Related Sites Americans United for Separation of Church and State (Off Site) Americans United is dedicated to maintaining separation of church and state. The Constitutional Principle: Separation of Church and State (Off Site) Critique of David Barton’s “America’s Godly Heritage” (1996) by the Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs (Off Site) David Barton, in his taped presentation […]
Another fanatic thinks God said "Thou shalt kill."
Arguments to Design (1996) Antony Flew A fresh look at an old family of arguments It is high time and overtime to take a fresh, open-minded, sceptical look at arguments to design. It has to be to not from because such arguments–which have been and remain the most widely employed and effectively persuasive of all […]
The Separation of Church and State Church, State, and Creationism [ Index ] Flag Desecration Amendment [ Index ] Government Endorsement of the Boy Scouts [ Index ] Is America a Christian Nation? [ Index ] Pledge of Allegiance [ Index ] Religious Discrimination and Government Promotion of Religion [ Index ] School Prayer [ Index ] Supreme Court Decisions [ Index ] Vouchers [ Index ] Related Sites [ Index ] Article Titles Church […]
Famous people who doubted religion.
Stephen Hawking and the Mind of God (1996) Antony Flew Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time [1] has been a record breaking best seller. A note in his later collection, Black Holes and Baby Universes [2] reveals that A Brief History remained on the bestseller list of The New York Times for fifty-three weeks, […]
Is Atheism Logical? (1996) Mark I. Vuletic [This article originally appeared in The Free Mind: The Newsletter and Forum of the University of Minnesota Atheists and Humanists 2(7), May/June 1996.] In his brief article “Is Atheism Logical?”, Hank Hanegraaff [1] tries to show that atheism is not rationally justifiable. For the most part, Hanegraaff’s article […]
Forces of the universe don't include magical spirits.
When God is conceived of as an all-powerful and all-loving deity, many arguments for his nonexistence can be raised. Two of the main ones are the Argument from Evil (hereafter abbreviated AE) and the Argument from Nonbelief (hereafter abbreviated ANB). In what follows, I shall provide precise formulations of those two arguments, make some comments about them, and then try to refute the main defenses (of God's existence) that might be put forward against ANB, which I consider the stronger of the two. I take ANB to be a sound argument establishing the proposition that God (conceived of in a certain way) does not exist.
Concerning Theodore Drange's Argument from Evil for the Nonexistence of God (2002) by Shandon Guthrie
"In the recent past, Professor Theodore Drange of West Virginia University has launched a twofold attack on traditional views of the existence of God. In a seminal article reproduced on the Secular Web's site entitled "Arguments from Evil and Nonbelief," Dr. Drange mounts a case against classic theism predicating its notion of an omnibenevolent God. His shorter articles have been subsequently maturated in his book, Nonbelief and Evil: Two Arguments for the Nonexistence of God. Although I find Drange's approach to be erudite, I believe that his argument is dubious. This article explores the Argument from Evil as presented by Dr. Drange and suggests that the conclusion that God does not exist is not warranted.
Reply to Guthrie (2003) by Theodore Drange
Theodore Drange responds to Guthrie's critique. Drange finds Guthrie's essay "unclear," and contends that Guthrie "erred in many ways," including "misstating my views in many ways (and continuing such misstatements even in his concluding paragraph), ... in trying to argue that God (were he to exist) is unable to reduce human suffering, and ... in his attempt to formulate a divine desire that conflicts with God's desire to reduce human suffering."
The Argument from Nonbelief : A Rejoinder (2003) by Paul Pardi
In Nonbelief and Evil, Theodore Drange presents what he calls the Argument from Nonbelief against the existence of God: the fact that not all people believe the gospel message before they die provides grounds for denying that the Christian God exists. Pardi contends, however, that there are good reasons to deny that this inference goes through; he argues that given the nature of free persons, it is not within the set of logically possible states of affairs that God is able to actualize. Further, Pardi contends that Drange has an inadequate understanding of religious belief that should be rejected and replaced with a more robust formulation.
A Rebuttal to Pardi's Criticism of ANB (2004) by Philip Kuchar
"I argue that Pardi's criticisms of Drange's version of the argument from nonbelief (ANB) do not refute ANB, although they may or may not require peripheral corrections or clarifications on Drange's part. I focus not so much on Drange's formulation, but on what I take to be the central intuitions of ANB and on the inadequacy of Pardi's objections. I assume some familiarity with Pardi's paper and with ANB, although I present what I consider to be ANB's central claims."
(1995) Jim Perry Related documents: Was Jesus Mad, Bad, or God? … Or Merely Mistaken? (2004) by Daniel Howard-Snyder (Off Site) (PDF) A critique of the trilemma argument by a Christian philosopher. The Trilemma on Trial (Off Site) by James Patrick Holding Holding’s rebuttal to this essay. (Strangely, Holding does not provide a link to this […]
The Horner-Till Debate Did Jesus Rise Bodily From the Dead? (1995) Michael Horner and Farrell Till About This Transcript Synopsis of Horner’s Position (from the debate program) Synopsis of Till’s Position (from the debate program) Introductory Remarks (Jeff Lowder, Debate Organizer) Introductory Remarks (Lee Moriwaki, Debate Moderator) Mr. Horner’s Opening Arguments [25 min], Cross-Examination by […]
Here is the story of my intellectual development, and the consequences which followed. I apologize for the length, but I think all of the information is important to the story. I also apologize for the informal style, as much of the stuff here is very emotional to me and nobody besides myself proofread it before I submitted it.
Make life better, in spite of the craziness.
Crackpot militias: guns against "the Antichrist."
Planet positions don't dictate people's lives.
Index of pages in the Craig-Washington Debate: Does God Exist?
This is a transcript of a debate on the existence of God, between Dr. William Lane Craig and Dr. Corey Washington, which took place on 9 February 1995 at the University of Washington, before an audience well over 1500 people.
I want to say a couple things about atheism and about the kind of evidence that I think one has to give in support of that, or theism. Tonight I'm going to be defending atheism, the view that God doesn't exist. I'm going to try to give you good reasonable, rational arguments for atheism. At the same time, I'm going to give you what I take to be good, solid arguments against the thesis that God exists.
I want to at least refer to the arguments I gave against God's existence.
I want to address at least a couple of Dr. Craig's objections.
Let’s run through some of the claims that Dr. Craig made.
A Close Look at Dr. Hovind’s List of Young-Earth Arguments and Other Claims (1995) Dave E. Matson Specific Young-Earth Arguments Carbon-14 and Radiometric Dating The Geologic Column Some Additional Topics Examined Miscellaneous Topics Bibliography
As death nears, heaven fantasies are self-deception.
Once again, supernaturalism produces mass deaths.
Cultists plant nerve gas to kill subway passengers.
A popular response to the problem of evil contends that there is a necessary connection between free will and the existence of moral (or human-caused) evil. Alvin Plantinga, for instance, has advanced a concept of "transworld depravity"--essentially the idea that in any possible world where a given person has substantial free will, that person will necessarily commit at least one immoral act. In criticizing Plantinga's notion of transworld depravity, Clement Dore offers an alternative solution. But Weisberger argues that Dore's solution also fails because the existence of free will in no way necessitates either the human capacity to act wrongly or the excessive amount of moral evil we actually find in the world. Weisberger concludes that the free will defense utterly fails to undermine the argument from evil.
It stemmed from a famous doomsday fiasco.
Holy-rollers and holy hucksters.
Women stoned, Ulster bombed, as faith goes bonkers.
A fundamentalist uprising against "godless" textbooks.
