Religions, Epistemic Isolation, and Social Trust

What is it about?

Chapter 6: “Religions, Epistemic Isolation, and Social Trust" considers whether Wittgenstein’s philosophy provides resources that may be used to epistemically isolate and protect religious beliefs and practices from public criticism. I argue that a central theme in Wittgenstein’s philosophy – the social nature of linguistic meaning – is incompatible with the idea that religious discourses are conceptually cut off from other discourses. The chapter explores the remarks on the idea of a private language in Philosophical Investigations in order to show how the isolationist reading of Wittgenstein does not fit well with central features of his developed philosophy. Drawing on the work of Stanley Cavell on and Annette Baier, I argue that trust is a requirement for establishing and maintaining the cooperative venture of language.

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