Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-cphqk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-25T19:27:14.928Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The proper basicality of belief in God and the evil-god challenge

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2022

Perry Hendricks Open the ORCID record for Perry Hendricks [Opens in a new window]
Perry Hendricks*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana 610 Purdue Mall, West Lafayette, IN 47907, USA
*
email: ampchendricks@gmail.com
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The evil-god challenge is a challenge for theists to show that belief in God is more reasonable than belief in evil-god. In this article, I show that whether or not evil-god exists, belief in evil-god is unjustified. But this isn't the case for belief in God: belief in God is probably justified if theism is true. And hence belief in God is (significantly) more reasonable than belief in evil-god, and the evil-god challenge has been answered.

Keywords

Alvin Plantingadivine hiddennessevil-god challengejustificationreligious epistemology
Type
Original Article
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 59 , Issue 1 , March 2023 , pp. 55 - 62
Check for updates
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bergmann, M (2001) Skeptical theism and Rowe's new evidential argument from evil. Nous 35, 278–296.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bergmann, M (2005) Defeaters and higher-level requirements. Philosophical Quarterly 55, 419–436.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bergmann, M (2006) Justification Without Awareness. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Collins, JM (2019) The evil-god challenge: extended and defended. Religious Studies 55, 85–109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fales, E (2003) Critical discussion of Alvin Plantinga's Warranted Christian Belief. Nous 37, 353–370.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hendricks, P (2018) Sceptical theism and the evil-god challenge. Religious Studies 54, 549–561.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hendricks, P (2020). Skeptical theism proved. The Journal of the American Philosophical Association 6, 264–274.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hendricks, P (2021) Divine hiddenness or de jure objection to theism: you cannot have both. Analysis 81, 27–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lancaster-Thomas, A (2018a) The evil-god challenge part I: history and recent developments. Philosophy Compass 13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lancaster-Thomas, A (2018b) The evil-god challenge part II: objections and responses. Philosophy Compass 13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lancaster-Thomas, A (2020) Encountering evil: the evil-god challenge from religious experience. European Journal for Philosophy of Religion 12, 137–161.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Law, S (2010) The evil-god challenge. Religious Studies 46, 353–373.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lougheed, K (2020) Religious disagreement, religious experience, and the evil-god hypothesis. European Journal for Philosophy of Religion 12, 173–190.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McAllister, B and Dougherty, T (2019) Reforming reformed epistemology: a new take on the sensus divinitatis. Religious Studies 55, 537–557.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McNabb, T (2018) Religious Epistemology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moon, A (2016) Recent work in reformed epistemology. Philosophy Compass 11, 879–891.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moon, A (2017) Plantinga's religious epistemology, skeptical theism, and debunking arguments. Faith and Philosophy 34, 449–470.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Oppy, G (2013) The Best Argument Against God. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Page, B and Baker-Hytch, M (2020) Meeting the evil-god challenge. Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 3, 297–317.Google Scholar
Plantinga, A (1984) Reason and belief in God. In Plantinga, A and Wolterstoff, N (eds), Faith and Rationality: Reason and Belief in God. Notre Dame: Notre Dame University Press, pp. 16–93.Google Scholar
Plantinga, A (2000) Warranted Christian Belief. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rasmussen, J and Leon, F (2019) Is God the Best Explanation of Things? A Dialogue. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schellenberg, JL (2015) The Hiddenness Argument: Philosophy's New Challenge to Belief in God. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tucker, C (2011) Phenomenal conservatism and evidentialism in religious epistemology. In van Arragon, R and Clark, K (eds), Evidence and Religious Belief. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 52–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wilson, L (2021) Moral motivation and the evil-god challenge. Religious Studies 57, 703–716.CrossRefGoogle Scholar