Of course, just as when most people say, “The apple is red” they don’t simply mean that they had the subjective experience of seeing a red apple. Most people mean that the apple is in fact red. But the reason they believe that the apple is red is because they had the subjective experience of seeing a red apple with their own eyes. Likewise, many people believe in the reality of God because they had a subjective experience that they believe to have been the presence of the holy spirit or something like that.
One: “When (some) religious people say (some of) what they do about God, they aren’t really making statements of fact, they are expressing certain internal experiences that are difficult or impossible to get across more directly.”
Two: “When (some) religious people say (some of) what they do about God, they are making (what they consider to be) statements of fact, but their belief in those statements is derived from certain internal experiences that are difficult or impossible to get across more directly.”
Claim One is what would have to be true to justify, e.g., your statement that arguing about religious experiences misses the point because religious talk isn’t about logic but about subjective experiences. However, Claim One seems to me to be almost certainly very false as regards most of what most religious people say.
Claim Two is probably true of many (though clearly not all) believers. However, “X’s claims about God have X’s religious experiences as part of their evidence base” is no more reason for not debating those claims than “X’s claims about God have X’s sacred scriptures as part of their evidence base” or “X’s claims about God have certain contentious claims about fundamental physics as part of their evidence base”.
Of course, just as when most people say, “The apple is red” they don’t simply mean that they had the subjective experience of seeing a red apple. Most people mean that the apple is in fact red. But the reason they believe that the apple is red is because they had the subjective experience of seeing a red apple with their own eyes. Likewise, many people believe in the reality of God because they had a subjective experience that they believe to have been the presence of the holy spirit or something like that.
I think you are equivocating between two claims.
One: “When (some) religious people say (some of) what they do about God, they aren’t really making statements of fact, they are expressing certain internal experiences that are difficult or impossible to get across more directly.”
Two: “When (some) religious people say (some of) what they do about God, they are making (what they consider to be) statements of fact, but their belief in those statements is derived from certain internal experiences that are difficult or impossible to get across more directly.”
Claim One is what would have to be true to justify, e.g., your statement that arguing about religious experiences misses the point because religious talk isn’t about logic but about subjective experiences. However, Claim One seems to me to be almost certainly very false as regards most of what most religious people say.
Claim Two is probably true of many (though clearly not all) believers. However, “X’s claims about God have X’s religious experiences as part of their evidence base” is no more reason for not debating those claims than “X’s claims about God have X’s sacred scriptures as part of their evidence base” or “X’s claims about God have certain contentious claims about fundamental physics as part of their evidence base”.