Locke was one of the most influential philosophers of the 17th century, the most important representative of English empiricist philosophy, and he had an important influence on Western religious philosophy in the 18th century and beyond. At 2:30 p.m. on May 26, 2020, the Center for Religious Studies held a forum on religious studies at the "Tencent Conference", and the keynote speaker, Professor Chen Li, gave a lecture entitled "Empiricism or Metaphysics? — Locke's Argument for the Knowledge of God's Existence" academic report. The report was presided over by Professor Lu Jianfu, director of the Religious Research Center, and all teachers and students of the center attended on time.
Teacher Chen Li expounded from four aspects: knowledge of God's existence, cosmological proof, the problem of God's unity, and historical unity. She argues that, unlike Descartes, Locke's argument, based on "knowledge of his own existence," is intended to determine the possibility of "deducing" or "proving" the existence of God based on his own "intuitive knowledge." Locke argues for the unity of God from three aspects: fullness, omniscience, and omnipresence, and regards God as "an immaterial, eternal, infinitely complete existence," arguing that a perfect existence does not require any attribute or degree of perfection, otherwise it needs more completeness to complete itself. Teacher Chen Li emphasized that Locke's proof of the "existence of God" is actually a rational critique, and his purpose is to show that the existing proofs of the existence of God are not certain, which also reveals his basic attitude towards the epistemological significance of theistic propositions, that is, under the norms of the principle of evidenceism, theistic propositions are not only uncertain in the epistemological sense, but also questionable in terms of divine sources.
After the report, Professor Lu Jianfu believes that the proof of god's existence in Western religious theory is a very important field of study, and Professor Chen Li explained Locke's "argument" very deeply and professionally, allowing us to get a glimpse of the different ideas of God proof in the Middle Ages and modern times. After that, Associate Professor Li Hua, Teacher Li Guangqi and Teacher Qi Feizhi raised questions respectively, discussed and exchanged with Teacher Chen Li, and triggered students to think about relevant issues.
Dr. Chen Li graduated from the School of Philosophy of Wuhan University and studied at the University of British Columbia in Canada, where she mainly studied the philosophy of religion, medieval philosophy, modern Western religious philosophy, religious epistemology and big data applications and religious social survey methods. He has presided over the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation project "Research on Locke Epistemological Principles and Belief Normative Thought", and published many papers in journals such as World Religions Research, Philosophical Review, and Chinese Religion.