Dr. Carrier’s Second Reply to Alvaro
We are here debating the Kalam Cosmological Argument from a deistic rather than theistic perspective. Carlo Alvaro is taking the affirmative; Richard Carrier the negative. See our initial entry for all the details, including an index to all entries yet published. -:-...We Should Reject Even the First Premise of the Kalam Cosmological Argument
After an exchange of articles with Andrew Loke (see Why Nothing Remains a Problem: The Andrew Loke Fiasco and his reply) we were asked by a private professional forum to debate the topic of the Causal Principle, which anchors the first premise of the Kalam...Ten Ways the World Would Be Different If God Existed
Imagine you just became a god. No, really. One second from now you become all powerful—for no reason at all; no one did this to you, you didn’t earn it, it literally just randomly happens. And by having all powers logically possible, you immediately also...Boyce and Swenson’s Theological Argument against Multiverse Theory
In 2020, Christian philosophers Kenneth Boyce and Philip Swenson presented a thesis at a conference, which has yet to appear under peer-review (though a version is in review), arguing that “fine tuning” is actually evidence against a multiverse. This is...How the New Wong-Hazen Proposal Refutes Theism
A new law of nature has been fleshed out and proposed, in a research paper by Wong, Cleland, Arend, and Hazen, which theory I will just label for convenience the Wong-Hazen thesis. To read the original paper, see “On the Roles of Function and Selection in...Is Science Impossible without God? The Argument of Tomas Bogardus
Yesterday I surveyed a whole category of arguments for theism, the “Science Needs God” complex. And I concluded by mentioning a (sort of) new one, by a well-credentialed professor of philosophy, Tomas Bogardus (another fashionable Protestant convert to...The Myth That Science Needs Christianity
Years ago I wrote several articles debunking the commonplace claim that Theism (or indeed even Biblical Christianity) was necessary for modern science. It’s time for an updated round-up, particularly in preparation for a recent new attempt to argue this that I...All the Laws of Thermodynamics Are Inevitable
A lot of what happens in the universe is caused by the Laws of Thermodynamics. Christians often wonder where these laws come from. What explains them? Well, the interesting thing is that nothing explains them. And I mean that in the literal sense: the absence of...Three Common Confusions of Creationists
In response to some recent queries, and being reminded of some things in an old slideshow of mine, which accompanied a talk I gave in Humboldt some years ago (which was supposed to be my opening for a debate with a creationist; but the creationist bailed as soon as...The Ontology of Logic
One question atheists tend to be bad at answering, because they rarely give it much competent thought, is the ontology of logic: what, physically, does it mean to say that logically impossible things can’t ever happen or exist? Or as a theist might pose the...Justin Brierley on the Science of Existence
Does science prove God? It is painfully ironic that Justin Brierley opens his chapter on this topic with a false quote from a scientist (p. 22). This common Christian failure to do the work to ascertain what scientists have actually said about these subjects explains...A Hidden Fallacy in the Fine Tuning Argument
One of the most popular and persuasive arguments for theism is the so-called Fine-Tuning Argument. But there is a singular fallacy in it that I think usually gets overlooked. There are of course actually many fallacies in it, but those have been well-explored (hence...Why A Neo-Aristotelian Naturalism Is Probably True
I have written a few times on my worldview as a whole—my “philosophy of life.” To be viable I believe any worldview must consist of a complete, consilient, coherent, evidence-based account of the six foundations of knowledge: epistemology (which...Thomism: The Bogus Science
I have pretty thoroughly embarrassed Edward Feser already, the preeminent advocate for Thomism today, the Medieval Dumbity that consists of purely armchair, and often pseudological, theorizing about natural reality, which ignores the entirety of the sciences and...The Carrier-Marshall Debate: My Fourth Reply
Christian historian Dr. Wallace Marshall and I are debating whether or not enough evidence points to the existence of a god. For background and format, and Dr. Wallace’s opening statement, see entry one. For subsequent entries, see index. This time we are still...Get Dr. Carrier’s Latest!
About the Author
Richard Carrier is the author of many books and numerous articles online and in print. His avid readers span the world from Hong Kong to Poland. With a Ph.D. in ancient history from Columbia University, he specializes in the modern philosophy of naturalism and humanism, and the origins of Christianity and the intellectual history of Greece and Rome, with particular expertise in ancient philosophy, science and technology. He is also a noted defender of scientific and moral realism, Bayesian reasoning, and historical methods.
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