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Arguing about Gods 1st Edition
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- ISBN-100521122643
- ISBN-13978-0521122641
- Edition1st
- PublisherCambridge University Press
- Publication dateNovember 5, 2009
- LanguageEnglish
- Dimensions6 x 1.18 x 9 inches
- Print length472 pages
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- Publisher : Cambridge University Press; 1st edition (November 5, 2009)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 472 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0521122643
- ISBN-13 : 978-0521122641
- Item Weight : 1.34 pounds
- Dimensions : 6 x 1.18 x 9 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #1,842,092 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #208 in Islam (Books)
- #4,829 in Philosophy (Books)
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About the authors

I am a Professor of Philosophy and a member of the Australian Academy of Humanities.
I have been working at Monash University for the past twenty-five years. During my time at Monash, I have taught mostly philosophy of religion, metaphysics, and logic. My current courses are: God, Freedom and Evil; Metaphysics; and Philosophy of Religion.
Prior to my appointment at Monash, I was a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Philosophy Program in the Research School for the Social Sciences at the Australian National University in Canberra. Before that, I was a Lecturer at the University of Wollongong (no, Bruce, not Woolloomooloo).
I wrote my doctoral dissertation at Princeton University. My dissertation advisor was Gil Harman; my dissertation was about questions in the philosophy of language. Before that, I was an undergraduate student at Melbourne University. I completed two degrees: a BA with a major in philosophy; and a B.Sc with a major in mathematics (and a minor in physics).
Skipping back a bit, I was born in Benalla (pop. 8000); my family moved to Ballarat (pop. 80,000) when I turned six, and were still living there when I started to attend Melbourne University. My parents were Methodists; I ceased to be a religious believer when I was in my early teenage years. I am interested in a wide range of question about religion; I have done much work on arguments about the existence of God.

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So why five stars? Why say this is an important work.
Because Oppy is brilliantly wrong in this book, and I respect it, even though the book also has a fatal flaw.
The fatal flaw is in how Oppy defines a "successful argument." He sets the bar so high that his own standard is self-refuting since he does not have a successful argument for his understanding of a successful argument.
Anyway, his thesis is that there are no successful arguments for *or* against God. For Oppy, none of the arguments he gives should make a theist stop believing that God exists. He also thinks theists can be rational in their belief. Oppy's point is that both theists and atheists should simply cool their horses about claiming to have successful arguments either way.
That's interesting. For the theist, it might even be encouraging: One of the leading atheist philosophers in the world believes there is no argument that should make you give up your belief in God.
But where the book really shines is how Oppy deals with so many arguments for and against God. This makes a great reference work for Christians engaged in doing apologetics. Every Christian apologist should have this book on his or her shelf and refer back to it.
For Oppy is clearly brilliant and a worthy interlocutor. Some of his arguments are better than others, however. I appreciated 80 percent of what he said on various moral arguments that I consider subpar myself (though there *are* moral arguments I think are good). But some of his discussion of actual infinities and God's attributes being infinite struck me as frankly far beneath a philosopher of Oppy's caliber. We all have blind spots, but omnipotence certainly does not require or even suggest an actual infinite.
(In fact, I came away with far greater confidence in the Kalam Cosmological Argument after reading this book.)
Much of the book I did not think accomplished what Oppy hoped. Some of his arguments were simply weak. And worse, at times, it seemed like Oppy's strategy boiled down to "Some philosophers think X, and X is not compatible with Y, so the argument for Y is not successful." That's perhaps an unfair characterization, but if you read the book, watch out for that sort of pattern. That sort of strategy works mainly because of Oppy's special definition of a successful argument.
Another weaknesses of the book is Oppy's sometimes opaque writing style. Sometimes he is as clear as a bell, and other times he is much more difficult to follow--and not just because of the high-level content. But either way, Oppy's writing is, well, nothing to write home about. He is competent, but it is clear that he is a thinker, not a writer even if he writes. There is no beauty here. Sometimes communication is lacking.
This is in contrast to, say, other modern atheist philosophers like Schellenberg or Mackie who do write with some beauty and with a clarity that I appreciate.
Even with its flaws, however, this is a work Christian apologists should buy and read. I do not think the book needs to be read cover to cover, however. It is sufficient to read the beginning and the end as well as the sections that interest one.
Because if you can understand Oppy and where Oppy goes right and wrong on a particular argument, then you are well on your way. Buy it. Read it. Own it. Have it on your shelf. Refer back to it.
One final note: This book is not like The God Delusion. It's far better. It's also a far harder book.
Given Oppy's skilled dismantling of theistic arguments, as well as his stance of being "firmly of the belief that there are no supernatural entities of any kind," it may come as a surprise that he still concludes that there are no arguments, either for or against the existence of God, that ought to change a rational person's mind. But surely there must be some beginning stance that is more rational than another, and which could be the deciding factor in the rationality of theism. Arguing About Gods could have seriously benefited from an examination of the burden of proof, or what presuppositions count as rational.
Even given Oppy's measured conclusions, the book still provides plenty of resources for readers to form their own conclusions, and there are few books that provide a deeper coverage of the arguments. This book will provide much food for thought for those who are already familiar with academic philosophy, and who are looking for one of the best argued and well thought out books on philosophy of religion.












