falsification

Question 1

karl popper

Answer 1

• 1902-1994

Question 2

karl popper n falsification

Answer 2

• greatest opponent to LP
• f= point that a proposition is scientific if one can state what evidence would prove it wrong
• this=principle of demarcation between scientific n unscientific, not the meaningful/meaningless
• if we believe science is all about proving r views to be true then we would make no progress at all
• its not for determining meaning but scientific asssertion
• he didnt deny RL has meaning, j that its not scientfiic
• things like marxism and psychiatry are meaningless because they are unfalsifiable: based on ways to prove themselves true, not false.
• a claim/belief is falsifiable if we can imagine what would prove it false

Question 3

karl popper how falsification works

Answer 3

• a scientist proposes a hypothesis
• they test it to see whether it works
• there may be many reasons why it seems to work but one occasion when it does not work is enough to disprove the hypothesis
• no general theory can be proven but it can be disproven
• we can test general statements by testing for things that work against it
• criticism becomes the main way we make progress
• eg all swans r white, we c loads ot white swans but if we see a black one then statement=false
• its a synthetically testable statement with meaning because it can be proved wrong.

Question 4

antony flew

Answer 4

• 1923-2010
• applied to RL
• religous ppl cant say what could prove their belief in god false, so theyre not acc asserting anything about way things r
• rl=meaningless
• it fails to assert anything about reality
• cog meaning requires expression of belief but a belief=mental representation of reality
• in order for belief to be about reality it must be falsifiable
• so even tho rl expresses belief since theyres unfalsifable beliefs rl fails to have cog meaning

Question 5

flew

parable of the gardener

Answer 5

• 2 ppl walk in forest n see clearing
• 1 says theres a gardener who tends to it
• other suggests waiting n see if its true
• after while believer say gardener=invisible
• so set up wire fences to try n detect him
• believer then says its a non physical gardener
• the unbeliver gets annoyed n asks flews crucial question:
• “But what remains of your original assertion?”
• religious person claims to believe in god but to protect belief from empirical testing they continually add qualifications to belief sayings its ‘not this/that’ etc
• eventually it will be nothing n ‘die a death of a thousand qualifications’.
• what is the difference between a world in which this gardener (God) exists, and a world in which it doesn’t?
• if belief in god=consistent w any possible discovery about reality then its existence makes no diff to reality.
• rl= fails to assert anything=unfalsifable n so meaningless

Question 6

flew summary

Answer 6

• All our beliefs about reality could be false (empiricism is true)
• So, a belief that cannot be imagined to be false, cannot be about reality.
• Religious belief cannot be imagined to be false.
• Therefore, RL fails to express beliefs about reality.

Question 7

flew eg of religous ppl hold to belief that god loves us like a dad loves kid

Answer 7

• flew believes amount of suffering n evil in world should falsify this as no loving dad would inflict such misery on kids
• many religous ppl continue to maintain faith in god despite suffering eg story of job, so inability to acknowledge god may not love them suggests their beliefs r meaningless

Question 8

flew qualification quote

Answer 8

‘die a death of a thousand qualifications’.

Question 9

richard dawkins
world n god

Answer 9

he pointed out that the world would be the same if there was no god, so you can see how this lines up.

Question 10

strength

The parable of the gardener strengthens Flew’s Falsificationism.

Answer 10

• even if rb appears falsifable, in cases it were tested they would edit their belief rather than admit they were wrong
• shows the ‘god the gaps’ phenomenon
• through history many beliefs have been claimed about god whcih science has over time shown false eg genesis creation story. rather than accept falsity of belief, they edit it
• so even if they say soemthing could disprove their belief we r justified in thinking that a mere pretence

Question 11

weakness: Religious belief is actually falsifiable

Answer 11

• St Paul claimed that if Jesus didntrise from the dead then faith is ‘pointless’ (1 Corinthians 15:14).
• so Christianity could be proven false if we find evidence that Jesus didnt rise from the dead, such as finding Jesus’ body.
• suggests Flew is incorrect to think RL is always unfalsifiable as there are at least some believers whose belief is incompatible with some logically possible state of affairs.
• Paul’s religious language passes Flew’s test of falsification + so would be meaningful.

Question 12

flew
evaluation defending falsification

Answer 12

• POG suggests that if we did discover jesus’ body, christians including st paul might make some excuse as to why its acc not a valid tests after all
• eg christians may be tempted to think the body is fake put there by devil
• tempting that is, it underlines flews point that theres no way to falsify belief in god

Question 13

john frame
evaluation criticizing falsifcationism

Answer 13

• john frame turns the parable on its head, w scenario where gardener=visible n claims to be royal gardener n sceptic refuses to believe that regardless of evidence
• shows flews appr fails as his belief in atheism=unfalsifiable
• atheists believe there isnt suffecient evidendce to justify belief in god
• issue=cannot say what could prove that belief false
• eg to add to his argument, if jesus appeared again or god rearranged stars to say ‘god is here’-an atheust wiuld simply say that was more likely j a hallucination, or evidence theyre in simulation
• atheism=unfalsifiable
• so falsifiability doesn’t seem a valid test for distinguishing between meaningful and meaningless language regarding religion.

Question 14

flews challenge

Answer 14

• he challenges rm hare n basik mitchell to respond to the question:
• ‘what would ahve to occur or occured to constiute for u a disproof of love of or the existence of, god?’
• hes set a trap
• if they say nothing thne their claims cannot be falsified n thus fall into his ‘nonsense’ category-theyre ‘vacous’
• so the other 2 philosphers must find a way to respond to flew that evades the trap

Question 15

RM Hare n bliks

Answer 15

• a blik=simply how u view soemthing
• ‘i must begin by stressing that, on the ground marked out by flew, he seems to me to be completely victorious’
• but he uses his own parable to suggest flews on wrong ground to understand religous assertions

Question 16

parable of the paranoid student

Answer 16

• lunatic convienced all dons want to murder him
• when presented w eveidence to the contrary, he maintains his views that theyre being devious
• hes obviously deluded, but what about?
• he says its not a delusion about a proposition bc we never asserted anything to be falsified
• so he says teh student has wrong bliks
• j bc theres no evidence to support his claim, it doesnt mean his blik (attitude)=meaningless

Question 17

bliks

Answer 17

non-rational + cannot be falsified because they are groundless (aka they are based on no rational or reasonable grounds).
yet Hare argues that even though they can’t be falsified, they are still meaningful to those who believe in them.
-but his not clear what a blik acc is=issue w argument
- religous claims=bliks, so=meaningful even thought theyre not falsifiable

Question 18

flews response to bliks

Answer 18

• the concept of a blik may have an important role in philosophy
• but not in religious philosophy
• claims about god’s existence or the historicity and resurrection of jesus christ cannot be bliks
• religious bliks must be separate from standard religious doctrine
• hare’s view is actually a radical view of religious claims

Question 19

john hick on hare

Answer 19

• tooks hares view n applied it directly to religion
• argues religous beliefs r based upon reason
• he claimed there r distinct sane n insane bliks like in his eg
• but if bliks r unverifiable and unfalsifiable, bliks cannot be right, wrong, sane or insane.
• these inconsistencies are philosophically unsatisfying.

Question 20

response to hick on hare

flews theories of truth

Answer 20

• coherence theory of truth= bliks part of it. like we like to think r family=good ppl
• correspondence theory of truth= saying god exists above my world view, which is what religous ppl r truly saying, not j a little belief in god

Question 21

basil mitchel

Answer 21

• 1917-2011
• states flew makes error in his analysis of the religous believer bc christian attitude isnt that of detached observer but of the believer

Question 22

basil

parable of the paristan n stranger

Answer 22

• A soldier is fighting for the resistance against the government in a civil war.
• One day someone comes to them and claims to be the leader of the resistance.
• They stay up all night talking and the stranger leaves a strong impression on the soldier n says no matter what i do still have faith.
• As a result, the soldier decides to have faith in this person, even when they see them fighting for the government.
• even when friends convience him hes a double agent, he has faith
• their original encounter is enough for him and gives the stranger the benefit of the doubt.

Question 23

basil parable relate to christians

Answer 23

• analogous to way christians have initial experince/relationshio w god which justifies their faith
• they then do recognise evil=evidence against god
• soemtimes ppl will deal w terrible evil that outweighs strength of evidence they had for god
• then stop believing in god
• so belief=falsifiable
• but mitchell insists the level of evil required to falsify person belief cannot always be known in advance
• everyone will have own limit
• so rl for must part=falsifiable
• so flew=wrong to think for belief to be rational the believer must be able to say in advance what would falsify it
• falsification is not immediately obvious.

Question 24

Evaluation defending Flew against basil

Answer 24

• issue w basil is we wouldnt know which ppl have unfalsifiable blind faith n which dont know their falsification in advance
• cant claim belief is falsifiable if falsification=unknown
• persons exp n relationship w god isnt evidence
• in parable=real person is evidence but religous encounter w god only happens in ppls minds
• so not rlly analogous to acc meeting a person in reality n weighing whether theyre on ur side
• Experience of + relationship w God is not valid empirical evidence.

Question 25

Evaluation criticizing Flew against basil

Answer 25

• flews gardener parable fails to capture way religious belief functions
• it isnt constant process of altering belief to protect it from rational testing
• its based on personal experience n falsifiable
• lots of egs of religious ppl abandoning belief due to evil
• it looks like a fact many religious ppl have faith based on personal relationship w god until evil outweighs it
• if asked before they wouldnt have been able to say what would undermine it
• rl=falsifiable even if falsification cant be known in advance
• so he defends cognitive meaningfulness of rl

Question 26

the falsification symposium: john hick and eschatological verification

Answer 26

• hick adds to basil parable
• the stranger would know if he was telling truth, even though the partisan cannot judge. theres truth here
• when war ends, truth will come out n the stranger will be a hero or traitor
• he says since christianity has specific beliefs about afterlife which means its possible to meet criteria for weak verification. when we get to heaven we can verify its truth
• his error=in equating falsification n verification.
• he says heaven=verifiable but not falsifiable
• so theres eschatological verification but not falsification

Question 27

Hume’s argument for non-cognitivism

Strength of the non-cognitive approach: Hume’s psychology

Answer 27

• hare was influenced by humes psych argument for non cog
• cog part of mind=controlled by r noncog feelings
• were unaware in way r reasoned judgements r acc controlled by r unconcious socially conditioned feelings
• when we have strong emotion r mind creates a reason to act on it= rationalisation
• explains why ppl refuse to accept evidence that goes against deep beliefs such as hares student n religous belief
• rl=appearance of cog meaning but is acc expressing emotions (blik) their belief is rooted in

Question 28

Weakness: Hume’s theory of human psychology is controversial.

Answer 28

• kant rejected it arguing huamns were capable of putting their emotions aside n acting out of purely rational motives
  -psychologist Jonathan Haidt thinks Hume was closer to the truth than Kant, but still think that Hume went a bit too far by saying that reason was always a slave to emotions.
• belief invloves emotions but still based on reason in some ways
• eg flew changed mind about god n became religous after modern version of design argument
• suggests although RL might often be rooted in non cog attitudes, reason can still affect r cog attitudes
• r reason can control r emotions to some degree esp long term
• =hares wrong to say rl can only be rooted in non cog emotions

Question 29

Evaluation defending non-cognitivism

Answer 29

• egs such as flew who changed his mind about god=extremely rare
• most religous believers simply follow faith of family/culture
• suggests hume n hare is correct about vast majority of cases of rl
• philosphers who make arguments for religous beliefs r arguablly not really using rl in typical way
• rl as it exists socially is not best represented by way religous philosphers use it
• they try to put an intellectual sophistication on soemthing which is rlly j attitudes n spirtual feelings
• so we conclude rl of average believer is non cog

Question 30

Evaluation criticizing non-cognitivism

Answer 30

• rl at least soemtimes can be based on reason n thus express cog beliefs
• theres a spectrum of reasoned belief from blind faith on 1 hand to v rational religous beliefs like aquinas
• basil accepted some religous ppl have blind faith so maybe hare=right about them
• but mitchell insists theyre minority
• it looks like hares wrong regarding majority of religous belief