Johnny-Dee wrote: Hey Vic, I'm currently taking a grad seminar on Descartes, and I've been grappling with the "problem of the circle." This has led me to consider whether AFR arguments have a similar circularity. For Descartes, the circle goes something like this:
(1) I am certain that God exists only because I am certain of whatever I clearly and distinctly perceive.
(2) I am certain of whatever I clearly and distinctly perceive only because God exists.
How do AFR arguments avoid a similar problem of circularity. Of course, the AFR circle (if one exists) would be different, perhaps it would go something like this:
(1*) I am justified in believing my cognitive faculties function rationally only because God exists.
(2*) I am justified in believing God exists only because my cognitive faculties function rationally.
With all of this stuff on Descartes, this gave me a perfect opportunity to raise this question, which I've been meaning to ask you.
An excellent question, and one that I have come to terms with in my own work. I think I handle this issue better in my essay, “The Lewis-Anscombe Controversy: A Discussion of the Issues,” from Christian Scholar’s Review in 1989 than I do in my book. Or at least I shortened the discussion when I wrote my book. I cover it on pp. 58-60 of CSLDI. It has to do with the distinction between Skeptical Threat Arguments and Best Explanation Arguments. The idea is this: If we begin by raising skeptical questions about reasoning and argue from there to the conclusion that theism can refute skepticism but atheistic views cannot, then we run into trouble. If we, for example, raise skeptical questions about whether the law of noncontradiction is really a sound logical principle, and then we argue that if there is a God then God’s agency can justify the status of the principle of noncontradiction, then all we have to do is look at the fact that we are presenting an argument that is at the same time using the law on noncontradiction to see that we are caught in a circle.
A Best Explanation argument takes it as a fact that we do reach truths through inferences. Only if our opponent, say an eliminative materialist, says “Well, of course, there’s no such thing as rational inference, but so what,” then we point out the disastrous epistemological consequences of denying that there are rational inferences. The AFR as I construe it does not justify our confidence in rational inference with an appeal to anti-materialist metaphysics. What it does is insist that both sides in the dispute agree that there is rational inference, but while one side is trying to explain the rational in terms of the non-rational, our side is not. So I would never answer the question “Why do you believe that modus ponens is good logic?” by saying that God has created me and therefore that belief is true. If, on the other hand, I am asked why I think I am able to recognize that modus ponens is good logic, then I might give a theistic explanation at that point.
Steve Lovell's account in the linked paper on naturalism is very helpful as well.
Johnny-Dee's comment is here.
http://dangerousidea.blogspot.com/2006/11/outline-of-descartes-meditations.html#comments
3 comments:
"What it does is insist that both sides in the dispute agree that there is rational inference, but while one side is trying to explain the rational in terms of the non-rational, our side is not."
So your side is trying to explain the rational in terms of the rational? That sounds circular to me.
Guess I should mention that I am a Christian who believes that God created the world so that it is completely independent of Himself. I take it as a given that all natural phenomenon occuring in the world should have a "natural" explanation. In other words, despite being sympathetic toward your basic theistic stance, I don't find the AFR to be very effective or appealing.
Harold
John: The short answer is that I thought Steve Lovell answered you pretty effectively on the Euthyphro, and I see no reason why Steve's answer there can't work here. I may post a "long answer" later.
"Even though C.S. Lewis did say that reason had to involve the supernatural 'invading' the natural, the AFR is more an argument against certain forms of materialism which are ultimately self-refuting because they deny the reality of certain phenomena that critical reason depends on for it to exist. Of course God created the world to be independent of itself, and there is a 'natural' explanation for everything. But a natural explanation in a Universe created by God will be richer and more metaphysically suggestive than one in a chance, purposeless Universe. "
JD, if the natural world really is a creation of God, an independent reality from the uncreated divine world, then I don't see why a theist's or atheist's explanation for the natural phenomena in this world should differ in any meaningful sense.
As a theist I assume we would agree that at the fundamental level of the uncreated world, reality is different than in this created world. But I think it more consistent with the view of a truly independent created world that all the phenomena in it arose naturally according to the laws of that world. That means, I take it, that the ability to make rational inferences, consciousness, etc. have emerged from the natural processes in this world. And this seems to be exactly what science has so far discovered.
"The AfR goes deeper than that, down the 'fabric of reality'."
I understand that to mean that you would agree with Lewis about the necessity of the supernatural invading the created world for reason to occur. In other words, it would be impossible for God to create a world in wich some sentient creatures evolved naturally with the capability to reason. I believe that sort of God is less powerful than the One I believe in: Who created a truly independent world; a world that does not have to rely on the intervention of the uncreated world in order for it to work properly. And that is one reason why I think Lewis' AFR is theologically flawed.
Harold
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