Nicholas McGinnis at the Rotman Institute has a fascinating follow up post to Mohan's recent, critical post on Alvin Plantinga. First, McGinnis has an interesting argument, drawing on Buridian, that effectively shows that Plantinga assumes he "knows the will of God." Sometimes I wonder why Plantinga's cabal gives him a free pass on such stuff, but that's really none of my business.
Second, and more important, is McGinnis' "side-note" treatment of what can be best described as a colossal failure of judgment at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (one of my favorite institutions in the whole of professional philosophy). For, "Plantinga’s SEP entry on 'Religion and Science' ...functions as a showcase for Plantinga’s own views." It is nice to see that Plantinga shares my admiration for Newton, but it is odd to read in a SEP entry, without qualification, that "Indeed, the pursuit of science is a clear example of the development and enhancement of the image of God in human beings, both individually and collectively." One especially striking aspect of McGinnis' argument is that in the entry Plantinga favorably discusses Michael Behe's views on “irreducible complexity.” After an excited ("a Gargantuan challenge" to Darwinism) paragraph-long favorable summary of those views, Plantinga adds a single sentence -- and without irony -- that others "argue that Behe has not proved his case."
Anybody paying attention at SEP?
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