Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jn8rn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T17:48:33.172Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Adolf Grünbaum on religious delusions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 March 1999

BRIAN GARVEY
BRIAN GARVEY
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Republic of Ireland
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Grünbaum claims it is possible that all belief in God is a delusion, meaning a false belief which is engendered by irrational psychological motives. I dispute this on the grounds that in many cases belief in God is engendered by purely cultural factors, and this is incompatible with its being engendered by psychological ones. Grünbaum also claims that saying a culturally engendered belief cannot be a delusion makes social consensus the sole arbiter of reality. I dispute this on the grounds that we can say that socially engendered beliefs fail to be delusions because they fail to meet the psychological criterion, rather than because they are true.

Type
Research Article
Information
Religious Studies , Volume 35 , Issue 1 , March 1999 , pp. 19 - 35
Copyright
© 1999 Cambridge University Press

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.)