Only God Knows Best

Aspirational Theism and Epistemic Value

Abstract

This paper develops an epistemic argument for aspirational theism, the view that for agents who regard theism as a live epistemic possibility, there exist defeasible reasons to rationally hope that God exists. The argument begins from the fact that finite epistemic agents must economize their cognitive resources, and thus should seek sources of substantive, rather than trivial, epistemic goods. If God exists, He would be uniquely well-positioned—given His omniscience and moral perfection—to deliver epistemic goods that are personally fitting and epistemically valuable. The paper distinguishes aspirational theism from pro- and anti-theism and aspirational atheism, situating the favored view within broader debates concerning rational hope, epistemic value, and the ethics of belief. And it engages with several objections from divine hiddenness, privacy, and pessimistic meta-induction, concluding that even under skeptical theist constraints, theistic hope remains epistemically appropriate for many.