4.2 Verification and Falsification debates

Question 1

The Christian Debate

Answer 1

Christian’s don’t think they are making non-cognitive statements when they say ‘God is love’ or ‘God created the universe’ - they believe they are making cognitive assertions about an all-powerful being who created the universe and has a relationship with human beings.

Question 2

Logical Positivism and the verification principle

Answer 2

In the 1920’s a group of philosophers - the Vienna Circle - developed a critique of religious language which came to be known as logical positivism. Their claim was that only the statements that have meaning are those which: 1. are logically true AND 2. can be verified empirically.
Logical positivists argue statements like ‘God is necessary’ are synthetic (need to be tested through observation of the world).

Question 3

Ayer’s verification principle

Question 4

Criticisms of Ayer

Question 5

Support of Ayer

Question 6

The verification principle part 2

Answer 6

Statement ‘My dog has four legs’ is verifiable and meaningful, ‘My dog is dreaming about Einstein’ is unverifiable and meaningless.

PROBLEM: 1. we find statements meaningful that are not strictly speaking true/false or empirically verifiable. We may disagree on what is ‘good art’ but that does not make the discussion meaningless. 2. We can’t verify historical statements through sense-experience yet who would maintain that statements are meaningless such as ‘Caesar’s father died suddenly while putting on shoes.