Meta Arguments
Cumulative Case Arguments
Cumulative case arguments are popular in modern times. J. Warner Wallace, Frank Turek, Gary Habermas have all published convincing works that build on the case for Christ and the resurrection. Wallace rebrands as Cold-Case Apologetics, which works well to relate to the historical facts and logical approach to the investigation of the historicity of Jesus. A preponderance of evidence results that proves that Jesus was God beyond a reasonable doubt. Now for the syllogisms!
Using Meta refers to data about data, that which describes data.
● There‘s enough evidence for God’s existence to make God’s existence more likely. ● There’s enough evidence for God’s existence to make theism more likely than naturalism (or other meta-theories).
Cumulative Credence Raiser
1) The more independent arguments there are that the p is true, the higher one’s credence should be that p is possibly true.
2) There are more than enough arguments for God’s existence to justify the belief that God possibly exists.
3) If we’re justified in believing God possibly exists, we’re justified in believing God exists.
4) So, we’re justified in believing God exists.
● Benjamin Arbour, “Dogmatic Open-Mindedness and Open-Minded Dogmatics,” in Trickett and Gilhooly (eds.), Open-Mindedness in Philosophy of Religion (Cambridge Scholars, 2019), ch. 5.
The Possibility of a Sound Theistic Argument
1) It is possible for there to be a sound theistic argument. 2) If it is possible for there to be a sound theistic argument, God exists. (mainly in internal apologetics) 3) So, God exists.
The Theistically Ambiguous Universe
1) The universe is theistically ambiguous. 2) The fact that the universe is theistically ambiguous is more likely if theism is true than if naturalism is true. 3) So, that the universe is theistically ambiguous is evidence of theism over naturalism.
See also: Pragmatic Apologetics
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