Philosopher William Alston died peacefully in his home in Jamestown New York on 13 September 2009 aged 87; he had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer just a week earlier.
Many of my readers will not know but Alston was one of the leading contemporary Christian Philosophers of the last fifty years. [...]
Entries Tagged as 'William Alston'
Rest in Peace William Alston
September 15th, 2009 3 Comments
Tags: William Alston
God, Darwinian Evolution and The Teleological Argument
August 8th, 2009 58 Comments
Does Evolution make belief in God untenable? At the recent conference, Faithful Science? – Just How Well Do Science and Faith Get Along? I presented a paper examining this question.[1] This blog series has grown from that paper and the discussions I had with the theologians and scientists in attendance at the conference.
It is commonly [...]
Tags: William Alston
Religion and Science: A Response to Ken Perrott’s “Other Ways of Knowing”
July 23rd, 2009 129 Comments
Ken Perrott, at Open Parachute, took issue with some comments I made in my recent defence of Plantinga’s stance on Evolution being taught in state schools. To gain focus let’s look at one thing I said to Ken in the comments section on that post,
If the relevant evidence points towards a theory it does [...]
Tags: William Alston
Tooley, Plantinga and the Deontological Argument from Evil Part II
May 27th, 2009 1 Comment
In my last post, Tooley, Plantinga and the Deontological Argument from Evil Part I, I sketched Tooley’s distinction between a deontological and an axiological argument from evil and argued that Tooley rejects the axiological version because it rests on controversial ethical claims that are likely to be rejected by many theists. I outlined Tooley’s deontological [...]
Tags: Alvin Plantinga · Atheism · Divine Command Theory · Michael Tooley · Philosophy of Religion · Problem of Evil · William Alston
Tooley, Plantinga and the Deontological Argument from Evil Part I
May 13th, 2009 1 Comment
This two-part series criticises the deontological argument from evil proposed by Micheal Tooley in The Knowledge of God, the print debate between him and Alvin Plantinga.1 My critique proceeds in four parts. Initially I will sketch Tooley’s distinction between a deontological and an axiological argument from evil and will argue that Tooley rejects the axiological [...]
Tags: Alvin Plantinga · Atheism · Divine Command Theory · Michael Tooley · Philosophy of Religion · Problem of Evil · William Alston
John W. Loftus on The Christian Illusion of Moral Superiority Part I
May 7th, 2009 12 Comments
Several Christian thinkers, most notably, C S Lewis, John Hare, Robert Adams and William Lane Craig have argued that Theism provides a superior foundation for moral obligation than Naturalism does. Most of these thinkers defend this notion by developing and defending a divine command theory.[1] John W Loftus is aware of this and in The [...]
Tags: Atheism · Divine Command Theory · God and Morality · John Loftus · Philip Quinn · Robert Adams · Stephen Evans · William Alston
Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, William Lane Craig and the Argument from Harm Part I
April 18th, 2009 No Comments
This is the first of a two-part series where I examine a recent argument criticising religious ethics by Walter Sinnott-Armstrong.
In many of his publications and debates William Lane Craig has defended the contention that if theism is true then there exists a sound foundation for moral duties. In a recent article, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong has criticised [...]
Tags: Divine Command Theory · Ethics · God and Morality · Walter Sinnott-Armstrong · William Alston · William Lane Craig
The Problem of Evil: Why does God Allow Suffering?
April 12th, 2009 73 Comments
One of the most common objections to the Christian faith is the problem of evil. Of all objections mounted against the Christian faith, prima facie, it does seem the most compelling, one of the hardest things for us to get our heads around.
How does a Christian reconcile the fact of evil and suffering in the [...]
Tags: Alvin Plantinga · Apologetics · Philosophy of Religion · William Alston
Belief without Proof: Is Belief in God Rational if there is no Evidence? Part II
April 6th, 2009 2 Comments
In my previous post I criticised the rationalist objection to belief in God. In this post I want to sketch an alternative view of faith and reason defended by Alvin Plantinga. In my next post I will address two common objections to this conception.Belief in God as Properly BasicIn several of his works Alvin Plantinga [...]
Tags: Alvin Plantinga · Faith and Reason · William Alston
Does Pluralism Make Faith Arbitrary?
October 20th, 2008 2 Comments
Recently I have been reading Timothy Keller’s book The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism. (This is not like me because I don’t typically read popular apologetics books, and it is even more rare that I would lead a blog entry with one.)
One thing that interested me is that when Keller examines [...]
Tags: Apologetics · Faith and Reason · Pluralism · Timothy Keller · William Alston
