Family Man

This is precisely what has been bothering me about luv-luv's recent arguments. Somehow, evidentialists have "prove" everything. Why that is is not clear, and it certainly is not the position Clifford took in his essay.

Eric H

Hello Family Man


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Quote family man….Let me start by making one criticism of Clifford. His theory is inadequate in that there is a second way to come to a belief: reason (read logic). For example, if the Argument from Design was a valid argument, then theists could claim to hold a rational belief, even though the Argument from Design doesn't conclusively prove that God exists -- it just suggests it. Of course, I don't believe the Argument from Design is a valid argument, but that's another thread.
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Belief is not limited to theists only; above you say that you do not believe in the design argument.
It seems both atheists and theists can only believe their position is true.
The only difference is our beliefs seem to be formed be looking at similar evidence but coming to different conclusions. I believe that it probably takes a similar amount of reasoning and doubt to hold either position.
Maybe the greater importance should be placed on what our beliefs motivate us to do, and there are certainly extremes in this.

Peace

Eric

Family Man

I do not believe that the design argument is valid. If the design argument was under consideration, I'd support that statement. I'm makinga logical argument, not an evidential one. That is not the same thing as making a positive faith statement.

No, the only real question is whether the theistic position is reasonably supported. If it is not, then belief in God is not warranted.


The difference is that theists consider certain facts to be evidence, while atheists would not. The question is whether the theistic conclusion is valid.

You'd have to elaborate on that.

I'm not sure I agree. It seems to me that James, for example, is encouraging people to hold irrational beliefs. That position has distinct negative consequences. Nor is it an isolated case: we are frequently exhorted to accept God because:

1) he is beyond our understanding.
2) if we just open our heart, we'd understand.
3) if he didn't exist life has no meaning

among other arguments that are clearly unsupported. That strikes me as having serious negative consequences. In short, I don't think promoting irrational thought to justify belief is beneficial to society as a whole.

Pyrrho

I am a bit curious about your various comments regarding Burger. You say that you have no desire to defend what he (or she) says. Is this purely a matter of the time it would take to write such a response? (That would be very understandable.) Or is it that there is some disagreement that you have with Burger?

It seems to me that Burger is in virtually complete agreement with Clifford, though, of course, as Clifford wrote his essay (and died) before James came out with his essay, Clifford had nothing to say specifically about James' essay.

If you would prefer to discuss this via email, feel free to do so.

luvluv

Family Man:

Well, as you well know it is not simply the presence or absence of evidence upon which an empirical investigation seeks to find out the truth, it is also the presence or absence of defeaters.

Evidentiarily there are numerous defeaters to the proposition that a dog can a) be 2000 years old, b) talk, c) be intelligent enough to give sufficient instructions. There is evidence that can be brought to bear to strongly suggest that those claims are more than likely untrue. So to anyone with adequate cognitive faculties, the belief that a 2000 year old dog talked to him and gave him ordered instructions to kill should not make it past the empirical evaluation stage.



But the central issue which you haven't answered is that if such a belief could pass by a person's initial emprical evaluation then such a person will believe it ON THE MERITS OF HOW HE PERCIEVES THE EVIDENCE, WHETHER OR NOT HE USES PRECURSIVE FAITH. Again, if such a belief passes mustard with Burkowitz, then he is believing it on EVIDENCE, not on faith, and neither James nor Clifford bears the blame for this man's belief, but his own faulty evaluative faculties.

There are two main problems with evidentialism that you folks have yet to address:

1) There is no universal evidentiary standard by which one can clearly delineate rationally justified beliefs from rationally unjustified beliefs.

Again, the question NO ONE, will answer, or even approach:

HOW DOES AN EVIDENTIALIST DECIDE HOW MUCH EVIDENCE IS ENOUGH EVIDENCE?

Clearly there are some very smart theists who believe there is strong evidence for the existence of God (J.P Moreland, William Lane Craig, etc.) And there are some equally smart atheists who believe there is no evidence for God. Both categories seem to be evidentialists, so far as their religious beliefs (or lack thereof) are concerned.

How does an evidentialist prove to another evidentialist that his or her evidence is insufficient to prove a claim?

2) People vary in their ability to evaluate evidence properly. Burkowitz, for example, could feel that he is in a privilidged epistemic position. He could feel, in his own mind, that his faculties were functioning properly and that he has no reason to distrust his senses. He could therefore conclude, on the basis of the evidence, that the dog ACTUALLY DID talk to him just as he remembers. He could consider the trustworthiness of his own faculties sufficient to overwhelm the defeaters previously mentioned.

Now, of course all of this is absurd, because Burkowitz's faculties ARE impaired, but Burkowitz doesn't know this. Most people whose faculties are somehow impaired are not aware of the fact. But the point is that evidentiary constraints are no guarantee against irrational beliefs. Forget whether or not the beliefs are true or not, evidentialism cannot even guarantee against irrational beliefs.

In fact, since James system presupposes an evidentiary process before his criteria can begin to take effect, James system could not possibly justify an irrational belief unless such a belief had already passed through an empirical investigation unscathed. That is to say, unless there were at least as many reasons to believe a proposition as there were to disbelieve them, James' process would not even enter into the picture.

The fact is that precursive faith and evidentialism fail, so far as irrational beliefs are concerned, in precisely the same instances: when the believer's abilty to evaluate evidence are faulty. This being the case, evidentialism is no more capable of ruling out irrational beliefs than precursive faith. All that you and Jobar appear to be saying so far is that precursive faith is dangerous in the hands of a fool, but so far as I can see so is evidentialism.

Does anyone really think that if Burkowitz, with his mental faculties being impaired the way they were, would have been any less dangerous as an evidentialist? In fact, I can find no evidence that he WASN'T an evidentialist. He never said, so far as I can tell, that he was unsure of whether or not the dog actually talked to him but he simply believed he did on faith. He said, if I remember correctly, that the dog talked to him, that he knows the dog talked to him, and that is all there is to it. What evidence do you have that a person with faulty epistemic faculties would even NEED to justify irrational decisions with faith? Their cognitive processes are already so faulty that they wouldn't be any better off if they were evidentialists.

So, as far as I can tell, the strategy that you and K have been using to this point is totally worthless. Unless you can describe how James' system can be used by a person with totally intact evaluative abilities to justify a CLEARLY irrational belief, then James' system is no better and no worse than Clifford's. Both break down, when and only when, a person is unable to accurately evaluate evidence.

Okay but an empiricist is not a rationalist. Those are two very big, very seperate camps. Which one precisely are you in? So far as I can tell, Clifford would not allow even sound rational argument to be a determinant for belief. Which is another criticism one could bring against his formula.

But again, this skirts the value consideration (which you never address). What if I value personal freedom over social order? How can you evidentially show me that social order is a superior value to personal freedom?

The bottom line fact is that you absolutely cannot give evidential support in favor of one value over another without question-begging. If someone doesn't already agree with you that social order is more important than individual freedom, it will be impossible to prove to him that stealing is morally wrong by showing him, statistically, that stealing causes social disorder. He might say, "so what? Freedom is the moral imperative, not order!"

Then what would you say to him?

So far as I know, ethicists agree with me in this regard. You cannot empircally or logically dispute basic values, and all of a person's moral and ethical perspectives emerge from these different values. If two people have different basic values, evidence won't amount to a pile of beans.

Yes, it is, because if stealing is not always wrong than how do I know AHEAD OF TIME that this particular act of theft which I want to commit is actually wrong? If stealing is not ALWAYS wrong, then I would have to actually commit the crime to find out, wouldn't I?

No, he made the unevidenced claim that beliefs based on faith are morally wrong.

I understand that, but my contention is, because of the fact that evidentialism cannot, as a system, compensate for a person's faulty evaluative faculties, and because there is no universal standard for how much evidence is sufficient for belief, evidentialism, like precursive faith, is not even a guarantee of RATIONAL beliefs.

So if the best criticism you have of precursive faith is that it is defenseless against irrational beliefs, and the same is true of evidentialism, where does that leave us?

It is absolutely not beyond the topic at hand. You have challenged me to show how James' system can overcome some certain unpalatable beliefs. Now I challenge you to show how James' system could overcome the evidenced belief that women should not be allowed financial equality with men.

If you can't do that, if you haven't done that, and you are an evidentialist, then you have no right to believe that women should have financial equality with men. For you, such a belief would be irrational, at least until you provide demonstrably superior evidence to the contrary.

(You know, if I shouted at you every time you misinterpreted one of James' quotes, there'd be precious little bandwith left by now.)

I understand that Clifford does not need conclusive proof, but he does need to at least guarantee against irrational beliefs for your critique of James to be valid at all. If you support evidentialism, despite the fact that it can allow for irrational beliefs, then you can hardly reject precursive faith on those same grounds.

Further, while Clifford does not require conclusive proof, he does require "sufficient evidence." Yet he offers no explanation of just what constitutes "sufficient evidence". So again, I drop the gauntlet, how much evidence is sufficient evidence? Could not a person whose evidential threshold was extremely low get away with some clearly irrational beliefs? There is nothing in Clifford's system which would prevent this.

But you admit yourself, do you not, that there are things which are absolutely true which we cannot actually prove to be true. And an evidentialist approach would absolutely guarantee that we never, ever have access to such truth.

So which is the bigger problem, a system which totally blocks us from certain truths (some of which may be of enormous importance) or a system which is not entirely able to eliminate irrational beliefs?

*(Though, again, in all fairness, precursive faith, coupled with a preliminary empirical investigation, is far more capable of filtering out irrational beliefs than evidentialism is at filtering in unevidenced truths)*

You say that the fact that evidentialism's faults are not problematic because no epistemic system guarantees us that all our beliefs are true. But that is not evidentialism's critical flaw. The flaw is that it prevents us ABSOLUTELY from certain beliefs which ARE TRUE. Is it not a problem if an epistemic system keeps one eternally blocked from certain true beliefs?

(And again, if you were a real evidentialist, you could not even believe that there was anything external to your mind. It is a practical impossibility to provide evidence for that claim. )

James' system offers us the opportunity to take advantage of some truths for which there can be no evidence and benefit from acting on those beliefs if they turn out to be true. James' system is a gamble, but it is a rationally justified gamble in the face of the stakes.

Well, again, James' system presupposes an empirical process, so you won't have any more irrational beliefs if you were to adopt James system as you have right now. (Notice how I didn't type that in bold, capitalized letters.)

And note, there is a difference between an irrational decision and an unrational decision. Beliefs adequately justified by James process (by believers with fully functioning faculties) are NEVER irrational, they are merely unrational. They are not believed contrary to reason, but for determining factors other than reason. Again, this presupposes an accurate preliminary empirical investigation. But if such an investigation is carried on succesfully, James' system will only produce unrational, never irrational, beliefs. By definition if the belief is CONTRARY to reason, it will never pass on to the level of precursive faith (assuming, again, the functioning faculties of the believer).

I only meant that James was right when he said that some people would rather know truth than avoid error. I am one of those. He said that some people would rather avoid error than know the truth. You appear to be one of those. Both of our epistemic systems make perfect sense for each of us to adhere to given how we view the world.

That's perhaps what we are both missing here, is that it is a judgement call based on personal priorities. James system works for a person whose temperment is such that he cannot bear the prospect of not being able to know truths which are out there and which can benefit him to know, simply because he cannot PROVE them. Clifford's system works for those whose temperment is such that they cannot bear holding false beliefs, no matter how many true beliefs they end up missing.

There is no reason for a person such as myself to bind himself by Clifford's rules, and no reason for a person such as yourself to open yourself up to James' rules.

Family Man

Once again, luvluv, you're demanding that Clifford provide "guarantees" where, in any fair reading of his essay, no guarantees would be required. Is it Clifford's fault that there are irrational people out there that can't evaluate evidence properly? It's perfectly ridiculous.

But, in reality, you're making the same mistake you were making when you said (repeatedly) that Clifford can't "conclusively prove" things. Consider this example: you are a prosecutor currently trying Person A of a crime on the basis of evidence X,Y,Z. (For purposes of this example, assume that all evidences are ones that would be accepted by any rational person -- and in fact has been accepted by your boss and colleagues). Is your prosecution rational? Of course.

In preparation for the trial, you run across Person B, who says something that is inconsistent with your case. Is your prosecution of Person A still rational? Yep, you still have adequate evidence. Would it be rational to drop your prosecution of A in favor of B at this point. Of course not, you lack enough evidence (the statement only rouses suspicion -- it isn't evidence of guilt).

However, you decide to investigate further and uncover evidence Q, which demonstrates that B planted evidences X, Y, and Z to frame A. Is your prosecution now irrational? Of course, the evidence points in a different direction. That you were mistaken in your analysis of the evidence is not an indictment of Clifford. One can rationally hold an incorrect belief. What Clifford is trying to demonstrate is that care in one's belief will reduce those types of errors.

That people don't always evaluate the evidence properly is not a problem for Clifford. What he is saying is: Be careful about how you formulate beliefs. Look at the evidence closely before deciding on what you believe. If you do this, your consequent actions will be more moral than if you don't. That people are either unable, or unwilling, to follow his advice does not make his advice less valid.

And, in fact, here is the fatal flaw in James' formulation. You say:

I agree. But then, why should the idea of God pass empirical muster either? After all, if there was enough evidence that we could rationally conclude that God exists, why would we need James? Why can't we say that there are enough defeaters that a person a) can't walk on water, b) can't drive demons out of pigs and c) can't resurrect and ascend to heaven. It's because you arbitrarily decide that the God idea is meaningful idea, while a 2000 year old talking dog isn't. James isn't using empiricism to rule out the irrational; he is using his formulation to justify popular, but unsupported (i.e. irrational) beliefs.

But we do decide everyday that we have enough evidence to believe things. It happens everytime a jury returns a verdict (assuming that they don't let their prejudices get in the way). It happens whenever a scientist presents a paper that is widely accepted in his field. That there is no hard and fast rule is not a valid problem. If it were, we'd never have advanced as far as a species as we have.

I've already demonstrated why this is false.

I've been looking for an explanation of the notion of a situation where "evidence can't help", since that has never struck me as a coherent idea. I've finally found it and I see the problem. In my view, in order to conclude that something is true, the evidence must all point in one direction. For example, if I'm investigating a crime here in Colorado, I can't conclude that Person X is guilty, even if he had motive and means, if he were serving in the Marine Corps in Iraq. Only if I resolve all contradictory evidence can a valid belief be formed. Hence, all beliefs are resolved at the empirical level and James is never considered, which is why I believe it has no value.

Since Clifford's system isn't designed to be used by the irrational, I don't think you have a point. And James doesn't use evidence, so I fail to see what your point is there. James' system fails because it provides no meaningful means for deciding when a belief can be rationally held. Once again, the live criterion is completely arbitrary and permits all beliefs, even the absurd.

Are you seriously suggesting that the empiricist and rationalist positions are mutually exclusive? That one can't be an empiricist and a rationalist? I'd like an explanation of how that could be. (Hint: the empiricist position does not suggest that experience is the only method to the truth, and the rationalist position does not suggest that reason is the only method either.)

Is it rational to believe that social order is important? Yes.

Is it rational to believe that freedom is important? Yes.

Is it rational to believe that social order is more important than freedom? Yes.

Is it rational to believe that freedom is more important than social order? Yes.

Can Clifford tell us which position is correct? No, and I thought that we agreed that he never intended to. I really don't see what your point is here, nor do I think it relevant (which is why I didn't address it -- but since you insist.)

Really? So I need to rob the local Stop 'N Shop to figure out it is wrong? How absurd.

No, he made the evidenced claim that beliefs based on faith are morally wrong. I suggest you reread his essay.

It isn't true of evidentialism. Evidentialism, properly applied, has a method to root out irrational beliefs. Precursive belief, properly applied, has no such mechanism.

Yes, if I can't provide evidence that women should have financial equality with men my belief would be irrational. Whether or not women should have financial equality, however, is not relevant to the topic at hand, so I choose not to discuss it.

AFAIK, I haven't misinterpreted James' position. You have clearly have misinterpreted Clifford, however.

Good. I presume that I won't be subjected to anymore statements like "unless Clifford can provide conclusive proof of..." anymore.

I think I've already explained your latest fallacy. He doesn't have to guarantee anything.

Yes, some people have low thresholds of evidence. They're called Christians. Again, Clifford is not guaranteeing anything. Someone who sets his evidence threshold too low is risking accepting irrational beliefs. Someone who sets them too high is risking paralysis. That there is no hard and fast rule, however, does not invalidate the system. It simply means that results you get from it will be in direct proportion to the care in which you use it.

Let's put it this way: should we ban cars because people occasionally crash them? Should we ban cars until manufacturers can guarantee that no one will crash? Of course not. Your demands for a guarantee is equally ludricrous. Just because it doesn't "guarantee" anything doesn't mean it isn't useful.

There are some things that are unknowable, yes. I don't see that as a problem.

The bigger problem is a system that might lead us into an even greater error. Consider your ocean example. The fallacy of it is that you assume that belief that you can reach the board will enable you to reach the board. It is just as likely that someone could start out fully believing he can reach the board, but flounders and drowns before he reaches it. Belief is not the same as truth, and it is more likely, if you believe without evidence, that you will stumble and hurt yourself than if you suspend belief.

The attraction of James is that he is saying: "Hey, believe what you want. What can it hurt?" But perhaps the truth is that there is a God, but he could care less what you believe. Except Christians, because the notion of a blood sacrifice is offensive to God and he can't understand why anyone would believe the ridiculous crucifixion story. So Christians get sent to hell, while everyone else (including atheists) get eternal bliss.

In other words, James system is, at heart, a souped up version of Pascal's Wager. By assuming that it is the Christian God or nothing, it is ignoring the very real possibility that your choice of Christianity is just as erroneous as my choice of atheism.

No, because it is better to withhold belief than to blindly assume any certain belief is true. It may be false.

Untrue and unsupported.

Now you know why I think it is a souped up version of Pascal's Wager.

I also have no need for James system either, since the empirical process by itself is sufficient.

Good for you.

Uh, there is no such thing as a "unrational decision". Unrational is not a word, and has no meaning. If you are trying to coin a word, that's fine, but you're going to have to explain what you mean by "unrational".

You misunderstand me because I want to maximize truth while minimizing errors. It diminishes truth and increases errors. I'll agree that James system, as Pascal's, is comforting for those who wishes to believe even though there is no good reason to believe. It is also equally fallacious, and I certainly wouldn't recommend it anyone. James is clearly inferior to Clifford.

Family Man

Let me use this analogy to demonstrate the dangers of luvluv's position.

Clifford comes up with a system to separate truth from error. The system isn't perfect -- occasionally a truth will be culled out and a falsehood accepted -- but all agree (as apparently does James and luvluv) that it generally works (albiet imperfectly).

James comes along and picks up one of the items that was discarded. He says, "I know I don't have a solid reason to say this is true, but I happen to think it is so I'm putting it back." Given that he has no good reason, he is essentially picking an item at random. Odds are, he just added a falsehood to the set we believe to be truth. He has just arbitrarily diminished a carefully thought out set of truths.

James has done us all a terrible disservice.

luvluv

Family Man:

What, precisely, is the reason that you object to James' method? Originally you said it was because there was no way for James' system to filter out irrational beliefs. You seem to be backtracking now.

I understand that Clifford does not need to guarantee rational beliefs, but if Clifford does not need to be able to guarantee rational beliefs then why does James?

It is inconsistent of you to object to James' methodology on the sole consideration that it fails to eliminate rational beliefs and not hold Clifford's methodology to the same standards.

James' reccomends the same. Remember, I plead with you, that James insists upon an exhaustive preliminary investigation that is just as stringent as Clifford's, and it is only those claims which come through that preliminary investigation as UNDECIDABLE that are eligible for James' methodology.

First of all, we are not talking about Christianity here, or even theism, but simply about beliefs that cannot be conclusively decided evidentially. But if I were going to engage in this conversation, I would say that there is a lot more evidence that Jesus did all the things ascribed to him than there is evidence that Manson's dog actually talked. It is my opinion (contra Hume) that at a certain point surrounding evidence even for an outstandingly bizzare claim could override one's assumptions. If hundreds of people swear they saw the dog talk purposely, many of them quite obviously sane, and were willing to risk their lives and livliehoods for this belief, then, despite the fact that in my experience dog's simply don't talk, that would be reason enough for me to look more into the belief. The Christian claims made of any random person divorced of any supporting evidence surrounding the fact would certainly be absurd. If somebody told me that Jimmy from around the corner rose from the dead, I certainly would not believe it. But if dozens of people I knew personally and who I knew to be of sound mind swore to me that he did, if they were willing to change their lives and even risk their lives on that having been the case, that would at the very least be reason for me to further investigate the claim.

However, just one person with a record of insanity claiming to have, in the privacy of his own home, heeded the commands of a 2000 year old dog, is simply not a claim that should pass through someone's emprical filter.

(For the record I don't consider there to be many evidenced claims of miracles in the New Testament except the Ressurection. If you want to get into that in another thread we can. So I would not risk my hat that any one of the individual miracles in the scriptures, taken in isolation, actually happened. I'm sure there is some hair on some of those stories. But once one has good reasons for admitting the ressurection, there is a higher level of probability for the other miracles. That's probably for another thread, but there you go.)

Right, so again, evidentialism is a system which is just as prone to irrational beliefs as is precursive faith.

I said:

You said:

I don't see that anywhere in your post. So you're saying people DO NOT vary in their ability to evaluate evidence properly?

I don't think you mean this. Are you saying you can't form a belief if there is even ONE contradictory bit of evidence to your thesis?

So if you had even ONE reason to doubt your wife's fidelity (say she lied to you about where she was going one evening) you would not be able to believe that she was faithful? One bit of disconfirming evidence to you trumps ALL the accumulated confirming evidence?

Well, techincially if he had the means, that would indicate that he had some way of doing the crime even from Iraq, but I digress...

That's just not true. There is simply no way that you can resolve ALL contradictory evidence before a belief is formed.

If that is true, and you believe that Fukiyama is wrong about women working outside the home, how do you rule out his evidence?

It is possible for there to be GOOD evidence for and against the same proposition. Should we have gone to war in Iraq, for instance? There was good evidence on both sides of the issue. At a certain point we simply acted arbitrarily on what we thought was right. (I think we made the wrong move, but who am I to judge). While it would certainly have been preferable to wait until conclusive evidence was provided, there is some evidence that Saddam actually has at least a few hundred liters of unaccounted for anthrax. So given the stakes, should the President have waited? What if he had done so and we lost 1000 people in an Anthrax outbreak? (I don't believe a word of this, mind you. I'm against the war. I'm just posing the hypothetical.) There was no conclusive evidence for or against Iraq having weapons of mass destruction. There was good evidence that he did and good evidence that he didn't. And it is just possible that if we had decided to be evidentialists about it, and withhold our beliefs, that Saddam Hussein could have shipped a good bit of Anthrax to willing terrorists who would have used the stuff somewhere in the world.

Are you suggesting that James' system IS designed to be used by the irrational?

My point was that since James' system presupposes an emprical investigation, it only justifies irrational beliefs in the same cases that evidentialism does: when the person using the system has defective faculties.

In fact, it could be argued that James' system has a HIGHER standard, because only people who are highly selective about their beliefs will ever admit that an important proposition before them has excellent support for both it's truth and it's falsehood. A person with faulty faculties is less likely to use James' system because it presupposes someone who is making a careful consideration of their beliefs. Whereas a person like Manson is never likely to consider that the defeaters for the proposition that his dog is talking to him are equal to the support for that position. Neither is he likely to pause and ask himself whether the proposition is live, momentous, and forced. A person with faulty faculties is unlikely to ever base his beliefs on James' system, whereas people with faulty faculties make bad decisions "on the evidence" all the time.

Clifford's sytem does not help with this because he provides no evidentiary threshhold and no methodology for establishing the rationality of a belief using evidence. He simply says "you should have sufficient evidence" with no explanation of just what sufficient evidence is. So if Manson thinks the fact that he clearly heard his dog talked to him is "sufficient", who is to argue with him? James theory at least takes questioners through specific steps, Clifford's theory is well-intentioned but so vague and undefined that it is more subject to abuse than is James'.

What part of "James' process of precursive faith REQUIRES and PRESUPPOSES a preliminary evidential investigation" do you not understand?

Well, it does say that a belief can be rationally held when it is, on the evidence, at least as likely to be true as untrue.

And again, Clifford also provides no means for deciding when a belief can be rationally held, because it provides no criteria for what "sufficient" evidence is. Until it can do so, then both evidentialism and precursive faith are in the same boat in that regard. Unless an evidentialist can decide how much evidence is enough evidence then he is no more capable of deciding when a belief can be rationally held than is a practitioner of precursive faith.

Beliefs cannot be live unless they go through the REQUIRED and PRESUPPOSED evidentiary investigation. If an absurd belief gets through this investigation it is on the same grounds that absurd beliefs get through in Clifford's system: because the indivudual using that system has faulty faculties.

Yes, crazy people could abuse precursive faith. But those same crazy people would misuse evidentialism, so what is the point?

Well, technically I think they are mutually exclusive (either one believes that truth, at it's base, can be proved only by evidence or only by reason). Certainly, one could accept both criteria but make neither one superior to the other, but one could not hold that both reason alone and evidence alone is the superior means of confirming truth.

At any rate it is a very different thing to defend evidentialism than it is to defend rationalism. My point is that I'm pretty sure that Clifford WAS NOT a rationalist, in that he would not even have been persuaded by completley SOUND argumentation if that argument were not "sufficiently" supported by evidence.

So, if you are a rationalist (or have rationalist sensitivities) wouldn't that be a further fault with James' system?

The point is that Clifford said that NO FORM OF KNOWLEDGE can be morally held without evidence. And since Clifford's claim cannot justify morality, the central claim of his essay is SELF-DEFEATING.

1)Clifford says that it is immoral to hold a belief without evidence.

2) But there is no evidence that it is immoral to hold a belief without evidence.

3) Therefore, it is immoral for Clifford to hold the belief that it is immoral to hold a belief without evidence.

And since Clifford never addresses the superiority of evidentialism over faith as a means of discovering truth or even rationally held beliefs, but focuses mainly on it's moral aspects, his entire claim is therefore invalidated.

Now it is true that it is possible to build a much stronger case for evidentialism on non-moral grounds, but Clifford, poor fool, does not do that.

Double no, he made an anectdotal case that believing things on faith COULD lead people to be more susceptible to believing other things not based on evidence. But he did not:

1) Provide evidence that those who have faith are more susceptible to irrational beliefs than are others.

(Are people who believe in God really more likely to believe that a 2000 year old dog told Manson to kill someone than is an atheist?)

2) Prove that believing things based on a lack of evidence is morally wrong IN THE FIRST PLACE!!!

Even if he could prove one, he has no hope of proving two, so it is a self-defeating claim. Even if believing based on faith makes a person more credulous, he has yet to PROVIDE EVIDENCE that promoting credulity is morally wrong!

I'm aware that these defects are not products of evidentialism per se, but faults with his version of it. I don't expect that YOU hold that one who believes without evidene is guilty of bad morals, merely bad epistemology. However, it is CLIFFORD that I am critiquing here, not evidentialism. If you wish to simply disassociate yourself from the terrible manner in which Clifford made his case, feel free. But Clifford did leave himself wide open in this regard.

Wrong because precurisve faith, properly applied, REQUIRES AND PRESUPPOSES a full evidential investigation which will root out all irrational beliefs.

Again, both precursive faith and evidentialism fail in precisely the same instances, when the believers evaluative functions are faulty.

You don't have to discuss it. I'm simply asking you if you actually have DONE the investigation and provided yourself with enough evidence that women should have financial equality?

If you haven't, then you hold that belief on faith OR you don't hold it at all.

I'm just saying, you use precursive faith all the time, whether you are aware of it or not.

And why could not the same thing be said of James?

I'm not demanding a guarantee. You are critical of James' system because it does not rule out irrational beliefs (it does, actually, but why quibble). All I am saying is that evidentialism also does not rule out irrational beliefs. So if you are nonetheless an evidentialist, this would invalidate your criticism of precursive faith.

There is a problem if we can benefit, and benefit greatly, from things which are true, but which we cannot prove to be true, (or for which we cannot provide sufficient evidence if you prefer).

(And technically nothing is really KNOWABLE besides the fact that our minds exist [and that's only knowable to us as individuals, I don't KNOW that your mind exists]. We only have rationally held beliefs. We can't say for certain that any of them are truly known, or true. And it is true, by the way, that there is no evidential support for the existence of an external world. I swear to you. Read Russell's The Problems of Philosophy or any one of a dozen introductory books on Philosophy, or ask any one of the really smart Philosophy buffs around the forum. It would take to long to try and prove, but trust me. I'm asking you to look for EVIDENCE that I'm telling you the truth.)

What is your evidence for this claim?

What is your evidence for this claim?

1) That is not what James is saying. The ad hominem strawmen are not helping your position. James is saying you MAY believe what is, for you, live, momentous, and forced IF this belief is undecidable upon exhaustive evidentiary investiagtion.

2) James was not supporting Christianity, or even THEISM! I'm not even sure the guy was a theist, and if he was I would suspect he was a DEIST, not a Christian. I am not here discussing whether you should use James' system to become a Christian. I am simply questioning the merits of evidentialism, and suggesting that it is sometimes rational to believe beyond what the evidence can decide.

Maybe I should have used non-rational. An irrational decision is one CONTRARY to reason. A non-rational decision is merely one not primarily BASED in reason, but not contrary to reason either.

Your decision as to who you were going to marry was probably a non-rational decision. It was decided (hopefully) by love and not because of rational arguments or evidence.

I don't understand what you mean. Are you saying that James system leads people to accept less truth? I don't see how that's possible. There is no way for James system to cause people to jettison their pre-existing true beliefs. Unless you can demonstrate such a happenstance. It certainly can potentially increase errors, but there is no way for us to know that it does because BY DEFINITION the beliefs it allows cannot be SHOWN to be true or false by evidential or rational investigation.

What do you mean by fallacious? What fallacy in particular is James committing? Can you demonstrate that instead of simply asserting it?

Family Man

What backtracking? What is being proposed here is a tool. Tools can be used correctly or incorrectly. Used correctly, Clifford filters out irrational beliefs. Used correctly, James does not (which you tacitly admit when you claim that it needs evidentialism for that function). I haven't changed my criticism at all, I just don't require perfect human beings as you apparently and for no good reason do.

How many times do I have to explain this (or do I have to shout again so that you'll pay attention)? The "preliminary investigation" resolves all cases. Either a investigation concludes that there is a sufficient evidential or logical reason to believe something, or it doesn't. There is no middle ground. That leaves James with nothing to evaluate, making it useless.

Which supposively includes religion in general and Christianity in particular. And if you don't think James was primarily thinking about religion in his essay I suggest you read it again. I think I've got ample evidence to conclude that religion is the primary force behind this charade (and I'll provide some below).

I assume you're talking about Berkowitz's dog. And if you've read modern scholarship about Jesus's life you'd know that the general consensus is that most of what was ascribed to Jesus didn't happen (such as walking on water) and what they claim he did do and say is so innocuous that no one would conclude he was God. But that's another topic which has been extensively discussed in BC&A. I can recommend some threads or books if you'd like.

I don't disagree, but I have not ever experienced a bizarre claim being independently reported by reputable people, so I'm not sure what your point is.

Agreed, and neither should the shaky claims of the Early Christians either.

For the record, I don't consider there to be any evidenced claims of miracles in the NT, including the Resurrection. But, once again, that is another thread.

No. If you take a hammer and smash your thumb with it, it is not the hammer's fault. It is yours.

No, I'm saying it is irrelevant.

Why would one lie be evidence that she was being unfaithful? Aren't there other possible explanations for such a lie? There is a difference between clear evidence and vague suspicion, and what you presented is hardly clear. Now if I saw her passionately kissing another man, that would negate my previous belief, wouldn't it?

No he doesn't because he doesn't have opportunity. Do you see what I mean about clear evidence?

Who says I do? I said I suspect he is wrong, based on what strikes me as some logical errors on his part (think cause and effect). I didn't say he is wrong. I said until his evidence is refuted he has a rational basis for his belief. Until my arguments are refuted, I have a rational basis too. That people can disagree about the meaning of evidence is not a refutation of Clifford.

You have a point here, though I thought we agreed that Clifford isn't telling us the correctness of a belief. Bush clearly believes that the war can be won fairly easily and that it would enhance the nation's national security. There can be some conflicting information in forming a belief -- facts A, B, and C will enhance security while fact D would increase it -- but the overall effect is that of enhancement. Let's not oversimplify things here; it's a messy world out there. But the evidence still has to be pointing in one direction. If the evidence isn't clear, only a fool would take the risk our President has taken. Of course, it is entirely possible that we have a fool for a President, but that's yet another thread.

I think it is designed so otherwise rational people can justify irrational beliefs.

I think I've already made myself clear on this point.

Except that James' is explicitly designed for situations where there isn't excellent support. It's supposively to be used when we can't decide, remember? That's hardly excellent support; that's no support.

No, it doesn't. Instead of coming to the obvious conclusion that if a belief can't be adequately supported don't believe it, James says believe anyway. That isn't indicative of someone being scrupulous about his beliefs; that's indicative of self-indulgence.

In other words, does James produce rigorous criteria for excluding problematic beliefs? No. But then, you've been studiously avoiding discussing that arbitrary live criteria, haven't you? I wonder why.

That's Berkowitz, and the State of New York certainly argued with him. In fact, we look at evidence everyday. It's embedded in our legal system, our educational system, and our workplaces. I have yet to see a clear example where James system would work in any situation with any degree of confidence.

And, in fact, if you think about it Clifford allows you to challenge the beliefs of others. It is James that doesn't. I can look at the evidence for a belief and conclude whether it is justified. I can present my case to others and see if they agree. With James, however, whether something is believable depends on the individual. If we agree whether a belief is forced and momentous, then I can't challenge another person's judgement as to it's liveness because that is completely arbitrary.

Given the complete arbitrariness of the live option, that statement is a complete joke. If an employee of mine tries to explain why they want to do something, and all they say is they felt like it (which is what the live option essentially says) I'd have to wonder about the wisdom of that course of action. If, on the other hand, if the person said he wanted to do it for reasons A, B, C -- all of which makes some degree of sense -- I'd be much more inclined to grant the request.

The bottom line is, I can provide numerous examples where sufficient evidence is used in real life to make decisions. To date, you have yet to provide even a hypothetical example that holds up under the most cursory examination where James system can be effectively used. (At least, I don't see people floating in the ocean anymore.)

What part of reason and evidence always decides the question do you not understand?

And why are you trying to have it both ways? How can you say that a preliminary evidential investigation should be used, then conclude that Clifford's promotion of evidence is flawed?

And if they go through the evidentiary investigation, then James has nothing to evaluate.

Clifford doesn't have to justify (i.e. prove) morality. All he has to do is give us reason to believe that our moral beliefs are rational.

Yep.

The American Legal System says you're wrong. There is a reason why evidence is required before a defendant is convicted. There is a reason why airlines perform regular maintenance checks (it's called reducing your risk, remember Clifford's ship example?). There is a strong logical argument why it is immoral to believe without a strong evidential or logical basis for it. Or do you think juries should convict people because that notion is "live" (i.e. they don't like his looks, not that that doesn't happen).

Since your second point is flat out wrong, so is your conclusion.

His entire essay addressed the superiority of evidentialism -- it was his thesis, in fact.

He provided an irrefutable logical argument.

More likely? Yes. If you irrationally accept the possibility of supernatural beings, you are more likely to accept a 2000-year old dog than someone who rejects the supernatural on the grounds that there is no solid reason to believe supernatural beings exists. That ought to be self-evident.

He doesn't need to prove it. He simply has to put a solid argument out there, which he did. The onus is now on you to show how faith is just as moral as evidence.

I think Clifford made an excellent case. You're the one who is making all sorts of unsupported assertions and illogical arguments.

Yes, I have, and no I don't use precursive faith.

Because with James, there is no standard that can be debated. If I find something live, all I have to do is to fold my arms and say "Sorry". The arbitrariness of the live option renders the system laughable.

Then why did you keep saying, "Clifford doesn't guarantee"? And evidentialism, correctly applied, does rule out irrational beliefs. In fact, by your own admission, James needs evidentialism to rule out the irrational, which means no one needs James (except to make them feel good about certain preconceived notions).


And which you could suffer from if it is not true. And since there is no mechanism in James to judge the truth of a belief, you are much more likely to adopt an incorrect belief.

Agreed that nothing really knowable, but I'm interested if one can rationally believe there is an external world, not if we can prove it. Do you really want me to ask if we can rationally believe that there is an external world in the Philosophy forum? I don't think I'm the one who'll be embarrassed. It seems to me that Clifford gives us a rational reason to believe.

It is a logical argument. There are many more false beliefs than correct ones. If you filter out most correct beliefs through evidence, what's left is mostly false beliefs. If you pick one and decide, this is forced, momentous, and live to me, in all likelihood you've just picked out a false belief. That false belief may be harmless, but it could be harmful too.

See last comment.

Evidence always decides.

He most certainly was. Evidence:

And

And that's just examples. James' essay is infused with references to religion and how his formulation rescues the concept from Clifford. Have you even read James?

And if religion wasn't at issue, would we even be having this debate? With James strident defense of religion in his essay, and your obvious faith and inability to come up with a coherent example of precursive faith guiding us to rational beliefs, I believe I have more than enough reason to believe this is primarily a religious issue at heart. It was you who made the statement that I'm so anti-God that my arguments were questionable, wasn't it? You are aware that you betrayed your true motivation with that comment, don't you?

So you're going to substitute one non-existent word with another? A decision can only be rational or irrational. There is no middle ground, which is why we have no word for the concept you're promoting here. If you don't have a rational basis for your decision, it is irrational.

So one can't be rational and in love at the same time? Do you honestly think I didn't rationally consider such things as whether we were compatible? Whether we shared similiar goals? Whether we wanted children and how many? Really, luvluv, I hope you didn't choose your wife on emotional decisions alone. Jeez, no wonder there are so many divorces.

Yes. If you add falsehood, you are minimizing truth. If you believe a falsehood, some truth must be missing, no? If you believe in God, and God doesn't exist, then I'm right and you're wrong.

Nor is there any way to jettison pre-existing false beliefs either, which is the point.

Actually, I've already demonstrated that it does.

James is making the same mistake as Pascal in that he is assuming that risks are outweighed by the potential benefits. We don't know that the risks are outweighed by the benefits. The God who hates Christians is just as likely as the Christian God. That's a hefty risk that's ignored. James formulation is more subtle than Pascal's, but it is essentially the same thing.

Family Man

I think we can boil down this debate to a small number of issues:

1) Does Clifford fail to provide a reason to believe that belief on faith is immoral? This is obviously false. The logic is that, if you are careful with your beliefs -- i.e. you follow the evidence -- you are much less likely to make mistakes (and therefore harm) than if you forget the evidence and believe on faith.

This really isn't that controversial of an idea. If you're running an airline, you are required to inspect and maintenance your planes on a regular basis. The reasoning is that no one is going to take the soundness of the plane on faith. Anyone who flies needs to be able to trust that the plane they're boarding is in good mechanical shape, and if these inspections didn't occur no rational person would fly.

If you familiar with the financial services industry, you must be familiar with the notion of due diligence. Due diligence is the requirement that, if you take responsibility for other people's money, you'd damn well better do your homework. If you put a client's money into an investment without first getting solid evidence that it is a good investment him you are opening yourself up for a lawsuit. No sane person required to do due diligence would make any investment on faith.

Finally, we have our court system (at least, Americans do: I can't speak for the rest of the world). It requires that the evidence be clear before a conviction can be imposed on a defendant. A prosecutor can not stand before a jury and say, "Yes, the evidence is unclear in this case. Some of it points to the defendant's guilt, while others point to his innocence. Don't worry about that. Just take it on faith that he's guilty." Such a prosecutor would be looking for other work forthwith.

No, Clifford's formulation has a very sound basis behind it, and is widely accepted in society. The only reason it is controversial, and the only reason it is seriously considered by anyone (as a reading of James clearly shows) is that Clifford suggests we can't justifiably believe in any religious position. And luvluv, I don't buy bridges in Brooklyn. Don't try to sell me one.

2) Is the notion that James system can be used in cases where the evidence "doesn't help us" a coherent idea? No, it is not. The evidence (or logic) always decides the issues. To see this, let's consider the three cases above.

Would any sane person say: "This plane appears to be in good mechanical shape, but there appears there might be a problem here. Aw, fly her anyway. It probably won't crash." If the evidence is unclear whether the plane is in good flying condition, the only moral choice is to ground the plane until the potential problem is checked out and cleared.

If you've got a fiduciary responsiblity, do you say to yourself: "Gee this company has a got a great prospectus, it's just too bad it has a bad track record." If the investment is at all questionable, your only option is to find a better investment. And, in fact, there are more than a few Wall Street firms paying out millions in lawsuits because they failed in their due diligence.

Finally, the court system is discussed above, and I don't think I need to go over it again.

Clearly, if the issue is momentous, the proper course is that, if the evidence is unclear or contradictory, one should disbelieve or suspend belief until further evidence is produced. That doesn't leave James with anything to justify.

3) Is your claim that there is no hard and fast rule of what constitutes sufficient evidence valid? No, it isn't. If it were, then every defense attorney could get up in front of a jury and say that since there is no hard and fast rule as to what constitutes "proof beyond a reasonable doubt" they can't convict his client. It's absurd. However, an a case-by-case basis, we can come up with guidelines to determine what is sufficient evidence for any particular circumstance. Do you think airlines don't have certain requirements planes must meet before they are considered fit to fly? Have you ever been in a car accident and watch a policemen apply certain rules to the evidence to determine blame in an accident? Are you aware that judges give instructions to juries, bascially telling them what constitutes reasonable doubt? In my field, database development, don't you think there are standards that determine whether a data schema is valid (trust me, you don't want to get into third normal form). That Clifford can't come up with a general scheme to cover all situations just means you're asking for the impossible. In real life, we do come up with standards for what constitutes sufficient evidence all the time.

4) Does your claim that we're imperfect beings invalidate Clifford's formulation? If Clifford was claiming we could prove these things, you'd have a point. But since he's suggesting a course of action, you don't. This is a tool, and a tool can be used badly or well.

5) Does James formulation allow us to say, with any confidence, that we should believe any proposition? As I've said numerous times, the momentous and forced options simply rule out the trivial, and the live option is left to the arbitrary whim of the beholder. There's a reason why James called his essay Will to Believe, luvluv. He thought he was providing a justification for people to believe arbitrarily. Unfortunately, he failed.

6) Does the faith formulation underestimate the risks of its decision? It clearly does. No where in your ocean example did you ever factor in the possibility that the swimmer, acting on faith alone, might drown. And no where did Pascal or James ever consider the very real possibility that religious belief could have harmful effects in the afterlife, or in our current life for that matter.

Considering the issues, Clifford is clearly the way to go.