Schellenberg's Noseeum Assumption about Nonresistant Nonbelief

In this article, I outline a strategy for challenging J.L. Schellenberg’s hiddenness argument, and specifically the premise within the argument that asserts the existence of what Schellenberg calls nonresistant nonbelief. Drawing on some of the philosophical resources of skeptical theism, I show how this premise is based on a particular “noseeum assumption”—what I call Schellenberg’s Noseeum Assumption—that underwrites a particular “noseeum argument.” This assumption is that, regarding putative nonresistant nonbelievers, more likely than not we’d detect these nonbelievers’ resistance toward God if there were any. I give reasons for thinking that it is not more reasonable to affirm than to refrain from affirming Schellenberg’s Noseeum Assumption, and so reason to think that the hiddenness argument is not a good argument for atheism. I also defend the strategy I outline against several objections.

Has God Indeed Said? Skeptical Theism and Scriptural Hermeneutics

This paper demonstrates that the skeptical theist’s response to the problem of evil deprives the analytic theologian of theoretical resources necessary to avoid accepting as veridical merely apparent divine commands that endorse cruelty. In particular, I argue that the same skeptical considerations that lead analytic theologians to endorse skeptical theism also lead to what I call “divine command skepticism”—an inability to make certain kinds of judgements about what a good God would or would not command. The danger of divine command skepticism is not that it generates new reasons to think that God has commanded horrors, but, rather, that it undercuts the defeaters we might otherwise have for thinking that God has commanded those horrors. It does so both by rendering illicit certain theological and hermeneutical methodologies employed within liberatory frameworks (i.e., various kinds of liberation theologies) and by depriving the theologian of some of the more “traditional” mechanisms for resolving such apparent conflicts.

A Phenomenological Approach to Skeptical Theism

"The purpose of the present essay is to present a version of the evidential argument from evil and to propose a ‘skeptical theistic’ response from a phenomenological point of view. In a word, the problem with the evidential argument from evil is that it attempts to put forth as justified an interpretation of the moral significance of historical events which actually exceeds the limits of human knowledge and which is based on a misinterpretation of experience. The essay also corrects certain analytic-philosophical notions regarding the nature of appearance, terminating with a discussion of the familiar critiques of analytic skeptical theism and the question of whether the belief in the existence of God might not be affected by the apparent skepticism implied by the phenomenological approach to knowledge in general. Keywords: existence of God, argument from evil, skeptical theism, phenomenology, analytic philosophy "

The Problem of Evil, Skeptical Theism and Moral Epistemology

This paper argues that skeptical theism isn’t susceptible to criticisms of the view presented in James Sterba’s new book on the logical problem of evil. Nevertheless, Sterba’s argument does serve to underscore the unpalatable moral-epistemological consequences of skeptical theistic skepticism (STS): for precisely the reasons that STS doesn’t succumb to Sterba’s critique, STS threatens to undermine moral knowledge altogether.

God, Suffering, and the Value of Free Will

This book focuses on arguments from suffering against the existence of God and on a variety of issues concerning agency and value that they bring out. The central aim is to show the extent and power of arguments from evil. The book provides a close investigation of an under-defended claim at the heart of the major free-will-based responses to such arguments, namely that free will is sufficiently valuable to serve as the good, or to serve prominently among the goods, that provides a God-justifying reason for permitting evil in our world. Offering a fresh examination of traditional theodicies, it also develops an alternative line the author calls a divine intimacy theodicy. It makes an extended case for rejection of the position of skeptical theism. The book expands upon an argument from evil concerning a traditional doctrine of hell, which reveals a number of interesting issues concerning fault, agency, and blameworthiness. In response to recent work contending that the problem of evil is defanged since God’s baseline attitude toward human beings is indifference, the book defends the essential perfect moral goodness of God. Finally it takes up the question of whether or not it makes sense to live a religious life as an agnostic or as an atheist.

Skeptical Theism

This chapter critically examines skeptical theism, roughly the point of view that God exists but that God’s reasons for permitting evils are beyond our abilities to discern. Matters addressed include the epistemic import of appearances of pointlessness, the skeptical theses and analogies for the human condition with respect to apparently pointless evils defended by Michael Bergmann, and concerns about skeptical spread. The chapter provides support for the idea that, if there were God-justifying reasons for evils, we would see them, thereby defending a key premise in the argument from pointless evils and the argument from facts about evil.

Conclusion

This chapter summarizes the case that has been made in the book in defense of the argument from pointless evils and the argument from the facts about evil in support of atheism. It highlights important claims about agency and claims about value that have been brought out by close examination of the punishment theodicy, the free will theodicy, the character-building theodicy, the divine intimacy theodicy, and the position of skeptical theism. The chapter also points toward directions for further work on the problem of evil in the philosophy of religion.