Theism and Explanation

Dawes, Gregory W.

doi:10.4324/9780203876121

Cited by 14 publications

(11 citation statements)

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“…237–238). In other words, Leslie's Platonic creation story does not fit with our background knowledge: “[t]hose facts which we are aware of independently of the explanation in question” (Dawes, , p. 126).…”

Section: John Leslie's Theory Of Ultimate Realitymentioning

confidence: 99%

John Leslie's Platonic and non‐religious pantheism of infinitely many divine minds

Vandergriff

2018

Philosophy Compass

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Section: John Leslie's Theory Of Ultimate Realitymentioning

confidence: 99%

John Leslie's Platonic and non‐religious pantheism of infinitely many divine minds

Vandergriff

2018

Philosophy Compass

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“…The explanation chosen in the IBE process is the one judged to have the strongest explanatory virtues. Explanatory virtues can be in conflict with each other; they differ in importance with the particular explanation in question and they will not all be relevant to any particular problem . They are a flexible, debatable, overlapping, complex set of criteria, which are themselves subject to judgment and disagreement.…”

Section: Background Conceptsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Explanatory virtues can be in conflict with each other; they differ in importance with the particular explanation in question and they will not all be relevant to any particular problem. 74 They are a flexible, debatable, overlapping, complex set of criteria, which are themselves subject to judgment and disagreement. As emphasized by Sober, 51:68 "Inference to the best explanation is an unobjectionable phrase, as long as it does not give the false impression that scientific inference allows one to discriminate between empirically equivalent theories.…”

Section: Inference To the Best Explanationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Explanations for adaptations, just‐so stories, and limitations on evidence in evolutionary biology

Smith¹

2016

Evolutionary Anthropology

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Explanations of the historical origin of specific individual traits are a key part of the research program in paleontology and evolutionary biology. Why did bipedalism evolve in the human lineage? Why did some dinosaurs and related species have head crests? Why did viviparity evolve in some reptiles? Why did the common ancestor of primates evolve stereoscopic vision, grasping hands and feet, nails instead of claws, and large brains? These are difficult questions. To varying degrees, an explanation must grapple with (1) judgments about changes in fitness that might follow from a change in morphology - without actually observing behavior or measuring reproductive success, (2) the relationship between genes and traits, (3) limitations on doing relevant experiments, (4) the interpretation of causes that are almost certainly contingent, multifactorial, interactive, hierarchical, nonlinear, emergent, and probabilistic rather than deterministic, (5) limited information about variation and ontogeny, (6) a dataset based on the random fortunes of the historical record, including only partial hard-tissue morphology and no soft-tissue morphology, (7) an equally partial and problematic (for example, time-averaged) record of the environment, (8) the compression of all data into a geological time scale that is likely to miss biologically important events or fluctuations, (9) dependence on a process that can only be inferred ("form and even behavior may leave fossil traces, but forces like natural selection do not", ) and finally, (10) the assumption of the "adaptationist programme" that the trait in question is in fact an adaptation rather than a consequence of genetic drift, correlated evolution, pleiotropy, exaptation, or other mechanisms.

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“…For critical evaluations of theistic explanations, seeMackie (1982),Dawes (2009) andPhilipse (2012). For analysis of the related question of the ''God of the Gaps'', seeKojonen (2016b).…”

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confidence: 99%

Methodological naturalism and the truth seeking objection

Kojonen

2016

Int J Philos Relig

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Methodological naturalism, the exclusion of the supernatural from the natural sciences, has drawn critique from both proponents of Intelligent Design and some philosophical naturalists who argue that the methods of science can also be used to evaluate supernatural claims. One principal objection to methodological naturalism has been what I call the truth seeking objection. In this article I develop an understanding of methodological naturalism capable of answering the truth seeking objection. I further also argue that methodological naturalism as a convention of science can be best defended by abandoning scientism. In this way methodological naturalism can be reconnected to the original theistic context in which it was first developed.

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Theism and Explanation

Cited by 14 publications

References 0 publications

John Leslie's Platonic and non‐religious pantheism of infinitely many divine minds

John Leslie's Platonic and non‐religious pantheism of infinitely many divine minds

Explanations for adaptations, just‐so stories, and limitations on evidence in evolutionary biology

Methodological naturalism and the truth seeking objection

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