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Section 3:
MW, 11:20 a.m.–12:35 p.m., Jennison 407
Section 7:
MW, 5:00 p.m.–6:15 p.m., Jennison 407
 Philosophy 101
Problems of Philosophy
Bentley College
Fall 2004
 		Instructor: Miles Rind
Office: Morison 114
MW, 10:10–11:10
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Assignment for Wednesday, September 29

Reading:
  1. William James, "The Will to Believe" (PDF file)
  2. Anthony Weston, A Rulebook for Arguments, chs. 2 and 3 (pp. 10–23)
Study questions:
  1. (On section I:) What does James mean by a "hypothesis"? What does he mean by an "option"?
  2. (On section I:) James makes three different distinctions among options: living versus dead, forced versus avoidable, and momentous versus trivial. How would each of those distinctions apply to the following options:
    1. whether to believe that the earth is flat or not to believe it;
    2. whether to believe that the earth is flat or that the earth is not flat (if you don't see any difference between this and (1.), think about it until you do);
    3. whether to believe that it will rain tomorrow or that it will not;
    4. whether to believe that life is worth living or not to believe it.
  3. What does it mean, in James's terms, for an "option" to be "genuine"? What would be an example of a genuine option?
  4. (On section VII:) What, according to James, is our "duty" in matters of opinion (compare with Clifford's "ethics of belief")? What are the two "laws" of that duty, according to him? What difference does it make if we obey only one of the laws rather than the other or both?
  5. (On section VII:) What is James's objection to Clifford's conception of the ethics of belief? Is his criticism just? Does Clifford in fact disregard the imperative to know the truth?
  6. (On section IX): In what ways, according to James, can one's believing or not believing a hypothesis have an effect on whether the hypothesis in question is true?
  7. (On section X): What does James mean by "the religious hypothesis"? Is believing that hypothesis equivalent, in your judgment, to believing in God, or to having religious beliefs? What sort of option, in terms of James's three distinctions, is the choice whether or not to believe the hypothesis in question?
  8. (On section X): How is the argument of this section supposed to justify James's thesis, stated on p. 3 (section IV)?


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