Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rdxmf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-01T04:47:20.390Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Knowledge, Belief, and Faith*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 September 2007

Anthony Kenny
Anthony Kenny
Affiliation:
Oxford
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Is belief in God reasonable? Richard Dawkins is right to say that traditional arguments for the existence of God are flawed; but so is his own disproof of the existence of God, and there are gaps in neo-Darwinian explanations of the origin of language, of life, and of the universe. The rational response is neither theism nor atheism but agnosticism. Faith in a creed is no virtue, but mere belief in God may be reasonable even if false.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy , Volume 82 , Issue 3 , July 2007 , pp. 381 - 397
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 2007

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Actuum enim ad intellectum pertinentium quidam habent firmam assensionem absque tali cogitatione [= weighing up of alternatives] sicut cum aliquis considerat ea quae scit vel intelligit: talis enim consideratio iam est formata. Quidam vero actus intellectus habent quidem cogitationem informem absque firma assensione: sive in neutram partem declinent, sicut accidit dubitanti; sive in unam partem magis declinent sed tenentur aliquo levi signo, sicut accidit suspicanti; sive uni parti adhaereant, tamen cum formidine alterius, quod accidit opinanti.

2 Sed actus iste qui est credere habet firmam adhaesionem ad unam partem, in quo convenit credens cum sciente et intelligente; et tamen eius cognitio non est perfecta per manifestam visionem, in quo convenit cum dubitante, suspicante, et opinante.