
Why Believe?
2009
First Published
3.69
Average Rating
206
Number of Pages
Religious belief, or its lack, is something that touches our integrity very deeply. It goes to the heart of who we are, what we take ourselves to be doing with our lives, and how we locate ourselves in relation to others. Much philosophy tackles belief in God as if it depended entirely on abstract intellectual argument, but John Cottingham's carefully reasoned yet impassioned account shows how the religious outlook connects with our deepest human longings, how it links up with our moral and aesthetic experience, how it is integrally involved in the quest for self-understanding, and how it is not after all in conflict with a scientific understanding of the world. Rigorously argued yet maximally accessible, this book cuts through the sterility of much modern debate and offers a new and exciting perspective on the conflict between secularism and spirituality.
Avg Rating
3.69
Number of Ratings
35
5 STARS
29%
4 STARS
40%
3 STARS
14%
2 STARS
6%
1 STARS
11%
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Author

John Cottingham
Author · 9 books
John Cottingham is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, University of Reading. Professor of Philosophy of Religion, University of Roehampton, London. Visiting Professor, King’s College London. Honorary Fellow, St John’s College, Oxford University. John Cottingham has published over thirty books – fifteen as sole author, a further nine editions and translations, plus (either as single or joint editor) eight edited collections – together with over 140 articles in learned journals or books. From 1993-2012 he was Editor of Ratio, the international journal of analytic philosophy.