scholarly journals The fine-tuning argument: the Bayesian version

2002 ◽  
Vol 38 (4) ◽  
pp. 375-404 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. C. BRADLEY

This paper considers the Bayesian form of the fine-tuning argument as advanced by Richard Swinburne. An expository section aims to identify the precise character of the argument, and three lines of objection are then advanced. The first of these holds that there is an inconsistency in Swinburne's procedure, the second that his argument has an unacceptable dependence on an objectivist theory of value, the third that his method is powerless to single out traditional theism from a vast number of competitors. In the final section of the paper the fine-tuning argument is considered, not now as self-standing, but as one of a number of theistic arguments taken together and applied in the manner of the final chapter of Swinburne's The Existence of God. It is argued that points already made also block the way for this line of thought.

Author(s):  
Stannard John E ◽  
Capper David

The aims of this book are to set out in detail the rules governing termination as a remedy for breach of contract in English law, to distil the very complex body of law on the subject to a clear set of principles, and to apply the law in a practical context. This book is divided into four parts. The first section sets out to analyse what is involved in termination and looks at some of the difficulties surrounding the topic, before going on to explain the evolution of the present law and its main principles. The second section provides a thorough analysis of the two key topics of breach and termination. The third section addresses the question when the right to terminate for breach arises. And the fourth and final section considers the consequences of the promisee's election whether to terminate or not. The final chapter examines the legal consequences of affirmation, once again both with regard to the promisee and the promisor, with particular emphasis on the extent of the promisee's right to enforce the performance of the contract by way of an action for an agreed sum or an action for specific performance.


Author(s):  
Alex Tissandier

This chapter looks in detail at the three main engagements with Leibniz in the main text of Deleuze’s Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza. The first concerns the role of real definitions and proofs of possibility in arguments for the existence of God. The second concerns the theory of adequation in a logic of ideas. The third concerns mechanism, force and essence in a theory of bodies. The chapter argues that these engagements all share the same form. First, Deleuze locates a similarity between Leibniz and Spinoza in their criticism of a particular Cartesian doctrine. Second, he grounds this criticism in a shared concern for the lack of a sufficient reason operating in Descartes’s philosophy. Third, he nominates expression as the concept best suited to address this lack and fulfil the requirements of sufficient reason. Finally, he shows that the way expression functions in Spinoza’s philosophy is each time superior to Leibniz’s own use of the concept. Despite the priority given to Spinoza in this text, it nevertheless contains our first introduction to various key Leibnizian concepts which will become increasingly important in Deleuze’s later philosophy.


2019 ◽  
pp. 53-73
Author(s):  
Martin Lin

This chapter offers reconstructions of Spinoza’s four arguments for the existence of God. Among the lessons learned from these reconstructions is that, although Spinoza’s first argument is often described as ontological, it relies on many substantive premises that go beyond the definition of God and it is not vulnerable to standard objections to ontological arguments. Additionally, the second argument introduces Spinoza’s Principle of Sufficient Reason, and seeing how Spinoza applies it to the existence of God sheds light on how he understands both the PSR and causation and explanation more generally. The chapter concludes by arguing that the third and fourth arguments pave the way for Spinoza’s claim that, besides God, no substance can be or be conceived and consideration of them shows why Spinoza’s argument for monism does not beg the question against the orthodox Cartesian.


2014 ◽  
Vol 111 (3) ◽  
pp. 244-258
Author(s):  
John M. DePoe

This article presents an overview of various formations of contemporary teleological arguments with a brief historical background. The fine-tuning argument and three of its most well-known objections are considered first. Next, the argument from design based on the origins of life is presented. The third teleological argument is based on the temporal order of the universe. The final section of the article considers and responds to well-known objections commonly raised against design arguments. The conclusion is that the contemporary versions of the teleological argument have a positive role to play in Christian apologetics despite some of their limitations.


2000 ◽  
Vol 45 ◽  
pp. 43-74 ◽  
Author(s):  
Malcolm Heath

Until the beginning of the nineteenth century the treatise On sublimity was universally attributed to the third-century critic, rhetorician and philosopher Cassius Longinus. Weiske's edition, first issued in 1809, marked a turning-point in the trend of scholarly opinion, and Longinus' claim to authorship is now generally rejected, often summarily. A variety of alternative attributions have been canvassed; most commonly the work is assigned to an anonymous author of the first century A.D. But a minority of scholars have resisted the consensus and defended Longinus' claim to authorship. This paper will argue that they were right to do so.To avoid ambiguity, I shall follow Russell in using the symbol ‘L’ as a non-committal way of designating the author of On sublimity; by ‘Longinus’ I shall always mean Cassius Longinus. So the question before us is whether L is Longinus. I begin by explaining why manuscript evidence (§2) and stylistic comparison with the fragments of Longinus (§3) fail to resolve the question. I then try to find a place for the composition of the treatise within Longinus' career (§4). This leads to a consideration of the final chapter, widely regarded as inconsistent with a third-century date; I shall argue that there is no inconsistency (§5). If so, the way lies open to a reassessment of the case in favour of Longinus' claim.


Te Kaharoa ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Cleave

This paper considers Indigenous groups and data. The paper begins with fifteen assorted questions which are addressed in various ways in the next two sections. The second section is a review of ‘Indigenous Data Sovereignty’ a collection by Kukutai and Taylor of 2016. This collection is seen as an excellent statement of the position of the Indigenous group regarding data and each chapter is reviewed in several paragraphs. Beginning with Kukutai and Taylor, the third and final section is a commentary on recent literature on data with reference to the Nation-state, Big Tech and Indigenous groups. This section considers a shifting situation involving machine learning and the hunting, gathering and farming of data. A reappraisal of the way data is used in the context of the Indigenous group, the Nation state and Big Tech is proposed. That reappraisal involves new considerations of identity in forms of ethnicity, nationalism and tribalism as well as the way Indigenous groups are defined by others and the ways in which they define themselves.


Author(s):  
Alasdair Cochrane

This introductory chapter prepares the ground for the theory that is sketched and defended in the rest of the book by systematically considering the need for it, its assumptions, and broad outline. The chapter is structured around four sections. The first section offers a brief statement of the kind of ‘sentientist politics’ that the book defends: namely, a ‘sentientist cosmopolitan democracy’. The second then provides an overview of the way in which this book’s theory of ‘sentientist politics’ differs from and contributes to existing literature in the area. The third section addresses the issue of ‘feasibility’, asking whether and to what extent it matters that the theory offered throughout the book is radically ambitious. The final section then offers a brief outline of the chapters to follow.


Author(s):  
Göran Sundström

This introduction presents four chapters that comprise a discussion of Swedish public administration. The first chapter discusses four characteristics which together form the backbone of what is often referred to as the Swedish administrative model. The second chapter is a study of Swedish administrative reform from the mid-1970s until today. The third chapter discusses Swedish public servants and the question to what extent they are to be considered traditional bureaucrats or “managers” modeled after the private sector; and the final chapter explores the way the Swedish government governs the administration and the challenges that entails, given the organizational complexity of modern states.


2012 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dirkie Smit

Etienne de Villiers as ethicist of responsibility. The paper considered six ways to describe Etienne de Villiers as ethicist of responsibility. They broadly corresponded with chronological phases in his academic career. The first was the way in which he initially took responsibility to teach theological ethics in a methodologically reflective way. The second was the way in which he increasingly found answers to these methodological concerns in responsibility ethics as an approach. The third was the way in which he spent much time analysing the work of responsibility ethicists. This critical engagement led to a fourth phase, still ongoing, developing his own approach. Against this background, the paper argued that he had always been an ethicist of responsibility in the fifth sense that he addressed urgent moral challenges. Developing this, a final section claims that he was an ethicist of responsibility according to Weber�s description of science as vocation. The paper was read as key note presentation at the University of Pretoria on 09 November 2011, when D.E. (Etienne) de Villiers was honoured on the occasion of his retirement. On the specific request of the organisers, the speech was held in Afrikaans and the original oral form was retained here, including the personal rethorical style of the introduction and conclusion.


Author(s):  
Daniel Dombrowski

Despite the fact that Hartshorne often criticized the metaphysics of substance found in medieval philosophy, he was like medieval thinkers in developing a philosophy that was theocentric. From the 1920s until the beginning of the twenty-first century he defended the rationality of theism. For much of this period he was almost alone in doing so among English-speaking philosophers. He was largely responsible for the rediscovery of St Anselm’s ontological argument. But his greatest contribution to philosophical theism was not regarding arguments for the existence of God, but rather a theory regarding the actuality of God – i.e., how God exists. In his process-based conception God was seen as supreme becoming in which there was a factor of supreme being, in contrast to the view of traditional theism, wherein God was the supreme, unchanging being. Hartshorne’s neoclassical view has influenced the way many philosophers understand the concept of God. A small, but not insignificant, number of scholars think of him as the greatest metaphysician of the second half of the twentieth century.


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