Natural Theology, Evidence, and Epistemic Humility
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.24204/ejpr.v9i2.1924Keywords:
Epistemic Humility, Paul Moser, Natural TheologyAbstract
One not infrequently hears rumors that the robust practice of natural theology reeks of epistemic pride. Paul Moser’s is a paradigm of such contempt. In this paper we defend the robust practice of natural theology from the charge of epistemic pride. In taking an essentially Thomistic approach, we argue that the evidence of natural theology should be understood as a species of God’s general self-revelation. Thus, an honest assessment of that evidence need not be prideful, but can be an act of epistemic humility, receiving what God has offered, answering God’s call. Lastly, we provide criticisms of Moser’s alternative approach, advancing a variety of philosophical and theological problems against his conception of personifying evidence.References
Barrett, Justin. 2004. Why Would Anyone Believe in God? (Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press).
Coe, John. 2009. “Spiritual Theology: A Theological-Experiential Methodology for Bridging the Sanctification Gap.” Journal of Spiritual Formation & Soul Care 2(1): 4-43.
Conee, Earl. 1998. “Seeing the Truth.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 58 (4): 847-857.
—. 2004. “First Things First.” In Earl Conee and Richard Feldman (eds.). Evidentialism: Essays in Epistemology (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
—. 2012. “Self — Support.” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 84 (2): 419-446.
Conee, Earl and Feldman, Richard. 2004. Evidentialism: Essays in Epistemology (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
Dougherty, Trent. 2013. “Dealing with Disagreement from the First Person Perspective: A Probabilist Approach.” In Disagreement and Skepticism. Edited by Diego Machuca (New York: Routledge).
—. 2014a. The Problem of Animal Pain: A Theodicy for Creatures Great and Small (New York, NY: Palgrave).
—. 2014b. “Faith, Trust, and Testimony: An Evidentialist Account.” In Religious Faith and Intellectual Virtue. Edited by Laura Frances Callahan, Timothy O’Connor (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
—. 2014c. “The Hidden God: On Paul Moser’s The Severity of God: Religion and Philosophy Reconceived.” Marginalia. <http://marginalia.lareviewofbooks.org/the-hidden-god-by-trent-dougherty/>
Dougherty, Trent, and Poston, Ted. 2008. “A User’s Guide to Design Arguments.” Religious Studies 44 (1): 99-110.
Dougherty, Trent, and Tweedt, Chris. 2015. “Religious Epistemology.” Philosophy Compass 10 (8) (2015): 547–559.
Dougherty, Trent, and Walls, Jerry. (forthcoming). The Plantinga Project: Two Dozen (or So) Theistic Arguments (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
Evans, C. Stephen. 2010. Natural Signs and Knowledge of God: A New Look at Theistic Arguments (Oxford University Press, 2010).
Feldman, Richard. 1995. “Authoritarian Epistemology.” Philosophical Topics 23 (1): 147-169.
—. 2004. “The Justification of Introspective Belief.” In Earl Conee and Richard Feldman (eds.). Evidentialism: Essays in Epistemology (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
Hasker, William. 1999. The Emergent Self (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press).
Heumer, Michael. 2001. Skepticism and the Veil of Perception (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield).
Keener, Craig S. 2013. Acts: An Exegetical Commentary, 3 Volume Set. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic).
Lewis, C. S. 1978. Miracles: A Preliminary Study. Revised Ed. (New York: Macmillan).
Kant, Immanuel. 1979. The One Possible Basis for a Demonstration of the Existence of God. Translation and introduction by Gordon Treash (New York: Abaris Books).
—. 1998. Critique of Pure Reason. Translated by Allan W. Wood. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Moreland, J. P. 2008. Consciousness and the Existence of God (New York: Routledge).
Moser, Paul. 2000. “Why Isn’t God More Obvious?” (Norcross, GA: RZIM, 2000).
—. 2001. “Divine Hiding.” Philosophia Christi 2 (3) (1): 91-107.
—. 2010. The Evidence for God: Religious Knowledge Reexamined (New York, NY: Cambridge University Press).
—. 2012. “Natural Theology and the Evidence for God: Reply to Harold Netland, Charles Taliaferro, and Kate Waidler.” Philosophia Christi 14 (2): 305-311.
—. 2013. The Severity of God (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013).
—. 2014. “God without Argument.” In Is Faith in God Reasonable? Debates in Philosophy, Science, and Rhetoric. Edited by Corey Miller, Paul Gould (New York: Routledge, 69-83).
—. 2015. “God and Epistemic Humility”, Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory 14 (2): 414-24.
Plantinga, Alvin. 1967. God and Other Minds (Ithaca: Cornell University Press).
—. 1974. The Nature of Necessity (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
—. 1993. Warrant and Proper Function (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
—. 1996a. “Respondeo ad Feldman.” In Warrant in Contemporary Epistemology: Essays in Honor of Alvin Plantinga’s Theory of Knowledge. Edited by Jon Kvanvig (London: Rowman and Littlefield 1996).
—. 1996b. “Epistemic Probability and Evil.” In D. Howard-Snyder (ed.). The Evidential Argument from Evil (Bloomington: Indiana University Press).
—. 2000. Warranted Christian Belief (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
—. 2001. “Internalism, Externalism, Defeaters and Arguments for Christian Belief”, Philosophia Christi 3 (2): 379-402.
—. 2014. “Religion and Science”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Edited by Edward N. Zalta.
<http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2014/entries/religion-science/>.
Porter, Steven L. 2007. “What Do the Five Ways Have to Do with the Ascent of Mt. Carmel?” Philosophia Christi 9 (1): 189-202.
—. 2008. “Sanctification in a New Key: Relieving Evangelical Anxieties Over Spiritual Formation.” Journal of Spiritual Formation & Soul Care 1 (2): 129–148.
Reppert, Victor. 2003. C. S. Lewis’s Dangerous Idea: In Defense of the Argument from Reason (Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press).
—. 2009. “The Argument from Reason.” In The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology. Edited by William Lane Craig and J. P. Moreland (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing).
Rickabaugh, Brandon. 2015. “Eternal Life as Knowledge of God: An Epistemology of Knowledge by Acquaintance and Spiritual Formation.” Journal of Spiritual Formation and Soul Care 6 (2): 204-228.
Rickabaugh, Brandon, and McAllister, Derek. Forthcoming. “Who You Could Have Known: Divine Hiddenness, Epistemic Counterfactuals, and the Recalcitrant Nature of Natural Theology.” International Journal for Philosophy of Religion.
Swinburne, Richard. 2003. The Resurrection of God Incarnate (Oxford: Clarendon Press).
—. 2001. Epistemic Justification (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
—. 2004. The Existence of God. 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press).
—. 2013. “The argument from souls to God.” Religious Studies 51 (3): 293-305.
Taliaferro, Charles. 2009. “The Project of Natural Theology.” In The Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology. Edited by William Lane Craig and J. P. Moreland (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009).
Tucker, Chris. 2010. “Why Open-Minded People Should Endorse Dogmatism.” Philosophical Perspectives 24 (1): 529-45.
Unwin, Stephen D. 2003. The Probability of God: A Simple Calculation That Proves the Ultimate Truth (New York: Three Rivers Press).
van Inwagen, Peter. 2006. The Problem of Evil (New York, NY: Oxford University Press).
Willard, Dallas. “Jesus the Logician”, Christian Scholars Review 28 (4) (1999): 605-614.
—. 2009. Knowing Christ in Today: Why We Can Trust Spiritual Knowledge (New York, NY: HarperOne).
