Religious experience and the probability of theism: comments on Swinburne
Christoph Jäger
Religious Studies September 1, 2017 DOI: 10.1017/s0034412517000191 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Key points | Argues that Swinburne's appeal to religious experience cannot raise the probability of theism as intended: on many plausible assignments the non-experiential evidence already drives that probability toward 1, and a Bayesian argument analogous to one against phenomenal conservatism implies the probability of theism after religious experience cannot exceed the prior probability that the best rival hypothesis is false. The author contends these results are still compatible with 'weak rational belief' in theism, which can be strong enough for rational faith. |
Abstract
Abstract: I discuss the role of religious experience in Richard Swinburne's probabilistic case for theism. Swinburne draws on his principle of credulity to argue that, if in addition to other evidence we consider that many people have theistic religious experiences, theism comes out as more probable than not. However, on many plausible probability assignments for the relevant non-experiential evidence, the conditional probability of theism already converges towards 1. Moreover, an argument analogous to a general Bayesian argument against phenomenal conservatism suggests that, after we take account of evidence from religious experience, the probability of theism cannot be greater than the prior probability that the best rival hypothesis is false. I conclude that these observations are compatible with what Swinburne would call ‘weak rational belief’ in theism and that such weak belief can be strong enough for rational faith.