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Abstract |
My paper addresses what a religion is. I comment briefly on the "substantive versus functionalist" debate, and I provide reasons to reject both of them. While I offer short summary arguments against the functionalist approach, I develop two detailed arguments against the substantive one. The former moves from the evidence that religious beliefs change over time. The latter moves from internal disagreements about the meaning of the core beliefs of a faith. These two arguments show that it is impossible to reduce the belief system of any historical faith to a set of propositions which all the adherents to a tradition assent to. Although my arguments are conceptual, I include also empirical materials in support of my view.
I then conclude by presenting a pluralist account of religions from an internalist standpoint.
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Keywords | Substantive definitions of religion Functionalist definitions of religion Peter van Inwagen Religious Pluralism |
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References found in this work BETA
La religione dei valori diffusi [The religion of diffused values].Roberto Cipriani - 2009 - la Società Degli Individui 34:40-54.
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2016-08-24
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2016-08-24
Total views
144 ( #66,245 of 2,404,065 )
Recent downloads (6 months)
18 ( #41,810 of 2,404,065 )
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