Some Questions and Answers
Is reality a dream? If not, what differentiates the ‘real world’ from the ‘dream world’? If so, Life is wrapped in a dream. If that is true, then wouldn’t death be wrapped in a dream? Is death just one big dream?
The key to the answer is the recognition that the concepts “reality” and “dream [world]” refer to two distinctly different modes of experience. By the very nature of these two concepts, they cannot refer to the same thing. Therefore, the simple answer is “No!”. Reality cannot be a dream without seriously abusing the meaning of the two words. Poets, of course, are granted license to abuse the language for artistic purposes. But philosophers must take greater care.
We each experience “The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” in two distinctly different modes. When experiencing life in one mode, we notice that things perceived are constant, persistent, consistent, and coherent. When experiencing life in the other mode, we notice that things perceived are dramatically less constant in form and character, often transient in existence, frequently mutually inconsistent both from thing to thing and across time, and far more frequently quite incoherent. One mode of experience draws the focus of our attention, is amenable to inquiry, and responsive to our reactions. The other mode of experience often drifts uncontrollably past our attention, is rarely subject to inquiry, and is often unresponsive to our reactions. On any scale of measure, the difference between the two modes of experience is dramatic and unmistakable whenever noticed. One of these modes of experience we call the “real word”, the other we call the “dream world” (or hallucinations, or illusions).
Most of us spend most of our time experiencing life in the “real world” mode. Episodes spent in the “dream world”, while they may seem quite real at the time, always end with a transition back to the “real world” mode of experience. Some people, for reasons as diverse as drugs to organic brain damage, spend more of their time in the “dream world”. Some people, again for diverse reasons, lose the ability to notice the distinctly different character of two modes of experience, and are unable to distinguish their “real” experiences from their “dream” experiences.
The bottom line is that life is not a dream. The “real world”, unlike the “dream world” possesses an unmistakably greater degree of constancy, consistency, and coherence. In the real world, elephants are huge, grey and don’t fly. That remains true across time, and is consistent with all other information we have about the real world mode of experience. In the dream world, pink elephants can buzz around your head, and turn into green mice stomping on the roof of your house. The fact that sometimes a dream appears so real you can’t tell, does not alter the fact that you always wake up.
I’m having trouble answering a big question. Maybe you can be of help. Here it is:
“Different cultures have different truths.“
“A truth is that which can be accepted universally.”
What are the implications for knowledge of agreeing with these opposing statements?
It is not clear from your question whether you are interested in the implications for knowledge of agreeing with each of these statements individually or collectively. I’m going to try to answer in a way that addresses both possibilities.
It is widely (but not universally) accepted in Philosophy that “knowledge” constitutes a justified belief in a true proposition — where for our purpose here we can define a “proposition” as an assertion that says something that can be either true or false. So the implications of these two statements you have provided arise from their respective notions of what constitutes a “True proposition”.
The two statements that trouble you present quite distinct and conflicting notions of “Truth”. But that is because they come from quite different conceptual realms. So it is not surprising that they appear to conflict when juxtaposed out of their natural habitats.
The first statement — “Different cultures have different truths.” This is a classic statement from cultural anthropology. Within that context, the meaning of the statement derives from two observations: (a) what makes an identifiable “culture” are the common beliefs shared by the people of that culture; and (b) what separates one culture from another, are the differences between the common beliefs of the two cultures. For there to be two cultures, there must (almost by definition) be two different sets of common beliefs shared by two different groups of people.
For our purpose here, let’s define “a belief” (like a proposition defined above) as an assertion that says something that can be either true or false. What marks a cultural belief, then, is the acceptance of some assertion as true by all (or at least the great majority of) the people of that culture. This general acceptance can be (and often is) quite independent of whether the assertion corresponds to the facts of the matter, or is consistent (coherent) with the other beliefs of the people of that culture. It can even be independent of whether in fact anyone at all actually believes the assertion to be true. All that really counts is whether the great majority behaves as if they believe the assertion to be true.
Within the context of cultural anthropology, the statement in question is not an attempt to establish a definition of “Truth”. Nor is it an attempt to claim that the notion of “Truth” is culturally relative. It is instead a bit of poetic license used to express the fact that different cultures believe in different collections of fundamental assertions about their culture and their world. It is a description of what people believe to be true, rather than a statement about what is actually true or what is actually knowledge.
To take this statement out of its cultural anthropology context is to dip into a school of philosophical thought usually referred to as “Cultural Relativism” (for obvious reasons). Within this wider context, the statement would have to be interpreted as both a definition of “Truth”, and a claim that the notion of “Truth” (and thus “knowledge”) is culturally relative. Within Cultural Relativism, a belief is considered to be “True” if it is widely believed to be true within the relevant culture. Since beliefs differ between cultures, as documented by cultural anthropology, “Truths” must necessarily differ between cultures.
(Cultural Relativism is more widely maintained as a system of Ethics than as a treatment of truth and knowledge. In Ethics, Cultural Relativism maintains that what is “good” and “right” is defined by the common beliefs of the culture as to what ought to be considered “good” and “right”.)
The second statement — “A truth is that which can be accepted universally.” Taken at face value, the statement is a straight definition of “Truth”. It establishes the criteria that determine whether or not some assertion is to be considered true. Whatever the assertion is, if it can be accepted universally, then it is to be considered true. Unlike the cultural anthropology context of the first statement, this definition of “Truth” does not require actual acceptance by anyone. It requires only that such acceptance is possible, and makes no reference to how unlikely that possibility might be. Unlike the Correspondence Theory of “Truth”, it does not reference the actual facts of the matter. And unlike the Coherence Theory of “Truth”, it does not concern itself with the consistency of beliefs.
Consider an assertion such as “Unicorns exist” or “Fairies dance under the moonlight at the bottom of my garden”. Certainly it is thinkable that these two assertions could be accepted universally — independently of whether unicorns or fairies exist or not; independently of whether a belief in the existence of unicorns or fairies is consistent with other beliefs held to be true; and independently of whether there actually is universal acceptance of these assertions or not. Therefore, each of these assertions would have to be regarded as “a truth”. Clearly this is not a reasonable approach to a general meaning of “Truth”. And clearly, this notion of “Truth” is inconsistent with notions expressed in either the cultural anthropology or Cultural Relativism contexts of the first statement. So we must assume that there is a hidden context behind this statement that has been lost in transmission.
If truth is determined by the cultural acceptance of the assertion as true, then you “know” any assertion that you believe to be true, and that you have cause to believe is generally accepted as true within your culture. Alternatively, if truth is determined by the possibility of universal acceptance of the assertion as true, then you “know” any assertion that you believe to be true, and that you have cause to believe could possibly be universally accepted as true.
Note that in both these cases, there is no reference to the actual facts of the matter, and no reference to the consistency between one assertion of knowledge and another. Thus, it would be perfectly feasible for you to “know” both that “Unicorns exist” and that “Unicorns do not exist”. This is not how people normally think of knowledge they consider whether they “know” something.
In the absence of any context for the second statement, there are a number of ways to reinterpret it so that it makes a little more sense. We could, for example, draw upon the cultural context of the first statement and reinterpret the meaning of “universally” in the second to mean “universally within a culture”. This reinterpretation would at least make the two statements consistent.
Another reinterpretation would be to understand “That which can be accepted universally” to mean “That for which there is justification that all rational people would accept if they were aware of it”. This would incorporate the notion of justification critical to the concept of “knowledge” we are employing here. It would also eliminate the unlikely but remotely feasible possibilities opened up by the use of “can”. On the other hand, without some contextual reason for this reinterpretation, it is certainly stretching the use of English to find this meaning in the words provided.
I’ll leave you with the question of whether or not either the Cultural Relativist or the universal acceptance notion of “knowledge” and “Truth” is consistent with how you employ those notions. I know for me, neither is reasonable. Personally, I subscribe to the Correspondence Theory of Truth (wherein an assertion is true just in case it accurately describes the facts of the matter). I find, therefore, that both of these statements are philosophically incorrect, although they may certainly possess poetic meaning within some special contexts (such as cultural anthropology).
The short answer is — Yes!
The longer answer is — it depends on one’s moral standards.
If, as many people, you adopt or inherit your moral standards from one of the many religions extant, then you most likely have an “unselfish/ altruistic” foundation for your moral beliefs. You will probably hold that, ceteris paribus, it is the welfare of others that is your primary moral concern. In that event, your own happiness is at the mercy of others — either because you are called upon to make sacrifices in the interests of the common good, or a duty to help others, or a commandment to not be selfish and self centered. And in that case, you will only find yourself happy when someone else makes it their business to make you happy. Making yourself happy is immoral.
But on the other hand, if you adopt your moral standards after a reasoned analysis of the best evidence available and without any preconceived conditions, then you will realize that the welfare of oneself and one’s family is your primary moral concern. From this standard of morality, making oneself happy and allowing oneself to be happy is a noble ethical pursuit. And in that case, happiness is the expected self-generated reward for a properly conducted moral life.
You takes your pick, and you reaps the consequences.
How do I know that what I perceive as the colour red is the same colour that you perceive as being red?
There are a couple of ways of approaching an answer to this question, depending on just how the question was intended — as a question about knowledge, or as a question about perception.
You know that you are using the label “red” correctly if you have adequate evidentiary justification for a belief that you are calling “red” the same suite of things in world that others call “red”. This is the process of learning what the symbol “red” means. And it is the process of learning the English language.
To know more specifically that you are labelling as “red” the same things that I label as “red”, you need to compare your list of “red” things with my list of “red” things. If the two lists correspond sufficiently, then we are both using the label in a similar manner. The match between our respective lists of “red” things need not be exact. It merely needs to be sufficiently similar to avoid confusion in most cases.
To know that you are perceiving the color red the same way that I do is a separate question. And you may be surprised to find that it is largely irrelevant. It makes absolutely no difference to anyone (other than a scientist curious about that specific aspect of perception) whether we each perceive red in the same way or not. One of us could be color blind, or wearing color transposing glasses. Or it may be natural for “red” things to appear differently to each perceiver. Makes no difference. All that matters is that we each respectively call “red” (roughly) the same things in the world.
It is only if we find different things in the world that we each label as “red” that we can explore the differences in how we perceive “red”. And aside from those clear cases of color blindness, we will almost always find that such differences in our respective lists of “red” things is due to a difference in our vocabularies. My wife, for example, has a much richer vocabulary of “red-like” color names (crimson, raspberry, candy cane, garnet, rose, wine, etc.). So I label as “red” many more things in the world than she does. Does she perceive “red” differently? Doesn’t make any difference. And barring more scientific investigation with specific light frequencies, there is no way to tell.
Do we have a mind in addition to our brains? If not then how do we explain conscious thoughts?
The answer to your first question depends, of course, of just what you conceive “mind” to be. Some people (philosophers included) conceive “mind” to be some sort of non-material “Spirit” that animates the human animal. In which case, naturally, the answer to your question would be “yes”. Others are more materialistic, and consider that all there is is the brain, so the answer to your question would be “no”.
Me, however, I consider the “mind” to be the product of the brain in action. Somewhat akin to the majesty of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony being the product of an orchestra in action. Materially, all that exists is the orchestra. But the majestic harmony produced can be regarded (and studied) as something entirely different.
As to your second question, I would highly recommend Consciousness Explained by Daniel C. Dennett. I found it an eminently readable and very entertaining exploration of your very question. I feel sure you will enjoy it.
If a person is sliced symmetrically in half instantaneously about the vertical axis, before that person’s inevitable death, where would his consciousness lie? Since the brain is also symmetrically divided perfectly, would it be possible to have two entities of that person in that moment? A “logical” and a “creative” version of that person, so to speak?
Your question presupposes that the conscious “I” is somehow independent of the brain in such a manner that it could function with only half of one. I challenge this assumption as a position for which we have no evidence. So my answer would be that the consciousness would die in the instant that the brain was divided.
There is a significant amount of evidence, to which you make passing reference, that the two halves of the cerebrum contribute different sorts of mental functions to consciousness. But there is no evidence that consciousness could successfully function without either set of those functions.
There is evidence from victims of severe epilepsy that the corpus callosum can be severed without impairing consciousness. The corpus callosum is the structure deep in the brain that connects the right and left hemispheres of the cerebrum. But that is not the only pathway that connects the two halves of the brain. There is more to the brain than the cerebrum. Patients who have undergone such treatment have never displayed dual personalities. Rather they have demonstrated that there must be alternate pathways for information to flow from one side of the cerebrum to the other.
There is also evidence from people with various sorts of brain damage, that consciousness can get along reasonably well without major portions of the brain. But none of that evidence would suggest that one half of a functioning consciousness could suddenly get along without the other. Survivors of major brain-cell losses take years to even partially recover. All evidence of this sort would suggest that loosing any piece of the brain causes severe mental problems for the unfortunate victim. Loosing one-half of the brain-cells would undoubtedly be instantly fatal.
For more discussion of this issue, in greater depth and with greater expertise than I can muster here, I refer you to Consciousness Explained by Daniel C. Dennett.
Someone give me a convincing argument against the reasoning that humans have “free will”. I’ve heard the argument that if you could calculate everything at a certain moment you could predict the future. But that doesn’t mean we don’t have free will, it just means we can predict the future. I think that a lot of philosophers take the “everything has been determined” standpoint because they are pretentious.
Try Elbow Room: The Varieties of Free Will Worth Wanting by Daniel C. Dennett. I think you will find the author very readable, and his text directly addresses your question.
I am trying to drastically change my life and gain a better understanding of life in general. What philosophical books have changed your life? I would prefer to read books that I can readily apply to my social life.
Here is my own offering of the three most life changing books I have read — (1) Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand; (2) The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins (and I recommend you follow this with The Extended Phenotype by the same author, in order to complete the story started in the first book); and (3) Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus by Dr. John Grey. All are very readable, and targeted at the average reader. They are not heavy philosophical works.
Once you have managed those, try these heavier philosophical works — Darwin’s Dangerous Idea and Consciousness Explained by Daniel C. Dennett; The Wealth and Poverty of Nations by David S. Landes; Culture Matters by Lawrence E. Harrison and Samuel P. Huntington.
Add to this list a good History of Western Philosophy. My own favorite is A History of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russell, but it is a little dated (first published in 1945), stops with William James and John Dewey and the early Logical Positivists, and should be supplemented with a text that covers the Twentieth Century. With this as a base, I think you will be well positioned to start your own reading list.
I have something in my mind that’s troubling me. Somehow I have managed to see that generalizations are not correct, since we know nothing about the universe and there could be something out there that would make that generalization incorrect. I don’t know, but I strongly believe that generalizations are a major problem in people’s way of thinking. What’s your opinion about this?
What you have identified is more commonly known (in philosophical circles at least) as “The Problem of Induction”. An inductive conclusion is a generalization from a sequence of observed particulars to a general conclusion. The “Problem of Induction” is that the truth of such conclusions can only be demonstrated Inductively. This can be considered either as arguing in circles, or “bootstrapping” — depending on how sceptical you are feeling.
For example — I see a swan and it is white. I wander about my environment and observe that all the swans that I see are white. After compiling what I feel is adequate evidence to justify the conclusion I generalize to the inductive conclusion that “All swans are white”. This, of course, is incorrect. My conclusion will be invalidated the first time I encounter a black Australian swan.
When one employs induction to reach such generalizations, one must keep in mind that the conclusion reached is only probably true, and not absolutely true. The degree of confidence one can have in the conclusion depends on the nature of the evidence supporting the conclusion. The more the evidence, the more detailed the understanding of the causations involved, the more confidence one can have in the truth of the conclusions. But inductive conclusions are thereby unlike “religious” truths that are taken to be absolutely, totally, and unchallengeably true.
On the other hand, all statements about the nature of Reality are Inductive conclusions. Far from being a major problem in people’s way of thinking, Inductive Reasoning is an essential part of how we deal with the slings and arrows of daily life. Do you set the alarm clock to wake you on time tomorrow morning? Do you turn the steering wheel left (rather than right) when you want to make a left turn? Do you eagerly anticipate that mouth-wateringly delicious fork-full of (whatever) at dinner time? If you do any of these things, then you are basing your actions (and your emotions) on the inductive generalization that the future will be like the past, and that things will continue to work the way that you have experienced them working in the past. That the sun will rise tomorrow (and the Universe will not disappear in a puff of sub-quantum smoke) is an inductive generalization.
But I think I might know why you are arriving at your belief that such generalizations are a major problem in people’s thinking. Most people are brought up within an Authoritative social environment. Parents, schools and most especially religious organizations are constantly bombarding the poor student with messages such as — “Do what I tell you because I tell you”, “Believe what I tell you because I tell you”, and most destructively “These are the Truths, and they are absolute!”. As a result, too many people begin to think that any statement that is accepted as “True” is “Truth Absolute”. Too many people forget the conditional on inductive generalizations — they are only probably true, are always subject to revision and correction, and they are only as useful as the evidence that justifies them.
I would like someone to answer this question I have been pondering for a long time. Where exactly does our (your) “Liberty” come from? As many responses would help.
P.S. Not just the Constitutional argument for Liberty, but is there a natural right to Liberty?
I am going to provide my answer from one particular philosophical perspective. There are other philosophical perspectives that will result in quite different answers. So I really hope that you get more than my answer to this question.
First, I must lay some foundation. “Life” is characterized by the unique fact that living things change and move — “act” — through the directed application of internally collected, stored, converted, and channeled energy. At a very fundamental level, the goal of all living behaviour is the maintenance of the life that is behaving. It is that (not necessarily contiguous) stretch of the DNA (or RNA) molecule that can be labelled as a Gene that is what must be recognized as the entity that survives and proliferates — continuation of which is the goal of Life’s actions. The actually observed behaviour of all living creatures, both in general and individually, is highly flexible and variable but within the broad genetically defined limits of continued genetic survival.
As an example of life, as an example of the species Homo sapiens, and as an individual consciousness, our purpose is to ensure the continued survival and proliferation of our genes. To be “Good” at anything is to do a quality job at fulfilling the purpose of that thing. A good Human Being is efficient and effective, and fulfils with quality, the purpose for which the Human Being was built — to ensure the continued survival and proliferation of our genes. To ensure the continued survival and proliferation of our genes is a never ending struggle. There is never enough assurance that the job is complete. There is always something extra that can be done, some marginal increase of assurance that can be found. The struggle continues whether or not the individual is consciously aware of why they are striving, or what they are striving for. Even if they are striving under misconceptions, misinformation, or mistaken assumptions, the human animal is built to strive. The best situation is to be consciously aware of why you are striving, and employ the best of your intellectual abilities to make conscious rational choices of what to strive for. Happiness comes from knowing you are doing a good job.
In order to best provide for the welfare of himself and his family, mankind has discovered that it is a good thing to have the freedom to pursue whatever means seem to be the best available at the moment. At the same time, however, mankind has also discovered that he can better the welfare of himself and his family by co-operating with his fellow humans in projects of mutual benefit. A co-operating social group, however, must necessarily impose some restrictions on the individual freedoms of each member of the group. Otherwise, nothing would get done co-operatively. The concept of individual personal freedom within the confines of a co-operating social group is the source of the concept “liberty”.
So — where does “liberty” come from? It comes from the mutual agreements arrived at by the co-operating members of a social group. “Liberty” is the freedom of action allowed by the group to each member of the group. More importantly, constraints on liberty are imposed by mutual agreement amongst the members of the group on their respective individual freedom in order that they each may best achieve the mutual benefits attainable from group co-operation.
So much for the meta-political theory. In actual practice, of course, especially in modern societies, there is little in the way of “mutual agreement” in the development of what are deemed necessary constraints on individual freedom in the interests of best achieving supposedly mutually beneficial co-operative goals. In any event, our liberty comes from the determinations of the political processes as to the extent of individual freedom we ought to have while we remain part of a social group.
I hope that the foregoing also adequately explains why we have no “natural right” to liberty.
Dear sir, I want to know the purpose of life. I am of the opinion that, if anyhow we’re going to die, then why such anxiety to work while living?.Why don’t I die, instead of living? Is it my basic human nature or some other mysterious principle that commands me to exist like this? Please provide a solution. I have been worrying about it for the past 2 years.
First, an important disclaimer. I am a realist/ materialist. I am not an idealist or a dualist. So my answer to your question will exclude any reference to religious or spiritual concepts. For answers from those perspectives, you will have to seek guidance from your friendly priest, minister, or spiritual advisor. I am sure you will have no problem finding a suitable representative of whatever religious faith appeals to you (or that you happen to stumble across). And they will tell you that your purpose in life is to unselfishly and altruistically dedicate your existence to the glorification of whatever notion of God they propose. You will have to take their word for it, of course.
On the other hand, if you are seeking an answer that you can check out for yourself, then you are seeking a materialist answer where science and evidence have a meaningful role to play. The answer I provide here will not be met with agreement by many. It does, however, have the advantage of being consistent with all that we currently know about biology, evolution, and psychology.
The first step in answering your question from this perspective is to acknowledge that you are a member of the species Homo sapiens. As such, you are a primate, a mammal, an animal, and a living organism with a 3 to 4 billion year evolutionary history behind you. (I refer you to any of the numerous works on evolutionary biology for further argument on this point). The argument goes like this: Life is Action. “Life” is characterized by the unique fact that living things change and move — “act” — through the directed application of internally collected, stored, converted, and channeled energy. > Life’s Actions are Teleological (Goal Oriented). At a very fundamental level, the goal of all living behaviour is the maintenance of the life that is behaving.
The second step is to acknowledge that the “Thing” that has been evolving over the myriad of generations that have lived since the dawn of life on Earth, is the genetic code and not the individual. You, yourself, are but a bio-chemical machine. You were constructed by the fertilised cell that was the result of the union of your mother’s ovum and your father’s sperm. And you were constructed in accordance with the recipe encoded in your genes. You are a survival machine for the genes in your DNA. (I refer you to the works of Richard Dawkins for further argument on this point.) The argument goes like this: The Gene is the Unit of Life. It is that (not necessarily contiguous) stretch of the DNA (or RNA) molecule that can be labelled as a Gene that is what must be recognized as the entity that survives and proliferates — continuation of which is the goal of Life’s Actions. The Reproductive Imperative. The actually observed behaviour of all living creatures, both in general and individually, is highly flexible and variable but within the broad genetically defined limits of continued genetic survival. > Our Purpose. As an example of life, as an example of the species Homo sapiens, and as an individual consciousness, our purpose is to ensure the continued survival and proliferation of our genes. The Definition of Good. To be “Good” at anything is to do a quality job at fulfilling the purpose of that thing. A good Human Being is efficient and effective, and fulfils with quality, the purpose for which the Human Being was built — to ensure the continued survival and proliferation of our genes. > Better is Never Enough. To ensure the continued survival and proliferation of our genes is a never ending struggle. There is never enough assurance that the job is complete. There is always something extra that can be done, some marginal increase of assurance that can be found.
And Finally, the struggle continues whether or not the individual is consciously aware of why they are striving, or what they are striving for. Even if they are striving under misconceptions, misinformation, or mistaken assumptions, the human animal is built to strive. The best situation is to be consciously aware of why you are striving, and employ the best of your intellectual abilities to make conscious rational choices of what to strive for. Happiness comes from knowing you are doing a good job.
That then, is your answer. The meaning of your life, your function, your purpose, the reason you exist, is to ensure that your genes get transmitted to the next generation. The point of it all is the welfare of your genetic descendants (over the long run, of course). Go to work because it is the best means available to you at this time, and in this place, to prepare you to do well by your children. You are not here to be good for society. You are not here to become whatever God might have intended. You wake up every morning and tackle the day because you have a function to perform. Friends, family, and society matter only to the extent that they can contribute to your ultimate purpose in life.
Many people will object to this answer, including many professional philosophers and of course anyone with a religious/ spiritual bent. But any alternative they offer to my answer will come either from their religious or spiritual premises (which I have specifically disavowed), or from out of thin air. As humans we are gifted with the ability to choose alternative goals in life. And you are free to pursue whatever ends tickle your fancy.
However, regardless of what other goals may be offered instead, if you are not successful at fulfilling this evolutionary meaning of your life, then your genetic codes (and their 3 to 4 billion years of ancestry) will vanish from the future. You are here to ask the question you asked because your parents (and their parents, and their parents, etc.) were good at their job. The future will be populated by individuals whose ancestors were successful at this evolutionary purpose. Are you going to be an ancestor, or a dead end?
Why are people not contented with what they have? Even when they’re already successful they still aren’t happy, they’re are still searching for something. So why is that?
The answer follows on from my answer above.
To be “Good” at anything is to do a quality job at fulfilling the purpose of that thing. A good Human Being is efficient and effective, and fulfils with quality, the purpose for which the Human Being was built — to ensure the continued survival and proliferation of our genes.
To ensure the continued survival and proliferation of our genes is a never ending struggle. There is never enough assurance that the job is complete. There is always something extra that can be done, some marginal increase of assurance that can be found.
The struggle continues whether or not the individual is consciously aware of why they are striving, or what they are striving for. Even if they are striving under misconceptions, misinformation, or mistaken assumptions, the human animal is built to strive. The best situation is to be consciously aware of why you are striving, and employ the best of your intellectual abilities to make conscious rational choices of what to strive for. Happiness comes from knowing you are doing a good job.
Should religious doctrines and practices be regulated according to their moral worthiness, or should religion be permitted to operate free of outside interference?
How would Socrates respond to this question?
As to your first question – the answer is – Neither!
What characterises almost all religious beliefs is the adoption of some particular form of moral standard. In fact, one might almost define a “religion” as the adoption of some particular moral standard. Certainly one can identify the flavor of religious belief involved by knowing the particular moral standard adhered to. The problem is that, by the very nature of religious belief, there is nothing that might tend to generate any commonality of moral standards between different religious beliefs.
Now, I am assuming here that you are intending your question to be one of regulating or freeing the doctrines and practices of different religions. Obviously (I hope), within the confines of one particular religion the moral standards of that religion should be (quite properly) used to regulate the particular doctrinal interpretations and practices of its adherents.
But since moral standards are particular to specific religions, it would be impossible to regulate the doctrines and practices of one group of religious believers using the moral standards of another religion. Not, at least, without being (properly) accused of arbitrariness and unjustifiable coercion. How do you think a Christian would react to being governed according to the moral standards of Hinduism? Or vice versa? (How do you think MacDonalds might fair in a regulatory environment where cattle are sacred?)
On the other hand, granting unrestrained liberty to any religious belief is not the answer either. Properly interpreting the “Word of God” (whichever God might apply) is an exercise in unconstrained imagination. There are absolutely no limits to the doctrines and practices that can be dreamed up and claimed as “religious”. Rastifarians smoke marijuana as part of their religious ceremonies. Voodoo demands animal sacrifices. Certain sects of Devil Worship and some ancient Incan religious beliefs demand human sacrifices. Most so-called “civilised” societies frown on such behaviors.
The proper approach, I think, is to identify a single natural moral standard that is based on nature and not on religious beliefs, and then constrain people’s flights of religious fancy by that moral standard. I would suggest to you that the proper moral standards to apply are “no initiation of the use of force” and “accept responsibility for the consequences of your actions”. With these two secular moral standards enforced, I think society can tolerate just about any other religious doctrine or practice.
As to your second question – Who cares?
Socrates lived over two millennia ago, in a social environment pretty homogeneous (everybody he ever met believed either in the Greek Gods or the Egyptian Gods – and there was not a lot of difference between Greek and Egyptian moral standards). Socrates never had to face the religious diversity one can find in any moderately sized modern metropolis. How could his thoughts on the matter have any practical bearing on the modern problem?
Is it fair to say that religious fundamentalism is evil?
Well, that depends!!
It depends first on just what you mean by “fair”. And it depends even more on the standards of good and evil that you wish to apply. Certainly, to a religious fundamentalist the answer is a resounding “No!!”.
But then, by the very nature of your question, I would have to assume that you are not a religious fundamentalist. So the answer depends primarily on the standards of good and evil that you apply. According to some standards, the answer would be “Yes – religious fundamentalism is evil”. By others, the answer would be “No – religious fundamentalism is not evil”.
By my own personal moral standards, I would come down on the “Yes” side. I hold the highest moral regard for knowledge and learning about how Reality behaves. I therefore consider the studied ignorance of religious fundamentalism to be a particularly bad way of learning how to predict which way the tiger will jump. But then, my moral standards are not very common, and many people would disagree with me.
Examine Einstein’s claim that “God does not play dice with the universe” in the context of the teleological argument for the existence of God. Consider both strengths and weaknesses of the argument.
How valid do you think the argument is as proof of the existence of God?
The “Teleological argument” (or an argument from design) is an argument for the existence of God based on apparent evidence of design in nature. Although there are variations, the best known formulation was done by William Paley (British philosopher-theologian 1743-1805) in his “Natural Theology”, published in 1800. For a thorough defeat of this argument, see Daniel C Dennett’s “Darwin’s Dangerous Idea”.
In a general way, the argument goes:
1. In all things we have experienced that exhibit design, we have experienced a designer of that artifact.
2. The universe exhibits order and design.
3. Given 1, the universe must have a designer.
4. The designer of the universe is God.
Within this context, Einstein’s comment (that “God does not play dice with the universe”) can be interpreted as an objection that the randomness of Quantum Mechanics violates the second premise — that the Universe exhibits order and design — and therefore must be wrong. One would have to understand thereby that Einstein considered the randomness of dice and Quantum Mechanics as a demonstration of disorder.
Interpreting Einstein’s comment within this context is a rather weak approach to understanding his point. A better approach would be to understand Einstein’s concept of the Universe and God’s role within the context of Newtonian mechanics. Until the development of Quantum Mechanics, the popular conception of the Universe was of a clock-work mechanism. A deterministic mechanism wherein one could predict the infinite future if one knew the position course and speed of all the multitude of parts. Einstein grew up within this conception of the Universe, and a God that created and/or managed such a mechanism. For him, therefore, the randomness of Quantum Mechanics was an affront that violated his conception of God as a “Divine Mechanic” and the Universe as predictable and deterministic.
The only strength that the Teleological argument has left for it is its apparently logical formulation. It is thereby convincing to many who know little of modern science. Dennett, in his “Darwin’s Dangerous Idea” has done a thorough job of removing any evidentiary foundation behind all variations of the first premise. And has thus rendered the Teleological Argument quite impotent as an argument for the existence of God.
What are some of the weaknesses of the Ontological Argument?
Ontological arguments are arguments, for the conclusion that God exists, from premises which are supposed to derive from some source other than observation of the world — e.g., from reason alone. In other words, ontological arguments are arguments from nothing but analytic, a priori and necessary premises to the conclusion that God exists.
For some of the weaknesses in these arguments see – http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ontological-arguments
I have two questions, if that is ok.
1) Are liberal democracies more peaceful?
2) Is the language of rights the best way to protect peace?
I realize that these two answers are probably too short to really answer your questions, but –
1) No liberal democracy has ever attacked another liberal democracy. Does that make them more peaceful? I suppose it depends on what you mean by “peaceful”. Liberal democracies have gone to war to protect themselves (WW1 & WW2, to cite just 2), they have gone to war to protect what they have deemed to be the “vital interests of their citizens” (Korea, Vietnam, to cite just 2), and they have gone to war to “protect the peace” (Iraq 1, Iraq 2, to cite just 2). Due to the political difficulties inherent in convincing a suitable portion of their citizenry that war is justified, liberal democracies are in general slow to go to war. The history of warfare in the 20th century would seem to suggest that liberal democracies have been, by far, responsible for fewer deaths in inter-state and intra-state conflicts than any other form of government.
2) The language of rights is the best way to protect the continued efficacy of liberal democracy. Liberal democracies are not defined only by the presence of a government by an elected majority. Liberal democracies are also defined by the civil concept that the rule of law is superior to the powers of both elected representatives and empowered civil servants. Key to that concept is the principle of citizen rights which cannot be trampled upon by the majority will. So I would suggest, if the above argument successfully defended the hypothesis that liberal democracies are more peaceful, that the language of rights is also the best way of protecting the peace.
How can people have free will? According to science everything is based on a fundamental law. Even in quantum physics where the molecules are supposedly acting randomly. Or when we assume we are telling our arms to move when its all just a law of impulses in the brain. I don’t believe in free will. Rather I believe in restrained free will. What do you think?
I would highly recommend Daniel C. Dennett’s “Freedom Evolves”. I considered this an excellently written exploration of this very question. I feel sure you will enjoy it.
Hi, would you kindly tell me the differences between effectiveness and efficiency in management?
Give at least five differences and how to measure them.
“Efficiency” is doing something right. How to measure how right (well) you are doing, naturally depends on what it is you are doing. You might measure “widgets processed per unit time”, or “cost per unit output”, or perhaps “patients still alive”.
“Effectiveness” is doing the right thing. You measure that by the contribution of your effort to the corporate bottom line (profit). It doesn’t matter a whole lot whether your particular management unit is a profitable profit center or lowest cost cost center. What matters is whether your management unit can be shown to contribute directly to the corporate bottom line. To quote Peter Drucker – “There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all.”
Since we are talking about two separate fields of discourse, there cannot be five differences, or ways to measure those differences.
Is the infinite a relative truth or an absolute truth?
Neither! The question is ill formed and therefore does not permit an answer. (Perhaps you might like to rephrase the question?)
On the right hand side, you have used the concept “Truth”. But “Truth” is a property of propositions. On the left hand side, all you have is “The infinite”. But “infinite” is a property of something — in this case an unspecified noun. Unless you actually mean here “The Infinite” — as in God or some such. In neither case have you specified a proposition of which “Truth” can be applied. It is therefore quite impossible to specify which subdivision of “Truth” might apply.
The question of the universe expanding and contracting has puzzled me. What is the universe contracting and expanding in? My concept of the universe has always been the it is the whole and there is nothing beyond the universe. If that is so what is outside the universe that it expands and contracts in?.
To which Jurgen Lawrenz replied:
I’ve asked myself the same question often enough and never found an answer. I can’t give you one either, for it puzzles me as much as you why scientists come up with such obviously incongruent notions, which leave the word ‘universe’ out on a limb as a meaningless concept. Alternatively, of course, you could look upon it as an embarrassment of our understanding: we want to know if the universe is all there ‘is’, but we can’t know, and so we look at atoms and electrons and quarks and leptons and imagine that in their rhythm a mirror image of the rhythm of the universe is displayed. Sorry: this is no answer. But there is no answer, and therefore the whole question is null and void. Perhaps that’s one good reason why we still need philosophy!?
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With apologies to Jurgen, when he says “There is no answer”, he is incorrect. Therefore, the matter is not “an embarrassment of our understanding”. (Although, perhaps Jurgen means just an embarrassment of his understanding?)
The word “universe”, is used to signify two related but quite different concepts. One is the familiar one that Andy refers to — the totality of matter and energy (and, by extension, space) in existence. Understanding Andy’s question with this as the meaning of “universe”, there is a relatively simple answer. By definition, there is nothing outside the universe, and nothing that the universe expands or contracts “in”. It would be like asking what is before “A” or after “Z” in the alphabet. The question commits a “frame error” of adopting an inappropriate frame of reference. (Perhaps this is what Jurgen means when he says the question is “null and void”?)
To help you adopt the proper reference frame, perhaps a popular analogy is in order (which you have probably encountered before). Visualise the surface of a balloon. The two dimensional surface of the balloon is finite and unbounded. When you blow up the balloon, any two spots on the surface will get further apart. Even if a two-dimensional observer (a “flat-lander”) could not measure the surface area of his space (because he can “See” such a small part of it), he would be able to deduce, from the increasing distance between any two spots, that the total area is expanding. As three-dimensional observers, we can see the two-dimensional surface area expanding in our three dimensional space. But that “outsider’s” perspective is not a necessary requirement for the validity of the flat-lander’s conclusion that his space is expanding. Our three dimensional space is expanding just like the two-dimensional surface of that balloon. And it makes no more sense for us to ask “expanding in what” than it did for the flat-lander to ask about the expanding area of his two-dimensional space. (Assuming that to a flat-lander, a third spatial dimension is as unvisualisable as a fourth spatial dimension is to us.)
There is another line of reasoning that arrives at the same answer. To the best of our current understanding, our universe is infinite and unbounded. For the universe to be unbounded means that there is no “edge” (boundary) for there to be anything beyond. For the universe to be infinite in extent means that there is no distance beyond which there could be something that is not part of our universe. If our universe is, in fact, either infinite or unbounded, then there is no place for there to be anything “outside” of our universe, and nothing in which our universe could be expanding. And the same arguments apply to hypothetical “higher dimensions”. If the universe is, in fact, four (or “n”) dimensional, then the extents within these additional dimensions are also already a part of our universe.
If you object that you cannot visualise how a three (or four or “n”) dimensional space could curve or expand without invoking a further dimension in which this curvature or expansion could take place — don’t be too concerned. We have evolved as three dimensional beings with a mental capacity tuned to deal with the normal slings and arrows of our daily existence. That the challenge of visualising multi-dimensional mathematics is beyond your capacity should be considered normal. That is what mathematics is for, after all. To help us understand and describe things of this Reality that are beyond our capacity to visualise. (Who, after all, can visualise -1 or a 4-dimensional hyper-cube?)
There is, as I mentioned, another meaning of the word “universe”. It is a meaning that is properly reserved to certain branches of Cosmology and Theoretical Physics, and to certain kinds of fiction (science fiction and fantasy fiction). Although, as Jurgen was perhaps alluding to, it is a meaning that is well abused in popular writing. Within the proper restricted contexts, the word “universe” is used to refer to the totality of matter and energy (and, by extension, space) in the reality with which we are familiar. Notice the nature of the restriction. It is useful when one is speculating on the possible existence of “alternate realities” of various sorts. Cosmologists employ this meaning of the word when they are speculating about possible ways that “our” universe may have been spawned by an “earlier/other” universe. Theoretical Physicists employ this meaning of the word when they are speculating about the “real” meaning of Quantum Indeterminacy (the Multiple Worlds interpretation). In both of these manners of employment, “our” universe is considered to be but one of an infinite number of universes embedded in a “Supra-universe” (one that employs the “in existence” meaning of the word universe). But I don’t believe that in any of these manners of speaking, there is envisaged anything outside of “our” universe in which “our” universe would be expanding. So, as far as I know, even within this restricted meaning of the word universe, the answer to Andy’s question is still the “nothing” that I described above.
Today I am sitting in my high school library at 9:55 am. So far in my life I have listened and watched my friends and myself go about life. I have come to a point in which I have fallen into a rut. Although I am not the best writer or student, all I can think about are questions about society and questions about our world. I write today not to find an answer to all my questions but to attempt to find a peace of mind. My questions are as follows.
Why are we capitalists?Is it human nature to be greedy or have we been corrupted?
Next, why should we go through school and life trying to accomplish as much as we can? Does this make us better people to society? or does this make us the people we were intended to become by god or whatever created us?
Last, what is point of everything? Why do we wake up every morning? because I’m not buying into the “we have our family our friends and society to live for” thing. I know it will be very hard to answer some of these questions.
John Brandon provided this answer:
Your first question is a presumption to which many people would not subscribe. In fact, my own instincts do not lean towards capitalism. I find it appalling that capitalism seems to have got completely out of hand, and is running riot in the world. My greatest concern is that it has now become linked with democracy, a capitalist state is now automatically considered to be a democratic state. ‘Free market’ and ‘free people’ are not interchangeable concepts!
Is it human nature to be greedy? A good question to follow the one on capitalism, the two terms are often linked. Perhaps there is something in the notion that a capitalist can never have enough. Greed shows itself in theft and murder, in embezzlement and profiteering. However, most people do not fall into these categories. Received knowledge from the society in which a person is brought up will probably have a great deal to do with whether they recognise greed as an essential attribute to make progress and achieve a ‘good life’. A capitalist society is geared to produce such a person. However, whether a person accepts this world view is very much a matter of choice. A person entertaining sets of categories of what is right and what is wrong is likely to place greed in the latter category, and speak against it; but does a capitalist society encourage the majority to see some moral right in the former?
Greedy people are usually “Thick skinned’ and selfish, so what others think about them is of little interest to them. Of course, what a greedy person does to hurt or upset others also makes little impression on their conscience. Unfortunately, this has now reached its zenith in the destruction of the environment, the greed for oil profits, the greed for timber profits, the handing over of vital utilities to the greed of privatisation, the greed of the car companies, the greed of pharmaceutical companies, supermarkets, etc. etc.. Encouraging capitalism as a morally correct and democratic process is a major factor in the demise of our planet. We also have to ask ourselves what part political systems that turn a blind eye to all this play, or why in some cases they endorse it. In fact many politicians actually have their fingers in the pie.
You ask, why should we go through school and life trying to accomplish as much as we can? The short answer is the reciprocal question: Why not? Again, it rather depends on our world view and our aims within that world. Your further question regarding making us better people in society and, becoming what God or the creator intended, are extensions of the original question. If you firmly believe that there is a purpose in life and that purpose has religious connotations, then you are likely to be considerate of your fellow beings, and find a purpose which aims to improve the life of society. Your questions seem to point to a state of introversion, which leads to a rather self-orientated and pessimistic view of life. The extrovert view which is concerned with recognising having a place in society and being concerned with the well being of others, leads to a more optimistic view of the world.
Success in society can be viewed as self achievement, aiming to stand on the pedestal and to glory in the awards. Alternatively, it can be seen as something achieved for the whole of society, the achievement being its own reward. If we wish to believe that this latter objective was God’s purpose for our existence, then that is a very valuable bonus to the achievement.
You ask, what is the point of everything? Why do we wake up in the morning? I see this again as a very self-centred and depressed approach to life. We should not sit tight under the shadow of pessimism wondering what the point of everything is. We should be out there finding out for ourselves what it is. I suggest we wake up every morning to do just that. My advise to a person who finds no meaning in life is to become a philosopher and share in the excitement of trying to discover what the world and what life is all about. We can either be depressed with our shallow view of the world, or we can be stimulated by seeking the deeper reasons for what we perceive around us. And be warned, the concepts we form in life constitute the world we live in.
– – – – –
Having reviewed the answer that John Brandon provided to your questions, I am driven to provide an alternative view of the situation.
According to http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/c1/capitali.asp “capitalism” is “an economic system based on private ownership of the means of production, in which personal profit can be acquired through investment of capital and employment of labor.” And according to the Encyclopaedia Britannica, “capitalism” “also called free market economy , or free enterprise economy – [is an] economic system, . . . in which most of the means of production are privately owned and production is guided and income distributed largely through the operation of markets.
In order for a Capitalist economic system to function, the political environment within which the economic system exists must sustain two features. It must provide some minimal support to the legal principles of private property, and it must provide some minimal level of individual freedom. There cannot be private investment in the means of production unless there can be private ownership of the stuff being invested. There cannot be a functioning market to guide productive investment and income distribution unless there is a minimal amount of individual freedom to participate in markets at will.
So John’s “greatest concern … that [capitalism] has now become linked with democracy” is seriously misplaced. Contrary to his suggestion that “a capitalist state is now automatically considered to be a democratic state”, the reverse is more properly correct. Any form of government that grants its citizens both a right to privately own property and a modicum of individual liberty will inevitably come to support a capitalist economy. An example of this inevitability can be seen currently in China. Although certainly not a democratic state, China is quickly becoming a capitalist economy. It is inevitable that a modern liberal democracy (one that, by definition, provides legal support for both private property and individual freedoms) will be a capitalist economy. “Free market” and “free people” might not be interchangeable concepts. But “free market” presupposes “free people”. And “free people” includes within it “free markets”. Given a modicum of legal support for private property, “free people” thus implies “capitalism”. It is obvious, however, from the tone of your question and the nature of John’s answer, that neither of you look kindly on the concept of private property.
So why are we capitalists? We are capitalists because we live in a liberal democracy where the vast majority of the people have discovered that private property and the workings of free markets are the most effective and efficient means of achieving the greatest economic welfare for the greatest number. History has demonstrated that when it comes to economic measures of well being, nothing is as successful as capitalism at delivering the Utilitarian ideal of “The greatest good for the greatest number”.
Your second question is a very emotionally loaded one “Is it human nature to be greedy or have we been corrupted?” The very formulation of your question both presumes more than many would accept, and presupposes the answer. According to Microsoft’s American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, “greed” is “an excessive desire to acquire or possess more than what one needs or deserves, especially with respect to material wealth”. Your question therefore presumes that most people’s nature is to display an excessive desire to possess more than one needs. Your further suggestion that we do so because we have been corrupted suggests that you feel that not only do most people desire excessively more than they deserve, they do so because they are damaged goods.
I dispute both of your presumptions. Most people are not greedy. Nor is it human nature to be greedy. (Which is not to say, of course, that there are not greedy people about.) It is human nature for people to want more than they have. It is human nature to strive to improve their lot in life. It is human nature for people who live in a capitalist economic system to strive to earn more than they have. It is human nature for people who live in a social environment to seek to circumvent the rules established by others. It is human nature to co-operate with those they can co-operate with, and compete with the rest. This does not make human nature greedy. There is nothing about the natural human desire for more than one has that is excessive. And as long as the capitalist economic system functions properly, people will not receive more than they deserve.
The answers to the rest of your questions I think are best provided by addressing your question about “The point of everything”. The answer I am about to provide you will not be met with agreement by many (I am sure John, for one, would strenuously disagree). It does, however, have the advantage of being consistent with all that we currently know about biology, evolution, and psychology.
- Life is Action. “Life” is characterized by the unique fact that living things change and move – “act” – through the directed application of internally collected, stored, converted, and channeled energy.
- Life’s Actions are Teleological (Goal Oriented). At a very fundamental level, the goal of all living behaviour is the maintenance of the life that is behaving.
- The Gene is the Unit of Life. It is that (not necessarily contiguous) stretch of the DNA (or RNA) molecule that can be labelled as a Gene that is what must be recognized as the entity that survives and proliferates — continuation of which is the goal of Life’s Actions.
- The Reproductive Imperative. The actually observed behaviour of all living creatures, both in general and individually, is highly flexible and variable but within the broad genetically defined limits of continued genetic survival.
- Our Purpose. As an example of life, as an example of the species Homo sapiens, and as an individual consciousness, our purpose is to ensure the continued survival and proliferation of our genes.
- The Definition of Good. To be “Good” at anything is to do a quality job at fulfilling the purpose of that thing. A good Human Being is efficient and effective, and fulfils with quality, the purpose for which the Human Being was built — to ensure the continued survival and proliferation of our genes.
- Better is Never Enough. To ensure the continued survival and proliferation of our genes is a never ending struggle. There is never enough assurance that the job is complete. There is always something extra that can be done, some marginal increase of assurance that can be found.
- And Finally – Best?. The struggle continues whether or not the individual is consciously aware of why they are striving, or what they are striving for. Even if they are striving under misconceptions, misinformation, or mistaken assumptions, the human animal is built to strive. The best situation is to be consciously aware of why you are striving, and employ the best of your intellectual abilities to make conscious rational choices of what to strive for. Happiness comes from knowing you are doing a good job.
So – “The point of it all” is the welfare of your genetic descendants (over the long run, of course). Go to school because it is the best means available to you at this time, and in this place, to prepare you to do well by your children. You are not here to be good for society. You are not here to become whatever God might have intended. You wake up every morning and tackle the day because you have a function to perform. Friends, family, and society matter only to the extent that they can contribute to your ultimate purpose in life.
Finally, I fully agree with John’s concluding remarks – “My advise to a person who finds no meaning in life is to become a philosopher and share in the excitement of trying to discover what the world and what life is all about. We can either be depressed with our shallow view of the world, or we can be stimulated by seeking the deeper reasons for what we perceive around us. And be warned, the concepts we form in life constitute the world we live in.” Amen!
An elderly lady of 99 years of age has recently been diagnosed with cancer. She lives in a residential home for the elderly and her cognitive abilities are fully intact. Her doctor does not wish the elderly lady to know about her illness. Should this lady be informed about her illness, or would her knowing cause more harm than good?
Whether her knowing might cause more harm than good is a “Trick” question. It might. But the only person who has the right to answer that question is the lady involved. No one else, and especially not the doctor, has any moral basis from which to deny the patient this critical information about her health and future. The only basis from which one could expect to deny the lady this key information would be either pragmatic financial concerns, or emotionalism. Neither of these are sound ethical reasons.
I would immediately suspect the doctor of suffering from a severe case of conflict of interest. Is the doctor working for her patient (who needs to know), or is she working for the owner/ manager of the residence (who perhaps does not want to incur the expense of medical treatment)? Is the doctor confusing an emotional response to a patient she has grown attached to? Or is she perhaps expecting to inherit something from the lady’s early demise? Under the specified circumstances (admittedly minimal), I would treat the doctor as guilty until proved innocent.
I have been reading Bertrand Russell’s The Problems of Philosophy, and it has been puzzling me. I don’t like his doctrine of sense-data, but I can’t figure out quite why. Is he right? I’ve tried to think of ordinary experience in this way, but it just doesn’t seem to fit. If sense-data are so ‘immediate’ to us then why does there need to be a separation at all?
I too do not like the sense-data theory. I think you will find an excellent response to Russell’s analysis in “The Evidence of the Senses” by David Kelley.
Very briefly, Kelley’s thesis is that “perception” is not the mind’s receipt and processing of “Sense-data” transmitted by the senses to the mind. Perception is instead the brains receipt of nerve signals from the sensory organs. Kelley moves the “line” between the mind’s act of perception and the body’s act of sensing outwards to the act of sensing. Thus, there is no place for any intervening concept of “Sense-data”, and no requirement for some centralized place where “Sense-data” is presented to a perceiver to be interpreted and understood. Sensory interaction with the environment IS perception. Kelley says it much better than I.
In what ways should a Christian political thinker’s faith influence his or her political writings?
Not being a Christian, I really should not attempt such impudence. But I do, however, have a return question for you — Why would you choose to post such a question to a philosophy web site? Having lurked in the area for some time, I would have thought (perhaps erroneously) that the “Ask a Philosopher” site is rather obviously not into Theistic Philosophy. Or is it possible that, despite the tone of your question, you are not really seeking a Theistic answer?
The only non-answer I can offer to you, is that a Christian political thinker’s writings should reflect the “Word of God” as exemplified in the Gospels. In other words, if as a political thinker, one is intending to be a “Good Christian”, then one should expound in one’s political writings no thoughts that have not been previously expounded in the Scriptures.
Of course, if your expectation as a political thinker is that one should think for oneself, and reach your own conclusions based on the preponderance of the best evidence available, then one must put Christian Faith aside as emotionally significant for many people, but not really relevant to one’s understanding of how Reality (and politics) actually works on a day to day basis.
I am doing an extra credit project in which I can get help and answers from any source as long as I give them (you) credit. Please help me answer the following question groups:
1) Do human beings have a natural tendency to good, a natural tendency to evil, or some combination of tendencies? What are the implications of your answers for ethics?
2) What conditions must be present before we can say a person is truly happy? Which of these conditions are most important? What is the best expression of the relationship between ethics and happiness?
3) Is the preserving of one’s dignity or the serving of a principle other than self-interest ever a higher good than personal happiness?
4) Is there any action that is good in itself, without reference to the consequences it brings about? Or does every good derive its value from its consequences?
5) Whose interest should be paramount in ethical judgment? One’s own? Those of the people directly affected by the action? The interests of all humanity ? Is the answer necessarily the same in all situations?
6) Are some acts morally obligatory regardless of the consequences for human benefit or harm?
7) How important is objectivity in moral judgment? To what extent can the process of moral judgment be objective?
8) Is there a single universal moral code that is binding on all people at all times and in all places? If so, how are the difference sin moral perspective to be accounted for? If not, how can people with different moral perspectives be expected to live in harmony and how is the notion of progress in ethics to be understood?
The challenge one faces in answering any of these questions you have posed, is to understand the system of Ethics that underlies the answers offered. How one defines “good” and “evil” will determine how one views the various alternatives you have raised. Different philosophers define these concepts in different ways, and would provide vastly different answers to your questions. From the perspective of the Catholic Church for example, humans are naturally evil and happiness is the consequence of doing as God commands. If you are a Utilitarian, you will hold that human beings have no tendencies in either direction (good or evil). So it is not that answers to these questions have implications for Ethics, it is that one’s system of Ethics dictates how one answers these questions.
(1) Myself, being an Evolutionary Pragmatist at an intellectual level, I maintain that by nature human beings are fundamentally neither good nor evil, merely capable of choosing to be either. On the other hand, by personal character I am a pessimistic cynic about the extent of human stupidity, so emotionally I feel that most human beings are essentially evil by default. To me, most people appear to choose to avoid choosing, and thus do and become evil by default. I believe that being “good” requires some minimal amount of intelligent attention to one’s choices – something that I feel most people fail miserably at.
(2) For most systems of Ethics, being “good” and being “happy” are two separate and unconnected domains. Although all maintain that one “ought” to be happy when one is doing what one “ought”, they do not guarantee that if you are appropriately “good”, you will inevitably be happy. Personally, I disagree. Evolutionary Pragmatism maintains that we are an evolved species. Therefore, for Evolutionary Pragmatism, “happiness” is an emotional reaction that people experience when they are achieving the purposes for which evolutionary processes have evolved that particular emotional response. And as such, they are evolved behavioral responses to those circumstances which have in the past proved most proficient at ensuring the survival and proliferation of our genetic heritage. I believe, therefore, that we are happiest when we are being “good” (effective and efficient) at doing what evolution has designed us to do – ensure the survival and proliferation of our genetic heritage.
(3) From the perspective of Evolutionary Pragmatism, the answer is a qualified no. The qualification comes from the importance to ethical evaluation of the time factor. It is often the ethical thing to do to postpone immediate happiness for future greater benefits. A bird in the hand is not always worth more than the pair in the bush. And sometimes, serving one’s dignity or someone else’s best interests (and by presumption being unhappy) in the short run, can return greater rewards of happiness in the longer run.
(4) Many philosophers would say yes – though they would differ on the actions they consider “good in themselves”. Me – I say no. Good derives from consequences.
(5) Again, many philosophers would offer differing answers. But I would argue that the only point of view that has any merit in ethical evaluation is your own. The only happiness you can measure is your own. The only happiness you can control is your own. Therefore, you must value things according to how much they contribute (or will probably contribute) to your own happiness – no one else’s. (With all due attention to the long run consequences – no point in enjoying the short term thrill at the cost of the long run pain.)
(6) No. Consequences are the only measure.
(7) Valuation (how much contribution to your long term happiness) is necessarily a subjective act – it is after all your own individual happiness at issue, no one else’s. No two people will value the same potential consequences in the same way. But objectivity comes into play when one considers the likely consequences of one’s actions. Reality is more or less predictable, and that predictability can be studied objectively. Besides the value that you place on the consequences, is the objectively determinable question of the consequences that will likely result from your choice.
(8) Despite the protestations of a myriad of philosophers, politicians, and social scientists – there is. And that universal moral code – binding on all people at all times and in all places – is that in the long run we are all dead, and the only thing that you will leave behind you is your genetic heritage. In the long run, the only thing that will matter is whether the future is owned by your descendants or other people’s descendants. No matter how “good” you are according to the ethics of Catholicism, Kantianism, Utilitarianism, Socialism, or what-have-you-ism – the only thing that will matter for the future is who will occupy that future.
The differences in moral perspectives result, in my opinion, from an ignorance of the information from the modern sciences of evolution. Progress in ethics, also in my opinion, comes from a growing familiarity by Philosophers of the latest science. It may be true that Mankind is the first species that can choose its own goals. But the future will be owned by those whose parents chose the goal of ensuring their own genetic heritage survived and proliferated. Ethics is survival behavior – above the self, and beyond the now. Everything else is a waste of effort – entertaining when one has the luxury to explore fantasies, but to be junked as less than useless when the crunch comes.
Why would humans want to live without certainty?
A very interesting question, that tells me far more about you and your beliefs than you might expect.
It is not that humans want to live without certainty. I am sure that almost everyone would love to be absolutely certain of all of the consequences of each of their possible actions. It would certainly make choosing the proper course of action (the “right thing to do”) an awful lot easier.
Instead, it is that humans have to live with uncertainty, because Reality is only approximately predictable even in principle. And is even more uncertainly predictable given our starting position of only partial information (and many simply erroneous notions). Thus the consequences of our actions are only very approximately predictable under the best of circumstances, and are frequently only roughly guessable. Uncertainty is a fact of life. No want about it.
With reference to the logical status of the following statement as well as your understanding of philosophy, critically assess the third statement:
2. Philosophers are lovers of wisdom.
3. Philosophers say that God does not exist.
(1) OK. This seems to be establishing a definition. You are establishing that the symbol “G-o-d” is to be considered semantically equivalent to the symbol “w-i-s-d-o-m”, and when the symbol “God” is used, it should hereafter be understood to refer to the concept also referred to by the symbol “wisdom”. A little unconventional, as it is not generally considered “clean” logic to radically redefine the meaning of commonly employed symbols (ask a thousand people what the symbol “God” means, and I would be surprised if any mention “wisdom”). But it is a technically acceptable logical move.
(2) OK. A reasonable interpolation from the Greek. The word “philosophy” comes from the Greek word “philosophein”, which literally means “lover of wisdom”. It is believed that this term was first coined by the famous Greek philosopher Aristotle, in referring to himself as a seeker after wisdom, as opposed to an already wise man (sophia). So philosophers can, by definition, be assumed to be lovers of wisdom.
(3) Not-OK. The problem arises from an intended confusion over the meaning of the symbol “God”. If you mean for this statement to be interpreted in light of your redefinition of the symbol “God” in statement (1), then your statement (3) is simply wrong. Philosophers do not say that wisdom does not exist. On the other hand, if you intend to confuse the reader by meaning in (3) the standard Judeo-Christian-Islamic concept usually referred to by the symbol “God”, then there is no conflict with your statement (1). The symbol “God” is being used to refer to two separate and unequal concepts in (1) and (3). Thus Philosophers (and specifically the realist/materialist sort) can maintain that the “God” of standard Judeo-Christian-Islamic concept does not exist, without maintaining that wisdom does not exist.
What are your proofs against Christianity? And how to you justify the COUNTLESS proofs (many undeniable, albeit a few undeniable) FOR Christianity?
I do not offer a proof “against” Christianity. I merely maintain that I have yet to encounter ANY valid justification FOR Christianity. And in the absence of sufficient justification in support of the hypothesis, it is simpler to reject the hypothesis as unproven.
I know you think that there are countless proofs for Christianity. And, in truth, many a writer has weighed in on the argument with great excesses of verbiage. I have read a number. But all of the so-called proofs that I have encountered so far commit one of three fundamental kinds of errors:
(a) Assuming the consequent. Many of the so-called proofs that I have encountered attempt to prove that God exists (or Christianity is valid) from premises that themselves assume the truth of the argument being attempted. (An overly simplified but typical sort of argument runs – “Christianity is valid because the Bible says so”.)
(b) Simple errors of logical thinking. These sorts of argument were more frequent in the millennia before the Renaissance, as it was politically dangerous for a critic to point out logical errors in other writers’ analyses. (An overly simplified example would be – “God exists because the Universe must have been created.” It ignores the logical possibility that the Universe may not have been created, but is infinite.)
(c) Ignorance of, or conscious discounting of, the evidence from the various branches of science on the nature of Reality. These are the sorts of arguments seen most frequently today. An overly simplified example would be “God exists because of all of the intricate design demonstrated by nature.” It ignores the evidence from evolutionary biology.)
If you do have an argument for Christianity that does not fall into one of these three categories, I would be most interested in seeing it.
How does one come to terms with consciousness and free-will scientifically? Quantum mechanics? Superstring theories involving a 10 dimensional “universe” partitioned into 4 and 6, with the space 6 somehow explaining consciousness? What?
And yes, I guess I’m expecting a counter-argument that the notion of free-will is merely an illusion and that everything is fated. I don’t believe so however, even though it is impossible to prove one over the other.
I think you will find a very readable and tightly reasoned response to your question in “Elbow Room” and “Freedom Evolves” by Daniel C. Dennett.
Dennett argues that the concept of “Free Will” has (in the words offered by Jurgen Lawrenz) “given rise to more red herrings than any other philosophical topic”. And once you really understand what you mean by the concept “free will”, you will understand that most of those red herrings are just exactly that. Dennett is a “compatibilist” — meaning that he argues that contrary to popular opinion, there is no incompatibility between a materialist’s view of physics as deterministic, and the philosopher’s concept of “free will” (properly understood).
I’m told that in order to have my union dues go to a charity rather than to the union (I am a newly forced union member), that I must give a philosophical reason for not wanting my dues to go to the union.
What can be more philosophical than “I don’t believe in them”? How can I support something I don’t believe in?
By “I don’t believe in them”, do you mean the dues, or the unions, or something else? I can’t think of how you could argue that you don’t believe in the dues. Associations of all sorts collect dues from their members in order to finance mutually beneficial activities. I think you would have a very hard time justifying the reasoning that you disagree with that activity. For similar reasons, I think you will have a hardtime justifying the reasoning that you disagree with unions in general.
I think where you need to focus is on the aspect of coercion involved in the membership in the union and the forced collection of dues. You can check out any of the Objectivist web-sites for pithy arguments on why coercion is morally unacceptable. The essence of the argument runs – the voluntary exchange of values always nets each party to the exchange a net profit. Any involuntary exchange is a sub-optimal solution. In your case, you might argue that you perceive no personal benefit that might be derived from participation in the union, and that therefore the coerced collection of dues is theft.
Who owns the genetic material of an aborted fetus? For example who owns the umbilical cord etc. The mother, foetus or hospital, for example? Does the foetus have rights or is it just a part of the mother? I have looked through a lot of web sites and found nothing very accurate that relates to this particular sort of question/ topic.
I think you need to think about providing a definition of “ownership” and “rights” before any answers to your question can be meaningful.
For example, if you define “ownership” as what the local laws provide, then who owns the aborted foetus (including its genetic material) will vary from one jurisdiction to another. Similar for the presence of rights. The legal rights of the foetus also varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.
But if you are seeking answers from a moral/ethical perspective, then it becomes important to understand just what you mean by ownership and rights. And those concepts vary from one system of ethics to another.
Why is Ayn Rand considered by some as a philosopher, if she is not a “good” philosopher? i.e. she seems to be one person in philosophy who is either loved or hated. Thus, no one hates Plato, Socrates, or Aristotle, is it because their ideas have stood the test of time or because of time their ideas are more historical and thus more neutral. Also, then can anything be gleaned or made usable in her philosophy of Objectivism?
I’ll preface this response by admitting that I am a fan of Ayn Rand, so this response will be admittedly biased from some perspectives.
My own take is that there are two reasons why Ayn Rand is not considered a “good” philosopher, and is hated by much of the Philosophical world. First, Ms Rand proposed a system of ethics diametrically opposed to the Leftist / Socialist inclinations of the bulk of the intellectual (including Philosophical) elites of the 30’s thru the 80’s. As such, she was frequently dismissed out of hand as promulgating something that was “clearly wrong”. And second, she made no attempt to earn the respect of other philosophers by studying for degrees, memorizing the works of numerous past philosophical thinkers, or playing the PhD game of publishing well footnoted articles in recognized learned journals.
It is a common failing of those who have labored hard for their PhD’s (and not just in Philosophy) to dismiss as uneducated those who have not demonstrated the same depth of learning. In philosophical circles, this is most visible from the extent to which philosophical argument becomes a discussion about how past thinkers would interpret some issue. [Consider, for example, the high proportion of questions to this forum that are about the thoughts of such long dead thinkers.] Philosophical thinkers who choose not to study the past, are therefore too often dismissed as unworthy of the label “Philosopher”. At least while the current generation of “properly qualified” PhDs still rule the roost. Future generations may take a different view of things.
Can we know something that has not yet been proven to be true?
Depends on what you mean by “proven”.
“Proof” is usually considered to be absolute and binary. A proposition is either proven and is therefore absolutely true, or is unproven, and is therefore not true. This is, however, a logical or deductive concept inapplicable to inductive reasoning. In inductive reasoning, you accumulate sufficient evidence to justify a generalisation. You can never “prove” (in the logical sense) the generalisation. Although many people, in casual discourse, use the word to indicate that the inductive conclusion is sufficiently justified to be “almost certainly true”. So the question is, in which sense are you using “prove”?
The usual philosophical understanding of “knowledge” is a justified belief in a true proposition. Therefore, if you are using the more logical sense of the word “prove”, and you have sufficient justification to believe the proposition is true, and the proposition is in fact true, then you can know something that has not yet been proven to be true.
On the other hand, if you are using the more casual (inductive) sense of the word “prove”, and you have sufficient justification to believe the proposition is true, and the proposition is in fact true, then your knowing something is the proof that it is true. So in this sense, you could not know something that is not proven (in the casual/ inductive sense) to be true.
Why are gay and lesbian relationships rampant not just in the US but all over the world?
Because, statistically speaking, about ten percent of the human population is gay/ lesbian. The percentage holds accurate (within sampling error) across cultures, races, and the sexes. It is one of the strongest arguments that homosexuality has a genetic basis.
Gay and Lesbian relationships only seem more rampant, because liberally biased popular media always seems to make such a fuss out of a minority struggling for “equal rights”, or against big governmental biases.
Why is killing wrong? In terms of uncontroversially wrong kinds of killing of people. NOT controversial kinds of killing such as abortion, euthanasia, the death penalty, killing in self-defense, killing of soldiers in war, suicide, assisted suicide, etc. Why is killing wrong in general in the more ordinary cases?
If you believe in one of the various religions that dictate that killing is wrong, then killing is wrong simply because God has told us that it is wrong. And if you don’t like that answer, then you must tackle the conundrum that has challenged theologians for generations — Is it wrong because God says so? Or does God say so because it is wrong?
On the other hand, you may be seeking a non-theistic answer. In that case, try this on for size — killing is defined by the group as an unacceptable behavior, because it is detrimental to the achievement of the common goals of the group to have group members running around killing each other off. What makes it “wrong” is the fact that mankind has lived in groups for several million years, and we have evolved to recognize the group taboo against killing off members of the group.
Couch the same reasoning in terms of a rational morality, and you get killing another member of your own group is almost always detrimental to the attainment of your long term best interests.
Why is killing wrong? I cannot argue why I think killing is wrong using valid arguments with premises and conclusions.
Here are several alternative approaches for you to consider –
(1) Some people maintain the absolute moral dictate that killing is wrong — period, and end of reasoning!. To them, it is a fundamental premise with no further background than the premise itself. Hence –
(p1) Killing is wrong.
(c) Killing is wrong!
(2) Some people maintain that whatever is commanded by God is the foundation of moral right and wrong. Hence –
(p1) Whatever God commands is a moral commandment.
(p2) It is wrong for us to violate a moral commandment given by God.
(p3) God commands that we do not kill.
(c) Killing is wrong!
Note that the third premise is debateable. In the King James version, the commandment (Exodus 20:13) is translated as “Thou shalt not kill”. But in the more recent New International Version, the commandment is translated “You shall not murder”. There is a fairly significant moral difference between these two translations. (A distinction usually lost on the religious anti-abortion faction.)
(3) Some people, following the reasoning of Kant, argue that moral behaviour is behaviour that respects the other individual as an end in him/herself. Hence –
(p1) To be morally right is to respect the other person as an end in him/herself.
(p2) Killing another person is to treat that individual as a means to your end, and not as an end in him/herself.
(c) Killing is wrong!
Note that both these premises can be debated. Not all philosophers agree with Kant’s “Categorical Imperative” approach to morality. It is, for example, inconsistent with any of the consequentialist moral theories such as Utilitarianism or Evolutionary Ethics. And while it is rather obvious that some killings involve treating the victim as a means to your end rather than an end in him/herself, it is not at all obvious that all instances of killing necessarily are such.
(4) Some people will argue that it is wrong to break the law, and killing is (in most meaningful senses) against the law. Hence –
(p1) It is wrong to break the law of the land.
(p2) Killing is (mostly) against the law.
(c) Killing is (mostly) wrong!
Note that premise one would be debated by anyone who believes that the laws can sometimes be themselves “bad” laws that ought to be broken. “Civil Disobedience” would be immoral by this argument, and most people would not accept that conclusion.
And here is my own personal favourite – the Evolutionary Ethics argument —
(5) Some people argue that killing is wrong because it almost always interferes with the realization of the benefits to be had from social cooperation. Hence (in over simplified terms) –
(p1) Man is a social species who gains many individual benefits as the result of social cooperation.
(p2) Killing other members of the social group is almost always disruptive to the realization of the benefits of social cooperation — by both the individual doing the killing, and by the other members of the group should killing be tolerated.
(c1) Social groups always establish norms of acceptable behaviour, and penalties to dissuade unacceptable behaviour.
(p3) The standard of moral behaviour is the best interests of the individual, considered over the long term.
(c2) It is almost never in the long term best interests of the individual to incur the wrath and punitive response of the society within which the individual is functioning.
(c3) Killing is (almost always) wrong!
How is it possible that science keeps putting a theory forward about evolutionary biology when it doesn’t seem to make sense? I mean, evolution seems to be a means by which organisms adapt to their changing environment, no harm in that, but to me it seems illogical that a sea-creature would acquire legs so that it can thrive on land because these would initially impair their movements under water and so make them more vulnerable in the sea. Let’s assume that man is evolving at this moment to a creature that has the ability to fly, then we should be growing some sort of wings over time, so it would probably begin with stumps in the shoulder area, but these would hinder us in our daily tasks, and if we then follow the survival of the fittest theories.
To which John Brandon offered this response:
You appear to have latched onto one of the basic problems associated with Darwin’s theory of evolution. The important point to note here is that you are referring to a theory and not a statement of fact. For over one hundred years science has tried from every angle open to it to prove the theory to be a material fact; unfortunately, all the alleged evidence has turned out to be rather flimsy.
The great weakness of the theory is its dependence upon accidental progress by chance genetic mutation. Unfortunately for this notion most mutations are usually degenerative, or even fatal to the organism; and even if this were the mechanism for progress it is difficult to visualise a series of fortuitous events appearing within the limited geological time scale obtaining since the Cambrian period approx 500m years ago, when life in great diversity seemed to burst forth from nowhere. If physics can boast a Big Bang for the origin of the universe, then biology can also boast a very significant Big Bang for the origin of advanced life forms in the Cambrian. Another very nasty thorn in the side for evolutionists. Also weighing heavily against the theory is the limited time for adaptation in rapidly changing environments, where dependence for survival is on chance mutations. There is a great deal of evidence in the geological strata to suggest that time and again the dominant life form of a geological period has been overwhelmed by rapid environmental changes which have pushed them into extinction. The dinosaurs being a case in point. Extinction rather than evolving into something else seems to be the order of the day.
There is also the great possibility that, even in the case of a fortuitous mutation, this would not be sufficient to overcome an environmental hazard; the major systems of physical bodies are controlled by complex series of genetic material, particularly where metabolic processes require huge numbers of complex enzymes working in sequence; each enzyme itself being a complex protein where one amino acid missing or out of place could be fatal.
Science would prefer to keep hammering at this old chestnut rather than admit that there could be some powerful driving force in the universe which we have not yet discovered. To most of them this smacks too much of religion. The man who pushed evolution was not Darwin but “Darwin’s Bulldog” T H Huxley, a scientist looking for personal advancement and “an inveterate hater of religion”. He saw evolution as a weapon with which to bring down the church. Unfortunately for him and his followers his premature attack has led to a disjointed, loosely woven, hotch potch of ideas, which require constantly shoring up against the advances of modern physics and biology. To give Huxley his due, he never accepted even to his death that the case for evolution had finally been proven.
See The Rise of the Evolution Fraud, M Bowden, Sovereign Publications, Kent.
– – – – –
I am moved by the ideas contained in John’s answer, into providing a counter balancing interpretation.
Firstly, is evolution just a theory? No it is not. John is quite incorrect. Evolution is a proved material fact, well supported by the evidence. In the words of one of the foremost biologists of the 20th Century.
In the American vernacular, “Theory” often means “imperfect fact” — part of a hierarchy of confidence running downhill from fact to theory to hypothesis to guess. Thus the power of the creationist argument: evolution is “only” a theory and intense debate now rages about many aspects of the theory. If evolution is worse than a fact, and scientists can’t even make up their minds about the theory, then what confidence can we have in it? Indeed, President Reagan echoed this argument before an evangelical group in Dallas when he said (in what I devoutly hope was campaign rhetoric): “Well, it is a theory. It is a scientific theory only, and it has in recent years been challenged in the world of science — that is, not believed in the scientific community to be as infallible as it once was.”
Well evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world’s data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts don’t go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein’s theory of gravitation replaced Newton’s in this century, but apples didn’t suspend themselves in midair, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from ape-like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin’s proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered.
Moreover, “fact” doesn’t mean “absolute certainty”; there ain’t no such animal in an exciting and complex world. The final proofs of logic and mathematics flow deductively from stated premises and achieve certainty only because they are not about the empirical world. Evolutionists make no claim for perpetual truth, though creationists often do (and then attack us falsely for a style of argument that they themselves favor). In science “fact” can only mean “confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional consent.” I suppose that apples might start to rise tomorrow, but the possibility does not merit equal time in physics classrooms.
Evolutionists have been very clear about this distinction of fact and theory from the very beginning, if only because we have always acknowledged how far we are from completely understanding the mechanisms (theory) by which evolution (fact) occurred. Darwin continually emphasized the difference between his two great and separate accomplishments: establishing the fact of evolution, and proposing a theory — natural selection — to explain the mechanism of evolution. (Stephen J. Gould, ” Evolution as Fact and Theory”; Discover, May 1981.)
Second, does Darwin’s theory of natural selection depend only, or even most importantly, on “accidental progress by chance genetic mutation”? No it does not. John has fallen into the traditional Creationist trap of ignoring the critical importance of genetic variation within populations, combined with differential reproductive success as a result of environmental pressures acting on those genetic variations. Yes, mutation plays a part. And yes, given the tremendous complexities of life chemistry, most mutations are detrimental. But that is irrelevant. Given the large numbers of individuals involved, and the large number of generations involved, an extremely small chance of a beneficial mutation is all that is required. And even the concept of “beneficial” is open to scrutiny. What may be deleterious to one individual, may turn out to be beneficial to another individual in different environmental circumstances.
Third, the Cambrian Period (specifically, 543 to 520 million years ago) marks an important point in the history of life on earth; it is the time when most of the major groups of animals first appear in the fossil record. This event is sometimes called the “Cambrian Explosion”, because of the relatively short time over which this diversity of forms appears. It was once thought that the Cambrian rocks contained the first and oldest fossil animals, but these are now to be found in the earlier Vendian strata. Thus John is incorrect is suggesting that “life seemed to burst forth from nowhere”. The Cambrian/ Precambrian boundary is no longer considered as the place where life suddenly appears. There is a continuum of life across this boundary. Grotzinger et al write:
Once held as the position in the rock record where the major invertebrate groups first appeared, the Precambrian-Cambrian boundary now serves more as a convenient reference point within an evolutionary continuum. Skeletonized organisms, including Cambrian-aspect shelly fossils, first appear below the boundary and then show strong diversification during the Early Cambrian. Similarly, trace fossils also appear first in the Vendian, exhibit a progression to more complex geometries across the boundary, and then parallel the dramatic radiation displayed by body fossils. (Grotzinger, John P., Samuel A. Bowring, Beverly Z. Saylor and Alan J. Kaufman, 1995, “Biostratigraphic and Geochronologic Constraints on Early Animal Evolution,” Science, 270:598-604)
Evidences of macroscopic life forms are now found as early as 680 million years ago in the form of worm burrows (Pagel, Mark, 1999. “Inferring the Historical Patterns of Biological Evolution,” Nature, 401(1999):877-884). And several modern phyla are now claimed to appear in the Precambrian and thus are not part of the supposed ‘Cambrian Explosion.’ Here is a short list gleaned from the internet:
- Phylum Porifera (Brasier, Martin Owen Green and Graham Shields, 1997. “Ediacaran Sponge Spicule Clusters from Southwestern Mongolia and the Origins of the Cambrian Fauna,” Geology, 25:4:303-306)
- Phylum Mollusca (Fedonkin, Mikhail A. and Benjamin M. Waggoner, “The Late Precambrian Fossil Kimberella is a Mollusc-like Bilaterian Organism,” Nature, 388(1997):868-871)
- Phylum Annelida (Cloud, Preston, and Martin F. Glaessner, 1982. “The Ediacarian Period and System: Metazoa Inherit the Earth.”, Science, 217, August 27, 1982)
- Phylum Cnidaria (Conway Morris, Simon, 1998. The Crucible of Creation, (Oxford: Oxford University Press) p 9)
- Phylum Arthropoda (Waggoner, Benjamin M., “Phylogenetic Hypotheses of the Relationships of Arthropods to Precambrian and Cambrian Problematic Fossil Taxa,” Syst. Biol., 45(1996):2:190-222)
Current contenders for the cause of the Cambrian explosion include: 1) the Snowball Earth, specifically the genetic isolation associated with runaway icehouse conditions; 2) Oxygen Limitation, constraining animals to small size and/or limited exertion; 3) Nutrient Stimulus, inducing or accelerating animal evolution through an influx of nutrients; 4) developmental innovations allowing the construction of complex organization; and 5) ecological innovation, particularly that induced by complex multicellular organisms. (http://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2001ESP/finalprogram/abstract_7355.htm)
My own favourite is the last one listed here. It seems reasonable to me that the advent of complex multi-cellular organisms would (at some early point in their evolution) rapidly broaden the possibilities for advantageous mutations. If the organism has a number of cooperating cells, it also has a number of “places” where a mutation could change its opportunities for finding an unoccupied and beneficial ecological niche. But once all those niches are filled with opportunistic mutations, further adventurous mutations face much greater competition. So, John is quite incorrect to suggest that the Cambrian explosion is a “Thorn in the side of evolutionists”.
Fourth, John is also incorrect to suggest that mass extinctions are a problem for the theory. As John suggests, mass extinctions caused by rapid environmental changes, like the one that one that ended the reign of the dinosaurs, have happened numerous times throughout the history of Life on Earth. And he is correct that extinction rather than evolving into something else seems to be the order of the day. But both these points are totally irrelevant to his thesis. It is the very fact of evolution — differential reproduction resulting from environmental pressures on genetic variation within species — that is the “cause” of Life surviving these mass extinction events.
Fifth, John has the attitude of science exactly backward. It is not the case that “Science would prefer to keep hammering at [evolution] rather than admit that there could be some powerful driving force in the universe which we have not yet discovered”. It is the case that evolution is a proven fact. It is the case that the theory of natural selection a well tested and highly useful theory of how evolution takes place. And it is the fact that science does not generally waste much time looking for a “powerful driving force in the universe which we have not yet discovered” for which there is no evidence, or current need.
Sixth, John’s characterizations of T.H. Huxley is correct (according to many histories of the early campaign to popularize Darwin’s theories). But they are also totally irrelevant to his thesis. The scientific support for evolution and Darwin’s theory of natural selection have far surpassed the rather inept attempts of Huxley.
Seventh, while I haven’t read Bowden (the book is not in my local library), I would be curious how he distinguishes “The truth” from “a fraud”. From my own methods of evaluation, on all but one means of distinction, evolution comes out as “The truth” and it is the anti-evolutionist argument that gets the epithet “a fraud”. The only exception to this that I have encountered so far, is if one comes to the question with a pre-conceived notion that Darwin has to be wrong. And if one is going to recommend additional reading sources, I would offer as a counter to Bowden, the following works:
a.. Darwin’s Dangerous Idea by Daniel C. Dennett
b.. The Selfish Gene and The Extended Phenotype by Richard Dawkins
c.. The Red Queen by Matt Ridley
d.. Darwin’s Ghost by Steve Jones
e.. Or start your online research here: http://www.fsteiger.com/urllist.html
Is euthanasia wrong? I am in need of reasons why euthanasia is morally wrong and why society should not accept euthanasia. Or why they should accept euthanasia.
According to the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (Fourth Edition): “Euthanasia” means “The act or practice of ending the life of an individual suffering from a terminal illness or an incurable condition, as by lethal injection or the suspension of extraordinary medical treatment.” And it comes from the Greek euthanasi, meaning “a good death”.
For the purpose of this discussion, there are two aspects of this definition that need emphasis. Firstly, the “victim” involved is not leading a normal life. The implication of the definition is that the quality of life of the “victim” is deemed intolerably poor. And second, euthanasia is a positive action, unlike the passive inaction of the already socially sanctioned “removal of care”, or “turning off the machines”.
Lets divide acts of euthanasia into a number of categories for further analysis:
(1) Voluntary Euthanasia
(2) Non-voluntary Euthanasia
(a) Where the “Victim” is conscious and rational
(b) Where the “Victim” is either unconscious or irrational
(1) Voluntary Euthanasia. This would involve actively ending the life of someone who wishes to end their life. Either directly through such specific acts as mentioned in the definition cited above, or indirectly through what has often been referred to as “assisted suicide”. As long as the intended “victim” of the act is rational, and is reaching her decision to end her own life rationally, with reasonable justification, I can think of no rationale that would suggest that this kind of euthanasia is morally wrong. Of course, there are many people who hold what I consider to be an irrational belief that life is somehow “Sacred” and to be sustained regardless of costs or consequences. I can see where such a belief might prevent someone from participating in an act of voluntary euthanasia either as “victim” or as “assistant”. But I can not fathom a moral basis from which such a belief would justify coercively restraining others from participating in such acts. Certainly, there are people who rationally judge that their continued life is intolerable, and death would be a welcome release. I can see no moral basis from which to coerce such people into continuing to tolerate the intolerable. Nor can I see any moral basis from which to coerce potential assistants into not assisting the chosen path of the “victim” in such cases.
I did mention one caveat, however, that really is the “kicker” when it comes to putting the theory into regular practice. How can we make sure that the “victim” in question has reached the decision rationally? We would want to ensure that such an irreversible decision is reached with proper justification, and is not the result of some transient emotional trauma. So the reasons why society might not want to sanction voluntary euthanasia do not stem from the morality of such acts, but from the practical problems of ensuring that the euthanasia is indeed voluntary.
To rephrase your question in those terms then if society were to sanction voluntary euthanasia, can we ever be assured that the decision to end one’s life is reached intelligently, with proper justification and in the absence of transient emotional trauma? Personally, I think the answer must be, Yes. On a case by case basis, I think it is reasonable to think that we could take such measures to assure ourselves that the intended “victim” is making a proper decision. And although institutionalising the practice opens up the risk that the associated bureaucracy might get carried away (as most bureaucracies have a tendency to do), I think it is quite feasible that we can implement sufficient protections. The medical profession does, after all, have some experience in dealing with such troubling matters.
(2a) Non-voluntary Euthanasia of a Conscious and Rational Victim. Can actively ending the life of a conscious and rational “victim” who does not wish to die ever be morally justified? We must first set aside, as not really within the meaning of “euthanasia,” any set of circumstances where society already recognises “justifiable homicide” (e.g. — self-defence, capital punishment, acts of war, etc.). For the remaining possibilities, I can think of no rationale that would morally justify what essentially amounts to lethal coercion. (Which is why the protections surrounding voluntary euthanasia have to be thorough enough to ensure that the euthanasia in question is indeed voluntary.)
(2b) Non-voluntary Euthanasia of an Unconscious or Irrational Victim. Which leaves the remaining category of non-voluntary euthanasia of a “victim” who is either unconscious (with no prospects of becoming conscious) or irrational (with no prospects of becoming rational). Personally, I can think of no rationale that would render such acts of euthanasia morally wrong. As with voluntary euthanasia, protections must be implemented to ensure that the “no prospects” conditionals are, for all practical considerations, in fact “no prospects”. And society might not wish to condone such acts on the basis of the practical costs and difficulties of implementing such protections. But as with the strictures on institutionalised voluntary euthanasia, that would be a social cost/benefit trade-off not a moral determination.
But given that such protections can be implemented, keeping the incurably irrational or incurably unconscious alive is an inexcusable waste of someone else’s resources. If it is your choice to allocate your resources to keep such a “victim” alive, that is your prerogative. The resources involved are yours. But if society proposes to coerce me out of my resources in order to keep your “victim” alive, I can think of no moral principle that would justify that coercion. If you are footing the bills to keep such a “victim” alive, on what moral basis could I, or society, justify the coercion necessary to prevent you from ceasing your benevolence? And if I am footing the bills for your “victim”, on what moral basis can you justify coercing me to continue my benevolence? I can think of none. The victim’s “right to life” ceases at the point where it requires coercion of others to sustain it.
Is the death penalty ever a legitimate punishment? or is killing always wrong?
To which John Brandon replied –
If the law of the state declares capital punishment to be the penalty for certain crimes, then the punishment is legitimate. Whether it is morally right or not is another question. There is a possibility that most civilized people consider killing to be a wrong. Most certainly, states claiming to establish justice based on the Christian ethic ought to recognise and obey the commandment, “Thou shalt not kill.” It follows that if this commandment can be disobeyed, then so can the other nine, faiths do not cater for selectivity. There is no proviso in the commandment which allows you to kill if you are a high court judge or a state executioner. However, legal systems based on some other faiths include the “Tooth for a tooth, eye for an eye and life for a life’ concept.
To fully discuss the question of killing being always wrong would take us into the complexities of war. Is it more acceptable for the defender to kill the aggressor than it is for the aggressor to kill the defender? Should a conscientious objector allow himself to be killed rather than kill his opponent? Is killing in self-defence always acceptable?
Finally, there is the delicate question as to whether killing perpetrated by the state as justice is actually revenge.
– – – – –
Firstly, I do agree with John that if the law of the land declares capital punishment to be the penalty for certain crimes, then the punishment is legitimate, and whether it is morally right or not is another question. And I agree that the question is a delicate one — whether killing perpetrated by the state is justice or is actually revenge.
I would just like to point out that when John refers to the Commandment “Thou shalt not kill”, he is implying that justice based on the Christian ethic must necessarily employ the King James Version of the Bible. There are newer translations of the language in which the original has come down to us in (I don’t remember whether the original script of Exodus comes to us in Greek, Aramaic, or some other ancient form.) For example, where Exodus 20:13 is rendered in the King James Version as “Thou shalt not kill.”, it is rendered in the New International Version, the New American Standard Bible, and the English Standard Version as “You shall not murder.” And in The Amplified Bible, it is “You shall not commit murder.” (You can go to http://bible.gospelcom.net to see any particular Bible passage as it is rendered in any of 18 different versions. That site will also route you to pages that describe the methods employed in translation.)
Now, according to my American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, “murder” means – “(noun) The unlawful killing of one human being by another, especially with premeditated malice.” And according to my Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, “murder” means “(noun) the unlawful premeditated killing of one person by another.” Or “(verb) kill unlawfully and with premeditation.”
So, contrary to John’s suggestion, there is indeed a proviso in the commandment which allows you to kill if you are a high court judge, or a state executioner, or even if you are defending yourself from an aggressor in your home, on the street, or in a war. None of those forms of killing constitutes “murder” according to current legal statues. Nor can they be viewed as immoral, if one is employing as one’s moral standard, the more up-to-date translations of the Ten Commandments. (The Bible, of course, contains many contradictory admonitions, so it is entirely possible that other passages of the Bible may be found to render any killing “contrary to the commands of God”.)
What is the difference between the following two (alleged) possibilities?
1. There might have existed someone physically just like me, who did not possess consciousness.
2. There might have existed someone physically just like me who possessed a consciousness just like mine WHO WAS NOT ME.
From the perspective of a realist/materialist, the very statement of the possibilities in question raises key additional questions. Just what does it mean to be “physically just like me”?
If what is intended is simple exterior physical appearance, then there is nothing strange about either possibility. Possibility (1) refers to somebody who might possibly have existed, who closely resembles me, and who is considered to be dead. And possibility (2) refers to somebody who might possibly have existed, who closely resembles me, and who is considered to be alive. This distinction is so mundane, that it is probable that the question is meant in a more difficult sense.
In this more difficult sense, the meaning of “physically just like me” is taken to refer to the totality of the physical existence of me. And from this interpretation of “physically just like me”, there is no difference between the two propositions. Neither is logically possible. It is not logically possible that there exists someone physically just like me that does not possess consciousness. To a materialist like myself, consciousness is a physical aspect of my physical existence. To be “physically just like me” therefore implies “possessed of a consciousness just like mine”. Even in the “possible worlds” interpretation of “possibilities”, therefore, it would not be logically possible for my doppleganger to exist both exactly physically like me, and not invested with consciousness. Even more strongly, it would not be logically possible for my doppleganger to exist exactly physically like me, and not be possessed of a consciousness exactly like mine. Which means that it would not be logically possible for my doppleganger to exist without being me. To a materialist, all that “I” am is the physical characteristics of matter that is my consciousness.
Finally, it is always possible to “Tweak” the intended meaning of “physically just like me” to logically permit the existence of any desired variation between the mundane and the difficult. There are so many potential variations on this theme, that a more detailed specification of meaning would be necessary to permit further exploration of the intended question. For example, what does the questioner mean by “did not possess” consciousness. Is the intended doppleganger imagined to lack a consciousness at the time of consideration, or is the doppleganger imagined to never have had a consciousness?
Of course, if the questioner does not like the materialist answer, then the next obvious question is – just what does it mean to be “me”?
I’m an ex-philosopher turned English (EFL) teacher. I have been trying to find some interesting philosophical texts that I could use with my students, but have failed to find anything suitable so far. Obviously the most important thing is clear and simple language, but containing interesting ideas (they are all intelligent post-grad students). I hope you can help! Thanks.
Given that you are teaching ESL, I would suggest “Culture Matters” by Lawrence E. Harrison and Samuel P Huntington. It contains a number of philosophically interesting articles that you can cherry-pick through. In a similar vein, you might consider “Paradigms Lost” by John Casti. It also contains a number of shorter articles from which you can choose. For more intensive reading, I would recommend either “The Selfish Gene” by Richard Dawkins, or “Darwin’s Ghost” by Steve Jones. For a literary selection, you can do no better than “The Fountainhead” by Ayn Rand — an easily readable story with a philosophical message sure to generate lots of discussion.
What is the meaning of life from your perspective?
Your question is a very simple one, and a very common one – especially to those new to the subject of philosophy. In fact, in my own very limited experience, it is the question that most frequently starts an individual on the road to a deeper investigation into the various subjects of philosophy.
On further investigation, one will usually find that this very simple question is also a very complex one. In fact, one will quickly discover that one has to be more specific about just what one means by “meaning”, “life”, and “meaning of life”. It turns out there are a number of ways to interpret this seemingly very simple question.
Here is a small sampling of the ways that I have found this question actually intended. By “What is the meaning of life?” do you mean –
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- What is “life”? In the sense of how or why is “life” different from “non-life”?
- What is the purpose (or function or intent) of life? In the sense of “why does life exist at all?
- What is the significance of life (to the Earth or to the Universe)? In the sense of does it matter to the rest of the Earth or the Universe whether there is life or not?
- What is the purpose (or function or intent) of the human species?
- What is the significance of the existence of the human species (to the Earth or to the Universe)?
- What is the purpose (or function or intent) of my life? A much more specifically intended question usually posed by someone struggling to find some anchor to their daily struggles.
- What is the significance of my life (to the Earth or to the Universe)? Also a very specifically intended question, posed by someone feeling overwhelmed by the apparently insignificant role allotted to the individual by “Science”. (We each are one of six billion humans living on a tiny speck of dirt circling a run of the mill star at the outer edge of a run of the mill galaxy that is one of trillions in the Universe. How insignificant can you get?)
I am going to try to provide a brief answer to your question from the point of view of (vi) above. And along the way hopefully approach a response to some of the other possible interpretations of your question.
First, an important disclaimer. I am a realist / materialist. I am not an idealist or a dualist. So my answer to your question will exclude any reference to religious or spiritual concepts. For answers from those perspectives, you will have to seek guidance from your friendly priest, minister, or spiritual advisor.
The first step in answering your question, is to acknowledge that you are a member of the species Homo sapiens. As such, you are a primate, a mammal, an animal, and a living organism with a 3 to 4 billion year evolutionary history behind you.
The second step is to acknowledge that the “Thing” that has been evolving over the myriad of generations that have lived since the dawn of life on Earth, is the genetic code and not the individual. You, yourself, are but a bio-chemical machine. You were constructed by the fertilised cell that was the result of the union of your mother’s ovum and your father’s sperm. And you were constructed in accordance with the recipe encoded in your genes. You are a survival machine for the genes in your DNA. (I refer you to the works of Richard Dawkins for further argument on this point.)
That then, is your answer. The meaning of your life, your function, your purpose, the reason you exist, is to ensure that your genes get transmitted to the next generation.
This is a general principle of all life. So the general answer to the question “What is the meaning of life?” is quite simply – for each individual organism to ensure that the genes that are encapsulated in each organism get transmitted to the next generation. Or, in a more general wording – the meaning of life is to ensure that life continues.
Many people will object to this answer, including many professional philosophers. But any alternative they offer to my answer will come either from their religious or spiritual premises (which I have specifically disavowed), or from out of thin air. As humans we are gifted with the ability to choose alternative goals in life. And you are free to pursue whatever ends tickle your fancy.
However, regardless of what other goals may be offered instead, if you are not successful at fulfilling this evolutionary meaning of your life, then your genetic codes (and their 3 to 4 billion years of ancestry) will vanish from the future. The future will be populated by individuals whose ancestors were successful at this evolutionary purpose.
Finally, I offer some advice provided by John Brandon earlier in these questions – “My advise to a person who finds no meaning in life is to become a philosopher and share in the excitement of trying to discover what the world and what life is all about. We can either be depressed with our shallow view of the world, or we can be stimulated by seeking the deeper reasons for what we perceive around us. And be warned, the concepts we form in life constitute the world we live in.” Amen!
After reading through the current answers section of this website I have noticed a trend toward agnosticism among nearly all of the respondents. It would seem to me that a belief in God supposes the intangible, which is therefore perceived by most high thinkers as illogical and therefore not a valid factor in any philosophical equation. Is agnosticism a prerequisite to being a logical thinker? I have to do something taboo and place an interesting Biblical reference here: 1 Corinthians 1:20.
You are not going to like this answer, but I would suggest that the consequence (not the prerequisite) of being a logical thinker is at least agnosticism if not atheism. Logical thinking demands that one examine one’s premises. And challenge them for reasonableness and justification. A belief in God demands that one accepts the premise that God exists without question or challenge. Justification is an illegitimate issue. Unless one maintains a strict mental separation between one’s religious thinking, and one’s logical thinking, one cannot help but begin to question one’s religious premises.
“I would like to know if your body and soul are separated?
Is it your soul who feels and thinks? Is it possible that we reincarnate and keep our soul? Is it possible that we keep our wisdom in our soul and when we go to a sort of heaven when we’re perfect? I mean with ‘perfect’, when we are one with everybody and have all wisdom, I don’t mean knowledge.”
The answer to your questions depend very much on just what you mean by “Soul”.
If by “Soul” you mean the religious concept of the animator of the body, and the immaterial spirit that will eventually reside in heaven or hell, (the animating and vital principle in human beings, credited with the faculties of thought, action, and emotion and often conceived as an immaterial entity; the spiritual nature of human beings, regarded as immortal, separable from the body at death, and susceptible to happiness or misery in a future state; the disembodied spirit of a dead human being) then your guess is as good as anyone else’s. As there is absolutely no evidence for the existence of such a thing, and absolutely no evidence either way on any of the auxiliary questions you have asked, you can make up your own answers to please your sense of emotional comfort, and no one will be able to dispute you. The religious notion of a “soul” resides in the realm of religious faith, and not in the realm of science and evidence. So there is absolutely no limit what so ever on what you choose to have religious faith in.
If, however, you choose to adopt a more scientific / materialist interpretation of the “soul”, then the answer to your main question is “No!” The “soul” is the consequence of the biochemical operation of the brain. As such, it cannot be separated from the brain. So obviously, the soul dies when the brain dies, we don’t go to heaven, and there is no reincarnation.
“Why, in a democracy which grants us virtual freedom, are we forced to receive an education?”
The answer is that no democracy really does “grant us virtual freedom”. Despite the wording that appears in whatever (virtual or actual) “Bill of Rights” may apply to your jurisdiction, a democracy does not really grant individual residents much freedom at all. The laws, rules, regulations, and outright foolish restrictions imposed by a democracy on the average citizen’s “freedom” fills rows of bookshelves in small print. And the list grows by a shelf or two every year. Take a look at any lawyer’s reference library — and you’ll see just one small part of it. I remember seeing an estimate for the growth rate in Canada in the 1960’s — it was on the order of 50,000 pages per year. And surely that rate has increased in more recent times.
The fact that you think your particular form of democracy does indeed grant you a degree of freedom is a testament to the social propaganda that reigned during your formative years. The “public image” of a democracy is one that stresses the rights of the individual to do as s/he pleases. The suppressed reality of a democracy is that the individual is allowed by everyone else to do as s/he pleases, so long as whatever that is does not impinge on the demand of that alien majority to be unencumbered by the consequences. The net result of this conflicting constraint is that your “freedom” is strictly limited by the ways in which the majority of your fellow citizens feel they might be inconvenienced by whatever it is you might wish to do.
The maximization of personal freedom is not the proper purpose of a democratic form of governance. The proper purpose of a democracy is the maximization of the welfare of the citizenry through the cooperative efforts of those citizens towards mutually desirable goals. Recent history (since 1850, say) clearly demonstrates that central management of such efforts is not nearly as effective as local and personal management of such efforts. But, if your particular interests in “freedom” are to pursue non-cooperative efforts, or pursue goals that conflict with the mutually desirable goals of the majority, you will find your freedom severely limited. Any so called “Bill of Rights” that might supposedly constrain the majority in this regard, will not really constrain them at all.
Which brings us to your actual question about forced education. The majority has decided, for various reasons, that forcing you to get an education is in the best interests of the majority in their pursuit of their cooperative efforts towards their mutually desirable goals. Some of the rationales that have been offered for this decision include:
(a) modern society is both socially and technically sophisticated, and if you are going to contribute to society and not become a parasite on the majority, you will need a rather sophisticated education. You will need to learn a great deal that you cannot easily learn any other way, if you are to obtain a productive means to self-sustainment, and if you are to avoid falling foul of one of those myriad ways of pissing off the majority of your fellows, and if you are going to raise up your own children in a “proper” way..
(b) A democracy works most effectively when, to the greatest possible extent, every citizen firmly believes that it is the best way to ensure their own personal welfare. And the education system has proved most effective at suitably “socializing” the young into this convenient belief.
(c) Young people are in the poorest of positions to appreciate the importance of these two rationales — they neither know enough yet (of history, sociology, and various technical fields), nor have been sufficiently “socialized” yet (to “properly” value things), to appreciate the longer range consequences of not having a “good”(ie. suitable to the interests of the majority) education.
We are told constantly by Christians of various flavours that “God is Love”. We often see hanging from upper bleachers during a ball game a banner which says “John 3:16,” which, if you look it up, says the same thing. In the sacred writings of the Jews we find this lofty spiritual concept in Deut. 6:5 and Hos. 14:5.
To see if this means what it appears to mean, let us examine a representative sampling of passages from both Testaments (drawn from The Ways of an Atheist, by Bernard Katz. Prometheus Books, Amherst, New York, 1999).
First, from the Old Testament:
God so “loves” us that He —
- created every living entity, declaring it was “good” (Gen. 1:21-22). Of course this included man-eating animals, the great white shark, flesh eating bacteria, and the AIDS viruses.
- wiped all living things off the face of the earth except Noah and his family and that which was preserved in the ark (Gen. 6). (Hmm. What about the things that lived in the sea, or the air? What about bacteria or viruses?)
- killed the first-born of the Egyptians (Exod. 12:29).
- sanctioned slavery (Exod. 21:2-3).
- ordered slave-raiding parties (Deut. 20:10-15).
- sanctioned the capture and deflowering of women, after which they could be thrown aside (Deut. 10-14).
- commanded the killing of those who were supposed to be witches (Exod. 22:18).
- that he commanded the killing of those who were supposed to be wizards (Lev. 20:6).
- ordered the death of anyone who did not worship Him only (Exod. 22:20).
- ordered death for anyone who practiced bestiality (Exod. 22:19).
- ordered death for anyone in a family who had a different religion, that is, worshiped other gods (Deut. 13:6-11).
- commanded death to any sabbath-breaker (Exod. 13:14-15).
- commanded that any uncircumcised male was to be outlawed from his kinfolk (Gen. 7:14).
- sanctioned death to anyone who blasphemed (Lev. 24:10-16).
- ordered death for any man caught having sex with a married woman, as well as death for the woman herself (Deut. 22:22).
- ordered both men and women to be outlawed from their kinfolk if the man had intercourse with the woman during her monthly period (Lev. 20:18).
- answered complaints by sending poisonous snakes which killed many (Num. 21:5-6).
- ordered the massacre of a whole nation (Deut. 2:34).
- ordered a pestilence which killed seventy thousand people because David had sinned by taking a census (2 Sam. 24:15).
- himself killed 102 men just to prove that Elijah was a true prophet (1 Kings 1:10-12).
- commanded vengeance upon the fourth generation of children for the sins of their fathers (Num. 14:8).
- commanded all worshipers of the Devil to suffer eternal torment (Rev. 14:9-11).
- condemned us all to torment because of our inheritance of the sin of Adam (Rom. 5:18). Since this goes way beyond the fourth generation as described in Num. 14:8, it is evident that God changed his mind.
And from the New Testament –
God so “loves” us that He —
- commanded that the great majority of mankind will go to hell (Matt. 7:13-14).
- condemned to everlasting destruction those who do not know the Father or his Son’s Gospel (2 Thess. 1:7-9).
- condemned to hellfire those of us who call others fools (Matt. 5:22).
- damned anyone who does not believe in his Son (John 3:36).
- damned those who were rich (Luke 6:24). j
- damned even those who are well-spoken of (Luke 6:26).
- allowed devils to possess men (Matt. 8:16).
- sacrificed an innocent person for our sins (1 Pet. 2:24; Heb. 9:26).
If this is God’s notion of “Love”, I myself want no part of it!! The Bible’s concept of “God’s Love” is enormously different from the concept of “Love” employed by the average person. So different, in fact, that for Christians to call how God feels about us “Love” is to indulge in false and misleading advertising.
So what is “Love” according to how the average person uses the word?
According to The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language (Third Edition © 1996 by Houghton Mifflin Company), Love is “A deep, tender, ineffable feeling of affection and solicitude toward a person, such as that arising from kinship, recognition of attractive qualities, or a sense of underlying oneness.”
We’ve been given the impression that to define love is near to impossible. Maybe there’s a fear that if we define it, it would somehow be less powerful…less impactful…less exhilarating. Maybe we like the mystery of it. But is it really that complicated? Perhaps the complications surrounding love come from all “stuff”we add on to this powerful emotion. Perhaps the complications come from the Judeo-Christian-Muslim struggle to match what God does, with what the average person does under the aegis of “Love”. Lets drop all the baggage surrounding relationships and define what it is we are experiencing in the moment of love.
What does the average human feel when you love someone? If distilled down to its core components, what would those be? Love is an emotion, a feeling, a wanting, and a “being”. We know it feels good, but what specific feelings, wantings, and beings are present when we feel love? Here are some of the generally accepted common denominators of love…
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- Love is Accepting. — Acceptance is labelling someone as “okay” and having no particular desire to change them. Who they are is perfectly fine with you. You pose no condition on whether you will love them or not. This is call unconditional love. When your love IS conditional, the moment they step outside your set of conditions, love evaporates.
- Love is Appreciating. — Appreciation is one step beyond acceptance. It’s when your focus is on what you like about another. We look at them and feel this sweeping appreciation for who they are, their joy, their insights, their humour, their companionship, etc. When someone says they are “in love” with another, they mean their appreciation is so enormous for this person that it consumes their every thought.
- Love is Wanting Another to Feel Good. — We want those we love to be happy, safe, healthy, and fulfilled. We want them to feel good in all ways, physically, mentally and emotionally.
- Love is Attention. — Love expressed is when you give your attention, your time, your focus to someone. Webster defines attention as “the giving of one’s mind to something.” We don’t always express our love. Love is a feeling and the expression of that feeling is separate. It’s an action. There’s a practical reason we don’t always express our love for another. It’s an issue of TIME. We only have 24 hours in a day (if you make it up that way). If the expression of love was a core ingredient to love, we would have to be stingy with who we loved, because there simply wouldn’t be enough time to love everyone! If you see the distinction between the feeling and the expression, you can then love endless numbers of people. There are many ways in which we give our attention to another. We use our five senses. Our ears to listen. Being completely present with the one who is speaking. Our eyes, watching another, undivided attention. Tasting/smelling? (I’ll let you figure that one out). Touching, giving a hug, holding a hand, a caress, or sexual expression. How you express your love depends on the type of relationship.
- Love is Selfish. — You are with that person, accept, appreciate, want, and devote attention to that person, because they make you happy. Of course you desire to make them happy too, but that is the result of the fact that you love them. If love were a sacrifice, it would be a sacrifice to spend time with the person. But if you love someone, you enjoy spending time with them, therefore, it is selfish. The person you choose to love represents the things you value most in yourself. You do not love someone you consider worthless, but one who embodies values you consider to be of great worth. The values you consider to be of great worth are the values you strive to achieve in yourself.
“Love and friendship are profoundly personal, selfish values: love is an expression and assertion of self-esteem, a response to one’s own values in the person of another. One gains a profoundly personal, selfish joy from the mere existence of the person one loves. It is one’s own personal, selfish happiness that one seeks, earns, and derives from love.” (Ayn Rand, and I can’t remember the reference).
Whatever it is that God is, God is not “Love”. None of the things that God has done (at least according to the scriptures) under the label “Love” can be considered to fit within the standard meaning of the word.
“I have to do a paper for English Comp 1 (it’s extra credit so I don’t have to do it but I’d like to). Our teacher asked us why do good things happen to bad people and bad things happen to good people. He wants us to write a two page paper on it concentrating on something major in history (9/11, conquests, flu epidemics, black plague). Basically anything major in history that has happened to good people. any ideas? What is a good person anyhow, I for one don’t believe anyone is good, but I told him that and he wasn’t so “approving” of me writing a paper stating that. Any ideas or links you have about this would be much appreciated….one more thing…I’m not interested in a religious standpoint, I know why Christians think it happens, but that’s not something I’m interested in writing or even considering.”
Try this approach —
Things that happen to people can be generally classed as “good things”or “bad things”according to some unspecified standard of evaluation. People also can be generally classed as “good people”or “bad people”by a similar (but not necessarily the same) unspecified standard of evaluation. Specifying the standards of evaluation involved in these classifications is not necessary.
Now, assume as a trial hypothesis that whatever happens, is in some sense a random event. What I mean by this is that it is generally unpredictable what things will happen to which people. If that is the case, then it will be inevitable that the things that happen to people (whether “good people”or “bad people”) will average out to 50% “good things”and 50% “bad things”.
Empirical observation of what does in fact happen to people would strongly support two conclusions. First, that people generally expect “good things”to happen to “good people”(and “bad things: to happen to “bad people”) and therefore dismiss such occurrences as “normally expected performance”. The opposite occurrences (“bad things”happening to “good people”and “good things”happening to “bad people”) are noticeable and memorable because they do not fit into our expectations. Hence there is an observational bias towards the “bad things”that happen to “good people”(and the “good things”that happen to “bad people”).
And secondly, it is empirically obvious that despite corrections for the above described bias, the distribution of “things”that happen to people does not seem to be balanced at 50-50 (“good”versus “bad”). It would appear that whatever qualities constitute being a “good person”, they do in fact provide some insulation against a random distribution of “good things”and “bad things”happening. But however effective being a “good person”seems to be at tilting the distribution in a “good”way, enough “bad things”happen to “good people”, that one cannot conclude that being a “good person”is totally effective.
Hence the conclusion that while the distribution of the occurrence of “good things”and “bad things”is not entirely random, it is not entirely determined by the “goodness”or “badness”of people. So we can conclude, in the words of Louis Pasteur “Chance favours the prepared mind.”
“There is a point I do not understand about final causes and their applicability to physical systems.
Action guided by final causes (future conditions as cause of the event) are not considered as scientifically acceptable in the world of matter. Only actions guided by efficient causes (prior conditions as cause of the event) are considered as scientifically acceptable in the physical world.
However, simple robots like the cybernetic turtle orientating its movement in the direction of a source of light can have their action guided by a final cause (reach the source of light). So a simple robot built up with matter following only efficient causes seems to be in a position to obey final causes. How is this possible?”
In “The Intentional Stance”Daniel C. Dennett distinguished between what he refers to as the “intentional stance”and what he refers to as the “physical stance”. These are two different ways of viewing and thinking about a physical system. Most of science deals with the world from the “physical stance”. As such, only physical causation — what Aristotle called “efficient causes” — is relevant.
However, we can also view the same physical system from the “intentional stance”and bring in teleology (goals, Aristotle’s “final causes”) into the picture. The intentional stance views the system as an agent pursuing goals, and can understand the system from that perspective. Dennett’s example was of a thermostat “wanting” to keep the room at a preset temperature. The example you provide is the simple robot turtle “wanting”to reach the source of light. At the physical level, however, all is “efficient cause”. Photons from the light source impinge on a photo receptor, and through appropriate circuitry, “cause”the robot to move in that direction. Physically, all is “caused”by photons impinging on photo receptors and electrons following an electronic circuit from one pole of a battery to another.
The “kicker”is that the electronic circuitry has to be designed in the proper way to get the robot to behave as if it “wants”to reach the light. In the case of the robot, the designer was a human engineer. In the case of a real turtle reaching for some lettuce, the “designer”was the trail and error consequences of natural selection.
What does the word “good”mean?
From The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Third Edition (Houghton Mifflin Company, 1992) we get the dictionary definition –
“Good – (adjective) 1. Being positive or desirable in nature; not bad or poor. 2 a. Having the qualities that are desirable or distinguishing in a particular thing. b. Serving the desired purpose or end; suitable 3 a. Not spoiled or ruined. b. In excellent condition; sound. 4 a. Superior to the average; satisfactory. b. Used formerly to refer to the U.S. Government grade of meat higher than standard and lower than choice. 5 a. Of high quality. b. Discriminating. 6. Worthy of respect; honourable. 7. Attractive; handsome. 8. Beneficial to health. 9. Competent; skilled. 10. Complete; thorough. 11 a. Reliable; sure. b. Valid or true. c. Genuine; real. 12 a. In effect; operative. b. Able to continue in a specified activity. 13 a. Able to pay or contribute. b. Able to elicit a specified reaction. 14 a. Ample; substantial b. Bountiful. 15. Full. 16 a. Pleasant; enjoyable. b. Propitious; favorable. 17 a. Of moral excellence; upright. b. Benevolent; kind. c. Loyal; staunch. 18 a. Well-behaved; obedient. b. Socially correct; proper. 19. (Sports) Having landed within bounds or within a particular area of a court.”
And
“Good – (noun) 1 a. Something that is good. b. A good, valuable, or useful part or aspect. 2. Welfare; benefit. 3. Goodness; virtue.”
In case you didn’t notice, if you disregard the circular definitions, there are 36 separately identified shadings of meaning here for the word “Good”. All but a single one of these definitions (17a – Of moral excellence; upright.) will generate little philosophical disagreement as to what it means, and to what examples in Reality it refers to.
It is interesting to note that all but this single “moral”meaning of the word can be considered to be evaluations of how well some subject being judged fulfills its intended purpose. Look at the key words used in the definitions as “quasi-synonyms” – positive, desirable, distinguishing, suitable, excellent, sound, superior, quality, beneficial, competent, skilled, complete, thorough, reliable, valid, true, genuine, operative, pleasant, enjoyable, favourable, benevolent, kind, loyal, correct, proper, valuable, useful, fitting, appropriate, genuine. They all can be interpreted as an evaluation of how well the subject of the judgment measures up on the standard of fulfilling its purpose. You might say that there is a “functional” meaning of “good” that is usual, and a “moral” meaning of “good” that is the exceptional case. The “functional” meanings are by far the easiest to understand, the easiest to provide concrete examples of, and the bulk of the various shades of meaning. The “functional” meanings of “good” can be understood in terms of – “An X is a good X, if it does a [positive, desirable, distinguished, suitable, excellent, sound, superior, quality, beneficial, competent, skilled, complete, thorough, reliable, valid, true, genuine, operative, pleasant, enjoyable, favourable, benevolent, kind, loyal, correct, proper, valuable, useful, fitting, appropriate, genuine] job of doing what an X is supposed to do.”
Which leaves us with the single moral / ethical meaning — “Good – (adjective) 17 a. Of moral excellence; upright. (noun) 1 a. Something that is good. 3. Goodness; virtue.”
Lets add to this mix the dictionary definitions of “moral”and “virtue”, since these words appear key to understanding the moral meaning of “good”. Again from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Third Edition (Houghton Mifflin Company, 1992) we get the dictionary definitions –
“Moral – (adjective) 1. Of or concerned with the judgment of the goodness or badness of human action and character. 2. Teaching or exhibiting goodness or correctness of character and behavior. 3. Conforming to standards of what is right or just in behavior; virtuous. 4. Arising from conscience or the sense of right and wrong. 5. Having psychological rather than physical or tangible effects. 6. Based on strong likelihood or firm conviction, rather than on the actual evidence.”
And
“Virtue – (noun) 1 a. Moral excellence and righteousness; goodness. b. An example or kind of moral excellence. 2. Chastity, especially in a girl or woman. 3. A particularly efficacious, good, or beneficial quality; advantage. 4. Effective force or power.”
The problem with these two additional dictionary definitions is that they are, as you can see from the above, completely circular. A “good” (in the moral rather than functional sense) thing, choice, action or alternative is one that which is “morally good” or “morally excellent”. And one that is “moral” is one that is judged “good”. Relying on the dictionary meanings of “good” and “moral” provides absolutely no intelligible foundation from which to suggest that anyone’s particular belief about what is “good” is in any way not correct and valid and proper. So the dictionary does not really supply us with much of a practical guide to morals.
Unfortunately, a dictionary tries to be a documentation of how people use a particular word. It is not trying to be a guide as to how words really ought to be used. Which means, in practical day-to-day application by most people – “good”in a moral sense is whatever I choose to believe is good. And this is the essence of “Subjectivist” Ethics.
Unlike normal social discourse, in the realms of philosophical discussion, ethical alternatives cannot be publicly labelled as more or less desirable without some form of justification stronger than “Because I say so!” It is perfectly acceptable to say, in the privacy of your own thoughts, “The moral good is whatever I choose to believe is the moral good.” But it is almost always unacceptable to those with whom you deal in society to say to them that “The moral good is whatever I choose to believe is the moral good.” To do so raises the probability that someone else will reply “I don’t agree!” or “So what?” or “Who are you to tell me what to do?”
Unless, that is, all concerned are willing to relax the generally accepted philosophers belief that the practice of philosophy is more than merely the expression of personal opinion. Suppose we do change this, and accept as a starting position that the moral good is so just because someone says so. Since such a system of morality is based on the presumed validity of each person’s subjective opinion, there is no logically valid rebuttal to another person’s opinion. There is no basis upon which to found a claim that one person’s opinion is any more accurate or correct or valid than another’s.
If this is, in fact, an acceptable starting foundation, then the resulting system of morality will be useful and valid only for those who agree with some one particular individual’s personal opinion that this moral good is indeed more desirable in some way than that. The ethical system that results from such a starting axiom is not likely to be consistent or logically coherent. There is nothing to require that the accepted opinion on any related subjects be consistent or logical. Adherents of such a system would not be able to converse on ethical topics with anyone who did not agree with the accepted judgments as to what is morally good. And, more importantly, there is only one avenue open to adherents of such a Code of Morality if they wish to indulge in any social interactions with people who do not agree with the judgments about what constitutes the moral good. The only practical alternative is – “Agree with us/me – or else!”
Of course, merely because Subjectivist Ethics appears to produce undesirable side-effects for some people, is not a legitimate argument against its validity. A rationale of “I don’t like the results” is just as empty as a rationale of “Because I say so!”. Once again, unless you are willing to stop all philosophical discussion with the rebuttal of “I don’t agree!”, persuasion and argument must extend into realms where both parties can agree with the ground rules. To successfully convince people that your opinions about what is morally good are correct and appropriate the discussion, argument, and persuasion must begin from a foundation that is mutually agreed upon. It is here where most systems of ethics have foundered, because the only alternative to voluntary agreement with someone else’s unjustified opinion is “or else”.
How are you going to convince me that the side-effects are undesirable? And how are you going to convince me that, even if they are undesirable, these side-effects are, in general or in particular, “Bad”? Appeals to the “Intuitively Obvious” suffer from the same deficiency as do the “Because I say so!” arguments discussed above. If I disagree with the obviousness of the statement, the argument founders.
One popular version of Subjectivist Ethics is more commonly called “Social Consensus Ethics”. It has a wide following, especially among those of a more “liberal democrat” nature, because of the “democratic” consequence that the consensus of popular opinion is the determinant of what is morally good. “Good” (in its moral sense) becomes semantically equivalent to “Socially Blessed”. From this perspective, Laws are the legal embodiment of the opinions of the consensus as to what is good. And the coercive powers of the police are the physical embodiment of the “or else”.
Perhaps a more familiar kind of Subjectivist Ethics is “Absolute Rule Ethics” more commonly called “Religious Ethics”. In this version the opinion of some accepted Authority figure – a God, or a Prophet, or a Wise-Man – is taken as the determinant of what is morally good. “Good” (in its moral sense) becomes semantically equivalent to “Authority Blessed/Commanded”. From this perspective, the Word of Authority is the final and unchallengeable arbiter as to what is morally good. And the coercive power of the anger of the Authority (the “Wrath of God”) is the physical embodiment of the “or else”.
The alternative to basing a Code of Morality on personal opinion, is basing it on something in Reality that everyone can see, and independently examine. With this foundation as a starting point, when some philosopher proclaims what is morally good, a doubter can go out and form his own opinion based on the facts of Reality.
Many western philosophers have used the word “happiness” to define what constitutes the moral good. Their approach is based on the universally accepted observation that it is better to be happier than not (other things being equal). Any doubter can always make a personal evaluation of the happiness that will likely result from any alternatives. And the doubter can discuss with others their own experiences and appraisals of happiness.
The various “happiness” philosophies differ, of course, in their exact definition of what they mean by the word “happiness”. The Hedonists, as one example, defined happiness to mean primarily physical pleasures. Others have defined it to mean spiritual contentment, or intellectual satisfaction. And different philosophers establish different realms where-in the individual reaps the reward of “happiness” for achieving the moral “good”. In some, the “happiness” is achieved immediately, upon the execution of some act or thought that is “good” by their definition. In others, the reward is postponed to some form of after-life, or is experienced in some form of “other-life” that is separate and distinct from a Reality as usually understood.
But regardless of their particular definitions of what constitutes “good” versus “bad”, or how the individual will reap the rewards for choosing the “good” over the “bad”, their universal approach to justifying their approach and definitions is that the “good life” is purported to be better than the “bad life”, and better than anything in between because the “good”delivers “happiness”and everybody is in universal agreement that “happiness” is better than “unhappiness”. In other words, “happiness”philosophies transform the moral sense of “good”into a functional one. A morally “good”thing, choice, action or alternative is “good”because it does a [positive, desirable, distinguished, suitable, excellent, sound, superior, quality, beneficial, competent, skilled, complete, thorough, reliable, valid, true, genuine, operative, pleasant, enjoyable, favourable, benevolent, kind, loyal, correct, proper, valuable, useful, fitting, appropriate, genuine] job of doing what a ethical choice is supposed to do – deliver happiness.”
This functional “transformation”results from the fact that all of the various “happiness” philosophies are based on the moral premise that the goal of human behaviour, and all ethical choices and judgments, is to increase in the amount of “happiness”. With, of course, critical differences resulting from the different ways that these philosophies define “happiness”, and different realms in which that “happiness”is to be realized.
“What is the relevance of philosophy to the contemporary scene?”
When viewing the contemporary scene, we all make value judgements about alternatives. We do this all the time, at all scales from the immediate and local (like whether to have coffee or orange juice or both for breakfast) to the distant and global (like what to do about global warming, if anything). We cannot look at any issue, question, alternative, or simple factual event without making value judgements about whether this or that is preferable.
Philosophy is the business and practice of investigating, identifying, questioning, and challenging the underlying assumptions upon which we base those value judgements.
The vast majority of people make their value judgements without ever realizing what underlying premises their judgements are based on. The vast majority of people never ponder the question of whether or not those underlying premises are reasonable or consistent (or what “reasonable”and “consistent”might mean in this context). The vast majority of people will assume that if you disagree with my value judgements, then there is something wrong with you. Something that needs to be corrected — by force if necessary. They never wonder why we disagree, or from what underlying difference in premises the disagreement arises.
By identifying and challenging those underlying premises, philosophy and philosophers bring to people’s attention (when they care to pay attention) the more fundamental issues that underlie the superficial disagreements over value judgements. And it is only through attention to those underlying differences in premises that differences in value judgements can be resolved without resort to force.
So you think that global warming, abortion, capital punishment, Republicans, Democrats, the war in Iraq, George Bush, Islam’s treatment of women, the West’s disrespect of women and family, Western decadent culture, pornography, the local zoning regulations, the tax rate, this TV show, that restaurant, this book, that girl/boy is “good”or “bad”? Why do you think so? Against what standard of measure do you proclaim that this or that is “good”or “bad”? What do you actually mean by “good”and “bad”? If such value judgements are simply a matter of personal opinion, then there can never be any reasonable justification for employing force to impose one set of opinions on others. The powerful can impose their value judgements on those they will simply because they can. But if such value judgements are more than simply personal subjective opinions, then it must be the case that some of those conflicting judgements must be wrong, and can be corrected by education rather than by force.
Look at the extent of the differences in value judgements in the contemporary scene — such wide differences, over so many issues, at so many different scales of relevance to individuals. And look at the extent to which force is being employed to “correct”what are perceived to be other people’s wrong headed value judgements. Don’t you think that some careful attention to the underlying premises that generate these differences might be worth the effort?
Personally, I feel that philosophy has greater relevance to the modern scene than it has ever had before — if only because the issues over which we disagree are so all encompassing and important for our future. It is unfortunate that so few in positions of public influence pay any attention to philosophy.
To this question, Geoffrey Klempner responded:
This may seem obvious, but if I ‘die’ that means that I lose consciousness and ‘never wake up’. If I did wake up –at any time, even billions of years, in the future –then I didn’t really die, I merely lost consciousness for a long while.
But think of what that means. To assert, ‘GK has died’ implies a statement about all future times, to infinity. There is no finite length of time such that, if ‘you’ were to reappear after ceasing to ‘live’, that person could not, as a matter of logic, be you. The problem is that I don’t know what ‘infinity’ means. I don’t understand, I can’t get my mind around, the notion of infinite future time. But understanding the notion of infinite future time is a necessary condition for grasping what it is to ‘die’.
If, like me, you do not understand the notion of infinite future time then, like me, you have no alternative but to admit that you do not know ‘what death is’, and no amount of talk about mind and body or the criteria for personal identity can make good that deficiency.
Because I disagree with his last statement, I would like to offer an alternative interpretation to that offered by Geoffrey.
Geoffrey states that the assertion “GK has died” implies a statement about all future times, and that becuase he does not unerstand the concept of infinite future times, he therefore does not understand what death is.
But this reasoning is dependent on a particular notion of what constitutes a particular “person”, an individual “identity”, an “I”. In particular, Geofrey’s response presumes that the “physical plant” that is the “I” at this time/place has no significant connection to what constitutes the “I” in question. His suggestion that it is logically possible that “I” might wake up “at any time, even billions of years, in the future” presupposes that whatever it is that wakes up – the particular “person”, the individual “identity”, the “I” in question – has no necessary connection with the physical plant that initially lost consciousness – died.
It is, of course, not very clear from his brief comment just what notion of “I” he does hold. But if he can conceive of his “I” awaking some billions of years into the future, I think it is quite reasonable to assume that he is conceiving his “I” as independent of the material of which his current body is constructed. Otherwise, I would have expected him to mention something about the maintenance of that physical body over the intervening gap in consciousness. And he does close with that problematic statement “no amount of talk about mind and body or the criteria for personal identity can make good that deficiency”.
The alternative I would like to offer takes the view that what constitutes the particular “person”, the individual “identity”, the “I” in question is intimately connected with the “physical plant” in which that particular “person”, individual “identity”, or “I” currently finds itself. On this view, what “I” am is a consequence of the biochemical processes that are taking place within the physical plant that is my body and brain. On this materialist view of personal identity, the problem of what consititues death becomes quite comprehensible.
What constitutes “life” is notoriously hard to define. But one way to do so is to notice particularly the way in which whatever life is, it effectively maintains a local state of lower entropy (higher energy content, greater informational content, more organized) than its environment. And the processes, actions, and behaviours of living things are directed towards the maintenance of this relatively lower level of local entropy. Death then is understandable as the cessation of the processes that maintain this lower level of local entropy, and the return of the physical constituents of life to the average entropy of the environment.
All of this is but a fancy way of saying that unless you do something to keep yourself alive, you will die. And death is the absence of the processes that keep you alive.
Which means that if you adopt my suggested interpretation of what constitutes a particular “person”, an individual “identity”, an “I” then death is permanent. The materialist view of personal identity leaves no opening for a logical possibility that you might wake up at some time in the future, if the processes that keep you alive have ceased. So Geoffrey’s concern over the problem of knowing what “infinity” or “all future times” means does not arise. And understanding the notion of infinite future time is *not* a necessary condition for grasping what it is to ‘die’.
It is said that I truly love another if my happiness is depends on his/her happiness. i.e. I cannot be happy unless s/he is happy. My questions is, is this always true, or are there cases in which I cannot be said to love another truly even though my happiness depends on his/her happiness?
I would suggest that your happiness depending on another’s is a necessary but not sufficient condition for “love”. What I mean by this is that while I think it would not be proper to say that you “love” someone if your own happiness is not dependent to some extent on the happiness of that other person, I think “love” involves much more than that.
According to The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (Microsoft Bookshelf Basics), “love” is “a deep, tender, ineffable feeling of affection and solicitude toward a person, such as that arising from kinship, recognition of attractive qualities, or a sense of underlying oneness.”
Here are some of the generally accepted common denominators of love according to some of the “Relationship Self-Help” books I have encountered –
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- Love is Accepting. — Acceptance is labelling someone as “okay” and having no particular desire to change them. Who they are is perfectly fine with you. You pose no condition on whether you will love them or not. This is called unconditional love. When your love IS conditional, the moment they step outside your set of conditions, love evaporates.
- Love is Appreciating. — Appreciation is one step beyond acceptance. It’s when your focus is on what you like about another. We look at them and feel this sweeping appreciation for who they are, their joy, their insights, their humour, their companionship, etc. When someone says they are “in love” with another, they mean their appreciation is so enormous for this person that it consumes their every thought.
- Love is Wanting Another to Feel Good. — We want those we love to be happy, safe, healthy, and fulfilled. We want them to feel good in all ways, physically, mentally and emotionally. This is the part that identified in the question when the questioner said that their happiness is dependent on the happiness of the one they love.
- Love is Attention. — Love expressed is giving your attention, your time, your focus to someone. Webster defines attention as “the giving of one’s mind to something.” We don’t always express our love. Love is a feeling and the expression of that feeling is separate. It’s an action. There’s a practical reason we don’t always express our love for another. It’s an issue of TIME. We only have 24 hours in a day (if you make it up that way). If the expression of love was a core ingredient to love, we would have to be stingy with who we loved, because there simply wouldn’t be enough time to love everyone! If you see the distinction between the feeling and the expression, you can then love endless numbers of people. There are many ways in which we give our attention to another. We use our five senses. Our ears to listen – being completely present with the one who is speaking. Our eyes to see – watching another with undivided attention. Tasting/smelling – (I’ll let you figure that one out as an exercise for the reader). Touching – giving a hug, holding a hand, a caress, or sexual expression (an aspect often given less credit that it deserves). And remembering — remembering the little things to show you are paying attention, and remembering the big things to show that you know where your priorities lie.
- Love is Selfish. — When you are with the person you love, accept, appreciate, want, you devote attention to that person because they make *you* happy. Of course you desire to make them happy too, but that is the result of the fact that you love them. If love were a sacrifice, it would be a sacrifice to spend time with the person. But if you love someone, you enjoy spending time with them, therefore, it is selfish. The person you choose to love represents the things you value most in yourself. You do not love someone you consider worthless, but one who embodies values you consider to be of great worth. The values you consider to be of great worth are the values you strive to achieve in yourself.
And finally, here’s a quote from Ayn Rand (I don’t remember the source) –
“Love and friendship are profoundly personal, selfish values: love is an expression and assertion of self-esteem, a response to one’s own values in the person of another. One gains a profoundly personal, selfish joy from the mere existence of the person one loves. It is one’s own personal, selfish happiness that one seeks, earns, and derives from love.”
What’s with solipsism? I have a friend who believes that the world well and truly revolves around him. He is the creator and that’s that. It seems logically impossible to overcome that kind of thinking since it is non-falsifiable. Is there any way to reason around solipsism?
As a philosophical position, Solipsism has the advantage (if you can call it that) if being logically consistent. Therefore, it would appear to be impossible to reason around your friend’s Solipsism — assuming that your friend is being a logically consistent Solipsist (which I admit is rather hard to imagine).
On the other hand, it also appears to be impossible for your friend the Solipsist to declare in any meaningful way that he is the only valid consciousness – because anyone he tells it to (like you) will automatically disbelieve it. While that may be acceptable to your friend, it presents a major problem for a philosopher. It makes Solipsism workable only as a completely private belief. Which doesn’t necessarily mean it isn’t true, of course. It just means that if it is true, then none of the “people” that a Solipsist identifies in his experiences will agree that it is true. If two Solipsists happen to meet, neither will accept the possibility that the other is right or even “real” (in the non-Solipsist sense). Each will insist that “I am the only existent”, and the other is therefore necessarily wrong. After all, the other person — even if also an avowed Solipsist — is nothing more than a particularly interesting pattern in the experiences of the Solipsist.
So even if your friend thinks the logic dictates that he should believe in Solipsism — and it is hard to deny the persuasiveness of the logical arguments following from the premises of Subjectivism — he will never find any like minds who will agree with him. And he will find it ultimately to his advantage (in terms of pleasure and pain) to actually believe that Solipsism is false. Which sort of sounds contradictory, even if logically it is not.
There is also a less immediate difficulty faced by the Solipsist. The Solipsist concept of “the world” is based on the observation that there are quite obviously patterns in my experiences that are more or less constant, persistent, consistent, coherent, drawing the focus of my attention, amenable to inquiry, and responsive to my reactions. But the logically impermissible question is — **Why** are there patterns rather than random noise? What, if anything, causes the patterns? What, if anything, causes the patterns to be constant, consistent, etc.? To these sorts of questions the Solipsist has no possible answer. The patterns simply are. And to the extent that they are constant, consistent, etc. they are self-sustaining. Further inquiry is illegitimate. And again, while that answer may satisfy your friend, that sort of answer is simply unacceptable to philosophers. Metaphysics, after all, is supposed to question everything.
So far as I can determine, no professional philosopher likes the Solipsist conclusion to the premises of Subjectivism. But if you don’t like the consequences of a logically valid argument, you have only one real choice. And that is to adopt different premises.
If you would like a more detailed exploration of Solipsism, try this Essay.
What is the point in philosophy if we don’t know the answer to the basic most questions – like the reasons we are here, or what is this world?
The point of philosophy is to understand just what you *mean* by these questions. It is not trivially obvious what these questions mean, or what the answers would mean if we had them. Philosophy is, among other things, the examination of just what the questions mean and just what the answers would mean if we could discover them.
For example — What is a “reason”? What kind of answer would provide a reason we are here? What do you mean by “here”? Do you mean the geographic location you currently occupy? Or do you mean to refer to the fact that we human beings exist? And what do you mean by “exist”? And so forth.
How could we recognize an answer to one of these “most basic questions” if we do not know what we mean by the question? And then again, how do you know that we do not already have answers to these questions? They have occupied philosophers for thousands of years. Many philosophers have written weighty volumes in their attempts to address only parts of the answers. Would you be able to recognize that one of these philosophers has actually hit upon the “right” answer?
To study philosophy is to study the implications of these more fundamental questions.
Could god create a statement that is both true and false?
Did god create the rules of logic or is he subservient to them?
And if so what are the ramifications?
“Could God create a statement that is both true and false?”- Before I can answer that you are first going to have to provide some definition of what you mean by “God” and by “true”. There are many different conceptions of “God”. Some of which include an unconstrained omnipotence, and some of which include logical constraints on Her omnipotence. If you conceive of a God who can create a square circle, then surely God can create a false truth. On the other hand, even if God’s omnipotence is constrained by logical limits, there are many different conceptions of what constitutes “truth”. So even under the constraints of logic, it may be possible for God to create a statement that is both true and false. One theory of truth, for example, is “Emotivism” — that maintains that “true” and “false” are but linguistic labels for our approval or disapproval of some statement. In that event it would be trivially easy to create a statement that some consider “true” and others consider “false”.
“Did god create the rules of logic?” No, God did not create the rules of Logic — Man did. All of logic and mathematics are the reasoned consequences of a defined set of axioms. While those axioms, and the resulting body of mathematical and logical reasoning, are designed and intended to describe reality, they are Man-defined not God-given. On the other hand, it might be argued that while God did not create the rules of logic, She at least created the reality that those rules are intended to describe. It is presumed that God created reality. So if our God-created reality is indeed logically consistent (something not provable), and the Man-created defined axioms of logic and mathematics are in fact good descriptions of that reality (also something that cannot be proved), then credit should be shared between God and Man.
“Is God subservient to the rules of logic?” Well that depends too much on your conception of “God”. Most people will grant that God is omnipotent within the constraints of logic — He can’t create a square circle, for example. In that case, one would have to say that He is subservient to the rules of logic. But others would insist that God is strictly omnipotent, and unconstrained by the rules of logic. In the complete absence of any evidence on either side, you are free to believe what you wish.
Assuming for sake of argument that God is the original energy source that created the universe, then what materials did he use to create with? If only God alone existed then wouldn’t it stand to reason that the only materials he had in order to create with was his own essence, energy etc.? Would this mean that pantheism or monism is a more logical form of theism? Otherwise you must posit creation ex nihilo which simply seems to me to be an appeal to authority at best and an appeal to magic at its worst.
We have, of course, absolutely no evidence at all with which to constrain our speculations as to how God created the Universe — if in fact She did. Actually, that statement can be made even stronger. We have absolutely no evidence at all with which to constrain our speculations as to how the Universe got created. We do, on the other hand, have plenty of evidence that constrains the nature of the Universe that was created, however it was created. But in the absence of evidence constraining the creation of the Universe, we are free to speculate pretty much at will, in which ever way amuses us.
So one speculation is that God created our “positive” Universe at the same instant He created a “negative” Universe — a sort of universe-sized quantum fluctuation. All of the “materials” (read “positive energy”) She used to create our “positive” Universe were exactly balanced by the creation of the “negative” Universe. This would be just exactly like the spontaneous appearance of a positron and an electron out of the vacuum of space. The energy of the positron exactly balances the energy of the electron, yielding a net zero effect on the Universe. Hence the creating God would not have to come up with any surplus energy or other “materials”. Aside, of course, from decreeing the “rules of the game” that are the physics of the Universe. Once the rules of the game were in place, all She would have to do is fiddle with the quantum probabilities a bit. This speculation has the advantage of being totally consistent with all of our current physical evidence and theories. And the added advantage of being neither an appeal to authority, nor an appeal to magic.
Can nature, or what is natural, be considered any kind of guide to what is virtuous or even tolerable? We often hear it said that “it is natural for some people to be homosexual.” But then it is presumably equally natural for some people to be colour blind, to be aggressive, to be attracted by children. It may be natural for animals to behave as they do, but barely desirable for humans to behave like animals. But then natural human behaviour is superior ethically, we may believe. However, if that is so it is only by some external standard that we can judge human nature to be superior. In that case, it is the standard that has to apply, and not nature. How do we know that Jesus of Nazareth was virtuous, other than by some external standard?
Ah! But the challenge is — from where comes this “external” standard, and why is it an acceptable (appropriate? necessary? best? only?) standard?
More particularly, we would have to arrive at some meaningful context for the concept of “external” — external from what? External from the person being appraised? Or external from all human behaviour? Or external from the natural environment? Or perhaps you mean here “external” as in the dictates provided by a “supernatural” God?
While I think it reasonable to posit a standard that is necessarily external to the person we are appraising, I don’t think it is necessary that the standard be necessarily external to all human behaviour. Utilitarianism, for example, posits that the standard is “the greatest happiness for the greatest number”. This is certainly “internal” to the naturalness of human behaviour.
Is there not a popular tendency to equate evil with immorality? If we assume morality is concern for human and animal welfare, then it is clear that to kill is an evil in isolation. However, in an imperfect world, it was probably a morally justifiable decision for Britain to declare war in 1939. It may also be morally justifiable to cull animals, or to conduct some medical experiments on them. Morality is often a choice between greater and lesser evils, for the sake of future good although this utilitarian principle can be made too much like arithmetic, and should not justify extreme present evil.
The reason that there is a general “tendency” to equate evil with immorality is because “evil” is by definition that which is immoral or wrong. Morality is all about standards of conduct that are accepted as right or proper or wrong and improper. Hence “evil” is just another word for “immoral”.
“If we assume morality is concern for human and animal welfare, then it is clear that to kill is an evil in isolation.” Except that you have here just demonstrated that it is not evil “in isolation”. You first had to establish the premise that morality is concern for human and animal welfare.
All moral evaluations are ultimately founded on some fundamental premise as to what constitutes the appropriate standards of right or good behaviour. You have established one here (concern for human and animal welfare). Other philosophers have offered other alternatives. Each alternative fundamental moral premise will result in (more or less) different judgements as to what is moral and immoral behaviour.
For example, the individualist moral premise holds that the individual is more important than the state. And by many moral codes within that class, the Nazi’s were evil and war was moral. The collectivist moral premise holds that the community is more important than the individual. And by many moral codes within that class, the Nazi’s were doing the moral thing, and England was the evil empire. After all, it was not the *intent* of the Nazi’s to do evil. By their moral standards, they were doing the right thing. It is just that their moral standards were not consistent with the individualist moral standards of the winning side (the writers of the history texts).
Even Utilitarianism can generate some “counter-intuitive” moral recommendations — at least for those who believe in an individualistic moral code. Utilitarianism will, for example, recommend that torturing one individual is morally acceptable if as a consequence the happiness of enough others is raised sufficiently. Hence it is acceptable to a Utilitarian that torture is practiced by the police and security forces on the premise that the continued welfare of the community is sufficiently important to the happiness of the general population that the “utility” balances out.
What is the best way to solve the Epicurean Paradox? How can you reconcile the existence of evil with an all good all powerful God?
Your question immediately raises the response — against what standard are you going to measure “best”? In the absence of any guidance on this score, I am going to provide the sort of answer that *I* think is best. You will have to judge for yourself how it measures on your own scale of “best”.
The dictionary tells us that a “paradox” is a statement, proposition, or situation that seems absurd or contradictory, but is presumed to be none-the-less true. But in logic, a self-contradictory situation, a statement or proposition that contradicts itself, is a reductio ad absurdum proof that at least one of the premises that leads to the contradiction is false in some way. Therefore, in order to “solve” the Epicurean Paradox, one must examine the premises that lead to the apparent contradiction, and question whether they are in fact really true.
The one premise that seems to me to be most easily questioned — because it lacks any independent evidential support what so ever — is the premise that an “all good, all powerful God” actually exists. After all, the only evidence that leads us to accept such a premise is that God tells us (in the Bible) that He is all good and all powerful. This is circular reasoning — the only evidentiary support for the truth of the premise is evidence only if the premise is assumed to be true.
To solve the paradox, then, all that is needed is to relax this rather strong premise somewhat. Perhaps God does not exist (my own choice). Or if you choose to believe that God exists (your choice, presumably, given the nature of your question), perhaps He is not all good, or perhaps He is not all powerful. Either of these latter two alternatives would resolve the apparent contradiction just as well as the first.
If God is not all powerful, then He might be powerless to prevent the machinations of the Devil. Or perhaps God is indeed omnipotent, but merely chooses to limit His exercise of that omnipotence. However, addressing the question of why He might so choose gets us into the issue of the goodness of God.
So the other option is to consider the possibility that God is not all good. This is a favourite alternative of some Christian Fundamentalists — although they would, of course, be the last to admit it. What they actually do is redefine the meaning of the word “good” so that it includes everything that God does, even those things that we poor uncomprehending and undeserving penitents mistakenly call “evil”. Hence the paradox is only apparent because we apply mistaken understandings of “good” and “evil”. The things that we mistakenly call “evil” are still the acts of an all good God, and are therefore necessarily “good”. It is just that we poor servants in His service do not fully understand His goodness.
But of course, in the absence of any evidence to constrain our speculations, we can we can amuse ourselves endlessly with variations on these themes — as religious philosophers have done for thousands of years.
Good question! I have often wondered that myself. I have often even wondered that *of* myself — when I have discovered that I have done something particularly dumb!
The only answer I have been able to come up with that seems to fit the situation is that people are just plain lazy.
Thinking is actually pretty hard work. After all, to actually think about things, to make conscious and considered choices about things, you have to be actually paying attention to things. Most people seem to stay so intently focused on their immediate goals (driving the car, finding the next meal, etc.) that they spare no effort to notice that there are alternatives and opportunities passing them by. To notice these alternatives and opportunities, you have to approach your daily activities with an open mind. Most people seem to find it much easier to keep a closed mind, and ignore the possibilities. After all, doing something different, taking a chance on something not “proven” is risky. And most people are uncomfortable with risk.
Taking effective advantage of the alternatives demands sufficient knowledge of how the world works to be able to predict consequences with reasonable accuracy. Most people seem to prefer to stay in their own little rut, and avoid the effort of learning how the world outside that rut actually works. That is why most people find change uncomfortable, and new things risky.
Forming thoughtful opinions on any matter means that you have to actually consider the alternatives, identify possibilities, and extrapolate consequences. It takes much less effort to adopt the opinions of someone else. Most people, most of the time, seem to let other people do their thinking for them. They manage their lives on the basis of instinct, habit, and the opinions of others.
The only reason I can think of to explain this avoidance of effort, is that most people, most of the time are inherently lazy. And I include myself in that generalization!
What do you think of the wrecking ball that David Hume applies to science? Does he really show that necessary connections are merely based on psychological conditioning or constant conjunctions of similar events? What should be the impact of Hume and empiricism in this era of great scientific and technological advances?
From the dictionary:
cause – 1. a. The producer of an effect, result, or consequence. b. The one, such as a person, an event, or a condition, that is responsible for an action or a result.(3)
effect – 1. Something brought about by a cause or an agent; a result.
And from David Hume An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding [Hume, David (Eric Steinberg, Ed.) An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding Second Edition;
Hackett Publishing Company, Indianapolis, 1993. ISBN 0-87220-229-1. Chapter on Cause and Effect, Part I.]
“All reasonings concerning matter of fact seem to be founded on the relation of cause and effect. By means of that relation alone we can go beyond the evidence of our memory and senses. If you were to ask a man, why he believes any matter of fact, which is absent, (for instance, that his friend is in the country, or in France) he would give you a reason, and this reason would be some other fact, as a letter received from him, or the knowledge of his former resolutions and promises. A man finding a watch or any other machine in a desert island, would conclude that there had once been men on that island. All our reasonings concerning fact are of the same nature. And here it is constantly supposed that there is a connection between the present fact and that which is inferred from it. Were there nothing to bind them together, the inference would be entirely precarious. The hearing of an articulate voice and rational discourse in the dark assures us of the presence of some person. Why? Because these are the effects of the human make and fabric, and closely connected with it. If we anatomise all the other reasonings of this nature, we shall find that they are founded on the relation of cause and effect, and that this relation is either near or remote, direct or collateral. Heat and light are collateral effects of fire, and the one effect may justly be inferred from the other.”
And also Dave Hume, A Treatise of Human Nature [Hume, David (Ernest Mossner, Ed.) A Treatise of Human Nature. Penguin Books Inc., London, England. 1985.
ISBN 0-140-43244-2. Chapter 19, Section iv.]
“We have no other notion of cause and effect, but that of certain objects, which have been always conjoined together, and which in all past instances have been found inseparable. We cannot penetrate into the reason of the conjunction. We only observe the thing itself, and always find that from the constant conjunction the objects acquire an union in the imagination. When the impression of one becomes present to us, we immediately form an idea of its usual attendant; and consequently we may establish this as one part of the definition of an opinion or belief, that it is an idea related to or associated with a present impression.”
When Hume wrote these words — circa 1740 — he was reasonably correct in his characterization of our common every day understanding of the relationship between cause and effect. However, this was before the scientific revolution of the Enlightenment. In particular Newton’s First Law of Motion — “Objects in motion tend to stay in motion, and objects at rest tend to stay at rest unless an outside force acts upon them.” In other words, any event that we can observe constitutes a change in the previously existing status quo. And by Newton’s First Law, any such change requires the application of force — a flow of energy.
Since the time of Newton then, our common understanding of the physics of energy flow has constrained our talk of cause and effect. It is certainly true that we notice instances of cause and effect by the constant conjunction of events. But contra Hume’s suggestion above, for us to assert that one event another is to assert that there is a suitable energy flow from the causing event that initiates the change that is the effect event. Which is not, of course, to say that we are necessarily aware of what that flow of energy is, or of any details of the steps of the flow. It is merely to claim that there is such a flow.
The “higher level perspective” (“Humean causation”, or what I like to refer to briefly as “causation(1)”) is a view of “cause and effect” consistent with Hume’s analysis. An observed repeated conjunction of two events – one labelled as the “cause”, and the other labelled as the “effect”.
Suppose at 8.21 PM, I make an experiment: I think “Sound of thunder”. At that exact same moment, you seem to “hear” the sound of thunder. Only no-one else did. Cause and effect? How does one prove that? The way Hume says (in his rules for judging causes and effects)? If this happens just once, we mark it down as happenstance. If it happens occasionally but not consistently, we mark it down as simple coincidence. But if it happens consistently, repeatedly, and especially if we can make it happen at will, we can – a la Hume – recognize the concatenation of events as a candidate cause-effect pair. This sort of thing happens all the time, and is the general way in which we identify cause-effect linkages.
Combine this higher level perspective with the detailed reductionist focus of science. Science, in examining the suggested Humean cause-effect pair that is my thought and your hearing of thunder, will attempt to find out just how your thought “caused” my heard thunder. And it will do that by attempting to track the transfer of energy between your thought and my hearing. While Newtonian Mechanics is not the most accurate available theory of physics, it has been more than adequately demonstrated as sufficient for all but relativistic or quantum events. To propose, therefore, that your hearing thunder is the effect is to propose that the biochemical reactions in your head that is your hearing of thunder must be initiated by some application of external stimuli – an application of force – a transfer of energy originating in the cause – the biochemical reactions in my head that are my thinking “Sound of thunder”.
If scientific investigation cannot find such an energy flow (as would be likely in this case), then the hypothesis that my thought “caused” your hearing of thunder would be seriously questioned. Other sources of the noticed linkage would be sought before scientists would be willing to throw out most of our understanding of physics. Hence we have the “lower level perspective” of cause-effect relationships that is the flow of energy (application of force) between the event that is the “cause” and the event that is the “effect” (“Newtonian causation”, or what I like to refer to briefly as “causation(2)”) that acts as a constraint on our “freedom” to notice pairs of Humean cause-effect conjunctions of events.
Understanding the relationship between “cause” and “effect” is critical to our understanding of reality, and critical to how we survive “The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune”. From the perspective of physics, the link between a cause and its effect can be determined by following the flow of energy. The cause is always the creator of the energy that triggers the effect. But at the “higher” level of practical day-to-day events, the link between cause and effect is often simply a Humean observed correlation between the occurrence of two sets of circumstances.
Which set of circumstances is the cause and which is the effect is often not clear. If we choose the wrong set as the “cause”, we often find ourselves pursuing theories of how reality works that become overly complex, and ultimately self-defeating. By reversing field, and realizing that we have the cause-effect relationship backward, we discover that our theories become simpler, that they have broader application, and that they offer greater opportunities for deeper understanding. When we get our understandings wrong, we run the risk of becoming lunch rather than enjoying it. But take heart. We are pretty good at doing it right. We are descendants of a long line of hungry but fragile omnivores who have successfully managed to predict where and when the tiger will jump.
How can there NOT be a God? It appears as if the world is existing, in some manner of temporally linear fashion, and has existed for some amount of time. If the so called “laws of cause and effect” are any gauge, it seems that the world, if it is in fact existing, has to have begun at some point. So time, insofar as events happen and things endure, exists, and the world had to have started; that is to say, it can’t be temporally infinite, for this would violate the laws of cause and effect with the problem of an infinite regression. But it couldn’t have simply happened out of nothingness, could it? Someone must have started it. Right?
You raise an interesting point.
However, have you considered that if we do assume that there is a God that started it all, all of the issues you raised with regards to the existence of the world can be raised with regards to the existence of God. Consider this re-phrasing of your question:
How can there NOT be a Hyper-God? It appears as if God is existing, and has existed for some amount of time. If the so called “laws of cause and effect” are any gauge, it seems that God, if it is in fact existing, has to have begun at some point. So time, insofar as events happen and things endure, exists, and God had to have started; that is to say, it can’t be temporally infinite, for this would violate the laws of cause and effect with the problem of an infinite regression. But God couldn’t have simply happened out of nothingness, could it? Someone must have started God. Right?
I think you see the potential for just as significant an infinite regress. There are two ways (at least) out of this seeming dilemma. One is the suggestion that God is outside of time and space, and beyond the scope of the laws of causation, so that there are no questions of there being something “before” God. But this is more or less inconsistent with the Christian notion of a “personal God” who hears and responds to our prayers. The other is the suggestion that God is (by definition?) infinite in duration and infinite in scope, so again there is no question of there being something “before” God. But if it is acceptable for God to have infinite temporal duration, why is it not acceptable for the world to have infinite temporal duration?
In short, I do not accept as reasonable your suggestion that “someone must have started” the world.
