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The Hiddenness Argument: Philosophy's New Challenge to Belief in God
In many places and times, and for many people, God's existence has been rather less than a clear fact. According to the hiddenness argument, this is actually a reason to suppose that it is not a fact at all.
The hiddenness argument is a new argument for atheism that has come to prominence in philosophy over the past two decades. J. L. Schellenberg first developed the argument in 1993, and this book offers a short and vigorous statement of its central claims and ideas. Logically sharp but so clear that anyone can understand, the book addresses little-discussed issues such as why it took so long for hiddenness reasoning to emerge in philosophy, and how the hiddenness problem is distinct from the problem of evil. It concludes with the fascinating thought that retiring the last of the personal gods might leave us nearer the beginning of religion than the end.
Though an atheist, Schellenberg writes sensitively and with a nuanced insider's grasp of the religious life. Pertinent aspects of his experience as a believer and as a nonbeliever, and of his own engagement with hiddenness issues, are included. Set in this personal context, and against an authoritative background on relevant logical, conceptual, and historical matters, The Hiddenness Argument 's careful but provocative reasoning makes crystal clear just what this new argument is and why it matters.
The hiddenness argument is a new argument for atheism that has come to prominence in philosophy over the past two decades. J. L. Schellenberg first developed the argument in 1993, and this book offers a short and vigorous statement of its central claims and ideas. Logically sharp but so clear that anyone can understand, the book addresses little-discussed issues such as why it took so long for hiddenness reasoning to emerge in philosophy, and how the hiddenness problem is distinct from the problem of evil. It concludes with the fascinating thought that retiring the last of the personal gods might leave us nearer the beginning of religion than the end.
Though an atheist, Schellenberg writes sensitively and with a nuanced insider's grasp of the religious life. Pertinent aspects of his experience as a believer and as a nonbeliever, and of his own engagement with hiddenness issues, are included. Set in this personal context, and against an authoritative background on relevant logical, conceptual, and historical matters, The Hiddenness Argument 's careful but provocative reasoning makes crystal clear just what this new argument is and why it matters.
158 pages, Hardcover
First published May 23, 2015
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204 people want to read
About the author
J.L. Schellenberg
13 books21 followersJ. L. Schellenberg (born 1959) is a Canadian philosopher best known for his work in philosophy of religion. He has a DPhil in Philosophy from the University of Oxford, and is Professor of Philosophy at Mount Saint Vincent University and Adjunct Professor in the Faculty of Graduate Studies at Dalhousie University, both in Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Schellenberg’s early development of an argument from divine hiddenness for atheism has been influential.[2] In a subsequent series of books he has arrived at a form of religion called ‘skeptical religion’ which he regards as being compatible with atheism.[3] In 2013 the Cambridge University Press journal Religious Studies published a special issue devoted to critical discussion of Schellenberg’s philosophy of religion.
Schellenberg’s early development of an argument from divine hiddenness for atheism has been influential.[2] In a subsequent series of books he has arrived at a form of religion called ‘skeptical religion’ which he regards as being compatible with atheism.[3] In 2013 the Cambridge University Press journal Religious Studies published a special issue devoted to critical discussion of Schellenberg’s philosophy of religion.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
September 15, 2019
I give it five stars for content and two stars for clunky writing. Oxford University Press may be having a little joke at our expense, to subtly demonstrate how many of its authors and editors will never read the Oxford Guide to Plain English. Despite the author's stated intention to write for a broad audience, there are too many unnecessarily intricate garden path sentences to sap the reader's working memory.
For example, I couldn't parse this on the first several re-reads:
"What points like those we’ve examined provide us with reason to suppose God would value are often broad types of things—such as courage—that can be instanced (philosophers say “tokened”) in various ways, and also in a developing relationship with God."
...until a day later, when I belatedly realized this is probably an example of center embedding. Unraveling the embedded clause makes the sentence a bit easier to swallow on the first go:
"Points like those we’ve examined provide us with reason to suppose God would value what are often broad types of things—such as courage—that can be instanced (philosophers say “tokened”) in various ways, and also in a developing relationship with God."
In any case, the hiddenness argument appears to just about rule out a God - at least a God who might qualify as "perfectly loving." The argument seems to have already seeped into "New Atheist" discourse in some form. The late Christopher Hitchens recounted how our anatomically modern ancestors lived lives of misery and ignorance for perhaps 200,000 years before the infinitely loving God finally deigned to reveal himself in a backward Roman province in the Middle East. Now I know all our forbears on the left side of the March of Progress chart possessed nonresistant nonbelief.
Here and there Schellenberg writes as if he hasn't read much evolutionary psychology (although he does cite two of its notable proponents, Robert Wright and Richard Dawkins). For example:
"Such an argument might have some weight if its reasons for saying love is good were the only reasons. But they’re not. For one thing, these reasons all stress love’s instrumental value in human life—what it’s good for. Isn’t love also intrinsically valuable, good in itself? And if so, mightn’t there be a very different reason for saying God would have it too? A person who’s open and sharing, willing to give of herself in relationship, has a quality we admire, as well as desire for ourselves; we rightly think it’s good in itself for a person to be this way, and not just that we can get or give something by being loving. Consider for a moment this sharing, relational love in its various human manifestations: the love of friends, the love of siblings, the love of spouses. It is not only because of what it produces in the way of happiness or personal and societal growth that we value it."
It's hard to know what to make of the rhetorical question, "Isn’t love also intrinsically valuable, good in itself?" The only demonstrable example we have of love, or of any emotion, is in humans (and perhaps precursors in other higher animals). We know all human emotions are instrumental (or perhaps side effects of other things that are instrumental). That's why our emotions evolved in the first place. They gave our ancestors a slightly greater reproductive fitness than their presumably less-emotive or differently-emotive fellow hominids who were then either quickly or slowly edged out of the evolutionary competition. (See Why We Feel: The Science of Human Emotions by Victor S. Johnston.)
To view love as intrinsically valuable is therefore like viewing tree roots or fish scales or octopus eyes and all other phenotypic traits as intrinsically valuable too. Clearly tree roots have instrumental value for trees, but what sort of intrinsic value could tree roots have? If the question makes no sense for tree roots, how could it make more sense for love? The same evolutionary mechanisms produced all phenotypic traits. To grant some of our own adaptive traits a special exalted status seems to require more than assuming it to be obvious. If it seems obvious, then perhaps we haven't thought through the implications of our natural history yet. If trees were sentient, to which of their traits would they grant the same exalted status? Photosynthesis, perhaps, the sustenance for almost all living things? And how would mindless evolution know to direct itself toward evolving instrumental traits that would eventually culminate in something with intrinsic value? It sounds too good to be true. We wouldn't expect evolution to produce anything but instrumental value, without some external magical force to rig the game.
I don't fault Schellenberg here, as he seems to be playing along with the theologian's narrow perspective of making Man the measure of all things, including (and especially) God. And of course all the major religions evolved long before anyone understood how humans came to be. Viewing humans as the deliberate creation of a personal God makes it easier to imagine God would build in things with intrinsic value (although a version of the Euthyphro dilemma seems to creep in here, if there is some form of value apart from instrumental value).
The Coda to the book seemed a complete departure from Schellenberg's otherwise tight (if at times hidden) logic. An exerpt:
"In our culture people who think about whether there is a God and conclude there isn’t will commonly infer—whether gladly or sadly but rarely indifferently—that blind nature is all there is. They become (to use the philosophical term for their position) metaphysical naturalists. This is largely because of how influential the natural sciences have come to be in our culture. Science has given many people a great and often unthinking optimism that everything there is will turn out to have the character of everything science has studied: namely, that of belonging to a system governed entirely by natural law."
Schellenberg seems to subtly mischaracterize the scientific method here (in its instantiation as Bayesian epistemology). A scientific thinker thinks in terms of probabilities. Thus the spectacular success of science over the last four centuries shouldn't lead to any sort of unthinking optimism. Rather it would lead to a steady increase in our Bayesian probability assessment that natural law governs everything. Imagine flipping a coin a million times and getting heads every time. You would be forgiven for imagining heads is the only outcome the coin can give, although your conclusion would still only be inductive. Inductive, but with a massive prior probability backing you up.
Progress in science has seen a steady erosion for nonmaterial theories such as dualism, vitalism, and the God of the Gaps. The trend has been obvious and sustained for centuries. Clearly the safe bet is to assume the trend will continue, gradually erasing all the gaps and God or God-proxies with them. Any bet can be wrong, of course, but metaphysical naturalism just keeps going from strength to strength. Schellenberg seems to argue against the trend, analogous to a Young Earth Creationist who ignores the steadily accumulating mountain of evidence for evolution while insisting scientists will someday realize their error. Yes, there is a vanishingly tiny chance that scientists have misinterpreted everything, and someday there will be rabbits in the Precambrian forcing a re-think. But the battleship of evidence gets harder to turn every year as more evidence accumulates.
If evidence matters more than idle and perhaps self-serving speculation, Schellenberg seems to underestimate the strong and increasingly stronger case for metaphysical naturalism.
For example, I couldn't parse this on the first several re-reads:
"What points like those we’ve examined provide us with reason to suppose God would value are often broad types of things—such as courage—that can be instanced (philosophers say “tokened”) in various ways, and also in a developing relationship with God."
...until a day later, when I belatedly realized this is probably an example of center embedding. Unraveling the embedded clause makes the sentence a bit easier to swallow on the first go:
"Points like those we’ve examined provide us with reason to suppose God would value what are often broad types of things—such as courage—that can be instanced (philosophers say “tokened”) in various ways, and also in a developing relationship with God."
In any case, the hiddenness argument appears to just about rule out a God - at least a God who might qualify as "perfectly loving." The argument seems to have already seeped into "New Atheist" discourse in some form. The late Christopher Hitchens recounted how our anatomically modern ancestors lived lives of misery and ignorance for perhaps 200,000 years before the infinitely loving God finally deigned to reveal himself in a backward Roman province in the Middle East. Now I know all our forbears on the left side of the March of Progress chart possessed nonresistant nonbelief.
Here and there Schellenberg writes as if he hasn't read much evolutionary psychology (although he does cite two of its notable proponents, Robert Wright and Richard Dawkins). For example:
"Such an argument might have some weight if its reasons for saying love is good were the only reasons. But they’re not. For one thing, these reasons all stress love’s instrumental value in human life—what it’s good for. Isn’t love also intrinsically valuable, good in itself? And if so, mightn’t there be a very different reason for saying God would have it too? A person who’s open and sharing, willing to give of herself in relationship, has a quality we admire, as well as desire for ourselves; we rightly think it’s good in itself for a person to be this way, and not just that we can get or give something by being loving. Consider for a moment this sharing, relational love in its various human manifestations: the love of friends, the love of siblings, the love of spouses. It is not only because of what it produces in the way of happiness or personal and societal growth that we value it."
It's hard to know what to make of the rhetorical question, "Isn’t love also intrinsically valuable, good in itself?" The only demonstrable example we have of love, or of any emotion, is in humans (and perhaps precursors in other higher animals). We know all human emotions are instrumental (or perhaps side effects of other things that are instrumental). That's why our emotions evolved in the first place. They gave our ancestors a slightly greater reproductive fitness than their presumably less-emotive or differently-emotive fellow hominids who were then either quickly or slowly edged out of the evolutionary competition. (See Why We Feel: The Science of Human Emotions by Victor S. Johnston.)
To view love as intrinsically valuable is therefore like viewing tree roots or fish scales or octopus eyes and all other phenotypic traits as intrinsically valuable too. Clearly tree roots have instrumental value for trees, but what sort of intrinsic value could tree roots have? If the question makes no sense for tree roots, how could it make more sense for love? The same evolutionary mechanisms produced all phenotypic traits. To grant some of our own adaptive traits a special exalted status seems to require more than assuming it to be obvious. If it seems obvious, then perhaps we haven't thought through the implications of our natural history yet. If trees were sentient, to which of their traits would they grant the same exalted status? Photosynthesis, perhaps, the sustenance for almost all living things? And how would mindless evolution know to direct itself toward evolving instrumental traits that would eventually culminate in something with intrinsic value? It sounds too good to be true. We wouldn't expect evolution to produce anything but instrumental value, without some external magical force to rig the game.
I don't fault Schellenberg here, as he seems to be playing along with the theologian's narrow perspective of making Man the measure of all things, including (and especially) God. And of course all the major religions evolved long before anyone understood how humans came to be. Viewing humans as the deliberate creation of a personal God makes it easier to imagine God would build in things with intrinsic value (although a version of the Euthyphro dilemma seems to creep in here, if there is some form of value apart from instrumental value).
The Coda to the book seemed a complete departure from Schellenberg's otherwise tight (if at times hidden) logic. An exerpt:
"In our culture people who think about whether there is a God and conclude there isn’t will commonly infer—whether gladly or sadly but rarely indifferently—that blind nature is all there is. They become (to use the philosophical term for their position) metaphysical naturalists. This is largely because of how influential the natural sciences have come to be in our culture. Science has given many people a great and often unthinking optimism that everything there is will turn out to have the character of everything science has studied: namely, that of belonging to a system governed entirely by natural law."
Schellenberg seems to subtly mischaracterize the scientific method here (in its instantiation as Bayesian epistemology). A scientific thinker thinks in terms of probabilities. Thus the spectacular success of science over the last four centuries shouldn't lead to any sort of unthinking optimism. Rather it would lead to a steady increase in our Bayesian probability assessment that natural law governs everything. Imagine flipping a coin a million times and getting heads every time. You would be forgiven for imagining heads is the only outcome the coin can give, although your conclusion would still only be inductive. Inductive, but with a massive prior probability backing you up.
Progress in science has seen a steady erosion for nonmaterial theories such as dualism, vitalism, and the God of the Gaps. The trend has been obvious and sustained for centuries. Clearly the safe bet is to assume the trend will continue, gradually erasing all the gaps and God or God-proxies with them. Any bet can be wrong, of course, but metaphysical naturalism just keeps going from strength to strength. Schellenberg seems to argue against the trend, analogous to a Young Earth Creationist who ignores the steadily accumulating mountain of evidence for evolution while insisting scientists will someday realize their error. Yes, there is a vanishingly tiny chance that scientists have misinterpreted everything, and someday there will be rabbits in the Precambrian forcing a re-think. But the battleship of evidence gets harder to turn every year as more evidence accumulates.
If evidence matters more than idle and perhaps self-serving speculation, Schellenberg seems to underestimate the strong and increasingly stronger case for metaphysical naturalism.
February 16, 2019
Undoubtedly, the Hiddenness Argument is one that anyone who is even remotely interested in the philosophy of religion has certainly heard of at some point. You'll run into it on Twitter, at school, online lectures, etc, etc.
If there is one thing that I learned from this book apart from a proper understanding of the argument itself, is how misunderstood this argument actually is by both those who believe in the existence of an omnipotent and perfectly loving God and those who don't.
Atheists will no doubt carry it in their argumentative toolbelt, but, if YouTube debates and Twitter feuds are an indication, not many of them understand the argument properly.
Most theists that I have heard argue against Divine Hiddenness as presented by J.L.S. are only interested in rebutting it but not really in understanding; and if you've only considered the rebuttals to views you don't hold, do you really know much of anything?
The strength of the Divine Hiddenness argument is strong. The deductive nature of the argument, at least to J.L.S (admittedly, I don't myself find much to disagree with, if anything) is both sound and valid.
Apart from the content of the book, its presented in an extremely approachable way by J.L.S., and for that, he has to be commended. He did a great job of outlining and supporting the argument in a way that anyone with even a basic grasp of logic and philosophy will be able to understand and absorb.
If there is one thing that I learned from this book apart from a proper understanding of the argument itself, is how misunderstood this argument actually is by both those who believe in the existence of an omnipotent and perfectly loving God and those who don't.
Atheists will no doubt carry it in their argumentative toolbelt, but, if YouTube debates and Twitter feuds are an indication, not many of them understand the argument properly.
Most theists that I have heard argue against Divine Hiddenness as presented by J.L.S. are only interested in rebutting it but not really in understanding; and if you've only considered the rebuttals to views you don't hold, do you really know much of anything?
The strength of the Divine Hiddenness argument is strong. The deductive nature of the argument, at least to J.L.S (admittedly, I don't myself find much to disagree with, if anything) is both sound and valid.
Apart from the content of the book, its presented in an extremely approachable way by J.L.S., and for that, he has to be commended. He did a great job of outlining and supporting the argument in a way that anyone with even a basic grasp of logic and philosophy will be able to understand and absorb.
December 24, 2020
4.5/5.
Here is Schellenberg’s logical proof of the hiddenness argument:
1) If a perfectly loving God exists, then there exists a God who is always open to a personal relationship with any finite person.
2) If there exists a God who is always open to a personal relationship with any finite person, then no finite person is ever nonresistantly in a state of nonbelief in relation to the proposition that God exists.
3) If a perfectly loving God exists, then no finite person is ever nonresistantly in a state of nonbelief in relation to the proposition that God exists (from 1 and 2).
4) Some finite persons are or have been nonresistantly in a state of nonbelief in relation to the proposition that God exists.
5) No perfectly loving God exists (from 3 and 4).
6) If no perfectly loving God exists, then God does not exist.
7) God does not exist (from 5 and 6)
And in symbolic form:
1) P->Q
2) Q->R
3) P->R (from 1 and 2).
4) ~R
5) ~P (From 3 and 4).
6) ~P->S
7) S (from 5 and 6).
Schellenberg’s book carefully introduces each of these premises over the course of a few chapters, provides thorough yet concise arguments and explanations for the veracity of each premise, and addresses objections and counter arguments for each premise as well. He also takes the first few chapters to provide context of the origin of the argument as well as providing an intro to logic.
I appreciated how he gave a fair trial to theism and even added some strong perspectives for theism that were new to me. I also like how he ended the book with an open attitude to further explore ultimism, rather than the closed perspective that the “new atheists” often espouse:
“What is the upshot? Just this. That neither complacency nor despair should be our attitude upon concluding with the hiddenness argument that the traditional God of theism does not exist. Having concluded that no such God exists, the safest and also most intellectually adventurous next move is not to metaphysical naturalism—as though the idea of personal gods is the best our species can do!—but rather, with our vision enlarged by thoughts of deep time, onward to the next level of investigation into ultimate things. If we accept this positive challenge, and if, in time, the brighter possibilities here are realized, then the hiddenness of the traditional God will only have had the effect of allowing the real God—ultimate reality as it truly is—to be more clearly revealed.”
Although this book purports to be designed for a wide readership, I’m not sure I would agree with that assertion. I managed to keep up just fine, but I imagine readers who have never ventured into any intellectual inquiry may have trouble following everything.
Another reservation that I have is that I would have liked to see him elaborate more in certain sections instead of essentially dismissing a section by saying that there are no competent counter arguments. I understand his aim was brevity, but if I was someone completely new to religious arguments, for example, I’d have been lost in his section titled “Counter-Arguments” in chapter 8, among others. He made references to the cosmological and ontological arguments without actually explaining their contents. There are other similar references throughout the book that completely new readers might not understand. If you’ve read Dawkins’ “The God Delusion”, then you’ll keep up just fine since Dawkins’ book explains most of the references made in Schellenberg’s.
Overall, I was very satisfied with this book and even felt nostalgic of my days back when I was a believer as Schellenberg recalled examples from his own personal journey of faith which resembled my own. It’s not often that I find someone who had a similar journey towards nonresistant nonbelief and managed to explain it far better than I could have, so for that, I appreciated the personal connection.
Here is Schellenberg’s logical proof of the hiddenness argument:
1) If a perfectly loving God exists, then there exists a God who is always open to a personal relationship with any finite person.
2) If there exists a God who is always open to a personal relationship with any finite person, then no finite person is ever nonresistantly in a state of nonbelief in relation to the proposition that God exists.
3) If a perfectly loving God exists, then no finite person is ever nonresistantly in a state of nonbelief in relation to the proposition that God exists (from 1 and 2).
4) Some finite persons are or have been nonresistantly in a state of nonbelief in relation to the proposition that God exists.
5) No perfectly loving God exists (from 3 and 4).
6) If no perfectly loving God exists, then God does not exist.
7) God does not exist (from 5 and 6)
And in symbolic form:
1) P->Q
2) Q->R
3) P->R (from 1 and 2).
4) ~R
5) ~P (From 3 and 4).
6) ~P->S
7) S (from 5 and 6).
Schellenberg’s book carefully introduces each of these premises over the course of a few chapters, provides thorough yet concise arguments and explanations for the veracity of each premise, and addresses objections and counter arguments for each premise as well. He also takes the first few chapters to provide context of the origin of the argument as well as providing an intro to logic.
I appreciated how he gave a fair trial to theism and even added some strong perspectives for theism that were new to me. I also like how he ended the book with an open attitude to further explore ultimism, rather than the closed perspective that the “new atheists” often espouse:
“What is the upshot? Just this. That neither complacency nor despair should be our attitude upon concluding with the hiddenness argument that the traditional God of theism does not exist. Having concluded that no such God exists, the safest and also most intellectually adventurous next move is not to metaphysical naturalism—as though the idea of personal gods is the best our species can do!—but rather, with our vision enlarged by thoughts of deep time, onward to the next level of investigation into ultimate things. If we accept this positive challenge, and if, in time, the brighter possibilities here are realized, then the hiddenness of the traditional God will only have had the effect of allowing the real God—ultimate reality as it truly is—to be more clearly revealed.”
Although this book purports to be designed for a wide readership, I’m not sure I would agree with that assertion. I managed to keep up just fine, but I imagine readers who have never ventured into any intellectual inquiry may have trouble following everything.
Another reservation that I have is that I would have liked to see him elaborate more in certain sections instead of essentially dismissing a section by saying that there are no competent counter arguments. I understand his aim was brevity, but if I was someone completely new to religious arguments, for example, I’d have been lost in his section titled “Counter-Arguments” in chapter 8, among others. He made references to the cosmological and ontological arguments without actually explaining their contents. There are other similar references throughout the book that completely new readers might not understand. If you’ve read Dawkins’ “The God Delusion”, then you’ll keep up just fine since Dawkins’ book explains most of the references made in Schellenberg’s.
Overall, I was very satisfied with this book and even felt nostalgic of my days back when I was a believer as Schellenberg recalled examples from his own personal journey of faith which resembled my own. It’s not often that I find someone who had a similar journey towards nonresistant nonbelief and managed to explain it far better than I could have, so for that, I appreciated the personal connection.
June 3, 2020
Schellenberg's "Hiddenness Argument" lays out the argument clearly and has some good ideas but, ultimately, I think, his main premise fails. He argues that an ultimate personal being will love, and he defines love as (more or less) always being open to a relationship with non-resistant persons. Since (he says) non-resistant person exist, God cannot exist.
God is love - Christianity requires this, but God is not ONLY love. A morally perfect ultimate being who is worthy of worship would, arguably, necessarily have other qualities such as justice and holiness. Throw in the human propensity for moral deficiency and this changes the discussion considerably. Could a morally perfect being have fellowship with morally corrupted creatures? In fact, on some Christian views of human nature, it's questionable that there even are any 'non-resistant' creatures since they would say that, by nature, humanity is in a state of rebellion against God, which makes us definitionally resistant.
Schellenberg ably defends the argument that HIS god couldn't exist, but not why THE God couldn't. Fortunately, God's existence is not subject to the arguments of philosophers. And if he were, I'll see your hiddenness argument and raise you an ontological argument.
God is love - Christianity requires this, but God is not ONLY love. A morally perfect ultimate being who is worthy of worship would, arguably, necessarily have other qualities such as justice and holiness. Throw in the human propensity for moral deficiency and this changes the discussion considerably. Could a morally perfect being have fellowship with morally corrupted creatures? In fact, on some Christian views of human nature, it's questionable that there even are any 'non-resistant' creatures since they would say that, by nature, humanity is in a state of rebellion against God, which makes us definitionally resistant.
Schellenberg ably defends the argument that HIS god couldn't exist, but not why THE God couldn't. Fortunately, God's existence is not subject to the arguments of philosophers. And if he were, I'll see your hiddenness argument and raise you an ontological argument.
September 11, 2015
I've switched from being anon believer to now being a disbeliever
May 18, 2017
A beautiful philosophical approach, according to logical rules, leading to a clear cut atheistic conclusion.
February 12, 2020
This is a great introduction to an argument that the author first developed in his 1993 book. The argument starts by noting that there are what the author calls "non-resistant nonbelievers" -- people who don't believe in God, but not because they actively resist it. If God is personal and loving, the argument continues, we wouldn't expect this. Rather, we'd expect that God is always open to having a relationship with every person. And so, even if there were people who resisted having that relationship, there wouldn't be anyone who failed to believe without resisting. The very fact that there are such people gives us reason to think that there is no loving personal God.
The author puts the argument together with a great deal of focus on its logical structure, and then goes to great lengths to define the key terms -- in particular, what he does not mean by each premise. And then he considers several objections to each premise and responds to them.
This is a work in analytic philosophy of religion, and those with very little philosophical training will likely find it tough going. I'm using it for a senior seminar for philosophy majors, and it is perfect for that audience.
The author puts the argument together with a great deal of focus on its logical structure, and then goes to great lengths to define the key terms -- in particular, what he does not mean by each premise. And then he considers several objections to each premise and responds to them.
This is a work in analytic philosophy of religion, and those with very little philosophical training will likely find it tough going. I'm using it for a senior seminar for philosophy majors, and it is perfect for that audience.
December 23, 2019
This book is a miscarried attempt by an analytic philosopher to write a popular book. It’s still quite technical at points and substitutes autobiographical detail for clarity and illumination. I can’t imagine a normal reading finding this easy to read. In fact, his more technical work is actually easier to understand.
December 11, 2022
Simply brilliant!
July 10, 2024
Moronic content expressed badly. The central argument presented is poorly structured and ugly. The author is arrogant, idiotic, and a horrible (HORRIBLE) writer. Worst book I’ve finished in years.
October 1, 2015
This is one of the freshest, innovative books from an atheist perspective I have read for a long time. Most atheist apologetics rehash the same tired (but no less important) arguments against theism with little new to say. But THE HIDDENNESS ARGUMENT offers a what seems to be a very compelling new argument agains the existence of God. In addition to the presentation of the argument itself, Schellenberg also discusses the nature of good reasoning and logic, providing this important background to readers who may not already know about it. While the book description above suggests that the argument is crystal clear, it will take some readers considerable effort to follow it. But it is worth it. There has also been a plethora of responses from theists critiquing the argument — which I am yet to follow up. If you are interested in the atheist/theist debate, and don’t mind a challenging, provocative read, then check out THE HIDDENNESS ARGUMENT.
December 9, 2015
Reading Schellenberg is always great.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews