Reasonable Belief: Must We Always Proportion Our Belief to the Evidence?
PC welcomes its own Professor Timothy O. Linehan for a special lecture titled "Reasonable
Belief: Must We Always Proportion Our Belief to the Evidence?" on Friday, October
17, 2025. The event, part of the Cultural and Historical Awareness Program (CHAP),
will be held at the PC Theater at 7:00 PM and is free and open to the public.
Lecture Title: Reasonable Belief: Must We Always Proportion Our Belief to the Evidence?
Speaker: Timothy O. Linehan
Bio: Timothy Linehan is Professor of Philosophy at College of the Sequoias and creator
of the philosophy YouTube channel Let’s Get Logical. Before moving to Visalia in 2017,
he taught at McHenry County College and Westmont College.
Description: Consider the following slogan: Don’t believe anything unless it’s backed by solid
evidence. It sounds like reasonable advice. But is it? This question can be framed
by the classic debate between W.K. Clifford and William James. Clifford defended the
view that we are obligated to proportion our beliefs to the available evidence. James,
by contrast, argued that it can sometimes be reasonable to believe beyond the evidence.
Religious belief is his most provocative example. In this talk, I defend James’s position
and explore the idea that, at times, believing beyond the evidence is not only reasonable—but
essential to a flourishing human life.
