Richard Granville Swinburne was born on 26 December 1934 at Smethick, Staffordshire. After school at Charterhouse, he did his compulsory national service in the Navy, becoming a Russian interpreter. He went up to Oxford as an undergraduate in 1954, reading for a B.A. in philosophy, politics and economics. After getting first class honours, he read for the B.Phil. in philosophy, which he obtained in 1959.

Alfred Edward Taylor, philosopher, was born at Oundle on 22 December 1869, to the Reverend Alfred Taylor, a Wesleyan minister, and Caroline Esther Fax. He was educated at Kingswood School, Bath, and at New College, Oxford, of which he was elected a scholar and, in 1931, an honorary fellow. He obtained literae humaniores in 1891.

William Temple, Archbishop of Canterbury, was born 15 October 1881 at the bishop's palace, Exeter. The youngest child of Frederick Temple, archbishop of Canterbury, and his wife, Beatrice Blanche, daughter of William Lascelles (himself son of the second Earl of Harewood), William was born when Frederick was nearly sixty.

William Homan Thorpe was born 1 April 1902 in Hastings. His father was an accountant actively involved in a local nonconformist church. Thorpe went to university late, entering Jesus College, Cambridge in 1921. He graduated in agriculture, and then took a PhD in entomology (awarded in 1929). After a few years working on parasites at a laboratory in Surrey, he returned to teach in Cambridge, again at Jesus College, and remained there for the rest of his career. He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1951 and awarded a personal chair in 1966.

Paul Tillich was born 20 August 1886 in Starzeddel, then a province of Brandenberg Germany (now part of Poland). His family moved to Berlin in 1900 when his father was called to a position as a Lutheran pastor. After graduating from the Friedrich Wilhelm Gymnasium in 1904 Tillich attended the universities of Berlin Tübingen and Breslau. He graduated in 1911 from the University of Breslau with a doctoral degree in philosophy.

The British historian Arnold Joseph Toynbee was born in London on 14 April 1889 and died on 22 October 1975 in York, North Yorkshire, England. He was educated at Winchester College and Balliol College, Oxford. He was the nephew of economic historian Arnold Toynbee, with whom he is sometimes confused. His first marriage to Rosalind Murray, with whom he had three sons, ended in divorce in 1946. Professor Toynbee then married Veronica M. Boulter, his research assistant.

Edward Burnett Tylor was born 2 October 1832 to Harriet Skipper and Joseph Tylor, the owner of a brass foundry in their home town of Camberwell in Surrey. Both parents belonged to the Society of Friends and elected to have their son educated at Grove House, a Quaker school in Tottenham. When they reached the age of sixteen, both Edward and his brother, the geologist Alfred Tylor, were denied entrance to a university on account of their faith. Instead, Edward became a clerk in his family’s business, a job he kept for seven years.

Peter van Inwagen (b. 1942) is the John Cardinal O’Hara Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame. Previously he taught at the University of Syracuse. He received his B.S. from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 1965 and his Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Rochester in 1969 under Richard Taylor. Professor van Inwagen’s publications have focused on metaphysics ethics and philosophical theology.

Robert M. Veatch is a leading medical ethicist in the United States often serving as an advisor to professional medical associations legislators and research organizations. He is currently professor of medical ethics at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., and is former director of the university’s Kennedy Institute of Ethics. He is also an adjunct professor in the Department of Community and Family Medicine at Georgetown Medical Center.