William Vallicella has a pretty good recent post about the pseudo-argument: "Some of Us Just Go One God Further" However, I simply must dispute (*) his final thought in the piece:
For sophisticated theists, however, atheism is a live option. The existence of this asymmetry makes one wonder whether any productive dialog with atheists is possible.The problem with so many such "sophisticated theists" is that they choose, for various reasons, to behave as though they were stupid.
The truth of the matter is this: atheism -- the denial that there is a Creator-God -- is not a live option for any rational being.
The problem (for atheism) isn't just that atheism cannot account for all we know to be true -- no -ism can do that, nor has the requirement to do that. The problem (for atheism) is that atheism implicitly denies things we know to be true, including truth about ourselves -- and no -ism which does that can possibly be true.
And what is *known* to be false, *known* to be impossible to be true, can never be a "live option" for rational beings.
I've sketched this particular "Problem With Atheism" --
The First Question
You Cannot Reason (a sketch of my, for lack of a better name, "Ego Argument Against Atheism")
I'm not the only one (looking at the argument in "You Cannot Reason" from a slightly different angle).
(*) And, by the way, I am convinced that my disputing of such wrong-headed collegiality is one reason I am a "punk" in his eyes.
14 comments:
While this certainly won't bring you and Valicella closer on this topic, I will point out that while Bill clearly thinks "sophisticated theists" consider atheism to be a live option, he does not think eliminative materialism is a live option. He's gone so far as to say that if he were teaching a philosophy course, he wouldn't bother covering it.
... and I still owe you a completed post.
1) Why are Computers an example of an entity that follows Logic as well as Physics?
I have not really understood it but some say that Computers only implement a Logic that their designers have implemented in them.
So is the objection invalid?
2) Re: Creator-God, I think one can also have a Creator that is not God- a typical Science-fiction scenario.
1) They're not.
We computer folk just *speak* as though computers can count and do perform logic ... because saying the literal truth is too much a mouthful. Of course, as is always the problem with using inexact language, some folk forget that the language they're using is a metaphore and/or an analogy.
2) One can have a Reworker who is not God, but one cannot have a Creator-God who is not God.
He discussed this here:
http://maverickphilosopher.typepad.com/maverick_philosopher/2010/05/atheism-materialism-and-intellectual-respectability.html
Here's a slightly edited version of it:
"Joseph A. e-mails:
Just a quick question. You recently posted that you think atheism can be intellectually respectable. Fair enough. But wouldn't you agree that intellectual respectability in general seems to be assumed more often than it should be?
To put a point on the question: Do you think materialism is intellectually respectable? I seem to recall you saying that (at the least) eliminative materialism is a view you wouldn't bother teaching in a philosophy course. Yet it also seems that some people, even those who would argue that theism isn't intellectually respectable, would bend over backwards to deny that EM isn't as well.
We should begin with a working definition of 'intellectually respectable.' I suggest the following:
A view V is intellectually respectable =df V is logically consistent with (not ruled out by) anything we can legitimately claim to know.
Not every version of theism is intellectually respectable, obviously, but some are. If you think otherwise, tell me which known fact rules out a sophisticated version, say, the version elaborated over several books by Richard Swinburne. ('Known fact' is not pleonastic in the way 'true fact' is; a fact can be unknown.)
a. Will it be the 'fact' that nothing immaterial exists? But that's not a fact, let alone a known fact. Abstracta such as the proposition expressed by 'Nothing immaterial exists' are immaterial but indispensable. Arguments to the effect that they are dispensable merely show at the very most that it is debatable whether abstracta are dispensable, with the upshot that it will not be a known fact that nothing immaterial exists. No one can legitimately claim to know that nothing immaterial exists.
b. Will it be the fact that nothing both concrete and immaterial exists? Even if this is a fact, it is not a known fact. I am arguably a res cogitans. We do not know that this is not the case the way we know that the Moon is not fifty miles from Earth.
c. Will it be the fact of evil? But how do you know that evil is a fact at all? Can you legitimately claim to know that the people and events you call evil are objectively evil and not merely such that you dislike or disapprove of them? But even if evil is an objective fact, what makes you think that it is logically inconsistent with the existence of God? The Hume-Mackie logical argument from evil is almost universally rejected by contemporary philosophers.
My claim is that there is no fact which we can claim to know -- in the way we can claim to know that the Moon is more than 50 miles from Earth -- that rules out the existence of God. But I also claim that there is no such fact that rules it in. Both theism and atheism are intellectually respectable. I take no position at the moment on the question whether one is more respectable than the other, or more likely to be true; my claim is merely that both are intellectually respectable -- in the way that eliminative materialism and the belief that the Moon is its own source of light are not intellectually respectable."
On Computers, Donald Knuth summed up how they work and are worked as (He starts by explaining the job and task of a programmer):
An ability to put the solutions to problems into such explicit terms that a computer can "understand" them. (These machines have no common sense; they do exactly as they are told, no more and NO less. This fact is the hardest concept to grasp when one first tries to use a computer.)
Well I never thought computers had common sense since I began as a programmer and had experienced the bugs etc.
But still the computers perform logical operations (Ground-Consequent relations) in a physical space (thus satisfying Cause-Effect relations).
But is it not the classic position the intellect that performs logical operations must be immaterial?.
Because if something has Cause-Effect relations, it can not have Ground-Consequent relations (CS Lewis in Miracles).
I suppose Douglas Hofstadter's models of computation are now thought not serious?
Gyan: "But still the computers perform logical operations (Ground-Consequent relations) in a physical space (thus satisfying Cause-Effect relations)."
Computers do not perform logical operations. Computers perfom symbol manipulation.
'Symbols' are inherently meaningless entities which minds use to stand for (i.e. symbolize) other entities. Among the entities for which a 'symbol' may stand are:
1) other symbols;
2) numbers;
3) logical operations;
4) concepts;
5) states (physical or otherwise);
6) objects (physical or otherwise);
7) pretty much anything at all.
Gyan: "But is it not the classic position the intellect that performs logical operations must be immaterial?.
Because if something has Cause-Effect relations, it can not have Ground-Consequent relations (CS Lewis in Miracles)."
I suspect that you may seriously misunderstand "the classic position" as badly as you misunderstand what computers actually do.
Gyan: "I suppose Douglas Hofstadter's models of computation are now thought not serious?"
Models -- by definition -- are not the real thing.
Well computational scientists say that brain too performs merely symbol manipulation. How to answer them?
Thanks for the link PhB. But, the fact is, Vallicella is incorrect, that is, he is wrong, when he says that atheism is intellectually respectable.
Phantom Blogger (quoting Vallicella, speaking with a (thankfully) mild Philosophese accent): "A view V is intellectually respectable =df V is logically consistent with (not ruled out by) anything we can legitimately claim to know."
Ilíon (speaking in English): "... what is *known* to be false, *known* to be impossible to be true, can never be a "live option" for rational beings."
So, Vallicella and I agree on the principle; just not the application of the principle to a specific mindset.
Atheism -- God-denial -- denies things we know to be true. I've given links in the OP pointing to some discussion about this. Since atheism denies that we know to be true (and cannot not know ti be true), it therefore cannot be true that atheism is "intellectually respectable."
Ergo, Vallicella is wrong to say that it is.
And, by the way, I had tried to discuss this with him, back before his "collegiality meltdown" concerning the foolish assertions about "emergence."
Phantom Blogger (quoting Vallicella): "Not every version of theism is intellectually respectable, obviously, but some are."
I suspect that, following customary practice, Mr Vallicella is lumping such "theisms" as Classical paganism and Germanic/Norse paganism in with Judeo-Christian monotheism. But, these paganisms, along with most others, actually lump with naturalism, which is to say, with modern (or "western") atheism, rather than with Judeo-Christian monotheism.
The only commonality between Judeo-Christian monotheism and (for exanple) ancient/classical Greek polytheism is the word 'god.'
Gyan: "Well computational scientists say that brain too performs merely symbol manipulation. How to answer them?"
Perhaps some "computational scientists" should get their brains out of their backsides.
Brains, whatever they may or may not do, are not minds. These "computational scientists" -- and you, it seems -- are but echoing a foolish and self-refuting eliminative materialism.
Gyan,
John Searle wrote a critique of people who compare the brain to a computer here:
Is the Brain a Digital Computer?
http://users.ecs.soton.ac.uk/harnad/Papers/Py104/searle.comp.html
I think Vallicella's point is that its the philosophies that are tied to atheism (through atheist philosophers) that denie what we know to be true, rather than atheism as a philosophical idea within itself.
I agree that he doesn't show how you can have a intellectually respectable atheism without accepting dubious philosophical positions such as naturalism and materalism though, considering all there arguments stem from concepts derived from these positions.
Phantom Blogger: "I think Vallicella's point is that its the philosophies that are tied to atheism (through atheist philosophers) that denie what we know to be true, rather than atheism as a philosophical idea within itself."
In that canse, then Vallicella hasn't thought carefully enough ... and he's making a flawed argument with subtle ad hominem and ipse dixit fallacies built into it.
Atheism -- God-denial -- is an assertion about the very nature of reality, just as "theism" is, and certain things logically follow from it.
Phantom Blogger: "I agree that he doesn't show how you can have a intellectually respectable atheism without accepting dubious philosophical positions such as naturalism and materalism though, considering all there arguments stem from concepts derived from these positions."
I think you ought to have said, "... that he doesn't show how you can have [a logically consistent] atheism without accepting ..."
And, it is because these "dubious philosophical positions" logically follow from God-denial, it logically follows that God-denial cannot be an intellectually respectable stance.
I agree with all the points you have made.
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