Reviews for Philosophy of religion

The average rating for Philosophy of religion based on 2 reviews is 2 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2011-08-04 00:00:00 Yee May Leong I didn't like this book the first time I read it. But Rowe is a competent philosopher and I must pay respects. He very clearly sets forth the issues and is capable of making some pointed critiques, but at the same time many of his answers are now dated and his biases are apparent. As far as Philosophies of Religion go, this is as good as any. It was the first I read. Exposition: He rehashes the standard "5 Ways" from Thomas Aquinas and gives the usual Kantian and Humean rebuttals to St Thomas. What he is not telling you is that many philosophers have 1) demonstrated that St Thomas did not use the five ways the way Rowe says he used the five ways (cf. Fergus Kerr) and 2) assuming St Thomas did use the five ways the way Rowe says he used the five ways, many scholars have dismantled Kant and Hume. He probably spends too few pages on the free will debate, and he often introduces bizarre ways to solve the problem (a suggestion is made that if one could go back in time one could solve the problem. While we are in fantasy land, I suppose that could work). The section on Freud needs extra work. Yes, Freud's insights can (and should!) be used to critique deviant Christianities (e.g., German liberalism), but psychology is more of a faith than a science and really has no claim to criticize Christianity on scientific grounds. Pros: 1) Although Rowe has his own axe to grind, he is relatively fair (usually) to the other positions. Although not a theist himself, he does point out problems in some skeptical arguments. 2) The prose is clear, even if the concepts aren't always. He avoids excessive use of symbolic logic. 3) He covers most of the basics and the endnotes and bibliography are informative. Cons: 1) While this might be a better Phil. of Rel. book than most, I am not convinced it is $90 better. Indeed, I imagine the only reason someone would shell out $90 for this book is because it is required in a classroom. One can find far more rigorous treatments by respected scholars for less than 1/4 the price. 2) Though he is mostly fair, he gave short shrift to Alvin Plantinga and came close to straw-manning his argument. In any case, he didn't explore what it means for a belief to be properly basic and warranted (true, he mentioned it but that was it). 3) The section on Free/Predestination is flawed on two counts: 3a. Predestination is a theological term and has more to do with God's action in Christ towards the believer (or church). When Rowe discusses predestination, he actually means determinism. Even Reformed treatments of predestination do not (generally) make claims about whether or not our individual actions are free (at least not direct treatments). This chapter should have specifically dealt with Compatibilism/Determinism (in all of its shades)/Libertarian Free Will. Rowe, unless he has updated his position in recent editions, seemed to reduce all alternatives to "Free will or Predestination." Conclusion: If you can find it used and very cheap, get it (which is what I did). I can't imagine spending $90 on it. While I do have some huge problems with his conclusions, it's a rigorous enough read. I would move on to other treatments. He rehashes the standard "5 Ways" from Thomas Aquinas and gives the usual Kantian and Humean rebuttals to St Thomas. What he is not telling you is that many philosophers have 1) demonstrated that St Thomas did not use the five ways the way Rowe says he used the five ways (cf. Fergus Kerr) and 2) assuming St Thomas did use the five ways the way Rowe says he used the five ways, many scholars have dismantled Kant and Hume. He probably spends too few pages on the free will debate, and he often introduces bizarre ways to solve the problem (a suggestion is made that if one could go back in time one could solve the problem. While we are in fantasy land, I suppose that could work). The section on Freud needs extra work. Yes, Freud's insights can (and should!) be used to critique deviant Christianities (e.g., German liberalism), but psychology is more of a faith than a science and really has no claim to criticize Christianity on scientific grounds.

Review # 2 was written on 2019-09-29 00:00:00 Ratrice Bowden Nothing too special, just another introduction to philosophy of religion to add on to the dozens of already existing ones. This book does have one peculiarity and that is that because the author is an atheist, he is determined to end off every chapter with the conclusion that so and so argument for the existence of God therefore fails. Now at times do agree that some arguments fail however the reason for its failure is far more comprehensive then how the author is trying to brush-off. For example, the central debate in the Leibnizian cosmological argument from contingency is to prove the validity of the principle of sufficient reason that the argument invokes. It would have been much more honest, for Rowe, to either prove his case against it or not bring up his opinion on it. Instead, he simply asserts that we have no good reason to believe it, therefore the argument fails. This problem is found in almost every chapter from the kalam argument to the ontological argument. For that fact alone I give him two stars. Why not one? Because some chapters were given respect to like the design argument, the argument from evil, and some of the ending chapters. I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone who wants to honestly learn what theists believe and their arguments proving so. This book did injustice to the rich legecy of this field of enquiry.