Not rocket science, nor brain surgery
An interesting (at least in places) discussion at Pharyngula of Eagleton on Dawkins. One of the interesting bits is the one where Andrew Brown drops by to comment. He notes that he reviewed The God Delusion for Prospect with a follow-up at Comment is Free (I put both in News here, and I think commented on one or both; they’re not new). He draws a rather irrelevant analogy.
The shortest form of all these objections is this analogy: Suppose that I, knowing nothing about economics, write a book saying that the world would be better off without money: that money has led people to terrible crimes, and may even be thre root of all evil — “and besides, when you look at it money doesn’t even exist: who is this ‘I’ who promises to pay the bearer on demand? Why should we believe in dollars when no one believes in Reichsmarks or in cowrie shells?” Would this be a scientific work? Would it advance our understanding of money, or of economics?
But religion isn’t economics, and it’s not like economics. Religion is not an expert subject. That’s why I find all these questions about theology beside the point. Religion of course can be an expert subject, but it isn’t of its nature an expert subject, especially not in the form of the various Protestant denominations. Religion is public, and democratic, and inclusive, and all-embracing; furthermore, people are constantly making us a present of their religious beliefs in all sorts of public media, from newspapers to political campaigns to radio shows to tv dramas. It is a perfectly legitimate and indeed necessary undertaking to look at and dispute with that form of religion – public religion – everybody’s religion – Bush’s religion, Blair’s religion, Cristine Odone’s religion. That’s why economics is beside the point.
Brown goes on:
There are lots of us who believe that religion is primarily a social reality. The way to study social realities, and to understand them, is not to ponce around saying “Nyah nyah nyah it’s all just an illusion.”
Well, there are also lots of us who believe – for good reason, I would say – that religion is a social reality that rests on particular supernatural beliefs – to wit, that there is a personal omnipotent benevolent omniscient god who is real but out of our reach and who is transcendent but nevertheless answers our prayers and is involved in our world. One way to study and also criticize a social reality that is based on those beliefs is indeed, surely, to ask whether there is any reason to believe all that. Why wouldn’t it be? When we’re always being urged to believe all that ourselves, and urged or commanded to respect people who believe it, and told to be quiet about our opinion of it, and having plays and museum exhibits closed down before we can see them because of it. It’s our business, isn’t it; it’s everyone’s business. Economics isn’t.* I wouldn’t apply for the job of chairman of the Federal Reserve, because I quite agree that I don’t know enough about economics, but religion isn’t like that (not that I plan to apply for the job of archbishop of Canterbury either).
I can see saying that approach is not terribly interesting or challenging, I can see not wanting to bother with it, but Brown seems to be saying that it’s illegitimate, and I don’t buy that. I don’t think an approach that disputes religion as it is commonly (and often) presented is in the least illegitimate, in fact I think it needs doing.
*Well, economics is, but not in the sense of being able to criticize it cogently merely because we know how to spend money.
So if religion is primarily a social reality, and the actual existence of God is an illusion, Mr. Brown think the way we should study religion is to keep quiet about the ‘God is an illusion’ part so that people don’t get all pissed off and upset when we study religion as if it were primarily a social reality, and ignore God.
Are they mutually exclusive? Is it one or the other? Can’t some people study the wondrous depth of religion as a social reality, and other people point out that no, if you take the concept of God *literally* — if you take it seriously as a hypothesis which tells us something about the nature of reality and not just as high poetry or a narrative form around which we build social realities — there really isn’t one?
I think there is room for both. Dawkins didn’t write the book Mr. Brown would write. That’s fine, but I hope it’s not just because he thinks it impolitic.
Oops. Bit of absent-minded formatting there. Beg pardon.
Well, exactly. And part of the social reality that religion is, is that a great many people do take the concept of god literally, with all the consequences that flow from that.
Surely a crucial distinction is that money exists?
‘especially not in the form of the various Protestant denominations’
Or catholics or muslims and on and on.
Rather obviously, many people also believe that the innate superiority of their particular ethnic group is a social reality, and the reviewer might be more inclined in that case to go “Nyah nyah nyah it’s all just an illusion.”
Or maybe that would just be poncing around, and instead we should spend more time drawing social and political conclusions from a few-point difference in average performances on IQ tests…
Faith is the liberty dollar of religious institutions.
Thanks for the link to the full glory of the Eagleton article. I thought it was hilarious, because basically he was peddling the same kind of total bulls**t about religion that he used to inflict on long-suffering humantiy students about literature. String together enough meaningless phrases and obscure references with the minimum of punctuation and you’ll persuade the unsuspecting that what you are writing actually means something; but in the end it’s the same nonsensical hand-waving that we get from any Southern Baptist or indeed Pope or imam.
This is what i sent, in reply to the lrb…
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Here are some errors in Eagletons’ unbelievably stupid review of Prof. Dawkins’ book….
“Faith” is DEFINED as belief without evidence.
So how can he put up faith as a defence in a reasoned argument?
Dawkins is NOT obsessed with creation.
If only because he is saying there wasn’t one.
We DO have evolution, but that is emphatically, NOT creation.
Etc. (it really is too tiring to debate with people who don’t seem to be able to think straight )
Eagleton is obviously not capable of coherent, long-term rational thought….
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
And, I might add at this point, only too fond of his own irrational, unscientific windbagging.
i Surely a crucial distinction is that money exists?
Bills and medals exist that represent the idea of money, but the thing itself? Where is it and what is it made of?
I think there are more legs in the analogy than is being allowed. Economic is not an expert subject either (although it can be). We are all of us calculating, conscious economic agents who make reasoned economic decisions every day of our lives.
I think the analogy is absolutely precise, not least because I have suffered through any number of books about the evils of global capitalism written by people who didn’t know what they were talking about and they all took a tone exactly like the one Dawkins took with respect to religion (they were also all, like him, blissfully unaware that they were in general reinventing fallacies of the 19th century).
I think it pretty curious that anyone could believe that (modern, neoclassical) economics isn’t a social and political institution which demands respect from nonbelievers. I would hazard a guess that many more theatres and museums have been closed down on the say-so of economists than mullahs, and schools, hospitals and social programs too. It also rests on a number of highly questionable metaphysical beliefs (including one – the existence of a numeraire unit of capital – which is actually self-contradictory!)
Eagleton is just doing a variation of the “I’m so sophisticated” argument that we have seen used here in similar contexts in recent weeks. For example – if you want to build a castle in the air you need to find stones that float. Objectors express the concern that there is no such thing as levitating stones so your plans will not work. You respond by pointing out that you have studied castle architecture for years and the objectors don’t know an embrasure from a bastion. When the objectors point out that there still is no such thing as levitating stone you just give a condescending sigh at how unsophisticated they are.
To put it another way – you don’t need to know much about economics to know that real money isn’t made out of chocolate.
I finally read Eagleton’s review yesterday. I thought it was quite well-written, and I had no problem understanding any of it. I cannot of course technically say whether he is correct or not as I have not read Dawkins’ “The God Delusion”.
I would tend to agree with OB’s point about public religion. But Dawkins’ book is titled “The God delusion”, not “the misery of public religion”. And the question of the existence of God does involve theology and philosophy to a significant extent. It seems to me that the problem with Dawkins’ in the eyes of many of his critics is that he dismisses theology as nonsense out of hand. And he substitutes the conceptions of God theology has worked out with his own – a scientifically investigable giant tooth fairy. And then proceeds to knock it down.
Now, I can well imagine that this approach irritates some people. And there does seem to me to be a contradiction between holding that talking and thinking about God is inherently meaningless (which seems to be Dawkins’ position with regards to his dismissal of theology, and sometimes yours, OB) and mounting a comprehensive attack on the existence of God as false.
Now, I have a strong suspicion that empiricism is hopelessly wrong as a comprehensive philosophy of science. I’m happy to say that here. I’m happy to blog about it. But I wouldn’t write a book about it without reading the body of work produced by supporters of empiricism over and over again.
“I think the analogy is absolutely precise. […]I think it pretty curious that anyone could believe that (modern, neoclassical) economics isn’t a social and political institution which demands respect from nonbelievers. […] It also rests on a number of highly questionable metaphysical beliefs (including one – the existence of a numeraire unit of capital – which is actually self-contradictory!)”
So as an “absolutely precise” comparison to economics, religion is a social and political institution. It rests on a number of highly questionable metaphysical beliefs. Some of these are actually self-contradictory.
If economics is the dismal science, theology is the dismal philosophy. It’s a wonder that anyone can even assemble fallacies based on its claims.
[So as an “absolutely precise” comparison to economics, religion is a social and political institution. It rests on a number of highly questionable metaphysical beliefs. Some of these are actually self-contradictory.]
indeed, and to make it even more precise still, for all its faults, neoclassical economics contains many extremely important contributions to our understanding of the world, has been produced by some incredibly intelligent people and certainly shouldn’t be simply gainsaid without taking the trouble to learn what it’s about. Nor are cherry-picked examples of its most baleful effects in the real world particularly interesting or insightful as a criticism of the subject itself.
When atheists attack popular fundamentalist conceptions of God they are accused of not understanding the subject, since such childish ideas are nothing at all like the sophisticated, rarified, philosophical versions which take care to say nothing about God which would leave it open to such a clumsy scientific assault.
Go after liberal theology, and they yelp that the atheist is an extremist who fails to distinguish between moderate allies and the loony-toon dogmatists who are the REAL problem.
What to do? Maybe atheists should just keep their opinions to themselves, and everyone can be easy again.
Furthermore…since the analogy is precise, I take it we’re to conclude that religion contains many extremely important contributions to our understanding of the world? Like what? That’s a vague enough phrase to cover almost anything, but even so, like what? And if there are such contributions, are they contributions that could not have been made by anything other than religion? Are they essentially religious contributions? Or are they contributions made by people who were religious because there wasn’t a lot of intellectual competition in the 12th century? What extremely important contributions to our understanding of the world has religion made that only religion could have made?
I take it we’re also to conclude that religion has been produced by some incredibly intelligent people. Sure, but that has become less true as new information and evidence has become available. Aquinas was a smart guy, but that fact isn’t really a reason to treat religion as a rigorous form of inquiry now.
It seems odd to me that some people are arguing that Dawkins misses that mark by not explicitly addressing the more sophisticated versions of theology that some academics have adopted over the years. I think Eagleton gives the game away when he says –
As far as theology goes, Dawkins has an enormous amount in common with Ian Paisley and American TV evangelists. Both parties agree pretty much on what religion is; it’s just that Dawkins rejects it while Oral Roberts and his unctuous tribe grow fat on it. –
I mean, how could the televangelists be growing fat off the fundie crowd if there were not a vast number of fundies to be fleeced? And if their views are so commonplace, how could Dawkins be wrong in addressing what people actually believe?
“And if their views are so commonplace, how could Dawkins be wrong in addressing what people actually believe?”
Just what I keep wondering. Since that is his subject – why shouldn’t he address it?
Richard – I think Eagleton got some teasing from reviewers for that interesting trinity of, erm, commitments when After Theory came out.
OB – difficult issue. I’d agree that the fundamentalistic kind of protestantism so rampant in the US has little philosophical or theological depth, and that the lay version of this faith, if it is what George W. Bush holds, has neither. But Bush didn’t develop his theism out of thin air. It’s a derivate of a belief system developed by people who were well acquainted with the philosophical thought of their times. Christianity owes as much to Plato as to St. Paul.
You argue that you want to criticize public religion rather than theology. That’s fair enough. But we both agree (as opposed to Brown) that religion does involve the central claim of a Deity. To attack this, I don’t think one can avoid dealing with theology as well – even hackneyed, third or fourth-hand versions of theological claims. Kind of like Marxism. An effective critique of Marxism would preferably include Marx, Trotsky, etc. and not just third-rate Stalinist hacks. Even if the latter are well represented among supporters of Marxism with guns, and even if Stalinism does repeat and reaffirm, in a dogmatic and not very profound way, some of the central claims of Marxism. And even if criticism of the latter is (was?) most necessary (just not relevant to Marxism as a whole).
So I’d treat theology and public religion (including fundamentalist incarnations of such) as seperate yet intertwined issues. My issue with Dawkinsesque critiques of religion is not so much that it conflates the two but that it does not even seem to acknowledge the complexity of the phenomenon it’s dealing with. Particularly in as far as it professes to deal with the existence of a Deity as a scientific issue.
[I take it we’re to conclude that religion contains many extremely important contributions to our understanding of the world? Like what? ]
Well, for one thing, the insight that there is an interesting philosophical question of why there is something rather than nothing. But since this is a clearly rhetorical question, you’ll forgive me for not busting a gut to give it an answer.
[And if there are such contributions, are they contributions that could not have been made by anything other than religion? ]
All sorts of things could be different, including the history of economics. But just because Sraffa’s theory of the production of commodities by commodities *could* have been turned into a viable microfoundation, doesn’t give someone an excuse to ignore all of Samuelson now if they want to be taken seriously talking about economics.
[And if their views are so commonplace, how could Dawkins be wrong in addressing what people actually believe?]
There are plenty of halfwit economic hack pundits who spend all their time shouting down talking points of other hack pundits of the other party. They apparently make a living out of it, and so does Dawkins, but nobody mistakes what they are doing for economics.
Funny, I must have missed Dawkins on economics.
” there is an interesting philosophical question of why there is something rather than nothing”
You are kidding, right?
I, too, was rather under the impression that religion, qua religion, had provided most of the *less* interesting answers to the “something rather than nothing” question, since the stock response of all religions is to say “something else made it”. And after that it’s turtles all the way down… Compared to contemplating the sublime existence of a primordial Higgs Field, or speculating on the existence of infinite universes, it’s drivel.
Most religions [Buddhism is a partial exception] seem to have made the fundamental error of assuming that ‘why?’ must mean ‘what for?’, when the really interesting question ought to be ‘how come?’.
Dave,
Aside from the possibility multiple universes are implied by our scientific theories (in which case we’ll have to accept them, obviously), speculating on a multiplicity or even an infinity of universes has always seemed much less parsimonous to me than speculating on a Deity as an ultimate cause.
The question of “why is there something rather than nothing” is in my opinion interesting – but God as the condition for the possibility of existence as Eagleton mentions is hard to get one’s head around. I don’t yet have an answer to the obvious objection that existence must be accepted as brute fact. I wouldn’t call it “drivel” either, though. And it drives home the point that ultimate explanations – whether deistic/theistic ones or “existence-as-brute-fact” ones – are in principle not open to empirical study.
I think it’s quite important that we’re dealing with a “what for” explanation, rather than a “how come” explanation. Because the relationship between an unlimited Deity and the universe cannot be causal in any normal sense of the word. Which is why I’ve always been a bit suspicious of infinite regress arguments. They seem to me to impose a kind of billiard-ball model of causality on the issue which doesn’t apply at all (the same goes obviously for careless theistic argument in this direction).
An aside on infinite regress: the advantage that the atheistic “brute fact” alternative would have would be one of more simplicity, at the most. But no explanation is self-contained: they all stop at some kind of ultimate origin, which cannot be itself explained.
But back to causality. If we’re going for a “what for” argument instead, a purpose-driven explanation for the existence of the universe, we end up with the problem that no teleological explanation is, I think, empirically verifiable in the same sense that causes are, but the existence of a Deity does remain something which can be rationally argued for and against. Other than with “how come” causality. Which implies nothing about the nature of what is being caused. Teleology does. And the “how come” explanation for existence itself is forever out of our reach, totally – but “what for” explanations may be more valid or invalid with regards to what the universe actually is, behaves, etc. In other words, we’re moving the argument for/against a Deity from ultimate beginnings to the here and now, which I think is more fruitful.
Parmenides was contemplating this question in the fifth century B.C – somewhat before the Abrahamic religions got in on the act – so I don’t think that counts at all.
Anyway, since you brought it up, what exactly has religion contributed to answering that particular question? Of course, it has posited that there is something rather than nothing because God chose to create the material universe. Nevertheless, under this assumption, why is there a God rather than no God?
By that, I don’t mean what reason is there for thinking that the existence of the universe necessitates a supernatural creator (that we call God). Rather, if we take it as a given that this supernatural creator exists, then why does such an entity exist at all, rather than just not existing?
In contrast to the religious answers, which succeed only in replacing one question with another, science does have something of use to say on this matter. See, for example –
http://www.colorado.edu/philosophy/vstenger/Briefs/Something.pdf
Leaving this question aside for now, in what other ways exactly has religion helped us to understand the world? I don’t want to hear about secular contributions from religious scientists, philosophers, or others. I am looking for specifically religious insights into the understanding of our world.
[are you arguing that theologians have to learn evolutionary theory in depth and must refute every one of its detailed arguments scientifically?]
I am certainly arguing that theologians who decide to take on the foolish task of arguing against evolutionary theory ought to learn what the hell they are talking about and am rather surprised that this might be controversial.
I also note, for about the hundredth time, that Stephen Hawking’s answer to the questions “what lies outside of the universe?” and “what happened before the event at which space and time were created?” is more or less identical to the one in the Summa Theologicae.
[I also note, for about the hundredth time, that Stephen Hawking’s answer to the questions “what lies outside of the universe?” and “what happened before the event at which space and time were created?” is more or less identical to the one in the Summa Theologicae.]
I’m not so sure about that. But, even if we grant this, so what? In Acquinas’ time, such a conjecture could be no more than just pure speculation. Certain theistic branches of Hinduism, such as in Vaishnavism, conceive of a creation event with similarities to the Big Bang. Are we to grant them similar insight? If you make enough guesses, sometimes you will get lucky.
“There are plenty of halfwit economic hack pundits who spend all their time shouting down talking points of other hack pundits of the other party. They apparently make a living out of it, and so does Dawkins, but nobody mistakes what they are doing for economics.”
Surely no one is calling what Dawkins is doing theology, just as no one would call your tirades against Dawkins evolutionary theory.
“I also note, for about the hundredth time, that Stephen Hawking’s answer to the questions “what lies outside of the universe?” and “what happened before the event at which space and time were created?” is more or less identical to the one in the Summa Theologicae.”
It’s almost as if they were both human beings doing metaphysics about unanswerable questions.
I expect that Hawking also agrees that if a person has a spell put on them to make them get married then that marriage is invalid.
Nick,
I did include the reservation that if our observations do imply a multiverse, then obviously it should be accepted. I know way too little about physics and cosmology to provide a firm opinion about the issue. However, I do notice that all proposals involving a multiverse (MWI, Smolin’s natural selection proposal, string theory) are more or less controversial (as any interpretation of quantum theory or candidate for a theory of everything is). What I was saying that in the absence of very compelling reasons to accept a multiverse, it is not a particularly good answer to anthropic arguments for theism. Perhaps there are such compelling reasons – but it will take me some time to build up the knowledge base to evaluate them.
Another quick comment:
“It is not plausible, as it requires the positing of a supernatural universe-creating entity – when we have no reliable evidence that anything supernatural exists at all. Empirical methods have consistently discovered only natural things and causes, even underlying many things once thought to be supernatural. Meanwhile, no other methods have produced any consistent conclusions about the substance or causes of anything, much less anything supernatural.”
I must object here that the total inventory of things that we know to exist in the universe goes beyond natural things and causes. It includes qualia, reason and logic, consciousness etc. And the existence of some of these is intuitively, non-empirically known. Now some of these may be ultimately reduced to the workings of the naturalistic world. I have my reasons to believe that ultimately, they won’t be – but the reductionist effort is fruitful even if ultimately reduction of mind to matter may be unattainable. But I make this point that if we take stock of what count or does not count as an explanandum for which a Deity may or may not be a good explanation, we cannot stop at the physical world. To do so would be to base ourselves a metaphysic incompatible with theism at the outset. In other words, it would be begging the question.
Like, what Nick said, dude.
And, why is it clever and big to ask questions like ‘what happened before time?’ Isn’t that a bit like, oh, I dunno, ‘if elephants had wings, would they make good pets?’
But Merlijn, is a metaphysic compulsory? I know it’s a bit like someone saying ‘I’m not political’, but really, isn’t it a bit harsh insisting that claiming not to have a metaphysical viewpoint is a metaphysical viewpoint? Are we really not allowed to believe that, not only is no-one out there, but that there is no ‘there’ there — particularly as nothing beyond abstract speculation [or ‘making it up as you go along’, as we philosophical philistines call it] gives any grounds for thinking that there might be a ‘there’ there?
Merlijn,
[I was saying that in the absence of very compelling reasons to accept a multiverse, it is not a particularly good answer to anthropic arguments for theism.]
I would suggest that you have it entirely back to front. In my opinion, unless there is a very good reason for believing that no multiverse theory is likely to be true, then there is no reason to fall back upon any theistic resolution for the anthropic arguments. It is always less parsimonious to go with a theistic explanation – for all of the reasons that I listed in my previous post.
[However, I do notice that all proposals involving a multiverse (MWI, Smolin’s natural selection proposal, string theory) are more or less controversial]
The majority of cosmologists also reject the theistic explanation for this. They broadly fall in to one of the following camps –
1) Some particular set of fundamental constants was inevitable, and our universe is the result of the particular set that arose at the beginning of our universe. Of course, this says nothing about how the universe came into existence in the first place, but does answer the fine-tuning argument for the existence of a deity.
2) Some variety of multiverse theory is true. As noted previously, it requires fewer ad-hoc assumptions to posit a multiverse rather than just a single universe – so this solution is actually more parsimonious than the single universe one, and is far more parsimonious than the theistic proposition.
The problem with your reasoning is that your theistic explanation is superficially seductive, as it initially seems to be more parsimonious, but you are failing to look at all of the implications entailed by this explanation. When you do this, you see that such an explanation introduces far more ad-hoc assumptions than a purely naturalistic explanation.
[I must object here that the total inventory of things that we know to exist in the universe goes beyond natural things and causes. It includes qualia, reason and logic, consciousness etc.]
No it doesn’t. You are confusing what we are not able to fully explain yet by naturalistic means, and what doesn’t have a naturalistic explanation at all. Just because we can’t yet fully explain these phenomena by naturalistic means does not mean that we never will be able to. You are asserting that we will never – even in principle – be able to explain these phenomena by natural means. However, you have no evidence to support this assertion.
Naturalists would respond that all the arguments for naturalism (especially the argument from precedent and the argument to the best explanation) entail that whatever the explanation of qualia actually is, it is far more likely to be a natural explanation than a supernatural one, and therefore naturalism is still the most credible worldview. Naturalists also point out that no supernatural theory of qualia has been produced or verified, either, and therefore supernaturalism has also failed to explain this phenomenon. And in such a case, our best bet is to follow past precedent, which in cognitive science has been a consistent and remarkable trend of confirming physicalism in almost every other aspect of the study of mind. Science has already confirmed that qualia-production has identifiable locations in the brain and requires the expenditure of energy (oxygen and nutrients), two indications that qualia have a physical cause. Since there is no scientific evidence supporting the hypothesis that qualia have a supernatural cause, their existence does not argue against naturalism.
I would tend to argue that a professed absence of metaphysics is metaphysical as long as it is reasonable. Because rigorous skepticism towards any kind of metaphysics would involve skepticism towards the existence of a knowable reality, other minds, and similar very reasonable propositions. Also, I prefer metaphysical ideas which are presented as such, because then their basis is clearer and they are more open for criticism and consideration. This is not to say that, shall we say, Daveism or Bensonism or other kinds of “minimal metaphysics” are unreasonable positions. I haven’t finished the debate within myself yet.
Nick:
“No it doesn’t. You are confusing what we are not able to fully explain yet by naturalistic means, and what doesn’t have a naturalistic explanation at all. Just because we can’t yet fully explain these phenomena by naturalistic means does not mean that we never will be able to. You are asserting that we will never – even in principle – be able to explain these phenomena by natural means. However, you have no evidence to support this assertion.”
That’s exactly what I am asserting. I have no scientific evidence to support that assertion, but I nevertheless have some very good reasons to do so. The main one is presented in Popper’s “The Open Universe” and I think also in the Thomas Nagel book “The Last Word” I just got from the library. Essentially, a reductionist, determinist account of mentality would necessarily involve a reductionist, determinist account of logic and reason – at which point the explanation would become self-refuting, as the reductionist account itself would be based on logic and reason (which is primary to our knowledge of the universe). In other words, the argument is a bit similar to the argument against epistemic relativism (which famously undercuts its own validity). If valid, it would mean that whereas mentality may arise naturalistically from physics, we would never know that it does.
Merlijn,
The subject as qualia is of course one that produces much debate amongst philosophers and scientists. There is currently no consensus on this matter, but I would refute your suggestion that you have good reason to believe that qualia have no naturalistic cause.
You said –
[I must object here that the total inventory of things that we know to exist in the universe goes beyond natural things and causes. It includes qualia, reason and logic, consciousness etc.]
However, the fact that we may never be able to reach a consensus upon a naturalistic explanation does not mean that no such explanation exists. It may be that reason cannot deduce this explanation (for the reasons that you give, although I will certainly reserve judgement on this point, as Popper and Nagel’s reasoning might be mistaken), but that does not mean that such an explanation doesn’t exist. Further, you imply that qualia therefore have a supernatural explanation. So, what would this explanation be, and how would you deduce it?
In fact, your argument does not support the assertion that there is a supernatural explanation for qualia. Rather, it leads to the conclusion that no naturalistic explanation can be deduced – which is not the same thing. In a situation where one reaches an impasse by not being able to satisfactorily explain qualia by any means, then I would say that this would then be ruled out of court by both naturalists and theists. As such, I don’t believe that you can use it to support your thesis at all.
Nick,
I don’t disagree with your thesis that my rejection of a naturalistic explanation for, say, reason or logic does not imply a supernatural one, if supernatural is to imply theistic. It does mean, in my understanding of the word “explanation”, that the explanation does not exist, even if eliminative materialism would be true (though unknowably so).
But what I originally responded to was your statement that:
“Empirical methods have consistently discovered only natural things and causes, even underlying many things once thought to be supernatural. Meanwhile, no other methods have produced any consistent conclusions about the substance or causes of anything, much less anything supernatural.”
The first part of this is true, though perhaps trivial: I think that empirical methods in the strict, positivist sense are inapplicable to anything non-physical (such as human history). But that does not entail we have no knowledge of anything else. We know that we ourselves exist, pretty reliably so, if intuitively. We know reason and logic exist.
What my argument leads to is not a shortcut to theism, but the position that metaphysical naturalism cannot be supported as a default position. It may be true, or not. However, this means that the explananda for any theist or non-theist hypothesis go quite beyond what we can empirically verify.
“[And if there are such contributions, are they contributions that could not have been made by anything other than religion? ]
All sorts of things could be different, including the history of economics. But just because Sraffa’s theory of the production of commodities by commodities *could* have been turned into a viable microfoundation, doesn’t give someone an excuse to ignore all of Samuelson now if they want to be taken seriously talking about economics.”
It’s not an excuse, it’s a serious (genuine, non-evasive) objection. The problem is (in my view) that there are historically a lot of people who thought about our understanding of the world in religious terms because no others were available, or because the others available seemed or were too impoverished, too lacking in evidence and data, or because the others available were taboo, or because they’d never had access to the others available. It’s a historical, contingent fact that religion was the chief framework for thinking about our understanding of the world in many parts of the world for many centuries; that means that it is at least likely that in other contingent circumstances people who thought about our understanding of the world would have done so in other ways. In other words it is possible to think of religious thought about our understanding of the world as an intrusion or infection of otherwise more sensible or rational or fallibilist or open-ended or productive or empirical or genuinely inquiring ways of thinking about the matter. To put it crudely, yes, sure, in the 9th century people thought about our understanding of the world in religious ways, and that was a sad limitation on their thinking, which was based on false or improbable premises. This limitation prevented them from making important contributions to our understanding of the world; it caused them to do something more like subtracting from our understanding of the world.
But maybe I’m wrong about that. So give us some examples.
Merlijn,
[What my argument leads to is not a shortcut to theism, but the position that metaphysical naturalism cannot be supported as a default position. It may be true, or not. However, this means that the explananda for any theist or non-theist hypothesis go quite beyond what we can empirically verify.]
As you will be aware, amongst philosophers the theory of knowledge is almost as contentious as that of consciousness. Also, as pointed out by Hume, there are circularity issues with the type of inductive reasoning used within science. Consequently, no explanation of the world around us can ever be claimed with absolute certainty. One can only reach provisional conclusions. In a real-world scenario in which we have many possible hypotheses that explain a phenomenon (possibly including supernatural ones), rationality dictates that we should provisionally accept the most reasonable hypothesis on offer.
When it comes to fathoming the universe, what counts is finding the most plausible hypotheses by means of comparing them with observation. In order to move beyond the realm of pure metaphysics, one must endeavour to compare one’s chosen hypothesis with reality, to assess its fit with the evidence. With no requirement to compare with reality, one can concoct ever-increasingly complex worldviews, without any way to know if they are true or not. Logical consistency alone as a criterion will only get you so far, as an infinity of logically consistent hypotheses can be put forward to explain some phenomenon or other. We have to compare our favoured hypothesis with reality. As Hume said – even a rational man with no experience “could not have inferred from the fluidity and transparency of water that it would suffocate him, or from the light and warmth of fire that it would consume him.”
In such a scenario I assert that we should resort to an argument to the best explanation. In general, the more one explanation exceeds all others on each of the following criteria, the more confident we can be that it is true –
• Explanatory scope
• Explanatory power
• Plausibility
• Parsimony
• Evidential fit
I would contend that the worldview that is the argument to the best explanation of the world we see around us is metaphysical naturalism. That does not mean that metaphysical naturalism is necessarily true, but rather that it is currently the best explanation on offer. Thus, I contend that it should be provisionally accepted. It is certainly a far better explanation than any competing theistic worldview.
If you would like to read more about this, I would highly recommend that you get hold of a copy of Richard Carrier’s book ‘Sense and Goodness Without God – a Defense of Metaphysical Naturalism’
The courtroom discussion of metaphysical naturalism in the Kitzmiller case is interesting, too.
Merlijn,
Two things. Firstly, I think that we reached a point of agreement upon the qualia question. Namely, whilst it may be conceivable that we may never have a naturalistic explanation of qualia, that alone does not support the theory that qualia have some supernatural cause. On that subject, I thought you might be interested to read the following, as it covers some of the same ground –
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/reppert.html
Secondly, I just wanted to deal with a point that you made in one of your earlier posts (and have noticed you made on other occasions) –
[But I make this point that if we take stock of what count or does not count as an explanandum for which a Deity may or may not be a good explanation, we cannot stop at the physical world. To do so would be to base ourselves a metaphysic incompatible with theism at the outset. In other words, it would be begging the question.]
In answer to that, I would point out that we have no evidence that there exists anything outside of the physical world (i.e. supernatural). However, even if we suppose that some supernatural entity does exist, we seem to be limited in our enquiries to just the material world. Hence, we can only attempt to infer the existence of such an entity by searching for its effects upon the material world. So, in order to make any progress with this question, we need to frame our supernatural entity hypothesis in such a way that it makes predictions about the material world that we are able to investigate.
Now, when we investigate the material world, we should do so scientifically, as this is by far the most successful methodology that we have at our disposal. It combines logic with observation in the most rigorous way that we have so far been able to invent. Now, you may argue that we cannot investigate the non-material world scientifically, but that is not what we are attempting to do here. I repeat, since we appear to be limited to the material world (and have no direct evidence that any supernatural realm exists at all), we have no choice but to attempt to infer its existence but looking for its effects within the material universe. Therefore, that objection is a red herring.
On a mundane level, this involves testing psychics and suchlike by carrying out empirical tests of their supposed powers. They have framed their assertions in such a way that the phenomena should be detectable to us in the material world. Therefore, if they are not detected, then the psychics’ hypothesis is falsified.
Similarly, in order to investigate the god hypothesis, we need to frame it in such a way that it makes predictions about what we would expect to observe in the material universe. If we are not able frame our god hypothesis in such a way, then it cannot be investigated at all, as we have no other means at our disposal. Logic alone will not do here, as we can formulate any number of hypotheses that would pass the logic criterion. Furthermore, there are logical issues with the god hypothesis anyway, as I pointed out in a previous post.
Now, some may argue that their god hypothesis makes no predictions about what we would expect to see in the material universe. In such a case, we have no way of testing such a hypothesis, and if the proposed supernatural entity or ability is so rare, so obscure, so inert, so unrelated to human experience, and so strange and complex as to entail exactly the same observations already entailed by naturalism, that there is no reasonable argument to be made for believing it.
In your case, you seem to hold a belief akin to pantheism (or, perhaps, panentheism). So, to test your hypothesis, you need to make some predictions of what we would expect to see in the material universe if such a god exists. You seem to think that the apparent cosmological fine-tuning is something that you would expect to find. However, on its own I think that this is not good enough reason for going with your hypothesis as opposed to some naturalistic one (for reasons that I have already covered. You also have the qualia point, but I think we covered that). So, your hypothesis I would rate as unlikely, but not absurd.
Now, by contrast, the types of hypothesis advanced by many theists (for example, an all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-good God who is specifically interested in humans) do make many predictions about what one would expect to see in the universe. Almost without exception, these predictions are not met in reality, so the hypothesis is almost certainly false.
So, to summarise, we are justified in investigating our god hypothesis scientifically, as this is all that we can do. That is not to say that the supernatural cannot exist, but rather that we seem to be confined to the material world and, when investigating the material world, the scientific method is our best bet. If we had direct access to any supernatural realm, then we could investigate it that way. However, there is no plausible evidence that we have such access, so until some is presented, we are limited to the materialistic. In the meantime, we have no choice but to frame our hypotheses of supernatural entities in such a way that they make predictions about what we would expect to observer, and test these.
If you disagree, then how would you propose that we test our supernatural god hypothesis in any other way than by observing the material universe?
My money’s still on Nick, but what a contest! Biff, pow, zap! Makes me wish we could do it all down the pub, would be a roaring evening. And I got to look up what ‘qualia’ are. Stonking!
And now that you know what qualia are you know everything!
Knowing what qualia are means you know nothing surely?
(Actually in the pub now – so I’ll reply to Nick’s points tomorrow. Exchange reminds me of why I read N&C – careless argument not tolerated here. Will be back)
One naturalistic explanation for qualia might be that they are irreducible mental tokens. There has been no evolutionary need to allow us to introspect or express them, so we get along OK by just agreeing that most of us experience something at a given point in the visible spectrum and having our mind assign a random ID to that experience that it doesn’t use for anything else. The regress has to stop somewhere.
I don’t really see the fascination with qualia. This isn’t to say I don’t enjoy them (I’m an artist) but I don’t think they are the showstopper for naturalism they are often claimed as.
Indeed. And I have never thought there was a little man inside the box making all the pictures on my computer screen either.
Where do simple biological facts, like anaesthesia, or a bang on the head, turning consciousness off like a light-bulb, come into all these suggestions that there must be something ‘more’ than the brain involved?
Are we back to the ‘Ooh, I’m so special’ argument?
A little speculation now on the subject of qualia. Perhaps the always-assumed connection between qualia and consciousness is just a red herring. For example, how can we be so sure that a mouse does not experience qualia? Why would it not experience some feeling of what it is like to see the light at the end of a tunnel, or to feel the warmth from a stove if it is moving towards it? Why would a butterfly not experience some feeling of ‘attractiveness’ in a flower that it is drawn towards? Colour vision is present in some lower animals, so why wouldn’t they have some experience of ‘redness’? How about a bat? Can we be so sure that it experiences no peculiarly bat-like qualia?
I would suggest that qualia are merely functions of perception, and are thus likely to be present in other animals too. We are conscious of our perception of qualia, because we are conscious, but that does not imply that consciousness is a prerequisite for experiencing qualia, or that qualia in themselves tell us something interesting about consciousness. Our experience of qualia will likely vary from that present in lower animals, as we have an additional layer of self-awareness that they don’t seem to possess. For example, our perception of pain may be different to that of other animals, but that doesn’t imply that they don’t experience pain at all.
However, in my opinion, the experience of qualia alone cannot be used to justify property dualism, and may in fact be an example of the masked man fallacy. We may never be able to construct a complete naturalistic explanation of qualia, but that may be due to limitations of language, imagination, or ingenuity, and does not imply that a supernatural explanation is appropriate. Julian Baggini’s article on this site is relevant here –
http://www.butterfliesandwheels.com/badmovesprint.php?num=49
Also, for more discussion on qualia, see –
http://www.imprint.co.uk/cottrell/jcsmainframe.html
So…the list of religion’s ‘extremely important contributions to our understanding of the world’ is still not forthcoming. I guess we’ll have to go on thinking there is no such list then.
Brief reply to Nick –
I think the key to where we disagree is the following:
“In answer to that, I would point out that we have no evidence that there exists anything outside of the physical world (i.e. supernatural)”
(Note that I am intentionally avoiding the word ‘supernatural’ here). In any event, the validity of the above depends on your notion of evidence. If it is taken to mean “empirical, experimentally repeatable” evidence, then I would agree, but would regard the statement as somewhat trivial at the same time – as empirical, scientific methodology in the positivist sense is only applicable to physical stuff. But I would reiterate that the existence of things such as subjectivity, reason, mathematical principles, etc. is clear even if not buttressed by evidence in the sense mentioned above. It may well be that these follow from matter, biology, neurochemistry and the like – but then the validity of the conclusion above would already be assumed.
So from where I’m at, my default position would not be metaphysical naturalism but some kind of Platonic dualism. For the reason, basically, that aside from matter we are dealing also with the laws and the principles that govern matter, and these are very real, if ideal. Aside from that, it does seem to me that there is something objective yet empirically unverifiable about the validity of logic, or 1+2=3. You mentioned Hume’s criticism of induction, and whereas I would obviously agree that the validity of the conclusion is not entirely guaranteed with induction (the next observation may just falsify it all), I think that in our view on the universe we must nevertheless assume the laws of nature which are inductively established to be non-locally valid. Because the methodology of science depends on it – if they would be local in space and time, the whole enterprise of verifying and falsifying them would become unreliable. But this is a metaphysical viewpoint, one that cannot be established by science itself. In any event, given all that, and given that I suspect that at least some of the “ideal” things mentioned are not reducible to matter (see below), it would seem at least as natural to me to regard matter as a manifestation of the ideal laws and mathematics governing it than the other way around. But I’ll read Carrier when I have more time.
Now that, in itself, does not imply Deism or Theism. It may be more close to what Dawkins regards as basic principles of the universe falsely identified with God. Nevertheless, it would seem to me that an overt kind of Platonic idealism is at least a step on the way there.
I can think of issues which would falsify my “God hypothesis”. A definite rejection of anthropic reasoning on the basis of some kind of multiverse theory would dent it. The reduction of mentality, rationality and logic to biochemistry would indeed falsify it – but if this is indeed possible, the non-existence of God would be the least of our worries. Because if mentality is reduced to neurochemistry in a deterministic manner and locked in a scientifically established deterministic view on the universe, we would be able to foresee the development of the universe as a whole including ourselves and the growth of our own knowledge (at which point we would already have our future knowledge, i.e. we get into a paradox – this is Popper again).
In any event, I don’t think this kind of “testing” resembles the empirical method: rather, it would be investigating the fit of a certain metaphysical viewpoint with a given, always developing, scientific view of the world. As I’ve argued before, I don’t think God can be investigated as a subject of science in the same way protons can be. However, I do believe science and philosophy interact in various ways.
“I would suggest that qualia are merely functions of perception, and are thus likely to be present in other animals too.”
Yes, I think they are related to the sense centres of the brain. Perhaps it’s possible that simpler animals have only qualia and no consciousness. I don’t mean this in the sense that they cannot communicate their experiences, but that they have no ability to describe or introspect their own experiences to themselves neurologically.
So qualia and subjectivity could in fact be opposed, as qualia might be anti-subjective phenomena inside the brain but outside what we would regard as the self-aware subject.
Merlijn,
[In any event, the validity of the above depends on your notion of evidence. If it is taken to mean “empirical, experimentally repeatable” evidence, then I would agree, but would regard the statement as somewhat trivial at the same time – as empirical, scientific methodology in the positivist sense is only applicable to physical stuff.]
I believe that I have already answered that point. In my view, there is no evidence of any other type, as any such evidence would already have proven the existence of the supernatural – so that objection merely begs the question. What we need to do is seek a middle course – i.e. to seek physical evidence from which we can infer the supernatural. For example, science can and does study phenomena, such as intercessory prayer, which if empirically verified would be highly unlikely to be explainable naturally.
Perhaps you consider that if something can be studied by science, and possibly falsified by it, then it no longer counts as supernatural. However, in that case, exactly what would you consider to be supernatural, and how might be ever go about determining its validity or otherwise? Can it only be investigated by some other supernatural means? Surely, in such a case, we are just begging the question again.
[But I would reiterate that the existence of things such as subjectivity, reason, mathematical principles, etc.]
I do not take these examples as evidence of any supernatural phenomenon. Why do you think that I should? Again, we have a distinction between what cannot be fully explained yet (or, perhaps, ever), and what is considered non-naturalistic. You seem to think that the former implies the latter, but I beg to differ. I do, in fact, suspect that subjectivity and reason “follow from matter, biology, neurochemistry and the like”. Mathematics is an interesting subject in its own right. However, I still do not accept that you can draw any conclusion about the supernatural from it, so it is something of a red herring here.
[Aside from that, it does seem to me that there is something objective yet empirically unverifiable about the validity of logic, or 1+2=3.]
That it is very moot point, as I’m sure you know, but do you think that point somehow implies the supernatural? Why?
[I think that in our view on the universe we must nevertheless assume the laws of nature which are inductively established to be non-locally valid.]
So do I.
[But this is a metaphysical viewpoint, one that cannot be established by science itself.]
That’s the whole point of what Hume was saying. However, all metaphysical standpoints are in the same boat here I’m afraid.
[I can think of issues which would falsify my “God hypothesis”. A definite rejection of anthropic reasoning on the basis of some kind of multiverse theory would dent it. The reduction of mentality, rationality and logic to biochemistry would indeed falsify it]
So, in apparent contradiction to what you have been saying previously, are you now proposing empirical tests for your supernatural hypothesis?
[Because if mentality is reduced to neurochemistry in a deterministic manner and locked in a scientifically established deterministic view on the universe, we would be able to foresee the development of the universe as a whole including ourselves and the growth of our own knowledge (at which point we would already have our future knowledge, i.e. we get into a paradox – this is Popper again)]
Actually, I subscribe to a Compatibilist viewpoint (see: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/compatibilism/).
In my opinion, your argument is fallacious, as you have conflated two premises into one, and drawn a false conclusion. The first part is false, as:
• “We would be able to foresee the development of the universe as a whole including ourselves and the growth of our own knowledge”
Does not follow from your premise that:
• “Because if mentality is reduced to neurochemistry in a deterministic manner”
Secondly, whilst it might follow from an entirely deterministic view of the universe that the future of the universe could be foreseen, there is no reason to suppose that we would ever have sufficient information or capability to be able to do this. That our consciousness is a result of purely naturalistic processes and the universe obeys deterministic rules (of course, there is debate on this point as well) does NOT imply that we will ever be able to foresee the development of the universe as a whole, and our knowledge within it. So, your argument is a non sequitur.
[In any event, I don’t think this kind of “testing” resembles the empirical method: rather, it would be investigating the fit of a certain metaphysical viewpoint with a given, always developing, scientific view of the world.]
I think that you have a rather confused view of what constitutes the scientific method (of which, the empirical method is but one part), as I think that such tests are within the remit of science. See the following for more information: http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/SciLit.html
[As I’ve argued before, I don’t think God can be investigated as a subject of science in the same way protons can be. However, I do believe science and philosophy interact in various ways.]
But, you previously stated that “A definite rejection of anthropic reasoning on the basis of some kind of multiverse theory would dent it. The reduction of mentality, rationality and logic to biochemistry would indeed falsify it”. So, which is it? It does depend upon what you mean by “investigate”, of course. If you mean seek to verify or falsify, then I think that you have just contradicted your previous statement. If you mean something more vague, such as deduce the properties of, then this would be harder – but not necessarily impossible. If there was good evidence for the existence of such a supernatural deity, then we might be able to make headway in inferring its characteristics indirectly – as that’s the type of process that science does quite often.
To summarise, I think that you have not made your case. You seem to think that the scientific method is not applicable to verifying or falsifying hypothesized supernatural entities (even by indirect inference), but do not answer my case from yesterday. You then give some examples of tests that science may one day be able to do that might falsify your god hypothesis, and thereby contradict yourself. You give examples of phenomena that you think will be forever inexplicable by naturalistic means. However, even if we accept this – which is far from obvious – you make no good case for the implication that they have some supernatural case.
Briefly,
I never understood the point for a distinction between natural and supernatural, and hence am not using it. The word supernatural would be applicable to a miracle-wreaking, interventionist Theistic God – but that’s not an alternative I am considering. Whether I would consider rationality, mind etc. as natural or supernatural is an interesting question: as it is, I would answer negatively to the latter, as I do not believe they can subvert or break the laws of physics which I would argue they are in some kind of Platonic fashion immanent in. But these are difficult questions.
As an aside, I do not believe the supernatural can be reliably inferred from the natural. It would be possible that the effects of prayer as such could be scientifically verified – but not any putative theory behind it involving a listening and intervening Deity. I think that the only possible scientific answer to any proof of the salutory effects of prayer would be “the effect is statistically valid, but we have no idea how it comes about”. The reasoning that “God did it” may be more or less compelling – but it isn’t, and cannot be, scientific.
The reason being that if we’re dealing with an omnipotent and interventionist God, there is nothing that God cannot do. We’re dealing with a way too powerful and limitless kind of explanation for science to handle (and this is not a criticism of science, to the contrary!).
There’s another consideration, which I will dwell on below, which is that teleological explanations, which are always in the last instance based on empathy – “what would I have done” – are by necessity weaker than the causal ones used in natural science, which are experimentally repeatable.
I would reject the scientific pretensions of ID for the same reason: in order to invoke a Designer as an explanatory principle, we need to have at least some notions on the limits of the designer. Something we can point to and say: “There’s no way, knowing what we know about the designer, that he could have designed that“. With the kind of Designer which it is obviously all about, this is impossible. But I think the same kind of problem would go for the effects of prayer and the like. The scientifically respectable explanation for the relativity of life absent Darwin, absent evolution, would be “we don’t know”.
This does not mean one can’t more or less responsibly speculate about the existence of God, frame such in an overarching philosophical framework, or reject it on the basis of its incompatibility with such a framework, etc. But it would mean that limitless Deities (the non-interventionist panentheist one as well as the interventionist one of traditional theism) are in principle not the stuff of science.
As for determinism, I agree we would never be able to have all the information needed to determine the state of the universe a certain time for now. But I would think this bodes ill for the possible scientific confirmation of determinism. A deterministic view on the universe may still be possible – but I do not believe it will be able to leave the area of metaphysics.
I would insist that there is no contradiction between my statement that God is in principle not a scientifically investigable category; and that nonetheless one’s fit between a metaphysical and a scientific worldview can be more or less successful. My usage of the word “falsify” may have been unclear – but I did not intend “falsify” in the meaning of “scientifically falsify”. The thing about the verification and falsification of scientific hypotheses is that they are compelling, ideally equally so to any observer.
I do not think the same kind of strong compelling nature exists with teleological explanations (including those involving the purpose of the whole universe). In order for me to think of a way to “falsify” such an explanation, I must regard it as valid in the first place. But I think there is room for someone to reject anthropic reasoning out of hand, multiverse or no multiverse. Which is why I said, on the one hand, that a multiverse with varying laws of physics would “dent” my worldview – and why on the other thread I related somewhat reservedly to anthropic reasoning.
Mutatis mutandis, the same would go for metaphysics. Which is why you do not find a consensus among metaphysicians on such things as the mind-matter relationship even close to the consensus among physicists about relativity; and why the questions asked here some weeks ago on what theologists have reached consensus about is irrelevant. In language history, there isn’t even consensus that explanation is even possible; and I would gather the same might be the case for history in general. This does not mean that rational discussion about these issues is impossible, or that all explanations or non-explanations are equal – it just means that explanation never reach the compellingness of the deductive-nomological model of the natural sciences.
The second kind of falsification I was thinking of is of a wholly different kind. At the moment, I would place determinism firmly within philosophy – so the clash between my God hypothesis and determinism is one between incompatible philosophical lines of thought. Nothing empirical about it. But I can conceive (barely) that a deterministic, reductionist mind-matter relationship would one day be scientifically validated. In fact, for reasons explicated, I am not sure if I can conceive it if I think through all the consequences of it. But I may be wrong. If I am, however, I would be wrong on a lot of things: including my view on scientific method, the difference between the natural sciences and the humanities, etcetera.
Addendum to the following to clarify my position on “God as scientific hypothesis”. In my opinion, there’s an essential difference between, say, explaining the origin of the eye and a putative teleological explanation for the fundamental properties of the universe.
In the former, positing a Deity as designer is in principle unscientific for the reason a Deity is unlimited, omnipotent, etc. In the latter case, positing a Deity as a teleological, underlying explanation for the structure of the universe may or may not be a good idea – but the objection of the former case doesn’t apply, as we are dealing with the whole of what we know and what we can observe, including physical laws, constants, etc.
The explanation would encompass the ultimate categories of science (fundamental laws and principles) and by definition not be within their domain. Hence my position that fine-tuning arguments and the like are affected by scientific knowledge, but not subject to science itself.
“In language history, there isn’t even consensus that explanation is even possible; and I would gather the same might be the case for history in general.”
Do you think the same might be the case as a matter of practical fact – that there are just so many variables compared to the number of people available to investigate them that it simply can’t be done (which is pretty much my understanding of why the ‘human sciences’ are so [necessarily] fuzzy)? Or do you think it might be the case on principle – that even with infinite time to investigate every single fact about every single event, down to the physical causes of each – it still couldn’t be done? If you think it’s the second, do you know why?
Merlijn,
Sorry, I haven’t had time today to reply to your previous post.
The whole concept of the applicability of science, and of what constitutes and distinguishes nature and the supernatural is very interesting of course. I can recommend the following reading –
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/keith_augustine/thesis.html
My reply will follow soon…
OB – Complicated issue.
I think both are true. Impossibility in practice, and in principle.
Now, the lack of consensus I mentioned goes to teleological explanation as well as deductive, causative explanation. And in linguistic history, these questions have seen very little treatment (with a few exceptions). Reason being first the difficulty of determining what happened in undocumented prehistory, second the fascination with synchronic structure or universal grammar as primary during most of the 20th century. I know very little about the situation in general history.
I think it’s very easy to support the notion that prediction and the like are impossible in practice in linguistic history, human history etc. for the reasons you mentioned. Not a single “law” in human history has been discovered and not for want of looking. But I’ve recently come to reject the idea in principle as well. One reason being that I think that at least linguistic history loses descriptive coherence, not to speak of explanation, without applying some kind of hermeneutic “stepping into another’s shoes” – i.e. analysing structural changes as purposeful actions by intentional agents. Historical linguists have done so for a century or more, knowing it or not. In general history, I’d say that it is more superficially clear that we are dealing with human actions, and teleological explanations are less controversial.
Now, it’s possible to regard that as a stopgap approach. We explain history teleologically, while aware of the fact that such explanations are always post-hoc, prediction is impossible, and compellingness is weaker than in the natural sciences. They may be compelling in that purposeful actions adhere to commonly shared rational norms and are understandable by that virtue – but accepting such a criterion would already mean accepting a non-positivist approach to philosophy of science. At the same time, we may feel that below all that, human actions, and hence history, linguistic history, etc. are nonetheless based on physics, neurology, biochemistry – even if we will never be able to make that reduction.
I would depart from that and go for a “hard” version of teleology. I.e. the explanation works because human actions are ultimately determined by purposes of self-determining humans, and they are unpredictable (if understandable) because human actions are free. Which doesn’t mean that they are random. I.e. I would say that human actions are of a ‘third kind’: neither causal in a deterministic fashion, nor random.
I think the both approaches really root in ultimately different metaphysical grounds. They make little difference to the practice of human history. One could prefer the “soft” version of teleological explanation on the grounds of an ideal of unified science, or a metaphysical position of materialism. One could prefer the second one on the basis of its commonsensicalness – it’s a basic fact of experience that our actions seem, within limitations, free to us; that we seem self-determining to ourselves, if not, as Marx said, in circumstances of our own choosing.
My own reasons for accepting the second one would be the following:
1) As I’m not exactly a materialist – i.e. I accept the existence of at least some non-material categoriesas irreducibly real – I see no compelling reason to accept any ultimate if unattainable model of physical causation of human actions.
2) The first alternative – that a superficially teleological model is ultimately rooted in physical causation – seems quite complicated to me. There are aesthetic criteria at work here as well, I guess. I love the logical, rational processes employed in “hermeneutic” reasoning: abduction, analogy, etc. The sudden flash of insight that you “understand” some kind of complicated syntactic innovation. And there’s a beautiful symmetry involved here: that to understand human action is, ultimately, to re-enact and to perform it (as human actions are rooted in rational human thought).
I am aware that the concept “hermeneutic” may have been used as a buzzword in various fashionable nonsense. See the title of Sokal’s hoax for instance. I must hasten to add that I think the employment of it is incompatible with any kind of relativistic, “culturally local” notion of truth. The whole enterprise is based on the notion that human beings experience the same kind of truth in employing the same kinds of rational thought. I remain very strictly non-postmodernistic here.
Anyway, these arguments may not be convincing to you. And as I stated, I think an acceptance of a softer kind of teleological model is perfectly compatible with how the human sciences are practiced. Ultimately, one’s preference would be based on one’s holistic, metaphysical “world-view”. Which in my case includes some kind of validity of logic, rationality that is primary, objective, etc. In any event, it’s fascinating to think through the consequences of some superficially very “minor” issues and differences as the ones above. Which I guess is my weakness: I like to hear myself think ;-)
Merlijn, yes, it is fascinating. Even if (however it feels to us) it’s ultimately caused by physical processes and nothing further!
I guess the minor difference between us boils down to your “I see no compelling reason to accept any ultimate if unattainable model of physical causation of human actions.”
I suppose it’s just that I see no compelling reason not to.
And yet, I remain quite woolly in other ways. I still disagree with people who claim one can’t meaningfully say Bach is better than Vivaldi or Shakespeare is better than Edgar Guest, that aesthetic opinions are pure taste, pure preference, and nothing else.
Odd, isn’t it.
I would argue that you then do accept some kind of objectively valid aesthetic criteria (as do I). Or perhaps you are compartmentalizing a bit? ;-) Then again, total consistency is a sign of an inert mind.
Not sure. Never am sure. Recurrent problem. I don’t think I do accept that there are genuinely objectively valid aesthetic criteria, yet I still think one can meaningfully argue for some aesthetic criteria. Is that incoherent? Contradictory? I’m not sure. (Can I opt for quasi-objectively valid? Borrowed from Simon Blackburn’s ‘quasi-realism’?) I think one can give meaningful, non-nonsensical reasons for claiming that Sxhpr is better than [insert bad poet here] but those reasons will still be short of binding or knock-down or incontrovertible.
Merlijn: I too am intrigued by your remark that “In language history, there isn’t even consensus that explanation is even possible.” That seems to me surprisingly defeatist. OK, there can’t be a universally accepted explanation of why, step by step, users changed (for example) the Latin of Cicero into the Italian of Dante; or the English of Chaucer into the English of Shakespeare. But isn’t that because there’s only fragmentary data about the street versions of Cicero etc, and, crucially, no recordings?
In contrast, won’t the language historians of 2200 be able to examine huge archives of many languages, and, in principle, reach some consensus about why each change happened?
I agree that it could turn out to be very difficult, for example to understand who the influential speakers are who can get a new usage accepted. But why would you and your colleagues think it in principle impossible?
And even without much data, can’t you form some plausible theories about why, in the last 2000 years, case endings (for example) vanished in Italy, but survived in Russia?
On the other hand, it seems to me that there are not, and never could be, any data about the operations of a presumed deity, of whatever kind.
Turning to aesthetics, we can observe that some works of art go on moving many humans in many cultures for centuries, while others are forgotten. OK, it still doesn’t follow that the works that survive are objectively ‘better art’, but in my opinion it’s a good enough criterion for practical purposes. Moreover, many music lovers, both now and in 1800, could give you some fairly objective reasons why they can happily listen to most Haydn symphonies 50 times in their lifetime, but quickly tire of Wanhal.
Careful with empirical generalizations about aesthetics, Nicholas. I would wager that larger numbers of people today are moved by episodes of “As the World Turns” than Shakespeare. Also, if we counterpose the following pieces of poetic language:
“Have ye beheld the young God of the Seas,
My dispossessor? Have ye seen his face?
Have ye beheld his chariot, foam’d along
By noble winged creatures he hath made?
I saw him on the calmed waters scud,
With such a glow of beauty in his eyes,
That it enforc’d me to bid sad farewell
To all my empire: farewell sad I took,
And hither came, to see how dolorous fate
Had wrought upon ye; and how I might best
Give consolation in this woe extreme.
Receive the truth, and let it be your balm.”
And
“There you were, I fell on the floor
The way you move, girl, only made me want you more
I did not know you had me hypnotized
There’s a movement of your body dancin’ in my eyes
I know I had to hold you and make you mine
Don’t want to control you just to have a good time
In ecstasy when you’re layin’ down next to me
Oh, no, no, ecstasy, yeah, when you’re layin’ down next to me”
I daresay we would be able to make some kind of judgement on aesthetic quality, even without knowing anything about the two writers concerned, or their public reception.
Indeed, today more people are moved by an episode of “As the world turns” than by Hamlet. My test is how much people are moved by them in 2200.
On my test, Hyperion is not great art. As far as I know, few people now pick it up to read for pleasure. Subjectively, I can suggest why: self-consciously antique language, empty imagery (foam’d along by noble winged creatures), laboured chiasmus which does not work in English (sad farewell/farewell sad), and the dull post-posed adjective “extreme”.
I tentatively suggest that Barry White is little read now. Possibly plenty of people still love the tunes and his voice; however that particular one only got to number 40 in the UK. Subjectively, I would point to one good line (“There’s a movement of your body dancin’ in my eyes”), so much more vivid than Keats’ foamed creatures. The rest is formulaic. But let’s wait and see if Barry’s in the Oxford book of 20th century verse, published in 2200.
I love Hyperion. Especially Oceanus’ monologue, the attempt to relinquish one’s world and consign oneself to oblivion with dignity. A wonderful metaphor for mortality and how to face it. I’d have quoted more of it ;-) As for the language – there may be some rough edges to my appreciation for English, as it is in the end a foreign one for me.
Perhaps we should make another comparison – say Dylan Thomas’ “Do not go gently…” and the lyrics to Manowar’s “Pleasure Slave”? And pretend that neither of the writers are known – we do not know that one of them is a song lyric. They are both scribbled down on a piece of paper found by alien anthropologists thousands of years after the end of our civilization. Could the alien anthropologists build a reasoned opinion about the comparative quality of the poems? I think they could!
I think that the examples you mention of explanation of linguistic change are quite right. But the notion of people self-consciously preserving archaic forms for whatever reason (group identification with regard to the next dialect; avoidance of a linguistic innovation that would create harmful homophony – there’s lots of examples of this stuff) is surprisingly controversial. Again, Roger Lass for instance strongly argues against exactly this kind of intuitively attractive explanation (in mainly two books – “On explaining language change”, 1980 and “Historical linguistics and language change”, 1997 – the latter is highly recommended. Even if he’s wrong about explanation, he’s right about so many other things).
I think part of the reason is some kind of “physics envy” among linguists. As our subject is more abstract, and more rule-bound, than any other humanistic subject. During the heyday of generative grammar, the adagium was to study language with the same methodology as physics was studied. At least Lass can’t quite escape that – in that he rejects the kind of deductive explanation from law but still sticks to a positivist view on science with prediction as the main goal.
I think the clincher here is your example of analogy. As analogy is a cognitive operation enacted by an individual. The explanation and the description of the change fall together. If we ditch the concept in favour of some kind of unknown “laws of language change” which do not involve the individual speaker, we have to ditch analogy and we can’t even coherently describe the change. As it is, analogy was banished from linguistic vocabulary during most of the 60s and 70s after it was slowly re-introduced.
Merlijn: Long may your pleasure in Hyperion continue. I count it just my misfortune that I don’t like it.
Yes, we could find two graffiti in Pompeii, one a bit of brothel doggerel, and one a lost and exquisite fragment of Catullus. And we’d know which was which, because 1900 years is long enough to be able to judge. The Catullus was doing well to survive to 79, and would still speak to us now. But no doubt the brothel doggerel was much more popular in 79.
I didn’t know about “physics envy”. Interesting, and of course misplaced. I’m surprised it wasn’t always taken as obvious that language changes depend on the whims and foibles of individual speakers, whereas the spectrum of sunlight does not depend on the foibles of hydrogen atoms – even though the behaviour of an individual hydrogen atom is a matter of probability, not prediction.
I’m surprised also that analogy was ever banished. Anyone can hear children doing it, all the time. (For example, my elder son, now 13, for a long time used “This is mines”, by analogy with ours yours and hers.)
Now shall we claim the prize for the thread that has drifted furthest off the topic, or shall I go back to asserting that theologians have no coherent adagia at all?
I think we can nominate ourselves for a shared John Halasz award of verbosity. Ophelia?
But again, I will protest at your statement about theology. Even if I agree with your statement that “On the other hand, it seems to me that there are not, and never could be, any data about the operations of a presumed deity, of whatever kind.” if that is to mean empirically verifiable data. I’ve been arguing much the same point to G. Tingey.
This does not make the question of the existence of God a meaningless one. I would say that the discussions here would indicate it is pretty meaningful. And it can be rationally argued for and against (there are more or less atheistic branches of theology as well) as a philosophical viewpoint. There is a possible philosophical standpoint that the question is meaningless in the absence of empirically verifiable data, of course. But that’s, for right and wrong, a viewpoint among many others.
And one can argue that the relationship between people and God is pretty real even in the absence of a Deity.
Again, you may counter that then we are arguing philosophy of religion, sociology of religion, history of religion – and all that. And I do not essentially disagree here. Theology as a unified subject has its roots in a theocratic age. Absolutely. But even if its existence as a “unified subject” is due to historical accident rather than to its own internal coherence, the work done under the nomer of “theology” does not automatically lose its validity.
No, sorry, Merlijn, you’re not really in the running for the JH award. Too clear, too many paragraphs, too dialogic instead of monologic. Also not really even close for length. JH could fill a whole unparagraphed screen without breaking a sweat.