Monthly Archives: January 2008

The Leap of Faith

Philosophy

Recently (when I’ve been posting), I’ve written a bit on rationalism and have been trying to construct a logical defence of it, both for myself, and for my (so far very well-spoken) critics.  I added a bit of a response here that attempted to clarify some points, but even that brings about more comments:

First:

We do use faith when we suppose that no monsters will jump out of our refrigerators and eat us. This isn’t blind faith, of course. It’s a reasonable faith based on experience. In general, monsters don’t habitate our refrigerators, no matter how long your leftovers hang about there! But there’s no reason why monsters should not be there. Nor is there any reason why dandelions should be blue one day instead of yellow. A Christian might say God wills such things, but there is no reason why God should not say, “Tomorrow I’ll make icebox monsters and blue dandelions just to remind men that they rely on Me more than they give credit for.”

This is where the fundamental issue is.  The “monsters in the fridge” analogy is something we take for granted.  We have never seen monsters in a fridge, and therefore we assume there shall not be monsters in the future.  This is an inductive argument (which I tried to allude to in my last post on this).  As Hume theorized: there can be no (deductive) logical justification for induction, it is merely a habit.  All arguments for induction are inherently circular (i.e. induction is only justified by an inductive argument).

So, when we say it’s reasonable to assume there’s no monsters in the fridge (which we agree), we have an inductive argument for that, and the only justification for using induction is that it’s worked in the past (which is an inductive argument itself!)

So, I think we both realize the same issue, and it’s pretty deep.  Science itself is an inductive practise, and is generally credited with being rational/logical – but it potentially has no rational basis!

Perhaps god (or God if you prefer) makes induction justified in this world, but you’re right that that does not ensure the future success of induction, so this is a problem for all of us (theist, deist, atheist, or whatever else).

As it stands (as there seems to be no philosophical consensus on any way to solve Hume’s problem from ~250 years ago) I think we are all left to take that leap and hold onto induction, since it seems as though it evolved from the basic habits of animal behaviour to a complex rational account of the world found in our minds today. So that is the leap of faith I’ll admit honestly to taking, and I think its one we all take.

Huckabee WTF?

Politics, Religion

We all know the Republican candidates have been wearing their evangelism on their sleeve in the US elections recently, but Huckabee (the front-runner) has blown the top, saying it’s time for a “to amend the Constitution so it’s in God’s standards.”  Even if he’s unsuccessful, it’s still scary this man is running for president (and doing pretty well).

If you’re in the US, please do what you can to keep the loonies out, and if you’re not, try to put pressure in anyway you can.  Most liberal, and even many conservatives (theist or not) can see the advantages of keeping church and state separate.

(Via Pharyngula)

Response on Rationalism

Atheism, Philosophy, Religion

I got some good responses to my The Logic of Rationalism post, in paticular I wanted to make a full response to this post:

Which brings me to this post. With respect to the author, aren’t you just advocating subjectivism? And are you really willing to say with intellectual honesty that even if rationalism is supported only by circular logic that you’d still use it because you don’t like the alternative? Because, and I am an expert in this arena, that would be faith, bro.

The problem here lies with Hume’s Problem of Induction: simply stated that there is no rational or non-circular argument for using induction.  Now atheist and fundamentalist theist both use induction everyday (if you open your fridge and don’t expect a monster to jump out and kill you – you’re using induction).  So every one of us makes a “faith leap” (if you want to call it that) in assuming induction holds (since it seems to – but that statement is itself inductive reasoning).  So I guess what I was intending to say is that without induction our lives cannot be lived, we are evolved to live on the assumption and that’s all we can deal with.

Now as for subjectivism, I’d have to say that I’m more agnostic on this point.  As it stands I don’t think the universe has shown necessary objective/teleological evidence, but that’s not really to say there isn’t.  I need to think more on this before I’m really sure where I stand.

I should mention that using a methodology to refute a methodology is actually a rather common test. I mean, what’s the point of relying on a philosophy that can be used to discredit it itself?

At the risk of overkill, how do you know your rationalism is reliable? If you’re following the logical dictums of Descartes’ cogito ergo sum, how do you know that your thoughts are reliable? After all, atheists usually allege that reason itself evolved by chance [or some inexplicable yet benevolent mechanism called natural selection for which they also cannot posit a reasonable materialistic origins for] so how do we know your reason and hence your rationalism is reliable?

We don’t!  But for me, it seems that without the jump to induction and working from there we can’t function as “rational” beings (whatever that even means).  I think the point here is that these are deep philosophical and interesting questions, that very much get beyond the classical arguments in the “is there a god” debate.  I think an argument for god developed around these ideas would be one of the strongest I’ve seen/heard so far.

And, above all, what is the objective standard for your rationalism? Or is it subjectivism all along? “I believe therefore it must be. I hope.”

I hope this isn’t the case. I hope you can provide me with the objective standard of your rationalism. Otherwise, I fear, you will perhaps have disproven your own existence. If “I think, therefore I am,” what are the consequences if one is not thinking?

– Sirius Knott

I don’t know about disproving my own existence, but I don’t know if Descarte was on the button with that one.  I’ll admit that I’m not a philosopher, but dabble a little with my spare courses.  I hope I responded somewhat to your questions (which are of the utmost interest), and I look forward to future thought and discussion on these topics (I’ll likely be writing/YouTubeing) more on this in the future.

Please Help the SSA

Atheism, Links

The Secular Student Alliance has done a lot to support the University of Alberta Atheists and Agnostics and other campus freethought groups, and they are constantly in need of financial support themselves.  Please go to the Friendly Atheist and click on the links to pledge $5, $10 or more per month to help continue their work.  If you give at least $10 per month you can get a signed copy of I Sold My Soul on eBay.

The Logic of Rationalism

Atheism, Logic, Religion

There’s a potential criticism of rationalism that is any defence of rationalism is built on rationalism and thus is a circular argument, and there’s therefore no justification for basing one’s outlook on rationality.

Neglecting the fact that it required a rational argument to attempt that bit of deception, lets see what reason I can develop for rationalism.

When one person has an experience (lets say you) and wants to share it with someone else (say me) for the purposes of advancing our groups collective knowledge (for survival or increased advantage), you have only a few forms of communication with which to transfer that knowledge (language, interpretive dance, but no direct brain to brain communication).  So for you to pass that experience to me requires a way to make it sound convincing and plausible.  At the same time, I don’t want to take in bunk knowledge from a kook (no offence intended), so I need a way of deciding whether or not the knowledge being passed is valid.  This is where logical reasoning comes in – you structure the argument in a way that is sound, and if I judge it to be sound and convincing I accept it.

So the way I see it, irregardless of if that initial claim of circular logic is true, there is still a good enough reason for me to live sceptically and to doubt claims of revelation.