Yuval Avnur

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) made important contributions to mathematics, the theory of probability, and several scientific fields, was one of the inventors of the first mathematical calculator, and was also a deeply religious thinker who grappled with issues concerning the existence of God, the possibility of human salvation, and the sinfulness of human life. His famous Wager is often discussed, but there is much else of interest and relevance in his thought which remains undiscovered. This book provides an accessible yet detailed account of Pascal's philosophy and how it applies to important issues facing all of us today, as well as novel interpretations of Pascal's ideas. It will stimulate and challenge anyone who is interested in the role of the heart in rationality, human nature, our relation to reality and our individual and collective purpose, and the underexplored thoughts of one of history's greatest geniuses.

This chapter argues that omniscience is impossible and therefore that there is no God. The argument turns on the notion of grounding. The chapter begins by illustrating and clarifying that notion. It then lays out five claims, one of which is the claim that there is an omniscient being, and the other four of which are claims about grounding. It shows that these five claims are jointly inconsistent. It then argues for the truth of each of them, except the claim that there is an omniscient being. From these arguments it follows that there are no omniscient beings and thus that there is no God.

This chapter discusses the idea that, even if there is no evidence or argument in favour of belief in the external world or religious belief, there is a _pragmatic_ justification for believing in the external world but not for religious belief. It turns out that, ultimately, this pragmatic approach is not satisfying. However, as Austin (1956) famously noted, justifications have had more than their fair share in philosophy. Accordingly, alternative strategies are considered that appeal to a defence — which need not necessarily involve a justification — of our belief in the external world. This chapter considers a defence that appeals to an _exemption_. The various versions of this strategy, including Strawson's attempt on behalf of Hume and Wittgenstein, are not entirely satisfying. It then considers _excuses_ that are not pleas for exemption. It offers a Hume-inspired, ‘natural’ excuse for our belief in the external world. This excuse constitutes a much better defence of our belief in the external world than any similar excuse for religious belief, so the secular criticism of religious belief is cleared of inconsistency. This solution is independent of any appeal to epistemic justification.

Many people form beliefs about matters of social and political importance online, in what have been described as “echo chambers.” These include social media news feeds and news sites tailored to the consumer’s political perspective. Some philosophers have suggested that there is nothing especially worrying about this from an epistemological view, while others have taken it to be a serious problem in need of diagnosis and remedy. This chapter applies some ideas of the 17th-century philosopher Blaise Pascal to the dispute about echo chambers. Pascal emphasized the role of affect, or what he called “the heart,” in determining belief. The ways in which the heart can affect belief are characterized as motivated reasoning and motivated seeing—the influence of affective states on the processing of evidence and the appearance of evidence, respectively. These influences and their manifestation in online echo chambers are discussed, and the consequences for one’s rationality assessed. A Pascalian perspective that emphasizes the heart, rather than focusing exclusively on reasoning, has great potential to explain and diagnose the problem with online echo chambers, and thereby shed light on a major issue in applied epistemology.

_An interdisciplinary exploration of Pascal's philosophy across theology, science, and political thought_ Blaise Pascal has emerged as a central figure in early modern thought whose legacy transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries. _A Companion to Pascal_ addresses the growing scholarly need for an integrated perspective on his philosophy, bringing together essays by leading scholars that contextualize, analyze, and extend Pascal's work. It offers a wide-ranging and in-depth examination of Pascal's multifaceted intellectual contributions that enables readers to progressively build and apply knowledge across the disciplines Pascal influenced, ranging from theology and mathematics to epistemology and political philosophy. The Companion opens by situating Pascal within his intellectual milieu—his interactions with Augustinian theology, his responses to Montaigne and Descartes, and his involvement with the Port-Royal community. Parts II and III move into Pascal's technical contributions, including his foundational role in probability and physics and his unique epistemological stance. Subsequent sections examine Pascal's rhetorical strategies and religious commitments alongside his political and ethical views. The final part assesses Pascal's enduring influence, tracing his impact through figures such as Søren Kierkegaard, William James, and Pierre Duhem. A vital resource for those seeking an understanding of Pascal's philosophical outlook and enduring legacy, _A Companion to Pascal:_ Presents a unique interdisciplinary approach to Pascal that spans philosophy, theology, science, literature, and political thought Offers new perspectives on Pascal's engagement with Descartes, Montaigne, and Augustine Explores lesser-known dimensions of Pascal's work, such as his influence on phenomenology and Marxist theory Analyzes the philosophical implications of Pascal's scientific and mathematical innovations Includes focused chapters on Pascal's Wager, logic, epistemology, and his views on grace and predestination With a comprehensive structure that allows both thematic and chronological exploration of Pascal's thought, _A Companion to Pascal_ is ideal for advanced students and scholars in philosophy, theology, history of science, and French literature. It is particularly valuable for university-level courses in Early Modern Philosophy, Philosophy of Religion, and Intellectual History, and serves as an essential reference for academics, educators, and interdisciplinary researchers.

Evidential Preemption occurs when a speaker asserts something of the form “Others will tell you Q, but I say P,” where P and Q are incompatible in some salient way. Typically, the aim of this maneuver is to get the audience to accept P despite contrary testimony of others, who might otherwise be trusted on the matter. Phenomena such as echo chambers, conspiracy theories, and other political speech of interest to epistemologists today, all commonly involve evidential preemption, so the question arises: What effect, if any, does evidential preemption have on the audience's epistemic situation? In a widely discussed paper, Begby (Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 2021, 102, 515) argues that evidential preemption can change the audience's epistemic situation in such a way that future testimony that Q, which would otherwise have been persuasive, can be rationally discounted to a significant degree. If so, evidential preemption is not a mere rhetorical flourish, but rather results in a rationally insulated belief that P. Since evidential preemption is a common feature of echo chambers and conspiracy theories, this would be a disturbing result. We bring good news: it is not so, at least not in the way Begby suggests. If evidential preemptions can change one's epistemic situation in a worrying way, it is a mystery how.

According to veridicalism, your beliefs about the existence of ordinary objects are typically true, and can constitute knowledge, even if you are in some global sceptical scenario. Even if you are a victim of Descartes’ demon, you can still know that there are tables, for example. Accordingly, even if you don’t know whether you are in some such scenario, you still know that there are tables. This refutes the standard sceptical argument. But does it solve the sceptical problem posed by that argument? I argue that it does not, because we do not know substantively more about the external world according to veridicalism than we do according to the sceptical argument. Rather, veridicalism merely reformulates what little knowledge we have. I then draw some general conclusions about the nature of the sceptical problem, the formulation of the standard argument, and the significance of this for some other, non-veridicalist strategies.

I address a puzzle in Pascal's Pensées. While Pascal emphasized that God is hidden, he also seemed to think that signs of God are everywhere in nature. How does he reconcile these two claims? I offer a novel solution which emphasizes the role of love and what I call “second-personal” significance, and which results in a distinctively Pascalian account of religious experience of nature. By distinguishing implication from various senses of ‘proof’, I explain why, though deeply significant, such experiences cannot play the role of proving God's existence, and how they are compatible with God's hiddenness. Neither theism nor atheism is assumed by this account.

In this essay I defend a solution to a skeptical paradox. The paradox I focus on concerns epistemic justification (rather than knowledge), and skeptical scenarios that entail that most of our ordinary beliefs about the external world are false. This familiar skeptical paradox hinges on a “closure” principle. The solution is to restrict closure, despite its first appearing as a fully general principle, so that it can no longer give rise to the paradox. This has some extra advantages. First, it suggests a general strategy that provides solutions to other versions of the paradox, not just those that depend on closure. Second, it clarifies the relation between the paradox and other kinds of skeptical problem.

The problem of skepticism is often understood as a paradox: a valid argument with plausible premises whose conclusion is that we lack justification for perceptual beliefs. Typically, this conclusion is deemed unacceptable, so a theory is offered that posits conditions for justification on which some premise is false. The theory defended here is more general, and explains why the paradox arises in the first place. Like Strawson’s (Introduction to logical theory, Wiley, New York, 1952) “ordinary language” approach to induction, the theory posits something built into the very notion of justification: it is loaded with a bias towards the proposition that we are not massively deceived. Beyond the paradox, remaining skeptical problems consist of metaphysical and practical questions: whether we are massively deceived, or why we should use our loaded notion rather than some other. Such challenges have profound epistemological significance, but they are not problems that an a priori theory of justification can solve.

In this ‘age of information’, some worry that we get our news from online ‘echo chambers’, news feeds on our social media accounts that contain information from like‐minded sources. Filtering our information in this way seems prima facie problematic from an epistemic perspective. I vindicate this intuition by offering an explanation of what is wrong with online echo chambers that appeals to a particular kind of motivated reasoning, or bias due to one’s interests. This sort of bias affects, not which evidence one is exposed to, but how one makes use of the evidence that one has, on the basis of one’s interests. I argue that consulting an online echo chamber often facilitates and amplifies this bias. I then draw some general conclusions about the potential downside of having ready access to so much information.

ABSTRACT Atheists and agnostics have a vexed relationship. Atheists often regard agnostics as timid, or perhaps as disguised apologists. Agnostics often regard atheists as dogmatic hypocrites: they proclaim something on insufficient evidence, while accusing theists of this. This dynamic is familiar from the academic and popular literature. Here, I consider a more radical conflict between the two, based on Kripkean semantics for empty terms applied to atheism. Sorensen : 373–388) christened the Kripke-inspired formulation of atheism ‘Unicorn Atheism’ and argued from there to the incoherence of agnosticism. But, I argue, the objection fails and instead presents an opportunity to reformulate agnosticism. By appreciating the relevance of Kripkean semantics to the issue, a better understanding of the two positions, and their conflict, emerges.

Is there something wrong with the way we form beliefs about our surroundings? Most people assume not. But there is a character, the skeptic, who disagrees. What, exactly, is this skeptic claiming, and why should this concern us? We are, after all, just humans doing what humans do: forming beliefs on the basis of our faculties. In what sense could this be wrong, and how could it matter if it is? By considering the way in which the notions of vice and criticism can express these questions, we can clarify them and discern some potential answers. These answers, I will suggest, can explain not only why we shouldn’t worry too much, but also the lasting appeal of skeptical problems. The idea is that we can accept, or grant for the sake of argument, that we fall short of some important standard while insisting that it is entirely unreasonable to criticize people, or ourselves, on that basis.

_ Source: _Volume 7, Issue 4, pp 246 - 257 The two main components of Coliva’s view are Moderatism and Extended Rationality. According to Moderatism, a belief about specific material objects is perceptually justified iff, absent defeaters, one has the appropriate course of experience and it is assumed that there is an external world. I grant Moderatism and instead focus on Extended Rationality, according to which it is epistemically rational to believe evidentially warranted propositions and to accept those unwarrantable assumptions that make the acquisition of perceptual warrants possible and are therefore constitutive of ordinary evidential warrants. I suggest that, even though Extended Rationality might be true, it cannot do the work that Coliva wants it to do. Although my objections do not show that it is false, they can serve to clarify what sorts of problem a theory of justification or rationality could possibly address. This provides an alternative to Coliva’s view of the skeptical problem and the question, on what does rationality hinge?

A well known skeptical paradox rests on the claim that we lack warrant to believe that we are not brains in a vat. The argument for that claim is the apparent impossibility of any evidence or argument that we are not BIVs. Many contemporary philosophers resist this argument by insisting that we have a sort of warrant for believing that we are not BIVs that does not require having any evidence or argument. I call this view ‘New Rationalism’. I argue that New Rationalists are committed to there being some evidence or argument for believing that we are not BIVs anyway. Therefore, New Rationalism, since its appeal is that it purportedly avoids the problematic commitment to such evidence or argument, undermines its own appeal. We cannot avoid the difficult work of coming up with evidence or argument by positing some permissive sort of warrant.

The scandal to philosophy and human reason, wrote Kant, is that we must take the existence of material objects on mere faith. In contrast, the skeptical paradox that has scandalized recent philosophy is not formulated in terms of faith, but rather in terms of justification, warrant, and entitlement. I argue that most contemporary approaches to the paradox (both dogmatist/liberal and default/conservative) do not address the traditional problem that scandalized Kant, and that the status of having a warrant (or justification) that is derived from entitlement is irrelevant to whether we take our beliefs on mere faith. For, one can have the sort of warrant that most contemporary anti-skeptics posit while still taking one’s belief on mere faith. An alternative approach to the traditional problem is sketched, one that still makes use of contemporary insights about “entitlement.”.

Most solutions to the skeptical paradox about justified belief assume closure for justification, since the rejection of closure is widely regarded as a non-starter. I argue that the rejection of closure is not a non-starter, and that its problems are no greater than the problems associated with the more standard anti-skeptical strategies. I do this by sketching a simple version of the unpopular strategy and rebutting the three best objections to it. The general upshot for theories of justification is that it is not a constraint on such theories that we must somehow have justification to believe that we are not massively deceived.