Naoki Kitta

I am a PhD candidate under the supervision of Prof. Philip Goodchild.

My dissertation aims to rehabilitate the reasonableness of John Hick's religious pluralism by disclosing the deep structure of his philosophical system. To realize this aim, my dissertation introduces a new philosophical method of reliabilism, which is proposed by Ernest Sosa and emphasizes total balance and historical maturation. As a result of the introduction of reliabilism, Hick's philosophical system is disclosed to be composed of Hick's own philosophy of personhood, combined with the philosophies of Wittgenstein, Kant, and Hume. Instead of emphasizing one of them, my dissertation proposes to read these different components of Hick's philosophical system as forming a total worldview, which are complementary with each other.

Also, my dissertation situates Hick's philosophy in the history of philosophy of religion (e.g. pre-analytical paradigms of British Idealism and Critical Realism, and analytical paradigms of Logical Positivism, neo-Wittgensteinian philosophy, and Reformed Epistemology). Hick's project is discussed as a recovery of a pre-analytical worldview from within analytical contexts.

As Hick's central philosophical works, my dissertation focuses on Faith and Knowledge and An Interpretation of Religion. Faith and Knowledge has not been examined in detain in past literature. But Hick's arguments about personhood, Wittgenstein, Kant, and Hume in An Interpretation of Religion originates in Faith and Knowledge (both the first edition and the second edition). A correct understanding of Hick's religious pluralism in An Interpretation of Religion is impossible without a detailed examination of Faith and Knowledge.