فصلنامه پژوهش های فلسفی - کلامی
سال بیست و چهارم شماره 1 (پیاپی 91، بهار 1401)

Reformed epistemology, based on the reliability of the functions of cognitive faculties, holds that one can believe in God directly without argument or evidence. Alvin Plantinga, one of the proponents of this view, replaces justification with warrant in the classical definition of knowledge and considers true belief, which has a warrant as knowledge. On this basis, he considers it reasonable to believe in the existence of God because it has a warrant and arises from our healthy cognitive faculties without the need for an independent argument. Some defenders of the cognitive science of religion also seek to provide evidence from cognitive science to explain religious beliefs in such a way as to show that there is a natural mechanism in man to know God. They argue based on this mechanism in favor of the existence of God. Justin Barrett, one of the leading proponents of this view, uses a mental bias called the Hyperactive Agency Detection Device (HADD), which is evolutionarily developed in humans, to explain the process of generating belief in supernatural intentional beings, including God. In recent years, efforts have been made to integrate these two approaches and use the experimental results of cognitive science to validate reformed epistemology. The 2010 joint paper by Barrett and Clark, the former a cognitive scientist and the latter a reformed epistemologist, is a prime example of this effort. Although this paper lists some of the differences between the various perspectives in cognitive sciences of religion and reformed epistemology, its ultimate goal is to show the correlation and convergence of the two approaches. One of the similarities emphasized in this article is related to a particular type of cognitive faculty, called the sense of divinity or Sensues Divintatus, and in both approaches is mentioned by various terms.While acknowledging some similarities between the two theories, the present paper seeks to undermine the view that tries to use the cognitive science of religion as a scientific basis for validating reformed epistemology. This task has been done in this article by pointing out and providing evidence in favor of the fundamental differences between the two theories. In this article, two arguments are presented to show their fundamental differences.The first argument is based on differences in the origins and roots of the two theories. According to this argument, HADD as a cognitive tool in Barrett’s theory can be counted as a mediator, proof, or scientific evidence to prove God; while the foundation of reformed epistemology is to put aside these intermediaries and explain the rationality of belief in God, without resorting to an argument. As the scholars of the cognitive science of religion agree, what creates human bias towards intelligent factors is a spandrel or byproduct property that is not adoptive in the human evolutionary process. Some of them consider the generation of this property as the reason for the existence of God, but regardless of whether this argument is true or false, human cognitive biases in this argument are mediations to prove the existence of God. Accordingly, the two theories, despite their apparent similarities, are fundamentally different.The second argument emphasizes the difference in the goals or visions of the two theories. The main concern of the cognitive science of religion, according to Barrett, is how to produce belief; while the main concern of reformed epistemology is the rationality of belief. In fact, by relying on HADD, one can only remark on how a belief is made, regardless of its rationality. However, this does not meet the purpose of reformed epistemology. In reformed epistemology, Plantinga considers belief in God to be a kind of basic belief that we are reasonable to accept. Here, some have said, the belief produced in the evolutionary process can also be reasonable. This claim can be examined in its place, but so far as the ultimate goal of the cognitive science of religion is the explanation of belief production, and it is different from the ultimate goal of the reformed epistemology, that is, the explanation of the rationality of belief, it is sufficient for this article to show their differences.

Bernard Williams in his “Internal and External Reasons” argues for internalism about reasons. He holds that according to internalism of reasons, agent A has reason to Φ if and only if he has a desire ψ which will be satisfied by Φ-ing and he also believes that it is so. Williams maintains that if one does not have a preceding desire and cannot form any desires through deliberation then it will be rational to claim that he does not have reason to Φ. Clearly desires play a crucial role here because if an agent does not have such desires, then he does not have reasons for action. Williams goes beyond this claim and says only internal reasons are reasons for action. In this article, we argue against his claim. After explaining descriptive and normative senses of rationality and alternative views regarding the rationality of beliefs and desires, in virtue of the idea of blameworthiness, responsibility, and having practical reason, we show that there are a set of actions for which moral agents are blameworthy and they, therefore, have reasons at least for certain actions which are not dependent upon their desires. This idea would be supported by the facts that most people consider a person who violates hedonic, prudential, and moral norms as much as possible to be irrational, that they consider the act of counting him as rational to be counterintuitive, and finally that societies have founded institutions for restraining such a person.Our argument from blameworthiness can be formulated as follows:(1) If a moral agent performs an action X for which he can justly be blamed, then he will be responsible and he ought not to perform X (the concept of blameworthiness entails responsibility).(2) If a moral agent is responsible and he ought not to perform X, then there is a reason for him not to perform X (responsibility entails having reason).(3) There are a set of actions, S, that moral agents can be justly blamed for performing.(4) So moral agents are responsible for performing an action in S (from 1 and 3).(5) So there are reasons for moral agents not to perform an action in S (from 2 and 4).By falsifying the negation of premise (3), we show that (3) is true. To falsify that it is not the case that there are actions for which moral agents can be justly blamed, we presented an example of an extremely immoral, imprudent, and pain-seeking agent who forms abnormal desires and acts against moral, prudent, and hedonic norms as much as possible. Since there are not any desires for such norms in his psychology, and his actions are based on these desires, he is not regarded as rational by most people and social institutions such as psychiatric clinics and courts. In addition, it would be irrational to hold that he is rational in his having immoral, imprudent, and pain-seeking desires and acting accordingly because it is a rational, prevalent, conventional practice to believe so and any theory which denies its rationality should provide convincing reasons.

There are two main approaches to evolutionary epistemology: the analogical or Spencerian approach, and the literal or Darwinian approach. The analogical approach claims that the process of the development of culture – particularly the development of science – is purely like that of living creatures and is based on natural selection. Michael Ruse calls this approach the “traditional approach” or the “analogical approach”, and sometimes calls it the “Spencerian approach.” In the latter approach, which this essay is going to consider from the viewpoint of Michael Ruse, the claim is that not only the development and evolution of animal bodies but also the development of the structures of their mind is a product of natural selection. The proponents of these approaches are divided into two groups: first, theorists like Lorenz, Reidl, and Wuketits, who believe that evolutionary epistemology is complementary to the critical philosophy of Kant. Second, theorists like Clark link evolutionary epistemology to Humean skepticism. Ruse, like Clark, believes that evolutionary epistemology is complementary to Humean philosophy and that the human mind isn’t a blank slate, but it is provided with innate capacities or secondary epigenetic rules. So, Ruse like Quine, believes that there isn’t any difference between analytic and synthetic propositions and that they all are synthetic propositions and posteriori. The difference is that Quine appeals to philosophical reasons, and Ruse appeals to biological ones. Moreover, there isn’t any necessity in knowledge according to Quine but rather, a pragmatic necessity; while Ruse believes that there is a type of necessity, that is, according to the present framework of our minds, based on our evolutionary history, we are condemned to think causally and mathematically, but we may lose this framework in the evolutionary process. It seems that Ruse’s viewpoint corresponds more with our common sense than that of Quine because we always put up resistance against those who believe that the principles of mathematics and logic are contingent. The viewpoint of Ruse was criticized, and he responds to his critics. We believe that some of his answers aren’t plausible.One of the most important criticisms against Ruse’s evolutionary epistemology is that it is self-contradictory, that is, what is important for evolutionary epistemologists is success in survival and reproduction, and the truth doesn’t matter to him, so he should accept that we need to believe that the principles of evolution itself can possibly be false. Ruse, responds to this criticism by distinguishing between the reality of common sense and metaphysical reality.We show in this essay that this solution doesn’t work because Ruse doesn’t suggest any criterion for distinguishing between beliefs based on common sense and beliefs based on metaphysical reality so we can express doubts about the examples he gives for common-sense beliefs. Furthermore, even if it were to be accepted that common-sense beliefs are infallible the problem still exists because natural selection isn’t a common-sense belief, so according to this, all of our beliefs might be mistaken, including the natural selection mechanism itself, and applying it to human knowledge.

While there is no real tension between faith and reason for Muslim scholars, in post-Kantian philosophy of religion there have been serious doubts about the rationality of religious doctrines. It is noteworthy that Ghazali’s critiques of philosophical reasoning are totally different from Kant’s. Ghazali denied the reliability of pure reasoning without the help of faith, while Kant denied the access of reason to the intangible world. By paying attention to Kant’s philosophy for understanding the very difference of the faith/reason tension in Islamic tradition and contemporary philosophy of religion and employing an extra-religious approach and an analytical-critical method, the present research has studied Ghazali’s corpus and concluded what concerned Ghazali was faith, not reason; since he held that only a pious believer could be saved from the hell. He was not concerned about reasoning without revelation and religious belief. Ghazali maintained that philosophical reasoning falls short of the truth of affairs. One could say, from a different point of view, he was aware of the limits of reasoning in the same way as Kant was; but unlike Kant, through faith, he arrived at matters which are far from the access of reason. Finally, although in Kant’s thoughts, faith has lost its rational bases, Ghazali was not in the same situation. He held that mystical, prophetical reasoning, which he called “al-Qalb” (the Heart), could obtain the truth and has no conflict with faith and revelation, and it is just human reasoning that makes judgments that could come in conflict with religious beliefs. Previous research saw Ghazali as fideistic; although thinking of him of rationalist or fideistic, could be easy based on his Ashʿari commitment, but after enough reflection on his works, it turns out to be difficult to do so because one could find both evidence for his rationality or fideism. Regarding his prioritizing faith over reason, there is a lot of textual evidence in his corpus; his tendency toward reason is not very explicit but can be perceived implicitly from his works. Despite his efforts to emphasize revelation and faith, as well as left human reasoning for revelation, what arises afterward, which has a kind of validity even for him, is the same common reason. Ghazali interpreted the prima facie meaning of Quranic verses which are impossible from a rational viewpoint, such as the corporeality of God. There is no middle ground between faith and reason, and yet Ghazali still stands in the very middle; thus, he could not be seen as just fideistic. If he wanted to demarcate what could be interpreted, he would have taken the side of reason. At the same time, comparing his rationality with Descartes’ is a naïve position to hold. Mystic-minded Ghazali did not see the issue of faith and reason like a philosopher and, ultimately, due to his obedience to God, as well as the fact that his main concern is salvation, he prioritized faith over reason. It is not possible to speak of tension or competence for a mystic-minded like him.

For a long time, human beings have been wishing to improve the genetic composition of their generation and clearing it of some disabilities and defects, and this concern has always been pursued in different ways in different eras. The existence of authoritarian and racist policies and discriminatory methods in the old Eugenics made it easy to rule that it was immoral, but it is somewhat difficult to judge the liberal and new Eugenics because one group, citing the scientific contexts and social contexts resulting from the advances in genetics and the values of liberal societies, dictates its moralization, while the other group, despite these contexts, still retains the relevant ethical challenges.One of these important challenges is the violation of the principle of justice, albeit in a different way than in the past. Injustice in the old Eugenics was discriminatory due to the imposition of a Eugenics program on a particular class, and the manifestation of injustice in the new Eugenics is that by prescribing that its benefits belong to certain classes, it is not possible for the public to benefit from it. The author of this article believes that various ethical challenges still exist in the liberal and modern Eugenics program with a focus on the principle of justice, and the present article seeks to identify, examine and analyze them from a point of view.The findings of this paper are that some of the ethical considerations related to the application of the principle of justice to Eugenics are:Although some solutions may be effective at some level, it is not possible to provide an absolute and general solution for all cases of breeding.Bioethical issues such as Eugenics due to their multifaceted nature, need the consideration of the requirements of various principles and some contextual considerations related to cultural and social conditions and indigenous and regional situations.It is necessary to have appropriate programs to eliminate the factors that incite immoral attitudes and prejudices against the disabled.Despite the context in which it has been made, advocates of liberal Eugenics themselves admit that the challenge of discrimination remains and have an unprecedented impact on genocide and the rise of racism.The well-being of individuals in society depends on the fair distribution of the benefits and resources of Eugenics in a fair social context, and the prescription and distribution of these resources in a society with defective and unjust structures will not have the desired effect.

In this article, the author claims that Kant’s political thought is formed both in the break from his moral thought and in the continuation and decline of his moral thought in politics. Kant has previously struggled in the field of ethics to realize autonomy in external and internal nature, as well as in institutions, on the premise that man is evil and that the world of phenomena or experience lacks rationality. And to escape from this problem, he either seeks refuge in the unknown future or in God and theoretically never has a theory to establish a relationship between the world of phenomena and phenomena, or in other words, the subjective and objective. In such a state, the person stands outside nature with his free inside, and the experience or object appears to him as something threatening. Kant brings all these problems with him to his world of understanding of politics. And because it has already created a disconnect between the two realms of subject and object, this continues also in political thought, because it cannot use the capacity of its new understanding of human freedom to achieve the theory of public will and its embodiment outside. Instead, it seeks to establish the government of law and ensure it by forcing the state to achieve good citizenship for society. Thus Kant’s political thought separated from the freedom of autonomy and it falls into utilitarian thought.In this article, the author not only believes that there is a gap between freedom and autonomy in Kant’s moral thought and his political philosophy but also believes that Kant’s theoretical decline in political thought is due to the weakness of his moral thought. That is, not establishing a relationship with the real world or phenomena or experience in Kant’s moral thought and not realizing his autonomy outside, whether on the basis of anthropology based on man’s evil or on the irrationality of the outside world and also not accepting its institutions which is the embodiment of human desires and wishes; all of these have had an inevitable impact on his political thought. in such a way that whenever Kant speaks of politics in the real world, he can never speak of the transcendental freedom embodied in it. Thus, that conflict between subject and object or morality and nature or human desires with social institutions in politics has been reproduced again. In such a situation, as Kant has not been able to bring that abstract moral man into the realm of politics and in concrete cases, explain the conditions of its realization in case of public will, inevitably, one must turn to the government for the realization of both private and public will in the field of politics which is not at all the embodiment of the public will of individuals, but a master who prepares man for social life by coercion and its metaphysical repression. Thus, autonomy is not realized in politics as in ethics in the external sphere, and empirical coercion in the form of government will impose itself on the abstraction of autonomy like God in Kant’s moral thought.

As a normative ethics theory, virtue ethics theory can present a criterion for criminalization. The revival of this theory brought about a great new change in new ethics philosophy in the second half of the 20th century. Its effects on criminalization are just like the two sides of a coin. On the one hand, it has the capacity of promoting ethics to reach its climax and even act as a permit for criminal intervention in the internal qualities of the individuals and on the other hand, it can decriminalize most of the vicious actions in order to make citizens virtuous.In the field of the philosophy of the law of virtue, the theory of the ethics of virtue is used for the philosophical justification of criminalization. Therefore, in order to present a virtuous criminal theory, special attention is paid to moral vices. In the theory of virtuous criminalism, we are faced with two main axes: one, flourishing, and the second, vice. The presentation of a legislative theory in the philosophy of virtue-based law takes into account human flourishing. Proponents of liberalism, on the other hand, argue that criminalizing moral depravity violates privacy; while the problem is not simple. For this reason, the criminalization of vicious behavior faces challenges including the threat of self-ownership and the justification of these behaviors from the perspective of the principle of harm. The main question now is, to what extent is the criminalization of moral vices in the context of the theory of self-government? One might also ask how virtuous criminal theory can be justified by a reading of the principle of harm. The present paper has achieved the following approach with a descriptive-analytical method The criminalization of some moral vices violates the right of citizens to self-government. Therefore, criminalizing these behaviors will not be justified. On the other hand, from the perspective of the theory of virtuous criminalism, moral vice is not a sufficient and even necessary condition for criminalization. For this reason, assuming that the criminalization of a vice is justified on the basis of a reading of the principle of harm, it can not necessarily be claimed that the application of criminal law against this behavior is effective. In addition, the purpose of this study is to explain the limits and challenges of the theory of virtuous criminalism in the context of the theory of self-government and the principle of harm. In addition, in this article, readers are introduced to the concerns of liberals. And they will realize that criminalization in the context of virtue-based philosophy of law does not necessarily violate privacy, that is, we will not face maximum criminalization. In addition to the analysis of the nature of virtue ethics, the present thesis dissertation reviews argumentative methods of virtuous criminalization in the context of virtue-oriented criminal law jurisprudence and criticizes hurdles and methods of creating a liberal approach.