Key concepts for Philosophy 280, Midway College

Posts for Philosophy 280 Midway College, from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia.
Basically a Philosophy of Religion deals with the reasonableness, or rationality of belief and belief concepts. It can also be called a justification or warranting by which thinkers, past and present have attempted to understand faith and belief systems.

Key Concepts covered here: Appeal to authority; Citing an “expert,” Conditions for legitimate Argument from Authority; Deductive reasoning; Inductive reasoning; Questions asked; What is "God?"

An appeal to authority is a type of argument in logic also known as argument from authority, argumentum ad verecundiam (Latin: argument to respect) or ipse dixit (Latin: he himself said it, where an unsupported assertion depends on the asserter's credibility). It is one method of obtaining propositional knowledge and is often a logical fallacy. Some examples of appeals to authority:

* Referring to the philosophical beliefs of Aristotle. "If Aristotle said it was so, it is so".
* Quotes from religious books such as the Bible. "The Bible says X, therefore X is the right thing".
* Claiming that some crime is morally wrong because it is illegal. "It's against the law for stores to be open on weekends, therefore it's wrong for them to do so".
* Referencing scientific research published in a peer reviewed journal. "Science (in the form of an article in a prestigious journal) says X, therefore X is so".
* Believing what one is told by one's teacher, preacher or priest. "My teacher (or other authority figure) said so, therefore it must be right."

Sometimes, an appeal to authority is a logical fallacy. This is the case when a person presenting a position on a subject mentions some authority who also holds that position, but who is not an authority in that area. For instance, the statement "Arthur C. Clarke recently released a report showing it is necessary to floss three times daily" should not convince many people of anything about flossing, as Arthur C. Clarke is not an expert on dental hygiene. Much advertising relies on this logical fallacy; for example when Michael Winner promotes car insurance, despite having no expertise in the field of car insurance.

Citing a person who is an authority in the relevant field should carry more weight, but given the possibility of mistake, should not be compelling. In the Middle Ages, roughly from the 12th century to the 15th century, the philosophy of Aristotle became firmly established dogma, and using the beliefs of Aristotle was an important part of many debates. Aristotle's thought became so central to the philosophy of the late Middle Ages that he became known in Latin as Ille Philosophus, "the philosopher," and quotations from Aristotle became known as ipse dixits ("He, himself, has spoken."). In this case, Aristotle is an example of someone who is an authority in philosophy, but philosophy is an area where direct evidence is less readily available, and therefore, Aristotle's ideas carry weight, but are not the final word. On the other hand, arguing that all astronomers believe that the planet Neptune exists - and therefore, that serves as evidence of the planet's existence - is a more compelling argument because astronomers are knowledgable in the relevant field and are in a position to readily prove or disprove the existence of the planet (direct experience). However, it is still better to argue from evidence than from what astronomers believe.Induction (philosophy)

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Conditions for a legitimate argument from authority

1. The authority must have competence in an area, not just glamour, prestige, rank or popularity.
2. The judgement must be within the authority's field of competence.
3. The authority must be interpreted correctly.
4. Direct evidence must be available, at least in principle.
5. The expert should be reasonably unbiased (not unduly influenced by other factors, such as money, political considerations, or religious beliefs).
6. The judgement must be representative of expert opinions on the issue (as opposed to an unrepresentative sample).
7. A technique is needed to adjudicate disagreements among equally qualified authorities.
8. The argument must be valid in its own right i.e. without needing to appeal to authority at all - except of course to its own authority as entirely valid. (This last point ought to dissuade any who might consider an argument legitimate from authority alone - even if that argument is about the legitimacy of itself as an argument from authority. And, has serious implications for the relevancy of the argument from authority portion - even if valid in its own right - of a greater argument in the first place.

Deductive reasoning
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Deductive reasoning is the process of reaching a conclusion that is guaranteed to follow, if the evidence provided is true and the reasoning used to reach the conclusion is correct. The conclusion also must be based only on the evidence previously provided; it cannot contain new information about the subject matter. Deductive reasoning was first described by the ancient Greek philosophers such as Aristotle.

Deductive is a descriptor for one type of logical reasoning. In logic, there are two broad methods of reaching a conclusion. The alternative to deductive reasoning is inductive reasoning.

Both types of reasoning are routinely employed. One difference between them is that in deductive reasoning, the evidence provided must be a set about which everything is known before the conclusion can be drawn. Since it is difficult to know everything before drawing a conclusion, deductive reasoning has limited use in the real world. This is where inductive reasoning steps in. Given a set of evidence, however incomplete the knowledge is, the conclusion is likely to follow, but one gives up the guarantee that the conclusion follows. However it does provide the ability to learn new things that are not obvious from the evidence.

Many incorrectly teach that deductive reasoning goes from the general to the specific and that inductive reasoning travels in the opposite direction. Deductive reasoning is fundamentally in the form of an assertion of idea to materialisation, while inductive reasoning is from empirical evidence to formulate the generalised knowledge of the observation thereof. It is not unusual therefore for science, in its beginning form to be induction based. However, since the discovery of quantum physics, it is realised that higher science via deduction post greater possibilty in resolving higher theoretical scientific problems.

Deductive reasoning is supported by deductive logic, for example:
Syllogisms

All apples are fruit.
All fruits grow on trees.
Therefore all apples grow on trees.

Or

All apples are fruit.
Some apples are red.
Therefore some fruit is red.
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
(Redirected from Inductive reasoning)

This article is about induction in philosophy and logic. Inductive reasoning is the counter to deductive reasoning. For other article subjects named induction see induction.

Induction or inductive reasoning, sometimes called inductive logic, is the process of reasoning in which the conclusion of an argument is very likely to be true, but not certain, given the premises. It is to ascribe properties or relations to types based on limited observations of particular tokens; or to formulate laws based on limited observations of recurring phenomenal patterns. Induction is used, for example, in using specific propositions such as:

* The ice is cold.
* A billiard ball moves when struck with a cue.

to infer general propositions such as:

* All ice is cold.
* For every action, there is an equal and opposite re-action
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The questions asked in the philosophy of religion

There are a lot of philosophical questions that can be asked about religious beliefs. Two of the significant questions in this field are:

1. What is God? That is, what is the meaning of the word 'God'?
2. Do we have any good reason to think that God exists, or to think that God does not exist?

Still, there are other questions studied in the philosophy of religion. What, if anything, would give us good reason to believe that a miracle has occurred? What is the relationship between faith and reason? What is the relationship between morality and religion? What is the status of religious language? Does petitionary prayer make sense? That is, Is it rational to believe that prayer works?

What is God?

The question "What is God?" is sometimes also phrased as "What is the meaning of the word 'God'?" Most philosophers expect some sort of definition as an answer to this question, but they are not content simply to describe the way the word is used: they want to know the essence of what it means to be God. Western philosophers typically concern themselves with the God of monotheistic religions (see the nature of God in Western theology), but discussions also concern themselves with other conceptions of the divine.

Indeed, before attempting a definition of a term it is essential to know what sense of the term is to be defined. In this case, this is particularly important because there are a number of widely different senses of the word 'God'. The term is ambiguous: it is used in different ways by different people. So before we try to answer the question "What is God?" by giving a definition, first we have to get clear on which conception of God we are trying to define. Among those people who believe in supernatural beings, some believe there is just one God (monotheism; see also monotheistic religion), while others, in the greatest numbers Hindus, believe in many different gods (polytheism; see also polytheistic religion). Buddhists generally do not believe in a personal God similar to that of the Abrahamic religions but direct attention to a more undefined state of being called Nirvana.

Within these two broad categories there is a huge variety of possible beliefs, although there are relatively few popular ways of believing. For example, among the monotheists there have been those who believe that the one God is like a watchmaker who wound up the universe and now does not intervene in the universe at all; this view is deism. By contrast, the view that God continues to be active in the universe is called theism. (Note that 'theism' is here used as a narrow and rather technical term, not as a broader term as it is below. For full discussion of these distinct meanings, refer to the article Theism.)
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Rationality of belief

The second question, "Do we have any good reason to think that God exists, or to think that God does not exist?", is equally important in the philosophy of religion. Since Plato and Aristotle, philosophers and theologians have offered arguments and counterarguments for the existence of God.

Judaism, Christianity, and Islam have all developed religious world views based on, or incorporating, philosophical speculation. There are separate entries (Wikipedia) on Jewish philosophy, Christian philosophy, and Islamic philosophy.
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