On the Existence of God: A Study of Richard Swinburne’s Probabilistic Argument

• Main Authors: Chih-Chien Tsai, 蔡志堅
• Other Authors: Kuo-Tsai Tan, Ph. D.
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2013
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/7uzs6b

碩士 === 基督教台灣浸會神學院 === 基督教神學研究所 === 101 === “God’s existence and its proof” has always been a debatable issue in between rationality and conviction in history. Richard Swinburne, a British philosopher, proposed probabilistic argument trying to make analysis of this issue. The argument, however, is involved with the appropriate selection of prior probability, which, if is not carefully applied, will significantly decrease the objectivity in the progress of analysis. In this paper, Bayesian robustness analysis was applied. Posterior probabilities in probabilistic argument and with respect to reasonable families of priors were compared. It is found that the former lies in the interval of the latter. This method provides the foundation of objectivity to Swinburne’s probabilistic argument in the selection of prior probability. The numerical calculation was referred to Stephen Unwin’s setting. The computation result of Swinburne’s probabilistic argument was also applied to make explanatory comments to Pascal’s Wager, another well-known argument in philosophical theology.