Calling Lucy Lowe!

Well Lucy, if you’re reading this, feel free to comment with a few examples of some of the more “awkward” Bible texts of which you’re aware, and your positions on them. It will be interesting to explore, consensus or not.

God and Economics

This post discusses one of Ludwig von Mises’s key insights which formed the basis for the differentiating factor of the Austrian school of economics.  It’s an interesting article, and I couldn’t help but notice many parallels between Mises’s arguments and those of theists.

I found it particularly interesting that Karl Popper was referenced.  I’ve found his “Black Swan” criticism of certainty within deductive empiricism to be a helpful illustration of how “random hypothesis” procedures can’t be transferred to explorations about morality, logic and other universal concepts.  One can never reach a useful theory through only trial and error; one must begin with some reasonable a priori principles.  This line of reasoning can be employed to show the weaknesses of naturalistic explanations of uniquely human traits; nature has only trial and error mechanisms, and thus the complexity and harmony of human intelligence, aesthetic appreciation and morality aren’t explained by it.

The recent subprime loan crisis in the U.S. provides an interesting economic anecdote for this principal.  Some of the brightest mathematical minds of our day were employed by investment banks to model behaviors of borrowers, and their models showed that a strong return with an acceptable amount of risk could be reached via certain “packaged” combinations of high quality and low quality loans.  These models were pimp-slapped by reality when defaults on loans reached levels far outside of the historical norms used as a given, and the economic carnage is expected to reach into trillions of dollars.

Here’s hoping we can find a way to limit the intellectual carnage caused by similar ill-advised confidence in empiricism in theistic/atheistic discussions.

Back to Keith

Sometimes when I get an idea in my head, I can’t seem to stop thinking about it.  So, all these months later, I now have new insight into the “Thought Experiment” referenced a few posts back: I now think my first response to Keith is actually more solid than I originally thought. 

I basically said that if indeed those who would hurt a child fell into some sort of sleep just before the act, the Argument from Morality would be even stronger than it is, and I think it is one of the strongest arguments for supernaturalism and God as things are.  Only the most uncomfortable of rhetorical acrobatics could explain such a sleep in any non-supernatural way (although I’m sure some would try, perhaps postulating that natural selection selected the mechanism in order to preserve the genes in the children).  True free will requires choice, and if the alternative to believing in God isn’t somewhat reasonable, there really is no true choice but to believe in Him. In a similar way, Marshall “Why Does God Hate Amputees” Brain doesn’t think through what it would mean for practically all amputees to grow back their limbs after receiving prayer.  Suddenly, God would no longer be an option, but a requirement. 

There are two counters to this line of reasoning I’d like to tackle: 

1. God supposedly revealed Himself to people in the Bible, yet they still had choice
   a. However, He often only revealed Himself after a person had already become set in their path
   b. When (a) was not the case (i.e. Adam and Eve), a somewhat reasonable counter-choice against God was presented (”you will not surely die, God doesn’t want to you to become powerful like Him”, etc.)
   c. Further, the only cases I know of either (a) or (b) involve God working out the plan of salvation, and He seems to be pretty quiet in history otherwise 

2. If God allows for a world which is set up to create a seemingly reasonable alternative to Him, “God” is an unfalsifiable idea, since any proof against His existence could be swept under the umbrella of His allowing free will (somewhat along the lines of a young-earth creationist saying the world was created with apparent age).
   a. If God didn’t break into history, I would allow for that.  But since He did, and left behind numerous bits of falsifiable archeological/historical/textual evidence, this is a moot point.

Mad No Longer

After taking several months to ponder the last post, I feel I’ve come to somewhat of a conclusion: If a human’s possible moral freedom is limited even in the slightest way, humanity in general is wronged deeply, not unlike how human life in general is cheapened by a single murder. Possible moral freedom should be thought of as that freedom which exists inside the necessary limits of the physical world (as humans are physical) and of social/cultural behavior firewalls (as humans are social creatures).

Moral freedom is connected deeply to who we foundationally are, for much of our humanity comes from our ability to make moral choices.  Accordingly, there is no such thing as unnecessary evil.  For humans to exist as we know them, evil must exist, from minor to horrific levels.

After surveying the various views, this one seems to be the most resonant with reality.  Nonetheless, thinking through it all has really made me fall in love with God’s subtlety, respectfulness, and grandeur all the more.

Keith’s Thought Experiment Is Driving Me Mad!

I recently commented on a post which began a conversation which has really made me think about my beliefs in a new way. The post basically hypothesized about a world where God caused potential child murderers to fall into a deep sleep just before trying to carry out such an awful act. The blogger believed such a world, if it allowed for other evil, would be much more palatable than that which we currently inhabit, yet still allow for expressions of free will.

Here are some excerpts from our discussion:

______________________________________

Keith - You state that “we have total freedom within the range afforded us by physical and social limitations.” To me that sounds equivalent to saying that we are not totally free, for we are free only “within the range afforded us by physical and social limitations.” Since in comment 3 above your objection against God intervening was that “[a]ny universal limitations on moral action whatsoever” would mean that we are not really totally free, I thought that “limitations” were the stumbling block. But now you admit physical and social limitations, but still claim that we have total freedom. Again I ask you to please explain, what do you mean by total freedom?

If you force me to guess what you mean, I’ll hazard you mean by “total freedom” the choice to obey or disobey God. Thus, God preventing a child’s murder would be an unacceptable limitation on the murderer’s choice to disobey God. Is that what you believe?

Also, I wish you would explain how it is that the “slightest divine disrespect of human autonomy destroys free will.” For example, would God causing someone to fall into a deep sleep destroy that person’s free will? How?

Poppies - Your guess as to my belief is very accurate. I apologize for any perceived lack of clarity; it’s a result of my taking it for granted that certain limits are taken for granted in these types of discussions.

As for the mechanism of how any divine disrespect of human autonomy destroys free will: Let’s say people did fall asleep upon intending to kill children. If this were always the case, 100% repeatable under all conditions, such a situation would basically be fairly infallible proof of God. I say “fairly” because there will always be people for whom nothing is convincing due to a mindset utterly against God, but since most people in our current world believe in God I would have to imagine this child-murder-avoiding-sleep world would cause most people to feel as if they had no choice but to obey God’s commands. The reality of God’s 3-O existence would be incredibly palpable. It’s an important aspect of free will that God remain subtle, not particularly easily accessed, and dismissable. Hopefully that’s clear, I’ve made some assumptions that I think most people would find reasonable, but if you feel I should drill down further, I’m happy to do so.

Keith - I find your explanation of how any divine intervention would destroy free will unsatisfactory. Take the story of Adam and Eve. Certainly, they were quite sure that God exists — they were on speaking terms after all. Yet, they were obviously free to disobey. Also, consider Moses. He came upon God in the burning bush. He heard His voice. He saw the glory of God “from behind” after God passed by. Sounds to me like Moses would have been quite sure that God exists. Do you think that destroyed his free will? And there are many more examples of individuals portrayed in the Bible as knowing that God exists, yet appearing to still have free will.

How can you be sure that strong evidence of God’s existence would prevent people from disobeying? Most people agree that they have an obligation to obey the laws of the state, and they certainly believe that the state exists. They also know that if they are caught they will be punished. Yet, many still break laws. Now, if you replace “state” with “God” in the above, why would people not still be free to obey or disobey?

And let me point out to you — in ancient Israel as portrayed in the Old Testament, the state was headed by God. If what you are saying were true (and the events in the Old Testament really happened as written), then Adam, Abraham, Noah, Moses, the prophets, and the whole generation that witnessed the Exodus, would have had their free will destroyed. You’re theory may make sense (to you) philosophically, but it doesn’t fit with the stories told in the Bible. Unless you take all that stuff as metaphorical, I don’t see how you can believe such a theory as a Christian.

Poppies - To be perfectly honest, I hadn’t thought about it in those terms before. I now see I can’t hold the theory I previously held. I’ll have to think about it more, because your thought experiment now takes on new meaning for me.

Keith - Now you’ve gone and done it! You’ve suprised me. I look forward to reading what you come up with.
______________________________________

I’ve been thinking about this for days, and I have yet to come up with anything conclusive. If taken to it’s logical conclusion, Keith’s train of thought could end up in a world where the only freedom to express evil would be by way of thought alone; stopping at child murder seems pretty arbitrary, there’s lots of other moral evil we could do without. This obviously wouldn’t jibe with any conception of robust freedom. Yet, it does seem that a pretty large amount of divine intervention could occur without destroying free will.

These ideas have really rocked some long-held conceptions of mine. It will be interesting to see how this ends up. I feel like I’m going mad!

Switzerland is Impossible

I just got an unexpected free moment, so I’m going to jot down a post on a topic I feel is of great importance. A unique post was recently written by Evil Bender, one of my favorite atheist bloggers. In it, he states “humans, in short, cannot escape metaphor as a means of understanding.” I think this is true, depending on how one defines “metaphor”. I think of this kind of metaphor as “worldview”, a framework by which we interpret ideas.

Though I feel it’s very self-evident, it’s important to note that “facts” are always analyzed through the interpretive lens of a worldview. There is no such thing as an unbiased position on a fact, one can’t live in an analytical Switzerland. Thomas Kuhn’s work even implies that a priori worldview assumptions must be made before one can even know where and how to look for facts.

All this being said, the questions arise, how does one compare worldviews, and how are they chosen? Is either process rational, or will critical discussions and explorations on the topic always end fruitlessly?

Karl Popper’s “myth of the framework” idea is helpful to note here. Basically, he claims that people with entirely different worldviews, or sets of fact interpretations, can have meaningful dialogue if said dialogue is embarked upon in the the spirit of good faith rational criticism. Kuhn, on the other hand, wrote about the incommensurability of various worldviews. His work implies that people take up the banner of various worldviews for entirely irrational reasons (the verdict is out on whether he believed that implication).

I find it fascinating that atheists see these problems clearly when speaking of religion, but they typically refuse to see them when discussion turns to their own worldviews. They often speak in ways that imply an atheistic worldview is the clear default.

Presuppositionalism, typically spoken of as a style of defending religious beliefs based on the acceptance of scripture axiomatically, is, I think, probably the only coherent way to discuss theism and atheism. There is, ultimately, a large circularity inherent in any worldview, because all theories must gain authority from some axiomatic source. The comment discussion in my post Who Made God between myself and Arturo is a good example. Arturo felt I didn’t understand that the discussion was about an argument about arguments, because in his worldview, it is possible to use inferential deduction to show that it is necessary that inferential deduction is not necessary. This is axiomatic on his part, and no amount of my attempts to show the self-refuting nature of this idea would ever likely breach his worldview, because that one idea makes many other ideas he holds possible and justified. I don’t blame him at all, and in fact, I think the worldview built on this foundation is quite sophisticated. My own theistic worldview also requires axioms, and I readily admit it.

So then, back to the question of choosing and comparing worldviews. I currently think that a worldview is more or less justified depending on it’s degree of correspondence with reality. I think reality can be defined by both empirical and inferential evidence. I believe that critical rationalism is one of the best tools for determining correspondence, or what Popper called the “verisimilitude of truth”. I also think, though, that one’s worldview axiom must be highly systematic from that start, because arriving at justifiably actable knowledge via Popper’s critical rationalist system of essentially random (creative-imagination-based) hypothesis generation followed by attempts at falsification would require an almost infinitely long time period.

For anyone interested in determining their worldview’s correspondence to reality, I suggest the following (obviously biased) questions:

- does my worldview deny the orderliness and reasonably accurate measurability of the empirical world?
- does my worldview deny an objective source of morality and logic that exists independently of humanity?
- does my worldview deny immateriality (ideas, meanings, morality, value, etc.)

If your worldview does any of these things, I think it’s time to go shopping.

Who Made God?

I often observe people bringing out the “who made God” question, so let me just throw this out:

The Kalam Cosmological Argument clearly explains how it is that the creative force behind the universe needs no creator but the universe does, and if someone claims they’ve found a way to disprove this argument, you can be practically assured they don’t truly understand it.

Is it a cop-out to say the physical world needs a cause, but the same doesn’t apply to the creative force behind it? Well, no: the physical world is such that to claim it’s origin is inherent within itself is to claim actual infinite regresses can physically exist, which is illogical, even if one posits cyclical universes. Even quantum virtual particles, the popular basis for the atheist version of “creatio ex nihilo”, are effects that require prior causation. It’s clear that the cause of the universe must not be bound by the universe’s temporal and causative constraints, and thus must exist “outside” of it, perhaps in another dimension of some sort. Far from being a dodge or an argument from convenience, it’s simply the only logical assumption (at this point in human knowledge).

That this creative force is likely the Judeo-Christian God is fodder for a different post, but the Kalam Cosmological Argument link does touch on certain reasons as to why this is probable.

Who made God? That’s like asking what the color blue smells like, or how many married bachelor’s are there, or from where do atheists derive their objective morality.

The Purpose-Driven Strife

I’ve been thinking much lately about how Naturalism could possibly account for humanity’s well-documented desire for purpose. I think this topic is pretty central to the tension between Naturalists and Theists, so it makes sense that discussion about meaning between the two camps tends to get ugly fast. I’ll try to make this post as open as possible considering it comes from a Theist.

I assume most Naturalists would begin their argument from the point of view of evolutionary adaptation, perhaps even describing this desire for purpose as a spandrel. In trying to imagine what environmental factors could cause a species to develop an overwhelming desire for a meaningful existence, though, I’m pretty lost.

Perhaps this desire for meaning could possibly be related to an instinctual drive to continue humanity’s gene pool, in a “selfish gene” (Richard Dawkins) sort of way. In seeking meaning, humans desire their everyday efforts to contribute to something greater than and outside of themselves, which may be an expression of their genes attempting to gain maximum reproduction. This doesn’t seem quite resonant with experience, though, in that there are manifold instances of human desire for purpose being satisfied by situations not only quite harmful to gene replication, i.e. war, setting records in extreme sports, etc., but even utterly neutral to said replication, i.e. Dawkins himself saying he finds meaning in feeling “privileged to be allowed to understand why the world exists”.

There are some who say it’s futile to seek purpose in life since there really is none beyond self-created existential purpose. However, this flies in the face of the beliefs and actions of such a great majority of history that it seems to me ignorant or prejudiced. Meaning seems to be one of the major driving forces of human history, and this doesn’t make much sense in a Naturalistic world.

Theists, however, can speak of purpose quite comfortably. It’s a cornerstone of their beliefs, and is woven throughout much of their arguments.

The question comes down to, as usual, to what does the available evidence point? And as usual, I’m pretty convinced the experiential arrow points to Theism, but I’m open to other ideas.

Keep them coming!

Open Letter to Suby

The following is in reaction to a commenter on my last post:

Suby, I first off must say your lack of vitriol is refreshing. Thanks.

You mention the Bible, so I’ll speak specifically of Christianity.

I’ll readily admit that most Christians have conclusions created before they see evidence. I’d add that most atheists, scientists, researchers, etc., also do this. Welcome to the true scientific method, which is: conjecture, refutation, conjecture, refutation…

Note that Christians have specific conjectures that are generally systematic; there’s not a great preponderance who claim that God is evil, or that green men run around rooms when no one’s looking. To say so is to show an ignorance (which is commonplace) of the systematic, logic-based quality of Christianity. Logic doesn’t make something true, but Christianity does have concrete barriers of possibility, so it doesn’t have the mark of utter randomness one sees in, say, Greek mythology.

You spoke of “stringent measures” taken by scientists, but you seem to have more faith in the lack of human fallibility than do other scientists and atheists. For instance, Karl Popper, atheist scientist, said “All scientific statements are hypotheses, or guesses, or conjectures, and the vast majority of these conjectures … have turned out to be false. Our attempts to see and to find the truth are not final, but open to improvement; … our knowledge, our doctrine, is conjectural; … it consists of guesses, of hypotheses, rather than of final and certain truths.” Bertrand Russell, the old-school king of atheism himself, said “All inductive arguments in the last resort reduce themselves to the following form: ‘If this is true, that is true: now that is true, therefore this is true.’ This argument is, of course, formally fallacious. Suppose I were to say: ‘If bread is a stone and stones are nourishing, then this bread will nourish me; now this bread does nourish me; therefore it is a stone, and stones are nourishing.’ If I were to advance such an argument, I should certainly be thought foolish, yet it would not be fundamentally different from the arguments upon which all scientific laws are based.”

All this is not to attack science; I’m simply pointing out that faith in the accuracy or completeness of science is just that, faith; it wasn’t that long ago that scientists thought friction was caused by “interlocking asperites” instead of chemical bonding (and that’ll probably be proven false also). My recommendation is to avoid Scientism, and to embrace true knowledge wherever it may be found and whatever ramifications it may have.

Regarding the Bible, with all due respect, you mention many “facts” that are false. For instance, you say that it has been “changed so many times” as if it has been a linear translation, but in actuality, most objective scholars are very impressed with the level of accuracy between modern translations and the earliest manuscripts, which are, as you may not know, still the source of modern translations. The common idea of the Bible as a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy is just erroneous.

Regarding Biblical interpretation, again, with as many Christians as there are in the world, there’s a significantly narrow range of interpretation that makes up orthodoxy. There’s little evidence of “convenient” interpretation (not that it doesn’t exist, just like there are scientists who conveniently intepret tobacco study data, for instance).

I just googled “atheist errors” and quickly found a site that listed pages and pages of them, but that doesn’t mean they’re accurate. Many religious people slander atheists without a concern for accuracy, just as many people say the Bible is full of contradictions without concern for accuracy. The Bible is a complex book, and requires contextual reading for an accurate understanding. If you can show me any true contradictions, I’d love to hear about them, I’ve been looking for one for about ten years now.

My main point is that atheists often have preconceived conclusions and hold fast to them through faith despite contradictory evidence, and claim a monopoly on truth, yet this is the behavior of which they accuse Christians. Lets all stop pretending that we’re not fallible, stop smearing those who think differently than us as less dedicated to logic and reason, and have real conversations that could lead to profound conclusions to which we would otherwise never come.

I’m open-minded and ready to truly take in the substantive arguments you may have; I hope you feel the same.

The Problem of Evil: A Conversation

I recently had an enlightening conversation with another blogger, and because the topic is so important, I thought I would copy some highlights over to this blog:

john

1. If God is omniscient, then God knows when, where, and how human suffering will occur if it is not prevented.
2. If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to prevent each instance of human suffering.
3. If God is omni-benevolent, then God wants to prevent each instance
4. So, if there exists a God who knows how to prevent human suffering, has the power to prevent it, and wants to prevent it (i.e. if the “3-O” God exists), then human suffering will not occur.
5. Human suffering occurs (relentlessly and ubiquitously).
————-
6. Therefore, the “3-O” God does not exist – and theism is false

poppies

I see the main issue as the definition of “omnipotent”. Omnipotence only has meaning in a context of all *possible* power. Premise #2 I see as faulty.

Does God have the power to create a triangle with no angles? I would think not since such an object is illogical, and since God is the source of logic and reason it would go against his nature.

I think most people agree that choice is a central aspect of a loving relationship, which is apparently a high priority for God in his dealings with humans. For choice to be real and not just apparent the danger of evil choices is necessarily courted. It is impossible and not within the realm of omnipotence to ensure against evil without endangering the precious autonomy of those with whom God wants have a freely chosen relationship.

john

Poppies,
Thank you for that response. I am always looking for insight into this problem that has plaged philosophy and men for quite some time.
The definition of Omnipotence is as follows: “having unlimited power to do anything. For that reason it must follow that God dose have the “power” to eliminate evil. However, I wonder, would it be possible for God to use both moral and natural evil to help the growth of men?–and why?
cool point!

poppies

I question that from having unlimited power to do anything it follows that God “must” have the power to eliminate evil. True, God can do any “thing”, but is eliminating evil in a world of free choice a “thing”, or is it not a “thing” and instead an “impossibility”?

If one says it is a “thing”, then why is this ability a thing but active mutability is not? Surely if God is omnipotent, he has and uses the power to change his nature, right? And, of course, God has and uses the power to be capricious, or evil, or amoral, or non-existent… (note the saracasm in the last two sentences)

You see, when you define omnipotence as the power to do both the possible and the impossible, God ceases to exist since the context provided by possibility and impossibility is lost. Something can only be defined in terms of differentiation from other things, but if there are no logical limits to who God is and what he can do, he ceases to be anything.

john

Poppies,
Thank you for the insight; I understand what you are saying. That seems to be true, it would follow that if God truely were omni-maximum then he would have power to do anything. However, possiblility would be lost, but I ask isnt that a requirement for a supream being. It would follow that if God were supream (unlimited) then he would not require the possible or the impossible?
I think that the point you are making in the last paragraph is very good. I once was working on an argument that was like that, yet why would God require himself to be limitted to the comparisons of other things? I see that it would seem necesary to have weekness define power, but couldn’t God be defined by the same maxim?-which is to say …
1. If God is the greatest then there must be something not so great as to difine his greatness.
or-
1. If God is perfect then imperfection must define his perfection.
2. God is perfect
3. thus, he is defined as such?
I think its a God point but logical limits can be limitless if they are logical… well…one would suppose.

poppies

Ah, you’re onto some very important topics regarding which I’ve only recently come to clarity.

First, I would say in the reply above, you effectively ask “isn’t it a requirement for a Supreme Being to be beyond logic?”, which is something many people think. It’s related to the Euthyphro (apparent) Dilemma, and the correct response is the same: God is bound by logic, by morality, by immutability, by a desire for autonomy in his creatures, by a whole host of things, because he is bound by who He is.

It is not “other things” outside of Himself that God is limited by and defined by, but it is instead his very nature. Being a perfectly unified, non-contradictory, immutable Being, he would cease to be God if ever he acted in contradiction to His nature. Because it is his nature that defines him, he could logically exist alone, with no need to reference weakness, or evil, or the like. It is the error of Dualism to require some outside reference point to define His goodness or power.

I feel it is much more impressive to realize that God does all of His amazing actions within self-defined constraints, rather than His being some random, impersonal (because personality implies a well-defined unchanging nature) force that can knock down the deck and start all over at any time.