I've been putting this blog off for a long time because there was a fourth kind of ought I wanted to talk about, but I can't remember what it was.
Anyway, there are three kinds of oughts--the rational ought, the pragmatic ought, and the moral ought. And the reason I'm telling you about this is because in a lot of discussions (especially discussions over the grounding problem in morality), I see these different kinds of oughts conflated, which results of the participants talking past each other. I thought maybe if I could get the word out about these distinctions in "oughts" that maybe the conversation could move forward a bit.
The rational ought is like when you say, "You ought to believe that two and two make four." The rational ought comes from the fact that reality is a certain way and that sometimes given certain premises, the rational thing to do is believe a certain proposition that follows from the premises. A person who believes that all men are mortal and that Socrates is a man ought also to believe that Socrates is mortal.
A pragmatic ought is like when you say, "You ought to change the oil in your car." You're not doing anything immoral by not changing the oil in your car, but it's still a good idea for practical reasons. The pragmatic ought comes from the fact that some things are in your best interest or they serve your purposes. You ought, in the pragmatic sense, to save money, eat well, stay in school, etc.
A moral ought is like when you say, "You ought to be faithful to you wife." The moral ought comes from the fact that we all have obligations or imperatives that are imposed on us. We ought, in the moral sense, to be kind, generous, fair, and honest.
All of these oughts can be expressed using other words, such as good, bad, should, shouldn't, right, and wrong. Here are some examples:
The rational ought
'B' is a good answer to the question.
You should believe the man is guilty because there's good evidence for it.
That answer is not right.
The pragmatic ought
Saving money for retirement is a good idea.
You should save money for retirement.
[Hmm, maybe "right" and "wrong" don't work well with the pragmatic ought.]
The moral ought
It is good to be honest.
You should be honest with people.
Being honest is the right thing to do.
It is easy to conflate the moral ought with the pragmatic ought because most of the time, the moral thing to do is the pragmatic thing to do. If we all lived morally, the world would be a happier place. We'd all be better off.
That isn't always the case, though. It might be a good idea in the pragmatic sense to kill somebody, because it would help everybody else ought by relieving them of a burden. But it could still be wrong. And it might be right to be honest with somebody even if there are disadvantages in doing so.
In debates about the grounding question of morality, I have often seen people explain the pragmatic ought thinking they have given grounds for the moral ought. In answer to the question, "Why be moral?" atheists will sometimes answer that acting in a way that people call "moral" is in our best interest. If we don't want people to steal from us, we ought not steal from them. But, of course, that doesn't mean it's morally wrong to steal from people; it just means stealing is a bad idea in the pragmatic sense. A person who attempts to ground morality in practical advantages isn't really grounding morality at all since they are only explaining pragmatic oughts, and not moral oughts.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Friday, May 21, 2010
The crucifixion
There are a number of scholars from the entire range of the liberal/conservative spectrum who have said the most certain thing we can know about Jesus is that the Romans executed him by crucifixion. I don't know what all their individual reasons are for saying that, but I'll tell you what I think is the strongest reason.
The early Christians thought Jesus was the Christ. He was the fulfillment of the promises given to Israel to always have a man on the throne of David. By claiming to be the Christ, Jesus was essentially claiming to be the promised king of Israel. It was natural, then, that people would expect him to redeem Israel--to run the Romans off and reestablish Israel's national sovereignty and to usher in the kingdom of God on earth.
Now think about this. How likely is it that a group of Jews would make up a story about a christ and include in the story that the christ was killed by Israel's enemies? And they didn't even say he was killed heroically in battle. Rather, they came up with the most humiliating way for a criminal to die--by public crucifixion. And then they went about trying to win people over to this criminal-on-the-cross. I think that is an absurd notion.
If anything, I think Jesus' followers would've gone into damage control mode as a result of the crucifixion. They wouldn't have invented the idea. At worst, the idea that Jesus' died for sins was an invention meant to redeem Jesus' death on the cross. And the resurrection was invented to maintain the notion that Jesus was the christ in the face of his death.
In my opinion, the crucifixion of Jesus is about as certain as any historical event could be without having video footage. I have a hard time taking anybody seriously who denies it.
And that entails that Jesus existed, which is why I also have a hard time taking anybody seriously who denies the existence of Jesus.
The early Christians thought Jesus was the Christ. He was the fulfillment of the promises given to Israel to always have a man on the throne of David. By claiming to be the Christ, Jesus was essentially claiming to be the promised king of Israel. It was natural, then, that people would expect him to redeem Israel--to run the Romans off and reestablish Israel's national sovereignty and to usher in the kingdom of God on earth.
Now think about this. How likely is it that a group of Jews would make up a story about a christ and include in the story that the christ was killed by Israel's enemies? And they didn't even say he was killed heroically in battle. Rather, they came up with the most humiliating way for a criminal to die--by public crucifixion. And then they went about trying to win people over to this criminal-on-the-cross. I think that is an absurd notion.
If anything, I think Jesus' followers would've gone into damage control mode as a result of the crucifixion. They wouldn't have invented the idea. At worst, the idea that Jesus' died for sins was an invention meant to redeem Jesus' death on the cross. And the resurrection was invented to maintain the notion that Jesus was the christ in the face of his death.
In my opinion, the crucifixion of Jesus is about as certain as any historical event could be without having video footage. I have a hard time taking anybody seriously who denies it.
And that entails that Jesus existed, which is why I also have a hard time taking anybody seriously who denies the existence of Jesus.
Creating life
I read an article this morning on the BBC called "'Artificial life' breakthrough announced by scientists". Basically, they put a DNA molecule together by copying the DNA of a known bacteria, then put the DNA in the cell of an already existing bacteria. And it worked.
Personally, I think that is really cool. I mean think of the possibilities if we could build DNA ourselves. The reason humans have five fingers, birds have wings, and snakes lack legs is because of their DNA. If we really understood how DNA is able to code for all these features, and if we're able to build DNA molecules, then the possibilities seem limitless. We could create all sorts of things that barely even resemble what already exists. We could recreate dinosaurs. We could make horses with wings. We could make super-humans.
Of course there'll be an ethical debate about how we should use this technology. If they won't even allow human cloning, there's no way anybody is going to allow hybrid pseudo-humanoids. I'm just saying we could.
I think that with this technology, there is potential for great danger and great good. We've already seen what can happen when software engineering capability falls into the hands of the wrong people. Some people can't resist the urge to create computer viruses and spread them to as many people as possible. It's only a matter of time before some nut creates a super virus or a super bacteria that will reek all kinds of havoc. Biological warfare will spare no one.
But at the same time, it seems at least possible to create organisms that fight cancer or other diseases. Maybe a person's own stem cells can be taken out, re-engineered, and inserted back into the person that would allow the person to live longer. I really can't tell you what the possibilities might be, but I suspect there are all kinds of good possibilities.
So is it worth it? Is the potential good worth pursuing given the potential harm? To an extent, I'm not sure it matters, because we have such a thirst for knowledge--such a curiosity--that this is going to be explored regardless of the dangers. If government ever tried to put a stop to it, somebody in a secret lab somewhere would do it anyway. But I think at the very least, people ought to be made aware of the potential dangers.
Somebody posted a question this morning on Yahoo Answers wanting people's thoughts. One nut on there thought it somehow proved that life could've emerged through purely naturalistic causes. How he figured that the ability of an intelligent being (namely, humans) to engineer life is somehow evidence against Intelligent Design is beyond me. It sounds to me like the very definition of Intelligent Design. I wonder if the nut on Yahoo Answers thinks that since we've shown that humans are able to engineer cars, that cars could have emerged through purely naturalistic causes.
And that raises an interesting question. Suppose we decide to create, from scratch, a few different living organisms and implant them on a planet somewhere far away from earth. And then suppose those creatures evolved to the point that they could ask such questions as, "Where did we come from?" "Why are we here?" And suppose they discovered the theory of evolution. And suppose a small number of them said, "Wait a minute. Our DNA shows evidence of intelligent design. We think life was engineered by an intelligent being." They would be right, wouldn't they?
Think about that for a minute. Their evidence for intelligent design would be no different than our evidence for intelligent design. And they would be right to draw that conclusion. Is it unreasonable, then, for us to draw that conclusion?
But most people say our DNA does not show evidence of intelligent design. Think about that, too. It means that if we engineered life, put it on another planet, and it evolved into smart critters like us, they would never be able to tell their they had been engineered. They would never be able to tell that their DNA was the result of intelligent design. In spite of the fact that their DNA was the result of intelligent design, there would be no evidence for it. And the most justified conclusion for them would be that they emerged through a blind natural process.
Personally, I think that is really cool. I mean think of the possibilities if we could build DNA ourselves. The reason humans have five fingers, birds have wings, and snakes lack legs is because of their DNA. If we really understood how DNA is able to code for all these features, and if we're able to build DNA molecules, then the possibilities seem limitless. We could create all sorts of things that barely even resemble what already exists. We could recreate dinosaurs. We could make horses with wings. We could make super-humans.
Of course there'll be an ethical debate about how we should use this technology. If they won't even allow human cloning, there's no way anybody is going to allow hybrid pseudo-humanoids. I'm just saying we could.
I think that with this technology, there is potential for great danger and great good. We've already seen what can happen when software engineering capability falls into the hands of the wrong people. Some people can't resist the urge to create computer viruses and spread them to as many people as possible. It's only a matter of time before some nut creates a super virus or a super bacteria that will reek all kinds of havoc. Biological warfare will spare no one.
But at the same time, it seems at least possible to create organisms that fight cancer or other diseases. Maybe a person's own stem cells can be taken out, re-engineered, and inserted back into the person that would allow the person to live longer. I really can't tell you what the possibilities might be, but I suspect there are all kinds of good possibilities.
So is it worth it? Is the potential good worth pursuing given the potential harm? To an extent, I'm not sure it matters, because we have such a thirst for knowledge--such a curiosity--that this is going to be explored regardless of the dangers. If government ever tried to put a stop to it, somebody in a secret lab somewhere would do it anyway. But I think at the very least, people ought to be made aware of the potential dangers.
Somebody posted a question this morning on Yahoo Answers wanting people's thoughts. One nut on there thought it somehow proved that life could've emerged through purely naturalistic causes. How he figured that the ability of an intelligent being (namely, humans) to engineer life is somehow evidence against Intelligent Design is beyond me. It sounds to me like the very definition of Intelligent Design. I wonder if the nut on Yahoo Answers thinks that since we've shown that humans are able to engineer cars, that cars could have emerged through purely naturalistic causes.
And that raises an interesting question. Suppose we decide to create, from scratch, a few different living organisms and implant them on a planet somewhere far away from earth. And then suppose those creatures evolved to the point that they could ask such questions as, "Where did we come from?" "Why are we here?" And suppose they discovered the theory of evolution. And suppose a small number of them said, "Wait a minute. Our DNA shows evidence of intelligent design. We think life was engineered by an intelligent being." They would be right, wouldn't they?
Think about that for a minute. Their evidence for intelligent design would be no different than our evidence for intelligent design. And they would be right to draw that conclusion. Is it unreasonable, then, for us to draw that conclusion?
But most people say our DNA does not show evidence of intelligent design. Think about that, too. It means that if we engineered life, put it on another planet, and it evolved into smart critters like us, they would never be able to tell their they had been engineered. They would never be able to tell that their DNA was the result of intelligent design. In spite of the fact that their DNA was the result of intelligent design, there would be no evidence for it. And the most justified conclusion for them would be that they emerged through a blind natural process.
Thursday, May 06, 2010
Catholic Answers
I signed up at the Catholic Answers forum a long time ago so I could participate in the discussion forums, and I've been getting emails ever since. I just want you to see the subject line of the one I got today so you can tell me what you think.
Is it just me or does that come across sounding a lot like something Johann Tetzel was doing back in the 16th century? Of course endulgences didn't have eternal consequences since purgatory wasn't eternal, but it does sound similar, doesn't it?
Now don't get me wrong. I'm not accusing Catholic Answers of anything. I'm sure what they mean is that if you send them money, you will be contributing to a ministry that is trying to bring people to salvation in Christ. I don't think they are saying that if you send them money, you'll be better off in eternity. But you have to admit it sure comes across that way, doesn't it?
Invest in Catholic Answers Live--The Dividends are Eternal
Is it just me or does that come across sounding a lot like something Johann Tetzel was doing back in the 16th century? Of course endulgences didn't have eternal consequences since purgatory wasn't eternal, but it does sound similar, doesn't it?
Now don't get me wrong. I'm not accusing Catholic Answers of anything. I'm sure what they mean is that if you send them money, you will be contributing to a ministry that is trying to bring people to salvation in Christ. I don't think they are saying that if you send them money, you'll be better off in eternity. But you have to admit it sure comes across that way, doesn't it?
Tuesday, May 04, 2010
Fine tuning and many worlds
Today, I have a question for you. I posted this question on Yahoo Answers, but nobody answered it, so now it's your turn.
According to the fine tuning argument, there are a whole bunch of constants that have to have very precise values before life could exist in the universe. Some examples of these constants include the gravitational constant, the strong nuclear force, the charge of an electron, etc. There are about 26 of them, and some of them are ratios between the values of other ones. If any one of these constants were different by a smidgen, then life would not be possible. Since we live in a life-permitting universe, and since it's unimaginably unlikely that the universe would be life-permitting, it appears that the universe was rigged. Somebody intentionally tuned the values of these constants with the intention of making the universe habitable to living things.
There are a number of ways to respond to this argument. You could say the physical constants are not contingent at all, and that they could not have had any different values. There's a necessity about them. Who knows? If they could not have been otherwise, then they're not really "tuned" at all.
Or you could say we got lucky. The fine tuning argument only renders it improbable that the universe would be life-permitting. It doesn't render it impossible. Crazy things happen.
Or you could say that any sort of universe is equally improbable, but that doesn't make it at all remarkable that it would turn out some particular way. If there hadn't been life, there would've been something else that would've been unique to that universe. There's nothing special about life that makes our universe remarkable. Choosing life as the object toward which the universe was "finely tuned" is arbitrary since any combination of values for the constants would've yielded something unique. Personally, I think this is the strongest argument against the design argument from fine-tuning.
Or, you could say that if the universe had not been life-permitting, then we wouldn't be here to be thinking about it. I've heard this one a lot, but this seems to be about the worst response to the fine tuning argument. I think the firing squad analogy adequately reveals the weakness in this type of response.
But I didn't want to talk about any of these responses today. I wanted to talk about the "many worlds" or the "multiverse" response. In this response, it is granted that the constants of the universe are contingent. They could have been otherwise. And, in fact, they are otherwise in many different universe. According to this view, there may be a gazillion different universes. The more universes there are, the more likely it is that at least one of them would have the right combination of constants to be life-permitting. We just happen to live in one that is. And, in fact, every thinking thing that considers the fine tuning argument lives in such a universe.
Lemme use an analogy. Let's suppose only one person bought a lottery ticket. And let's suppose they won the lottery. If that happened, we might all be justified in thinking the game had been rigged. Somebody intentionally tweaked the balls so they would produce the same numbers that were on the ticket. But if millions of people each got a lottery ticket, it would not be remarkable at all that at least one of them would have the right numbers. And the more lottery tickets there are, the more likely it is that somebody would win.
So it is with universes. No matter how unlikely a life-permitting universe is, the more universes there are, the more likely it is that one would come along that had just the right combination of constants. That's right. The unlikely may be likely, depending on your background information.
(That reminds me of the debate about miracles, and how some people think miracles are unlikely because they're so rare and statistically improbable, and how some people respond by saying that even statistically unlikely events may be likely in light of further background information. It would be ironic if somebody thought it was absurd to suggest that anything unlikely could be likely (like the resurrection) while at the same time subscribing to the many universes idea.)
One might respond by saying there's no evidence for universes other than ours, and the explanation is ad hoc. But here, I don't think it's clear where the burden of proof lies. Both sides are positing an entity or entities to explain how it is that the universe is finely tuned for life. One side posits a designer. The other posits multiple universes. If fine-tuning alone isn't enough to justify belief in either a designer or multiple universes, and if we have to look elsewhere for verification that such entities exist, then both theories fail. Why should we presume one explanation until the other gets further verification? Why does one side have a burden of proof the other side doesn't have?
That's not really where I wanted to go, though. I'm going to get to my question now. Both sides agree about one thing--that the constants of the universe are contingent. They could've been otherwise. This question is mainly for the many worlds people. If it's true that the constants can vary in value from one universe to the next, and there's no necessity about them having any particular value, why is it that they don't vary within universes? Why, for example, don't we find some electrons in our universe that have different charges than other universes? Why isn't the force of gravity stronger with some masses than with other masses? Why is there such uniformity in our universe when it seems like there could've been diversity? Is it just an incredible coincidence that every particle of the same kind is exactly like every other particle of the same kind all over the universe, or is there a physical cause for it?
According to the fine tuning argument, there are a whole bunch of constants that have to have very precise values before life could exist in the universe. Some examples of these constants include the gravitational constant, the strong nuclear force, the charge of an electron, etc. There are about 26 of them, and some of them are ratios between the values of other ones. If any one of these constants were different by a smidgen, then life would not be possible. Since we live in a life-permitting universe, and since it's unimaginably unlikely that the universe would be life-permitting, it appears that the universe was rigged. Somebody intentionally tuned the values of these constants with the intention of making the universe habitable to living things.
There are a number of ways to respond to this argument. You could say the physical constants are not contingent at all, and that they could not have had any different values. There's a necessity about them. Who knows? If they could not have been otherwise, then they're not really "tuned" at all.
Or you could say we got lucky. The fine tuning argument only renders it improbable that the universe would be life-permitting. It doesn't render it impossible. Crazy things happen.
Or you could say that any sort of universe is equally improbable, but that doesn't make it at all remarkable that it would turn out some particular way. If there hadn't been life, there would've been something else that would've been unique to that universe. There's nothing special about life that makes our universe remarkable. Choosing life as the object toward which the universe was "finely tuned" is arbitrary since any combination of values for the constants would've yielded something unique. Personally, I think this is the strongest argument against the design argument from fine-tuning.
Or, you could say that if the universe had not been life-permitting, then we wouldn't be here to be thinking about it. I've heard this one a lot, but this seems to be about the worst response to the fine tuning argument. I think the firing squad analogy adequately reveals the weakness in this type of response.
But I didn't want to talk about any of these responses today. I wanted to talk about the "many worlds" or the "multiverse" response. In this response, it is granted that the constants of the universe are contingent. They could have been otherwise. And, in fact, they are otherwise in many different universe. According to this view, there may be a gazillion different universes. The more universes there are, the more likely it is that at least one of them would have the right combination of constants to be life-permitting. We just happen to live in one that is. And, in fact, every thinking thing that considers the fine tuning argument lives in such a universe.
Lemme use an analogy. Let's suppose only one person bought a lottery ticket. And let's suppose they won the lottery. If that happened, we might all be justified in thinking the game had been rigged. Somebody intentionally tweaked the balls so they would produce the same numbers that were on the ticket. But if millions of people each got a lottery ticket, it would not be remarkable at all that at least one of them would have the right numbers. And the more lottery tickets there are, the more likely it is that somebody would win.
So it is with universes. No matter how unlikely a life-permitting universe is, the more universes there are, the more likely it is that one would come along that had just the right combination of constants. That's right. The unlikely may be likely, depending on your background information.
(That reminds me of the debate about miracles, and how some people think miracles are unlikely because they're so rare and statistically improbable, and how some people respond by saying that even statistically unlikely events may be likely in light of further background information. It would be ironic if somebody thought it was absurd to suggest that anything unlikely could be likely (like the resurrection) while at the same time subscribing to the many universes idea.)
One might respond by saying there's no evidence for universes other than ours, and the explanation is ad hoc. But here, I don't think it's clear where the burden of proof lies. Both sides are positing an entity or entities to explain how it is that the universe is finely tuned for life. One side posits a designer. The other posits multiple universes. If fine-tuning alone isn't enough to justify belief in either a designer or multiple universes, and if we have to look elsewhere for verification that such entities exist, then both theories fail. Why should we presume one explanation until the other gets further verification? Why does one side have a burden of proof the other side doesn't have?
That's not really where I wanted to go, though. I'm going to get to my question now. Both sides agree about one thing--that the constants of the universe are contingent. They could've been otherwise. This question is mainly for the many worlds people. If it's true that the constants can vary in value from one universe to the next, and there's no necessity about them having any particular value, why is it that they don't vary within universes? Why, for example, don't we find some electrons in our universe that have different charges than other universes? Why isn't the force of gravity stronger with some masses than with other masses? Why is there such uniformity in our universe when it seems like there could've been diversity? Is it just an incredible coincidence that every particle of the same kind is exactly like every other particle of the same kind all over the universe, or is there a physical cause for it?
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Plantinga's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism
I recently read Naturalism Defeated?: Essays on Plantinga's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism. In the beginning, Alvin Plantinga briefly explains his evolutionary argument against naturalism. Then there are a collection of essays criticizing his argument. The essays weren't necessarily addressing Plantinga's explanation found at the beginning of the book, but to other presentations Plantinga has published in books and articles on the argument. Then at the end, he responds to the essays. This was a really interesting book on epistemology, but I have to admit that I didn't understand it all. I want to talk about it anyway.
First, lemme give a brief explanation of the argument (or at least my understanding of the argument). First, I'll start with a couple of definitions:
1. Naturalism--the view that the physical cosmos is all there is. There are no ghosts, gods, or supernatural beings.
2. Evolution--the view that life (particularly human life for the purposes of this argument) developed through a process of unguided mutation and natural selection.
Plantinga thinks that if both naturalism and evolution are true, then probability that our belief-producing cognitive faculties are reliable is low or inscrutable. Or, in philoso-geek-speak:
P(R/N&E) is low or inscrutible,
where P stands for probability, R stands for the reliability of our belief-producing cognitive faculties, N stands for naturalism, and E stands for evolution.
Plantinga further thinks that, as a consequence, anybody who believes in both naturalism and evolution has a defeater for their belief in the reliability of their belief-producing cognitive faculties. And, if they can't trust their belief-producing cognitive faculties, then they can't be rational in holding to naturalism, evolution, or anything else that is the result of their belief-producing cognitive faculties. So, believing in both naturalism and evolution is self-refuting.
Plantinga further argues that this defeater of the reliability of their cognitive faculties cannot be defeated because the only way to defeat it is to rely on one's cognitive faculties to do so.
Now I want to explain why Plantinga thinks P(R/N&E) is low or inscrutable. If there were a God (i.e. if naturalism were false), but we evolved through purely natural cause and effect, then it's still possible for our belief-producing cognitive faculties to be reliable. After all, it's possible that the origin of life was like a cue ball that when hit causes all the other balls to go exactly where the pool player intends them to go through perfectly natural cause and effect. He doesn't have to intervene anymore after hitting the cue ball. Perhaps God got things going, but then things evolved in such a way that our cognitive faculties are reliable. If so, then we could trust our cognitive faculties because God would guarantee them. So naturalism is necessary to make Plantinga's argument work. Evolution alone won't do it.
But naturalism alone won't do it either. If our cognitive faculties came about through some unknown process, maybe the process would guarantee their reliability somehow even though there was no God to have a purpose in any of it. So it's the combination of naturalism and evolution that Plantinga thinks renders our cognitive faculties unreliable.
Now, given naturalism, lemme explain why he thinks evolution is not likely to produce reliable cognitive faculties. It's because natural selection chooses adaptive behavior. It only cares about our cognitive faculties insofar as our cognitive faculties have some causal influence over our behavior.
And there are different views about that among naturalists. One view is called epiphenominalism. That's the view that all of our mental states are caused by our brains, but that the causation does not go the other way around. Our mental states (e.g. our beliefs and desires) cannot cause anything in our brain. Now, if that view is true, then obviously our minds have no causal influence over our behavior. It's easy to see why, in that case, P(R/N&E) would be low or inscrutable. Since our behavior would have nothing to do with our cognitive faculties, and natural selection only cares out about behavior, then natural selection would not care about our cognitive faculties. Our cognitive faculties would be irrelevant to whether we were naturally selected or not.
In another view (don't know the name), it is possible for our minds to have causal influence over our brains. But there are two sub-views under this view. One is that our minds have causal influence over our brains because of their syntax, and the other because of their semantics. By "syntax," I mean the structure of the brain that produced the mental event or that is associated with the mental event. By "semantics," I mean the actual content of the mental event--the actual belief or desire--or the "aboutness" of the mental event.
Let me see if I can explain that a little better. The difference is like the difference in whether a book has causal influence because of the physical properties of the ink and paper or whether it has causal influence because of the meaning of the words in the book.
Now if it turns out that our minds only have syntactical influence over the brain, but not semantical, then again, it's easy to see why this would make P(R/N&E) low or inscrutable. Natural selection would only care about the physical structure of the brain associated with a mental event because that is what results in behavior. It wouldn't care about the content of the mental event. If the physical structure of the brain is all that matters, then it wouldn't matter whether your beliefs were true or false.
Only if our minds have causal influence over our brains by virtue of semantics will natural selection care about our beliefs and our desires.
By the way, I'm using "care" anthropomorphically. Don't read too much into that.
So it's this last view that has any hope of giving us reliable cognitive faculties--cognitive faculties that will produce mostly true beliefs rather than false beliefs. But the only way for evolution to produce reliable cognitive faculties is if it turns out that true beliefs are more likely to result in adaptive behavior than false beliefs. If false beliefs are just as likely to result in adaptive behavior as true beliefs, then it would be easy to see how evolution would produce unreliable cognitive faculties.
Plantinga argues that it's easy to come up with combinations of false beliefs and desires that would result in adaptive behavior. They can be silly, too, because all we're interested in is getting our body parts to the right place to ensure our survival and reproductivity. Suppose, for example, that a tiger is chasing you. You believe tigers are harmless, cuddly, fun animals who love to play chase, and such is your desire to play with said tiger that you run from it. Although the belief is false, it gets your body parts where they need to be to stay alive. Or let's take something even more silly. Let's say you believe the tiger is sweet, you want to hug it, and you believe the best way to hug it is to run from it. It's an absurd belief, but it gets you where you need to go to stay alive. And it's not hard to come up with scenarios like this. For any situation a person can bring up in which they might claim that some true belief resulted in adaptive behavior, you can come up with an absurd belief that would have the same result. So, argues, Plantinga, evolution is not likely to produce reliable cognitive faculties.
The most common objection that I half way understood was that although given evolution and natural selection alone, our cognitive faculties might be unreliable, it could be there are other factors which, when combined with naturalism and evolution, would increase the probability that our cognitive faculties are reliable. In other words...
P(R/N&E) may be low or inscrutable, but P(R/N&E&C) might be high.
I don't remember what suggestions were given for C, but I remember some of the critics pointing out that we have an intuition about the reliability of our cognitive faculties that overcomes any argument to the contrary. There's a kind of Descartian clearness and distinctness about our cognitive faculties.
Plantinga didn't respond to that the way I expected him to. What I would've said was that, yeah, sure. I totally agree that our cognitive faculties are reliable. That's not my point. My point is that if our cognitive faculties were the result of naturalistic evolution, then they would not be reliable. Since they are reliable, then either naturalism is false, evolution is false, or they're both false. Here's the syllogism:
1. If N&E are true, then our cognitive faculties are unreliable.
2. Our cognitive faculties are not unreliable.
3. Therefore, either N is false, E is false, or they're both false.
But that's not how Plantinga responded. I'd tell you how he responded, but I don't remember.
Another objection I remember was that although it's easy to come up with individual cases of where a false belief might produce adaptive behavior, it doesn't follow that our beliefs could be systematically false and still result in adaptive behavior. Now this, I kind of agreed with. One of the problems I had with Plantinga's argument before I read this book is that it just seemed likely to me that, as a whole, true beliefs are more likely to produce adaptive behavior than false beliefs, even if it turns out that in some cases, false beliefs might produce adaptive behavior. Because cognitive faculties don't just produce individual beliefs. They produce kinds of beliefs.
In the past, Plantinga has responded to this kind of argument by giving an example of how a systematically false kind of belief can still result in adaptive behavior. For example, suppose you believed that everything was a witch, including inanimate objects. Your cat is a witch, your car is a witch, etc. You might believe that witch hamburger is tasty or that witch girl is a cutie and none of these beliefs would result in behavior that was any different than if you didn't have these beliefs. So almost all of your beliefs would be false, but they would still result in adaptive behavior.
One of the critics pointed out that all of these false beliefs can be broken down into true and false beliefs. For example, "That witch hamburger is tasty," can be broken down into, "That object is a witch," and "That object is a kind of hamburger," and "That object tastes good." So you've got two true beliefs and one false belief.
I want to stray away from this book a little now and share a thought I've had for a while since I first heard Plantinga's argument. I've noticed that in a lot of debates between theists and atheists over morality that atheists will explain our morality by appealing to evolution, or at least social evolution. Moral beliefs produce adaptive behavior. That's why we developed into moral creatures. There's no reason to suppose there's any divine law behind these moral instincts.
Think about that. Atheists who argue this way aren't saying that objective moral values emerged through evolution. Quite the opposite. They are denying the existence of objective moral values on the basis that our moral beliefs are the result of evolution. Essentially, they are conceding one of Plantinga's primary arguments--that if our belief-producing cognitive faculties are the result of evolution, then we cannot trust their reliability. It's because evolution produced our belief in morality that somehow calls their reliability into question. But if that's the case, then why stop at morality?
Which is more likely--that evolution would result in reliable belief-producing cognitive faculties or that it would result in unreliable belief-producing cognitive faculties? If reliable, then shouldn't we all embrace the existence objective moral values since that seems to be our most natural inclination? But if unreliable, then why not admit that our belief in naturalism and evolution are both irrational? In fact all of our beliefs are irrational?
But that brings me back to the book and a thought I had while reading it. This is another objection I had to Plantinga's argument. If it turns out that a person who believes in both naturalism and evolution is rationally obliged to believe that the reliability of their belief-producing cognitive faculties is low or inscrutable, then shouldn't they doubt that conclusion? It seems like if Plantinga's argument is sound, then a person could never rationally come to the conclusion that they are irrational because it would require them to reason rationally. How could they trust that naturalism and evolution are incompatible with the reliability of their cognitive faculties if their cognitive faculties are being called into question? Do you know what I'm saying?
Near the end of the book, I was happy to find that Plantinga noticed this problem, too, and he addressed it. He didn't really solve the problem so far as I could tell (or that I can remember). He just discussed it. It leads to an infinite loop.
That's about all I have to say. My apologies to Alvin Plantinga and all the essay writers for that book if I've butchered any of your views. I fully admit that I didn't understand everything I read. But it was really interesting! And I will probably read it again at some point.
First, lemme give a brief explanation of the argument (or at least my understanding of the argument). First, I'll start with a couple of definitions:
1. Naturalism--the view that the physical cosmos is all there is. There are no ghosts, gods, or supernatural beings.
2. Evolution--the view that life (particularly human life for the purposes of this argument) developed through a process of unguided mutation and natural selection.
Plantinga thinks that if both naturalism and evolution are true, then probability that our belief-producing cognitive faculties are reliable is low or inscrutable. Or, in philoso-geek-speak:
P(R/N&E) is low or inscrutible,
where P stands for probability, R stands for the reliability of our belief-producing cognitive faculties, N stands for naturalism, and E stands for evolution.
Plantinga further thinks that, as a consequence, anybody who believes in both naturalism and evolution has a defeater for their belief in the reliability of their belief-producing cognitive faculties. And, if they can't trust their belief-producing cognitive faculties, then they can't be rational in holding to naturalism, evolution, or anything else that is the result of their belief-producing cognitive faculties. So, believing in both naturalism and evolution is self-refuting.
Plantinga further argues that this defeater of the reliability of their cognitive faculties cannot be defeated because the only way to defeat it is to rely on one's cognitive faculties to do so.
Now I want to explain why Plantinga thinks P(R/N&E) is low or inscrutable. If there were a God (i.e. if naturalism were false), but we evolved through purely natural cause and effect, then it's still possible for our belief-producing cognitive faculties to be reliable. After all, it's possible that the origin of life was like a cue ball that when hit causes all the other balls to go exactly where the pool player intends them to go through perfectly natural cause and effect. He doesn't have to intervene anymore after hitting the cue ball. Perhaps God got things going, but then things evolved in such a way that our cognitive faculties are reliable. If so, then we could trust our cognitive faculties because God would guarantee them. So naturalism is necessary to make Plantinga's argument work. Evolution alone won't do it.
But naturalism alone won't do it either. If our cognitive faculties came about through some unknown process, maybe the process would guarantee their reliability somehow even though there was no God to have a purpose in any of it. So it's the combination of naturalism and evolution that Plantinga thinks renders our cognitive faculties unreliable.
Now, given naturalism, lemme explain why he thinks evolution is not likely to produce reliable cognitive faculties. It's because natural selection chooses adaptive behavior. It only cares about our cognitive faculties insofar as our cognitive faculties have some causal influence over our behavior.
And there are different views about that among naturalists. One view is called epiphenominalism. That's the view that all of our mental states are caused by our brains, but that the causation does not go the other way around. Our mental states (e.g. our beliefs and desires) cannot cause anything in our brain. Now, if that view is true, then obviously our minds have no causal influence over our behavior. It's easy to see why, in that case, P(R/N&E) would be low or inscrutable. Since our behavior would have nothing to do with our cognitive faculties, and natural selection only cares out about behavior, then natural selection would not care about our cognitive faculties. Our cognitive faculties would be irrelevant to whether we were naturally selected or not.
In another view (don't know the name), it is possible for our minds to have causal influence over our brains. But there are two sub-views under this view. One is that our minds have causal influence over our brains because of their syntax, and the other because of their semantics. By "syntax," I mean the structure of the brain that produced the mental event or that is associated with the mental event. By "semantics," I mean the actual content of the mental event--the actual belief or desire--or the "aboutness" of the mental event.
Let me see if I can explain that a little better. The difference is like the difference in whether a book has causal influence because of the physical properties of the ink and paper or whether it has causal influence because of the meaning of the words in the book.
Now if it turns out that our minds only have syntactical influence over the brain, but not semantical, then again, it's easy to see why this would make P(R/N&E) low or inscrutable. Natural selection would only care about the physical structure of the brain associated with a mental event because that is what results in behavior. It wouldn't care about the content of the mental event. If the physical structure of the brain is all that matters, then it wouldn't matter whether your beliefs were true or false.
Only if our minds have causal influence over our brains by virtue of semantics will natural selection care about our beliefs and our desires.
By the way, I'm using "care" anthropomorphically. Don't read too much into that.
So it's this last view that has any hope of giving us reliable cognitive faculties--cognitive faculties that will produce mostly true beliefs rather than false beliefs. But the only way for evolution to produce reliable cognitive faculties is if it turns out that true beliefs are more likely to result in adaptive behavior than false beliefs. If false beliefs are just as likely to result in adaptive behavior as true beliefs, then it would be easy to see how evolution would produce unreliable cognitive faculties.
Plantinga argues that it's easy to come up with combinations of false beliefs and desires that would result in adaptive behavior. They can be silly, too, because all we're interested in is getting our body parts to the right place to ensure our survival and reproductivity. Suppose, for example, that a tiger is chasing you. You believe tigers are harmless, cuddly, fun animals who love to play chase, and such is your desire to play with said tiger that you run from it. Although the belief is false, it gets your body parts where they need to be to stay alive. Or let's take something even more silly. Let's say you believe the tiger is sweet, you want to hug it, and you believe the best way to hug it is to run from it. It's an absurd belief, but it gets you where you need to go to stay alive. And it's not hard to come up with scenarios like this. For any situation a person can bring up in which they might claim that some true belief resulted in adaptive behavior, you can come up with an absurd belief that would have the same result. So, argues, Plantinga, evolution is not likely to produce reliable cognitive faculties.
The most common objection that I half way understood was that although given evolution and natural selection alone, our cognitive faculties might be unreliable, it could be there are other factors which, when combined with naturalism and evolution, would increase the probability that our cognitive faculties are reliable. In other words...
P(R/N&E) may be low or inscrutable, but P(R/N&E&C) might be high.
I don't remember what suggestions were given for C, but I remember some of the critics pointing out that we have an intuition about the reliability of our cognitive faculties that overcomes any argument to the contrary. There's a kind of Descartian clearness and distinctness about our cognitive faculties.
Plantinga didn't respond to that the way I expected him to. What I would've said was that, yeah, sure. I totally agree that our cognitive faculties are reliable. That's not my point. My point is that if our cognitive faculties were the result of naturalistic evolution, then they would not be reliable. Since they are reliable, then either naturalism is false, evolution is false, or they're both false. Here's the syllogism:
1. If N&E are true, then our cognitive faculties are unreliable.
2. Our cognitive faculties are not unreliable.
3. Therefore, either N is false, E is false, or they're both false.
But that's not how Plantinga responded. I'd tell you how he responded, but I don't remember.
Another objection I remember was that although it's easy to come up with individual cases of where a false belief might produce adaptive behavior, it doesn't follow that our beliefs could be systematically false and still result in adaptive behavior. Now this, I kind of agreed with. One of the problems I had with Plantinga's argument before I read this book is that it just seemed likely to me that, as a whole, true beliefs are more likely to produce adaptive behavior than false beliefs, even if it turns out that in some cases, false beliefs might produce adaptive behavior. Because cognitive faculties don't just produce individual beliefs. They produce kinds of beliefs.
In the past, Plantinga has responded to this kind of argument by giving an example of how a systematically false kind of belief can still result in adaptive behavior. For example, suppose you believed that everything was a witch, including inanimate objects. Your cat is a witch, your car is a witch, etc. You might believe that witch hamburger is tasty or that witch girl is a cutie and none of these beliefs would result in behavior that was any different than if you didn't have these beliefs. So almost all of your beliefs would be false, but they would still result in adaptive behavior.
One of the critics pointed out that all of these false beliefs can be broken down into true and false beliefs. For example, "That witch hamburger is tasty," can be broken down into, "That object is a witch," and "That object is a kind of hamburger," and "That object tastes good." So you've got two true beliefs and one false belief.
I want to stray away from this book a little now and share a thought I've had for a while since I first heard Plantinga's argument. I've noticed that in a lot of debates between theists and atheists over morality that atheists will explain our morality by appealing to evolution, or at least social evolution. Moral beliefs produce adaptive behavior. That's why we developed into moral creatures. There's no reason to suppose there's any divine law behind these moral instincts.
Think about that. Atheists who argue this way aren't saying that objective moral values emerged through evolution. Quite the opposite. They are denying the existence of objective moral values on the basis that our moral beliefs are the result of evolution. Essentially, they are conceding one of Plantinga's primary arguments--that if our belief-producing cognitive faculties are the result of evolution, then we cannot trust their reliability. It's because evolution produced our belief in morality that somehow calls their reliability into question. But if that's the case, then why stop at morality?
Which is more likely--that evolution would result in reliable belief-producing cognitive faculties or that it would result in unreliable belief-producing cognitive faculties? If reliable, then shouldn't we all embrace the existence objective moral values since that seems to be our most natural inclination? But if unreliable, then why not admit that our belief in naturalism and evolution are both irrational? In fact all of our beliefs are irrational?
But that brings me back to the book and a thought I had while reading it. This is another objection I had to Plantinga's argument. If it turns out that a person who believes in both naturalism and evolution is rationally obliged to believe that the reliability of their belief-producing cognitive faculties is low or inscrutable, then shouldn't they doubt that conclusion? It seems like if Plantinga's argument is sound, then a person could never rationally come to the conclusion that they are irrational because it would require them to reason rationally. How could they trust that naturalism and evolution are incompatible with the reliability of their cognitive faculties if their cognitive faculties are being called into question? Do you know what I'm saying?
Near the end of the book, I was happy to find that Plantinga noticed this problem, too, and he addressed it. He didn't really solve the problem so far as I could tell (or that I can remember). He just discussed it. It leads to an infinite loop.
That's about all I have to say. My apologies to Alvin Plantinga and all the essay writers for that book if I've butchered any of your views. I fully admit that I didn't understand everything I read. But it was really interesting! And I will probably read it again at some point.
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
To evolve or not to evolve
When I first started this blog, the purpose was to be able to post thoughts that I had but hadn't necessarily given a lot of thought to just to get feedback. That way, I could refine my thoughts. But as I began to accumulate readers, I became reluctant to post just any ole thought I had. I kind of felt obliged to be right, and to put forth some effort to make sure I was right before I posted it. I got to where I didn't want to post anything unless I was prepared to defend it. But I didn't like that feeling because it defeated the purpose for which I started this blog. I didn't start this blog to evangelize or to convince other people of my point of view, but as time went on, that's what I ended up doing.
Well, today, I want to post a random thought I had while driving home from work one day.
Supposedly, we're all the result of natural selection acting on random mutations. But as people become more compassionate, and technology improves (especially medical technology), natural selection is sort of disabled. That's one of the criticism Friedrich Nietzsche had about Christianity. Because Christian morality is concerned with the weak, it allows the weak to prosper instead of being weeded out. And that, in turn, prevents the rise of the over-man--the next step in human evolution. We are unable to evolve as a species because we are helping the weak survive and reproduce. I don't think Nietzsche was the only person to recognize the problem. That's why the Nazi's were trying to exterminate Jews, gays, and everybody they thought were inferior. It was a way of helping natural selection do its job. It was more like unnatural selection, but it did what the Nazis thought natural selection was SUPPOSED to be doing, but was being kept from doing by Christian morality. And here in America, we had eugenics. At least we weren't trying to kill people. We were just sterilizing them to prevent them from reproducing. I know the Nazi's were influenced by Nietzsche. I don't know whether the Americans were.
Compassion won out, though. The good guys won the war, and eugenics was outlawed. So, for several decades, we have done everything we can to prevent mankind from evolving. And the better our medicinal capabilities become, the more stagnant our evolution will be. In fact, I'd say we've pretty much stopped it altogether. We're as far as we can get because we keep the sick and the weak alive, and they breed.
But I think that could change with this whole genome thing. I read an article recently that was talking about how it becomes cheaper and cheaper to sequence a human genome. I think the first time they did it, it cost something like $50,000. I don't remember what it was. But now, it can be done for something like $5000. And it's going to continue to get cheaper. And we're going to understand the genome much better in the future.
So this is what I think might happen. Sequencing the genome will become so cheap and so useful that pretty much everybody will have their own genome sequenced. It will allow them to anticipate sickness and disease, which in turn will allow them to prevent it. But there's another practical use in sequencing a person's genome. If everybody is doing it, then everybody is going to have a record. And with everybody having a record of the genome, it's just a matter of time that people are going to want to know what kind of genes their significant other has before they get married. After all, if they're going to have children, they're going to want the best. And since you might be a little more reluctant to have children with somebody who has inferior genes, or to have children if your genes are inferior, people with better genes might end up procreating more than people with inferior genes do. And people with inferior genes may find it more difficult to get married than people with good genes. If that happens, it can act as natural selection. People with inferior genes will be attenuated in the gene pool.
On the other hand, we don't need our genes necessarily to make it more difficult for us to reproduce. There are plenty of other factors you might look at that are more obvious. There are pretty people, ugly people, smart people, stupid people, confident people, shy people, healthy people, unhealthy people, lazy people, and industrious people. Nobody is being weeded out of the gene pool because ugly people can find other ugly people, stupid people can find other stupid people, etc. If everybody's genome is sequenced, then people with inferior genes will find other people with inferior genes. Nobody is going to be weeded out.
I don't know why shyness doesn't get weeded out of the gene pool. Shy people and confident people are like cat people and dog people. Dog people can go to the park with their dog and meet other dog people. Cat people can't do that. So it's easier for dog people to connect than it is for cat people to connect. In the same way, it's easier for confident people to connect than it is for shy people to connect. So you'd think shyness would get weeded out of the gene pool.
Of course shyness isn't necessarily the result of genes. To an extent, it can be the result of your environment. It's both, although with some people it has more to do with their genes and with other people it has more to do with their environment. But at least genetic shyness ought to be weeded out.
Another thing to think about is the fact that everybody has good traits and bad traits. A person may be ugly but make up for it with a charismatic personality. A person may be shy but make up for it by being a genius. Inferior traits ride piggy bag on superior traits. Since a person with inferior traits may be sought after because of their superior traits, those inferior traits will stay in the gene pool.
Well, today, I want to post a random thought I had while driving home from work one day.
Supposedly, we're all the result of natural selection acting on random mutations. But as people become more compassionate, and technology improves (especially medical technology), natural selection is sort of disabled. That's one of the criticism Friedrich Nietzsche had about Christianity. Because Christian morality is concerned with the weak, it allows the weak to prosper instead of being weeded out. And that, in turn, prevents the rise of the over-man--the next step in human evolution. We are unable to evolve as a species because we are helping the weak survive and reproduce. I don't think Nietzsche was the only person to recognize the problem. That's why the Nazi's were trying to exterminate Jews, gays, and everybody they thought were inferior. It was a way of helping natural selection do its job. It was more like unnatural selection, but it did what the Nazis thought natural selection was SUPPOSED to be doing, but was being kept from doing by Christian morality. And here in America, we had eugenics. At least we weren't trying to kill people. We were just sterilizing them to prevent them from reproducing. I know the Nazi's were influenced by Nietzsche. I don't know whether the Americans were.
Compassion won out, though. The good guys won the war, and eugenics was outlawed. So, for several decades, we have done everything we can to prevent mankind from evolving. And the better our medicinal capabilities become, the more stagnant our evolution will be. In fact, I'd say we've pretty much stopped it altogether. We're as far as we can get because we keep the sick and the weak alive, and they breed.
But I think that could change with this whole genome thing. I read an article recently that was talking about how it becomes cheaper and cheaper to sequence a human genome. I think the first time they did it, it cost something like $50,000. I don't remember what it was. But now, it can be done for something like $5000. And it's going to continue to get cheaper. And we're going to understand the genome much better in the future.
So this is what I think might happen. Sequencing the genome will become so cheap and so useful that pretty much everybody will have their own genome sequenced. It will allow them to anticipate sickness and disease, which in turn will allow them to prevent it. But there's another practical use in sequencing a person's genome. If everybody is doing it, then everybody is going to have a record. And with everybody having a record of the genome, it's just a matter of time that people are going to want to know what kind of genes their significant other has before they get married. After all, if they're going to have children, they're going to want the best. And since you might be a little more reluctant to have children with somebody who has inferior genes, or to have children if your genes are inferior, people with better genes might end up procreating more than people with inferior genes do. And people with inferior genes may find it more difficult to get married than people with good genes. If that happens, it can act as natural selection. People with inferior genes will be attenuated in the gene pool.
On the other hand, we don't need our genes necessarily to make it more difficult for us to reproduce. There are plenty of other factors you might look at that are more obvious. There are pretty people, ugly people, smart people, stupid people, confident people, shy people, healthy people, unhealthy people, lazy people, and industrious people. Nobody is being weeded out of the gene pool because ugly people can find other ugly people, stupid people can find other stupid people, etc. If everybody's genome is sequenced, then people with inferior genes will find other people with inferior genes. Nobody is going to be weeded out.
I don't know why shyness doesn't get weeded out of the gene pool. Shy people and confident people are like cat people and dog people. Dog people can go to the park with their dog and meet other dog people. Cat people can't do that. So it's easier for dog people to connect than it is for cat people to connect. In the same way, it's easier for confident people to connect than it is for shy people to connect. So you'd think shyness would get weeded out of the gene pool.
Of course shyness isn't necessarily the result of genes. To an extent, it can be the result of your environment. It's both, although with some people it has more to do with their genes and with other people it has more to do with their environment. But at least genetic shyness ought to be weeded out.
Another thing to think about is the fact that everybody has good traits and bad traits. A person may be ugly but make up for it with a charismatic personality. A person may be shy but make up for it by being a genius. Inferior traits ride piggy bag on superior traits. Since a person with inferior traits may be sought after because of their superior traits, those inferior traits will stay in the gene pool.
Saturday, April 03, 2010
resurrection and evolution: the irony
Jim: Resurrections are highly improbable events, so it's highly unlikely that Jesus was raised from the dead.
Bob: As for the probabilities of Jesus rising from the dead, yes its highly improbable--however we know that highly improbable things do happen. What are the statistical odds that you and I would be carrying on this conversation right now? What are the odds of someone being struck by lightning twice at different times in their life? What are the odds of someone winning the powerball lottery? All of these are statistically "off the chart" yet they happen.
Bob: It is highly improbable that life would evolve naturally, so it is unlikely that humans evolved.
Jim: As for the probabilities of live evolving naturally, yes its highly improbable--however we know that highly improbable things do happen. What are the statistical odds that you and I would be carrying on this conversation right now? What are the odds of someone being struck by lightning twice at different times in their life? What are the odds of someone winning the powerball lottery? All of these are statistically "off the chart" yet they happen.
Does anybody else see the irony? I suspect some people reading this may think I'm just making it up, but I can assure you I'm not. Jim's argument against resurrections comes up all the time, and usually David Hume is invoked. Bob's answer comes up all the time, too. Here's one example.
Bob's argument against evolution comes up all the time, too, in discussions of intelligent design, the origin of life, and the fine tuning of the universe to permit life. Jim's answer came up on a blog I saw just today (which is what prompted this post). In fact, I quoted it verbatim, which you can read in the comments here.
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