Syllabus
Monday 200 Deadlines
Readings
- What is an Argument?
- Some Vocabulary Describing Arguments
- Analyzing Concepts
- Some Puzzles Concerning Omnipotence (by George Mavrodes)
- The Design Argument (by Allen Stairs and Chris Bernard)
- The Cosmological Argument
- The Ontological Argument (by Alvin Plantinga)
- Compassionate Phenomenal Conservatism (by Michael Huemer)
- Religious Experience Justifies Belief in God (by William Alston)
(Reply to Alston) - Do Mystics See God? (By Evan Fales)
(Reply to Fales) - Natural Evil (by Richard Swinburne)
- Must God Create the Best? (by Robert Adams)
- Is Theism Compatible with Gratuitous Evil (by Daniel and Francis Howard-Snyder)
- Evil and Van Inwagen (by Jeff Jordan)
- Skeptical Theism and Divine Lies (Erik Wielenberg)
- Does Skeptical Theism Lead to Moral Skepticism (by Jeff Jordan)
- Epistemic Humility, Arguments from Evil, and Moral Skepticism (by Daniel Howard-Snyder)
- Skeptical Theism and Divine Truths (by Aaron Segal)
- Heaven and Hell (by Jon Kvanvig)
(read the part about Hell) - Three Versions of Universalism (by Michael Murray)
- In Defense of Naive Universalism (Daniel Howard-Snyder)
Course Specific Handouts**
- Argument Handout
- Invalid Arguments
- Conceptual Analysis, Thought Experiments, and Counterexamples
- The Concept of God
- Omniscience Puzzles
- Arguments for God’s Existence
- Teleological Arguments: Part One
- The Fine-Tuning Arguments (Teleological: Part Two)
- The Fine-Tuning Argument
- Two Cosmological Arguments (Handout)
- Two Cosmological Arguments (Slides)
- Two More Cosmological Arguments
- An Epistemic Version of PSR
- Is Existence a Property?
- Phenomenal Conservatism
- Can Religious Experiences Justify Belief in God?
- The Problem of Evil (Presentation Slides)
- The Problem of Evil: The Best of All Possible Worlds Argument
- The Evidential Problem of Evil – No Minimum Claim
- Skeptical Theism
- The Problem of Hell
- Universalism
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**Note: These Handouts are supplements/outlines of class lecture and discussion – they will not always contain everything that comes up in class that you will be expected to know.
Exams
- Midterm Exam Questions
- Midterm Exam Study Gude (to help focus on the questions)
- Final Exam Questions
- Final Exam Study Guide
- Final Exam Schedule Here
First Writing Assignment
OPTION ONE: GRADED BLOG POSTS
OPTION TWO: Short 3-5 Page Paper
- Short Paper Assignment
- Submit paper using Google Docs – See Here for Instructions
USEFUL HANDOUTS
- Presenting, Explaining, and Evaluating Arguments
- What I’m Looking For
- A Method for Extracting Arguments
Final Research Paper
- Final Paper and Research Posts
- BONUS: Using PEE as a Building Block to Write Longer Papers (this should help you see how the short paper assignment can help you with the long paper assignment)