I hope you are right for I while I am a Christian philosopher (or a philosopher who is a Christian) I believe that many of my friends and colleagues who are atheists or agnostics or who accept Islam or a non-theistic view of God (as my Hindu philosopher colleague and friend) are just as reasonable as I am in the sense that each of them has intellectual integrity and has spent at least as much time intelligently reflecting on their convictions, earnestly seeking the truth in such matters. Still, I think each of us needs to hold that the reasons that justify our different beliefs are not defeated (undermined) by the reasons for incompatible beliefs. An atheist might be able to acknowledge that I am just as reasonable as she is, but she cannot (in my view) think that her reasoning is undermined by the evidence or reasoning that I undertake. Alternatively, consider a Christian-Muslim exchange (something I am deeply committed to). I accept a traditional Christian understanding of God incarnate on the basis...

Great question. There seem to be cases when a person might rationally chose to act irrationally --as occurs in Shakespeare's play Hamlet when the main character, Hamlet, acts as though he is mad to confuse his father-in-law (and, it turns out, the murderer of Hamlet's father) and this buys Hamlet more time in his contemplating how to avenge his father's death. I believe that USA President Nixon --and I am sure some other world leaders- sought to project to potential enemy states that he was capable of being irrational. There also seem to be cases of when persons deliberately put themselves into states of mind in which rationality goes out the window, as when a person deliberately becomes heavily intoxicated or allows their passions to be so completely unedited that they are in an 'anything goes' mode. Apart from such cases, there may be a different, more paradoxical case, and perhaps the following is what you have in mind. Imagine a person is deliberating about whether to choose A or B and...

Tough question! In a very fine book, The Concept of Faith, Lad Sessions argues that there are at least four different kinds of faith. But setting aside Sessions more ambitious, technical proposals and work, I believe the term "faith" in English can be used either to describe the object of belief (for example one may speak of the Christian Faith) or trust. In the latter sense, faith may involve hope, belief, reason. It need not be "blind" --which I assume means something like 'on the basis of very little, if any evidence.' I suggest faith can be based on tremendous evidence even rising to the level of knowledge. I have faith in my neighbor's integrity as I feel I know him well and have seen him act with integrity when things were highly stressful. In a religious context, one may claim to believe in (for example) God or to have faith in God and this may be a way of disclaiming CERTAINTY or KNOWLEDGE. After all, those who follow some religious traditions are sometimes referred to as ...

Great question! Your point about any explanation of rationality will have to presuppose (or assume) it seems right. After all, if our choice is between a rational explanation of rationality or an irrational one, the former seems to have the advantage! Moreover, I am inclined to think that there are basic, not further explainable truths about rationality: it is rational to believe in the law of identity (or A is A or everything is self-identical), but there are extant different accounts of the emergence of rational reflection among humans (and maybe some non-humans) and different theories of rationality. As for accounting for the emergence of rational creatures, some think this can be handled in accord with a thoroughgoing evolutionary account that shuns any reference to theism or Platonism or some other teleological (purposive account). For some of the difficulties facing this approach, see Thomas Nagel's fascinating new book Mind and Cosmos. In terms of the nature of rationality, there are two...

Good question and good suggestion! Beginning with the last point, there are philosophers who love self-refuting arguments, the most famous being the Cartesian (and Augustinian) proposal that claims such as "I do not exist" have a habit of self-destructing. But some philosophers (and not a few poets) have sometimes introduced a narrow conception of 'rationality' in contrast to the emotions or experiences that seem to defy easy rational analysis, e.g. experiences that are moral, aesthetic or religious. So, when Pascal claimed that "the heart has its reasons whereof reason knows nothing" he was still appealing to reason but in contrast with what you might call abstract, emotionless rationality. This is probably best seen, not as a philosopher recommending we be irrational, but that we not be restricted to a narrow concept of the rational. On this point, a follower of Pascal might be in the same company with romantic poets such as Wordsworth or Coleridge and Blake or even St. Thomas Aquinas. All these...

That is an excellent question that has fascinated philosphers from the beginning in the west. Socrates seems to have equated knowing an act is good with desiring it, and reasoning that if someone desires X they must (on some level) both think it good and do the act or try to do it (unless constrained internally by an injury, for example or some external constraint, e.g. chains). From a Socratic point of view, the person who seems to be in the situation of thinking jogging is good but electing not to jog (without good reason) must (on some level) think that jogging is not (or not always) good. For he or she to remain watching TV rather than go running, the person must think something like: in this case, it is ok because running can be dangerous and I might be hit by a car or [whatever]....and so it is perfectly fine for me to wait until tomorrow to go for a run. The greeks called this apparent liability for us not to do what we think we should akrasia, a term that is usually translated as "weakness of...

Great set of questions. In any community (whether on the job or in a family) it can feel quite unfair if one party is having to do all the work or at least more work to understand the other person's point of view (using more empathy, imagination, listening more). Ideally, one expects that each party will be equally open to being persuaded by the other. Actually, political philosphers today are spending quite a bit of time on this topic. For example, this is Joshua Cohen's description of ideal deliberation: "Ideal deliberation aims to arrive at a rationally motivated consensu -to find reasons that are persuasive to all who are committed to acting on the results of a free and reasoned assessment of alternatives by equals." I suppose you are not equals with the "boss" but Cohen would probably argue that from the point of view of fair deliberation, one should be on an equal footing even if (at the very end) the boss decides on (for example) what policy should be followed. For further technical work...

Fascinating line of reasoning! One thing to question is premise two. Granted if you are angry at someone, it follows that you are judging that the person has done something wrong (wether to you or to someone or something you identify with or value). But it does not follow that you would like to see the person punished or seek to "get back at this person." Imagine you love the person you are angry with and all you really want is an apology or a request for your forgiveness or perhaps you desire a material compensation (the person smashed your car and you want compensation plus replacement of the car). Also, the link between 2 and 4 may need some re-considering. We typically distinguish between revenge and retributive justice. The latter is measured and impersonal: so, in retributive justice when someone wrongfully causes a given harm, there is a proportional penalty (so, assault may call for one year of incarceration and lots of communiity time afterward). But revenge is often personal and without...

Some philosophers have indeed wondered about the basis for family and romantic relations --from Plato to Abelard and Heloise to Bertrand Russell. I wonder, however, whether your worries about a foundation for a romantic, committed relationship wouldn't apply to any number of different relationships such as a non-romantic friendship or even non-committed romantic relationships (whom should I seek romance with tonight?), and the like. In any event, I wonder about the extent to which love is really under one's control. Isn't the situation often as follows: you meet someone whom (for whatever reason: beauty, wit, interests, history, philosophy, theology, athletic ability) you find attractive. You come to know and appreciate her as a good person and (idealy) vice versa, and this naturally leads to a desire for union (what is sometimes called unitive love). Isn't it more common for matters of justification to arise when one considers why one should not continue toward commitment? In other words, isn't the...

The matter is more complicated than looking at Wikipedia. There are plenty of good reasons for being an atheist, but as I have sought to make evident in replying to other questions in the category of 'religion' there is a vast philosophical literature supporting religious beliefs without what might be called Wikipedia fallacies. You might check out the free online Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entries Philosophy of Religion and, as an example, the entry for the Cosmological Argument, which contains a pretty plausable (non-fallacious) version of the cosmological argument. Check out, too, the Blackwell Companion to Philosophy of Religion. I might also suggest that no philosopher today (or almost none) thinks that they can prove God's existence or non-existence or prove utilitarianism is correct or physicalism or realism in philosophy of science. Today, most of us deal with arguments we take to be plausable or persuasive, but these fall short of proofs.