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Sunday, July 10, 2005
Fran’s Sunday Ruminations: All You Can Be, Part 1
I'm not sure whether Eternity Road readers generally approve or disapprove of these Sunday Ruminations. They're more philosophically and spiritually oriented than the weekday fare, which might disturb the folks who come here for my political and sociological tirades. A lot of people are more comfortable talking about infant euthanasia than about matters of right, wrong, and ultimate reality.
(One very kind reader recently wrote to tell me that he prints out these Sunday screeds and reads them aloud to his wife when the two of them are in their hot tub. That was extremely complimentary of him and most gratifying to learn, but in all probability, not all three hundred of you possess wives. Some of you might not even possess hot tubs.)
Whatever your attitude toward these topics and the thoughts I express on them, I implore you all to recognize and remember this: Mine is a single mind. I strive consciously toward greater integration of all my premises and convictions; indeed, I've been doing so for many years. If you dismiss the philosophical and spiritual explorations as being outside the domain of your concerns, you might never understand how I reached the other conclusions I present here...whether you agree with them or not.
My ongoing conversations with Pascal have lately focused on the significance of the various Commandments: how they relate not solely to our decision making, but to our assumptions about the world and attitudes toward it. Yesterday we discussed the First Commandment at some length:
I am the Lord thy God; thou shalt have no other gods before Me.
To the unreflective, this sounds like nothing more than the postulate of monotheism: one God rather than a potentially unharmonious and squabbling pantheon. But as Pascal was at pains to elucidate, it has powerful implications for Man's attitude toward the universe and his relationship with it.
It should be quite evident that Man did not create the Universe and has no power over the laws that govern it. Children know this; indeed, they tend to be less deluded about it than many adults. Children are far more at the mercy of metaphysically given reality than are adults; adults have access to many more ways of implementing their wills and satisfying their desires. But if Junior can't reach the cookie jar and there's no adult around to reach it for him, all the wishing he can do will fail to teleport a single cookie into his grasp.
Nevertheless, today a great many persons entertain a fancy commonly called the social construction of reality. This bit of nonsense privileges human perception, particularly as "enforced" by prevalent norms and conventions, over all notions of objective reality, and therefore over all notions of objective truth. It strains to plant roots in Platonic idealism: the postulate that ideal forms precede real objects metaphysically, rather than being merely mental constructs that arise from our power to note similarities and differences among objectively real things. It first began to take hold in large numbers of minds with the preachments of Bishop George Berkeley, who formulated the maxim esse est percipi, "to be is to be perceived." In a famous quip, Berkeley put it thus: "The tree's not a tree when there's no one about on the quad!"
But of course, Smith, who's not looking at the tree, might be standing alongside Jones, who is. Jones could thus assure Smith that the tree, stubbornly and against all good taste, had continued to exist despite Smith's inability to see it with his back turned. There are only two ways to pursue Berkelian idealism past this juncture:
- To posit "many worlds:" separate realities for the two, and for others of still different perceptions;
- To subject the existence of Jones himself to Smith's decision on the matter.
To the best of my knowledge, Berkeley was insufficiently arrogant or foolish to press either of these ideas. Human fatuity that complete had to wait for our own era.
I don't propose to explore the "many worlds" hypothesis, for a brace of reasons:
- There's no evidence for it;
- In the nature of things, there never can be evidence for it;
- It's only an evasion of the objective reality of the metaphysically pre-existent Universe: that which precedes conscious apprehension, and whose characteristics are indifferent to anyone's opinions about them.
No one would ever have proposed such a notion except as a defense for something like Berkelian idealism. As it has no ding an sich, and in point of fact denies that any proposition about reality can ever be probed by objective means, we may dismiss it with prejudice.
The second proposed defense, that Smith may dismiss the perceptions of others because they're not his own, leads unerringly to the philosophical dead end called solipsism.
Solipsism is the crudest hammer ever wielded against objectivity. It posits that the individual mind alone is real: that the Universe Smith thinks he sees, hears, feels, smells and tastes is actually the creation of his own mind, in response to his desire that there be something beside himself. If Smith adopts this posture, he must view everything but his own mental process as no more than a hallucination. Even his own corporeal substance.
To Smith the solipsist, Jones is unreal. To Jones the solipsist, Smith is unreal. They dismiss puzzled onlooker Davis, who strains to persuade each of the other's reality, with impartial consistency.
The Wachowski Brothers ain't got nothin' on this. Yet it is the terminus of all thought that originates from a subjective assessment of reality.
Isn't it plain that, if only the individual mind is real, and all else is Maya, then nothing can possibly be real, including the mind itself? For if the mind is subject to an unceasing barrage of illusions, including ones in whose conscious construction it had no part, then it cannot control its surroundings. It's on no better than an equal footing with those surroundings, and thus must be an illusion itself.
Solipsism degenerates to nihilism.
In its "socialized" form, solipsism requires a consensus -- the "social construction" mentioned above -- to sustain some particular shape for illusive reality. But this web disintegrates under its own gossamer weight: who is this bunch that's straining to elicit a consensus about what's real and what isn't? Did you let them into your illusion? Why? They might not let you into theirs.
The ancient Hebrews, liberated from bondage in Egypt by a series of miracles and the leadership of Moses, entertained no fantasies about consciousness preceding reality, or reality as the creation of the mind itself. They faced a different temptation, albeit equally deadly. In their time, the delimitation of gods, most notably their instantiation as physical objects -- idols -- was commonplace. The mind likes to have tangible, perceptible things it can fasten on, even during contemplation of the numinous. But such reductions of the nature of the Divine to delimited physical forms, or alternately, to areas of authority, are anathematic to monotheism. More, they beg the regress question: Who created and empowered these deities, and maintains the order in the Universe despite the divisions and tensions among them? And if there's a God above all gods, why would He tolerate lesser deities, whose participation in the ordering of the Universe would be rendered unnecessary by the very fact of His existence?
It is defensible, in a rather joyless and fatalistic way, to suppose that there is no God. It is equally defensible to maintain that there is One. But higher numbers are beyond all rationales.
Most persons of our day give next to no thought about the metaphysical implications of their convictions about the existence of God. Perhaps this is in the nature of our kind. We're really not that thoughtful, we humans. Few even of the thoughtful among us are able to grasp the implications of a genuinely sweeping postulate about ultimate things.
However, even to those disinclined to worship, or to entertain the possibility that a Supreme Being with transcendent purposes fashioned the Universe according to His Will, the First Commandment speaks of the most serious of all ontological premises: the acceptance of the objective nature of reality.
Thou shalt have no other gods before Me.
To wit:
- No divine beings of lesser stature who would nevertheless possess independent authority to alter natural law or meddle in the affairs of men;
- No insistence that the reality around us is our own mental "creation";
- No rejection of reality because it cannot be made perfectly conformant to our preferences.
Each of those false trails leads by swift and certain steps to nihilism. Apart from nihilism and objective reality, no other poles exist. But if we embrace objective reality, we are compelled to measure ourselves against its matrix. And we learn that we are but a speck, a mote in the Eye of God. But within that matrix, we specks have room to work, play, learn, and grow: to pursue the business of being men.
We have room to be all we can be.
I expect that this series of essays will be extensive -- I already have a list of topics prepared for it -- but if anyone has particular themes he'd like to see discussed here, I'd be happy to receive your suggestions. I don't promise to act on them; there are some subjects I don't feel I'm fit to explore or elucidate. But even those I shy back from might stimulate thoughts on other, more approachable topics.
May God bless and keep you all.
Comments
May I commend the reading of “The Imitation of Christ” to all of good will who read here, on this 7th Sunday in Trinity....just google the title and chose a file to liking.
BTW, good job as always, Fran.
GBWY
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Posted by on 07/10/2005 at 12:22 PMJust because somebody had to do it and—well—because it popped into my alleged mind....
“I can’t see how you two tell each other apart.”
“That’s easy. I’m always here; sometimes she goes away.”
“That is probably the most succinct statement of solipsism I’ve ever heard.”
--Lazarus Long and one of his clones, Time Enough for Love, Robert A. Heinlein
Good one, Fran.
M
Posted by Mark Alger on 07/10/2005 at 12:33 PMI have a one-man crusade to point out that “discomfit” means “totally overthrown; disrupted in battle; routed”, and to argue that 99.99% of all uses of “discomfit” would be far better replaced “with discomfort”.
I argue that while one or two people who read this blog might be discomfited by religous talk, a larger percent are likely to be discomforted, and that’s the word that should be used.
Certainly, you would regard the discomforting of readers with spiritual talk to be neutral, and the discomfiting of readers with spiritual talk to be a hugely good thing, no?
Posted by TJIC on 07/10/2005 at 12:54 PMAll right, all right…
Posted by Francis W. Porretto on 07/10/2005 at 01:08 PMFirst, solipsism, even in its more watered down “social consensus” view, has always seemed to me to be nothing more than a justification for sociopathy. After all, if Jones does not actually exist, empathy on Smith’s part towards Jones is not only useless, but actually approaches insanity.
As to another point you make: “It is defensible, in a rather joyless and fatalistic way, to suppose that there is no God. It is equally defensible to maintain that there is One. But higher numbers are beyond all rationales.”
Well, I see there is a need to provide the rationale. When I get a chance (probably tomorrow), I’ll put up a post on this.
Posted by Jeff Medcalf on 07/10/2005 at 01:13 PMWell, your argument against multiple deities seems to be premised on the assumption that any such would necessarily view and reason about the world in the same way as humans do...an assumption which may be entirely absent in a polytheistic worldview, and which pointedly cannot be applied to the one God you (and I) believe in without causing an awful lot of contradictions.
Not that I disagree with any of your conclusions, of course, but that particular argument seems kind of weak.
For what it’s worth, though, the anticipation that you’d have posted another Sunday rumination by now is absolutely the only reason I’m still awake at half past noon. (I don’t work tonight, but according to my normal schedule I’d be unconscious by now.)
Posted by Matt on 07/10/2005 at 01:34 PMI can say, with great certainty, that Davis does indeed find himself to be a puzzled onlooker when faced with solipsists.
Posted by on 07/10/2005 at 03:29 PMAll the modern, postmodern, and antifoundational theories I can recall struggle to resolve their basic contradictions - the most glaring of which you’ve laid neatly bare here today. I lost interest in this philosophical debate once I determined that these schools of thought were designed as human-centric primarily to “get around the God problem”.
But this is gonna be fun, Fran ! I’m looking forward to the slice-n-dice ! :D
Posted by Joe on 07/10/2005 at 03:51 PMWhen H’Shem showed His face on the Mountain. He gave a choice. Accept the Universe as a created object or forsake the revelation.
The Choice was made.To postulate an accidental universe is to believe a series of coincidences as unlikely as winning the lottery every day for a month.
There is no incompatibilty between quantum physics and G-d. The observer (who does not observe) who creates the Universe (which exists in the mind of G-d)is the creator there of. The act (which is no action) which creates the Universe is not bounded by our perception of it. He (who cannot be described) who creates exists in a Meta-Universe accessible to our reason (?) but not to our senses. Thus we know that we do not know. For those present to the possibilty of a miracle - A miracle is possible.
Posted by on 07/10/2005 at 09:19 PMYes, at pains.
The conclusions I arrive at I have difficulty explaining. Simple, yet requiring the wholesale discarding of much that I see as decayed. Detritus held over by what has been corrupted and which actively employs countermeasures against reforms. Far easier to report the view than explain the process and then have to field your myriad objections. The other guy is at fault; it’s never us.
Fran sees much of what I see as valid, but hasn’t fully grasped how to get to where I recommend. I wish I could fault him from veering there directly. My frustrations are the bitter fruit of my own shortcomings.
The faithful find it difficult to express what the agnostic to Establishmentarian faiths such as myself sees.
As I see it, the very concept of The One is useful to the individual. I fear this seems to Fran, at his most charitable towards me, bordering on blasphemy.
A note to the faithful and to the glib skeptic.
Fran and I both refer to the God of all creation, one who views human life is His highest achievement. For only man’s intellect can come to grips with what has been created. Only the intellect of man can appreciate it. It is also the same intellect in its most despaired state (twisted, I think, by being misled) that comes to detest existence. (This God is not to be confused with any that is worshipped by some men who would bring destruction to other human life for disobeying their demand for submission to them.)--continued--
Posted by Pascal Fervor on 07/11/2005 at 12:31 AMI begin.
Ego wishes to excel in anything (the expert). The inclination, to specialize, to go deep into what we have the most affinity, is strong.Yet the commandment suggests that only in looking into or at least caring for everything may man finds ultimate happiness (respect for and protection of life-sustaining merit is most righteous).
I see in the commandment a warning against the folly of any sort of self-deification. “I’m just so good, I get such pleasure from my endeavors, what do I care for others except as they are useful to me.” Fran addressed that today coming at it from a different angle.
The commandment also warns against following any who tend to self-deify. Not yet addressed here, but I think it may be inferred. It is likely easier to do for the mostly anti-statist readers of this site than for others.
More.
Even in our post-modern, self-esteemed hierarchy there remains still an admiration for the Renaissance man. But we also know, at the same time, the hierarchy retains another condescending thought. Expressed with a sneer: “Jack of all trades? Master of none.” The lay expert is to be snubbed as a dilettante: “leave the heavy thinking to us experts, boy.”You may easily find that those who have achieved recognition by peers (attained professional note) or society at large (celebrity) are often the first to foster the continued snub of Jack. I shared the witless self-parody of one such fading star in comments last week.
Those in power, who are politically astute, dare not deny the obvious until they have no other choice. When threatened, most of the time they will play competition off for laughs, endeavoring to paint as ridiculous any who see the superiority of a new way of thinking. This is Andersen’s fraudulent tailors’ ploy from The Emperor’s New Clothes.
As for the advice available to any reader of the 1st Commandment (the unafraid atheist and agnostic included).
Recognize how much, like solipsist Smith, you are apt to miss out on what could be the knowledge that opens the door to your next improved, more content self, when you fail to consider this advice. Stand back. Reflect. See how your tree fits in the forest. Meanwhile in other ways Jones is like Smith. And Davis helps point out where they complement each other.The Alliance.
Not Smith nor Jones nor Davis nor Anyman sufficiently fills in for all that the others lack. Still they make do. They, as a group, can avail of more that the universe has to offer than any may reach on their own. In theory, each must earn the others’ mutual respect in order to share the gifts the others have to offer. This is a concept of brotherhood even found in Atlas Shrugged, though I highly doubt Rand ever gave the commandments any credit.And then there is the downside of such confederations.
Together, having become drunk with their mutual admiration, should they be tempted to supplant the concept of God, the laws of nature repeatedly punishes bitterly all who try. Nature is a cruel mistress. Play, but dare not think you’re master.Yes play. Coming to understand the importance of the First as fatherly foremost as advice as opposed to autocratic demand seems obvious to me in the least. It is what I chose to make of the nature of my own fatherhood. I know other fathers who don’t share that view, and know still more who are not fathers who have no clue. But is a choice of a view that seems to me to be the best target to aim at.
Adding to my anti-autocratic view is that the life-sustaining faiths view outside restrictions on the individual’s free will as evil. They point as tantamount to saintliness the civilizing self-restrictions of man’s animal appetites. The greater the temptations overcome, the more saintly the person. It is the self-restriction, especially after one recovers after one has fallen short of the mark (repentance), which is praised beyond other achievements.
The Establishmentarians view such things today as threatening. The First puts God above them, and the individual in direct contact with God, and they cannot abide either. It undermines their authority if the aim to be rulers and not public servants. The secular anti-statist should see the appeal here too. But he’s been dissuaded from that course, now hasn’t he?
Yes, it’s easier for a man of faith to see this. So how ever can he appeal to the non-faith-based potential ally?
It’s harder for him if he cannot help his faithless brothers first see the universal nature of that advice. So that he may help them stand with him against the power seekers.
--concluded next
Posted by Pascal Fervor on 07/11/2005 at 12:35 AMMan alone cannot set the measure of ideals. In words more acceptable to the non-believing, they are found in natural law. Only after they agree to review the concept of the First is there any chance they may mull it over and overcome the propaganda.
And the crucible which holds all those laws, which permits us to glance at the ideals which set us on the road to excellence, is, to me, a non-sectarian philosophical gift: the very concept of God.
Posted by Pascal Fervor on 07/11/2005 at 12:38 AMThe question of whether there is a God has always fascinated men. This is particularly true since the advent of Charles Darwin and his theories of Natural Selection, and others like him who think that science leads away from the concept of a Higher Power.
Very recently (perhaps the last 50 years, or so) science has begun to ask questions of Darwin’s theories that they cannot answer. In an article in “The American Spectator” a fellow named Don Peterson explores the advent of the rather strong intellectual ideas behind what is called “Intelligent Design”. This is not what many call “Creationism” but is an intellectual and mathematical exploration of the implications of some of the more recent understandings about biochemistry.
Their conclusion is that Darwinism cannot account for even single-celled life forms, and that, in fact, all life falls in a mathematical domain that cannot be produced by natural selection. If life cannot be produced by random chance, then that suggests purpose, and of course purpose suggests a Higher Power. I don’t have a link to post, but you should be able to find it easily enough. It’s worth a read.
Posted by on 07/11/2005 at 09:02 PMFran, I’d really like to see your thoughts on Intelligent Design. From what I can tell, it seems like a pseudo-scientific attempt to justify young Earth Creationism. I can’t see any conflict between speciation and Creationism, per se, as long as you don’t believe that the Earth was created in the last few thousand years. But I’m curious to hear your thoughts on this.
Posted by Jeff Medcalf on 07/11/2005 at 10:33 PMJeff,
I sort of felt like you apparently do until I read the article I referenced. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to dredge it back up out of the internet, so I can’t give you a link to it.I should emphasize that Intelligent Design is NOT Creationism. The article I read has three main themes: (1)Darwinism has a number of internal contradictions and a number of the more common examples of Darwinism are frauds. See “Darwin on Trial” a book by Philip Johnson, a law professor at Berkeley. (2)Darwinian Evolution cannot produce an irreducibly complex organism. See “Darin’s Black Box” by biochemistry professor Michael Behe, at Lehigh. (3)It is mathematically impossible for something of the complexity of DNA to be produced by natural laws acting on random chance. I don’t have a book to reference, but look up William Dembski on the web and you should find sufficient references. He has multiple PHDs and is a fellow of the National Science Foundation.
My take on this is that it is not “psuedo-scientific”, but that it is, in fact, a fairly sober and rigorous look at the adequacy of Darwinism to produce life, and that finds it wanting on multiple grounds. I don’t know much about biochemistry, my masters degree is in Aeronautics and Astronautics, but the logic and the math that I have seen seem to me to be pretty credible.
While the concept of an Intelligent Designer is a reasonable inference of the work on Intelligent Design, it in no way infers anything about Genesis or, indeed, any religious concept of creation. At best, what it does is to add rather rigorous analysis to support the idea of some form of Higher Power.
Posted by on 07/12/2005 at 01:58 PMJeff,
I finally found a reference to the article I mentioned. Unaccountably, it’s not on The American Spectator’s site but is on William Dembski’s blog. In any event, it’shttp://www.uncommondescent.com/index.php/archives/100
Editorial comment: in my last post I referenced Michael Behe’s book, but it should be “Darwin’s Black Box”, not “Darins”:-)
Posted by on 07/12/2005 at 04:14 PM
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