Religious Experience (A)

• A posteriori = inferring God's existence from sprititual encounter

• Swinburne: "An omnipotent and perfectly good creator will seek to interact with his creatures"

• Direct proof = empirical evidence (5 senses)

• Synthetic = from observation

• Subjective = open to interpretation

• Inductive = number of possible conclusions

• 'Probability argument'

• Vardy: need to analyse precisely what we mean

• Vardy cited Swinburne - 2 types of RE:

• Smart: "involving some kind of perception of the invisible world or a perception that some visible person is a manifestation of the invisible world"

• James - 4 ways:

• Ineffability: directly experienced to be understood eg. St Teresa

• Noetic quality: revelations and illuminations helf to provide knowledge and transcend rational categories

• Transciency: last for short time and modify life eg. Paul/ Saul

• Passivity: beyond control eg. Ian McCormack

• Otto: refers to "being in the prescence of an awsome power"

• eg. conversion events offer "wholly other" nature of God

• Wesley: "I felt my heart strangely warmed as I felt that I did trust in Christ for salvation"

• Bible - Isaiah: "For I am a man of unclean lips and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King"

• Tyler: recall what happened whilst 'dead'

• eg. Ian McCormack - stung by jellyfish, experienced divine power

• lead to RE eg. music, dance, meditation and prayer

• Temple: "when I pray, coincidences happen and when I don't, they don't"

• Meditation = prayerful state - seek understanding and union with God to deepen relationship

• H. D. Lewis: "not just a feeling, but a conviction or insight, a sense that something must be"

1. Experience of x idicates reality of x

2. Experience of God indicates reality of God

3. Possible to experience God

Conclusion. God exists

• Principle of testimony: unless evidence to contrary should believe people

• Swinburne: "In the absence of special considerations, the experiences of others are (probably) as they report them"

• 3 types of evidence to render testimonies unreliable
  • Circumstances unreliable
  • Evidence to suggest lying
  • Can be explained in terms other than God

• Basic principle of rationality to believe them because so many = Principle of credulity 

• Swinburne: "how things seem to be is a good guide to how things are"

• Based on principles and examines concepts of cumulative and inductive arguments

• Cumulative = based on many different arguments

• Tyler: weight of evidence taken into account

• Swinburne: combined RE alongside teleological, cosmological, ontological and moral arguments

• Swinburne: inductively - reasonable to assume God loving and wants personal relationship