Applications are solicited for twelve research proposals each year to engage in research projects on the nature and value of faith. Winners of research awards will participate in a collaborative research group consisting of the winners of the twelve awards, two post-doctoral research fellows working with this project on the Nature and Value of Faith, and will be led by Jonathan L. Kvanvig, Daniel Howard-Snyder, and Trent Dougherty. The deadline for applications is February 1, 2015. Details below the fold.

The research group will spend a month of intensive research at a seminar in Columbia, MO, July 6-July 31, 2015. The seminar will address questions concerning the value and evaluation of faith and will involve week-long visits by Lara Buchak (Berkeley), John Schellenberg (Mount Saint Vincent), and Allan Hazlett (Edinburgh). Participants will have the opportunity to spend a month of intensive seminar work on the topic they propose with the aim of producing a substantial publication in the range of 8–12,000 words. The following academic year, a major conference will be held in connection with the seminar to which seminar participants are invited. The conference following the summer 2015 seminar will be held in San Antonio, TX, January 14-17, 2016 at La Mansion del Rio, a magnificent historic hotel on the Riverwalk. Summer seminar participants will receive a research award of $4,000 plus expenses paid for participating in a collaborative research seminar. All seminar participants will be able to spend the month in Columbia, MO, at one of several available downtown facilities, within walking distance from a large variety of restaurants, coffee shops, and other places of interest, as well as within walking distance of the University of Missouri campus and its Student Unions, where seminar sessions will be held.

The application will consist of (i) a research proposal of no more than 5 pages, detailing the proposed research to be conducted and any relevant prior work related to it, (ii) a curriculum vita, and (iii) a cover letter. The evaluation committee will consist of the co-directors of the project, and the criteria for selection are demonstrated expertise in philosophy of religion or theology, with evidence of the ability to undertake significant research which will contribute to the aims of the project.

Applicants should explain in their application how their intended research addresses the nature of faith. Among the issues that might be investigated vary by year and are listed below. Electronic applications only, and may be sent to The Directors (Kvanvig, Howard-Snyder, Dougherty) with “RFP Response” in the subject line.

Here is a list of questions and issues that can be fruitfully pursued within the scope of the project, though it is not meant to exhaustive.

Is the possession of faith valuable? If so, does its value depend on contingencies like the value of its object, or the circumstances in which it is possessed, or what caused it? Is its value merely instrumental? Or is there something valuable in its own right in possessing it?

How should faith be evaluated? Along what parameters? Epistemic, moral, aesthetic, what? If on some particular understanding of, for example, faith that something is so, it involves cognitive, conative, and behavioral-dispositional components, is an overall evaluation of an instance of it even possible? Or are the evaluations of the components incommensurable? If they are commensurable, how are these different evaluations to be weighted in such a way that a determination of overall value can be arrived at?

How is faith related to other things we care about as human beings? How is it related to friendship, marriage, parenthood, childhood, and so on? Might it relate one part of a person’s life to other parts, bringing them together into a cohesive unity? Is it at all relevant to how we might face difficulties of various sorts? What is the relationship between faith and inquiry, whether scientific inquiry or inquiry of any other sort?

How is faith related to other things we care about as scholars? In the religious domain, might a deeper understanding of faith provide fresh ways to think about toleration, pluralism, divine hiddenness, disagreement, skepticism in religion, evidence for religious claims, the problem of faith and reason, evidentialist objections to religious faith, methodology, religious struggle and so on?
Assuming there is a God, why is faith in God important? What is it about faith that makes it crucial to being in proper relation with God? To salvation, etc.?

Can faith be taught? If so, should it be taught? If so, by whom and how? Relatedly, what specific novels, biographies, films, artworks, etc. exhibit faith, or a conspicuous lack thereof? Do some forms of thought—those characteristic of psychology, philosophy, theology, etc. (if any)—serve to cultivate faith in their practitioners?

The deadline for applications is February 1, 2015.