Review of Tim Mulgan's Purpose in the Universe

This is the first chapter of my book Purpose in the Universe: the moral and metaphysical case for Ananthropocentric Purposivism, published by Oxford University Press in October 2016. Two familiar worldviews dominate Western philosophy: materialist atheism and the benevolent God of the Abrahamic faiths. This book explores a third way. Ananthropocentric Purposivism claims that there is a cosmic purpose, but human beings are irrelevant to it. It develops a philosophical case for Ananthropocentric Purposivism that it is at least as strong as the case for either theism or atheism. The book borrows traditional theist arguments to defend a cosmic purpose. These include cosmological, teleological, ontological, meta-ethical, and mystical arguments. It then borrows traditional atheist arguments to reject a human-centred purpose. These include arguments based on evil, diversity, and the scale of the universe. The book also highlights connections between morality and metaphysics, arguing that evaluative premises play a crucial and underappreciated role in metaphysical debates about the existence of God, and Ananthropocentric Purposivism mutually supports an austere consequentialist morality based on objective values. The book concludes that, by drawing on a range of secular and religious ethical traditions, a non-human-centred cosmic purpose can ground a distinctive human morality. Our moral practices, our view of the moral universe, and our moral theory are all transformed if we shift from the familiar choice between a universe without meaning and a universe where humans matter to the less self-aggrandising thought that, while it is about something, the universe is not about us.

The Pluralist , 2024

Philosophy Compass, 2017

Two familiar worldviews dominate Western philosophy: materialist atheism and Abrahamic theism. One exciting development in recent philosophy of religion is the exploration of alternatives to both theism and atheism. This paper explores two alternatives: axiarchism and ananthropocentrism. Drawing on the long tradition of Platonism, axiarchists such as John Leslie, Derek Parfit and Nicholas Rescher posit a direct link between goodness and existence. The goodness of a possible world is what makes it actual. Ananthropocentric Purposivism (AP) holds that the universe has a purpose and that humans are irrelevant to that purpose. If there is a God, then God cares about what matters, but we do not matter to God.

Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britiain, 2024

Philip Goff's new book represents an extension of his earlier philosophical explorations into the nature of consciousness and its relationship to the physical world. In Galileo's Error (2019) Goff offered putative solutions to the hard problem of consciousness-how the experiential, non-physical nature of minds can be related to and explained in terms of the material world of physical objects-by making use of versions of panpsychism proposed by, amongst others, Galen Strawson who, incidentally, was Goff's former tutor and PhD supervisor.

Zygon, 2016

Clifford Cain, editor and also author of six of the ten chapters in this book, is the Harrod-C.S. Lewis Professor of Religious Studies at Westminster College, Fulton, Missouri. He solicited contributions by colleagues from the sciences-biology and physics-as well as from philosophy from his home institution to address the issue of cosmology (Laura Stumpe, "The Big Bang Theory," 17-34), evolution (Gabe McNett, "Seeing the Reality of Evolution," 45-71), genetics (Jane Kenney-Hunt, "The Complex Relationship between Nature and Nurture," 95-112), and intelligent design (Rich Green, "Intelligent Design," 123-43), providing theological commentaries himself to each of these topics besides writing the Introduction (1-15) and the Conclusion (153-58). The book "is intentionally directed toward a general, nonspecialist audience, because the contributors believe that the attempt to relate science and religion should not be reserved for, or monopolized by, experts talking only to each other" (ix). This overarching goal is well achieved. The individual contributors not only explain almost every technical term they use and provide essential references in "notes" at the end of their chapters, but also unfold complex matters in plain language and in such a way that these easily can be grasped (a nice proof of their didactic skills). While, then, nothing much needs to be said regarding the straightforward, very basic presentations of the scientific topics; it is the theological interpretations that warrant a closer examination, because it is these to which the book's title refers when speaking of "re-vision." What is revised and reimagined here is not scientific theory or research as such, but the theological interpretation of scientific and, as in the case of intelligent design, pseudo-scientific theories and research in light of process theology. Process theology "picks up on both the God of the philosophers and the God of the Bible" (147, original emphasis), "promotes a view of the world that involves change, development, novelty, and organic unity," and "posits a concept of God as having two natures. .. a transcendent aspect and also an immanent" one (76). Properly understood, process theology abolishes the concept of an omnipotent God and renders the literalistic, fundamentalist interpretation of the Bible impossible. To thus revise the concept of God and the study of the Bible "is critical" because in light of scientific findings "it is no longer tenable" to cling to a religiously informed deterministic worldview by asserting "a notion of God as divine Regulator with infinite power and meticulous providence" (154). The same applies to "biblical literalism," for this "not only creates (unnecessary) conflict with science, it also does not do justice to religion's scriptures themselves" (153; original parenthesis). With an almost pastoral concern, Cain pleads for a nonconfrontational "conversation" (12) between science and religion for mutual benefit, since both "are needed for a complete picture of reality. .. and make necessary contributions to

2016

Clifford Cain, editor and also author of six of the ten chapters in this book, is the Harrod-C.S. Lewis Professor of Religious Studies at Westminster College, Fulton, Missouri. He solicited contributions by colleagues from the sciences-biology and physics-as well as from philosophy from his home institution to address the issue of cosmology (Laura Stumpe, "The Big Bang Theory," 17-34), evolution (Gabe McNett, "Seeing the Reality of Evolution," 45-71), genetics (Jane Kenney-Hunt, "The Complex Relationship between Nature and Nurture," 95-112), and intelligent design (Rich Green, "Intelligent Design," 123-43), providing theological commentaries himself to each of these topics besides writing the Introduction (1-15) and the Conclusion (153-58). The book "is intentionally directed toward a general, nonspecialist audience, because the contributors believe that the attempt to relate science and religion should not be reserved for, or monopolized by, experts talking only to each other" (ix). This overarching goal is well achieved. The individual contributors not only explain almost every technical term they use and provide essential references in "notes" at the end of their chapters, but also unfold complex matters in plain language and in such a way that these easily can be grasped (a nice proof of their didactic skills). While, then, nothing much needs to be said regarding the straightforward, very basic presentations of the scientific topics; it is the theological interpretations that warrant a closer examination, because it is these to which the book's title refers when speaking of "re-vision." What is revised and reimagined here is not scientific theory or research as such, but the theological interpretation of scientific and, as in the case of intelligent design, pseudo-scientific theories and research in light of process theology. Process theology "picks up on both the God of the philosophers and the God of the Bible" (147, original emphasis), "promotes a view of the world that involves change, development, novelty, and organic unity," and "posits a concept of God as having two natures. .. a transcendent aspect and also an immanent" one (76). Properly understood, process theology abolishes the concept of an omnipotent God and renders the literalistic, fundamentalist interpretation of the Bible impossible. To thus revise the concept of God and the study of the Bible "is critical" because in light of scientific findings "it is no longer tenable" to cling to a religiously informed deterministic worldview by asserting "a notion of God as divine Regulator with infinite power and meticulous providence" (154). The same applies to "biblical literalism," for this "not only creates (unnecessary) conflict with science, it also does not do justice to religion's scriptures themselves" (153; original parenthesis). With an almost pastoral concern, Cain pleads for a nonconfrontational "conversation" (12) between science and religion for mutual benefit, since both "are needed for a complete picture of reality. .. and make necessary contributions to

Bible Proves God Doesn't Exist, 2000

This thesis critically examines the non-existence of God through Lawsin's One Theory of Everything (Creatio per Materias et Instructiones), integrating cosmological, teleological, and ontological perspectives. The cosmological perspective refutes traditional arguments for a divine creator by presenting a self-sustaining universe governed by materials and instructions. The teleological perspective addresses the argument of design and purpose in the universe, suggesting that apparent design can be explained through natural processes and evolutionary mechanisms. The ontological perspective critiques classical arguments for God's necessity, offering alternative explanations rooted in human cognition and perception. By synthesizing these perspectives, the thesis provides a comprehensive rebuttal to theistic beliefs, proposing a naturalistic schema that accounts for the origins of life and the universe. This work contributes to the ongoing philosophical and scientific debates on the existence of God, proposing that a naturalistic approach is a more plausible explanation for the phenomena traditionally attributed to divinity.

Theology and Science, 2019

2007

This paper uses an historical perspective to illustrate the ambiguous way scientific data, that has implications for understanding our place in the universe, has been interpreted. It is shown that the data can be interpreted from a theistic or atheistic perspective. Scholars of the history and philosophy of science have concluded that theism can never be derived from the argument of design, including the recent proposal of intelligent design. It is also shown that while ambiguity appears fundamental to certain scientific and biblical concepts this need not be a cause for alarm. While it is argued that religious experience can never be derived from scientific knowledge and draws upon deeper issues than intelligence, recent scientific understandings give us no reason to doubt the value of religious experience. In fact, it could be argued that there might be a case for treasuring religious experience.

New Models of Religious Understanding, 2017

We know there is a continuing decline in religious belief, at least in the developed Western World. But what is it that people are rejecting? The answer may at first seem clear: they are rejecting the classical theistic worldview that held sway in the West for many centuries, up until the modern age. But what exactly is this classical theism that is now losing its hold on many peoples' allegiance, or which they seem to find it increasingly hard to accept? According to one its most distinguished expositors, the philosopher Richard Swinburne, theism is an 'explanatory hypothesis, which purports to explain why certain observed data are as they are.' These observed data include certain very general features of the universe, such as the law of gravity, and the fact that these laws are such as to bring about from an initial state (the Big Bang) 'the eventual existence (some 13 billion years later) of human beings; and that these humans are conscious beings.' 1 If the main focus of theism is indeed on an explanatory hypothesis of this kind, then I think it is not hard to see how it has lost its appeal. For the features just cited are precisely the kind of thing modern science aims to account for; and so great has been its success to date that I suspect a great many people would be inclined to accept the physicist Brian Cox's claim (in a much praised television broadcast) that science is 'very close' to explaining the general features of the cosmos and our own eventual emergence from the slowly unfolding process since the Big Bang. 2 In his broadcast, Professor Cox invoked Einsteinian relativity, quantum mechanics, and the elegant mathematical theory called 'inflation', in order to account for the unfolding of the universe over the last 13 or so billion years. Add to that the success of the Darwinian model of evolution by random mutation and natural selection, coupled with modern genetic science, and we have an extraordinarily rich explanatory structure, worked out in the crucible of a rigorously constrained methodology, and meticulously tested against a formidable body of observational evidence. So brilliant is much of this work that even the gathering and processing of the relevant data is an achievement meriting Nobel prizes in its own right. Set against an explanatory apparatus of this calibre, it's not hard to see why contemptuous eyebrows are raised when someone says 'I actually have an alternative and rather better hypothesis: a person did it, a person willed it all, a person created it all and keeps it in existence.' It has become fashionable for theologians and philosophers of religion to disparage the attacks on religion mounted by militant atheists such as Richard Dawkins, but I think integrity requires us to acknowledge just how exasperating the alternative theistic 'hypothesis' must seem to Dawkins and to many of those like him who have a detailed knowledge of the magnificent and hard-won achievements of science. Imagine for a moment what a field day an advocatus diaboli would have with the explanatory hypothesis of theism. A person, we are told, is responsible for the cosmos. "A person? What kind of person?" Well, an invisible person. "You mean we can't see his body?" No, he doesn't have one. "Doesn't have one? How then can he exercise any power over the universe?" Well (to quote from Swinburne),'ordinary human persons exist for a limited  This is a typescript the definitive version of which was subsequently published in Fiona Ellis (ed.