religious language Flashcards
what is an example of religious language
‘god exists’
‘god loves us’
‘god answers our prayers’
what is cognitive
cognitive statements are meaningful in that they are our expressions of our beliefs in the world. they can be true or false. moral statements are treated as factual statements.
what is no cognitive
statements are meaningful in that they express some other type of mental state such as emotions. they do not make claims about the world. there are objective moral truths
what is the main difference between non cognitive and cognitive
cognitive makes a claim about the world
what is AJ ayers verification principle
A statement is only meaningful if it is a tautology, or if it can be empirically verifiable.
any statement which does not meet this criteria is FALSIFIABLE.
What is the issue with AJ’s verification principle
it fails its own test. The statement “a statement is only meaningful if it is analytical or empirical” is neither analytical nor empirical. so this statement is meaningless.
What does falsifiable mean
a falsifiability is part of a statement which makes it meaningful. there must be some possible bit of evidence which makes it true of false. otherwise it is meaningless.
explain Ayer and the elimination of metaphysics
metaphysics’s claims are beyond empirical and analytical proof. this applies to the metaphysical and religious language claims.
Ps and Cs of Ayer and the elimination of metaphysics
P1- claims are meaningful if there are tautologies or empirical
P2- religious language makes claims which are not tautologies
P3-RL makes claims about metaphysical entities (God)
P4-Metaphysical entities are beyond empirical observation
C1-therefore Religious claims are not factually significant because they do not meet the criteria
C2- therefore they are meaningless
criticism of Ayers VP- failure to accommodate
fails to accommodate much of what we understand as meaningful (art, philosophy poetry) and this should make us doubt this principle.
john hicks response to ayer
eschatological verification
‘GOD EXISTS’
accepts principle of logical positivists and ayer, specifically that a ‘factually significant statements truth or falsity makes a difference to our experience of the world’
‘god exists’, hick argues that this can be verified as long as it is possible to describe an experience in which rational doubt about gods existence can be removed.
Bases his argument on the possibility of experiencing god in the after life.
what are religious statements? (not asking for examples)
Non-straightforward assertions of the world. Posses unusual features which raise questions about the world.
