Religious responses to the verification principle Learning objectives To know how believers defend the use of religious language To analyse the defence of the Verification Principle

Starter Look at the pictures on the next slide What challenge to the VP do they represent? A B C D E F What challenges to the VP have been missed out?

Challenges to the Verification Principle

AO2 Evaluation of the Verification Principle Can you think of any challenges to the VP Can you think of any strengths

Responses to the Verification Principle The most significant criticism was the statement of the theory itself does not pass the test as a meaningful statement. The verification theory cannot be verified by sense experience and so is not a meaningful synthetic statement; and it is not analytic. The idea that all meaningful synthetic statements have to be empirically verifiable also causes practical problems. Many of the claims in science, for example the existence of black holes, cannot be verified by sense experience. Many historical statements of events that have happened in the past cannot be tested now using the senses.

Statements such as ‘I had a weird dream last night’ would have to be dismissed as meaningless because there is no way of testing them using the senses, but statements such as these do have meaning to us. Just like “I love you”. Logical positivists accepted that there was a problem, and that they were disallowing too much as meaningless, so the theory was weakened by Ayer to allow for ‘indirect experience’. However there was still a desire to dismiss all meaningless talk of the supernatural, of god, of life after death and other theological concepts such as sin and salvation. Religious truth claims such as ‘God created the world’ were ruled out as unsound.

Eschatological verification John Hick argued that religious truth claims are verifiable, because they are ‘eschatological verifiable’. He meant that although we cannot test and see at the moment, in this life and world, whether the good will be rewarded, or whether God really does exist and love us, after death these claims will be verified. Although critics of John Hick have argued that ‘eschatological verification’ is not possible, because even if there is an afterlife and even if we do have a physical senses in it with which to perceive things, they will not necessarily be the same senses that we have now; and if there is no afterlife, then there will be no one to do the verifying. It became clear and Ayer himself agreed, that the theory could not be adjusted so that scientific and historical statement were seen to be meaningful and yet religious claims ruled out.

Task Using your knowledge of the Verification Principle and challenges to it how do you think religion would defend itself?

Religious responses The verification principle can be criticised as it was developed by non believers and they did not understand the meaning and purpose of religious language for the believer They could be trying to explain something that is ineffable (give an example) so the meaning is not conveyed using verifiable language

Via Negativa 1. What is the via negativa? Fully explain with examples This is the idea that it is possible to talk about God by saying what he is not It is often used by mystics such as St John of the Cross. Some philosophers believe that the via negativa can help in some ways, they do not believe they help people to understand what God is or say anything about God that is definitely true St Augustine and others claimed that positive attribute of God should be countered by the recognition that human language is inadequate when describing God How can Swinburne’s toy example support this?

Via Negativa 3. How did Moses Maimonides believe that people will come to understand God through negative attributes and what did he believe were the problems with using positive attributes? Misguided to liken God to anything we can know e.g. ship example Get a better idea about God by explaining what He is not 4. How does Brian Davies criticise Maimonides’ ship example? If someone had all Maimonides’ negations they would not automatically know he was talking about a ship, it could be a wardrobe

Via Negativa 6. Create a table/two spider diagrams/or two lists of the strengths and weaknesses of the via negativa. People want to say what God is e.g. good and loving Can’t distinguish between atheism and theism 7. Do you think the via negativa is a good way to speak about God?

Discussion - In groups of four Ayer Hick Swinburne – toy analogy and representing general challenges Maimonides Prepare a short summary of your character’s ideas Prepare for any questions you might be asked Discuss the issue ‘Does the verification principle make all God talk meaningless?’ as the characters

Logical Positivists acknowledged that the VP rules out statements that we consider to have meaning. Therefore, Ayer developed the strong and weak form. Most philosophers would say that the principle is not discredited when applied to religious language as they accept religious statements do not aim to be cognitive (convey facts) but to influence ideas and behaviour - Blik

The VP has made the mistake of ignoring the importance of faith The VP has made the mistake of ignoring the importance of faith. Mitchell has claimed that believers will not turn away from their faith even if they are presented with evidence against it. ‘It is a matter of having faith that there is an explanation, even if we can’t see what it is – of saying that we don’t understand, but we trust’ Stairs

Summary Religious language can not be verified using empirical evidence because it is non cognitive language Therefore, a different criterion is needed for determining meaning Religious language can be used in a non-literal way e.g. analogy