-
1780The Tristram Shandy ParadoxPhilosophia Christi 4 (2): 335-349. 2002.This paper is a response to David Oderberg's discussion of the Tristram Shandy paradox. I defend the claim that the Tristram Shandy paradox does not support the claim that it is impossible that the past is infinite.
-
805Evidential Arguments from Evil and Skeptical TheismPhilo 8 (2). 2004.In this paper we respond to criticisms by Michael Bergmann and Michael Rea in their “In Defense of Sceptical Theism : A Reply to Almeida and Oppy,” Australasian Journal of Philosophy 83.
-
19History of Philosophy in Australia and New Zealand (edited book)Springer. 2014.This two volume works provides a comprehensive history of philosophy in Australia and New Zealand. Volume one provides a chronological history, with one chapter devoted to the early years in which idealism dominated Australasian philosophy, and then chapters that cover each of the decades from the second world war. Volume two provides a thematic history, with treatment of most of the major areas to which Australasian philosophers have made significant contributions.
-
282Wagering on an Ironic God: Pascal on Faith and Philosophy by Thomas S. Hibbs (review)Journal of the History of Philosophy 56 (2): 372-373. 2018.This is a short review of Thomas S. Hibbs' book: *Wagering on an Ironic God: Pascal on Faith and Philosophy*.
-
102Atheism and AgnosticismCambridge University Press. 2018.This is a Cambridge *Element*, on the topic of atheism and agnosticism. It contains four main parts. First, there is an introduction in which atheism and agnosticism are explained. Second, a theoretical background to assessment. Third, a case for preferring atheism to theism. Fourth, a case for preferring agnosticism to theism.
-
13Early Modern Philosophy of Religion: The History of Western Philosophy of Religion Volume 3 (edited book)Acumen Publishing. 2013.The History of Western Philosophy of Religion brings together an international team of over 100 leading scholars to provide authoritative exposition of how history's most important philosophical thinkers - from antiquity to the present day - have sought to analyse the concepts and tenets central to Western religious belief, especially Christianity. Divided chronologically into five volumes, The History of Western Philosophy of Religion is designed to be accessible to a wide range of readers, fro…Read more
-
480On Functional Definitions Of Art: A Response to RoweBritish Journal of Aesthetics 33 (1): 67-71. 1993.This paper is a critical assessment of M. W. Rowe's functional definition of art.
-
172The Semantics of Media (review)Australasian Journal of Philosophy 79 (4): 582-583. 2001.Book Information The Semantics of Media. By Jeff Ross. Dordrecht, Kluwer. 1997. Pp. vii + 137. £56.75.
-
26A companion to philosophy in Australia & New Zealand (edited book)Monash University Publishing. 2011.This work is a companion to philosophy in Australia and New Zealand. It contains over two hundred entries on: Australasian philosophy departments; notable Australasian philosophers; significant events in the history of Australasian philosophy; and areas to which Australasian philosophers have made notable contributions.
-
141The Best Argument Against GodPalgrave-Macmillan. 2013.Preface -- Introduction -- Preliminary matters -- Some big ideas -- Minimal theism and naturalism -- Standard theism and naturalism -- Conclusion.
-
42The Antipodean philosopher (edited book)Lexington Books. 2011.v. 1. Public lectures on philosophy in Australia and New Zealand -- 2. Interviews with Australian and New Zealand philosophers
-
422On Rescher on Pascal's WagerInternational Journal for Philosophy of Religion 30 (3). 1991.In Pascal's Wager: A Study Of Practical Reasoning In Philosophical Theology ,[1] Nicholas Rescher aims to show that, contrary to received philosophical opinion, Pascal's Wager argument is "the vehicle of a fruitful and valuable insight--one which not only represents a milestone in the development of an historically important tradition of thought but can still be seen as making an instructive contribution to philosophical theology".[2] In particular, Rescher argues that one only needs to adopt a …Read more
-
283Why semantic innocence?Australasian Journal of Philosophy 70 (4). 1992.This paper rejects the imposition of "semantic innocence" as a constraint on semantic theories. In particular, it argues that recent attempts to justify the imposition of "semantic innocence" as a constraint on semantic theories fail.
-
301Biblical Science? (review)Philo 1 (2): 68-78. 1998.Short critical review of Gerard Schroeder's *The Science of God*.
-
46Reinventing Philosophy of Religion: An Opinionated IntroductionPalgrave-Macmillan. 2014.This book is an opinionated introduction to philosophy of religion. It is divided into three parts: one on epistemology, one on metaphysics, and one on values. The book embodies an approach to philosophy of religion that is very different from prevalent contemporary approaches.
-
313A fairly lengthy book review that appears at the Secular Web.
-
162Positive review of Laats and Siegel (2016) *Teaching Evolution in a Creation Nation* (University of Chicago Press).
-
3482Arguments for atheismIn Stephen Bullivant & Michael Ruse (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Atheism, Oxford University Press. pp. 53. 2013.This paper consider three families of arguments for atheism. First, there are direct arguments for atheism: arguments that theism is meaningless, or incoherent, or logically inconsistent, or impossible, or inconsistent with known fact, of improbable given known fact, or morally repugnant, or the like. Second, there are indirect arguments for atheism: direct arguments for something that entails atheism. Third, there are comparative arguments for atheism: e.g., arguments for the view that (atheist…Read more
-
1162Review of H Kragh (1996) Cosmology and Controversy (review)Australasian Journal of Philosophy 77 (3): 387-9. 1999.Short review of Helge Kragh's excellent book on the contest between big bang and steady state theories of the universe.
-
281God and Infinity: Directions for Future ResearchIn Michał Heller & W. H. Woodin (eds.), Infinity: new research frontiers, Cambridge University Press. pp. 233. 2011.This paper discusses the treatment of "infinity" in philosophy of religion, including its use in discussions of divine attributes, and its use in various arguments about the existence of God (including the kalam cosmological argument and Pascal's wager). The aim of the paper is to set out -- and where possible, to resolve -- various foundational problems about infinity.
-
787The Shape of Causal Reality: A Naturalistic Adaptation of O’Connor’s Cosmological ArgumentPhilosophia Christi 12 (2): 281-288. 2010.This paper is a companion to an article that I published in *Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Religion*. The OSPR discusses the third chapter of Tim O'Connor's *Theism and Ultimate Explanation. This paper discusses a range of other issues that are not picked up in the OSPR discussion.
-
265Ontological argumentsStanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2014.Latest version of my SEP entry on ontological arguments, which first appeared in 1996. General discussion of ontological arguments. Includes a brief historical overview, a taxonomy of different kinds of ontological arguments, a brief survey of objections to the different kinds of ontological arguments identified in the taxonomy, and more extended discussions of Anselm's ontological argument (Proslogion 2), Godel's ontological argument, and Plantinga's ontological argument.
-
349The Two Envelope 'Paradox'Analysis 54 (1). 1994.This paper discusses the finite version of the two envelope paradox. (That is, we treat the paradox against the background assumption that there is only a finite amount of money in the world.)
-
3829Rowe's evidential arguments from evilIn Justin P. Mcbrayer (ed.), A Companion to the Problem of Evil, Wiley. pp. 49-66. 2013.This chapter discusses the two most prominent recent evidential arguments from evil, due, respectively, to William Rowe and Paul Draper. I argue that neither of these evidential arguments from evil is successful, i.e. such that it ought to persuade anyone who believes in God to give up that belief. In my view, theists can rationally maintain that each of these evidential arguments from evil contains at least one false premise.
-
796Epistemological Foundations for Koons' Cosmological Argument?European Journal for Philosophy of Religion 2 (1). 2010.Some people -- including the present author -- have proposed and defended alternative restricted causal principles that block Robert Koons’s ’new’ cosmological argument without undermining the intuition that causation is very close to ubiquitous. In "Epistemological Foundations for the Cosmological Argument", Koons argues that any restricted causal principles that are insufficient for the purposes of his cosmological argument cause epistemological collapse into general scepticism. In this paper …Read more
-
1805The Devilish Complexities of Divine SimplicityPhilo 6 (1): 10-22. 2003.In On the Nature and Existence of God, Richard Gale follows majority opinion in giving very short shrift to the doctrine of divine simplicity: in his view, there is no coherent expressible doctrine of divine simplicity. Rising to the implicit challenge, I argue that---contrary to what is widely believed---there is a coherently expressible doctrine of divine simplicity, though it is rather different from the views that are typically expressed by defenders of this doctrine. At the very least, I th…Read more
-
747More Than a Flesh WoundArs Disputandi 2 214-224. 2002.In ‘The Kalam Cosmological Argument Neither Bloodied nor Bowed’ , David Oderberg provides four main criticisms of the line of argument which I developed in ‘Time, Successive Addition, and Kalam Cosmological Arguments’ . I argue here that none of these lines of criticism succeeds. Further I re-emphasise the point that those who maintain that the temporal series of past events is formed by ‘successive addition’ are indeed thereby committed to a highly contentious strict finitist metaphysics.
-
423Pruss, motivational centrality, and probabilities attached to possibility premises in modal ontological argumentsEuropean Journal for Philosophy of Religion 4 (2): 65-85. 2012.This paper is a critique of a paper by Alex Pruss. I argue that Pruss's attempt to motivate acceptance of the key possiblity premise in modal ontological arguments fails.
-
506This paper investigates the question whether we could have reason to believe that time is two-dimensional. I connect discussion of this question to discussion of the question whether we could have reason to believe that there has been a global time freeze.
Areas of Specialization
Philosophy of Religion |
Areas of Interest
Epistemology |
Metaphysics |
Philosophy of Language |