The Epistemology of Religion

Abstract

Entertaining a proposition normally exposes our mind to a range of psychic states, ranging from involuntary to voluntary states, depending on the irresistibility of the proposition in question. There are some propositions which are too certain to entertain without believing them, and some too vague, too suspicious to hold without some degree of doubt. Normally, we relate to any matter we consider in one of these three different propositional attitudes: (dis)belief, acceptance (or rejection) or suspension of judgment. Though religion cannot be confined solely to acceptance of or a belief in the theistic God, as religions like Buddhism and Hinduism demonstrate, it is commonplace in ordinary language to think of religion in terms of having a belief in a transcendent being, a deity, at least in the Christian, Jewish or Muslim cultures. Most religions assert themselves as an account of the universe, human condition or their nature. Some people believe its explanations, some merely accept them. That is, religion can be a belief-system about the universe. But it may lack such belief-system, and could be a matter of mere acceptance. There are people who do not believe religious explanations about the origin of life or the universe, but they still accept them as a way of life. In this article, I aim to analyze the psychological bridge, in the way of belief and mere acceptance, between us and the idea there is a God in light of the existing evidence for and against the existence of God, assuming that we are dealing with rational agency.