Now that the semester is (nearly) over, I’ll be able to devote much more attention to blogging and reading. In other news, it looks like I’ll be attending the MA program at University of Missouri, St. Louis in the fall. I’m really excited to work with I take to be some great minds in the philosophy of mind and cognitive science. Also worth noting: my paper, that I recently gave a presentation on, will be published in Res Cogitans during late summer. I’ll link to that shamelessly once it is up. Some news tidbits:

• Philosophy and Computation (a conference in Lund, Sweden) will be live-streaming on Sunday, and if you have an hour or two free you should definitely check it out.
• Atheism and the Case Against Christ will be coming out in July. I’ve already read through it once, and I’ll be reading through it again and provide a review shortly before it comes out. I highly suggest picking up a copy!
• Leah from Unequally Yoked will be beginning the Ideological Turing Test again soon. It’s a neat opportunity to play Devil’s Advocate to your own position and to evaluate arguments from both sides. I’m looking forward to it.
• John Loftus has a post up wondering about what would happen to Christianity if Christians simply stopped spreading the Gospel. I’d be interested in hearing a response from any theists about what they think would happen.
• Mike from Foxhole Atheism has a post up titled Is Naturalism a Type of Faith?. As far as I can tell, it’s a more modest argument about methodological naturalism (science, etc.) than metaphysical naturalism, but I think an interesting argument could be extended to cover both.

I’ve been reading the debacle over Krauss’s recent comments about philosophy with a great deal of interest. It started off with an interview in the Atlantic in which Krauss argued that physics has made philosophy obsolete, and he seemingly back-tracked over some of the claims he had previously made in regards to his book. This gathered a fury of responses from philosophers and scientists alike (one of the better ones) that denounced his wide dismissal of the utility of philosophy. Krauss then sought to clarify his position in this article in Scientific American. Personally, I thought Krauss’s response was careful and respectable, but I’d like to talk a bit about what I think philosophy is, and what it’s aim should be (or is).

This back-and-forth has made me think a lot about the nature and utility of philosophy. Philosophy is notoriously hard to define, and I think it’s purpose or end goal is even more difficult to narrow down. A lot of people think it’s about knowing “how to live the good life” or “knowing the good” or other similar questions. I’ve actually got a slightly different contention, one which is informed by Wilfrid Sellars’s Philosophy and the Scientific Image of Man. In this work, which I highly suggest reading in its entirety, Sellars defines the task of philosophy as follows:

“The aim of philosophy, abstractly formulated, is to understand how things in the broadest possible sense of the term hang together in the broadest possible sense of the term. Under ‘things in the broadest possible sense’ I include such radically different items as not only ‘cabbages and kings’, but numbers and duties, possibilities and finger snaps, aesthetic experience and death. To achieve success in philosophy would be, to use a contemporary turn of phrase, to ‘know one’s way around’ with respect to all these things, not in that unreflective way in which the centipede of the story knew its way around before it faced the question, ‘how do I walk?’, but in that reflective way which means that no intellectual holds are barred.”

He has a very specific meaning for “to know one’s way around [with respect to all these things]“, and hopefully I can paint a brief picture of how it relates to the overall scope of philosophy. Sellars differentiates between two views of the world, one which he calls the manifest or man-in-the-world (I like the German word, dasein). The manifest can be described as “a sophistication and refinement of the image in terms of which man first came to be aware of himself as man-in-the-world; in short, came to be man.” He characterizes the manifest as being concerned especially with persons and things so that normativity and reason are central concerns of this type of image (consider how one might reason about another person’s behavior: ‘They may have gone to the party because they didn’t have to work the next morning.’) The manifest image can change, Sellars argues, empirically (by improving our observations through inductive reasoning) or categorically (from Cartesian mind-body dualism to believing humans are fully physical beings).

The scientific image, on the other hand, can hypothesize about new frameworks and indeed build on and correct them, in the hopes that one day there will be an exhaustive and complete description of what there is and the explanation of the processes at work in the universe. Sellars argues that the scientific image often clashes and presents a “rival” image to the manifest, and he sees the principle task of philosophy to, as he concludes, “transcend the dualism of the manifest and scientific images of man-of-the-world.”

In order to further clarify, we can look at this task in the context of a specific philosophical problem: free-will. I won’t attempt to provide a resolution, but we can begin to see the layout of how these problems and potential solutions might develop. The manifest arguably sees human beings as possessing agency, or the freedom of the ‘will’ to delineate between courses of action through reasoning and reflection. While the manifest image of free-will may arguably understand the psychological, biological, and neurological constraints upon these freedoms (and this has changed the landscape of the manifest in how we think about freedom which is now far less radical – as we might excuse people who are “in the heat of passion” or “mentally unfit” from their actions), the manifest is primarily concerned with how this relates to our observations about the world. We generally think of people as agents who could have done otherwise given the same situation.

This can’t be construed scientifically, and indeed it might be counter to what we could represent in a physical system emulated by science. In neuroscience, for example, Benjamin Libet’s experiments in the 1980′s seems to undermine many of the principles we might take for granted in delineating about free-will. It seems that unconscious processes might “decide” our actions before we are consciously aware of them, which severely undermines the idea that we can properly reason about courses of action.

The task of philosophy, one might argue, is to somehow reconcile or transcend these two images and their representations of freedom. To give an argument for how the manifest and scientific image could be seen as a single, cohesive narrative about the freedom of human beings. Philosophers have begun to do just such a thing, and there are a myriad of positions which disagree about how exactly to do that.

We can see this in a survey of two positions, compatibilism and incompatibilism. Compatibilism would argue that freedom of the will and determinism (all of our actions are a result of the causes before them) are actually compatible positions. (More on the position can be found here.) Compatibilism might be seen as a hybrid of the manifest and scientific and would attempt to provide a compelling narrative on how we could view freedom. Incompatibilism, on the other hand, would suggest that perhaps freedom is a concept that is not salvageable, and argues for a dismissal of the former view of the manifest.

With that example, we can see how philosophy operates and what it is attempting to accomplish. A complete and sophisticated account of human freedom is indispensable, as it informs so many other aspects of our lives: economics, politics, our justice system, etc. If we buy what Sellars is selling (ha!), then we can see the principle task of philosophy is weaving together the various specialties in a broader, more general sense so that we can properly “find our way around”.

I was at a philosophy conference this weekend, and in the same section in which I delivered a paper, there was another that compared natural and non-natural epistemologies. In the paper, the author argued that naturalists and non-naturalists (if I remember correctly, he compared Quine, Kim, Plantinga, and another naturalist) agree on most aspects, but naturalists simply “close themselves off” to anything that isn’t informed by a scientific approach. That is, naturalists unnecessarily limit themselves due to a committment to methodological naturalism, and close themselves off to other avenues for gaining knowledge.

I could tell, from the use of Plantinga, very early on where the paper was going. He (the author) mentioned “sensus divinitatis” as an example of such an avenue. He described how someone might see a mountain and “immediately know” that they were a result of God’s handiwork rather than just a process of natural creation. My initial response was a  bit snarky: I simply asked if I could claim to have knowledge through a “sensus Zeusitatis”  in the same way that Plantinga might claim to have knowledge of his God. The author, an incredibly nice and genuine guy, simply remarked “I don’t know. I suppose.” I’ve thought quite a lot about this issue since, and I’d like to further explore a different aspect.

John Calvin describes “sensus divinitatis” as follows:

“That there exists in the human mind and indeed by natural instinct, some sense of Deity [sensus Divinitatis], we hold to be beyond dispute, since God himself, to prevent any man from pretending ignorance, has endued all men with some idea of his Godhead…. …this is not a doctrine which is first learned at school, but one as to which every man is, from the womb, his own master; one which nature herself allows no individual to forget.” (Calvin)

You might ask, why should I trust this to be reliable? After all, people claim to have all sorts of crazy experiences all of the time. While you might not suspect they are always lying, there are probably better explanations for these moments than a genuine religious experience. Well, if God does exist, we might expect this sort of sense to be shared among humans. Alvin Plantinga has famously argued in Warranted Christian Belief (WCF) that this process could be reliable (as long as God exists) even if  it does not appear so by examining it through the use of reason:

“Suppose our battery of ways of formingbeliefs, our belief-forming faculties, are in fact reliable; suppose, indeed, that we have been created by God,who intended that we be able to know the sorts of things we think we know by virtue of just such a batteryof faculties: reason, memory, sense perception, introspection, sympathy, the sensus divinitatis and the internal instigation of the Holy Spirit (see below, chapter 8), if there are such sources of belief, and all the rest. What reason is there to think that if these faculties are reliable, then it would appear that they are from the perspective just of reason, that bit of memory, and introspection?”

Plantinga has a much less ambitious goal in mind for WCF than actually validating theism or his own brand, Christianity. He is arguing that given God’s existence, we can expect a sort of “sensus divinitatis” to be reliable. He’s making the claim that if God wanted us to know things from this battery of senses (taste, touch, smell, sight, reason, sensus divinitatis, the Holy Spirit, etc.), it’s not necessarily true that something that is apparent to one sense (say the existence of God by way of the sensus divinitatis) would be readily apprehensible by another (sight, for instance). Plantinga notes that not everyone benefits from a properly functioning sensus, as we have all been corrupted by sin.

There have been a wide range of objections to this sort of claim. One is to argue that this sort of view is too permissive and that this sense can’t be considered reliable. If you want to claim a special knowledge of God given to you by a sort of magical sense, we need a way to make sure that (1) you are not pulling the wool over our eyes when talking about your religious experience and (2) we can differentiate between valid magical senses and non-valid magical senses. When I have a Christian telling me they have had religious experience of the God of the Bible, and a Hindu telling me that they have had religious experiences related to their faith, who do I trust and why? (See Dr. McCormick’s “sensus atheistus” post for more on this line of criticism.)

Others might be inclined to simply grant Plantinga’s argument, as it is a seemingly trivial claim (for example, here). As Luke points out in that article, Plantinga’s argument doesn’t accomplish much. If God exists, then belief in God is warranted. So? Well, I’d like to explore this claim a bit more. Let’s take Plantinga’s thesis for granted: we have a sensus divinitatis that operates as a conduit for God and in some mysterious way, independent of reasonable reflection, we can immediately apprehend God’s existence.

We know that Christianity (or mono-theism or classical theism) is a relatively modern belief, and that most primitive religions didn’t share these sorts of doctrines. Instead, we have polytheism, rampant mysticism, and tribal religions which don’t resemble any of the sort of monotheistic religions which are prevalent today. Presumably, these mechanisms also operated in these primitive peoples in the same way that our other senses presumably did. Why were they mistaken? Why did they not apprehend the God of monotheism as the correct author of these supernatural yearnings? If they had the same sense, shouldn’t they have gotten the same result?

One might argue that we have progressed, in some sense of the term, in our religious knowledge. We could argue that in the same way these primitives erred in regards to reason, they also erred in their appraisal of their sensus divinitatis. (Notice: we don’t have widespread disagreement about what color the sky is, so we’ve already moved past some sort of “immediate apprehension”.) They simply didn’t have the requisite ‘knowledge’ from this sensus that we have to make an informed decision. I don’t see how one can sensibly advocate for “progress” in regards to the sensus as it is described by Calvin, Plantinga, etc. The sensus isn’t like our reasoning faculties: we can’t acquire new knowledge and adopt different conclusions. We can’t know the conclusions provided to use by the sensus by reasoning about it.

The answer appears obvious: we can’t be sure we are right about God and they were wrong. In fact, we might even assume that the secularism of modern society (the increased emphasis on reasonable reflection, etc.) might further distance ourselves from this sense, and instead we should adopt the religions of yore. After all, they haven’t been corrupted by an adulterated sensus divinitatis as ours unquestionably has. I think that this vast difference in religious traditions in the history of humanity offers us a reason to suspect that even if God exists, our sensus may still be unreliable.

I’m an avid reader of Prosblogion, and their most recent post by Helen De Cruz examines the results of a survey they had posted earlier examining the Philosophy of Religion area of study, and particularly asking those classifying themselves as such to evaluate natural theology arguments. The results of the survey were interesting by themselves, but what I found more interesting was this:

One of the striking results from my survey on natural theological arguments is that most philosophers of religion are theists. Even if I restrict my count to a subsample consisting only of those people who are philosophers, who have listed philosophy of religion as one of their areas of specialization, and who are faculty or non-faculty with PhDs, the sample is overwhelmingly theist. Of this select subsample (N = 118), 70.3 % are theists, 16.9% atheists and 12.7% agnostics (the rounding explains why we are not at exactly 100 %).

It seems that we should both solicit and properly weigh expert opinion when forming a belief about a given proposition. For instance, if we are forming a belief about whether or not a particular cancer treatment will be effective, we ought to consider the qualified opinion of oncologists. If we polled oncologists nationwide and found that 75% or more thought the treatment would be effective, it ought to incline us to revise our original belief towards the ‘Yes’ side. If, however, less than 25% endorsed the effectiveness of the treatment, we ought to revise our original belief towards the ‘No’ side.

While the popular belief by itself doesn’t fix the truth of the proposition, it is reasonable to allow expert opinion to shape and adjust your initial estimate. More specifically, Cruz remarks upon the idea that we should trust the oncologist’s collective opinion over perhaps a pediatrist or a nutritionist or the rest of the scientific community as a whole. She quotes Alvin Goldman:

“to the extent that it is feasible, N should consult the numbers, or degree of consensus, among all relevant (putative)experts. Won’t N be fully justified in trusting E1 (expert 1) over E2 if almost all other experts on the subject agree with E, or if even a preponderance of the other experts agree with E?”

If Philosophy of Religion is indeed a relevant expertise to the question of whether or not God exists, should we adjust our beliefs to reflect the degree of consensus in PoR? If so, it seems that the strength of natural theological arguments are stronger than they get credit for.

Let’s consider the general population of philosophers and their respective attitudes towards the God question. From PhilPaper survey results:

God: theism or atheism?

Accept or lean toward: atheism	678 / 931 (72.8%)
Accept or lean toward: theism	136 / 931 (14.6%)
Other	117 / 931 (12.5%)

Rather than show the strength of the relative God proposition, however, I think this shows an unhealthy self-selection in the philosophy of religion as an area of study, and confirmation bias when evaluating natural theological arguments. One commenter wrote on the initial survey (emphasis mine):

Consider just one: In a foundational experiment on cognitive bias researchers investigated effects of argumentation on proponents and opponents of capital punishment—talking about a Lord paper. Both sets of participants read summaries of the procedures, results and critiques of studies on the deterrent effects of capital punishment. One set of documents provided evidence of the deterrent efficacy of punishment, and this set referred to research done in the same U.S. state before and after capital punishment was instituted. The other set of documents provided evidence of the deterrent inefficacy of punishment, and this set referred to research done in different states, some with and some without capital punishment. Half of each group was given the first set showing deterrent efficacy and half of each group was given the second set showing inefficacy. In other words half of each group had their pre-theoretical beliefs confirmed by the available evidence and half of each group had them disconfirmed.

The results exhibited a pattern of cognitive bias that became a focus of continued research in subsequent decades. Participants in both groups considered the documents supporting their convictions to represent a well-designed study that offered valuable evidence about the utility of capital punishment. Participants did not ignore counterevidence to their convictions; instead they thoroughly, carefully criticized the evidence against their convictions. 

The above study that the commenter referenced shows that people have an uncanny ability to judge even comparable research in light of their own predispositions, and one can only imagine how much stronger this propensity is when discussing something as personal and powerful as religious faith and arguments for theism.

What does this say about the initial survey results about the strength of natural theological arguments? I think it’s safe to say we shouldn’t rely upon those who classify their area of study as PoR to properly evaluate the strength of arguments in support of theism. As Cruz points out, it’s much like asking astrologers to judge the efficacy of astrology. Not that theology is as prima facie fake as astrology, but that those interested have a vested interest in seeing it succeed. We might also consider the initial decision to choose Philosophy of Religion as a vocational interest. It seems odd for many atheistic philosophers to devote significant time during their careers to a question they find devoid of content. Theist philosophers, on the other hand, must feel that questions residing in PoR are of the utmost importance.  This might help to explain a higher concentration of theist philosophers dominating PoR, while they are a small minority among the overall field.

Well, I did not see that one coming. It’s taken me awhile to fully appreciate cl’s rather unorthodox reply, and I admit I am still largely confused as how to take it. Right off the bat, cl admits that Peter’s “needless suffering” exists, but cl doesn’t see that this conflicts with the God of the Bible:

I’ve concluded that needless suffering exists. On my view, sin caused death, suffering and so-called “natural evil.” According to Genesis, God made the world good and humans had eternal life. Sin entailed a fall from the highest possible good. It was not necessary, God did not desire it. The suffering sin produced cannot possibly be logically required for the higher good to obtain because the highest possible good had already obtained. Criticisms that God “could have made a world without suffering” are nullified.

Here, cl is arguing that we have already had the highest possible good, and that humanity’s actions have put an end to it. Sin, or presumably — the original sin — was a fall from perfection. Without coloring the debate too much, I have to wonder if cl is referring to a literal Genesis here, or a figurative one? It seems that cl must commit himself to a literal Genesis, as the evolutionary history of mankind doesn’t exactly speak volumes about a previous perfection where we had eternal life.

Moving on, cl disputes the idea that suffering is needed in order to realize a higher good:

Even though suffering is needless, eliminating suffering doesn’t eliminate any higher good. Suffering isn’t necessary to produce goods. Obviously, Jesus didn’t believe that removing suffering eliminated higher good, else no sick would have been healed, nor would commands to heal be issued. In fact, we would have been commanded to ignore suffering. This defangs Peter’s “obstruction of divine justice” argument on the spot.

This  strikes me as a plausible  response to this notion that goods are necessarily obtained through suffering, especially given the considerations of his argument above.

Argument from Ignorance, Incredulity

cl does take a page from the Skeptical Theist playbook by noting:

Peter’s inability to conceive of a higher good or logical requirement does not justify even the provisional assumption that none exists, and to posture otherwise is to argue from incredulity. [2] Similarly, my inability to identify a higher good or logical requirement does not justify even the provisional assumption that none exists, and to posture otherwise is to argue from ignorance.

This is one area of Peter’s argument that I also found weak, and I think this will force Peter to buttress the epistemic warrant for moving from a position of “it seems that there is unnecessary suffering” to “there is unnecessary suffering”.

However, considering the context with which cl began his post, one can wonder how relevant this is. If cl is simply admitting that unnecessary suffering exists (indeed, it seems cl sees all suffering as unnecessary under the proper context), we need not surmise whether or not this move is warranted. It’s simply irrelevant.

Analyzing Analogies

cl finds Peter’s analogies to be fallacious:

These are textbook examples of the fallacy from false analogy. [4] Magic notwithstanding, there is no remote possibility of reindeer flying. However, since several members of the class “suffering” are logically required to obtain higher goods, the possibility of Peter’s examples following suit seems significant. So why would he imply only a “remote possibility” that his examples might be logically required to obtain higher goods? Why would he imply that a measly $1,000 is commensurate to eternal joy?

I’m inclined to agree with cl on these. While I think I know what points Peter was after in these analogies, I think they were a bit theatrical and didn’t quite address the points he was intending them to address. After all, we have the requisite tools to determine whether or not a reindeer flies, but do we actually have the requisite tools to understand God’s purpose in allowing suffering?

Again, though, I must stress that cl’s opening concession makes this largely irrelevant. If cl is arguing that needless suffering does exist, then isn’t Peter also warranted in making this assumption? It seems the real point of contention is not this “noseeum” (from probable to actual) but rather whether or not needless suffering entails (logically or probably) the existence of the God of the Bible.

cl begins to point out possible goods that may have come from the Black Death:

Alternatively, historians such as Bowsky (1971) and Bridbury (1983) suggest the plague may have been a key turning point in European economic development: wages would not have risen had there not been such a drastic increase in the demand for laborers. Isn’t a deficit of laborers logically required in order to spur demand? Why does Peter act stumped? Are these not grounds to doubt Peter’s claim that his examples are “proof beyond reasonable doubt” of needless suffering?

I have to imagine that very few people will take the deaths of so many Europeans from a horribly violent and destructive plague as serving a higher good by the fact that it “may have been a key turning point in European development”.

I feel as though cl is wasting words here: why defend the Bubonic Plague at all? If natural evil is simply a result of our moral failure (original sin and the fall), then we are not owed an explanation for why it will bring about good, and the fact that it doesn’t is simply indicative of a rotten world that has fallen from God’s good graces.

Theodicies

cl makes a similar point to a worry I had about Peter’s theodicy critique:

Peter’s note that the soul-building theodicy cannot explain animal suffering is irrelevant. One cannot justifiedly fault a theodicy for not explaining a particular type of suffering when another theodicy can (consequence for sin). #4, defanged.

I agree with cl here. It’s unfair for the atheist to criticize a theodicy for not being universal when it simply isn’t intended to be so.

Black Death: Punishment by God

I didn’t see this one coming. cl says:

The Black Death was a moral evil that deserved punishment. Regarding Theodicy #2, Peter said victims “were not especially more sinful” than people today. According to the Bible, that’s false. Filthiness is sin.

cl is arguing here that the people who died from the Bubonic plague were being punished for being filthy. Moreover, he argues that the cleanliness laws found in Scripture could have prevented such a catastrophe:

Take heed, foolish humans! We were warned not to become “defiled” by rats or other animals designated as “unclean” [8] and warned not to eat anything they touched. [9] God commanded us to bury dung outside city limits, [10] to avoid contact with bodily discharges because they are “unclean,” [11] to cleanse anything a person with bodily discharge touches, [12] to evacuate and seal up any house with “greenish or reddish” mildew, [13] and if the mildew persists after seven days, to “scrape the walls” inside the house, [14] remove any contaminated stones [15] and dump them outside city limits. [16]

Among other things, Wikipedia lists, “decay or decomposure of the skin while the person is still alive, high fever, and extreme fatigue” as symptoms of bubonic plague, [17] and God specifically warned that failure to obey would result in—wait for it—wasting diseases andfever that would drain away our life. [18]

Interesting argument. Of course, Levicitus is ripe for the picking when it comes to dangerously absurd rules, laws, and customs. Should humans also take heed that eating shellfish is an abomination? (Lev 11:10) Should we also avoid planting two of the same crops in a field? (Lev 19:19) It seems to me cl needs to make a case as to why we should take the entirety of these laws seriously.

cl concludes by turning Peter’s own words to him:

This evidence is so strong even Peter claims it proves God’s goodness and glory “beyond a shadow of a doubt,” leaving him no rational alternative but to abandon atheism and acknowledge the God of the Bible. Peter recently wrote,

…knowledge of the germ theory of disease contained in the Bible rather than left to be discovered by fallible scientists would have saved billions of lives. Why [God] didn’t do so, given that it would prove [God's] glory and goodness beyond a shadow of a doubt, is unknown.” [19, emphasis mine]

My list is just the tip of the iceberg, and already we have something akin to modern hygiene and germ theory, delivered 3,000 years before Pasteur was so much as a twinkle in his father’s eye—by people atheists often denigrate as ignorant goat-herders.

A pretty interesting conclusion, and I’m anxiously awaiting Peter’s response. It’s hard to judge cl’s response, as the terms of the debate have certainly shifted. In the upcoming sections, hopefully we will flesh out a better response to the Free Will Theodicy argument that Peter originally brought up. If we are going to cast all suffering as generating from (or inherited from) the Fall, we will also need substantial warrant to take such a position seriously.

Cl addresses most theodicies in turn (although we didn’t see much interaction with the ‘natural law’ theodicy, and only brief mentions of free-will), and went to great lengths to alleviate one of Peter’s examples. I don’t think it’s fair at this juncture to deduct points for failure to respond to any specific argument (as, again, the debate has certainly shifted paradigms), but I will deduct (1) point from cl for failing to properly explicate exactly how we should interpret the Genesis story.  So, I will award cl 11 points.

I’m one of the three judges for the debate between cl and Peter Hurford. In the interest of keeping the judging as fair as possible, Peter and cl have agreed to have one atheist, one theist, and one agnostic serve as judges. I suppose I fall under the “atheist” category, and I want to thank them for including me in this discussion.

To qualify myself a bit in this particular subject, I spent a semester last year in a seminar class on the Problem of Evil, so I have a fairly extensive foundation in the state of affairs in philosophy regarding this debate, as well as a familiarity with the primary texts involved. While I certainly have a position on the issue, I’m going to attempt to remain as objective and impartial as humanly possible. My overall impression of Peter’s opening statement was very positive.

Needless Suffering

Peter begins by delineating what needless suffering entails:

“Put simply, needless suffering is anything that causes pain to an entity capable of feeling it and is not logically required in order to realize a higher benefit for that entity or other entities.”

The language “an entity capable of feeling it” is a bit vague, but it seems he is referring to an idea roughly equivalent to sentience. None of his examples tie him to any necessary definition here, so we can operate under that assumption. He makes the claim by that if needless suffering exists, we do not live in the best possible world, which is to say by eliminating the needless suffering we will improve our world.

The pain of surgery and recovery, under Peter’s definition, would be an example of necessary suffering. We endure surgery and the pain of recovery in order to save us from more pain or severe consequences down the road.

I think this example actually fails as necessary suffering under Peter’s definition, though. The suffering of surgery is not “logically required” in order to realize a higher benefit – after all, God could magically remove a kidney without having a person endure the pain in surgery. I think this is a slip between natural/logical possibility and the entailment relationships, but it’s not terribly prudent to pursue it anymore here.

Assumptions & The Problem of Evil

Peter makes two assumptions: (1) Theism posits the existence of a God that is benevolent and omnipotent and (2) this God would have no reason to allow needless suffering. He omits omniscience here (I assume accidentally), but other than that this is a pretty basic description of the Problem of Evil. Knowing this debate isn’t about the general Problem of Evil, he makes a distinction:

“This is called the Problem of Evil, even though the debate isn’t about evil actions per se, but rather needless suffering as a whole.”

Peter is roughly reforming Rowe’s evidential argument from evil, arguing that God and needless suffering are mutually exclusive.

Peter’s 3 Examples of Needless Suffering

Peter has three examples of needless suffering in mind that he thinks are impossible for an omni-God to allow:

(a) Babies that suffer intensely and die from birth defects

(b) Nonhuman animals that suffer intensely in the wild and in our factory farms

(c) The Bubonic Plague that killed 25 million people in the 14th century.

Example (b) is a page right out of Rowe’s book. Rowe’s prototypical example of gratuitous evil (‘needless suffering’) is a small fawn, Bambi, dying a slow and painful death over a matter of weeks from egregioius burns. Examples (a) and (c) are evils that don’t result from human choice but rather are a consequence of living in our environment. Peter wishes to argue that these are needless because “no higher benefit can be identified that would logically require any of these examples.”

Peter then turns to theodicies, or attempts to explain why certain flavors of suffering might exist given the existence of God. He feels that by undermining the  cases for these theodicies, he buttresses the case for these being instances of unnecessary suffering.

Theodicy #1 Free Will  

Peter briefly talks about the Free-Will theodicy, but dismisses it fairly quickly as he says:

But I need not draw Cl into a long debate over the nature of free will, since it is quite clear that there is no free will involved in any of the examples I mentioned.

I’m not sure this is entirely true (factory farming, human treatment of animals, fetal alcohol syndrome and other effects by poor choices of diet, activity, etc.), but it’s also rather inconsequential. The broad majority of specific instances of suffering under Peter’s examples do fall outside of the realm of human freedom.

Theodicy # 2 Punishment of Sin 

One popular theodicy is that suffering is punishment for sins, and Peter makes a three-prong case against this theodicy:

• Nonhuman animals don’t have original sin, let alone can make moral decisions capable of being sensibly punished.

• Babies with original sin don’t need to be punished for the original sin because they have not made any conscious choice to reject God or act malevolently.
• Given how uncorrelated sinful behavior is with suffering, this theodicy is highly implausible. Those who suffered through the Bubonic Plague were not especially more sinful than those today who have the advantages of modern medicine.

Peter’s third criticism of this theodicy seems to be the most profound. If suffering is punishment for sin, it doesn’t seem that it’s being doled out in a justifiable manner. Evil people can have lavish and extraordinarily pain-free lives, while saints and heroes can live their entire lives in the pits of suffering. It’s a strong criticism, and one that has certainly been echoed by a majority of phil-religion scholars.

Theodicy # 3 – The Need for Natural Law

Peter dismisses this theodicy by saying that (1) “there’s no reason an omnipotent God couldn’t make a world with a consistent physics that doesn’t have these examples” and (2) none of [his] examples are “remotely fundamental” to physics, and the world could operate just fine without the Bubonic plague.

I think Peter van Inwagen’s “massively irregular world” is a pretty good critique of Peter’s stated reasons. I’m not sure that the criticisms Peter levels at this argument actually address what the main thrust of this theodicy intends to illustrate. I don’t want to spend too much time editorializing, but the question a theist might ask of Peter is “What kind of world is one an atheist would find satisfactory? One in which God whimsically changes the laws of nature in order to prevent someone from stubbing their toe?”

Theodicy #4 – The Soul Building Defense

Again, Peter offers a three-pronged criticism of this theodicy:

• All three of these seemingly different defenses can be defeated in the same way – God could have instilled any of these lessons, love for God, or character from birth.
• Given that God knows all lessons, has infinite love for himself, and is of perfect virtue, yet has not suffered, there is no reason to think that suffering is logically necessary for these three things.
• None of these elements of soul-making are at all relevant to nonhuman animals or those who die too young, since they are incapable of any of these three things.

How do we know that reindeer cannot fly? Sure, we’ve investigated reindeer and not found any biological wings, helicopter blades, or jetpacks – but maybe they defy gravity through some undiscovered means. Sure, we’ve never observed a flying reindeer and observed millions of reindeer that don’t fly their entire lives, but this could just mean reindeer are holding out on us. Is this an argument from ignorance? Are we unfairly reasoning from “I can’t see a reason why reindeer are incapable of flight” to “Reindeer cannot fly”?

It’s been a while for blog posts!  With the stresses of applying to graduate school and finishing a tough semester largely behind me (besides the absolute turmoil of waiting for admission decisions!), I’d like to resume posting here as much as possible. Here’s some tidbits and housekeeping that I wanted to get out:

Ryan of AIGBusted has a response to “The Gospels Tell Me So”, continuing our slow but steady continuation of Luke’s “Christianity is False” Series. Here’s a snippet:

“In a nutshell, the authors argue that since the gospels say that certain miracles happened, we ought to believe them because we usually believe what ancient authors wrote (if they intended to record history). Now let me be very clear: I agree that in general we ought to believe ancient historians. But what about in the specific case of miracles? In the present day, we’ve investigated lots of miracle reports and found them to be mistakes, frauds, or not credible in some way. See the work of James Randi or Joe Nickell if you don’t believe me. That tells us that most of the time, perhaps all of the time, when someone reports a miracle it did not happen. Therefore, when it comes to miracle reports in the gospels, they ought to be considered false until rigorously proven otherwise. This standard is no different from the standard we apply to other ancient authors. After all, most of us wouldn’t believe tales of witchcraft occuring in Salem, Massachusetts or ghost stories from the ancient world.”

I’ve written a paper about Plantinga’s evolutionary argument against naturalism (piggybacking onto Paul Churchland’s response). You can find it here.  The introduction is as follows:

“Alvin Plantinga’s Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism argues that given the story of biological evolution and naturalism, we wouldn’t expect our cognitive mechanisms to be reliable, or that the probability of any given belief being true is very low. Given that our beliefs are generated by our cognitive mechanisms we have a defeater for all of our beliefs which include both evolution and naturalism. Paul Churchland responded by arguing that it is not our native cognitive faculties that justify our beliefs of evolution and naturalism, but the faculties provided to us by the sciences through enhanced evaluation techniques and artificial sensory modalities. Plantinga’s “innocent assumption” is that the theory of evolution and metaphysical naturalism are derived from our native cognitive systems alone, which undermines his entire argument. In this paper, I will argue that Churchland’s response is successful in defeating the conclusion of Plantinga’s argument in regards to biological evolution, and consider whether or not Churchland’s response is adequate in defense of philosophical naturalism. Finally, I will examine Churchland’s alternate proposal of representation as a map of possible experiences, and consider the consequences of such a theory in regards to the EAAN.”

I’ve been working on a response to Plantinga’s Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism, which has me reading the newest iteration of the argument in his book with Michael Tooley, Knowledge of God. In it, another argument against naturalism got my attention. A neural event will have NP properties (the physiological properties of the neural event), and content (the proposition itself: ‘There is a sabertooth tiger in the bushes’). Given a naturalism account of thought and conscious activity, it seems we have a neural event that is causally and logically sufficient for our propositional attitudes. So my NP properties are logically and casually sufficient for my belief that ‘My argyle socks look awesome.’ According to naturalism, we need not countenance an immterial self/soul that thinks those things, because our NP properties are sufficient.

Plantinga feels that it’s impossible to imagine/conceive of a way in which an “underlying reality” (that is, the NP properties/neural event itself) can account for thought. He notes possibly the most well-known appreciation of this problem with Leibniz:

“One is obliged to admit that perception and what depends upon it is inexplicable on mechanical principles, that is, by figures and motions. In imagining that there is a machine whose constructionwould enable it to think, to sense, and to have perception, one could conceive it enlarged while retaining the same proportions, so that one could enter into it, just like into a windmill. Supposing this, one should, when visiting within it, find only parts pushing one another, and never anything by which to explain a perception. Thus it is in the simple substance, and not in the composite or in the machine, that one must look for perception.” (SEP)

I’m rather nonplussed by the prospect of using our imagination or ability to conceive as a means of determining reality. When I was younger, I had no idea how microwaves worked, and I thought the lights inside must be incredibly hot to warm up my Hot Pocket so quickly. I was always baffled when I opened the microwave and found that the air wasn’t exceptionally warm and the lights weren’t even remotely hot. How did it cool down so quickly? Does my inability to conceive of how a microwave works have any bearing on the reality of the microwave working? Assuredly not.

Let’s examine Plantinga’s proposed solution. Pretend for a moment that Leibniz’ Mill is an insurmountable problem and it seems we need to countenance an immaterial self to properly capture the phenomena of thought. Peter van Inwagen points out the difficulties inherent with either account: why should it be any easier to explain thought via dualism (immaterial parts maneuvering to form thought) than it should for materialism (material parts maneuvering to form thought)?

Plantinga argues that they are different because typically an immaterial self, a soul, is simple. It does not consist of parts, therefore thought does not need to be explained by the workings of its parts. One might ask, how does it produce thought? It produces thought because it is a basic activity of selves to think. Just as an electron has a charge, immaterial selves have thought. Therefore, asking the question How does an immaterial self think? is just as nonsensical as asking How does an electron have a charge?

It is harder for me to imagine an immaterial thing that thinks basically than it is to imagine a combination of parts generating thought. It prompts a laundry list of questions: How is thought properly basic to an immaterial self? How can an immaterial thing think, and do we have good evidence for thinking that they do?  How can an immaterial self have parts or not have parts? Where does the immaterial self causally interact with the material self? The pineal gland?

It seems to me that this is just another ghost in the machine (a la Ryle), and does very little in moving forward sensical talk about the process of thought. The inability to imagine or conceive of a system producing thought has no bearing on whether it actually can.

I just read Ted Sider’s Hell and Vagueness after a friend of mine presented it in class, and I think it’s perhaps the strongest argument against the Heaven/Hell concept that I’ve ever encountered. I’ve seen variants of it before, but none that have been as persuasively argued and that have so clearly drawn the line in the sand. I’m going to focus on his argument about the concept of faith and its relation to salvation, but he also argues about moral judgments in his essay which I strongly encourage you to look at.

He begins by noting that Heaven and Hell are binary states: Heaven is really, really good - a place of divine worship and celebration. Hell, on the other hand, is the worst possible evil, a place of eternal punishment.  So, if we were going to put them on a spectrum, it would look something like this:

Heaven<——————————————>Hell

Of course, there are possible states in between that range from “Very good” to “Very bad”, but presumably these two are the best and worst, respectively. More notably, everyone goes to one of these two places: there are no destinations in between the two ends of the spectrum. (Annhiliationism might seem to disagree prima facie, but the underlying problem still remains) So, it seems that such a binary conception of reward and punishment should be judged by an equally binary scale: people without faith should go to Hell and people with faith should go to Heaven. While this sounds simple enough, Sider argues brilliantly that this is not the case.

But, as Sider argues, even propositional attitudes like faith come in degrees. It’s not as simple as “having faith” or “not having faith”, there are all sorts of positions in between. You could be doubting, but still believe in most Christian doctrines. You could be coming into faith, after having a lifetime of doubts. Drug addicts might profess faith until they fall off the wagon.  You could be a “weekend warrior”, as my church loved to call them, that professed faith sincerely every Sunday but forgot about it the moment the weekend ended.  At what age can we actually know what we are declaring when we say we have “faith”?

Or, of course, there is the other side of the spectrum. What exactly do you have to have faith in to go to Heaven? Do you just need to believe that there’s a higher power, and act accordingly? Do you need to believe everything in the Bible is literally the word of God? Do you just need to believe in the Resurrection? Do you need to believe in the Trinity? While Sider doesn’t explicitly address this in his essay, it’s a corollary concern that can also push the intuition that faith isn’t such a binary concept.

So, it seems like faith is a spectrum.

Absolute Faith <—————————————————-> No Faith

All of these positions would be occupied by a person with a distinct amount of faith (presuming we could build a rubric for what ‘faith’ requires). On one end we might have the Pope, Paul, St. John the Baptist, while on the other we might have people like Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, and other atheists without so much as a smidgeon of faith. In the middle, we might have the “Weekend Warriors”, people that are having severe doubts but still retain some semblance of faith, or people who are deciding whether or not they believe, etc.

But, God has to draw the line somewhere, right? He has to say “X amount of faith is required in order to grant access to Heaven”. He has to draw an arbitrary line in the sand that determines the eternal resting place of the individual. Here is where the crux of the problem lies: the people on either side of the line are going to be different only by the slightest amount. For the sake of illustration, let’s say that you could plot faith on a scale from 1F-100F (100 being “Absolute Faith”, 0 beings “No Faith”) and let’s say that God draws the line at 50.

A person with 49F is going to be minutely different from a person with 51F, but they are going to receive extraordinarily different retributions for those differences. The person with 49F is going to spend an eternity in Hell, while a person with 51F is going to receive eternal salvation by virtue of 2F! 

This hardly seems like actual justice. Imagine if we employed the same technique for stealing. If you steal an item that’s valued less than $100, you will a stern warning days in jail. If you steal an item valued at $100.01, you will be put to death. That’s absurd, and any reasonable human being will attest to the injustice of such a system. But, if we look closely, the Christian system is far more injust than the system I have just described. A difference of a modicum of faith will result in either eternal joy or eternal suffering, not simply two varying levels of “bad”, but an absolute binary opposite.