Naturalism Under Pressure
Is philosophical naturalism coherent on its own terms?
Why it matters
Naturalism (the thesis that only the natural world exists) is the default worldview of much modern academia. But it faces serious internal tensions around the reliability of reason itself ('s EAAN), the existence of consciousness, the applicability of mathematics, and the existence of objective moral facts. A robust worldview evaluation examines whether naturalism can fund the goods it assumes.
The main case
's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism (EAAN) runs: evolution selects for survival, not truth. If naturalism is true and our faculties evolved, the probability that our faculties are truth-tracking is low or inscrutable. But if our faculties are not truth-tracking, we cannot trust them — including the belief that naturalism is true. Naturalism thus undermines the rational grounds for believing naturalism. Additionally: consciousness resists reduction (the "hard problem"); mathematics' uncanny applicability to physical reality is unexplained; objective moral values hang in causal vacuum. Each is a live tension.
Claim · Evidence · Objection · Response
1.The EAAN makes naturalism self-undermining.
DebatedEvidence
- Evolution selects for adaptive behavior, not true belief per se.
- Belief content is causally inert in most physicalist theories of mind.
- If the link between belief content and adaptive behavior is contingent, truth is not selected for.
Strongest objection
"Truth-tracking faculties are adaptively useful in many domains."
Response
Useful in some domains (immediate predator-spotting) but not obviously across abstract domains like metaphysics. The argument does not require proving our faculties are unreliable — only that from naturalism, we cannot be confident they are reliable.
- Warranted Christian Belief — Alvin Plantinga (2000)scholarlyFind on Amazon
- Where the Conflict Really Lies — Alvin Plantinga (2011)scholarlyFind on Amazon
2.Consciousness is a serious liability for naturalism.
DebatedEvidence
- The "hard problem" (Chalmers): why is there any subjective experience at all?
- Physicalist reductions consistently leave out the qualitative feel of experience.
- On theism, consciousness is expected (God is consciousness); on naturalism, it is an anomaly.
Strongest objection
"Consciousness will be explained by future neuroscience."
Response
The hard problem is a conceptual, not empirical, gap. More data about brains does not address why physical processes are accompanied by any inner experience at all.
- Scaling the Secular City — J.P. Moreland (1987)scholarlyFind on Amazon
- Warranted Christian Belief — Alvin Plantinga (2000)scholarlyFind on Amazon
What scholars debate
's EAAN is among the most debated contemporary arguments. Critics (Fitelson, Sober) have challenged probabilistic details; defenders have strengthened the argument. The hard problem of consciousness has no consensus reductive solution.
Reflection
- 1.Can our faculties be trusted if they are purely adaptive?
- 2.What would it take for consciousness to be fully explained by brain states?
- 3.Does naturalism make the world we actually experience more or less intelligible?
Key sources
- Warranted Christian Belief — Alvin Plantinga (2000)scholarlyFind on Amazon
- Where the Conflict Really Lies — Alvin Plantinga (2011)scholarlyFind on Amazon
- Scaling the Secular City — J.P. Moreland (1987)scholarlyFind on Amazon
Featured thinkers
A founding figure of the revival of Christian philosophy in the 20th century, known for Reformed Epistemology, the Free Will Defense, and the Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism.
Analytic philosopher who has written on consciousness, substance dualism, naturalism, and Christian epistemology.
Mathematician and philosopher of science who has publicly engaged leading atheists on science, God, and reason.
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