Abstract
With substance dualism and the existence of God, Swinburne (2004, The Existence of God, Oxford University Press, Oxford) and Moreland (2010, Consciousness and the Existence of God, Routledge, New York) have argued for a very powerful explanatory mechanism that can readily explain several philosophical problems related to consciousness. However, their positions come with presuppositions and ontological commitments which many are not prepared to share. The aim of this paper is to improve on the Swinburne-Moreland argument from consciousness by developing an argument for the existence of God from consciousness without being committed to substance dualism. The argument proceeds by suggesting a solution to the exceptional-point-of-view problem, i.e., the question how it can be explained that there is a conscious being lucky enough to experience the point of view of a relatively tiny brain amidst a giant universe that is indifferent about which physical entities it brings about according to the laws of physics.
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Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Original Papers
- Modal Realism and the Possibility of Island Universes: Why There are no Possible Worlds
- Counterpart Theories: The Argument from Concern
- A Functional Approach to Ontology
- On the Nature of Persons; Persons as Constituted Events
- Modest Dualism and Individuation of Mind
- Proving God without Dualism: Improving the Swinburne-Moreland Argument from Consciousness
- Holism | Cosmopsychism – And the Collapse of the Wavefunction
- Laws, Dispositions, Memory: Three Hypotheses on the Order of the World
- Response to Book Review
- Self-Relating Internalism: Reply to Vallicella
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Original Papers
- Modal Realism and the Possibility of Island Universes: Why There are no Possible Worlds
- Counterpart Theories: The Argument from Concern
- A Functional Approach to Ontology
- On the Nature of Persons; Persons as Constituted Events
- Modest Dualism and Individuation of Mind
- Proving God without Dualism: Improving the Swinburne-Moreland Argument from Consciousness
- Holism | Cosmopsychism – And the Collapse of the Wavefunction
- Laws, Dispositions, Memory: Three Hypotheses on the Order of the World
- Response to Book Review
- Self-Relating Internalism: Reply to Vallicella