Thinking About God: First Steps In Philosophy

192 Pages·2004·1.388 MB·English

by  Gregory E. Ganssle

T H I N K I N G
G O D
A B O U T
Fi r s t S t e p s
i n P h i l o s o p h y
Gregory E. Ganssle
InterVarsity Press
P.O. Box 1400, Downers Grove, IL 60515-1426
ivpress.com
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©2004 by Gregory E. Ganssle
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Design: Cindy Kiple
Images: Helle Bro Clemmensen/iStockphoto
ISBN 978-0-8308-7748-5 (digital)
ISBN 978-0-8308-2784-8 (print)
For David, Nicholas and Elizabeth,
who bring joy and laughter to our lives

CONTENTS
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
PART ONE: INTRODUCTION
1 Why Bother Thinking About God? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
2 What Is Philosophy? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
3 You Cannot Prove God’s Existence . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
4 What About Faith? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
5 Can We Be Neutral? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
6 Where Do We Begin?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
PART TWO: REASONS TO BELIEVE IN GOD
7 Starting at the Beginning: Why Is There Anything at All? . . . 43
8 Starting at the Beginning: Must the Universe Have a Cause? . . 52
9 Starting at the Beginning: Must the First Cause Be God?. . . . 59
10 Looking at the Details: Design and Designers. . . . . . . . . 66
11 Looking at the Details: Darwin and Design. . . . . . . . . . 73
12 Looking at the Details: Fine-Tuning and Design . . . . . . . 77
13 Looking at the Details: Many Worlds and Small Chances . . . 81
14 Looking in the Mirror: Moral Reality . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
15 Looking in the Mirror: Moral Facts Point to God. . . . . . . . 97
16 Reasons to Believe: The Cumulative Case . . . . . . . . . . . 104
PART THREE: GOD AND EVIL
17 The Square Circle Objection. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
18 God and Evil Reconciled. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
19 Reasons God Could Have to Allow Evil . . . . . . . . . . 122
20 Freedom and Determinism:
A Chapter You Might Want to Skip . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
21 The Unicorn Objection. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 138
22 Is There an Elephant in the Room? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
PART FOUR: WHAT IS GOD LIKE?
23 Beginning to Think About What God Is Like . . . . . . . 153
24 What Can God Do?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156
25 What Can God Know? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166
26 Can God Know the Future? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 175
27 Does God Communicate? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
Suggestions for Further Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
Index. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185
Praise for Thinking About G od . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188
About the Author. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190
More Titles from InterVarsity Press . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
Academic Textbook Selector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I
t is a privilege to thank the many people who helped this project
along. First of all, I want to thank the students in my philosophy class
at Christian Heritage School. Over the past several years, they have
taught me how to think more clearly in order to communicate compli-
cated arguments in the language of actual human beings. Much of this
book was field tested there. David Fullerton, in particular, has been a
big help and encouragement. I have not lost hope that he will eventu-
ally switch from physics to philosophy.
InterVarsity Press provided two anonymous readers who each
gave me detailed comments on the text. I am deeply indebted to
them for their careful criticisms. This book is much better because of
their efforts. Gary Deddo, my editor at InterVarsity Press, has been
quite helpful. I am grateful to him for seeing the merit in this project,
for then seeing it through to completion and, most of all, for his
friendship.
I also want to thank Oxford University Press for permission to
quote from The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy by Simon Blackburn
in chapter thirteen. Parts of chapter four come from my paper,
“Copernicus, Christology and Hell: Faith Seeking Understanding,”
which was published in the journal Philosophia Christi (vol. 20, no.2
[1997]: 1-13). I thank the editor for permission to reuse some of that
material.
Finally, I am delighted to thank my family. My wife, Jeanie, is al-
ways great fun. Her support, love and friendship are my greatest trea-
10 THINKING ABOUT GOD
sures. Nothing in my life would be what it is without her. Our chil-
dren, David, Nick and Elizabeth, had to bear up under many dinner
conversations about the puzzles in this book. We laughed a lot. It
gives me great pleasure to dedicate this book to them.