Ontology of Theistic Beliefs


Book Description

This volume aims to apply ontological theories and arguments to theistic beliefs and theistic world views. After an introduction that traces out the complexity of the field by categorizing the multifaceted definitions of ontology and (theistic) believing, thirteen articles discuss specific aspects of the two terms as well as their interaction. With contributions by Chris Daly, Gabriele De Anna, Michał Głowala, Christian Kanzian, Daniel Linford, Jason Megill, Uwe Meixner, Elisa Paganini, Eleonore Stump, Mirosław Szatkowski, William F. Vallicella and Peter van Inwagen.




The Errors of Atheism


Book Description

The Errors of Atheism is a response to the glaring gap that exists in analytical philosophy on the concept of God. While there is the large body of work that either defends or challenges orthodox Christian theistic arguments, there is a lack of analytical philosophical work articulating agnosticism as a critique of both theism and atheism. J. Angelo Corlett shows that the conceptual depths of theism must be explored beyond orthodoxy in order to re-open the debate on the problem of God. His book is an agnostic's statement on the current state of the debate about God's existence and where the discussion must go to make genuine philosophical progress instead of remaining in a dialectical stalemate.




The Axiology of Theism


Book Description

Theism is the view that God exists; naturalism is the view that there are no supernatural beings, processes, mechanisms, or forces. This Element explores whether things are better, worse, or neither on theism relative to naturalism. It introduces readers to the central philosophical issues that bear on this question, and it distinguishes a wide range of ways it can be answered. It critically examines four views, three of which hold (in various ways) that things are better on theism than on naturalism, and one of which holds just the opposite.




The Ontological Argument


Book Description




Ontological Proofs Today


Book Description

The book Ontological Proofs Today, apart from the introduction, consists of six parts. Part II comprises papers each of which pertains either to historical ontological arguments, or to some other, rather new, ontological arguments, but what makes them stand out from the other papers in this volume, is the fact that they all treat of the omniscience or the omnipotence of God. Part III includes papers which introduce new ontological arguments for the existence of God, without referring to omniscience and omnipotence as the transparent attributes of God. The issue of the type of necessity with which ontological proofs work or may work is raised in the articles of Part IV. In Part V the semantics for some ontological proofs are defined. Part VI consists of papers which, although quite different from each other in terms of content, all explore some ontological issues, and formal ontology may be considered the link between them. Part VII comprises two articles, by R. E. Maydole and G. Oppy, mutually controversial and different in their assessment of some ontological proofs.




Metametaphysics


Book Description

Metaphysics asks questions about existence: for example, do numbers really exist? Metametaphysics asksquestions about metaphysics: for example, do its questions have determinate answers? If so, are these answers deep and important, or are they merely a matter of how we use words? What is the proper methodology for their resolution? These questions have received a heightened degree of attention lately with new varieties of ontological deflationism and pluralism challenging the kind of realism that has become orthodoxy in contemporary analytic metaphysics.This volume concerns the status and ambitions of metaphysics as a discipline. It brings together many of the central figures in the debate with their most recent work on the semantics, epistemology, and methodology of metaphysics.




Speculative Grace


Book Description

This book offers a novel account of grace framed in terms of Bruno Latour’s “principle of irreduction.” It thus models an object-oriented approach to grace, experimentally moving a traditional Christian understanding of grace out of a top-down, theistic ontology and into an agent-based, object-oriented ontology. In the process, it also provides a systematic and original account of Latour’s overall project. The account of grace offered here redistributes the tasks assigned to science and religion. Where now the work of science is to bring into focus objects that are too distant, too resistant, and too transcendent to be visible, the business of religion is to bring into focus objects that are too near, too available, and too immanent to be visible. Where science reveals transcendent objects by correcting for our nearsightedness, religion reveals immanent objects by correcting for our farsightedness. Speculative Grace remaps the meaning of grace and examines the kinds of religious instruments and practices that, as a result, take center stage.




A Moral Ontology for a Theistic Ethic


Book Description

This title was first published in 2003. This book develops a moral ontology for a theistic ethic that engages the work of contemporary moral and political philosophers, and reaffirms the relevance of a theistic tradition of God's relation to the world reflected in the fundamental teachings of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Drawing on recent thought in the non-religious fields of psychology and political and moral philosophy, which build around the concept of human flourishing in community, Kirkpatrick argues that a theistic ethic need not be the captive of parochial or sectarian theological camps. He proposes a common or universal ethic that transcends the fashionable ethnocentric 'incommensurate differences' in morality alleged by many post-modern deconstructionists. In the wake of ethnic religious strife post September 11th 2001, this book argues for a common morality built on the inclusivity of love, community, and justice that can transcend sectarian and parochial boundaries.




Nietzsche's Philosophy of Religion


Book Description

In his first book, The Birth of Tragedy, Nietzsche observes that Greek tragedy gathered people together as a community in the sight of their gods, and argues that modernity can be rescued from 'nihilism' only through the revival of such a festival. This is commonly thought to be a view which did not survive the termination of Nietzsche's early Wagnerianism, but Julian Young argues, on the basis of an examination of all of Nietzsche's published works, that his religious communitarianism in fact persists through all his writings. What follows, it is argued, is that the mature Nietzsche is neither an 'atheist', an 'individualist', nor an 'immoralist': he is a German philosopher belonging to a German tradition of conservative communitarianism - though to claim him as a proto-Nazi is radically mistaken. This important reassessment will be of interest to all Nietzsche scholars and to a wide range of readers in German philosophy.




Heidegger and Theology


Book Description

Martin Heidegger is the 20th century theology philosopher with the greatest importance to theology. A cradle Catholic originally intended for the priesthood, Heidegger's studies in philosophy led him to turn first to Protestantism and then to an atheistic philosophical method. Nevertheless, his writings remained deeply indebted to theological themes and sources, and the question of the nature of his relationship with theology has been a subject of discussion ever since. This book offers theologians and philosophers alike a clear account of the directions and the potential of this debate. It explains Heidegger's key ideas, describes their development and analyses the role of theology in his major writings, including his lectures during the National Socialist era. It reviews the reception of Heidegger's thought both by theologians in his own day (particularly in Barth and his school as well as neo-Scholasticism) and more recently (particularly in French phenomenology), and concludes by offering directions for theology's possible future engagement with Heidegger's work.