Format: The exam will consist of two parts: short answer and long answer. There will be twelve short answer questions of which you pick 8. Answers should be anywhere from one to five sentences. There will be at least 6 long answer questions, of which you pick 4. Answers should be about 2-4 blue book pages. All of the questions on the midterm will be on the final. The exam is scheduled for Thursday JULY 27 at 8:00am, in our regular class place.

Some Terms

Deductive Arguments
Valid/Invalid
Soundness
Inductive Arguments
Strong/Weak
Cogent
A Priori
A Posteriori
Contingent
Necessary
The Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR)
Brute Facts
Argument by Analogy
Fallacy of Composition
Anselm's Definition of God
Reductio Ad Absurdum
Existence in the Mind
Existence in Reality
Quantitative vs. Qualitative Identity
Unfalsifiable Theories
Omnipotence, Omniscience, Omnibenevolence
Paradox of Omnipotence
God as: Judger, Punisher/Rewarder
God's Commandments to Love
Omnipotence, Omniscience, Omnibenevolence
The Paradox of Omnipotence
The Paradox of Omniscence (with Free Will)
Moral vs. Natural Evil
The Free Will Thesis
Determinism
Incompatibilism
Hard Determinism
Libertarianism
Compatibilism
Divine Command Theory
Pathos of Distance
Slave Morality
Transvaluation of Values
The Examined Life

Principles, Arguments, and Objections

The Cosmological Argument 1--Aquinas' Second Way or The Argument from Causation
Aquinas' Argument for Premise 3 (of The Second Way)
The Problem with Aquinas' Argument for Premise 3 (of the Second Way)
"Infinity is weird" objection
Hilbert's Hotel
The Infinite Series of Walls
Limitations of Aquinas' Second Way
How PSR applies to the Cosmological Argument
The Teleological Argument
Hume's Objections to the Teleological Argument
The Ontological Argument
Guanilo's Perfect Island Objection
Kant's Objection: Existence is not a Predicate
Inconceivability Objection (against GCB)
Existence in the Mind and Criterion of Identity
"Greater than"? WTF?
Pascal's Wager
'Beliefs are Not Voluntary' Objection
'Beliefs in God Cannot be the Result of a Wager' Objection
The Anti-God Objection
W. K. Clifford's Objection
Unfalsifiable Theories and How this Applies to Pascal's Wager
The Problem of Evil
Attempted Solutions to the Problem of Evil (on hand-out and in the Mackie article)
Free Will and the Problem of Evil
The Free Will Problem
The Bank Robber Example
The Euthyprho Problem
Nietzsche's Theory of "Good" and "Bad"
 

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