Reformed epistemology and properly basic belief

Program / Course 13: Foundations of Apologetics / Lesson 6.4

What you will learn

• Explain what it means for a belief to be properly basic and why Reformed epistemologists apply the idea to belief in God.
• Describe the evidentialist challenge that Reformed epistemology answers.
• State the role of Calvin’s sensus divinitatis and of warrant in Plantinga’s later work.
• Name the main objections, including the Great Pumpkin objection and the problem of competing religions.

The big idea

Reformed epistemology is a movement in philosophy, led by Alvin Plantinga, Nicholas Wolterstorff and William Alston, that argues belief in God can be rational even if it is not supported by arguments. Many ordinary beliefs, such as that other people have minds or that the past is real, are held without proof and are not irrational. The Reformed epistemologist claims that belief in God can be like that: a properly basic belief, formed in the right way by a mind working as it should. This view answers the demand that faith must be backed by evidence, and it has also drawn serious objections.

Key terms

Epistemology

The branch of philosophy that studies knowledge, justification and rational belief.

Basic belief

A belief held directly, not on the basis of other beliefs. Examples include seeing a tree, remembering breakfast or feeling pain.

Properly basic

Describing a basic belief that it is rational to hold without argument, under the right conditions.

Classical foundationalism

The view that rational beliefs must either be self-evident, evident to the senses, or based on such beliefs by good argument.

Sensus divinitatis

A Latin phrase meaning sense of the divine. John Calvin used it for a natural awareness of God found in human beings. Plantinga uses it for a faculty that produces belief in God in suitable circumstances.

Warrant

In Plantinga’s usage, what makes the difference between true belief and knowledge: the belief is produced by faculties working properly in a fitting environment, aimed at truth.

Defeater

A reason that removes or weakens the rational standing of a belief.

Background

In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries many philosophers argued that belief in God is rational only if there is sufficient evidence for it. W. K. Clifford wrote that it is wrong always, everywhere and for anyone to believe anything on insufficient evidence, and later critics such as Antony Flew and Bertrand Russell took a similar line. This position is called evidentialism. It treated religious belief as a hypothesis in need of proof.

A group of philosophers in the Reformed tradition, which follows John Calvin, replied in the 1970s and 1980s. They argued that the evidentialist standard is itself unreasonable, and that belief in God does not need arguments to be rational. This lesson describes their main ideas. It does not assume that they are right, since many philosophers disagree, but it presents them as their defenders do.

Step-by-step explanation

Step 1: The challenge of evidentialism

Evidentialists hold that a belief is rational only if it is supported by good evidence or argument. Applied to religion, this means that a person who believes in God without being able to give arguments is irrational, or at least not justified. For centuries Christian apologists accepted the challenge and worked to supply the arguments.

The Reformed epistemologists did not reject arguments. They asked whether the demand for them was reasonable. They noted that the standard behind it, usually classical foundationalism, is hard to defend. Many beliefs that all rational people hold, such as that the world existed five minutes ago, or that other minds exist, cannot be proved from self-evident truths or sense experience.

Step 2: Basic beliefs and proper basicality

A basic belief is one a person holds without basing it on other beliefs. When someone sees a tree, the belief that there is a tree there is formed directly. Plantinga argues that some basic beliefs are properly basic: it is rational to hold them without argument. Which ones qualify depends on the circumstances in which they arise. A belief about a tree formed by looking at a tree is in order. The same belief formed by taking a drug may not be.

Plantinga argues that belief in God can be properly basic in suitable circumstances, such as when a person looks at a mountain, feels guilt or gratitude, or reads the Bible. The belief is not inferred from an argument but arises directly in response to such experiences. This is similar to how belief in other minds arises from encountering people.

Step 3: Calvin and the sense of the divine

The Reformed epistemologists find a source for this in John Calvin. In the first book of the Institutes, Calvin writes that there is in the human mind a natural awareness of God, which he calls the sense of divinity. He taught that this awareness is part of human nature, that it is distorted by sin and that people suppress it. He also taught that faith comes through the inward witness of the Holy Spirit, who confirms the truth of Scripture to the believer.

In his later book Warranted Christian Belief, Plantinga develops this into a model. If God exists and has made human beings to know him, then belief in God formed by the sense of the divine, and renewed by the Spirit, would be produced by faculties working as designed, and so would have warrant. He calls it the Aquinas-Calvin model, because both thinkers taught that God can be known without argument.

Step 4: What the view claims and does not claim

The Reformed epistemologist does not say that all religious beliefs are equally rational, or that anything may be believed without proof. He says that belief in God is not unreasonable simply because it lacks an argument. He also does not say that arguments are useless. Plantinga himself has defended arguments for God, but treats them as supports and not as foundations.

The view is also conditional. Plantinga says that if Christianity is true, then it is likely that Christian belief has warrant. Whether Christianity is true is another question, and the model does not prove it. He argues that the question of rationality cannot be separated from the question of truth, and so critics of Christian belief must give reasons for thinking it false.

Step 5: Objections and replies

The most famous objection is the Great Pumpkin objection: if belief in God can be properly basic, why not belief in the Great Pumpkin, who returns each Halloween? Plantinga replies that his argument does not allow any belief to be basic, and that the conditions matter. Critics answer that this leaves open who decides which beliefs qualify.

A second objection is religious diversity. People in other traditions report similar basic beliefs about different gods. If all are properly basic, they conflict. Plantinga replies that the existence of rivals is a potential defeater to be considered, not an automatic refutation, and that Christians may reasonably remain confident if they have good reasons. A third objection is that the view makes belief hard to criticize. Defenders reply that defeaters remain possible, such as evidence of unreliable formation or of conflict with well-established facts.

1. What is evidentialism, and why did Reformed epistemologists challenge it?
2. What is a properly basic belief? Give one example from everyday life.
3. How does the sensus divinitatis fit into Calvin’s thinking?
4. What does it mean to say that Plantinga’s model is conditional?
5. How does the Great Pumpkin objection work, and how does Plantinga reply?
6. How should a person weigh the existence of other religions when considering this view?

Examples

Different perspectives

Reformed epistemologists

Plantinga, Wolterstorff and Alston argue that belief in God can be rational without argument, that evidentialism is mistaken and that the question of warrant depends on whether Christianity is true. They see their work as in line with Calvin.

Classical and evidential apologists

Many apologists who favor arguments say that Reformed epistemology is helpful but not enough. They hold that arguments are still needed to persuade those who do not share the belief, and that the view should be paired with evidence.

Roman Catholic

Catholic philosophers have engaged the view with interest. Plantinga draws on Aquinas, and Catholic teaching holds that God can be known by reason and also by faith. Some Catholics note that the view gives less weight to the Church’s role in forming and testing belief.

Eastern Orthodox

Orthodox thinkers often find the stress on direct awareness of God congenial, as it fits their emphasis on experience of God. They note that Orthodox knowledge of God is shaped by liturgy and the Church, and not only by the individual believer’s faculties.

Secular and skeptical philosophers

Many philosophers argue that the view makes belief too easy to defend, that it cannot distinguish true from false religious beliefs, and that the model depends on the very claim in dispute. Others admire its challenge to evidentialism while rejecting its conclusion.

Why it matters

This view changes the shape of the conversation about faith and reason. It suggests that the burden is not always on the believer to start with proof, and that the demand for proof may be an unexamined assumption. At the same time it keeps the question of truth open, since the rational standing of belief depends on whether the belief is true. A student who understands the view can see why some apologists put less weight on argument, and what questions it raises.

Common misunderstandings

Knowledge check

Think it through

1. Which of your beliefs are basic, held without an argument, and are you comfortable that they are rational?
2. How can you tell whether a basic belief has been formed in a reliable way?
3. What would be a defeater for your most important belief?
4. How does this view change the way you would speak with someone who asks for proof?

Independent assignment

Basic and non-basic beliefs

In your own notebook, write 500 to 700 words. List ten beliefs you hold, and mark which are basic (held directly) and which rest on argument or evidence. For each basic belief, say why it is reasonable to hold it. Then consider whether belief in God could be in the first group, and write the strongest objection you can to the claim. Do not conclude unless you wish to. Keep this for yourself.

Further study

• Alvin Plantinga, Warranted Christian Belief Read the introduction and summaries. It is demanding, so focus on the outline of the model.
• John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion Read Book 1, chapters 3 to 5 on the sense of divinity.
• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Religious Diversity (Pluralism) Read about the problem raised by competing religious claims.
• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Hiddenness of God A related challenge about why belief in God is not more widespread.
• Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae Compare Aquinas’s remarks on faith and knowledge of God.
• Romans 1:19 Read verses 19 and 20, a text Calvin cites for the knowledge of God.
• Psalm 19 Read verses 1 to 4 on the heavens declaring God’s glory.