-
9Normative Objections to TheismIn Graham Oppy (ed.), A Companion to Atheism and Philosophy, Wiley. 2019.I discuss several normative – in particular, moral – objections to theism. These objections arise for theism independently of the doctrines associated with particular sectarian religious traditions, and independently of particular metaethical positions such as divine‐command theory. The objections stem mainly from theistic attempts to solve the problem of evil, that is, to explain why a perfect God permits, or why a perfect God might permit, the suffering that our world contains.
-
51Determinism, Death, and MeaningRoutledge. 2022.This book offers new arguments for determinism. It draws novel and surprising consequences from determinism for our attitudes toward such things as death, regret, grief, and the meaning of life. The book argues that rationalism is the right attitude to take toward reality. It then shows that rationalism implies determinism and that determinism has surprising and far-reaching consequences. The author contends that the existence of all of humanity almost certainly depends on the precise time and m…Read more
-
44There must have been a first generationThink 18 (53): 7-13. 2019.I argue, from premises accepted by every educated person, that there must have been a first human generation, contrary to what Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett have prominently claimed.Export citation.
-
54Substantial Change: Continuous, Consistent, ObjectiveJournal of Philosophy 114 (10): 551-562. 2017.Since antiquity, philosophers have struggled to describe the instant of change in continuous time in a way that is both consistent with classical logic and also objective rather than arbitrary. A particularly important version of this problem arises, I argue, for substantial change, that is, any case in which a metaphysical substance comes into or goes out of existence. I then offer and defend an analysis of the instant of substantial change in continuous time that is consistent with classical l…Read more
-
Theism as Theory: Issues in the Epistemology of Religious BeliefDissertation, Cornell University. 1992.This essay in epistemology focuses on issues associated with belief in God, understood as belief in the existence of the God of orthodox monotheism and in the truth of related theistic claims. What type of belief is belief in God, and under what general conditions is such belief epistemically justified? I consider various answers to these questions, I offer some answers of my own, and I suggest some consequences of the latter for several important issues in the epistemology of religion. ;I defen…Read more
-
70Two Views of Religious CertitudeReligious Studies 28 (1). 1992.At least since Cardinal Newman's Grammar of Assent , Anglo-American philosophers have been concerned with the role of certitude, or subjective epistemic certainty, in theistic belief. Newman is himself famous for holding that certitude is an essential feature of any sort of genuine belief, including in particular religious belief. As one recent commentator, Michael Banner, notes, for Newman
-
33Belief Policies (review)Philosophical Review 106 (3): 448. 1997.Unfortunately, the book's weaknesses outweigh its strengths. Chief among the weaknesses is its spotty attention to relevant and important literature, both historical and contemporary. Even though Helm writes at length about assent, and even though he discusses Augustine, he completely ignores John Henry Newman, whose Grammar of Assent deserves at least a mention. Helm devotes more than a chapter to the relation between belief and the will and another chapter to fideism, yet he never mentions Lou…Read more
-
223Skeptical theism and moral obligationInternational Journal for Philosophy of Religion 65 (2). 2009.Skeptical theism claims that the probability of a perfect God’s existence isn’t at all reduced by our failure to see how such a God could allow the horrific suffering that occurs in our world. Given our finite grasp of the realm of value, skeptical theists argue, it shouldn’t surprise us that we fail to see the reasons that justify God in allowing such suffering, and thus our failure to see those reasons is no evidence against God’s existence or perfection. Critics object that skeptical theism i…Read more
-
3035The moral skepticism objection to skeptical theismIn Justin P. McBrayer & Daniel Howard‐Snyder (eds.), The Blackwell Companion to the Problem of Evil, Wiley-blackwell. pp. 444--457. 2013.Skeptical theism combines theism with skepticism about the ability of human beings to know God's reasons for permitting suffering. In recent years, it has become perhaps the most prominent theistic response from philosophers to the evidential argument from evil. Some critics of skeptical theism charge that it implies positions that theists and many atheists alike would reject, such as skepticism about our knowledge of the external world and about our knowledge of our moral obligations. I discuss…Read more
-
935Ordinary Morality Implies AtheismEuropean Journal for Philosophy of Religion 1 (2). 2009.I present a "moral argument" for the nonexistence of God. Theism, I argue, can’t accommodate an ordinary and fundamental moral obligation acknowledged by many people, including many theists. My argument turns on a principle that a number of philosophers already accept as a constraint on God’s treatment of human beings. I defend the principle against objections from those inclined to reject it
-
13Closing the ‘Is’-‘Ought’ GapCanadian Journal of Philosophy 28 (3): 349-365. 1998.In a dense and fascinating article of some ten years ago, Toomas Karmo adds his voice to the chorus of philosophers who deny the possibility of soundly deriving ‘ought’ from ‘is.’ According to Karmo, no derivation containing an ethical conclusion and only non-ethical premises can possibly be sound, where ‘sound’ describes a deductively valid derivation all of whose premises are true. He also suggests that the only valid derivations of ‘ought’ from ‘is’ will be trivial ones. His argument has, to …Read more
-
405A Dilemma for SkepticsTeorema: International Journal of Philosophy 29 (1): 23-34. 2010.Some of the most enduring skeptical arguments invoke stories of deception -- the evil demon, convincing dreams, an envatted brain, the Matrix -- in order to show that we have no first-order knowledge of the external world. I confront such arguments with a dilemma: either (1) they establish no more than the logical possibility of error, in which case they fail to threaten fallible knowledge, the only kind of knowledge of the external world most of us think we have anyway; or (2) they defeat thems…Read more
-
261Stop Asking Why There’s AnythingErkenntnis 77 (1): 51-63. 2012.Why is there anything, rather than nothing at all? This question often serves as a debating tactic used by theists to attack naturalism. Many people apparently regard the question—couched in such stark, general terms—as too profound for natural science to answer. It is unanswerable by science, I argue, not because it’s profound or because science is superficial but because the question, as it stands, is ill-posed and hence has no answer in the first place. In any form in which it is well-posed, …Read more
-
4938Atheism and the Basis of MoralityIn A. W. Musschenga & Anton van Harskamp (eds.), What Makes Us Moral?, Springer. pp. 257-269. 2013.People in many parts of the world link morality with God and see good ethical values as an important benefit of theistic belief. A recent survey showed that Americans, for example, distrust atheists more than any other group listed in the survey, this distrust stemming mainly from the conviction that only believers in God can be counted on to respect morality. I argue against this widespread tendency to see theism as the friend of morality. I argue that our most serious moral obligations -- the …Read more
-
25Our Errant Epistemic AimPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 55 (4): 869-876. 1995.Often the first issue addressed by a theory of justified belief is the aim, goal, purpose, or objective of epistemic justification. What, in short, is the point of epistemic justification? Or, to put it a bit differently, why value justification: why is it worth having or pursuing? Prominent epistemologists, including both externalists and internalists, have proposed the following answer: the ultimate aim of epistemic justification is to maximize true belief and minimize false belief. This answe…Read more
-
108Cornea and ClosureFaith and Philosophy 24 (1): 83-86. 2007.Could our observations of apparently pointless evil ever justify the conclusion that God does not exist? Not according to Stephen Wykstra, who several years ago announced the “Condition of Reasonable Epistemic Access,” or “CORNEA,” a principle that has sustained critiques of atheistic arguments from evil ever since. Despite numerous criticisms aimed at CORNEA in recent years, the principle continues to be invoked and defended. We raise a new objection: CORNEA is false because it entails intolera…Read more
-
74Anselmian atheismPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 70 (1). 2005.On the basis of Chapter 15 of Anselm's Proslogion, I develop an argument that confronts theology with a trilemma: atheism, utter mysticism, or radical anti-Anselmianism. The argument establishes a disjunction of claims that Anselmians in particular, but not only they, will find disturbing: (a) God does not exist, (b) no human being can have even the slightest conception of God, or (c) the Anselmian requirement of maximal greatness in God is wrong. My own view, for which I argue briefly, is that …Read more
-
32Perceiving God: The Epistemology of Religious ExperiencePhilosophical Review 102 (3): 430. 1993.
-
4Linda Martin Alcoff, Real Knowing: New Versions of the Coherence Theory Reviewed byPhilosophy in Review 16 (6): 385-387. 1996.
-
148Closing the ‘Is’-‘Ought’ GapCanadian Journal of Philosophy 28 (3): 349-366. 1998.In a dense and fascinating article of some ten years ago, Toomas Karmo adds his voice to the chorus of philosophers who deny the possibility of soundly deriving ‘ought’ from ‘is.’ According to Karmo, no derivation containing an ethical conclusion and only non-ethical premises can possibly be sound, where ‘sound’ describes a deductively valid derivation all of whose premises are true. He also suggests that the only valid derivations of ‘ought’ from ‘is’ will be trivial ones. His argument has, to …Read more
-
833The impossibility of local skepticismPhilosophia 34 (4): 453-464. 2006.According to global skepticism, we know nothing. According to local skepticism, we know nothing in some particular area or domain of discourse. Unlike their global counterparts, local skeptics think they can contain our invincible ignorance within limited bounds. I argue that they are mistaken. Local skepticism, particularly the kinds that most often get defended, cannot stay local: if there are domains whose truths we cannot know, then there must be claims outside those domains that we cannot k…Read more
-
1041Agnosticism, Skeptical Theism, and Moral ObligationIn Justin McBrayer Trent Dougherty (ed.), Skeptical Theism: New Essays, Oxford University Press. 2014.Skeptical theism combines theism with skepticism about our capacity to discern God’s morally sufficient reasons for permitting evil. Proponents have claimed that skeptical theism defeats the evidential argument from evil. Many opponents have objected that it implies untenable moral skepticism, induces appalling moral paralysis, and the like. Recently Daniel Howard-Snyder has tried to rebut this prevalent objection to skeptical theism by rebutting it as an objection to the skeptical part of sk…Read more
-
381On Gellman's Attempted RescueEuropean Journal for Philosophy of Religion 2 (1). 2010.In "Ordinary Morality Implies Atheism" (2009), I argued that traditional theism threatens ordinary morality by relieving us of any moral obligation to prevent horrific suffering by innocent people even when we easily can. In the current issue of this journal, Jerome Gellman attempts to rescue that moral obligation from my charge that theism destroys it. In this reply, I argue that his attempted rescue fails
Areas of Specialization
Epistemology |
Metaphysics |
Philosophy of Religion |
Logic and Philosophy of Logic |
Areas of Interest
Epistemology |
Metaphysics |
Philosophy of Religion |
Logic and Philosophy of Logic |