Clifford’s Ethics of Belief

1. All beliefs, even seemingly inconsequential ones, have a significant effect on the believer’s decision-making and on their society.

2. If the beliefs are false, this effect is likely to be negative.

3. Basing one’s beliefs on strong evidence gathered through fair, skeptical investigation reduces the likelihood that they will be false.

C: All humans have a moral obligation to strive to only hold beliefs which are based on strong evidence acquired through fair, skeptical inquiry.

This is a fairly strong argument, though it is missing an important premise: namely, that humans have a moral obligation to try to have a positive effect on the world. Clifford does not state this premise or argue for its truthfulness, but without it his argument is invalid. However, this premise is widely assumed to be true, and it could even be argued that not having a negative effect on the world is definitionally moral (though the obligation part is less clearly implied). It is reasonable for Clifford to focus on the other aspects of his argument which are more likely to be controversial, particularly given the difficulty of making sweeping moral arguments. The premises which he does state are all true, and when the unstated one is added the conclusion does necessarily follow.

Practically, Clifford’s thesis calls on us to take responsibility for our own beliefs. They are extremely important to our identity and actions, so every precaution must be taken to ensure that they are true. We may think that we can escape this obligation by relying on wiser authorities for our beliefs, but our conviction that these authorities are in fact wiser and should be trusted is itself a belief which we must come to hold somehow. Under these circumstances, we have no choice but to struggle to uncover the truth ourselves. One of the most consequential opportunities to apply this principle is in voting, and more broadly in choosing one’s political alignment within society. Before using the power vested in us by democracy, we have a responsibility to independently seek out evidence and form our own assessments of the options available. However, it is insufficient to simply do research immediately before participating in an election, because by this point we will already have some political beliefs, even if they are not immediately obvious. We must keep in mind our empirical responsibilities during any engagement with politics, verifying the sources of information we are exposed to and searching our own thought processes for bias. Our beliefs will never be entirely accurate, but making them closer to the truth will allow us to have a more positive effect on the world.

Clifford’s argument seems free of significant fallacies, except arguably of the fallacy of presumption with regard to moral obligation discussed above. However, due to the relatively uncontroversial nature of the premise he presumes, this is an unimportant omission.

(475 words)