Sunday, December 02, 2007
Plantinga on Dawkins
The God Delusion is full of bluster and bombast, but it really doesn't give even the slightest reason for thinking belief in God mistaken, let alone a "delusion."-Alvin Plantinga
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This is, more or less, what Plantinga has said about *every* book that critiques religious belief. If one were to use Plantinga's standards, one could say equally correctly that there has never been a book that has made the slightest dent to naturalism.
"If one were to use Plantinga's standards, one could say equally correctly that there has never been a book that has made the slightest dent to naturalism."
In other words, naturalists are just as dogmatic about their position as theists.
Dawkins would say that Joseph was deluded to think that a real angel appeared to him in a dream and told him to flee to Egypt.
But where is Dawkins argument that what happens in dreams is not real?
God has given us reliable cognitive faculties, enabling us to discover truth.
But Dawkins does not know the mind of God, and he has only an argument from incredulity when he says that God would not create dreams as one of the many mechanisms by which we can discover truth.
An argument from incredulity is a basic logical fallacy that shows the amateurism of Dawkins.
Dawkins disdain for dreams reveals his naturalistic biases.
If a dream produces a belief in God, then that is just as properly basic a belief as Joseph's belief that he had to flee to Egypt to escape Herod.
Rather, that he refuses to admit that certain considerations count against religious belief. The same can be said of many non-theists, of course, but that doesn't make it right. The appropriate response, it seems to me, is for people on both sides of the debate to admit that there are pieces of evidence that should count against their positions. Mr. Reppert seems willing to grant this; I wonder why Plantinga is not.
It is a shocking calumny to suggest that Plantinga thinks there is no evidence against religious belief.
Do you really want to claim that Plantinga deals with the evidential argument from evil by saying there is no evidence? That would be a total caricature of his position.
Plantinga even came up with a new unit – the turpitude – as a way of putting the evidence against religious belief into some sort of scale and balance.
Perhaps Plantinga’s method of measuring the amount of evidence against religious belief is a rough and ready measure, it is hard to be precise about these things, but where does Dawkins even attempt to measure the amount of evidence for religious belief?
As for belief in God being a delusion, hasn’t Dawkins bothered to read Plantinga?
Plantinga says that properly basic beliefs, such as a belief in God, can only be properly basic if they have been formed in a proper manner. If you are deluded, those beliefs in God have not been formed in a proper manner and so are not properly basic beliefs.
So a properly basic belief in God cannot be a delusion , or else it would not be a properly basic belief.
Does Dawkins not understand basic concepts in theology, such as what a properly basic belief is?
Sheesh.....
I absolutely believe in a higher power
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