My new Critical Thinking course - ideal for pupils, students, teachers, sceptics.

My new Critical Thinking course - ideal for pupils & teachers wanting to sharpen their thinking skills! 3 hours of snappy entertaining videos. Plus multiple choices quizzes. And if you get baffled, I'm on hand to respond to queries. Price of a paperback book!

Comprises all the most useful and fun bits of my teaching. Ideal for teachers and pupils wanting to sharpen their thinking.

The course (with sample videos) is here: https://www.udemy.com/course/critical-thinking-p/

And here's a sample video:

Comments

Unknown said…

Good Day,
I hope all is well. I was wondering If there is a more current edition of Believing Bullshit than the 2011 edition? I'd like to purchase the book which seems apropos during these Q-Anon times. How well do the ideas in the book fit some of the bullshit that we see in 2021?

Regards,

Wells.

June 2, 2021 at 2:31 PM

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

Plantinga's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism refuted

Here's my central criticism of Plantinga's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism (EAAN). It's novel and was published in Analysis last year. Here's the gist. Plantinga argues that if naturalism and evolution are true, then semantic epiphenomenalism is very probably true - that's to say, the content of our beliefs does not causally impinge on our behaviour. And if semantic properties such as having such-and-such content or being true cannot causally impinge on behaviour, then they cannot be selected for by unguided evolution. Plantinga's argument requires, crucially, that there be no conceptual links between belief content and behaviour of a sort that it's actually very plausible to suppose exist (note that to suppose there are such conceptual links is not necessarily to suppose that content can be exhaustively captured in terms of behaviour or functional role, etc. in the way logical behaviourists or functionalists suppose). It turns o

Why do atheists think Christians believe unreasonably, if they don't?

How reasonable is it for the religious to believe the central tenets of their respective religions? According to many atheists: not very. Many atheists suppose it is in each case unreasonable for Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Bahá’ís, Quakers, Mormons, Scientologists, and so on to believe what they do. The religious person usually takes a different view of at least their own religious belief. They suppose science and reason do not significantly undermine, and may indeed support, the core tenets of their own faith. The same is true of non-religious theists. They consider their brand of theism is reasonably, or at least not unreasonably, held even if no particular religion is. Indeed, many theists consider atheism unreasonable. Even when participants in discussions between atheists on the one hand and defenders of some variety of religious or theistic belief on the other include intelligent, philosophically sophisticated and well-informed people striving to think carefully and objec

Stephen Law

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