Topics Religion

Question What exactly is evidence, and why do some maintain that we should not expect to find any evidence of God? What's the problem with rejecting the God idea based on lack of evidence? Sorry I can't be more specific.

Accepted:
September 6, 2006

Comments

Consider these (actual) evidential situations:

I have no specific evidence that there is a Danish plumber who looks enough like me to fool my mother in a photograph.
I have no specific evidence that there is a thirty-word English sentence that, when uttered, would cause an earthquake in Tonga.
I have no specific evidence that anyone has ever said "kumquats are delicious".

In each of these cases, not only do I not have specific evidence for the claim, but it's not even true that I likely would have such evidence were the claim true.

Despite these parellels, there's a big difference among the cases: I feel quite comfortable in my firm belief that there is no such English sentence, while it seems to me that there may well be such a Danish plumber, and I am nearly certain that someone has said "kumquats are delicious" (this exhibits the problem with rejecting a claim simply because of lack of specific evidence). We would want a good philosophical account of evidence and justification to explain the difference.

As a start, it seems clear that where there's no specific evidence for a claim we are not necessarily completely at sea about whether to believe it (or more generally about how to estimate odds of its truth). Sometimes our "background knowledge" renders the odds very low, sometimes high, sometimes intermediate. (Perhaps this means we can have "indirect evidence" about a claim despite having no direct evidence.)

In the case of a god (given a particular characterization of what a god would be), let's assume that neither do have specific evidence, nor would we likely have any were there a god. Still, there are familiar arguments based on background knowledge (for instance, of the designed-ness of the universe, or of the completeness of physical science) that try to motive high or low odds. Those who accept such arguments become believers or atheists despite the lack of direct evidence.

Of course, many are unpersuaded by such arguments. Suppose you are one of them. Then you lack specific evidence and you lack any clearly articulated indirect evidence. How then should you estimate the odds of there being a god? Perhaps you have a strong hunch--if you have one, should you trust it (hunches are often reliable despite our inability to articulate reasons behind them), or should you worry that it likely issues from untrustworthy sources like wishful thinking or fear? And if you're without even a hunch, what then? Call it 50-50? But surely even that assignment of odds is arbitrary without support---given your background knowledge, why should a god get that much credence? Why should it get only that much? But if 50-50 is too arbitrary, surely so is any other estimate. Could you simply refuse even to estimate odds on the grounds that, unlike in the three cases above, this time it is reasonable to be completely at sea?

Question What exactly is evidence, and why do some maintain that we should not expect to find any evidence of God? What's the problem with rejecting the God idea based on lack of evidence? Sorry I can't be more specific. Accepted:September 6, 2006

Question What exactly is evidence, and why do some maintain that we should not expect to find any evidence of God? What's the problem with rejecting the God idea based on lack of evidence? Sorry I can't be more specific.

Accepted:
September 6, 2006