Thank you especially for reprising Alan Plantinga's thoughts regarding the present matters. Bottom line, it seems to me he hones in on what constitutes "warranted" belief.
"Warranted belief" necessarily finds its basis or criterion in something indetectable to science, which bases its own method in direct observables.
"Warranted belief" does not have so much to do with the phenomena of observation; it has to do with the observer of same — and as you suggest, with the basic cognitive constitution of the observer. Which has moral implications for human culture and society at large.
A "warranted belief" depends for its soundness on its source of truth. And that is the reason Plantinga draws our attention to what I would call "the ultimate axiom," which can only be God Himself.
In the history of mankind, the expressed universal idea is that God exists. If you get rid of that understanding, then other understandings — such as the metaphysical materialist one — can run riot through human societies, with no discernible limit.
But those engaged in such an enterprise can only succeed by deforming the world that human beings actually live in; and by deforming the structure of the human personality itself.
Above all, by erasing human history altogether....
I'd love to go on here, but am facing family difficulties at the moment.
So please give me a "rain-check?"
Meanwhile, to see how such ideas connect with immediately important trends in contemporary American sociopolitical "reality," please see here.
Thank you so very much for your splendid essay/post. dear Texas Songwriter!
A similar point is being raised over here. Perhaps Plantinga's thoughts and your insights should be mentioned there as well?