The Conflict Between Naturalism and Human Reason

Over the seventeen years that VP has been in existence I've frequently written on the inadequacy of the naturalistic worldview, i.e. the view that holds that natural processes and forces are all that exist, that there are no supernatural, immaterial beings.

Throughout the years I've argued that naturalism gives us no basis for believing in many of the things naturalists themselves hold dear. If nature is all there is there are no grounds for believing in human rights and dignity, ultimate meaning and purpose, objective moral truth and obligation, free will, the self, the immaterial mind, and much else.

I've also argued that naturalism lacks the resources to explain human consciousness and the origin of life and has a very difficult time explaining other biological phenomena such as sexual reproduction, insect metamorphosis, animal embryology, irreducible complexity and much else.

In addition, another problem has come under scrutiny on VP, a problem that some philosophers believe is, all by itself, fatal to naturalism. It's a problem raised by C.S. Lewis and given philosophical shape and depth by subsequent thinkers, most notably Alvin Plantinga.

Alvin Plantinga

This is the problem the naturalist encounters when trying to reconcile his beliefs in naturalism, evolution and the reliability of human reason. It seems that the three of these are incompatible with each other in the sense that if one believes in any two of the three he can't logically have confidence in the truth of the third.

Of course, if naturalism is true then theism is false, but theism is compatible with both evolution (though not naturalistic evolution) and the reliability of human reason. Thus, if theism is true the incompatibility problem disappears. It's just another example of why theism does a better job of explaining the world than does naturalism.

Philosopher William Lane Craig provides a brief but helpful discussion of this problem in the following video. For a fuller but more technical treatment of the problem read Alvin Plantinga's book Where the Conflict Really Lies: