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Philosophy > Religious langauge > Flashcards

Religious langauge Flashcards

1
Q

What constitutes as religious language?

A

Religious language is language concerned with the subject of God, such as when people speak about what they believe in and why they believe in it.

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2
Q

How does the nature of God make discussion about him difficult?

A

As God is transcendent, it is difficult to describe him fully using just standard human language.

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3
Q

What did Hume say about the limits of human language in discussion of God.

A

“We have no other language in which we can express our adoration of him.”

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4
Q

When was the verification principle developed and by whom?

A

Logical positivists developed the verification principle in the 1920s

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5
Q

What does the correspondence theory of truth say about language?

A

That language is empirical and gains its meaning through how relates to the world.

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6
Q

Moritz Schlick on verification.

A

“The meaning of the presupposition is the method of verification… we know the meaning of the statement if we know the conditions under which the statement is true or false.”

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7
Q

How did logical positivists want to influence philosophy?

A

The aimed to make the way it discussed things more scientific.

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8
Q

Name and explain the types of statement the verification principle would deem meaningful.

A

Analytical: A statement is true by definition, e.g all bachelors are unmarried.

Synthetic: A statement can be proven to be true or false via empirical testing. E.g all swans are green, Life exist on other planets, etc.

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9
Q

What did logical positivists conclude about religious language?

A

Religious statements are meaningless as they are subjective.

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10
Q

In what book did Ayer dismiss the idea that claims about God could be “significant propositions”?

A

Language, Truth and Logic (1936)

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11
Q

Name 4 criticism of the Verification principle.

A

1) Emotions and opinions become meaningless as the are objective.
2) Ethical claims become meaningless despite being used as the basis of societies.
3) The laws of science are meaningless as they can not be 100% verified.
4) Historical statements are meaningless as no one is alive to verify them.

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12
Q

What does Ayer do to address criticisms of the the verification principle

A

Ayer further developed verification with the addition of “strong” and “weak” verification:

Strong verification occurs when there is no doubt in the validity of a statement, such as the Pope is Catholic.

Weak is where statement is probable based on evidence.

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13
Q

How does Keith Ward contribute to the verification principle?

A

He argues that God himself could verify his own existence.

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14
Q

Explain John Hick’s eschatological principle.

A

A statement has the potential to be verified at the end of time or at death.

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15
Q

Who influenced Anthony Flew’s ideas of religious language?

A

Karl Popper.

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16
Q

How does Falsification contribute to the religious language debate?

A

It argues religious language is meaningless as it is unfalsifiable/ uncriticisable.

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17
Q

What argument does Flew attack with falsification?

A

John Wisdom’s parable of the gardener.

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18
Q

What does Flew say about an invisible, undetectable gardener?

A

That they are functionally no different from no gardener at all.

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19
Q

“God dies a death of a thousand qualifications.”- Flew. What is this a response to?

A

The attempts used to justify evil and suffering; the “god works in mysterious ways” argument.

20
Q

How does R.M.Hare develop and critique falsification?

A

He describes religious statements as “bliks”, unfalsifiable but still cognitive statements due to the fact they have significance tot he user.

21
Q

What does Basil Mitchell say?

A

The theist accepts there views can be critiqued, they just have personal faith that supersedes that for them.

22
Q

How does Swinburne’s toy cupboard analogy critique falsification?

A

He argues that it is possible for toys to be able to come to life while everyone is a sleep. While that statement is unfalsifiable, we understand the meaning of the statement.

23
Q

Give one quote describing Via negativia.

A

By denying all descriptions of God, you get insight and experience of God rather than unbelief and scepticism.”

24
Q

What do people who argue that language has meaning non-cognitively say?

A

language is significant not because it purely describes what is true or false but because it can describe things through interpretation.

25
Q

What is Univocal language?

A

When religious language uses words the same way as everyday language would?

26
Q

What is Equivocal language?

A

When the context of a words meaning is different in religious language than it is in everyday language.

27
Q

What is the flaw of univocal language?

A

It anthropomorphizes God, removing him of transcendence.

28
Q

What is the flaw of equivocal language?

A

It distances us from God and makes it difficult to understand him.

29
Q

Univocal language quote.

A

“No name belongs to God in the same sense that it belongs to creatures; for instance, wisdom in creatures is a quality, but not in God.”

30
Q

How does Burrell argue that analogy are a middle ground between univocal and equivocal language.

A

“Analogies are proportional similarities which also acknowledge dissimilar features.”

31
Q

What is Aquinas’ “Analogy of proportionality”?

A

The view that all good qualities belong infinitely to God and in proportion to humans.

32
Q

What is Aquinas’ “Analogy of attribution”?

A

The view that God is the cause of all good things and that our attributes are shared by god, but at a higher level.

33
Q

What does modern developer of analogy Ian Ramsey say?

A

He offers “Models & Qualifiers”; a Model is an analogy to help us understand, “God is love” while adding a qualifier, such as “infinitely” helps address the scope.

34
Q

How does symbolic religious language provide meaning?

A

It acts as a way of “identifying” concepts and then “participating” in the meaning of that concepts.

35
Q

What is the difference between a sign and a symbol?

A

Signs give direct information about something else.

Symbols gain meaning through context and deeper understanding.

36
Q

How does Paul Tillich in “System Theology” describe symbolic language?

A

“Transcending” the capacity of any finite reality to express it directly.

37
Q

How does Don Cupitt use anti-realist philosophy to argue that religion is significant.

A

Religion is a system of signs and symbols that we create to make sense of the world, and language relating to it is how we convey that.

38
Q

How is symbolism criticized?

A

1) Misinterpreted due changing times. E.g reduced patriarchy meanings ideas of God as a father are fading.
2) trivialisation of original meaning (Sunday as Sabbath day).

39
Q

What does Wittgenstein say about language’s meaning?

A

“Don’t ask for the meaning, ask for the use.”

40
Q

How does Wittgenstein’s language game show religious language to be pluralistic.

A

Language is contextual, its meaning comes from shared understanding and context between participants.

41
Q

How do Ludwig Wittgenstein and D.Z. Philips argue that religious language is incommensurable?

A

Religious language only has meaning within its own context.

42
Q

According to D.Z. Philips, what does religious language express?

A

An emotional attitude and understanding of life and a commitment to living life according to that understanding.

43
Q

What did Wittgenstein believe before he developed language games?

A

He was a logical positivist.

44
Q

What does Language games mean?

A

The idea that language is contextual and its meaning comes from the shared understanding between participants.

45
Q

Advantages of language games.

A

1) Religious language has meaning as it is distinct from other types of language.
2) Believers can be initiated into the rules of the game.
3) incommensurability of language defends religious language from criticism.

46
Q

Disadvantages of language games.

A

1) Language games can not be empirically tested due to their incommensurability.
2) Alienates those outside of the game and the rules of the game can not be changed to allow outsiders in.

Philosophy (6 decks)

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