George Berkeley NATURE OF EXISTENCE In this reading, we come across an interesting discussion, which focuses on the nature of existence of things and persons. Here, the two friends Hylas and Philonous are trying to argue the true nature of existenc Continue Reading...
Doctrine of the Holy Trinity The Doctrine of the Trinity and Anti-Trinitarian Theologies: Servetus, Milton, Newton The Doctrine of the Trinity The Arian Heresy Anti-Trinitarianism Part I: Michael Servetus Anti-Trinitarianism Part II: John Milto Continue Reading...
Thus, Sam argues that although the world often seems unjust (and is filled with innumerable instances of evil), yet P. is solved through the belief that every condition (good, in this case) necessitates an equal and opposite condition (evil, as it Continue Reading...
Life and Death and Freud and Nietzsche What are the similarities between Plato's concept of life after death and the early Christian concept of life after death? How did later Christians combine these concepts? What is the evidence that Jesus came b Continue Reading...
Chemistry and Biology on Christian Mind The Effects Chemistry and Biology on Christian Mind Science and Christianity share a very conflicting relationship. There are different faces of this relationship and we can determine this relationship by us Continue Reading...
Even before one gets to Rowe's argument, however, one may disregard Hick's argument because it depends on imagining an infinite number of possibilities to explain away evil, rather than accounting for it. Instead of actually explaining how a benevo Continue Reading...
Scripture Argument Argument from Scripture: God's existence cannot be proven by the presence of the concept of God within the text of the Holy Scriptures Does God exist? Some would argue that this is the most fundamental question posed by any relig Continue Reading...
Atheist In "On Being an Atheist," H.J. McCloskey discusses what it means to him to be an atheist. In doing so, he criticizes the classical argument in favor of God's existence. This is not a new criticism, as people have been arguing about whether Continue Reading...
Darwinism has had a major effect on how people view the creation accounts of Genesis, believing the creation tales to be completely erroneous and based on nothing but myth and myth alone. Darwinism has planted the seed of the idea that humans are me Continue Reading...
Faith and Reason Irreconcilable Irreconcilable Faith and Reason The challenge of reconciling reason to faith has been one that has dominated philosophy since thinking and oration became known as philosophy. The challenge is to address the idea that Continue Reading...
"On the fact that the Christian religion is not the only religion. -- So far is this from being a reason for believing that it is not the true one that, on the contrary, it makes us see that it is so. Men must be sincere in all religions; true heath Continue Reading...
Philosophy In his discourse, The Republic, Plato describes the "ideal state" as composed of three social classes: the merchant class, military class, and philosopher-kings. The merchant class maintains and provides service to the society by safeguar Continue Reading...
In society today, we are bombarded with messages that suggest that our morality is driven by anything but the Bible. Indeed, turn on the television and images which are antithetical to Christ's word are everywhere, open the pages of a textbook and y Continue Reading...
James believed that belief in God could be contemplated in terms of "live and dead hypotheses" (James 2010). He argues that when one is trying to find an argument for God existing or God not existing, we must consider three things: 1) Living or dea Continue Reading...
Following Aquinas's argumentation, we will reasonably ask ourselves, at a certain point, what the cause of what was considered to be the First Cause is. However, with the temporal cause, we may not assume an extra cause, because there will have been Continue Reading...
Descartes Discourse IV For centuries, humans have wondered about certain basic paradigms of the universe -- how do we know what we know? Is there truth? Is there a God? How can we prove that? While we know that this basic question has been debated f Continue Reading...
d.). By our very nature of being able to ask questions, we refocus on our ability to image a creator who gave us the power to self-actualize. Since we know that we can think, posit, and live, if not through our physical means, then through what we w Continue Reading...
Yes, of course. But Hick too is making an important initial assumption here: He is assuming that a test of human goodness is a necessary part of the universe. But this is only the case if one assumes the presence of a certain type of God -- one that Continue Reading...
Philosophy (general) In sections 37 thru 45 of the Monadology Leibniz offers three different proofs of the existence of God. Explore the way in which each of these proofs is derived from the 'two great principles' introduced immediately before. The Continue Reading...
Theological position of Dwight N. Hopkins The biblical presentation of human existence and its origin and our own experience of human life in this world are to accept the fact that Adam and Eve were real persons and they are the descents of all huma Continue Reading...
" On the doctrine of the eternality of God, Aquinas concludes that God is in everything, and that he is in everything because existence is present in all things. From this point-of-view, Aquinas' account of the doctrine of divine omnipresence reveals Continue Reading...
Medieval Christian World-View of St. Thomas Aquinas M]an is directed to God, as to an end that surpasses the grasp of his reason... Whereas man's whole salvation, which is in God, depends upon the knowledge of this truth. Therefore, in order that th Continue Reading...
Spinoza defines "substance" as "what is in itself and is conceived through itself, i.e. that whose concept doesn't have to be formed out of the concept of something else." He defines "attribute" as "what the intellect perceives of a substance as con Continue Reading...
However, unlike the madman, the mystic is forced to reconcile a lifetime of perceiving life as an individual with the idea of being a messenger for divinity. Finally, mystics and madness are alike in that they are perceived as being irrational, in Continue Reading...
Also, men oppose her for reasons of jealousy, he stresses, not because they really think that she is acting in an anti-Christian manner. Thus while Socrates Scholasticus himself never even entertained any point-of-view remotely considered heretic, i Continue Reading...
As such, it is clear that my own personal belief in God shapes the way I view and experience the world, as well as my decisions in how to act within it. There are both theistic and naturalistic consequences to the act of believing or not believing. Continue Reading...
Once again, the theist can simply point out that human knowledge -- either our own, or in the collective sense -- is not only incomplete but not even necessarily close to complete. Furthermore, inference from incomplete evidence is dangerous; before Continue Reading...
Ideals of Fantasy and Reality According to Descarte and Hume This paper considers what is real and what is fantasy by understanding the ideals of philosophers such as Descarte and Hume. Bibliography cites seven sources. The reality of croquet and t Continue Reading...
In the city of Medina, Muhammad united the warring tribes. Following eight years of fighting Mecca tribes the Muslims conquered Mecca. In the year 632, after returning to Medina from a farewell pilgrimage to Mecca, Muhammad became ill and died. At t Continue Reading...
Life After Death Introduction classical point of departure in defining Death seems to be Life itself. Death is perceived either as a cessation of Life - or as a "transit area," on the way to a continuation of Life by other means. While the former pr Continue Reading...
Faith: Philosophy Paul Tillich Paul Tillich was one of the most famous theologians of the 20th century. He represented the 20th century movement called neo-orthodoxy. Most of Tillich's work is represented in a series of transcribed lectures. Tillic Continue Reading...
Atheist- Review IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF Article Critique "On Being an Atheist" by H.McCloskey Belief in the spiritual or supernatural is almost always expressed by the individual within such a religious belief system. And there are huge nu Continue Reading...
Mind-Based Identity: A Problem Impossible to Ignore One of the most basic questions of human existence is essentially "What am I?" Although humans have known in varying degrees throughout recorded history that they are biological beings, there has Continue Reading...
Hume and the Lack of a Causal Link Between Our Known Experiences and the Existence of a Supreme Being The "here and now": That is what concerns David Hume. There is simply no value in discussing such amorphous intangibles as one can infer from "the Continue Reading...
Introduction For grasping religion and science’s scope, besides the connection existing between them, it is imperative to acquire, at a minimum, a general idea of what entails religion and science. In any case, the two concepts aren’t inv Continue Reading...
McCloskey responds to this by asking "might not God have very easily so have arranged the world and biased man to virtue that men always freely chose what is right?" But in that case, humans would not have genuine free will. And God is justified, Ev Continue Reading...
From this point-of-view, it is not god who creates man, but the human mind which has come up with this ingenious invention. Since people believe in this idea, then it might very well be stated that it is real and that the degree of reality of an obj Continue Reading...
Angelology, or the study of angels, has been a topic of human fascination since the dawn of time. There are several perspectives from which angels can be viewed. Many are skeptical about their existence, since they cannot be physically perceived with Continue Reading...
