Example philosophy of religions dissertation topic 2:

Malebranche, the simplicity of God, and the Catholic Church.

As a seventeenth century philosopher, Malebranche, suggested, in his Treatise on Nature and Grace (1680) that God had the power to prevent naturally occurring evils (such as his mal-formed spine). He further argued that God could have, had He so desired, created a better world than that which He did create. Malebranche also suggested that it is not God who is responsible for sinful actions because such acts derive not from His being or grace but from other sinful agents. The Roman Catholic Church subsequently placed the book on its Index of Prohibited Books in 1690. This dissertation seeks to analyse this work of Malebranche and also to place it into its historic context by reviewing the counter contemporaneous philosophical arguments furthered by, for instance, Antoine Arnauld and Jean-Jacques d’Ortous de Mairan.

Suggested initial topic reading:

• Malebranche, N. (1992). Treatise on nature and grace. (Translated by P. Riley.) Oxford: Clarendon Press.
• Schmaltz, T. (1996). Malebranche’s theory of the soul. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Schumacher, R. (2008). ‘Locke on the intentionality of sensory ideas’, Theories of Perception in Medieval and Early Modern Philosophy, Vol. 6, pp. 271-283.