Product Description

A wave of modern atheists have taken center stage and brought the long-standing debate about the existence of God back into the headlines. Spearheaded by Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens, this 'new atheism' has found a powerful place in today's culture wars. Although this movement has been billed as 'new,' the foundation of its argument is indebted to philosopher Antony Flew and his groundbreaking paper "Theology and Falsification," the most widely reprinted philosophical publication of the last five decades. Flew built his highly acclaimed academic career publicly debunking the existence of God. But, now the renowned philosopher has arrived at the opposite conclusion and officially joined the other side.With refreshing openness to argument and an absence of the anger and hostility that have been hallmarks of the 'new atheism,' Flew shows how his commitment to following the argument wherever it leads resulted, to his own astonishment, in his conversion to belief in a creator God. Certain to be read and discussed for years to come, "There Is a God" will forever change the debate about the existence of God.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5248 in Books
• Published on: 2009-01-09
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

About the Author
Antony Flew is a renowned philosopher who was arguably the best-known atheist in the English-speaking world until his announcement in 2004 that he now accepts the existence of God. The son of a Methodist minister, Flew often attended the weekly meetings of C. S. Lewis's Socratic Club as an undergraduate at Oxford, but was not convinced by Lewis's argument from morality that a God exists. In 1950, Flew set the agenda for modern atheism with his renowned essay "Theology and Falsification," which became the most widely reprinted philosophical publication of the last half century. Flew has published over thirty books, including God and Philosophy, The Presumption of Atheism, and How to Think Straight. He spent twenty years as professor of philosophy at the University of Keele and has also held positions at Oxford, the University of Aberdeen, and the University of Reading. He now lives in Reading, England.

Customer Reviews

Flew's journey
This clear and very readable book charts Tony Flew's journey from strongly expressed atheism to a reasoned case for theism. With wit and good sense he explains and revisits his previous views and emphatically demonstrates his exemplary commitment to follow arguments and the truth wherever it leads. The text has a fair number of amusing anecdotes and personal reflections, and the ideas are neatly expressed and explored with persuasive insight. Flew is very strongly persuaded by many in the field of science who have variously presented views that suggest that the shape, nature and character of the totality of a meaningful reality that we expereince and explore presupposes a meaning and purpose that is transcending. Flew, following a prbablistic line of reasoning, makes the case for a theistic rationale without special pleading or flights of mystical fantasy.

Following the evidence
After fifty years as a leading non-theistic philosopher, whose challenges to theistic thinkers did much to shape the debate about God, Flew declared himself convinced of the existence of a God (although not of any particular religious tradition) in 2004, thereby sending shock-waves through the atheist community.

Unfortunately, several prominent atheists responded to Flew's apostasy with ad hominem assertions about his losing his marbles in his dotage (yes he is getting slower and forgetful, especially of names; but his solo interviews and writings seem lucid, and his arguments should be taken on their own merit), or about his hedging his bets with respect to the afterlife (despite the fact that Flew doesn't believe in an afterlife!).

Part autobiography, part theistic apologetic, Flew's 'last will and testament' There Is a God (written with Roy Abraham Varghese) is a fascinating read that deserves wide circulation and careful consideration.

Flew summarised the reasons for his change of mind in an exclusive 2007 interview with Benjamin Wiker:

'With every passing year, the more that was discovered about the richness and inherent intelligence of life, the less it seemed likely that a chemical soup could magically generate the genetic code. The difference between life and non-life, it became apparent to me, was ontological and not chemical. The best confirmation of this radical gulf is Richard Dawkins' comical effort to argue in The God Delusion that the origin of life can be attributed to a `lucky chance.' If that's the best argument you have, then the game is over... I would add that Dawkins is selective to the point of dishonesty when he cites the views of scientists on the philosophical implications of the scientific data. Two noted philosophers, one an agnostic (Anthony Kenny) and the other an atheist (Nagel), recently pointed out that Dawkins has failed to address three major issues that ground the rational case for God. As it happens, these are the very same issues that had driven me to accept the existence of a God: the laws of nature, life with its teleological organization and the existence of the Universe.'

Antony Flew's rejection of Atheism
There have been some hysterical and ill-informed postings on various atheist blogs and websites about Antony Flew's rejection of atheism, and particularly his recent book There is a God (co-authored and edited by Roy Abraham Varghese - Harper One, 2007). Suggestions have been made that Flew is now senile and being exploited by Christians. 'Don't read this book!' shouts one atheistical blogger. Well, I have read the book, and I find it lucid and compelling. Much of it has been compiled by Varghese from Flew's published and unpublished writings and interviews, but every page has been checked and signed off by Flew himself, as he has made perfectly clear in print. I personally found some of Varghese's short editorial links a bit off for their jarring Americanisms, but they seem not to have bothered Flew. There are two appendices: one by Varghese himself and the other by Bishop Tom Wright, to whom I incidentally owe my own reconsideration of Christian claims. Both are excellent.

Two things can be added: firstly, Flew's dissatisfaction with Dawkins is long-standing. In Darwinian Evolution, published in 1984 when he was still a Vice President of the Rationalist Press Association (RPA), Flew described The Selfish Gene as a "major exercise in popular mystification", adding "Dawkins labours to discount or depreciate the main upshot of fifty or more years work in genetics" and he gives examples of this trend. In a further passage, Flew agrees with some trenchant criticisms of the book previously made by philosopher Mary Midgley (Gene Juggling, in Philosophy, October 1979 - see also her Selfish Genes and Social Darwinism in Philosophy for 1983 - both available online as free downloads). These paragraphs have been largely included in There is a God, showing that Flew's rejection of Dawkins's Selfish Gene hypothesis, echoed by many scientists and philosophers since it was first published, is not a new departure, but a long-standing, widely-shared and well-founded objection. They expose the fundamental flaws in Dawkins's theory, which undermine almost everything he has written since. His central dogma that "we are survival machines - robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes" removes any possibility of personal responsibility - for anything. We are simply the puppets of our genes. What a perfect excuse for all malefactors, including child rapists and murderers like Ian Brady, Ian Huntley and Roy Whiting: "It was them genes what dunnit, Guv!" An excuse, perhaps: but hardly a comfort. Dawkins was properly rebuked on Irish television when he said: "I'm not interested in freewill." How could there be any such thing in his worldview?

A second point: Barry Duke, editor of The Freethinker, has informed me by email that he has met Antony Flew (presumably some time back - he doesn't say) and he insists - without giving any reasons - "The man's an idiot". It would be interesting to know whether this opinion is based on Flew's views and writings while he was still a Vice President of the RPA, and the most prominent atheist philosopher in Britain, or whether it is a knee-jerk reaction, based on Flew's more recent rejection of the atheism which he had espoused for almost half a century. Well, I can tell you, dear readers, that I have also met Antony Flew (only once, in 1996 at an Oxford conference where we each presented a paper, and then socialised afterwards), and I have also read - over a 40 year period - practically all his published work. I can assure you that the man was not an idiot then, and neither is he an idiot now; though his memory, at 84, is admittedly not what it was. I was, incidentally, a Director of the RPA from 1989 to 1998, as well as (briefly) President of the National Secular Society (1996-97).