While I'm more or les inclined to agree with your analysis, Nancy, I think what they journalist (NOTE!) means by this is that Flew is convinced by a kind of "inference to the best explanation" on the issue of first cause of the universe, rather than on the basis of a "personal experience of the divine" or some such. (Isn't there a point where the "best" available explanation is so bad that it is not worth inferring, even pro tem, and so we should just hold off adhering to *any* specific belief on the matter until we think of something better?)
It is intersting that religious folk are celebrating Flew's "conversion" as a "victory." There was a time when one would have been excommunicated (or worse) for "merely" being a deist of this sort. Averroes got in a good deal of trouble for this sort of thing, as I recall. (And some American evangelists spend a good deal of time trying to *deny* that Thomas Jefferson and several other of the "Founding Fathers" were deists of pretty much this same ilk.)
Actually Jefferson was more more a Unitarian/Universalist than a Deist.
Franklin on the other hand was probably closer to a closet atheist; Washington simply couldn't stand being in a church.
--
"No one in this world, so far as I know, has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people." -H. L. Mencken
* PAUL K. BRANDON [EMAIL PROTECTED] * * Psychology Dept Minnesota State University * * 23 Armstrong Hall, Mankato, MN 56001 ph 507-389-6217 * * http://www.mnsu.edu/dept/psych/welcome.html *
--- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected] To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
