# Plantinga and open-theism



## rembrandt

Does anyone know about Plantinga (the one at Notre Dame) and open-theism? The reason why I am asking is because Tom Crisp, who is supposedly one of the top ten evangelical philophers in America, studied under him at Notre Dame. And Tom Crisp, who goes to my church, supposedly is leaning heavily toward open-theism. If I major in Philosophy (not sure yet) I will probably study under him at Florida State. A little weary though.

Anyone know about Plantinga's views of open-theism?

Rembrandt


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## Craig

Good question.

Just a bit of FYI from what I have found out.

John Sanders (one of the major thinkers for Open Theism) likes Plantinga A LOT. My roommate in college...who basically is a disciple of Sanders agrees and says Plantinga is the most brilliant Christian philosopher of our time.

His brother, Alvin Plantinga is a Social Trinitarian.

These items make me very wary of him...but I don't know what his actual position is. He dubbed &quot;Reformed Epistemology&quot;...which I frankly am a bit rusty on. It seems to be pressuppositional (which I like); but also pomo...which open theists thrive on.


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## rembrandt

thanks. I never knew what Social Trinitarianism was until I just did a search for it. It seems quite interesting- although I assume most everybody would go with the relative identity strategy. Hmmm... I might do a post on this to see peoples thoughts. 

Rembrandt


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## Coram_Deo

One of my professors here at college did his disertation on Plantinga and from what I hear he is more of a determinist. But for those who are interested in Open Theism this might be of interest. Greg Boyd one of the leading open theists is working on a new idea that will turn Aristotle on his head. He is venturing to show that Aristotle's idea of logic and how indeterminancy is illogical is inncorrect by taking Aristotle's square of logic and turning it into a hexagon in which Logical Inderminancy comes about. This will be some ground made for OVists because it will give them a base to argue from instead of defending arguments thrown at them. 
Blessings,
Michael


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## cupotea

Professor David Reiter, my philosophy teacher here at Grand Canyon University, is a huge fan of Alvin Plantinga, though he disagrees with many of his theological views. Reiter is a strict Calvinist in the tradition of John Frame and Van Till. He has met Plantinga one-on-one and says that Plantinga believed that the councils of Doecht went too far. He also believes in some form of libertarian freedom, from what I was able to gather.

Though not a Calvinist, Reiter says that Plantinga does come from a Reformed background. Is that possible?

One thing I've read from Plantinga:
&quot;A self-refutation of naturalism&quot; - A brilliant argument against atheistic naturalism. He shows, following Lewis' argument from reason, that an atheistic naturalist has no reason to trust his cognitive faculties, given the fact that our faculties (given naturalism) exist solely for self-preservation and not for examining or ascertaining truth. Given atheism, why trust our senses at all? Why not believe that our body is seeking our food, while in our mind we are living in a dream-world that makes us feel like everything is happy and hunky-dory?

My thoughts on Plantinga: Good philosopher, mediocre theologian.


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## RickyReformed

How many Plantingas are there? I have some mp3's (3 to be exact) of messages given at RTS (don't know which RTS) where Alvin Plantinga from Notre Dame was introduced by Ron Nash and in which he gives some lectures on Reformed Epistemology. In the lectures, he says his background is from the CRC. These mp3 messages used to be available at www.wordmp3.com (which I do not endorse since they also sell Auburn Avenue lectures and James Jordan on paedocommunion, i.e. be discerning)

Berith.org has book titled &quot;Paradox and Truth: Rethinking Van Til on the Trinity
by Comparing Van Til, Plantinga, and Kuyper&quot;
by Rev. Ralph Allan Smith, in which the author interacts with Cornelius Plantinga's view on the Trinity. He is the one that is the social trinitarian. The focus of the book deals with developing an apologetic based on the Trinity.

Also, is this the same David Reiter that won the (Gordon H.) Clark Prize? If so, he refutes Alvin Plantinga's free-will defense of the problem of evil according to John Robbins.


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## cupotea

Alright, Ricky. I had to do a little homework, but I just found out that my professor, Dr. David Reiter, did in fact win the Clark prize! This must be the same man you're talking about. What do you know about him? Also, what did John Robbins actually say about Reiter?


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## RickyReformed

He spoke very highly of him in the article (not much detail, though) but you can read it for yourself at

http://www.trinityfoundation.org/reviews/journal.asp?ID=062a.html

or you can search the Trinity Foundation archive for the article titled &quot;Reiter Wins Clark Prize&quot;.


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## cupotea

I talked to Reiter about the article, as well as showing it to him. He just laughed, because it was so long ago. He wrote the paper on examining the problem of evil. However, Reiter does not remember addressing Plantinga in the paper. Robbins may have simply seen that Reiter's refutation of Libertarianism applied very effectively to Plantinga.

I'm going to see if I can get a copy of Reiter's paper, and if he will give me permission, perhaps I will get it posted sometime, if anyone would be interested...


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## johnny_redeemed

> _Originally posted by JesusFan_
> Alright, Ricky. I had to do a little homework, but I just found out that my professor, Dr. David Reiter, did in fact win the Clark prize! This must be the same man you're talking about. What do you know about him? Also, what did John Robbins actually say about Reiter?


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## Davidius

Wikipedia says that Plantinga is a Calvinist. Did I miss something?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvin_Plantinga


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## No Longer A Libertine

Stay away from Roger Olson or actually study him if you want to rip Open Theism a new one with the greatest of ease, then confront this Planta and Crisp fella', might as well take a class from a heretic to challenge him before his unsuspecting prey.


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## polemic_turtle

Dr. Plantinga has some liberal / moderate views with which I'm uncomfortable with, except at a distance. His daughter is a PCUSA pastor, I believe, and he doesn't like Edwards on the "Freedom of the Will"( Marsden says he prefers something that allows for a bit more freedom ). Given the latter, he's clearly liberal.. I mean.. who could disagree with Edwards? Has anyone read Edwards? If so, what do you think it could have been? I mean, everybody says it's _the_ thing to read and he says he disagrees?

Seriously, though, I have enjoyed listening to him as a man who is a philosopher. This might help: "Cornelius Van Til and Alvin Plantinga: A Brief Comparison".


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