[ Author Index | Subject Index ]
The Modern Library contains material written during or after 1970, which tends to be more scholarly than Kiosk material.
Addendum B: Are the Odds Against the Origin of Life Too Great to Accept?
Bad Science, Worse Philosophy: the Quackery and Logic-Chopping of David Foster’s The Philosophical Scientists (2000) Richard Carrier The following material examines arguments officially and formally refuted in Richard Carrier, “The Argument from Biogenesis: Probabilities against a Natural Origin of Life,” Biology & Philosophy 19.5 (November, 2004), pp. 739-64. Note the clarification added to Addendum C […]
Richard Carrier Carrier Wanchick Carrier2
Carrier’s First Rebuttal (2006) Wanchick’s Case Is Insufficient I don’t have room to rebut every false or dubious claim Wanchick makes in his opening statement, so I will focus only on essentials. Leibnizian Cosmological Argument (LCA) Wanchick proposes that (i) “the universe does not exist necessarily,” so (ii) it must have an “external cause,” […]
Richard Carrier Foster10
Bad Science, Worse Philosophy: the Quackery and Logic-Chopping of David Foster’s The Philosophical Scientists (2000) 10. Foster’s Biggest Blunder Richard Carrier I have refuted Foster’s first argument, his claim that life is too improbable to have evolved through natural selection. But about half of Foster’s book is concerned with establishing or drawing conclusions […]
Review of The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark
Review of The Homeric Epics and the Gospel of Mark (by Dennis R. MacDonald; Yale University, 2000) By Richard Carrier An Incredible Book This is an incredible book that must be read by everyone with an interest in Christianity. MacDonald’s shocking thesis is that the Gospel of Mark is a deliberate and conscious anti-epic, an […]
Richard Carrier Improbable New
Was Christianity Too Improbable to be False? (2006) [See Introduction] Richard Carrier 4. Was the New Always Bad? James Holding argues next that for the Romans, “Old was good. Innovation was bad,” and “this was a big sticking point for Christianity, because it could only trace its roots back to a recent founder.” […]
Richard Carrier Musoniusreply
Was Musonius Better than Jesus? (2006) Richard Carrier In “Two Ancient Teachers, Two Bad Analogies” and “The Real Jesus: A Brief Portrait,” Amy Sayers responds to my essay “On Musonius Rufus: A Brief Essay” (1999), but she reads far too much into what I say there, and essentially argues against positions I never affirmed. […]
Richard Carrier Resurrection 2b
This file has been relocated: it is now Section II of Probability of Survival vs. Miracle: Assessing the Odds.
Richard Carrier Resurrection 3f
This file has been relocated: it is now Section VI of General Case for Spiritual Resurrection: Evidence Against Resurrection of the Flesh.
Richard Carrier Rnap
Research Notes and Protocols (Bibliography of Skepticism in the Ancient World) (1998) Richard Carrier (copyright 1999) What I Have Done In compiling my bibliography, I employed the following resources, which are mainly (though not exclusively) electronic databases: The Database of Classical Bibliography (and the ensuing issues of L’Année Philologique), The Guide to Historical Literature, […]
Richard Gale Swinburne Argument
Swinburne’s Argument from Religious Experience (1994) Richard Gale The following article was originally published in Reason and the Christian Religion, ed. by Alan Padgett (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994). I have long admired Richard Swinburne’s work, not only for the way it has raised the level of discussion in the philosophy of religion by […]
Robby Berry Lioaca
Life In Our Anti-Christian America Robby Berry Prologue During a recent exchange of flames and frivolity on a local Usenet group, a newsgroup available only to students of Ohio State University, somebody made the observation that America was an “anti-Christian” society. As an Atheist, I am well aware of the extent to which religion, […]
Robert Price Beyond Born Again Chap7
________________________________________ 89 Beyond Born Again Section II– The Evangelical Apologists: Are They Reliable? Chapter 7: A False Trilemma Once Evangelical apologists feel they have practically proven the resurrection, they attempt to get all the mileage out of it they can. The resurrection itself must be defended anyway. But wouldn’t it be helpful to be able […]
Robert Price Price Rankin Dialogue
Dialogue JOHN: Well Bob, thank you very much. This is delightful. I’d like to ask you one question. At the beginning, are we coming through? OK? At the beginning, you talked about mythological archetypes and you talked about all the stories of Jesus and the supernatural and whatnot. I want to ask you a […]
Taner Edis Review Of Martin
Can Secular Philosophy Give Us Objective Morality? (2003) A review of Michael Martin’s Atheism, Morality, and Meaning (Amherst, NY: Prometheus, 2002) Taner Edis Philosophers have a way of going on quests to find reasons for what already seems intuitively obvious. Especially if religion is involved–it is hard to see anyone believing in, say, God, […]
Testimonials Walker
Confessions of an Australian Atheist Kim Walker During the Sydney Olympics, Australian slang became the focus of many a newspaper article. So perhaps you may have already come across the word wowser. Wowser is one of those old fashioned words that nobody really uses anymore, but its existence still speaks volumes about Australian society. So […]
Theism Christianity Christian Worldview
Christian Worldview Beyond Born Again: Toward Evangelical Maturity (1993) [ Index ] by Robert M. Price Critical Review of Is God a Moral Monster? (2017) by Craig Vander Hart In Is God a Moral Monster? Making Sense of the Old Testament God, Paul Copan attempts a bold apologetic of the Judeo-Christian God’s moral status. The so-called new […]
Theism Cosmo Links
Cosmological Arguments: Related Links Atheistic Cosmological Argument [Index] From the II Modern Library. Craig, William Lane [ Index ] An index of articles confronting the arguments of the well-known Christian apologist. Evolution and Chance FAQ (Off Site) “Two matters that critics of evolutionary theory can be relied upon to misunderstand are the notions of chance […]
Theism Miracles
Argument from Miracles The occurrence of miracles is frequently purported to be evidence of the supernatural, and therefore of the existence of a God. In addition to the articles below, see also related Debates, Reviews, and Links. To purchase related reading, go to the Secular Web Book Store. Resurrection [ Index ] Selected articles on the […]
Tim Thompson Brown
On Walter Brown & Plate Tectonics (1997) Tim Thompson Related WWW Resources A Beginner’s Guide to Plate Tectonics from Rasumssen College The ABC’s of Plate Tectonics by Donald L. Blanchard Plate Tectonics, The Cause of Earthquakes from the University of Nevada, Reno, Seismological Laboratory Structural Geology and Tectonics Division of the Geological Society of […]
Tyler Wunder Davis 5
When Theories Collide The proponents of Mythicism and Core Facts are aware of one another: both Martin and Wells have criticized Habermas (see Martin, pp.65-67, 87-97; Wells 1989, pp.22-23, 46-52); Habermas has also attacked both Wells and Martin on the matter of Jesus’ historicity (1996, pp.27-46)(32) and addressed Martin separately on the matter of […]
William Young Evangelicalagnosticism
Evangelical Agnosticism (1985) William Henry Young The Summer 1981 FREE INQUIRY contained the article “What is Agnosticism?” by H. J. Blackham. It dealt primarily with intimations of agnosticism among skeptical philosophers before 1869, when Thomas Henry Huxley invented the term as a label for his personal approach to religious and philosophical questions. This article will […]
Were Humans Intelligently Designed?
Were Humans Intelligently Designed? Science Says No! by Bill Schultz Table of Contents Introduction Why You Can’t Exactly Copy Christy Brinkley Electronic Chips: Design vs. Evolution The Human Genome Is A Mess Correlating Evolutionary and Geological History My Conclusion: Science Denies “Intelligent” Design Further Reading Acknowledgements Footnotes Introduction As an officer of the Internet Infidels, […]
Brian Pietruszewski Gish
Some Questions for Duane Gish (1998) Brian Pietruszewski [Note: The following questions were written in preparation for a visit by Duane Gish to Rice University. They are meant to be confrontational and asked face-to-face with Gish.] 1. Why does your web page tout “research” that attempts to dispute potassium argon (K-Ar) dating at Mt. […]
Church State Flag
Flag Desecration Amendment Although the issue of flag desecration is normally thought of as a free speech topic, it is also a church-state separation topic. Proposals to outlaw desecration of the U.S. flag may reasonably be viewed as blasphemy laws. Is the American flag a secular symbol or a sacred icon? (1998) by Edward Tabash […]
Dave Matson Young Earth Additional Topics Problems
A5. A Couple of Ice Age Problems Dr. Hovind believes that there was only one ice age which began sometime after Noah’s flood ended, that being around 4300 years ago by his reckoning. Thus, the world moved from a warm, tropical climate to an ice age only a few thousand years ago. There are […]
Dave Matson Young Earth Geologic Column Out Of Place
Hovind (G4): Polystrata fossils, missing layers, layers out of order, misplaced fossils, and layers in reverse order all invalidate the geologic column. G4. None of these charges amount to a hill of discarded beans. We can’t examine every claim that has been made, but we can look at a few examples. a) Polystrata fossils. By […]
Dave Matson Young Earth Specific Arguments Moon Isotopes
Young-earth "proof" #6: The Moon contains considerable quantities of U-236 and Th-230, both of which are shortlived isotopes that would have expired long ago if the Moon were 4.5 billion years old. Thorium-230 is an intermediate decay product of uranium-238 which has a half-life of about 4.468 billion years (Strahler, 1987, p.131). Thus, it will […]
Dave Matson Young Earth Specific Arguments Topsoil
Young-earth "proof" #16: Topsoil takes only a few thousand years to form. The present thickness of topsoil indicates a young earth. 16. Those "scientific" creationists who trot this plum about must be delirious! Do they really believe that we should wind up with x miles of topsoil (or some such nonsense) after billions of years? […]
Debates Secularist Abortion
First Rebuttal Jennifer Roth In his opening statement, Mr. Carrier identified two sources of disagreement on moral issues: disputes over facts, and disputes over values. I agree with his assessment; however, some disputes do not lend themselves to easy categorization. Take, for example, the question of when a human individual comes into existence. The answer […]
Debates Secularist Euthanasia Debators
Meet the Debators The topic for this debate is: Is There a Rationalist Case Against Euthanasia? Arguing For A Rationalist Case Against Euthanasia is Joseph Eiche Brief Bio Coming! Arguing Against A Rationalist Case Against Euthanasia is Jim Bruce Brief Bio Coming! Go to the Debate Forum for lively discussion on the issue of Euthansia […]