20th Century Religious Language

    Cards (41)

    • Verificationism
      The method or approach of the logical positivists, which claims that only scientific language can be meaningful - i.e. language which is empirically verifiable
    • Cognitive language
      Language that expresses beliefs that can be true or false
    • Ayer accepts that religious language expresses beliefs, so he doesn't say it's non-cognitive
    • Ayer's argument
      Religious language is unverifiable and thus meaningless, so it can't be true or false
    • Religious language cannot have full cognitive meaning according to Ayer, it is 'not cognitive'
    • Logical positivist
      Someone who thinks that only scientific language can be meaningful
    • Ayer's verification principle
      For language to be meaningful, a statement must be either analytic (true by definition) or empirically verifiable (we can test whether it is true or false through experience)
    • If we don't know how to test whether a statement is true or false, then it is meaningless
    • Empirically verifiable

      A statement must be either verifiable in practice, meaning we are able to verify it, or verifiable in principle, meaning that we know that there is a way to verify it even if we are currently unable
    • 'God' is a being supposedly beyond the empirical world we can experience - Ayer calls it a 'metaphysical term'. There's no way to verify it
    • All religious language is meaningless because it is neither analytic nor empirically verifiable
    • Hick's critique - eschatological verification
      Religious language is empirically verifiable - in an afterlife. When we die, we will see God and then we'll know
    • Hick is arguing that God is verifiable in principle, because there is a way to verify God even if we are currently unable to do so while alive
    • However, if there is no afterlife, we won't know. If death is annihilation there won't be a moment of realisation of that. So Hick has only shown that religious language is possibly verifiable in principle, but not actually verifiable in principle
    • Falsificationism
      Popper's theory that science doesn't work by just looking for things which verify a theory - it works through trying to prove its theories wrong - looking for falsifications
    • Flew's application of Falsificationism to religious language

      Religious language expresses beliefs that are unfalsifiable and thus fail to assert anything, so they can't be true or false
    • Asserting that 'X' is the case is equivalent to asserting that 'not X' is not the case. We could imagine that X is not the case, which would be imagining how our assertion 'X' could be false. So, all assertions must be falsifiable
    • Religious believers can't say what could prove their belief in God false. So, religious language is meaningless
    • Mitchell's counter to Flew
      Most religious people base their belief in God on the evidence of their personal experience and relationship with God, and their belief can actually be countered by evidence (is falsifiable) because of the problem of evil
    • Mitchell argues Flew's mistake was to think that we must know in advance how a belief is falsifiable in order for it to be falsifiable
    • Hare's non-cognitive 'Bliks'
      Religious language expresses non-cognitive attitude/emotion/worldview, not an attempt to describe reality
    • Hare claims that religious language affects human behaviour and mentality - so this makes it meaningful to those who have it
    • Most religious people would reject Hare's theory, claiming they are expressing a cognitive belief that God exists, not just their personal feelings/attitudes
    • Aquinas' cosmological argument looks like a logical argument, not just an expression of personal feelings/attitudes
    • However, Aquinas' reasons for creating the cosmological argument could still be to rationalise his emotions and attitudes, even if the argument itself is logical
    • Belief
      A cognitive state that can be true or false
    • Non-belief
      A non-cognitive state like emotions or attitudes
    • Cognitivism is the view that religious language expresses belief which can be true or false
    • Non-cognitivism is the view that religious language expresses some non-belief (like emotions/attitudes) that cannot be true or false
    • 'Oww' is non-cognitive language
    • 'The chair is made of wood' is cognitive language
    • 'The chair is beautiful' is non-cognitive because it expresses a personal attitude/feeling
    • For Ayer & Flew, cognitive language must not only express belief, but the belief must be verifiable/falsifiable
    • Ayer & Flew claim religious language is not verifiable/falsifiable, but they don't say it's non-cognitive - they just call it 'not cognitive'
    • Hare's non-cognitivism
      Religious language expresses emotion/attitudes which he sums up as a 'blik'
    • Wittgenstein's view of religious language
      It can express beliefs, but those beliefs are not scientific - they are meant to express participation in a social game. So religious language is not-cognitive.
    • Aquinas' view of religious language
      It expresses beliefs about what God is like, which Aquinas thinks are true. So, religious language is cognitive for Aquinas.
    • Mitchell and Hick think religious language is cognitive
    • Tillich's symbolic language is non-cognitive
    • Inter-faith dialogue happens
      This suggests religious language is cognitive - beliefs can be communicated whether the other person shares the belief or not