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Simplicity and Theology1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 October 2008

Don Fawkes  and
Tom Smythe
Don Fawkes
Affiliation:
Fayetville State UniversityNewbold StationFayetvilleNorth Carolina 28301-4298
Tom Smythe
Affiliation:
Fayetville State UniversityNewbold StationFayetvilleNorth Carolina 28301-4298
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Abstract

Richard Swinburne has given a defense of arguments for the existence of God (and in particular of teleological arguments) in his book The Existence of God (1979/1991). This paper argues that such theistic arguments fail, and poses some general problems for theistic arguments. Swinburne's use of a principle of simplicity is not given adequate justification and, if justified, works against theism. There are adequate rebuttals to Swinburne's arguments that depend upon there being few particles of basic physics, universal laws of nature, cogent cosmological argument, and temporal order in the universe. Theistic arguments falter on malleability, on going well beyond evidence, on anthropomorphism, on treating consistency as if it were evidence or explanation, on selective and inconsistent use of principles, and on a lack of any serious attempt to disprove hypotheses. All of this serves to support the conclusion suggested by Hume's posthumous theological writings that theistic arguments are so malleable, profligate, overreaching, equivocal, anthropomorphic, selective, inconsistent, and uncritical as to be inept.

Type
Research Article
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 32 , Issue 2 , June 1996 , pp. 259 - 270
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1996

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