A. The Arguments Formulated In chapter 13 of Atheism: A Philosophical Justification, Michael Martin argues that Salmon’s arguments can be expanded to provide a powerful case for atheism: If Salmon’s arguments concerning the unique properties of God are restated and expanded, they provide a powerful inductive case for positive atheism in the narrow sense. The … Atheistic Teleological Arguments, Part 4: Michael Martin’s Expanded Version

Two general comments. First, I am uninterested in matters of Salmon’s interpretation of Hume, so I’m going to skip over that issue in its entirety.[10] Second, it seems to me that the idea of using a frequency interpretation of probability for assigning probability values to ultimate metaphysical posits is fundamentally misguided;[11] I think the epistemic … Atheistic Teleological Arguments, Part 3: Assessment of Salmon’s Argument(s)

As I read him, Salmon presents multiple arguments against the design hypothesis. Let us consider the logical form of each argument in turn. Note that all of the argument labels are mine; Salmon does not label any of his arguments in his essay. A. The Argument Against an Unspecified Intelligent Designer This is the argument … Atheistic Teleological Arguments, Part 2: Salmon’s Argument(s) Formulated

Wesley Salmon Since Michael Martin begins his chapter on atheistic teleological arguments (ATAs) with a discussion of Wesley Salmon’s 1978 article, “Religion and Science: A New Look at Hume’s Dialogues,” let us review Salmon’s argument.[1] My goal now is simply to figure out what Salmon’s argument is; I will defer an assessment of Salmon’s argument … Atheistic Teleological Arguments, Part 1

I first learned about so-called “atheistic teleological arguments” (ATAs) when I read Michael Martin’s Atheism: A Philosophical Justification in 1995. When I first read Martin’s chapter on ATAs, I found them very puzzling. Since 1995 I have thought about them off and on but without investing the time to really understand them. Since I have … Atheistic Teleological Arguments: Index