I am a Christian professor in philosophy and apologetics, with special interests in ethics, knowledge, and seeing the body of Christ live in the fullness of the Spirit and truth.
“Craig’s Nominalism, the Incarnation, and Lowe’s Four-Category Ontology” in E.J. Lowe’s Metaphysics and Philosophical Theology (Routledge Studies in the Philosophy of Religion)
and
“The Fact-Value Split, Nominalism, and Moral Knowledge” in Moral Arguments for God’s Existence: Navigating the Terrain
I just did an interview with Dr. Stan Wallace, the president of Global Scholar, on this topic. We explore several related topics, too.
Check it out here:
Biola University now has a central website for the books by its philosophy & theology authors, including many of my own works. It is Shopeaglebooks. Enjoy!
Here’s a brief overview of why I think one’s self-conceptualization (i.e., one’s “true self”) will not preserve one’s dignity.
From Roman & Littlefield, the publisher’s website:
Constructivism dominates over other theories of knowledge in much of western academia, especially the humanities and social sciences. In Exposing the Roots of Constructivism: Nominalism and the Ontology of Knowledge, R. Scott Smith argues that constructivism is linked to the embrace of nominalism, the theory that everything is particular and located in space and time. Indeed, nominalism is sufficient for a view to be constructivist.
However, the natural sciences still enjoy great prestige from the “fact-value split.” They are often perceived as giving us knowledge of the facts of reality, and not merely our constructs. In contrast, ethics and religion, which also have been greatly influenced by nominalism, usually are perceived as giving us just our constructs and opinions.
Yet, even the natural sciences have embraced nominalism, and Smith shows that this will undermine knowledge in those disciplines as well. Indeed, the author demonstrates that, at best, nominalism leaves us with only interpretations, but at worst, it undermines all knowledge whatsoever. However, there are many clear examples of knowledge we do have in the many different disciplines, and therefore those must be due to a different ontology of properties. Thus, nominalism should be rejected. In its place, the author defends a kind of Platonic realism about properties.
I had an interview with Dennis Metzler in 2022 on the foundations of ethics.
My new essay just came out in Christian Research Journal (Dec 2021). Here is a synposis:
Critical theory (CT) has become a major influence in society. It maintains that oppressed groups should be liberated from their oppressors. CT manifests itself in many ways, including critical race theory and feminist theory. That is, CT provides justification for women to be liberated from their patriarchal domination, and a crucial way that can be achieved is through the permissibility of abortion. Yet, on the contrary, I argue that abortion should be construed as immoral based on CT’s own internal logic. By determining the value of their unborn by their conceptualizations, women arbitrarily exercise power over and oppress their unborn.
Some counter that actually the unborn is an oppressor, restricting the woman’s freedom to make her own choices, as well as to define her own sense of identity via her self-conception. Another objection is that while the unborn are humans, they are not persons, for in order to count as persons, humans also have to have certain functional qualities, such as a self-concept. However, for CT, there is no equality on the basis of self-concepts. According to CT, there are no essences, and thus the claim that we are valuable because we have self-concepts is nothing but an interpretation given from a particular standpoint, which results in an arbitrary imposition of power. It is a much greater oppression for the woman to have the unborn put to death than for her to remain pregnant. Thus, taking CT consistently, the unborn need to be liberated from their oppression by abortion….
See that issue, pages 16-21.
I noticed from announcement by Reasonable Faith that RF has posted a link to the panel discussion held at the 2020 Evangelical Philosophical Society national conference.
Here is that link if you’d like to watch.
And, since then, my article about this topic came out in Theologica.
As is the case for all of us, COVID has impacted me as well. Part of it included a much heavier teaching load in the fall of ’20 and spring of ’21. Often I was scrambling just to keep up with online classes and students’ many posts!
Also, in many writing projects, I feel I have been “on hold,” waiting for publishers to reply to me or to release some work that I did some time ago. I have three book projects in the works, one on nominalism, another on critical race theory (an ethical, philosophical assessment), and how the church has been deeply affected by naturalism (and what to do about it).
I want to catch you up on some developments. Two essays have been published in the first half of 2021.
In January, my essay on nominalism and human dignity appeared:
“The Nominalist Foundations of Constructivist Dignity.” In The Inherence of Human Dignity: Foundations of Human Dignity, Vol. 1, ed. by Barry Bussey and Angus Menuge (Anthem Press, 2021).
These two edited volumes explore philosophical, legal, and other factors involved in human dignity discussions today (including the “new dignity”), and not just in the U.S.
Another essay was published this spring, and this one explores the implications of William Lane Craig’s anti-Platonism (or, nominalism) for the penal substitutionary theory of Christ’s atonement:
“Craig’s Anti-Platonism, Lowe’s Universals, and Christ’s Penal Substitutionary Atonement.” TheoLogica: An International Journal for Philosophy of Religion and Philosophical Theology 5(2), 2021. DOI: https://doi.org/10.14428/thl.v5i2.55993
Two more essays, as well as one book proposal, are out for review, so I hope to have some more updates sometime soon.