John Page

Including yours (and mine). Now, back to the reality that has by force of evolution bred our (fine, sick, delusory, rational, etc. take your pick) minds....

Cheers, John

John Page

The last sentence really threw me. I don't see what human distinction between order and randomness has to do with a theoretical god's knowledge.

Cheers, John

Corgan Sow

hi, BEANO,

I am no fan of naturalism, but the notion that Christianity prevails over naturalism sounds to me a bit amusing.

It is no different from you Christians claim "God is there and He was" when bugged with "begging the question". The idea of where the Creator comes from is no different from naturalism itself.

"God is there and all that it is"

Really?

Irishbrutha

First, sup, SDA, that's my home town, and second, have you been to England?

Anyway, just out of curiosity how would you justify the necessity of behaving as if these propositions are true? I'll explain via a problem of mine with Hume. (Different statements, but his is helpful in understanding my problem with yours).

Hume says this in his essay on Miracles in the "Enquiry". He says, "a wise man, therefore, proportions his belief to the evidence". Anyway, he's gonna go on and say that the likelihood of a miracle, being a violation of the laws of nature, is the least probable blah blah blah. But I'd like to focus on his statement.

A proper definition of wisdom (my first question in reading this statement) is foundational to the entire discussion. And I find that Hume can't give me a proper definition of wisdom. Of course we all know that he's saying that proportioning one's belief to the evidence will derive benefit, and therefore will be wise. As you've said yourself, SDA, this benefit is "making sense of the universe". Without implying too much ethically, we can say that maybe this benefit is that I will derive satisfaction from properly accomplishing the functions to which I subjectively feel obligated to fulfill, or that I will believe myself to have gained a more "proper" understanding of nature, and thus my actions will be a more "proper" response to nature. Or nominalistically, this benefit is the ability to function according to the perceived rules to which this system called nature adheres.

But why should we believe that "making sense of the universe" is beneficial to us at all? Why is adherence to the system useful to us? Why is functionality a goal to be desired? For one thing, we don't really know that we are making any real sense of the actual universe, and secondly, according to Hume, we have no real knowledge of ourselves. So how can we assert what it means to benefit ourselves if we know neither the object being benefitted (ourselves), nor the causes (interlocking events within nature) of our benefit.

Even if I discount his identity problem, and assume that we do objectively know ourselves, and that we can objectively understand the effects of external objects/identities/forces upon us. Hume doesn't believe in final causes, only efficient causes. The empiricist/naturalist can't believe in final causes, because there is no "impression" (sense experience) which would lead to the "idea", reflection of that experience, of final causality in our minds. And if there are no final causes, no human nature, no final purpose toward which humanity is being led (whether Theistic or Non-Theistic), then what does it mean for a human to be benefitted? Not only can Hume not even assert that others are benefitted by what he is benefitted, but he also cannot even claim that he is benefitted. Indeed he will be the first one to tell you this. What we call ethics is merely the subjective meaning we give to pain and pleasure (extreme simplification). Yet he will also be the first one to give normative standards by which we should both believe, and then act. He asserts a normative "ought" based upon a subjective "is". He does the same with the Uniformity of Nature. It's an arbitrary assertion based upon a perceived need for the proper function of the self within a perceived reality. And so in the end, the naturalist can only say that it gives me satisfaction to believe in uniformity, to believe in the necessity of causality, to believe in the usefulness of function, and ultimately even to believe in the idea of beneficience.

For the record, I am using the word "belief". I do so because Hume recognizes that without it he is bankrupt, and it seems that your previous statement agrees with Hume on this point.

Anyway, I'm not saying that supernature answers the problems. I'm just pointing the problems out. Hume's statement in "Dialogues", regarding the argument from Design, appropriately fits. Essentially, he says that the argument cannot give us anything about the nature of the being whose intelligence was a necessary condition of the order which we see in nature. It gives us a rational being, but that's all. Although, I do think it gives us something as opposed to nothing, someone as opposed to no one (both the Argument from Design as well as the Problem with Naturalism). The nature of that something/someone is better dealt with from other directions.

-Shaun

[ November 21, 2002: Message edited by: Irishbrutha ]</p>

tronvillain

I know that number one is true, and while I do not know if two or three are true, I take the position that it does not matter if they are true or not. My perceptions are brute facts of my existence, as are my inclination and ability to use them to construct hypotheses about what my future perceptions will be.

You do not have to believe that "making sensee of the universe" is beneficial to you at all, but you will do it anyway. It is simply in your nature to hypothesize about future experience based on past experience - you may do it well or you may do it poorly, but you will do it.

Vorkosigan

What is a 'common' definition? The one that has right-thinking-urban-humanists across the world going 'yeah i like the sound of that' or the one accepted within philosophical circles. The metaphysicaly meaningless (and it is) definition you mention would be expunged from any serious discourse on the nature of things because people tend to discuss the way reality is rather then our mental health. I would however conceede that maybe i've just got this all wrong and deserve a good spanking.


I'll take number 2 on that one. If philosophers confuse "atheism" with "metaphysical naturalism" or with "irreligion" then they've fallen into confusion and need to correct themselves.

Does this common definition of Atheism you find so appealing correlate to reality or not? Does it have metaphysical content? No? So why would anyone want to discuss a person's mental health?

I have no idea why you keep referring to "mental health."

I've already said this common definition of atheism has metaphysical implications. But they are largely negative -- you can't turn to gods when you go about constructing cosmologies. But it doesn't imply much about the way the universe runs. Other information is required. So while having some metaphysical fallout, there's no overarching cosmology or metaphysics in the statement "I don't believe in gods."

In any case, turning now to the issue at hand. Your argument against evolutionary naturalism (to use Giere's term) ran:

• Perhaps a short dialogue will indicate why I think there is a problem.
  
  A: How can we justify knowledge?
  B: Look at Evolution, here's a reason to think we have knowledge about the world.
  A: Yeah, but how did you know about Evolution?
  B: We used our sense perceptions to gather information about Evolution.
  A: But didn't Hume and Descartes call into question the accuracy of our sense perceptions?
  B: Yes they did, but I see no reason to doubt that my sense perception is giving me *some* knowledge about reality. They prove themselves everyday.
  A: Well I think the problems of Hume & Descartes are quite serious in regards to the justification of knowledge. Hume mentioned that causes are not like effects. Think about how different a flame is to a match, or the chemicals that ignite the fire? But if our senses are caused by the world around us what reason do we have for thinking that any sesne perceptions we have bears any resemblance to the data about evolution. I understand that we believe it to be the case but how can we justify that? What reason do we have for thinking, in light of Hume's and Descartes problems that we know anything about Evolution. Do we simply take it on faith?
  
  Now let's for a small moment imagine that God exists and that theism is true. If that were the case then we could say in response to that justification question "Because God created me to know the world and the world to be known. Therefore I have a reason for thinking I know things about Evolution." But without help from God what reaosn can we give to that question because it seems there *is* no reason why this universe came to be or why any thing is like any thing?

Here's something I wrote a while back on this very topic, cribbed from Giere, of course, with some additions of my own.

"Let's start out with a one-sentence summary: naturalism, when you come right down to it, is the belief that consciousness cannot operate directly on reality outside the mind.

As far as my particular naturalist beliefs, I am an evolutionary naturalist. Human cognitive capacities are evolved capacities, just like those of other animals. It is undeniable that human abilities are well-adapted to the world in which humans function, and that these capacities are non-trivial. A fantastic amount of processing power is required just to walk or read a poem.

Empiricist philosophers have emphasized the role of perceptual experience in their analyses of knowledge because of the high degree of subjective certainty attached to such experience. The problem was then to get beyond this subjective experience. From an evolutionary perspective, there's a connection between subjective certainty and the objective reliability of our interactions with the world. Although the evolutionary history of some of these capacities for developing reliable perceptions of world is still in the dark, there's no denying the reliability of our perceptions.

Traditional rationalism has focused on these subjective intuitions we have, that space-time is 3D and that time is linear. These judgements seem to be built into the way we think. Indeed, they seem to be (see Tools, Language and Cognition in Human Evolution), since those aspects of the world relevant to our fitness have that structure. But rationalists, like empiricists, are still stuck with the problem of subjectivity. From their perspective, it seems impossible that one could ever discover what science has indeed discovered, that the cosmos has several dimensions, and so forth.

Evolutionary theory provides an alternative. By looking back at their own evolutionary history, scientists can better understand their own cognitive situation and investigate the development of their own cognitive capacities. We know already that we have reliable perceptions about the world; the problem of induction is really twofold, not just "how is it we can induct" but "how is it our inductions are so reliable?" The reply to Hume is contained in modern cognitive science, which has shown that inductive capacities are built into humans (and other animals). So are things like logic, the idea that things in the world have intentions, and so on. Most of these originate in the cognitive equipment necessary for competition in our highly developed social world. If you look at the Primer on Evolutionary Psychology I provided above you'll get a few simple examples of how logic (in that case, conditionals) operates in human social systems.

In other words, the cognitive view starts with the realization that our perceptions are largely reliable, wonders why this is so, and then uses the tools of science to discover why, confirming that indeed our perceptions our reliable.

Some of you I know are shouting "Hey wait! This is circular!" I would argue, as I think Wittgenstein did, that epistemology has been gripped by the idea that one must prove in Straight Lines. The philosopher reasons from first principles, then, grounded in A, moves on to B. The cognitive scientist starts with B and using B, goes back to find what A is all about. Circularity does not exist here, because at each iteration of the scientific process, something has changed: we have more knowledge about ourselves and the world. This is not circularity, but a positive feedback loop. Using our powerful cognitive abilities made reliable by evolution, we expand our knowledge of the world, thus understanding our own cognitive abilities better. This new knowledge enables us to better understand the world. And so on. As Giere noted in Explaining Science : A Cognitive Approach(Science and Its Conceptual Foundations) "the existence of these positive feedback loops is not a limitation that must be overcome by some special form of philosophical analysis. On the contrary, it is one of the things that makes modern science so powerful."

I don't worry too much about what philosophy says about ontology or epistemology, because those answers are going to come from the cognitive sciences. That has pretty much been the trend over the last 300 years; that the realm of philosophy is being invaded and colonized by the sciences. Although philosophy is incredibly good as a poser of questions for the cognitive sciences to answer."

Now, Plump, you said:

• But if our senses are caused by the world around us what reason do we have for thinking that any sesne perceptions we have bears any resemblance to the data about evolution.

The whole point of evolution is that it provides the basis by which we can be confident that our picture of the world is effective, our sense data useful and reliable. The brain is evolved to fit a particular environment (in the broadest sense, both geographic and social). Fundamentally we know are senses are reliable because errors would quickly kill us.

You can, of course, insist that there's no ultimate certainty out there. Sure, we could be living in some Matrix-like construction of our own or other mind(s). But there's no evidence consistent with that assertion. Until you come up with powerful evidence to regard our senses as generally ineffective......

You also wrote:

• Now let's for a small moment imagine that God exists and that theism is true. If that were the case then we could say in response to that justification question "Because God created me to know the world and the world to be known.

Of course, this is nonsense. For starters, you make a gigantic and completely unsubstantiated leap from "theism" to your particular theism. This is a particularly noxious form of rhetorical aggrandizement Christians are constantly guilty of. The two are not the same. Even if theism is true, your god still might not exist. What you really mean is: "assume that my version of Christianity and its doctrines is true....."

In any case, you have not solved the problem of reliability of sense data. You have simply asserted it is reliable because you believe that to be the case. In fact you are right where philosophy was prior to modern evolutionary and cognitive science, with of course, the additional problem of proving that your deity is not a trickster god.

I, on the other hand, have not merely a powerful and testable theory with a diverse basis in biology and cognitive science, but a series of methodologies, drawing on both the biological and psychological, that can be used to attack various issues. You do not even have a viable theory yet, just a package of assertions that you think constitutes a coherent whole, and that contains no methodologies for exploring its many assertions about the nature of reality.

Vorkosigan

Steven Carr

If the Christian world view is true, then there are demons who are motivated and capable of deceiving you. There goes your epistemology.

Steven Carr

why, on a naturalistic veiw, am i obligated to be rational?[/QB][/QUOTE]

Who said that you were being rational?

Once you can show that your beliefs are rational, we atheists can then see why theism obliges you to be rational.

For example, tell us why (using only your God-mechanism) the following is irrational :-

1) All swans are white
2) Snowy is a swan
3) Therefore, my dog has 6 legs.

Apaprently, only people who presuppose the supernatural can spot the mistake in that syllogism. Frankly, I think others can as well.

John Page

Vorko:

I enjoyed reading the excellent summary in your post. Yes, I need to know how and why it is that I think what I do. This would make the relationship between the process of mind and our ever changing reality more understandable.

Another way of looking at this topic is to say we are faced with a choice, some form of naturalism or a confabulation of the mind. It seems we are ultimately prisoners of our minds (the mind not being infinite and imposing limits on what we can think), condemned to a path restricted by the evolutionary phenomena to which Vorko refers.

Cheers, John