Appendix: Two Dozen (or so) Theistic Arguments

Abstract

What follows are notes for a lecture on theistic arguments given in a summer seminar in philosophy of religion in Bellingham, Washington, in 1986. Although the last twenty years have seen a good bit of interesting work on theistic arguments (for example, on the fine-tuning arguments),1 the notes, while shortened a bit, are unrevised. My intention had always been to write a small book based on these arguments, with perhaps a chapter on each of the main kinds. Time has never permitted, however, and now the chances of my writing such a book are small and dwindling. Nevertheless, each, I think, deserves loving attention and development. I’m not sure they warrant publication in this undeveloped, nascent, merely germinal form, but Deane-Peter Baker thought some people might find them interesting; I hope others will be moved to work them out and develop them in detail. I’ve argued in Warranted Christian Belief and elsewhere that neither theistic nor full-blown Christian belief requires argument for justification or rationality or (if true) warrant. One can be justified and rational in accepting theistic belief, even if one doesn’t accept theism on the basis of arguments and even if in fact there aren’t any good theistic arguments. The same holds for Christian belief, which of course goes far beyond theism: One doesn’t need arguments for justified and rational Christian belief. If theistic belief is true, furthermore, then, so I say, it can have warrant sufficient for knowledge for someone, even if he or she doesn’t believe on the basis of theistic arguments, and even if in fact no good theistic arguments exist. That said, of course, it doesn’t follow that there aren’t any good theistic arguments, and as a matter of fact, so the title of this section intimates, there are good theistic arguments – at least two dozen or so. I hasten to add that the arguments as stated in the notes aren’t really good arguments; they are merely argument sketches, or maybe only pointers to good arguments. They await that loving development to become genuinely good.