Stephen Law

Wittgenstein and Kripke disagree about the status of the proposition: the Standard Metre is one metre long. Wittgenstein believes it is necessary. Kripke argues that it is contingent. Kripke's argument depends crucially on a certain sort of thought‐experiment with which we are invited to test our intuitions about what is and isn’t necessary. In this paper I argue that, while Kripke's conclusion is strictly correct, nevertheless similar Kripke‐style thought experiments indicate that the metric system of measurement is after all relative in something like the way Wittgenstein seems to think. Central to this paper is a thought‐experiment I call The Smedlium Case.

Brian Loar believes he has refuted all those antiphysicalist arguments that take as their point of departure observations about what is or isn't conceivable. I argue that there remains an important, popular and plausible-looking form of conceivability argument that Loar has entirely overlooked. Though he may not have realized it, Saul Kripke presents, or comes close to presenting, two fundamentally different forms of conceivability argument. I distinguish the two arguments and point out that while Loar has succeeded in refuting one of Kripke's arguments he has not refuted the other. Loar is mistaken: physicalism still faces an apparently insurmountable conceptual obstacle

This paper develops a challenge to theism. The challenge is to explain why the hypothesis that there exists an omnipotent, omniscient and all-good god should be considered significantly more reasonable than the hypothesis that there exists an omnipotent, omniscient and all-evil god. Theists typically dismiss the evil-god hypothesis out of hand because of the problem of good–there is surely too much good in the world for it to be the creation of such a being. But then why doesn't the problem of evil provide equally good grounds for dismissing belief in a good god? I develop this evil-god challenge in detail, anticipate several replies, and correct errors made in earlier discussions of the problem of good.

In Warrant and Proper Function, Alvin Plantinga develops an argument designed to show that naturalism is self-defeating. One component of this larger argument is what I call Plantinga's belief-cum-desire argument, which is intended to establish something more specific: that if the content of our beliefs does causally effect behaviour (that is to say, semantic content is not epiphenomenal), and if naturalism and current evolutionary doctrine are correct, then the probability that we possess reliable cognitive mechanisms must be either inscrutable or low. This paper aims to refute Plantinga's belief-cum-desire argument

The year is 2100. Geena is the proud new owner of Emit, a state-of-the-art robot. She has just unwrapped him, the packaging strewn across the dining room floor. Emit is designed to replicate the outward behaviour of a human being down to the last detail . Emit responds to questions in much the same way humans do. Ask him how he feels and he will say he has had a tough day, has a slight headache, is sorry he broke that vase, and so on. Geena flips the switch at the back of Emit's neck to ‘on’. Emit springs to life

The vast majority of Biblical historians believe there is evidence sufficient to place Jesus’ existence beyond reasonable doubt. Many believe the New Testamentdocuments alone suffice firmly to establish Jesus as an actual, historical figure. I question these views. In particular, I argue (i) that the three most popular criteria by which various non-miraculous New Testament claims made about Jesus are supposedly corroborated are not sufficient, either singly or jointly, to place his existence beyond reasonable doubt, and (ii) that a prima facie plausible principle concerning how evidence should be assessed—a principle I call the contamination principle—entails that, given the large proportion of uncorroborated miracle claims made about Jesus in the New Testament documents, we should, in the absence of good independent evidence for an historical Jesus, remain sceptical about his existence.