Alvin Plantinga

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Alvin Plantinga

1 .

The Nature of Necessity
by Alvin Plantinga. 258 pgs.

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This book, one of the first full-length studies of the modalities to emerge from the debate to which Saul Kripke, David Lewis, Ruth Marcus, and others are contributing, is an exploration and defense of the notion of modality de re, the idea that objects have both essential and accidental properties. Plantinga develops his argument by means of the notion of possible worlds and ranges over such key problems as the nature of essence, transworld identity, negative existential propositions, and the existence of unactual objects in other possible worlds. He also applies his logical theories to the elucidation of two problems in the philosophy of religion: the problem of evil and the ontological argument.

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Title Page

PREFACE

CONTENTS

I Preliminary Distinctions And Remarks

Ii Modality De Re: Objections

Iii Modality De Re: Explanations

Iv Worlds, Books, And Essential Properties

V The Necessity of Natures

Vi Transworld Identity Or Worldbound Individuals?

Vii Possible but Unactual Objects: The Classical Argument

Viii Possible but Unactual Objects: On What There Isn't

Ix God, Evil, and the Metaphysics Of Freedom

X God and Necessity

INDEX
2 .

Warranted Christian Belief
by Alvin Plantinga. 508 pgs.

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This is the third volume in Alvin Plantinga's trilogy on the notion of warrant, which he defines as that which distinguishes knowledge from true belief. In this volume, Plantinga examines warrant's role in theistic belief, tackling the questions of whether it is rational, reasonable, justifiable, and warranted to accept Christian belief and whether there is something epistemically unacceptable in doing so. He contends that Christian beliefs are warranted to the extent that they are formed by properly functioning cognitive faculties, thus, insofar as they are warranted, Christian beliefs are knowledge if they are true.

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Title Page

Preface

Contents

Part I: Is There a Question?

1: Kant

2: Kaufman and Hick

Part II: What is the Question?

3: Justification and the Classical Picture

4: Rationality

5: Warrant and the Freud-And-Marx Complaint

Part III: Warranted Christian Belief

6: Warranted Belief in God

7: Sin and Its Cognitive Consequences

8: The Extended Aquinas/Calvin Model: Revealed to Our Minds

9: The Testimonial Model: Sealed Upon Our Hearts

10: Objections

Part IV: Defeaters?

11: Defeaters and Defeat

12: Two (or More) Kinds of Scripture Scholarship

13: Postmodernism and Pluralism

14: Suffering and Evil

Index
3 .

Warrant: The Current Debate
by Alvin T. Plantinga. 228 pgs.

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Title Page

Preface

Contents

1: Justification, Internalism, and Deontology

2: Classical Chisholmian Internalism

3: Post-Classical Chisholmian Internalism

4: Coherentism

5: Bonjourian Coherentism

6: Bayesian Coherentism and Warrant

7: Bayesian Coherentism and Rationality

8: Pollockian Quasi-Internalism

9: Reliabilism

10: Prospect and Retrospect

Appendix

Index
4 .

Meaning and Truth: Essential Readings in Modern Semantics (Includes "Actualism and Possible Worlds" by Alvin Plantinga)
by Jay L. Garfield, Murray Kiteley. 638 pgs.

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Paragon Issues in Philosophy

Contents

Acknowledgments

Preface

General Introduction

Part One: The Beginnings

Introduction

Of Names and Propositions

On Sense and Nominatum

The Semantic Conception of Truth and the Foundations of Semantics

On Denoting

Part Two: On Descriptions

Introduction

On Referring

Mr. Strawson on Referring

Meaning and Necessity

Reference and Definite Descriptions

Speaker's Reference and Semantic Reference

Presupposition and Two-Dimensional Logic

Dthat

On the Logic of Demonstratives

Part Three: On Tarski

Introduction

Donald Davidson Truth and Meaning

Tarski's Theory of Truth

Physicalism and Primitive Denotation: Field on Tarski

Part Four: Intensionality

Introduction

Quantifiers and Propositional Attitudes

On Saying That

An Overview of Montague Semantics

Subjectivity's Bailiwick: and the Person of Its Bailiff

Part Five: The Structure of Meaning

Introduction

Two Types of Quantifiers

A Logical Theory of Verb-Phrase Deletion

Structured Meanings

Structural Ambiguity

Part Six: Possible Worlds

Introduction

Propositions

Possible Worlds

Actualism and Possible Worlds

The Trouble with Possible Worlds

Part Seven: Pragmatics

Introduction

On Specificity

Metaphorese

Metaphorical Assertions

The Problem of the Essential Indexical
5 .

Faith after Foundationalism: Plantinga-Rorty-Lindbeck-Berger: Critiques and Alternatives
by D. Z. Phillips. 331 pgs.

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In a brilliant series of essays, the distinguished philosopher D. Z. Phillips explores the alternatives for faith after foundationalism. A significant exploration of post-foundationalist thought in its own right, "Faith After Foundationalism" is also an important evaluation and critique of the theological implications of the views of Alvin Plantinga, Richard Rorty, George Lindbeck, and Peter Berger.

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Faith after Foundationalism: Plantinga-Rorty-Lindbeck-Berger— Critiques and Alternatives

Contents

Acknowledgements

Preface

Part One: Can There Be a Religious Epistemology?

1: Foundationalism and Religion: a Philosophical Scandal

2: The Reformed Challenge to Foundationalism

3: Preliminary Criticism of the Reformed Challenge

4: Basic Propositions: Reformed Epistemology and Wittgenstein's on Certainty

5: Epistemology and Justification by Faith

6: Religion and Epistemology

7: A Reformed Epistemology?

8: Religious and Non-Religious Perspectives

9: Philosophy, Description and Religion

Part Two: Manners without Grammar

10: The Hermeneutic Option

11: Optional Descriptions?

12: The Hidden Values of Hermeneutics

13: The Sociologising of Values

14: Religion in the Marketplace

Part Three: Grammar and Theology

15: Grammar and the Nature of Doctrine

16: Grammar and Doctrinal Disagreement

17: Grammar without Foundations

18: Grammarians and Guardians

Part Four: Religion and Concept-Formation

19: Epistemological Mysteries

20: A Place for Mystery

21: Morality, Grace and Concept-Formation

22: Religious Concepts: Misunderstanding and Lack of Understanding

Bibliography

Index

About the Book and Author
6 .

The Worlds of Possibility: Modal Realism and the Semantics of Modal Logic
by Charles S. Chihara. 350 pgs.

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Charles Chihara gives a thorough critical exposition of modal realism, the philosophical doctrine that there exist many possible worlds of which the actual world--the universe in which we live--is just one. The striking success of possible-worlds semantics in modal logic has made this ontological doctrine attractive. Modal realists maintain that philosophers must accept the existence of possible worlds if they wish to have the benefit of using possible-worlds semantics to assess modal arguments and explain modal principles. Chihara challenges this claim, and argues instead for modality without worlds; he offers a new account of the role of interpretations or structures of the formal languages of logic.

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Title Page

Preface

Contents

Notational Conventions

Intoduction

1 Possible Worlds Semantics

2 Transworld Identity

3 Modal Realism

4 Anti-Modal Realism

5: The Semantics of Classical Predicate Logic

6 Modality Without Worlds I The Semantics of Modal Sentential Logic

7 Modality Without Worlds II The Semantics of Modal Quantificational Logic

8 Modality Without Worlds III Explorations, Developments, and Defences

9 Anti-Realism in Mathematics

Bibliography

Index
7 .

Atheism: A Philosophical Justification
by Michael Martin. 546 pgs.

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Contents

Preface

Introduction

Part I Negative Atheism

Chapter 1: The Justification of Negative Atheism: Some Preliminaries

Chapter 2: The Meaningfulness of Religious Language

Chapter 3: The Ontological Argument

Chapter 4: The Cosmological Argument

Chapter 5: The Teleological Argument

Conclusion

Conclusion

Conclusion

General Conclusion

Chapter 6: The Argument from Religious Experience

Chapter 7: The Argument from Miracles

Chapter 8 Some Minor Evidential Arguments for God

Chapter 9 Beneficial Arguments for God

Chapter 10: Faith and Foundationalism

Part II Positive Atheism

Chapter 11 the Justification of Positive Atheism: Some Preliminaries

Chapter 12: Divine Attributes and Incoherence

Chapter 13: Atheistic Teleological Arguments

Chapter 14: The Argument from Evil

Chapter 15: The Free Will Defense

Chapter 16: Natural Evil

Chapter 17 Soul Making Theodicy

Chapter 18: Some Minor Theodicies

Conclusion

Appendix

Conclusion

Notes and Index

Index
8 .

Essays in the Metaphysics of Modality
by Alvin Plantinga, Matthew Davidson. 239 pgs.

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Perhaps no one has done more in the last 30 years to advance thinking in the metaphysics of modality than has Alvin Plantinga. Collected here are some of his most important essays on this influential subject. Dating back from the late 1960's to the present, they chronicle the development of Plantinga's thoughts about some of the most fundamental issues in metaphysics: what is the nature of abstract objects like possible worlds, properties, propositions, and such phenomena? Are there possible but non-actual objects? Can objects that do not exist exemplify properties? Plantinga gives thorough and penetrating answers to all of these questions and many others. This volume contains some of the best work in metaphysics from the past 30 years, and will remain a source of critical contention and keen interest among philosophers of metaphysics and philosophical logic for years to come.

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Title Page

Acknowledgments

Contents

Essays in the Metaphysics of Modality

Introduction

Notes

References

1: De Re Et De Dicto

Notes

2: World and Essence

Notes

3: Transworld Identity or Worldbound Individuals?

Notes

4: Possible but Unactual Objects: on What There Isn't

Notes

5: Actualism and Possible Worlds

Notes

References

6: The Boethian Compromise

Notes

7: De Essentia

Notes

8: On Existentialism

Notes

9: Replies to My Colleagues

Notes

10: Modal Realism and Modal Reductionism

Notes

References

11: Why Propositions Cannot Be Concrete

Notes

Index

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