Issues with the EAAN

The Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism or EAAN for short is an argument by reformed philosopher and theologian Alvin Plantinga  which purports to show that there is an epistemic inconsistency in affirming both evolutionary theory and naturalism.  Naturalism is the view that the  natural world is all there is. As Russell put it, “the universe is just there, and that’s it.” Evolution Is the chief scientific theory underlying Modern Biology which explains the diversity of species by the mechanisms of random mutation and natural selection. Plantinga has on one occasion summarized his argument this way, 

“More specifically, EAAN begins from certain doubts about the reliability of our cognitive faculties, where, roughly, a cognitive faculty—memory, perception, reason—is reliable if the great bulk of its deliverances are true. These doubts are connected with the origin of our cognitive faculties. According to current evolutionary theory, we human beings, like other forms of life, have developed from aboriginal unicellular life by way of the mechanisms of natural selection and genetic drift working on the source of genetic variation… But if naturalism is true, there is no God, and hence no God (or anyone else) overseeing our development and orchestrating the course of our evolution. And this leads directly to the question whether it is at all likely that our cognitive faculties, given naturalism and given their evolutionary design, would have developed in such a way as to be reliable, to furnish us with mostly true beliefs.” (Naturalism Defeated?, p. 2, 3) 

In other words, more concisely, one may say that if there is a God who created Man, providentially through evolutionary mechanisms then we have reason to regard our cognitive faculties as generally reliable tools in discerning truth—but in the absence of theism, we have every reason to be suspicious of the reliability of such faculties. 

My general thoughts upon the argument are that it is implausible to regard false beliefs as evolutionarily advantageous. It is difficult to give an example of false beliefs that would increase the survivability of an organism. Conversely, knowing the world as it really exists and reacting to it accordingly is a good way to stay alive. True beliefs tend to be more adaptable than false beliefs. Plantinga elsewhere responds to such concerns by saying “Yes, certainly. This is indeed true. But it is also irrelevant.” But this seems to be entirely relevant. If true beliefs tend to be adaptive, then evolution would indeed favor cognitive faculties that tend to be reliable for truth seeking. The blind design of natural selection would favor reliable cognitive faculties in mammals and other higher animals. Whether or not there is a God, one can have provisional confidence that evolution has produced a fine set of cognitive faculties in homo sapiens. Fodor pressed this argument with quite formidable ancillary arguments in his essay “Is Science Biologically Possible?” Indeed, I can see no force in the EAAN whatsoever.