[Date Prev][Date Next] [Chronological] [Thread] [Home]

Faith: rational or irrational?

To reply to this message or start a new topic please email: BUPS-DIS@bups.org


Apologies for the question marks everywhere. Tried to avoid it this time.
Below is the ammended version...


>-- Original Message --
>Date: Thu, 24 Aug 2006 16:07:17 +0100
>From: "Elaine Yeadon" <elaine.yeadon@lineone.net>
>Subject: Faith: rational or irrational?
>To: BUPS-DIS@bups.org
>
>
>To reply to this message or start a new topic please email: BUPS-DIS@bups.org
>
>
>Faith: rational or irrational?
>
>Should faith, which seems necessarily to involve some element of uncertainty
> - some blindness on the part of the believer - always be non-rational (or
>even irrational) or does it involve some rational calculation?
>
>[Disclaimer: I'm often confused about how to read Kierkegaard. I'm aware
>that the following presents just one reading. But it is the idea itself
in
>which I?m interested, not really the accuracy of the literary interpretation
> - heresy, I know?]
>
>Kierkegaard is famed for arguing that faith defies rationality, for, in
order
>to be faith rather than knowledge, the commitment cannot be based on evidence.
>In this sense it is 'blind'. Reacting against the more traditional rationalist
>approach (especially when it was applied to religious belief), he abhorred
>the idea that someone could claim to have a faith in God based on evidence
>or logic, a notion exemplified by Pascal's Wager, which reasoned that being
>part of a Faith was the safer option. Briefly, the reasoning runs: If you
>are wrong and there's no God or Afterlife, then you haven't lost much, whereas
>if you are right and God does exist, then you are rewarded greatly rather
>than being severely punished as those would be who did not follow him. For
>Kierkegaard this was a superficial and selfish way to live based on scientific
>evidence or calculation rather than on character and faith. As a result,
>his writings distinguish between objective truths which he sees as the information
>we gain through science, rationality and other worldly observations, and
>subjective truths, recognized through passion, conviction and faith.
>
>"the objective way of reflection leads to the objective truth, and while
>the subject and his subjectivity become indifferent, the truth also becomes
>indifferent, and this indifference is precisely its objective validity;
for
>all interest, like all decisiveness, is rooted in subjectivity.  The way
>of objective reflection leads to abstract thought, to mathematics, to historical
>knowledge of different kinds; and always it leads away from the subject,
>whose existence or non-existence, and from the objective point of view quite
>rightly, becomes infinitely indifferent." Concluding Unscientific Postscript
>
>Specifically on faith he states:
>	
>"Faith does not simply result from scientific enquiry; it does not come
directly
>at all?Rather it is the case that in this voluminous knowledge, this certainty
>that lurks at the door of faith and threatens to devour it, [the believer]
>is in so dangerous a situation that much effort will be needed, in great
>fear and trembling, lest he fall victim to the temptation to confuse knowledge
>with faith." Concluding Unscientific Postscript
>
>However, another important aspect of subjective truth is that it requires
>a full commitment. It makes no sense to say 'I believe that pigs can fly,
>but I'm probably wrong', for the element of doubt means that it is not full
>belief. Thus for a truth to be fully subjective, there must be no reliance
>on objective evidence and no element of doubt.
>
>'if [the believer] had assumed [belief] by virtue of any proof he would
have
>been on the verge of giving up his faith.' Concluding Unscientific Postscript
>
>Herein lies a problem for me. I don't understand how one can allow for doubt
>in the certainty of the belief without requiring some rationality, by which
>the doubt can be dealt with or overcome. I fail to see how the 'blind' faith
>so far discussed is anything but tenacity. The believer, to have real faith,
>must surely recognize that his belief is epistemologically uncertain; otherwise
>it would seem (to him) to be in the same category as the objective truth
>which Kierkegaard argues destroys faith. Tenacity lacks the epistemological
>value of faith because it takes into account neither the subjective 'passion'
>of belief nor the objective justification.
>
>We needn't only consider religious faith here either. I think that the debate
>can be applied to any epistemologically uncertain or seemingly non-provable
>belief. Many people would accept the rational element of faith in a theory
>for day-to-day, scientific or otherwise academic beliefs, but not allow
a
>rational component of religious Faith (capital f). Is this justified? -
many
>people claim to experience God just as clearly as they experience the material
>processes of science. It's not clear to me that people have less of a justification
>to look for reasons to believe in God than they do to believe scientific
>theories.
>
>For the record, I don't think Pascal's Wager provides rational reason for
>faith - it's more of a rational motivation to try to come to faith. However,
>I think it does emphasize the requirement for recognizing uncertainty and
>acting upon it rationally. 
>So, what do you think?  Must faith involve rationality?  Must it preclude
>it?
>
>-Elaine
>
>
>
>[I'm eager to avoid the following discussion becoming a theist-bashing exercise,
>so could we focus on the question of whether or not faith should be rational,
>not whether people are correct to believe in God? Thank you :-) ]
>
>
>
>___________________________________________________________
>
>Tiscali Broadband from 14.99 with free setup!
>http://www.tiscali.co.uk/products/broadband/
>
>
>
>Browse or search the BUPS-DIS archives, or unsubscribe from the mailing
list
>at: http://www.bups.org/mailinglist.shtml


___________________________________________________________

Tiscali Broadband from 14.99 with free setup!
http://www.tiscali.co.uk/products/broadband/



Browse or search the BUPS-DIS archives, or unsubscribe from the mailing list at: http://www.bups.org/mailinglist.shtml