Uncommon Descent Serving The Intelligent Design Community

William Lane Craig and Alvin Planting rank in Top Ten of world philosophers

Denyse O'Leary
August 15, 2021
Intelligent Design, Philosophy
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William Lane Craig writes to his newsletter mailing list:

William Lane Craig and Alvin Plantinga

Dear Friends of Reasonable Faith,

Ever since I became a Christian as a teenager, I’ve longed to make a difference in the world for Christ, to have an impact for the Kingdom of God. You can imagine, then, how gratified and encouraged—not to say bowled over!—I was to learn that Academic Influence has ranked me as the tenth most influential philosopher in the world over the last three decades (1990-2020)! What is especially significant is that these rankings are not just someone’s subjective opinion but are computed according to an algorithm that takes into account such objective data as number of citations of one’s work. According to Forbes magazine, “Using machine-learning technology, . . . Academic Influence searches open-source data in two massive sources. . . for papers, chapters, books, and citations to individuals worldwide. Collectively, these databases contain billions of continuously updated data points about millions of individuals’ achievements.” I was especially thrilled to be ranked just behind my philosophical role model Alvin Plantinga at number seven.

William Lane Craig, “August” at Monthly Report

Alvin Plantinga is sympathetic to intelligent design. Craig sort of wavers.

Here is the entire Top Ten.

Comments
AnimatedDust News, don’t forget the “A” in PlantingA.
Wrong. Is not PlantingA is Platinum. Lieutenant Commander Data
News, don't forget the "A" in PlantingA. AnimatedDust
Has Dawkins debated anyone since John Lennox cleaned his clock twice? What a bitter old man, clinging against all hope to his dead view of nature and nature's God. AnimatedDust
William Lane Craig is no.1 hands down. Dawkins was scared to debate no.1 for a reason. Lieutenant Commander Data
Not Dawkins and Singer AaronS1978
Daniel Dennett's "universe created itself" theory alone is enough to disqualify him from any list of philosophers. The fact that Dawkins made the list at all is a statement about Academic Influence's methodology. In fact, I think William Lane Craig will be embarrassed to be on the same list. But the idea is "influential" philosophers - not necessarily good ones.
What is especially significant is that these rankings are not just someone’s subjective opinion but are computed according to an algorithm that takes into account such objective data as number of citations of one’s work. According to Forbes magazine, “Using machine-learning technology, . . . Academic Influence searches open-source data in two massive sources. . . for papers, chapters, books, and citations to individuals worldwide. Collectively, these databases contain billions of continuously updated data points about millions of individuals’ achievements.”
Citations are as much a popularity contest as it would have been to simply let anonymous readers of the site to vote on their "favorite philosophers". Silver Asiatic
Dawkins has been an influential evo-illusionist. He has never conducted any science that would further his concept of evolution by means of blind and mindless processes. ET
I think that's reasonable. They can be fairly described as influential, along with the likes of Quine, Daniel Derrida, Peter Singer, Daniel Dennett and Richard Dawkins who also made the list. Seversky
An interesting collection, reflecting current concerns. It is interesting to note that when we refer to these and to people like Dr Schaeffer in Chemistry, we are not pointing to obscure non-entities no one heard of or cares what they think. kairosfocus
That’s actually wonderful to hear given all the bad press Christianity seems to get from the media AaronS1978

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