Author’s Abstract
- In this paper I argue that a human on Earth consists of two interconnected parts (two substances, in philosophical terminology) - body and soul. The body is material, the soul is immaterial. The soul is the essential part of the person; it is the continuing of my soul which constitutes the continuing of me, as argued in my The Evolution of the Soul.
- At death my body ceases to function, and gradually decays. If there is a God, as I believe, what happens to the soul depends on his will; and I believe that he has revealed that normally he will keep it in existence for ever. I do not know what would happen to the soul if there were no God.
- I can't prove to you in twenty minutes, as well as everything else, that there is a God and so that the soul will go on existing forever. But I can, I hope, prove to you that there is a soul for something to happen to.
Comment:
- For the full text, follow this link (Local website only): PDF File1.
- For the paper on-line, see Swinburne - The Possibility of Life after Death
- This is Richard Swinburne's contribution to 'An Afterlife', a symposium that was part of 'Death: a Live Issue', a Humanist Philosophers' Group conference on death and dying held at King's College London on 19 October 2002.
- See Peter Cave
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- Blue: Text by me; © Theo Todman, 2026
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