religious language

• Cognitivism and non-cognitivism are terms in philosophy that need clarification.
• The correspondence theory of truth states that to say something is true is to say it corresponds to the way things are.
• The propositional nature of statements refers to statements that express a truth value (true or false).
• Cognitivism and non-cognitivism are discussions about the nature of language and whether our claims about the world are truth-apt (can be either true or false).
• Cognitivism states that some statements make claims about the world and can be given a truth value.
• Non-cognitivism states that some statements do not aim to make claims about the world and cannot be given a truth value.
• In his Proslogion, Anselm gives a version of the ontological argument, which would make him a cognitivist about religious language.
• The philosopher JL Mackie was a moral cognitivist.
• The problem of religious language considers whether it is possible to talk about God meaningfully, especially if the traditional conceptions of God as being incorporeal, infinite and timeless are accepted.
• The attitude that God is ineffable has inspired many theologians to adopt the via negativa (also known as apophatic theology), which involves only employing negation/denial when talking about God.
• The two directions of fit in philosophy are the shopping list and changing the world to fit ideas in mind.
• In the context of religious language, non-cognitivism about religious language means that some statements about God are meaningless.
• Cognitivism about religious language means that some statements about God are meaningful and can be given a truth value.
• Alfred Jules Ayer's approach to religious language was informed by his theory of Verificationism.
• Ayer's theory of meaning is predicated on the Verification Principle, which states that a sentence is meaningful if and only if it is an analytic truth or it is verifiable through sense experience.
• Ayer would argue that the phrase 'God exists' is meaningless.
• The weak verification principle states that the truth of a statement can be determined by its logical consequences, but it allows for exceptions.
• The verification principle states that the truth of a statement can be determined by its logical consequences.
• One criticism of strong verification is that it does not allow for exceptions.
• The Verification Principle is similar to Hume's fork.
• The Verification Principle renders certain statements meaningless.
• Under the strong verification principle, statements like "All bachelors are unmarried", "There are mountains on the other side of the moon", "All men are mortal", and "Electrons carry negative charge" are meaningful.
• The nature of universal statements is such that they cannot be verified by a finite set of observations.
• Weak verificationism, as defined by Ayer, states that all meaningful claims are analytic or empirically verifiable.
• The Verification Principle, as stated by Ayer, states that a sentence is meaningful if and only if it is an analytic truth or can be verified through sense experience.
• John Hick offers an analogy in response to Ayer’s verificationism, stating that two men are traveling along a road, one believes it leads to the Celestial City, the other believes it leads nowhere.
• Ayer contends that "God-talk is nonsense", arguing that if God is something that cannot be meaningfully described, then even if a Mystic experiences God, they still won't be able to give a meaningful description of their experience.
• According to Ayer, nothing can be done to test the truth or falsehood of the Mystic's visions or encounters with God, they must be considered meaningless.
• The falsification principle states that a statement is meaningful if it could be falsified by some set of empirical observations.
• Falsifiable: logically incompatible with some (set of) empirical observations.
• The falsification principle succeeds where the verification principle fails by allowing for universal claims that are meaningful.
• Sir Karl Popper's project was to distinguish between the scientific method and the non-scientific, often referred to as pseudo-science.
• Some statements are impossible to falsify, such as existential or probabilistic statements, which may alternatively be quite easy to verify.
• The probability of getting heads in a coin flip is 0.5, can this be falsified?
• If we weaken the falsification principle as being "evidence that merely counts against the truth of a claim", then we are simply talking about the verification principle again, as verification is about finding evidence that reduces as well as supports the possibility of the claim.
• As unobservables are not directly observable, but postulates, it does not follow that statements about them can be entailed from observations.
• A statement is meaningful if the probable truth of statements can be established through observation or we know in principle what observation is required to ascertain its truth, even if we cannot currently do so.
• A statement is directly verifiable if it is an observation statement itself or it, along with some other observation statements, entails an observation statement that cannot be entailed by those others alone.
• The verification principle states that a sentence is meaningful if and only if it is an analytic truth or it is verifiable through sense experience.
• Ayer claims that the verification principle is a criterion of meaning, a claim about the nature of statements, and its truth may be determined through the arguments of its implications.