Sample Material of UPSC Mains Philosophy (Optional) Study Kit
Topic: Philosophy of Religion (Religious Beliefs and Language-games)
D. Z. PHILLIPS
RECENTLY, many philosophers of religion have protested against the philosophical assertion that religious beliefs must be recognized as distinctive language-games. They feel that such an assertion gives the misleading impression that these language-games are cut off from all others. This protest has been made by Ronald Hepburn, John Hick, and Kai Nielsen, to give but three examples. Hepburn says, ‘Within traditional Christian theology ... questions about the divine existence cannot be deflected into the question “Does ‘God’ play an intelligible role in the language-game?”
Hick thinks that there is something wrong in saying that ‘The logical implications of religious statements do not extend across the border of the Sprachspiei into assertions concerning the character of the universe beyond that fragment of it which is the religious speech of human beings.’ Nielsen objects to the excessive compartmentalization of modes of social life involved in saying that religious beliefs are distinctive language-games and argues that ‘Religious discourse is not something isolated, sufficient unto it seIf’. Although ‘’Reality’’ may be systematically ambiguous ... what constitutes evidence, or tests for the truth or reliability of specific claims, is not completely idiosyncratic to the context or activity we are talking about.
Activities are not that insulated. ‘I do not want to discuss the writings of these philosophers in this paper. I have already tried to meet some of their objections elsewhere. Rather, I want to treat their remarks as symptoms of a general misgiving about talking of religious beliefs in the way I have indicated which one comes across with increasing frequency in philosophical writings and in philosophical discussions. I write this paper as one who has talked of religious beliefs as distinctive language-games, but also as one who has come to feel misgivings in some respects about doing so.