A Presumptuous Path to Theism, Modal Realism, or Axiarchism

Bibliographic Data

ID21461602
AuthorsMatthew Adelstein (0000-0001-9704-025X, Forêt Méditerranéenne), Amos Wollen (0000-0002-1092-6312, Thiel College, corresponding author)
Year2026
Publication date2026-06-30
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueErkenntnis (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0165-0106 • E-ISSN: 1572-8420
PublisherSpringer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1007/s10670-026-01130-y
OpenAlexW7166652045
LanguageEN
References cited29

We argue that adopting the Self-Indication Assumption (SIA)—a thesis about self-locating evidence, according to which your existence favours theories on which there are more observers who you yourself might be over theories on which there are fewer—strongly confirms the disjunction of theism, modal realism, or axiarchism. We say that if SIA is correct, your existence becomes highly surprising on garden-variety atheism. For almost certainly, if each of these views are false, only a proper subset of possible observers who you might be would exist, if any. In contrast, on some forms of theism—forms of theism on which God must create an unsurpassably good world—it’s not so unlikely God would create every possible observer, to love and/or benefit each one. Something similar is true of axiarchism, and modal realism entails that every possible observer exists. As a result, we argue, your existence strongly confirms the disjunction of maximizing theism, modal realism, or axiarchism over garden-variety atheism, conditional on SIA

Modal · Modal logic · Ontology · Theism · Epistemology, Ethics, and Metaphysics · Philosophy and Theoretical Science · Theology and Philosophy of Evil