Swinburne’s principles of testimony and credulity

• Swinburne's rejections of the special considerations

  1. Concerns the reliability of the claim. If they have been known to lie in the past you can doubt what they say about the religious experience - Swinburne disagrees because it cannot be shown that all claims are unreliable. 2. The truth of the claim. If someone has previously made unlikely perceptual claims previously then its likely the claims about the religious experience is not true - Swinburne argues that it cannot be shown that all such claims are untrue 3. Difficulty showing that God was present in the experience - Swinburne states that God is presumably everywhere so rather than the onus being on the experiencer to show that God was present, the onus is on the doubter to show that he was not 4. The possibility that what is claimed can be accounted for in other ways - Swinburne argues that as the creator God underpins all processes, including those that go on in the brain, so if God causes an experience through the temporal lobes that would be perfectly normal
• What is the principle of credulity?

  Is the experience credible? Could it happen realistically?
• What is the principle of testimony?

  Is the person reliable? Are they a known liar or trustworthy?
• What are the special considerations that may prove religious experiences false?

  1. Concerns the reliability of the claim.

  2. The truth of the claim.

  3. Difficulty showing that God was present in the experience

  4. The possibility that what is claimed can be accounted for in other ways
• Concerns the reliability of the claim


  If someone describes to you a religious experience and it turns out that he has been known to tell lies in the past, then you have good grounds for doubting what he says about his religious experience
• Why does Swinburne reject the first special consideration?


  It cannot be shown that all such claims are unreliable. Just because someone has lied in the past, this does not mean that they are lying about having a religious experience
• The truth of the claim

  If somebody makes unlikely perceptual claims, such as being able to read small text at a distance of 100 yards, then his claims about a religious experience are not likely to be true
• Why does Swinburne reject the second special consideration?

  It cannot be shown that all such claims are untrue. Again, someone making a claim that is false does not mean that a particular claim to a religious experience is likely to be untrue
• Difficulty of showing that God was present


  How could the experiencer do this?
• Why does Swinburne reject the third special consideration?

  God is presumably everywhere, so rather than the onus being on the experiencer to show that God was present, the onus is on the doubter to show that he was not
• Possibility that what is claimed can be accounted for in other ways

  Someone who claims to have had a religious experience may be suffering from TLE
• Why does Swinburne reject the fourth special consideration?

  As the creator, God underpins all processes, including those that go on in the brain, so if God causes an experience through the temporal lobes, that would be perfectly normal (as William James would argue)
• Swinburne's principles help verify religious experiences

  1) normal sense experiences are reliable. Subjective

  2) someone who has had a religious experience of what seems to be God has, by the principle of credulity, reasonable reason for believing it was God

  3) the testimony of others who report similar experiences supports such claims

  4) peoples lives change, there is measurable difference

  5) Swinburne uses the cumulative effect. Along with all other arguments for God's existence, religious experience is yet another part to the jigsaw. It increases the idea that God exists
• Swinburne's principles don't help verify religious experiences

  1) just because we test everyday things through peoples common experience doesn't mean we can verify the supernatural. Objective

  2) it is still a large leap to presume that the experience is God. There are multiple reasons given by Persinger or Freud rather than assuming God

  3) people may be liars or hallucinating

  4) peoples lives change for all sorts of reasons

  5) history is littered with views and ideas that do not always hold up