In this online debate historian Richard Carrier and theology scholar Jake O'Connell spar over whether Paul believed that Jesus rose from the dead in the same body that died, or in a new body, leaving his old body behind to rot in the grave.

Totality Beliefs and the Religious Imagination chronicles a medical doctor's journey from traditional religion to Eastern-path meditation and mysticism, finally ending in nonbelief. The author writes in great detail about his own loss of any kind of faith in his personal journey toward atheism and naturalism. Although the author has come to reject all supernatural claims, he nevertheless apparently suspects that humanity cannot endure without hope in the existence of some unseen supernatural being. He seems to doubt that any secular worldview can ever satisfy the spiritual yearning of the masses. Reviewer Edward Tabash, a constitutional lawyer who is extensively involved in atheist activism, deeply appreciates the author's comprehensive chronology of the journey from religion, through mysticism, to nonbelief. Tabash has made a similar journey. However, Tabash does not embrace the author's apparent pessimism about ever persuading masses of humanity to give up their supernatural beliefs.

Anthony Campbell's short and accessible Totality Beliefs and the Religious Imagination illustrates a temperament rather than providing exhaustive arguments against religious beliefs. Campbell thinks that the supernatural is not real, but there is no rancor in his view of religion. He does not treat supernatural convictions as a straightforward mistake curable by a steady application of common sense. Nor does he think that religion is invariably an evil. And even though he has come to think that religions involve too many false beliefs, he thinks that there are too many important questions entangled with our religious traditions to just cast them aside.

John Allen Paulos is a mathematician who writes popular books about the role that mathematics plays in everyday life. In Irreligion he tackles arguments for the existence of God, from design arguments to arguments from miracles to Pascal's wager. His refutations are intended to plant the seeds of doubt more than to offer scholarly analysis. In some cases mathematics is relevant to the argument, but overall the book is a rather light-hearted and personal account of why the author remains unconvinced.

Many New Testament scholars have presented their personal reconstruction of the historical Jesus, laboring to painstakingly separate fact from myth. Unfortunately, in the absence of a rigorous methodology, religious beliefs have doggedly militated against their best efforts, and E. P. Sanders' The Historical Figure of Jesus is no exception to this tendency. In this review, Jacob Aliet outlines what he takes to be the five main weaknesses of Sanders' scholarship, some philosophical, some methodological, as revealed in The Historical Figure of Jesus.

Uncertainty about the existence of God is common, but what are the implications of such uncertainty? Is it not the case that a loving God would not leave us in the dark about her existence, and therefore God's hiddenness from large numbers of human beings constitutes strong evidence that a loving God does not exist? Or should we take the opposite tact, that it is most reasonable to affirm faith in God in the absence of certainty about her existence?

(2008) John Schellenberg           1. The ‘Many Gods’ Objection Revived           2. The ‘Many Attitudes’ Objection Introduced           3. Conclusion: More Twists in the Tale Jeffrey Jordan’s pragmatic argument for the rational preferability of theistic belief in circumstances of indecisive evidence is resourceful and interesting, but I shall argue that it fails even if we assume–as I would […]

(2008) John Schellenberg           1. Love is Not Love that without Love of Unity Unites           2. Ought-Nots and Will-Nots           3. Why a Pragmatic Solution Won’t Work Jeffrey Jordan’s response to my hiddenness argument is essentially an extension and application of his pragmatic stance on matters religious. The result is an interesting and original solution to the […]

(2008) John Schellenberg I start with a disclaimer. To be persuaded by my argument, readers need not first accept that the previous arguments of the debate have left us with a draw, with both sides–theism and atheism–about equally well (or ill) supported. Given the banner of ‘faith and uncertainty’ that flies over the present section […]

(2008) Jeffrey Jordan           Assumptions of the Divine Hiddenness Argument           Objection One           Objection Two           Objection Three John Schellenberg has presented an argument noteworthy in several respects. One interesting respect is that his “divine hiddenness” argument is a philosophically interesting innovation in a debate that has raged for millennia. Innovation in philosophy, especially an interesting innovation, is […]

(2008) Jeffrey Jordan When approached about participating in a debate on the implications of “religious uncertainty” for religious commitment, I was asked to represent the theistic side. This I was happy to do. My opponent was asked to represent the atheistic side. Little did I imagine then that the debate would devolve into quibbles about […]

(2008) Jeffrey Jordan           Decision Theory           Pragmatic Arguments           Evidentialism           The Jamesian Wager A castaway builds a bonfire hoping to catch the attention of any ship or plane that might be passing nearby.[1] Even with no evidence that a plane or ship is nearby, he still gathers driftwood and lights a fire, enhancing the possibility of rescue. […]

Is baptism necessary for salvation? In his article, "The Bible's Teaching on Baptism: Contradictory or Complimentary?" Eric Lyons states the following: "According to numerous skeptics, the Bible contradicts itself regarding whether or not water baptism is essential for salvation (e.g., Drange, 1996; Morgan, 2003; cf. Wells, 2001). According to these men, Jesus and Paul were confused regarding the purpose of baptism--was it necessary, or not?" Lyons cites my Biblical Inconsistencies as the source of the claims that he alleges that I make regarding baptism. To put it plainly and succinctly, he is simply and completely wrong. I make none of the claims that he alleges that I make.

In his opening case Quentin Smith argues that the existence of the universe is self-explanatory because it is self-caused, and that this conclusion is inconsistent with theism. However, to be consistent with his principle that a causal explanation of each part of the universe logically explains the existence of the whole, and that the Big Bang caused the sequence of states following it, he must claim that the Big Bang provides an additional explanation of the sequence of states following it. But then the theist can claim that this is the sort of additional explanation that God provides for the existence of the universe, and that God is essential to providing a complete explanation of our universe, even though the universe contains no beginning point. Moreover, Smith's explanation of the existence of the universe may be fatally circular, or lead to an infinite regress where, no matter what part one starts with, the part of the universe doing the explaining is always further in need of an explanation—until one posits God to close the regress.

Paul Draper rightly argues that fine-tuning gives us no reason to believe in a generic design hypothesis that tells us nothing about the motives of the designer. He also correctly notes that "The Case for Cosmic Design" does not establish the existence of God; but it nevertheless offers evidence for the existence of God. Fine-tuning is more surprising under the naturalistic single-universe hypothesis than under theism, and thus constitutes evidence for theism over the naturalistic single-universe hypothesis. When all of the evidence is considered, whether theism is objectively more likely to be true than the naturalistic single-universe hypothesis is an open question that depends upon a difficult assessment of the prior epistemic probability of theism. Since there are independent motivations for believing theism apart from fine-tuning and other design evidence, that evidence counts in favor of theism even if we cannot show that theism is true. Moreover, unless we have good reason to believe that the existence of evil is very improbable under theism, the combination of the fine-tuning data and the existence of evil supports theism over the naturalistic single-universe hypothesis. It is reasonable under the theistic hypothesis to think that the existence of limited, vulnerable moral agents is an overall good despite the evils that almost certainly would accompany the existence of such agents.

Robin Collins offers three design arguments for the existence of God, with the primary fine-tuning argument contending that life or intelligent life depends for its existence on the fact that a number of physical parameters of the universe have (numerical) values that fall within a range of life-permitting values that is very narrow. Such fine-tuning entails, Collins argues, that the existence of life is much more surprising on naturalism than on theism.