Scepticism, Evidentialism and the Party Argument: A Pascalian Perspective

Robert Holyer

doi:10.1017/S0034412500001803

Scepticism, Evidentialism and the Party Argument: A Pascalian Perspective

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 October 2008

Robert Holyer

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Robert Holyer: Affiliation:
Arkansas College, Batesville, Arkansas 72503, USA

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Sceptical arguments, it is commonly claimed, may succeed in disarming some powerful objections to religious belief, but they do nothing more than establish a state of parity between the believer and the objector. For this reason, they make no positive contribution to the justification of religious belief and therefore are of value only to the fideist who insists that religious beliefs do not have and do not need rational support. However, while this opinion is widely held by philosophers of religion, it ignores the fact that sceptical arguments have given rise to a constructive tradition in epistemology: what is often referred to as naturalism. In what follows I shall develop a suggestion from this tradition, and that is that sceptical arguments lead not to an abandonment of claims to justified belief but to a revision and contextualization of our epistemic standards. Though this suggestion can be found in a number of philosophers in this tradition, my inspiration for it comes from Pascal, who made an important place for scepticism in the evidentialist argument for Christianity which we find in the Pensées. To develop this suggestion, I shall first sketch a position inspired by Pascal and then argue that the possibilities it suggests have been insufficiently considered in a number of recent discussions of the importance of sceptical arguments in the epistemology of religious belief.

Type: Research Article
Information: Religious Studies , Volume 25 , Issue 2 , June 1989 , pp. 191 - 208

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0034412500001803 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1989

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^{page 191 note 1} Scepticism and Naturalism: Some Varieties (London: Methuen, 1985), p. 2.

^{page 191 note 2} Borrowing Alvin Plantinga's distinction between prima facie and all-things-considered epistemic duties and obligations. See ‘Reason and Belief in God’, in Faith and Rationality, edited by Plantinga, Alvin and Wolterstorff, Nicholas (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1983), pp. 16–33.Google Scholar

^{page 192 note 1} Scepticism and Reasonable Doubt: The British Naturalist Tradition in Wilkins, Hume, Reid, and Newman (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986), p. 6. This work has been of great help to me in clarifying the thought that has gone into this essay in a way that is difficult to document.

^{page 192 note 2} I use ‘rational belief’ and ‘justified belief’ somewhat interchangeably, realizing that they are not always the same.

^{page 193 note 1} This term and the distinction behind it are explained by Ferreira, , Scepticism and Reasonable Doubt, p. 109.Google Scholar

^{page 194 note 1} 1, 3, translated by Oswald, Martin (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1962), p. 5.Google Scholar

^{page 194 note 2} Pensées, 194 (Brunschvicg edition), translated by Trotter, W. F. (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1958).Google Scholar

^{page 195 note 1} Pensées, 194.Google Scholar

^{page 196 note 1} It is commonly objected to cumulative case natural theology that we cannot infer from the idea of an omniscient, omnipotent being anything about his intentions and desires. Making the theistic hypothesis more theologically determinate, as I suggest, would go some way towards meeting this objection.

^{page 196 note 2} This notion of rationality has been more recently defended by Mitchell, Basil, The Justification of Religious Belief (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1973)CrossRef Google Scholar and Pojman, Louis, ‘Rationality and Religious Belief’, Religious Studies XV (1979), 159–72.CrossRef Google Scholar

^{page 198 note 1} (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1984).

^{page 198 note 2} International journal for Philosophy of Religion XIV (1983), 129–41.

^{page 198 note 3} (Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1983).

^{page 199 note 1} Pp. 89–105.

^{page 199 note 2} p. 102.

^{page 200 note 1} Philosophical Theology, I (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1928), p. 301.

^{page 200 note 2} p. 90.

^{page 200 note 3} (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1967).

^{page 200 note 4} p. 270.

^{page 201 note 1} Plantinga's position is clearer in his later writings. See especially, ‘Reasons and Belief in God’. In view of the notion of justifying conditions that he develops in this essay, Feenstra, Ronald J., ‘Natural Theology, Parity, and Unbelief’ Modern Theology V (1988), 1–11CrossRef Google Scholar, also argues that Plantinga's position is not really a parity argument.

^{page 201 note 2} p. 130.

^{page 202 note 1} ‘Science and Religion: Their Logical Similarity’, Religious Studies V (1969), 49–68.

^{page 202 note 2} p. 68.

^{page 202 note 3} p. 56.

^{page 202 note 4} p. 133.

^{page 203 note 1} p. 134.

^{page 204 note 1} p. 57.

^{page 204 note 2} p. 135.

^{page 205 note 1} p. 98.

^{page 205 note 2} p. 107–8.

^{page 205 note 3} p. 152.

^{page 205 note 4} Pp. 150–1.

^{page 206 note 1} p. 147.

^{page 206 note 2} p. 155/6.

^{page 207 note 1} ‘Is a Religious Epistemology Possible?’ in Knowledge and Necessity, edited by Vesey, G. N. A. (London: Macmillan, 1970), p. 277.Google Scholar

^{page 207 note 2} Ibid. p. 276.

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