Theistic Explanation Research Articles

History, Philosophy, and Miracles

Modern analogies to healing claims within the Gospels render them plausible as historical experiences. Such experiences are widespread today. Philosophic and theological explanations of such experiences vary, but the emergence of patterns of such experiences in theistic contexts helps support the case for a theistic explanation.

Human rights and divine holiness

Abstract Theists commonly hold that God endows humans with rights. Standard explanations draw on natural law theory or divine command theory. However, the natural law account does not give God a central role in explaining our rights, and the divine command account does not assign human nature a significant explanatory role. A successful theistic explanation of human rights must meet three conditions: (1) God must directly explain human rights; (2) human nature must also directly explain human rights; (3) this dual contribution must explain why morality forbids rights violations by grounding the deontic reasons associated with rights. I propose a holiness account of rights. On this view, God endows human nature with rights by making human nature holy, and God does so by fashioning humans with one of God's essential properties: the capacity to love. This theory satisfies all three conditions and explains the deontological character of rights.

An Atheistic Argument from Naturalistic Explanations of Religious Belief: A Preliminary Reply to Robert Nola

Robert Nola has recently defended an argument against the existence of God on the basis of naturalistic explanations of religious belief. I will critically evaluate his argument in this paper. Nola’s argument takes the form of an inference to the best explanation: since the naturalistic stance offers a better explanation of religious belief relative to the theistic explanation, the ontology of God(s) is eliminated. I rebut Nola’s major assumption that naturalistic explanations and theistic explanations of religion are incompatible. I go on to criticize Nola’s proposed naturalistic explanations: Freudianism, a Hypersensitive Agency Detection Device, and a Moralising Mind-Policing God. I find these inadequate as actual explanations of religious belief. Even if they are correct, they will not show that theism is false. So Nola’s argument fails to convince.

From a Necessary Being to a Perfect Being: A Reply to Byerly

Cosmological arguments for God typically have two stages. The first stage argues for a first cause or a necessary being, and the second stage argues from there to God. T. Ryan Byerly offers a simple, abductive argument for the second stage where the best explanation for why the being is found to have necessary existence is that it is a perfect being. The reasoning behind this argument is that universal generalizations explain observations of their instances; for example, the universal generalization that all ravens are black explains why some particular raven is observed to be black. Similarly, the fact that a being has all perfections explains why we find the being to have necessary existence. I distinguish between two readings of Byerly’s proposed theistic explanation, and conclude that his explanation does not offer an advantage to the theist in either case.

Det naturalistiska paradigmets framgångar - en utmaning för teism?

The atheist philosopher Gregory Dawes states that theistic explanatory models should not be a priori dismissed as unscientific. Nevertheless, he maintains that the naturalistic paradigm is legitimate and should be defended. Dawes and John Mackies critique of theism, however, goes beyond a priori metaphysical commitments to naturalism and the traditional debate about whether theistic explanations can count as natural science, to what they consider to be more important philosophically: the question of whether theistic explanations can be good explanations at all. According to Dawes and Mackie, theistic explanatory model should be dismissed, not because it is a religious doctrine, but because it does not meet the natural sciences procedural requirement, i.e. that statements shall refer to publicly available evidence. In addition, commitment to methodological naturalism is based on a 400-year success story of naturalistic explanatory models. There is nothing to stop religious thinkers from trying to overturn the naturalistic paradigm. But until then, we have good reason to dismiss theistic arguments for God’s existence even if there is currently no established naturalistic explanation for the phenomenon in question. Obviously, if there are good reasons to rule out design in principle on the basis of these arguments, evidence for God’s existence cannot even get off the ground. However, I propose that it is problematic to apply the procedural requirement of the natural sciences when assessing the plausibility of theistic explanations. This comprises in particular the principle of background knowledge, who claims that explanations should minimize the supposition of new ontological entities or mechanism that deviate from the physical ones we know by experience exist. I will also argue that the principle of Occam's razor is not applicable to theism when considering the success of methodological naturalism. Ruling out theism as unnecessary requires that theism and methodological naturalism are incompatible and competing theories. I will argue that theism does not necessarily compete with naturalistic explanations and, on the contrary, theism makes naturalistic explanations plausible.

GOD, SCIENCE, AND METHODOLOGICAL NATURALISM

In this paper, I call into question a commonly assumed principle in science known as methodological naturalism, which is the idea that science should only accept natural, as opposed to supernatural, explanations. In support of MN, two arguments are commonly thrown against the idea of theistic explanation in science: the science stopper argument and the God-of-the-gaps argument. The science stopper argument states that appealing to theistic explanations hinders science from making steady progress; it simply stops science from its tracks. In other words, abandoning MN spells the death of science. The God-of-the-gaps argument states that appealing to God when explaining phenomenon is a form of an argument from ignorance, what critics call God-of-the-gaps thinking, which is considered to be fallacious reasoning. Any gap in nature that is explained by God, so the argument goes, is simply an appeal to our ignorance that we have no yet found the correct explanation to such natural mystery. In this scenario, an appeal to God is assumed to simply show our lack of knowledge with regard to the workings of nature. After introducing these arguments, I assess their strength by looking at the history of methodological naturalism. I then show how the history of science does not only fail to support these arguments but actually refutes them

Craig's Contradictory Kalam: Trouble at the Moment of Creation

William Lane Craig’s much-discussed kalam cosmological argument for God’s existence is intended to provide support for a particular theistic explanation of the origin of the universe. I argue here that Craig’s theistic account of the origin of the universe entails two contradictions and hence should be rejected. The main contribution of the paper is the identification of some relatively straightforward but previously unrecognized problems in Craig’s hypothesis that the beginning of the universe was a temporal effect of a timeless personal cause.

The gap problem made easy?

AbstractByerly recently developed a new solution to the gap problem for cosmological arguments. His idea is that the best explanation for why the necessary being is found to have necessary existence is that it is a perfect being. I raise an objection to Byerly’s solution on the ground that there is some rival naturalistic explanation that is as good as Byerly s theistic explanation.

THE AMBIVALENCE OF SCIENTIFIC NATURALISM: A RESPONSE TO MARK HARRIS

AbstractResponding to Mark Harris, I reflect on his tantalizing question whether the provision of naturalistic explanations for biblical miracles renders the narratives more, or less, credible. I address his “reversal,” in which professional scientists now feature among defenders of a literalistic reading, while professional biblical scholars are often skeptical. I suggest this underlines the ambivalence of scientific naturalism from the standpoint of Christian theology. Historical examples are adduced to show that, until the mid‐nineteenth century, naturalistic and theistic explanations were commonly regarded as complementary. Accordingly, the primacy often accorded to scientific progress in accounts of secularization is questionable. Two concluding questions are raised. If a methodological naturalism inheres in biblical scholarship, as in the sciences, how do biblical scholars decide whether the historical trajectories they construct for the composition of biblical texts are destructive or affirmative of faith? Second, when the miracle is the Resurrection of the dead Christ, does not the scientific impossibility of this foundational event remain sacrosanct?

The naturalism of the sciences

The sciences are characterized by what is sometimes called a “methodological naturalism,” which disregards talk of divine agency. In response to those who argue that this reflects a dogmatic materialism, a number of philosophers have offered a pragmatic defense. The naturalism of the sciences, they argue, is provisional and defeasible: it is justified by the fact that unsuccessful theistic explanations have been superseded by successful natural ones. But this defense is inconsistent with the history of the sciences. The sciences have always exhibited what we call a domain naturalism. They have never invoked divine agency, but have always focused on the causal structure of the natural world. It is not the case, therefore, that the sciences once employed theistic explanations and then abandoned them. The naturalism of the sciences is as old as science itself.

The coexistence of natural and supernatural explanations within and across domains and development.

People across highly diverse cultural contexts use both natural and supernatural explanations to explain questions of fundamental concern such as death, illness, and human origins. The present study examines the development of explanatory coexistence within and across domains of existential concern in individuals in Tanna, Vanuatu. We examined three age groups: 7- to 12-year-old children, 13- to 18-year-old adolescents, and 19- to 70-year-old adults (N=72). Within the domain of death, biological and spontaneous explanations were most common across all ages. For illness, children showed the highest rates of explanatory coexistence, while adolescents and adults favoured biological explanations. Within the human origins domain, theistic explanations were most common across the age groups. Overall, these data show that coexistence reasoning in these domains is pervasive across cultures, yet at the same time it is deeply contextually specific, reflecting the nuanced differences in local ecologies and cultural beliefs. Statement of contribution What is already known on this subject? Individuals across highly diverse cultural contexts use both natural and supernatural explanations to understand the events that occur in their lives. Context and cultural input play a large role in determining when and how individuals incorporate natural and supernatural explanations. The development of explanatory coexistence has primarily studied explanations for isolated domains. What does this study add? We examined explanatory coexistence in a culture with recent conversion to Christianity and formal education. The current research examines how individuals reason within and across the domains of human origins, illness, and death. Developmental differences associated with explanatory coexistence are examined.

Mutual epistemic dependence and the demographic divine hiddenness problem

AbstractIn his article ‘Divine hiddenness and the demographics of theism’ (Religious Studies, 42 (2006), 177–191) Stephen Maitzen develops a novel version of the atheistic argument from divine hiddenness according to which the lopsided distribution of theistic belief throughout the world's populations is much more to be expected given naturalism than given theism. I try to meet Maitzen's challenge by developing a theistic explanation for this lopsidedness. The explanation I offer appeals to various goods that are intimately connected with the human cognitive constitution, and in particular, with the way in which we depend upon social belief-forming practices for our acquisition of much of our knowledge about the world – features about us that God would value but that also make probable a lopsided distribution of theistic belief, or so I argue.

God & Moral Law. On The Theistic Explanation of Morality by Mark C. Murphy, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2011, pp. 192, £37, hbk

New BlackfriarsVolume 95, Issue 1055 p. 127-128 Review GOD & MORAL LAW. ON THE THEISTIC EXPLANATION OF MORALITY by Mark C. Murphy, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2011, pp. 192, £37, hbk JOHN D. O'CONNOR OP, JOHN D. O'CONNOR OPSearch for more papers by this author JOHN D. O'CONNOR OP, JOHN D. O'CONNOR OPSearch for more papers by this author First published: 02 December 2013 https://doi.org/10.1111/nbfr.12051_8Read the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat Volume95, Issue1055January 2014Pages 127-128 RelatedInformation

The Argument from Consciousness and Divine Consciousness

The paper aims for an improvement of the so-called argument from consciousness while focusing on the first-person-perspective as a unique feature of consciousness that opens the floor for a theistic explanation. As a side effect of knowledge arguments, which are necessary to keep a posterior materialism off bounds, the paper proposes an interpretation of divine knowledge as knowledge of things rather than knowledge of facts.

God and Moral Law: On the Theistic Explanation of Morality. By MarkC. Murphy. (Oxford UP, 2011. Pp. x + 192. Price £35.00.)

God and Moral Law: On the Theistic Explanation of Morality. By MarkC. Murphy. (Oxford UP, 2011. Pp. x + 192. Price £35.00.)

God and Moral Law: On the Theistic Explanation of Morality, by Mark C. Murphy

God and Moral Law: On the Theistic Explanation of Morality, by Mark C. Murphy

Science and religion: Compatibility issues

This slim contribution to the Point/Counterpoint series is the outcome of the debate between Alvin Plantinga and Daniel Dennett at the Central Division meeting of the American Philosophical Association in 2009. The debate consisted of a lecture by Plantinga, a response by Dennett, and a counter-response by Plantinga, which the book reproduces. The book includes further responses by Dennett, Plantinga, and Dennett again. Because it is a debate, there are numerous points that cannot be addressed in detail within Science and Religion’s short length. Perhaps, the three most significant are whether the randomness of Darwinism is compatible with God’s guiding the course of evolution, whether a naturalistic evolutionary explanation is preferable because it posits fewer entities than a theistic evolutionary explanation, and Plantinga’s Evolutionary Argument against Naturalism. Regarding the first, Plantinga points out that the randomness of Darwinian evolution does not mean uncaused nor does it mean unsupervised. It merely means the lack of any physical mechanism in the organism or its environment that determines which mutations would be beneficial for the organism’s survival and then causes just those mutations to take place. Of course, this does not rule out the possibility that God may determine which mutation would be beneficial and then causes it, since God is neither physical nor a mechanism. ‘‘Hence the randomness involved in Darwinism does not imply that the process is not divinely guided’’ (6). Incredibly, Dennett concedes this but considers it moot because of the second point: ‘‘it is an entirely gratuitous fantasy’’ (27). We can certainly add God or other designing agents (like extraterrestrials) to the picture, but if we already have an explanation available that fully accounts for everything we observe, to appeal to such agents is completely unnecessary. Ockham’s razor cuts them away, and we are

God and Moral Law: On the Theistic Explanation of Morality. By MARK C. MURPHY.

God and Moral Law: On the Theistic Explanation of Morality. By MARK C. MURPHY.

God and moral law: on the theistic explanation of morality

Introduction: God and morality 1. Moral law 2. Theistic explanation of moral law 3. Natural law theory 4. Theological voluntarism 5. Theistic explanation of the laws of nature 6. Moral concurrentism References Index

Is Theism a Simple, and hence Probable, Explanation for the Universe?

Richard Swinburne, in his The Existence of God (2004), presents a cosmological argument in defence of theism (Swinburne 1991: 119, 135). God, Swinburne argues, is more likely to bring about an ordered universe than other states (ibid.: 144, 299). To defend this view, Swinburne presents the following arguments: (1) That this ordered universe is a priori improbable (2004: 49, 150, 1991: 304 et seq.), given the stringent requirements for life (cf. also Leslie 2000: 12), and the Second Law of Thermodynamics (Giancoli 1990: 396); (2) That it seems as if this ordered universe can be explained by theism; (3) A theistic explanation for the universe is more probable because it is a simple explanation. To this end, Swinburne makes use of Bayes’ Theorem. Symbolically, this claim can be represented as (e) for the evidence of the existence of a complex universe, and (h) for a hypothesis. Swinburne’s argument is that theism has a higher prior probability, P(htheism) > P(hmaterialism), since theism is simpler than materialism. He concludes that P(e|htheism) > P(e|hmaterialism). In this paper I will address only this argument (3) above, and defend the view that it is false: theism is not simpler than materialism, nor it is more probably true. I conclude that theism is less probable than materialism, expressed by P(htheism) < P(hmaterialism) : 2/N(2n+1) < 1/n, where N is the number of possible universes and n the number of entities in existence.