The Mystery of Existence - Why Is There Anything At All? by John Leslie

Description: This compelling study of the origins of all that exists, including explanations of the entire material world, traces the responses of philosophers and scientists to the most elemental and haunting question of all: why is anything here--or anything anywhere? Why is there something rather than nothing? Why not nothing? It includes the thoughts of dozens of luminaries from Plato and Aristotle to Aquinas and Leibniz to modern thinkers such as physicists Stephen Hawking and Steven Weinberg, philosophers Robert Nozick and Derek Parfit, philosophers of religion Alvin Plantinga and Richard Swinburne, and the Dalai Lama. * The first accessible volume to cover a wide range of possible reasons for the existence of all reality, from over 50 renowned thinkers, including Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Descartes, Leibniz, Hume, Bertrand Russell, Stephen Hawking, Steven Weinberg, Robert Nozick, Derek Parfit, Alvin Plantinga, Richard Swinburne, John Polkinghorne, Paul Davies, and the Dalai Lama * Features insights by scientists, philosophers, and theologians * Includes informative and helpful editorial introductions to each section * Provides a wealth of suggestions for further reading and research * Presents material that is both comprehensive and comprehensible John Leslie is University Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Guelph, Canada, and Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. Well-known in the philosophy of cosmology and religion, he has held visiting professorships at institutions including the Australian National University (Research Department of Philosophy) and the University of Liège (Institute of Astrophysics). He is the author of numerous publications including Value and Existence (Blackwell, 1979), Universes (Routledge, 1989), The End of the World: the Science and Ethics of Human Extinction (Routledge, 1996), Infinite Minds (Oxford University Press, 2001), and Immortality Defended (Blackwell, 2007). Robert Lawrence Kuhn is a public intellectual and the creator and host of Closer To Truth, the long-running PBS / public television series on science and philosophy. With a doctorate in brain research (UCLA), he is the author or editor of more than 30 books, including Closer To Truth: Challenging Current Belief and Closer To Truth: Science, Meaning and the Future. A recognized expert on Chinese politics and economics, he is the author of The Man Who Changed China: The Life and Legacy of Jiang Zemin (Crown, 2005), China's best-selling book of 2005, and How China's Leaders Think (Wiley, 2011). He is a frequent commentator on the BBC, Bloomberg, CNBC, China Central Television (CCTV), and Euronews. About the Editors vi Acknowledgments vii 1 General Introduction 1 2 Some Quotations 13 3 Possible Responses to "Why Anything?" 16 4 First Solution: A Blank is Absurd 18 5 Second Solution: No Explanation Needed 41 6 Third Solution: Chance 71 7 Fourth Solution: Value/Perfection as Ultimate 101 8 Fifth Solution: Mind/Consciousness as Ultimate 142 9 Fine-Tuning and Multiple Universes 171 10 The Problem Seems Genuine 211 Bibliography and Further Reading 289 Index of Names 310 Index of Concepts 313

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