Research Paper about Hope and Faith

The diversity of hope is nearly limitless. It can dispose us toward any number of objects, with great variety in the level of emotion and certainty we experience. In working with and against Dr. Adrienne Martin’s account of HOPE and FAITH in How We Hope, I aim to shine a clearer light on what separates and connects the terms. Our accounts differ insofar as I would like to get rid of faith’s reliance on the theoretically unknowable and emphasize faith as hope plus a feeling of certainty, whereby we make claims on the nature of things. But first, a reflection on hope and faith as they are commonly used:

In everyday language, it is uncommon to use the term faith with a clear, non-abstract hoped-for object. This leads me to a question: How does the abstractness of a hoped-for object relate to our assessment of its possession? If I hope to acquire a coffee at the cafeteria, things will be rather clear. Before I acquire or do not acquire it, there will be no illusion that I have it. I may imagine the coffee’s look and taste, but this will not fully satisfy me, and so I will know I do not actually have it. Once acquired or not acquired, I will also be certain of the success or failure of its acquisition. It seems unlikely, then, that such a particular hoped-for object will admit any assessments other than yes, I have it, or no, I do not have it. But what about more abstract hoped-for objects? For instance, I may hope that human nature is entirely good. While hoping, I am uncertain whether human nature is good, though this is due to my ignorance and not the hoped-for object’s actual possession. In this way, it is akin to hoping for something in the past, such as the hope that Hitler suffered before he died. For, it is and has been the case that human nature is either entirely good or is not entirely good according to the law of contradiction, just as it is already determined that Hitler suffered or did not suffer. Yet someone may say that they hoped, and now they know that human nature is entirely good because of the arguments of philosophers like Mencius and Plato. They will believe that they acquired the hoped-for object insofar as it is supported by what appear to be sound arguments. A decade later, however, the same person may find despair when they see a counterargument by Xunzi and ‘know’ that they have not acquired the hoped-for object (that is, they know human nature is not entirely good). Abstract hoped-for objects are a lot harder to assess, then, for we lack clarity as to whether we can ever be certain of their acquisition. But should this stop us from hoping for such objects?

Using the work of Kant, Dr. Adrienne Martin explains that certain abstract hopes (Kant refers to these as “postulates of practical reason”) are unknowable through experience, and therefore unknowable through theoretical reason, so we cannot confirm their truth or falsity, making us “theoretically licensed, and practically justified” to commit to the abstract hopes (103-104). She continues:

“Committing to the practical postulates involves being theoretically agnostic about their truth in one’s pursuit of the Highest Good. One notable difference is that hope also involves seeing the relevant probability as demanding a back-up plan, while committing to the practical postulates requires no such plan.” (105)

Martin, then, is claiming that some ideas cannot be proved or disproved through an ordinary use of reason. We remain undecided in this way, choosing either to not commit or to fully commit to abstract ideas (specifically, practical postulates), leaving no room for flexible probability assessments and backup plans.

But how would my former example fit in? I identified a scenario where a person goes from merely hoping to firmly believing human nature is good according to the arguments of philosophers—because of theoretical reason. Does it matter whether the theoretical reason was truly sound, or only that they have committed to the practical postulate? This person I speak of, in their certainty, would not make backup plans. And, more than being theoretically licensed, they would be theoretically grounded. It also seems unlikely that they would lose practical justification, for belief in a good human nature could easily fit into Kant’s guideline for practical justification, which is that it requires the Highest Good be set as our end (Martin 102). The main difference between my example and the path to practical postulates which Martin suggests relates to one of her key aspects of faith: “meta-confidence” (105).

Martin says, “[F]aith is what you get when you add a certain meta-confidence to either hope or expectation” (105). She then describes meta-confidence as the confidence that theoretical reason will not be responsible for a change in hope (105). The example I provided would not have meta-confidence as Martin intimates because the feeling of certainty stems from theoretical reason, and so, Martin suggests, it would be susceptible to future changes in theoretical reason. While I agree with this susceptibility, I contest Martin’s avoidance of theoretical reason in her account of meta-confidence because I do not believe people are always aware of the fact that they may change their outlook in the future. Descartes, for instance, believed himself to have arrived at an indubitable truth when he argued for God’s existence. It would be difficult to imagine someone moving him away from this view using reason. In many ways, I imagine that he experienced greater, less-susceptible confidence than others who followed Martin’s path to faith in God. An opposing argument to this might be that Descartes only used reason to further support faith along the lines Martin expressed, and not to discover it. It still seems highly likely, however, that, even if it is not true for Descartes, some people are influenced by arguments to the point of feeling absolutely certain. In my mind, an accurate account of faith would capture these instances as well as those posed by Martin.

At the root of the need to include theoretical reason as a path to faith is the fact that we are, in our moments of faith, unaware of the difference between a lack of susceptibility and the feeling of a lack of susceptibility to theoretical reasoning. Because we are entirely capable of believing that our theoretical reasoning is superior to any other potential theoretical reasoning, we can have the same experience as Martin’s meta-confidence. Of course, looking back on our past beliefs, we still see that arguments we were completely convinced of fail to meet our current understanding. But does this mean we were any less certain when we experienced the beliefs originally? Of course not. If we are to take faith as relevant to our lived experience, then we should not differentiate between the complete confidence which results from reason and the meta-confidence identified by Martin. This departure from Martin, however, brings with it a need to readdress the essential questions: What are we to call faith, and how does it relate to hope?