argue that Kabbalistic Judaism has the resources to bypass this argument completely. The paper also explores a stream of Kabbalistic advice that the tradition offers to people of faith for those times at which God appears to us to be hidden.

An argument for the rationality of religious belief in the existence of God is defended. After reviewing three preconditions for rational belief, I show reasons to privilege the criterion of consistency. Taking the inconsistency of the religious belief in God and the belief in the scientific world picture as the impediment to a rational belief in God, I propose that we can overcome this objection by assuming, firstly, that God is a universal class. This allows us to put the problem (...) of God in set-theoretic terms, such that the antinomy that follows from such an assumption can be overcome by assuming that God is not a subject but a strict class that cannot be individuated. I conclude that that the self-contradictory nature of God does not prevent the believer from making a rational, ethical assessment that the contradiction resides in the possibility of using language to explain his existence, but that this does not make belief in the existence of God unjustifiable – on the contrary. In this way, we can say statements that claim God exists are justifiable. (shrink)

Religious fictionalism is the theory that it is morally and intellectually legitimate to affirm religious sentences and to engage in public and private religious practices, without believing the content of religious claims. This article discusses the main features of fictionalism, contrasts hermeneutic, and revolutionary kinds of fictionalism and explores possible historical and recent examples of religious fictionalism. Such examples are found in recent theories of faith, pragmatic approaches to religion, and mystical traditions in religious theology.

This paper assesses J. L. Schellenberg’s account of propositional faith and, in light of that assessment, sketches an alternative that avoids certain objections and coheres better with Schellenberg’s aims.

This is a critical review of David O'Connor's book, God and Inscrutable Evil.

The main idea consists in researching the existence of certain characteristics of nature similar to human reasonability and purposeful actions, originating and rigorously inferable from the postulates of quantum mechanics as well as from those of special and general relativity. The pathway of the “free-will theorems” proved by Conway and Kochen in 2006 and 2009 is followed and pioneered further. Those natural reasonability and teleology are identified as a special subject called “God” and studyable by “quantum theology”, a scientific counterpart (...) of classical theology as far as the latter endeavors to justify rationally God (without quotation marks) postulated by religion, but meaning in the present study, first of all, Christianity. The suggested “quantum theology” is situated in the historical opposition and conflict of science and religion in Modernity and its reflection in Heidegger’s conception of “ontotheology”. The conception of “ontomathematics” introduced in previous papers to unite and unify physics, mathematics, and philosophy is reinterpreted in the present context to be conservatively generalized in a way to include “quantum theology”. Two conceptions, “locality” and “nonlocality”, originating initially from physics and especially, from theory of entanglement and quantum information, are also generalized ontomathematically, and thus in relation to the newly introduced “quantum theology”. The “quantum theology” subject of “God” is juxtaposed with God of religion and billions of believers all over the world. Husserl’s conception of “philosophy as a rigorous science” is considered to be generalized now to theology as quantum theology, particularly by the phenomenon (in the sense of his “phenomenology”) of “God”, or by an “epoché” to whether God exists or not. The research of the phenomenon of “God” is extended to the conception of the “totality” being inherent for philosophy, especially for classical German philosophy preceding Husserl’s phenomenology. Those sequences for philosophy implied by the introduction of quantum theology are investigated further, on the pathway of ontomathematics, also in relation to what “God” should mean for today’s physics and mathematics. The option and research field of “experimental quantum theology” is discussed as a direct corollary from quantum theology though being sacrilegious as for classical theology. The concluding section reflects in a more loose way on the relation of “God” for quantum theology to God for religion and billions of believers all over the world. (shrink)

Despite the characteristically secular and ‘disenchanted’ spirit of our time, many maintain a kind of tolerance apropos to religiosity, provided only that it remains to be an individual and private affair. This nevertheless prepared and eventually led to the rise of a movement committed to the denigration of religion’s frontiers, especially on the grounds of its rationality and moral authority – the new atheism. Compared to its older forms, the neo-atheistic crusade is more aggressive in approaching religious beliefs, proclaiming how (...) their ‘irrationality’ is to be shunned on account of an encompassing scientific understanding and explanation of the world and its phenomena. Its influence owes greatly to the intellectual assurance and vitriolic style of its Four Horsemen whose respective fields account for an elaborate attack on the religious enterprise. Given the neo-atheistic contentions – that religious beliefs are ‘irrational’ and are responsible for an irrational picture of reality, thus, making religion ‘dangerous’ – this study provides an epistemological critique of the aforementioned through the compatible frameworks of Alvin Plantinga and Jacques Maritain. It concludes that with all its merits, the new atheism from the standpoint of the synthesis of Plantinga and Maritain fails to eject religion and religious beliefs from the realm of human knowledge and morality. (shrink)

This paper examines whether atheists, who believe that God does not exist, can have faith. Of course, atheists have certain kinds of faith: faith in their friends, faith in certain ideals, and faith in themselves. However, the question we’ll examine is whether atheists can have theistic faith: faith that God exists. Philosophers tend to fall on one of two extremes on this question: some, like Dan Howard-Snyder (2019) and Imran Aijaz (2023), say unequivocally no; others, like Robert Whitaker (2019) and (...) Sam Lebens (2023), say unequivocally yes. Here, I take a middle position: I argue that atheists can have action-focused theistic faith (faith in how they act) but not attitude-focused theistic faith (faith in what attitudes they have). (shrink)

J. L. Schellenberg's Philosophy of Religion argues for a specific brand of sceptical religion that takes ‘Ultimism’ – the proposition that there is a metaphysically, axiologically, and soteriologically ultimate reality – to be the object to which the sceptical religionist should assent. In this article I shall argue that Ietsism – the proposition that there is merely something transcendental worth committing ourselves to religiously – is a preferable object of assent. This is for two primary reasons. First, Ietsism is far (...) more modest than Ultimism; Ietsism, in fact, is open to the truth of Ultimism, while the converse does not hold. Second, Ietsism can fulfil the same criteria that compel Schellenberg to argue for Ultimism. (shrink)

The Scottish philosopher David Hume (1711-1776) is widely regarded as the greatest and most significant English-speaking philosopher and often seen as having had the most influence on the way philosophy is practiced today in the West. His reputation is based not only on the quality of his philosophical thought but also on the breadth and scope of his writings, which ranged over metaphysics, epistemology, morals, politics, religion, and aesthetics. The Handbook's 38 newly commissioned chapters are divided into six parts: Central (...) Themes; Metaphysics and Epistemology; Passion, Morality and Politics; Aesthetics, History, and Economics; Religion; Hume and the Enlightenment; and After Hume. The volume also features an introduction from editor Paul Russell and a chapter on Hume's biography. (shrink)

This paper considers the question of “atheism” as it arises in Hume’s _Dialogues_. It argues that the concept of “atheism” involves several signficiant ambiguities that are indicative of philosophical and interpretive disagreements of a more substantial nature. It defends the view that Philo’s general sceptical orientation accurately represents Hume’s own “irreligious” and “atheistic” commitments, both in the _Dialogues_ and in his other (“earlier”) writings. While Hume was plainly a “speculative atheist”, his “practical atheism” was targeted more narrowly against “superstition” - (...) as opposed to deism or religion of a more “philosophical” kind. (shrink)

This introduction provides a brief overview of the issues and arguments that arise in Hume's _Dialogues concerning Natural Religion_ (1779). It also provides a few brief comments relating to the historical context in which this text should be interpreted , as well as an account of the place of the _Dialogues_ in relation to Hume's other philosophical works.

The problem of divine hiddenness discussed among both theist and non- theist circles. From an atheistic perspective the existence of people who are sincerely looking for God but cannot reach Him is a supportive point for atheism. On the other side, same problem supports agnosticism since there are equal evidence from both side for the existence of God from an agnostic perspective. The theists who are belonging to different religion have tried to find some solutions to this problem. For instance; (...) there is a theistic understanding which claims hiddenness of God provides us freedom to believe and another one says it is the only way to have personal relationship with God. A different position brings solution from the Jewish idea that chosen people of God. In this article, I have evaluated those different approaches. In the first section, I have indicated that there is no agreement on the implication of divine hiddenness problem even amongst non-theistic positions by shortly introducing atheistic and agnostic approaches. In the second section, I dealt with theistic approaches and the problems that they produced while trying to provide a solution to the problem. After an inquiry on how we are supposed to understand hiddenness, I have tried to show the problem has nothing new since premises of the divine hiddenness problem are not verifiable by everyone. As a conclusion I have offered postponing the divine hiddenness problem and discussing existence of God on a rational ground by presenting a counterargument. (shrink)

This paper offers a defence of metaphysical naturalism, in the context of the Fine Tuning argument. Theistic objections to the Multiverse (MV) hypothesis are considered, specifically the claim that the MV hypothesis commits the Inverse Gambler’s Fallacy (IGF) and, as per the This Universe Objection (TUO), that it violates the Requirement of Total Evidence. It is argued that the IGF claim moved the goalposts when it comes to assessing the validity of the MV hypothesis. The Cosmic Slot Machine analogy will (...) be used to demonstrate how the This Universe Objection (TUO), fails to adequately account for the anthropic principle (or selection effect) and how the MV hyptothesis does satisfy the Requirement for Total Evidence. -/- With respect to the Naturalistic Single Universe (NSU), the implications of the ex-nihilonihil- fit principle, for evaluating the epistemic probability of a Life Permitting Universe (LPU)under the NSU hypothesis, are considered. It is argued that the ex nihilo nihil fit principle entails that an LPU is not improbable under the NSU hypothesis. (shrink)

In this paper, I elucidate the scapegoat construct and its necessary psychological presence within theistic and atheistic variations of the narrative self, as well as the Chinese and Japanese variations of the Buddhist no-self, and enumerate the ritual processes undertaken by these practitioners to create, banish, and sacrifice their respective motifs of applied blame. I attempt to substantiate the inward and outward transcendent manifestations of this construct as the identifying qualities of the Christ figure, and the harmful external manifestations as (...) evidence of the Yahweh figure later in the work. As a sort of Neo-Jungian approach to comparative religion, I guarantee that this work will instantiate significant theoretical value in the mind of the reader, qualified as the transcendent end of my self-sacrifice and banishment of slothfulness necessary for its completion. (shrink)

Dudgeon, William (1705/6–1743), freethinker and philosopher, is of unknown origins. A tenant farmer who resided at Lennel Hill Farm, near Coldstream, Berwickshire, he was one of several philosophers active in the borders area of Scotland during this period. Other figures in this group include Andrew Baxter, Henry Home (Lord Kames), and most importantly David Hume.....

The aim of this article is to bring to light some of the factors that allowed the emergence of secularization, and to understand to what extent and in what ways these factors contributed to the formation of the main lines of Spinozism. I will first examine the issues of secularization, emphasizing the importance of the transformations in the status of the Hebrew language during the Renaissance. I will then analyze the role that the Tractatus theologico-politicus may have had in European (...) culture. Finally, I will clarify Spinoza’s relationship to deism and atheism, specifying the nature of the controversies related to his religious attitude. (shrink)

This paper will attempt to offer a defence of to the Multiverse (MV) hypotheses, in the context of the theistic Fine Tuning Argument (FTA). It will be argued that theistic proponents of the FTA who argue that the MV hypothesis commits the Inverse Gambler’s Fallacy (IGF) are, themselves, guilty of moving the goalposts when it comes to assessing the validity of the MV hypothesis. The Cosmic Slot Machine analogy will be used to demonstrate how the This Universe Objection (TUO), first (...) outlined by White (2000) and further clarified by Draper et al (2007), fails to adequately account for the anthropic principle (or selection effect). (shrink)

In this brief review it is not possible to do full justice to this lively and lucidly presented study. It is fair to say, I think, that the considerable merits of this work rest primarily with its intelligent and reliable selection of material, most of which is already available and familiar. This study does not aim to challenge any orthodoxies or present new material of some significant kind. Rasmussen does not need to do this since his real concern is to (...) tell a story about two great thinkers in an engaging manner – a task which he achieves with great success. This is a book that scholars will thoroughly enjoy and appreciate and which will also find many appreciative readers well beyond these boundaries. (shrink)

Prior research found correlations between reflection test performance and philosophical tendencies among laypeople. In two large studies (total N = 1299)—one pre-registered—many of these correlations were replicated in a sample that included both laypeople and philosophers. For example, reflection test performance predicted preferring atheism over theism and instrumental harm over harm avoidance on the trolley problem. However, most reflection-philosophy correlations were undetected when controlling for other factors such as numeracy, preferences for open-minded thinking, personality, philosophical training, age, and gender. Nonetheless, (...) some correlations between reflection and philosophical views survived this multivariate analysis and were only partially confounded with either education or self-reported reasoning preferences. Unreflective thinking still predicted believing in God whereas reflective thinking still predicted believing that (a) proper names like ‘Santa’ do not necessarily refer to entities that actually exist and (b) science does reveal the fundamental nature of the world. So some robust relationships between reflection and philosophical tendencies were detected even among philosophers, and yet there was clearly more to the link between reflection and philosophy. To this end, demographic and metaphilosophical hypotheses are considered. (shrink)

In his article, ‘What's Wrong with Tooley's Argument from Evil?’, Calum Miller's goal was to show that the evidential argument from evil that I have advanced is unsound, and in support of that claim, Miller set out three main objections. First, he argued that I had failed to recognize that the actual occurrence of an event can by itself, at least in principle, constitute good evidence that it was not morally wrong for God to allow events of the kind in (...) question. Miller's second objection was then that, in attempting to show that it is unlikely that God exists, I had failed to consider either positive arguments in support of the existence of God or possible theodicies, and thus that I was unjustified in drawing any conclusions concerning the probability that theism is true in the light of the total evidence available. Miller's third and final objection was that one of the approaches to logical probability that I employed – namely, that based upon a structure-description equiprobability principle, rather than a state-description equiprobability principle – was unsound since it has clearly unacceptable implications. In response, I argue that all three of Miller's objections are unsound. The third objection, however, is nevertheless important since it shows that my type of argument from evil cannot be based merely on the evils found in the world. One must also consider good states of affairs, and their relations to bad ones. I show, however, that that deficiency can be addressed in a completely satisfactory manner. (shrink)

This article presents an argument for atheism that contains a premise stated from the first-person perspective and that is intended to rationally persuade people who satisfy certain conditions. The argument also contains a premise about what God would do, if God existed, that is acceptable to theists and is affirmed in some major monotheistic religious traditions. This article explains how the argument differs from some other familiar arguments for atheism and then discusses some critical responses to it.

The article analyses libertine themes and authors of 17th century in articles, critical notes and reviews of three major Italian journals of the 20th century – Rivista di filosofia, Giornale critico della filosofia italiana and Rivista critica di storia della filosofia (since 1984 titled Rivista di storia della filosofia). The category of ‘libertinism’ refers to various disciplinary fields: philosophy, politics, literature, modern history or religious history. This ambiguity influences the analyses of libertinism in the Italian historic-philosophical debate. The last two (...) decades of the 20th century show a renewed interest of the three journals on libertine themes and on the relationship between libertinism and philosophy. Research on libertine thought focuses mainly on French libertinism (i.e. libertinage érudit) and on the philosophical clandestine literature: the journals discuss or review clandestine texts, as the Theophrastus redivivus (1659), whose critical edition was published in Italy in 1981–1982. (shrink)

In this paper, I critically analyse Jerome Gellman’s proposal that there existsa type of experience in which a subject experiences evil and perceives in this evil that there is no God. This a-religious experience gives prima facie support to the belief that there is no God. I show how accepting Gellman’s pro-posal allows us to go beyond the classical distinction between the intellectualand the emotional problem of evil. It also allows us to defend the rationality of some atheists, who do (...) not believe in God because they experienced evil, but do not know the relevants arguments from evil. I suggest that there are twoproblems with Gellman’s account. The first is that there are no clear criteria of identifying a given experience of evil as the perception of God’s non-existence. The second problem concerns the scope of Gellman’s proposal. It is possible that some experiences of evil, which lead people to the belief that there is no God, do not count as perceptions that there is no God. In case of beliefsformed on the basis of such experiences, one must therefore look for another,non-perceptual grounds for justifying such beliefs. (shrink)

Cognitive science of religion is sometimes portrayed as having no bearing on the theological doctrines of particular religious traditions, such as Christianity. In this paper, I argue that the naturalistic account of the etiology of religious beliefs offered by the cognitive science of religion undermines the important Christian doctrine of the grace of faith, which teaches that the special gift of divine grace is a necessary precondition for coming to faith. This has some far-reaching ramifications for Christian theology. -/- .

Many atheists argue that because gratuitous evil exists, God (probably) doesn’t. But doesn’t this commit atheists to wishing that God did exist, and to the pro-theist view that the world would have been better had God existed? This doesn’t follow. I argue that if all that evil still remains but is just no longer gratuitous, then, from an atheist perspective, that wouldn’t have been better. And while a counterfactual from which that evil is literally absent would have been impersonally better, (...) it wouldn’t have been better for anyone, not even for those who suffered such evils. (shrink)

Naturalists have many and diverse reasons for thinking that morality does not depend upon God. In this paper, I do not aim to give an exhaustive inventory of these reasons. Rather, I aim to give reason that emerge from the kind of naturalism that I accept. After explaining what I mean by "God", "morality" and "dependence", I note that, on the kind of naturalism that I accept, it is impossible that God exists. Unsurprisingly, therefore, I hold that it is impossible (...) that morality depends on God. While--as I go on to discuss--there are reasons to think that morality could not be dependent on anything else, I also canvass reasons for thinking that even theists should worry about the suggestion that morality might be dependent on God. -/- This chapter was published in a 'debate' book. My 'debate' partner was Matthew Flannagan. The book also contains my response to Flannagan's chapter on this topic. I have not included that response here. (shrink)

In this paper, I set out a fairly careful argument for the claim that natural reality ("the universe') does not have--and could not have--a cause. I being with a discussion of the question whether causal reality could have a cause. I claim that it is obvious that causal reality cannot have a cause. I then turn to a discussion of natural reality. I contend that, necessarily, natural reality exhausts causal reality: necessarily, natural reality and causal reality are one and the (...) same. Given that it is impossible for causal reality to have a cause, it follows immediately that natural reality cannot have a cause. -/- The paper is a chapter in a 'debate' book. My 'debate' partner is Rob Koons. There is also a brief response to Koons' contribution that is not uploaded here. (shrink)

In this article, I argue that sceptical theists have too narrow a focus: they consider only God’s axiological reasons, ignoring any non-axiological reasons he may have. But this is a mistake: predicting how God will act requires knowing about his reasons in general, and this requires knowing about both God’s axiological and non-axiological reasons. In light of this, I construct and defend a kind of sceptical theism—Deontological Sceptical Theism—that encompasses all of God’s reasons, and briefly illustrate how it renders irrelevant (...) certain charges of excessive sceptical and how it evaporates equiprobability objections. Furthermore, I put forth a simple argument in favor of Deontological Sceptical Theism, which shows that everyone (at least currently) ought to endorse it. (shrink)

Platonic religiosity is the first of two volumes devoted to the analysis of religiosity or religious feeling (pathos) in Plato. -/- (Back cover) Platonic Religiosity is a hermeneutical attempt to read Platonic works from the perspective of their religiosity. The aspects examined in the book are limited for the moment to the most basic, perhaps even the simplest, dimensions of religious feeling, those involving the representation of a relationship between man and divinity, Earth and Heaven, "low" and "high". Low and (...) high are spatial metaphors constitutive of our thinking. Although, in this case, they indicate the link between man and the super-sensible world, they also presuppose, at all times, the devout feeling (and the risk) of an insurmountable distance and remoteness that divides men from the numen. The need to affirm the relationship partly overcomes the presence of this feeling of distance, but never manages to neutralise it completely. -/- Religious feeling as such always oscillates between two terms: the need to establish a relationship with the divinity, and thus to guarantee its proximity to man, and the affirmation of its transcendence, namely the distance that divides us from the numen, up to the point, eventually, where the danger becomes the greatest: the denial of the god by man (atheism) or the human feeling of being abandoned by the god. The presence of these oscillations in the Platonic texts is analysed in several chapters of the book, devoted to different themes, such as the representations of reciprocity (do ut des), the images of the friendly god and the hostile god, the feeling of the threshold, prayers and invocations, verecundia and nostalgia, the feeling of dependence, the notion of prescience, assimilation to the god, the different types of ineffability, the role of atheism and incredulity, and lastly the notion of conversion, which substantiates Platonic religiosity by characterising it in the sense of a redemption-belief. (shrink)

The Fine-Tuning Argument (FTA) is an argument put forward by proponents of theism, in which they attempt to make a case from Bayesian inference, that the [apparently] fine tuned constants of our universe is more likely given a theistic hypothesis, than a naturalistic one. Some naturalists argue that this is not the case given the Multiverse (MV) hypothesis (that our universe is one of a plurality in a broader multiverse). The MV hypothesis is rejected by theists who argue it commits (...) what Ian Hacking (1987) referred to as “the Inverse Gambler’s Fallacy”. In this paper I will attempt to demonstrate [what I perceive as] the errors in logic made by theists first in positing that a life-permitting universe (LPU) is improbable under the naturalistic-single-universe (NSU) hypothesis, and subsequently the errors in arguing that the MV hypothesis commits what Ian Hacking (1987) referred to as “the Inverse Gambler’s Fallacy”. First, I will attempt to demonstrate why an LPU is not improbable under the NSU. Second, I will attempt to demonstrate that if we ascribe a probability value to our LPU, we can directly infer either an MV or the existence of “Deeper Laws” (Barnes, 2020) from that probability value. (shrink)

James Sterba has recently argued that the free will defense fails to explain the compossibility of a perfect God and the amount and degree of moral evil that we see. I think he is mistaken about this. I thus find myself in the awkward and unexpected position, as a non-theist myself, of defending the free will defense. In this paper, I will try to show that once we take care to focus on what the free will defense is trying to (...) accomplish, and by what means it tries to do so, we will see that Sterba’s criticism of it misses the mark. (shrink)

Sam Harris (2010) argues that, given our neurology, we can experience well-being, and that seeking to maximize this state lets us distinguish the good from the bad. He takes our ability to compare degrees of well-being as his starting point, but I think that the analysis can be pushed further, since there is a (non-religious) reason why well-being is desirable, namely the finite life of an individual organism. It is because death is a constant possibility that things can be assessed (...) as “for” or “against” one (Champagne 2011a; Smith 2000). Such an account lets us objectively adjudicate moral questions, as Harris desires. However, by anchoring itself in the mortal body as a whole and not just the brain, such an account dampens the claim that neuroscience would have all the answers. Moreover, it pivots on an affirmation of one’s life that can seem mysterious by regular scientific standards. This chapter thus explains why the trade-off is worthwhile. (shrink)

Nagasawa has argued that the suffering associated with evolution presents a greater challenge to atheism than to theism because that evil is incompatible with ‘existential optimism’ about the world – with seeing the world as an overall good place, and being thankful that we exist. I argue that even if atheism was incompatible with existential optimism in this way, this presents no threat to atheism. Moreover, it is unclear how the suffering associated with evolution could on its own undermine existential (...) optimism. Links between Nagasawa's argument and the current debate about the axiology of theism are also explored. (shrink)

By taking into account Epicurus’s extant texts and the most recent bibliography, this article aims at showing that he was not a convinced and stubborn atheist, as it was often believed during the Middle Ages. Rather, his idea of religion was vivid, positive and respectful of the traditional deities: to such an extent that Epicurus can be characterized as an ascetic and even mystical figure.

There is hardly any theme in Karl Marx’s theoretical corpus that has garnered as much traction as his theory of fetishism. Ever since Marx introduced the term into his critique of political economy in Capital, fetishism became a field of theoretical force, creating its own gravitational center toward which the interest of later generations of historians, social theorists, and political activists has been pulled. While much ink has been spilled on the specific content and theoretical scope of fetishism in Capital (...) for over one and a half centuries, young Marx’s initial exploration of the term rarely enjoyed critical attention. This is especially true in regard to the period from his early journalism in the Rheinische Zeitung (1842–43) to his Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844. (shrink)