Skip to main content

Skeptical Theism - primer for the uninitiated


Heard of skeptical theism? Perhaps not. But it's all the rage in certain religious circles. So, to get you up to speed, here's a quick primer.

There's a good chance your religious opponent will be familiar with skeptical theism and will use against you in an argument about the existence of God.  So it's wise to be prepared.

Continues here....
Labels:

Comments

Unknown said…
As I understand this Pandora's Box argument, it does not rescue the problem of evil. Because it is not an argument, that we can know god's (lack of) justifications. If we switch from problems of evil to sceptical problems, then theists still have problems, but not the one we previously argued about.
May 8, 2015 at 2:40 PM
Anonymous said…
Dr. Law,

I'm still interested in reading your paper on the Pandora's Box argument.
Please email me at mmanryATlifebiblechurch.com

Thanks,

Matt Manry
May 27, 2015 at 5:23 PM
Anonymous said…
I'm not impressed by the Pandora's box objection, at least as presented in the article. Lying is, presumably, an inherently immoral act. For God to lie to us is an active evil in which God would be engaged, not an allowance of evil towards some grander purpose. It seems the skeptical theist can consistently countenance one but not the other.
July 16, 2015 at 3:43 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

EVIDENCE, MIRACLES AND THE EXISTENCE OF JESUS

(Published in Faith and Philosophy 2011. Volume 28, Issue 2, April 2011. Stephen Law. Pages 129-151) EVIDENCE, MIRACLES AND THE EXISTENCE OF JESUS Stephen Law Abstract The vast majority of Biblical historians believe there is evidence sufficient to place Jesus’ existence beyond reasonable doubt. Many believe the New Testament documents 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 indepen...
159 comments
Read more

The Evil God Challenge and the "classical" theist's response

On another blog, FideCogitActio, some theists of a "classical" stripe (that's to say, like Brian Davies, Edward Feser) are criticisng the Evil God Challenge (or I suppose, trying to show how it can be met, or sidestepped). The main post includes this: In book I, chapter 39 , Aquinas argues that “there cannot be evil in God” (in Deo non potest esse malum). Atheists like Law must face the fact that, if the words are to retain any sense, “God” simply cannot be “evil”. As my comments in the thread at Feser’s blog aimed to show, despite how much he mocks “the privation theory of evil,” Law himself cannot escape its logic: his entire argument requires that the world ought to appear less evil if it is to be taken as evidence of a good God. Even though he spurns the idea that evil is a privation of good, his account of an evil world is parasitic on a good ideal; this is no surprise, though, since all evil is parasitic on good ( SCG I, 11 ). Based on the conclusions of se...
446 comments
Read more

Sye show continues

I was sent a link to this , for those interested in the never ending saga of Sye TenBruggencate and his "proof" of the existence of God. Hit "sinner ministries' proof of the existence of god" link below or on side bar for 30+ earlier posts on this topic that I wrote during an extended interchange with him last summer (check the literally many hundreds of comments attached to these posts if you really want to get into how Sye thinks and argues). Sye's amazing intial "proof" is available here . PS. For those interested, my own "presuppositional" proof, parodying Sye's proof by his principle "the impossibility of the contrary" (which turns out to be the key to Sye's proof) is: My claim: Sye's mind is addled and his thinking unreliable because he was hit on the head by a rock. Prove this is false, Sye. Try to, and I will say - "But your "proof" presupposes your mind is not addled and you can recognise a pr...
250 comments
Read more