Abstract
In his recent book, Disagreement, Deference, and Religious Commitment, John Pittard challenges J.L. Schellenberg’s rejection of mystical experience as worthy of enjoying presumptive doxastic trust for two main reasons. First, Pittard holds that Schellenberg wrongly focuses only on avoiding error while placing no emphasis on gaining truth. I argue that, contra Pittard, Schellenberg’s account nicely balances the competing epistemic goals of gaining truth and avoiding error. Second, Pittard thinks that Schellenberg’s criteria for presumptive trust in that of universality and unavoidability are arbitrary. I counter that Schellenberg’s criteria are not arbitrary since they are the best way of achieving these goals. I conclude that despite not enjoying presumptive doxastic trust, this in itself does not entail that mystical experiences are never trustworthy.
Highlights
For some years philosophers of religion have discussed the problem of religious diversity; see (King 2008)
Schellenberg and Pittard have an interesting disagreement on this point, with Schellenberg denying that mystical experiences should enjoy presumptive trust and Pittard rejecting Schellenberg’s reasoning
One item that appears sometimes lost in Pittard’s analysis of Schellenberg is that what is under dispute is whether mystical experience should be granted presumptive trust
Summary
Philosophers of religion have discussed the problem of religious diversity; see (King 2008). Disagreement, Deference, and Religious Commitment, John Pittard argues that Schellenberg’s reasons for refraining from giving presumptive trust to mystical experiences are mistaken If right, this could potentially serve to (at least partially) resolve the threat from strong conciliationism. Carol says that the aftermath of the experience was in the form of a wonderful mental and spiritual glow, and adds: “I became convinced later that a spiritual Reality underlay all earthy reality, and the ultimate ground of the universe was benevolent in a positive way, surpassing our temporal understanding This conviction has remained with me, but in an intellectual form; it has not, prevented me from feeling acute personal depression and disappointment time and again, throughout my life”. Later in life, she developed a strong interest in Buddhism, but felt that it was founded on a negative premise, whereas the universe seemed to her to be positive (Wiebe 2015, p. 71)
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