Keller, James

English

Asbury Theological Seminary

Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers Volume 2 Issue 2 Article 10 4-1-1985 Reflections on the Value of Knowledge: A Reply to Creel James Keller Follow this and additional works at: https://place.asburyseminary.edu/faithandphilosophy Recommended Citation Keller, James (1985) "Reflections on the Value of Knowledge: A Reply to Creel," Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers: Vol. 2 : Iss. 2 , Article 10. Available at: https://place.asburyseminary.edu/faithandphilosophy/vol2/iss2/10 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at ePLACE: preserving, learning, and creative exchange. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faith and Philosophy: Journal of the Society of Christian Philosophers by an authorized editor of ePLACE: preserving, learning, and creative exchange. REFLECTIONS ON THE V ALUE OF KNOWLEDGE: A REPLY TO CREEL James Keller In a recent issue of this journal, Richard Creel asks the provocative question "If you were given an opportunity to choose between (I) knowing the way reality is, and (2) having enduring faith that there is a God in the classical theistic sense, on the condition that you could not have both and your choice would be irrever-sible, which would you choose?"l He answers this question, but spends more time on a similar question about which alternative one should choose. I am concerned with his discussion of the latter question. He answers that we should choose an enduring faith because our highest moral obligation is not to seek the truth but "to believe and live in a way that is compatible with and supportive of the supreme value," which he believes to be universal happiness. Since universal happiness is possible if there is a God in the classical sense but may not be if there is not, he would rather not know if there is not. Such a choice of ignorance he defends by saying that "universal fullness of life" is a greater value than knowledge of the nature of reality; therefore, if life can be lived "as fully and perhaps more fully by choosing something that involves ignorance of x than by choosing something that involves knowledge of x, then we should choose the alternative which involves ignorance of X."2 On its face, this is a surprising position for a philosopher to take. I want to argue that it is also an inappropriate position for any rational person to take. My basic reason is simple: it may be that my enduring faith in God in the classical theist sense would support my promoting the supreme value more than knowledge of the way reality is would support it, but would such a faith promote the supreme value better than some alternative faith? Nothing in Creel's argument shows this. Yet if our highest moral obligation is to support the supreme value, then we must seek that faith which will best promote it. To determine what that faith is, a knowledge of the way reality is will be more useful than an enduring faith in God in the classical sense. Creel's argument also appears to contain an equivocation between universal happiness and one's own happiness. He says that our highest moral obligation is to seek the former, but when he defends the choice of ignorance, he invokes the latter. Perhaps my life may be fuller with an enduring faith of the sort he FAITH AND PHILOSOPHY Vol. 2 No.2 April 1985 All rights reserved. 191 192 James Keller speaks of, but that does not mean that such a faith will be most efficacious in enabling me to promote universal happiness. Whether or not it will be depends on the nature of human beings and the rest of reality. Indeed, it may even be that reality is such that faith in God in the classical sense hinders the promotion of universal happiness rather than promotes it, yet that universal happiness is promoted if one lives by some other faith and is achievable if all people live by that other faith. Only a knowledge of the way reality is will enable us to determine this. Again, we see that the pursuit of our highest moral obligation gives us reason to prefer a knowledge of the way reality is to an enduring faith in God in the classical sense. The point at issue between Creel and me has important implications. Creel argues that it is appropriate to fight with all one's heart, soul, mind, and strength to retain one's faith; to walk away from dialogue with unbelievers when one feels one's faith being threatened, when one begins to take seriously the possibility that one's faith is untrue. 3 For the fault may lie not in the rational defensibility of one's faith but in one's ability to carry out that defense; and even if not, one still should cling to one's faith, for it is of more value than knowledge of the way reality is. Therefore, at this point, it is appropriate for the believer to break off the dialogue. 4 But if the believer does have a misplaced faith-i.e., a faith which does not best support his promoting the supreme value-such a strategy will hinder him from ever finding that out. Thus it will prevent him from fulfilling what Creel himself says is an individual's highest moral obligation. Of course, there is no guarantee that a knowledge of the way reality is will bring a person to the correct faith (for a person may not trust or commit himself in the manner appropriate in light of that knowledge). But an accurate knowledge of the way reality is will surely help prevent some misplaced commitments and may promote the correct one. There is a further practical point. Even if Creel were right where the choice is between the alternative he poses, it might be incorrect to use conclusions drawn from consideration of that choice for guidance about how we ought to live in this life. For we have no guarantee that we will have an enduring faith. Despite our best efforts to preserve our faith, we might not. We might be overwhelmed by events so shattering that we lose our faith. Is our best defense against this happening Creel's strategy of refusing rational discussion when our faith is threatened, or is it taking the risk of losing our faith in order to seek a more accurate understanding of the way reality is, which might better prepare us for these challenges? Which strategy would be more effective is an empirical question which I do not presume to answer. I raise it only to point out that Creel's argument, even if it did establish his point about the correct choice in the situation he poses, does not show that it is the appropriate one for our actual REFLECTIONS ON KNOWLEDGE 193 situation. This reminder of our actual situation, in which we are guaranteed neither an enduring faith nor an accurate knowledge of the way reality is, prompts a couple of final caveats about my argument. First, I would not want anything in my argument to be taken to imply that we have any overriding obligation to seek knowledge-i.e., any obligation which overrides all other obligations. We have no such obligation. But I would also insist that we have no such overriding obligation to cling to the faith which we currently hold, whether that be faith in the God of classical theism or any other faith. Such an obligation would presup-pose that the faith is not misplaced, and it seems to me to involve no less hubris to assume that my current faith could not be misplaced than it does to aSSllme that my current beliefs about reality could not be in error. Second, given the limitations on the know ledge and the dialectical skill of each of us, we should properly hesitate to give up our faith any time in our search for knowledge we encountered a single problem which we could not immediately resolve. But this salutary humility about our intellectual skills, which breeds a diffidence about clinging to Ollr assumed knowledge, should, it seems to me, breed a similar diffidence about clinging to our traditional faith (whatever that be), for it may also be misplaced. Wofford College NOTES I. Richard E. Creel, "Philosophy's Bowl of Pottage: Reflections on the Value of Faith," Faith and Philosophy, Vol. I, No.2 (April 1984), p. 230. It is not wholly clear in the article whether Creel means these two alternatives to refer to guaranteed conditions or to conditions which merely in fact obtain. For example, is one being asked to give up guaranteed knowledge for a faith which is guaranteed to endure or to give up any knowledge at all for a faith which just happens to endure, and vice-versa? The differences are important. If Creel has in mind something guaranteed, then one could, for example, choose faith and still seek knowledge, but with no certainty of finding it; or one could choose knowledge and might still have faith in the God of classical theism, but with no certainty that it endure. If Creel is thinking only of something which in fact obtains, then choosing either alternative would mean completely giving up the other. If one chose faith, he could never in fact know anything (not just never be guaranteed that his purported knowledge is accurate); if one chose knowledge, one could never have a faith which in fact endured. In this discussion I tended to take Creel to be thinking of guaranteed alternatives, for he does not seem to rule out believers coming to accurate convictions about certain things, though he does argue that they should not follow their rationally arrived at convictions where these seemed to threaten their faith. 2. Ibid., p. 231. 3. Ibid., pp. 232-34. 194 James Keller 4. Creel suggests that his participating beyond this point may be analogous to participating in an effort to prove that his father has done something awful (p. 234). He admits that others may have an obligation to provide such proof (though when the father is God, who can the others be?), but insists that his obligation is to stand by and defend his father. Certainly it is, but there comes a point where denial of his father's wrongdoing is itself a wrong, a wrong against truth and against the others with whom one shares the human community. What is appropriate at that point is hard to determine in the abstract. Certainly, one might well still love and care for one's father, but to deny that he did wrong or to refuse to look at the evidence that he did is itself a wrong. Moreover, if part of the issue is whether the alleged wrongdoer really is his father, what would Creel say his obligation is? 

Reflections on the Value of Knowledge: A Reply to Creel

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Reflections on the Value of Knowledge: A Reply to Creel

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