(born January 21 , 1932 in Bigelow, Minnesota ) is Noah Porter Professor Emeritus of Philosophical Theology, and Fellow of Berkeley College, at Yale University. A prolific writer with wide-ranging philosophical and theological interests, he has written books on Metaphysics , Aesthetics , Political Philosophy , Epistemology and Theology , and Philosophy Of Religion . Together with other philosophers -- ( Alvin Plantinga , William Alston , and Richard Mouw ) -- Wolterstorff was involved in setting up the journal Faith and Philosophy and the Society of Christian Philosophers .
- Degrees
- --- Calvin College , Grand Rapids , Michigan ( BA ) in philosophy 1953 .
- --- Harvard University , ( PhD ) in philosophy 1956
- University Positions
- --- Professor of Philosophy, Calvin College ( 1959 - 1989 ).
- --- Noah Porter Professor of Philosophical Theology , Yale University ( 1989-2001 ), and, concurrently, Adjunct Professor in the Philosophy Department and the Religious Studies Department.
- Visiting Professorships
- --- Harvard University , Princeton University , Yale University , Oxford University and the Free University of Amsterdam ( Vrije Universiteit ).
- President of the American Philosophical Association (Central Division)
- President of the Society of Christian Philosophers
While an undergraduate, Wolterstorff was greatly influenced by Calvin College professors , another alumnus of Calvin College).
Wolterstorff builds upon the ideas of the Scottish common sense philosopher Thomas Reid , who approached knowledge "from the bottom-up". Instead of reasoning about Transcendental conditions of knowledge, Wolterstorff suggests that knowledge and our knowing faculties are not the subject of our research, but have to be seen as its starting point. Wolterstorff rejects classical Foundationalism , and instead sees knowledge as based upon insights in reality which are direct and indubitable. As there is no foundation of certainties, one is left with the question on how to interpret reality, what leads into the domain of Hermeneutics .
- ''On Universals. A study in ontology'' (Chicago Univ. of Chicago Press, 1970).
- ''Reason within the bounds of religion'' (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1976, 1984). ISBN 0802816045
- ''Educating for responsible action'' (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980).
- ''Art in Action'' (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1980). ISBN 0802818161.
- ''Worlds and works of art'' (Oxford: Clarendon Series of Oxford Univ. Press, 1980). ISBN 0198244193
- ''Faith and rationality. Reason and belief in God'' with Alvin Plantinga (Notre Dame: Univ. of Norte Dame Press, 1983). ISBN 0268009651
- ''Rationality in the calvinian tradition'' with H. Hart & J. van der Hoeven (Lanham: Univ. of America Press, 1983)
- ''Until justice and peace embrace'' (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983).
- ''Lament for a son'' (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1987). ISBN 080280294X
- ''Divine discourse. Philosophical reflections on the claim that God speaks'' (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1995) ISBN 0521475570
- ''John Locke and the ethics of belief'' (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1996). ISBN 052155909X
- ''Religion in the Public Square'' R. Audi (Rowman and Littlefield, 1997)
- ''Thomas Reid and the Story of Epistemology'' (Cambridge, 2001). ISBN 0521539307
- ''Educating for Shalom'' (Eerdmans, 2004)
- Sloane, Andrew, ''On Being A Christian in the Academy: Nicholas Wolterstorff and the Practice of Christian Scholarship'', Paternoster, Carlisle UK, 2003.
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