Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-g8jcs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T12:14:33.408Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Does divine hiding undermine Positive Evidential Atheism?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 March 2015

SCOTT F. AIKIN*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN 37240, USA e-mail: [email protected]

Abstract

Positive Evidential Atheism is the two-part view that our available evidence sufficiently supports the belief that God does not exist and that God's non-existence is a morally good thing. Paul Moser's recent work (2012, 2013, 2014, and forthcoming) provides a case that Positive Evidential Atheism is undermined by ‘intentional divine elusiveness’. This essay defends Positive Evidential Atheism from Moser's objection along two lines: (1) Moser's undercutting argument does not respect the fact that the positivity and evidentiality claims of Positive Evidential Atheism are logically connected, and (2) positive atheists needn't be those from whom God has hidden.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aikin, Scott F. (2010) ‘The problem of worship’, Think, 25, 101113.Google Scholar
Aikin, Scott F. (forthcoming) ‘God and argument’, Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory.Google Scholar
Aikin, Scott & Hodges, Michael (2013) ‘St. Anselm's ontological argument as expressive’, Philosophical Investigations, 37, 130151.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aikin, Scott & Talisse, Robert (2011) Reasonable Atheism (Albany: Prometheus Books).Google Scholar
Drange, Theodore (1993) ‘The argument from non-belief’, Religious Studies, 29, 417432.Google Scholar
Maitzen, Stephen (2006) ‘Divine hiddenness and the demographics of theism’, Religious Studies, 42, 177191.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moser, Paul (2002) ‘Cognitive idolatry and divine hiding’, in Howard-Snyder, Daniel & Moser, Paul (eds) Divine Hiddenness: New Essays (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 120147.Google Scholar
Moser, Paul (2012) ‘Undermining the case for evidential atheism’, Religious Studies, 48, 8393.Google Scholar
Moser, Paul (2013) The Severity of God (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).Google Scholar
Moser, Paul (2014) ‘The virtue of fellowship with God’, in O'Connor, Ted (ed.) Religious Faith and Intellectual Virtue (New York: Oxford University Press).Google Scholar
Moser, Paul (forthcoming) ‘God and epistemic authority’, Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory.Google Scholar
Rachels, James (1997) ‘God and moral autonomy’, in Can Ethics Provide Answers? (New York: Rowman & Littlefield), 109123.Google Scholar
Schellenberg, J. L. (1993) Divine Hiddenness and Human Reason (Ithaca: Cornell University Press).Google Scholar