About me…

I graduated in philosophy of religion many years ago and have since acquired my PGCE and now teach and lecture in religion, ethics, and philosophy. I enjoy reading (made even better while drinking a good, strong English cup of tea of course), listening to good music (especially Hans Zimmer), long walks by the sea, spending time with family and friends.

Update: In June 2014 I had brain surgery which, while successful, has caused me to considerably slow down with my blogging (as well as virtually everything else too!). I apologise that I cannot blog at the rate I used to. 

I am English so look out for dry humour, weird (correct) spellings, and excessive use of sarcasm (although, to me, it’s not excessive of course) in my posts.

Episcopius is a reference to Simon Episcopius, the protégé of Jacob Arminius, who was the primary author of the Arminian Confession of 1621 and who was one of the most important Remonstrants and Christian thinkers of the 17th century.

My primary interests are the theological debates and history of Arminianianism and Calvinism, metaethics, religious ethics, normative ethics, the moral arguments for God, the relationship between science and Christian theism, free-will, epistemology, and the problem of suffering and evil.

Some of my favourite recent philosophers (in no particular order) are:

Linda Zagzebski, Onora O’Neill, Kevin Timpe, Russ Shaeffer-Landau, Jerry Walls, Paul Draper, Alvin Plantinga, Keith Ward, Richard Swinburne, John Cottingham, Robert Audi, Anthony Kenny, Robert Kane, Robert Koons, Philippa Foot and Eleonore Stump.

I am currently reading:

‘On What Matters’ by Derek Parfit

‘Acting on Principle: An Essay on Kantian Ethics’ by Onora O’Neill

‘An Introduction to Buddhist Ethics’ by Peter Harvey

I don’t see any of my blog posts as finished products and I have a tendency to endlessly tinker with them so I apologise if you find that annoying. I am very open to being corrected if I have misrepresented anyone since I aim to avoid that as much as is humanly possible. I am not really looking to change people’s minds as much as hoping that what you read will inspire you to go and read about it more.

This is just for the nerds (like me) who like stats:

• My primary audience is North America (I get more views from North America than all other countries put together by a factor of over two!).
• There was only one day (that I have noticed anyway) when North America was outnumbered in terms of views and that was New Zealand the day I posted my ‘Four Lifeguards’ blog – perhaps lots of New Zealand lifeguards were disappointed that day but I’m thankful they don’t send hate mail.
• Piper blogs get lots of views (don’t know why)!
• Largest amount of hits in any one day was 452 largely due to Massimo Pigliucci putting a link to my article in defense of him on his blog. Thanks Massimo!!
• My audience are not terribly interested in reading about Richard Carrier (no further comment)!
• The only time I’ve got into double figures viewing for France was the day I blogged about James White! Is he loved in France? Pourquoi?

COMMENTS on my blog:

Comments are almost always permitted but please don’t take offense if I don’t reply. It’s nothing personal.

If you regularly view my blog please write a comment some time. I seem to have a couple of die-hards in Australia, Brazil and in Ireland! Who are you strange people?

Thanks for reading and thinking!