Kierkegaard on belief and credence

Dados Bibliográficos

ID21602927
AutoresZ Quanbeck (0000-0001-5823-1803, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Chapel Hill North Carolina USA, autor correspondente)
Ano2024
Volume32
Fascículo2
Páginas394-412
Data de publicação2024-06-01
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoEuropean Journal of Philosophy (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0966-8373 • E-ISSN: 1468-0378
EditoraWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/ejop.12891
OpenAlexW4385550837
IdiomaNL
Citações recebidas5
Referências citadas33

Kierkegaard's pseudonym Johannes Climacus famously defines faith as a risky “venture” that requires “holding fast” to “objective uncertainty.” Yet puzzlingly, he emphasizes that faith requires resolute conviction and certainty. Moreover, Climacus claims that all beliefs about contingent propositions about the external world “exclude doubt” and “nullify uncertainty,” but also that uncertainty is “continually present” in these very same beliefs. This paper argues that these apparent contradictions can be resolved by interpreting Climacus as a belief‐credence dualist. That is, Climacus holds that beliefs and credences (i.e., degrees of belief) are two irreducibly distinct types of mental states. Beliefs are resolutions that close inquiry, thereby excluding doubt and reflecting subjective certainty by disregarding the possibility of error. Credences, by contrast, reflect assessments of evidential probabilities, thereby encoding a recognition of “objective uncertainty” by acknowledging the possibility of error. In addition to solving a vexing interpretive puzzle and showing how Kierkegaard anticipates contemporary views about the nature of belief and credence, this paper demonstrates that Kierkegaard developed a sophisticated account of the nature of belief, doubt, and certainty that merits serious philosophical consideration

Certainty · Conviction · Credence · Epistemology · Faith · Political science · Computer Science · Epistemology, Ethics, and Metaphysics · Kierkegaardian Philosophy and Influence · Law · Philosophy · Theology and Philosophy of Evil

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