I am happy to announce the release of a two-volume book series entitled Idealism and Christianity, which I edited with the help of my colleagues Steve Cowan, Joshua Farris, and Mark Hamilton. The books are published by Bloomsbury Press and … Continued
This semester I am teaching a course entitled “Philosophy of the Afterlife,” which covers a range of issues, including the concept of human immortality, near-death experiences, reincarnation, the doctrines of heaven, hell, and purgatory, and the prospect of achieving immortality … Continued
Last weekend’s Rethinking Hell conference at Fuller Seminary in Pasadena went extremely well. Greg Stump, Christopher Date, et al. did a superb job organizing and directing it. Those in attendance represented the spectrum of Christian views on the issue: traditionalists, … Continued
Last week I attended the conference of the Biola Center for Christian Thought, which is the annual capstone event at the CCT. This year’s research theme was “Intellectual Virtue and Civil Discourse,” and the conference featured a number of noteworthy … Continued
An interesting philosophical question concerns whether human beings are making progress. Great thinkers have fallen on either side of the issue, as you can see here. Some who take the negative view on this issue use lack of human moral … Continued
When reading or hearing the stories of atheists, certain patterns tend to emerge. One standard account goes like this: I was a devout Christian but along the way became dissatisfied with certain aspects of my faith. As I learned more … Continued
It has been one of my career goals to publish a scholarly piece with a Cambridge journal. Now that dream has been realized, as the journal Think has recently published my article “Why Flatulence is Funny.” Actually, in this article … Continued
In February I presented a paper at an ethics conference in which I critiqued a Journal of Medical Ethics article that defended infanticide. The thesis of the article is that so-called “’after-birth abortion’” (killing a newborn) should be permissible in … Continued
When it comes to philosophy of religion, there are few topics as challenging, and interesting, as the problem of evil. At least as far back as the ancient thinker Epicurus, philosophers have been wrestling with the question, If God exists, … Continued
In the field of psychology there has traditionally been an emphasis on psychological disorders—the various ways in which people malfunction in regards to their patterns of thought and behavior. That is, you might say that the standard approach in the … Continued