Abstract

In what sense does philosophy investigate the reality of God? The answers that Whitehead and Wittgenstein give to this question are the subject matter of this dissertation. I discuss their later views on the nature of philosophy and the implications of these views for philosophical problems that have relevance to religious questions. In particular, I discuss the old problem of the nature of reality and what that entails about the particular question of the reality of God. I also look at their views on philosophic method, the ramifications of these views for the question of the right method of approaching the question of God, and what they actually say about God. ;My motto in this dissertation comes from Wittgenstein but I apply it equally to him and Whitehead: "Show me how you are searching and I will tell you what you are looking for." I ask whether they advocate either an "underlaborer'" or a "master-science" conception of philosophy, the first depriving philosophy from having subject matters of its own, reducing it to a technique for solving problems in other disciplines, and the second turning it into a scientific discipline that competes with other sciences for a better interpretation of 'reality'. And although I reach the conclusion that neither Whitehead nor Wittgenstein is an underlaborer or a master-scientist, major differences between them surface during the investigation. These differences relate to the questions as to whether metaphysics is a valid "grammar," whether religion needs justification, and whether the logic of God's reality allows it to be characterized as a metaphysical reality. ;My conclusion is that Wittgenstein's criticisms of metaphysics are applicable to Whitehead's version of it, and that certain defenders of Whitehead's metaphysics fail to defend it against those criticisms. I argue that Whitehead's metaphysics is a kind of first philosophy that sublimes the logic of religious belief, and that it is confused to expect it to offer justification for religion. The implication for God's reality is that Whitehead sublimes its logic when treating it as a metaphysical reality whereas Wittgenstein is correct to situate it within its religiously natural home