WILLIAM JAMES, DICKINSON MILLER, AND C. J. DUCASSE ON THE ETHICS OF BELIEF

2015 ◽  
pp. 50-62
Author(s):  
Edward H. Madden
Keyword(s):  
William James ◽  
Ethics Of Belief ◽  
The Ethics Of Belief

De scheepseigenaar en de gelovige: William Clifford over God, bewijs en doxastische verantwoordelijkheid

2007 ◽  
Vol 61 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-108
Author(s):  
Rik Peels
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Religious Beliefs ◽  
William James ◽  
Ethics Of Belief ◽  
Belief In God ◽  
Extensive Analysis ◽  
William Kingdon Clifford ◽  
The Ethics Of Belief

At the end of the nineteenth century, in his famous essay ‘The Ethics of Belief’ the well-known mathematician and philosopher William Kingdon Clifford offered a powerful argument against religious beliefs. This article first gives an extensive analysis of Clifford’s evidentialist argument by placing it against the background of his evidentialist epistemology. Second, some arguments of William James, Clifford’s most famous critic, are expounded and criticised. Although there is some plausibility to these arguments, they are insufficient to refute Clifford’s evidentialism. Third, the author presents some problems for Clifford’s evidentialism, having to do with evidentialism as a moral thesis and with doxastic involuntarism, and offers some new arguments against Clifford’s evidentialist argument. Clifford’s argument against belief in God, as it stands, turns out to be untenable.

Public Theology, the Ethics of Belief and the Challenge of Divine Hiddenness

2007 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 382-407
Author(s):  
Owen Anderson
Keyword(s):  
Immanuel Kant ◽  
Intellectual History ◽  
David Hume ◽  
William James ◽  
Public Theology ◽  
Ethics Of Belief ◽  
Rational Argument ◽  
Divine Hiddenness ◽  
Belief In God ◽  
The Ethics Of Belief

AbstractThis article considers the claim made by William Clifford that no belief should be held without sufficient reason and its implications for belief in God and public theology. Responses to Clifford, notably by William James, have tended to emphasize the personal side of religious belief. Public theology assumes a means for settling disputes through rational argument. However, David Hume and Immanuel Kant raised significant challenges to belief in God, and this developed during the nineteenth century into a rejection of public theology. This article traces the intellectual history behind Clifford's claim, and argues that, by the time that Freud offers his claim that belief in God is immature, the justification for public theology has been undermined. By clearly identifying the challenge facing public theology, this article lays the framework for constructing a response to the critique of reason given by Kant and the scepticism of Hume. If public theology is to be defended, this response is both necessary and timely.

William James and the Ethics of Belief

Philosophy ◽  
1983 ◽  
Vol 58 (225) ◽  
pp. 353-364 ◽  
Author(s):  
G.L. Doore
Keyword(s):  
William James ◽  
Religious Faith ◽  
Ethics Of Belief ◽  
Main Principle ◽  
Insufficient Evidence ◽  
Widespread Agreement ◽  
The Will ◽  
American Style ◽  
Anglo American ◽  
The Ethics Of Belief

There is widespread agreement among philosophers that William James's well-known attempt to justify religious faith in ‘The Will to Believe’ is a failure. But despite the fact that James wrote his essay as a reply to the ‘tough-minded’ ethics of belief represented by such thinkers as W. K. Clifford and T. H. Huxley, the reasons commonly given today for rejecting James's position seem to be mostly based on the same principle of intellectual ethics that motivated Clifford and Huxley. Clifford, it may be recalled, maintained that ‘It is wrong always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence’. Although this is a rather rhetorical way of stating it, the principle is basically the same one adhered to by most scientists and philosophers who consider themselves rigorous and ‘objective’ thinkers. Even philosophers not associated with the hardheaded modern Anglo-American style of empiricism commonly pledge their allegiance to such a principle. For example, Brand Blanshard (who is an epistemological idealist) holds that the ‘main principle’ of the ethics of belief is that one should ‘equate one's assent to the evidence’ and he then goes on to criticize James, on the basis of this principle, for advocating self-deception and intellectual dishonesty.

The Morality of Religious Belief

1985 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 551-557
Author(s):  
Clyde Nabe
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Religious Belief ◽  
William James ◽  
Ethics Of Belief ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
The Will ◽  
The Ethics Of Belief

Van Harvey's The Historian and the Believer appeared nearly a century after W. K. Clifford's ‘The ethics of belief’. Harvey is critical of the epistemological supports of religious belief in a way strikingly similar to Clifford's criticisms. But Clifford's view did not go uncriticized in the intervening period. William James for instance used Clifford's essay as a foil for his argument in ‘The will to believe’. Now here is Clifford's argument again offered in twentieth century garb in Harvey's book. That a view so similar to Clifford's can arise again a century later, and after strong criticism, suggests that there is some important integrity to that view, and that that view strikes a responsive chord in the ear of many contemporary human beings. This paper intends therefore to examine Clifford's and Harvey's works in order to uncover what makes their shared view attractive.

James, Clifford, and the Scientific Conscience

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
David A. Hollinger
Keyword(s):  
New England ◽  
William James ◽  
Belief Systems ◽  
Religious Faith ◽  
Ethics Of Belief ◽  
The Will ◽  
The Ethics Of Belief

This chapter presents a comparative reading of W. K. Clifford's 1877 treatise, “The Ethics of Belief,” and William James' 1897 essay, “The Will to Believe.” It provides an interpretation of each in the distinctive contexts of England in the 1870s and New England in the 1890s. It argues that Clifford displayed more sensitivity than James did to the consequences of belief. This is an ironic reversal of roles in the story of a great pragmatist who insisted that “the whole defense of religious faith hinges upon” the action that faith requires or inspires. James' “The Will to Believe” should be understood not only as an artifact of its author's agony about the fate of Christianity in the age of science, but also as a product of his political complacency. Clifford had a much more modern understanding than James did of the function of belief systems in society and politics.

Reasoning and Lapses in James’ The Will to Believe

2012 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 387-399
Author(s):  
Jonathan Adler
Keyword(s):  
Ethics Of Belief ◽  
Insufficient Evidence ◽  
The Will ◽  
The Right ◽  
The Ethics Of Belief

James’ The Will to Believe is the most influential writing in the ethics of belief. In it, James defends the right and rationality to believe on non-evidential grounds. James’ argument is directed against Clifford’s “Evidentialism” presented in The Ethics of Belief in which Clifford concludes that “[i]t is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence”. After an overview of the James-Clifford exchange and James’ argument, I reconstruct his argument in detail. Subsequently, I examine four steps in James’ argument, and try to show that these amount to fallacies – enticing to reason, but not cogent.

ON THE ETHICS OF BELIEF

Ratio ◽  
1992 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 147-159
Author(s):  
Nicholas Nathan
Keyword(s):  
Ethics Of Belief ◽  
The Ethics Of Belief
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