Basics of Epistemology

In order to come to any conclusion about whether God exists, we have to examine how we might know that He (she or it) exists. Are we certain of God's existence? Or is there just a probability? How can our finite minds apprehend the concept of the infinite? How do we justify our claims to know anything?

These are the problems of epistemology. The defining questions of epistemology include the following:

1. What is the nature of propositional knowledge, knowledge that a particular proposition about the world is true? Knowing a particular proposition requires both that we believe it and that it be true, but it also clearly requires something more, something that distinguishes knowledge from a lucky guess. Let's call this additional element ‘warrant’. A good deal of philosophical work has been invested in trying to determine the nature of this additional element.
2. How can we gain knowledge? We can form true beliefs just by making some lucky guesses. How we can gain warranted beliefs is unclear. Moreover, to know the world, we must think about it, and it is not clear how we gain the concepts we use in thought or what assurance, if any, we have that the ways in which we divide up the world using our concepts correspond to divisions that actually exist.
3. What are the limits of our knowledge? Some aspects of the world may be within the limits of our thought but beyond the limits of our knowledge; faced with competing descriptions of them, we cannot know which description is true. Some aspects of the world may even be beyond the limits of our thought, so that we cannot form intelligible descriptions of them, let alone know that a particular description is true.

The third item, I imagine, will be particularly important while discussing the reality of God.

Out of these questions, five major camps have evolved: Subjectivism, Rationalism, Empiricism, Pragmatism, Faith.

Subjectivism says that there is only one thing anyone can know exists: our mind (rather, and more to the point, my mind, because I have no real basis for knowing you exist). Sometimes called epistemological idealism, this position holds that we can only understand the world through our own unique perspective and that other perspectives may or may not actually exist. Knowledge, therefore, deeply personal and entirely a matter of opinion.

Rationalism is theory that we acquire knowledge through thinking, using our minds. Rationalism relies on necessary, self-evident and universal truths, as well as syllogism (analytic truth and deductive reasoning). In other words, the real world is only knowable because it has a logical structure that can be analyzed and grasped through reason.

Usually opposing Rationalism is Empiricism, the view that we acquire knowledge by testing things out and using our sensory experience. It relies on synthetic truth, direct observation, induction (indirect empirical knowledge, generalization). A theories about the world must be tested against observations of the natural world, as per the scientific method.

Pragmatism is the view that knowledge is not, strictly speaking, out there waiting to be discovered. Rather, it is mutable and must be considered in relation to the consequences of its acceptance or rejection. There must be some conceptual agreement, practically speaking, about a given term. Essentially, if the theory, belief, or "fact" works, then it is true.

Finally, there is Faith (sometimes called Authority or Fideism). Epistemological faith is the belief that we quire knowledge through inspiration and revelation. There are some things we simply cannot know through our own personal perspectives, reason, experimentation or conventions. Reason is fallible and our sense can deceive. So, we must make leaps of faith toward any kind of knowledge. At the very least, we must suspend our skepticism and accept knowledge even though we cannot achieve certainty. Justification may be necessary for knowledge of this sort, but it is entirely insufficient to determine if something is actually true.

In the end, epistemology is as much about levels of certainty as it is about the way we know. Usually this is arranged from most certain or apodictic, to psychological certainty (does it feel certain?), to conventional ("all bachelors are unmarried men"), to pragmatic (is is helpful to be certain?), finally down to probabilities. For example, people can point to mathematical truths that can, supposedly, be proved indubitably. But is "1 + 1 = 2" a mere stipulative tautology? Is there any probability that this kind of knowledge is simply an useful convention? So, the quest becomes one of using whichever theory and then attempting to justify or examine our certainty.

To prove that God exists--to be certain in the way that many Christians appear to be--seems like a very difficult thing to do. But, throughout the history of the Church, subjectivists, empiricists, rationalists, pragmatists and fideists have, with various degrees of certainty, all taken their turns. Each one has used the tools of epistemology to make their case for (or against) the existence of God.