Doxastic conflicts are a pervasive feature of the modern human experience. We form beliefs on various interrelated subjects that, not rarely, conflict with each other. In this article, I argue that when an individual experiences a crisis between doxastic attitudes toward science and religion, there may be a deeper issue than just a disharmony among beliefs. There may be a higher-order clash between two distinct norms of rationality, which provides a robust account for why doxastic conflicts of this nature are widespread and challenging to resolve. I employ concepts from social epistemology to elucidate the nature of the epistemic clash and explore possible resolutions. First, I characterize a hypothetical conflict between an agent’s scientific and religious beliefs. Second, I introduce three categories from contemporary debates in social epistemology: epistemic dependence, expertise, and epistemic community. Third, employing these categories, I characterize the high-order conflict an agent may experience between two distinct norms of rationality. Fourth, I describe four asymmetries between scientific and religious doxastic attitudes that bear importance to rationality. Fifth, from these asymmetries, I suggest a course of action an agent may take to mitigate their cognitive uneasiness and move towards a more integrated rational profile.
It is a widely held belief that science and religion are in conflict, a view reflected in various surveys.
While this research has enriched our understanding, it also raises questions about the relevance of traditional approaches to this relationship. Some suggest that focusing on cognitive and epistemic dimensions may be either overly narrow or limited in explanatory power (
Doxastic conflicts are a pervasive feature of the modern human experience. We form beliefs on various interrelated subjects that often conflict with each other. This is particularly evident in many people’s scientific and religious beliefs. In this article, I argue that when an individual experiences a crisis between doxastic attitudes toward science and religion, there may be a deeper issue than just a disharmony among beliefs. There may be a higher-order clash between two distinct norms of rationality, which provides a robust account for why doxastic conflicts of this nature are widespread and challenging to resolve. Here, I employ some concepts from social epistemology to elucidate the nature of the epistemic clash and explore possible resolutions.
It is important from the outset to clarify that my focus is not on religious beliefs in general but specifically on those that intersect with the science-and-religion debate, where epistemic tensions arise due to conflicting claims about the natural world.
I proceed as follows. First, I characterize a hypothetical doxastic conflict between the scientific and religious beliefs of an epistemic agent. Second, I introduce three key categories from contemporary debates in social epistemology: epistemic dependence, expertise, and epistemic community. These categories are crucial for my argument. Third, employing these categories, I characterize the deeper, or high-order, conflict an epistemic agent may experience—that is, a conflict between two distinct norms of rationality. Fourth, I point out that there are four important asymmetries between scientific and religious doxastic attitudes that bear importance to our rationality. Fifth and finally, from these asymmetries, I tentatively suggest a course of action a hypothetical epistemic agent may take to mitigate their cognitive uneasiness and move towards a more integrated rational profile.
Think of the following sets of propositions, set
Propositions of set
The Earth is approximately 4.5 billion years old.
Modern
Traits such as predation and violence were part of animal behavior long before
Propositions of set
The universe was created by God in seven days.
God created the original couple from whom all other humans descend.
Traits such as predation and violence emerged among humans only after the original sin.
Consider that propositions in set
Now, let us suppose Abelia has acquired various beliefs about the theory of evolution and the doctrine of creation. It is likely that, not being an expert, she has acquired them through testimony—someone told her such things, and she believed them. She has not independently collected evidence, assessed it, and made a judgment to decide what to believe. Instead, she believes these propositions because someone she trusts has communicated them to her, whether through conversations, courses, lectures, or other means.
However, Abelia is facing a cognitive crisis. She has realized that some of the propositions of
Traditionally, the image of the ideal epistemic agent was aligned with the notion of intellectual autonomy. According to this view, the rational person is the one who, facing a question or an inquiry, gathers the evidence, carefully evaluates it, and forms their own conclusion. Such an agent does not defer their judgment to others and does not believe something merely because others do. In fact, believing something just because others believe it can be seen as vicious thinking.
However, in recent decades, developments in social epistemology have raised staggering objections to this individualistic portrayal of rationality (e.g.,
Among the various relevant themes, three are important for my purposes: epistemic dependence and deference, expertise and epistemic authority, and epistemic community. Let us examine each of these concepts.
If you are someone like me or Abelia, you have acquired many of your important beliefs on the basis of someone telling you about them. To defer a belief in a proposition
You could say that the propositions from set
In religious matters, something similar holds for Abelia. She is not a specialist in the original languages of the scriptures or the culture of Second Temple Judaism. Nonetheless, she believes Jesus was a real person who died, crucified by the Roman Empire. Probably, she has not had any contact with old documents, debates over textual evidence, or archeological findings. Instead, she came to believe because her religious minister or trusted person told her so.
As I explore shortly, it is significant that in both cases Abelia seems to follow a rational pattern of belief formation. As Heidi Grasswick (
On what occasions should we defer our opinion to the opinion of others? In the aforementioned examples, Abelia has not collected or evaluated evidence through a personal inquiry. But what if she wanted to do so? Well, likely, she would not be able to, given that collecting and assessing evidence in specialized fields require multiple years of training, a vast amount of background knowledge, and specific skills—none of which she possesses.
In circumstances like these, we seek to defer our opinions and inquiries not to random people but to experts, those “who are best positioned to determine answers to questions in their domain of expertise, and this is because the experts have the best information to go on, and they are best equipped to evaluate that information” (
Beyond the somewhat trivial observation that we often defer our opinions to those of relevant experts, many argue that in various cases, the most rational course of action is to defer to experts (
The third topic relevant to our concerns is the fact that we all are part of, often simultaneously, various epistemic communities.
From this broad characterization, epistemic communities encompass not only academic departments and scientific research teams but also a diversity of groups such as juries, families, and churches. In a family, for instance, many epistemic practices are performed, some kind of division of cognitive labor is commonplace, and epistemic dependence and trust are pervasive: we typically trust our family members when they assert something about themselves, and we rely on accorded norms to guide interactions (e.g., rules for informing each other when one basic item is missing). While churches are communities with spiritual and moral ends, it is reasonable to also characterize them as epistemic communities. Within churches and other religious groups, information circulates, and various epistemic practices are performed, including teaching doctrines, delivering sermons, providing counseling, and transmitting religious views. The role of epistemic dependence is also evident: people often trust the claims of religious leaders regarding matters of faith and doctrine, such as Abelia trusting her leader regarding set
Alongside these local communities, a broader notion of epistemic community also seems plausible. Consider when we talk about trusting scientists, the consensus of science, or that the propositions of set
To make this distinction clearer, I distinguish between level 1 (local) and level 2 (practice-based) epistemic communities. This distinction helps clarify how testimonial relationships function differently across contexts, particularly between laypersons and experts, and why such differences are epistemically significant.
Level 1 epistemic communities are local, interactive groups wherein members typically maintain direct, personal relationships. These include families, classrooms, religious congregations, small research teams, or even group chats. Within these communities, information circulates through habitual, often informal exchanges—face-to-face conversation, trusted routine interaction, and embedded social norms. Trust is typically interpersonal and affectively grounded. These local groups play a crucial role in shaping the epistemic habits of their members: they mediate trust, frame what counts as credible testimony, and often serve as gatekeepers for information from the outside (cf.
In contrast, level 2 epistemic communities are practice-based, non-localized networks constituted by participation in a shared domain of expertise, inquiry, ideology, or broad social practice. Members may never meet or know one another personally, yet they are bound together by shared cognitive goals, institutional standards, and epistemic norms. Scientific disciplines like evolutionary biology and astrophysics are clear examples, where communication occurs through peer-reviewed publications, conferences, consensus documents, and replicable methodologies. But nonscientific and ideological communities can also form level 2 epistemic communities—such as flat-earthers or climate skeptics—so long as members share sources, standards, and a sense of epistemic allegiance.
As we will see, there is an important distinction in how the epistemic practices of acknowledging and trusting the testimony of experts apply to each type of epistemic community.
After characterizing some key concepts, we can now describe the doxastic crisis that many people face in matters of science and religion. Let’s return to our hypothetical scenario in which Abelia holds beliefs that appear to her to form an inconsistent doxastic structure.
Let us add some elements to our initial picture. First, we could say that Abelia is an epistemic agent as long as she is an active part of various epistemic communities formed by all sources of information that she consults and relies on in her epistemic practices. Second, Abelia is a responsible epistemic agent, forming her beliefs by responding to the available evidence, always seeking the truth and avoiding falsehoods. Third, Abelia depends on various epistemic agents to form many of her most cherished beliefs. She recognizes various communities of experts (level 2 practice-based communities), such as scientists of many academic fields. Fourth, since she considers herself a layperson in many of these matters, she habitually defers her opinion to the opinion of the experts. As an epistemically responsible person, she knows that while full consensus is not always achievable in scientific disciplines, there is at least partial or broad consensus that represents the robust opinion of the vast majority of experts in practice-based communities.
At the same time, Abelia is a devoutly religious person. She regularly engages in spiritual exercises such as prayer and meditation, attends weekly church services, and holds her religious beliefs in high regard. Through her years as part of her church (a level 1 local epistemic community), she has learned the propositions of set
Saying Abelia is being rational in these cases means she is conforming her doxastic attitudes to some norm of rationality.
PROPDEF: a rational epistemic agent who is not an expert in a given domain should defer her beliefs to those who are experts in that domain.
This norm captures a basic principle of epistemic responsibility in a world shaped by the division of cognitive labor. However, PROPDEF is not an epistemic absolute. Like many norms of rationality, it should be understood as
This is precisely Abelia’s situation. On the one hand, the scientific community she relies on is a well-established level 2 practice-based epistemic community, characterized by institutional mechanisms of review, discipline-specific norms, and structured methodological standards. The presence of broad expert consensus in this domain gives Abelia strong reasons to defer to their testimony concerning the propositions in set
On the other hand, her religious beliefs are formed within a level 1 local epistemic community—her religious community—whose authority is not merely relational or affective. Rather, Abelia takes her minister and the church leadership to be epistemically trustworthy: they follow the theological standards of her denomination, exhibit intellectual virtues such as honesty, careful interpretation, and contextual sensitivity, and are demonstrably knowledgeable in matters of doctrine and scripture. Her trust in them then is not merely a function of familiarity but of perceived epistemic competence within that religious domain.
In this light, Abelia’s positive doxastic attitudes toward both
There is, however, an issue that is becoming transparent to Abelia. She starts to realize that some propositions of set
First, there is a psychological problem. Abelia feels a cognitive discomfort for holding what seems to be incompatible beliefs. It is probable that, given such discomfort, she seeks to revise her belief system, either dropping some beliefs and/or acquiring new ones until she reaches a more cohesive psychological profile.
The second problem is epistemic. By holding seemingly inconsistent beliefs, Abelia is facing not only a psychological issue but also a normative one: she is violating a norm of rationality. Although epistemologists disagree on the exact role coherence must play in the justification of a belief system, it is safe to say they broadly agree that coherence is an important epistemic value or desideratum that should be pursued (cf.
COHERENCE: a rational epistemic agent ought to pursue a belief system in which beliefs cohere with each other, at least when the inconsistencies are recognizable upon reflection and have significant epistemic or practical stakes.
We can characterize Abelia’s conflict from two angles. First, there is a doxastic conflict, since some of her beliefs in set
This normative conflict requires further refinement. The issue is not that the two norms inherently clash but that adhering to both can lead to a cognitive conflict when their outputs—what they prescribe in particular cases—result in apparent inconsistency. The conflict does not arise from a failure of deference but rather from the simultaneous success of deference within two domains whose outputs are, at least superficially, in tension. Second, the case portrayed has a diachronic dimension. Abelia obtains certain beliefs by deferring to experts at one point, only to later realize that these beliefs do not hang together aptly. But the fact that she, like everyone else, acquires and reflects on her beliefs over time does not imply that the regulatory role of epistemic norms is itself diachronic. PROPDEF and COHERENCE are relevant at every stage of inquiry. Third, epistemic norms typically include
The doxastic conflict is broadly recognized and often explored in the literature. The epistemic–normative conflict, in turn, is a higher-order conflict, and it is harder to solve. It may be one salient factor to explain why cognitive crises such as that of Abelia are so deeply felt and hard to overcome. We can characterize Abelia’s predicament through the following dilemma: either (1) she is being irrational for violating COHERENCE and therefore must modify her belief system until she reaches a new, coherent belief system, but then, in modifying her belief system, she would abandon beliefs that were rationally formed (via PROPDEF); or (2) she is from the outset being rational for conforming to the norm of PROPDEF since she formed her beliefs soundly, but that would raise the question of how one could be rational violating COHERENCE, i.e., believing in inconsistent propositions. Should Abelia comply with PROPDEF or COHERENCE?
While the content of the propositions in set
As discussed, epistemic communities can be understood at different levels of comprehensiveness. Both
Similarly, Abelia’s beliefs in
In the sciences, a given field—such as evolutionary biology or paleontology—functions as a relatively unified level 2 epistemic community, structured by shared methodologies, institutionalized mechanisms of knowledge production (e.g., peer review, replication studies), and broadly accepted criteria for evaluating claims. This unity ensures that when a local epistemic community, such as a school, teaches a scientific proposition, it is typically traceable to a well-established, consensus-forming level 2 scientific community.
Theology, as an academic discipline, operates similarly to the sciences in many respects: it employs rigorous methodologies, undergoes institutionalized peer review, and maintains structured frameworks for inquiry. What distinguishes religious epistemic communities from scientific ones is not the internal functioning of academic theology but the existence of multiple, sometimes competing, level 2 practice-based epistemic communities within religion.
Alongside academic theology, other independent level 2 epistemic communities—such as biblical studies—function as distinct sources of expertise, each employing its own disciplinary methods. Additionally, religious denominations and ecclesiastical institutions constitute yet another form of level 2 epistemic community, with their own mechanisms for generating consensus, often shaped by doctrinal commitments and historical traditions rather than purely academic inquiry.
I acknowledge that some scientific theories and concepts are not uniformly understood, even among experts. For instance, Lenny Moss (
This structural difference has significant epistemic implications. Abelia’s scientific beliefs are traceable to a unified and widely accepted level 2 epistemic community, but her religious beliefs in
In science, especially regarding well-established theories, prevailing consensus is relatively straightforward to recognize, and rationality demands deferring to it (e.g.,
Given the ever-increasing specialization of the natural sciences, even if a layperson attempts to think for herself instead of deferring to experts, they probably will not be able to do so successfully. After all, the competencies required to gather and evaluate evidence demand extensive background knowledge and years of specialized training (
But in the domain of religion, it seems laypeople are often encouraged to engage more actively with the content of their beliefs, seeking a level of understanding
This asymmetry is not absolute, and I acknowledge that laypeople can gain some understanding of scientific theories through education, just as some religious claims are accepted with little comprehension. However, the difference is one of degree rather than kind. Scientific literacy campaigns aim to improve public understanding, but even well-informed laypeople typically lack the expertise to independently evaluate specialized scientific claims. In contrast, religious traditions often place value on believers developing at least a partial grasp of the interpretive frameworks that structure their faith commitments.
This difference has an important implication for how laypeople relate to experts. In science, the layperson’s relationship with the expert is (or should be) that of expert-as-authority, in which the layperson defers to the epistemic authority, and if their personal reasoning conflicts with expert consensus, rationality typically demands they override their own judgment in favor of the expert view (
A hasty conclusion from the two previous asymmetries would be that, to solve Abelia’s doxastic and epistemic plight, she should simply abandon her belief in the propositions of set
For that, we can draw on Lara Buchak’s risky-commitment account of faith. According to Buchak, faith is not a belief without sufficient evidence. Rather, it is a rational commitment to treat a proposition as true in action and reasoning, even in the face of epistemic uncertainty (Buchak 2017). A person has faith in a proposition when she cares about its truth, has a positive stance toward it, and is willing to take risks by continuing to act on it despite potential counterevidence. This form of faith is not irrational stubbornness but a context-sensitive response that can preserve rational agency in the face of limited or inconclusive evidence, particularly when abandoning a belief would dismantle long-standing interpretive frameworks or life projects.
In
This framework aligns closely with Abelia’s case. Her commitment to certain religious doctrines can be understood as a form of rational faith: one that resists the pressure to suspend belief not because she is ignoring counterevidence but because she judges that the tradition to which she is committed remains epistemically serious. Thus, even if Abelia’s beliefs in the propositions of set
From asymmetry 3, we have seen that discarding religious beliefs is not easy, at least for someone who still wants to embrace their religious identity. Furthermore, discussing the first asymmetry, I showed that a norm like PROPDEF demands Abelia defer her scientific opinions to the broad consensus of the scientific communities. In religious matters, in turn, things are not so clear. While Abelia’s level 1 local epistemic community can be unbending regarding the truth of the propositions of
These disagreements seem to stem from at least two sources. First, theologians and biblical scholars may hold theoretical commitments that are radically distinct. Second, even religious authorities who share the same doctrinal commitments can have distinct interpretations of the meanings of the propositions of set
This difference in the interpretation of meanings does not seem to impinge, at least at the same level, on scientific propositions.
From the discussion of these asymmetries, I defend that there are four criteria, or desiderata, that constrain Abelia’s course of action if she is to improve her epistemic standing. First, given that epistemic individualism is out of the question, PROPDEF remains a normative necessity. Second, especially based on discussions regarding the first two asymmetries, beliefs toward scientific consensus are relatively fixed for the layperson, i.e., a layperson must defer to the scientific expert consensus. Third, especially regarding the third asymmetry, religious beliefs should be maintained if possible, or at least not be immediately dismissed for the sake of COHERENCE. Fourth, particularly derived from the fourth asymmetry, while scientific propositions typically have one clear meaning, religious claims encompass multiple interpretations, especially those within the realm of theological theories; thus, changing the interpretation of a theological theory is a feasible move for a religious person committed to epistemic rationality.
A comment is pertinent on a possible incompatibility between the third and fourth desiderata. After all, desideratum 3 can be (simplistically) read as “maintain religious belief!” while desideratum 4 can be read as “change religious belief!” To solve this apparent tension, a conceptual sensitivity will be helpful. Benno van den Toren (
Thus, to summarize our four criteria or desiderata:
Epistemic dependencies are unavoidable: PROPDEF is a normative necessity.
A layperson’s dependence on scientific propositions ideally aligns with the expert-as-authority model: she believes in the proper scientific testimony.
A religious layperson’s dependence on religious doctrines ideally aligns with the expert-as-authority model: she believes in the doctrine.
A religious layperson can adjust her theological theories by trusting in and depending on other religious authorities who offer distinct interpretations.
My primary goal has been to characterize the cognitive crisis epistemic agents, such as Abelia, face when holding seemingly incompatible scientific and religious beliefs. In this final section, I tentatively present some steps a rational agent could take to address their cognitive situation. The aim here is not to prescribe what all religious believers ought to do but rather to illuminate a range of rationally viable responses available to nonexperts like Abelia when confronted with deep doxastic conflict.
In light of her situation, we can enumerate four main options Abelia faces. First, since following PROPDEF in her processes of belief formation resulted in an incompatible belief system, she could discard PROPDEF as a relevant norm, suspend her belief in the propositions of sets
A second option, based on Buchak’s model as discussed in the third asymmetry, is for Abelia to bifurcate her doxastic attitudes into two directions:
Another option is to suspend judgment when faced with competing epistemic authorities of roughly equal credibility. This is, in fact, a well-established epistemic strategy in cases of underdetermination or conflict, and it can preserve coherence when adopting a firm doxastic stance on either side would introduce contradiction. In that sense, a wholesale suspension of judgment is a genuine candidate for rational resolution in situations like Abelia’s. However, the cases I am investigating concern agents who are not merely navigating abstract epistemic puzzles but are instead trying to preserve a lived religious identity. For such agents, suspending judgment about central theological doctrines would not feel like a temporary withholding of assent but rather like a renunciation of faith itself. As such, the kind of wholesale suspension of belief that might resolve epistemic tension at a purely theoretical level would not be a live option for the kind of case I am examining.
That said, a form of selective suspension may still be epistemically and personally viable. While Abelia may not be willing to suspend belief in core theological doctrines—such as divine creation or the meaningfulness of divine action—she may find it rational to suspend judgment regarding specific theological doctrines that conflict with well-supported scientific claims. For example, she might withhold commitment to a literalist interpretation of Genesis without abandoning belief in creation itself. This kind of targeted epistemic withholding can create space for doxastic reconfiguration while maintaining the integrity of one’s religious identity. It allows the agent to revise or reinterpret certain commitments without destabilizing central ones. This form of selective suspension also provides a natural transition into the next, fourth course of action.
Fourth, Abelia could still adhere to PROPDEF, acknowledging the unavoidability of epistemic dependences (cf. desideratum 1), but she could now change to whom she defers her religious opinions (satisfying desideratum 2). She could seek out religious authorities, for instance, who interpret the propositions of
Let me tentatively indicate a possible course of action for epistemic agents in situations similar to Abelia’s who think the fourth option is the better one. The issue is that Abelia
Once Abelia recognizes herself to be in a doxastic conflict and decides to move forward, the next step is to ask questions about all sorts of things, including the quality of her epistemic dependencies and the epistemic communities she’s part of. After all, cognitive uneasiness prompts questions. Such questions can lead her to elicit some important information (
She could then reconsider two main things concerning her epistemic communities.
Further, she could explore other level 1 local epistemic communities that share similar doctrinal commitments (cf. desideratum 3) but offer different theological interpretations of
To alleviate these concerns, remember that Abelia is not revising dependencies on the science side, since she already trusts the consensus of scientific communities rather than individual opinions (cf. desideratum 2). In terms of religion, one safer movement would be to pursue alternative religious voices that possess similar doctrinal commitments (cf. desideratum 3).
Nonetheless, remodeling one’s epistemic memberships and dependencies can go wrong in several ways, but that is a peril all thinkers face. Ultimately, the quality of this movement will depend partly on Abelia’s intellectual capacities and virtues (
The cognitive crisis faced by epistemic agents like Abelia, stemming from seemingly incompatible scientific and religious beliefs, demands careful consideration and action. Given that rationality demands a more stable dependence on level 2 practice-based epistemic communities, Abelia can reevaluate her other epistemic communities and dependencies. By inhabiting new local communities, she can cultivate trusting relationships with peers and authorities who can provide her with fresh theological perspectives. Additionally, by expanding and/or altering her interlocutors to include diverse voices and exploring alternative interpretations, she can acquire new modes of epistemic dependence. Following these adjustments to her epistemic communities, adhering to PROPDEF can yield new outcomes, achieving a doxastic structure that approaches the ideal of COHERENCE. This process involves practicing social and intellectual virtues such as inquisitiveness, proper trust, and intellectual fellowship. While not offering a definitive resolution, this approach furnishes a framework for epistemic agents to actively address their socially rooted cognitive challenges.
As a final note, I acknowledge that shifting one’s epistemic dependencies and intellectual memberships, no matter how rational or virtuous one aims to be, is relative to, and substantially induced by, one’s previous trusting habits and preferences (cf.
I am deeply grateful to Jeroen de Ridder for his many insightful suggestions and the intellectual generosity and wisdom with which he has accompanied this project. I also wish to thank Roberto Covolan and Tiago Garros for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this article. Finally, I am thankful to ABC2 for providing not merely institutional support but a genuinely virtuous epistemic community in which many of the ideas developed here were first tested and refined.
See, for instance,
While Abelia is a hypothetical figure, the epistemic tensions she embodies reflect patterns observed in real-world religious communities. For example, Esther Chan and Elaine Howard Ecklund (
Strictly speaking, sets
Philosophers as old as Thomas Reid in the eighteenth century already defended the idea that testimony is a fundamental source of knowledge, emphasizing our natural dependence on others in acquiring beliefs. See Terence Cuneo and René van Woudenberg (
As Hanna Kiri Gunn (
As Jonathan Matheson (
For some approaches to this theme, see Marcelo Cabral (
Such level distinctions, however, are not always clear-cut, particularly in light of the powerful phenomenon of online communities. For instance, our online behaviors (such as likes and dislikes, time spent on specific sources, etc.), tracked and reinforced by algorithms, create certain online communities composed of the profiles and informational sources we engage with most. These online communities do not fit neatly within the level divisions. Even when flagged experts exist within an online community, their expertise is often hard to verify. These online communities function as if they were local communities, in that trust is largely unreflective, and the attribution of expertise is not governed by practice-based, authenticated norms.
A detailed analysis of the different types of consensus among experts is offered by Jonathan Matheson, Scott McElreath, and Nathan Nobis (
Epistemic norms are those that “govern what we ought to say, do, or think from
Some believers may, instead of feeling troubled by the apparent inconsistency between their religious and scientific beliefs, embrace a form of chimeric epistemology (cf.
Of course, some degree of doxastic incoherence is very often tolerated in practice, especially in frontier domains such as physics, where incompatible theories coexist without immediate resolution (e.g., quantum mechanics and general relativity). However, Abelia’s case is different. The conflict she experiences is not an isolated theoretical anomaly but a clash of domain-level commitments with strong normative pull.
There are areas and subjects in the sciences where consensus is far from obvious. However, the kinds of scientific claims I address in this article, such as those in
These patterns of epistemic deference are reflected in empirical and philosophical research on lay belief formation. For instance, Helen De Cruz (
Religious communities generally lack a unified epistemic authority capable of coordinating belief across contexts. Even in traditions like Roman Catholicism, where such authority is formally claimed, ambiguity persists. Doctrinal texts can be vague, and it is often unclear whether deference should be directed to the pope, academic theologians, or biblical scholars.
For an overview of various conceptions of understanding, see Michael Hannon (
The asymmetry I describe is observable in empirical settings. Helen De Cruz (
René van Woudenberg (
One might ask why an epistemic agent should seek a religious community that accommodates scientific findings rather than a scientific community that accommodates their religious views. As I have argued, while scientific consensus can be contested, the mechanisms for achieving it—such as peer review, empirical testing, and disciplinary boundaries—tend to be more standardized than those in religious traditions, where theological authority is often dispersed across multiple interpretive traditions, particularly when dealing with theological theories rather than doctrines. When attempting to identify which religious community represents the consensus on, for example, the specific interpretation of the meaning of Adam and Eve, one might consider a particular denomination’s confession of faith as well as the academic communities of theologians, biblical scholars, and others.
Real-world parallels to Abelia’s epistemic realignment are documented in sociological literature. For instance, Tatiana Tiaynen-Qadir et al. (
This problem is similar to one discussed by Levy (