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Entries Tagged as 'Alvin Plantinga'

Is Theism Incompatible with the Pauline Principle? Comments on James Sterba’s Argument from Evil

November 3rd, 2022 Comments Off on Is Theism Incompatible with the Pauline Principle? Comments on James Sterba’s Argument from Evil

My paper, “Is Theism Incompatible with the Pauline Principle?” has been published in a special issue of Religions, devoted to the topic Do We Now Have A Logical Argument From Evil? The abstract is as follows:   This paper criticises James Sterba’s use of the Pauline principle to formulate a logical version of the problem of […]

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Can a Divine Command Theory Vindicate the Objectivity of Morality: Huemer on Observer Independence, part two

September 12th, 2021 Comments Off on Can a Divine Command Theory Vindicate the Objectivity of Morality: Huemer on Observer Independence, part two

In my last post, I discussed Michael Huemer’s argument that a divine command theory cannot vindicate the objectivity of moral requirements. As I interpret him, the  argument is: [1] Our commitment to morality presupposes that moral requirements are objective. [2] Moral requirements are objective just in case there obtain facts about what is right and […]

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Contemporary Philosophy of Religion and NCEA Religious Studies: Part three

October 21st, 2017 Comments Off on Contemporary Philosophy of Religion and NCEA Religious Studies: Part three

This is a talk I gave to the New Zealand Association of Philosophy Teachers annual conference at St Cutherberts College in September this year. Several people have asked me to make this talk available. I have broken my talk up into four parts. Part One introduces what philosophy of religion. In part two I will outline two […]

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Alvin Plantinga Calling for an Argument

February 4th, 2012 6 Comments

We moved house recently but before we got the telephone services disconnected at our old house we rescued this answer-phone message left by our then 9 year old son Noah for Matt – note the attempted American accent: Alvin Calling (Noah had no idea how we worked out it wasn’t really Alvin Plantinga.)

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In Defense of Reasonable Disagreement

May 30th, 2011 39 Comments

At the close of his 1967 book “God and Other Minds”, Alvin Plantinga argues that if theistic belief is to be dismissed as “irrational”, or in some sense “epistemically sub-par” on the basis that it lacks a rationally compelling argument, then likewise we should also reject belief in other minds, since the best argument for […]

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Fallacy Friday: Denying the Antecedent

April 30th, 2011 31 Comments

This week I will look at the fallacy of denying the antecedent. Before I can elaborate exactly what is involved in this fallacy, it is important to introduce and analyse some valid arguments that are superficially similar. Modus Ponens One of the very first valid inferences one learns in logic is modus ponens. To use […]

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Contra Mundum: Why Does God Allow Suffering?

April 4th, 2011 29 Comments

22 February 2011 “may well be New Zealand’s darkest day”; these were the words of Prime Minister John Key in the aftermath of the earthquake which devastated the South Island’s largest city Christchurch. The death toll is expected to be over 200, many more have been injured, have lost property and now live in fear […]

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