Science and Faith in a Game of Strategy

Marty Folsom;

doi:10.5840/traddisc202046215

Science and Faith in a Game of Strategy

Tradition and Discovery The Polanyi Society Periodical ◽

10.5840/traddisc202046215 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 46 (2) ◽

pp. 36-42

Author(s):

Marty Folsom ◽

Keyword(s):

Social Cohesion ◽

Human Experience ◽

Christian Belief ◽

Michael Polanyi ◽

Christian Community ◽

Final Goal ◽

Moral Outcomes ◽

Science And Faith

In this article, Michael Polanyi engages a young audience in a confrontation of worldviews. He is resistant to a form of scientific belief that has defaulted to a naturalism that undermines the human experience of social cohesion. He proposes a return to Christian belief to provide a way toward a better future. But has he given us anything to trust in, other than switching parties with whom to affiliate? Does he actually direct us to consider the contents of “what to believe” or contend that we should believe in the Christian community for better moral outcomes? Is Polanyi’s final goal a deeper investigation of “what to believe” or to create a moral outcome he believes is missing? And is morality the final goal of belief?

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Plantinga and the Balkanization of Reason

Philosophia Christi ◽

10.5840/pc20202219 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 22 (1) ◽

pp. 123-141

Author(s):

Patrick J. Casey ◽

Keyword(s):

Religious Belief ◽

Epistemic Status ◽

Christian Belief ◽

Christian Community ◽

Privileged Access ◽

To Come

In this paper, I argue that Plantinga maintains it is possible to come to know that Christianity is true, but only from the inside. Further, since Plantinga argues that one’s judgments about the epistemic status of Christian belief depend upon one’s prephilosophical metaphysical views, his position amounts to the claim that the Christian community has privileged access to truth and that non-Christians are ill-equipped to evaluate their beliefs. The upshot of Plantinga’s position is, I suggest, that people from different communities will disagree about the epistemic status of religious belief, and reason is simply incapable of adjudicating those disputes.

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Love in a Colonial Climate: Marriage, Sex and Romance in Nineteenth-Century Bengal

Modern Asian Studies ◽

10.1017/s0026749x00003309 ◽

2000 ◽

Vol 34 (2) ◽

pp. 349-378 ◽

Cited By ~ 16

Author(s):

Tapan Raychaudhuri

Keyword(s):

Nineteenth Century ◽

Social Cohesion ◽

Belief Systems ◽

Human Experience ◽

World Views ◽

Basic Emotions ◽

Sexual Impulse ◽

Different Cultures

Studies concerned with the intimate areas of human experience suggest that the institutions and social mores structured around the instinctive drives of mankind—such as sex, love and fear, are not meant to serve the same purpose in every culture. Belief systems, world views and culturally-determined expectations from life determine the texture, causation and expression of even our very basic emotions. Nature's purpose for the sexual impulse may be the propagation of the species, but in controlling and harnessing this drive for the ends of social cohesion, different cultures have had very different objectives in view and used very different means. The emotive affects associated with its expression have also varied accordingly.

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Mathematics, Physics and Religion: A Need for Candor and Rigor

Scottish Journal of Theology ◽

10.1017/s0036930600055708 ◽

1984 ◽

Vol 37 (4) ◽

pp. 457-470

Author(s):

Frederick W. Norris

Keyword(s):

Middle Ages ◽

Fruit Trees ◽

Roman Catholic ◽

Christian Belief ◽

Intellectual Culture ◽

Christian Community ◽

History Of Christianity ◽

The Enlightenment ◽

The Reformation ◽

History Of

In Western culture, religion and the sciences often have found themselves to be more and more at odds since the period of the Enlightenment. The change which that era brought to the Christian community could be illustrated as follows. The analogy is perhaps a bit overdrawn, but it does indicate how important the historical shifts were. During the earliest phase of Christian belief, Christianity had to compete with other religions as one fruit-bearing tree within a varied orchard. When the Christian religion became established and dominant in the Middle Ages it tended to cause other trees to wither and die because of its enormous and on occasion darkening size. During the Reformation a radical pruning took place which gave life not only to the Protestant branch but also a new vitality to the Roman Catholic branch. What the Enlightenment represented was the first pervasive suggestion that most fruit trees — perhaps even the orchard — were unnecessary. One could find individual precursors of such attempts as well as a number of people during the Enlightenment who found various religions satisfying. But at no time in the history of Christianity had a large segment of the intellectual culture been so fascinated with the idea that religion in most all of its forms might be useless.

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