Paul Draper

Paul Draper is a Professor of Philosophy at Purdue University specializing in the philosophy of religion, epistemology, and the relationship between science and religion. He has held editorial roles with the journal Philo and is among the most influential contemporary defenders of evidential arguments against theism. His widely cited 1989 paper 'Pain and Pleasure: An Evidential Problem for Theists' (Noûs) argues that the distribution of pain and pleasure observed in nature is significantly more probable on the 'Hypothesis of Indifference' (a naturalistic hypothesis on which the universe is indifferent to sentient welfare) than on theism, thus furnishing prima facie evidence against theism. This Humean-Bayesian probabilistic strategy has shaped much subsequent work on the evidential problem of evil and prompted replies from theists including Peter van Inwagen, Alvin Plantinga, and Daniel Howard-Snyder. Draper has also written on the problem of divine hiddenness, the relation between evolution and theism (arguing that naturalism better explains evolutionary phenomena than theism), and on agnosticism, which he defends as an epistemically respectable stance distinct from atheism. He co-edited 'God or Blind Nature? Philosophers Debate the Evidence' (2007–2008), an online exchange later issued in print. His work is characterized by methodological care, charity to opponents, and resistance to polemics typical of New Atheism.