Philosophers F-J

• Finnis proposed the idea of ‘Eudaimonia’ (becoming the best version of yourself)

  Finnis believes that humans can achieve Eudaimonia while alive as long as they support and flourish in all of the following:

  Pursuit of goods

  A coherent life plan

  No arbitrary preferences of values (eg detachment over commitment)

  Respect and the common good

  Following one’s conscience
• Finnis would disagree with natural law since he believes that in order to decide right from wrong, we must use our conscience.

  While conscience is the voice of God and natural law was established by God, conscience takes the context of the situation into consideration, which is not the case for natural law.

  Aquinas however, does support the idea of Eudaimonia. However, Aquinas believes that Eudaimonia is impossible to achieve while alive.

  However, Finnis would disagree since Finnis believes that you don’t have to go to heaven to have successfully fulfilled Eudaimonia
• Anthony Flew criticises the freewill defence on the basis of the meaning ‘freewill’

  He considers freely chosen actions to have their causes within the person themselves rather than externally

  God could have created a world in which all humans had a nature that was good, and yet in which they were free to choose in Flew’s sense

  In such a world, humans would always choose freely to do the right thing - surely that would be better than this world?
• Responding to Flew:

  The obvious response is to question whether ‘naturally good’ people would be any different to puppets

  The theistic belief in God gave humans the freedom to choose to worship him and love him, or the freedom to turn away from him

  What value would there be in the love for God felt by those ‘naturally good humans’
• Resurrection:

  Christianity inherited from Judaism the belief in a life to come and the idea of heaven and hell

  Jesus sided with the pharisees who believed in the resurrection of the dead

  Belief in the resurrection had emerged within Judaism and originally was believed to be a physical re-animation of the faithful believers who were buried.

  However, in the first century BC, Jewish writings introduced a more spiritualised understanding of resurrection and that life returns in the form of a spiritual body

  Although, in christianity, the physical belief continued
• Hebraic conception of resurrection:

  • Belief in a psycho-physical unity
  • Hebrews believed that individuals totally perish at death but are then re-created by God
• Greek approach to resurrection:

  • Belief in the immortality of the soul
  • Greeks believed that the body's soul is naturally immortal and continues after the death of the body
• Radical theistic view:

  • It makes no difference whether God gives eternal life by creating immortal souls initially or by individually re-creating after death
  • Continued existence is seen as a gift from the creator
• Jesus' resurrection:

  • Basis for Christian belief in life after death
  • Jesus and his disciples already believed in life everlasting
• Theistic:

  • Belief in a God or gods
• Why do we believe in life everlasting?


  Jesus believed this - his parables taught that our existence would lead to another phase

  God is our heavenly, loving parent - If God loves each one of us and tries to encourage a perfect relationship between each other and ourselves, would God not hold us to life beyond this short Earthly one?
• Reasons why the act of 'telepathy' supporting the idea for life after death is rejected by some religious thinkers:
• They reinterpret the language of eternal life to be referring to the fact that our earthly lives will be eternally remembered by God
• They believe that Jesus was only capable of eternal life since he was considered 'divine'
• Our mental life is absolutely dependent on the functioning of the cerebral system located in our brain
• When we die, our brain also dies, making eternal life impossible
• The concept of life after death is seen as a result of humans' self-centered nature
• The idea of life after death is believed to comfort humans and conquer their fear of death
• According to H.H Price, if consciousness continues after death, the mind might create its own world, similar to a dream
• This world would be as real as our current environment, but all materials and contents would be from memory
• This world may not always be pleasant, as subconscious desires can lead to unpleasant experiences
• In this thought world, minds may interact telepathically and collaborate to form common worlds for like-minded individuals
• Price suggests that desires externalised in this thought world may lead to the development of new and better desires, allowing individuals to gravitate towards 'higher worlds'
• According to Buddhism and Hinduism, re-embodiment takes the form of re-birth in this world, and occurs many times.

  However, according to Christianity, our embodiment is in ‘another world’ and occurs only once.

  Christianity believes that we have a ‘spiritual body’ which is an expression of our inner nature and new environment - they believe that this is what will go to heaven

  However, due to this belief, Christians believe that our resurrection body will have the same shape as the present body but at an optimal age and glorified
• Purgatory is a major division in Christian thought regarding whether life continues after death with moral decision making or if it ends at death
• Purgatory acts as a place of purification for those who are worthy to prepare themselves for heaven
• There is a debate about whether those who do not believe in God can turn to God in purgatory
• Purgatory is specifically for those who have already made their decision for God
• Heaven is pictured in different ways, such as eternal rest, Heavenly City, or saints singing hymns around the throne of God
• Basic conception of heaven: a final state where those who please God live eternally in his presence and enjoy the limitless riches of his divine love
• Hell has also been pictured in various ways, including physical torture or unending mental torment
• Humans are made in God's image, so it is in our nature to be directed towards God
• God desires human salvation, but human freedom may allow rejection of God
• Question raised: Do we naturally come to God in our own freedom, or has our freedom been programmed, making us not truly free?
• Hobbes believed that humans naturally strived to do evil, similar to Augustine
• Hobbes accepted the need for rulers and hierarchy because without them life would be "nasty, brutish and short"
• People formed governments out of fear to prevent a society like that
• Selfish rulers affected the attitude of the human race according to Hobbes
• Hobbes believed it was better to follow a terrible ruler than to have a civil war
• Bentham would agree with Hobbes on this point