2007 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary
The Emergence and Development of Reformed Epistemology in the USA
| Project/Area Number |
17520061
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Section | 一般 |
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| Research Field |
Religious studies
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| Research Institution | Doshisha University |
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Principal Investigator |
MIYAKE Takehito Doshisha University, Faculty of Theology, Associate Professor (60268109)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2005 – 2007
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| Keywords | philosophy of religion / Christian thought / American studies / Reformed epistemology / theism / warrant / theodicy / religious pluralism |
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| Research Abstract |
This research aims to clarify the main theories and issues of Reformed epistemology against its social and cultural background. Although Reformed epistemology has formed a major school of thought in the philosophy of religion in the U.S.A., it is virtually unknown in Japan.
Reformed epistemology originated in the 1980s from the Dutch neo-Calvinist movement, which had been transplanted in America, with the intention of disproving classical foundationalism and atheistic evidentialism. Among its major advocates are Alvin Plantinga and Nicholas Wolterstorff. The main thrust of Reformed epistemology is that for Christians theistic beliefs are properly basic and rational without any evidential foundation. And that, if Christianity is true, Christian beliefs are warranted as knowledge.
The main purpose of Reformed epistemology is to defend the rational acceptability of classical Christianity against possible defeaters such as the problem of evil and religious pluralism. Against the logical problem of evil Plantinga developed Free Will Defense. The central argument of Free Will Defense is to show that it is possible that "it was not within God's power to create a world containing moral good but no moral evil."
Reformed epistemologists take an exclusivistic stance when faced with a great many incompatible religions in this world. Some religious pluralists challenge exclusivists by arguing that a plurality of religions makes classical Christianity improbable or that it is morally or epistemically arbitrary or egoistic to accept a specific system of religious beliefs in the face of a plurality of diverse religions. Plantinga maintains that, for Christians, Christian beliefs have warrant or a source of knowledge to which the adherents of other religions do not have access, and thus Christian beliefs and other religious beliefs are not on an epistemic par so that it is justified to hold Christian beliefs exclusively.
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Research Products
(8 results)
