Transcript Reformed Epistemology and Belief in God

Reformed Epistemology
and Belief in God
• Reformed Epistemology is a school of
Epistemology rooted in the Reformed
(Calvinist) tradition of Protestantism.
• Epistemology: The branch of
Philosophy concerned with the nature
and origin of knowledge
• The philosopher who has really
pioneered Reformed Epistemology is
Alvin Plantinga.
• Reformed Epistemology takes as its
point of departure a critique of Classical
Foundationalism
• Classical Foundationalism
– There is a set of beliefs that are
properly basic (foundational), i.e. a
set of beliefs that are properly NOT
believed on the basis of other beliefs.
– Belief in non-basic beliefs is
proportional to the degree of support
they receive from the properly basic
beliefs.
– In order for a belief to be properly
basic, it must be:
• Self-evident (e.g. 2+2=4)
• Incorrigible (Undeniable, e.g. “I
exist.”)
• Evident to the Senses (e.g. “I am in
pain.”)
• Reformed Epistemology rejects the last
of Classical Foundationalism’s claims.
• Reformed Epistemology maintains that
Classical Foundationalism’s criteria for
properly basic beliefs are too narrow.
• Reformed Epistemology maintains
that beliefs can be properly basic
without their being self-evident,
incorrigible, or evident to the
senses.
– People clearly accept ordinary
perceptual beliefs, e.g. ‘I see a
tree’ as properly basic, even
though they are neither selfevident, incorrigible, nor evident to
the senses.
– “Upon having an experience of a
certain sort, I believe I am perceiving
a tree . . . . [M]y being appeared to
[treely causes me to form this belief
and] confers on me the right to hold
the belief . . . . We could say, if we
wish, that this experience is what
justifies me in holding it; this is the
ground of my justification, and, by
extension, the ground of the belief
itself.”
Alvin Plantinga, “Reason and Belief in God”
– A person does not form the belief ‘I
see a tree’ on the basis of other
beliefs he has.
– Nor does a person experience the
tree and then infer from the
experience ‘I see a tree.’
– The person simply has the
experience and that experience
immediately causes him to form the
belief ‘I see a tree.’
– Plantinga gives exactly similar
arguments for how memory beliefs
and beliefs about the mental states of
other persons are both formed and
justified.
– Having the requisite experience is a
necessary, but not a sufficient,
condition for being justified in holding
the belief the experience causes as
properly basic.
– Regarding the belief ‘I see a rose-colored
wall before me’ Plantinga comments:
• “If I . . . know I am wearing rose-colored
glasses, or that I am suffering from a
disease that causes me to be thus
appeared to, no matter what the color of
the nearby objects, then I am not
justified in taking [‘I see a rose colored
wall before me] as [properly] basic.”
Alvin Plantinga, “Reason and Belief in God”
– Nevertheless, ceteris paribus, a perceptual
experience is enough to justify, as well as
cause, a perceptual belief.
• Reformed Epistemology and Belief in God
as Properly Basic
– Following John Calvin, Plantinga
maintains that certain experiences cause
humans to form beliefs about God
• Calvin maintains that “God reveals and
daily discloses Himself in the whole
workmanship of the universe.” God’s
divine art “reveals itself in the
innumerable and yet distinct and well
ordered variety of the Heavenly Host”
(John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian
Religion)
• Calvin is NOT claiming that
humans experience order in the
universe and then infer, a lá the
Teleological Argument, that God
exists.
• Rather, Calvin is claiming that the
experience of order in the universe
causes humans to form such
beliefs as ‘This flower was created
by God’ or ‘This vast and intricate
universe was created by God.’
• These beliefs are not inferred from
the experiences; rather, the
experiences cause humans
immediately to form these beliefs.
• In other words, these experiences
cause humans to form beliefs about
God in exactly the same way that
other experiences cause humans to
form perceptual beliefs, e.g. ‘I see a
tree,’ memory beliefs, and beliefs
about the mental states of other
persons.
– The experiences that cause
humans to form perceptual beliefs,
memory beliefs, and beliefs about
the mental states of other persons,
ceteris paribus, also justify those
beliefs as properly basic.
– Given all of the above, “God belief
causing” experiences, ceteris
paribus, should justify the “God
beliefs” as properly basic.
– “According to Calvin, everyone,
whether in faith or not, has a tendency
or nisus [urge], in certain situations, to
apprehend God’s . . . actions. This
natural knowledge can be and is
suppressed by sin, but the fact
remains that a capacity to apprehend
God’s [presence] is as much part of
our natural noetic equipment as is the
capacity to apprehend perceptual
truths, truths about the past and truths
about other minds.
– “Belief in the [presence] of God is in
the same boat as belief in other
minds, the past, and perceptual
objects; in each case God has so
constructed us that, in the right
circumstances, we form the beliefs in
question.”
Alvin Plantinga, “Reason and Belief in God”
– The “God beliefs” that are properly
basic are beliefs such as ‘God has
created all of this’ and ‘God is to be
thanked and praised.’
– The belief ‘God exists’ is not properly
basic.
• “[I]t is not . . . accurate to say that it is
belief in God that is properly basic . . . .
[W]hat are properly basic are such
propositions as [‘God created all of this’
and ‘God is to be thanked and praised’],
each of which self-evidently entails that
God exists. It is not the relatively highlevel and general proposition that God
exists that is properly basic, but instead
propositions detailing some of God’s . . .
actions . . . .”
Alvin Plantinga, “Reason and Belief in God”
• Further Thoughts on Reformed Epistemology
– Reformed Epistemology is really just a
sophisticate, philosophical version of some
very old religious intuitions about God’s
presence in the world.
• “This is my Father’s world, / the birds
their carols raise, / the morning light, the
lily white, / declare their maker’s praise. /
This is my Father’s world: / He shines in
all that’s fair; in the rustling grass I hear
him pass; / he speaks to me
everywhere.”
Stanza No. 2 of the Hymn “This is My Father’s
World”
• “The heavens declare the glory of
God, and the firmament
proclaims his handiwork. Day
pours out the word to day, and
night to night imparts knowledge,
not a word nor a discourse
whose voice is not heard.
Through all the earth their voice
resounds and to the ends of the
world, their message.”
Psalm 19:2-5b
– Reformed Epistemology is consonant
with certain strains of contemporary
Catholic thought.
• Contemporary Catholic theologian
George Weigel has noted that:
– “What the Catechism [of the
Catholic Church] calls ‘converging
and convincing arguments’ for the
reality of God emerge not from
abstraction, but from our experience
of the world and of our own lives.”
George Weigel, The Truth of Catholicism
• Relying on the work of sociologist
Peter L. Berger in his book A
Rumor of Angels, Weigel also
notes:
– “Berger describes little girls
playing hopscotch in a park:
‘They are completely intent on
their game, closed to the world
outside it, happy in their
concentration. Time has stood
still for them . . . . The outside
world has,
– “‘for the duration of the game,
ceased to exist. And, by implication .
. . pain and death, which are the law
of that world, have also ceased to
exist. Even the adult observer of this
scene, who is perhaps all too
conscious of pain and death, is
momentarily drawn into the beatific
immunity.’ The girls’ play takes place
in a time dimension of its own, a time
out of time . . . . The experience of
being ‘in’ that time out of time is a
signal of transcendence.”
George Weigel, The Truth of Catholicism
• Weigel has identified experiences that he
believes directs the human mind to
something outside space and time, i.e.
something eternal, in a word, God.
• The parallels between Weigel and
Plantinga are obvious.
• A Word about Conceptualizations of God
– For an experience to cause the belief ‘I see
a tree,’ one must possess the concept
treeness.
• If one possess this concept, the
experience immediately causes and,
ceteris paribus, justifies the belief ‘I see a
tree.’
• This is so even if one’s concept of
treeness is defective, e.g. it
includes the notion that a tree’s
leaves are always green.
– For an experience to cause and,
ceteris paribus, justify the belief ‘God
is to be praised and thanked,’ one
must possess the concept of God.
• As with perceptual concepts, one’s
concept of God might be defective.
• For example, from a Christian
standpoint, the Jewish and Islamic
conceptualizations of God are
defective because, in them, God is
conceived as unitary rather than
triune.
• One’s concept of God may be, from
a Christian standpoint, even more
defective than this, e.g. identifying
God with the cosmos, a lá certain
Eastern religions or Process
Theism.
– What Plantinga argues is that, unless it’s
been totally atrophied by sin, humans’
religious sense will cause and, ceteris
paribus, justify some sort of religious
belief, no matter how conceptually
defective that belief may be.
• Plantinga would also argue that sin
explains the existence of defective
conceptualizations of God.
– One’s belief that one’s own
conceptualization of God is the best
available canNOT be properly basic. It
must be argued for.
• Final Thoughts
– Most philosophers believe that Plantinga
has successfully shown that beliefs about
God are in the same epistemic boat as
perceptual beliefs, memory beliefs, and
beliefs about other minds.
– What many philosophers also believe is
that Plantinga has not shown that any of
these beliefs is properly basic.
– Plantinga has written three books trying
to establish this claim.
– The jury is still out on Plantinga’s work.