Theism versus Naturalism in Terms of the Explanation of History

It is human nature to seek the ultimate explanation for existence. However, not all people have the same perspective on this issue. This study deals with naturalism and theism, which are the two opposite poles of humankind’s desire to reach the ultimate explanation. There are many contemporary philosophers who defend the superiority of the explanatory power of theism compared to alternative views. The views of these philosophers are in general a continuation of their predecessors. The extent to which these theistic defenses, which have only a few original aspects, are truly successful against non-theistic views requires philosophical analysis. Therefore, the philosophical analysis of the claim of being more successful will contribute to more qualified discussions in the philosophy of religion and thus to continue the current theism-naturalism discussions on a more rational basis. Kenneth L. Pearce, who has been frequently mentioned recently in philosophy of religion and has been in discussions with the leading names of atheism, has produced many studies with the idea that he has made positive contributions to theism. Pearce defends this idea with a contemporary version of the argument from contingency, a member of the family of cosmological arguments. In this version, the basis of Pearce’s argument is the concept of “History”. “History” is the total sequence of causes and effects, past, present and future. The question of how theism is more successful than naturalism in explaining “History” is a subject worth examining. Therefore, this study analyzes philosophically the internal consistency, truth value, validity and persuasive power of the claim that theism explains the universe better than naturalism. The analysis shows that Pearce couldn’t defend theism strongly enough against naturalism with the argument from contingency as he claims.