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9 - Plantinga

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 November 2018

Graham Oppy
Affiliation:
Monash University, Victoria
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Summary

This chapter considers what is arguably the best-known recent defence of an ontological argument: Alvin Plantinga’s ‘victorious’ modal ontological argument. I begin by reviewing Plantinga’s assessment of previous ontological arguments. These arguments then provide inspiration for Plantinga’s argument, which avoids certain pitfalls of the previous ones. However, as I explain, there is still the problem of reverse arguments: the problem is that there is no better reason for a neutral agnostic to accept the premises of Plantinga’s argument than to accept the premises in a parallel argument for atheism. I consider whether one could still defend Plantinga’s argument by providing a sub-argument to support Plantinga’s crucial premise that a maximally great being is possible. I try out an argument based on ‘modal continuity’ with respect to degrees of value. I make use of recent work in modal epistemology to supply a defeasible, value-uniformity principle, whereby all degrees of value alike are possible. This principle, if true, supplies some reason to think that maximal value – which arguably entails maximal greatness – is possible. I consider various objections, including parody arguments, as a way to test his argument. Finally, I provide some empirical conditions for determining whether Plantinga’s newly reinforced argument may, or may not, count as ‘successful’.
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Ontological Arguments , pp. 176 - 194
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2018

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  • Plantinga
  • Edited by Graham Oppy, Monash University, Victoria
  • Book: Ontological Arguments
  • Online publication: 01 November 2018
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316402443.010
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  • Plantinga
  • Edited by Graham Oppy, Monash University, Victoria
  • Book: Ontological Arguments
  • Online publication: 01 November 2018
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316402443.010
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Plantinga
  • Edited by Graham Oppy, Monash University, Victoria
  • Book: Ontological Arguments
  • Online publication: 01 November 2018
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781316402443.010
Available formats
×