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<span class="timestamp published" title="2011-06-16T21:07:56+00:00">June 16, 2011, <span>9:07 pm</span></span>
<h3 class="entry-title">Epistemology and the End of the World</h3>
<address class="byline author vcard">By <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/author/gary-gutting/" class="url fn" title="See all posts by GARY GUTTING">GARY GUTTING</a></address>
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<p class="summary"><a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/category/the-stone/">The Stone</a> is a forum for contemporary philosophers on issues both timely and timeless. </p>
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<h4>Tags:</h4>
<p class="meta tags"><a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/belief/" rel="tag">belief</a>, <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/epistemology/" rel="tag">epistemology</a>, <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/philosophers-on-the-news/" rel="tag">Philosophers on the News</a>, <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/philosophy/" rel="tag">Philosophy</a>, <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/religion/" rel="tag">religion</a>, <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/the-rapture/" rel="tag">the Rapture</a> </p>
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<em>In the coming weeks, The Stone will feature occasional posts by Gary
Gutting, a professor of philosophy at the University of Notre Dame,
that apply critical thinking to information and events that have
appeared in the news.<br>
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<p>Apart from its entertainment value, Harold Camping’s ill-advised
prediction of the rapture last month attracted me as a philosopher for
its epistemological interest. Epistemology is the study of knowledge,
its nature, scope and limits. Camping claimed to know, with certainty
and precision, that on May 21, 2011, a series of huge earthquakes would
devastate the Earth and be followed by the taking up (rapture) of the
saved into heaven. No sensible person could have thought that he knew
this. Knowledge requires justification; that is, some rationally
persuasive account of why we know what we claim to know. Camping’s
confused efforts at Biblical interpretation provided no justification
for his prediction. Even if, by some astonishing fluke, he had turned
out to be right, he still would not have <em>known</em> the rapture was coming.</p>
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<blockquote>The recent failed prediction of the rapture has done nothing to shake the certainty of believers.</blockquote>
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<p>Of particular epistemological interest was the rush of Christians who
believe that the rapture will occur but specify no date for it to
dissociate themselves from Camping. Quoting Jesus’s saying that “of
that day and hour no one knows,” they rightly saw their view as
unrefuted by Camping’s failed prediction. What they did not notice is
that the reasons for rejecting Camping’s prediction also call into
question their claim that the rapture will occur at some unspecified
future time.</p>
<p>What was most disturbing about Camping was his claim to be <em>certain</em> that the rapture would occur on May 21. Perhaps he had a subjective <em>feeling of certainty</em>
about his prediction, but he had no good reasons to think that this
feeling was reliable. Similarly, you may feel certain that you will get
the job, but this does not make it (objectively) certain that you
will. For that you need reasons that justify your feeling.</p>
<p>There are many Christians who are as subjectively certain as Camping
about the rapture, except that they do not specify a date. They have a
feeling of total confidence that the rapture will someday occur. But
do they, unlike Camping, have good reasons behind their feeling of
certainty? Does the fact that they leave the date of the rapture
unspecified somehow give them the good reason for their certainty that
Camping lacked?</p>
<p>An entirely unspecified date has the advantage of making their
prediction immune to refutation. The fact that the rapture hasn’t
occurred will never prove that it won’t occur in the future. A sense
that they will never be refuted may well increase the subjective
certainty of those who believe in the rapture, but this does nothing to
provide the good reasons needed for objective certainty. Camping, after
the fact, himself moved toward making his prediction unrefutable, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/24/us/24raptureweb.html">saying that May 21 had been an “invisible judgment day,”</a>
a spiritual rather than a physical rapture. He kept to his prediction
of a final, physical end of the world on October 21, 2011, but no doubt
this prediction will also be open to reinterpretation. </p>
<p>Believers in the rapture will likely respond that talk of good
reasons and objective certainty assumes a context of empirical
(scientific) truth, and ignores the fact that their beliefs are based
not on science but on faith. They are certain in their belief that the
rapture will occur, even though they don’t know it in the scientific
sense.</p>
<p>But Camping too would claim that his certainty that the rapture would
occur on May 21, 2011, was a matter of faith. He had no scientific
justification for his prediction, so what could have grounded his
certainty if not his faith? But the certainty of <em>his</em> faith, we all agree, was merely subjective. Objective certainty about a future event requires good reasons.</p>
<p>Given their faith in the Bible, believers in the rapture do offer
what they see as good reasons for their view as opposed to Camping’s.
They argue that the Bible clearly predicts a temporally unspecified
rapture, whereas Camping’s specific date requires highly questionable
numerological reasoning. But many Christians—including many of the best
Biblical scholars—do not believe that the Bible predicts a historical
rapture. Even those who accept the traditional doctrine of a Second
Coming of Christ, preceding the end of the world, often reject the idea
of a taking up of the saved into heaven, followed by a period of
dreadful tribulations on Earth for those who are left behind. Among
believers themselves, a historical rapture is at best <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/patheos-on-faith/post/harold-camping-mainstream-christians-and-the-rapture/2011/05/25/AGIKKQBH_blog.html">a highly controversial interpretation</a>, not an objectively established certainty.</p>
<p>The case against Camping was this: His subjective certainty about the
rapture required objectively good reasons to expect its occurrence; he
provided no such reasons, so his claim was not worthy of belief.
Christians who believe in a temporally unspecified rapture agree with
this argument. But the same argument undermines their own belief in the
rapture. It’s not just that “no one knows the day and hour” of the
rapture. No one knows that it is going to happen at all.</p>
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</div><br>-- <br>Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)<br><a href="mailto:art.deco.studios@gmail.com">art.deco.studios@gmail.com</a><br>