UnBelieving God: A Skeptic's Guide to the Philosophy of Religion

• Week 1: Arguing for God’s existence—the standard arguments
  We’ll introduce our approach: a quick presentation and evaluation of the most typical and popular arguments for religious belief. We’ll discuss “Pascal’s wager” and then describe “salvation by appropriation,” “religious testimony” and “strength of belief.”
• Week 2: Arguing for and against God’s existence
  We will continue examining and critiquing the most-favoured arguments for religious belief: “the meaning of life,” “appeal to scripture” and the old “faith vs. reason” debate. We’ll then turn our attention to the most powerful arguments against religious belief: “the problem of religious pluralism” and “the problem of evil.”
• Week 3: Arguing against God’s existence
  Continuing with arguments against religious belief, we’ll explore “The Ubiquitous Fallacy of Religious Belief: ‘The God of the Gaps.’” Then we will move into new territory: “Can we be good without God?” We will begin by discussing “divine command theory,” and the question: “Where does moral obligation come from?”
• Week 4: Arguing about God and morality
  We’ll define “metaethics,” and then consider the matter that always arises in arguments between believer and unbeliever, best described as: “moral absolutes vs. moral relativism.”
• Week 5: Arguing further about God and morality
  We’ll ask the question: “Is everything really relative?” As a possible response, we will describe the “good reasons approach to ethical decision making.” We will also ask: “Are there moral dilemmas?” and present, with careful consideration, the so-called “slippery slope.”
• Week 6: In the public square: the chain of assumptions
  Christopher Hitchens said, in response to the claim that a First Cause created the universe, “You still have all your work ahead of you.” In this final class we will present a few of the links that need to be established as part of that “work.” We will finish with a brief discussion about the place of religious values in the public square.

By the end of the course, you should be able to:

• Realize the importance of critical thinking and careful argument when discussing foundational topics in the philosophy of religion 
• Identify the most popular contemporary arguments for belief in God, and be aware of the skeptic’s respective rejoinders
• Understand the force behind the claim that God is necessary for the foundation of morality, and appreciate the response from the skeptic 
• Consider how these topics have real consequences for our day-to-day lives, both personally and in the public square

• Lectures with videos
• Participation in discussions
  
• Supplementary resources accessed through Canvas
  
• Reflective essay (applicable only to certificate students)

No textbook is required. We will provide all course materials online.