I’ve seen a sharp increase in the “assailment-by-entailment fallacy” on social media and in popular/semi-popular books as of late regarding the theological boogey-man known as “theistic personalism/mutualism” (TP). We are told, in no uncertain terms, that if one affirms TP then

one also affirms the following (rightly) problematic beliefs: that (a) god is a creature, that (b) the god of TP is compatible with and fits nicely with philosophical naturalism, that (c) the god of TP is just a bigger, better, supped-up version of us, that (d) affirming TP is

“tantamount to atheism”, and that (e) TP is a form of “monopolytheism”, “the belief that there is one God but that he looks a lot like the gods of mythology, possessing human attributes, only in greater measure.”

Since the critic of TP (classical theist) believes that TP entails the problematic beliefs (a)-(c), they proceed to attribute (a)-(c) to proponents of TP. Here’s the move:

1. S believes TP.
2. If TP is true then (a)-(c) are true.
3. So S must believe (a)-(c)

But unless the critic of TP has positive reason for thinking that the proponent of TP believes that TP entails (a)-(c), then the inference is straightforwardly unwarranted. And doesn’t the mere fact that a proponent of TP professes to be a *Christian* theologian or philosopher

serve as positive evidence that they don’t believe the problematic entailment holds (what Christian would affirm a view they believe entails that God a creature)?. Not only is the move unjustified, it is a failure of intellectual charity.

By the way, I’m a classical theist; we can and must to better.

[Thanks to Robert Garcia and Nathan King for drawing my attention to the assailment-by-entailment fallacy in their excellent article “Toward Intellectually Virtuous Discourse".