Andrew Marsh And The Ethics Of Belief

The argument presented by William James in “The Will to Believe” covers theistic beliefs and also includes various philosophical issues as well as matters of practical life. James's primary concern is to argue that Clifford's Rule is irrational. According to Clifford's Rule, one should avoid error at all costs and ultimately risk the loss of certain truths. James claims that Clifford's Rule is just one intellectual strategy and then makes an argument to seek truth by any means available, even at the risk of error or being completely false. James is not arguing against conforming one's belief to the evidence. Nor is he arguing against the importance of evidence. His argument is against withholding beliefs whenever there is little evidence,

In Kelly James Clark’s Article “Without Evidence or Argument”, Clark argues that belief in God, does not require the support of evidence or argument in order for it to be rational. Clark’s argument is against W.K. Clifford’s article “The Ethics of Belief”, in which Clifford claims that everything must be believed only on the basis of sufficient evidence (139). Throughout Kelly Clark’s article he states many things that support his conclusion of belief without evidence or argument, however, my paper will only discuss what Clark says on p.139 starting with the paragraph “The first problem with Clifford’s…” and the following paragraph, ending with the words “...to see why.”

Eboo Patel, founder of the Interfaith Youth Core and author of Acts of Faith, exemplifies the idea of religious pluralism, the acknowledgement of diverse religious groups and their ideologies, and portrays how America can apply this concept to its society in order to possess a better sense of equality as a whole. Patel expresses this belief through his yearning for religious identity. His own personal experiences have shaped his pluralistic position towards religion and life. America would be able to achieve a well functioned society if its citizens would be more open minded and educate themselves on the opinions and beliefs of others.

Across the world there are a surplus of beliefs and systems regarding Gods and religions. There are hundreds and thousands of theologians that claim they have the “truth” about the world and human creation. Although some of these claims may have truth wrapped in them, often times they are covered with fabrication, simply desiring to please the listener and offer the most beneficial reasoning for accepting it. I understand why someone with no religious upbringing or background would not quite know where to start when taking a look at Christianity; however, I’m here to help you understand the amazing aspects of Christianity. These aspects have caused over two billion people around the world to dedicate their lives and ways to follow the center of the religion- God.

William K. Clifford, a great mathematician and philosopher of the 1877 authored the essay The Ethics of Belief. In this famous essay he wrote about how it is always wrong to believe anything that does not have concrete evidence. Although people always have different opinions, beliefs based on bad or incomplete evidence are always wrong no matter what. I believe what Clifford says in this essay about bad evidence because when people believe things that are not true it could negatively affect another person’s life. Clifford gives two examples one of a boat and one about gossip, which helps demonstrate how not having concrete evidence to support one’s statements can negatively impact people around them.

C.S. Lewis disputed for reason-based Christianity as opposed to faith-based Christianity. This is a questionable decision on Lewis’ part because conventional Christianity is indisputably faith-based. Lewis’ principal readers were supposed to be skeptics and atheists rather than current believers. Skeptics doubt for lack of reason and evidence; therefore, only reason and evidence is more likely to draw their reconsideration. In his book, Mere Christianity, Lewis writes: “I am not asking anyone to accept Christianity if his best reasoning tells him that the weight of the evidence is against it.” (about.com).

In W.K Clifford’s Essay he states that “It is wrong, always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.” This argument is not totally wrong but does have some problems to it. In Clifford’s essay he explains a scenario with a ship owner and someone who he will be sending out to the sea. The ship owner does no believe the ship to be good enough, ready enough or in other words sea worthy to be sent out to the sea. Instead of checking the ship to see if it is ready to be sent out to the sea because it Is time consuming, he decides to send the ship out anyway. In the end, the ship ends up sinking in which case, Clifford considers to owner to be guilty of the ship sinking because he should have believed that ship

James(1897) argues that certain actions and convictions need pre-existing beliefs which do not require sufficient evidence. He uses Pascal’s Wager as an example – James (1897) argues Pascal’s Wager may force individuals in choosing to either believe in God or not, regardless of there being sufficient evidence to prove the existence of the former or latter. However, James (1897) argues that different propositions

Eric Hoffer wrote ?The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements? in early 1950 when he offered insight about the current cultural phenomenon surrounding public movements. In his book, Hoffer discusses about the appeal of mass movements, the potential converts, united action and self-sacrifice, and finally the beginning and end of mass movements. This discussion draws upon examples from religious, social, and nationalistic movements.

Rodney Stark and Roger Finke’s Acts of Faith explores the idea of religion acting like an economy, and, more specifically, religion responding to competition in the same way that markets do. In the background of this idea of a religious economy is the overarching question of why America has higher rates of religious participation. Using data from a variety of European countries in conjunction with data gathered in the United States, Stark and Finke found that decreased religious pluralism, as a result either of a country’s history or government regulations, indeed led to lower rates of religious participation, up to a certain point (a “ceiling”, to keep with the economic language). That is to say, “Catholics will be more active the less Catholic their community.” A notable exception to this theory, however, is Mormonism.

The Will to Believe is a lecture that was presented by William James in 1896, it specifically defends that one can choose to believe in a religion without prior evidence of its truth. William James was a well-distinguished philosopher as well as a psychologist and a physician. He with a few other philosophers like Charles sanders Pierce and John Dewey were fundamental in establishing modern philosophy in America and are thought to be the founding fathers of pragmatism.

Samuel Benjamin Harris, also known as Sam was born on April 9th, 1967 in Los Angeles, California. He is an American philosopher, author, and neuroscientist. He attended two colleges, the university of California Los Angeles and Stanford University. He is the co-founder and chief executive of a nonprofit organization called Project Reason; which promotes science and secularism. Also he’s the host of Waking Up podcast. He has published many books and articles such as: The End of Faith, Waking Up, Letter to a Christian Nation, The Moral Landscape, Free will, Lying, and many more. The End of Faith was on the New York Times bestselling list for almost four months. That same book also won other awards such as The PEN/Martha Albrand award.

In the report, The Case for Faith by Lee Strobel was the main focus of study and discussion on the strongest objections of Christianity, additionally, the book following Lee Strobel as he sought answers intentionally to disprove Christianity. However, there were circumstances which led to him proving the case as to why faith in God is justified. Accordingly, the main task of this report provided answers to the theological objections proposed in the book. Given these points, a conclusion arose on the contents of the book disputing whether the information in the book is valid, as the overall opinions on the book were confirmed.

However, to the point of God actually existing I am skeptical. Many people turn to the Bible to bring proof to the table of any doubters like myself. While the bible brings forth some interesting facts that we all would like to believe, it does not necessarily make them true. The bible is not evidence itself because it cannot be confirmed as it is thousands of years old. Who knows, it could have been mistaken to be a bible when it was really just a compilation of short stories over a long period of time. Another claim that tries to prove god is real, is Decartes 3rd Meditation which states; If we have a clear and distinct idea of god, than a cause must be as great as its effect this idea cannot come from an imperfect thing like myself. Therefore, God must exist.(Pojman128) This would be true if the first two points could not be challenged. I can simply deny ever having the idea of god, and no evidence is provided for the second idea it is just an assertion that we, apparently an imperfect thing can ever think of something that we are not, which is simply not true. Perfection is based on the eye of the beholder, we all have different ideas of perfection, whether it is great being of pureness, greatness or whatever the case may be. I also choose bring about Bertrand Russell’s argument that since God is all-loving, all-knowing, and

You can not have religion without faith. George W. Forell states that "faith is universal," (Forell 1). By this Forell is saying that everyone has some sort of belief, they believe in something or somebody. Forell is not limiting this belief to God, or gods for that matter, he simply means that all humans believe in something- money, or education, or the general goodness of mankind. Forell goes on to also describe Christian faith; "Classical Protestantism asserts that God wants fellowship with man and that if we trust completely in Jesus Christ and his work we will have communion with God. This complete and utter trust in Jesus Christ is faith," (Forell 19). I tend to side with George W. Forell and his explanation of Christian faith.