RP - Religion and life Flashcards
2 contrasting views of Big Bang
Stephen Hawking - Universe began with the Big Bang, it created itself out of nothing. Our cosmic habitat is one of 10tothe500, the fine tuned laws of nature can be explained using the existence of mulit-verses
Sir Roger Penrose - More than 10tothe500 universes are needed to produce ours from chance, claims the universe has a purpose, it not there by chance (Plato), William Lane Craig further suggests, an entity creating itself ex-nihilo = contradiction, mulitverses are not a simpler and verifiable explanation, if they did exist, Aquinas would say God made them.
Christian/Muslim interpretations of the Big Bang
YECs - Universe = 6000/1000 yeaqrs old, universe was created in 7 days as described in Genesis 1. Religion + Big Bang science = incompatible, latter is false as scripture holds inerrant authority on faith, morals AND science.
OEC - Interpret “day” as a long period of time (Refer to Surah 21:30). Scriptures hold inerrant authority on faith, morals and metaphysics only, religion+science = duplex modus. Physics provides necessary but insufficient. The deity is the eternal first cause and creates the singularity, allows the law of physics to unfold teleologically as secondary cause (without intervention).
NOMA
Liberals - Scripture provides moral knowledge only, science provides facts. Cosmological/metaphysical references = myth but provide moral, the deity is creator of cosmos that is good.
Richard Dawkins God delusion argument + criticisms
Creative intelligences exist at the end of a long evolutionary process, they arrive late in the universe and cannot be responsible for making it.
Criticism 1 - Does not affect YECs
2. Dawkins commits straw man fallacy by conflating human and divine intelligence (nearly all theists believe God transcends time and space and thus does not evolve), God existed before the evolutionary processes)
Theistic interpretation of natural selection
YECs - Universe is 6-1000 years old, invalidates natural selection timescales
OECs - Alfred Russel Wallace - suggest natural selection is necessary yet insufficient account, requires metaphysical explanations provided by scripture and theistic metaphysics`
Theistic interpretation of natural selection
YECs - Universe is 6-1000 years old, invalidates natural selection timescales
OECs - Alfred Russel Wallace - suggest natural selection is necessary yet insufficient account, requires metaphysical explanations provided by scripture and theistic metaphysics, which provides frameworks for how life/natural selection began. Natural selection (NS) may have arose by design not chance/organisms evolving form simplicity suggest teleological direction that points to teleological guidance of a deity.
Criticism of OECS interpretation of natural selection
NS/SOTF is often cruel, triggers Epicurean argument of God not being OOO.
S.J Gould argues that the “Simple to complex view of evolution” is contradicted in many places via fossil records, and that the progressive directionality of evolution would reach end point is not a scientific hypothesis.
Roman Catholic view on abortion
Pro life - life is sacred and has all life has intrinsic rights, only God can end it - Job 1:21 “The Lord gives…the Lord has taken away”
Human life begins at conception
In case of rape, tu quoque fallacy triggered, adoption favoured
Kant - abortion universilation leads to rational beings being used as means to a end, if denied results in reductio ad absurdum
Exception in the case of double effect, if mother were to die. ectopic pregnancies can be aborted
Peter Singer view on abortion
Always permissible - newborns lack personhood (autonomy/rationality/self-consciousness)
Embryo has no preferences to weigh against mother’s
Infanticide possible “killing newborn never equivalent to killing a person who wants to go on living”
Doctors switch of life support for those without personhood, why not unbrons?
Denies Christian view as it based on superstition, denies intrinsic/deontological good, there is no purpose in nature
Anglican view on abortion
Great moral evil but permissible in certain circumstances, via media between sanctity of life and quality of life
Employ DCE and situation ethics
Permissible in case of rape/severe handicap, where quality of life overrides sanctity of life
If abortion banned, backstreet abortions would take place (dangerous)
500 a week = too much (Rowan Williams)
Islamic view on abortion
Highly undesirable but permissible
Life is sacred, but receives soul at 120 days, (similar to Augustine/Aquinas view on delayed ensoulment)
After 4 months, can only be aborted in case of rape/endangerment to mother
Sharia Law - lesser of 2 evils should occur
Roman Catholic view on euthanasia
Forbid all forms, sanctity of life overrides quality of life “…a time to be born and a time to die” Ecclesiastes
Must die naturally, letting die is not the same as killing (active vs passive), active = murder
Double effect - death may arise via painkillers unintentionally
Natural Law - being must preserve existence, all ordinary treatments should continue
Kant - universalization = means to an end
Hospices for those who are in pain
Assisted suicide (2015 bill) could reductio into involuntary euthanasia (Aktion T4)
Suffering could have higher purpose eschatologically
Peter Singer/liberal protestants
All forms permissible - sanctity of life rests on “incoherent deontological principles”
Employ situation ethic, difference between active/passive is incoherent
Those without personhood = euthanasia, as medical resources for those who need it outweigh those without personhood
Voluntary euthanasia permissible - life is “not a gift from God”
Argues voluntary euthanasia permissible in other countries, does not result in reductio to involuntary active
Dominion - animal/environmental rights
Animals/environment have no/less rights than humans, can be used to means to our ends.
DCE/DL - “fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over every living thing”
Humans have higher right to life as we are made in the “imago dei” and are animated by the breath of God
Humans have rationality/freewill by rationally deliberating ands overcoming our instincts being “Lords” over ourselves and creation
Stewardship - animal/environmental rights
Animal rights analogous to human rights, especially mammals/higher apes
DCE/DL - “…put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it”
God’s image is in nature thus it is sacred, duty to take care of it, will be judged accordingly
Espouse vegetarianism - “It is better to be happy than to have your bodies act as graveyard for other animals”
