The Argument from reasonable Non-Belief (ANB)

Preliminaries and OutlineThank you to unitedandy for providing a rigorous and well-presented case. I look forward to a stimulating exchange! I'd like to lay all my cards out on the table so that it can be clear what angle I am attacking this argument from. I am a Christian inclusivist. [1] My rebuttal will largely focus on the nature of belief, and how when scrutinized, the ambiguities and implicit assumptions involved in Pro's use of the concept of belief undercuts his argument from reasonable non-belief. Thus, my objections will be launched squarely from the realm of epistemology. I have thought of much these epistemological objections to this kind of argument before, and luckily for me, I have found some philosophers (Trent Dougherty and Ted Poston) who agree with me. :) As their thoughts and arguments are much more clear than mine I will be using their papers as guidelines. [2] The objections focus on the kind of belief (or even lack of belief) needed for a personal relationship with God; if I can undermine Pro's seemingly implicit assumptions and bring out the clearly the kinds of belief that could be sufficient for a relationship with God pro's argument is undercut. Degrees of beliefThe first obvious thing to point about belief is that most of it comes in degrees. There are categorical beliefs to be sure, but, for the most part, most of are beliefs are probalisitic in the sense that you assign different probabilities/levels of credence to how sure you are that belief p is the case. For example, I believe much more strongly that I exist than that the sun is roughly 93 million miles away. On a scale of 0 - 1 (where 1 is absolute certainty) my belief in the former is at a 1 where my belief in the latter is at .8. Pro's argument seems to rely on the implicit assumption that if God existed he would bring about a state of affairs where a those who are sincerely open-mind and reasonable will find the evidence sufficient for them to believe in God. In other words, that those people would have a reasonably or decently high degree of belief - say, .8 or over. What reason is there accept that this is the case? None that I can see as a person can be in a person relationship even if they have low degree of belief - say .5). A quick example [3] is where a prisoner is stuck in solitary confinement and they hear faint tapping through the walls. It kind of sounds to the prisoner like another person might be doing that but he's not sure and he might as well just be hearing dripping water or rats or it just might as well be all in his head. Nonetheless, he taps back in hopes that it's another person. The other person in the other solitary confinement cell is in much the same situation. She's not sure whether the taps she hears are coming from a person or not but she taps back in any case. Neither of them have a high degree of belief that the other even exists yet they can be said to be in some sort of personal relationship. De dicto/De re beliefAnother important point I want to make is the distinction between de re and de dicto belief. [4] De dicto literally means "of the word" and a de dicto belief will be will have a "that-clause" in it. De re literally means "of the thing" and a de re belief is one where the believer believes that something has a particular property. An example illustrates the distinction clearly:For instance, suppose that Mary Jane has the de dicto belief that Spiderman has the Spidey-sense. Mary Jane does not know that Spiderman is the same person as Peter Parker but she also has the de re belief that Spiderman has the Spidey-sense. She does not realize she has this belief but she does as she believes that Spiderman ("the thing") has the property of "possessing the Spidey-sense". If Peter Parker and Spiderman are the same person then it follows that he also has that particular property.The relevance this has to rebutting the ANB argument can't be understated. The ANB seems to assume that a de dicto belief is required as unitedandy indicates in the first round: "To develop a meaningful and loving relationship with Him, we have to believe that he exists in the first place. Now, anyone who has had a personal relationship before knows that a necessary condition for the relationship described above is at the very least believing that they exist." What reason is there to accept the claim that there must exist de dicto belief to form a personal relationship? None that I can see in this case either.So we have seen that neither a high degree of belief nor de dicto belief are required for a personal relationship and Dougherty and Poston have an example to make it the cases more clear: "Again in a moment of need some extra money shows up in your account. You do not know if this is a mistake or if someone has given you this money. For whatever reason, it just doesn’t occur to you to ask the bank to figure it out. You suspect, though, that someone has in fact transferred this money to you and you think to yourself, 'Thank you, whoever you are.' Now in this case you have neither de dicto belief nor a very high degree of belief, but—especially if the other person can read your mind—it is fair to say that the two of you have a meaningful relationship." [5]Putting these two epistemological objections together seems to me to seriously hamper the ANB as it seems to rely on false assumptions. If we can see that a personal relationship can be had without either a high degree of confidence in a belief and without de dicto belief in cases of normal human relationships it's hard to see how either of those kinds of beliefs are necessary in the case of a personal relationship between God and humans. Indeed, if we accept that God has the essential property of goodness, that is, he is The Good - to put it in Platonic terms - it may be that people who believe in The Good and do the right things have a de re belief in God but do not have an explicit de dicto belief in God.And, for the record, I do believe that this coincides nicely with biblical teachings. I think a strong case can be made, from the bible, that explicit, de dicto belief is a sufficient but not necessary condition for a personal relationship with God. [6] One verse I like to point to is this one that I think coincides with my philosophical case nicely:Acts 17:23-28"17:23 For as I went around and observed closely your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: ‘To an unknown god.’ Therefore what you worship without knowing it, this I proclaim to you. 24 The God who made the world and everything in it, who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by human hands, 25 nor is he served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives life and breath and everything to everyone. 26 From one man he made every nation of the human race to inhabit the entire earth, determining their set times and the fixed limits of the places where they would live, 27 so that they would search for God and perhaps grope around for him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us. 28 For in him we live and move about and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we too are his offspring.’ "Hell and HeavenI don't accept the traditional concept of Hell and I think a good case can be made for annihilationism based on both biblical and philosophical reasons. [7] However, I don't see how Pro's hell or heaven objections have much force if he cannot diffuse my epistemological objections.Sources[1] http://www.theopedia.com...[2] http://www.thedivineconspiracy.org...[3] Ibid.[4] http://en.wikipedia.org...[5] http://www.thedivineconspiracy.org...[6] http://www.ukapologetics.net...[7] http://www.beretta-online.com...