rationality of religious belief introduction to philosophy jason m. chang
TRANSCRIPT
Rationality of Religious Belief
Introduction to PhilosophyJason M. Chang
Lecture Outline
1. Background
2. Antony Flew’s position
3. R.M. Hare’s position
4. Basil Mitchell’s position
BackgroundThe issue
• Two ways of thinking about issue
o Religious beliefso Religious persons
• Definition of rational belief
Background
Why the issue is important
• Importance of being rational
o Public importance
o Private importance
Are religious persons rational?
Background
The debate (1948)
Participants
o Antony Flew
o R.M. Hare
o Basil Mitchell
Antony Flew’s position
The position
• Religious beliefs are irrational
Antony Flew (1923-2010)
Antony Flew’s position
Invisible gardener story
• Features of the Believer Explorer
o Maker of qualifications
Antony Flew’s position
Idea of a qualification
• Definition
• Too many qualifications
“Some gardener tends the plot, but _____________ .”• He is invisible• He is scentless• He is invulnerable to
electric shock• He is eternally elusive
Qualifications of the original
claim
Antony Flew’s position
Flew on the religious believer
• Guilty of too many qualifications
“God loves us as His children”• People of dying from
cancer• Holocaust• Famine, plague,
earthquakes
• “God’s love is not human love”
• “God works in mysterious ways”
• “We are in no position to judge”
“but _____________ .”
Antony Flew’s position
Flew on the religious believer
• Religious beliefs are unfalsifiable
o Definition
o About unfalsifiable beliefs
“God loves us as His children”
Counterevidence to the belief
Abandon belief
Make a qualificat
ion
Antony Flew’s position
“What would have to occur or to have occurred to constitute for you [the Believer] a disproof of the love of, or the existence of, God?”
Religious beliefs are irrational because they are unfalsifiable
R.M. Hare’s position
The position
• Religious beliefs are examples of “bliks”
• All people (religious or nonreligious) have “bliks”
R.M. Hare (1919-2002)
R.M. Hare’s position
What is a “blik”?
o Fundamental belief
o Unquestioned belief (most of the time)
o Existentially significant
o Not easily abandoned
o Not empirically falsifiable
CATEGORIES BELIEF “God has a plan for me”
Fundamental belief
Unquestioned
Existentially significant
Not easily abandoned
Not empirically falsifiable
Yes – fundamental to who I am and how I understand events in the
worldMost of the time (occasionally I may question)
Yes – it gives me confidence, helps me act, gives my life meaning
Yes – I cannot imagine abandoning this belief
Yes – even if bad things happen to me, they do not falsify my belief
R.M. Hare’s position
R.M. Hare’s position
Does an atheist scientist like Richard Dawkins have “bliks”?
Richard Dawkins (1941 - )
R.M. Hare’s position
“Bliks” held by scientists (including Dawkins?)
o “Everything (at least all events on earth) can be explained in terms of natural, scientific laws”
o “Our senses are reliable sources of knowledge”
R.M. Hare’s position
“Bliks” held by most parents
• “My child is a good person”
R.M. Hare’s position
Hare’s point
• Flew’s mistake
• Hare’s claim against Flew
R.M. Hare’s position
“Having abandoned some of the more picturesque fringes of religion, they think [nonbelievers] they have abandoned the whole thing – whereas in fact they still have got, and could not live without, a religion of a comfortably substantial, albeit highly sophisticated kind, which differs from that of many ‘religious people’ in a little more than this, that “religious people” like to sing Psalms about theirs.”
Basil Mitchell’s position
The position
• Compromise between Flew and Hare
Basil Mitchell (1917-2011)
Basil Mitchell’s Position
The stranger story
• The Believer Resister
• Maintains belief against counterevidence
Is the Mitchell’s Resister irrational like Flew’s Explorer?
Basil Mitchell’s Position
Much depends on how the Resister responds to counterevidence to his beliefs.
Basil Mitchell’s position
Counterevidence – sometimes sees the
Stranger aiding the enemy
(1) Abandons original belief
(3) Maintain original belief – while dismissing
the counterevidence
as having no consequence
(2) Maintain the original belief –
while experiencing the force of the counterevidenceTestable
hypothesis Genuine faith Empty, blind, irrational belief
Basil Mitchell’s position
(1) Abandons original belief Testable
hypothesis
(2) Maintain the original belief – while
experiencing the force of the
counterevidence
Article of significant faith
(3) Maintain original belief – while dismissing the
counterevidence as having no
consequence
Meaningless, blind, irrational
belief
Basil Mitchell’s position
Mitchell’s conclusions
• Definition of irrational person
• The religious believer