Award Winners

“Alternative Concepts of God and the Problem of Unconceived Alternatives” is a two-year research project located at ITI Catholic University in Austria and directed by Simon Maria Kopf. The project has been generously funded by the SET Foundations. Dr. Kopf, Associate Professor of Fundamental Theology at the ITI, will organise an international workshop on August 1-2, 2024, and publish a special issue on the topic with Prof. Georg Gasser from Augsburg University.

The aim of the project is to enquire to what extent the so-called “problem of unconceived alternatives” (Stanford 2006), originally formulated in the context of philosophy of science, as a much-noted intervention in the realist/anti-realist debate, poses a challenge for philosophy of religion and theology. As P. Kyle Stanford notes, “The historical record of scientific inquiry itself, I suggested, offers abundant evidence of the repeated failure of scientists and scientific communities to even conceive of fundamentally distinct alternatives to extant theories that were nonetheless both scientifically serious and reasonably well-confirmed by the evidence available at the time” (Stanford 2019, 3915-6).

In this research project, we would like to raise the following question about a hotly debated topic in philosophy of religion in recent decades, namely, alternative concepts of God: Does the historical record of religious practices offer evidence of the repeated failure of philosophers/theologians and religious communities to conceive of fundamentally distinct alternative concepts of God that are both philosophically serious and equally reasonable interpretations of religious experience? That is, are there unconceived alternative concepts of God in the history of religion that offer equally convincing explanations of religious experiences and life?

If there is evidence of such unconceived alternatives in the past, then this might give reason to suspect that alternative concepts of God might emerge in the future of which we have “simply not yet managed to conceive” (Stanford 2006, 16). What consequences would this have for philosophy of religion and theology? Are philosophers of religion and theologians, like Stanford proposes for theoretical fundamental scientists, “routinely using a perfectly legitimate inferential tool outside of the epistemic context in which it can be reasonably expected to uncover truths about [God and] the world” (Stanford 2006, 32)? In short, why should theology and philosophy of religion be in a better position than the fundamental theoretical sciences?

The workshop will revolve around three main areas:

1. Philosophy of Science – Philosophy of Religion
a. What is the ‘problem of unconceived alternatives’?
b. Discussion of ‘alternative concepts of God’
c. Is the problem of unconceived alternatives, originally formulated in the context of philosophy of science, also applicable to philosophy of religion?

2. Arguments in Philosophy of Religion
a. Are eliminative inferences used in philosophy of religion? If so, where and how?
b. Examination of different arguments in philosophy of religion

3. Philosophy of Religion – Theology
a. If the problem of unconceived alternatives also affects philosophy of religions and the debates around alternative concepts of God, does it also affect theology?
b. What role do revelation and faith play in this context?

Confirmed speakers include P. Kyle Stanford, John Schellenberg, Peter Harrison, Jessica Frazier, Veronika Weidner, Mohammad Saleh Zarepour, Georg Gasser, Bruno Niederbacher, Winfried Löffler, Simon Maria Kopf, and Barbara Hallensleben

One of the greatest challenges for theology and philosophy are the results of cognitive neuroscientific research, which increasingly determine the understanding of human beings and their religious experiences.

The main question of the project is: can theologians use the philosophy of (neuro)science to gain better insights into neuroscience data on religiosity, including factors that influence the results and interpretation, e.g., the brain/mind models, methods, and neuroimaging devices used? The aim of the project is to provide theologians with accessible and comprehensible material to enter this complex field of research with the help of philosophy of science and its relatively young subfield – philosophy of neuroscience.

The Theology, Science, and Technology minor will provide students with the skills and opportunities to critically engage and thoughtfully reflect on the conversations, connections, and conflicts between the theological enterprise, the natural sciences, and technologies. The minor will leverage the university’s preeminence in and commitment to theology and philosophy as well as the natural sciences and its emergent engagement with the social dimensions of science and engineering. That engagement is manifest not only in the new Schiller Institute for Integrated Science and Society, but in recent major/minor programs in Global Public Health and the Common Good as well as the minor in the Medical Humanities. As a Jesuit, Catholic institution that seeks to find God in all things, the minor will provide students with the opportunity to more fully integrate and critique their theological, scientific, and technological experiences from across the institution and will equip students with the intellectual tools they need to recognize both the strengths in and limits to our academic methods’ diverse ways of knowing. This will provide students with the skills and opportunities to critically engage and thoughtfully reflect on the conversations, connections, and conflicts between theology, the sciences, and technology. By design, graduates of the program will be able to theologically contextualize – rather than compartmentalize – the epistemological dimensions of their vocations. This goal contributes to making long careers that are rich, meaningful, and central to the efforts of a Jesuit education.

The PI has assembled a steering committee from interested faculty from across the university, and the preliminary proposal for the minor has the support of the university’s administration and was positively reviewed by the university’s Educational Policy Council in May of 2023. The PI is currently revising the program proposal and researching for the syllabus for the minor’s novel gateway course. The final proposal will be submitted to the university administration in the 2023-2024 academic year, and the PI expects the program to launch formally in the Fall of 2025.

My project focuses on the use of causal closure (or completeness)  principles in causal exclusion arguments. Although these principles are ontologically robust, the best evidence we have in their defense is inductive and largely pragmatic. Further,  in recent decades,  empirical evidence has substantially undermined the philosophical ideal of a univocal, closed, fundamental level of reality. (Thus, as Steven Horst notes in his 2007 Beyond Reduction,  contemporary philosophy of minds  seems to be “held hostage by the science of the 1950’s.”) I argue that the scientific evidence for a metaphysically weighty closure principle is scant, at best. This is especially true in light of the implications of Hempel’s dilemma. Ultimately, with Alyssa Ney, I argue that physicalism is best construed as a pragmatic attitude. I then consider whether such an attitude can sustain a closure principle at all. What would pragmatic closure look like? What kind of work could it do?

I received a grant for a course release in the Spring 2023, during which I made considerable progress on two papers: “Theological Modeling and Models in the Sciences” and “Trinitarian Doctrine and Scripture: Lessons We Can Learn from Model-Data Symbiosis”

This course is an integrative course that brings the disciplines of Theology and Philosophy of Science into constructive dialogue. The course will explore key themes that lie at the intersection of both of these disciplines such as the following: the function of communities and social contexts in shaping the construction of knowledge, the role of experience in knowledge production, the nature of evidence, definitions of “laws of nature,” the nature and function of explanation, the possibility of assessing theories, the use of models, and the entanglements of theology and science with values and ethics. This course places a high value on discussion and student engagement, and it will culminate with a conference in which students will have an opportunity to share papers and posters with the wider community demonstrating their own creative and innovative work from the semester. The course and the student conference will also feature guest lectures/discussions from scholars who work at the intersection of Theology and Philosophy of Science.

Combining the unique strengths of UC Irvine’s Religious Studies department with those of its Logic and Philosophy of Science department, we will co-teach a course integrating philosophy of science with the study of religions around the world.

The course will integrate theoretical elements, including the nature of knowledge and belief, causation, and explanation,  alongside practical, real-world scenarios where religion and philosophy of science interact.

Topics include the affective dimension of secularism and science and the reason of religions, the "scientization" of religions in Asian colonial contexts, the controversy surrounding the 30m telescope on Mauna Kea, and the incorporation of Mātauranga Māori into New
Zealand public education, among others.

Discussion-based classes will include guest speakers from UCI and those working at
the intersection of religion and science, as well as a field trip to a regional site of interest.