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Component 1: Philosophy of religion and ethics (7062/1)

Section A: Philosophy of religion

3.1.1 - Arguments for God: Design argument (Paley)A watch found on a heath seems to demand a watchmaker; does nature likewise point to God? Beginning with William Paley's analogy in Natural Theology, you will trace the a posteriori, inductive move from complex, purposeful order to an intelligent designer. You will also evaluate how far this anal...

3.1.1 - Arguments for God: Design criticism (Hume)Paley compares organisms to designed artefacts, but is the universe sufficiently like a machine for that analogy to work? You will apply Hume's criticisms in Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion to Paley's reasoning: weak analogy, disproportionate conclusions, and rival explanations such as many...

3.1.1 - Arguments for God: Ontological argument (Anselm)Can God's existence follow from the concept of God alone? Anselm's Proslogion defines God as "that than which nothing greater can be conceived" and argues a priori, by reductio ad absurdum, that this being cannot exist only in the mind. You will explain the move from conceptual greatness to neces...

3.1.1 - Arguments for God: Ontological criticisms (Gaunilo and Kant)Anselm claims that the greatest conceivable being must exist, but can a definition establish reality? Gaunilo's perfect island parody and Kant's claim that existence is not a real predicate attack different steps in the ontological argument. You will distinguish their objections, examine Anselm's...

3.1.1 - Arguments for God: Cosmological argument (Aquinas' Way 3)Why is there anything contingent at all? In Aquinas' Third Way from the Summa Theologiae, beings that come into and pass out of existence cannot explain themselves, so the argument moves toward a necessary being. You will explain contingency, necessity, and the rejection of an infinite regress, t...

3.1.1 - Arguments for God: Cosmological criticisms (Hume and Russell)Even if every contingent thing has an explanation, must the universe as a whole have one? Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion challenges the move from explained parts to a necessary total explanation, while Bertrand Russell treats the universe as a brute fact. You will explain how both o...

3.1.1 - Arguments for God: proof, faith and reasonDesign and cosmological arguments begin with experience; Anselm begins with thought. Does either route produce proof, or do such arguments mainly make faith intellectually reasonable? Comparing Paley, Aquinas, and Anselm, you will explain a posteriori and a priori reasoning, deductive and inducti...

3.1.1 - Problem of evil: natural and moral evilA murder and an earthquake both cause suffering, yet only one appears to arise from human choice. The distinction between moral evil and natural evil sharpens the challenge posed to an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent God. You will explain difficult boundary cases, from disease to negli...

3.1.1 - Problem of evil: logical and evidential formsIs one instance of evil enough to contradict belief in God, or does the scale and apparent pointlessness of suffering merely make God improbable? J. L. Mackie's logical problem and the evidential argument associated with William Rowe place different burdens on theism. You will explain inconsisten...

3.1.1 - Responses to evil and suffering: theodicy frameworkA theodicy must do more than say that suffering has a reason: it must reconcile evil with divine power, knowledge, and goodness without trivialising victims' pain. You will distinguish a defence from a full theodicy, map Hick's soul-making account, Plantinga's free will defence, and Griffin's pro...

3.1.1 - Hick's soul-making theodicyCould a world without danger, resistance, or suffering produce mature persons? Drawing on Irenaean themes, John Hick argues that humans develop from the image toward the likeness of God through soul-making under conditions of epistemic distance. You will explain freedom, a stable natural order, a...

3.1.1 - The free will defenceIf God prevents every harmful choice, can creatures possess morally significant freedom? Alvin Plantinga's free will defence answers Mackie's logical problem by proposing that even an omnipotent God cannot guarantee free choices that always go right. You will explain possible worlds, moral respon...

3.1.1 - Process theodicy as presented by GriffinProcess theodicy changes the usual question by denying that God possesses unilateral coercive power. In David Ray Griffin's account, God lures each event toward richer possibilities while creatures and natural processes retain genuine self-determination. You will explain persuasive power, creativ...

3.1.1 - Theodicies: strengths and weaknesses of each responseHick, Plantinga, and Griffin do not defend God in the same way: soul-making gives suffering a developmental purpose, free will locates moral evil in creaturely choice, and process thought limits divine control. You will compare these responses against logical consistency, coverage of natural and...

3.1.1 - The nature of religious experienceWhen someone reports encountering God, the holy, or ultimate reality, what makes the event religious rather than an intense emotion or unusual perception? Using examples such as prayer, a sense of presence, and mystical awareness, you will explain first-person interpretation and the difference be...

3.1.1 - Visions: corporeal, imaginative and intellectualAn external apparition, a vivid dream-image, and a sudden non-visual grasp of divine truth may all be called visions, but they make very different claims. You will explain the distinction among corporeal, imaginative, and intellectual visions, compare their dependence on sense perception, and eva...

3.1.1 - Numinous experiences: Otto and the wholly otherFor Rudolf Otto, the numinous is neither a proof nor an ordinary feeling: it is an apprehension of the mysterium tremendum et fascinans, the holy as both overwhelming and compelling. You will explain why the "wholly other" resists rational description, connect creature-feeling with awe and depend...

3.1.1 - Mystical experiences: William James and Walter StaceWilliam James identifies mystical states by ineffability, noetic quality, transiency, and passivity; Walter Stace instead stresses non-sensuous, non-intellectual union. Do these accounts reveal one common mystical core across traditions, or impose a pattern on diverse experiences? You will explai...

3.1.1 - Verifying religious experiences: challengesA sincere report can establish that someone had a powerful experience without establishing that God caused it. This gap between first-person certainty and public verification raises questions about testimony, conflicting religious interpretations, repeatability, and alternative explanations. You...

3.1.1 - Religious experience and scientific challengesIf neuroscience can correlate a vision with temporal-lobe activity, has it explained away God or only described the experience's mechanism? Scientific challenges appeal to brain states, drugs, psychology, and social conditioning as naturalistic explanations. You will explain how these accounts ca...

3.1.1 - Religious responses to verification challengesA brain-based account of religious experience need not settle what the experience means. Religious responses argue that science may describe a mechanism without disproving divine agency, while William James tests experiences by their lasting "fruits" in a person's life. You will explain non-reduc...

3.1.1 - Swinburne's principles of credulity and testimonyOrdinary life depends on trusting appearances and other people's reports unless we have reasons for doubt. Richard Swinburne extends that practice to religious experience through the principles of credulity and testimony. You will explain why experiences count as prima facie evidence, identify de...

3.1.1 - Religious experiences: influence and value for faithReligious experiences can convert a sceptic, deepen prayer or reshape a community, yet influence is not the same as evidence. William James's focus on transformative effects and Swinburne's principles of credulity and testimony help explain personal, practical, communal and evidential value. The...

3.1.1 - Religious language: cognitive and non-cognitive viewsWhen believers say "God is loving," are they reporting a fact or expressing trust, worship and commitment? You will distinguish cognitive, truth-apt claims from non-cognitive uses of religious language, test the distinction against statements about God, prayer and life after death, and evaluate w...

3.1.1 - Religious language: verification and falsification challengesA. J. Ayer's verification principle and Antony Flew's falsification challenge press a question deeper than whether "God exists" is true: does the claim have factual meaning at all? You will explain analytic and empirically verifiable statements, Flew's demand that assertions exclude something, an...

3.1.1 - Religious language response: Hick and eschatological verificationJohn Hick argues that claims about God, judgement and life after death may be meaningful now because they could be verified eschatologically if true. The Celestial City parable explains this future-facing answer to verificationism and exposes an asymmetry between verification and falsification. E...

3.1.1 - Religious language response: R.M. Hare and BliksR. M. Hare's dons parable begins with a person convinced that every don is murderous, illustrating a Blik: a basic framework that shapes how the world is interpreted and resists ordinary falsification. Explaining Hare means seeing why religious language can be non-cognitive yet meaningful. The ke...

3.1.1 - Religious language response: Wittgenstein and language gamesA prayer, a confession and a laboratory report do not gain meaning in the same way. Drawing on Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations, you will examine meaning as use, language games and forms of life, then evaluate whether locating God-talk within worship and communal practice reveals its r...

3.1.1 - Religious language as symbolic: TillichFor Paul Tillich, "God" does not name one being among others: religious symbols point beyond themselves, participate in what they disclose and express an ultimate concern. Distinguishing symbols from signs and literal descriptions reveals how talk of God as Being-itself or the ground of being wor...

3.1.1 - Religious language as analogical: AquinasIf "God is good" uses good exactly as it does of humans, God seems creaturely; if it uses an unrelated sense, the claim becomes unintelligible. Aquinas's analogical middle way, developed in Summa Theologiae I, question 13, links divine names to creaturely perfections. You will explain analogy of...

3.1.1 - Religious language: Via NegativaApophatic thinkers warn that every positive description risks shrinking an infinite God into a creaturely object. Pseudo-Dionysius, Maimonides and the practice of remotion explain why the Via Negativa says God is not finite, physical or dependent. Its evaluation asks whether negation protects tra...

3.1.1 - Religious language: strengths and weaknesses of differing understandingsWhich account best lets religious language be meaningful without misrepresenting God? You will compare Ayer and Flew's tests with Hick's eschatological verification, Hare's Bliks, Wittgenstein's language games, Tillich's symbols, Aquinas's analogy and the Via Negativa. Evaluating them through pub...

3.1.1 - Miracles: realist, anti-realist, law-violation and natural-event viewsA reported healing might be an objective divine act, a breach of natural law, a providentially timed natural event or a faith-shaped interpretation. Explaining the topic requires separating realist from anti-realist accounts and law-violation from natural-event accounts. The evaluation then asks...

3.1.1 - Miracles: David Hume and Maurice Wiles comparedDavid Hume and Maurice Wiles both challenge interventionist miracles, but from opposite directions. Hume's Enquiry weighs fallible testimony against uniform experience of natural law; Wiles's God's Action in the World asks why a good God would intervene selectively while greater suffering continu...

3.1.1 - Miracles: significance of these views for religionMiracle theories reshape more than belief in unusual events: they affect scripture, revelation, petitionary prayer, worship and the character attributed to God. Explaining their significance means tracing how realist, anti-realist, law-violation and natural-event views alter religious life. Evalu...

3.1.1 - Soul: nature, existence and Descartes' argumentDescartes begins not with scripture but radical doubt: even if body and world are uncertain, the thinking self disclosed by the cogito cannot be doubted while it thinks. Using Meditations II and VI, you will explain substance dualism, clear and distinct conceivability and the mind's alleged indiv...

3.1.1 - The body and soul relationshipIs a person a soul inhabiting a body, an embodied unity, or wholly physical? Plato's Phaedo and Descartes defend separability, Aristotle and Aquinas develop hylomorphism, while materialism links mental life to brain and body. The explanation must separate the relationship's ontological, causal an...

3.1.1 - Continuing personal existence after deathSurvival requires more than leaving influence behind: the subject after death must be numerically the same person, not merely a convincing copy. Comparing soul, bodily and psychological criteria of identity, then testing resurrection through John Hick's replica model, exposes what might bridge de...

Section B: Ethics and religion

3.1.2 - Natural moral law and the principle of double effectAquinas grounds morality in practical reason: good is to be pursued, human goods protected and secondary precepts derived from natural inclinations. Yet one act can bring both good and bad effects, as in Summa Theologiae on self-defence. You will explain natural moral law and double effect's cond...

3.1.2 - ProportionalismWhen a natural-law rule would produce grave harm, proportionalism asks whether a sufficiently serious reason can justify an exception. Aquinas's basic goods and double-effect reasoning anchor the explanation of proportionate reason, values and disvalues in concrete cases. The approach must then b...

3.1.2 - Situation ethics with reference to FletcherJoseph Fletcher rejects both legalism's fixed rules and antinomianism's lack of guidance, making agape the single absolute. Examining situationism, the four working principles, the six fundamental propositions and the demand for the most loving outcome explains how difficult choices are made. Eva...

3.1.2 - Virtue ethics with reference to AristotleAristotle asks not simply "What rule should I follow?" but "What kind of person am I becoming?" The Nicomachean Ethics connects eudaimonia to rational activity, habituation to stable character, and the doctrine of the mean to phronesis in particular situations. Evaluation must ask whether virtue...

3.1.2 - Differing approaches to moral decision makingThe same dilemma looks different when Aquinas asks about objective goods, Fletcher seeks the most loving outcome and Aristotle asks what a practically wise person would choose. You will compare natural law and double effect, proportionalism, situation ethics and virtue ethics by their first decis...

3.1.2 - Applying ethical theories to theft and lyingWould stealing food in extreme necessity still violate justice, and should someone lie to a murderer seeking a victim? These cases expose what each theory treats as decisive. Applying Aquinas's natural law and account of truth, proportionalism's exceptions, Fletcher's agape and Aristotle's phrone...

3.1.2 - Strengths and weaknesses of ethical decision-making theoriesShould moral decisions follow objective goods, respond flexibly to circumstances, or cultivate a wise character? Aquinas' natural moral law and double effect, proportionalism, Fletcher's agape-centred situation ethics, and Aristotle's virtue ethics answer differently. We will explain how each met...

3.1.2 - Embryo research, cloning and designer babiesEmbryo research may relieve suffering, yet it can involve destroying embryos; genetic selection may prevent disease, yet turn parenthood towards design. Using the 14-day rule, reproductive cloning and "designer baby" enhancement as examples, we will explain how Aquinas' natural moral law, Fletche...

3.1.2 - AbortionAbortion brings fetal moral status, bodily autonomy and the preservation of life into direct conflict. Aquinas' natural moral law and double effect, Fletcher's situation ethics, and Aristotle's virtue ethics do not rank these concerns alike. You will explain how intended and foreseen harm, agape...

3.1.2 - Voluntary euthanasia and assisted suicideWhen a competent person asks for help to die, does respect for autonomy and relief of suffering outweigh the duty to preserve life? You will distinguish voluntary euthanasia from assisted suicide before applying Aquinas' natural moral law and double effect, Fletcher's agape, and Aristotle's virtu...

3.1.2 - Capital punishmentCan the state deliberately kill a convicted offender while still respecting life and human dignity? Capital punishment tests retribution, deterrence, public protection, repentance and the risk of irreversible injustice. We will explain how Aquinas' natural moral law, Fletcher's agape-centred situ...

3.1.2 - Animals as food and intensive farmingEating animals can sustain human life and livelihoods, but intensive farming may make efficiency depend on restricted lives and avoidable suffering. Starting with animal sentience and welfare, you will explain Aquinas' hierarchy of rational goods, Fletcher's demand for agape and Aristotle's conce...

3.1.2 - Animals in scientific procedures and cloningAnimal experiments promise medical knowledge, while cloning may aid agriculture or conservation; both can also impose pain, failed pregnancies and death on sentient creatures. Dolly the sheep and the 3Rs of replacement, reduction and refinement make the conflict concrete. You will apply Aquinas'...

3.1.2 - Blood sportsFox hunting, bullfighting and animal fighting turn pursuit, injury or death into sport, yet defenders invoke tradition, skill, community and pest control. Do any of those goods justify animal suffering for entertainment? We will explain how Aquinas' rational moral order, Fletcher's agape and Aris...

3.1.2 - Animals as a source of organs for transplantsXenotransplantation could answer a desperate shortage of human organs, but genetically modified pigs may be bred, confined and killed as biological resources. This tension sets preservation of human life against animal welfare, consent and public-health risk. We will explain how Aquinas' natural...

3.1.2 - Meta ethics: the meaning of right and wrongWhen someone says "lying is wrong", are they describing a fact, reporting a command, naming harmful consequences or expressing a self-evident value? Meta-ethics steps back from the action to examine what "right", "wrong" and "ought" mean. You will distinguish normative, applied and meta-ethical q...

3.1.2 - Divine Command TheoryDoes God command actions because they are good, or are they good because God commands them? Plato's Euthyphro dilemma exposes the central pressure on Divine Command Theory. You will explain how divine commands are said to ground moral obligation and objectivity, then evaluate questions about God'...

3.1.2 - Naturalism and UtilitarianismCan "right" be translated into the production of pleasure and "wrong" into the production of pain? Ethical naturalism says moral claims refer to natural features of the world, and utilitarianism supplies a concrete test case. Through Bentham's utility and Mill's account of happiness, we will expl...

3.1.2 - Non-naturalism and IntuitionismIf pleasure is not the same thing as goodness, what kind of property is moral value, and how could we know it? G. E. Moore's Principia Ethica, the open-question argument and the naturalistic fallacy lead towards non-naturalism and intuitionism. You will explain why basic values are called self-ev...

3.1.2 - Meta-ethical strengths and weaknessesThree rival accounts compete to explain moral authority: God's commands, natural facts about pleasure and pain, and self-evident non-natural values. The Euthyphro dilemma, Moore's open-question argument and disagreements between intuitions put each under pressure. We will explain and compare Divi...

3.1.2 - Conditions of moral responsibilityA harmful outcome does not by itself make someone blameworthy: responsibility depends on whether the act was genuinely theirs and whether they understood its moral meaning. Aristotle's discussion of voluntary action in Nicomachean Ethics Book III sharpens the distinction between agency, compulsio...

3.1.2 - Libertarianism, hard determinism and compatibilismIf every choice has prior causes, can anyone still deserve praise or blame? Libertarian agent-causation, illustrated by Roderick Chisholm, protects the possibility of choosing otherwise; hard determinism denies ultimate freedom; David Hume's compatibilism identifies freedom with acting from one's...

3.1.2 - Moral responsibility, reward and punishmentPunishment may look backward to what an offender deserves or forward to deterrence, protection and rehabilitation. Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics links voluntary action with praise, blame, honours and punishments, raising a basic fairness test: was the person responsible? You will explain how fre...

3.1.2 - The nature of conscience: religious and non-religious ideasIs conscience God's inward witness, an act of practical reason, a governing faculty or internalised social authority? Augustine, Aquinas and Butler give distinct religious accounts, while Freud's superego and Kohlberg's developmental psychology offer non-religious explanations. You will explain h...

3.1.2 - Conscience in moral decisions: lies, promises and adulteryA lie may protect someone, a promise may become impossible, and adultery may be rationalised by desire; conscience must turn general moral claims into decisions within such cases. Aquinas treats conscience as practical judgement, Butler as a superior reflective authority, and Freud as the supereg...

3.1.2 - The value of conscience as a moral guideA powerful inner conviction can preserve integrity, but it can also be mistaken, badly formed or inherited from prejudice. Aquinas links conscience to practical reason, Butler to a superior reflective faculty, and Freud to the superego. Their contrasting accounts will help us explain how conscien...

3.1.2 - Bentham and Kant: key ideas about moral decision makingImagine a false promise that prevents immediate pain but undermines trust. Bentham asks which outcome maximises utility through the hedonic calculus; Kant asks whether the maxim can be universalised and whether persons are treated as ends. You will explain their consequentialist and deontological...

3.1.2 - Bentham, Kant and religious moral decision makingBentham can echo religious compassion by reducing suffering, while Kant can echo religious duty through universal law and human dignity. Yet utility is not divine command, and Kantian autonomy is not obedience to revelation. Using Bentham's Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation...

Component 2, option 2A: Buddhism (7062/2A)

Section A: Study of Buddhism

3.2.1 - The BuddhaWhy does one life carry such different kinds of authority? Theravada Buddhism presents Gautama Buddha as the awakened teacher whose renunciation, meditation and insight model the path. The Mahayana Lotus Sutra, especially the burning-house parable, interprets his teaching through skilful means. Y...

3.2.1 - Dukkha and pessimismDukkha means more than obvious pain: it names the instability and unsatisfactoriness of conditioned life. Through the Four Noble Truths and the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta, you will examine why craving makes even pleasant experience insecure. The central debate is whether this diagnosis makes Bud...

3.2.1 - The Pali CanonCan a scripture remain authoritative when it was orally transmitted before being written down? The Pali Canon, or Tipitaka, preserves the Vinaya, Suttas and Abhidhamma for Theravada Buddhists. You will explore its connection to Gautama Buddha, assess debates over historical accuracy, and see how...

3.2.1 - Theravada, Mahayana and TrikayaBuddhist traditions do not all understand "the Buddha" in the same way. Theravada foregrounds Gautama as the historical awakened teacher, while Mahayana presents a broader vision of Buddhahood through the Trikaya: nirmanakaya, sambhogakaya and dharmakaya. You will distinguish these three bodies a...

3.2.1 - Anicca and emptinessEverything conditioned changes, but Mahayana Buddhism pushes that insight beyond simple impermanence. You will begin with anicca as a mark of existence and a reason to loosen attachment, then trace its development into sunyata, the emptiness of independent essence. You will test whether emptiness...

3.2.1 - NirvanaNirvana is Buddhism's final liberation, yet it cannot be pictured as an ordinary place or object. You will distinguish Nirvana attained during life from what is said after an enlightened person's death, then examine Nagasena's analogies in the 80th dilemma of the Questions of King Milinda. Can sc...

3.2.1 - The meaning and purpose of lifeShould a Buddhist seek a better rebirth, personal Nirvana, or awakening for all beings? A favourable rebirth can support further practice, but liberation from samsara remains the final goal. You will set the Theravada arhat beside the Mahayana bodhisattva and evaluate whether these ideals compete...

3.2.1 - Anatta (no-self)If there is no permanent self, what exactly is a person? The teaching of anatta analyses human existence through the five aggregates: form, feeling, perception, mental formations and consciousness. Nagasena's chariot analogy in the Questions of King Milinda then shows how a useful identity can ex...

3.2.1 - SamsaraSamsara links birth, death and rebirth through karma, but Buddhists disagree about how literally its realms should be understood. You will examine the wheel of becoming as cosmology, metaphor and psychology, before considering Tibetan belief in the 14th Dalai Lama as an expression of Avalokitesva...

3.2.1 - Good conductBuddhist morality begins not only with what someone does, but with the intention shaping the act. Through kamma, kusala and akusala, you will explore how wholesome and unwholesome choices form character and future experience. This raises a difficult question: if habits and past conditions influen...

3.2.1 - Five precepts and six perfectionsTwo influential Buddhist ethical frameworks train conduct in different ways. The Five Precepts restrain killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, false speech and intoxication, while the Mahayana six perfections cultivate generosity, morality, patience, effort, meditation and wisdom along the bodhisa...

3.2.1 - AhimsaAhimsa demands non-harm, but applying it is rarely simple. Buddhist views on embryos and abortion, animal treatment, war and weapons of mass destruction can pull the first precept, compassion, intention and consequences in different directions. You will work through these conflicts and evaluate w...

3.2.1 - The SanghaIn Thailand, the monastic Sangha depends upon lay support while offering teaching, ritual leadership and opportunities to make merit. That reciprocal relationship is changing under modern social and economic pressures. You will examine traditional monastic life, new public roles in the twenty-fir...

3.2.1 - Devotion and its purposesBowls of flowers, chanting and Buddha images can look like worship of a god, yet Buddhist devotion has different purposes. You will compare Theravada and Mahayana practices, examine how images focus memory and aspiration, and trace how making and sharing merit connects laypeople with the Sangha a...

3.2.1 - MeditationMeditation is a discipline on the Noble Eightfold Path, not merely a technique for feeling calm. Using right effort, mindfulness and concentration, you will examine how practice develops insight and supports liberation. Modern therapeutic mindfulness then raises a live dispute: can meditation be...

Section B: Dialogue with philosophy of religion