Bertrand Arthur William Russell was a British Philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian and social critic. Russell was a prominent anti-war activist, he championed anti-imperialism and went to prison for his pacifism during World War I. Later, he campaigned against Adolf Hitler, then criticized Stalinist totalitarianism, and he also attacked the involvement of the United States in the Vietnam War. Bertrand Russell was the recipient of countless awards for excellence during his long lifetime (1872-1970), including the Nobel Prize for literature, which he won in 1950. The range of his critical inquiry is without parallel in contemporary Western culture. Russell described himself as an agnostic, "speaking to a purely philosophical audience", but as an atheist "speaking popularly", on the basis that he could not disprove the Christian God similar to the way that he could not disprove the Olympic Gods either. For most of his adult life Russell maintained that religion is little more than superstition and, despite any positive effects that religion might have, it is largely harmful to people. . In the article the author explains to the reader and stresses upon the opinion as to why the existence of god is a false concept and thus concludes that there is no point in believing in a supreme ruler. The author expressively portrays his argument to the reader through the usage of strong progression of ideas supported with examples, a criticizing yet neutral tone with emotional appeal and rhetorical questions posed at the author with good development of language.
The author argumentatively explains his opinion as to why the concept of god and religion is erroneous, why religion contradicts every fundamental aspect of...
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... did not come into being. He always is. Therefore it is meaningless to ask what caused God, or who made God. He has neither beginning nor end.
author intro
http://www.prometheusbooks.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=226
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertrand_Russell
1st cause.
http://loveacceptforgive.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/a-critical-response-to-why-i-am-not-a-christian-by-bertrand-russell.pdf
copy paste
http://www.berith.org/essays/br/br03.html
tones
http://www.irsc.edu/uploadedFiles/Students/AcademicSupportCenter/WritingLab/Tone-and-Purpose.pdf
1st cause
http://www.focus.org.uk/whomadegod.php
http://www.existence-of-god.com/first-cause-argument.html
use of irony
http://neoenglishsystem.blogspot.com/2010/09/write-note-on-russells-use-of-irony-in.html
This essay explains how he feels about any religion, “To choose unbelief is to choose mind over dogma, to trust in our humanity instead of all these dangerous divinities…The ancient wisdoms are modern nonsenses. Live in your own time, use what we know, and as you grow up, perhaps the human race will finally grow up with you, and put aside childish
Evans, C. Stephen and Manis R. Zachary. Philosophy of Religion, 2nd Ed. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2009. Print.
H J McCloskey intelligently put his thoughts together and shared his beliefs in his article called “On Being an Athiest” addressing some key arguments discussed in atheism and theism from an atheistic point of view. He makes no apologies for bringing up a difficult topic and for trying to argue persuasively for his views. He makes a great point when he states, “…I make no apology for doing so, as it is useful for us to remind ourselves of the reasons for and virtues of our beliefs (50).” Whether a theist or an atheist we should know what we believe and why we believe what we believe. This paper will use the material recently studied in Philosophy to respond to “proofs” and ideas put forth by McCloskey in his article.
Throughout this essay I will demonstrate how religion has played a role in the lives of humans as well as explicate the reasoning behind the true nature of the creation of religion by a psychopath.
The controversial topic involving the existence of God has been the pinnacle of endless discourse surrounding the concept of religion in the field of philosophy. However, two arguments proclaim themselves to be the “better” way of justifying the existence of God: The Cosmological Argument and the Mystical Argument. While both arguments attempt to enforce strict modus operandi of solidified reasoning, neither prove to be a better way of explaining the existence of God. The downfall of both these arguments rests on commitment of fallacies and lack of sufficient evidence, as a result sabotaging their validity in the field of philosophy and faith.
Evans, C. Stephen. Critical Dialog in Philosophy of Religion. 1985. Downers Grove, IL. InterVarsity Press. Taken from Philosophy of Religion - Selected Readings, Fourth Edition. 2010. Oxford University Press, NY.
Theology is an intentionally reflective endeavor. Every day we reflect upon the real, vital, and true experience of the benevolent God that exists. We as humans tend to be social beings, and being so we communicate our beliefs with one another in order to validate ourselves. Furthermore atheism has many forms, three of the most popular atheistic beliefs include: scientific atheism, humanistic atheism and the most popular one being protest atheism. Scientific atheism is the idea that science is the answer for everything and god is not existent. The humanistic approach states that society is self-sufficient; therefore God is not needed for survival. Therefore how could he exist? The position that I will argue in this paper is the pessimistic idea of protest atheism.
Hitchens, Christopher. God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. New York: Twelve, 2007. Print.
“Religion is an institution established by man for various reasons. Exert control; instill morality, stroke egos, or whatever it does. Organized, structured religions all but remove god from the equation. You confess your sins to a clergy member, go to elaborate churches to worship, and told what to pray and when to pray it. All those factors remove you from god.”
This paper will try to discuss the three Philosophical Positions on the Existence of God namely, the Theism, Agnosticism, and Atheism. Why do they believe? Why don’t they believe? How do they believe? What made them believe? Who helped them believe? These are just some of the questions that this paper will try to give answers and supply both believers and non-believers the enough indication that whatever their position may be, the responsibility in their hands of whatever reason they have must be valid and intellectual.
On the other hand, what caused God? If everything didn’t exist, than what caused God to exist? Nothing created God, He has always existed There can only be one being that can be uncaused. If there were more than one uncaused being, then beings would have potential. They would be striving to be what the other uncaused being is. This counteracts what an uncaused being is. It’s impossible because it would make an uncaused cause no longer be a being that is pure act. The being or beings would potentially be striving to be more than it or the other is.
“Christianity, along with all other theistic belief systems, is the fraud of the age. It serves to detach the species from the natural world, likewise, each other. It supports blind submission to authority[control of the masses].”(Zeitgeist 2007) In this essay, we will explore the different roots of religion and the plagiarism that Christianity and a number of different religions have committed.
Durkheim’s study of religion in The Elementary Forms of Religious Life is widely renowned to be one of the founding theories and definitions of the sociology of religion. The Elementary Forms of Religious Life presents Durkheim’s core belief that sociology of religion should be studied in a rational and objective manner. This essay will go into the definition of religion provided in chapter 2 in depth, particularly Durkheim’s sacred and profane dichotomy, which he views as fundamental to religion, and his controversial denial of the divine being necessary for all religions. This essay will examine the counterargument of how the Divine could arguably be a feature common in all religions. Furthermore, we will focus on Durkheim 's problematic
This essay is a conclusive look at the problems and contradictions underlying a belief in God and the observable traits of the world. This problem is traditionally labelled The Problem of Evil. This essay will be an analysis into the Problem of Evil and a counter rebuttal to objections levied against the Problem of Evil. This analysis will be on the nature of god and the world of evil, the world as a mixed creation, ‘sorting’ into heaven and hell objection, God’s ‘mysterious ways’ objection, the inscrutability of god objection, values presupposing pain objection, inherent contradictions in ‘God’s freewill’ and finally non-human
1) Oxford Readings in Philosophy. The Concept of God. New York: Oxford University press 1987