Reviews for The Big Argument: Does God Exist?: Twenty-Four Scholars Explore How Sciece, Archaeology, and Philosophy Suggest the Existence of God

The average rating for The Big Argument: Does God Exist?: Twenty-Four Scholars Explore How Sciece, Archaeology, and Philosophy Suggest the Existence of God based on 2 reviews is 4.5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2016-02-17 00:00:00 Paul Fossett Levinas asks if there is a possibility of a meaningful God as a part of establishing a search for truth. The text is very bound in itself and still intermediates with the reader, which is fascinating. The book could in general be seen as a radicalization of Descartes' idea of the Infinite in the Finite as it asks what conditions this possibility, which will be suggested to be the fear for the other. Transcendence and the possibility of truth is made possible through responsiveness/responsibility. The question "Does God exist?" will be shown to be overshadowed and determined by the inevitable question "Why suffering rather than something better?". There is a lot of cross-referencing to both philosophical and theological works that requires some extra reading of the reader. Some things that appears and I suggested to be read before that makes it easier to read and understand the arguments are Otherwise than Being, maybe an overview of phenomenology or such to understand how Levinas enters dialogue with Husserl and the other guys, some Heidegger - at least to get an overview of the notions there and the massive critique executed by Levinas, some insight of "Old Testament" to get the theological connotation, some Cartesian meditations to see the limit of thinking, some Augustinus to get a sense of how Levinas discusses truth and time, some overview of Hegel to understand why Levinas suggests that Hegel is implying a violent ideology, some Nietzsche to get how Levinas try to push philosophy beyond humanism/anti-humanism and moralism/anti-moralism, some Plato and Aristoteles to understand what Levinas thinks has gone wrong in philosophizing about language, some Weil to grasp what Levinas is aiming at with "waiting" and "passing time". With that said, the book might present itself and its argumentation without having read the mentioned. This is why the book is greater than its content.

Review # 2 was written on 2015-06-21 00:00:00 Chris Estrada I love these collections of Levinas' writings. He had his primary texts, Totality and Infinity and later Otherwise than Being, and then around these circled his many essays. They all come back to his ethical mode of thinking of the other, but in their circling motion they take in other themes as well. From this collection, "God and Philosophy" was very insightful towards Levinas' thinking. I also found that "Transcendence and Evil" contained some great thoughts on the idea of evil, beyond the simple duality of the classic 'problem of evil.'