A. Arif Adalar

If you encounter a disagreement, what makes you think you are the right party? You may think you know better. What if your opponent is someone you considered epistemically equal to yourself? Someone who is your peer. Peer disagreement, as a relatively recent topic in epistemology, has attracted increasing attention. Thus, there are some gaps in the field. In this research, I aim to address one aspect of it, which is the individuality of epistemic responsibility. In the first part, key concepts of the discussion and various attitudes derived from the systematization of these concepts, such as peerness standards, rationality, permissiveness, uniqueness thesis, and principle of independence will be examined and then the new position will be introduced. A number of positions have been developed through different systematizations of these concepts. In the second part of the article, those different approaches; steadfast view, conciliatory view, justificationist view, equal weight view and total evidence view of peer disagreement with pros and cons in solution and explanatory power will be explained. After setting the tone of the discussion, the justification of why personal responsibility matters and what is special to it will be discussed. Briefly, the responsibility view provides a steadfast position while not rejecting the principle of independence and uniqueness thesis and, by not breaking the ideal peer disagreement. Finally, the application of this position will be demonstrated on religious and non-religious beliefs, and it will be shown that even in an ideal peer disagreement on religious beliefs, individuals can keep their position.

Peer disagreement, as a subdiscipline of epistemology, is started to get attention especially in the last few years. When it occurs in between epistemically uneven persons, disagreement is not surprising, since agreement is not expected anyway. However, disagreement between peers has a surprising impact, since sometimes we find it hard to accept that some people think different than us. We may even suspect ourselves. Like this, the main problem of the peer disagreement is to figure out how should one respond to disagreement if peerness is on the table, inquiring which position is justified. In this thesis, where different approaches and their consequences are evaluated, it has been discussed that whether a peer disagreement is possible or not about belief in God. If it is possible, then what would be the solution? My point is, although there are many difficulties, peer disagreement on belief in God is possible. However, on the contrary of conciliatory view defenders, who are defending we are supposed revise or suspend our belief in the face of peer disagreement, I claim that by depending on individuality of personal responsibility keeping belief in God is justified. While doing this, like many other philosophical texts I have not used any quantitive method. All examples are solely thought experiments. In the thesis, concepts and claims have been evaluated through philosophical analysis and offered new solutions.

The problem of divine hiddenness discussed among both theist and non- theist circles. From an atheistic perspective the existence of people who are sincerely looking for God but cannot reach Him is a supportive point for atheism. On the other side, same problem supports agnosticism since there are equal evidence from both side for the existence of God from an agnostic perspective. The theists who are belonging to different religion have tried to find some solutions to this problem. For instance; there is a theistic understanding which claims hiddenness of God provides us freedom to believe and another one says it is the only way to have personal relationship with God. A different position brings solution from the Jewish idea that chosen people of God. In this article, I have evaluated those different approaches. In the first section, I have indicated that there is no agreement on the implication of divine hiddenness problem even amongst non-theistic positions by shortly introducing atheistic and agnostic approaches. In the second section, I dealt with theistic approaches and the problems that they produced while trying to provide a solution to the problem. After an inquiry on how we are supposed to understand hiddenness, I have tried to show the problem has nothing new since premises of the divine hiddenness problem are not verifiable by everyone. As a conclusion I have offered postponing the divine hiddenness problem and discussing existence of God on a rational ground by presenting a counterargument.