Problems of Religious Luck

Problems of Religious Luck
Author: Guy Axtell
Publisher: Lexington Books
Total Pages: 291
Release: 2020-07-07
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1498550185

To speak of being religious lucky certainly sounds odd. But then, so does “My faith holds value in God’s plan, while yours does not.” This book argues that these two concerns — with the concept of religious luck and with asymmetric or sharply differential ascriptions of religious value — are inextricably connected. It argues that religious luck attributions can profitably be studied from a number of directions, not just theological, but also social scientific and philosophical. There is a strong tendency among adherents of different faith traditions to invoke asymmetric explanations of the religious value or salvific status of the home religion vis-à-vis all others. Attributions of good/bad religious luck and exclusivist dismissal of the significance of religious disagreement are the central phenomena that the book studies. Part I lays out a taxonomy of kinds of religious luck, a taxonomy that draws upon but extends work on moral and epistemic luck. It asks: What is going on when persons, theologies, or purported revelations ascribe various kinds of religiously-relevant traits to insiders and outsiders of a faith tradition in sharply asymmetric fashion? “I am saved but you are lost”; “My religion is holy but yours is idolatrous”; “My faith tradition is true, and valued by God, but yours is false and valueless.” Part II further develops the theory introduced in Part I, pushing forward both the descriptive/explanatory and normative sides of what the author terms his inductive risk account. Firstly, the concept of inductive risk is shown to contribute to the needed field of comparative fundamentalism by suggesting new psychological markers of fundamentalist orientation. The second side of what is termed an inductive risk account is concerned with the epistemology of religious belief, but more especially with an account of the limits of reasonable religious disagreement. Problems of inductively risky modes of belief-formation problematize claims to religion-specific knowledge. But the inductive risk account does not aim to set religion apart, or to challenge the reasonableness of religious belief tout court. Rather the burden of the argument is to challenge the reasonableness of attitudes of religious exclusivism, and to demotivate the “polemical apologetics” that exclusivists practice and hope to normalize.

Making Sense of God

Making Sense of God
Author: Timothy Keller
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 338
Release: 2016-09-20
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0525954155

We live in an age of skepticism. Our society places such faith in empirical reason, historical progress, and heartfelt emotion that it’s easy to wonder: Why should anyone believe in Christianity? What role can faith and religion play in our modern lives? In this thoughtful and inspiring new book, pastor and New York Times bestselling author Timothy Keller invites skeptics to consider that Christianity is more relevant now than ever. As human beings, we cannot live without meaning, satisfaction, freedom, identity, justice, and hope. Christianity provides us with unsurpassed resources to meet these needs. Written for both the ardent believer and the skeptic, Making Sense of God shines a light on the profound value and importance of Christianity in our lives.

The Routledge Handbook of the Philosophy and Psychology of Luck

The Routledge Handbook of the Philosophy and Psychology of Luck
Author: Ian M. Church
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 1028
Release: 2019-02-11
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1351258745

Luck permeates our lives, and this raises a number of pressing questions: What is luck? When we attribute luck to people, circumstances, or events, what are we attributing? Do we have any obligations to mitigate the harms done to people who are less fortunate? And to what extent is deserving praise or blame affected by good or bad luck? Although acquiring a true belief by an uneducated guess involves a kind of luck that precludes knowledge, does all luck undermine knowledge? The academic literature has seen growing, interdisciplinary interest in luck, and this volume brings together and explains the most important areas of this research. It consists of 39 newly commissioned chapters, written by an internationally acclaimed team of philosophers and psychologists, for a readership of students and researchers. Its coverage is divided into six sections: I: The History of Luck II: The Nature of Luck III: Moral Luck IV: Epistemic Luck V: The Psychology of Luck VI: Future Research. The chapters cover a wide range of topics, from the problem of moral luck, to anti-luck epistemology, to the relationship between luck attributions and cognitive biases, to meta-questions regarding the nature of luck itself, to a range of other theoretical and empirical questions. By bringing this research together, the Handbook serves as both a touchstone for understanding the relevant issues and a first port of call for future research on luck.

Faith in Certain Terms

Faith in Certain Terms
Author: Olli-Pekka Vainio
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 201
Release: 2023-11-30
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1000969304

This book considers how certainty and faith are related in Christian faith. It asks: How certain can Christian believers be about their beliefs about God? Should Christians doubt the assurance of their salvation? The chapters provide an historical analysis of both certainty of faith and assurance from the early Church to modern times while also paying attention to confessional differences. The author explores contemporary debates in analytic epistemology on the certainty and fallibility of our beliefs and argues for a fallibilist understanding of Christian faith. The book also addresses some less discussed arguments that threaten the certainty of faith and offers an account of faith as cognitive practice. It will be of interest to scholars of both theology and philosophy.

Blessed

Blessed
Author: Kate Bowler
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 350
Release: 2013
Genre: History
ISBN: 0190876735

Gospels -- Faith -- Wealth -- Health -- Victory -- American blessing -- Megachurch table -- Naming names.

For God's Sake

For God's Sake
Author: Antony Loewenstein
Publisher: Macmillan Publishers Aus.
Total Pages: 359
Release: 2013-07-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1743289138

Four Australian thinkers come together to ask and answer the big questions, such as: What is the nature of the universe? Doesn't religion cause most of the conflict in the world? and Where do we find hope? We are introduced to the detail of different belief systems - Judaism, Christianity, Islam - and to the argument that atheism, like organised religion, has its own compelling logic. And we gain insight into the life events that led each author to their current position. Jane Caro flirted briefly with spiritual belief, inspired by 19th century literary heroines such as Elizabeth Gaskell and the Brontë sisters. Antony Lowenstein is proudly culturally, yet unconventionally, Jewish. Simon Smart is firmly and resolutely a Christian, but one who has had some of his most profound spiritual moments while surfing. Rachel Woodlock grew up in the alternative embrace of Baha'i belief but became entranced by its older parent religion, Islam. Provocative, informative and passionately argued, For God's Sake encourages us to accept religious differences but to also challenge more vigorously the beliefs that create discord.

Wittgenstein and the Cognitive Science of Religion

Wittgenstein and the Cognitive Science of Religion
Author: Robert Vinten
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 257
Release: 2023-06-15
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1350329371

Advancing our understanding of one of the most influential 20th-century philosophers, Robert Vinten brings together an international line up of scholars to consider the relevance of Ludwig Wittgenstein's ideas to the cognitive science of religion. Wittgenstein's claims ranged from the rejection of the idea that psychology is a 'young science' in comparison to physics to challenges to scientistic and intellectualist accounts of religion in the work of past anthropologists. Chapters explore whether these remarks about psychology and religion undermine the frameworks and practices of cognitive scientists of religion. Employing philosophical tools as well as drawing on case studies, contributions not only illuminate psychological experiments, anthropological observations and neurophysiological research relevant to understanding religious phenomena, they allow cognitive scientists to either heed or clarify their position in relation to Wittgenstein's objections. By developing and responding to his criticisms, Wittgenstein and the Cognitive Science of Religion offers novel perspectives on his philosophy in relation to religion, human nature, and the mind.

Being Saved

Being Saved
Author: Marc Cortez
Publisher: SCM Press
Total Pages: 536
Release: 2018-08-30
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0334054958

With contributions from leading theologians and philosophers, "Being Saved: Explorations in Human Salvation" brings together a series of essays on the major topics relating to the doctrine of salvation. The book provides readers with a critical resource that consists of an integrative philosophical-theological method, and will invigorate this much-needed discussion. Contributors include Oliver Crisp (Fuller Theological Seminary) Paul Helm (Regent College, Vancouver and Highland Theological College, Scotland) Joanna Leidenhag (University of Edinburgh) Andrew Loke (Hong Kong University)

Religious Disagreement and Pluralism

Religious Disagreement and Pluralism
Author: Matthew A. Benton
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 304
Release: 2021-11-25
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0192589695

Epistemological questions about the significance of disagreement have advanced alongside broader developments in social epistemology concerning testimony, the nature of expertise and epistemic authority, the role of institutions, group belief, and epistemic injustice, among others. During this period, related issues in the epistemology of religion have re-emerged as worthy of new consideration, and available to be situated with new conceptual tools. Does disagreement between, and within, religions challenge the rationality of religious commitment? How should religious adherents think about exclusivist, inclusivist, and pluralist frameworks as applied to religious truth, or to matters of salvation or redemption or liberation? This volume explores many of these issues at the intersection of the epistemology of disagreement and religious epistemology. It engages in careful reflection on religious diversity and disagreement, offering ways to balance epistemic humility with personal conviction. Recognizing the place of religious differences in our social lives, it provides renewed efforts at how best to think about truths concerning religion.