1 of 1 members found this review helpful.
“Victor Reppert does an admirable job of elaborating upon, elucidating, and defending Lewis' argument from reason (basically, the idea that naturalism is self-refuting because it is inconsistent with the validity of reasoning), which appeared in his book Miracles (one of my favorites of Lewis' work). The main force of the argument stems from the fact that materialists are committed to there being only non-purposive and non-rational forces at work in the universe, which work mechanistically and physicalistically; while reason is itself a rational, purposive, and teleological phenomena. As materialism leaves no room for reason, and gives no satisfactory explanation of how the rational could ever rise from the non-rational, it therefore undermines the very reason (flawed, apparently) which gave rise to it as an idea. The argument is actually several further argument as well; and it is more accurate to speak of the arguments from reason. But I will leave further exploration of this to Reppert's book.
Reppert explores the modern arena of theistic-materialistic debate, explores the types of beliefs one can have on the subject (or any controversial subject), the nature of the debate, and the history of the formulation of Lewis' argument. The philosophical work here seems exceedingly complete, despite the book's small length; space is given to almost every objection, as well as a reasonable answer. Most of the time the subject matter is not above the average reader, though the book does, as is only to be expected, sometimes get lost in philosophical technicalities. But this of course I did not mind: such things are mentally bracing. Reppert's final statement makes it clear that he is not arguing exclusively toward theism, only against materialism and naturalism: though he does say more than once that the argument from reason gives a strong occasion to accept theism. The ideas in this book are ones which every philosopher and every thinker should come to terms with, regardless of their views on science and religion. ”
Michael wrote this review Wednesday, July 22 2009.
(
reply |
permalink )
