Unless he has very strong reason for supposing that there is a God, a theist needs a theodicy (or at least needs to begin to develop one) in order justifiably to believe that there is a God. Part 2 of this book describes the good goals that God might be seeking to produce in his Universe—beauty; creatures having knowledge (in a largely internalist sense), having their good desires satisfied, with a free will to do actions that promote each others’ well‐being, being of use to others, and worshipping God. Part 3 shows how the possibility of moral evil, and the actual occurrence of natural evil (providing knowledge of possible good and bad actions, and the scope for good response) are necessary to secure these ends. God has the right to allow some creatures to suffer for the benefit of others, so long as he compensates them in this life or after death. The expected value of allowing the evils in order to achieve the good goals is positive.
Modern disputes about what makes a belief epistemically justified or rational are flawed through failing to recognize that there are different kinds of justifications that are in different ways indicative that the belief is true. I distinguish synchronic justification (the belief being a justified response to the believer's situation at the time) from diachronic justification (the belief constituting a justified response to adequate investigation over time); and, for each of these kinds, internalist justification (justification by introspectible factors) from externalist justification (justification by factors not necessarily accessible to the believer). A belief is internally synchronically justified if it is rendered inductively probable by the believer's basic beliefs; but ‘inductively probable’ may mean probable by true a priori standards (logically probable), by true standards to the best of the believer's ability to discover this (epistemically probable), or simply by the believer's own standards (subjectively probable). External synchronic justification is normally a matter of being produced by a reliable process, and there are many different ways of spelling that out. A belief is diachronically justified to the extent to which it results from adequate investigation. This depends (positively) on how probable it was that investigation would lead to evidence that would make a difference to the original probability of the belief; how probable it was that the issue was important; and (negatively) on how probable it was that investigation would cost much time and money. But all these ‘probabilities’ can be spelled out in different internalist and externalist ways. Almost all these kinds of justification are worth having, because it is logically probable that a belief justified in almost all these ways will be true. This account of justification is extended to give an account of different kinds of knowledge, all of which are worth having.
This book assesses the worth of arguments for and against the existence of God. Evidence confirms (makes more probable) an explanatory hypothesis in so far as (1) given the hypothesis the evidence is to be expected, that is the hypothesis makes the evidence probable, (2) the evidence is not otherwise to be expected, (3) the hypothesis is simple, and (4) it fits with background knowledge (i.e., knowledge about how things behave in neighbouring fields of enquiry). When we are assessing hypotheses (such as theism, the hypothesis that there is a God) purporting to explain everything, there will be no background knowledge. Theism is a very simple hypothesis. If there is a God, there is some reason to expect that he will create a universe, with laws of nature, leading to the evolution of humans (bodies connected to souls), who often have experiences which seem to them experiences of God. It is most improbable that all this evidence would exist if there was no God. Taken together therefore all this evidence makes it probable that there is a God. The occurrence of evil, whether produced by humans or natural processes, does not significantly diminish that probability.
This book is about what it is for there to be a God, and what reason there is to suppose that God to be the traditional Christian God. Part 1 (Chs.1 to 5) analyses the metaphysical categories needed for this purpose – substance, cause, time, and necessity. Part 2 (Ch. 6 to 10) begins by setting out some of the different ways in which the doctrine that there is a divine individual (an individual with the traditional divine properties) can be developed. There can be more than one divine individual so long as a first such individual is necessarily the cause of the existence of the others. Given the supreme moral goodness of cooperating with one individual in sharing everything with a third individual, it follows that if there is one divine individual, there will be three and only three such individuals; hence the necessity of the Christian doctrine of the Trinity – that there is one God consisting of three divine persons. One of these persons may choose to become incarnate, i.e. human, and there are reasons why he would do so.
Part 1 (Chs. 2–7) argues that mental events (consisting in the instantiation of mental properties – sensations, thoughts, purposes, desires, and beliefs) are distinct from physical events (such as brain events), although in causal interaction with them. Part 2 argues that these mental events consist in the instantiations of properties in immaterial substances, souls. A human being (and any higher animal) consists of two parts, the essential part – his soul, and a contingent part – his body. It is extremely unlikely that there could be a scientific explanation of the creation of souls. Humans are distinguished from the higher animals by an ability to reason logically, and by having moral awareness, free will, and an integrated system of beliefs and desires. Neither direct empirical evidence nor pure a priori philosophical argument can show what will happen to the soul after death. This could only be shown by some very general metaphysical system.
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