Responsible Belief

Responsible Belief tackles the problem of fixing the tenacity of believers in forming, holding, and modifying beliefs. In conversation with the history of philosophy and religion, the author attempts to expose and refute some aspects of the dominant epistemological framework for engaging belief fixation and improvement. In contrast to this framework, Dr. Frazier provides a model of a responsible believing agent rooted in an ethic of the intellectual virtue tradition. In dialogue with Aristotle, he proposes three principal virtues, which he calls the generative, the transmissive, and the metamorphic. The author's alternative framework includes an examination of the role that intellectual passions play in the melioration of belief. Responsible Belief considers whether Doestoevsky's claim that ""Beauty will save the world"" has a place in discussions of belief formation and revision and offers an account of its vitality in addressing the concerns raised in the book.

""When is belief responsible and when is it not? Complexities abound in this area of inquiry, but Frazier contends that an answer must attend to the history and the psychology of a belief. In addition, intellectual virtues must be front and center, according to his story. Ideas from Aristotle, Philo, Augustine, and Peirce loom large, as theology joins philosophy in the quest for explanation. Readers will find here an abundance of relevant ideas as they seek a responsible portrait of responsible belief.
--Paul K. Moser, Professor of Philosophy, Loyola University Chicago

""This scholarly work reflects the seasoning of a life formed in and devoted to the very things it commends. Arguing that modern epistemology, with its narrow focus on justification, is ill-equipped to mature people in responsible believing, Frazier taps the ancient greats to propose a wider account: Humans' natural inclination to truth, hampered by our prideful self-deception, may be wooed by the world's intimations of beauty, and restored through intellectual love and humility, and a spirituality of inquiry.""
--Esther Lightcap Meek, Professor of Philosophy, Geneva College; author of Loving to Know: Introducing Covenant Epistemology and other books on knowing



Robert M. Frazier is Professor of Philosophy at Geneva College, Beaver Falls, PA.