Contemporary Debates in Philosophy of Religion by Michael L. Peterson

Author:Michael L. Peterson [Peterson, Michael L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2013-12-04T16:49:00+00:00

4 Initial Deep Problems

RP faces some deep problems already. One is this: Why are we to think that all will be well for everybody, or everybody who is decent? One philosopher expressed his view of the afterlife succinctly, if crudely: first we die, then we rot. What reasons are there for thinking that there is an afterlife? In the light of RP's pessimism or skepticism about religious claims generally, why believe this one? Even if one believes that we will survive the death of our bodies, why suppose that people who accept and live by the values of which RP approves will end up well?

The basic point can be put like this. American Protestant modernists or liberals held that God is in heaven and smiles on those who are morally decent. Moral decency is the ticket to heaven because God runs the railroad. RP advocates cannot seriously appeal to God. RP, viewed from one angle, is American Protestant modernism minus monotheism. But, minus monotheism, why think that moral decency is a ticket to anywhere? (I don't suggest that monotheism entails Protestant modernism.) If it is a ticket to somewhere, why not to hell? RP's optimism is groundless.

Another problem is this. The only real consideration that is typically offered by RP advocates that there is an evidential tie among religious traditions is that there continues to be disagreement concerning how the traditions should be rationally assessed.

Some think that rational assessment and religious tradition can't even date, let alone wed. Some think that religious traditions have been rationally assessed, and the result is that they are one and all false. Some think that religious traditions have been rationally assessed and one, or at least one type, of religious tradition comes out far better than the others. Some presumably believe that the result of rational assessment is a tie. This disagreement is utterly unimpressive to RP advocates; they simply ignore it.

They are, however, impressed by this: the fact that the apologists for various religious traditions, and the philosophers who offer rational assessments of religious traditions, don't agree on the results. In this respect, RP is like the standard argument for moral relativism. That argument, stated with more rigor than usual, goes like this. A moral rule tells you that some sort of action is right or wrong without telling you why. A moral principle tells you what makes an action right or wrong without telling you which ones are right or wrong. For example, Lying is wrong is a moral rule, and Persons ought to be respected is a moral principle; being disrespectful to persons makes an action wrong, and lying to someone is typically disrespectful to her. (These examples come from a broadly Kantian perspective; other examples would do as well.) Cultural relativism claims that cultures disagree about moral principles; culture A accepts a moral principle P, and culture B accepts moral principle Q.From this, moral relativism is inferred; it is concluded that no moral principle is true. This is the no moral truth view noted above.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.