1.6 Religious Experience as an Argument for Theism

Question 1

Swinburne:

Answer 1

Principle of Credulity

• “If it seems to a subject that X is present, then X is probably present; what one seems to perceive is probably so”
• We should accept someone’s experience unless evidence over wise

Principle of Testimony

• People usually tell the truth
• We should accept a statement unless I can demonstrate positive grounds showing it to be mistaken

Question 2

James’ Argument

Answer 2

• Normal people have religious experience
• Experience indicates truth, then God must be factually true
• Some REs have had profound effects on whole societies (more reasonable to assume God is responsible rather than hallucinations)
• Religious Experience cannot be dismissed on grounds of mental illness

Question 3

Can the Finite experience the Infinite?

Answer 3

1. How you can distinguish God from other objects of experience.
   - God is creator (how would you recognise attribute)
   - To recognise omniscience you would have to be omniscient
2. God has no body
3. Direct Experience of God is Impossible

Question 4

Problems of Verifying Religious Experience

Answer 4

1. Individuals undergo religious experience
2. Religious Experience is like emotion
3. Those who encounter these portray the Being revealed to them quite differently
4. Many experiences are caused by drugs / alcohol

Question 5

Science

Answer 5

1. Freud claimed religion is ‘an illusion based on human wishes’
   - Meets psychological needs
   - Paranoid wish-fulfilment
2. Dawkins
   - Religious Experiences are just a psychotic mind set
3. Kant: we can only experiences things in the empirical realm (cannot logically prove God)