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The Naturalists’ Conundrum

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Kantian Naturalist writes that almost all naturalists (including, presumably, himself) believe selection tends to favor true beliefs.

I don’t know why he would say this, because Neo-Darwinian Evolution (“NDE”) posits that selection favors characters that increase fitness as measured by relative reproductive fecundity. Per NDE, selection is indifferent the truth. It will select for a false belief if, for whatever reason, that belief increases fitness.

Now the naturalist might say that it is obvious that true belief must increase fitness more than false belief. Is it obvious? Consider the conundrum of religious belief from an NDE perspective:

1. By definition the naturalist believes religious belief is false.

2. The overwhelming majority of people throughout history have held religious belief.

3. Therefore, the naturalist must believe that the overwhelming majority of humans throughout history have held a false belief.

4. It follows that natural selection selected for a belief that the naturalist is convinced is false.

We can set to one side the question of whether a particular religious belief is actually false. The naturalist, by definition, believes they all are, and therefore he must believe that natural selection selected for a belief he thinks is false.

What is the naturalist to do? Indeed, if the naturalist concedes that natural selection at least sometimes selects for false beliefs, how can he have any confidence in his own conviction that naturalism itself is true?

Appeals to “the evidence” won’t save the naturalist here. Both sides of the religion issue appeal to evidence.

Comments
Phinehas:
1. How does where you stand differ from where the rest of us stand as flawed and exceedingly limited beings? 2. If your concept of the nature of God depends entirely on the inner musings of a flawed and limited being, other than that one was crafted by mind and the other by hand, what distinguishes your God from a pagan idol?
Well, in the first place, my view of humankind is that we are all perfect beings who have chosen to experience limitation during our temporary sojourns here on Earth. But even if I grant your premise, what distinguishes your conclusions regarding the truth of reality from mine? Who is it besides you in your limited and flawed nature that decides for you that scripture is the correct authority (and not any of the other claimants---the Koran, the Buddhist scriptures, New Age thinkers, etc., etc.)? The truth is that each of us is on our own when it comes to deciding who and what to accept as truth. It's the human condition.
3. As a flawed and limited being, are you at all concerned about the prospect of judging/condemning a God who created a Hell?
Not in the slightest. I am quite certain that the whole notion of a vengeful, condemning, and punitive God was invented by those in power as a way to control the population, nothing more. I believe in a perfectly loving God, in Whom there is no room for vengeance, condemnation, or punishment. I really have no doubts about that.Bruce David
December 18, 2012
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BA: re #63: The first time you brought this up, I followed your links. I distinctly remember that the descriptions the majority of the NDEs experienced by Thai people reflected a vision of Hell and the judgment process that was decidedly non-Western, and clearly reflected the way that their religion viewed Hell and the process of after-death judgment. Also, there was at least one in which the person experiencing the NDE was told that souls' sojourn into Hell was a purification process prior to their next incarnation. I'm not willing to repeat that search. It isn't worth my time. But in any case, you have attacked the peripheral points and missed the central one---that there are many possible explanations for the facts you present. Your picking one particular feature of Western culture, namely its religious heritage as the salient one upon which to build an explanation is arbitrary. You could have picked any one of many as the basis of your explanation. For example, there are a large number of people in the US and Europe who could be characterized as "New Age", for want of a better term. The experiences of the majority of people in the West correspond to the view of the afterlife held by them much better than that of orthodox Christianity or Judaism. Thus, you could have claimed that the reason that Western NDEs are as they are is due to the large New Age populations in Western countries. Or there is my hypothesis, that it is a belief that one is going to Hell coupled with a strong fear of it that appears to be present in Eastern cultures but mostly absent from Western ones that accounts for the differences in their respective NDE experiences. I'm sure I could come up with more alternatives to explain the phenomena if I wanted to devote the time to it, which I don't, particularly since I have made this point to you before, but you don't get it. This is the last comment I will post on this subject.Bruce David
December 18, 2012
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@Graham2 Suit yourself, of course. But before you take off, is there something you found particularly incoherent about these questions? - Are not both religion and faculties the end result of the same natural processes? - Do not both pass the ‘well enough to survive’ test equally? - If ‘well enough to survive’ is a trustworthy enough standard for our faculties, why is it not a trustworthy enough standard for our religion? I've tried my level best to approach the issue from a naturalist perspective. I'm only speaking of religion in terms of what exists and has historically existed in reality. To deny the existence of religion and its place in history would be to walk away from reality, not to return to it.Phinehas
December 18, 2012
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Phinehas: Im afraid this discussion has become incoherent. UD is amusing for a while, but I find the ever-present religion tiring, and I just want to get back to reality.Graham2
December 18, 2012
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BD:
In fact, the video is a strong confirmation of my point—love and judgment are incompatible. Where there is perfect love, there is no judgment.
and elsewhere:
But from where I stand, the idea that God would create a Hell so contradicts the nature of God as to be utterly ridiculous.
Curiously enough, I believe I wound up at the following video through the process of viewing some of the videos BA77 linked to at some point. (By the way, I 've long been wondering BA77 how you manage all of your links and information.) I love Tim Keller. So I was happy to find this sermon segment of his on Hell. As a self-proclaimed Christian, I found it quite informative. So I think there is plenty of room for all parties to be further informed, particularly those on the "outside" (BD? KN?) regarding concepts and doctrines related to Hell within the orthodoxy of the "church universal." If you are going to stand somewhere where "the idea that God would create a Hell so contradicts the nature of God as to be utterly ridiculous," you might as well continue in the ongoing effort of making sure that you are actually standing in the right place. Tim Keller: Does God send people to Hell? If you get the time, would love to know your reaction (any of you- insiders or outsiders). Does the view described comport with the notions you have previously found so easy to dismiss?MrMosis
December 18, 2012
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@Graham2 I simply mean that religions have been 'good enough' in the same way that our faculties have been 'good enough.' Both have resulted in reproductive success. (I don't think the same can be said for belief in Santa Claus, at least among those capable of reproduction.) Please forgive my use of the word 'gene.' I meant it in an analogous sense. Obviously, we don't have a 'religious gene' any more than we have a 'faculties gene.' I'm happy to use whatever terminology you think more appropriate to describe the natural mechanisms that gave us both our faculties and religion. For are not both religion and faculties the end result of the same natural processes? (If not, how not?) Do not both pass the 'well enough to survive' test equally? If 'well enough to survive' is a trustworthy enough standard for our faculties, why is it not a trustworthy enough standard for our religion?Phinehas
December 18, 2012
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In re: Box @ 75:
Kantian Naturalist, how do you explain the emergence of these teleological properties?
It's all about evolutionary love, babe!Kantian Naturalist
December 18, 2012
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Religions have been 'good enough' ? What on earth does that mean?. Santa Claus is also 'good enough'. Do you believe in Santa Claus ? 'Reproductively succesful religious gene' ? 'non-religious gene' ? Sorry, I pass.Graham2
December 18, 2012
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@Graham2 In addition to functioning pretty well, historically we've also functioned pretty religiously. Like our faculties, religions aren't perfect, but they've been good enough. If nature has gifted me, along with many others, a reproductively successful religious gene, is there any reason we should promote the less reproductively successful non-religious gene?Phinehas
December 18, 2012
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BD,
But from where I stand, the idea that God would create a Hell so contradicts the nature of God as to be utterly ridiculous.
1. How does where you stand differ from where the rest of us stand as flawed and exceedingly limited beings? 2. If your concept of the nature of God depends entirely on the inner musings of a flawed and limited being, other than that one was crafted by mind and the other by hand, what distinguishes your God from a pagan idol? 3. As a flawed and limited being, are you at all concerned about the prospect of judging/condemning a God who created a Hell?Phinehas
December 18, 2012
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ba77 @74 ... You continue to quote from biblical blogs, Metacafe, and people like Michael Egnor(!). These really dont help your case. As for the soundness of my faculties, they arent perfect, but good enough. Sure, we are prone to optical illusions, unrealistic optimism (all soldiers are sure they wont be the one to die) etc, but we function pretty well, well enough to survive.Graham2
December 18, 2012
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Kantian Naturalist: "I do think that all life is, just as such, teleological — from bacteria all the way on up, down, and sideways — so I’d say that teleological properties were first instantiated or actualized when the first living thing came into existence."
Kantian Naturalist, how do you explain the emergence of these teleological properties?Box
December 18, 2012
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i.e. if your thoughts are merely the result of the material states of your brain, and yet your cognitive faculties are unreliable on evolutionary naturalism, how is it possible that you would come to that truthful realization evolutionary naturalism produces unreliable cognitive faculties unless your mind was able to come to that realization independent of your material brain? footnote: The Mind and Materialist Superstition - Six "conditions of mind" that are irreconcilable with materialism: Michael Egnor, professor of neurosurgery at SUNY, Stony Brook Excerpt: Intentionality,,, Qualia,,, Persistence of Self-Identity,,, Restricted Access,,, Incorrigibility,,, Free Will,,, http://www.evolutionnews.org/2008/11/the_mind_and_materialist_super.htmlbornagain77
December 18, 2012
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what is this ” transcendent component” ? A reasoning "mind" that is independent of the material states of your brain.bornagain77
December 18, 2012
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In re: MrMosis @ 61: I do think that all life is, just as such, teleological -- from bacteria all the way on up, down, and sideways -- so I'd say that teleological properties were first instantiated or actualized when the first living thing came into existence. As to the question of abiogenesis, origin-of-life, I can say this much: (1) it's been a while since I've looked at any of the abiogenesis models, and none of them seemed really plausible to me -- though there was a time when Cairns-Smith's "clay hypothesis" tickled my fancy; (2) I don't see any in-principle, conceptual problems with the idea that living things arose when an autocatalytic set of molecules became enclosed in a semi-permeable membrane, and that basically is the "fold in being' of which Merleau-Ponty spoke.Kantian Naturalist
December 18, 2012
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I know I shouldnt ask this, but what is this " transcendent component" ?Graham2
December 18, 2012
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Graham2 you state: "I actually agree with Barry!" as to this,, "selection is indifferent the truth." But alas Graham2, don't you realize that you have just conceded the necessary premise to Plantinga's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism and thus undermined any truth claims you may make about your naturalistic beliefs? notes:
Scientific Peer Review is in Trouble: From Medical Science to Darwinism - Mike Keas - October 10, 2012 Excerpt: Survival is all that matters on evolutionary naturalism. Our evolving brains are more likely to give us useful fictions that promote survival rather than the truth about reality. Thus evolutionary naturalism undermines all rationality (including confidence in science itself). Renown philosopher Alvin Plantinga has argued against naturalism in this way (summary of that argument is linked on the site:). Or, if your short on time and patience to grasp Plantinga's nuanced argument, see if you can digest this thought from evolutionary cognitive psychologist Steve Pinker, who baldly states: "Our brains are shaped for fitness, not for truth; sometimes the truth is adaptive, sometimes it is not." Steven Pinker, evolutionary cognitive psychologist, How the Mind Works (W.W. Norton, 1997), p. 305. http://blogs.christianpost.com/science-and-faith/scientific-peer-review-is-in-trouble-from-medical-science-to-darwinism-12421/ Alvin Plantinga - Evolutionary Argument against Naturalism - video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r34AIo-xBh8 The following interview is sadly comical as a evolutionary psychologist realizes that neo-Darwinism can offer no guarantee that our faculties of reasoning will correspond to the truth, not even for the truth that he is purporting to give in the interview, (which begs the question of how was he able to come to that particular truthful realization, in the first place, if neo-Darwinian evolution were actually true?); Evolutionary guru: Don't believe everything you think - October 2011 Interviewer: You could be deceiving yourself about that.(?) Evolutionary Psychologist: Absolutely. http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21128335.300-evolutionary-guru-dont-believe-everything-you-think.html Evolutionists Are Now Saying Their Thinking is Flawed (But Evolution is Still a Fact) - Cornelius Hunter - May 2012 Excerpt: But the point here is that these “researchers” are making an assertion (human reasoning evolved and is flawed) which undermines their very argument. If human reasoning evolved and is flawed, then how can we know that evolution is a fact, much less any particular details of said evolutionary process that they think they understand via their “research”? http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2012/05/evolutionists-are-now-saying-their.html
Thus Graham2, since on the one hand you know that naturalism cannot guarantee that your cognitive faculties will be reliable, yet on the other hand your cognitive faculties are reliable enough for you to know that naturalism cannot guarantee them, will you be honest enough to admit that naturalism is false and that there is a transcendent component to you that was able to come to that truthful realization? Or will you backpedal and change your mind and say that you don't really agree with Mr. Arrington?bornagain77
December 18, 2012
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Similarly, belief in fictitious friends in the sky may give me comfort.
Is this effect similar to the ficticious mechanisms you believe exist without evidence now? :)Upright BiPed
December 18, 2012
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selection is indifferent the truth. It will select for a false belief if, for whatever reason, that belief increases fitness I actually agree with Barry! Now thats a worry, but I dont see any conundrum. Generally, our judgement has to be pretty solid, or we wont survive in the real world, but sometimes a wrong belief can increase our chances of survival, eg: an optimistic belief that I will be rescued from a desert island keeps me going. If I were to be truly rational, I would wade into the sea and drown ... this minimises my overall discomfort. Similarly, belief in fictitious friends in the sky may give me comfort.Graham2
December 18, 2012
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Central Scrutinizer: Not being a Christian, I have no serious interest in how Christianity is defined -- I'm quite willing to let whomever is a Christian define what that means. I was merely going off of how Plantinga sets up the conversation:
Many have claimed, therefore, that there is a deep incompatibility between evolution and Christian belief and hence between religion and science; but are they right? To investigate the question we must know how to think of Christian belief. Suppose we take it to be defined or circumscribed by the rough intersection of the great Christian creeds: the Apostle's Creed, the Nicene Creed, and the Athanasian Creed, but also the more particular creeds such as the Catholic Baltimore Confession, the Reformed Heidelberg Catechism, the Belgic Confession and the Westminster Confession, Luther's Small Catechism, and the Anglican Thirty-Nine Articles; the result would be something like the "Mere Christianity" of which C. S. Lewis spoke.
That said, if someone wants to emphasize the experiential side of faith, that's fine with me -- I have no objection.Kantian Naturalist
December 18, 2012
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KN:
Of course, if it is obvious that living things are designed, then there’s no need for an inference to design, is there?
Good question. To the one to whom it is obvious, there really is no need. However, it's often a good idea to have some currency in the marketplace of ideas. Michael Behe provides a good example. To him it was obvious that the complicated structures and processes he was studying in the cell were designed. However, he also felt that it was important to justify that intuition with some scientific rigor if he was to present it to the world. The result was Darwin's Black Box.Bruce David
December 18, 2012
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Kantian Naturalist: Christianity is highly unusual in the emphasis it puts on intellectual endorsement of a set of propositions.
Not true, at least if you use the New Testament as the basis of "Christianity." Jesus's message over and over was essentially, "put your full trust in me, I am the Messiah, I have the authority to judge the earth, and my death pays for your guilt, and if you do I will rescue you from the consequences of your rebellion", the operative word being "trust." It is not merely acquiescence to a set of propositions. It is about full trust and commitment to Jesus. He made an all or nothing demand. Anything less is not "Christianity."CentralScrutinizer
December 18, 2012
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correction: "there is a strong case to be made for a soul entering eternity upon death,,"bornagain77
December 18, 2012
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BD you claim: 'Notice by the way that this dichotomy is not universal. There is a small percentage of people in the West who experience unpleasant NDEs as well as a similar percentage in the East who do not.' Yet, I have spent hours combing the NDE websites, and the web in general, looking for extremely positive eastern NDE's, that are like the extremely pleasant heavenly paradise Judeo-Christian NDE's, and they are not to be found. Even the lone example of the Hong Kong woman who had a positive NDE, that you brought up a few weeks ago (which I knew about), was tainted for it turned our that she had been brought up with a British education, thus a Judeo christian influence can not be ruled out in her case. Thus you are either mistaken or you are being purposely misleading towards the evidence when you state. "small percentage of people in the West who experience unpleasant NDEs as well as a similar percentage in the East who do not" In fact the percentage in the Judeo-Christian west for unpleasant to pleasant NDE's is approximately thus: THE FOUR TYPES OF NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCES 1) Initial Experience (sometimes referred to as the "non-experience") Involves elements such as a loving nothingness, the living dark, a friendly voice, or a brief out-of-body experience; perhaps a visitation of some kind. Usually experienced by those who seem to need the least amount of evidence for proof of survival, or who need the least amount of shakeup in their lives at that point in time. Often, this become a "seed" experience or an introduction to other ways of perceiving and recognizing reality. Incident rate: 76% with child experiencers; 20% with adult experiencers 2) Unpleasant and/or Hell-like Experience (inner cleansing and self-confrontation) Encounter with a threatening void or stark limbo or hellish purgatory, or scenes of a startling and unexpected indifference, even "hauntings" from one's own past. Usually experienced by those who seem to have deeply suppressed or repressed guilts, fears, and angers, and/or those who expect some kind of punishment or discomfort after death. Incident rate: 3% with child experiencers; 15% with adult experiencers 3) Pleasant and/or Heaven-like Experience (reassurance and self-validation) Heaven-like scenarios of loving family reunions with those who have died previously, reassuring religious figures or light beings, validation that life counts, affirmative and inspiring dialogue. Usually experienced by those who most need to know how loved they are and how important life is and how every effort has a purpose in the overall scheme of things. Incident rate: 19% with child experiencers; 47% with adult experiencers 4) Transcendent Experience (expansive revelations, alternate realities) Exposure to otherworldly dimensions and scenes beyond the individual's frame of reference; sometimes includes revelations of greater truths. Seldom personal in content. Usually experienced by those who are ready for a "mind stretching" challenge and/or individuals who are more apt to utilize (to whatever degree) the truths that are revealed to them. Incident rate: 2% with child experiencers; 18% with adult experiencers http://www.theglobalintelligencer.com/aug2007/fringe BD you also claim: "that the Hell experienced by Eastern people in their NDEs is not a Christian Hell of eternal suffering." and yet,,, Near-Death Experiences in Thailand: Excerpt: The Light seems to be absent in Thai NDEs. So is the profound positive affect found in so many Western NDEs. The most common affect in our collection is negative. Unlike the negative affect in so many Western NDEs (cf. Greyson & Bush, 1992), that found in Thai NDEs (in all but case #11) has two recognizable causes. The first is fear of `going'. The second is horror and fear of hell. It is worth noting that although half of our collection include seeing hell (cases 2,6,7,9,10) and being forced to witness horrific tortures, not one includes the NDEer having been subjected to these torments themselves. (Murphy 99) http://www.shaktitechnology.com/thaindes.htm Horrific tortures??? In this following video the Experiencer speaks of it being unbearably hot as well as meeting 'lucifer': Near Death Experience Thailand Asia - video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8M5J3zWG5g Thus BD you are once again severely mistaken or are being purposely misleading to the evidence: BD you then claim,,, "The time periods are generally of finite duration, and conform to the notion of Hell inherent in the religion to which they subscribe." And other than your 'inner knowing' that has 'the ring of truth', and regression hypnosis pseudo-science, how in blue blazes do you know that these horrific tortures being witnessed in eastern NDE's are of finite duration and that they might be 'reincarnated' out of hell? In fact there is a strong case to be made on a sould entering eternity upon death: Albert Einstein - Special Relativity - Insight Into Eternity - 'thought experiment' video http://www.metacafe.com/w/6545941/ 'In the 'spirit world,,, instantly, there was no sense of time. See, everything on earth is related to time. You got up this morning, you are going to go to bed tonight. Something is new, it will get old. Something is born, it's going to die. Everything on the physical plane is relative to time, but everything in the spiritual plane is relative to eternity. Instantly I was in total consciousness and awareness of eternity, and you and I as we live in this earth cannot even comprehend it, because everything that we have here is filled within the veil of the temporal life. In the spirit life that is more real than anything else and it is awesome. Eternity as a concept is awesome. There is no such thing as time. I knew that whatever happened was going to go on and on.' Mickey Robinson - Near Death Experience testimony Luke 16 22 And it came to pass, that the beggar died, and was carried by the angels into Abraham's bosom: the rich man also died, and was buried; .23 And in hell he lift up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom. .24 And he cried and said, Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame. 25 But Abraham said, Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things: but now he is comforted, and thou art tormented. .26 And beside all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would come from thence.bornagain77
December 18, 2012
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I think it applies equally to anyone whose metaphysical position prevents them from seeing the blindingly obvious fact that living organisms are the product of design!
Touche! Ha ha! :) Of course, if it is obvious that living things are designed, then there's no need for an inference to design, is there? As I see it, there are two really interesting problems at work in all of these conversations: (1) are living things best described as purposive, teleologically structured entities? (2) what is the best explanation of why living things display the teleological features that they do? The hard-core materialist is someone who will simply answer "no" to (1). For those who answer "yes" to (1), then it's their different answers to (2) which demarcate the relevant positions.Kantian Naturalist
December 18, 2012
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KN:
Whereas this Kantian distinction allows me to be a realist about teleology at the level of organisms, a realist about immanent teleology, without having to endorse transcendent teleology.
This helps me understand the distinction. But I still don't understand what is now distinct. If an organism has its immanent teleology, at what point in its development did it "begin"? Arguably not the first cell surely? (presuming, for sake of thought, an organism of the variety that begins living in such a way (single cell.)) But at some as yet undetermined point, the organism starts experiencing/evidencing immanent/internal teleology? Relatedly, this seems to necessitate that the continuing of this sort of emergence of the "purpose-of-self" requires the repackaging of the "purpose" into the ingredients and instructions necessary to sufficiently organize the material precursors (into the pre-emergence form). In other words, this "immanent teleology" continues by way of its being repackaged into a seemingly strictly efficient-causal envelope. (Side Note: for which the entirety of the physical universe curiously lends a hand in shepherding along until the new steward of immanent purpose "emerges" from the aforementioned envelope. That is, except of course for the anomalous instances when the entirety of the physical universe instead seemingly conspires to thwart its emergence.) Also, depending perhaps on the answer to the question of when/how/where the immanent teleology arises/emerges from/within a given organism, the question of when it first arose/emerged is also quite interesting. Perhaps in the first stochastically "arrived at" self-replicating [while tolerating not too un-amenable modifications] molecule? In the RNA world? In the first "cell"? The first prokaryote? In the first protobiont? Why not in the primordial stew? Actually primordial Earth. Solar system. I'll arbitrarily stop there I guess.MrMosis
December 18, 2012
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KN:
I think that denying this fact of our lived experience — our lived experience of them as living experiencers themselves — is only possible if one is the grip of a powerful metaphysical doctrine which prevents one from acknowledging one’s own experience. And that’s what Epicurean materialism does.
Well put. I think it applies equally to anyone whose metaphysical position prevents them from seeing the blindingly obvious fact that living organisms are the product of design!Bruce David
December 18, 2012
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However, I can think of no way to make teleological [Aristotelianism] compatible with non-teleological Darwinism.
I think that they can be, because teleological realism pertains to what living creatures do -- so here we're talking about metabolic processes, reproductive processes, neurophysiological processes, etc. From where I sit, one can be a realist about teleology at the level without invoking teleology at the level of evolutionary processes. Despite all that, there are certainly times when I feel quite strongly the attraction of something like Peirce's metaphysics of "evolutionary love" (see also "Peircean Animism and the End of Civilization"). Though this may seem a bit odd to those of you who assimilate my views with "materialism," the fact is that I very much share the sensibility of Jay Rosenberg, who had this to say in his "The Elusiveness of Categories, the Archimedean Dilemma, and the Nature of Man: A Study in Sellarsian Metaphysics":
71. We have been asking for an explanation of why, with respect to epistemic ends and, more broadly, with respect to the representations of the world consequent upon the human epistemic activity controlled by those ends, man is as he is. Taken seriously, the Aristotelian proposal suggests that humans seek to understand and thus to represent the world as a matter of natural necessity. It is a law of nature that man, as a species, searches for explanations of phenomena and thereby comes to project representations of his world. Since it is the job of science to develop theoretical frameworks which provide explanatory accounts of natural laws, it now becomes a part of that enterprise to develop a comprehensive theoretical account of man-in-the-universe from which it will follow that men seek to understand and represent the universe of which they are a part. And the way to do this may well be by means of a total conception of the universe as a physical system which of natural necessity evolves subsystems that in turn necessarily project increasingly adequate representations of the whole. Crudely, our universe necessarily "grows knowers" and thereby come to reflect itself (picture itself) within itself. 72. Such a theory would treat man and the universe as fundamentally correlative. The fundamental nature of man would, of course, be explained by an appeal to the general character of the physical universe of and within which men is an evolutionary product. But, equally, the fundamental nature of the physical universe would be explained by showing that in a universe of that sort, and only in a universe of that sort, could there evolve a species of entity which generate representations of the total physical system of which they are but a part and thereby come to inquire into the fundamental nature of that system. 74. . . . We cannot understand the universe until we understand it precisely as a universe which is such that, within it, a species of entities evolves which seeks to understand and represent it. And we cannot understand ourselves and our epistemology until we understand them both as products of this total evolutionary system and as parts of the very process of its evolution. 75. . . . our universe thus conceived as understandable only as a total system evolving within itself a representation of itself is a philosophical old friend: the Hegelian Absolute evolving to self-consciousness. . . . What I am suggesting here is that we can now understand the self-actualization of the Hegelian Absolute as well, in terms of a synoptic empirical theory of man-in-the-universe which views the epistemic activities of persons and the fundamental nature of the physical arena in which those activities occur as explanatorily correlative, neither being understandable without recourse to a conception of the other.
Kantian Naturalist
December 18, 2012
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Hi MrMosis: If the captcha fails, it generally offers a go back, which should work. If you are composing something long, do it in Word or AbiWord etc -- set straight not curly quotes if you will put in links to other pages -- and then copy-paste. KFkairosfocus
December 18, 2012
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(I had a long reply last night, but forgot to do the captcha and lost it. This is an attempted reconstruction and is probably now out of date and out of synch with the thread- sorry in advance!) KN:
The paradigm of a supernatural being is a being that has psychological properties (beliefs, desires, etc.) but no biological or physical properties. (Clearly this would need to be refined to accommodate all real-world cases — it’s not clear if the inhabitants of the Dreamtime of Australian Aboriginal culture would count as ‘supernatural’.) But if we’re talking about the concept of “supernatural being” that plays a central role in Christian metaphysics, this definition will do quite nicely. So all a naturalist need do is contend that there are no beings like that: having psychological properties, but no biological or physical properties. Put otherwise, the naturalist contends that all the beings which have psychological properties, also have biological and physical properties.
Hmm that's odd. I had always imagined that, rather than God being made in the image of man, man was made in the image of God. That is, rather than [because we are intelligent and enlightened enough now to have moved beyond our superstitious anthropomorphizing ways] ruling out a first cause with attributes similar to our own, it seems entirely plausible and coherent to me to consider that our psychological, etc. attributes are to some degree subsets of like attributes "in" the "mind" of Subsistent Being Itself. Rendering all matter, energy, physical laws, etc. as the requisite supporting infrastructure. (Which are forever worthy of inquiry and study of course, including of the methodologically naturalistic variety- particularly for those serving purposes "higher" than one's own utility) ... What I struggle to come up with is how/why this view is less warranted than KN's non-Epicurean Naturalism (or any other related "naturalistic") interpretation. (not to mention the part about leaving the rubber of matter meeting the road of consciousness in the supernatural-within-nature realm of the "emergent") From whence the grounding comes that anchors the warrant to rule out supernatural existence with "psychological" or mind-like attributes? It seems the only viable grounds are necessarily of an emotional/identity sort e.g. "I don't wish to live/function/think as if that were true. Now, please hand over my naturalistic blinders. Just not the Epicurean brand!" The question though of why becomes very interesting.MrMosis
December 18, 2012
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