Sun 8 Jun, 2008
The May 29 post on Tingley and Pascal has continued to raise discussion. It opened up questions about “the heart” as evidence or a way of knowing God. What does it mean? Is it valid? I originally wrote this as a comment following this one, but I’ve decided to post it as a main blog entry instead.
What if there were observational evidence, perceptions, that not everybody has access to? This is something like what Alvin Plantinga suggests in Warranted Christian Belief, and it has definite Biblical underpinnings.
We know there are everyday perceptions not everyone has access to: the visual world is inaccessible to the blind, and the profoundly deaf cannot know the world of sound except through rough analogies to felt vibrations. The Bible speaks of a kind of spiritual perception, a sense of God, that not all persons experience. The reasons are found in places like 1 Corinthians 2:10-14, where “the natural person” is one who has not been regenerated (given new spiritual life) through a relationship with Christ. In our natural condition, we are separated from God so thoroughly we can’t even tell he’s there, but he can and does open the eyes (metaphorically) of his followers so they gain that perception.
This is not fideism, faith in faith or belief for the sake of believing, without evidence. This is belief on the basis of perception. I believe there are dogs next door because I can hear them barking. I believe the weather is clear this morning because I see blue when I look up at the sky.
Obviously, the dogs and the weather both involve more than my immediate perceptions. I have a long, rich, personally and socially developed web of conceptions and confirmations surrounding my beliefs. In relation to the dogs, I have observed many dogs barking, I have never observed other animals barking; and in my experiences of other persons’ statements about dogs and barking, I’ve never heard it seriously suggested that it could be otherwise. I’ve heard recordings of dogs barking, but my experience with acoustics and my knowledge of my neighbor inform me that this is no recording. (Of course I also know that they have had a dog for a long time, but this is the first time I’ve heard two different “dog voices;” my knowledge of their having multiple dogs there is based on nothing but perception, within this conceptual background.)
My perception of the barking, accompanied by much other knowledge and experience, leads me to conclude there are dogs there. Is there a parallel set of confirming knowledge for the perception of God? Certainly there is. There is the clarification of perception given through revelation, God’s word. There is the social confirmation of millions of others who agree in what they perceive. There is the historical confirmation provided through archaeology, textual history, and so on. There is the personal confirmation provided through testing: I have tried God, and found him to be good (Psalm 34:4-8). There is the philosophical confirmation by which I find Christian theism to be far more explanatory than other worldviews.
I’m rambling, I know. But I’m trying also to explain “the heart.” It is partly about a direct perception of God. Since we’ve been on the subject of Pascal here, it’s worth pointing out what he himself said about about this, including:
GOD of Abraham, GOD of Isaac, GOD of Jacob
not of the philosophers and of the learned.
Certitude. Certitude. Feeling. Joy. Peace.
GOD of Jesus Christ.
My God and your God.
Your GOD will be my God.
Forgetfulness of the world and of everything, except GOD.
He is only found by the ways taught in the Gospel.
Grandeur of the human soul.
Righteous Father, the world has not known you, but I have known you.
Joy, joy, joy, tears of joy.
And what if one does not have this experience of God? I suggest you ask him for it. He will certainly answer, if you welcome it on his terms. He is the “Righteous Father,” who cares and loves as the most perfect father on earth cares and loves, only far better; and he is also one who intends to deliver us from our sin. Taste, and see that the Lord is good!
So, Tom, this is a perception unlike other perceptions, because there is no material condition that prevents anyone from perceiving the same thing, like blindness or deafness. This is a moral/intentional/heart blindness (?). And yet, it is the crucial aspect of determining an objective reality (whether God exists).
Is there any other conclusion about objective reality that in which only those with the correct heart/intent can perceive the crucial perception that would lead one to the correct conclusion about objective reality? How curious that a subjective condition is necessary for an objective conclusion. The harder criticism would say that it is ad hoc, if not begging the question. I still contend that, by itself, this situation is absurd and argues against the existence of God.
But that’s a crucial qualifier, because, as Tom notes, this apparently absurd situation is buttressed nonetheless by everything else that believers believe. The claim is that it is reasonable to believe this otherwise absurd situation because other aspects of God are reasonable.
So, taking the best atheist and theist arguments, giving each side the benefit of the doubt, leads us to conclude that, at best, one side or the other is deluding itself only by supporting their unsupportable structure with many other arguments, but enough of those other arguments are not ultimately supportable and only are supported with other likewise unsupportable elements. But that side can’t tell that the whole thing is supportable because the resulting structure is too complex to easily see its lack of support.
So, now what? How do we try to argue that lack of complex, inter-related support or lack thereof?
Seriously, Paul, given the entire message of Jesus Christ, I fail to see what’s curious about it. I think if you gave it some thought you could think of lots of real things that people cannot see if they are not morally ready to see them. Think in terms of interpersonal relationships. And…
This is the way it’s been for millennia–what’s ad hoc about it?
You see, I think you’re trying to make it make sense within a system where it obviously can’t make sense. You betray this approach by being surprised that this is the one perception for which failure can be attributed to something other than material reality. Why would that surprise you? It’s spiritual perception. Material failings influence material perception. More specifically, the failing that is specific to the perception influences the perception. Not being able to discern electromagnetic radiation does not harm one’s ability to discern acoustic vibrations. Why would it (or any other physical thing) have to influence one’s ability to discern something other than what it is, i.e., something spiritual?
And why do you call this spiritual life a subjective condition? What does that mean in this case? What is subjective about it?
This is hardly ad hoc. Reality at its core is spiritual before it is material. Creation is contingent. God is Spirit, and perceiving him requires spiritual perception. Yet we start out spiritually disconnected, alive physically but not spiritually. We’re dead to that perception. But God can and does give life (and the perception with it). It’s on his initiative; we can’t will ourselves back to life, but we can certainly ask him for it as I said above.
You’re right–no matter which worldview one adopts, it is extremely complex.
Yet Christianity is simple, too. It answers where we came from, what we’re here for, what our meaning and purpose are, why we have the yearnings we do, why they are unsatisfied, and how they can be satisfied. It explains why the universe exists, how it began, why it is rational and why we can apprehend it rationally. It explains where beauty comes from and what evil actually means. Consciousness, free will, and rationality are perfectly at home in it.
Materialism can’t explain much of this at all; and what it does explain, it tends to explain either by positing an infinitely vast yet unobservable array of alternate universes for the sake of improving probabilities, or by explaining things away (as in the case of consciousness or genuine right and wrong).
Christianity explains why we stubbornly want the universe to be good at its core. You can force-fit that into an evolutionary approach, but it’s not a comfortable explanatory fit at all. Christianity explains why things bother us, things that don’t bother the dogs and the dolphins and the chimpanzees. Still further, it leaves room for science, for God created the heavens and the earth and lets things run almost always in predictable ways.
The creation/evolution controversy is really a sideline by comparison to the strengths Christianity brings to science (apart from all-too-common caricatures and misunderstandings).
So yes, there’s complexity there, but I studied it a long time before I ever blogged, and I’ve faced a whole lot of objections here since I started, and Christianity continues to be, clearly, a better explanation of all these things. Yet some people don’t see it that way. I think the answer goes back to the original topic of this post.
Tom, I think I’m right and you think you’re right. In fact, we both *know* that we’re right (within human and reasonable limits). So I invite you to look at the situation from above, so to speak, the actual content of our disagreement. Let’s both suspend what we know to be true (which contradicts each other) for a moment and look at the disagreement not as partisans. I’m wondering if this view might lead us further down the road of our argument, if not actually start to push both of us one way or the other.
I see several views, I’m not sure they are mutually exclusive:
1. One of us is not only wrong but is seriously deluded through a combination of ignoring valid evidence or faulty logic. Not seeing how our position is wrong through the unsupported supporting the unsupportable because the resulting web of support is so complex is one way this can happen; there are others.
2. Regardless of what reality is and who’s right, we both have come to our positions not so much because the position is right, but because we have been enculturated in a paticular way. For myself, I remember reading an old book by the agnostic Ingersoll (who was a very popular orator, he died in 1899) that my father had when I was 12 or so and which made an impression on me; surely you, growing up in a Christian country, had your share of formative experiences about Christianity. We both support the unsupportable through the complexity of the web of support, even as one of us is (presumably) right. That is, we’re right for the wrong reasons, so to speak – we’ve lucked into the truth.
I think there are other perspectives that are valuable, I’ll return to them, perhaps.
Any comments, Tom?
An interesting post. I’m not sure I understand what you mean by “the heart” as a kind of evidence. And I’m not exactly sure what perceive means, or how one would perceive evidence of “the heart” at work. Both are important to you post, but remain little explained.
The Bible does speak often of “the heart,” of our hearts. It doesn’t talk about our heart in terms of evidence or perception. Rather, people are described by the Bible as having “hard hearts” or “soft hearts,” hearts that are “closed” and “shut” and “proud” or hearts that are “soft,” “tender” and “broken.”
The heart isn’t evidence and it isn’t a perception, or at least claiming that the heart is evidence or can be perceived isn’t a biblical claim. “The heart” is a sign of our deepest self and how we relate to God Almighty. Our heart can be transformed and the self can be opened to God or it can be closed to His saving grace by our hardheartedness.
Why talk about “the heart” in terms of evidence and perception? On what biblical grounds do you talk about “the heart” in these terms?
Perhaps this is my ultimate point: how do we both check ourselves to make sure we’re not either deluded, or may have just stumbled onto the truth (which means that we’re not following the evidence or the logic, which means we might be wrong), not from the stance of a partisan, but from above the disagreement?
Jacob says:
Yes it does.
http://bible.cc/john/12-40.htm
http://bible.cc/mark/8-17.htm
Paul
The same way you check for delusions when you perceive any other truth. Is it true that you exist as a human – complete with human personality and human nature - or are you being deluded into thinking you have a human personality and a human nature ?
Jacob, I am utterly astonished that you would say this:
It’s not whether I agree with you or disagree. It’s that you’re making a positive statement that you know what the Bible says about something. How can you do that? You’ve said you find nothing in the Bible that indicates that it speaks to morals or norms, and that I was imposing that view on the Bible. You faulted me once for saying that forgiveness is a major theme of Christianity, and that I was imposing that view on it. If you can read the Bible and not see that it speaks to morals and norms, or if you can read it and think that forgiveness is an optional topic for Christians, how can you say something so definite about anything it says at all?
So here’s how I will respond:
If any other reader is interested in seeing a response to Jacob’s question, please let us know.
Jacob, if you’re finally telling us that you think the Bible has definite teachings that can be understood, please let us know. Otherwise I’m just not going to respond. Your rules of engagement keep changing (new readers, please note that this is part of an ongoing discussion), and that’s no way to conduct a discussion.
I want to hear about how perceptions of the heart work, what they feel like, how do they seem, where do they take place, do you hear a voice that is God’s, do you see a visual form, etc. Or is it something you merely know? In which case it is really a perception?
Here is how I make a positive statement regarding the Bible. Can I see “moral norm” in the Bible? No. Can I see talk that describes “heart” as “evidence”? No. Can I see talk of “hard hearts” and “broken hearts”? Yes.
What I faulted you on with the “moral norm” bit is that you can’t and didn’t show a citation when I asked?
If you ask, I would be glad to look at the Bible and see what is or is not said about “the heart.” We both can look at what the word says. Maybe we can both learn something.
How can you say something so definite about anything it says at all?
I have an interpretation, Tom, just like everybody else.
It’s kind of funny. When I comment, there seems to be increasing hub-bub over my words and what I’ve allegedly said in the past and who I am and how I will or will not respond. How many other regular commenters get a poll taken as to how you should respond to comments?
Jacob, if you’re finally telling us that you think the Bible has definite teachings that can be understood, please let us know. Otherwise I’m just not going to respond. Your rules of engagement keep changing (new readers, please note that this is part of an ongoing discussion), and that’s no way to conduct a discussion.
I supremely trust the reveltaion of the Bible. I, along with everyone else, must interpret the words in the text to understand what they mean. Whatever teachings there are in the Bible are subject to our interpretation.
Paul, thanks for that question. I’ll come back to it unless someone else beats me to it.
Jacob, yes, I’m treating your comments differently. The request for citations on moral norms, from someone who “supremely trusts the reveltaion of the Bible,” is unnecessary caviling, and I’m not going to participate in it. You accused me of imposing my view on the Bible when I said forgiveness is a major theme. I have no confidence that I can answer your current question without your saying the same to me again, and then it’s no longer a question of what the Bible says, it’s a question of who is imposing what. I’m not going to get started on that. That may be of interest to you, but I don’t share that interest.
I’m simply asking you to cite verses from the Bible that support your interpretation.
I can and will gladly.
Why is that such an issue?
Hi Jacob,
I supplied them. What’s wrong with the verses?
Tom, I’m skimming over this discussion and there are a couple of things that have popped up as themes in this and recent posts. I am concerned that you may be getting ahead of yourself by not having some of your assertions challenged. To start with, I protest your assertions that:
1) Christians have ESP;
2) There is knowledge of the natural world that is not empirical that can be known;
I don’t mind your holding these arguments to be true, or that these arguments are used in support of assertions about spiritual knowledge; it is not my intention to question anyone’s spiritual beliefs. I have to protest, however, at seeing them being passed off unchallenged in eventual support of arguments that Christians hold a uniquely superior vantage from with which to judge the acceptability of scientific facts, dolphins do not want the universe to be good, etc.
If you think it wouldn’t productive to have these assertions challenged then I’ll keep from interfering with your comments. But you should know that these assertions and other like them seem, at first appearance, like bad premises on which to base an argument.
(Tom, this is just a re-post/minor edit of the comment I put into the prior thread; I think it’s relevant to post here because it speaks to the heart of what Paul and Tony are asking…no hard feelings if you’d rather cut it out.)
Paul, / Tony
Yes, the question of God is one that involves reality. Let’s be careful, though, since we’re starting anew, to note that the words “objective”, “logical”, “empirical”, and “real” are not mutually synonymous. They mean different things, and they imply different properties. (Quick example: one of the first things you learn about logic is that the conclusions of a logically valid argument are not necessarily real). One of the first hurdles that needs to be dealt with is this problem of pre-defining anything that is non-objective or non-empirical(material) as “non-real.” In a very direct sense, this just begs the question.
Yes, God is suggested by “observable evidence”; but “evidence” does not have to be limited to empirical quanta such as weight, temperature, and so forth. There are more things that we can observe than the empirical.
There is a good body of discussion about the validity of “the heart”, which is admittedly a poor term, if only because the nuances of it are much deeper than the words imply. “Emotion” is not a good replacement, nor is “instinct”, or “feeling”, or “conviction”. It’s somewhere in that ballpark, though. That’s why Lewis’ analogy is so important to this discussion.
We constantly apprehend logic using the intellect, and so we know that the intellect can tell us things about reality. We constantly apprehend empirical data through the senses, so we know that our senses can tell us things about reality. We constantly apprehend things like morality, beauty, and goodness – call it the “spirit” of things – through the “heart”, but for some reason skeptics want to reject that this faculty can tell us anything about reality. Yet, it’s the input of “the heart” that influences some of our most important judgments, and this we have no problem with.
I do recognize that there is a greater tendency towards subjectivity in “the heart”. That does not mean that it is useless in apprehending reality, or that those apprehensions are of purely subjective things. Remember, logic alone is worthless – you have to apply it to something. Empirical data is useless by itself, you have to interpret it with something. “The heart” alone is also useless. There is no sense in which I, or Tom, are suggesting that “the heart” ought to take precedence over the intellect or the senses, only that it should be given a place at the table. And, just as empirical data is always subject to perspective, so too can “the spirit” that is sensed by “the heart.”
Logic and empirical data, for instance, cannot tell you that an action is “moral” or “immoral.” The person who totally rejects “morality” in favor of heartless intellect/empiricism isn’t seen as a champion of virtue, but a monster. Even though we disagree on the particulars, there is a universal recognition in human beings that some kind of morality is necessary. That makes morals real, whether you think they are objective or subjective. Morality is something apprehended only by “the heart” – and there is nothing wrong with taking our view of them into consideration with our intellect and senses.
That’s just one example, but I don’t want to turn this into a ramble. The gist of what I’m saying is that, in all other categories other than “God”, there seems to be an agreement that “the heart” cannot be sensibly thrown completely aside. We want to apply ethical approaches to research, and moral applications of technology, and we want to generate compassion and happiness. Yet, when it comes to God, all of a sudden the heart isn’t just something to consider, or something to control, but something that can’t be considered at all.
Observations and reason strongly suggest that the combination of intellect and empirical data can neither confirm nor deny the existence of God. There are too many brilliant minds on both sides of the debate to seriously suggest that all it takes is more intelligence or more data to settle the question. And so, it’s eminently rational to assume that this is a reality that has to be apprehended (or the tie broken, if you will) though the third way, “the heart.” I think there’s enough evidence that we use “the heart” in discussing other aspects of reality to at least make that a reasonable assumption.
To put it another way, we know that any particular method of apprehension has limits, just like any measuring tool can only tell us what it’s able to tell us. Why assume that anything our tool can’t tell us simply doesn’t exist? Why assume that that tool’s scope must encompass all of reality? More to the point, if we have another tool available that we use all the time, why assume that we can’t use it , even indirectly, to help us learn more about one particular issue? This is the idea that the linked article is suggesting. “The heart” is a means that can be used in conjunction with the other two in order to increase our understanding.
Tony,
Referencing your (1) and (2) above, do you object to any of these statements?
1) Those with the ability to better perceive, perceive more and perceive more clearly than those that do not.
2) The laws of logic are known and are not empirical.
Tony,
Please recognize that I have no problem with challenges in general. I think you and Paul have asked some great questions. My concern with Jacob is just what I said it was–not that he has raised objections, but the basis and context.
I just got home from the eye doctor, and my eyes are dilated, so I’m not going to try to say more than this right now–it’s too hard to read and write. But as I told Paul, if someone doesn’t beat me to it, I intend to come back and respond when possible.
Jacob,
That was not, in fact, the issue, so let’s not get confused about that, please. I explained the issue previously. In brief: if you challenge someone to show documentation for something as incredibly uncontroversial as the fact that it speaks to moral norms, that seems like a spurious challenge, a cavil. If you come back and make unsupported remarks about something with the ambiguity (in historical theology and in metaphor) of the heart, and you don’t support it but speak as if you’re presenting an authoritative view anyway, that’s just not easy to take.
I’m not happy about this kind of dispute taking place in public here, so I’ll say no more for now. If what I wrote to you here is not clear, Jacob, please send me an email about it.
I had started this list of references before I went to the eye doctor. I’m going to post them without further comment for now:
Matthew 13:15
Mark 7:19
Luke 24:25
Acts 16:14
Acts 28:27
1 Corinthians 2:9
SteveK,
Perceive what? I do believe that your first statement could be shown to not always be true. For instance, is someone with better eyesight than me better able to perceive a piece of music? Also, if the object to be perceived can only be binary, does heightened perception of the object make for clearer perception of its state? Lastly, what are the criteria used to establish the degree of perception?
I’m not very well-versed in the laws of logic and I have not formed well-thought views on knowledge in general. With what little I know, however, I would agree with your second statement.
Tony,
Take a step back from this comment, and see what it really says:
You’re demonstrating that there are different forms of perception that are more (or less) appropriate for apprehending certain aspects of reality. Hearing, in this case, is the more appropriate sense. To deny that music exists because you’re hard of hearing (or have your fingers stuck in your ears), and you can’t see, smell, or taste the music would be silly.
1. To start, is this a moral condition that allows one to perceive God, or an intentional one, or the heart, or a spiritual sense, or what exactly? Several terms are getting thrown around like they’re synonyms, and they’re not. Perhaps this outlook/approach is rightly characterized by a combination of such factors, but if that’s the case, I’d like to hear about the details.
“Seriously, Paul, given the entire message of Jesus Christ, I fail to see what’s curious about it. I think if you gave it some thought you could think of lots of real things that people cannot see if they are not morally ready to see them.”
2. It is very curious that an objective conclusion must be founded on having a subjective viewpoint. As I went through with MM, it should be that a lack of bias, subjective view, etc., is necessary for an objective calculation. this should be apparent by the mutual exclusivity of subjective objective – they’re opposites.
It’s not a question of adopting a certain moral or subjective view in order to see a certain objective condition, it’s *the lack* or any moral or subjective view, which is a bias, that is necessary for objective conclusions. If you tell me that a lack of bias is impossible, as MM tried to, you might as well throw out objectivity as the postmodernists (hi Jacob) want to.
MedicineMan,
SteveK asked me I believed that: “Those with the ability to better perceive, perceive more and perceive more clearly than those that do not?” I responded that I could see reasons that this could not be true because I find the question so vague. I was asking for a clarification to his question; I was not trying to make a demonstration or an argument, per se.
I answered both of his questions. The first I answered that I could not agree, and gave reasons (questions unresolved in the framing of his question) for my reservation. The second I agreed to.
I don’t know why you would conclude that I was trying to assert that music does not exist. If this kind of straw man characterization is going to the be the tone of response to my questions I will stop responding to your comments.
Paul, et al:
Perspective is not possible to remove; it can only be noted and dealt with, so this:
…is a somewhat misleading analysis of what I said. Objectivity is not a binary quality – one can possess degrees of objectivity. No one is purely objective or subjective. Bias will arise, preferences will exist, such is inescapable. They can and must be noted and considered. Assuming you can obliterate your own biases any time you want is as delusional as the addict who says, “I can quit any time I want to.”
Example: I apprehend the size of the Washington Monument subjectively, based on my distance from it. From a mile away, it appears smaller than my hand. At ten feet, it appears gigantic. Its actual height is empirically objective, but my perception of it is subjective and affected by my own empirical status (how far away I am). In other words, my inescapably subjective perception of an empirical, objective reality is altered by my own empirical status. In the same way, it’s reasonable to note that our ability to perceive certain spiritual ideas is affected by our spiritual status (a la 1 Corinthians 2:14). I can choose to move closer to the Monument in order to get a clearer perception of it; the same can be done spiritually with respect to God.
Our apprehension of God is meant to be holistic; not fragmented. I’ve been using the term “the heart” in quotes for the very reason you’re discussing, which is that it’s a layered idea. I don’t really know a good term for it, though C.S. Lewis used the term tao to refer to it in broad terms.
So, when you say…
All I can say is that subjective viewpoints are all we have, if we’re going to be honest about it. We exist in a certain physical space, and all of our perceptions of physical information are subject to that perspective. We exist in a certain spiritual condition, and all of our perceptions of spiritual ideas are subject to that perspective. So what do we do? We note external, objective standards with which to compare those things. A meter may look larger or smaller, based on how far away the meter-long item is, but it’s still a meter. Subjectively perceived, objectively true. We spend our lives triangulating objective conclusions out of the intersection of subjective perceptions.
I don’t think that you can really support this, in practice. We have a name for people who ignore or reject all morals: sociopaths. We consider such a person sick, and worthy of our sympathy (and maybe fear). Partly, because such a person is dangerous, and partly because we recognize that they’re denying reality. Whether you think they’re objective or subjective, everyone recognizes that “morals” are real. Human beings have a “sense” that some actions “should not” be done, others “should be”, in ways that don’t originate in either empirical data or logic. The attitude that “morals should have nothing to do with it” gives us aspirations like this:
That generation would be purely rational, objective, and lacking in a moral view. Hopefully, you know who said that and where you can find it written. It sounds cute on paper, but in practice it is disaster waiting to happen. You can’t actually be devoid of a moral view – you have some personal sense of right and wrong. Those who don’t are immediately recognized as mentally ill. Lacking a moral sense is as crippling, if not more so, than being blind, deaf, or paralyzed.
No one wants to throw out objectivity. What I want is to recognize the totality of what is real; not just the slices of it that are convenient to my preferences. It’s rational to say that denying that a “third way” exists, ipso facto, would pose a major obstacle to gleaning any meaning from it. If I refuse to acknowledge that there is such a thing as odor – worse, if I plug my nose – then it’s to be expected that I would reject the idea that scent can tell me anything about the real world. Not only do I not perceive it, but I know that different people have different perceptions of scent. Should I then ignore it completely?
Tony,
I don’t think there’s cause to take offense, since I wasn’t imputing that argument to you. I was noting a statement that you made, and extending that to support the general argument.
That said, you did misunderstand or misrepresent what you were responding to. Those with better hearing, I think we can agree, perceive sound better than those those with poor hearing. That’s pretty much just a truism, but important to the point being made. There is no great controversy in suggesting that different people have different levels of perception in specific senses. Lumping all of the physical senses together misses the point.
Tony, I’ll try to clarify my statement (1) by giving an example we are all probably familiar with…..stereograms.
Some people can’t perceive them clearly or correctly because they lack the ability for one reason or another, yet the existence of the hidden images can’t be denied. This is what I meant when I said “Those with the ability to better perceive, perceive more and perceive more clearly than those that do not.”
MedicineMan,
How can you say, referring to my questions, “That said, you did misunderstand or misrepresent what you were responding to?” when you can’t know what the point of SteveK’s question was (I didn’t — hence, my request for clarification) and you appear to misunderstand my questions? For someone who trumpets a philosophy in which all viewpoints are subjective you seem fairly quick to assume a mantle of authority, including a characterization of my posing questions as an absurd argument that I was not making.
I truly find it hard to discern what you mean. When you write: “I don’t think there’s cause to take offense, since I wasn’t imputing that argument to you.” it’s not clear to me what argument you’re talking about. You go on to say “I was noting a statement that you made, and extending that to support the general argument.” And again, I don’t know what argument you think I was making, nor what the general argument is that you refer to. I don’t think I’m being quick to offend; I’m asking for clarity so that I can respond.
I think SteveK clarified his question to me later, and for that I am grateful. I have something to think about, and respond to. On the other hand it appears to me that you are making assumptions about my intent, others’ questions, and wrapping them all in prose that is either unclear or accusatory where no malice was intended.
Tony,
I remembered other examples of “those with the ability to better perceive, perceive more” — savant’s!
Savants are excellent examples of how a person can be so ‘disabled’ and yet so amazingly perceptive. Derek Paravicini is an amazing musical savant. This blind “disabled” man, accurately perceives things which the best musical minds cannot. He perceives (knows) the individual keys that are played on a piano within seconds after hearing a mish-mash of keys played as a single sound – even the sound from a full orchestra!! (see this video starting at about the 3 minute mark) Another example is this. Admittedly this one is proof by statistics, which science loves, but it’s an example nonetheless.
Tony,
I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree on my interpretation of your response, and your interpretation of that interpretation. It’s entirely possible that we’ve both missed each other’s intent, and I’m not going to get into a pointless argument about something unrelated to the topic at hand.
If you’ve really been bothered by something I said in the two above comments, then please accept my apologies. I’d be happy to clarify my points if you’d like, or drop them and continue on with more important lines of discussion.
SteveK,
Perceive is a tricky word, because, among other things, it implies the sensual stimulus itself and also the processing of that information; one can both perceive notes of music through the ears, and a melody from those notes in the mind. There are layers to perception, and that’s why I am wary of vouching that “Those with the ability to better perceive, perceive more and perceive more clearly than those that do not?” For example, I have excellent hearing. Say that Beethoven, at the stage he was losing his hearing, and I heard a piece of music. I would perceive all the sounds better, but Beethoven would (I am terribly unmusical) even through his half-deaf ears better perceive the music of what was being played. So that, the division of senses and processing of those senses, makes your short definition problematic to me.
If all you are trying to assert is that there are disparities among people in their perceptions then of course that is true. Chuck Yeager the pilot, Ted Williams the baseball player, for instance, were both famous for the visual acumen; they could see and read things faster than all but a very few people.
So yes, I would say that some people have better senses than others, and that enables them to perceive the information from those senses in a way that is measurably better than other people. (Chuck Yeager could see airplanes on the horizon before anyone in his squadron. Ted Williams hit .400, and, according to an old family friend, could read all the words on a 78 record label as it spun.)
So, at this point, I have to say, Why do you ask?
Why do I ask? Well, I asked because you protested the claim that Christians have a special ability to more clearly and accurately perceive some things compared to non-Christians.
MM, if you’re saying that belief in God is not objective, I agree.
Are you really saying that different perspectives of the Washington monument make an objective measurement of its size impossible?
Scientists also reject all morals in their work. Tom has often blogged that scientists, as scientists, have nothing to say about morality. Are you calling scientists sociopaths?
“We constantly apprehend things like morality, beauty, and goodness – call it the “spirit” of things – through the “heart”, but for some reason skeptics want to reject that this faculty can tell us anything about reality. ”
Wrong, they just realize that those things aren’t objective.
Paul,
Are you saying subjective perceptions can’t tell us anything about objective reality? Also, how do you (all of us, really) differentiate an objective perception from a subjective perception? In other words, how can a person know which is which?
SteveK,
Is it possible that Christians have a special ability to perceive more accurately and clearly? I doubt it, but I’m open to your argument.
What are Christian able to perceive more accurately and clearly? Is it ESP (outside the senses)? Is it measurable?
I agree that Savants, by the way, do have enhanced abilities, although I don’t think I’d qualify those abilities as perception. The ability to calculate complex numbers, play music, etc. are not outside the realm of other human abilities — they are simply better to a very high degree.
Paul,
Not really…there’s too much open room in that phrasing to agree with it. This is in no small part because you’re linking “non-objective” with “non-real”, or at the least, “non-meaningful.” Case in point:
There’s an undercurrent in your reasoning: anything not objective cannot tell us anything about reality. You underscore that again here:
No, and there’s absolutely nothing in what I said that suggests as much. On the contrary, I said this:
“Perception” and “measurement” are two different things. “Measurement” is a comparison of something against an external, fixed standard.
No, they do not “reject all morals” in their work. The nuts-and-bolts of their research is (usually) morally inert. There’s no moral principle influencing the way atoms combine, or the way that oxygen enters the bloodstream. There are some significant moral principles involved in how one studies those, though. Scientists who want to know how car crashes affect passengers don’t strap live people into cars and smash them up. To do so would be immoral. That’s the key part, “…scientists, as scientists…”
The empirical part of their work has nothing to say about morality, but that does not mean that their work is not influenced by morals. They don’t have to “reject” morals to learn about the shape of a crystal lattice, because there are no moral principles at work in that structure. The morals that they apply to their methodology do not change nature, or what they observe; this is why science in and of itself has nothing to say about morality.
American researchers don’t do the kinds of things that Josef Mengele did. Why not? Because what he did was evil. If you completely strip morals from any consideration in any sense, then you have no argument against what he did. Scientists do, in fact, operate under the restrictions and guidelines of moral principles. There is a monumental difference between a person who says, “I don’t have to use moral reasoning to understand how human nerves operate,” and the one who says, “I reject all morals when arranging my experiments into human nerves.”
Tony,
Generally speaking, a clearer perception of spiritual matters. Spiritual Lasik surgery, if you will. I’m not deluded enough (yet!) to think every Christian perceives clearly on these matters, just that, as Tom said above, our “eyes” have been opened to the reality of God. Whether or not we choose to “see” clearly with those eyes is another matter altogether. People with perfect vision still bump into walls.
Not ESP and not measurable.
These “enhanced abilities” *might* be what we’re talking about. I really don’t know. I think you are wrong about these not being enhanced perceptions. They are. Some of these people don’t just do things faster and better, they actually perceive things nobody else can. What you are saying is other people *could* do what the Savant does if only they had the time to develop their skills, and I don’t think that is correct. At least it hasn’t been shown to be the case.
SteveK,
Steve, can you give me examples for: “Some of these people don’t just do things faster and better, they actually perceive things nobody else can.”
You wrote: “ What you are saying is other people *could* do what the Savant does if only they had the time to develop their skills…” I don’t think that is what I was saying. I was saying that a savant’s ability is greater, but not different altogether. I can calculate numbers in my head. I can play a song on the piano. I can count objects. There are savants who can do these things very well, but they are not doing things that are different than what I can do — they are just doing them much better. I know that I would never be able to develop skills that are equal to those of a savant’s, but I would be able to have a degree of their skill. You seem to be saying that they have extra abilities, but I disagree; they have superior abilities.
Side question: if Christians have extra abilities commensurate with those of a savant’s, doesn’t this open up a problem whereby God is granting access to his reality to only those he’s predisposed to his reality? Doesn’t this speculation make God seem arbitrary and unjust?
Lastly, how can you assert that Christians have extra abilities to perceive God’s reality if you admit that this extra ability is not measurable? Doesn’t that sort of premise merely beg the question?
MM, what I’m trying to do is to make sure we’re using the hammer to pound in nails, not to try to unscrew a screw. That is, we certainly have subjective perceptions: I feel the chair I’m sitting on, for instance. But, in that case of qualia, the qualia are not objective and must have a different ontological status: the feelings I have by sitting in this chair are not real in the same way that the chair (objectively) is.
So we have to be careful not to bring in subjectivity into an objective task. God’s presence or communication to you is a necessarily private experience that happens inside your head. There’s nothing outside your head that we can point to that would let us share the experience. It is as objective as qualia are, which is to say, not at all. So we can’t use such perceptions to make an objective conclusion, one that is true for everyone.
MM, the relevant point about scientists and morals is that morals do not play a legitimate role in a scientific conclusion. Mere mortals will live up to that ideal to a greater or lesser extent, but that’s irrelevant. The point was that, for the purposes of making an objective conclusion, morals have no role to play, but scientists are not sociopaths for attempting such.
SteveK, let’s not conflate subjectivity with perception. Any perception is subjective in a sense, but that sense won’t help us here. Perceptions are objective when they are verifiable *by anyone in principle.* The problem with Tom’s point about being open to perceive God is that it eliminates people in principle. You’ll have to wait for a full-fledged argument about this, I don’t have the time right now and I have to think about how to lay this out.
MedicineMan,
You wrote: “It’s rational to say that denying that a “third way” exists, ipso facto, would pose a major obstacle to gleaning any meaning from it. If I refuse to acknowledge that there is such a thing as odor – worse, if I plug my nose – then it’s to be expected that I would reject the idea that scent can tell me anything about the real world. Not only do I not perceive it, but I know that different people have different perceptions of scent. Should I then ignore it completely?”
Okay, but odor can be measured. Our ability to perceive odor can be measured. Of what use is a sense that cannot be measured? Does it even qualify as a sense? It appears to me that you and SteveK (and Tom) are making speculations for which there is no argument. Your personal convictions are yours to hold. But when, by extension, you demand special treatment on account of these convictions you must demonstrate them as well, otherwise they are ungrounded demands for privilege.
Tony,
Derek, the musical savant is one example. You and I can perceive individual notes and sounds, but we cannot perceive what Derek can. Which leads me to my next comment….
Superior abilities certainly *can* be classified as extra abilities. Example: animals and humans both have conscious awareness. Animals perceive, they just don’t perceive what we can perceive. Mathematical concepts are just one example of this. This superior ability gives rise to an extra ability to perceive what others cannot.
Let me just say I’m not a Calvinist and I don’t wish to get into that whole can of worms. I think the biblical teaching is pretty clear that non-Christians can see the reality of God, but to a lesser extent than the Christian can.
As I said above, both the believer and non-believer have the ability to perceive the reality of God. My understanding is the believer can perceive more of that reality and perceive it more clearly. Make sense?
Paul,
We’ve been over what it means to ‘verify’. It’s definition is as broad or as narrow as you want to make it – thus making it subjective unless you go with the broadest of definitions to avoid this problem. Do you object to defining the term ‘verify’ in the broadest of terms? If so, on what objective basis do you do this?
How does Tom’s point eliminate this in principle? FYI, in my comment to Tony above I said both the believer and non-believer have the ability to perceive God, but the believer can perceive more of that reality and perceive it more clearly.
Tom?
SteveK,
I have to say your last entry doesn’t make sense — I believe you are making assertions, not arguments.
You wrote: “Derek, the musical savant is one example. You and I can perceive individual notes and sounds, but we cannot perceive what Derek can.” You are both claiming to know what Derek can perceive and what I can perceive. I do not grant you that authority. Also, how would you differentiate Derek from other great musical performers? Is he even counted among the 100 greatest pianists of all time? Is there a quantum jump by which the accomplished pianist becomes qualified as a savant with extra powers of perception that the accomplished pianists cannot imagine?
You wrote: “Example: animals and humans both have conscious awareness. Animals perceive, they just don’t perceive what we can perceive. Mathematical concepts are just one example of this.” How do you know what animals perceive? How can you say that animals don’t understand mathematical concepts? (There are biological studies that show that wasps can count eggs and their offspring. Bees remember dance steps that describe the location of pollen sources.) How do you intend to show what animals perceive (and by that I think you mean understand)?
You wrote: “ I think the biblical teaching is pretty clear that non-Christians can see the reality of God, but to a lesser extent than the Christian can.” Referring to the Bible begs the question.
You wrote: “As I said above, both the believer and non-believer have the ability to perceive the reality of God.” I understand that you are saying this. Do you understand that I contend you are failing to provide an argument — a logical structure, and evidence that supports a conclusion?
Tony,
I don’t think I’m doing that. See next comment.
No, these claims are not my own. I’m watching Derek perceive music in a way I can’t, and in a way the musical genuises of the world can’t – a claim made by the experts, not me. I’m also taking you at your word when you said “I am terribly unmusical”.
On what basis do you say may claims are just assertions?
It’s intersting that you say this and then claim that biologists *can* know this…”There are biological studies that show that wasps can count eggs and their offspring”
I didn’t say that. I’m saying they don’t perceive what humans can perceive – *big* difference. Don’t complicate this more than it has to be.
Humanity throughout history claims to perceive God in different ways and this is not evidence? What is evidence, then?
SteveK,
You wrote: “I didn’t say that [animals don’t understand mathematical concepts]“.
You wrote previously: “Animals perceive, they just don’t perceive what we can perceive. Mathematical concepts are just one example of this.”
The fact that you are denying the words that you write, and are making statements like “I’m watching Derek perceive music in a way I can’t…” (How can you know what he is perceiving by watching him?) inclines me to think you are not interested in composing an argument.
You wrote: “Humanity throughout history claims to perceive God in different ways and this is not evidence?” Nope, it’s a logical fallacy called “Argumentum ad antiquitatem.”
You wrote: “What is evidence, then?” I’m not an expert on this but I’m starting to think you should look up some rules on logic and fallacies.
I’m disappointed in your response, Tony. Of course I’m interested in composing an argument and I think I’ve done that using common understandings and even the testimony of experts. I’m interested if you’re interested in not putting words in my mouth. I’m not denying the words I wrote.
How do the biologists know the wasps percieve mathematical concepts like counting? Do they watch them?
You don’t know what evidence is, but you know enough to say “that isn’t evidence”. Is that right?
SteveK,
I think you should step back and try to look at what I’ve been responding to you about. You continue to make assertions that are not true and I’m running out of the energy to show you why they are deficient.
You wrote: “I’m not denying the words I wrote.” How can you reconcile that with this:
You wrote: “I didn’t say that [animals don’t understand mathematical concepts]“.
You wrote previously: “Animals perceive, they just don’t perceive what we can perceive. Mathematical concepts are just one example of this.”
That is a clear cut case of you denying the words that you wrote. If you would like to amend them then do so — I mis-speak and state things poorly all the time, and argument should be a process, not a opportunity to bludgeon one another with our unchangeable views. But don’t deny what is there and expect me to nod my head in silent assent.
You wrote: “How do the biologists know the wasps percieve mathematical concepts like counting? Do they watch them?” Yes, under control and experiment conditions. The experiment is predictable and repeatable. The explanation is that the wasps must have some way of counting. In other words, the evidence suggests that insects count. You made a blanket assertion that animals do not perceive mathematical concepts. Not only is this an unprovable assertion, but evidence suggests otherwise.
You wrote: “You don’t know what evidence is, but you know enough to say “that isn’t evidence”. Is that right?” Hmm. I said I’m not an expert on logic, but I am trying to become better. As part of my self-education I am learning about logic and fallacies. You asked me a straightforward question and I gave you a straightforward answer. Your “evidence” (“Humanity throughout history claims to perceive God in different ways…”) is a known fallacy. I do not see how you can deny that it is. If you’re not going to take the time to consider my responses as anything but empty words for you to put aside then we will indeed have trouble arguing with one another.
I’m catching up late again…
Paul, you wrote yesterday,
Actually, I think you would agree with MM and SteveK that subjective viewpoints are impossible to avoid. You have to be standing somewhere to make your measurement of anything. It is the kind of subjectivity we’re discussing that bothers you, I think.
For one thing, it’s of concern to you that a certain moral position is necessary to perceive God. Actually, Christian theology puts it in a different order: the moral position is the result of seeing God, not the cause. “We love God because he first loved us,” it says in Scripture; in fact, we love him when we understand he loves us, and not vice-versa. The heart that desires to do good is the heart that has seen God, and not vice-versa.
Does this mean that non-Christians who have not seen God do no good? Not at all. It is also part of Christian teaching that all persons see God, but that some suppress the knowledge of God in unrighteousness (Romans 1:18-21). They see but they don’t see (Matthew 13:13-16). The kind of perception we have been talking about here is that which combines both awareness and acknowledgment.
It is not moral improvement, however, that causes people to “see what they see” and to really acknowledge God; it is God’s allowing people to see him that causes moral growth.
(Someone asked along the way whether that makes God unjust. That’s a good question but if I pursue it now it won’t help with the current question. Please remind me later to come back to it.)
The above describes the situation from God’s perspective, as he has revealed it. From a human perspective, the prerequisite is not to be morally right but to be open to God and receptive to him. That’s why I wrote that one who doesn’t perceive God could ask him for that to be opened up to him.
Paul,
And yet those feelings are real, yes? Not in “the same way”, but real nonetheless? And they tell you something meaningful about reality, don’t they? I see where you’re approaching this from, but I don’t think it goes where you want it to. Taking that approach leads to solipsism – the idea that even our perceptions might not be real.
In part, but not in the whole, so this next line is false:
There is a most definite concept of “general revelation”, as well as scripture. Those aspects of communication from God are not private, they are public. Each person who laughs at a joke has their own private experience of apprehending humor; that experience can’t be shared (anyone else who laughs when hearing the joke experiences their own apprehension of humor, not someone else’s). It is real, nonetheless. Just because I can’t make you share my experience doesn’t mean that you can’t have an experience of your own.
We can use those subjective perceptions to make objective conclusions, we just can’t use subjective perceptions alone. If you and I stood a hundred yards apart, next to a train track, and listened to an engine whistle as it passed between us, we’d perceive the pitch of that whistle differently. Our perception is inescapably subjective. It’s still possible to come to an objective conclusion about what the original pitch was, by combining our subjective and objective information.
When this is limited to the “whats”, then I agree, but then this is really just a rhetorical tautology (non-moral questions are non-moral) and not helpful in the discussion. It’s when this attitude is applied to the “how”, “who”, and “why” that it’s a problem. We don’t condone deliberately a-moral decision-making, when there actually are moral questions involved, whether we think that morals are subjective or objective.
I’d be interested in hearing how people are eliminated from Tom’s idea; I’m inclined to disagree based on that tidbit, but I’d rather wait to see how you form the thought.
Now, for the question of what kind of perception we’re talking about.
Is the perception of God a kind of ESP? Is it measurable? Is it just subjective? I’ll take this in backwards order.
The answer to the third question is yes. It is subjective. Every perception is subjective. I can look out the window and see blue sky and green leaves. That is a private experience. Nobody else is having that perception, nor could they have the same one I am having.
Now, another person could look out the window and report that they see blue sky and green leaves. We could discuss our experiences in detail and find that they agree. We could go out and touch the leaves and feel the wind, and by those means gather other experiences that support the veridicality of our visual perceptions, and we could share those experiences. But a blind person could not share those visual perceptions at all.
The same is true for the sense of God. No two persons can share it in exactly the same way, but Christians often speak of our experience of God in ways that indicate that we are likely experiencing the same thing. We have other experiences and knowledge we can point to, that support its veridicality (as I wrote in the original post). Not every person can share the experience, just as not every person can see blue or green.
Can the perception of God be measured? Tony asked, “of what use is a sense that cannot be measured?” Nobody measured smell for the first several eons of animal existence, and yet I think it was useful. I think the real question is not about measurability but verifiability: is there anything besides this perception that provides confidence that it is something real and not imagined? The answer of course is yes; there is that set of supporting information I wrote about in the original post, and there is the evidence of changed lives in those who follow Jesus Christ.
Is the perception of God a kind of ESP? I suppose so, if by “sensory” you mean the traditional five senses; it is “extra” to those senses. I don’t see a problem with that. Each sense is tuned to its object: vision to electromagnetic radiation, hearing to acoustic energy, etc. We’re saying there is a spiritual world that does not primarily express itself in electromagnetic radiation, acoustic energy, pressure, chemical signatures, etc. It would be silly to expect vision, hearing, touch, taste, or smell to be appropriate to that.
It would also be silly to declare a priori that there is no spiritual world; or to say that even if there is a spiritual world, there is no way for humans to sense it in any way just because sight, hearing, etc. are not useful for the purpose. Those are assumptions that would need to be supported.
Tony,
A sense of logic, or intellect? A sense of morals? I know that we make attempts to “measure” intelligence, but every test that’s been developed is highly subjective in and of itself. Lewis’ analogy about “men without chests” comes up here, again. We want people to behave kindly, with charity, tolerance, love, etc. At the same time, there are those who deny that those idea have any legitimate source, or any legitimate apprehension. How do we objectively measure a person’s “moral sense”? That “the heart” cannot be measured does not make it useless.
Forgive me for being a little short here, but for someone who is so sensitive to having his thoughts, motives, and lines of inquiry questioned, you’re in a big hurry to dish out that which you’re not willing to take. Who’s asking for “special treatment” or “privilege”?
Argumentum ad antiquitatem means an appeal to tradition. If Steve had said that we should believe because our ancestors did, you’d be right to throw that term out there. He didn’t. Steve is rightly noting that there have been a massive number of people who claim to perceive God in some way. That should be considered as evidence that such a perception is possible – evidence which can be rejected on many grounds, of course. However, that’s not an appeal to tradition, it’s a reference to friendly witnesses. If I take your approach, then all of history is invalid; it’s nothing more than the claims of past generations, and therefore appeals to history are automatically fallacious.
That said, Steve, I think you need to explain how you’re differentiating between “understanding” something and “perceiving” it. That seems to be where you and Tony are missing each other.
There was a bit of cross-posting between Medicine Man and me just now, on the private experience of our senses. But no collusion there, I assure you!
Tony
I would like the opportunity to clarify further (as I have been attempting) and not get bludgeoned with statements like this: “That is a clear cut case of you denying the words that you wrote.”
Then we agree that you can know, by inference, what someone is perceiving by watching them. That’s what I said but for some reason you objected to this and said “How can you know what he is perceiving by watching him?” ?
The experiments done on Derek were as well.
Now comes the opportunity to clarify something that I thought was already clear. I’m not saying animals can’t perceive the mathematical concepts of ‘less than’ and ‘greater than’. I’m saying they can’t perceive higher mathematical concepts that humans can. Agreed?
I asked if my statement counts as evidence and you said “Nope”. I then asked you to tell me what counts as evidence. Do you have an answer?
MM and others,
I think the chain looks like this: the ability to perceive leads to perception which leads to knowledge which leads to understanding. You can’t understand that which you can’t perceive, and you can’t perceive that which you are unable. Does this sound right to everyone?
There was a bit of cross-posting between Tom and me just now, on the private experience of our senses. But no collusion there, I assure you!
(I keed, I keed.)
Hey, cut that out!
Steve,
I think there might be some traction to the way you’re phrasing it. A creature can ‘perceive’, but not ‘know’. They can ‘know’ and not ‘understand’, and so forth. But none of the latter can occur without all of the former (you have to know to understand, etc.) That seems reasonable; how do you apply that to this question of apprehending God, specifically?
MM,
My personal understanding (that means opinion) is that humans made in the image of God have the ability to perceive God whether they are a believer or non-believer. The ability to perceive God shows up as perceiving, or “seeing”, God in different ways throughout history. This can be thought as a distant, or ’murky’ perception of God. How do you go from perception of God to knowledge of God? Good question! Lemme think more about that. What do you think?
SteveK, by what means would you verify the perception of God by a person? See my responses MM immediately below for more about this.
===============
When you say they are real, you’re ignoring a very important distinction that I had just made. You can’t gloss it over. To say it briefly, it’s only real to you. That’s because it’s only happening in your head. See below about qualia and solipsism.
Qualia are solipisitic: there’s no way for someone else to verify them. They are only real to the individual. But the length of a tree can be perceived *and* verified by another. It’s objective.
Hold it right there. I’m talking about the communication from God or the perception of his presence, not the concept of God communicating. Anything that happens in your head can’t be verified by another, be it qualia, voices, the presence of God, etc.
Your humor example is just an example of qualia.
But that was the whole point – that science doesn’t use subjectivity validly to make its conclusions, and it’s not sociopathic.
Paul,
I don’t know. All I have is speculation. Perhaps it’s similar to the way a person might verify that they can perceive who’s calling them. I have no idea how the mechanics of this works out, but the results suggest something is (statistically) being accurately perceived, right? The lady would be correct in saying she can perceive something most others cannot, right?
Paul, I’m confused. Your points about qualia seem to support what I just wrote, and what all of us have been saying. It’s no refutation of one private sense experience to point out that all sense experiences are private.
MedicineMan,
You corrected me by saying that “Argumentum ad antiquitatem means an appeal to tradition. If Steve had said that we should believe because our ancestors did, you’d be right to throw that term out there. He didn’t.”
SteveK wrote this: “Humanity throughout history claims to perceive God in different ways…” How else am I supposed to interpret that other than Steve saying that our ancestors held this view?
You wrote: “Steve is rightly noting that there have been a massive number of people who claim to perceive God in some way. That should be considered as evidence that such a perception is possible – evidence which can be rejected on many grounds, of course. However, that’s not an appeal to tradition, it’s a reference to friendly witnesses.” As I understand it, a logical fallacy invalidates a logical conclusion. SteveK’s argument is indeed Argumentum ad antiquitatem, but even if it was an appeal to friendly witnesses as you state it remains equally invalid as a logical premise. So why do you say that it should be considered as evidence? Or are you saying that SteveK is not building a logical argument? (As an aside here, you and SteveK seem so bent on opposing my line of questioning that you appear to be opposing everything I write not on its sense but on its source — you last quibble over my classification of SteveK’s fallacy is wrong and just seems petty. I have not “attacked” several of your last posts because their arguments seemed solid enough and I didn’t think they were mischaracterizations, etc. I just ask that you consider what I am writing before attacking them.)
You wrote: “Forgive me for being a little short here, but for someone who is so sensitive to having his thoughts, motives, and lines of inquiry questioned, you’re in a big hurry to dish out that which you’re not willing to take. Who’s asking for “special treatment” or “privilege”?
Tom is, and those of you here who are supporting his contentions. The obvious example is science. Those of us who are non-Christians have to satisfy ourselves with just empiricism by which to interpret the natural world, where Tom is attesting that Scriptural interpretation can and should supersede that. In other words, my reliance on empirical evidence is less, in Tom’s mind, than Tom’s reliance on empirical evidence and Scriptural interpretation. That is an argument Tom has made, and it is the logical extension of this post.
Tom, there is a big difference between seeing the blue of the sky or the green of the tree and seeing God, one that you’re ignoring, and one that is crucial. We can, in principle, publicly perceive the sky and the tree together. We can both go to the tree and see if we can walk through it. We we both can’t, we begin to make the objective conclusion that there is something actually there.
But we can’t do that with stuff that is solely in our heads, like the perception of God, dreams, voices, etc. That’s the difference.
Steve,
I’ll have to think about your return question.
I do have a personal example that’s relevant to this conversation, I think.
I have a terrible sense of smell. My younger students liked the phrasing, “I smell bad”. I can smell strong odors, and things that I remember from childhood are easier to pick out. I just don’t do well using that faculty. For that reason, I don’t pay much attention to odors unless someone else points them out.
One of my summer college jobs was “prep cook” at a Macaroni Grill. I got there long before customers came in and made the component sauces, meats, dough, etc. Part of my routine was heating up the steam kettle, which ran on natural gas. I would come in, kneel in front of the kettle, slide back a little panel, and check to be sure the pilot light was lit. Then, I’d turn on the kettle and get started. If it wasn’t lit, I’d reach through the panel with a long match and set the pilot.
One morning, I walked in, knelt by the kettle, and saw no flame. I reached back to the counter, pulled out a match, lit it, and stuck it through the hole.
BOOM.
The next thing I knew, I was crumpled against the opposite wall, the 250 pound steam kettle was turned sideways, the lid was sitting on the floor, and the manager was poking his head out of the office: “Hey, that sounded like an explosion!” You can see why they made him the boss.
Apparently, he’d come in a few minutes earlier than usual, and given the kitchen a quick inspection. Knowing that the kettle needed to be hot before I could get started, he helpfully cranked up the controls…without checking the pilot light. A good-sized gas bubble built up, just waiting for my match.
The thing is, I can smell natural gas because the odor is strong – but I have to make a conscious effort to smell it. I could have noticed the smell if I’d been thinking about it. I just got complacent. My sense of smell didn’t normally tell me much, so I ignored it. That got me in trouble when I was faced with a situation where that ill-used sense was important. I saw that the pilot was out, felt that the kettle was cold – but didn’t think to smell for gas. Boom.
The point of bringing this up is that, in my experience, some senses are dulled through lack of use. I don’t mean that in a condemning way. But I can see how, if a person’s spiritual sense has never really done much for them, they’re not apt to apply it when the question of God comes up. Even if they do, they might have a harder time of it than someone who relies heavily on that sense.
I got comfortable with the notion that a particular sense had little to no use, and so I set it aside. I really, truly, did not smell gas when I blew the lid off of the steam kettle. I did not perceive the odor of gas, both because my sense of it was not strong, and because I wasn’t paying much attention to that sense in the first place. I could have smelled it, and after that experience you can bet I took a good whiff every time I saw that the pilot light was out. My sense is still marginal, but I’ve learned not to ignore it on that account.
SteveK, your argument doesn’t hold when applied to dreams. Many people have the same dream content, like falling, but that doesn’t make us think that the dream is objectively real (that is, the people who had the dream actually fell). That’s because we understand that it’s all in their heads.
Paul, what do you mean “solely in our heads?” Where did that assumption come from?
The perception, the quale, is solely in our heads. That’s true for the tree and the sky and God. The reality is elsewhere, for the tree and the sky and God.
Paul,
We are not claiming that perception of God is purely personal, purely subjective, or “just in our heads.” The point of this is that there are multiple ways to perceive God, and “the heart” is a valid one, not the only one. We can combine our objective evidences of God with each others’ subjective perceptions of Him and begin to make the objective conclusion that there really is something there.
Hey Medicine Man–cut that out again!
Paul,
Good thing because I wasn’t applying it to dreams. You asked: “by what means would you verify the perception of God by a person?” I gave an example of a means that I don’t understand, by which a person can perceive what isn’t physically there to be perceived. That’s all.
Tony, I don’t think this is correct:
It’s not an appeal to tradition. It’s an appeal to witnesses. To appeal to tradition is to say “we should believe X because all these other people have believed X.” To appeal to witnesses is to say, “We can believe that X exists because all these other people have experienced X.” Those are entirely different kinds of statements. And since that is what it is, I don’t understand why you say it is logically invalidated.
Tony,
Yes, he mentioned that they held that belief. He did not say, “and so we should, too.” Steve’s not suggesting that we believe because Grandpa believed. He’s saying that there are many people who have, and do, claim to have a perception of God. That’s not proof, but it is evidence, that has to be considered, that there is something to perceive. That’s not a quibble, it’s an important distinction. No offense to you, or Steve, or Tom, but I’m not in the habit of arguing over things I think are unimportant. If I bring it up, there’s a reason.
Not so far as I can see. He’s advocating a policy of mutual truth, not dominance by one or the other. I can just as easily say that your view holds that scripture ought always be subjugated to science. You’re not saying that in so many words, but you’re suggesting that view far more strongly than Tom’s suggesting the opposite.
I’m an incurable Socratic, so I’m going to ask questions and pose challenges specifically to make someone think about the how/why/said who/so what behind their positions. Sometimes the best way to make someone see a truth is to let them find it on their own. That often involves forcing them to defend or recant a position that they may not have fully considered.
The great part about that is it’s reciprocal. I get my own ideas challenged as much as anyone else’s that way. Not everyone likes that approach, but it’s the only way I know how to learn.
This is SteveK and I approve this message
If agreement isn’t evidence for *something* then what does that say about verification by others?
Steve,
You say there are experts who attest to Derek’s perceptions, and then you say there are experiments. You have yet to cite these things. In other words, your assertions are not supported. I truly don’t know what you’re talking about with Derek and you have addressed none of my questions regarding the distinction of his ability. If you could tell me what the expert testimony is, and what the experiments are, I would be happy to check them out and be glad to come back convinced that you are right. Without them I find your citing of his case unconvincing.
You say that I am bludgeoning you with my assertion that you deny what you have written. And yet no retraction, explanation, or clarification.
You wrote: “Then we agree that you can know, by inference, what someone is perceiving by watching them. That’s what I said but for some reason you objected to this and said “How can you know what he is perceiving by watching him?” ?
I am serious about asking how you (and the experts) can say that Derek is perceiving things differently than others. If I walk through a maze without touching the walls it’s reasonable to conclude that I am perceiving the walls. If a bat goes through at night without touching the walls it is reasonable to presume that the bat perceives the walls. We can do experiments that would prove that I use my eyes and the bat uses its ears. What are the experiments on Derek, and more to the point, what are the experiments on Christians that would lead us to conclude that what Christians are perceiving is real, and that the senses are measurable?
SteveK, MedicineMan, Tom, SteveK wrote: “Humanity throughout history claims to perceive God in different ways and this is not evidence?”
I give you this definition from the website “Logic and Fallacies”:
“Argumentum ad antiquitatem
This is the fallacy of asserting that something is right or good simply because it’s old, or because “that’s the way it’s always been.” The opposite of Argumentum ad Novitatem.
“For thousands of years Christians have believed in Jesus Christ. Christianity must be true, to have persisted so long even in the face of persecution.”
SteveK’s logical fallacy shares similarities with Argumentum ad numerum, etc. , but it still falls best under Argumentum ad antiquitatem. I seriously find it odd the way none of you will grant me under which category of fallacy this is best qualified when we all seem to agree that it is a fallacy.
SteveK, you asked what constitutes evidence. I meant for you to infer from my initial reply to this question that evidence should be an argument that is not a fallacy. However, I’m not sure, now, that the argument we are having requires a logical construction.
Tony, this is rather odd to me:
I don’t agree that appealing to witnesses is a fallacy. I explained the difference between this and the fallacy you refer to at 3:17 pm
Tom,
I read your 3:17 post quickly and did not understand correctly what you had written. But isn’t this a logical fallacy as well? (you wrote): “We can believe that X exists because all these other people have experienced X.” For instance, if more Muslims say that they have experienced the one true God through the Koran than Christians who claim it through the bible, would you accept their argument as evidence? Hundreds of people claimed to have experienced childhood abuse at the hands of their parents, but it was later revealed that virtually all of the “repressed memories” were concoctions based on bad psychotherapy and the inability of those involved to admit the wrong they had done to the wrongly accused. Etc.
MedicineMan,
I wrote about this topic on another post with Tom, but it does appear to me that by allowing for a scriptural interpretation of nature Tom is building a policy that recommends superseding science with his religious beliefs. I am including what I wrote because there is some overlap with this post, and I think that Tom has been touching on these issues in other posts and his comments in the past few weeks.
On the other post I wrote: “Tom, you are making two basic arguments, one is that Scripture is inerrant in its description of nature, and the second is that scientific interpretation cannot be accepted that is not also vetted by its agreement with Scriptural interpretation. This is placing untestable assumptions before testable ones. It turns science from a quest for natural knowledge into a handmaiden of your religious convictions. If allowed to be practiced, it would endanger the good that can be achieved by better understanding nature. In other words, everyone would be better served if your religious conviction guided you with what to do with scientific knowledge, NOT to determine what is scientific knowledge. In order for scientific knowledge to be scientific, it can only be tested by science. Testing by religion makes it something else.
Tony,
Did you watch the video? Did you watch Derek perceive the individual notes from a single sound – repeatably and predictably? Did you hear what the musical experts had to say about his perceptive ability?
Did you watch the other video? Did you hear that the results are statistically significant in the scientific sense?
Likewise, if Derek repeatably and predictably can perceive individual notes from a single sound, whereas other musical geniuses today cannot, then it is reasonable to presume Derek perceives something others cannot.
Regarding your fallacy charge, let me ask you this: Is scientific verification by others evidence for something – anything? If it is evidence for nothing then we can safely do away with it. If it is evidence for something then that defeats your fallacy charge.
Tony,
I could have expressed it better than I did. I should have said, “All these other people have experienced X; their testimony is evidence in favor of X.” Evidence needs to be weighed, of course, along with any other relevant information there may be.
Tom,
This is the same evidence science points to when they say something has been verified. The collective testimony of other scientists is evidence (not proof) in favor of theory X.
Tony,
I’ve read the discussion in both threads; I still don’t see how you get this interpretation:
I think Tom has made it pretty clear that if there seems to be a disagreement between science (interpretation of nature) and religion (interpretation of scripture/God), then the problem is in one or both interpretations, not with God or nature. Your summation says precisely the opposite – implying that religious interpretations are the gold standard. This, he has not done.
Tom’s not advocating one over the other. He’s making a sensible admission that humans are fallible, and we can’t assume personal infallibility in either science or religion. The Christian belief of an infallible Bible is NOT supposed to be belief in infallible human interpretation of it.
All you’re really arguing is the opposite, that religious interpretations are always of lesser truth-value than scientific interpretations. Any suggestion otherwise results in the responses you’re giving. I don’t think those are supportable logically or historically.
Wow, what a conversation, this is the best one for me in terms of level of discussion and length and depth of ideas.
I’m going to try to summarize everything I’ve written tomorrow, it might help me answer Tom’s last question (where it seems I’m supporting his ideas), as well as to clarify the issue.
MedicineMan,
You wrote that you can’t see where I could summarize this about Tom’s philosophy, that ““…scientific interpretation cannot be accepted that is not also vetted by its agreement with Scriptural interpretation.”
But that is what Tom is saying. If a scientific interpretation does not clash with Tom’s Scriptural interpretation, then no problem. But Tom posits that in times when scientific and Scriptural interpretation clash over nature, one should re-examine the scientific interpretation (as well as the Scriptural one) to see if it is incorrect. I contend that this is wrong — Scientific interpretations should be examined solely based on scientific standards, not Scriptural ones.
I am not trying to be coy about my position; I would say that the scientific process is the best way currently known to describe nature, and that a statement about nature that has not undergone the process by which scientific facts are established should not be regarded with equal value to scientific facts. Despite Tom’s statements that he holds science and Scriptural interpretation to be equal in their interpretation of nature, my summary of his position you quoted above remains correct; Tom does hold that scientific interpretations should be compared to Scriptural ones.
I can guess that a response to my protest over Tom’s proposed system is that “Science admits that it is imperfect and fallible, and has been wrong about things in the past, so there’s nothing wrong with using the strong convictions of Scripture to check against the sometimes too hasty conclusions of science.” There are several problems with that approach. For one, modern science already has in place a system for questioning its conclusions and explanations. (And I’m not talking about unproven hypotheses and flavor-of-the-month medical studies that journalists sound bite and the public accepts as a scientific fact – I’m talking about scientific facts like gravity, etc.)
Let me use an example. Say I run an artistic commune, and I propose to the community that we only accept scientific facts that are also beautiful. We all have different but oddly similar senses of what construes beauty. We accept many findings of science, because many scientific explanations are elegant and beautiful. But others we do not accept, like the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter, because to us they appear to conclude that there is no order and beauty in the world. I oppose this community’s process for accepting science because it is less complete and useful than one in which scientific facts are judged on the basis of science.
SteveK,
I apologize; I didn’t realize that the video on Derek you provided the link for was providing the evidence I was waiting for — videos are just harder to watch during the workday. I have watched the first one, but not the second one yet. I’ll try to get to that today.
Tony,
I replied to you here, (linked rather than re-posted).
Tony,
No problem, Tony. I understand. I couldn’t figure out why you were saying my claims were assertions only and now it makes sense. Remember that I’m not saying these videos *prove* anything, only that they are evidence.
Medicine Man,
You wrote: “Our view does not reject all scientific interpretations that disagree with scriptural interpretations – it notes that at least one of the two must be wrong when they seem to disagree.”
Yes, but your view does reject SOME scientific interpretations that disagree with Scriptural interpretations, and that is, by definition, superseding science to religion. Either scientific conclusions are to be judged solely on their own merits or they are not. It sounds to me like you’re saying that because you’re only using Scriptural interpretation to improve your Scientific interpretations that means you’re not really using Scriptural interpretations.
You wrote: “No one is talking about dismissing a scientific idea only because it conflict with a religious idea.” Tom is. Ask him yourself. I believe that Tom has said that he rejects the Theory of Evolution because he interprets Scripture as declaring that God made man distinct from all the other animals. How do you reconcile that with what you say I am mischaracterizing?
Now I suppose that you might say that you and Tom reject the Theory of Evolution because you judge it to be bad science. While I disagree with that assessment (as would something like 98% or more of all biological scientists), then what is the point of this post? In other words, why are you saying on one hand that you and Tom would only reject science based on science, but that your religious interpretations should guide you in your assessment of science?
You wrote: “If you’re convinced that scripture cannot speak to reality, then no other arguments make much difference.” I am convinced that the scientific process is the best way currently known to describe nature, and that a statement about nature that has not undergone the process by which scientific facts are established should not be regarded with equal value to scientific facts. You appear to be saying that science is improved when compared against an overlay of Scriptural interpretation, but that this does not ever present a situation where a scientific idea would be rejected because of its conflict with a religious idea. If that is true, why add the Scriptural overlay?
Tony, have you seen this comment yet? We seem to have split this topic onto two different threads.
You wrote,
I would rather state it this way. I’m not expecting you to agree, but this will help clarify the issue:
I submit to you that the difficulty we’re facing is that you do not consider Scripture to be an approach to truth, while we do. There’s more on that in the other comment I just linked to.
[Tom, yes I did see our other post. I think the confusion was due to my originally commenting in the wrong post this morning. My apologies.]
Tom, I would disagree with your restatement for inserting the word “truth.” Science is not about truth, it’s about trying to find better explanations for the natural world. I believe there is truth in the bible, but I think it’s wrongheaded to require that it contain natural truths, or, better for me, superior (than science’s) descriptions of the natural world.
———
In reference to your prior posting, I am sorry that we had to go through all that to clarify the distinction in our positions. (I did, despite the occasional heat, enjoy it though. Stupid time-wasting blog.)
I have a question for Tom, and for those of you who share his convictions. What would change your mind about how you interpret Scripture’s descriptions of the natural world as you hold them now? In other words, at what point would you cede those interpretations of Scripture on which you withhold the acceptance of scientific interpretations?
As a skeptic, I would certainly change my mind about the existence of God if God were to appear before us, or even if someone could provide a non-fallacious argument proving his existence. (Up until that point I would only say I do not know that God exists.) I would question the validity of the current Theory of Evolution as it exists today if a rabbit skeleton was found among fossils from the Cambrian era, etc.
It seems to me that previous interpreters of the Bible like Thomas Aquinas considered that a purely metaphorical reading of Scripture could be acceptable. I would say that because science does not give meaning to metaphysical questions, that one must look outside science for these answer and that the Bible may contain them.
So my question is, is there any point at which you would hold that the Bible contains metaphorical truths, but in those cases where Scriptural interpretations conflict with scientific facts it is the Scriptural interpretations that are ultimately incorrect? In other words, could a Bible that holds metaphorical truths but not necessarily natural ones still be a Bible to you? I’m pretty sure I know Tom’s answer, but I am curious about what the rest of you think on that topic as well.
Thanks, Tony, for that clarification. Based on your first paragraph it’s pretty clear that our differences reside in how we view the Bible. I’m a bit surprised to hear you don’t think science is a pursuit of the truth regarding the natural world. That would not be at all incompatible with its being also the pursuit of better explanations. A realist in regard to science (such as myself) would say that better explanations are better just if they more nearly approximate the truth, or, I suppose also, if they provide a heuristic step along a path that will eventually come closer to the truth.
My answer to your second question is easy: I am not a young-earth creationist precisely because evidence from the natural world seems to have corrected that view.
The Bible certainly includes metaphor. Discerning what’s intended as plainly literal and what’s metaphor is a process of study, comparing what we see in one passage with other knowledge we have, just as I wrote in the post on David Heddle and science and religion.
Tony,
I accept all scientific facts, but sometimes I question the assumptions and then the interpretations and conclusions inferred from those facts. Likewise, I question my assumptions and interpretations of scripture if the facts seem to go against it. Both must mesh. In all of that, I make ample room for God to be the sovereign, perfect, orderly, logical, loving, relational, creater that he is.
Hi Tony,
You’ve heard the chestnuts about pi, bats as birds, mustard seeds and the Earth being stationary?
I like the point about scientific realism. I was toying with a comment about that earlier today. Not everyone takes such a position, although I do. Many a scientist says that science is about models which best explain and predict certain data (and not all), but that they do not really represent the world – only how it seems to be functioning. Better models come along and better explanations are advanced (by better I don’t mean, in this view, more like reality). So, just as a scientist accepts a paradigm as a platform from which to conduct his work but which may or may not actually accord to reality (whatever that is), one can accept a theory as a boundary within which certain rules apply for now and wherein certain explanations seem best fitted, without altering what he knows to be the actual reality. Again, it is my view that science properly understood is discovering truths about reality, but it is no violation of any intrinsic scientific value to say “let’s accept for the sake of argument these parameters and discuss the facts in this light even though I do not believe this is actually Truth”. In fact, this is the position of a great many scientists, solipsists and envatted brains.
Sorry, this would appear to be the wrong thread.
Tony, others:
You’re mixing up “interpretation” and “facts.” As stated above, there is no choice to side with science – but only because you used the word “facts” for science and “interpretations” for religion. Facts are facts. They cannot be denied, but they can be misinterpreted.
If you’re asking at what point I’m willing to choose a scientific interpretation over a religious interpretation, then I can actually answer. I tend to take the conservative approach, going in both directions. That is, once something seems well established, then I’m reluctant to overturn it until reasons to do so are virtually undeniable. That applies for both kinds of interpretations, scientific and religious.
I’m comfortable acknowledging when my scriptural interpretation seems at odds with a scientific interpretation, recognizing that one of those is wrong, and keeping an open mind in regards to both. I am not comfortable always trying to pick one over the other, from the hip, on the basis of my own limited knowledge.
For example, the Bible says, “In the Beginning, God created…” For a while, scientific evidence pointed away from the interpretation that this was a literal statement. Then, recently, it became apparent that that was most definitely the case. On the other hand, science has long held that earth, and the rest of the universe, is several billion years old. I reviewed a book by a physicist who claims that his conception of relativity allows for a 6,000-year-old earth and a billions-of-years-old universe.
My approach would resist the “there was no beginning” and the “young earth AND old universe” until they were demonstrated to a high level of confidence. I wouldn’t say either was impossible. I would note that both conflict with certain scriptural interpretations, and that those conflicts have some truthful resolution – only one can be right when they actually disagree. I’ll keep an open mind and let the truth rise to the top.
In fairness, I’m highly skeptical of abiogenesis. This is in no small part because it conflicts with my interpretation of scripture. You’ll have to do a lot to convince me that abiogenesis actually happened / happens, but I’m not going to ignore any possible evidence that it did.
Medicine Man,
You wrote: “You’re mixing up “interpretation” and “facts.” ” No, I meant my question precisely the way I asked it. You can choose to rephrase your own question, ignore my question, ask for a clarification, etc. but I meant my question the way I phrased it. (http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=scientific%20fact)
You wrote: “For example, the Bible says, “In the Beginning, God created…” For a while, scientific evidence pointed away from the interpretation that this was a literal statement. Then, recently, it became apparent that that was most definitely the case.” Interesting. I wasn’t aware that science had made it apparent that it was definitely the case that “In the Beginning, God created…” Once again, for someone who is so quick to point out the supposed imprecision in my comments you seem to cast a less critical eye on the meanings of your own.
Aside from the miscorrection of my question, I appreciate your response.
But you have mixed up Charlie and Medicine Man.
I think, Tony, that the Wordnet definition of scientific fact is nearly synonymous with “interpretation.” Would you agree? Or if not, how would you distinguish them?
Tom,
I don’t think that scientific interpretation and scientific fact are synonymous. I’m not really that comfortable with the word interpretation in relation to science, for one — I just don’t come across it in scientific literature that often.
I actually have thought about what the Scriptural term would be that is an analogue to a scientific fact, and I don’t know if there is one, unless it would be something like “canonical” or maybe the less formidable sounding “correct.”
Tony,
If you meant the question exactly as it was asked, with all understanding of the difference between the two, then only one response was possible. I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt, and presume that they’re not asking purposeless questions, so I noted the cross-comparison of “fact” and “interpretation”. When any “fact” contradicts any “interpretation”, it’s the interpretation that is in error, because “facts” are “facts”. I’m not choosing a scriptural interpretation that says that earth is flat over an indisputable fact that it is spherical. I am, however, taking a critical approach to conflicting interpretations of all stripes.
I’m sorry if that’s difficult to understand. Please re-read: I indicated that science pointed away from a literal interpretation, and recently it has been made apparent that the interpretation certainly ought to be literal. The phrase “that was most definitely the case” immediately follows, and is clearly in reference to, the prior phrase, “the interpretation that this was a literal statement.” Hopefully you will not be offended at my mention of this imprecision in analyzing my comment.
Look, from this point forward, I guess we can double-check each others’ meaning in almost every circumstance, but I don’t think that posting pre-checks is going to do anything other than triple the words and hours it takes to get anywhere. If you feel I’ve misunderstood, then either I thought wrong, you wrote wrong, or both. Say so, correct me, and get on with it, because there’s no cause to take such things personally.
Tony,
Then what we have is a discrepancy in terminology between disciplines. I still wonder what the difference in actual meaning is, beyond the difference in the words that are chosen. It seems to me that a “fact” in science and an “interpretation” in Biblical hermeneutics can both be described as the best understanding we can derive of the information we have at hand, in view of the larger context of what we know. That applies to Bible and science equally, as far as I can tell. What do you think?
Tom,
Your rephrasing, “ that a “fact” in science and an “interpretation” in Biblical hermeneutics can both be described as the best understanding we can derive of the information we have ” is exactly how I meant the words to be understood.
Charlie,
You wrote: “If you meant the question exactly as it was asked, with all understanding of the difference between the two, then only one response was possible.” And yet SteveK, Tom, and even Charlie seemed to find a way to respond that was not your way. I’m not going to go on to respond to the rest of your comment — your first sentence was enough for me.
Charlie, you seem immune to constructive criticism, incapable of accepting correction, and set intractably against anything I might posit. I am not visiting here to take notes on what you consider to be true and correct with no chance for a give and take dialogue. I am seriously considering no longer responding to your comments.
I think that was Medicine Man, not Charlie.
And Tony, I think you may be rushing ahead on this. From my perspective he’s not being outrageous. What is it he’s doing that seems out of line? (You can email me if you want to on this–use the contact form linked above.)
Looks like my plan to do a comprehensive survey is not going to happen. Forgive me the following spotty responses:
MM wrote:
“We are not claiming that perception of God is purely personal, purely subjective, or “just in our heads.” The point of this is that there are multiple ways to perceive God, and “the heart” is a valid one, not the only one. We can combine our objective evidences of God with each others’ subjective perceptions of Him and begin to make the objective conclusion that there really is something there.”
I get the idea of confirming the subjective experience with objective evidence. But would you agree that the subjective evidence is not sufficient, whereas the objective evidence would be?
Tom wrote:
“Paul, what do you mean “solely in our heads?” Where did that assumption come from?
The perception, the quale, is solely in our heads. That’s true for the tree and the sky and God. The reality is elsewhere, for the tree and the sky and God.”
All perceptions are in one’s head, of course, but when I perceive a tree, I can test my perception of the tree with my neighbor. He sees me walk into the same tree and I see him walk into the tree that I walked into and we both conclude that it’s likely the tree is really there. When you perceive God (not his handiwork, or his logic, bu he himself), by him talking to you, or you feel a presence, or whatever it is, *that’s* the thing that is solely in your head. That’s different from the perception of a tree.
One other thought, to head off a possible objection.
Here’s my hypothesis:
A perception of something not one’s own qualia, dreams, thoughts, feelings, etc.–that is, something not inescapably and solely “in one’s own head” (because the perception of a material object is not within one’s head solely to the extent that we can show each other the object, and I can’t show you my dream)–must be verified materialistically in order to become a fact or true.
Material objects are the only entities that we can show to exist outside of ourselves. The other things that we can say exist in some fashion–dreams, thoughts, feelings, qualia–only exist within one’s own head. If it’s not solely within your head, it has to be material. The non-material stuff inside our heads exist in a different way than material objects exactly because they are not material and because they cannot be shown to another. (If this dualism is defeated by a monistic materialism, it wouldn’t change the final point of my argument).
One way to refute this hypothesis would be to identify a non-material entity that we can show to exist outside of ourselves, and for which anyone, in principle, could perceive.
Tony, thanks for that confirmation on the meanings of “fact” and “interpretation.” I think we can take that definition as a working definition then: “the best understanding we can derive of the information we have at hand, in view of the larger context of what we know.”
A Biblical interpretation and a scientific fact are both the same kind of thing, then, epistemologically speaking; and other than custom and aesthetics, we could interchange the words and speak of Biblical facts and scientific interpretations. Custom and aesthetics may dictate against this, but the actual meanings of the words do not.
Can we agree on that?
It would be ideal if we could come up with a neutral term for the sake of this discussion–something other than “fact” or “interpretation.” I haven’t been able to think of one, though.
How about TBUWCDOTIWHATIVOTLCOWWK – which is short for “the best understanding we can derive of the information we have at hand, in view of the larger context of what we know”?
Yup, I meant Medicine Man above, not Charlie, when I snapped at 4:06 today. Twice today I’ve got that one wrong, no less.
Charlie can be a real cranky-pants so don’t let him off so easily just yet (I kid, I kid).
Paul,
I would have to say no. I think that there’s a significant body of evidence demonstrating that empirical data, intelligence, and so forth are not enough to decide the question of God’s existence. I’m not saying that such a situation could not occur, in theory. I just don’t think that it’s a situation we find ourselves in now. I don’t think that’s a huge problem, though. There are a lot of valid sciences where we have little objective evidence and a lot of subjective evidence, such as psychology, paleontology, and so forth.
I would have to suggest the Law of Non-Contradiction as an example. Or the Law of the Excluded Middle, or the Law of Identity, or possibly even all of the laws of logic. They are non-material, yet they are most certainly real, and they most certainly have influence on reality. I don’t fully agree with the test being proposed (mostly, but not totally), but that’s one possible answer.
Everyone, I know I’m hitting this a tad late, but I’m absolutely not comfortable with using different terms to mean the same thing in two different areas. A “fact”, as I’ve been using it, is that which actually is, that which is a completely true description of some aspect or slice of reality. “The sun is composed mainly of hydrogen and helium,” or “the Earth is spherical”, or “John 3:16 says ‘For God so loved the world…’” are facts. The word “interpretations”, as I’ve been using it, means an extrapolation or interpolation derived from facts.
That the Bible says, “The evening and the morning were the first day,” (in Hebrew, of course) is a fact. That this means “24 hours” is an interpretation. That it means “24 million years” is an interpretation. One of those may seem far more likely than the other, but it’s still subject to change – because it’s an interpretation.
That the planet experiences climate change is a fact. That this is caused by man is an interpretation. That this is part of the natural course of things is an interpretation. One of those may seem far more likely than the other, but it’s still subject to change – because it’s an interpretation.
Interpretations may be factual, but they may also be false. Facts are those things proven to such an extent that they cannot be rationally denied. From that standpoint, there are a lot of “so-called-facts” in both religious and scientific circles that are, actually, very likely interpretations, but might not be actual “facts.”
The reason I say all of this is that if we apply “fact” to science and “interpretation” to religion, we subconsciously give science a credibility that we deny to religion. I think that truth is truth – it’s either an accurate description of that which is real, or not, and that applies to religion as well as science. The word “fact” implies certainty, “interpretation” implies uncertainty.
I would rather be sure to use the exact same term to refer to the same idea, so that it is clear exactly what is being discussed. If it is established beyond rational doubt (earth rotates, 1 is greater than 2, life propagates via DNA, gold is an element), let’s call it a “fact”. If it’s still subject to interpretation, let’s call it as such.
Privately, we may differ on what we think is established well enough to be considered “beyond rational doubt”, but if we stick to the same terms, at least we’ll all know what the others mean when they say it.
MM, what about considering the Law of Non-contradiction as an assumption, like a postulate in geometry? We went through that a couple of weeks ago, but nothing was resolved. The LNC still seems to me exactly like a postulate. We “know” that two parallel lines never meet, but only because of a postulate; there are geometries that work quite well in which two parallel lines *do* meet.
For the LNC, any rational thought is impossible without it, but that doesn’t prove that it isn’t an assumption and is real.
In fact (although I hestiate to ask this question) “What can the word ‘real’ mean when applied to a rule of logic?” I know what “real” means when applied to material objects, and I know what it means when applied to qualia (something different from what it means when applied to material objects), but I don’t know at all what it means when applied to a rule of logic. Logic isn’t real, it’s a method and a system that fits our universe, apparently (except for quantum reality). The universe is real, but methods that describe it or work within it are something different.
Paul,
I guess we could consider the LNC as an “assumption”, not necessarily “real”, but that causes more problems than it solves. That’s about as fundamental as it gets in terms of logic. If we can’t be sure that the LNC is real, then how can we be sure that time is real? Or that matter is real – once we let the LNC slip out of our definition of “real”, then what else could possibly be immune from speculation that it’s just an assumption that might not be actual? Again, we’re knocking on the door of solipsism.
With that in mind, I’d have to know what viable geometries exist in which this could possibly be true:
That’s self-contradictory on the face of it. “Parallel”, by definition, does not allow for intersecting. That’s right back to the LNC, and whether or not it’s valid. I’ve heard people argue that the LNC isn’t needed, that some forms of logic deny it, but every attempt to disprove it has to use it. Once you say that any one thing is true, and it’s opposite is false, you confirm that the LNC is inescapable. Even saying that one approach to logic or logical interpretation works, and others don’t is confirming the LNC. That the LNC might not be real more or less makes all forms of rational discussion meaningless.
I think there might be a blurring here that can be helped:
At some point, we have to recognize that we must use symbols to represent reality. The Arabic numeral “1”, and the English word “one” are representations of an idea. The same is true for the word “gravity”. There is some process, mechanism, or force that is being described by that word. If the universe functions in a way that is describable by “mathematics”, and it obeys “laws of physics”, both of which are symbolic expressions of the way the universe works, then “logic” is no different. There is not necessarily a “force of Non-Contradiction”, any more than there is a “force of addition” or a “force of time”. All the same, we cannot deny that logic is actually real without raising the same attack against mathematics or physics.
How is logic any less real than mathematics? That it is not material apparently does not matter, no pun intended. That it deals in abstractions apparently does not matter, either. Mathematics is real, because that word “mathematics” corresponds to the idea of something(s) which we know to be true. Logic is real, because that word corresponds to the idea of something(s) which we know to be true. The methods that we use to describe the workings of the world are abstractions and symbols, but that does not mean that what they represent is not true.
That just sort of ‘came out’, so if it doesn’t make any sense, please say so. I think it does, but what makes sense to me might not mean ten cents to anyone else.
Paul says:
I’m not so sure the idea of the LNC was unresolved. Many times the truth of the LNC was demonstrated:
http://www.thinkingchristian.net/2008/03/language-log-the-functional-neuroanatomy-of-science-journalism/#comment-2210
http://www.thinkingchristian.net/2008/03/language-log-the-functional-neuroanatomy-of-science-journalism/#comment-2254
http://www.thinkingchristian.net/2008/03/language-log-the-functional-neuroanatomy-of-science-journalism/#comment-2254
http://www.thinkingchristian.net/2008/03/language-log-the-functional-neuroanatomy-of-science-journalism/#comment-2262
http://www.thinkingchristian.net/2008/03/language-log-the-functional-neuroanatomy-of-science-journalism/#comment-2267
http://www.thinkingchristian.net/2008/03/language-log-the-functional-neuroanatomy-of-science-journalism/#comment-2303
===
As MM deduces, here’s a reminder that Paul’s view of knowledge causes him to be unable to affirm his own job or existence:
http://www.thinkingchristian.net/2008/03/language-log-the-functional-neuroanatomy-of-science-journalism/#comment-2315
Paul, as mentioned before, can’t tell that he’s not a brain in a vat.
http://www.thinkingchristian.net/2008/03/language-log-the-functional-neuroanatomy-of-science-journalism/#comment-2014
Or that he exists:
Sorry if that’s a caricature.
Hi Tom,
Sorry, I forgot about multiple links.
If you have a moment, could you free a comment about the LNC, geometry, brains in vats, Descartes, etc.?
Thanks.
It’s out of spam jail now
, acquitted on all counts.
I have a different kind of spam protection working now (bcspamblock), and it seems to be doing very well. I’m going to change the link setting so that it won’t block anything with less than 30 links. It doesn’t give me an option to turn that feature off completely, but 30 ought to be plenty!
MM, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-Euclidean for other geometries.
MM, can you say what you mean by the word “real” when you say that logic is real?
Thanks for those reminders, Charlie. Love the apprehending beauty thread. There were some great discussions there.
SteveK,
I finally watched the 2nd video you had linked to way earlier in this discussion. Long and short is that I would agree that the second video (Sheldrake) presents evidence for ESP, which was part of my question. As I’m sure you know, Sheldrake appears to be a controversial figure, and many scientists are said to have debunked his tests. Still, it should be fairly easy to repeat that experiment – I know that an organization in the UK was asking for volunteers in March, but I don’t know if they’ve done the test or published the report yet.
The example of Derek is interesting (who doesn’t love savants?), but in that case I still think Derek’s is not an example of Extra Sensory Perception, but of highly developed perception. I can hear multiple notes when the other pianist played, but I cannot distinguish them. The video mentioned that other accomplished musicians can distinguish the top and bottom notes and maybe get the middle ones right, but not to the degree that Derek can. So I would say that Derek’s ability is extraordinary, perhaps the most extraordinary, but not a case of him perceiving something other than sound. (If, for instance, Derek were a hundred miles away and in a soundproof box and could still distinguish the notes being played, it would be clear that he is sensing something other than sound – it seems virtually impossible that the undistorted audio signal could travel that far, hence it would appear that Derek is perceiving something extra sensory. That would be more similar to the Sheldrake ESP experiment.)
I have to be honest, I didn’t think anybody would take me seriously on the ESP question. I still think there’s a philosophical / theological problem with some humans having a greater physical ability to perceive a spiritual reality, let alone the problems of testability in our world. Still, the fact that no one dismissed it out of hand is something that certainly surprised me.
All,
I imagined that we all were familiar with what I believe are the common definitions for: Scientific Fact, Scientific Law, and Scientific Theory.
I am going to go ahead and cite or paraphrase (capitalizing what I think are the shorthand distinguishing features) what I believe are the most common and accepted (very short) definitions of these terms.
Scientific Fact: an OBSERVATION that has been confirmed repeatedly and is accepted as true (although its truth is never final)
Scientific Law: a set of observations AND PREDICTIONS about a natural behavior that has proven itself true under certain conditions
Scientific Theory: an EXPLANATION of natural phenomena (usually containing facts and/or laws) that is widely accepted by the scientific community
So, Medicine Man, if you did not understand what I thought was the commonly known definition of the term “Scientific Fact” I can now see why you protested at what you thought was an unfair comparison. I did not mean Scientific Fact = Truth. I truly meant, as I confirmed with Tom, scientific fact to mean it as its defined above, and Scriptural interpretation to be held to contain a similar level of correctness (based on the standards of Scriptural interpretation). As an aside, and this is something that I have discussed briefly with Tom, I don’t know how it is possible for a Scriptural interpretation to gain the same level of acceptance as a scientific fact, which I think is a significant difference between the two fields, and this difference between the two fields is part of the basis for my position.
Hi Tony,
Given your definitions I would accept no Scriptural interpretation that denied a scientific fact (that’s a little brash and I’ll take under advisement any thoughts from the other Christians here who have more time to weigh it).
I would question our ability to discern laws only slightly more and I would question our theories every time they conflict with a Scriptural interpretation and I would want to know which is right.
Tony,
I’m curious why it surprised you.
This is the same problem you are supposed to be addressing. You are comparing an interpretation of Scripture, which would be analogous to Theory, above, erroneously with Fact. You’ve provided a definition for Fact which shows the two are not to be compared. An observation of Scriptural statements can have exactly the same level of acceptance as an observation of a natural phenomenon. The interpretation of that observed statement would be analogous to the scientific theory explaining the natural observation.
SteveK,
It surprised me mostly because of the theological / philosophical problem that I mentioned. Also, for centuries, ESP studies have fielded to produce anything usefully scientific. This despite the fact that there’s a Nobel prize, fantastic wealth, possible military advantage, etc. as an incentive to anyone who can verify its existence. So I think that an assertion of having ESP is going to need fresh evidence to be persuasive.
Charlie,
I wasn’t trying to “rig” the question, and I think it’s a valid one. At this point I think I’m going to repost my question here: “So my question is, is there any point at which you would hold that the Bible contains metaphorical truths, but in those cases where Scriptural interpretations conflict with scientific facts it is the Scriptural interpretations that are ultimately incorrect?
The question I was trying to ask was could you imagine a future existence where the Bible did not have to contain literal truths about the physical world? In other words, if scientific facts were to be established that were at odds with every Scriptural interpretation that dealt with the natural world, would that also destroy your faith in the Bible? Or are the metaphorical truths enough? That’s honestly the only question I was trying to ask — I think I was just wondering how important the Bible’s literal interpretation of the natural world is to you in your faith. It wasn’t a trap, honest. And I am sincerely sorry if this question is offensive.
Charlie, that’s more disingenuous than a caricature. You make it sound like I don’t know that it’s still me when I wake up in the morning. Obviously, I live my life knowing that I exist. My argument was in the context of ultimate considerations (“If you really consider things logically to their ultimate conclusion, then . . . .”).
Tony,
While this is pretty far-fetched, only because of its extremity (emphasis mine):
My answer would have to be a cautious “yes.” Understand that’s awfully tenuous, though, since you said “every scriptural interpretation.” Since I think that we can, and should, apply our understandings of nature and our understandings of scripture to each other, that would imply, for me, a situation where there are no possible explanations for scripture which mesh with explanations for nature.
I guess I’m answering “yes”, only because I can’t imagine having a mindset that would say “no”. Ultimately, my faith in God is not inextricably tied to my faith in the Bible. That is, I have anchored my trust in God, and nothing else. My trust in the Bible is closely tied to that faith, but the Bible does not equate to or outrank God in my beliefs. The Bible could be errant, and still tell the truth about God. It could be totally wrong about God, and He could still exist. That “whooshing” sound you just heard was my home church gasping in absolute horror.
The question isn’t offensive at all. It’s perfectly reasonable. If the Bible is what it claims to be, then it should correspond to what we can observe. I’d have to agree with the assessment that a book which can’t be trusted to be accurate in natural things is hard to trust in supernatural things.
I have to note that the Bible makes very few references to the mechanisms of nature, since it’s primarily concerned with our relationship to God. That’s one reason it’s so aggravating to see some people hang so much artificial weight on certain interpretations of vague passages.
Medicine Man,
Your last comment was worth all the fuss we sometimes go through.
I felt like I was part of the congregation with the whooshing sound I made as I read it. That was surprising (your viewpoint), honest, and refreshing. Thanks for staying engaged; I appreciate it.
Tony,
I have to ask what I think is a fair follow-up question, on par with yours. If scientific facts were established that were at odds with every atheistic interpretation of the natural world, would that destroy your (non)belief?
I think the immediate question that arises is: “could that situation ever occur?” That is, have we pre-defined our positions such that only the most outrageously unreasonable scenario could unhinge our viewpoints? God writes “I Am Here” in neon colors on the moon, or an alien race shows us space-cam footage of the disciples stealing the body from the tomb, or some such. Are we allowing enough room to acknowledge that absolute proof (either way) will almost certainly never happen, and looking instead for reasonable doubt (or reasonable faith)? If not, then we’re not really looking for truth.
Good discussion here!
In answer to Tony’s question…
…here is my answer. The metaphorical truths in the Bible point to the same truths as the literal truths. There are parables about God’s Kingdom; they’re metaphorical, but they speak to a real Kingdom of a real God. The Bible says God will shelter us under his wings. That’s metaphor, but it speaks to genuine caring by a real God. I could multiply examples but you get the point.
There are some, mostly of a postmodern and/or theologically liberal mindset, who would take almost all of the Bible as metaphor. I am unable to agree with them, and if every literal truth were disproved by science, then all the metaphors would also be rendered insipid, vapid, worthless.
I don’t think science has it in itself actually to do that, because it’s the wrong category of study. But hypothetically, if science disproved all the literal truths of the Bible, I would have to give up everything else connected with it too.
Hi Tony,I doubt I’d lose my belief in God as that is not Bible-based. My belief in Christianity, as opposed to my theism, IS Bible-based. Jesus lived and died and was raised. These are literal truths, not metaphorical truths. If they were literally wrong and merely metaphors I would not be a Christian. As I see it, nothing can be in conflict with scientific facts – the BIble included. Anything that conflicts with a fact is wrong. LNC, you know.Would I accept a metaphorical Bible that has no literal truths? No. Luckily, it’s not and it is confirmed to a high degree – thus my belief in it.
===
Hi Paul,
Charlie, that’s more disingenuous than a caricature. You make it sound like I don’t know that it’s still me when I wake up in the morning. Obviously, I live my life knowing that I exist. My argument was in the context of ultimate considerations (”If you really consider things logically to their ultimate conclusion, then . . . .”).
It’s not disingenuous, that would make me dishonest and a hypocrite.I make you appear to be nothing that you don’t make yourself appear to be. You reinforce the very point at the end of your comment. When forced to take your own arguments to their logical conclusions you don’t know if you exist, you don’t know you’re not a brain in a vat and you don’t know you’re a jazz musician.
As I asked you then:
And while you’re at it, and have mentioned Descartes, can you affirm that you know that you exist? Can you do so without circular reasoning and without relying upon an unproven axiom?
You could not.You said, of vatiness:
But there’s no way I can tell if that statement (”I am a brain in a vat.”) is true or not. So I still don’t have a way of knowing.And of being a jazz musician:So, on one level, I can just answer your question: in principle, it is possible that I am not a jazz musician). It’s pretty unlikely because the *best* evidence that can be marshalled would lead to a yes answer.
Of course you live your life KNOWING you exist. But for weeks you pretended you could KNOW no such thing because to admit so was to punch a hole in your entire argument. Once again, we see you abandon your positions as soon as you get some distance from them and you want to make another point.And once again, the person who points this out to you [me] is derailing conversations and acting hypocritically.Your response now only makes the very point you resisted throughout those previous threads. It only reinforces what I said then – your radical skepticism, which is forced by your attempts to deny knowledge of God in principle, is not your true position. It is merely a convenient avoidance response.This reminds me of how, on that thread, you had to retract your previous claims about statistics providing knowledge, as alluded to here:
Sure my views change. But I think it is more than appropriate to point out, on yet another thread where you are impervious to our arguments, that you are now arguing a point contrary to the one you previously advanced and made impervious to our arguments. http://www.thinkingchristian.net/2008/03/language-log-the-functional-neuroanatomy-of-science-journalism/#comment-2170
As you now revive these points in your conversation with Medicine Man it is only fair that everyone know where you are coming from – especially as you claim it is his position that makes a mockery of objective knowledge.
<blockquote>My argument was in the context of ultimate considerations (”If you really consider things logically to their ultimate conclusion, then . . . .”). </blockquote>Hope this is not too fine a point … but this is precisely why we argue and question your positions. You HAVE to take them logically to their ultimate conclusions – otherwise what good are they. If they fail at their ultimate conclusions, as you now admit yours have, then they are false.Once again (and I’m sure you’ll deny this as you did before), you continually run into this problem because your starting positions are mistaken. You have to go to such lengths to protect them that you take a stand that is entirely untenable. This is obvious to observers, but never to you until you find yourself on another thread arguing against your previous self.The problem is not with your brain or intellect. And if you’ll pardon me for being so bold, neither is it because I’m a jerk, unreasonable or disingenuous.
Medicine Man,
I am outraged by your question!! Outraged!!! How dare you!!! (Kidding.)
Your question is: “If scientific facts were established that were at odds with every atheistic interpretation of the natural world, would that destroy your (non)belief?”
A few things here. I call myself a skeptic, which I think is a more accurate description of non-belief than atheist or agnostic; both of those latter terms imply that a decision has been made about God’s existence, the first that God does not exist, and the second that God’ existence cannot be known (proven). I am suspending my belief in God’s existence until I have seen evidence of God’s existence. (For one, I do think it’s a difficult metaphysical dilemma to hold that we are too complex too have appeared by chance but God is not.)
From a personal standpoint, I would be much happier knowing that I could live eternally, and that those I love would be with me. So I think that the view that skeptics relish destroying a beautiful idea is absurd. It is one reason why I have no interest in destroying anyone’s belief in God; in my case, as I tell my Christian friends, I simply have not been blessed with the gift of faith.
All that being said, I don’t know if scientific facts are the basis for my skepticism — I don’t think holding that gravity behaves as described should lead me to conclude that God does not exist. If a scientific fact or law could be devised for evidence of God’s existence, of course I would find that persuasive. I would be happier. In short, I would love it. But right not, I can’t imagine what that scientific fact could be.
Can you give me an example of a scientific fact that would be at odds with an atheistic interpretation?
Charlie,
I read over your last few comments concerning your dispute with Paul. It appears that you are continuing a discussion from previous posts that I am not familiar with. The main point of your comments seems to be that Paul is a jerk, and you are not. I have to wonder out loud how productive you think that discussion will be, and I also have to say that the evidence you are providing and the tone of your writing, at least to me, doesn’t lend credence to your point.
Hi Tony,Nice reply to Medicine Man.I like that you address the fact that science is not the basis for your skepticism and that you’d prefer that God exist. ===On your comment on my attempts with Paul, thanks for your critique. You are right that the many links and quotes I have included are from past posts with which you are not familiar and are not particularly germane to anybody who does not share that past.As to jerkiness, tone and motivation, I’ll just mention that from reading these threads you and I would tend to disagree as to your sensitivities and your ability to assess.For the record, I do not think Paul is a jerk but rather a nice guy for whom I have as much affection as I feel frustration. I think the point I am trying to make is worth making but I thank you for your feedback.
Tony – Like the others have said, my belief in God comes before my belief in the truths of the Bible and Christianity. Charlie put it nicely when he said “Jesus lived and died and was raised. These are literal truths, not metaphorical truths. If they were literally wrong and merely metaphors I would not be a Christian.” I’m a theist because I perceive God through experiences. I’m a Christian because of the facts of history and because the teachings of biblical Christianity mesh extremely well with those perceptions/experiences.
Tony,
If the question is “a” fact vs “an” interpretation, then I can say yes a thousand times over. If the question is “every fact” vs “all possible interpretations”, then no.
I can offer two correlated ideas that merge into something important, I think.
The “beginning” issue is one. There are some weighty theological implications of a non-eternal universe. Science eventually provided conclusive proof that this universe had, at some point, an actual, tangible beginning. The eternal nature of the universe was not a fringe or secondary part of atheistic thought – it was crucial. There was no reason to think that the universe had not always been, and so there was no need for a Beginner. The fact of the universe’s literal beginning injects a lot of doubt into the atheistic framework.
The second is the “fine-tuning” concept, which goes against the idea that this is just “any old” arrangement of reality. In a nutshell, the specific values and proportions of all of the universe’s forces, such as gravity, electromagnetism, strong and weak nuclear forces, etc. are exactly those needed to allow life to exist. This is not trivial. The strong force is ten thousand billion billion billion billion times stronger than gravity. That is not hyperbole, that’s actually what the ratio is. That shows how wide a range of forces there are, and if any of them were changed by one part in that ten thousand billion billion billion billion, life would be impossible.
The combination of these raises an almost inescapable specter of a creator. There is no empirical or logical reason to suggest that these values HAVE to be what they are. Matter, energy, and so forth can exist if these values are changed. Objects similar to stars and planets could exist, but not life. There is no empirical or logical reason to suggest that there are other universes, or prior incarnations of universes. The only universe that we know exists is perfectly tuned in the only way it could be for life to exist.
What this means is that the universe we live in is indescribably, outrageously, ridiculously specific to the requirements of life, and clearly finite in the length of its existence. From the standpoint of both probability and logic, the suggestion of a deliberate act of creation is very, very, very hard to dismiss.
Those are scientific facts, all verifiable by empirical data, none of which are dependent on or sourced from some sacred text or religious tradition. And they point an extremely emphatic finger towards a purposeful, deliberately arranged, caused and contingent universe. Objections to the conclusions I gave above are purely philosophical, and non-empirical. Every concept that attempts to deflect these is one based on pure conjecture.
That’s at least one example. When fully understood, it’s probably the strongest scientific challenge to atheism. It makes the possibility that this is an accidental universe so mind-bogglingly unlikely that it defies sensible consideration. In and of itself, it lends an enormous level of credence to the idea that this is a created universe.
Charlie, it’s nothing more than different levels of knowing, or shades of gray and meaning, or knowledge that isn’t absolute, but merely good enough. Any of those will make my ideas fall into place quite nicely.
Tony, thanks for your support in my discussion with Charlie, especially your comment about tone.
Paul,
Re: non-Euclidian geometry.
I stand corrected…I think. The term “parallel” seems to have alternate definitions that I was not fully aware of. Reading the Wikipedia link gave me the same expression that Calvin has in the upper right of this picture.
My conception of “parallel” was purely Euclidian, in that sense. It’s the only definition of “parallel” I’d been exposed to. I guess my response would be that, understood in the Euclidian sense, we know that parallel lines don’t meet, and we can springboard into the rest of my argument from there.
Using the different geometries wouldn’t be an accurate analogy to other forms of logic, for example, for the same reasons we discussed about using symbology to describe what’s real. Whether or not “parallel” lines intersect is wholly dependent on how you define your terms. Defining them in the Euclidian sense, they don’t, and anything saying otherwise is contradictory. The other geometries don’t deny this, they just have a different definition of “parallel,” which creates a totally different geometry. We can come up with all kinds of forms of logic, but once they start describing things that aren’t actually real, then they’re just rhetorical.
“Real”, for me, has a meaning much like “truth.” It’s a term that describes something which actually exists, which is truly part of the universe. It’s got a more visceral aspect to it, though. It’s not an abstraction, in the way I use it. Matter is real, my mind is real, gravity is real. When it’s applied to a system, that word has to be filtered through into what the system describes. That’s what I was getting at before. There may not be a “law of addition”, but the statement “1 plus 1 equals 2” expresses something “real.”
So, logic is “real” not in the sense that it has material or physical substance, or that it is a force or particle that obeys certain laws, but in that the system we call “logic” expresses something(s) about the universe which is(are) true, accurate, correlative, however you want to put it.
Ah, thanks Paul.So you do have knowledge after all, about your existence, vocation and non-envattedness.Did you arrive at this knowledge without unprovable assumptions and with no circularity in your reasoning (the type you claim defeat logical knowledge and the LNC)? Did you do so by eliminating subjectivity, or by getting outside your own head? No, I will say, you did not. There is no empirical, objective method by which you can escape the subjectivity of these conclusions.It would also appear that your previous claim that the LNC was not demonstrated because, unlike me, you did not have to accept a thing’s truth merely because you couldn’t imagine its negation holding is defeated. You know you exist and the argument you provided in support was “how could I not, it sure seems impossible that I not…”.By my metric this defeats your in-principle denials on the previous threads and also resolves what you said to Medicine Man above was unresolved. To finish with that idea, you do have knowledge which is not empirically derived, is not verified by science, is not merely qualia, is not proven, etc. And this is KNOWLEDGE.As an aside, Tony and Paul, Since you’ve both commented about my tone could you tell me what my tone is and what you’ve perceived about it?
Charlie, you completely ignored the distinctions I made in my last response to you.
MM, let’s return to the point, which is that the law of non-contradiction is more like a postulate in geometry than it is a theorem (which is something that is proved correct). What possible proof can there be for the LNC when, in order to prove it, you have to adopt it (because a proof would be nonsensical without it). The only way to bootstrap your way out of this situation is to postulate the LNC. Logic may work, it may lead us to useful conclusions about real things, but that doesn’t mean that it is real. It is merely a useful postulate.
Paul,I think the LNC is quite well proven by the opposite of what you said: you can’t even attempt to disprove it without using it. As you said, a proof (of anything) is nonsensical without the LNC. Reality itself makes no sense without it. There is no real-world situation that can be considered where the LNC does not apply. The LNC is an axiom, not a theorem or postulate. It can’t be proven simply because it is so self-evident that all other logical propositions depend on it.
I think that your approach to the concept of “real” is a little too slippery. You seem to be leaving the doors open a crack to let anything in or out, as it suits the preferences of a particular person. Some things simply are: they are “real”, “true”, however you want to put it. The LNC is one of those.
Hi Paul,Thanks for your response.Unfortunately it neither satisfied my curiosity, informed me of anything nor rebutted my point.If you can think of anything I said that indicates my absolute ignorance of your position please do point it out.In the meantime maybe you can help clarify something. I’m sure this would help you and Medicine Man as you attempt to stay on point amid my repeated interruptions.I said you don’t know that you exist (as you had said previously).You said this was a disingenuous caricature and that, contrary to my misrepresentation, you do, in fact, know that you exist.You’ve also indicated that there are various levels and shades of knowledge.Is this knowledge you have of your own existence shaded in such a manner that it is not actually knowledge? Or is it knowledge?If it is knowledge (which it is) and it depends upon assuming that which you are claiming to know (which it does) then your distinctions do nothing to expel the LNC from the various levels of knowledge or reality.You can not prove you exist, and are not a brain in a vat, without first adopting the position. And yet these are not merely useful postulates, but things you actually know – according to this current thread.Or is there something in your shaded levels of knowledge which allows you to say you know that you exist without really knowing it?
MM, I agree that the LNC is an axiom. Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axiomfor more.Saying that the LNC is an axiom doesn’t defeat my larger point, which referred to your 11 Jun 2008 at 8:33 pm post. I had asked for a non-material entity.Can we say that an axiom *exists?* It may be correct, or necessary, or useful, but in what sense does it *exist?*
Paul, I’m confused. Your last response to Charlie, which you said contained distinctions he ignored, consisted basically of
I don’t know how that fit into the discussion at all, because I can’t find the antecedent thoughts. Can you point me in the right direction?
Charlie had thrown in a critique that I guess doesn’t really fit into the LNC issue. He basically questioned how I could know anything if I don’t know that I’m not a brain in a vat. I was trying to tell him that, ultimately, no one can know if they’re a brain in a vat or not, but one can still act in daily life as if one isn’t, which in some sense means that one “knows” in everyday life that one isn’t a brain in a vat. That was the different “types” of knowledge, including non-absolute knowledge, that I was talking about.
Paul’s First Defense of Strong Skepticism:
We can never know anything with ultimate or absolute assuredness, even the question of whether we exist or not, because we can never know everything. It would take knowing everything to be sure that we weren’t ignorant of something that would reverse our supposed knowledge. Even if we conclude that Descartes was correct, and that we exist because we are posing the question of whether we exist or not, we don’t know if there is some consideration or fact X that would somehow, unbelieveably and contrary to every single thing we know, reconcile the apparent contradiction of us not existing and prove that we don’t. We would have to examine every crow to make sure that one isn’t white, and we would have to know everything in order to be sure, ultimately and absolutely, that there wasn’t something that would reconcile the contradiction in us not existing, or the LNC being wrong, etc. Even though discussion is impossible without the LNC, and even though it is unimaginable that we don’t exist, we don’t know what we don’t know. So all knowledge is provisional and merely useful.
Paul, there sure are a lot of statements in that last post that sound like you know them with ultimate or absolute assuredness.
Paul,
Riddle me this, Paul. How can you know if the “different levels of knowing, or shades of gray and meaning” you posses reflect reality? Don’t you have to know *something* (not everything) about reality in order to say “my thoughts about this part of reality are not entirely accurate”? How could you possibly know they aren’t accurate unless you have *a way* to know objective reality?
I think the way you answer these questions will either drive you further toward solipsism or it will get you thinking about how you can be 100% confident in the knowledge that you exist and 100% against the possibility that you don’t exist.
Paul,The LNC is the symbolic conception of a particular property of reality. In that sense, it “exists”. That which is described by the LNC actually is: reality is arranged such that mutually contradictory scenarios do not simultaneously occur. Reality is what it is, it is not what it is not. Any suggestion otherwise is absurd.
If you’re actually trying to argue that the LNC does not apply to reality, then I’m going to offer you one of two options: drop that argument or this conversation. Arguing with someone about whether or not opposite statements can both be true is as productive as trying to find a one-ended stick. Whether or not you do – or even can – legitimately disbelieve in the LNC, it’s a totally non-productive line of discussion, at least so far as this conversation is concerned. As you yourself noted, rational thought is not possible without the LNC. Lord knows there’s no point in trying to talk about anything with a person willing to go so far off the reservation.
If you want to doodle around with words, constructing evasions and arguments that have absolutely no connection to the real world, then please do so on your own. If absurdly strong skepticism is really something you want to adhere to, then I suggest that you save yourself and the rest of us a great deal of time and follow the example of Cratylus.
.
The following was written by Charlie.
I’d also question whether you have now retracted your knowledge of your own existence and your envatted brain as I just can’t tell at this point whether I caricatured your position disingenuously or accurately portrayed where you believe you currently stand. The implied question is what does it mean that you question the existence of the LNC when (if ..?) you also question your own?
.
Thanks very much Tom.I just now reposted the comment to read the rejection notice so that I could report what it said.But when I pasted it in from Text Edit it was finally accepted (thus the two aborted comments above).It had been rejected, in various forms, about half a dozen times previously.I can’t recall the message I received, except that it said the comment was rejected because of the spamming filter.Sorry I didn’t pay more attention.By the way, as of today I can use blockquotes as well as separate my paragraphs again, which I couldn’t the other day. Did you change something or was that problem on my end?
[edit]
I take that last part back. “Return” on my keyboard is having no observable effect when my comment posts.
No, Tom, the ideas in my last post need only be suspected in order to do its job in my argument.
Also, this position is one of uncertainty, which is curious because uncertainty about uncertainty only results in uncertainty.
Charlie,Sorry about my late reply (busy at work and at home this weekend). And to answer your question (now from so long ago) I wouldn’t expect that every scientific fact should be contrary to an atheistic interpretation for atheism to be untenable. I didn’t think scientific facts have much or anything to say about the probability of God’s existence.My problem with the universe’s having a beginning being evidence for God is that it seems to be saying that everything that has a beginning must have a beginner. I’m not very sophisticated in my understanding of logic, philosophy and theology, so I don’t automatically see why this must be so. But even if there is a logical conclusion that can be made that everything that has a beginning must have a beginner, doesn’t this demand that we also conclude who began the beginner? The issue of complexity is one that seems to answer a big question with a bigger one. How can it be unimaginable that all the circumstances required for our universe’s ability to sustain life could have occurred by chance, but that a creator capable of making such a universe is more likely to exist? I’m out of my league with the direction the last few days of blogs have gone here, so I don’t have anything to add to the general discussion.Charlie, are you sincere in wondering how Paul or I could find your tone to be sometimes harsh? If you are legitimately curious I will take the time to give you examples of what I was talking about. If you don’t think that’s necessary or would not be beneficial I won’t our time.
Tom’s last comment is good, so let’s change the strong skeptical position to include uncertainty, tentativeness, etc. If you need me to actually write out its restatement, let me know.
Tony,
In most of your comment it seems as though you’re talking to the wrong guy again. If that extended reply is merely to reiterate what I was happy to note – that science is not the source of your skepticism, then I appreciate that.
===
In the second half you do more directly address a comment of mine and refer again to that fact that you have perceived my tone from my comments to Paul. Earlier you had also perceived Medicine Man’s tone.
Yes, I would like to know how you see this.
I have the feeling that this harshness is just a subjective, personal interpretation of the facts (ie. the examples you would offer). Since our conclusions differ, and I’m certain that equivalent data could be gleaned from your comments and Paul’s as well, I doubt that you have a uniquely superior vantage point from which to judge objective harshness.
Tony,I know where you’re coming from. Some of this gets deep, and it’s hard to tell if it’s deep thinking or just deep cr*p.
The assumption that every effect must have a cause is much like the Law of Non-Contradiction. There are simply no imaginable scenarios in which that is not true. God is not an effect, and He can’t be an effect. He is the necessary starting cause of all other causes. I understand your question about “God’s beginner”, but that’s a common misunderstanding of the argument.
You can’t have a chain of causes going infinitely far back, either in time or sequence. There has to be a beginning point, and causality is the same. You have to have an un-caused cause somewhere. It’s not debatable, really. If the chain of causes was infinite looking back, then we’d never get to the present, because of the infinite distance from there (then) to here (now). There HAS to be something to start the cause-effect chain, and that first uncaused cause is God. It can’t be the universe, since we know that the universe had a beginning (it was caused). Asking “well, who caused God, then?” misses the point of the idea, which is that there HAS to be some starting point.
As far as the likelihood of God, we really only have two options: a planned universe or a random one. That alone makes God far, far, far more likely than no God. This also folds back into the causal argument above.
Everyone,
Look, I didn’t go back and read every comment, but I’ve been following this thread enough to make a comment on “tone”.
These are questions that involve some of our most important and foundational beliefs. No one likes having their fundamental beliefs questioned, and no one likes the suggestion that they may have thought / perceived / deduced incorrectly. That’s unavoidable in conversations like this, and really in any conversation involving reason:
There’s a difference between insults, rudeness, and mere bluntness. Time does not always permit the political gymnastics that soften the blows of reason. With that in mind, I think everyone (everyone) involved in this or any other similar thread needs to take a deep breath and get over themselves. Something we write is going to be misinterpreted from time to time. Other times, what we write is going to be taken to a conclusion we might not like. Both of those are opportunities to either note a flaw in our own argument, or to correct a flaw in the other person’s response. Neither is cause to get our dander up in some kind of “ya done me wrong” way.
There is a categorical difference between the statements, “you’re wrong / you’re being illogical / you haven’t thought about this / that’s not true / that’s not accurate, etc.” and “you’re an idiot / you obviously can’t think / how stupid can you get, etc.” If the other person isn’t being insulting, then take attacks on your arguments (or even your tone, ironically enough) as such, and not grievous stabs at your character. Acting otherwise is just an upside-down version of ad hominem.
There’s been nothing said here that’s an insult to anyone. Some of what’s been said may well be wrong, a bit egotistical, or irrational itself, but not anything worthy of complaint. In short, get over it and get on with it. If you’ve got the stones to confront the tough questions, you can keep them attached long enough to handle contentious answers.
MM
There are plenty of *imaginable* scenarios to counter what you said above – all are true only because they are imagined true - but none that are based on the knowledge of reality we have today. We know nothing about uncaused beginnings or angry unicorns, but we know of inductive logic and inductive logic can get you to an uncaused beginning if only you start with *real knowledge* instead of imaginary knowledge.
Steve,
Yes, thank you for the correction. I should have said no “actual” scenarios, or no “possible” scenarios, or some such.
Hi Medicine Man (and everyone else),I take your point on “tone” and I know it looks as though I am objecting to having mine questioned.But I have had my tone questioned on more than one occasion (go figure) and it doesn’t particularly bother me. My questions on this issue were concealing (I hoped) a bit of a subtext on “perception” as it relates to the OP.As I’ve let the cat out of the bag maybe I’ll just float the idea for all to consider – maybe it’s not worth consideration?On topic – almost – can we perceive tone? And if so, by what sense?We obviously perceive the facts of the words, “pretended”, “trumpeted”, “authority”, “disingenuous”, etc. But to perceive tone is something altogether different. Is tone a thing? Does it exist and is it real?To perceive tone one has to make an inference to intent, but intent cannot be seen or measured in this manner either. Does immaterial intent exist? Can we legitimately make inferences to intent? My answer is, yes, of course we can. If this line is relevant then it may be somewhat ironic that those questioning the extra-sensory-perception of the “heart” would be the ones perceiving tone and intent. Or do they admit the inference to be merely an induction from their knowledge of their own intent (thus, a double-edged indictment of their own behaviour), or is it merely a creation of their minds with no relation to objective reality?I would have liked to have brought this line of reasoning out in discussion, but with my cards on the table, does it make any sense as it stands?
Charlie et al.,I don’t want to get into an argument about tone, etc. either. I don’t mind the escalated tensions of the discussions — it’s part of the fun of the whole thing. And I know that I sound like a school marm with all my admonitions to pretty much everyone here, and, well, nobody wants to be likened to a school marm.My chief problem isn’t really about tone — it’s about letting the heat of our positions escalate to the point where it interferes with the argument. I think the signs of this are a) mischaracterization (the “straw-manning” of another’s arguments), b) leading the witness, and by this I chiefly mean asking long comments strewn with rhetorical questions that you answer yourself, c) aspersions on motives (“What you really want is for the world to be worse!”), and d) absolute statements (“Everything you’ve ever written is absurd!”) and false assumptions of authority (“What so and so is really trying to say is…”). Each of these side effects of argument are just tedious, and they get in the way. I don’t get upset with them because my feelings are wounded — I get upset with them because they make argument so difficult. Starting with my keyboard tick of writing “Charlie” whenever I mean “Medicine Man,” repeating mis-typing things like “not” when I meant “now”, and far worse to you all I apologize. I am often provoked, and I expect you to be provoked by what I write in response. I imagine I will be unspeakably angry with some of you in the future. Truly, it’s part of the fun.
Thanks for those good comments about tone, MM and everyone since.On the question of whether everything that begins to exist must have a “beginner:” Usually it is stated that whatever begins to exist must have a cause. MM is correct that this is one of those axioms that can hardly be avoided. Can you imagine anything that comes into existence entirely uncaused?One possibility that has been raised is the appearance of particles out of the quantum vacuum. As I understand it, though, the quantum vacuum is not an empty nothingness as we might erroneously conceive it. It is seething with energy. So there is a cause, a necessary and sufficient condition for the appearance of these particles.What about the first “beginner,” God? He didn’t need a cause for the beginning of his existence, because there was no beginning to his existence. The dictum that everything that begins to exist must have a cause does not apply to that which does not begin to exist.“The issue of complexity is one that seems to answer a big question with a bigger one. How can it be unimaginable that all the circumstances required for our universe’s ability to sustain life could have occurred by chance, but that a creator capable of making such a universe is more likely to exist?”The likelihood of a creator is not a matter of probability analysis. He either exists or he doesn’t; and if he exists, the probability of his existing is a nice satisfying 1 (or 100%). You could use probability analysis in assessing whether God suffices as the best explanation for phenomena, but that’s a different question.And God is not complex. Classical theology views him as undivided in essence, single in substance (though three in person). His thoughts and abilities are complex, but he himself is not. He has no “parts,” and to ask how he could have been made, as if he were assembled out of pre-existing material, would be self-evidently nonsense. How likely is it that a God could have been formed? Zero, of course. But that’s not what we believe of God.So the question of whether it’s likely a complex being such as God could exist is not relevant to the Christian conception of God.
Tom,
Tom, I agree with your last post in that I think that debating the evidence for God’s existence is largely immaterial to this discussion.
What I think is material are the arguments in favor of your assertion that it is correct to “reject SOME scientific interpretations that disagree with Scriptural interpretations.” This philosophy requires, I think, that there be very strong (commensurate with scientific theory?) arguments and evidence that:
a) Scripture contains explanations of the natural world that are better or equal to the ones than science currently does;
b) Scripture is intended to be a means for understanding the natural world;
c) correct Scriptural interpretations about nature can reliably be attained, starting with agreement that Scriptural interpretation should be used to reject some scientific interpretations; and
d) other religions cannot make similar assertions to establish the primacy of their interpretations of the natural world over that of science and/or your Scriptural interpretations.
I don’t believe it’s an indictment of God to say that you could be wrong about each of the conclusions you have reached in my requirements above; I believe you have acknowledge as much on various occasions.
In other words, I don’t think you need to provide strong evidence for God’s existence to recommend what you have in this post and your comments. I do, however, think that you need to provide persuasive arguments for the requirements above if you want to have your philosophy promoted and not opposed by the likes of me. (And I don’t mean you have to have answers now for the requirements I listed above, but I do think those are fair questions that ultimately need to be answered, and answered well.)
Good points, Tony. I believe you have accurately captured the important questions that need answering. I do think, however, that the answers to (a) through (d) are intimately tied to the question of God’s existence. If there is no God, then there is no basis for affirming (a) through (c), and if the Bible is not actually the right place for us to look to understand God, then there is no basis for affirming (d). They all tie together.
Detailed answers for (a) through (d) would far exceed the capacity of a comment thread like this. We’ve addressed them in the Evidences category of posts. (See also the same category in the legacy section of the blog.)
Not that I’m expecting you to go read all that now–I’m just pointing out that we’ve worked on it, and there’s stuff there for anyone to look at as they have time and interest. Of course there are other books and websites as well.
How about looking for evidence of the heart in a more common way before tackling the question of perceiving God? The more common way that I’m thinking about are human perceptions that lead to common human emotions. Yes, emotions are subjective, but that doesn’t mean the perception can’t be based on something real.
When we get sad due to a death in the family (as one example), does it mean we perceived something that isn’t part of reality, or does it mean we perceived something that was, in some way, truly sad and truly part of reality? If skeptics are going to choose the former rather than the latter then I don’t know what else to say. What knowledge-base does the skeptic draw from in order to reason their way to this conclusion? I’m genuinely curious to hear some responses.
Anyone? Bueller?
In 1930, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, in an effort to alleviate the effects of the… Anyone? Anyone?… the Great Depression, passed the… Anyone? Anyone? The tariff bill? The Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act? Which, anyone? Raised or lowered?… raised tariffs, in an effort to collect more revenue for the federal government. Did it work? Anyone? Anyone know the effects? It did not work, and the United States sank deeper into the Great Depression. Today we have a similar debate over this. Anyone know what this is? Class? Anyone? Anyone? Anyone seen this before?…..
- Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
SteveK,
Sorry I haven’t chimed in but I’m not sure I really understand the question. As a skeptic I am happy to speak on behalf of my people, although I suspect that I may not yet know the party line.
Tom,
Yeah, I agree that God’s non-existence would negate the resolution of my requirements, but I still think it’s productive to debate the arguments for the requirements I listed. Why? Because I prefer a world in which modern science and religion can coexist, and I believe that proposals like yours make this harder. If only you could see the error of your ways, if only…
I’ll do what I can to read the Evidences section of the site and see to what extent the requirements I raised have been resolved here. I’ll come back when I have more questions.
What I meant, Tony, was just that if I believed there was no God, then I would have to deny (a) through (c) too. The only basis I have for taking the Bible as authoritative on anything, including nature, is that it is God’s word, and God speaks truly.
Tony,
Fortunately you only have to speak for yourself.
My questions are about subjective perceptions and their link to reality (perceived existence, sadness, morality, justice, laws of logic, God, etc). Specifically, how can a person *know* (not assume) these perceptions are rooted in reality? Fundamentally, my questions are about knowledge – where and how you get it, how you know you can trust it, etc. You may not be the skeptic reference in my question but feel free to answer anyway.
Q1: When we get sad due to a death in the family (as one example), does it mean we perceived something that isn’t part of reality, or does it mean we perceived something that was, in some way, truly sad and truly part of reality? To clarify, I’m speaking about the one reality we all share, so the laws of logic apply.
Q2: To the skeptic that says it’s the former, where and how do you get the knowledge used to conclude this?
SteveK,
I think I understand now — you’re wondering how do we know how to have any emotion following a perception, I think. And how do we know that having a sad response is because the response is sad, as opposed to something else. (That I think is unknowable — our emotions are about as purely subjective an experience I can imagine.)
I’m not well-versed on the topic of knowledge nor emotion, so I don’t even know what the debating points are on that one. As a skeptic, I would make an assumption that emotions are a behavioral response that aid in natural selection. Sadness over the loss of a relative is a response, and more appropriately the desire to avoid sadness by preventing the loss of a relative, would have an outcome in natural selection; organisms that had the capability to experience sadness would presumably take steps to avoid it, much like organisms that can perceive heat would avoid circumstances that could burn it.
That’s my guess for a naturalist explanation of the origin of emotion. I’m sure there are better ones, but I thought you were wondering what my first conjecture, as a skeptic, would be, so there it is. I agree that it seems cold, and sad.
SteveK, I don’t see any reason to assume that the sadness I feel upon the death of a relative is anything but the emotion I feel. Sadness isn’t real beyond the internal qualia that I experience. Qualia have a different order of reality (I can’t label it or describe that order) because we can never verify to someone else the experience of our qualia like we can verify to someone else that a tree is in my backyard.
A person dying, on the other hand, is a real thing, which can be verified to someone else.
We perceive a person dying, which is real and can be verified to someone else, and then we may perceive an emotion, sadness, which is a qualia and which can’t be verified to someone else (the experience of it, that is – we may verify to someone else that we are crying, but the crying isn’t the emotion or the qualia)
Tony,
Where does this knowledge come from? You assumed it, but assumptions must be rooted in something tangible, perceived or experienced. What can you point to as your source for this knowledge?
Here it seems your knowledge of “cold and sad” comes from a tangible, perceived or experienced source rather than an assumption. The thing that immediately jumps out at me is this knowledge conflicts with your assumed knowledge above – at least to me it does.
SteveK,
You ask where my knowledge comes from on which I based my assumptions. I’d say from high school biology class, and from reading books on biology and anthropology over the last 30 years.
I don’t “get” your second question, that my side note that a mechanistic, clockwork explanation for human behavior seems cold and sad must come from a tangible or perceived source. I agree with Paul, in that our emotional responses are not the same thing as tangible, empirical reality. I was just trying to say that I take no glee in believing that there could be an evolutionary, behavioral basis for our emotional responses.
Tony,
Thanks for clarifying. I confess that I’m not interested in going much further with this, even though I was that one that brought it up. Chalk it up to being busy, or tired – or both. I’m sure we’ll have the chance to discuss perception and knowledge again.