This is part one of a book review of The Probability of God by Stephen D. Unwin Ph.D. This review will cover chapters 1-3 where he explains his scope and the six evidentiary areas. Part II will cover chapters 4-7, which contains the mathematical basis and evaluation of the six evidentiary areas and will arrive at the actual probability of God. Part III will cover chapters 8-12, where Unwin discusses where one goes from there.
The Author:
The following is the author’s biography from his website:
STEPHEN D. UNWIN was born in Manchester, U.K. He attended Chetham’s Hospital School and obtained his bachelor’s degree in physics from Imperial College, University of London. For his research in the field of quantum gravity, he received his doctorate in theoretical physics from the University of Manchester. He has held the post of British technical attaché to the United States Department of Energy, and founded Unwin Company, a consulting firm specializing in risk analysis and risk management for Fortune 100 clients. He currently lives in the Pacific northwest with his wife and two sons.
Style:
Unwin writes in a straight-forward style. He admits that he tries to be as pragmatic as possible and does a relatively good job satisfying this goal. Sometimes when you read any book one gets a sense that the author is hedging his or her bets; this is not the case in Probabilities. Unwin comes off as very honest about the subectiveness of what he is trying to do and looks, for the most part, at the different sides of the arguments that he considers.
Unwin does not try to make this a strictly scholarly work; he informs the reader early on that he wants to bring the confusing, abstract math of probabilities to the everyday reader. This is another goal that he succeeds in accomplishing. He had the rare gift of taking specialized knowledge and presenting it in a way that is understandable to readers with little or no background in the subject matter. Unwin often uses humor to break-up discussions of what would otherwise put racehorses to sleep and illustrate the complex and abstract. He is pretty funny too. Several times during reading this book I pulled my wife aside and read her the jokes. An instance of this is where he is distinguishing between the pantheistic god of Spinoza and the Hindus vs. the monotheistic, personal god of the Western religions:
Although there is some disagreement between and within religions about the specific characteristics of the person-God, the similarities in beliefs outnumber the differences. Put another way, followers of these religions could be relied upon to gang up on any hapless pantheist who found herself in the wrong part of town.
Method, Scope, and Goal:
Unwin wants to use the science of probabilities to determine what the probability of the existence of God can be assigned to. He makes it clear that he is looking for a Western-style God, one is that is a personal God. He does not want to have any higher resolution than that.
The method will be to identify several “evidentiary areas” and plug them into Bayes Probability theory, which will be discussed in Part II.
The six evidentiary areas:
He presents six areas of possible evidence for and against the existence of God.
- Existence of Goodness - Our moral ground us often considered evidence for an existence of a Moral God.
- Existence of Moral Evil - If God is good and powerful, why is there evil people?
- Existence of Natural Evil - If God is good and powerful, why do people die in accidents and natural disasters?
- Existence of Intra-Natural Miracles - Are my answered prayers signs of a God that listens to me?
- Existence of Extra-Natural Miracles - Parting waters… Who needs the laws of physics, I have a God on my side!
- Religious Experiences - But I can feel God’s presence… when I drink.