Paying the cost of skeptical theism

International Journal for Philosophy of Religion 69 (1):45-56 (2011)
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Abstract

In this paper I show that two arguments for the inconsistency of skeptical theism fail. After setting up the debate in Introduction section, I show in The initial debate section why Mylan Engel’s argument (Engel 2004) against skeptical theism does not succeed. In COST section I strengthen the argument so that it both avoids my reply to Engel and parallels Jon Laraudogoitia’s argument against skeptical theism (Laraudogoitia 2000). In COST* section, I provide three replies—one by an evidentialist theist, one by a closure-denying theist, and one by a necessitarian theist, and argue that the necessitarian’s reply successfully rebuts the inconsistency charge. I conclude that skeptical theism which accepts God’s necessary existence is immune to both kinds of arguments for its inconsistency

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References found in this work

Counterfactuals.David K. Lewis - 1973 - Malden, Mass.: Blackwell.
Counterfactuals.David Lewis - 1973 - Foundations of Language 13 (1):145-151.
Counterfactuals.David Lewis - 1973 - Philosophy of Science 42 (3):341-344.
The Problem of Evil and Some Varieties of Atheism.William L. Rowe - 1979 - American Philosophical Quarterly 16 (4):335 - 341.
The Problem of Evil.Peter van Inwagen - 2007 - Philosophical Quarterly 57 (229):696-698.

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