[ Author Index | Subject Index ]
The Modern Library contains material written during or after 1970, which tends to be more scholarly than Kiosk material.
Quentin Smith Universe
Internal and External Causal Explanations of the Universe (1995) Quentin Smith The following article was originally published in PHILOSOPHICAL STUDIES in 1995 (Volume 79, pp. 283-310). PART ONE: THE FORMULATION OF THE CONTROVERSY I A certain controversy about explaining all contingent beings erupted in the 18th century and has continued up to the present […]
Reason Agnosticism Agnostic
The Origin of the Word Agnostic Bill Young There is little doubt that Thomas Henry Huxley invented the word agnostic in the Spring of 1869. However, there is conflicting evidence about when this was and what it originally meant. According to R. H. Hutton, as published in the New English Dictionary, Huxley first used the […]
Richard Carrier Bigbangredux
I Was a Big Bang Skeptic (2002) Richard Carrier The ultimate resource has now become available online surveying all the evidence supporting the Big Bang theory, compiled by professional cosmologists: Evidence for the Big Bang (2006), by Bjürn Feuerbacher and Ryan Scranton, in the Talk.Origins Archive. For readers interested in why we should believe the […]
Richard Carrier Carrier Wanchick Bios
Who We Are (2006) Welcome to Naturalism vs. Theism: The Carrier-Wanchick Debate. Here Richard and Tom explain who they are. Richard Carrier: Richard Carrier is a published historian and philosopher, with a several degrees in intellectual history, including an M.Phil. from Columbia University, where he is currently working on his doctorate in ancient science. […]
Richard Carrier Foster0
Bad Science, Worse Philosophy: the Quackery and Logic-Chopping of David Foster’s The Philosophical Scientists (2000) Richard Carrier Originally published in 1998 and revised in 2000. T A B L E of C O N T E N T S: Who is David Foster? Some of Foster’s Strange Notions Exercises in Self-Refutation Why Foster Needs […]
Richard Carrier Improbable Luck
Was Christianity Too Improbable to be False? (2006) [See Introduction] Richard Carrier 18. How Successful Was Christianity? 18.1 Assumptions 18.2 Numbers: What the Christians Say 18.3 Numbers: What the Experts Say 18.4 With Whom Did Christianity Begin? 18.5 The Rise of World Christianity 18.6 Conclusion 18.1. Assumptions In previous chapters, we have sufficiently demonstrated that there was nothing […]
Richard Carrier Indef 4b
Geivett’s Exercise in Hyperbole (1999, 2005) Richard Carrier [Part 4B of a larger Review of In Defense of Miracles.] Going Too Far Douglas Geivett’s basic conclusion that it is possible to use miracles as evidence for the existence of God is formally correct (as is his reversed version of the argument, which I […]
Richard Carrier Moreland Naturalism
The Carrier Theory of Value and the Ethical Adequacy of Metaphysical Naturalism(2001) Richard Carrier In the May/June, 1996 issue of Promise, J.P. Moreland publisheda paper called “TheEthical Inadequacy of Naturalism” (pp. 36-39). In it he repeated anumber of fallacies and falsehoods about Secular Humanism that must berefuted, and in the process I will […]
Richard Carrier Resurrection 2
Why I Don’t Buy the Resurrection Story (6th ed., 2006) Richard Carrier Probability of Survival vs. Miracle: Assessing the Odds After years of study as an historian, I now believe that Jesus simply died, and the rest was invented, consciously or not, by his disciples, as a means to carry on his teaching […]
Richard Carrier Resurrection 3d
This file has been relocated: it is now Section IV of General Case for Spiritual Resurrection: Evidence Against Resurrection of the Flesh.
Why I Don’t Buy the Resurrection Story
Why I Don’t Buy the Resurrection Story (6th ed., 2006) Richard Carrier Main Argument What follows is a half-hour lecture I have given on several public occasions, first at Yale on 26 October 2000 at the request of the Yale College Humanists and Secularists. It was followed by a Q & A session of nearly two hours. […]
Richard Gale Atheism And Theism
Review of ‘Atheism and Theism’ (1999) Alexander Pruss and Richard Gale The following article is a review of the “great debate” by J.J.C. Smart and J.J. Haldane. The original debate was published by Blackwell Publishers in 1996. This review will be published in FAITH AND PHILOSOPHY in January 1999. The participants in […]
Rob Sarver Chap11
Rebuttal to ETDAV, Chapter 11 Rob Sarver Opening Remarks
Robert Price Beyond Born Again Chap5
________________________________________ 62 Beyond Born Again Section II– The Evangelical Apologists: Are They Reliable? Chapter 5: Evidences That Demands A Mistrial “My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest of man’s wisdom, but on God’s power.” — […]
Robert Price Price Rankin
Jesus: Fact or Fiction? A Dialogue With Dr. Robert Price and Rev. John Rankin This debate was transcribed by Pieter Crow. About this Debate Opening Statement by Robert Price Opening Statement by John Rankin Dialogue Questions from the Audience Closing Statement by Robert M. Price Closing Statement by John Rankin
Science
Science and Religion Creationism Physics Another Case Not Made: A Critique of Lee Strobel’s The Case for a Creator (2005) by Paul Doland In this chapter-by-chapter critique of Lee Strobel’s The Case for a Creator, Paul Doland comments on the general direction of the book before analyzing Strobel’s interviews with his various experts on specific […]
Testimonials Tallberg
… "And It Came To Pass"… Eric Tallberg As a somewhat recent convert to the secularist point of view, I feel I ought to say a few words (well, maybe a lot more than "a few") regarding how I came to a state resulting in my occasional and often misunderstood diatribes, both written and oral, […]
Theism Christianity Apologetics
Christian Apologetics and Apologists, Criticisms of Apologetics in General Lynn Anderson Greg Bahnsen W. David Beck Francis Beckwith Michael Behe E. Calvin Beisner Walter L. Bradley David Clark Paul Copan Winfried Corduan William Lane Craig Stephen T. Davis William Dembski Phil Fernandes Norman L. Geisler R. Douglas Geivett Duane Gish Gary Habermas Hank Hanegraaff J. […]
Theism Christianity Swinburne
Richard Swinburne An Analysis of Richard Swinburne’s The Existence of God (2010) by Gabe Czobel On first appearance, Richard Swinburne’s The Existence of God offers a highly structured, coherent, and rigorous argument for God’s existence grounded in Bayes’ theorem, inductive reasoning, confirmation theory, the intrinsic probability of simple hypotheses, substance dualism, and moral realism. But […]
Theism Judaism Judaism
Judaism and Jewish Apologetics Guido G.B. Deimel “Those who wish to seek out the causes of miracles, and to understand the things of nature as philosophers, and not stare at them in astonishment like fools, are soon considered heretical and impious and proclaimed as such by those whom the mob adore as the interpreters of […]
Theism Transcendental
Transcendental Argument It is impossible, this argument claims, for any authoritative rationality (including an atheist’s) to emerge from inchoate matter — the existence of God must be assumed, therefore, in order to deny God’s existence. In addition to the articles below, see also related Debates, Reviews, and Links. To purchase related reading, go to the […]
Thomas Sheehan Firstcoming Three
The First Coming: How the Kingdom of God Became Christianity (1986–electronic edition 2000) Thomas Sheehan III How Jesus Became God The first mention of Jesus anywhere in literature was made twenty years after he died, and is found in a text that records the already developed status of his reputation. Writing around 50 C.E., Saint […]
Tyler Wunder Davis 3
Naturalism’s Best Case: Christological Mythicism III. Naturalism’s Best Case: Christological Mythicism Recall that Davis characterized the naturalist’s most persuasive argumentative case as composed of the following claims: D1) the biblical testimony supporting the resurrection is unreliable, written years after the alleged event by unsophisticated, myth-prone people who were concerned with proclaiming statements of faith […]
Anachronist Why I Believe 89ab End
The Rest of the Book The remainder of this commentary will touch on a few issues in the remainder of the book. I had collected sufficient notes for a detailed review of each chapter, but these were lost when my computer died forever, before I finished with chapter 7 (though I have a few hand-scribbled […]
Bart Klink New Atheism
Review of God and the New Atheism (2009) Bart Klink Review: John F. Haught. 2007. God and the New Atheism: A Critical Response to Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press. 156 pp. The term “the new atheism” is used quite often lately to denote the current revival of popular atheism, especially […]
At the Intersection of “Metaphysical Naturalism” and “Intelligent Design”
At the Intersection of “Metaphysical Naturalism” and “Intelligent Design” by Bill Schultz Table of Contents Introduction God Is What We Define God To Be Dimensions Beyond Our Senses TANSTAAFL A Brief Romp Through Flatland Our Universe As Art Into The Extra-Dimensional Reality “Metaphysical Naturalism” and “Intelligent Design” Some Conclusions Further Reading Acknowledgements Footnotes Introduction I […]
Brian Holtz Naturalism
The Compatibility of Naturalism and Scientific Realism (2003) Brian Holtz In “The Incompatibility of Naturalism and Scientific Realism” (1998), the U.T. Austin philosopher Robert Koons argues that “Nature is comprehensible scientifically only if nature is not a causally closed system–only if nature is shaped by supernatural forces.” Koons’ fundamental mistake in his paper is […]
Church State Decisions
U.S. Supreme Court Decisions (arranged by date) Reynolds v. United States, 98 U.S. 145 (1879) Court finds that the federal antibigamy statute does not violate the First Amendment’s guarantee of the free exercise of religion. Everson v. Board of Education, 330 U.S. 1 (1947) Court finds that a New Jersey law which included students of […]
Dave Matson Young Earth Additional Topics Flood
A2. Water and Vapor and Noah’s Flood Attempting to supply the water for Noah’s flood is a much greater problem than one might realize. True, one can simply say that God did it and leave it at that. However, that argument will support the cosmological views of any and every religion, and they all […]
Dave Matson Young Earth Geologic Column Calibrate
Dr. Hovind (G1): The assumption that the geologic column is a base from which to calibrate the C-14 dates is not wise. G1. With a halflife of only 5730 years, carbon-14 dating has nothing to do with dating the geological ages! Whether by sloppiness or gross ignorance, Dr. Hovind is confusing the carbon-14 "clock" with […]