Plantinga: Is Belief in God Properly Basic?

No beliefs are properly basic.

Reply to Pfhorrest Shit, you read that quickly.

Reply to Banno I skimmed it to see if he was actually going to argue against foundationalism or not, and from what I can see he does not, only arguing that it does not rule out taking belief in God to be properly basic. My counterpoint is that foundationalism itself is wrong (as are all forms of justificationism, including coherentism and infinitism as well) and consequently no beliefs are properly basic. Proper rationality isn't about believing nothing unless it is properly justified from the ground up, but about only believing things that cannot be critically ruled out. (Which belief in the usual conception of God can).

(Coincidentally, my latest thread is mostly about exactly that topic.)

Quoting Pfhorrest

... foundationalism itself is wrong (as are all forms of justificationism, including coherentism and infinitism as well) and consequently no beliefs are properly basic. Proper rationality isn't about believing nothing unless it is properly justified from the ground up, but about only believing things that cannot be critically ruled out.

You beat me to it. :up:

EDIT: A nearly 40 year old article that makes even less sense to me now than when I'd first read it back in the mid-1980s, Reply to Hanover. Not worth a serious reread (or even Pfhorrest's skim) IMO. At least from my hybrid foundherentist (Haack, re: data) & falsificationist (Popper, re: models) perspective.

Quoting Pfhorrest

No beliefs are properly basic.

I beg to differ. Here's a couple:
- belief that our senses deliver a functionally accurate view of the world
- belief that there is an external world (i.e. solipsism is false).

These are basic beliefs because they are not derived from prior beliefs - they are innate, consistent with a reasonable world view, and the product of a "design plan" aimed at truth (not actually teleological, but evolutionary processes are analogous to a design plan).

Plantinga claims we have a sensus divinitatus, and that this works analogously to the senses. It's not logically impossible, but it is not a sense that can be verified to exist. Even if it does exist, it is a very inexact sense, since there's such extreme diversity in perception of a deity among humans past and present.

Reply to Banno I'll read the article because you've posted something I might finally be interested in.

I will point out also that the responses so far have been entirely unresponsive to your question as I understood it. Your question was whether a belief in God is properly basic in a foundationalist system, which is the question of the article. Your question and the article's question is not whether the concept of foundationalism is flawed. The meta-analysis of the posters here of foundationalism generally is based upon the laziness of not wishing to read the actual article, but instead just to fall back upon their general philosophy 101 objections to the enterprise of foundationalism.

Now that I've properly chastised our good posters, I'll actually read the article.

Carry on.

Reply to Banno When you put a provocative question in the title of the thread, most people are just going to respond to the title without bothering to read further. I learned this the hard way. Well, most people won't bother reading further than the title anyway, but at least if you don't bait them you might get fewer useless replies.

Quoting Relativist

No beliefs are properly basic.
— Pfhorrest
I beg to differ. Here's a couple:
- belief that our senses deliver a functionally accurate view of the world

Except for 'aspects of the world' within a narrow range of (non-planck) sizes & (non-relativistic) speeds, our (unaided) senses do not. Our "view" is not a "belief" but a perceptual-cognitive bias (e.g. change blindness). Or what Hume aptly termed "habit of thought", which persists until we stumble upon (scientific observation, anyone?) instances of perception that are not "functionally accurate".

- belief that there is an external world (i.e. solipsism is false).

There aren't any grounds to doubt "there is an external world", thus no issue at stake, or question to answer, to believe or not. And solipsism isn't even false, it's nonsense (pace Witty).

Reply to Banno

I would argue the belief in gods or a god is a basicality mainly because to get large groups of people to work together you need a false belief or perhaps a real belief such as Noah Harrari talked about in "Sapiens". Have you heard of "Pascal's Wager"? As to whether there is some sort of supernatural force out there, i would argue thats a matter of personal experience and considering the dark world we live in i could imagine why many would say there is not.

Reply to Banno

i screwed up the definition of basicality. Considering the article has 10 words i'm not completely (completely) familiar with, i would have to say that the belief in gods/god is not a basicality. I could look up the definitions but that would be alot of work.

Quoting Relativist

I beg to differ. Here's a couple:
- belief that our senses deliver a functionally accurate view of the world

What is "the world"? The only idea of a world I have is from my senses. Sometimes what I think they're telling me doesn't line up with other things I think they're telling me, but all I have to work with is what my senses seem to be telling me, and the best I can do is try to make consistent sense (no pun intended) of that as a whole. I don't have a foundational, basic belief that my senses are delivering an accurate view of something else beyond what I sense; what I sense just is what seems to be, and though it might not be, I have no reason to doubt that seeming unless other senses seem to contradict it.

- belief that there is an external world (i.e. solipsism is false).

What difference is there between an "external" world and, I presume, an "internal" one? Is the world I describe above an internal one or an external one? How could I tell the difference between those (nominally) two things?


Don't get me wrong, I think that something like the views you espouse here (empiricism and realism) are correct, and very core, central views that can support a bunch of different more specific views on other things, so if foundationalism were true they seem like they would make good basic beliefs. But foundationalism isn't true, and the reason to retain (not adopt) these beliefs is because there are no good arguments against them, and there are good arguments against doing otherwise. The same is true, FWIW, about anti-justificationism: there are good arguments against justificationism, and no good arguments for it, so it's rational to reject it and retain its negation. These three things (empiricism or more generally phenomenalism; realism or more generally objectivism; anti-justificationism or more generally what I call "liberalism") plus anti-fideism (which I call "criticism") are the four core principles of my entire philosophy, but they're still not properly basic beliefs.

Quoting 180 Proof

Except for 'aspects of the world' within a narrow range of (non-planck) sizes & (non-relativistic) speeds, our (unaided) senses do not.

So what if it's a narrow range? It is a range that has been relevant to our survival- as one would expect if it is a product of natural selection.

Our "view" is not a "belief" but a perceptual-cognitive bias (e.g. change blindness). Or what Hume aptly termed "habit of thought", which persists until we stumble upon (scientific observation, anyone?) instances of perception that are not "functionally accurate".

David Armstrong terms these "non-verbal beliefs", and I think that's an appropriate way to view it because these ground all other beliefs about the world- including the inferences of science.

It is not mere "habit" that infants perceive objects beyond themselves. It's not taught.

Quoting Pfhorrest

What is "the world"? The only idea of a world I have is from my senses. Sometimes what I think they're telling me doesn't line up with other things I think they're telling me, but all I have to work with is what my senses seem to be telling me, and the best I can do is try to make consistent sense (no pun intended) of that as a whole.

As I said, our sense of the world is FUNCTIONALLY accurate. We do not walk off cliffs; we do not eat rocks; we perceive and avoid predators.

Quoting christian2017

I would argue the belief in gods or a god is a basicality mainly because to get large groups of people to work together you need a false belief or perhaps a real belief

That doesn't entail a basic belief, because it is LEARNED. Basic beliefs aren't learned, they are innate. Plantinga suggests we perceive God through a theoretical "sensus divinitatus", analogous to vision, or hearing.

Has anyone, other than me, read Plantinga"s "Warranted Christian Belief"?

Seems the paper and the thread are going to hinge upon what counts as properly basic, or basic beliefs...

This, of course, requires first clarifying exactly what counts as a belief in the first place. Platinga seems to be talking about propositions.

Quoting Relativist

So what if it's a narrow range? It is a range that has been relevant to our survival- as one would expect if it is a product of natural selection.

Right. So not "basic", acquired (only by survivor species) via adaptation. In other words, emergent traits (i.e. habits) not "beliefs", or propositional assertions. Why conflate physiological, perceptual and neurological functions (i.e. inputs-throughput) with epistemic / cognitive states (i.e. reflexive outputs)?

It is not mere "habit" that infants perceive objects beyond themselves. It's not taught.

Hume refers to "habits of thought" in the context of reflexes dispositions traits skills etc acquired through being "taught", observation or trial & error practices (e.g. play). I add perceptual / cognitive biases to that. (Memo: "Innatism", like teleology, has been debunked. :roll: ) These are not 'answers to questions' with a truth-value aka "beliefs". And even if they were, by your own admission the result of natural selection - emergent (from adaptation), not "basic".

Reply to Relativist

i addressed that with the post i made right after the above post.

Quoting 180 Proof

So not "basic", acquired (only by survivor species) via adaptation. In other words, emergent traits (i.e. habits) not "beliefs", or propositional assertions. Why conflate physiological, perceptual and neurological functions (i.e. inputs-throughput) with epistemic / cognitive states (i.e. reflexive outputs)?

Being acquired as part of species development doesn't negate the fact these beliefs are innate to the individual, and that is sufficient for being basic.

If materialism is true, what are beliefs? David Armstrong suggests a belief is a dispositional state of mind; it disposes one to behave a certain way. Beliefs don't have to be verbal. My cat believes her water bowl will be in a certain place in the house despite the fact she can't formulate the words to state this. It's no different with us: perception is the acquiring of beliefs (that may be true or false) about the world. We have survived as a species because these perceptions have been sufficiently reliable to allow us to survive.

Quoting creativesoul

Platinga seems to be talking about propositions.

Right, he uses that narrow view of belief, but he considers perceptions (including the sensus divinitatus) as part of the belief forming process. Seeing a tree produces the belief that a tree is before us. Perceiving God produces the belief of God.

Reply to Relativist The content of ordinary empirical beliefs is more or less an expectation of having those same empirical experiences in similar contexts; the expectation of the sensations of experiencing a tree is the content of a belief that a tree exists; "the tree", that we believe exists, is whatever it is that gives rise to such sensations, and that is the whole of its being. So if belief in God is similar, and people's perception of God is the warm fuzzy feelings they get when praying or having religious experiences etc, then is "God" just whatever it is that gives rise to those feelings, and belief in God just an expectation of such feelings occurring in those contexts, etc? Is "God is love" more literal than it's usually taken to be, and "God" just is a kind of lovey feeling? That's basically theological noncognitivism right there, which is fine with even most atheists so far as I know. Nobody expects to go searching the world for the object that the feeling of love corresponds to, asking "does love really exist or is it just a feeling?" doesn't make any sense, there is nothing more to love than people feeling love. So if our conception of God is just of a feeling like that, then there is nothing more to "God" than people feeling like that. But that really doesn't mesh at all with the kind of "God" described in any holy texts, who himself has feelings and does things other than just give rise to feelings in people. It's the existence of that kind of thing, that does that kind of stuff, that's in question.

[s]The essay doesn't do justice to the title.[/s]

I don't understand this. If god-beliefs are properly basic within the original definition of properly basic then it would've been something substantial as that would mean god-beliefs are self-evident in the sense true sans proof. However, Plantinga seems to reject the original definition of a properly basic belief: A is properly basic to S iff A is incorrigible for S and/or A is self-evident. He makes no effort to offer us the "correct" definition of properly basic but that really doesn't matter since a god-belief being properly basic would be substantive only if Plantinga had kept to the original definition of properly basic.

Reply to Pfhorrest One thing may not have been clear: Plantinga doesn't claim his theory of the sensus divinitatus provides an objective proof of God's existence. Rather, his claim is that belief in God is as rational as believing solipsism is false. Further, he says belief in God constitutes knowledge, in the strict sense - not even subject to Gettier problems. He also acknowledges that if there is no God, it's not knowledge.

He takes the alleged knowledge acquired by the sensus divinitatus beyond a raw sensory input, analogous to the raw perception of a tree. He suggests it could go so far as to provide a basis for "knowing" the various doctrines of Christianity.

The main slam against this view is that ANY theistic belief could be "justified" in this way. Linus can claim to "know" the Great Pumpkin exists. An Islamist terrorist can claim to "know" God wants him to kill infidels. Plantinga acknowledges this.

My take on it is that his Reformed Epistemology is a worthy contribution to epistemology (it has sparked a lot of published responses). I also think it can be applied to materialism (I use a version to justify dismissing solipsism; solipsism can't be proven false, but our innate properly basic belief in the external world is not undercut by mere possibility). Without the notion of properly basic beliefs, foundationalism has no bedrock foundation.

My own position is foundationalist, I suppose one could say. But I've not really seen a good criterion for a properly basic belief in the paper, because I have yet to have seen a criterion for belief itself.

A properly basic belief, would be a belief formed and held prior to language use. Those are not propositional, for the believing creature has no language, and propositions require language. I'm also not too sure about calling them "innate" either...

I'll read the paper again. I've read through once and then skimmed again. Seems that what I'm raising here needs parsed out, to me at least...

What is the bare minimum criterion for what counts as a belief? What do all belief have in common such that that's what makes them beliefs?

Did anyone read the article?

The error is in thinking...

...that a belief is properly basic only in certain conditions; these conditions are, we might say, the ground of its justification and, by extension, the ground of the belief itself. In this sense, basic beliefs are not, or are not necessarily, groundless beliefs.

There seems to me a contradiction involved in setting out basic beliefs as dependent on anything.

@Sam26?

Quoting Banno

There seems to me a contradiction involved in setting out basic beliefs as dependent on anything.

The articles goes to pains to argue that it's not a justificatory relationship between a basic belief and something else which grounds it, it's something more like a practical one. If one sees a tree, in normal circumstances one may hold that one sees a tree, and infer that the tree exists. The inference there is not an act of cognition or deduction, it is a practical presupposition, like that it can be said that I believe that "I am holding a fork" is true when I am holding a fork purely in virtue of holding the fork. The argument construes belief in "God exists" in precisely the same manner as belief that forks exists while holding them.

While I disagree with the conclusions, I enjoy the conceptual machinery here. Basic beliefs spring from a context of activity, if one acts in a context involving God, belief in God is basic. The interesting question in my book is the status of being basic; is it a property of a statement, is it a binary relationship between a statement and a context, or is it a ternary relationship between a statement and a context and an event or activity?

"Properly basic belief" is perhaps a misnomer, and what Plantinga is talking about is, in the best case, (akin to) a "religious" form-of-life within which "god" language-games are not idle (Witty) ... or, adjacently, an absolute presupposition (Collingwyrd) framing / anchoring a "religious" (i.e. JCI) worldview ... or "god" is merely a regulatory idea as per CPrR (Cant).  In other words, semantic not epistemic. Someone tell me what am I missing.

What is properly basic, is what one cannot do without.


God, Nature, man.

Superego, id, ego.

Daddy, Mummy, child.

Thesis, antithesis, synthesis.

Three, three, the rivals.

Without God, man dissolves into nature, mind into matter. So God is as real as the distinction between man and nature, or self and world.

And, Plantings has to admit, as unreal.

Quoting fdrake

The articles goes to pains to argue that it's not a justificatory relationship between a basic belief and something else which grounds it, it's something more like a practical one.

Indeed, it does; but does it succeed?

Quoting Banno

Did anyone read the article?

It seemsto me that the error is in thinking...

...that a belief is properly basic only in certain conditions; these conditions are, we might say, the ground of its justification and, by extension, the ground of the belief itself. In this sense, basic beliefs are not, or are not necessarily, groundless beliefs.

There seems to me a contradiction involved in setting out basic beliefs as dependent on anything.

Quoting fdrake

The articles goes to pains that it's not a justificatory relationship between a basic belief and something else, it's something more like a practical one. If one sees a tree, in normal circumstances one may hold that one sees a tree, and infer that the tree exists. The inference there is not an act of cognition, it is a practical presupposition, like that "I am holding a fork" is true when one is holding a fork. The argument construes belief in "God exists" in precisely the same manner as belief that forks exists while holding them.

While I disagree with the conclusions, I enjoy the conceptual machinery here. Basic beliefs spring from a context of activity, if one has a context involving God, belief in God is basic. The interesting question in my book is the status of being basic; is it a property of a statement, is it a binary relationship between a statement and a context, or is it a ternary relationship between a statement and a context and an event or activity?

The claim that properly basic beliefs are not necessarily(always) groundless causes a bit of confusion. Banno is right to point this out. If a belief is grounded, then it's always grounded upon another more basic belief, unless one holds that well grounded belief needs no language(as I do). Plantinga does not seem to work from that though...

However, Platinga is right to focus upon the context involving basic beliefs. Such consideration is imperative to our understanding them.

The bit about the tree may lead somewhere interesting and useful. If one holds that one sees a tree, then what is that holding if not a belief that one sees a tree? I don't think it's helpful to then say that one further infers that the tree exists, and that that inference amounts to some special sort of practical presupposition. To quite the contrary, that's all quite wrong on it's face.

Holding that one sees something(a tree in this case) is a basic belief. At the most basic level of belief, prior to language use, when one sees a tree one cannot help but to believe that they are seeing something. That belief is inevitable, in that such pre-linguistic beliefs cannot possibly be doubted. Such beliefs are required in order to learn the names of things, such as that that is(called) "a tree". Thus, they facilitate language acquisition altogether. Earlier, relativist broached this consideration a bit. It deserves more discussion, for these are the times in which basic beliefs are formed, and they do not consist of statements of belief, whether they be grounded or groundless.

Quoting fdrake

I enjoy the conceptual machinery here. Basic beliefs spring from a context of activity, if one has a context involving God, belief in God is basic. The interesting question in my book is the status of being basic; is it a property of a statement, is it a binary relationship between a statement and a context, or is it a ternary relationship between a statement and a context and an event or activity?

I agree that the status of a basic belief is an interesting question. However, knowing that requires knowing what beliefs are. The context of belief formation is imperative for it provides us with the information needed in order to be able to identify the content of the belief(s) in question. I do not think that Plantinga or current convention has belief right to start with, so they're bound to get what counts a properly basic one wrong as well. In OC, Witt struggled with setting out hinge propositions(his notion of basic - bedrock - belief) for the same reasons...

Quoting unenlightened

Without God, man dissolves into nature, mind into matter. So God is as real as the distinction between man and nature, or self and world.

And, Planting[a] has to admit, as unreal.

:up:

From the paper on pg.1(41)

Some of my beliefs, however, I accept but don't accept on the basis of any other beliefs. Call these beliefs basic. I believe that 2 + 1 = 3, for example, and don't believe it on the basis of other propositions. I also believe that I am seated at my desk, and that there is a mild pain in my right knee.

This exemplifies this issue I'm pointing out here. The conflation of belief and propositions. Besides that, even if we grant that all beliefs have propositional content, one simply cannot believe that 2+1=3 without first believing that they know what those marks mean. This mark(2) refers to this quantity, etc...

One cannot believe that one is seated at a desk, unless one first knows what a desk is, etc...

One cannot believe that there is a mild pain in one's right knee, unless one knows how to distinguish between the severity of pains... mild, severe, etc...

All of these may be called "basic" or "properly basic" if we allow our search for basic belief to be guided by a gross misunderstanding of belief, such as working from an utterly inadequate criterion for belief to begin with. None of those beliefs are existentially independent from language use. All of them are existentially dependent upon language constructs. Yet, because belief is not properly understood, it is mistakenly believed to be dependent upon language, so no one bats an eye when people say things like Plantinga claimed here.

These are all consequences stemming from having belief wrong to begin with.

Something else occurred to me tonight, largely due to Un's participation...

What if the notion of "basic" amounts to something like being foundational to all other beliefs. In that sense, and under the right sorts of conditions/circumstances, Plantinga offers as good an argument as it gets for belief in God being basic/foundational.

In the context of being raised in religious communities, certain members of that community could very well have a belief in God that is rightfully, sensibly, and positively correctly said to be as basic as it gets... if being basic amounts to being foundational/fundamental to all other operative belief in the candidate's worldview.

Quoting Banno

The articles goes to pains to argue that it's not a justificatory relationship between a basic belief and something else which grounds it, it's something more like a practical one.
— fdrake

Indeed, it does; but does it succeed?

Not by my lights.

Although, I agree that basic belief does not have the same sort of justification/grounding as statements of belief that are called "basic". Basic belief... properly basic belief... is prior to language.

Some belief is prior to language. Thus, if we call some of these "basic", then the something that grounds it would be what's happened, and/or is happening... Being a part of the world grounds properly basic belief(the collapse of the distinction between us and nature). Plantinga skirted around this with the bits about sitting at desks and knee pain...

Quoting creativesoul

What if the notion of "basic" amounts to something like being foundational to all other beliefs.

That's exactly what a basic belief IS.

Correct, and that's exactly why foundationalism is bullshit (not in the technical sense). "Everything needs a reason", except for these things that obviously don't. Well then why isn't God or the Great Pumpkin or any other nonsense "obvious" enough? If you ever stop to say something is without need of justification, you're saying that it's beyond question, and therefore asking anyone who might disagree just to take your word for it, on faith. Foundationalism is equivalent to fideism, and consequently anti-rationalist. Critical rationalism is the only sound rationalism that doesn't fall either into fideism or an infinite regress to nihilism.

Quoting Relativist

What if the notion of "basic" amounts to something like being foundational to all other beliefs.
— creativesoul
That's exactly what a basic belief IS.

Well, that's what's said about them anyway. In what way are they foundational? Is it a matter of existential dependency and elemental constituency, or is it one of value assessment? Belief in God would be a value assessment. That's the most important belief for some. In that way, it would be both basic and grounded upon other more basic beliefs. Belief that one knows what certain words mean comes prior to any and all belief in God. The latter is existentially dependent upon the former.

Quoting Pfhorrest

If you ever stop to say something is without need of justification, you're saying that it's beyond question, and therefore asking anyone who might disagree just to take your word for it, on faith.

While I do not entirely disagree... This is about thinking about belief(reporting upon belief), not what belief itself is. Another consequence of getting belief wrong to begin with.

Quoting creativesoul

In what way are they foundational?

To be warranted, a belief needs rational justification. Justification means showing how the belief is inferred from other warranted beliefs. Ultimately, there will be beliefs that aren't derived from prior beliefs- these are the basic beliefs, the foundation for one's entire belief structure.

Quoting Relativist

...beliefs that aren't derived from prior beliefs- these are the basic beliefs, the foundation for one's entire belief structure.

Although it is quite clear that belief begins simply and grows in it's complexity, and is thus accrued in a way, I do not think that happens in a strictly linear fashion, although belief in God is close when one learns to talk like that from early on.

My name is...

That is a tree. That is a cat. That is a banana.

These are basic... right? Or are they?

Quoting creativesoul

Although it is quite clear that belief begins simply and grows in it's complexity, and is thus accrued in a way, I do not think that happens in a strictly linear fashion

I agree, but we can still analyse any specific belief to determine whether or not it is warranted. A belief that is fully wartanted would rely only on other warranted beliefs, so there are layers upon layers - until reaching the foundation. At any rate, that's the theory upon which foundationalism is based.

Reply to Relativist

Are the foundational beliefs warranted? What about justificatory regress?

Quoting creativesoul

Are the foundational beliefs warranted? What about justificatory regress?

That is the general problem with foundationalism. Plantinga addresses this by arguing that beliefs that are "basic in the proper way" (i.e. properly basic) have warrant. The "proper way" is that it was produced by a sound mind, in an environment supportive of proper thought in accord with a design plan successfully aimed at truth.

Quoting Banno

Indeed, it does; but does it succeed?

I find the argument plausible.

(1) I see a tree.
(2) I heard God speaking to me when I read the Bible.

People exist that have sound mind and normal perceptual faculties that do (1) and (2). I can no more doubt that I saw the tree than that I heard God. Therefore, the tree exists and God exists.

Assuming that you believe in basic beliefs, on what criterion would you distinguish instances of (1) from instances of (2) as basic beliefs?

Reply to fdrake (1) is clearly rooted in a basic belief (no pun intended)
(2) is rooted in basic belief only if there is a God who speaks to humans and we actually have the faculty to hear it.

I'll stress that Plantinga is not endeavoring to prove God. He's just showing that knowledge of God is possible (in the strict sense of "knowledge"), IF God exists.

Quoting Relativist

(2) is rooted in basic belief only if there is a God who speaks to humans and we actually have the faculty to hear it.

(1) is rooted in basic belief only if there was a tree who is seeable by humans and we actually have the faculty to hear it.

I believe the same logic applies to the tree as to God. You can substitute tree for God in the expression, and hearing for sight.

You are doubting that people have a special God faculty, whereas the example only requires hearing.

Reply to Relativist

I should say that I agree that the argument isn't really about God's existence, it's breaking down a bunch of implications.

Basic belief -> groundless belief? Nope.
Reject popular at the time (apparently) foundationalist criterion for basicality -> arbitrary beliefs are basic? Nope.

Then highlighting a pretty hard criterion problem for beliefs being basic.

The only argument for the existence of God in it is that if there's some belief which is properly basic that concerns God, it's reasonable for the person to conclude that God exists on that basis.

I am only vaguely familiar with Plantinga's approach, but the discussion and examples so far remind me of the non-foundationalist pragmatism of Charles Sanders Peirce. He sometimes preferred to call it "pragmaticism" in order to distinguish his realist version from the more popular nominalism of his good friend William James.

Our direct perception of things and events prompts us to make involuntary perceptual judgments that are quite fallible. We cannot help believing them at first, and they lead us to anticipate certain other things and events going forward. When those predictions are fulfilled in our subsequent experience, the belief--which is really a habit of conduct, even when expressed as a proposition--is corroborated; when they are confounded, it is falsified. In other words, this is just our everyday implementation of the scientific method:

1. Retroduction, formulating a plausible hypothesis.
2. Deduction, working out its necessary consequences.
3. Induction, evaluating whether those outcomes are realized.

Moreover, Peirce held that we have a direct perception of God. He somewhat famously wrote an article near the end of his life that presented "A Neglected Argument for the Reality of God" as a process of retroduction, rather than deduction as employed in most classical "proofs."

Reply to Banno Banno?

I haven't read everything in this thread, so if duplicate some of what's already been mentioned forgive the laziness.

Plantinga's properly basic beliefs are in some ways similar to how I interpret Wittgenstein's bedrock beliefs. I believe, and have argued this extensively in other places, that Wittgenstein's bedrock beliefs are outside the language-game of epistemology, i.e., they are not based on epistemological justifications. One way to understand this, is to consider doubting these kinds of statements. The classic example is Moore's statement, "I know this is my hand." To see how unclear this statement is (according to Wittgenstein) consider its negation, "I don't know this is my hand (but consider this is Moore's context, before a crowd holding up his hand). For the belief to be bedrock in the Wittgensteinian sense, it must generally (i.e., in most contexts) be the kind of belief that is exempt (again, in most contexts) from doubt. If it is generally not doubted, then it is a statement that is outside of our epistemological language-games in those undoubtable contexts.

If a proposition/statement can be sensibly doubted, then it makes sense that it would need to have a justification to support it, or it would need an epistemological justification to overcome the doubt. Knowing and doubting go hand-in-hand, which is why we need good reasons/evidence, or some other kind of justification. Otherwise, we could infer that one knows, simply by one's claim that one knows. Knowing requires an objective justification.

Plantinga's basic beliefs are similar, in that Plantinga believes that his properly basic beliefs, in this case, belief in God, is direct, immediate, and basic. So, in Plantinga's reformed epistemology, belief in God is so basic that support in terms of an epistemological justification is not needed. Belief in God is foundational or basic as Plantinga says. However, I would argue that Plantinga is wrong about this. Why? We can use the Wittgensteinian test, i.e., does it make sense to doubt that God exists? The obvious answer is, yes. The statement that God exists is not the same as "My hand exists." We don't have direct experiences with God, at least not in the sense that we do with our hands, or even our mothers, fathers, siblings, friends, etc. This would be true even if some people did have direct experiences with God. Why? Because most of us don't have direct experiences with God. Belief in God is not the same as a belief that one has a mother or father. Believing that one has a mother or father is properly basic. If you don't believe it, try doubting it.

My conclusion, is that if you have a belief in God, then it requires a good epistemological justification. It's a cop out to think that such a belief doesn't require such a justification.

Reply to Sam26 :up:

Reply to Sam26 Sam!

Quoting Sam26

The statement that God exists is not the same as "My hand exists." We don't have direct experiences with God, at least not in the sense that we do with our hands, or even our mothers, fathers, siblings, friends, etc. This would be true even if some people did have direct experiences with God. Why? Because most of us don't have direct experiences with God

On the contrary, Plantinga claims that most people DO have direct exprerience - a sense of divinity that produces beliefs about God:

[i]
The sensus divinitatis is a disposition or set of dispositions to form theistic beliefs in various circumstancs, in response to the sorts of conditions or stimuli that trigger the working of this sense of divinity. ...this knowledge of God is not arrived at by inference or argument but in a more immediate way. The deliverances of the sensus divinitatis are not quick and sotto voce inferences from the circumstances that trigger its operation. It isn't that one beholds the night sky, notes that it is grand, and concludes that there must be a God....It s rather that, upon perception of the night sky...these beliefs just arise in us. They are occasioned by the circumstances; they are not conclusions of them. [/i] -- Warranted Christian Belief, p173-175

This is analogous to seeing a hand, and this producing the belief "my hand exists".

Quoting Relativist

On the contrary, Plantinga claims that most people DO have direct exprerience - a sense of divinity that produces beliefs about God:

I know he claims that, but I'm saying that it's not the same as the kind of experiences we have with one another. The kind of experiences we have with one another are not the kind that can be sensibly doubted, at least not usually. Whereas these supposedly direct experiences with God are easily doubted for good reason.

If they can be doubted, then they are not basic as Plantinga claims. None of the major religions can agree on these experiences. People claim all kinds of things as direct experiences. However, now I'm a bit off topic.

Reply to Sam26 You have a good point but I think Plantinga might argue that a "proper functioning" person cannot sensibly doubt God's existence.

Reply to Relativist Ya, he would say something like that. Years ago I went to a couple of conferences and listened to Plantinga give lectures on this topic. I think it was around 1979-80 at Wheaton College.

Quoting Sam26

I know he claims that, but I'm saying that it's not the same as the kind of experiences we have with one another. The kind of experiences we have with one another are not the kind that can be sensibly doubted, at least not usually. Whereas these supposedly direct experiences with God are easily doubted for good reason.

And then there is the point I made earlier, that didn't seem to strike a chord with anyone. When you see your hand and are prompted to believe that your hand exists, the contents of that belief are an elaboration upon the details of the experience that prompted it. If you look up at a grand starry sky and are thereby prompted to believe that God exists, the contents of that belief, whatever they are (it's not really clear), are different from just an elaboration upon the details of the experience that prompted it, which would instead be something like a belief about astronomical facts.

Quoting Pfhorrest

the point I made earlier, that didn't seem to strike a chord with anyone. When you see your hand and are prompted to believe that your hand exists

When I see a rainbow and am prompted to believe the rainbow exists, is this a properly basic belief, that is an elaboration upon the details of the experience that prompted it? Or are rainbows more like God?

Quoting Pfhorrest

When you see your hand and are prompted to believe that your hand exists, the contents of that belief are an elaboration upon the details of the experience that prompted it.

I think I understand what you're saying, although it seems like a strange way to say it (using the word "prompt"). I would say that our sensory experiences can justify a belief, i.e., it's one of the epistemological ways we use to justify a belief. For example, "How do you know the orange juice is sweet?" "I tasted it." Or, "How do you know that Mary shot Joe?" "I was there the night Mary shot Joe, I saw it."

If we want to understand how it is that we know something, then look at how we use the word in ordinary circumstances. There are several ways we justify a belief. For example, testimony, sensory experience, linguistic training, logic (inductive and deductive reason), etc. My point is that there is a better way to talk about how we arrive at a belief without using the word "prompt." At least that is how I see it.

On the contrary, No one can mentally admit the opposite of what is self-evident; as the Philosopher (Metaph. iv, lect. vi) states concerning the first principles of demonstration. But the opposite of the proposition "God is" can be mentally admitted: "The fool said in his heart, There is no God" (Psalm 53:2). Therefore, that God exists is not self-evident.

http://www.newadvent.org/summa/1002.htm

Reply to unenlightened Yes.

Reply to Sam26 I’m just speaking in the way Plantinga does to show that his sensus divinatus is different from ordinary senses in an important way even within his own framework.

Quoting Pfhorrest

?unenlightened Yes.

Yes, rainbows are like God? Yes, the existence of rainbows is properly basic? Yes, rainbows are like hands? Yes, we have no bananas? Help me out a bit.

Quoting Hanover

The meta-analysis of the posters here of foundationalism generally is based upon the laziness of not wishing to read the actual article, but instead just to fall back upon their general philosophy 101 objections to the enterprise of foundationalism.

IN truth I was expecting the thread to quickly fall victim to the religious fervour infecting the forums - as Reply to PuerAzaelis. The other danger is the one you cite - and that Reply to 180 Proof so gleefully advocates, not reading the article.

So I'm pleased to see the discussion that @Sam26 has induced; that's what I was looking forward to.

Aquinas is not so bad.

Quoting Sam26

For the belief to be bedrock in the Wittgensteinian sense, it must generally (i.e., in most contexts) be the kind of belief that is exempt (again, in most contexts) from doubt. If it is generally not doubted, then it is a statement that is outside of our epistemological language-games in those undoubtable contexts.

Thank you, Sam, for participating.

Plantinga wants to treat basic beliefs as part of the epistemological game; he is looking for a suitable analysis, the rules of the game, as it were. But basic beliefs are what make the game possible, and hence are in that sense not a part of the game. They cannot be doubted without throwing out the whole game.

Quoting creativesoul

Basic belief... properly basic belief... is prior to language.

You know I will disagree with you one this; it implies that a properly basic belief is could not in principle be stated.

Reply to fdrake See Sam's argument; seeing a tree is not something that could be doubted, while the tree is before you. But hearing the voice of god while reading the bible is something that could be doubted.

It's an interesting argument, but I'm not convinced that it works.

Reply to PuerAzaelis Sure; can you fill in the gaps, so that we less versed in the Summa might understand what is being claimed, perhaps in the light of the article?

If Aquinas were asked the question of the OP, he might have said, no, the belief in God is not properly basic, since although the belief that there is no God is not dependent on any other proposition, it can be rationally denied.

Reply to Banno In the article, he explains that he's not talking about groundless beliefs. A basic belief doesn't rely on other beliefs.

I can doubt that I had breakfast this morning. I believe it based on memory, not on some other belief, so it's basic.

Reply to frank If you can reasonably doubt it, then it is not a basic belief. A basic belief is groundless, in that it is not dependent on, nor justified by, any other belief. Rather a basic belief is one that cannot sensible, rationally, be subject to doubt.

Of course, any belief might, irrationally, unreasonably, be doubted.

You might reasonably doubt your memory of having had breakfast, were there some evidence - the eggs you had planned to use are still there, the plates are in the draw and not the dishwasher, you had some other recent memory lapses. Not just any groundless belief will do.

Reply to Banno So if one has no reason to doubt one's religious experiences, then the beliefs grounded in them are basic?

Quoting unenlightened

When I see a rainbow and am prompted to believe the rainbow exists, is this a properly basic belief, that is an elaboration upon the details of the experience that prompted it?

Yes.

Quoting frank

So if one has no reason to doubt one's religious experiences, then the beliefs grounded in them are basic?

That's the topic here - but for any belief.

Perhaps, Albert has no reason to doubt his experience. So it is basic for Albert. But Benjamin does have reason to doubt Albert's religious belief, so it's not basic for Ben. Ben might say that Albert is mistake, or misguided, or some such.

That's a description of what is going on. Who is right? What ought we believe?

Reply to Pfhorrest So, there are basic beliefs? Or are you setting out a definition of basic beliefs, which you claim is empty?

Considering Quoting Pfhorrest

No beliefs are properly basic.

I think no beliefs are properly basic, because foundationalism is false; but, even if we were presuming that some beliefs were properly basic, belief in God prompted by seeing a starry sky and getting a feeling of grandeur is importantly different from belief in trees prompted by seeing trees.

Quoting Banno

Who is right? What ought we believe?

I think your beliefs are your business, not mine. If you want to discuss them with me, that's cool. If you're religious, I'd be curious.

I think that we should believe in religious tolerance. What's your view?

Quoting Pfhorrest

I think no beliefs are properly basic, because foundationalism is false,

You disagree with foundationalism, but do you have any other particular system for evaluating the reasonableness of your beliefs, and the beliefs of others?

Do you think belief in God can be rational? If the answer is yes, then Plantinga's Reformed Epistemology may be irrelevant to you. If no, then please describe your basis for thinking that.

Quoting Banno

while the tree is before you. But hearing the voice of god while reading the bible is something that could be doubted.

Why? What lets you distinguish one from the other?

Quoting Pfhorrest

When you see your hand and are prompted to believe that your hand exists, the contents of that belief are an elaboration upon the details of the experience that prompted it.

Myth of the Given.

Reply to fdrake Well, see Sam's posts. Ask him, if you don't follow. It's his argument.

Reply to Pneumenon Doubt for doubt's sake.

Reply to Banno

I don't really buy it. If you're going to make any condition of use sufficient for basicality, if you change the use you change the criteria of basicality. It requires some work to distinguish this from arbitrariness.

Reply to Banno If you're going to dismiss the discussion in that way, then his original comment about elaboration on experience isn't necessary to begin with. Analyzing it that way is what invites the Sellarsian response.

Quoting fdrake

If you're going to make any condition of use sufficient for basicality, if you change the use you change the criteria of basicality.

I agree that if you change the use you change the criteria of basicality. What is basic depends on what one is doing. So there is a sense in which, say, there being a god is basic to worshiping.

And so i must be misunderstanding @Sam26, since he seems sometimes to claim that there are things that are basic to all or any language games...

The answer must be in there being two sorts of basic beliefs - those that are presumed in order for an activity to occur, like keeping the bishop on its own colour in order to play chess; and those that are somehow universally basic... and "here is a hand" is one of those.

But I don't see that as workable.

Reply to Pneumenon But that's exactly what is going on here. Rejecting the myth of the given is presupposed by the article - that's what foundationalism is.

So you might have a point (I doubt it...:razz: ) but it is a point for another discussion.

Quoting Banno

and "here is a hand" is one of those.

Person on salvia with no left hand, "I can see my hand". Why should a minor thing like solipsism condition basic beliefs for the majority of people that don't even know what solipsism is?

Quoting Banno

Rejecting the myth of the given is presupposed by the article - that's what foundationalism is.

Huh?

Quoting Relativist

You disagree with foundationalism, but do you have any other particular system for evaluating the reasonableness of your beliefs, and the beliefs of others?

As I already said much earlier in the thread: critical rationalism. Wikipedia about it, and my own essay On Epistemology where I defend it (and a thread on this forum discussing the prior essay Against Cynicism that most of this aspect of my epistemology hinges on).

Quoting Relativist

Do you think belief in God can be rational? If the answer is yes, then Plantinga's Reformed Epistemology may be irrelevant to you. If no, then please describe your basis for thinking that.

On a critical rationalist account, if one has not encountered reason to reject a belief, then holding it is rational. You don't have to justify a belief from the ground up, it just has to survive criticism. I think there are reasons to reject belief in God, and holding on to such belief in the face of those reasons (if they really are good reasons, as I think) is irrational. But someone who hasn't faced such reasons yet could still rationally hold such a belief.

Quoting Pneumenon

Myth of the Given.

Sellars is arguing against foundationalism, as am I. (In the context you quoted, I was speaking within Plantinga's own foundationalist framework and showing how, even in that framework, not all beliefs are the same).

Reply to fdrake
Reply to Banno
I'll use Wittgenstein's examples to partly answer these questions. Wittgenstein argues against Moore's use of the word know in the proposition "I know this is a hand." One of the reasons Wittgenstein gives for this argument is that in Moore's context it would make no sense to doubt that that is Moore's hand. Later, Wittgenstein gives an example in which it would make sense to doubt that that is hand my hand. The example is where someone might wake up after an operation with their hand bandaged, and not know whether their hand had been amputated. In this case it would be perfectly legitimate to doubt whether you have a hand or not.

The criteria here is not arbitrary. The meaning of our words has a lot to do with context, a word might mean one thing in one context, and another in a quite different context. However, it's more than just context, as I pointed out, i.e., the use of the word doubt in a particular context tells us something about the use of the word know in the context also. Moreover, it tells us something about basic beliefs.

There are no absolutes here in terms of basic beliefs, which is why I say that generally it doesn't make sense to doubt that that's your hand. And generally it makes sense to doubt that God exists, or that you're having a direct experience with God. However, I would point out that IF someone did have a direct experience with God, then the belief would be basic for them. Of course what exactly counts as a direct experience? My contention is that what most people count as direct experiences with God are merely psychological. This is not to say that there can't be real experiences with God (if one exists), but only that it would be difficult to discern in most cases.

Plantinga is talking about belief in God (the Christian God) as properly basic. Just because billions of people believe something, that doesn't make it basic. He wants to argue that people have a kind of built in belief (innate belief) about God, but not just any God. Regardless, all one has to do is ask, "Does it make sense to doubt the existence of God?" Yes, unless I'm having an undoubtable experience, and I'm not doubting that this can happen. It's certainly metaphysically possible.

If I tell someone who is an agnostic that God spoke to me audibly in my bedroom last night as I prayed, it would make perfect sense to doubt such a declaration. That belief (if it really happened) would be basic for you, but surely not for the agnostic. The agnostic would have every right to doubt your experience.

Quoting Sam26

My contention is that what most people count as direct experiences with God are merely psychological. This is not to say that there can't be real experiences with God (if one exists), but only that it would be difficult to discern in most cases.

Ah, god as the beetle in the box!

I think there's a deep issue of what really constitutes or counts as 'basic' or 'foundational'. I would question the sense in which propositions are truly basic or foundational, insofar as they remain simply verbal constructions or formulations. I mean 'help me, I'm drowning', means nothing unless you really are.

The problem with religious beliefs, insofar as these are simply verbal propositions, then they're generally construed as being elaborated or based on other beliefs; for atheism, any statement about the object of religious veneration must necessarily be a statement about something that has only conventional reality, or exists only in the minds of those who believe it. So they can't be 'foundational', by definition, in this light.

And surely, there is no objective way for a believer to show otherwise, as what can be shown objectively must in some sense constitute an object of perception; whereas for the believer, God is not an object, but a subject with whom s/he has a personal and loving relationship. This is at the heart of the 'is/ought' problem that haunts much modern moral philosophy in my opinion.

I think what's happened in Western thought is that such beliefs have become detached from their moorings in terms of praxis; they're not longer anchored in a common domain of discourse. Therefore, they are for a lot of people (like Banno) simply meaningless - there's literally nothing that they could stand for, they're a kind of babble or nonsense talk (as the positivists used to say about all metaphysics). As, for our culture, science is normative with regards to claims about 'what exists', then there's not even any scientifically meaningful way to make sense of religious propositions - again, as the positivists say.

But, as Karen Armstrong argued in her book The Case for God,

[religious] myth was a programme of action. When a mythical narrative was symbolically re-enacted, it brought to light within the practitioner something "true" about human life and the way our humanity worked, even if its insights, like those of art, could not be proven rationally. If you did not act upon it, it would remain as incomprehensible and abstract – like the rules of a board game, which seem impossibly convoluted, dull and meaningless until you start to play.

Religious truth is, therefore, a species of practical knowledge. Like swimming, we cannot learn it in the abstract; we have to plunge into the pool and acquire the knack by dedicated practice. Religious doctrines are a product of ritual and ethical observance, and make no sense unless they are accompanied by such spiritual exercises as yoga, prayer, liturgy and a consistently compassionate lifestyle. Skilled practice in these disciplines can lead to intimations of the transcendence we call God, Nirvana, Brahman or Dao. Without such dedicated practice, these concepts remain incoherent, incredible and even absurd.

In Plantinga's case, the question is interpreted within the framework of Reformed Theology - not one that I share, but it does however provide an interpretive framework within which such ideas are at least meaningful. But they're meaningful because they engage the whole being - what is quaintly designated 'soul' - and not just the verbal/discursive/rational aspect of the mind (although Plantinga being an academic theologian must needs deal with ideas on that level also.) But that's why, also, religious narratives and philosophies are grounded in a transformed understanding, a vision of the nature of reality; that is what is behind the meaning of 'conversion' in the deepest sense.

Quoting Sam26

However, I would point out that IF someone did have a direct experience with God, then the belief would be basic for them. Of course what exactly counts as a direct experience? My contention is that what most people count as direct experiences with God are merely psychological.

Religions have been around a lot longer than psychology, which is a discipline that hardly seems to know what it is half the time. Surely religious experiences must have a psychological dimension, and surely they may have profound psychological consequences, not always benign, but the 'merely' says something else; 'the science of psychology' speaking from the white lab coat of authority.

I wonder if you would agree with this passage from an essay about Wittgenstein in Philosophy Now. He says that, in the Tractatus:

Wittgenstein had begun to feel that logic and what he strangely called ‘mysticism’ sprang from the same root. This explains the second big idea in the Tractatus – which the logical positivists ignored: the thought of there being an unutterable kind of truth that ‘makes itself manifest’. Hence the key paragraph 6.522 in the Tractatus:

“There are indeed things that cannot be put into words. They make themselves manifest. They are what is mystical.”

In other words, there is a categorically different kind of truth from that which we can state in empirically or logically verifiable propositions. These different truths fall on the other side of the demarcation line of the principle of verification.

Wittgenstein’s intention in asserting this is precisely to protect matters of value from being disparaged or debunked by scientifically-minded people such as the Logical Positivists of the Vienna Circle. He put his view beyond doubt in this sequence of paragraphs:

“6.41 The sense of the world must lie outside the world. In the world everything is as it is and happens as it does happen. In it there is no value – and if there were, it would be of no value. If there is value which is of value, it must lie outside of all happening and being-so. For all happening and being-so is accidental. What makes it non-accidental cannot lie in the world, for otherwise this would again be accidental. It must lie outside the world.”

In other words, all worldly actions and events are contingent (‘accidental’), but matters of value are necessarily so, for they are ‘higher’ or too important to be accidental, and so must be outside the world of empirical propositions:

[i]“6.42 Hence also there can be no ethical propositions. Propositions cannot express anything higher.

6.421 It is clear that ethics cannot be expressed. Ethics is transcendental.”[/i]

I would say, rather than 'outside of', 'prior to' - that in which the realm of objective judgement is anchored; in other words, that which is foundational.

Quoting Banno

Basic belief... properly basic belief... is prior to language.
— creativesoul

You know I will disagree with you one this; it implies that a properly basic belief is could not in principle be stated.

This seems to be a malformed sentence, At best, from where I sit, it's a confusing way to use the terms. I think, based upon our past exchanges, that you seem to think that what I've argued somehow, some way, leads to an inevitable admission that properly basic beliefs cannot in principle be stated.

That vein of thought stops well short of the mark, because that mark is what follows from my claims.


When considering properly basic beliefs of language less animals, we have no choice but to conclude that properly basic beliefs cannot be stated by the creature forming and/or subsequently re-forming(holding) the belief, because they do not have the language capacity required in order to be able to do so. They cannot talk about their own mental ongoings. They cannot even consider them, as a subject matter in and of itself. They cannot name them. We can, and do.

Language less creatures form and hold thought and belief. The evidence of this is had in experience itself. We can watch it happen! We can devise many conditions that are completely under our control. We can watch an animal learn about themselves and the world around them. These animals are thinking and believing creatures by any apt criterion of what counts as thought, belief, and/or expectation.

The proof of thought/belief formation is in the pudding of the creature's own newly developed expectations. We can watch it happen. We can determine which things they will pay closer attention to. We can determine which things they draw mental correlations between. We can know that they have done this by watching their behavioural patterns. We can watch them draw correlations between different things to an extent that reaches far enough to be called irrefutable proof.

Let me digress, back to talking about a properly basic belief being - in principle - statable or not...

In principle, I can clearly state exactly what all thought and belief consist of, what they are, at their very core. Correlations drawn between different things. All of 'em. So, it's much better to say that my position leads to the inevitable conclusion that properly basic beliefs ought be of the simplest variety, and that when we're considering the contents of rudimentary belief we ought well know that they do not consist of statements, and they do not come in propositional form.

Our reports do.

They consist of statements. Our knowledge of non linguistic thought and belief most certainly does. I'm stating what our criterion for what counts as properly basic belief must be. I'm doing so in the simplest yet adequate means I know for adequately understanding properly basic belief.

Prelinguistic belief does not have propositional form. Predication does. Propositions do. Statements do.

Properly basic belief must be the very first ones. If not, then 'properly basic beliefs' would not be the first beliefs. The first beliefs are formed long before the creature acquires common language. This too is applicable to Platinga, unless I've misunderstood something. Plantinga claims that properly basic beliefs are not always groundless. Platinga wants to ground properly basic belief in life's circumstances, and is not at all wrong for doing so...

The animal cannot offer us a report of it's own mental ongoings. That's ok.

Not everything we discover is capable of telling us about what it is that we've just discovered. A language less animal's belief is one such thing, as is Mt. Everest...

Both existed in their entirety prior to our naming and descriptive practices.

Quoting creativesoul

Prelinguistic belief does not have propositional form.

Then it's not a belief.

It might be a sensation, a sentiment.

But if it is a belief, it is a belief that such-and-such.

Reply to Banno

Ok. So Jack does not believe that he's about to be fed by you... ever?

:brow:

You ok with that?

Reply to creativesoul by you just stated Jack’s belief.

You can’t state a belief that can’t be stated.

You're conflating my report of Jack's belief with Jack's belief.

He believes that he's about to be fed by you. That's my report.

His belief does not have propositional content. It cannot. He has no language. Thinking in propositional terms and/or having propositional content requires naming and descriptive practices. Jack has none.

Jack cannot state his beliefs.

Propositions are not words. Propositions are the things that words mean.

You can have "propositional content" in your mind without having any words to mean by it. You can have, as I phrase it, an "attitude toward an idea" (a picture in your mind held to be in a certain relation to the world), which is what a proposition is, without yet having words with which to communicate that to someone else.

Quoting Sam26

My contention is that what most people count as direct experiences with God are merely psychological.

My contention is that what most people count as direct experiences of themselves is merely psychological.

Quoting unenlightened

My contention is that what most people count as direct experiences of themselves is merely psychological

What does "psychological" mean exactly? A theory of the self? Direct experience of myself is experience with a theory?

It's about what can, and what can't, be said.

Quoting frank

What does "psychological" mean exactly?

What does 'direct experience' mean?

One brings terms into question here and there. Earlier, I wondered if anyone was inclined to say that rainbows exist. In one sense they obviously do, and in another, they obviously have a pot of gold at each end.

I think, therefore I am thought. But a thought of myself, is no more myself than a thought of a unicorn is a unicorn.
I believe, therefore I am. If there is anywhere, a properly basic belief, then belief in one's own self is properly basic. So it is up to the theo-sceptic to distinguish this belief from belief in God in some way. I haven't noticed anyone doing it, and you are quite right to question the distinction between direct and psychological experience. That is what I myself am doing in my previous post.

Quoting creativesoul

Prelinguistic belief does not have propositional form.

Because belief is no more than a judgement. Judgements are correlations of that which consists in their entirety, etc, etc, etc......

Judgements are linguistic iff expressed; if not, remain mere cognitions.

The fundamental criteria of any belief: subjective validity.

Two cents, and not a penny more........

Quoting Wayfarer

Religions have been around a lot longer than psychology, which is a discipline that hardly seems to know what it is half the time. Surely religious experiences must have a psychological dimension, and surely they may have profound psychological consequences, not always benign, but the 'merely' says something else; 'the science of psychology' speaking from the white lab coat of authority.

When I speak of psychology in this (context you quoted) context, I'm speaking of mental and emotional contexts that arise from particular beliefs. I'm not speaking of the study of psychology. Thus, in my sense psychology has been around since man first walked the Earth. Moreover, I'm also thinking about meaning, and how meaning has a cultural context apart from our inclination to derive meaning from our subjective experiences or mental experiences.

I find it very difficult to put down in a few paragraphs what I believe about many of the things talked about in this thread. Much of the time it just gets misinterpreted. This isn't a complaint, it happens with all of us.

I disagree with much of what Wittgenstein said in those passages. But I also agree with some of it. For example, I agree that the mystical can be shown in our actions (e.g. prayer). I disagree with the idea that it's beyond language or beyond words. My study of NDEs indicates that mystical experiences can be expressed. I don't believe as Wittgenstein did in the Tractatus that there is a boundary to language, beyond which, is that which is senseless (not nonsense). I also disagree with his ideas about ethics. The explanation would take us far afield of this thread.

Reply to unenlightened I wasn't trying to be a smartass, I was wondering if the self is a theory, or a component of one. Gods are. Homer's gods are all over the place as explanations.

Psyche was a divinity, the name of which transferred to something non-divine: the breath of life, the soul, the seat of experience.

I imagine I can see your soul in your eyes.

Reply to frank Wasn't taking you for a smarts at all. Yes indeed, psyche is the divine self, and that is my main suggestion, that it behooves us to be rather cautious about denying the existence of gods.

Quoting Banno

It's about what can, and what can't, be said.

It can be said that there is God. It can be said there is no God. Rainbows and Psyche likewise. And allowing for context, there need be no contradiction.

Quoting unenlightened

Wasn't taking you for a smarts at all.

It's mutual. :hearts:

Wouldn't you deny the existence of the self?

Quoting Banno

It's about what can, and what can't, be said.

Then it's all about language use, and as a result of that and that alone... it's wrong.

Properly basic belief - if those come first - is prior to language. Plantinga's notion of properly basic belief does not come first. Statements of belief fail for the same reasons.

Quoting frank

Wouldn't you deny the existence of the self?

It's rainbows.Yes and no. I simply say God is as real/unreal as you and me. Personally in practice I behave as if I am real regardless of affirmations or denials, so I probably ought to treat God with the same respect.

Quoting Banno

Ah, god as the beetle in the box!

This is a greedy reduction. The use of the word God isn't determined solely by its attachment to a private sensation; it's rather that when someone senses such a presence, it is attributed to God. Just like the word "tree"'s use isn't determined by "I see this tree" when functioning as a basic belief.

Quoting Banno

...if it is a belief, it is a belief that such-and-such.

Where "such and such" is a statement. Statements are existentially dependent upon naming and descriptive practices. Jack has none. Jack has beliefs. Jack's beliefs are not statements.

Our reports thereof are.

Jack's beliefs are correlations drawn between different things. Jack's belief that he is about to be fed by you are shown by his standing in front of the bowl while looking up at you. He expects for you to put food in the bowl. His belief consists of the correlations he's drawn between you and the food and the bowl and certain other things during certain similar circumstances. I'm sure it's become habitual by now.

I would venture to guess that certain sounds are involved as well as scents, etc. My own cats expect to get treats each time I arrive home after being gone for some time. They can be nowhere in sight but still hear the sound of the treat bag being opened, and because they've long since drawn a correlation between that sound and eating treats, they come straight to their treat bowl, because they believe that they are about to get treats.

Their beliefs are the aforementioned correlations. They consist of correlations drawn between directly perceptible things. Those things become significant/meaningful as a result. That how all meaningful belief of language less creatures works. But this is only to further cement the idea that there is no such thing as a basic belief that grounds al other beliefs.

Our world-views contain far too many disparate beliefs. As Davidson claimed... it's more like a web.

Are there certain attachment points... structural members so to speak... that lend support to each other and/or subsequent more complex beliefs?

Sure.

My name is... My mom is... My brother is...

But those require language... naming and descriptive practices.

Quoting Sam26

However, I would point out that IF someone did have a direct experience with God, then the belief would be basic for them.

What distinguishes a direct experience from an experience?

Of course what exactly counts as a direct experience? My contention is that what most people count as direct experiences with God are merely psychological. This is not to say that there can't be real experiences with God (if one exists), but only that it would be difficult to discern in most cases.

Nowadays we've got means and arguments to doubt things like possession by spirits, God's existence and so on. But there were less resources in the past; it made more sense to believe in spirits and souls, so they fit into the transparent networks of association, action and thought that prevailed at the time. (Or some of the time). So it looks like what can be doubted isn't solely a function of conceptual necessity, it's a function of historical and social circumstances.

In other words, if whether it makes no sense to doubt a statement is the sole criterion for whether that statement may be held as a basic belief, and whether it makes sense to doubt a statement depends upon social and historical circumstances, then whether a statement can serve as a basic belief depends upon the social and historical circumstances it finds itself in.

If basic beliefs, by their nature, are necessarily true, then what is true comes to depend upon historical and social circumstances. If basic beliefs, by their nature, need not be true, they are not guaranteed to form a basis for a foundationalist epistemology.

I find the discussion in Platinga's article to bring us to consider the ambiguities involved with the very idea of basic beliefs and discovering what they are through analysing language use.

Quoting unenlightened

It's rainbows.Yes and no. I simply say God is as real/unreal as you and me. Personally in practice I behave as if I am real regardless of affirmations or denials, so I probably ought to treat God with the same respect.

That's kind of a startling thing to say. For all practical purposes the divine is real.

Quoting unenlightened

It can be said that there is God. It can be said there is no God. Rainbows and Psyche likewise. And allowing for context, there need be no contradiction.

So while psychology might have something to say here, philosophy remains irrelevant, or silent.

Reply to Pfhorrest Sure. And that propositional content, by definition, can be put into words.

If it can't, it's not propositional content.

SO you might express it in sound, paint, clay.

Or not at all.

Reply to fdrake
Quoting fdrake

What distinguishes a direct experience from an experience?

I suppose a direct experience might be something like the following: Standing in front of my oak tree in my back yard, as opposed to looking at the same oak tree in a picture (direct and indirect). Hearing God speak as he stands in front of you (e.g., Jesus and the disciples), or reading his words in the Bible. Although it's not always clear the way many religious people use these words.

Most basic beliefs wouldn't be doubtable no matter what time in history. Consider the following:

1. This is a tree (as I point to a tree on a clear day).
2. This is my mother or father.
3. This is my hand.
4. I live on the Earth.
5. He is conscious, pointing to someone sawing a piece of wood.
6. He is a person.
7. etc

There are endless basic beliefs that would be silly to doubt. Moreover, because someone doesn't doubt a belief, that in itself doesn't make it basic. It's not a matter of opinion.

There are some basic beliefs that do change over time, but many do not.

Many basic beliefs aren't even linguistic, they are simply part of the background we find ourselves in. I would say that animals, prelinguistic man, infants, and modern man show that they have certain beliefs without saying a word. They show their beliefs by their actions - digging a hole, a dog recognizing its master as he comes home, a baby reaching for a toy, each of these actions requires certain basic beliefs. Most of our daily actions require certain basic beliefs or we wouldn't be able to function.

Outside of language there is no epistemology, therefore it's not a matter of being true, these kinds of beliefs fall outside our epistemological language-games. Not all basic beliefs are of this kind, but many are.

Quoting fdrake

I find the discussion in Platinga's article to bring us to consider the ambiguities involved with the very idea of basic beliefs and discovering what they are through analysing language use

I agree with this. Although I find Wittgenstein's analysis of language to be much more sophisticated than Plantinga.

Quoting fdrake

This is a greedy reduction. The use of the word God isn't determined solely by its attachment to a private sensation; it's rather that when someone senses such a presence, it is attributed to God. Just like the word "tree"'s use isn't determined by "I see this tree" when functioning as a basic belief.

You and I both see the rainbow. The use of the word "rainbow" isn't determined solely by its attachment to a private sensation; it's rather that when someone senses such a presence, it is attributed to the rainbow.

If I say of myself that it is only from my own case that I know what the word "God" means - must I not say the same of other people too? And how can I generalize the one case so irresponsibly?

Now someone tells me that he knows what God is only from his own case! --Suppose everyone had a box with something in it: we call it a "God". No one can look into anyone else's box, and everyone says he knows what a God is only by looking at his God. --Here it would be quite possible for everyone to have something different in his box. One might even imagine such a thing constantly changing. --But suppose the word "God" had a use in these people's language? --If so it would not be used as the name of a thing. The thing in the box has no place in the language-game at all; not even as a something: for the box might even be empty. --No, one can 'divide through' by the thing in the box; it cancels out, whatever it is.

That is to say: if we construe the grammar of the expression of sensation on the model of 'object and designation' the object drops out of consideration as irrelevant.

Reply to Banno Yeah that was directed at creativesoul in defense of your side.

Reply to Pfhorrest
It was for you, too.

Quoting Pfhorrest

You can have "propositional content" in your mind without having any words to mean by it. You can have, as I phrase it, an "attitude toward an idea" (a picture in your mind held to be in a certain relation to the world), which is what a proposition is, without yet having words with which to communicate that to someone else.

...if we construe the grammar of the expression of sensation on the model of 'object and designation' the object drops out of consideration as irrelevant.

Seems to me that you and Wittgenstein are not too far apart here. At least, that would be so if you agree that there are uses for language that are not an "attitude toward an idea", a "object and designation".

Quoting frank

I think that we should believe in religious tolerance. What's your view?

Sure. Believe what you like

But if you espouse your beliefs in a public forum such as this, don't complain about the critique.


Edit: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/7746/my-belief-system

To state what a belief is, you have to put it into a sentence with a subject/predicate form. So whether or not beliefs are propositional, you have to say them in so they sound as if they're propositional.

Quoting Pfhorrest

Propositions are not words. Propositions are the things that words mean.

Many others share this view... this use of the term "proposition". This is not the thread to criticize it, but it's wrong on several levels, including but not limited to what belief and meaning are.

I'll say this much...

"Tree" is a word. It refers to trees. Trees are what "trees" means. Trees are not propositions.

Quoting Pneumenon

To state what a belief is, you have to put it into a sentence with a subject/predicate form. So whether or not beliefs are propositional, you have to say them in so they sound as if they're propositional.

Yes.

Hence, any belief can be stated; and if it cannot be stated it is not a belief.

To state what a belief is...

Belief does not require being stated.

Quoting Banno

...any belief can be stated; and if it cannot be stated it is not a belief.

It only follows that Jack has no beliefs. You and I both know that that's not right.

To state what Mt Everest is, you have to put it into a sentence with a subject/predicate form.

:brow:

Reply to creativesoulWhenever we get into a discussion, this comes up again.

Tedium ensues.

Quoting creativesoul

To state what Mt Everest is, you have to put it into a sentence with a subject/predicate form.

My mouth is too small.

Quoting Banno

It can be said that there is God. It can be said there is no God. Rainbows and Psyche likewise. And allowing for context, there need be no contradiction.
— unenlightened

So while psychology might have something to say here, philosophy remains irrelevant, or silent.

Psyche and Sophia are equally divine. If you ask the gods whether they believe in god, you are liable to get as biased an answer as if you ask a mortal whether they believe in the self.

Reply to unenlightened

Indeed. And...

To state what your mouth is, you have to put it into a sentence with a subject/predicate form...

Therefore your mouth has propositional content and/or form or it's not a mouth.

Quoting Banno

Whenever we get into a discussion, this comes up again.

Tedium ensues.

Yes. Philosophy done well is work... and quite often it is of the tedious variety.

Witt's quip is perfectly applicable in situations where some belief of an individual is claimed to be ineffable by the individual. If it cannot be stated by the individual, then it is not a well formed belief of the individual. They cannot know what it is that they're talking about. They know that they do not have a good enough grasp to be able to speak clearly about it. What is known can be stated clearly.

I'm clearly stating that not all belief has propositional content.

All belief consists of correlations. All predication consists of correlation. All statements. All sentences. All naming and descriptive practices. All interjection. All exclamation. All interrogation. Etc.

Our knowledge of this correlational content is the bridge between the ineffable(Jack cannot state his own beliefs) and the effable(we can clearly know and thus state what all belief consists of, including what Jack's belief consists of). Prior to common language use, all belief consists of correlations drawn between different directly perceptible things.

That is what facilitates all language use, creation, and acquisition.

Reply to creativesoul I know, right?

It's kind of fishy. :wink:

Quoting Sam26

My conclusion, is that if you have a belief in God, then it requires a good epistemological justification. It's a cop out to think that such a belief doesn't require such a justification.

Epistemological justifications require inter-subjective corroboration. The existence of a tree can easily be so corroborated. Can the existence of God?

Quoting Janus

Epistemological justifications require inter-subjective corroboration. The existence of a tree can easily be so corroborated. Can the existence of God?

Can the existence of beauty, of any value, of oases and mirages, of rainbows, of other minds, of one's own mind? Let's eliminate from the discussion anything that cannot be so corroborated; the discussion will be short indeed.

Quoting Janus

Epistemological justifications require inter-subjective corroboration.

Explain this statement, I don't follow.

Quoting unenlightened

Can the existence of beauty, of any value, of oases and mirages, of rainbows, of other minds, of one's own mind? Let's eliminate from the discussion anything that cannot be so corroborated; the discussion will be short indeed.

Perceptions of beauty, belief in values, perceptions of oases, mirages and rainbows, the ideas of one's own and others' minds all obviously exist, as do ideas of and beliefs in God.

Not everyone will perceive beauty, believe in any particular values or believe in God. Everyone will see oases, mirages and rainbows and trees if the conditions are right.

So what kind of further existence do beauty, values and God have? Would they exist absent human perceptual experience? Is there anything there which would reliably appear to all percipients as beauty, value or God, as there is in the case of oases, mirages, rainbows and trees, in other words?

"Properly basic belief" can be construed in a myriad of ways.

It is a name that is used to talk about a plurality of different things. This thread bears witness. All such constructions are linguistic ones. That is, all our linguistic constructs are existentially dependent upon language use. I think we all agree here. The name "properly basic belief" is itself existentially dependent upon common language use, it is the result thereof. All naming practices are language use.

So,"properly basic belief" is a name of our own arbitrary choosing. Like all naming practices, "properly basic belief" is used as a means to pick individual things out of the world to the exclusion of all others. The name always has a referent. The referent is not always the same. There are different senses(accepted uses) of the name. Some of those pick out that which is existentially dependent upon language. Some do not.

The difference is imperative to our understanding.

If a properly basic belief is not existentially dependent upon language, then it can consist of nothing that is. Statements cannot be properly basic by this criterion. Propositions, propositional form, and propositional content cannot be properly basic by this criterion.

Belief in God is most certainly existentially dependent upon language use. So, if we are to claim that belief in God is properly basic, then properly basic beliefs need not be the first ones, they need not be the basis of all others, they need not be the most basic ones...

Then why call them "properly basic"?

Reply to Sam26 Justifications for beliefs or for what one thinks (about what one perceives, for example) are only relevant in an inter-subjective context.

Such justifications rely upon some form of reliable corroboration. Can there be any reliable inter-subjective corroboration for the existence of God?

Quoting Janus

Perceptions of beauty, belief in values, perceptions of oases, mirages and rainbows, the ideas of one's own and others' minds all obviously exist,

Intersubjectively confirmed perceptions? That's a novelty!

Reply to creativesoul Properly basic beliefs can be given linguistic form, but they cannot be dependent on language use. The difficulty then is to explain how the jump is made from pre-linguistic intuition to linguistic formulation. We can say that the linguistic formulations of what might be considered to be "properly basic beliefs" find their foundations in pre-linguistic "seeing". but that is not the same as to say that the former are rationally justified by the latter.

Reply to unenlightened It is obviously reasonable to think that such perceptions exist because their existence is inter-subjectively corroborated in the sense that everyone will agree that such things are experienced. What did you think I meant?

from Plantinga

...so far as I know, no one has developed and articulated any other reason for supposing that belief in God is not properly basic...

If what counts as properly basic belief includes the first ones, the rudimentary ones, the most simple and basic ones, then belief in God quite simply cannot count. That's more conclusion than supposition.

Of course, I reject the targets of Plantinga's criticisms of the classical and other conventional foundationalist criteria for properly basic belief for reasons that are not in line with Platinga, but are in direct line with my critique thereof. I reject his for the same reasons I reject theirs.

Quoting Janus

Properly basic beliefs can be given linguistic form, but they cannot be dependent on language use. The difficulty then is to explain how the jump is made from pre-linguistic intuition to linguistic formulation. We can say that the linguistic formulations of what might be considered to be "properly basic beliefs" find their foundations in pre-linguistic "seeing". but that is not the same as to say that the former are rationally justified by the latter.

I wouldn't argue for and/or defend my position like that, but I do not think that we're too far apart in general.

I think the best path here is methodological in that we must first come up with an acceptable and adequate criterion for what counts as "belief". I've done that. Then and only then can we expect to make sense of the further subsequent qualifications of "basic" and "properly basic" as kinds of belief.

Basic belief must be of the simplest variety. Basics always come first. It makes no sense whatsoever to say otherwise. Doing so renders the notions of basic and complex utterly meaningless.

Basic belief must be of the simplest variety/kind. All kinds consist of correlations. Basic correlations would be drawn by a creature capable of drawing correlations between different directly perceptible things; the simplest correlations possible.

Perhaps the criterion could be adjusted - 'loosened up a bit' as it were - so as to be something like... the simplest variety/kind of belief adequate for serving as strong and/or reliable ground for some conclusion(more complex belief) or another. This loosening would permit some properly basic belief to be existentially dependent upon language, while also having no issue accounting for those that are not.

This would add some practical consideration.

Quoting Janus

So what kind of further existence do beauty, values and God have? Would they exist absent human perceptual experience? Is there anything there which would reliably appear to all percipients as beauty, value or God, as there is in the case of oases, mirages, rainbows and trees, in other words?

The notion of "further existence" is fraught.

A better question: What do beauty, values, and God consist in and/or of? Are they things that exist in their entirety prior to naming and descriptive practices?

Do those names pick out individual things that exist in their entirety prior to the namesake?

Quoting creativesoul

This loosening would permit some properly basic belief to be existentially dependent upon language, while also having no issue accounting for those that are not.

OK, so I had said that I think basic beliefs (in order to count as basic) must be pre-linguistically formed and may or may not be articulated. You seem to be saying that some basic beliefs are not pre-linguistically formed. Could you give an example of such a belief?

Quoting creativesoul

The notion of "further existence" is fraught.

I can't see why it is fraught. All I meant by anything having "further existence" is existence beyond merely human experience or perception of the thing in question; what we might think of as some kind of independent existence in other words. So a tree has "further existence" in this sense.

Freud said that psychotics love their delusions as themselves, and that philosophers have that same kind of relationship with their theories. He saw philosophical theories as being kin to internally consistent delusions: the intellect disconnected from its own environment.

That suggests that he saw an embrace of the world as happening only in an irrational context (maybe of the sort that allows a sense of sacredness?).

Quoting Janus

This loosening would permit some properly basic belief to be existentially dependent upon language, while also having no issue accounting for those that are not.
— creativesoul

OK, so I had said that I think basic beliefs (in order to count as basic) must be pre-linguistically formed and may or may not be articulated. You seem to be saying that some basic beliefs are not pre-linguistically formed. Could you give an example of such a belief?

Sure, but first...

To be clear regarding that 'loosening' bit, I was just teasing out some different possible meanings(ambiguity) of the notion of "properly basic belief". Different people have different criteria. Different people use the same term to pick out and subsequently refer to remarkably different things.

Oh the banes of philosophy.

:wink:

Plantinga's notion is much different than my own. Sorry if that much has not been clear enough.

Strictly speaking, since there is no such thing as belief at the moment of biological conception, and there is no such thing as disembodied thought, belief and/or cognition, then it only makes sense to say that all belief begins simply and accrues in complexity. It must be that way in order for belief to be amenable to evolutionary progression.

So, with that in the forefront of thought, basic belief would have to be of the first, initial, and/or simplest sort possible while those that are not would have to be of the sort grounded upon some other more basic belief(s). Otherwise there is no difference between grounded and ungrounded belief if both qualify as basic.

However...

Plantinga blurs those lines by claiming that a properly basic belief need not be a groundless, and/or unfounded belief/proposition.

If one's worldview includes a strongly held conviction regarding belief in God, then such a person always has their belief about God in the back of their mind, so to speak. The beliefs about God for some people act as a measuring rod of sorts, constantly and continuously used to help them decide whether or not to believe things that other people say. For example, I've known some of those people to think in ways similar to this...

Since God created everything... any claim to the contrary is wrong/false/not true. This counts as rational/logical thinking, like it or not. And it is exactly this sort of thinking that makes sense of saying that a belief in God is basic.

It's not basic in the sense that I've been arguing, but rather it is basic in the sense of being an operative set of beliefs... firm 'guidelines'... that which is held to be true, and thus the measure of whether other claims are... particularly when other claims contradict one's beliefs about God.

That's a very different sort of basic than I've set out, but it's not so different from some of the other conventional notions throughout history like some mentioned in the paper/book/link.

Quoting Janus

The notion of "further existence" is fraught.
— creativesoul

I can't see why it is fraught. All I meant by anything having "further existence" is existence beyond merely human experience or perception of the thing in question; what we might think of as some kind of independent existence in other words. So a tree has "further existence" in this sense.

Talk of "further" and "beyond" makes sense in comparative measures of distance. It's unnecessarily complex in that it needs clarifying by removing the terms from their normal use.

That which exists in it's entirety prior to our discovery is prior to our naming and descriptive practices(language use). A tree exists in it's entirety prior to our attributing the name "tree" to it. As I said, I do not think that we're that far apart. Here there is no need to explain what "further" existence is. Mt Everest. Language-less belief. The moon. Iron. Etc. All sorts of things exist in their entirety prior to our naming and descriptive practices.

Basic belief - on my view - is yet one more of those things.

Reply to creativesoul You're being unnecessarily pedantic and proscriptive regarding what constitutes "normal usage". The terms "further" and "beyond" are often used beyond the context of "comparative measures of distance"; you should know that and it should have been easy enough to work out what I was saying; which simply amounted to drawing a distinction between those things which are generally thought to have independent existence and those which are not.

And you still haven't addressed the more salient question as to whether you can give some examples of basic beliefs which are generated prior to, or independently of, language use.

And also you haven't attempted to address the problem of justification I mentioned.

Quoting frank

That suggests that he saw an embrace of the world as happening only in an irrational context (maybe of the sort that allows a sense of sacredness?).

And yet the sense of the sacred is usually found in conjunction with some form of religion and Freud was against religion, believing that it has its genesis in infantile psyches.

Quoting Janus

And yet the sense of the sacred is usually found in conjunction with some form of religion and Freud was against religion, believing that it has its genesis in infantile psyches.

I think "Here's a hand" is also usually found in conjunction with some folk ontology (platitudes most people are likely to endorse).

Reply to Banno

So I read it, and my take is somewhat different, likely just because of my starting point on such things.

To begin, I saw the objective of the article to substantiate the legitimacy of a belief in God, although not to prove the existence of God. That is, the inquiry was whether the epistemological standard a believer in God accepts is substantially similar to the one that the non-believer in God accepts in other matters.

Take, for example, what Plantiga accepts as a foundational belief: "I see a tree." He suggests that one's acceptance of the tree is foundational in that it requires no proof, but it is basic, and he suggests then that a belief in God is as well. According to this, we no more need to justify the tree's existence than we do God's, which would make the argument (in theistic terminology) that our acceptance of the tree's existence is no more or less an act of faith than is our belief in the existence in God.

My initial thought is that I'm not entirely convinced that our belief in the existence of a tree is foundational, at least not for Descartes (although the existence in God was ironically foundational to him, thus providing a basis for him for our knowledge there wasn't an evil genius manipulating our thoughts). "Foundational" therefore does not mean indubitable to Plantiga, nor does it mean fundamentally necessary for comprehension in some Kantian sense. I sense that his view of foundational is a form of pragmatism.

Regardless, Plantiga's question as I take it most generally is whether it is equally rational to accept God's existence as the tree's. The part of Plantiga's analysis not really discussed in this thread, which I took to be the crux of the counterargument against him, is that of the Great Pumpkin. That is, if I can say that God exists as a foundational belief, then why would I not be able to say the same of any absurd non-physical entity, like declaring there is a Great Pumpkin who visits us each Halloween and delivers us pumpkins.

The problem, as I see it, is that we're being asked a question without being provided a basic definition of what we're being asked to believe in. It seems clear that God as Plantiga envisions him is not the Great Pumpkin, so I'm left with the conclusion that the Great Pumpkin God is not a foundational belief, which means I don't know of the existence of the Great Pumpkin God like I do of the existence of trees. So, then, what sort of god would be foundational and just as rational a thing to believe in as a tree?

I think I can conclude that a god who parts seas and sends manna from heaven would be as absurd as one who delivers pumpkins, so that god wouldn't be foundational. If the god I'm being asked to accept as foundational is some nebulous, abstract, unknown entity that might have had a hand in our existence, then I guess that could be foundational, but if it's so ill defined, I'm not sure what the atheist is denying when he denies that existence either. So, should a Christian tell you that his view of the resurrection of Jesus Christ is as foundational as my view of the tree, I think that's nonsense and fails under the Great Pumpkin objection.

The question I don't think is answered adequately is what makes Yahweh (or Zeus or the Sun God or whoever), different from the Great Pumpkin? All of this is to say that I think the Great Pumpkin objection is not adequately responded to. So, to the question, "Is Belief in God Properly Basic?," a discussion of "basic" and "foundational" seem to put the cart before the horse if we don't know what God is.

Quoting Banno

You and I both see the rainbow. The use of the word "rainbow" isn't determined solely by its attachment to a private sensation; it's rather that when someone senses such a presence, it is attributed to the rainbow.

My friends Anna and Joshua both hear God. The use of the word "god" isn't determined solely by its attachment to a private sensation, it's rather than when someone senses such a presence, it is attributed to God.

You need a finer net.

Quoting Hanover

So, to the question, "Is Belief in God Properly Basic?," a discussion of "basic" and "foundational" seem to put the cart before the horse if we don't know what God is.

:up:

Quoting frank

Freud said...

All sorts of stuff that are now known as "projecting"...

Quoting Sam26

I suppose a direct experience might be something like the following: Standing in front of my oak tree in my back yard, as opposed to looking at the same oak tree in a picture (direct and indirect). Hearing God speak as he stands in front of you (e.g., Jesus and the disciples), or reading his words in the Bible. Although it's not always clear the way many religious people use these words.

Would you agree that the distinction between a direct experience of X and an experience of X differ only insofar as direct experience of X is not mediated, whereas experience of X in general is mediated?

I think when someone reads the bible and hears God speaking to them through it, the experience they have is not of the character of God announcing their presence through the interpretation of words; a mediated relationship; it's a borderline aesthetic sense of identity, a tacit "this is divine" that comes from immersion in the words, like a calling or a whisper of purpose. The people who have experienced this readily distinguish it from ordinary functioning of their senses, even if the divinity expresses itself in a usual sensory modality (so no necessary divine sense to have it). It's direct in the sense of finding oneself in an intimate connection with the divine while reading, not by inferring something is divine or being caused to believe that something is divine as a result of what is read.

Quoting Banno

The answer must be in there being two sorts of basic beliefs - those that are presumed in order for an activity to occur, like keeping the bishop on its own colour in order to play chess; and those that are somehow universally basic... and "here is a hand" is one of those.

Maybe there are two senses of it.

The particularised one:
(1) A belief B of a person P in a context C is properly basic if and only if P cannot doubt B in C without a performative contradiction necessitated by the doubt.

The universalised one:
(2) A belief B is properly basic if and only if for all contexts C and all people involved in them P; P cannot doubt B in C without a performative contradiction necessitated by the doubt.

The particularised one seems way too weak; basic beliefs look as fungible as normal ones depending on the context and the person; and the universalised one seems way too strong - I can't think of many beliefs that there aren't extenuating circumstances for that would make someone able to reasonably doubt them.

Quoting fdrake

Would you agree that the distinction between a direct experience of X and an experience of X differ only insofar as direct experience of X is not mediated, whereas experience of X in general is mediated?

I would agree, but would compare direct with indirect experiences. The best way to examine these kinds of experiences is to examine context driven experiences, or how we use the words in specific cases.

Quoting fdrake

I think when someone reads the bible and hears God speaking to them through it, the experience they have is not of the character of God announcing their presence through the interpretation of words; a mediated relationship; it's a borderline aesthetic sense of identity, a tacit "this is divine" that comes from immersion in the words, like a calling or a whisper of purpose. The people who have experienced this readily distinguish it from ordinary functioning of their senses, even if the divinity expresses itself in a usual sensory modality (so no necessary divine sense to have it). It's direct in the sense of finding oneself in an intimate connection with the divine while reading, not by inferring something is divine or being caused to believe that something is divine as a result of what is read.

I generally agree that some people, maybe most view it like you've described. I considered myself a Christian for many years until recently, and believed that many subjective experiences I had were from God. For example, that quiet whisper of God speaking - a kind of divine sense, that some would argue all of us have. I now have many problems with this kind of thinking. I don't outright dismiss it, but I'm very skeptical of most of it, even though I still have a strong spiritual belief system (e.g., my beliefs associated with NDEs).

Quoting Sam26

I would agree, but would compare direct with indirect experiences. The best way to examine these kinds of experiences is to examine context driven experiences, or how we use the words in specific cases.

I don't know that there is an everyday use of words that maps neatly onto the distinction between direct and indirect experiences. Whether perceptions of X are mediated through some Y or not is much less important than whether someone "was there to experience it" or not; what makes first hand testimony first hand testimony is that someone was there, not any epistemic account of direct (or indirect) perceptual events.

It looks extremely convoluted to get a good distinction between the two experience types solely out of ordinary use of language. As in, if someone needs glasses to see more than 1 meter away clearly, but with glasses has 20/20 vision, their vision of these distant objects is mediated by the glasses. If no mediation between a perceiver and what they perceive is a pre-requisite for forming basic beliefs regarding what is perceived, then such glasses wearers cannot thereby form basic beliefs using their vision. If no mediation is sufficient, then whereas if they took their glasses off, and reverted to their poor eyesight for distance, they would be in a situation to form basic beliefs about distant objects based on their vision even though they may be unable to see clearly beyond 1 meter away!

Quoting fdrake

I don't know that there is an everyday use of words that maps neatly onto the distinction between direct and indirect experiences.

I agree with this, i.e., there is no neat way of mapping this. It's like trying to map out what pornography is, like the Supreme Court said, I know it when I see it (Justice Stewart). I know that seeing that tree in my back yard is about as basic as you can get. The problem is setting out some definition that will fit each case. I don't think that can be done. It's like trying to come up with a definition of game that will fit every use of the word. It can't be done. This is why I say that each use needs looked at on its own merits. Even the words direct and indirect have problems as you pointed out.

This is why in most of my discussions I use the phrase "generally it's the case that." So, there are some general things we can say about basic beliefs. I do think there are nonlinguistic basic beliefs along with linguistic basic beliefs, but this covers a lot of ground.

Quoting Sam26

I do think there are nonlinguistic basic beliefs along with linguistic basic beliefs, but this covers a lot of ground.

:wink:

That one's hard(impossible to me) to deny.

The trick, if there is one to be had, is taking proper account of the belief content, what they consist of. Although, I've now come to see - clearly I think - that nonlinguistic belief are not under consideration in the paper, nor have they been throughout the history of epistemology. Rather, the focus... as it ought be for questions of what counts as a knowledge claim... is the claim.

As always, good to see ya Sam!

:smile:

Quoting Janus

...drawing a distinction between those things which are generally thought to have independent existence and those which are not.

And you still haven't addressed the more salient question as to whether you can give some examples of basic beliefs which are generated prior to, or independently of, language use.

Well, I've actually already answered these concerns in this very thread. However, I do not wish to continue going on here about my own position and how it applies to Plantinga and his concerns. So, this will be my last post setting these difference out. I do reject the idea of properly basic belief being anything other than the most basic of all kinds of belief... and those are not mediated and/or expressed in language by the creature that actually formed them. That's strictly speaking concerning what counts as "basic". I lean heavily toward ordinary language use on that.

On the other hand, as I've already set out a few different times, there is most certainly a sense of what counts as " basic" that permits and/or allows complex beliefs to count as such. This is because the criterion is all about the certainty one has in such belief as well as the belief itself being basic to a bunch of other ones. Although, again... strictly speaking none of those count as basic in the sense of the very first ones. So...

The entire discussion hinges upon calling complex belief "basic", which is of no real surprise to me, because all of the ones being called so are statements of belief, and statements consist of correlations that include language use. That's already one-step-removed from being basic... strictly speaking, of course!

P.S.

And I expect we would be involved in teasing out what each of us holds as being a criterion for what counts as "independently of language use". If I remember correctly, our positions do not work with/from the same criterion of what counts as such.

I work from existential dependency and/or independency, and that involves the basic elemental constituency of the thing under consideration. I also work from the notion of that which exists in it's entirety prior to our naming and describing it. That's not a clean cut. There's some overlap. Some things are existentially dependent upon thought and belief, us, and language use... but are nonetheless things that exist in their entirety prior to our awareness of them and/or our naming and describing them.

That's enough for here. This isn't the place for it. From here I'll tend towards continuing to talk about belief statements as belief... and see how they pan out as properly basic or not, according to the criteria in the link, because that is the aim of the thread.

Quoting Banno

The answer must be in there being two sorts of basic beliefs - those that are presumed in order for an activity to occur, like keeping the bishop on its own colour in order to play chess; and those that are somehow universally basic... and "here is a hand" is one of those.

"Here is a hand" is as basic as it gets for talking about hands. So, that also seems to be basic in the same sense as "bishops move diagonally" for playing chess. Both beliefs are needed in order to do something. The one is needed in order to talk about hands(language games), and the other is needed in order to play the game of chess. It's almost as if "Here is a hand" serves as a basic rule... just like "bishops move diagonally". In that sense, it's not two sorts at all, they are both the same in that they are the groundwork(basic rules) for doing something else with language.

:wink:

Quoting Sam26

I generally agree that some people, maybe most view it like you've described. I considered myself a Christian for many years until recently, and believed that many subjective experiences I had were from God. For example, that quiet whisper of God speaking - a kind of divine sense, that some would argue all of us have. I now have many problems with this kind of thinking. I don't outright dismiss it, but I'm very skeptical of most of it, even though I still have a strong spiritual belief system (e.g., my beliefs associated with NDEs).

I'm curious as to what happened. Do you no longer hear the sounds which you had attributed to God whispering, or do you still hear the sounds but now believe that they are caused by something other than God?

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

I'm curious as to what happened. Do you no longer hear the sounds which you had attributed to God whispering, or do you still hear the sounds but now believe that they are caused by something other than God?

This discussion would take us far away from the thrust of this thread. Suffice it to say that I don't believe, because I don't think there is sufficient evidence to support many of the Christian beliefs.

By the way, I never heard sounds, it was more like a feeling or intuition.

Quoting creativesoul

that nonlinguistic belief are not under consideration in the paper, nor have they been throughout the history of epistemology.

Correct, Plantinga never discusses basic beliefs in terms of nonlinguistic beliefs. Nonlinguistic beliefs wouldn't fall under the category of epistemology.

Hey Creative, how's it going?

Quoting Sam26

Correct, Plantinga never discusses basic beliefs in terms of nonlinguistic beliefs. Nonlinguistic beliefs wouldn't fall under the category of epistemology.

Hey Creative, how's it going?

I'm good Sam.

:smile:

I think I'm going to copy and paste a few of the criteria for "basic belief" mentioned in the link. May be interesting to grant them as a means to see where things go...

Argh...

I just cannot do it! I cannot bring myself to keep reading someone talking in terms of 'perceptual beliefs' and 'memory beliefs', when that very language use alone shows clearly that the author has gotten belief itself wrong to begin with.

All beliefs are existentially dependent upon and include physiological sensory perception and memory both. So, there is no stronger ground for concluding that both are irrevocable necessary elemental constituents of all belief. Thus, removing either from the other(to separate the two) is to remove both from the belief itself, and this move renders what's left utterly inadequate, insufficient, incomplete, and just not quite enough to remain a belief.

There is no belief without either. There is no belief without both. All belief is existentially dependent upon both perception and memory. There is no such thing as a perceptual belief as compared to memory beliefs.

Perhaps this would be best put a different way. What counts as a perceptual belief and a memory belief is determined solely by us, we cannot be wrong about it. Those things do not exist in their entirety prior to our naming and describing them. However, if we have knowledge of what all belief consist of; if we have knowledge of what all belief are existentially dependent upon; if we know what we're talking about when we're talking about belief, then we know that Platinga does not.

Sorry. I think I ought exit now.

:worry:

(1) I see a tree,
(2) I had breakfast this morning,
and
(3) That person is angry.

All three of these statements of belief are about what's happened and/or is happening.

Some belief is not.

The first is based upon(is existentially dependent upon) knowing how to use "I see a tree" and all that that entails. The second is based upon(is existentially dependent upon) knowing how to use "I had breakfast this morning" and all that that entails. The third is based upon(is existentially dependent upon) knowing how to use "That person is angry" and all that that entails.

All are based upon prior belief and not just one, but rather a plurality thereof; all of the ones required for language acquisition itself that are themselves propositional in content.

Learning the names of things is as basic as basic gets if we require all belief to have propositional content. None of the three are basic beliefs, even if we rule out non linguistic ones.

Quoting Sam26

I agree with this, i.e., there is no neat way of mapping this. It's like trying to map out what pornography is, like the Supreme Court said, I know it when I see it (Justice Stewart). I know that seeing that tree in my back yard is about as basic as you can get. The problem is setting out some definition that will fit each case. I don't think that can be done. It's like trying to come up with a definition of game that will fit every use of the word. It can't be done. This is why I say that each use needs looked at on its own merits. Even the words direct and indirect have problems as you pointed out.

Something that makes me deeply suspicious of this whole endeavour of subordinating conceptual analysis to the analysis of word use is that an idea can be posited and motivated by use and insulated from its problems by claiming that the idea itself is sound, it's just the ambiguities of language that render definitions for concepts more like family resemblances ("X tends to go together with Y in these circumstances") than complete characterisations ("X holds if and only if Y"). This is not to say behavioural indicators regarding a concept are worthless for examining how it works, it's just to say that it's not the whole story - simply because the use of words does not exhaust the domain of analysable phenomena.

Though I guess pursuing that connection would take the thread too far afield.

Quoting creativesoul

Learning the names of things is as basic as basic gets if we require all belief to have propositional content. None of the three are basic beliefs, even if we rule out non linguistic ones.

In the earlier parts of this thread I think posters have said what I'm about to reiterate, but then at some point this discussion became more of a linguistic analysis. I'm sure much is to be said about that, but I take the primary focus of the article to be pragmatic, meaning there are certain beliefs we hold to be self-evident and therefore basic and from that we build a world around it. When we see the tree, we certainly can question whether it's a tree and we can doubt all the way down to Descartes' cogito, but as a matter of pragmatics, we don't. We just start with a basic unwashed acceptance of certain things, and the question then becomes whether an acceptance of God is just as reasonable as an acceptance of trees.

For what it's worth, I think not. I think a belief in any meaningful god requires an act of faith that goes far beyond an acceptance that there is actually a real tree out there when you see it. In fact, I think a belief in God requires a suspension of rationality in some regard, and it requires a belief in purpose and meaning that goes far beyond seeing a tree. The foundational elements of most theological systems do not contain such simple statements as "the tree you see is the tree there is." They contain such statements as "The Bible is a sacred text that identifies the will of God and the path to a fulfilled and meaningful life." Surely there is a difference there.

Quoting Sam26

This discussion would take us far away from the thrust of this thread. Suffice it to say that I don't believe, because I don't think there is sufficient evidence to support many of the Christian beliefs.

By the way, I never heard sounds, it was more like a feeling or intuition.

I think it is important to the discussion because no one has adequately described whether "basic" beliefs are derived from sensations such as whisperings, or internal feelings and intuitions. It is a significant difference, because people tell us things, and we might believe what they say, and this would be an instance of deriving a belief from a sensation such as a whispering. On the other hand one might derive a belief directly from an internal feeling or an intuition, and this would be something completely different from being told something.

If we conflate these two distinct ways of deriving belief, we are headed for problems. So for instance, you had internal feelings or intuitions, which supported your belief, but you described this as "whisperings", as if an external person was telling you to believe this. Do you see how this description could be very misleading? Where is "the voice" coming from, within, or outside? If it is from within, as you now admit, then it is improper to describe it as a whispering, or voice, it is more like a feeling or intuition.

So, on the subject of a "basic belief", we have still not adequately determined whether such a thing comes from a feeling within, or from someone telling you what to believe. These two are very distinct, and if we conflate the two, and say a basic belief is some type of mixture of these two, or something like that, we will have endless discussions, lost in confusion, never getting anywhere.

Quoting creativesoul

All beliefs are existentially dependent upon and include physiological sensory perception and memory both. So, there is no stronger ground for concluding that both are irrevocable necessary elemental constituents of all belief. Thus, removing either from the other(to separate the two) is to remove both from the belief itself, and this move renders what's left utterly inadequate, insufficient, incomplete, and just not quite enough to remain a belief.

There are degrees of dependence. So it does not make sense to say all beliefs require internal elements and external elements and to say that it doesn't make sense to classify them in this way. Since a belief can be principally internally sourced, or principally externally sourced, it does make sense to classify them in this way. This is especially true if we are talking about "basic" beliefs, because we are looking for where the support for the belief comes from.

We have a distinction between theory and practise. Of course all theory contains elements from practise, and all practise contains theoretical elements, but this does not mean that the distinction is useless and bound to mislead us.

Quoting fdrake

Something that makes me deeply suspicious of this whole endeavour of subordinating conceptual analysis to the analysis of word use is that an idea can be posited and motivated by use and insulated from its problems by claiming that the idea itself is sound

If analyzing concepts isn't a matter of linguistic analysis, then what is it? Concepts by definition are linguistic, and definitions arise through use. Even when someone discovers something new, and thereby discovers a new concept, it's through use that it becomes a norm of language. It's in a culture of language that correct and incorrect uses become manifest. Furthermore, use isn't the be all and end all of the answer, simply because it takes a huge amount of effort sometimes to untangle correct use from incorrect use. This is clearly seen in Wittgenstein's Investigations, and it's clearly seen in On Certainty, which, I believe, is the actual application of Wittgenstein's thoughts in the PI.

Because something is motivated by use, it doesn't mean the idea is sound (so I agree). We often fail to understand just how complex some of these problems are, even those who think they have a good grasp of Wittgenstein's ideas (and I include myself in this class) often fail (more often than not) in their attempts to explain some of these ideas or concepts.

Quoting fdrake

This is not to say behavioural indicators regarding a concept are worthless for examining how it works, it's just to say that it's not the whole story - simply because the use of words does not exhaust the domain of analysable phenomena.

Of course the analysable data goes far beyond just a linguistic analysis. There is a danger in thinking that a linguistic analysis always answers a particular philosophical problem. I tend to use it for two reasons, first, it's where my interests lie, and second, language is the medium used to talk about these problems, especially philosophical problems.

Quoting Metaphysician Undercover

There are degrees of dependence.

Not existential dependence. A is either existentially dependent upon B or it's not. If A is existentially dependent upon B. and B is existentially dependent upon C, D, and E, then so too is A.

Of these, if any are basic, it would be C, D, and E.

Reply to creativesoul Thanks for your efforts here, but although you seem to be asserting that there are "basic beliefs" which are dependent on language for their genesis, you still haven't given an example of one.

Also, note that I disagree with Plantinga about God being a basic belief for the simple reason that I think beliefs that qualify as basic beliefs should be pre-reflectively and cross-culturally held by everyone; in other words the sorts of things that are believed on the basis of embodied human existence, and that most everyone would think you crazy for questioning.

I also think that the set of basic beliefs, as something like Collingwood's "absolute presuppositions" or Wittgenstein's "hinge propositions", would form the grounds upon which all other reason-based beliefs and knowledge are founded.

Beliefs which may be universally held in some cultures would not be "properly basic" if they have been culturally inculcated, because such beliefs often seem to come about through linguistic reification, and do not find their genesis simply in embodied experience.

Reply to frank Not sure what point you want to make here?

Quoting Janus

Not sure what point you want to make here?

Philosophy has roots in an anti-Dionysian stance. A philosopher likes to have rational grounds, and incorporating this attitude into other avenues of life has practical benefits to medicine, science, engineering, etc.

Freud was warning that taking this to an extreme can result in delusion. This is one of the starting points for surrealism. The part I was particularly interested in that Freud suggested that love of a theory is love of the Self. Unenlightened's comparison of God to the Self opened up a bunch of fruitful pondering for me.

Anyway, your belief that "This is a hand" is not held irrationally. It's still grounded in something irrational: perception. Right?

Quoting frank

Philosophy has roots in an anti-Dionysian stance. A philosopher likes to have rational grounds, and incorporating this attitude into other avenues of life has practical benefits to medicine, science, engineering, etc.

Freud was warning that taking this to an extreme can result in delusion.

I'm don't know what work(s) you have in mind. Would Freud say the delusion consists in having, or aspiring to have, rational grounds for all beliefs, or in thinking that one does have rational grounds for all beliefs?

Quoting frank

Anyway, your belief that "This is a hand" is not held irrationally. It's still grounded in something irrational: perception. Right?

Did you mean to write "not held rationally"?

I agree that "This is a hand" originates in perception or, perhaps better, embodied existence.

Quoting Janus

Would Freud say the delusion consists in having, or aspiring to have, rational grounds for all beliefs, or in thinking that one does have rational grounds for all beliefs?

No, it's that theory-building philosophers fall so deeply in love with their projects that they don't notice that they've become disconnected as if in a dream.

Quoting Janus

Did you mean to write "not held rationally"?

It's held rationally, but grounded in something irrational.

Quoting Janus

I agree that "This is a hand" originates in perception or, perhaps better, embodied existence.

What is "embodied existence"?

Quoting frank

No, it's that theory-building philosophers fall so deeply in love with their projects that they don't notice that they've become disconnected as if in a dream.

But would that not be the same as to say that they are delusional insofar as they believe they have rational grounds (as opposed to merely emotional attachment) for their beliefs (their theory-building projects)?

Quoting frank

It's held rationally, but grounded in something irrational.

How can a rational belief be (rationally) grounded in something irrational? Perhaps you mean "caused by" or "originating in"?

Quoting frank

What is "embodied existence"?

Existence as a body.

Quoting Janus

But would that not be the same as to say that they are delusional insofar as they believe they have rational grounds (as opposed to merely emotional attachment) for their beliefs (their theory-building projects)?

No. He meant that they get lost in the realm of the intellect. Rationality doesn't necessarily get you closer to the truth, that's the point.

Quoting Janus

How can a rational belief be (rationally) grounded in something irrational? Perhaps you mean "caused by" or "originating in"?

I meant "grounded" in the way it's used in the essay.

Quoting Janus

What is "embodied existence"?
— frank

Existence as a body.

As opposed to what?

Quoting frank

No. He meant that they get lost in the realm of the intellect. Rationality doesn't necessarily get you closer to the truth, that's the point.

So, what according to you does Freud say would get us closer to the truth than rationality? Which of his works are you citing?

Quoting frank

I meant "grounded" in the way it's used in the essay.

And what sense of "grounded" do you take that to be?

Quoting frank

As opposed to what?

Right, I should have specified sentient body.

Quoting Janus

Thanks for your efforts here, but although you seem to be asserting that there are "basic beliefs" which are dependent on language for their genesis, you still haven't given an example of one.

Thanks. You too. You missed it, so I'll repeat it here...

Learning the names of things is as basic as basic can be if basic belief is held to have propositional content and/or allowed to be existentially dependent upon language.


Quoting Janus

I think beliefs that qualify as basic beliefs should be pre-reflectively and cross-culturally held by everyone; in other words the sorts of things that are believed on the basis of embodied human existence, and that most everyone would think you crazy for questioning.

There are pre-reflective beliefs that are prior to language and pre-reflective beliefs that are not. That becomes a pretty nuanced path. It's enlightening, but it's not the easiest one to understand. Asking for universally held beliefs is probably an unattainable criterion however. I mean especially with philosophers... Some things are true of everyone, but I highly doubt you'll find that everyone shares the same basic belief, especially if it's based upon language use.



Quoting Janus

I also think that the set of basic beliefs, as something like Collingwood's "absolute presuppositions" or Wittgenstein's "hinge propositions", would form the grounds upon which all other reason-based beliefs and knowledge are founded.

I've nothing against either idea. However, due to the sheer breadth of belief content... what's it about... unless every subject matter shares some common denominator, we will inevitably end up with a set of basic beliefs that have little to do with one another. The common thread would be language use.

Naming comes first.

That's the best I can do at the moment.

Cheers!

:smile:

Quoting Janus

Which of his works are you citing?

Why? Were you planning to launch into a Freud phase?

Reply to frank I have read some of Freud many years ago, but I am not thinking about revisiting his work at the moment. It would be helpful to understanding what exactly you are claiming to know where you are getting your interpretations of Freud from, is all.

Reply to Janus Oh. This particular info on Freud came by way of reading about surrealism. Does that help?

Reply to frank Still not really seeing the connection.

Quoting Hanover

a discussion of "basic" and "foundational" seem to put the cart before the horse if we don't know what God is.

True.