In class today I distributed a reading where C.S. Lewis apparently argues that evidentialism is mistaken. Specifically, Lewis seems to think that it's not the case that a Christian's religious beliefs are reasonable just in case they are held in proportion to the Christian's total evidence. Evidentialism seems to say otherwise. So, evidentialism is false.
Critically evaluate the argument(s) found in the reading. Is there any good objection to evidentialism here?
Based on this reading, I'm not sure Lewis is completely arguing that evidentialism is false. He seems to support basing your initial beliefs of God and christianity on a persons total evidence. The author notes this, so I'm not even sure he is arguing that all evidentialism is false; it is just not what is used in some circumstances.
ReplyDeleteThe actual argument agaisnt evidentialism seems to be that because of the nature of our relationship with God after we are convinced he exists and is what the bible says he is, we cannot base our subsequent beliefs on our total evidence. This is because evidentialism does not work in the context of a relationship the same way it does in a scientific context. Our total evidence may go against some promise that God has made but our relationship is such that we have to trust God because he is in control and knows far more then we do. On this authors view of evidentialism it seems that in a relationship context evidentialism is false.
I agree with Rebekah, the article does not seem to be offering a argument against evidentialism, but instead it seems to be saying that our relationship with God should be viewed in the same way we view knowing other people. Which does make sense, I mean at the beginning of the year we discussed the difference between knowing about someone and knowing someone.
ReplyDeleteI guess evidentialism does not handle this very well but I really do not see that are a strike against it. Mostly because knowledge in epistemology is about propositions while knowing someone is not reducible to knowing a set of proportions. I think we decided that knowing someone required a relational component. But yeah if this was by some chance it was suppose to be a argument against evidentialism it does a poor job.
Chad Goodremote
I wanted to disagree, but I think I have to agree. The argument is that the mature believer does not waiver in faith back and forth depending upon what evidence they are familiar with (for example, the problem of evil or the experience of evil might cause someone to waiver).
ReplyDeleteHowever, EJ claims someone is epistemically justified like this: believing P is justified for S at t iff S's evidence at t supports P. At any point in my life, t, I will have the evidence I need based off the commitment I made originally to be a follower of Christ. To say I am a believer in Christ, or to have made that commitment at some point, I understood several things about what my belief will entail: doubt, faith, frustration, intellectual uncertainty, etc. I am understanding these issues in a new context: how do they relate to the framework I have adopted? Nothing about that seems to really violate EJ for me.
I am looking at my notes right now, particularly EJ prime, which reads "Doxastic attitude D toward P is epistemically justified for S at t iff having D toward P fits the evidence S has at t." I understand that this is based off a body of evidence, but I don't remember what all we said about this, or i don't have it in my notes. Do you think it is possible for the CS Lewis argument to be relevant to philosophical considerations about doxastic belief? Are they the same thing in this case?