Faith, Belief and Fictionalism

Finlay Malcolm, Michael Scott

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

20 Citations (Scopus)
28 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Is propositional religious faith constituted by belief? Recent debate hasfocussed on whether faith may be constituted by a positive non-doxastic cognitivestate, which can stand in place of belief. This article sets out and defends thedoxastic theory. We consider and reject three arguments commonly used infavour of non-doxastic theories of faith: (1) the argument from religious doubt;(2) the use of ‘faith’ in linguistic utterances; and (3) the possibility of pragmaticfaith. We argue that belief is required to maintain a distinction between genuinefaith, pretend faith, and fictionalist faith.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)257-274
JournalPacific Philosophical Quarterly
Volume98
Issue numberS1
Early online date5 Aug 2016
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 27 Dec 2017

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