Theism, naturalism, and scientific realism

Abstract

Scientific knowledge is not merely a matter of reconciling theories and laws with data and observations. Science presupposes a number of metatheoretic shaping principles in order to judge good methods and theories from bad. Some of these principles are metaphysical (e.g., the uniformity of nature) and some are methodological (e.g., the need for repeatable experiments). While many shaping principles have endured since the scientific revolution, others have changed in response to conceptual pressures both from within science and without. Many of them have theistic roots. For example, the notion that nature conforms to mathematical laws flows directly from the early modern presupposition that there is a divine Lawgiver. This interplay between theism and shaping principles is often unappreciated in discussions about the relation between science and religion. Today, of course, naturalists reject the influence of theism and prefer to do science on their terms. But as Robert Koons and Alvin Plantinga have argued, this is more difficult than is typically assumed. In particular, they argue, metaphysical naturalism is in conflict with several metatheoretic shaping principles, especially explanatory virtues such as simplicity and with scientific realism more broadly. I will discuss these arguments as well as possible responses. In the end, theism is able to provide justification for the philosophical foundations of science that naturalism cannot.

A new epistemological case for theism

“…The most famous of these is surely the one put forward by Alvin Plantinga (1993, 2011), who argued that the reliability of our cognitive faculties is to be expected given traditional theism, but not given metaphysical naturalism (understood as the view that there is no God, or anything like God) 1 . Robert Koons (2000), Tyler McNabb (2015), Jeffrey Koperski (2017), and others have produced similar arguments. Such arguments typically contend that reliance on some faculty or mode of inference is justified only if theism is true, or if those who rely on it are theists.…”

“…Although he intends this argument to apply to our cognitive faculties in general and doesn't single out any particular faculty or belief-forming method for debunking, others have tried to revise his argument in such a way as to restrict its scope. Of all such attempted revisions, most interesting for our purposes is Jeffrey Koperski's (2017). Koperski proposes that we reformulate Plantinga's basic argument into an argument targeting what he calls ‘metatheoretic shaping principles’ (MSPs), which are principles that ‘help determine what good theories look like, as well as how one should proceed in their development’.…”

An Evolutionary Sceptical Challenge to Scientific Realism

“…2 I do not have the space to discuss in detail the other, less recent arguments mentioned above with reference to my argument. I will only say that the arguments of Koperski (2017) and Severini and Sterpetti (2017) are largely tentative and promissory, and that those in Clark (1984) and Ruse (1995Ruse ( , 1998) rely on epistemological principles subtly different to the one my argument will rely on. Cf.…”

“…Even so, the idea of an evolutionary sceptical challenge to scientific realism is by no means unheard of in contemporary analytic philosophy. Clark (1984), Ruse (1995Ruse ( , 1998 and, in more recent times, Talbott (2016), Severini and Sterpetti (2017), Koperski (2017) have put forward or at least gestured towards arguments of this sort. 2 The arguments differ in the details, but share a common main thrust: standard evolutionary theory implies that it would have taken an epistemically problematic 'lucky accident' for the evolutionary process to have given us a cognitive apparatus with the capacity to acquire a scientific understanding of the world.…”