Stephen Law is a philosopher and author. Currently Director of Philosophy and Cert HE at Oxford University Department of Continuing Education. Stephen has also published many popular books including The Philosophy Gym, The Complete Philosophy Files, and Believing Bullshit. For school talks/ media: stephenlaw4schools.blogspot.co.uk Email: think-AT-royalinstitutephilosophy.org
Often, when we’re presented with strong evidence that our belief is false, we can easily change our mind. Show me I’m mistaken in believing that the Matterhorn is near Chamonix, and I’ll just drop that belief. However, abandoning a belief isn’t always so easy. That’s particularly the case for beliefs in which we have invested a great deal emotionally, socially and/or financially. When it comes to…
I recently came across this tweeted infographic, which is used to draw a conclusion I have also come across several times. The conclusion is that in the UK a Jewish individual is nine times more likely to experience a religious hate incident than is a Muslim. This is despite there being more hate incidents targeting Muslims. The argument for this conclusion is that there are around 15x more…
Just listened to The News Agents Investigates podcast on rise of far right, & I was not particularly surprised to find the left's (I think) very plausible explanation for the rise of the right got no mention at all , the issue being framed instead entirely around the collapse of centrism (centrism being good , obvs.!). The diagnosis offered by The News Agents for the rise of the far right focuses…
Could the universe be the creation of a supremely powerful and wicked deity? Most of us will rightly dismiss that suggestion out of hand. ‘Of course not’, we’ll say ‘Look around you – at all the love, laughter, ice-cream, and rainbows! This world contains far too much good for it to be the creation of such an omnipotent and omni-malevolent deity.’ And there’s no denying that while there is…
According to some, questions about the meaning of life are inextricably bound up with questions about God and religion. Without God, it is suggested, humanity amounts to little more than a dirty smudge on a ball of rock lost in an incomprehensibly vast universe that will eventually bare no trace of us having ever existed, and which will itself collapse into nothingness. So why bother getting out…
Jack Symes interviews me on The Evil God Challenge for his book Philosophers on God . Also included Richard Dawkins, Dan Dennett, Richard Swinburne, Yugin Nagasawa, and William Lane Craig. Prepublication draft. Chapter Eight The Evil-god Challenge Stephen Law Introduction The problem of evil is perhaps the most powerful argument against classical monotheism. However, as Nagasawa pointed out in our…
This is a pre-publication draft of a piece that appeared under a lightly different title in a recent Byline Times supplement on Trump, available here . In The Art of The Deal , Trump claimed that the decorative tiles in the children's room at his Mar-a-Lago resort were made by Walt Disney personally. When Trump's butler asked him if that was really true, Trump replied, “Who cares?” Trump is a…
A common Post Modern defence of unclarity in philosophy is that e.g. some boundaries are vague/unclear. 'If reality is vague and unclear, then we must be vague and unclear in talking about reality. Otherwise we are not being true to reality.' The analogy here is, perhaps, painting a picture. If a storm is something vague and fuzzy, then to be accurate your painting of it must be vague and fuzzy,…
(reposting of my 2017 article) I have recently been engaged in a very interesting discussion on Facebook about the Left's supposed antisemitism and Israel problem. It's widely supposed Labour has a major antisemitism problem that needs to be dealt with. Of course, there is antisemitism everywhere, but is there significantly more among Leftists? That's the suggestion. I don't see that the evidence…
I have always voted Labour, and have often been a member of the Party, campaigning and canvassing for them. For what it’s worth, here’s my feeling about voting Labour next General Election: 1. When the left vote Labour after they move rightwards, they are encouraged to just move further right, to the point where they are now probably right of where e.g. John Major’s Tory party was. And each time…
Both these things *can* be true: 1. Prejudice blindness. Not being the target of prejudice ourselves, we can easily miss it (so we should always listen). 2. Prejudice goggles. Considering ourselves or a minority a target, paranoia kicks in and we start 'seeing' prejudice where it isn't (and supposing those who can't see it must blind, or worse). E.g. some say anti-black racism against Meghan…
Tony Benn: is he stopped clock here (correct by lucky accident), or right on the money? If you are scratching your head wondering why we seem to be drifting scarily ever more rightwards, this is as plausible explanation as any I have come across. When I was last out canvassing for Labour, the message I got from a lot of voters was: 'I won't vote - they're all the same'. And they had a point: even…
If you believe inequality reduced under Labour, you've fallen for a myth. Sure, Labour redistributed, as the IFS confirm. But not nearly enough to reverse growing inequality. We're heading back to Victorian Britain under both parties, just at different speeds. See here . There was, recently, a once-in-a-generation opportunity to actually reverse this trend. It was destroyed by a coalition of…
After Part 1 of Al Jazeera's three part investigation 'The Labour Files' into Labour Party dirty tricks and smears against the Left, Michael Crick Comments. Crick is the only mainstream journalist who has even acknowledged the programme, to my knowledge. Part 2 is out Saturday. It is absolutely shocking what went on, but also absolutely shocking that the 'thugs, trots, and antisemites' narrative…
Here's a first draft article for THINK. Any errors, do let me know.... Ayer on Religious Language Stephen Law ABSTRACT: Here is a brief introduction to Ayer’s radical criticism of religious belief. According to Ayer, a sentence like ‘God exists’ doesn’t assert something false, rather, it fails to assert anything at all. Religious belief is of course criticised on a variety of fronts. Critics often…
A while back I wrote a paper on the existence of Jesus. It is available here . I wrote the paper because I was struck by the vehemence with which many Biblical experts insisted that anyone who doubted whether the New Testament documents alone establish the existence of Jesus beyond any reasonable doubt was a crank, or at least horribly ignorant. In my paper I argue (i) that the three most popular…
A while back I wrote a paper on the existence of Jesus. It is available here . I wrote the paper because I was struck by the vehemence with which many Biblical experts insisted that anyone who doubted whether the New Testament documents alone establish the existence of Jesus beyond any reasonable doubt was a crank, or at least horribly ignorant. In my paper I argue (i) that the three most popular…
How reasonable is it for the religious to believe the central tenets of their respective religions? According to many atheists: not very. Many atheists suppose it is in each case unreasonable for Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Bahá’ís, Quakers, Mormons, Scientologists, and so on to believe what they do. The religious person usually takes a different view of at least their own religious belief.…
Book is here . Prepublication draft below. FOREWORD STEPHEN LAW The problem of evil is widely considered to be one of, if not the, most significant threat to traditional theism, by which I mean the kind of theism that posits a being that is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent (roughly: all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-good). This volume focuses on what's often called the Evidential…
Politicians are, of course, skilled at dodging questions. Here is one of the many tricks in their arsenal. They use it to get themselves off the hook in all sorts of tight spots. A typical example: Interviewer: Minister, what will you do if the strike goes ahead? Minister: Well, you can’t expect me to answer a hypothetical question. A hypothetical question is a ‘What if…?’ question. Politicians…
(Prepublication draft of paper published in Int. J. Phil Religion (78) 2015) Normal 0 false false false EN-GB JA X-NONE THE PANDORA'S BOX OBJECTION TO SKEPTICAL THEISM ABSTRACT: Skeptical theism is a leading response to the evidential argument from evil against the existence of God. Skeptical theists attempt to block the inference from the existence of inscrutable evils (evil for which we can…
Can philosophy and critical thinking benefit your business or organisation? Yes! Here are two testimonials regarding work I've done recently for the Government of Malta and E.On Next: Charles Deguara, Auditor General at National Audit Office (Malta): 'In line with our policy of offering diverse professional development opportunities to our staff, Dr Stephen Law, a well renowned professor in…
My book The Philosophy Gym: 25 Short Adventures in Thinking! Philip Pullman called it 'a vivid, enlightening introduction to clear thinking.' 'Where did the universe come from? Is time travel possible? Are genetically designed babies morally acceptable? If you have ever asked yourself such questions, then you have already begun to think philosophically. This book is for those who want to take the…
Centrists, like Blair, who argue Labour must return to centrist policies to have any chance of winning again, have a problem with polling that shows moderately left-leaning Corbyn-style policies (e.g. free university tuition, free childcare, nationalised rail, higher taxes on wealthiest, etc.) were and still are popular. Centrists need to explain that polling away. Of course, they respond by…
According to the relativist, people who speak simply of what’s ‘true’ are naïve. ‘Whose truth?’ asks the relativist. ‘No claim is ever true, period. What’s true is always true for someone. It’s true relative to a particular person or culture. There’s no such thing as the absolute truth on any issue. This sort of relativism is certainly popular. For example, many claim that we ought never to…