The axiological question in the philosophy of religion is the question of what impact, if any, God’s existence does make to the axiological value of our world. It has recently been argued that we should prefer a theistic world where God is hidden to an atheistic world or a theistic world where God isn’t hidden. This is because in a hidden theistic world all of the theistic goods obtain in addition to the experience of atheistic goods. I complete this line (...) of argument by showing that theistic goods do indeed obtain in a world where God hides. In doing so I indirectly argue against proponents of divine hiddenness arguments such as J.L. Schellenberg. The correct answer to the axiological question turns out to be a solution to the problem of divine hiddenness. (shrink)

This is the outline: Introduction — La question de la cybernétique et de l'information — Une « pensée du milieu » — Cybernétique et homologie — Une théorie de l'apprentissage — L'information vue de l'autre côté — Champ et domaine unitaire — La thèse des « autres-je » — Le passage par l'axiologie — La rétroaction vraie — L'ontologie de Ruyer — Le bruissement de l'être même.

This article approaches Judaism through Rabbi Bradley S. Artson’s book, God of Becoming and Relationships: The Dynamic Nature of Process Theology. It explores his understanding of how Jewish theology should and does cohere with central features of both process theology and Robert S. Hartman’s formal axiology. These include the axiological/process concept of God, the intrinsic value and valuation of God and unique human beings, and Jewish extrinsic and systemic values, value combinations, and value rankings.

Description courte (Électre, 2019) : Une étude d'un des principaux axes de réflexion du philosophe des sciences et de la nature Raymond Ruyer (1902-1987). À la lumière des découvertes de l'embryogenèse et en s'appuyant par ailleurs sur la théorie de l'information, il proposa une interprétation des concepts unificateurs de la cybernétique mécaniste. -/- Short Descriptor (Electre 2019): A study of one of the main axes of reflection of the French philosopher of science and of nature Raymond Ruyer (1902-1987). Relying on (...) the discoveries about embryogenesis, and also with the use of information theory, Ruyer proposed an interpretation of the main unifying concepts of mechanistic cybernetics. -/- Cet ouvrage propose une étude fouillée d'un des principaux axes de réflexion du philosophe des sciences et de la nature français Raymond Ruyer (1902–1987) : la cybernétique. Après avoir proposé une philosophie structuraliste, Ruyer la modifia à la lumière des découvertes de l'embryogenèse, puis il proposa une interprétation des concepts unificateurs de la cybernétique mécaniste. Réfléchissant sur cette dernière et sur la théorie de l'information, en particulier sur l'origine de l'information, il défendit que cette cybernétique n'était qu'une lecture inversée de la vraie cybernétique, qui nous donnerait de lire dans l'expérience même les traces du pouvoir morphogénétique, appréhendé comme un champ axiologique. Dans un texte résumant son propre parcours, Ruyer affirma finalement que la critique de la théorie de l'information « peut donner […] l'espoir d'aboutir à quelque chose comme une nouvelle théologie. » Les idées directrices de Ruyer sont tout particulièrement contextualisées ici à partir de la question du développement des formes en biologie, et de celles de la génétique, de la genèse stochastique de l'ordre, et de l'identification mentale ou physique de l'information. Il se termine en départageant ce qui est théologique et axiologique dans ce projet de métaphysique qui, bien que resté inachevé, n'en représente pas moins le plus impressionnant conçu en France au siècle dernier. – This book offers an in-depth study of one of the main axes in the reflection of French philosopher of science and nature Raymond Ruyer. In a text summarising his own development, Ruyer stated about the philosophical critique of information theory that it "is what can give the most long-lasting hope of getting to something like a new theology." After propounding a structuralist philosophy, and distinguishing between form and structure, to then modify it in the light of discoveries in embryogenesis, Ruyer offered a re-evaluation of the unifying concepts of mechanistic cybernetics. Thinking about it and about information theory, he defended the idea that this cybernetics was in reality an inverted reading of the real one, which would allow us to read in experience itself traces of the morphogenetic power, apprehended as the axiological field. On some transversal points, the development of forms in biology and genetics, the stochastic genesis of order, the identification of information with either psychological and mental, or physical reality, behaviour, and the access to meaning, this work exposes the main ideas of Ruyer while situating them in the context of the breadth of others' contributions. It ends by determining what is theological and axiological in this project for a metaphysics which, although unfinished, is nevertheless the most impressive effort done in France in the last century. – Available on i6doc dot com (ISBN 978-2-930517-56-8 ; pdf 978-2-930517-57-5). (shrink)

The article deals with the problem of the divine light in the mystical works of St Symeon the New Theologian in the context of the Eastern Christian ascetical tradition. The author focuses on the passages referring to the divine light in the works of Evagrios Pontikos, St Isaac the Syrian, St Maximus the Confessor, and in the Makarian corpus. As is shown in the present contribution, none of these authors created a fully-developed theory of the vision of the divine light. (...) Being close to these writers in many ideas, St Symeon was generally independent of any of them in his treatment of the theme of vision of light, always basing himself primarily upon his own experience. (shrink)

This article explores and critically examines the concepts and value dimensions of God, process, creativity, eternal objects, and individuals in Whitehead's thought.

There is little more common in ethics than to think pain is intrinsically bad and pleasure is intrinsically good. A Humean-style error theory of the axiology of pain and pleasure is developed against these commonsense claims. We defend the thesis that the value of pain and pleasure is always contingent and only instrumental. We survey prominent theories of both intrinsic value and pain/pleasure, all of which assume that pain and pleasure are intrinsically valuable. We base our error theory on (...) counterexamples to this assumption, upon which these theories falter, and a theory of pain and pleasure which derives their value solely from their evolutionary function. (shrink)

The ethics of abortion considers whether abortion is immoral. Pro-choice philosophers think that it is not immoral, while pro-life philosophers think that it is. The axiology of abortion considers whether world would be better if the pro-choice or pro-life position is right. While much attention has been given to the ethics of abortion, there has been no attention given to the axiology of abortion. In this article, I seek to change that. I consider various arguments for thinking our (...) world would be better if the pro-choice position or the pro-life position is correct, ultimately concluding that it would be better if the pro-choice position is right. This is unfortunate, however, since there is no good reason to think the pro-choice position is correct. (shrink)

This article aims to describe about the analytical axiology of the political background in ye Tewodros raey historical theatre of Ethiopia. The theatre is the most important of the new generation to teach the Emperor Tewodros II challenges and also great visions of new civilized Ethiopia united. The theatre name also in English vision of Tewodros in Amharic are known ye Tewodros raey. As aspect of axiology have been evaluated the value of vision of Theodros to the audience (...) and the advantages. From the theater an axiology aspect of the political background vision of Theodros that the advantages are to more informative about patriotism, social awareness, concentration, imagination, communication skill, fun, problem solving/conflict resolution, trust, memory, aesthetics appreciation, cooperation/collaboration, empathy and tolerance. These papers have been used document study system as well as have used the qualitative research method to more describe as a theatre reviewing the aspect of axiology philosophical aspects. (shrink)

[from the publisher's website] Questions about the existence and attributes of God form the subject matter of natural theology, which seeks to gain knowledge of the divine by relying on reason and experience of the world. Arguments in natural theology rely largely on intuitions and inferences that seem natural to us, occurring spontaneously—at the sight of a beautiful landscape, perhaps, or in wonderment at the complexity of the cosmos—even to a nonphilosopher. In this book, Helen De Cruz and (...) Johan De Smedt examine the cognitive origins of arguments in natural theology. They find that although natural theological arguments can be very sophisticated, they are rooted in everyday intuitions about purpose, causation, agency, and morality. Using evidence and theories from disciplines including the cognitive science of religion, evolutionary ethics, evolutionary aesthetics, and the cognitive science of testimony, they show that these intuitions emerge early in development and are a stable part of human cognition. -/- De Cruz and De Smedt analyze the cognitive underpinnings of five well-known arguments for the existence of God: the argument from design, the cosmological argument, the moral argument, the argument from beauty, and the argument from miracles. Finally, they consider whether the cognitive origins of these natural theological arguments should affect their rationality. (shrink)

This dissertation is centrally concerned with exploring obituaries as repositories of values. Obituaries are a publicly-available natural language source that are variably written for members of communities that are wide (nation- level) and narrow (city-level, or at the level of specific groups therein). Because they are explicitly summative, limited in size, and written for consumption by a public audience, obituaries may be expected to express concisely the aspects of their subjects’ lives that the authors (often family members living in the (...) same communities) found most salient or worthy of featuring. 140,599 obituaries nested in 832 newspapers from across the USA were scraped with permission from Legacy.com, an obituaries publisher. Obituaries were coded for the age at death and gender (female/male) of the deceased using automated algorithms. For each publishing newspaper, county-level median income, educational achievement (operationalized as percent of the population with a Bachelor’s degree or higher), and race and ethnicity were averaged across counties, weighting by population size. A Neo4J graph database was constructed using WordNet and the University of South Florida Free Association Norms datasets. Each word in each obituary inthe corpus was lemmatized. The shortest path through the WordNet graph from each lemma to 30 Schwartz value prototype words published by Bardi, Calogero, and Mullen (2008) was then recorded. From these path lengths, a new measure, “word-by-hop,” was calculated for each Schwartz value to reflect the relative lexical distance between each obituary and that Schwartz value. Of the Schwartz values, Power, Conformity, and Security were most indicated in the corpus, while Universalism, Hedonism, and Stimulation were least indicated. A series of seven two-level regression models suggested that, across Schwartz values, newspaper community accounted for the greatest amount of word-by-hop variability in the corpus. The best-fitting model indicated a small, negative effect of female status across Schwartz values. Unexpectedly, Hedonism and Conformity, which had conceptually opposite prototype words, were highly correlated, possibly indicating that obituary authors “compensate” for describing the deceased in a hedonistic way by concurrently emphasizing restraint. Future research could usefully further expand word-by-hop and incorporate individual-level covariates that match the newspaper-level covariates used here. (shrink)

Ordinal polytheism is motivated by the cosmological and design arguments. It is also motivated by Leibnizian–Lewisian modal realism. Just as there are many universes, so there are many gods. Gods are necessary concrete grounds of universes. The god-universe relation is one-to-one. Ordinal polytheism argues for a hierarchy of ranks of ever more perfect gods, one rank for every ordinal number. Since there are no maximally perfect gods, ordinal polytheism avoids many of the familiar problems of monotheism. It links theology (...) with counterpart theory, mathematics and computer science. And it entails that the system of universes has an attractive axiological structure. (shrink)

In this article, I briefly reply to four critics who critically engage with my book God, Soul and the Meaning of Life in a special issue of the International Journal of Philosophy and Theology. I view them mainly as addressing the ‘meaning’ of God in three distinct senses, namely, in terms of how best to understand the word ‘God’ and related terms such as ‘the spiritual’, whether God is central to what gives our lives a particular sort of final (...) value, and how beliefs about God might be central to interpreting what on the face of it are non-religious beliefs and practices in contemporary Western society. My remarks are intended to continue the dialogue about these definitional, axiological, and hermeneutic meanings of God. (shrink)

Some academics and state officials in Indonesia argue for the adoption of Pancasila as a scientific paradigm for the country's scientific endeavours. They believe that using Pancasila as a foundation could give Indonesian science a distinct and unique character. However, this article seeks to reevaluate the feasibility of Pancasila as a scientific paradigm. By reviewing the literature on Pancasila and the philosophy of science, it arrives at the conclusion that Pancasila cannot serve as a scientific paradigm, either in a narrow (...) or comprehensive sense. Two primary reasons support this conclusion. Firstly, Pancasila lacks the necessary characteristics of a well-established scientific achievement. As a result, it cannot function as a scientific paradigm in the narrow sense defined by Kuhn. Secondly, Pancasila carries theological baggage that surpasses science’s capacity to accommodate it. This aspect prevents Pancasila from becoming a comprehensive scientific paradigm. Consequently, I propose that Pancasila is more suitable as an axiological basis for science, rather than a scientific paradigm. Unlike a scientific paradigm, this axiological foundation does not fall within the epistemic scope of science. (shrink)

This is a critical notice/review essay on *L'embryogenèse du monde et le Dieu silencieux*, a manuscript completed by Raymond Ruyer in the early 1980s. It came out as a monograph in November 2013, with the Éditions Klincksieck in Paris. It offers a presentation in an organized fashion of many aspects of his thought. Ruyer considered that a book about God could only be churned into a series of chapters on the unachievable character of our knowledge in different domains of human (...) inquiry. The nature of this final solution on God's relationship to the world and to natural forms is here assessed critically. (shrink)

Conversion is a word with a variety of meanings. It also has various significations, from the exchange between different currencies, to job conversion or the change of career path, to the change from one religion, political belief, viewpoint, etc., to another – all these types of conversion have mutual methods and shared purposes. They are all requiring malleability, the capacity of exchanging old things for the new ones, openness to different, the will to adopt something new or at least different, (...) and the legerity of giving up on the old things. All these requirements are always easier said than done, and therefore conversion is not for all types of characters and personalities, some being more stable and fundamental, thus resistant to renewal. There is no religion, on the one hand, that does not promote conversion and thus use proselytism to do it. On the other hand, same religions that believe conversion is an act of God, a sign that everyone should embrace and leave whatever religious belief they might have previously, consider it as a ‘sin’, an act that should be forbidden, the conversion/leaving for other, diverse religion. How is it regarded by religions and scientific thought and at what point it became obsolete? (shrink)

The aim of this commentary is to discuss the axiology of the cost–benefit approach assumed by Travis Rieder (2017) to analyze medical decision making in the case of extremely preterm infants.

This article first defines the absolute discourse, then discusses its possibility in theology, as well as the relationships between language, thought, and reality as they derive from the spirituality and life of the Eastern Church. Theology must face several problems—including the paradox of transcendence, the violence of metaphysics, onto-theology, and the duplicity of language itself—, but the Revelation of the Absolute itself legitimizes the theological discourse. By using both affirmations and negations, theology reveals an iconic structure (...) of discourse that opens itself towards life and spirituality. The conclusion is that, in the absolute discourse of theology, words, even ineffable ones, are insufficient without life. (shrink)

I distinguish between a _metaphysical_ problem generated by the argument for theological fatalism, and a _theological_ problem posed by the argument. Some responses to the argument, including ones associated with Boethius, Aquinas and Ockham, address only the theological problem. Even if such responses succeed in showing that God's foreknowledge doesn't threaten human freedom, they fail to take the full measure of the argument for theological fatalism, since the metaphysical problem remains to be solved.

The cultural transmission of theological concepts remains an underexplored topic in the cognitive science of religion (CSR). In this paper, I examine whether approaches from CSR, especially the study of content biases in the transmission of beliefs, can help explain the cultural success of some theological concepts. This approach reveals that there is more continuity between theological beliefs and ordinary religious beliefs than CSR authors have hitherto recognized: the cultural transmission of theological concepts is influenced by content biases that also (...) underlie the reception of ordinary religious concepts. (shrink)

Artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain, virtual and augmented reality, (semi-)autonomous ve- hicles, autoregulatory weapon systems, enhancement, reproductive technologies and human- oid robotics – these technologies (and many others) are no longer speculative visions of the future; they have already found their way into our lives or are on the verge of a breakthrough. These rapid technological developments awaken a need for orientation: what distinguishes hu- man from machine and human intelligence from artificial intelligence, how far should the body be allowed to (...) be changed and what are the dangers and opportunities presented by these technologies? Many of these questions are also addressed to theology. For example, questions about the image of humanity, the understanding of creation, the ethics of technological body interventions or the moral status of robots. What does theology have to say about these technological developments? It is the right time for theology to scientifically explore tech- nologization and AI and to formulate answers. As technology changes the various areas of human life, society and the world around us, the places and topics of theology are also undergoing transformation. Puzio, Anna: Theology Meets AI: Examining Perspectives, Tasks, and Theses on the Intersection of Technology and Religion. In: Puzio, Anna/Kunkel, Nicole/Klinge, Hendrik (Hg.): Alexa, How Do You Feel About Religion? Theological Approaches to Technology and Artificial Intelligence (Theology and AI 1). Darmstadt: wbg 2023, S. 29–41. DOI: 10.53186/1030373. (shrink)

Human values seem to vary across time and space. What implications does this have for the future of human value? Will our human and (perhaps) post-human offspring have very different values from our own? Can we study the future of human values in an insightful and systematic way? This article makes three contributions to the debate about the future of human values. First, it argues that the systematic study of future values is both necessary in and of itself and an (...) important complement to other future-oriented inquiries. Second, it sets out a methodology and a set of methods for undertaking this study. Third, it gives a practical illustration of what this ‘axiological futurism’ might look like by developing a model of the axiological possibility space that humans are likely to navigate over the coming decades. (shrink)

Lyons’s (2003, 2018) axiological realism holds that science pursues true theories. I object that despite its name, it is a variant of scientific antirealism, and is susceptible to all the problems with scientific antirealism. Lyons (2003, 2018) also advances a variant of surrealism as an alternative to the realist explanation for success. I object that it does not give rise to understanding because it is an ad hoc explanans and because it gives a conditional explanation. Lyons might use axiological realism (...) to account for the success of a theory. I object that some alternative axiological explanations are better than the axiological realist explanation, and that the axiological realist explanation is teleological. Finally, I argue that Putnam’s realist position is more elegant than Lyons’s. (shrink)

This brief article was written according to the writer's experiences based on the feedback.

In the Centuries of Theology I.48–50, Maximus states that there are two kinds of works that belong to God: one which corresponds to beings having a temporal, finite beginning, and one which corresponds to perfections of beings which have no beginning and are therefore eternal. Maximus labels the latter as participated beings (ὄντα μεθεκτά) and the former as participating beings (ὄντα μετέχοντα), with God transcending both as their cause. The structure of God-as-cause, participated beings, and participating beings matches Proclus’ (...) three-fold structure of participation with the ontological categories of unparticipated, participated, and participating. While Maximus borrows the basic language and structure from Proclus, he makes certain minor but significant differences, particularly in how the participated beings both relate to their source in God and in their status of existence. This paper thus sets out to analyze I.48–50 in the general context of the Centuries of Theology, considering how Maximus conceives of the ontological distinctions between God and God’s works. A comparison with Proclus’ understanding of participation follows, particularly from Proclus’ Elements of Theology Prop. 23, which succinctly states the three-term distinction of participation. The resulting comparison shows that Proclus’ framework of participation is flattened for Maximus, where the participated works represent multiple properties distinct in kind from the unparticipated, while God fits analogously in the status of the unparticipated. The underlying ontology supports Maximus’ implicit denial that such participated entities represent distinct divinities, as they do for Proclus, while Maximus’ assertion of God’s transcendence is still secured with the ontological distinction between the participated works and their unparticipated cause. (shrink)

Failing -- Ontology and desire in Dionysius the Areopagite -- Apophatic theology and its vicissitudes -- The death drive: from Freud to Žižek -- The gift and violence -- Divine violence as trauma -- Mystical theology and the four discourses -- Theology as failure.

Mystical Theology and Platonism in the Time of Cusanus engages with the history of mystical theology and Neoplatonic philosophy through the lens of the 15th century philosopher and theologian, Nicholas of Cusa. The volume comprises nineteen essays that break down the barriers between medieval and Renaissance studies, reinterpreting Cusanus’ place in the history of thought by exploring the archive that informed his thinking, while also interrogating his works by exploring them from the standpoint of their later reception by (...) modern philosophers and theologians. The volume also offers tribute to the career of Donald F. Duclow, a leading scholar in the field of Cusanus studies in particular and of the history of mystical theology and Neoplatonic philosophy more generally. (shrink)

This article attempts to reveal intercultural connections at the Kyiv Theological Academy at the beginning of the 20th century by reconstructing the spiritual biographies of two theological academy professors: Archimandrite (later, Archbishop of Berlin and Germany) Tykhon (Tymofii Liashchenko) and Petro Kudriavtsev. The article demonstrates how different cultural traditions intersected and combined in the spiritual experience of these figures. The author of the article argues that, as a result of revolutionary events in 1917–1919, both Kyiv Theological Academy professors experienced transformations (...) in personal cultural identity, and their spiritual biographies reveal a transition from Russian to Western European and a combination of both (Tykhon (Liashchenko) identities), and from Russian to Ukrainian ideological cultural orientation (Petro Kudriavtsev). (shrink)

Critical-Range Utilitarianism is a variant of Total Utilitarianism which can avoid both the Repugnant Conclusion and the Sadistic Conclusion in population ethics. Yet Standard Critical-Range Utilitarianism entails the Weak Sadistic Conclusion, that is, it entails that each population consisting of lives at a bad well-being level is not worse than some population consisting of lives at a good well-being level. In this paper, I defend a version of Critical-Range Utilitarianism which does not entail the Weak Sadistic Conclusion. This is made (...) possible by a fourth category of absolute value in addition to goodness, badness, and neutrality. (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. -/- (...) . (shrink)

This is a contribution to an Author Meets Critics special issue on John Martin Fischer's _Our Fate: Essays on God and Free Will_.

Planetary protection is not just a matter of science. It is also a matter of value. This is so independently of whether we only include the protection of science or if we also include other goals. Excluding other values than the protection of science is thus a value statement, not a scientific statement and it does not make planetary protection value neutral. It just makes the axiological basis (that is, the value basis) for planetary protection more limited in a way (...) that is inconsistent with the axiological grounds for back contamination, ethically questionable and strategically unwise. However we look at it, we cannot get away from the conclusion that the axiological dimension of planetary protection is a task that needs to involve experts on value theory as well as experts from a range of different sciences and also include opinions from outside the academic community. (shrink)

This chapter defends an axiological theory of pain according to which pains are bodily episodes that are bad in some way. Section 1 introduces two standard assumptions about pain that the axiological theory constitutively rejects: (i) that pains are essentially tied to consciousness and (ii) that pains are not essentially tied to badness. Section 2 presents the axiological theory by contrast to these and provides a preliminary defense of it. Section 3 introduces the paradox of pain and argues that since (...) the axiological theory takes the location of pain at face value, it needs to grapple with the privacy, self-intimacy and incorrigibility of pain. Sections 4, 5 and 6 explain how the axiological theory may deal with each of these. (shrink)

Arrhenius’s impossibility theorems purport to demonstrate that no population axiology can satisfy each of a small number of intuitively compelling adequacy conditions. However, it has recently been pointed out that each theorem depends on a dubious assumption: Finite Fine-Grainedness. This assumption states that there exists a finite sequence of slight welfare differences between any two welfare levels. Denying Finite Fine-Grainedness makes room for a lexical population axiology which satisfies all of the compelling adequacy conditions in each theorem. Therefore, (...) Arrhenius’s theorems fail to prove that there is no satisfactory population axiology. In this paper, I argue that Arrhenius’s theorems can be repurposed. Since all of our population-affecting actions have a non-zero probability of bringing about more than one distinct population, it is population prospect axiologies that are of practical relevance, and amended versions of Arrhenius’s theorems demonstrate that there is no satisfactory population prospect axiology. These impossibility theorems do not depend on Finite Fine-Grainedness, so lexical views do not escape them. (shrink)

The article critically covers the current issues of "value-driven management" and the creative economy. Analyzing the concept of a "fragile and incomprehensible" (BANI) world, the author conclude that the widely proclaimed era of the knowledge economy is nothing more than utopia. A value-based transformation is possible if it is approached in a comprehensive and systemic way, which requires large-scale transformations initiated and supported by the power structures. The author believe that the creative economy is more extensive than the traditional one, (...) and its development potential is rather limited. The paradigm of "commercial creativity", in fact, is aimed at providing employment and meeting the needs of the population of the "golden billion" countries. Статья в критическом ключе освещает актуальные вопросы «ценностного менеджмента» и креативной экономики. Анализируя концепцию «хрупкого и непостижимого» (BANI) мира, автор приходит к выводу, что широко провозглашенная эра экономики знаний — не более чем утопия. Ценностная трансформация возможна, если подход к ней будет комплексным и системным, для чего требуются масштабные преобразования, инициируемые и поддерживаемые властными структурами. Креативная экономика, как полагает автор, в большей степени экстенсивна, чем традиционная, а потенциал ее развития весьма ограничен. Парадигма «коммерческого креатива», по сути, нацелена на обеспечение занятости и удовлетворение потребностей населения стран «золотого миллиарда». (shrink)

Analytic theology is often seen as an outgrowth of analytic philosophy of religion. It isn’t fully clear, however, whether it differs from analytic philosophy of religion in some important way. Is analytic theology really just a sub-field of analytic philosophy of religion, or can it be distinguished from the latter in virtue of fundamental differences at the level of subject matter or metholodology? These are pressing questions for the burgeoning field of analytic theology. The aim of this (...) article, then, will be to map out several forms that analytic theology might (and in some cases actually does) take before examining the extent to which each can be thought to be distinct from analytic philosophy of religion. (shrink)

Transhumanism is a means of advocating a re-engineering of conditions that surround human existence at both ends. The problem set before us in this chapter is to inquire into what determined its appearance, in particular in the humanism it seeks to overcome. We look at the spirit of overcoming itself, and the impatience with the Self, in order to try to understand why it seeks a saving power in technology. We then consider how the evolutionary account of the production of (...) organisms does not set them against a perfect standard, but rather injects in them a contingency that seems to be near to the heart of the problem. We then try to assess the objective basis for improvements and manipulation of nature, and although we do not find it forbidden on all occasions, it seems that the criteria for such alterations are impossible to detach from a form of eugenics. We finally open a window toward a theological account of the problem, and find that the desire of autonomy and independence is inevitably going to be challenged by the Christian dogma of creation. (shrink)

Population axiology is the study of the conditions under which one state of affairs is better than another, when the states of affairs in ques- tion may differ over the numbers and the identities of the persons who ever live. Extant theories include totalism, averagism, variable value theories, critical level theories, and “person-affecting” theories. Each of these the- ories is open to objections that are at least prima facie serious. A series of impossibility theorems shows that this is no (...) coincidence: it can be proved, for various sets of prima facie intuitively compelling desiderata, that no axiology can simultaneously satisfy all the desiderata on the list. One’s choice of population axiology appears to be a choice of which intuition one is least unwilling to give up. (shrink)

The most central issue in Imam Khomeini's mysticism is the velayat. The quality of this relationship is one of the important issues of mystical analysis of scholars and its re-reading and explanation can be examined in the context of an important research issue. The present article, with the aim of examining and explaining this relationship and alignment, has tried to examine the texts and knowledge in this field by descriptive-analytical method. Findings of the research indicate that among the mystics who (...) have discussed the velayat, Imam Khomeini (RA) has been very successful in explaining the relationship between mystical velayat with the belief in monotheism, prophethood and Imamate. In fact, Imam Khomeini's mystical worldview provides a mystical explanation of faith in seemingly theological categories that is worth pondering. (shrink)

The open secret of analytic philosophy of religion since its 20th century revival has been that it is for the most part a revival of philosophical theology, and particularly Christian philosophical theology. More recently, Christian analytic philosophers and theologians sympathetic to them have transformed this open secret into a research program by explicitly thematizing the use of analytic philosophical tools for the particular work of Christian theology. Dubbing this work as “analytic theology” (AT) Oliver Crisp and (...) Michael Rea have succeeded in inaugurating AT as a distinct subregion in the philosophy of religion. Besides prompting a spate of first-rate philosophical work theorizing a variety of Christian theological commitments, the advent of AT has also prompted a good deal of meta-theological reflection: Is AT more conducive for certain conceptions of Christian theology than others? Among the various kinds of theology produced by AT, liberation theology is notably absent. In this paper, I offer a diagnosis of why that might be, outline an argument for analytic engagement with liberation theology, and sketch what such an engagement might consist in. (shrink)

The article is devoted to the review of history of homiletics as a science in the Kyiv theological tradition. On the basis of the analysis of the first domestic work on the theory of the sermon, made by Yoanykyi Haliatovskyi, process of influence of the Catholic baroque sermon on original homiletics in Kyiv in 17th century is shown. The article also analyzes homiletic views of an archbishop Theofan Prokopovych, who sought to reform the domestic church sermon, depriving it of the (...) extremes of Baroque literature. The author discusses contribution of professors Yakiv Amfiteatrov and archpriest Nazariі Favorov to homiletics as a science in Kyiv Theological Academy in 19th century. Special attention is paid to the analysis of the Professor Vasyl Pevnytskyi’s views who criticized the traditional approaches in Orthodox homiletics. In particular, Professor Pevnytskyi rejected the view on homiletics as a purely practical discipline, designed to provide students with knowledge about the preparation and delivery of the sermon. He believed that homiletics should not teach the method of preparing a sermon, but morally educate preachers. Pevnytskyi offered to rename homiletics to “spiritual literature” and introduced a historical method in its teaching. The course of “spiritual literature” had to show students how the living word influenced people and changed the world. Consequently, homiletics should turn into an analytical history of spiritual literature. The poetics shares the opinion of a number of Protestant theologists that success of the sermon does not depend on the perfection of its external form, but on how deeply a preacher captures the truth. He attributed the decisive feature of the preaching word not to abstract rules of drafting and preaching, but to a special inner inspiration (“animation”) of the preacher. Similar opinions were observed, in particular, in Protestant thinkers such as Philip Jacob Schpener, Franz Theremin, and Friedrich Schleiermacher. Prof. Pevnytskyi tried to creatively rethink their ideas. An alternative to scholasticism he saw in the holy tradition. It was on the foundation of patrician homiletic heritage that Pevnytskyi aimed to build a new course in homiletics. (shrink)

Some recent work in philosophy of religion addresses what can be called the “axiological question,” i.e., regardless of whether God exists, would it be good or bad if God exists? Would the existence of God make the world a better or a worse place? Call the view that the existence of God would make the world a better place “Pro-Theism.” We argue that Pro-Theism is not implausible, and moreover, many Theists, at least, (often implicitly) think that it is true. That (...) is, many Theists think that various good outcomes would arise if Theism is true. We then discuss work in cognitive science concerning human cognitive bias, before discussing two noteworthy attempts to show that at least some religious beliefs arise because of cognitive bias: Hume’s, and Draper’s and Nichols’s. We then argue that, as a result of certain cognitive biases that result when good outcomes might be at stake, Pro-Theism causes many Theists to inflate the epistemic probability that God exists, and as a result, Theists should lower the probability they assign to God’s existence. Finally, based our arguments, we develop a novel objection to Pascal’s wager. (shrink)

Lougheed argues that a possible solution to the problem of divine hiddenness is that God hides in order to increase the axiological value of the world. In a world where God exists, the goods associated with theism necessarily obtain. But Lougheed also claims that in such a world it’s possible to experience the goods of atheism, even if they don’t actually obtain. This is what makes a world with a hidden God more valuable than a world where God is unhidden, (...) and also more valuable than an atheistic world with no God. We show that Lougheed never considers the comparison between a world where God hides and an atheistic world. We argue that it’s possible for a person to experience theistic goods in a world where God does not exist, a possibility Lougheed never considers. If this is right it undermines his axiological solution to divine hiddenness. We conclude by showing how our discussion of the axiology of theism connects to the existential question of whether God exists; that is, we show that the axiological question is dependent on the existential question. (shrink)

The Russian academic theological tradition, scarcely known to the West, was the only milieu wherein the development of philosophy of religion in the pre-revolutionary Russia was under way. Philosophical investigation of the phenomenon of religion was being elaborated in the apologetic context, i.e. in critical analysis of non-theistic conceptions of the origin and essence of religion, and the figure of Friedrich Schleiermacher, with his reduction of religion firstly to cosmic feelings and later to the feeling of the ontological dependence, occupied (...) an invariable place in this analysis. The paper deals with critical comments on Schleiermacher’s Speeches on Religion and Christian Faith made by Victor Kudryavtsev-Platonov and his followers, which are being parsed in turn, as well as with historical links of the later Schleiermacher with phenomenology of religion and typological affinities of the earlier Schleiermacher with the theology of religious pluralism. (shrink)

In this entry, we survey key discussions on the role of narrative in theology and philosophy of religion. We begin with epistemological questions about whether and how narrative offers genuine understanding of reality. We explore how narrative intersects with the problems of evil and divine hiddenness. We discuss narrative's role in theological reflection and practice in general, and in black and feminist theologies specifically. We close by briefly exploring the role of narrative in theorization about life's meaning.

There is a shortage of clergy, at least in the Roman Catholic Church. Protestant churches in general are experiencing more of a distribution or placement challenge than a shortage. The two greatest hindrances to addressing the Protestant clergy distribution challenge are a lack of adequate compensation for clergy and the undesirable geographical location of a number of churches, as perceived by clergy. Influences such as secularisation, duality of vocation, time management, change in type of ministry, family issues, congregational and denominational (...) conflict, burnout, sexual misconduct, divorce or marital problems, and suicide, affect clergy. Studies on the shortage of clergy have been conducted mostly in the USA and Europe and not in South Africa. This article focuses on the research gap by means of a practical theological grounded theory exploration of the exodus of clergy. Grounded theory methodology is used to identify the reasons why clergy trained at a Bible college of a Protestant charismatic mega church leave full-time pastoral ministry. Findings correspond to previous studies with two reasons appearing more frequently than others: responding to a call and leadership related issues. Firstly, respondents differed in their replies with respect to reconciling their exit from full-time pastoral ministry with their call. The replies included not being called, a dual call, or called but left anyway. Secondly, respondents indicated that leadership influence was mostly negative with regard to affirming their call. (shrink)

I examine mystical experience through the history of European religious thought, its modern state, and different spiritual practices of the Patristic epoch. The survey gives some definitions: mystical experience is situated in the field of spirituality along with practices of its acquisition -- ascetics; and the fruits of it -- theology and doctrine. The second part of the article is devoted to a wide field of Christian texts as a representative example of the same experience of the crystallization of (...) mystical experience in ancient tradition, providing a few general types. Reading of religious texts is related very closely with the spiritual condition of the reader and supposes that he/she changes radically in the process of reading, being involved in some existential-hermeneutic circle. (shrink)