Study Sheet No. 1

 James W. Sire, The Universe Next Door: A Basic Worldview Catalog, 3rd edition.

Ch. Q.
1. A World of Difference: Introduction
1 How do the quotations from Stephen Crane and the Psalmist (Ps. 8) illustrate how worldviews
differ? (pp. 13-15)
2 Note the four purposes of Sire’s book: how does his second purpose differ from his first? 
(pp. 15-16)
3 What is a “worldview,” and how does it differ from a philosophy or theology? (pp. 16-17)
4 What seven basic questions does Sire use to define and distinguish worldviews? (pp. 20-21)
5 How does Sire let us know what his own worldview is? (p. 22)

2. A Universe Charged with the Grandeur of God: Christian Theism
6 How long did the worldview of Christian theism dominate Western history? (p. 23)
7  Why does Sire start with this worldview, instead of any other? (pp. 24-25)
8 What does it mean when we call God “infinite,” “personal,” “transcendent,” “immanent,” “omniscient,” “sovereign,” and “good”? (pp. 26-29)
9 Why is it significant that God is said to have created the cosmos “ex nihilo,” and as a “uniformity of cause and effect in an open system”? (pp. 29-31)
10 What does Sire mean when he defines “image of God” in terms of “personality” and “self-transcendence”? (pp. 31-32)
11 What is the basis of human intelligence and knowledge (of the world and of God), according to Christian theism? (pp. 34-36)
12 How does Aquinas explain the relationship between general and special revelation? (p. 36)
13 Define the four terms: creation, Fall, redemption, and glorification. (pp. 37-40)
14 Why does G.K. Chesterton call hell a “monument to human freedom,” and what does he mean? (p. 40)
15 How does Christian theism view history? (pp. 42-44)

3. The Clockwork Universe: Deism
16 What forces gave rise to deism in European history? (pp. 45-48)
17 How do the beliefs of John Locke and Voltaire show that deists were much less united on basic issues than theists? (p. 48)
18 How did the deist view of God differ from that of theists?  (pp. 48-49)
19 Why is the cosmos, according to the deist conception, described as a “closed system,” and what does this mean? (pp. 49-50)
20 If deists considered human beings personal, why does Sire say that the deist view turns us into “puppets”? (p. 50)
21 Why did deists reject the theist assumption that the cosmos is “fallen or abnormal”? (pp. 50-51)
22 Why does Alexander Pope take a deistic view of ethics when he declares that “whatever is, is right,” and why did deists feel practically pressured to be inconsistent when it came to questions of ethics? (pp. 52-54)
23 What made deism “so ephemeral”? (pp. 55-56)

4.  The Silence of Finite Space: Naturalism
24 How is God “reduced” in deism, and further “reduced” in naturalism? (pp. 59-60)
25 How do Descartes and Locke qualify as “swing figures” from theism to naturalism, according to Sire? (p. 60)
26 How does the quote from Carl Sagan (bottom, p. 61) show how God is replaced by “matter” in naturalism? (pp. 61-62)
27 What is remarkable about seminary professor, David Jobling’s view of God, Jesus Christ, and the cosmos? (pp. 63-64)
28 How does La Mettrie’s view of human beings reflect the worldview of naturalism? (pp. 64-65)
29 What happens to us at death, according to naturalism? (pp. 67-68)
30 How does the quotation from Richard Dawkins (p. 71) illustrate how naturalism’s view of history differ from deism’s? (p. 71)
31  Why to naturalists have trouble getting any notion of “ought” from and “is” in ethics? (pp. 72-76; esp. p. 73)
32 What is “humanism,” and how does Sire distinguish between secular and Christian humanism? (pp. 76-77)
33 What features of Marxism, according to Sire, make it representative of naturalism? (pp. 77-84; esp. p. 78)
34 What two reasons does Sire give, respectively, for the persistence of naturalism, and its inadequacy? (pp. 84-86)

5. Zero Point: Nihilism
35  Why does Sire write, “Strictly speaking, nihilism is not a philosophy at all”? (p. 87)
36  How do modern art galleries, and works of literature by authors like Samuel Beckett, Franz Kafka, Eugene Ionesco, Joseph Heller, Kurt Vonnegut Jr. And even Douglas Adams illustrate nihilism? (pp. 88-90)
37 What is the relationship between naturalism and nihilism? (p. 90)
38 What does Sire mean when he says that in a closed universe “freedom must be a determinacy unrecognized”? (p. 93)
39 Why does “chance” offer no more hope of escape from nihilism than the “necessity” operative in a universe understood as a closed system of strictly determined causes and effects?  (pp. 96-97)
40  How do Charles Darwin’s words (middle, p. 98) illustrate the epistemological problem that leads from naturalism to nihilism? (pp. 97-102)
41 According to Robert F. Capon, what inconsistency is typical of the epistemological nihilist, who says no reliable knowledge is possible?  (pp. 101-102)
42 What is “ethical nihilism,” as summarized by Sire? (p. 104)
43 Why aren’t most naturalists nihilists, if nihilism is a natural child of naturalism, according to Sire? (p. 107)
44 What five “inner tensions” does Sire note in nihilism? (pp. 107-111)

6. Beyond Nihilism: Existentialism
45 What is the chief objective of existentialism, according to Albert Camus? (p. 112)
46 Distinguish the two forms of existentialism and their historical origin. (p. 113)
47 What are the two forms in which reality appears, and why does existentialism emphasize their disunity? (pp. 114-115)
48 Why do existentialists such as Sartre insist that “existence precedes essence”? (pp. 116-117)
49 In what sense can we be “totally free,” according to existentialism, if we belong to an objective world that, according to science, is completely determined? (p. 117)
50 Why does the objective world appear “absurd” to the existentialist, and why must the “authentic” individual “revolt” against it? (pp. 117-118)
51 What happens to ethics in existentialism? (pp. 118-120)
52 Why does Sire say that Camus’ novel, The Plague, is “almost, but not quite” convincing, and why does he (Sire) think existentialism ultimately fails to overcome nihilism? (pp.124-125)
53 How does Fr. Paneloux (in The Plague) represent the position of theistic existentialism embraced by Kierkegaard? (p.129; see pp. 126-127)
54 How does the value existentialism place on “the personal” and “subjectivity [in knowledge]” help paradox to run rampant? (pp. 129-134)
55 Explain what led theistic existentialism to take “two steps away from traditional theism” and what those two steps were. (pp. 135-136)
56 Does theistic existentialism tend to interpret the Bible literally?  Why, or why not? (pp. 136-138)

7. Journey to the East: Eastern Pantheistic Monism
57 Why have Western individuals found attractive about Eastern thought, and why have they been willing to reject reason as untrustworthy? (pp.141-142)
58 What are Atman and Brahman, and why are they equated with one another? (pp. 144-145)
59 What does maya mean in Hinduism, and to what is it applied? (pp. 144-145)
60 Why does the highest state, “the awakened life of pure consciousness,” come closest to “approaching total oblivion”? (top, p. 151)
61 What two difficulties prevent karma from furnishing a genuine moral framework? (p. 153-154)
62 What is Hinduism’s view of death and history? (pp. 155-156)
63 What are the basic differences between Hinduism and Buddhism? (pp. 158-159)

8. A Separate Universe: The New Age
64 Why did New Age stories drop out of the news in the mid-1990s, when they made cover stories back in the mid-1970s? (pp. 163-165)
65 Why does Sire say that the New Age theme of personal and cultural evolution “seems more important to me now than ever before”? (p. 168)
66 From what disciplines does Sire illustrate the “panoramic sweep” of New Age thought? (pp. 170-175)
67 How is New Age “syncretistic and eclectic”? (pp. 175-176)
68 What elements in New Age resemble (1) naturalism, (2) theism, (3) Eastern pantheistic monism, and (4) animism? (pp. 175-178)
69 In what sense does the New Consciousness regard the self as the “prime reality,” and why do theists and naturalists alike consider “self-deception” the greatest danger at this point?  (pp. 178-179, 183)
70 How is the “invisible universe” (“Mind at Large”) distinguished from the “visible universe” (visible cosmos), and how is it experienced? (pp. 183-188)
71 What happens to space, time, and (especially) morality in the New Consciousness? (pp. 188-193)
72 What happens at death? (p. 194)
73 How does the occult version of the New Consciousness differ from the psychedelic, and conceptual relativist versions? (pp. 195-199)
74 What three “cracks in the New Consciousness” does Sire note? (pp. 204-210)

9. The Vanished Horizon: Postmodernism
75 Why does Sire say that postmodernism is not really “post” anything, but is “the last move of the modern”? (pp. 211-212)
76 What does Francois Lyotard mean when he defines postmodern as “incredulity toward metanarratives”? (pp. 213-214)
77 How does postmodernism differ from all the other worldviews in such a way that leads Sire to day that he “cannot catalog” it according to the same schema of questions? (p. 214)
78 Distinguish what takes place between (1) the shift from the “premodern” to the “modern” (beginning with Descartes) and (2) the shift from the “modern” to the “postmodern” (beginning with Nietzsche). (pp. 214-216; compare pp. 217-219)
79 What happens to “truth” in postmodernism, and how does “pragmatic truth” differ from “the truth of correspondence”? (pp. 219-222)
80 How does the notion that “narratives mask power” lead to “anarchy” in the thinking of Michel Foucault? (p. 224)
81 What happens to the concepts of “self” and “ethics” in postmodernism? (pp. 225-227)
82 What role has postmodernism played in the disciplines of literary theory, and what reactions are in evidence? (pp. 228-230)
83 What role has postmodernism played in the disciplines of history, science, and theology? (pp. 231-
84 What three positive contributions of postmodernism does Sire mention, and what three criticisms of postmodern does he make? (pp. 235-238)

10. The Examined Life: Conclusion
85 Are the worldviews discussed the only choices?  What does Sire say about other possible positions, such as Hedonism and Aestheticism? (p. 242-245)
86 What guidelines does Sire offer for choosing an adequate worldview? (pp. 245-248)
87 Why was Christian theism largely abandoned in the West, according to Sire?  Does he consider these adequate reasons? (pp. 248-249)
88 In what way does Sire suggest that theism is more than a worldview? (pp. 249-250)

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© 2004-2005 Philip Blosser