Talk:Is There a God?

Eval request from noticeboard

In your summaries, your chapter headings are all introductory statements so they all require a comma after them.

Under Chapter one This a departure from the standard Jewish, Christian or Islamic view. is not wholly accurate, so best remove or explain.

I think what you are referring to is a modern concept of God based on the Deistic view which only came into fashion after the Reformation period.

The Islamic view is discussed here [1] on pages 495-496. It includes a short mention of the Muslim theologian Avicenna who "has been understood by some to have placed future mundane events outside the sphere of God's knowledge" as one of three views of omniscience in Islam.

In this book Divine Omniscience and Omnipotence in Medieval Philosophy: Islamic, Jewish and Christian Perspectives [2] on page viii and a discussion of chapter 7, the author explains that Jewish commentator Gersonides argued that God did not know the outcome of the binding of Isaac until Abraham made his choice.

Chapter 2 of the same book says the Christian Boethius explains all contingency in terms of free choice.

Swinburne's view is not new; it is more of a return to the older pre-enlightenment view of God than it is an innovation. You can't say that - unless you find it somewhere in a RS - because that is an Or observation on my part, so it's probably best just to remove the claim altogether.

According to theism, God is responsible for the properties of inanimate things. Swinburne posits that there are moral truths independent of God's will and sides with Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus. Better explain: sides with them how? On what?

This paragraph needs dividing along its thematic lines.

Chapter 2 Laws of nature are human summaries, not substances by themselves. Swinburne cites the quantitative explanation of the orbit and the position of the planet Jupiter, Newton's laws and Einstein's laws. I think this should be made into one sentence. It would be clearer.

Chapter 3 Materialism. All factors in personal explanation have a complete inanimate explanation. needs a liitle more explanation. Carefully define inanimate as not cognizant: not requiring an act of will by a thinking being. This Everything harks back to a first beginningless state. also needs more. Most readers will not have a clue what this means.

According to Swinburne, materialism fails to explain many phenomena You might find Philosophy of Mind by Edward Feser interesting as it provides multiple examples.

Chapter 4 Swinburne thinks it is extraordinary that there should exist anything at all. Not just Swinburne! "Why is there something?" Is considered the first most basic of all philosophical questions. Here is a blog, [3] which of course you can't use, but in which he does mention Heidegger: "Mythology, I believe, began with a recognition, a feeling suggested by Heidegger’s question, the weirdness of being, you could say. Why is anything here, and how strange that I am awake to perceive it. What is this?" Perhaps a mention of the perennial nature of this question - and Heidegger - would be appropriate here. Furthermore, Swinburne assumes that a world containing humans is a good thing. Why does he assume this? Does he say? Hmmm, could be that's based in Genesis. Or he just figures life is better than non-life. If he says why he thinks that, I would include it. According to Swinburne, the assumption of a God is far simpler than that of a multiverse, and explains the very success of science. Add a sentence - or three - explaining these two claims, please. It doesn't have to be complex, and don't get off into the weeds about the multiverse, but since there are in fact a limited number (2?) of viable explanations for existence as we know it, this deserves a little more depth imo.

Chapter 5 The explanation is beyond science, but Swinburne believes the immaterial substance God partly working through natural laws such as evolution can provide a probable explanation. Jeez, I'd like some idea of how. That's sort of like "and then a miracle occurs". Are there steps? Some description or definition?

Chapter 6 This is a little difficult for the average reader to follow I think. The Problem of evil here on WP has a pretty decent discussion of greater good theodicies. Does Swinburne mention any other theodicies?

Overall this is an excellent and interesting article that only needs a little beefing up here and there imo. So, a free peer review. Take it for what it's worth. Jenhawk777 (talk) 04:52, 18 August 2021 (UTC)