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Beliefs, Attitudes, and Actions1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 March 1966

Peter Radcliff
Peter Radcliff
Affiliation:
San Francisco State College
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Extract

Whether one can decide or choose to believe is a difficult problem, with important consequences for ethics. An appeal to ordinary language is not likely to be decisive. On occasion, “I choose to believe,” “he adopted the belief,” and “do not believe,” find use. Of course, one can decide or choose to pursue belief. Pascal gave a prescription for producing certain religious beliefs. There are other prescriptions for other beliefs. Is there a stronger sense in which I can decide or choose to believe ? I do not use a causal recipe in performing many actions. Is there some way of choosing or deciding to believe that does not involve causal recipes.

Type
Articles
Information
Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review / Revue canadienne de philosophie , Volume 4 , Issue 4 , March 1966 , pp. 456 - 464
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Philosophical Association 1966

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References

2 Throughout the paper I use “strong sense of decide to believe” to mean a way of deciding to believe not involving causal or psychological techniques for producing belief.

3 Ryle, G., Concept of Mind. London: Hutchinson's University Library, 1949, p. 134.Google Scholar

4 Anscombe, G. E. M., Intention. Oxford: Blackwell, 1957, pp. 4–5Google Scholar

5 There are special cases which are exceptions to this: cases in which there s i no warrant for the belief, and it is in an area where there are procedures for determining the support for a belief, but in these cases while there is no evidence for the belief it is possible to give reasons for acting on the belief. The belief itself is not justified but acting on it is. This type of case need not concern us.

6 There are other cases of this sort. I can decide (in a strong sense) to stay awake but I can only decide to sleep in a weak sense of “decide.” I can decide not to be a nominee in a strong sense, decide to be a nominee only in a weak sense.

7 ”A Mistake About Causality in the Social Sciences,” loc. cit., p. 51.

8 Though MacIntyre claims that belief and action can be identical on occasion, he recognizes their distinctness. As he points out, predicates such as “true” and “prompt” apply to one but not to the other. He does not discuss “choose” or “decide.”

9 Feelings are also criticized. Whether this is justifiable is difficult to settle.

10 I have not discussed different types of belief. Perhaps certain kinds of belief are more closely connected with action than others. Is there a closer connection between belief in something and action than between belief that something is the case and action? Perhaps moral beliefs are more closely connected with action than factual beliefs. It is unlikely that anyone would maintain that the relation between belief in something or moral belief and action is stronger than the relation which Maclntyre takes to hold between factual belief and action. Even ifon occasion my moral belief consists in my performing a certain action, such a relation need not yield a strong sense of “deciding to believe”.