As always, I'd love criticism and refutation, I extremely encourage it. If I was right whatsoever, my name would be Hegel, and even Hegel's name wasn't Hegel. So I welcome all critiques in order to better formulate a descriptive truth.
I'd warn against reading outside MS Word to anyone attempting to do so. The formatting becomes quite disastrous, and without the ability to hover over equations and concepts to see their respective end notes, and believe me, you'll need the end notes, the meaning quickly gets lost behind the language. I'm attempting to port the current version to a web-friendly alternative, but I'm not quite there yet. At any case, here's the link.
Presuppositional Paradoxica: A Purely Scholastic Question (Draft 3)
Here is also a crude PDF (no hovering, hyperlinks for end notes, to test out how well converting Word documents into PDF and embedding them into these sorts of blogs works. I get a few issues on Chrome with zoom in/out, the drop caps, hyperlinks, hover abilities, and other formatting seems to be gone, but the headers, footers, and notes are there. Still working on a more complete conversion though. Anybody want to help, or, convert and post a Word document, as I know some of us are more fond of Word, just talk to me after class one day.)
I have, not a refutation, but a few thoughts.
ReplyDeletePage 2, line 21: "The Presuppositional Apologetic thesis is a line of discourse designed and unique to Abraham’s god. This is to say that it does not account for non-Abrahamic divinities such as, but not limited to: Zeus, Thor, Krishna, Buddha, or the legendary corndog maker from your local carnival." This is the difference between you and me. I would have stopped writing here (not that that's necessarily a good thing). The fundamental flaw, in my mind, with Abrahamic Presupposition, is that it specifically does not and could not account for other deities, or the beliefs therein, or even the fact that people might presuppose such beliefs. We'll ignore for a moment how the presuppositional claim is a claim for an epistemological A Priori which I find totally invalid. I suppose the point I'm trying to make here is that, as you say, "it must be noted that the Presupposer’s criterion of god is the stringed bottle rocket attached to their loose argument’s undoing." So I'm not introducing any new thought to you. So why am I writing this? I don't know, let's move on.
Page 11, line 20: "By having god as our subject, we are establishing that in some sense there exists, even if only imaginatively, a god. The term god, directly correlates with an idea, object, or subject within our own subjectivity. However, when an idea, object, or subject has a universal name that is a recognized by everyone, it is quite hard to call it imaginary." To be honest, I'm not altogether sure of the voice in which this was written. It seems to me to be an adaptation of the foundation of the Ontological Argument; that is, the way it is phrased seems to imply that having something as a subject necessarily entails existence. This might just be my misunderstanding of the language (it often is). As before, my question remains, even if I granted that such an argument is true, how do you get to YHWH/JHVH/Allah? Surely it must be impossible to know (as shown in the case of the divine logician) of an entity which exists outside logic, but it must be infinitely more impossible to claim to know the nature of said entity.
Page 12, line 12: "would you not find that the case for Martin’s existence was strengthened? Of course you would." I don't think I buy this. I don't think I'd take the belief of others, tenacious as it may be, to have any effect on my view of the veracity of said beliefs.
In all, I think the essay is a very thoughtful foray into the presuppositional argument. However, I must wonder, is there even a way of resolving this? Or could one simply just dismiss it outright as a logical paradox?
I suppose my ultimate thought is this, and it comes from the opening line of the RationalWiki page on Presuppositionalism:
"Presuppositionalism is a bullshitting tactic cooked up by Christian apologists when they realized that their old arguments were not working."
"This is the difference between you and me. I would have stopped writing here (not that that's necessarily a good thing). The fundamental flaw, in my mind, with Abrahamic Presupposition, is that it specifically does not and could not account for other deities, or the beliefs therein, or even the fact that people might presuppose such beliefs. We'll ignore for a moment how the presuppositional claim is a claim for an epistemological A Priori which I find totally invalid. I suppose the point I'm trying to make here is that, as you say, "it must be noted that the Presupposer’s criterion of god is the stringed bottle rocket attached to their loose argument’s undoing." So I'm not introducing any new thought to you. So why am I writing this? I don't know, let's move on."
DeleteHaha, I think it's Walter Benjamin that says sometimes you have to say it again. Nietzsche was fond of such a concept as well. And yes, the presuppositional argument is flawed in many ways, many more ways than we could ever express, or ever need to. Which is part of the reason I didn't just write a shorter explanation, just to show how intricately nonsensical the argument can be degraded.
"To be honest, I'm not altogether sure of the voice in which this was written. It seems to me to be an adaptation of the foundation of the Ontological Argument; that is, the way it is phrased seems to imply that having something as a subject necessarily entails existence. This might just be my misunderstanding of the language (it often is). As before, my question remains, even if I granted that such an argument is true, how do you get to YHWH/JHVH/Allah? Surely it must be impossible to know (as shown in the case of the divine logician) of an entity which exists outside logic, but it must be infinitely more impossible to claim to know the nature of said entity."
No you understand completely correctly. The argument is not deductively logical whatsoever. The implicative existence/language thing, to me, is really better seen in the categorical form on page 14. Which is simply to say when asserting propositions I always insert a member into the class that is my subject. It's linguistic trickery of course. It is by the limitations of language that our own language purports existential paradoxes, for I can not utter a subject without confessing that in some way that subject exists IN MY HEAD, not necessarily anywhere else of course. From what I can figure, we've already unburdened the presuppositional argument from having to attend to universal deductive claims, so now we must explore the presuppositional argument as a propositional attitude theory. That is, a theory of "I believe" vs "I know," and we must peer into the nature of how propositional attitude statements verify themselves in our very language as acceptable forms of truth, and how they propagate our existence, and influence our actions, etc. The voice changes in the last section from one of criticism, to one of sympathetic analysis.
"I don't think I buy this. I don't think I'd take the belief of others, tenacious as it may be, to have any effect on my view of the veracity of said beliefs."
DeleteDefinitely, even earlier in the Case, on note 13, which refers to page 8, I establish that logical consolation through another subject is consolation not fact. The claim here, and like I said before, this is an intentionally non-criticizing, sympathetic passage, is simply that there is a certain crude truth in numbers. That when the world was considered flat, to SOME it might've actually been flat, because they would never go pass a certain point in the water for fear of falling off. In that sense, their subjective reality, while in obvious confrontation with the facts, was indistinguishable, subjectively, to them from objective reality. Their objective and logical actions and decisions, while predicated on misinformation, caused them to logically conclude and act and exist in a reality in which they thought the world was flat. The claim is that when you have a majority surrounding you acting accordingly as such, your own reality is in influenced, because regardless of the facts, YOU have to live in a reality where these people are real, their actions are real, their actions affect you, and regardless of any truth to the matter, you have to deal with them (or write long philosophical essays about why they are stupid). You have to accept at a certain point that if we are all acting accordingly, then the distinction between subjectivity and objectivity is weakened. Perhaps that's a better way to say it than their argument is strengthened. If I'm in a red room full of blue people saying the walls are orange, who's the crazy one?
"In all, I think the essay is a very thoughtful foray into the presuppositional argument. However, I must wonder, is there even a way of resolving this? Or could one simply just dismiss it outright as a logical paradox?"
A paradox has truth, and the presuppositional argument is devoid of truth. I love the nature of paradoxes, and originally approached the topic as such, but the presuppositional argument is contradictory, not paradoxical, unless you accept the linguistic and inductive argument. (Which if you do, you also accept the arguments underlying message that for all intents and purposes, god is 100% deductively fake, and only a product of unified subjective experience, and you are a part of some otherworldly ~Logical+Logical existence.) So, to me, I'm calling it resolved. Now if you want to talk about "is god real or not?" Who knows. That's a different question. Is religion healthy? Different question. Jesus? A "meh" question. However the presuppositional argument is self-contradictory, case closed says I. I feel like all arguments should be approached in the particular though. Universal claims are so Kant. We're living in a Rorty kind of world. Can it be said that all theist argument will divulge into presupposition, and thus be false? Maybe. We'll have to take them as they come.
"I suppose my ultimate thought is this, and it comes from the opening line of the RationalWiki page on Presuppositionalism:
"Presuppositionalism is a bullshitting tactic cooked up by Christian apologists when they realized that their old arguments were not working." "
Haha, somebody get this man a hammer and nail head. Hit as directed.
Thanks for reading and responding BTW! We need to get together one day and you can show me the way of the writer.
DeleteIt'd be an honor, sir.
DeletePresuppositional apologetics is simply a debate tactic employed by theists to distract from the fact that there is nor ever has been any evidence for a god.
ReplyDeleteSimply put, the argument is this: you can't know everything so you don't know anything--therefore, (insert the nonexistent claim here) exists. Mathematically it's 99=0. Of course, the nonexistent claim inserted into the conclusion is usually an Abrahamic god.
Put another way: presuppositional apologetics claim you can't prove logic using logic, so logic can't be justified. Then the theists says--wait for it--therefore a god exists. (This is a logical version of 'you can't use science to prove science.) At this point, circularity and hilarity ensues, and it's often accompanied by ill-concealed laughter.
Here's how the theist's frames the argument.
The argument is based on foundational epistemology. The theist gets a non-theist to admit that we have to make at least one assumption, e.g., we're not brains in a vat, part of the Matrix, etc., or we don't know everything. From there, having admitted we have to make at least one assumption (presupposition) and we can't know everything, then we are no better off than the theist to make claims about reality. Then they claim a one of the thousands of gods (usually theirs) is the grounding for logic, so, therefore, my god. Yes, my God!
The trouble with the theist's reverse engineered god-of-the-gaps circularity is that science, evidence, logic, and the Law of Identity is grounded in reality as we know it. Without making the presupposition that we live in a material world, there simply isn't any way to advance.
Another problem, as Jon a William have dutifully noted, if we do allow the theist his presuppositional claim, they have to allow for all sorts of supernatural claims and further explain why garden fairies, gnome, goblins, ghosts, and the Flying Spaghetti Monster couldn't the the unmoved mover, the giver of laws, and the sustainer of the universe.
BIGFOOT EXISTS, AND HE LOVES YOU!!!!!!!!!!! I KNOW THIS BECAUSE BIGFOOT IS THE FOUNDATION FOR ALL EVIDENCE!!!!!!!!!
See what I did there.