The Foundations of Skeptical Theism

Faith and Philosophy 29 (4):375-399 (2012)
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Abstract

Some skeptical theists use Wykstra’s CORNEA constraint to undercut Rowe-style inductive arguments from evil. Many critics of skeptical theism accept CORNEA, but argue that Rowe-style arguments meet its constraint. But Justin McBrayer argues that CORNEA is itself mistaken. It is, he claims, akin to “sensitivity” or “truth-tracking” constraints like those of Robert Nozick; but counterexamples show that inductive evidence is often insensitive. We here defend CORNEA against McBrayer’s chief counterexample. We first clarify CORNEA, distinguishing it from a deeper underlying principle that we dub “CORE.” We then give both principles a probabilistic construal, and show how, on this construal, the counterexample fails

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Citations of this work

Evil and Evidence.Matthew A. Benton, John Hawthorne & Yoaav Isaacs - 2016 - Oxford Studies in Philosophy of Religion 7:1-31.
Sceptical Theism and the Paradox of Evil.Luis R. G. Oliveira - 2020 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 98 (2):319-333.
Skeptical Theism.Timothy Perrine & Stephen Wykstra - 2017 - In Chad V. Meister & Paul K. Moser (eds.), The Cambridge Companion to the Problem of Evil. New York: Cambridge University Press. pp. 85-107.
Vagueness and the Problem of Evil: a New Reply to van Inwagen.Luis Oliveira - 2021 - Manuscrito: Revista Internacional de Filosofía 44 (4):49-82.

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References found in this work

Indicative conditionals.Robert Stalnaker - 1975 - Philosophia 5 (3):269-286.
The Problem of Evil and Some Varieties of Atheism.William L. Rowe - 1979 - American Philosophical Quarterly 16 (4):335 - 341.
19 The Problem of Evil and Some Varieties of Atheism.William Rowe - 1979 - In Eleonore Stump & Michael J. Murray (eds.), Philosophy of Religion: The Big Questions. Blackwell. pp. 6--157.
Insensitivity is back, baby!Keith DeRose - 2010 - Philosophical Perspectives 24 (1):161-187.

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