September 12,2003

The WIll to Believe
 Intervarsity Lecture, 7pm , Sassafrass Room,Union. 

 Have a handout.


1.    I think we all have to agree that the evidence for Christianity is
pretty weak.   That is true because otherwise everybody with a
relatively open mind and reasonable intelligence  would be convinced,
and we all know intelligent and open-minded people who are not
Christians.

 The Christian having admitted that this is to be case, an atheist  or
agnostic might triumphantly say, "Then how can you possibly be a
Christian?"  If you're in the sciences, they might add: "Especially
since you're a scientist, not one of those sloppy humanities people."
Whether you're in the sciences or not, they will say, "And isn't it
silly that you expect me to be a Christian too, if the evidence is so
weak?"

 In these few minutes, I'll try to give you an answer. The question was
addressed cleverly by two philosophers, Blaise Pascal and William James.
Pascal was a sound 17th Century Christian; I don't know about James, who
lived in a skeptical 19th Century Harvard.

 William James actually lectured on this subject to a group of people
quite similar to you: The Philosophical Club of Yale, in 1897. In his
elegant introduction, he notes that Harvard was known as a freethinking
place, but Yale is more orthodox, and he wanted to show that Harvard
people still thought theology was interesting.  As  a Yale Man, I liked
that bit. Yale was actually founded by a group of Puritans who thought
Harvard had become too decadent to be a good place to train preachers.

2.     James first notes that decisions can divided into Forced or
Avoidable, Momentous or Trivial.

    Take the decision as to whether to believe that the earth is 5000,
10
billion, or 20 billion years old. This is an avoidable and trivial
decision for me.  It is avoidable, because if  I avoid making a
decision, it won't affect  my life at all. It is trivial, because if I
make a decision and I'm wrong,it won't affect my life at all.

 On the other hand, my decision on whether to believe that antibiotics
work, while avoidable  and trivial right now, would not be avoidable  or
trivial if I get pneumonia. I have to decide whether to take the
antibiotics, and  I might die if I make the wrong decision.

3. An entirely different dimension on how you might classify decisions
is
as to whether there is lots of evidence  for one alternative or not.

   There is lots of evidence that antiobiotics work, for example. But if
I'm not sick, whether to believe in them is still a trivial and
avoidable decision.

4. Now we come to an interesting point James makes: How can I speak as
if the decision to believe is voluntary? Shouldn't it be based on
evidence? Yes, but not completely. It's impossible to keep all the
evidence you've seen in your heads. What is common is that we look at
some evidence, make a decision as to what is correct, then forget what
the evidnce was, but we keep on believing.  Often, too, we look at the
evidence, see it isn't very strong one way or the other, but we make our
conclusion anyway, and proceed on the basis of our belief.

5. That's what often  happens with Christian belief. I look at the
evidence, and see that it's weak for Christianity-- but it's even weaker
against Christianity.  And so I make my decision, which is to be a
Christian. And I think everybody else ought to make the same decision,
in light of the evidence, but I can understand why they do not.

    I need a volunteer. Let us pretend that I am  the king. I am holding
some pennies in each hand. If you pick the hand which has more pennies,
I will allow you to live. Otherwise, my guards will kill you. What do
you do?  You pick the hand you think has more pennies, even though I've
just flashed the evidence at you so quickly you probably missed it.

 6. Note that this is a forced and momentous decision. If you don't pick
one hand or the other, my guards will kill you. You can't say: "I want
to study the situation some more."

This is why the agnostic's position should be very uncomfortable.  If he
thinks there is not enough evidence to know whether there is a God or
not, that's tough-- he still has to decide.

 In summary: to be a strong Christian does not require strong evidence.
It just
requires that the weak evidence for Christianity be stronger than the
even weaker evidence against it.


If I have time: Type I and Type II errors. (And Type III)

Type I: Reject the Truth; Accept falsehood.  False Positive.

Type II: Don't  Reject the Truth, but  Don't reject Falsehood. False
Negative.

 When evidence is weak,you can avoid Type I error or you can avoid Type
II error, but you can't avoid both. You have to either risk "Believing
What is False" or "Not Believing What is True".

 When a pollster asks you whether God exists or not, you can avoid being
wrong by saying, "I don't know." But you also avoid being right by
saying that. Which is more important-- avoiding error, or finding the
truth?


http://users.compaqnet.be/cn111132/wjames/The_Will_To_Believe.htm

http://www.godrules.net/library/pensees/pensees05.htm


If I have time-- do Pascal's wager.