Taffy Lewis

Doubting Didymus,

I don't see how theistic perception can draw any meaningful distinctions between various deities. There just isn't enough information of the kind needed for one to be able to say that they experience Shiva rather than the god of the hebrews. Further, this assumes that these are different deities. Maybe it is the same deity under different culturally conditioned descriptions. Keep in mind that I am talking about theistic perception as something distinct from sensory perception. Perception of God isn't some quasi-sensory experience in which one has visual or auditory sensations that one takes to be of some quasi-physical being. Rather, the experience is most often merely the experience of a powerful personal presence on which we depend and which we are in some way drawn. Perception of God, in my sense, is simply the fact that it seems strongly to a person that God is present to them. You seem to be thinking in terms of "visions" in which the percipient has visual or auditory sensations of a god appearing to them or speaking to them. I think those types of religious experiences are undermined by religious diversity.

First, I'm not talking about any particular theistic tradition. I'm merely talking about experiences of a personal presence on which we feel dependent and to which we are drawn. Attempting to identify this being with one and only one theistic tradition seems to miss the point. These kinds of experiences have occurred to millions of people through recorded history under varying cultural conditions.

As I've said, I see no means of differentiating between the different deities on the basis of theistic perception. Since one deity can make sense of these experiences as well as multiple deities, I see no reason to think more than one is involved. You can use whatever name you like to refer to this being.

Taffy Lewis

Godless Sodomite,

Measuring brain waves seems an unreasonble requirement to holding rational beliefs. We never in fact do this. Does it make sense to say, "One may claim that they've had an experience of a tree, true, but outside of observing the brainwaves of the believer (which can be and have been measured) we have no way of knowing if their experiences are truly as claimed." ? People have held rational beliefs in trees for thousands of years and this didn't require them to measure their brain waves. It seems to be a double standard to require that of religious experiences.

This doesn't conflict with anything I've said. I'm not claiming that we should presuppose there is a god in order to come to rationally believe there is a god. That makes no sense. I'm saying that perception of God is just like sensory perception in that conditions of perception must be met in order for beliefs to be formed on the basis of perception. I might believe there is a peach tree in my backyard because I perceive it. My perceiving it is a matter of fulfilling the conditions of perception. And my fulfilling of these conditions is due to certain choices I've made. It can be argued that belief in God is similar. It's not a matter of setting out to believe in God or the tree. The beliefs are by-products of choices that are made.

Vorkosigan

This doesn't conflict with anything I've said. I'm not claiming that we should presuppose there is a god in order to come to rationally believe there is a god. That makes no sense. I'm saying that perception of God is just like sensory perception in that conditions of perception must be met in order for beliefs to be formed on the basis of perception. I might believe there is a peach tree in my backyard because I perceive it. My perceiving it is a matter of fulfilling the conditions of perception. And my fulfilling of these conditions is due to certain choices I've made. It can be argued that belief in God is similar. It's not a matter of setting out to believe in God or the tree. The beliefs are by-products of choices that are made.

It is not quite the same thing. Anyone can share your perception of the peach tree; we can go to your house and agree that indeed you have such a tree behind it.

But we can't share your perception of god, that appears to be impossible. Worse, people who claim such perceptions have violent disagreements on what the origin is; Wiccans, ESPers, Christians, Muslims, Atheists, Hindus, Kikuyus, Skeptics and Shinto-ists all give differing accounts of these perceptions and their origins. Worse yet, these perceptions can be replicated with drugs or other stimulants, or induced by certain kinds of experiences, particularly those involving deprivation. Even worse, nothing is observed going in or out of the brain during those experiences, so the conclusion is that these experiences are taking place entirely in the mind of the perceiver and have nothing to do with gods. Of course, there is no organ of perception associated with god experiences or evolved to perceive gods.

Remember to that our perceptions are inextricably linked to our knowledge and beliefs about the world. Your claim to have seen a tree is mundane and believable, your claim to have perceived a god is absurd, since there are no gods.

Vorkosigan

Taffy Lewis

rainbow walking,

In my example of perceiving a tree, I explicitly state that the possession of the concept of a tree is a necessary condition for forming a belief on the basis of perception that a tree is present.

Further, I do not know why you attribute to me a naive conception of perception as I do not present any particular theory of perception. Philosophers who appeal to religious experience as direct justification for theistic belief usually have quite a bit to say about perception. In her book The Evidential Force of Religious Experience, Caroline Franks Davis says:

She cites the psychologist Neil Bolton as saying "the subject elaborates his repertoire of concepts at the same time that he organizes his environment and, consequently, we should speak of the construction of reality occurring in parallel with the development of cognitive structures such as hypotheses, concepts and plans."

She goes on to say that "the ability to have detailed and accurate perceptual experiences thus develops along with increased understanding of things we are perceiving".

All of this is found in her book in the chapter titled, "Experience and Interpretation". Her book is a fairly detailed defense of belief in God based on religious experience.

Again, I didn't defend a detailed theory of perception as this was merely a post on a discussion forum. However, my comments about perception would seem to be facts for which any theory of perception would have to take account. We form beliefs on the basis of perception and some beliefs are justified directly by experience whereas others are justified by inference. The direct/indirect distinction seems difficult to avoid. It just doesn't seem plausible to suppose that all of our beliefs must be justified by other beliefs. And to suggest that everything we know is known indirectly through knowing something else would lead to either an infinite regress or to circular justification. So some things we know must be known in an immediate (or direct) manner.

It seems reasonable to suppose that God would require us to meet certain conditions before he will reveal himself to us. If God exists, maybe he expects us to make some effort in discovering religious truths. And maybe being capable of perceiving these truths requires a certain outlook, character, disposition, or attitude.

At any rate, my purpose for presenting this model was to suggest that the theist can accept that beliefs cannot be chosen and also accept that people can be responsible for whether or not they believe in God. My purpose was to demonstrate this consistency.

[ August 03, 2002: Message edited by: Taffy Lewis ]</p>

Taffy Lewis

scumble,

Theists need not claim that all theists believe in God in a rational way. Many might believe for purely emotional reasons or some other nonrational cause.

With respect to the "degrading of non-believers", this is unfortunate but unavoidable. Either God exists or he doesn't. If God exists then many people who claim to experience him really do experience him and those that do not experience him are simply spiritually blind for some reason (whether that is because they are materialistic or not). And if God does not exist, then those that claim they experience him are simply delusional in some way.

So either way, some people are simply delusional or some are spiritually blind. Thus, some people are likely to get their feelings hurt.

rainbow walking

Hi Taffy Lewis,

rw: Yes, but you seem to have overlooked my qualifier that trees and computers are readily available to ascertain as ontological facts of reality. The concepts are readily verifiable. There are two problems with the concept of a god that emerge from this observation. The first involves an accurate definition of god but I realize that most folks just accept the basics initially and aren’t very familiar with the more technical issues involved in adequately defining this concept. The second revolves around the fact that this god is not himself perceptually verified or verifiable. For the most part the experiences you are referring to involve attributing some unusual phenomena or personal instance to be evidence of a god’s personal involvement. And, you know as well as I do, this is just a matter of interpretation of the experience. People with strong beliefs in god do this everyday. If they have a need and pray to god and the need is met, no matter that the providence came via another person, god gets the credit. That’s just interpretation pure and simple. It isn’t evidence that a god literally exists except to the person who has interpreted the circumstances in this way.

Taffy: Further, I do not know why you attribute to me a naive conception of perception as I do not present any particular theory of perception. Philosophers who appeal to religious experience as direct justification for theistic belief usually have quite a bit to say about perception.

rw: Well, please forgive me if you interpreted my reply in this fashion. I have no problem with your assertion that religious experience is a direct justification for theistic belief. In fact I most judiciously agree. But just don’t try to elevate that to an argument for the literal existence of a god. People do tend to interpret their experiences through the intellectual sieve of their worldview. This doesn’t translate into evidence or proof that their experiences, interpretations of them, or their worldview is based on truth.

rw: Just remember that experiences are events rather than individual things like a tree or a computer. When one is caught up in the experience of an event that seems to correspond to a concept they’ve been programmed to expect, it is easy to interpret the experience as a direct perception of the literal causative agent. We form beliefs on the basis of thought, information and ideas. Our perceptual senses have no power to form our beliefs. Our eyes don’t see, they just transmit information to our brains that process into sight. If our brains have been programmed to identify a huge object sticking up out of the ground as a tree and we happen to collide with one while riding our bikes both our senses and minds working together will interpret the experience as a collision with a tree. The same holds true for religious experiences as well. It’s all a matter of conceptual programming.

rw: Knowledge is defined as Justified True Belief. Our perception of things, whether direct or not, has no capacity to identify the data it is delivering to our brains. And an empty brain has no capacity to identify data that has been brought to it. There can be no indirect infinite regress because we simply do not have information beyond a certain time frame in history. But we can develop general ideas and worldviews from which we’ll begin interpreting all experiences that our perceptual capacity delivers. A person who already holds some form of a conceptualization of a god in their minds are likely to interpret certain experiences through this paradigm. A person who experiences an epiphany with out prior knowledge of a god concept will not. Perhaps if you could provide some specific examples of these direct perceptions of god it would be helpful in presenting your case.

Taffy: It seems reasonable to suppose that God would require us to meet certain conditions before he will reveal himself to us.

Rw: You mean like believing he actually exists literally which, of course, implies some prior conditioning.

Taffy: If God exists, maybe he expects us to make some effort in discovering religious truths.

Rw: Well, I couldn’t speak to the expectations of a god but I am certain that a great many people expect everyone else to accept their beliefs as true without skepticism.

Taffy: And maybe being capable of perceiving these truths requires a certain outlook, character, disposition, or attitude.

Rw: Or programming.

Taffy: At any rate, my purpose for presenting this model was to suggest that the theist can accept that beliefs cannot be chosen and also accept that people can be responsible for whether or not they believe in God. My purpose was to demonstrate this consistency.

Rw: If a person cannot choose to believe they cannot be responsible for their inability to choose to believe in that which they cannot. The only person who cannot choose to believe or dis-believe is the person who does not want to choose or has not the necessary information available to make a choice. Since all people are born without a belief in god anyone who does believe had to have garnered the concept of both god and belief from someone somewhere. Many people were programmed at such an early age to believe that they likely don’t have a choice. My basic question is why an omnimax god has chosen this method to win the affections of some people rather than a method that would insure everyone an equal opportunity? There are just too many gods and too many claims to make an informed choice.

Hobbs

I just posted something on the "Hello Atheists" thread that I think fits here, too. I hope readers of the other thread don't mind the repetition of me quoting it here. If I don't get a response from SUTG, I'd like to hear what Taffy Lewis has to say:

One thing I find mighty suspicious about the concept of God is that in matters of theology, morality, politics, etc., God always invariably agrees with his followers.

Now, since those followers so often disagree with one another, something is obviously wrong here. Despite their sincerity and certainty that they know and experience God, at least most of them must have gotten it wrong, and it's not really "God" that they "know" from the experiences they label as "religious." It seems to me to make much more sense to conclude that people create their gods in their own image, by taking their own opinions, preferences, and prejudices, which they feel so strongly and believe must be right, and granting them divine status.

If you believe in God, your claim to reliably know anything about God would be significantly enhanced (in my eyes, anyway) if you were to list a few points about which you and God disagree.

Taffy Lewis

Vorkosigan,

I said:

Then you responded:

I only claim that one condition for perceiving God is "honest pursuit of religious truth". A person might need to fulfill more than one of these conditions. Further, I did not claim that any of the conditions for perceiving God are sufficient for theistic perception. I only claim that certain conditions are necessary. The distinction between that which is necessary and that which is sufficient is very important. If our perceiving God also requires a free choice on the part of God to reveal himself then it will also be indeterminate whether or not God reveals himself.

Further, it's not clear to me how someone can find religious truth and also discover that it is a sham. This is blatantly contradictory.

You also said:

The term 'inference' refers to a conscious process. No doubt many brain processes are necessary in order to have such conscious episodes. However, the important distinction is that some of our beliefs are warranted directly by experience rather than through some indirect means. The justification for this claim is that if some things are not known directly then either we have an infinite set of warranted beliefs, circular warrant, or a set of beliefs which have no warrant at all. Everything can't be known indirectly. This is the most important aspect of the perceptual/inferential distinction.

Consider an example. How do you know that there is a computer in front of you? You might appeal to your experience of it and say that you know it directly. Someone might scoff at this and say they don't know this directly. That must mean they know it indirectly by knowing something else. What is that something else they claim to know? They might say they know it because they know of some physiological chain of events involving their eyes and light reflecting off of the computer. Well, do they know this directly or only through some other indirect means? If they know it directly then my point is made. But if they don't then we can ask them how they know this further basis for belief. I think you see where this is going. Either the chain stops with something grounded and warranted in a direct way or we have either an infinite chain, a circular chain, or a set of beliefs with no warrant at all.

You try to make a similar point about our thoughts. You say:

Again, we have the same problem. Something has to be known directly or we have an infinite set of thoughts. For example, you know aspect A of your thought through being aware of aspect B of your thought through being aware of aspect C of your thought through being aware of aspect D of your thought, etc. Every aspect of your thoughts cannot be known indirectly or our thoughts have infinite aspects. This is clearly impossible. So why not just say the propositional content of our thoughts are known directly? These are the aspects we are aware of when we make inferences.

You also said:

First of all, there has been much debate about particular areas of the brain which facilitate religious experiences including experiences of God. This has been referred to as the "god module". The research is early so we can't say anything definitive. One book dealing with a very narrow type of religious experience is Why God Won't Go Away:Brain Science and the Biology of Belief. The authors believe their research supports the notion that we are aware of some supernatural or spiritual realm.

Secondly, I don't know why a physical mechanism would have to be known in order for us to be warranted or justified in trusting theistic perception. Until this century we knew very little about the mechanism of sight. Does that mean people were not justified or warranted in trusting their sight until modern times? This seems to be a bit too sceptical. So we don't need such an account in order to trust theistic perception.

You also said:

This is definately a possility. But another possibility is that people actually experience God. Now we need some reason to believe one account rather than the other. It seems to me that a reasonable principle of rationality says that "how things seem to be in experience is good reason to believe that's how things are in reality unless we have reason to believe otherwise." So in the absence of good reason to think theistic perception is illusory or delusive we should trust it.

Taffy Lewis

S.A.Tan,

I have basically two main reasons why I think the rationality of theistic belief should be based upon experience of God rather than through an inference or argument.

First of all, most theistic arguments can easily reach a level of abstraction and complexity that most people simply cannot follow. Not only that, but theistic arguments also require quite a bit of training in critical thinking and technical knowledge in philosophy and the sciences.

One typical example is the kalam cosmological argument. Sure. It can be stated in a fairly simple form. However, once a person begins examining each premise and its justification the argument becomes too convoluted for the average person. A person needs to know quite a bit about the mathematics of infinity and scientific knowledge dealing with big bang cosmology, quantum mechanics, and high energy physics, among other things. The average person can't follow such debates and most aren't willing to follow them.

The second reason is that coming to know about God through an inference is very impersonal. Most theistic traditions claim that God wants a personal relationship with us. It seems that if we want to have a personal relationship with someone it is better that we should know them directly rather than inferring their existence and nature through bits and pieces of evidence they leave around. Suppose you had a neighbor that you never actually see yet you observe evidence here and there that someone lives next to you. That doesn't seem like much of a personal relationship to me.

Also, I don't see why a theist would need to show anyone that there is a god in order for that theist to be rational in believing in a god. Being justifed or warranted is not the same thing as being able to demonstrate that one is justified or warranted. There are obvious examples which show that you can have one without the other.

Lastly, I don't mean to deny that there are good arguments for the existence of a god. I merely deny that a person needs them in order to be warranted in their belief in a god. Also, it may be that some people can't experience God and can only come to believe in him through an argument.

Taffy Lewis

Vorkosigan,

You quoted me as saying:

Then you respond by saying:

The obvious response is that anyone can have exactly the same experiences theists have when some of them experience God. And just as you can go around my house and see my peach tree, you can fulfill the conditions of perceiving God and experience him and come to see that he is real.

The only objection you have that has any force is the following:

The existence of competing claims and incompatible accounts of God does weaken the confidence a theist can have that their experiences are veridical. However, the question is does it weaken it enough to undermine it. I don't think so. Again, we can compare theistic perception to sensory perception. Most sensory perceptions are genuine. At least we find ourselves compelled to believe they are. Yet quite a few are incompatible. Typical examples include hallucinations, illusions, and dreams. We spend about a third of our lives sleeping and sleep generates quite a few false visual and auditory sensations. Yet we don't allow this to undermine our general trust in sensory perception. Also, it is false that everyone believes in the physical world. Advaita Vendanta Hinduism and most strands of Buddhist thought teaches that the world of appearances (ie. sensory experience) is illusory. And among philosophers we have idealists who make similar claims. Yet most of us don't allow any of this to undermine our general trust in sensory experience and belief in the physical world.

Also, it doesn't seem that memory is as reliable as sensory experience and yet we trust it in general. So theistic perception need not be as reliable as sensory experience in order for us to trust it. Sensory experience, memory, and theistic perception are epistemically parallel in many ways.

This point can be dealt with fairly easily. Many false sensory experiences are generated through "drugs or other stimulants" and hallucinations can be brought on by deprivation or other pathological conditions. Again, this does not cast doubt on our general trust in sensory experience. In order to avoid a double standard it should not cast doubt on theistic perception.

Also, I see no good reason to believe that most theistic perception occurs under such pathological conditions. At least, you haven't given me any good reason to believe so.

This objection is misguided because you seem to require that we see or hear a god in order for us to know that theistic perception is trustworthy. But if we could perceive God through our senses then we would have no need of a theistic perceptual faculty.

Also, just because the immediate causes of the experience are factors that do not include God that does not mean that God cannot figure back further along the causal chain. Again, consider sensory perception. The sufficient conditions for one seeing a tree are found entirely within your skull. In other words, if those conditions are met (ie. you are in a certain brain state) then you will have a visual experience of a tree. That does not mean that a tree does not figure further back along the causal chain even if you don't need to invoke a tree when citing factors closer to the experience.