Monday, November 22, 2010

Jostling for Moral High Ground: The Courage of Atheists and Theists

The other day, Cliff Martin over at OutsideTheBox offered an interesting blog post about atheists who take the high moral ground and argue that it takes more courage to be an atheist than it does to be a theist. Martin invokes William James to suggest that, at least for many theists, it would be easier and less courageous for them to give up their faith.


The original post and the ensuing exchange not only touches on elements of William James’ philosophy that have been explored earlier on this blog and in my philosophy of religion class, but raises an interesting and important question: Who, if anyone, can claim the moral high ground of courage in the ongoing debates about theism?

My own view is that no one can. Or, perhaps more accurately, my view is that the answer depends on contextual factors—both in terms of the environment in which the individual atheist or theist takes their stand, and in terms of the individual’s own intellectual and religious journey. And since it’s hard to be sure of these things when talking about someone else, we should be hesitant about judging another person’s courage, whether they’re theists or atheists.

One belligerent critic on Martin’s post, Larry “The Barefoot Bum,” quickly shot back that “publicly denying the trivial, infantile superstitions of a large majority of the population — especially when those people tend to react with extreme and brutal violence when their infantile superstitions are denied — does require a bit of physical courage.” While I have little sympathy for Larry’s quick dismissal of theism as trivial nonsense—and while he clearly exaggerates the danger of overt violence faced by atheists (at least in the US and Europe)—there is, it seems to me, a germ of truth in his remarks.

The other day I had a conversation with a student of mine, clearly from a conservative Christian background; and as we talked it became clear that she was struggling with the ways in which my introductory philosophy class was challenging beliefs that were strongly normative in her community. She found some of the arguments we’d been looking at in the class quite convincing, but if she followed her intellect on these matters she’d have to make a choice. Should she be quiet about her disagreement with her community on fundamental matters, at the cost of undermining the authenticity of her relationships? Or should she be honest and public about her disagreement, at the cost of risking more overt rejection and alienation? That the issues raised in the class forced such a dilemma created a kind of meta-level dilemma—a conflict between intellectual integrity and loyalty to her community of origin.

At least some atheists have gone through a personal intellectual journey along these lines. That is, they have encountered arguments that not only challenge what they’ve been taught, but that cut to the very center of their community’s organizing worldview. It takes courage to face such arguments, since they might put one in a dilemma like the one my student confronts. And at least some atheists come to their atheism because they have honestly wrestled with these challenges to their faith—at which point it takes courage to be true to their beliefs at the risk of being alienated from their community.

Of course, atheists are not alone in confronting these sorts of challenges. In the former Soviet Union, devout theists faced serious costs for seeking to live out their faith openly. To a lesser extent, theistic academics in secular universities often face—if they are public in their profession of faith—the risk of being quietly judged as an adherent to “infantile superstition.” But certainly in the U.S. today, you are more likely to face this challenge growing up in a religious home and courting atheism.

But there is another issue here—and this is the real issue at stake in Martin’s post. The courage which Martin’s atheist friend touts as being a hallmark of atheism can be usefully understood in relation to Walter Stace’s his famous essay, “Man Against Darkness.” At least at the time that he wrote the essay, Stace believed that the weight of the evidence, especially the evidence coming from the sciences, clearly supported the view that the universe is at root a place without purpose or intelligence, a reality governed fundamentally by blind mechanism and chance.

Stace took this to be a growing realization of the modern era, an irreversible trend in our intellectual understanding of the world that forces us to confront a dilemma that earlier generations didn’t need to face. The question, for Stace, was what we should do in the face of this intellectual realization that we exist in an essentially blind and meaningless universe that cares not a whit for our endeavors or values. While he doesn’t frame this question in terms of courage, I think it’s fair to interpret his view as follows: It takes more courage to face what you think is the truth, even if it’s a truth that makes the reality you face far bleaker than you wish it were, than to retreat into comforting illusions that, on an intellectual level, you think are false.

Now I agree with Stace about this. Furthermore, I believe that many atheists have gone through a spiritual/intellectual journey that looks just like this. They have found themselves faced with the dilemma Stace describes, and have decided to do away with what they’re convinced are just comforting illusions. The problem, as I see it, is that many of these atheists universalize their own spiritual/intellectual journey and so presume that intelligent theists have faced the same dilemma, conceived in the same terms, but made the opposite choice.

What William James does, in “The Will to Believe,” is present the fruits of his own spiritual and intellectual journey. Just like Stace’s journey, it leads to a dilemma, a forced choice—but a different one than the one Stace confronted. For James the nature of reality is far more ambiguous, far less clear in its implications, than what Stace (at the time) took it to be.(I say “at the time” because, later in his career, Stace became interested in approaching mystical experience empirically, and the conclusions he reached on the basis of that work are not quite the same as those he embraced in “Man Against Darkness”).

Stace looks at the empirical world and is convinced that a materialist worldview is the only kind that maps well onto the facts. James, by contrast, is convinced that a range of worldviews map onto the empirical facts—and what distinguishes a materialist worldview from others that map onto the facts is that the materialist worldview posits no facts beyond what can be ascertained empirically. Other worldviews, while just as consistent with the facts, posit realms or domains of reality beyond what is empirically knowable.

James thinks that refusing to embrace what is empirically unknowable amounts, for practically purposes, to disbelief. Here, it is important to remember that James is a pragmatist about belief, in the sense that the meaning of your belief is given by the impact it has on what you DO. If you actively pursue some kind of spiritual alignment with a supposed transcendent level of reality, then you are a believer in practice. And given this pragmatic perspective, the one who withholds belief withholds this practice every bit as much as the one who actively disbelieves.

In short, there is a pragmatic attunement, James thinks, between the person who endorses a materialist worldview and a person who simply holds that we shouldn’t believe any empirically unknowable propositions. Pragmatically speaking, both are materialists—and so both are pragmatically rejecting worldviews that map onto the facts but add new levels of meaning to the facts by reference to realities that transcend them. (By the way, I am not at all convinced that James is right to wholly collapse agnosticism into atheism in the way he seems to—but for his purposes I think a complete pragmatic alignment isn’t necessary in any event).

James’ question is whether we have an epistemic duty to refuse to believe in the transcendent and so (pragmatically speaking) be materialists. It is from this standpoint that we must understand his comment to the effect that “a rule of thinking which would absolutely prevent me from acknowledging certain kinds of truths if those kinds of truth were really there, would be an irrational rule.” James thinks that the rule to refuse to believe beyond the empirical evidence is just such a rule, and hence irrational.

For James, the wellspring of religion is a distinctive kind of experience that seems to put one in touch with a transcendent good but which might just be a non-veridical product of psychological and neurological forces. Empirical evidence, he thinks, cannot tell us how to interpret these mystical states of consciousness. So do we trust these experiences, given that they cannot be verified? Or do we adopt a skeptical stance?

James doesn’t answer this question. Instead, he rejects the view that we are required to adopt the skeptical stance in the absence of sufficient evidence. Instead of being required by some rule of proper thinking to never believe beyond the empirical evidence, James thinks that when we confront alternatives that are equally consistent with the evidence, one of which goes beyond it and the other not, we are led to a position in which reason cannot guide us. Hence, we are ultimately forced to choose among rival passions: the fear of being duped, or the hope aligning ourselves with a truth that makes the universe more meaningful than empirical investigation alone can support.

This is the dilemma that my spiritual/intellectual journey has taken me to—and it is, I think, the journey that Cliff Martin’s journey has taken him to as well. And for those on such a journey, the decision to believe is a decision to resist a very real fear in order to live in hope.

44 comments:

  1. Eric

    Wasn't it C S Lewis who said:

    'Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point.'

    It's a great way of looking at courage I think. The application of integrity, compassion and tolerance all require great courage, and I think we face these challenges in one form of another no matter what our philosophical leanings.

    There is certainly a type of courage needed to stare unflinchingly into the atheistic void. Samuel Beckett puts it well in Waiting for Godot, where he has Vladimir say:

    'Astride of a grave and a difficult birth. Down in the hole, lingeringly, the grave-digger puts on the forceps. We have time to grow old. The air is full of our cries.'

    Shakespeare has Macbeth say something similar:

    'Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.'

    Some people I know find these views impossibly bleak and nihilistic. Myself I find great poetry in the place human hope and this style of realisation collide. So maybe it all comes down to one's personality.

    Bernard

    ReplyDelete
  2. Eric-

    I can't lay claim to any personal courage in atheism, being atheist from birth and childhood. And not active in any way, until as a mature biologist, I met a pastor who sang the praises of "Darwin's black box". The nature of religious belief is comforting by design, or at least sense-making where no empirical sense can be found, and in that extra step defies both intellectual honesty and humility.

    It really would take courage to believe in a truly novel theism, like Eckankar, or the Church Universal and Triumphant. But Christianity? That takes very little courage, if one lives in the Christian West and was brought up in the belief, and attends public universities with what amount to departments of Christian theology. As you say, context is everything.

    At any rate, I did read James's Will to believe a little while back, and was not impressed by its argumentation. It is full of false choices and pro-religion suppositions. It is basically a meditation on Pascal's wager that comes out in favor! Let me add a couple of snippets.

    Here he is speaking of the shyness of atheists/agnostics in putting belief into unbelievable or un-evidenced things:

    "It is like a general informing his soldiers that it is better to keep out of battle forever than to risk a single wound. Not so are victories either over enemies or over nature gained."

    This is the hook on which all of Christianity is to be hung? On "nothing ventured, nothing gained"? As a sort of a "what-the-hell" species of philosophy? This is a shocking dereliction of the critical faculty. No one and no condition of reality forces us to believe anything about transcendental affairs- they are entirely voluntary luxuries, without which we will be just as well off as otherwise, though a few purveyors of transcendentalism might find themselves out of jobs. When there is something worthwhile (i.e. rigorous, with non-mythical evidence) to think about such things, perhaps then the issue should become a "live" one.

    cont..

    ReplyDelete
  3. cont..

    "How many women's hearts are vanquished by the mere sanguine insistence of some man that they must love him!"

    Lower and lower James descends, here likening judgement about the unknown supernatural with a very real bit of male bullying. An intriguing and telling comparison, actually.


    "The whole defence of religious faith hinges upon action. If the action required or inspired by the religious hypothesis is in no way different from that dictated by the naturalistic hypothesis, then religious faith is a pure superfluity, better pruned away, and controversy about its legitimacy is a piece of idle trifling, unworthy of serious minds."

    I think James is fundamentally incorrect here. Religious "ideas" are sold as correct, not as some kind of emetic. Their purpose is to portray the world in some kind of correct way, which in turn leads logically to conclusions about how we should behave in response. An example is hell. Hell, in some theologies, exists, and thus provides extra-effective motivation to obey the other strictures of whatever sect one is in. It is no small matter to dispense with hell. One might not like it, and one might think its effects more pernicious then bettering. But its existence is a matter of fact- it can not just be wiped way by wishing it so. At least that is the religious "idea", though the recent erasure of limbo makes one wonder whether hell's days may be numbered as well! The purported point of religion is to set us in a true-er world. It is "good news", not a con job to get us to eat our peas. At least I didn't think it was, on its internal logic.

    It is possible that James is here giving away the game, saying in essence that all this theology is so much con-jobbery, devised to keep the better minds occupied and lesser minds well-behaved in whatever social system the theology of the moment undergirds. I would agree with him, but it would not speak well of his belief, if so.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thanks for the link.

    My snide and dismissive comment was in part a reaction to Martin's own snide tone; still, I think there's some truth there.

    I've never found the materialistic outlook at all bleak; I've always found my life, with my atheism, materialism and devotion to science, entirely rewarding. Indeed, I'm struck by this recent description of a common Christian outlook:

    [I]f your belief in salvation is fairly works based, then you find yourself needing to earn it by "working out your salvation with fear and trembling." there was a time when I felt I wasn't acceptable to God unless I was willing to endure persecution on a regular basis by risking rejection or ridicule for my stance on issues, sharing beliefs about God, or behaving differently than the culture (not drinking for example). Persecution is often viewed as a requisite part of christianity.

    Materialism is dead easy; it demands no "fear and trembling"; you take the world as it comes, and you do your best, and then you die. I'm not precisely thrilled at the thought of death, but at least I don't fear the Christian God's harsh and arbitrary judgment.

    I really don't understand the "fear and trembling"; I don't know many atheists who think much about the "bleakness" of a materialistic universe, and people who do feel this "fear and trembling" don't actually seem to get much actual comfort from their religion; they're trembling as much before God as they were before a hostile and indifferent universe.

    As for William James, well, I've never thought much of his philosophy. The whole point of epistemology is that which you don't have a choice about. Things fall when you drop them whether you like it or not. To conflate preference and epistemology seems like a grave philosophical sin.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Eric,

    I agree with the main points of your post, but I want to caution you from joining William James in the category-shifting games that held his otherwise wonderful career back from being as pertinent for modern life as it might have been. As is obvious from much of his writing, he was only a believer in the value of religious experience, not a believer in any specified theological content. So his criticism of materialism or empiricist atheism, although founded on decent philosophical (epistemic) grounds, amounts to something easy and convenient for him to say, and effecting really nothing. Ultimately, he had no religious commitments to speak of (besides maybe openness to the spiritual), so it's blithely convenient for him to chid the commitment of a skeptic. why? because he stands immune to any retort in kind. In short, the work of James does not belong in any discussion of a Moral High Ground, for he tethered himself to no specific stance. It's believers and nonbelievers that have specified the nature of God that they affirm (or deny) that can have a meaningful conversation about meaning or virtue (or lack thereof) in the universe.

    ReplyDelete
  6. The crux of the biscuit regarding James:

    [In contrast to strict empiricism, o]ther worldviews, while just as consistent with the facts, posit realms or domains of reality beyond what is empirically knowable. ...

    James’ question is whether we have an epistemic duty to refuse to believe in the transcendent and so (pragmatically speaking) be materialists. ...

    James thinks that when we confront alternatives that are equally consistent with the evidence, one of which goes beyond it and the other not, we are led to a position in which reason cannot guide us. ...

    If you actively pursue some kind of spiritual alignment with a supposed transcendent level of reality, then you are a believer in practice.

    [boldface added]


    (my commentary to follow)

    ReplyDelete
  7. One key concept here is the notion of a specifically epistemic duty. This concept requires more clarification, especially in relation to the notion of "transcendence".

    On pure linguistics, perhaps naively, it would seem an epistemic duty has to relate to knowledge. So it is a duty either about what we say we know, or about what we do with our knowledge. Thus, in relation to epistemology and epistemic duty, it seems natural to read "transcendent" as meaning transcending our ability to know, or transcending our ability to know empirically.

    (We should, I think, take a broad interpretation of empirical knowledge more sophisticated than Logical Positivism and Naive Empiricism. And we must, I think, take a much broader notion of "materialism" or "physicalism" than the crude atomic materialism of the 19th century. Empiricism and materialism can't entail an a priori commitment to particular ontological view; it must be seen as a methodological commitment.)

    Given the alternatives above, we can talk then about two kinds of transcendence: a transcendent knowledge, i.e. the claim we can know things that cannot be known by any empirical method, however sophisticated (i.e. knowledge transcends empiricism), and the transcendence of knowledge itself, we have some warrant to believe propositions we cannot know by any means (i.e. belief transcends knowledge).

    (more to follow)

    ReplyDelete
  8. Both of the above positions are problematic.

    In the first sense, it seems unobjectionable that we must come up with some methodology, some system of warrant, that "does the job" we normally expect an epistemic methodology to do. Of course, the above raises the question: specifically what job or jobs do we expect an epistemic system to perform?

    An empirical materialist such as myself expects an epistemic system to deliver surprising consistency: our epistemic system should in some sense compel belief in propositions that seem on first glance to be weird and counter-intuitive. Nobody asked for, for example, general relativity or quantum mechanics, yet the empirical evidence grabs us by the short hairs and compels belief.

    On this account, then, those theistic philosophers who have argued for a theistic epistemology — whether via scripture or revelation — really have failed miserably, either to show that any theistic epistemology does the same job that empirical epistemology manifestly does perform, or to persuade us that we should ask our epistemology to perform some other job.

    (more later; I have to go for a while)

    ReplyDelete
  9. (Sorry to spam the comments, but this is a complicated question)

    The second sense is problematic as well. What precisely do we mean by "belief"? More precisely, what do we mean by a belief about a transcendent reality, i.e. a reality that we cannot know? It seems we are doing some real conceptual violence to our notion of reality.

    If we take Philip K. Dick's aphorism seriously, then, "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." But a "transcendent" reality, beliefs about which transcend knowledge, does seem to go away when you stop believing in it, at least in a pragmatic sense. By definition, neither affirming or denying — or holding as meaningless, ignoring, or being ignorant of — a proposition about a transcendent reality can affect our knowledge. In contrast, correct affirmations of the reality available to empirical knowledge does pragmatically matter. If you are ignorant of or refuse to believe true statements about gravity, for example, you will have a rude awakening (if only for a millisecond) at the bottom of the cliff.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Lastly (bet y'all are relieved!) it is not at all clear that James himself is drawing a pragmatic distinction. Your paraphrase seems facially contradictory: there is "a distinctive kind of experience that seems to put one in touch with a transcendent good but which might just be a non-veridical product of psychological and neurological forces. Empirical evidence, he thinks, cannot tell us how to interpret these mystical states of consciousness."

    James has (I assume you've paraphrased him accurately) actually supplied an empirical, materialist interpretation, i.e. "a non-veridical product of psychological and neurological forces." In fact, these experiences are just as much evidence for the complex and subtle workings of the most complex object of which we are presently aware, the human brain. Ethical and practical considerations aside, there are any number of experiments one can imagine doing. For example, can a "religious" experience be triggered by stimulating part of the brain? What distinctive patterns of neurological behavior do we see when people have "religious" experiences?

    More importantly, the strict materialist is not required to deny these distinctive experiences. Indeed since we have good evidence that these experiences really happen, they are facts about the world; the empiricist is compelled to admit the facts. (She is not, of course, compelled to admit any particular naive explanation of the facts.)

    What, then, is the pragmatic differences between explaining these facts as interesting evidence about our neurobiology, and explaining these facts as a connection to a "transcendent" reality? How does one behave differently? What's the difference between "Wow, I had these compelling and interesting experiences that I'd like to repeat," and "Wow, I became connected to a transcendent reality that I'd like to stay in contact with"?

    What's the difference between saying, "Because I had these distinctive experiences, I'm going to change my behavior based on a new knowledge of the phenomenal facts," and "Because I connected to it, I'm going to change my behavior based on my experience of a transcendent reality"?

    We have enormously complex and complicated brains, shaped by evolution, genetics, developmental biology, learning, social interaction, etc.; it's not at all contrary to a materialist or empirical viewpoint that such a complex object will have complex, subtle and individualized properties: preferences, tastes, biases, prejudices, habits, etc.

    So what then is the pragmatic difference between saying, "I prefer to behave in this particular way," and "I prefer to have beliefs in a transcendent reality which impel me to behave in this particular way"?

    ReplyDelete
  11. Hi Larry

    Interesting comments, clear and provocative. I'm interested in the last question you raise. I suspect there is a pragmatic difference. I'm agnostic about the existence of any transcendent realm, and like you don't interpret any of my brain events as responding to or referencing any extra-physical realm. This is partly due to personality I think, and partly because I can't quite make such a style of belief fly.

    However, were I to believe that my experience of consciousness had a transcendent aspect, then I am sure this would affect my personal narrative in real and powerful ways. It is like attending the theatre perhaps, there are degrees to which one commits imaginatively to the performance unfolding, and the very best work allows us, for the duration of the play, to genuinely disappear inside the world of the actors. Watching a poorly realised piece of theatre, the workings, the contrivances, the falsehood if you like, never quite disappears and one is left disconnected and dissatisfied.

    My guess is that a fully realised religious experience can add the same sort of depth and colour to the business of living that a top piece of theatre achieves. It allows a sort of transformation through imagination available only to those who can suspend their disbelief. Now, as a non-theist, I choose to believe I can find my colour in different ways, ways indeed that are not available to the theist. I am not however in the position to compare the two.

    This underpins perhaps the pragmatic defence of religious belief. If it adds quality to life, and if all belief is in some sense pragmatic (I embrace my conception of gravity precisely because I wish to avoid the style of collision you refer to) then isn't there a strong argument for allowing others whatever style of belief gets them through the night?

    There is a poetic aspect to this business of living. As a non-theist I absolutely feel the dread of non-existence, and it seems to me to live fully one must respond to it in some way. It is our stubborn refusal to look away that I think propels so much of our greatest art and literature. The weakest forms of atheism seem at times to wish to demote the poetic, in the same way that the weakest forms of theism wish to undervalue the empirical.

    Or so it seems to me.

    Bernard

    ReplyDelete
  12. Interesting comments/discussion. Tragically, I am evaluating dossiers for an opening in our department. And there are many, MANY, MANY dossiers. And then some. And more after that...

    ReplyDelete
  13. Interesting, Bernard. Still, there seems to be some gap in your simile. The play is real: it is performed in a real theater with real actors really speaking their lines. The "artistic quality", good or bad, compelling or boring, is therefore a real (albeit abstract and emergent) property of that real performance as a performance.

    I can be moved by events in a different way if I know they are veridical. I can read a story, believing it to be fiction, and have one reaction to it; if I discover it is factually accurate, I can have a very different reaction to the exact same story. As the saying goes, "truth is stranger than fiction."

    Suppose you were to stumble across Hamlet or King Lear, under circumstances in which you were unable to ascertain whether the events were historically accurate yet near enough that the work still retained its literary impact. Would it make a difference if you chose to believe the play was or was not veridical? You would be deciding not according to objective, scientific investigation, but according to your subjective reaction to the play; your choice would be determined by, and thus could not determine, your reaction.

    This is fundamentally what I'm getting at. The materialist can find the "distinct experiences" every bit as compelling and interesting as the "religious"; the choice to believe those experiences did or did not put one in touch with a "transcendent" reality would be pragmatically gratuitous; being driven by nothing but the character of the experience (and one's subjective prejudices), such a choice could not therefore change the character of the experience or one's reactions to it.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Hello everyone,

    One thing I would like clarified is what we mean when we talk about the "Natural" world, and what differences it would have with a "Transcendent" one. From what I understand, "Natural" commonly seems to be defined so broadly as to mean "Things we believe to exist.". To make my point, consider the relationship between religious experiences and the effects they produce in the brain. The fact that they produce a brain state just like everything else in taken as a reason to consider them "Natural” phenomenon, but what if they produced no such thing? That is, if nothing unusual was going on in the brain, would anyone honestly take as evidence that a “Transcendent” realty existed, or would the very existence of such experiences be dismissed because “There is no evidence.”?

    Or another example: suppose we someday develop technology that allows us to raise people from the dead months after the heart has stopped, and everyone who was raised had reports about experience in the afterlife that all have remarkable consistency. Does the existence and nature of the afterlife become a “Natural” phenomenon now that it can be studied scientifically?

    ReplyDelete
  15. Hi, Thomas and welcome!

    ".. religious experiences and the effects they produce in the brain ..."

    Here we already come to a fork in the road, since a naturalist would say that as far as we know, religious experiences are experiences in the brain- nothing more or less. Delectable perhaps, but not coming from elsewhere. Eric would, in contrast, hold open the possibility that he could gesture towards an argument that they might possibly come from elsewhere.

    Experiences would certainly not be dismissed by a naturalist, but of course our technology is nowhere near being able to fully track down all the goings-on in the brain, so neither the naturalist can fully account for any experience as brain-based, and nor can a non-naturalist identify any other source or location they might come from. That will hopefully change with time.

    For your afterlife proposition, we will have to see about that. A naturalist would seriously doubt both that people can be so raised months after dying, and also that any reported peri-death experience is anything more than the declining flickers of a brain going out of commission. But granting your premises, and perhaps a rich experience of afterlife that could not, for instance, be a brief dream product, then the data would point to something traditionally understood as transcendental or unnatural, yes.

    On the other hand, if some natural phenomenon came to the rescue to explain these data, such as the spontaneous transition of the heretofore alive brain states into a neutrino-based invisible process that could keep the thought process going indefinitely, then the hypothesis would revert to something in the natural sphere. But I am just indulging in star trek tech-talk at this point.. it all depends on the hypothesis one puts forward.

    The signal characteristic of non-natural hypotheses is that they can not be empirically verified or analytically reduced. They stand outside of any form of verification, and that, IMO, is their purpose.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Hi Larry

    Thanks for the clarification.I don't think I understand your point fully yet.

    I may have been unclear with my theatre example. It's not about whether I think what is being represented is historically true, it's about the extent to which I am seduced by the poetic truth of the acted moment. If I am lucky, I forget I am watching actors, and in that moment the experience is transformed. To lack the imagination to have such moments of forgetfulness deprives us mightily I think.

    Could we not therefore see religious belief on the same terms? By suspending disbelief and imagining into existence another realm, are they not, like the theatre goer who yields to the constructed reality, potentially adding to their lives?

    (This is not argue the transcendental is real, or even makes sense. It is just to say, chosing to believe in it can transform one's experiences).

    I'm unsure whether you're arguing this act of imagination does not affect the theatre going experience, or that when the same imagination is applied to the theatre of our world, the anaolgy can't hold.

    If you have a chance I'd be interested to see which you're taking aim at.

    Bernard

    ReplyDelete
  17. I am not sure what “taking the moral high ground” means, but I’d like to share some thoughts about courage and theism:

    First, coherent theism gives one courage because it entails that, no matter what, all will be well in the end. I think this is one of the most precious fruits of theistic belief.

    On the other hand, to live one’s life as a consequent theist, i.e. to live as if God exists, requires a huge amount of courage. I suppose that’s why most theists live more or less the same way they would live if they didn’t believe in God.

    Finally, a thought related to theodicy: If courage is a valuable virtue, then one can only realize that value in a world in which moral and natural evil exist, for one needs courage precisely when doing the right instead of the evil thing will probably hurt. Moreover, for courage to exist the world must be such that God is hidden, for one needs courage only when it is not obvious that all will be well in the end. And this is exactly how our world is.

    And a relevant bit in favor of Christianity: God can be courageous only if S/He undergoes kenosis (sheds His/Her divine attributes) and incarnates into a world just like ours. So we see Jesus in the Gospels suffer physical and moral evil (the temptations), and on the cross losing sight of God and crying “My God, my God why have you forsaken me?” – just like it can happen to anyone of us. It’s when one loses sight of God that courage is most precious, and that’s perhaps one reason why even the best of people sometimes lose sight of God. Losing sight of God in their case can be a blessing.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Thomas: suppose we someday develop technology that allows us to raise people from the dead months after the heart has stopped, and everyone who was raised had reports about experience in the afterlife that all have remarkable consistency. Does the existence and nature of the afterlife become a “Natural” phenomenon now that it can be studied scientifically?

    If we take a methodological view of naturalism, then yes, of course: By (methodological) definition a "natural" phenomenon is one that can be studied and explained by scientific methodology.

    Bernard it's about the extent to which I am seduced by the poetic truth of the acted moment. If I am lucky, I forget I am watching actors, and in that moment the experience is transformed. To lack the imagination to have such moments of forgetfulness deprives us mightily I think. it's about the extent to which I am seduced by the poetic truth of the acted moment. If I am lucky, I forget I am watching actors, and in that moment the experience is transformed. To lack the imagination to have such moments of forgetfulness deprives us mightily I think.

    But why would a materialist not be seduced by the poetry of the acted moment? (I'm intentionally paraphrasing; I don't know what you mean by "poetic truth".) There's nothing at all supernatural or mystical about poetry or imagination. I can very easily imagine myself watching Hamlet's Danish court, or King Lear, without ever needing to believe those descriptions are historically veridical.

    I'm just saying that what I can or cannot imagine has nothing to do with what I think is actually veridical, i.e. factually true. Hamlet appeals just as much to my imagination as fiction as it would if it were 100% historically accurate.

    ReplyDelete
  19. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Hi Burk, nice to meet you.

    The signal characteristic of non-natural hypotheses is that they can not be empirically verified or analytically reduced. They stand outside of any form of verification, and that, IMO, is their purpose.

    The point with the afterlife thought experiment was that in such a situation the afterlife becomes empirically verifiable and analytically reducible, so by that definition, a natural phenomenon. That this feels counter-intuitive is why I question the use of that definition, and I think it applies to a lesser degree to religious experiences. If they made no impact on the Natural world that could be verified by outside observers, the simple question of there existence could be rejected for the same reason Naturists have historically denied the existence of a soul.

    -Forgot italics on last post.

    ReplyDelete
  21. Thomas-

    My characterization of supernaturalism that you quote was not the same as a definition. I don't believe in it, so it is hardly up to me to define it. I was just stating my view, and otherwise tried to lay out some of the relevant possibilities, as you were interested in. I also agreed that it would be possible to see some form of evidence from supernatural phenomena, with those phenomena staying supernatural, if there is a lack of any natural explanation.

    Such evidence is possible indeed, though it would then excite curiosity and investigation, and naturalistic theories might arise, or supernatural phenomena become part of our world in some regular way, like some kind of angel-rich TV show.

    The scriptures are full of counter-natural signs and wonders whose whole point was to confirm the existence of the supernatural and show who runs it. If such things were still going on, we would be in quite a different position, with mixed natural and supernatural models for reality. And you are going in the same direction, proposing counter-factual possibilities or hypotheticals. We shall see, but for the time being, naturalism appears to suffice.

    ReplyDelete
  22. Hi Larry

    Sorry to be tenacious. We're maybe talking at cross purposes here I think, but I am interested to check whether something I've always assumed just obvious is being negated, because it raises the fascinating possibility that all this time I've been missing something important.

    You wrote:

    -The "artistic quality", good or bad, compelling or boring, is therefore a real (albeit abstract and emergent) property of that real performance as a performance.

    I'd suggest the artistic quality is a property of the performance's interaction with its audience. So, no two people see the same play: the beliefs, attitudes and experiences they bring colour their perception of the performance.

    So too with life, and I accept the analogy is not a perfect fit (by definition I suppose). You appeared to be arguing earlier that a belief in the transcendental can not have a pragmatic value, because one can take out that layer of belief and still be moved to the same actions in response to the experience.

    Now, the thing I always assumed was just obvious was that our beliefs create predispositions towards certain types of responses. In the case of the transcendental, once I have such a belief in place, new information and experience is handled differently by the brain because this belief is part of the existing intellectual framework. So the tendency to form certain types of connections, in essence to make particular types of meaning, becomes tied to this pre-existing belief.

    If this is correct, it does seem to follow that the beliefs we form about the world have pragmatic implications, they predispose us to certain subsequent thoughts and hence actions.

    For this reason I find it very hard to dismiss the pragmatic argument for religious belief, despite having no such belief myself. I end up concluding that it is quite reasonable for people who find religious belief useful to go for it. I think you might disagree with this conclusion, and there's an interesting discussion to be had maybe if you do.

    Bernard

    ReplyDelete
  23. Bernard: I'd suggest the artistic quality is a property of the performance's interaction with its audience.

    You're probably correct; the philosophy of aesthetics is not my strongest suit. Even so, the members of the audience are just as physically real as the actors; any emergent property of actors + audience (or any other real people you care to include) is still fundamentally a natural, physical property.

    You appeared to be arguing earlier that a belief in the transcendental can not have a pragmatic value, because one can take out that layer of belief and still be moved to the same actions in response to the experience.

    That's not quite the point I want to make. It's more like we can map belief in a transcendental reality to other, more prosaic beliefs, and end up with the same experience. Sometimes the "map", though, is map to nothing.

    More importantly, though, if one does have beliefs about a transcendent reality, those beliefs can be correct or mistaken without changing anything about the believer.

    ReplyDelete
  24. Dianelos: First, coherent theism gives one courage because it entails that, no matter what, all will be well in the end. I think this is one of the most precious fruits of theistic belief.

    One could, of course, simply choose to believe that all will be well in the end, without the need for a god. Furthermore, as noted above, this belief, whatever its provenance, has the same effect on one's psychology whether it's objectively correct, mistaken, irrelevant or meaningless.

    If courage is a valuable virtue, then one can only realize that value in a world in which moral and natural evil exist, for one needs courage precisely when doing the right instead of the evil thing will probably hurt.

    One objection here is to only. I can think of other circumstances where courage seems appropriate, and of course an omnipotent god could simply create a virtue directly, without causal intermediary.

    More importantly, even taking "only" arguendo, why should courage be valuable without regard to evil, so valuable that it's worth actually torturing children just to inculcate? An immune system is valuable because there are bacteria (and viruses, etc.); without bacteria it's pointless to have an immune system. It would be ludicrous to create bacteria just so people would develop and immune system.

    Likewise, courage does not seem not valuable per se; it's valuable only in a world with evil already in it.

    I can't exclude your hypothesis, of course, but that's the naturalist's objection: we can't exclude any hypothesis. We could even hypothesize that God's intention is to create what we see as "evil"; all our "moral virtue" is nothing more than our sentimentality and resistance to God's plan. Or perhaps, as Kilgore Trout speculated, God's purpose is to develop really hardy bacteria; we humans are but one method of weeding out the weak bacteria.

    Again, the point is that the actual truth or falsity of certain kinds of belief seem irrelevant.

    ReplyDelete
  25. I can't exclude your hypothesis, of course, but that's the naturalist's objection: we can't exclude any hypothesis about the supernatural.

    ReplyDelete
  26. Larry

    Okay, that makes more sense. I think you're maybe a little optimistic with regard to such mapping, but can see now what you might be getting at.

    Thanks

    Bernard

    ReplyDelete
  27. (Lately I am having much trouble getting my posts to appear on this blog. Eric, can’t you make something about this?)

    Hi Larry, and welcome,

    You write: “One could, of course, simply choose to believe that all will be well in the end, without the need for a god.

    I wonder how this would work. After all it’s not like one can believe anything one chooses. In our case at the very least one needs some coherent worldview in which the belief that “all will be well in the end” fits. Can you describe to me any such worldview in which no God exists? For I can’t imagine one.

    I wrote that one can only realize the value of courage in a world in which moral and natural evil exist, to which you respond: “ One objection here is to *only*. I can think of other circumstances where courage seems appropriate,[snip]

    Can you describe such circumstances?

    [cont] and of course an omnipotent god could simply create a virtue directly, without causal intermediary.

    How can the virtue of courage be realized in a world in which there is no possible state of affairs where courage is used? How can one be a courageous person without ever having been courageous, and, even worse, without it being possible of ever having been courageous? It seems to me that you are proposing a logical impossibility there.

    More importantly, even taking "only" *arguendo*, why should courage be valuable without regard to evil, so valuable that it's worth actually torturing children just to inculcate?

    Right. On the one hand we have the positive value of all that can only be realized in a world where evil exists; on the other hand we have the negative value of that very evil. You raise a valid and important question, namely if the former goods weight more than the latter evils. But before answering this question properly, we must at least enumerate what these goods are. The purpose in my previous post was to point out that the value of courage (and from Eric’s original post it seems that both theists and atheists agree that courage is valuable) can only obtain in a world where evil exists.

    [continued next]

    ReplyDelete
  28. [continued from above]

    Likewise, courage does not seem not valuable per se; it's valuable only in a world with evil already in it.

    Suppose you were to arrive to a paradisiacal island where courage is not really of notable worth, pragmatically speaking. Even so, would you prefer to be there with a companion who has courage or would this issue be irrelevant? The point of this analogy is to demonstrate that, on the contrary, we seem to value courage in itself, and not just because of some pragmatic profit we get from courageous people. This of course is a fundamental value judgment of mine. It seems very clear to me that personal virtue is a good in itself, and is not good only because of good consequences. What do you think about this issue?

    I can't exclude your hypothesis, of course, but that's the naturalist's objection: we can't exclude *any* hypothesis.

    A priori one can’t exclude any hypothesis whatsoever. On the other hand one routinely rejects hypotheses when one finds that they are intrinsically impossible, or else that they do not fit with the appropriate background beliefs. Perhaps you mean that one cannot ever exclude a theistic hypothesis, because on theism “everything goes”. If that’s your meaning then you are wrong, as evidenced by the fact that atheist philosophers keep publishing papers arguing against the logical coherence or else against the probability of many specific theistic claims.

    ReplyDelete
  29. Eric said: "It is from this standpoint that we must understand his comment to the effect that “a rule of thinking which would absolutely prevent me from acknowledging certain kinds of truths if those kinds of truth were really there, would be an irrational rule.” James thinks that the rule to refuse to believe beyond the empirical evidence is just such a rule, and hence irrational. "


    I disagree. Take for example one person's wild alien abduction and experimentation story. The only evidence we have is this person's description of events. Most would agree that we should not accept this story as true, because there is insufficient evidence. The rule here is: "Don't believe things for which there is insufficient evidence"

    However, it just so happens that this story is true.

    Now this rule has prevented us from acknowledging this true story. William James is suggesting that this is an irrational rule, but I don't think we should ignore this rule because it gave us the incorrect outcome. It is one of the best rules we have in this area - the alternatives are much worse.

    ReplyDelete
  30. Dianelos: After all it’s not like one can believe anything one chooses.

    If that were true (and I wouldn't go to the mat to disagree with you), James' whole concept of choosing to believe goes out the window.

    In our case at the very least one needs some coherent worldview in which the belief that “all will be well in the end” fits.

    I dunno, really. I don't think all will be well in the end; I really don't care whether or not all will be well in the end. It could be that you indeed need to believe in magical sky fairies to make such a belief coherent. <shrugs> I pretend no competence in the elaboration of fantasy. On the other hand, the proliferation of religions and sects seems to empirically show the diversity of the products of fantasy.

    It seems very clear to me that personal virtue is a good in itself, and is not good only because of good consequences. What do you think about this issue?

    Obviously, I do not concur.

    On the other hand one routinely rejects hypotheses when one finds that they are intrinsically impossible, or else that they do not fit with the appropriate background beliefs.

    Too much to unpack there. What's "intrinsically impossible"? Indeed, what's intrinsically impossible for an omnipotent being? Personally, I'm not convinced that an omnipotent God could not create a rock so heavy he couldn't lift it. I certainly could not understand such a God, but why would the limitations of my puny intellect have any bearing at all on the issue?

    [A]theist philosophers keep publishing papers arguing against the logical coherence or else against the probability of many specific theistic claims.

    Even as a stone-cold atheist myself, it's not a project I have a lot of sympathy for, except to the extent that they rebut theists' empirically testable or meaningful claims.

    ReplyDelete
  31. Eric said: "James thinks that when we confront alternatives that are equally consistent with the evidence, one of which goes beyond it and the other not, we are led to a position in which reason cannot guide us. Hence, we are ultimately forced to choose among rival passions: the fear of being duped, or the hope aligning ourselves with a truth that makes the universe more meaningful than empirical investigation alone can support."

    There are more than two alternatives. For any evidence we care to choose, I can come up with dozens of alternative hypotheses. so which alternative, of the dozens available, should we choose? The one that makes the universe most meaningful?

    ReplyDelete
  32. Boz: [A] rule of thinking which would absolutely prevent me from acknowledging certain kinds of truths if those kinds of truth were really there, would be an irrational rule.

    This is a good point. I don't know, however, that any empiricist would hold so strictly to empiricism to say that it was absolutely true that empiricism is the only form of knowledge. It is the only form of knowledge we presently know about.

    But let's take it to the "higher" metaphysical level as I mentioned in an earlier post. I'm not sure if it's ultimately a coherent supposition, but suppose there were some truths that are "really" there but are absolutely unknowable. Would then the metaphysical rule that "we should believe as true only that which we know as true" therefore be irrational? James puts us on the horns of a dilemma; either we reject some truths because we can't know them, or we believe whatever we want, in the hopes of stumbling onto some unknowable truth by accident (and never knowing that we know the truth).

    It puts the empiricist on a related dilemma, given the under-determination of empirical knowledge: There are always an infinite number of theories that can explain any given phenomenon. (Indeed it's probably true that there are aleph-one theories even for aleph-null phenomena). Hence the reliance on Occam's razor. To accept the simplest theory is to reject an infinity of mutually exclusive alternatives that can't be excluded by the evidence.

    Then again, any definite choice excludes an infinity of alternatives. Is it somehow better to exclude these alternative capriciously rather than by a consistent rule? Would we not then lose an essential component of communication?

    ReplyDelete
  33. Larry

    Is caprice the only option? What of the argument that the empiricist preferences for elegance, fecundity, consistency, falsifiability etc exist entirely because of their pragmatic value? Can this form of pragmatism be extended to all potential knowledge without losing, as you say, an essential component of communication?

    This question gets answered in the field doesn't it? If some choose to apply empirical process to those area where it yields progress, while preferring to embrace transcendental explanations for those aspects of their personal narratives not open to empirical methodology, don't the same pragmatic criteria apply? Perhaps a little potential for communication is lost, but what if the individual judges this to be outweighed by the pragmatic value of their new narrative? How do we argue against this without ourselves invoking pragmatism?

    Your claim that the transcendental beliefs can be mapped to more prosaic beliefs to yield the same experience is one way around this problem, but at first blush it appears somewhat quixotic. How would one test such a hypothesis I wonder?

    Bernard

    ReplyDelete
  34. Bernard: It becomes critical, I think, to be more precise about what you mean by "transcendence". Do you propose an alternative epistemology that transcends in some sense empirical epistemology? Do you propose beliefs that transcend knowledge itself? Or do you propose something altogether different?

    ReplyDelete
  35. Hi Larry

    I may get this wrong, because in essence I'm speaking on behalf of beliefs I don't myself hold, but from what I can see the view that is potentially defensible on pragmatic grounds goes a little like this:

    A person has an experience of the world that feels to them vital to their being, Eric I think speaks of a feeling of great hope, a belief in goodness. You and I might interpret this as a purely physical phenomenon, a product of the way our brains have evolved and been conditioned by their environment. A theist, as best I understand, may interpret this instead as the human mind accessing a greater truth about existence, as is claimed in the case of approaching an understanding of moral values I suppose. So, where the materialist is led towards a position of moral relativity, the theist, taking the same experiences of empathy, revulsion etc, posits the existence of absolute moral truths.

    So that's all I mean by a transcendent belief, the interpretation of a given human experience within the context of a narrative of transcendent realities with which we interact. Because I have no idea how such interaction could occur, I don't find the view particularly attractive, but I can't deny that such an interpretation has pragmatic implications for the life experience. I am not sure of your stance on this.

    Bernard

    ReplyDelete
  36. Bernard: I'm sure it's my own inexperience or incompetence, but I did not understand your previous comment. Could you break it down into something a literal-minded high-school dropout such as myself can comprehend?

    ReplyDelete
  37. Hi Larry

    I tried replying earlier but the comment has dropped off, so apologies if this is repetition:

    I'm unsure which bit needs clarifying, but let me have a crack at restating the case I'm interested in a little more clearly.

    I've always found the case for religious belief on pragmatic grounds compelling. So, while finding personal satisfaction and consistency in my agnostic stance, I don't find there is anything inherently unreasonable in choosing religious belief on pragmatic grounds.

    You appeared to question the pragmatism argument, arguing I think that in terms of the effect of say a belief in the trasncendent, the same experience could ultimately be had using a more prosaic world view.

    I questioned the optimism of such a mapping exercise. I would argue that we each experience the world uniquely because experience is an interaction between the physical world and the individual mind (shaped as far as I am concerned by our unique genetic, cultural and personal histories) and thus all belief systems have pragmatic consequences.

    You asked for clarification of what I meant then by a belief in the transcendent. I mean a behavioural tendency to interpret certain experiences within the context of some realm that can not be reduced to the physical/empirical.

    As an example, you and I might both experience revulsion at the thought of a child being tortured and attribute this feeling to our evolutionary and cultural pasts. A theist may experience exactly the same revulsion, but attribute it to the existence of a moral truth that sits independent of the physical world, so has a platonic quality I suppose.

    This attribution then colours subsequent experiences. This colouring is, I would argue, available to a personal pragmatic assessment. A person may rationally choose to believe in the personal accessibility of the transcendent realm purely because of the affect the belief has on the quality of their life.

    You are quite right to point out there are trade-offs, this prior reality is inaccesible to the sort of shared communication and consideration that empirical models offer. This is one of the reasons I prefer not to embrace such beliefs, but this is a value call on my part, and so it is not unreasonable for others to choose differently at this point.

    Eric will be able to offer you a more sophisticated version of this idea I am sure. For my part I'm just interested whether there is an argument against this form of pragmatism.

    Hope that's clearer.

    Bernard

    ReplyDelete
  38. Bernard: I think the crux of the biscuit is here: "I mean [by transcendence] a behavioural tendency to interpret certain experiences within the context of some realm that can not be reduced to the physical/empirical."

    Empiricism, especially scientific empiricism, is a methodology; methodological reduction is very different from ontological reduction. Physicalism fundamentally means just "what we can say about reality by a scientific empirical methodology".

    So I have to ask again: In what sense can a transcendent belief not be (methodologically) reducible to empiricism, naturalism, physicalism or any of the other synonyms we use to refer to scientific methods of understanding reality? Is transcendence a different sort of knowledge? Or is it belief that transcends knowledge itself?

    ReplyDelete
  39. Larry

    Depends upon the definitions of belief and knowledge. I use believe and know interchangeably for example, whereas others use believe where I would use suspect or guess. So for me option one because option two doesn't work; but it is definition dependent.

    Not sure where you're going with this. My hypothesis is that we embrace naturalistic methodology on pragmatic grounds, and therefore must accept the pragmatic defence of religious belief/knowledge. Still not sure if you buy this.

    Bernard

    ReplyDelete
  40. Is there an epistemic methodology underlying religious belief?

    ReplyDelete
  41. Larry

    One imagines that depends upon the believer, and what you mean precisely by epistemic methodology. I don't think there needs to be for the pragmatism argument to hold.

    One methodology mentioned on this site takes Kant as a kicking off point. So, what if time, space and causation are functions less of the world and more of the mind's way of organising the world. At this point we can speculate on the existence of aspects of reality that transcend space/time etc and hence by definition are not available to empirical methodologies.

    A next step might be to assume that aspects of consciousness fall into this category. The methodology is then to examine one's personal conscious experiences for hints of the nature of this extra-physical realm. Would this count as an epistemic methodology? That would come down to definitions I guess.

    Personally I can't make this sort of view stick, I lack a certain quality of imagination perhaps. But for those who can, does the pragmatic justification hold, is my question.

    Bernard

    ReplyDelete
  42. So, what if time, space and causation are functions less of the world and more of the mind's way of organising the world. At this point we can speculate on the existence of aspects of reality that transcend space/time etc and hence by definition are not available to empirical methodologies.

    I think we're coming up against a rock of what empirical scientific methodology really is. Time, space and causality are results of the scientific method applied to empirical evidence.

    One of the problems of philosophy is that philosophers either don't understand scientific methodology or they simply despise it. Scientists, on the other hand, seem to hold philosophers in such contempt that they don't bother to explain scientific methodology in philosophical terms. "We want nothing to do with your navel gazing," they seem to say, "we're trying to get some work done."

    Being a self-educated philosopher with a scientific background, I've tried to describe the scientific method in philosophical terms. I've been rewarded for this effort by thorough contempt and dismissal from the philosophical community, and indifference from the scientific community.

    I think this discussion has about run its course, because you and I mean very different things by "empiricism", and I have no heart left for trying to explain coherent scientific empiricism to a hostile philosophical community apparently more interested in constructing ever more elaborate edifices of egregious baloney than in understanding how we actually learn things and know things about the universe.

    If you'd like to know more about how I view the scientific method and empirical epistemology, you're welcome to read my blog and comment there. Otherwise, I think I need to leave this question unresolved... like every other question raised in philosophy since the invention of writing.

    ReplyDelete
  43. Hi Larry

    Fair enough. I've enjoy your enthusiasm and you've given me things to think about. Thank you.

    I too have come to these discussions from a scientific background. I began looking into the philosophy of science while on a Royal Society fellowship at a molecular evolution research centre. This may explain why my grasp of philosophical terminology is at best tentative. Sorry if this was the cause of your frustration.

    I've not experienced anyone in the philosophical community despising scientific methodology, and the scientists I've worked with have always appeared fascinated with the philosophy of their subject. Whether this is due to good luck or my naivety I can not say.

    All the best.

    Bernard

    ReplyDelete
  44. It really all depends on location. Here in the Bible belt with my moderate views, I am attacked by Conservative Christians where when I was an Atheist I was simply dismissed. The difference, I feel, is curious. I suppose it has to do with the feeling that I'm bringing some sort of heresy to their faith, where as an Atheist I pose less of a threat.

    ReplyDelete