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Himma on the Free-Will Argument: a critical response

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 December 2012

ANDERS KRAAL
ANDERS KRAAL*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, University of British Columbia, 1866 Main Mall, E370 Vancouver, B. C. V62 1Z1, Canada e-mail: anders.kraal@ubc.ca
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Abstract

In two recent articles in this journal Kenneth Himma has launched an attack on what he describes as the ‘two versions’ of the Free-Will Argument, the first of which he describes as ‘the standard’ version and the second of which he identifies with Plantinga's Free-Will Defence in God, Freedom, and Evil (1974). In this article I argue for three main claims: (i) that Himma's objections against ‘the standard’ Free-Will Argument are directed at a straw man; (ii) that Himma's critique of Plantinga's Free-Will Defence is based on a misunderstanding; and (iii) that Himma's critique nevertheless is relevant to Plantinga's relatively neglected ‘Quantitative Free-Will Defence’ (also found in Plantinga's God, Freedom, and Evil), but fails to undermine this further defence due to its reliance on the unjustified assumption that the afterlife is irrelevant to the problem of evil.

Type
Articles
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 49 , Issue 4 , December 2013 , pp. 491 - 503
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2012 

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