Common Consent Argument for Theism

[narnia4]

Credit to prosblogion (group blog of some philosophers of religion). The argument is pretty simple-

1. Most people believe in God.
2. Therefore, God exists.

I know at first blush most would dismiss this as a fallacious appeal to the masses (argumentum ad populum), but I'm not so sure. Its a defeasible argument, but still a very legitimate argument imo. If someone believes that there is exactly a 50/50 chance that God exists given other evidence (or perhaps even that we cannot know whether God exists or not), this argument should be enough to push them to the theistic side.

I'll paste a thought experiment Alexander Pruss posted on the aforementioned blog. I think it illustrates what I'm trying to say quite well.

Let me try another thought experiment. You wake up, with no memories of anything, walking in the middle of a long line of people, on a narrow path suspended over an abyss. The path forks ahead, and the two paths going out from the fork, still over the abyss, are shrouded in mist. There is a loud announcement: "Remember that one of the paths leads to good place and the other to a bad place." You notice that the majority of people go to the left at the fork. Neither the people who go left nor the people who go right look like they're guessing--they look they believe themselves to be going to the better place. You ask the person behind you and in front of you what's going on, but they don't speak your language.

What do you do? You can't stop because of the press of people behind you. You must choose--left or right? The only data you have that differentiates left from right is that most people go left.

And surely that's exactly what you should do.

Any thoughts on this?

[Furstentum Liechtenstein]

1. Most people believe in God.
2. Therefore, God exists.

This is incorrect because very few people believe in YHWH. It would be more correct to say that,

1. Most people believe in a god.
2. Therefore, the transcendent exists.

...but even that is nonsense because it amounts to declaring something ''true'' by popular consent.

FL

[narnia4]

Well it is an argument for theism only. Its an epistemological argument, are we warranted to trust other people and their claims. If it were true that there were no evidence either way (obviously there is other evidence and I happen to think it all points toward theism anyway), this argument makes a small case for theism.

Let me use another analogy. Let's say you're playing a game of Who Wants to be a Millionaire, Greek edition. Its all Greek to you and you really have no idea what the answer to the question is. So you ask the audience, and 80% say the answer is "A". Now 80% of the people is a sound majority. Of course they all could be wrong, but lacking any other evidence, the fact that 80% said A is solid evidence that A is the correct answer.

[Beanybag]

Well. It was already pointed out by FL that a majority of people do not actually believe in the abrahamic God. A majority of people do believe in a god, but a plurality of people do not believe in any gods. A formalization of the argument ad populum just isn't great. What if a majority of peopled don't believe in god at some point? What if a majority of people didn't believe in god previously? A majority of people adhered to geocentricism at one point. And on and on. I think as far as you can get is the high likelyhood of spirituality or the transcendent, but even then, I'm not sure.

Let me try another thought experiment. You wake up, with no memories of anything, walking in the middle of a long line of people, on a narrow path suspended over an abyss. The path forks ahead, and the two paths going out from the fork, still over the abyss, are shrouded in mist. There is a loud announcement: "Remember that one of the paths leads to good place and the other to a bad place." You notice that the majority of people go to the left at the fork. Neither the people who go left nor the people who go right look like they're guessing--they look they believe themselves to be going to the better place. You ask the person behind you and in front of you what's going on, but they don't speak your language.

What do you do? You can't stop because of the press of people behind you. You must choose--left or right? The only data you have that differentiates left from right is that most people go left.

And surely that's exactly what you should do.

Any thoughts on this?

What you SHOULD do? Why should you know/want to do anything in that scenario? Why has down (or the nonchoice) been ignored as a path and been misrepresented as not even an option?

[narnia4]

The "should" part is really incidental, it was assumed that everyone would want to go down the "good" path (or in my example, win money). In real life, the question is trying to determine the veracity of the claim "God exists". I suppose the argument makes the "assumption" that people are interested in the truth or falsity of that statement.

The "majority of people" would actually account for all people of all times. Let's take your geocentricism example. Given no other information, if most people believed in geocentricism, it would be rational to believe in geocentricism as well. But we do have other evidence, and so rationally we should conclude that geocentricism is false. That's why the CCA is called a defeasible argument. Furthermore, I'm fairly confident that accounting for all people of all time, more people believe that geocentricism is false than that it is true. With atheism, only a tiny minority today believe there is no God and the modern version of atheism has only been around for a few hundred years at all. So as I said, we have defeasible evidence for theism. Not the Judeo-Christian God, but theism. Once you establish theism, however, you can look into other arguments for the God of Christianity.

Its really a very modest argument and it should be, imo, actually pretty non-controversial. Take my example. Am I wrong that, given that you want to give the right answer, you should answer "A" under that circumstance? If I am wrong, tell me how I am.

[Beanybag]

The "majority of people" would actually account for all people of all times. Let's take your geocentricism example. Given no other information, if most people believed in geocentricism, it would be rational to believe in geocentricism as well.

No it wouldn't, it would be rational to not hold any such belief until such time a rational, empirically justified true belief could be formed.

With atheism, only a tiny minority today believe there is no God and the modern version of atheism has only been around for a few hundred years at all. So as I said, we have defeasible evidence for theism. Not the Judeo-Christian God, but theism. Once you establish theism, however, you can look into other arguments for the God of Christianity.

Not true, atheism is a very large chunk. Religions like Taoism, Buddhism, Jainism, spiritualism, etc. are all atheistic as well, keep in mind. Once you've established theism, as well, you have not even established monotheism as hinduism is a very large amount of people still.

Its really a very modest argument and it should be, imo, actually pretty non-controversial. Take my example. Am I wrong that, given that you want to give the right answer, you should answer "A" under that circumstance? If I am wrong, tell me how I am.

Perhaps I am in an experiment of conformity. The people picking A might be trying to trick me. Or really, any infinitely vast number of things. What you have presented is a scenario in which there are too many unknowns making any probabilistic analysis result in unknown probabilities. You cannot say that any choice has any more probability or likelihood of correctness unless it logically follows that that is the case. You simply can't use a formal logical fallacy as an argument.

[narnia4]

So if 80% of people said A, you feel it would be equally or more reasonable to pick B, C, or D? That's a very tough sell. That's like saying that four out of five witnesses saying that Suspect A is the murderer doesn't make it any more likely that Suspect A is actually the murderer.

I didn't say that the argument has to convince you. How much evidence you believe is necessary can come down to personal preference. To repeat myself again, what it does is provide defeasible evidence for theism. If it were a true 50/50 proposition, given no other details, the argument would make theism more likely than atheism. Whether or not you want to "wait for empirical evidence" doesn't effect that.

And I said "atheism in its modern form". Multiple Greek gods still counts as theism, Buddhism isn't necessarily atheistic, and so on. All of what you said in that regard doesn't effect the argument.

So I'll repeat myself again. If you were playing Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? and 80% of the audience picked "A" as the right answer, how is A not the correct choice assuming you want to answer the question correctly?

[Beanybag]

So if 80% of people said A, you feel it would be equally or more reasonable to pick B, C, or D? That's a very tough sell. That's like saying that four out of five witnesses saying that Suspect A is the murderer doesn't make it any more likely that Suspect A is actually the murderer.

Provided none of them witnessed the murder and weren't direct witnesses, had no established credibility or corroborating reports, were not backed by empirical evidence, then no, I would not say that suspect A was a murderer beyond all reasonable doubt and I'd say it's wildly irresponsible to say otherwise. Eye witnesses have an outstanding history of being incorrect and deceived to begin with, to say nothing of hearsay and belief not based on empircal accounts. If there is a murder trial and 4/5 people say a person is guilty, what bearing does this have on his actual chances of being guilty? None. Not unless some measure of truth can be found in their testimony can it be said that their belief either way has any influence.

I didn't say that the argument has to convince you. How much evidence you believe is necessary can come down to personal preference. To repeat myself again, what it does is provide defeasible evidence for theism. If it were a true 50/50 proposition, given no other details, the argument would make theism more likely than atheism. Whether or not you want to "wait for empirical evidence" doesn't effect that.

No, it doesn't provide that case. The question of the existence of God cannot be said to be a 50/50 proposition, that makes no sense. It is a proposition with unknowns scattered everywhere and, as such, has unknown probability. Further, even if it were a 50/50 proposition, the number of people who believe either way is irrelevant and has no bearing on the probability for the reasons stated above.

So I'll repeat myself again. If you were playing Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? and 80% of the audience picked "A" as the right answer, how is A not the correct choice assuming you want to answer the question correctly?

Depends on the question. If it's a question I expect the audience to have knowledge of, then I might defer to their judgment. If I have no indication that the audience is knowledgeable whatsoever on the subject, then why should I? This is not a strong case.

[narnia4]

So if 80% of people said A, you feel it would be equally or more reasonable to pick B, C, or D? That's a very tough sell. That's like saying that four out of five witnesses saying that Suspect A is the murderer doesn't make it any more likely that Suspect A is actually the murderer.

Provided none of them witnessed the murder and weren't direct witnesses, had no established credibility or corroborating reports, were not backed by empirical evidence, then no, I would not say that suspect A was a murderer beyond all reasonable doubt and I'd say it's wildly irresponsible to say otherwise. Eye witnesses have an outstanding history of being incorrect and deceived to begin with, to say nothing of hearsay and belief not based on empircal accounts. If there is a murder trial and 4/5 people say a person is guilty, what bearing does this have on his actual chances of being guilty? None. Not unless some measure of truth can be found in their testimony can it be said that their belief either way has any influence.

You're jumping all over the place. I'm trying to make it clear but you don't seem to grasp what I'm saying. Who said anything about "beyond a reasonable doubt"? If four out of five people say one thing, it makes it more likely that what they say is true. That's the only point here. Witness testimony matters, and not only eye witness testimony. Beyond reasonable doubt isn't even in the equation here.

No, it doesn't provide that case. The question of the existence of God cannot be said to be a 50/50 proposition, that makes no sense. It is a proposition with unknowns scattered everywhere and, as such, has unknown probability. Further, even if it were a 50/50 proposition, the number of people who believe either way is irrelevant and has no bearing on the probability for the reasons stated above.

Given no evidence whatsoever, every proposition is "50/50". If I have no reason whatsoever to choose A or B, how can I say one is more likely than the other? The reason the number of people who believe either way is relevant is because they might know something.

So I'll repeat myself again. If you were playing Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? and 80% of the audience picked "A" as the right answer, how is A not the correct choice assuming you want to answer the question correctly?

Depends on the question. If it's a question I expect the audience to have knowledge of, then I might defer to their judgment. If I have no indication that the audience is knowledgeable whatsoever on the subject, then why should I? This is not a strong case.

So are you saying that it would be more rational to pick B, C, or D? I'd like to hear the case for that.

You should because they might have knowledge on the subject. The fact that 80% picked A provides evidence that they DO have knowledge... otherwise why would such a strong majority pick A? There may be reasons why, I didn't say it was a "strong" case. Its an appeal to probability. The fact that 80% picked A increases the probability that A is the correct choice. Given no knowledge of other variables, that makes A more probable than B, C, or D. Maybe it isn't enough evidence for you to say the answer must be A or maybe you could learn more about the variables later. But it does provide evidence for A. Not sure how else to put it, its kinda obvious.

I'll add that the chances are pretty good that we have enough information each way that this argument doesn't mean much. But it isn't supposed to mean much. Its just a look at some social epistemology.

[Beanybag]

You're jumping all over the place. I'm trying to make it clear but you don't seem to grasp what I'm saying. Who said anything about "beyond a reasonable doubt"? If four out of five people say one thing, it makes it more likely that what they say is true. That's the only point here. Witness testimony matters, and not only eye witness testimony. Beyond reasonable doubt isn't even in the equation here.

True, but I also said it has no bearing on the likelihood unless you can establish credibility, direct witness account, or some other relationship that establishes some sort of bearing on the truth. If I get 5 people to say something and believe it, it has no bearing on whether or not it's true, only that those people believe it. If they believe it for good reasons, then maybe it can start to have some bearing, but until such a time, the simple act of believing has no effect on the truth or even the likelihood of proof.

Given no evidence whatsoever, every proposition is "50/50". If I have no reason whatsoever to choose A or B, how can I say one is more likely than the other? The reason the number of people who believe either way is relevant is because they might know something.

No, this is a very common misconception. Given no indication or direction, you cannot form the probability space of a problem - it has unknowable probability. You can't say one is more likely than the other, but you can't say that they are equally likely either. You simply can't make any judgment as to their probabilities.

So are you saying that it would be more rational to pick B, C, or D? I'd like to hear the case for that.

No, I'm saying there is NO RATIONAL CHOICE.

You should because they might have knowledge on the subject. The fact that 80% picked A provides evidence that they DO have knowledge... otherwise why would such a strong majority pick A?

Do you know the probability that they might have knowledge? You might be able to form some quick probabilistic estimates (and I doubt you could do the correct probabilistic calculations controls for variance to be able to tell), but for things in which no one is known to have knowledge (theistic claims), it becomes an unknown probability. In the case of the poll of the audience, it can be more fairly said that their own opinions are not influencing others, but it can't be said of the more relevant examples.

There may be reasons why, I didn't say it was a "strong" case. Its an appeal to probability. The fact that 80% picked A increases the probability that A is the correct choice. Given no knowledge of other variables, that makes A more probably than B, C, or D. Maybe it isn't enough evidence for you to say the answer must be A or maybe you could learn more about the variables later. But it does provide evidence for A. Not sure how else to put it, its kinda obvious.

It's obviously and factually wrong, though. You just can't invent probabilities on a whim for unknowns like this. You have no indication that the beliefs of these individuals in any way corroborate to the truth. We have no way of evaluating the accuracy of these sorts of claims because we don't have a way to measure it. We're dealing with too many unknowns in an entirely unknown probability space.

If I ask the question: What is 5 >^< 8, where >^< is an unknown operator and the possible options are 13, 40, 9, and 3, and a majority of people pick 40, is 40 any more likely to be the answer? No! The operator stood for divide the second term by two and add to the first (9). For questions in which the probability of any relevant piece of information is unknown, the entire probability space becomes unknown. It just makes no sense to use this in any fashion.

[narnia4]

Well if you don't buy it you don't buy it, but I know that more than one epistemologist would disagree with you.

I will take your example though. If there's an equation with an unknown operator, you should pick the option that the majority pick because they may have information that you do not have. If there's an "I don't know" blank, then maybe you should fill that in. But the answer that more people give is more likely to be correct.

Now I might agree with you if I believed that "no choice" were an option. But there either is a God or there isn't and both of those views have logical consequences. Maybe a person should say "I don't know" (if this were the only evidence he'd have good reason to), but I think the argument works for what it is. Here's a link to the original article by the way, they have a better discussion on it than I can provide- http://prosblogion.ektopos.com/archives ... -cons.html

Thanks for replying by the way.

[Beanybag]

Well if you don't buy it you don't buy it, but I know that more than one epistemologist would disagree with you.

I will take your example though. If there's an equation with an unknown operator, you should pick the option that the majority pick because they may have information that you do not have. If there's an "I don't know" blank, then maybe you should fill that in. But the answer that more people give is more likely to be correct.

Now I might agree with you if I believed that "no choice" were an option. But there either is a God or there isn't and both of those views have logical consequences. Maybe a person should say "I don't know" (if this were the only evidence he'd have good reason to), but I think the argument works for what it is. Here's a link to the original article by the way, they have a better discussion on it than I can provide- http://prosblogion.ektopos.com/archives ... -cons.html

Thanks for replying by the way.

The reason I still find it fails is when we ask: What is the probability they might have information? If it's unknown, than we can't assign a probability to it. We can't even assign probability to probabilities - any attempt to define the probability space will fail. In all the examples where we do actually defer to majority opinion, it's because we have good reason to believe they have information - we have established a probability that they have information. Humans rarely think in terms of binary logic and apply probabilistic reasoning to almost everything we do. Many times our probabilistic estimates are flawed, but they serve their purposes well enough. With something where we have no way of knowing the probability of an event because we have never been able to measure their accuracy, the probability is unknowable and the argument fails to establish anything. We have no way to assign the probability that someone has knowledge of a God without assuming that they do - which we can't do since God's existence (or the probability of his existence) is the very thing we are trying to establish - we have no history or prior data to establish probability with. How often have people been correct in the past about existential questions of deities? We have no idea - in fact, I'd say the answer is closer to never, since people have very often been wrong about deities than they have been right.

[Beanybag]

Further, the notion itself seems kind of self-refuting.

1) Most people believe in God
2) Therefore God (probably) exists.. but
3) For every concept of God, most people believe it to be false
4) therefore every concept of God is (probably) false. OR
5) People tend to be wrong/unreliable with respect to theistic claims therefore
6) (Most) people are (probably) wrong about the existence of God

I just really think that this argument will fail to establish any meaning.

And I see no valid way of establishing which majority is to be considered, how to rule out options, or how they establish probability with respect to these claims without an induction fallacy. Just because people tend to defer to majority judgment only says that people tend to conform - even if this is mostly adhering to truth claims, I see no reason that this is necessarily related to a truth claim or how it can establish the probability of a truth claim, it sounds like a naturalistic fallacy.

[narnia4]

I should add that the idea that we cannot know that god exists or cannot know the probability that a god exists is your presupposition or conclusion, not part of the scenario I laid out. Some believe(d) that it is impossible for there not to be a god... maybe they know something we don't know. But their testimony is a kind (prima facie, defeasible, weak, whatever term you want to use) of evidence, at least that's my opinion. Now I personally would never use the argument because I think you could easily start talking about evolution or cognitive sciences or arguments against theism in order to defeat the CCA, I am only arguing that it constitutes evidence in some form.

[Beanybag]

I should add that the idea that we cannot know that god exists or cannot know the probability that a god exists is your presupposition or conclusion, not part of the scenario I laid out. Some believe(d) that it is impossible for there not to be a god... maybe they know something we don't know. But their testimony is a kind (prima facie, defeasible, weak, whatever term you want to use) of evidence, at least that's my opinion. Now I personally would never use the argument because I think you could easily start talking about evolution or cognitive sciences or arguments against theism in order to defeat the CCA, I am only arguing that it constitutes evidence in some form.

If it's an argument for the probability or existence of God, those arguments can't be used because God's existence would already be presupposed. Else, why not just use the actual proof for God? This is why I work from the position of unknown - If there is only one God and no history of other gods, we have no basis by which to establish probability. By itself, this argument can't establish anything. If we're trying to say that maybe people do have a proof for God as evidenced by the amount that believe it.. I'm still not sure that can be classified as evidence, even weak evidence. It seems impossible to establish the truth of that value as is. And, as I said, it seems like it can be used against theism in many different ways, or at least particular versions of theism. It was definitely worth discussing, but I don't think it's worth using, even to establish theistic belief as evidence.