A passage that I think gets at the core of his argument about believing in religious, holding religious beliefs. He says he cannot see my way to accepting the agnostic rules for truth seeking or willfully agreeing to keep my willing nature out of the game. A rule of thinking which would absolutely prevent me from acknowledging certain kinds of truths if those kinds of truths were really there would be an irrational rule. That for me is the long and short of the formal logic of the situation, no matter what the kinds of truth might materially be.
David and Tamler argue about William James' classic essay "The Will to Believe." What's more important - avoiding falsehood or discovering truth? When (if ever) is it rational to believe anything without enough evidence? What about beliefs that we can't be agnostic about? Are there hypotheses that we have to believe in order for them to come true? Does James successfully demonstrate that faith can be rational?
Plus, a philosopher at Apple who's not allowed to talk to the media - what are they hiding? And why are academics constantly telling students that academia is a nightmare?
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