Science, God and Ockham’s razor

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Abstract

In discussions about the existence of God, it is sometimes claimed that the progress of science has removed the need for God. This paper uses a Bayesian analysis of Ockham’s razor to formulate and evaluate this argument, which is referred to as the science explains away God argument (SEAGA). Four different strategies for responding to this argument are presented and evaluated. It is arguedthat one of these strategies highlights how difficult it is to show that the conditions for applying Ockham’s razor are satisfied and hence why SEAGA is very unlikely to succeed.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1145-1161
Number of pages17
JournalPhilosophical Studies
Volume174
Issue number5
Early online date20 Jul 2016
DOIs
Publication statusPublished (in print/issue) - May 2017

Keywords

  • Explaining away
  • Ockham’s razor
  • Bayesian reasoning
  • Atheism

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