No beliefs are properly basic.

Shit, you read that quickly.

I skimmed it to see if he was actually going to argue against foundationalism or not, and from what I can see he does not, only arguing that it does not rule out taking belief in God to be properly basic. My counterpoint is that foundationalism itself is wrong (as are all forms of justificationism, including coherentism and infinitism as well) and consequently no beliefs are properly basic. Proper rationality isn't about believing nothing unless it is properly justified from the ground up, but about only believing things that cannot be critically ruled out. (Which belief in the usual conception of God can).

(Coincidentally, my latest thread is mostly about exactly that topic.)

... foundationalism itself is wrong (as are all forms of justificationism, including coherentism and infinitism as well) and consequently no beliefs are properly basic. Proper rationality isn't about believing nothing unless it is properly justified from the ground up, but about only believing things that cannot be critically ruled out. — Pfhorrest

You beat me to it. :up:

EDIT: A nearly 40 year old article that makes even less sense to me now than when I'd first read it back in the mid-1980s, . Not worth a serious reread (or even Pfhorrest's skim) IMO. At least from my hybrid foundherentist (Haack, re: data) & falsificationist (Popper, re: models) perspective.

No beliefs are properly basic. — Pfhorrest

I beg to differ. Here's a couple:
- belief that our senses deliver a functionally accurate view of the world
- belief that there is an external world (i.e. solipsism is false).

These are basic beliefs because they are not derived from prior beliefs - they are innate, consistent with a reasonable world view, and the product of a "design plan" aimed at truth (not actually teleological, but evolutionary processes are analogous to a design plan).

Plantinga claims we have a sensus divinitatus, and that this works analogously to the senses. It's not logically impossible, but it is not a sense that can be verified to exist. Even if it does exist, it is a very inexact sense, since there's such extreme diversity in perception of a deity among humans past and present.

I'll read the article because you've posted something I might finally be interested in.

I will point out also that the responses so far have been entirely unresponsive to your question as I understood it. Your question was whether a belief in God is properly basic in a foundationalist system, which is the question of the article. Your question and the article's question is not whether the concept of foundationalism is flawed. The meta-analysis of the posters here of foundationalism generally is based upon the laziness of not wishing to read the actual article, but instead just to fall back upon their general philosophy 101 objections to the enterprise of foundationalism.

Now that I've properly chastised our good posters, I'll actually read the article.

Carry on.

When you put a provocative question in the title of the thread, most people are just going to respond to the title without bothering to read further. I learned this the hard way. Well, most people won't bother reading further than the title anyway, but at least if you don't bait them you might get fewer useless replies.

No beliefs are properly basic.
— Pfhorrest
I beg to differ. Here's a couple:
- belief that our senses deliver a functionally accurate view of the world — Relativist

Except for 'aspects of the world' within a narrow range of (non-planck) sizes & (non-relativistic) speeds, our (unaided) senses do not. Our "view" is not a "belief" but a perceptual-cognitive bias (e.g. change blindness). Or what Hume aptly termed "habit of thought", which persists until we stumble upon (scientific observation, anyone?) instances of perception that are not "functionally accurate".

- belief that there is an external world (i.e. solipsism is false).

There aren't any grounds to doubt "there is an external world", thus no issue at stake, or question to answer, to believe or not. And solipsism isn't even false, it's nonsense (pace Witty).

I would argue the belief in gods or a god is a basicality mainly because to get large groups of people to work together you need a false belief or perhaps a real belief such as Noah Harrari talked about in "Sapiens". Have you heard of "Pascal's Wager"? As to whether there is some sort of supernatural force out there, i would argue thats a matter of personal experience and considering the dark world we live in i could imagine why many would say there is not.

i screwed up the definition of basicality. Considering the article has 10 words i'm not completely (completely) familiar with, i would have to say that the belief in gods/god is not a basicality. I could look up the definitions but that would be alot of work.

I beg to differ. Here's a couple:
- belief that our senses deliver a functionally accurate view of the world — Relativist

What is "the world"? The only idea of a world I have is from my senses. Sometimes what I think they're telling me doesn't line up with other things I think they're telling me, but all I have to work with is what my senses seem to be telling me, and the best I can do is try to make consistent sense (no pun intended) of that as a whole. I don't have a foundational, basic belief that my senses are delivering an accurate view of something else beyond what I sense; what I sense just is what seems to be, and though it might not be, I have no reason to doubt that seeming unless other senses seem to contradict it.

- belief that there is an external world (i.e. solipsism is false).

What difference is there between an "external" world and, I presume, an "internal" one? Is the world I describe above an internal one or an external one? How could I tell the difference between those (nominally) two things?


Don't get me wrong, I think that something like the views you espouse here (empiricism and realism) are correct, and very core, central views that can support a bunch of different more specific views on other things, so if foundationalism were true they seem like they would make good basic beliefs. But foundationalism isn't true, and the reason to retain (not adopt) these beliefs is because there are no good arguments against them, and there are good arguments against doing otherwise. The same is true, FWIW, about anti-justificationism: there are good arguments against justificationism, and no good arguments for it, so it's rational to reject it and retain its negation. These three things (empiricism or more generally phenomenalism; realism or more generally objectivism; anti-justificationism or more generally what I call "liberalism") plus anti-fideism (which I call "criticism") are the four core principles of my entire philosophy, but they're still not properly basic beliefs.

Except for 'aspects of the world' within a narrow range of (non-planck) sizes & (non-relativistic) speeds, our (unaided) senses do not. — 180 Proof

So what if it's a narrow range? It is a range that has been relevant to our survival- as one would expect if it is a product of natural selection.

Our "view" is not a "belief" but a perceptual-cognitive bias (e.g. change blindness). Or what Hume aptly termed "habit of thought", which persists until we stumble upon (scientific observation, anyone?) instances of perception that are not "functionally accurate".

David Armstrong terms these "non-verbal beliefs", and I think that's an appropriate way to view it because these ground all other beliefs about the world- including the inferences of science.

It is not mere "habit" that infants perceive objects beyond themselves. It's not taught.

What is "the world"? The only idea of a world I have is from my senses. Sometimes what I think they're telling me doesn't line up with other things I think they're telling me, but all I have to work with is what my senses seem to be telling me, and the best I can do is try to make consistent sense (no pun intended) of that as a whole. — Pfhorrest

As I said, our sense of the world is FUNCTIONALLY accurate. We do not walk off cliffs; we do not eat rocks; we perceive and avoid predators.

I would argue the belief in gods or a god is a basicality mainly because to get large groups of people to work together you need a false belief or perhaps a real belief — christian2017

That doesn't entail a basic belief, because it is LEARNED. Basic beliefs aren't learned, they are innate. Plantinga suggests we perceive God through a theoretical "sensus divinitatus", analogous to vision, or hearing.

Has anyone, other than me, read Plantinga"s "Warranted Christian Belief"?

Seems the paper and the thread are going to hinge upon what counts as properly basic, or basic beliefs...

This, of course, requires first clarifying exactly what counts as a belief in the first place. Platinga seems to be talking about propositions.

So what if it's a narrow range? It is a range that has been relevant to our survival- as one would expect if it is a product of natural selection. — Relativist

Right. So not "basic", acquired (only by survivor species) via adaptation. In other words, emergent traits (i.e. habits) not "beliefs", or propositional assertions. Why conflate physiological, perceptual and neurological functions (i.e. inputs-throughput) with epistemic / cognitive states (i.e. reflexive outputs)?

It is not mere "habit" that infants perceive objects beyond themselves. It's not taught.

Hume refers to "habits of thought" in the context of reflexes dispositions traits skills etc acquired through being "taught", observation or trial & error practices (e.g. play). I add perceptual / cognitive biases to that. (Memo: "Innatism", like teleology, has been debunked. :roll: ) These are not 'answers to questions' with a truth-value aka "beliefs". And even if they were, by your own admission the result of natural selection - emergent (from adaptation), not "basic".

i addressed that with the post i made right after the above post.

So not "basic", acquired (only by survivor species) via adaptation. In other words, emergent traits (i.e. habits) not "beliefs", or propositional assertions. Why conflate physiological, perceptual and neurological functions (i.e. inputs-throughput) with epistemic / cognitive states (i.e. reflexive outputs)? — 180 Proof

Being acquired as part of species development doesn't negate the fact these beliefs are innate to the individual, and that is sufficient for being basic.

If materialism is true, what are beliefs? David Armstrong suggests a belief is a dispositional state of mind; it disposes one to behave a certain way. Beliefs don't have to be verbal. My cat believes her water bowl will be in a certain place in the house despite the fact she can't formulate the words to state this. It's no different with us: perception is the acquiring of beliefs (that may be true or false) about the world. We have survived as a species because these perceptions have been sufficiently reliable to allow us to survive.

Platinga seems to be talking about propositions. — creativesoul

Right, he uses that narrow view of belief, but he considers perceptions (including the sensus divinitatus) as part of the belief forming process. Seeing a tree produces the belief that a tree is before us. Perceiving God produces the belief of God.

The content of ordinary empirical beliefs is more or less an expectation of having those same empirical experiences in similar contexts; the expectation of the sensations of experiencing a tree is the content of a belief that a tree exists; "the tree", that we believe exists, is whatever it is that gives rise to such sensations, and that is the whole of its being. So if belief in God is similar, and people's perception of God is the warm fuzzy feelings they get when praying or having religious experiences etc, then is "God" just whatever it is that gives rise to those feelings, and belief in God just an expectation of such feelings occurring in those contexts, etc? Is "God is love" more literal than it's usually taken to be, and "God" just is a kind of lovey feeling? That's basically theological noncognitivism right there, which is fine with even most atheists so far as I know. Nobody expects to go searching the world for the object that the feeling of love corresponds to, asking "does love really exist or is it just a feeling?" doesn't make any sense, there is nothing more to love than people feeling love. So if our conception of God is just of a feeling like that, then there is nothing more to "God" than people feeling like that. But that really doesn't mesh at all with the kind of "God" described in any holy texts, who himself has feelings and does things other than just give rise to feelings in people. It's the existence of that kind of thing, that does that kind of stuff, that's in question.

The essay doesn't do justice to the title.

I don't understand this. If god-beliefs are properly basic within the original definition of properly basic then it would've been something substantial as that would mean god-beliefs are self-evident in the sense true sans proof. However, Plantinga seems to reject the original definition of a properly basic belief: A is properly basic to S iff A is incorrigible for S and/or A is self-evident. He makes no effort to offer us the "correct" definition of properly basic but that really doesn't matter since a god-belief being properly basic would be substantive only if Plantinga had kept to the original definition of properly basic.

One thing may not have been clear: Plantinga doesn't claim his theory of the sensus divinitatus provides an objective proof of God's existence. Rather, his claim is that belief in God is as rational as believing solipsism is false. Further, he says belief in God constitutes knowledge, in the strict sense - not even subject to Gettier problems. He also acknowledges that if there is no God, it's not knowledge.

He takes the alleged knowledge acquired by the sensus divinitatus beyond a raw sensory input, analogous to the raw perception of a tree. He suggests it could go so far as to provide a basis for "knowing" the various doctrines of Christianity.

The main slam against this view is that ANY theistic belief could be "justified" in this way. Linus can claim to "know" the Great Pumpkin exists. An Islamist terrorist can claim to "know" God wants him to kill infidels. Plantinga acknowledges this.

My take on it is that his Reformed Epistemology is a worthy contribution to epistemology (it has sparked a lot of published responses). I also think it can be applied to materialism (I use a version to justify dismissing solipsism; solipsism can't be proven false, but our innate properly basic belief in the external world is not undercut by mere possibility). Without the notion of properly basic beliefs, foundationalism has no bedrock foundation.

My own position is foundationalist, I suppose one could say. But I've not really seen a good criterion for a properly basic belief in the paper, because I have yet to have seen a criterion for belief itself.

A properly basic belief, would be a belief formed and held prior to language use. Those are not propositional, for the believing creature has no language, and propositions require language. I'm also not too sure about calling them "innate" either...

I'll read the paper again. I've read through once and then skimmed again. Seems that what I'm raising here needs parsed out, to me at least...

What is the bare minimum criterion for what counts as a belief? What do all belief have in common such that that's what makes them beliefs?

Did anyone read the article?

The error is in thinking...

...that a belief is properly basic only in certain conditions; these conditions are, we might say, the ground of its justification and, by extension, the ground of the belief itself. In this sense, basic beliefs are not, or are not necessarily, groundless beliefs.

There seems to me a contradiction involved in setting out basic beliefs as dependent on anything.

@Sam26?

There seems to me a contradiction involved in setting out basic beliefs as dependent on anything. — Banno

The articles goes to pains to argue that it's not a justificatory relationship between a basic belief and something else which grounds it, it's something more like a practical one. If one sees a tree, in normal circumstances one may hold that one sees a tree, and infer that the tree exists. The inference there is not an act of cognition or deduction, it is a practical presupposition, like that it can be said that I believe that "I am holding a fork" is true when I am holding a fork purely in virtue of holding the fork. The argument construes belief in "God exists" in precisely the same manner as belief that forks exists while holding them.

While I disagree with the conclusions, I enjoy the conceptual machinery here. Basic beliefs spring from a context of activity, if one acts in a context involving God, belief in God is basic. The interesting question in my book is the status of being basic; is it a property of a statement, is it a binary relationship between a statement and a context, or is it a ternary relationship between a statement and a context and an event or activity?

"Properly basic belief" is perhaps a misnomer, and what Plantinga is talking about is, in the best case, (akin to) a "religious" form-of-life within which "god" language-games are not idle (Witty) ... or, adjacently, an absolute presupposition (Collingwyrd) framing / anchoring a "religious" (i.e. JCI) worldview ... or "god" is merely a regulatory idea as per CPrR (Cant).  In other words, semantic not epistemic. Someone tell me what am I missing.

What is properly basic, is what one cannot do without.


God, Nature, man.

Superego, id, ego.

Daddy, Mummy, child.

Thesis, antithesis, synthesis.

Three, three, the rivals.

Without God, man dissolves into nature, mind into matter. So God is as real as the distinction between man and nature, or self and world.

And, Plantings has to admit, as unreal.