Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts with the label J.P. Moreland

Notes on J.P. Moreland's The Recalcitrant Imago Dei

J.P. Moreland argues that certain features that we take to be part of what it means to be human are incompatible with naturalism but are every bit accounted for by Biblical Theism. Naturalistic views usually have three components – a commitment to an empirical epistemology, a historical account (“Grand Story”) reliant upon causal theory and emergenitism, and a constitutive account restricted to an ideal physics explainable with reference to causal theory. Moreland argues that consciousness, free will, rationality, an enduring soul, objective morality and human intrinsic value are all incompatible with naturalism. Moreland concludes by suggesting that the best the naturalist can offer is a dismissive strategy that takes human features for granted without explanation but he is pessimistic about the success of such a strategy. Moreland’s argument appeals to the most common conception of human features without which we would be caused to wonder if there is anything left that counts as...