Of every particular enquiry there is a narrative to be written, and being able to understand that enquiry is inseparable from, implicitly or explicitly, being able to identify and follow that narrative. Correspondingly every philosophical account of enquiry presupposes some account of how the narratives of particular enquiries should be written. And indeed every narrative of some particular enquiry, insofar as it makes the progress of that enquiry intelligible, by exhibiting the course of its victories and its defeats, its frustrations and endurances, its changes of strategy and tactics, presuppose some ordering of causes of the kind that is only provided by an adequate philosophical account of enquiry.
[Alasdair MacIntyre, First Principles, Final Ends and Contemporary Philosophical Issues, p. 49.]
Monday, May 07, 2007
Substandard Treatment of Aquinas's Ways
I disagree with Alexander Pruss fairly often, but I was very, very pleased to see this in his recent review of Graham Oppy's Arguing about Gods:
This sort of substandard treatment of Aquinas's arguments is appallingly common among atheists who discuss them, particularly when only a tiny bit of research could remedy these flaws. The uniqueness objection is especially absurd (and absurdly common), and comes from the ridiculous practice of treating arguments in a wholly decontextualized way. It is a travesty that it ever survives undergraduate philosophy courses.
On the side of cosmological argument, we begin with a substandard discussion of the first three Ways in Aquinas. Oppy accuses Aquinas of giving invalid arguments since the arguments clearly fail to establish the uniqueness of the First Cause (pp. 99, 103, 106). The accusation is ludicrous since Aquinas cannot be intending to establish uniqueness in Question 2 (the Five Ways) of the Prima Pars of the Summa Theologiae as he explicitly devotes Question 11 to arguing for uniqueness, and Oppy never considers the arguments of Question 11. On p. 101, Oppy speculates about how Aquinas might rule out the possibility of an endless regress of movers, apparently unaware of Aquinas' giving three explicit arguments in the Summa Contra Gentiles, I, 13. In fact, Oppy in general seems quite unaware of the fact that the arguments in the Summa Theologiae are mere summaries, and extended subarguments for the main premises of the Five Ways are given elsewhere. Nor is any use made of the distinction between per se and per accidens series which appears to many to be central to interpreting the text. Without addressing Aquinas' full argument, the comprehensiveness necessary for Oppy's project has not been achieved.
This sort of substandard treatment of Aquinas's arguments is appallingly common among atheists who discuss them, particularly when only a tiny bit of research could remedy these flaws. The uniqueness objection is especially absurd (and absurdly common), and comes from the ridiculous practice of treating arguments in a wholly decontextualized way. It is a travesty that it ever survives undergraduate philosophy courses.
Sunday, May 06, 2007
Notes and Links
* An interesting review of a work on Mulla Sadra at NDPR.
* One of the most famous [Protestant] scholastics is Lutheran Johann Gerhard. You can get a taste of his work by reading his discussion of the state of exinanition and exaltation (PDF) of Christ. Exinanitio is the Latin term for kenosis. His Sacred Meditations (PDF) are also online; as you might expect from a Lutheran, the chapters on faith are the most interesting.
* SFFAudio points to a list of online lectures by Courtney Brown (Emory) for his Science Fiction and Politics course. I've begun listening to them, and from what I've heard the lectures on Asimov's Foundation novels -- born of a little bit of cribbin' from the works of Edward Gibbon -- are definitely interesting.
* Kenny Pearce has an interesting excerpt from his paper on the ontological economy of idealism.
* Ralph Luker posts an awesome presentation by Hans Rosling on graphical presentation of data on global economy and health.
* One of the reasons I went off a bit on Warburton's interview about clarity in my post on the subject is that much of Warburton's advice struck me as just plain silly. If you must offer rules of thumb for writing philosophy clearly, surely one could do much, much better. Frank Wilson at Books, Inq. responded with some thoughtful comments. I do think he's right about addressing general readers; while I wouldn't make the ability to communicate the subject to general readers a test of understanding it does seem to be a sign of it, assuming that we're talking about an ability to communicate the subject without distorting it. But I don't think Warburton can put this forward as a defense of his advice, because his explanation of why clarity is important puts heavy emphasis on the collaborative aspect of philosophy. I was also simply puzzled by his choice of examples, which are supposed to show the clarity that contributes to collaboration and the obscurity that impedes it, seem to be simply chosen on the basis of taste and familiarity, not on the basis of any serious reflection. It all just seemed muddled, even allowing for the conditions of an interview.
Warburton has given much better advice before. 6 on that list is just the usual arbitrary nonsense people repeat uncritically when giving advice about writing. I wish people would stop telling students not to write long sentences and instead tell them how to write long sentences well. Similar things may be said of all the other advice in 6. It's absurd to tell people to use adverbs sparingly when what they need to know is how to use them discriminatingly; it is silly to tell them to avoid complex syntax when what they need to know is how to balance that complexity. It's like telling people that the best way to do maintenance around the house is to throw out any tool bigger than a breadbox. Not only does such advice not tell people how to do maintenance, it would limit their tools for doing it. The same must be said of all these Thou-shalt-nots people hand out for writing. They are not a guide for writing well, and they lead to writers who try to avoid altogether instruments of language that are profoundly useful when well-applied. Much of the other advice in that post, however, is salutary, and could form the basis of a better account of clear writing than given in the interview, so perhaps it was just an 'off day' for Warburton. The muddle around the concept of 'clarity' exhibited in the interview, however, seems to me to be quite common among philosophers. I think it dangerous to good reasoning.
* One of the most famous [Protestant] scholastics is Lutheran Johann Gerhard. You can get a taste of his work by reading his discussion of the state of exinanition and exaltation (PDF) of Christ. Exinanitio is the Latin term for kenosis. His Sacred Meditations (PDF) are also online; as you might expect from a Lutheran, the chapters on faith are the most interesting.
* SFFAudio points to a list of online lectures by Courtney Brown (Emory) for his Science Fiction and Politics course. I've begun listening to them, and from what I've heard the lectures on Asimov's Foundation novels -- born of a little bit of cribbin' from the works of Edward Gibbon -- are definitely interesting.
* Kenny Pearce has an interesting excerpt from his paper on the ontological economy of idealism.
* Ralph Luker posts an awesome presentation by Hans Rosling on graphical presentation of data on global economy and health.
* One of the reasons I went off a bit on Warburton's interview about clarity in my post on the subject is that much of Warburton's advice struck me as just plain silly. If you must offer rules of thumb for writing philosophy clearly, surely one could do much, much better. Frank Wilson at Books, Inq. responded with some thoughtful comments. I do think he's right about addressing general readers; while I wouldn't make the ability to communicate the subject to general readers a test of understanding it does seem to be a sign of it, assuming that we're talking about an ability to communicate the subject without distorting it. But I don't think Warburton can put this forward as a defense of his advice, because his explanation of why clarity is important puts heavy emphasis on the collaborative aspect of philosophy. I was also simply puzzled by his choice of examples, which are supposed to show the clarity that contributes to collaboration and the obscurity that impedes it, seem to be simply chosen on the basis of taste and familiarity, not on the basis of any serious reflection. It all just seemed muddled, even allowing for the conditions of an interview.
Warburton has given much better advice before. 6 on that list is just the usual arbitrary nonsense people repeat uncritically when giving advice about writing. I wish people would stop telling students not to write long sentences and instead tell them how to write long sentences well. Similar things may be said of all the other advice in 6. It's absurd to tell people to use adverbs sparingly when what they need to know is how to use them discriminatingly; it is silly to tell them to avoid complex syntax when what they need to know is how to balance that complexity. It's like telling people that the best way to do maintenance around the house is to throw out any tool bigger than a breadbox. Not only does such advice not tell people how to do maintenance, it would limit their tools for doing it. The same must be said of all these Thou-shalt-nots people hand out for writing. They are not a guide for writing well, and they lead to writers who try to avoid altogether instruments of language that are profoundly useful when well-applied. Much of the other advice in that post, however, is salutary, and could form the basis of a better account of clear writing than given in the interview, so perhaps it was just an 'off day' for Warburton. The muddle around the concept of 'clarity' exhibited in the interview, however, seems to me to be quite common among philosophers. I think it dangerous to good reasoning.
Hume and the Infamous Footnote
The current version of the Wikipedia article on David Hume has a brief section on the infamous footnote in Hume's essay on natural characters. The footnote:
Of this footnote the article says,
The claim that such views were all but ubiquitous in the intellectual establishment of the time is, if it refers to eighteenth century Scotland, much more complicated. One of the early responses to the footnote was by his much more popular contemporary, James Beattie, who tears it to shreds. Beattie is an egalitarian; he believes that all men are created equal, and he attacks, mocks, and refutes every point here. The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy has a lovely summary of some of Beattie's main points. Hume was not in advance of his time; his condemnation of slavery in the essay on the populousness of ancient nations (to which the 1758 date refers) is far more restrained and ambiguous than condemnations that already existed. Gershom Carmichael had attacked the institution far more fiercely in his work on natural rights (PDF). People like Beattie and Carmichael were ahead of their time; Hume was right in step. The short passage that the Wikipedia article calls a condemnation "at great length" amounts to a criticism of slavery as a way of breeding antisocial habits in the masters. How unimpressive this is can be seen in comparing it to Carmichael's or Beattie's attack on it as inconsistent with natural rights. From the end of Beattie's long attack on Hume's racism:
[James Beattie: Selected Philosophical Writings, James A. Harris, ed. Imprint Academic (Charlottesville, VA: 2004) 137.]
Eric Morton discusses the infamous footnote at some length in his important article, Race and Racism in the Works of David Hume.
I am apt to suspect the negroes and in general all the other species of men (for there are four or five different kinds) to be naturally inferior to the whites. There never was a civilized nation of any other complexion than white, nor even any individual eminent either in action or speculation. No ingenious manufactures amongst them, no arts, no sciences. On the other hand, the most rude and barbarous of the whites, such as the ancient Germans, the present Tartars, have still something eminent about them, in their valour, form of government, or some other particular. Such a uniform and constant difference could not happen, in so many countries and ages, if nature had not made an original distinction betwixt these breeds of men. Not to mention our colonies, there are Negroe slaves dispersed all over Europe, of which none ever discovered any symptoms of ingenuity; tho' low people, without education, will start up amongst us, and distinguish themselves in every profession. In Jamaica indeed they talk of one negroe as a man of parts and learning; but ‘tis likely he is admired for very slender accomplishments, like a parrot, who speaks a few words plainly.
Of this footnote the article says,
This should be understood in its historical context, of course, such views were all but ubiquitous in the intellectual establishment (as elsewhere) of the time, and indeed would continue to be for a century after his death. Unlike many others of his day and much in advance of his time, in 1758, Hume condemned slavery at great length.
The claim that such views were all but ubiquitous in the intellectual establishment of the time is, if it refers to eighteenth century Scotland, much more complicated. One of the early responses to the footnote was by his much more popular contemporary, James Beattie, who tears it to shreds. Beattie is an egalitarian; he believes that all men are created equal, and he attacks, mocks, and refutes every point here. The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy has a lovely summary of some of Beattie's main points. Hume was not in advance of his time; his condemnation of slavery in the essay on the populousness of ancient nations (to which the 1758 date refers) is far more restrained and ambiguous than condemnations that already existed. Gershom Carmichael had attacked the institution far more fiercely in his work on natural rights (PDF). People like Beattie and Carmichael were ahead of their time; Hume was right in step. The short passage that the Wikipedia article calls a condemnation "at great length" amounts to a criticism of slavery as a way of breeding antisocial habits in the masters. How unimpressive this is can be seen in comparing it to Carmichael's or Beattie's attack on it as inconsistent with natural rights. From the end of Beattie's long attack on Hume's racism:
It is easy to see, with what views some modern authors throw out these hints to prove the natural inferiority of negroes. But let every friend to humanity pray, that they may be disappointed. Britons are famous for generosity; a virtue in which it is easy for them to excel both the Romans and the Greeks.
Let it never be said, that slavery is countenanced by the bravest and most generous people on earth; by a people who are animated with that heroic passion, the love of liberty, beyond all nations ancient or modern; and the fame of whose toilsome, but unwearied perseverance, in vindicating, at the expense of life and fortune, the sacred rights of mankind, will strike terror into the hearts of sycophants and tyrants, and excite the admiration and gratitude of all good men, to the latest posterity.
[James Beattie: Selected Philosophical Writings, James A. Harris, ed. Imprint Academic (Charlottesville, VA: 2004) 137.]
Eric Morton discusses the infamous footnote at some length in his important article, Race and Racism in the Works of David Hume.
Hawkins on Unauthoritative Tradition
One of the early influences on Newman's understanding of tradition was Edward Hawkins's book on unauthoritative tradition. Hawkins argues that God gave us not merely Scripture but the Church, and that both are legitimate means for attaining Christian truth. However, he is very clear that Scripture retains the dominant place. His argument for Church tradition is that it has presumptive value given that (1) the need for it is palpably felt when we try to teach Scripture; (2) it has in fact constantly existed; and (3) God has provided for it by instituting a system of ministers and teachers.
He thus sets up a sort of comparison between Scripture and the unauthoritative tradition of the Church. Scripture proves; Church tradition teaches. Scripture furnishes the foundation, Church tradition carries down the system. Scripture provides the substance, Church tradition provides the arrangement. Scripture demonstrates Christian truth, Church tradition by being unbroken points to it presumptively.
Hawkins, of course, is primarily thinking of catechesis, and his argument in favor of unauthoritative tradition is, in fact, an argument that the Church of England needs to do more to further its catechetical work. It's an argument that the catechesis of the Church has a fundamental role to play in spreading Christian truth. Interestingly, on such a view the Church becomes chiefly a catechetical system; Christians learn the truth from Scripture, and the purpose of the Church is chiefly to catechize people in it.
The emphasis on the word 'unauthoritative' serves the purpose of distinguishing this very Anglican view from the Catholic view. Catholics, of course, believe in unauthoritative tradition just as much as Hawkins. Hawkins, however, is very concerned to deny the 'Romish' view that there is a currently existing authoritative tradition. To have an authoritative tradition, Hawkins argues, you must have apostles, and we haven't had apostles in quite some time. Indeed, he suggests that there is a parallel between authoritative tradition and miracles: since he's a cessationist, he suggests that the transition from authoritative tradition to purely unauthoritative tradition is analogous to, and probably contemporaneous with, the transition from miracles to purely non-miraculous work. (Usually Newman's chief works on tradition are thought to be the book on the Arians and the essay on development; but, given that Newman was familiar with Hawkins's work, it's an interesting thought that perhaps the work on ecclesiastical miracles plays an essential role in Newman's thought and development on the subject of tradition. By reversing Hawkins and showing that the age of miracles did not cease, Newman can reverse the analogy, increasing the antecedent probability of an authoritative tradition.)
Hawkins also discussed the subject of unauthoritative tradition in his Bampton Lectures of 1840.
He thus sets up a sort of comparison between Scripture and the unauthoritative tradition of the Church. Scripture proves; Church tradition teaches. Scripture furnishes the foundation, Church tradition carries down the system. Scripture provides the substance, Church tradition provides the arrangement. Scripture demonstrates Christian truth, Church tradition by being unbroken points to it presumptively.
Hawkins, of course, is primarily thinking of catechesis, and his argument in favor of unauthoritative tradition is, in fact, an argument that the Church of England needs to do more to further its catechetical work. It's an argument that the catechesis of the Church has a fundamental role to play in spreading Christian truth. Interestingly, on such a view the Church becomes chiefly a catechetical system; Christians learn the truth from Scripture, and the purpose of the Church is chiefly to catechize people in it.
The emphasis on the word 'unauthoritative' serves the purpose of distinguishing this very Anglican view from the Catholic view. Catholics, of course, believe in unauthoritative tradition just as much as Hawkins. Hawkins, however, is very concerned to deny the 'Romish' view that there is a currently existing authoritative tradition. To have an authoritative tradition, Hawkins argues, you must have apostles, and we haven't had apostles in quite some time. Indeed, he suggests that there is a parallel between authoritative tradition and miracles: since he's a cessationist, he suggests that the transition from authoritative tradition to purely unauthoritative tradition is analogous to, and probably contemporaneous with, the transition from miracles to purely non-miraculous work. (Usually Newman's chief works on tradition are thought to be the book on the Arians and the essay on development; but, given that Newman was familiar with Hawkins's work, it's an interesting thought that perhaps the work on ecclesiastical miracles plays an essential role in Newman's thought and development on the subject of tradition. By reversing Hawkins and showing that the age of miracles did not cease, Newman can reverse the analogy, increasing the antecedent probability of an authoritative tradition.)
Hawkins also discussed the subject of unauthoritative tradition in his Bampton Lectures of 1840.
Saturday, May 05, 2007
Probably Certainly Probably Not
StatGuy's mention of the Yes, Prime Minister TV show, one of my favorites, reminded me of this exquisite dialogue (one of many in the series):
Sir Humphrey: "With Trident we could obliterate the whole of Eastern Europe."
Jim Hacker: "I don't want to obliterate the whole of Eastern Europe."
Sir Humphrey: "It's a deterrent."
Jim Hacker: "It's a bluff. I probably wouldn't use it."
Sir Humphrey: "Yes, but they don't know that you probably wouldn't."
Jim Hacker: "They probably do."
Sir Humphrey: "Yes, they probably know that you probably wouldn't. But they can't certainly know."
Jim Hacker: "They probably certainly know that I probably wouldn't."
Sir Humphrey: "Yes, but even though they probably certainly know that you probably wouldn't, they don't certainly know that, although you probably wouldn't, there is no probability that you certainly would."
Friday, May 04, 2007
On ad hominem
From the Denialism blog:
While it's a common misconception that ad hominem involves insult, this is not actually correct. You can commit ad hominem by complimenting a person as well, for instance,
Tom's argument for his explanation of Sam's behavior is faulty because Tom, being nice, can't understand how a wicked person like Sam thinks
will, in any circumstance where Tom's niceness is not actually relevant to evaluating Tom's explanation, be fallacious. This type of ad hominem is arguably less common, since in most cases we don't usually make the objection that positive characteristics of the arguer vitiate the argument, but it is certainly ad hominem, because it evaluates the argument negatively in terms of the arguer's character.
But MarkH is quite right both that this is not necessarily vicious and that ad hominem is poorly understood. I roughed out an account of ad hominem fallacy a while back that makes an attempt to deal with some of the problems that an account of ad hominem fallacies must face.
Further, some fallacies, like ad hominem are poorly understood, so when an opponent says you're wrong because of this this and this therefor you're an idiot, the poor victim of the ad hominem feels like they can claim victory over the argument. When in reality ad hominem refers to the dismissal of an argument by just insulting the person. Time and time again you see someone exasperated by the crank who won't turn despite being shown again and again where their error is, and finally just call the guy an idiot. That's actually not an ad hominem. That might be totally true and highly relevant to the argument at hand. Sometimes people are just too stupid or too ignorant to realize when they've been soundly thrashed, and true cranks will stubbornly go on, and on and on...
While it's a common misconception that ad hominem involves insult, this is not actually correct. You can commit ad hominem by complimenting a person as well, for instance,
Tom's argument for his explanation of Sam's behavior is faulty because Tom, being nice, can't understand how a wicked person like Sam thinks
will, in any circumstance where Tom's niceness is not actually relevant to evaluating Tom's explanation, be fallacious. This type of ad hominem is arguably less common, since in most cases we don't usually make the objection that positive characteristics of the arguer vitiate the argument, but it is certainly ad hominem, because it evaluates the argument negatively in terms of the arguer's character.
But MarkH is quite right both that this is not necessarily vicious and that ad hominem is poorly understood. I roughed out an account of ad hominem fallacy a while back that makes an attempt to deal with some of the problems that an account of ad hominem fallacies must face.
Clarity
There is an interesting interview with Nigel Warburton, in which Warburton elaborates the claim of John Searle which he uses as a motto on his own site, that "If you can't say it clearly, you don't understand it yourself":
(Ht: Duck) I may be idiosyncratic in my views here, but I think this use of 'clarity' is confused and obscure, for a straightforward set of reason. Either we understand clarity to be a feature of the writing, or a feature of how it is read, or a feature of what is expressed in the writing (and thus understood in the reading). It's natural to understand clarity to be a feature of the writing, and this is how Warburton at first glance goes on to characterize it, condemning Heidegger for polysyllabic abstraction. But that's an odd sort of condemnation. For instance, well-written papers in mathematical logic or category theory are said to be clear in this way: everything is laid out straightforwardly, simply, with good organization, careful analysis, precise argumentation. But it would be nonsense to suggest this allows readers in general to follow what they're saying, or that it minimizes the risk of misinterpretation in general; and mathematicians certainly don't avoid polysyllabic abstraction. This is because any difficulty in interpretation would be due to the difficulty of the subject itself. So if we're taking clarity to be a quality of the writing, it's simply false to distinguish it from obscurity by saying the latter leaves "at least some readers" in the dark about your meaning; readers in general will have less difficulty understanding an obscure news report than understanding a lucidly clear paper on string theory.
One possible way to get around this would be to restrict the domain of readers that count. But if we do this, we are giving up the notion that clarity is a quality of writing; rather, it is a proportioning of the text to the response of readers. Then clarity really becomes (by definition, I would imagine) that which risks less misinterpretation. But here we run into the question of which readers are supposed to be the standard. Clarity understood this way reduces misinterpretation, but by whom? The simplest way to characterize the domain of relevant readers is to treat it probabilistically: the relevant readers are those who were most likely to read it in the first place, or were the most likely to read it with interest in the first place. But this means that Heidegger can't be judged by any standards but how well people who are likely to read Heidegger with interest tend to understand him. This can be determined only by looking at how well they actually do understand him; you couldn't possibly do it by pointing at Heidegger's text, because if you aren't in the domain of relevant readers, your opinion about his clarity doesn't count, and if you are, you might well be the outlier in the group.
Warburton clearly wavers among all these. Consider the sort of obscurity he associates with his six levels of clarity:
(1) polysyllabic abstraction, "i.e., hiding behind long words" (note the choice of the term 'hiding' here)
(2) passive constructions or convoluted syntax
(3) poor use of paragraphs, which "often indicates poor argument structure" (again, note that the writing is supposed to indicate -- on what evidence I don't know -- something about what is expressed)
(4) "Philosophy involves building a case for a conclusion. The reader needs to be able to see how evidence, argument support the conclusion which purportedly follows from them." (Here we find an appeal to what the reader is able to see. I should point out, incidentally, that Descartes's first Meditation, which Warburton notes as an exemplar here, is very regularly misinterpreted on this very point. Readers usually miss the fractionating nature of the argument. That is, Descartes doesn't argue in a straight line. Instead, he presents a reason for doubt, then a reason to doubt the doubt, then a reason to think that we can have some certainty despite this doubt, then another (stronger) reason for doubt, and so forth. The pendulum swings back and forth, but at every swing more is loss to doubt, until we reach the possibility that God, or some proxy, might be a deceiver, in which case all our reasoning becomes suspect. I cannot count the number of intelligent readers of Descartes's Meditation who haven't caught on to the way Descartes is building a case, but instead see the Meditation as a series of more or less isolated arguments rather than a back-and-forth, despite the fact that that's obviously what it is.)
(5) Lack of illustrative examples: "When philosophers omit examples or applications of their ideas they sometimes float off into realms of imprecision - not all their readers will be happy to float off with them." Again, the reason given for considering this a flaw in writing is that it is a (possible) sign of imprecision of thought.
(6) This is poor underlying thought, and so it's obvious on what line it follows.
If we make clarity a matter of writing, we can save some of these levels. Clarity becomes a matter of word choice, sentence structure, and paragraphing. But then paradigm instances of clear writing, which use polysyllabic abstractions, passive constructions, and even convoluted sentences in order to be precise and in order not to be misleading, fall on the obscure side. (We also end up condemning people on grounds that seem inadequate. Is "The stone is lit by the sun" more obscure than "The sun lights the stone"?) Warburton thinks Hume clear. His contemporaries were split on the subject, many thinking him obscure, continually making strange word choices, structuring his sentences in curious ways, and perpetually stating things ambiguously. Samuel Johnson refused to consider him seriously as a writer of English at all; and it is certainly one of the reasons for the popularity of Beattie's attack on Hume that Beattie was almost universally recognized as the clearer writer, with a better grasp of the English of England, with which Scots of the time (including Hume) continually struggled. (We tend to forget that the English of Scotland was much less closely related to the English of England in the eighteenth century than it is now. The two have grown together, in part because of the hard work of the Scots of Hume's generation to show that they could meet the English intellectually on their own ground.) And it must be confessed that the history of Hume scholarship shows that Hume's contemporaries were at least right about his tendency to convolute his claims to the point of ambiguity. Hume, who has shown himself one of the easiest authors in the common curriculum to misinterpret, shows precisely how vague and shadowy the notion of clarity here must be.
If we make clarity a matter of underlying thought, then all these verbal issues become simply secondary, and the primary question is not whether Heidegger uses big words or complicated sentences but whether he reasons well with them. Hume is clear not if he avoids misinterpretation, but if he knows what he's talking about. And so forth. But then all the talk about passive constructions seems useless.
I think despite its use as a shibboleth, very few people have any clear idea of what they mean by "saying something clearly," and only an obscure notion of what they mean by "obscurity". Warburton's mysterious quality, which now supervenes on sentence structure, now on the underlying thought (where 'clarity' suggests 'having a nose for the subject', however we are supposed to determine that on the evidence of the text itself), now on how the writing tends to strike readers (although we don't know which readers), jumping from one to the other without any rhyme or reason, is, I think, typical.
The real value of clarity, to the extent that it seems worth paying attention to at all, has nothing to do with sentence structure as such; you can't inculcate it by telling people not to use passive constructions. The real value of clarity is not a well-defined trait at all. There are no sharp lines between obscure and clear; you cannot say, "Heidegger is obscure, Searle is clear" as if people fell into one category or the other. I would suggest that clarity is connected to what the eighteenth century Scots would have called good taste. Unlike most contemporary philosophers who chatter about clarity, the Scots actually went to great lengths to clarify what good taste was. There are some variations from account to account, but, roughly, to have good taste with regard to some activity or product (like painting or paintings) is to have a broad sympathy with people who are well acquainted with a broad range of examples of that activity or product so as to have developed the skills required to make refined discriminations and accurate comparisons with regard to that activity or product. Thus, having good taste in paintings means having a sense of how people who know paintings well would tend to judge paintings (generally by being such a person oneself). The only thing that seems to be in the vicinity of what contemporary philosophers mean by "saying something clearly" is "saying something in a way that would be approved by someone with good taste in reasoning". The rest is fluff, as far as I can see.
But it must be admitted that I have a taste for eighteenth-century theories of taste, and tend to see them as one more way in which eighteenth-century Scots philosophers were cleverer than their rather unimpressive modern-day Anglo-American cousins.
Clarity is expressing yourself in a way that allows readers to follow what you are saying. It minimizes the risk of misinterpretation. Clarity contrasts with obscurity. Obscurity leaves at least some readers in the dark about your meaning. I like the quotation from Searle. I like another quotation from the author Robert Heinlein too: 'Obscurity is the refuge of incompetence'. Obviously in some sorts of writing obscurity doesn't matter so much: some writers want to be interpreted in a variety of possibly contradictory ways. But Philosophy shouldn't be like this.
(Ht: Duck) I may be idiosyncratic in my views here, but I think this use of 'clarity' is confused and obscure, for a straightforward set of reason. Either we understand clarity to be a feature of the writing, or a feature of how it is read, or a feature of what is expressed in the writing (and thus understood in the reading). It's natural to understand clarity to be a feature of the writing, and this is how Warburton at first glance goes on to characterize it, condemning Heidegger for polysyllabic abstraction. But that's an odd sort of condemnation. For instance, well-written papers in mathematical logic or category theory are said to be clear in this way: everything is laid out straightforwardly, simply, with good organization, careful analysis, precise argumentation. But it would be nonsense to suggest this allows readers in general to follow what they're saying, or that it minimizes the risk of misinterpretation in general; and mathematicians certainly don't avoid polysyllabic abstraction. This is because any difficulty in interpretation would be due to the difficulty of the subject itself. So if we're taking clarity to be a quality of the writing, it's simply false to distinguish it from obscurity by saying the latter leaves "at least some readers" in the dark about your meaning; readers in general will have less difficulty understanding an obscure news report than understanding a lucidly clear paper on string theory.
One possible way to get around this would be to restrict the domain of readers that count. But if we do this, we are giving up the notion that clarity is a quality of writing; rather, it is a proportioning of the text to the response of readers. Then clarity really becomes (by definition, I would imagine) that which risks less misinterpretation. But here we run into the question of which readers are supposed to be the standard. Clarity understood this way reduces misinterpretation, but by whom? The simplest way to characterize the domain of relevant readers is to treat it probabilistically: the relevant readers are those who were most likely to read it in the first place, or were the most likely to read it with interest in the first place. But this means that Heidegger can't be judged by any standards but how well people who are likely to read Heidegger with interest tend to understand him. This can be determined only by looking at how well they actually do understand him; you couldn't possibly do it by pointing at Heidegger's text, because if you aren't in the domain of relevant readers, your opinion about his clarity doesn't count, and if you are, you might well be the outlier in the group.
Warburton clearly wavers among all these. Consider the sort of obscurity he associates with his six levels of clarity:
(1) polysyllabic abstraction, "i.e., hiding behind long words" (note the choice of the term 'hiding' here)
(2) passive constructions or convoluted syntax
(3) poor use of paragraphs, which "often indicates poor argument structure" (again, note that the writing is supposed to indicate -- on what evidence I don't know -- something about what is expressed)
(4) "Philosophy involves building a case for a conclusion. The reader needs to be able to see how evidence, argument support the conclusion which purportedly follows from them." (Here we find an appeal to what the reader is able to see. I should point out, incidentally, that Descartes's first Meditation, which Warburton notes as an exemplar here, is very regularly misinterpreted on this very point. Readers usually miss the fractionating nature of the argument. That is, Descartes doesn't argue in a straight line. Instead, he presents a reason for doubt, then a reason to doubt the doubt, then a reason to think that we can have some certainty despite this doubt, then another (stronger) reason for doubt, and so forth. The pendulum swings back and forth, but at every swing more is loss to doubt, until we reach the possibility that God, or some proxy, might be a deceiver, in which case all our reasoning becomes suspect. I cannot count the number of intelligent readers of Descartes's Meditation who haven't caught on to the way Descartes is building a case, but instead see the Meditation as a series of more or less isolated arguments rather than a back-and-forth, despite the fact that that's obviously what it is.)
(5) Lack of illustrative examples: "When philosophers omit examples or applications of their ideas they sometimes float off into realms of imprecision - not all their readers will be happy to float off with them." Again, the reason given for considering this a flaw in writing is that it is a (possible) sign of imprecision of thought.
(6) This is poor underlying thought, and so it's obvious on what line it follows.
If we make clarity a matter of writing, we can save some of these levels. Clarity becomes a matter of word choice, sentence structure, and paragraphing. But then paradigm instances of clear writing, which use polysyllabic abstractions, passive constructions, and even convoluted sentences in order to be precise and in order not to be misleading, fall on the obscure side. (We also end up condemning people on grounds that seem inadequate. Is "The stone is lit by the sun" more obscure than "The sun lights the stone"?) Warburton thinks Hume clear. His contemporaries were split on the subject, many thinking him obscure, continually making strange word choices, structuring his sentences in curious ways, and perpetually stating things ambiguously. Samuel Johnson refused to consider him seriously as a writer of English at all; and it is certainly one of the reasons for the popularity of Beattie's attack on Hume that Beattie was almost universally recognized as the clearer writer, with a better grasp of the English of England, with which Scots of the time (including Hume) continually struggled. (We tend to forget that the English of Scotland was much less closely related to the English of England in the eighteenth century than it is now. The two have grown together, in part because of the hard work of the Scots of Hume's generation to show that they could meet the English intellectually on their own ground.) And it must be confessed that the history of Hume scholarship shows that Hume's contemporaries were at least right about his tendency to convolute his claims to the point of ambiguity. Hume, who has shown himself one of the easiest authors in the common curriculum to misinterpret, shows precisely how vague and shadowy the notion of clarity here must be.
If we make clarity a matter of underlying thought, then all these verbal issues become simply secondary, and the primary question is not whether Heidegger uses big words or complicated sentences but whether he reasons well with them. Hume is clear not if he avoids misinterpretation, but if he knows what he's talking about. And so forth. But then all the talk about passive constructions seems useless.
I think despite its use as a shibboleth, very few people have any clear idea of what they mean by "saying something clearly," and only an obscure notion of what they mean by "obscurity". Warburton's mysterious quality, which now supervenes on sentence structure, now on the underlying thought (where 'clarity' suggests 'having a nose for the subject', however we are supposed to determine that on the evidence of the text itself), now on how the writing tends to strike readers (although we don't know which readers), jumping from one to the other without any rhyme or reason, is, I think, typical.
The real value of clarity, to the extent that it seems worth paying attention to at all, has nothing to do with sentence structure as such; you can't inculcate it by telling people not to use passive constructions. The real value of clarity is not a well-defined trait at all. There are no sharp lines between obscure and clear; you cannot say, "Heidegger is obscure, Searle is clear" as if people fell into one category or the other. I would suggest that clarity is connected to what the eighteenth century Scots would have called good taste. Unlike most contemporary philosophers who chatter about clarity, the Scots actually went to great lengths to clarify what good taste was. There are some variations from account to account, but, roughly, to have good taste with regard to some activity or product (like painting or paintings) is to have a broad sympathy with people who are well acquainted with a broad range of examples of that activity or product so as to have developed the skills required to make refined discriminations and accurate comparisons with regard to that activity or product. Thus, having good taste in paintings means having a sense of how people who know paintings well would tend to judge paintings (generally by being such a person oneself). The only thing that seems to be in the vicinity of what contemporary philosophers mean by "saying something clearly" is "saying something in a way that would be approved by someone with good taste in reasoning". The rest is fluff, as far as I can see.
But it must be admitted that I have a taste for eighteenth-century theories of taste, and tend to see them as one more way in which eighteenth-century Scots philosophers were cleverer than their rather unimpressive modern-day Anglo-American cousins.
Thursday, May 03, 2007
The Use of Old Books in Philosophy
Peter a couple of weeks ago had a post called The Shame of Philosophy on which I wanted to comment, but never quite got around to. The idea of the post is that these two facts together are supposed to be an embarrassment for philosophy as a discipline:
(1) Plato's Republic is still taught in philosophy courses.
(2) Plato's Republic is a book over 2300 years old.
The reason it's supposed to be an embarrassment is that "No other respectable discipline relies on texts that are so old". The contrast is with math and science:
But, of course, philosophy doesn't "rely on" Plato's Republic; it makes use of it. And implicit in the above characterization is an obviously respectable discipline that does make use of texts that old, and even older, namely, history. Peter gives a whole list of possible reasons why we might still use Plato's Republic, arguing that each fails to be a good, or in some cases, an adequate, reason:
1. The Republic is perfect.
2. We are so imperfect in philosophy that we cannot improve on Plato's Republic.
3. There are no philosophical truths.
4. Respect for tradition.
5. Philosophers are idiots, i.e., who misunderstand the purpose of philosophy or believe on inadequate basis 1-4.
6. The questions are still relevant.
7. There is no "official method".
7b. We have no adequate replacement for the Republic.
But in all this is no hint of what would presumably be the most obvious candidate, namely, that one of the things studied in philosophy courses is the history of philosophy. Philosophy is partly historical in nature, and thus has to exhibit it, at least to some degree, from the very beginning. And it is, I take it, very clear why this must be so: a key part of philosophy is being accurate about reasoning, particular the reasoning presented by others. To accomplish this you can't imbibe all your understanding of the reasoning of others from secondary texts. I have met people who were taught on something approximating the method suggested by Peter, that is, who only got their history of philosophy from secondary texts, and they are philosophical illiterates, incapable of understanding any arguments that are not spoonfed to them in terms with which they are already familiar. Nor is it in the least a reasonable argument that math and science do things differently; philosophy is not an ersatz natural science. People who want to play at being scientists should be ignored if they are not actually doing genuine scientific work, because people who play at being scientists, or at being scientist-like, without doing real science, are in general dabblers in quackery. If you ask me, the real embarrassment in philosophy is that you can find people who play at being scientists in this way. It's like people pretending to be doctors in order to be taken seriously; they'd be easier to take seriously if they just dropped the pretense.
But that's a digression. To return to the more immediate point: If there are people who teach the Republic "outside of the context of understanding the history of the field, or an understanding of ancient Greek literature," then the natural explanation is that they are incompetent teachers of philosophy. If there really are such people, I agree that it is a shame that they are allowed to teach the subject. But if they do exist, they cannot be all that common, because it seems quite clear that most people who teach the Republic do not teach it in this way; rather, they teach it as a taste, a first introduction to the riches of the history of the field. And it is clear that a work like the Republic is quite good for this sort of thing, for several reasons.
(1) It has been immensely influential through history, and therefore it's a useful text to start familiarizing students with, because they'll come back to it in one way or another, through reference, or allusion, or kindred argument.
(2) It is readable; indeed, philosophically inclined students often enjoy it immensely. It is also very discussable, as years upon years of introductory courses have shown. Both of these are essential to an introductory philosophical text.
(3) It has a mixture of both the strange and the familiar, and thus provides an excellent opportunity to start helping students sort out the difficulties of reasoning that takes place in terms with which they are unfamiliar. That is, it's a good text, and has through time been shown to be a good text, for starting students on the work of honing their analytic tools.
(4) The themes it discusses are big ones -- justice, death, knowledge -- and thus it allows for considerable branching out. This means, among other things, that the text allows for considerable pedagogical flexibility (which is a big plus in an introductory text) and that it provides a way to get students interested in other arguments and reasoning on these themes, whether ancient or modern.
One could, of course, choose other texts, from just about any time period, on similar grounds. That will chiefly be a matter of taste; but there will be works whose use exhibits especially good taste, in the Humean sense, and the Republic is certainly one of them.
(1) Plato's Republic is still taught in philosophy courses.
(2) Plato's Republic is a book over 2300 years old.
The reason it's supposed to be an embarrassment is that "No other respectable discipline relies on texts that are so old". The contrast is with math and science:
The ancient Greeks wrote about math and science and logic as well, but their writings in these areas are not presented to beginners as valuable instruction; students of those disciplines often learn about them only later when learning about the history of their discipline; and they are often referenced directly only by historians of the field. The only other field I can think of that relies directly on books of such age is religion/theology, and that is not good company to be in, given that we expect philosophy to a) explain the world and b) have rational foundations.
But, of course, philosophy doesn't "rely on" Plato's Republic; it makes use of it. And implicit in the above characterization is an obviously respectable discipline that does make use of texts that old, and even older, namely, history. Peter gives a whole list of possible reasons why we might still use Plato's Republic, arguing that each fails to be a good, or in some cases, an adequate, reason:
1. The Republic is perfect.
2. We are so imperfect in philosophy that we cannot improve on Plato's Republic.
3. There are no philosophical truths.
4. Respect for tradition.
5. Philosophers are idiots, i.e., who misunderstand the purpose of philosophy or believe on inadequate basis 1-4.
6. The questions are still relevant.
7. There is no "official method".
7b. We have no adequate replacement for the Republic.
But in all this is no hint of what would presumably be the most obvious candidate, namely, that one of the things studied in philosophy courses is the history of philosophy. Philosophy is partly historical in nature, and thus has to exhibit it, at least to some degree, from the very beginning. And it is, I take it, very clear why this must be so: a key part of philosophy is being accurate about reasoning, particular the reasoning presented by others. To accomplish this you can't imbibe all your understanding of the reasoning of others from secondary texts. I have met people who were taught on something approximating the method suggested by Peter, that is, who only got their history of philosophy from secondary texts, and they are philosophical illiterates, incapable of understanding any arguments that are not spoonfed to them in terms with which they are already familiar. Nor is it in the least a reasonable argument that math and science do things differently; philosophy is not an ersatz natural science. People who want to play at being scientists should be ignored if they are not actually doing genuine scientific work, because people who play at being scientists, or at being scientist-like, without doing real science, are in general dabblers in quackery. If you ask me, the real embarrassment in philosophy is that you can find people who play at being scientists in this way. It's like people pretending to be doctors in order to be taken seriously; they'd be easier to take seriously if they just dropped the pretense.
But that's a digression. To return to the more immediate point: If there are people who teach the Republic "outside of the context of understanding the history of the field, or an understanding of ancient Greek literature," then the natural explanation is that they are incompetent teachers of philosophy. If there really are such people, I agree that it is a shame that they are allowed to teach the subject. But if they do exist, they cannot be all that common, because it seems quite clear that most people who teach the Republic do not teach it in this way; rather, they teach it as a taste, a first introduction to the riches of the history of the field. And it is clear that a work like the Republic is quite good for this sort of thing, for several reasons.
(1) It has been immensely influential through history, and therefore it's a useful text to start familiarizing students with, because they'll come back to it in one way or another, through reference, or allusion, or kindred argument.
(2) It is readable; indeed, philosophically inclined students often enjoy it immensely. It is also very discussable, as years upon years of introductory courses have shown. Both of these are essential to an introductory philosophical text.
(3) It has a mixture of both the strange and the familiar, and thus provides an excellent opportunity to start helping students sort out the difficulties of reasoning that takes place in terms with which they are unfamiliar. That is, it's a good text, and has through time been shown to be a good text, for starting students on the work of honing their analytic tools.
(4) The themes it discusses are big ones -- justice, death, knowledge -- and thus it allows for considerable branching out. This means, among other things, that the text allows for considerable pedagogical flexibility (which is a big plus in an introductory text) and that it provides a way to get students interested in other arguments and reasoning on these themes, whether ancient or modern.
One could, of course, choose other texts, from just about any time period, on similar grounds. That will chiefly be a matter of taste; but there will be works whose use exhibits especially good taste, in the Humean sense, and the Republic is certainly one of them.
Bats and vOICe
Chris Chatham at Developing Intelligence:
Not quite. Nagel is not talking about "science's reductionist methods" but the reductionist accounts developed by philosophers of mind; extrapolation and models are not inherently reductionist. And what he actually says there is "no reason to suppose" is that it is subjectively like anything we can experience or imagine. The problem is that if we extrapolate from our own experience (such as analogizing it to our own senses), we get a genuine understanding of the phenomena but only a schematic one, and schematic understanding is incomplete and (Nagel would say, at least) doesn't involve the "specific subjective character" of the experiences.
Further, Nagel insists that it may be possible for us to develop a more objective way of handling subjective experiences than we currently have (he insists on it elsewhere, as well):
Of course, Chatham's basic point remains: when supplemented with technology, there is considerable promise for holding that we can do more with extrapolation -- what Nagel here calls imagination and empathy -- than one might expect. How far this can actually go, of course, is a question that has to be left to discovery. Nagel's basic point, however -- which implies that this doesn't help those who don't experience the sensory substitution, thus requiring the development of an objective phenomenology -- also seems to remain.
In his famous essay, Thomas Nagel suggested that science's reductionist methods can never provide a complete understanding of the "subjective qualities" of consciousness. To illustrate this problem, he wrote that there was "no reason to suppose that" we would ever be able to comprehend what it's like to be a bat - because we can't truly understand the subjective experience of, for example, echolocation.
Not quite. Nagel is not talking about "science's reductionist methods" but the reductionist accounts developed by philosophers of mind; extrapolation and models are not inherently reductionist. And what he actually says there is "no reason to suppose" is that it is subjectively like anything we can experience or imagine. The problem is that if we extrapolate from our own experience (such as analogizing it to our own senses), we get a genuine understanding of the phenomena but only a schematic one, and schematic understanding is incomplete and (Nagel would say, at least) doesn't involve the "specific subjective character" of the experiences.
Further, Nagel insists that it may be possible for us to develop a more objective way of handling subjective experiences than we currently have (he insists on it elsewhere, as well):
It may be possible to approach the gap between subjective and objective from another direction. Setting aside temporarily the relation between the mind and the brain, we can pursue a more objective understanding of the mental in its own right. At present we are completely unequipped to think about the subjective character of experience without relying on the imagination—without taking up the point of view of the experiential subject. This should be regarded as a challenge to form new concepts and devise a new method—an objective phenomenology not dependent on empathy or the imagination. Though presumably it would not capture everything, its goal would be to describe, at least in part, the subjective character of experiences in a form comprehensible to beings incapable of having those experiences.
Of course, Chatham's basic point remains: when supplemented with technology, there is considerable promise for holding that we can do more with extrapolation -- what Nagel here calls imagination and empathy -- than one might expect. How far this can actually go, of course, is a question that has to be left to discovery. Nagel's basic point, however -- which implies that this doesn't help those who don't experience the sensory substitution, thus requiring the development of an objective phenomenology -- also seems to remain.
Wednesday, May 02, 2007
A Guide to the Argument of Hume's Dialogues, Parts II&III
Previous Post
Cleanthes has set up an argument in which an analogy between the universe and a machine licenses the inference that, just as the latter has an intelligent cause, so (probably) does the first. Philo's first major move in the Dialogues is to argue that the dissimilarity between the universe and products of human intelligence is so great as to "bar all comparison and inference." In particular, he notes that in applying conclusions of experience to similar cases, every alteration of circumstances introduces a doubt about the legitimacy of the inference, requiring that we gather new information in order to make sure that the new circumstances are not important. There are, however, a vast number of differences between the universe and the products of intelligence that we know. This is particularly true given that the inference requires a move from a part (the products of intelligence) to the whole (the universe). Philo goes even further and denies that one part is a good analogy for another. Even more than this, we know so little about the universe at all, that it seems presumptuous to say something about its origin.
Philo continues piling on points, "somewhat between jest and earnest," when signs of impatience from Cleanthes cause him to stop. Cleanthes responds that someone might say the same with the Copernican system. (Note its reappearance as an example. We will see it again.) Someone inclined to cavil might reject the arguments for it by similar reasoning.
Philo responds that the difference is that we have experience of other planets. We see the moon turn on its center, and likewise Venus. [Venus, of course, does rotate; but Hume is wrong to use it as an example, since the cloud cover for Venus is so thick that it cannot be seen to rotate, and there was no more than a suspicion of its rotation before radio wave experiments in the 1950s penetrated the clouds and showed that Venus does, in fact, rotate. However, by Hume's time the phases of Venus would certainly have been known, and it is likely that he is confusing the two phenomena.] And so one with many other bodies in the solar system. So there are a great many mutually reinforcing analogies in favor of the Copernican system. Indeed, Philo goes further and says that [at the time of the discussion, of course] that they are the only basis for it; Cleanthes would need to have a similar set of strong analogies. Indeed, if we look at Galileo's Dialogue on the systems of the world, we find that a great deal of it is devoted to attacking the distinction between mundane and celestial matter, showing that the earth and the moon were similar in a vast number of details. This allowed one to build the sort of system of analogies that support the Copernican view of the solar system.
Philo ends Part II with a challenge to Cleanthes: "[C]ite your experience and deliver your theory."
Cleanthes is utterly unimpressed by this argument. He opens Part III by noting that the only reason Galileo and others had to devote so much effort to refute the distinction between mundane and celestial matter was that this distinction had so taken hold of people's prejudices that they denied the similarity. The similarity between the works of nature and the works of art, on the other hand, is straightforward and immediate, "self-evident and undeniable." They exhibit "the same matter, a like form": this is precisely what is required for analogies of the strongest sort. Philo's argument is like the argument against motion; the proper reponse to it is not serious argument, which it does not deserve, but "illustrations, examples, and instances."
In order to clarify this point, Cleanthes presents two hypothetical scenarios, the articulate voice and the natural library, in which we would all recognize that a similar inference obviously holds, and which Philo's argument does not have the resources to treat differently.
(1) The Articulate Voice: Suppose, says Cleanthes, that an articulate voice, exceeding what human beings could produce, were to be heard in the clouds, at the same instant, over every nation, and that this voice was heard by every people in their own language and dialect to speak words that were not only meaningful but salutary, worthy of a benevolent being superior to human beings. We would instantly assign to it an intelligent cause on the basis of analogy with human articulate voices, even though the nature of the voice shows clearly that it is very different from any human voice. No one would say that the articulate voice was just accidentally produced by "some whistling in the clouds" rather than from intelligence. Even so in the case of the universe.
(2) The Natural Library: But let's suppose a case that bears an even stronger resemblance to the universe. Suppose two things: (1) that there is a natural, universal, invariable language, common to every human being; and (2) that books are natural objects, perpetuating themselves like plants through reproduction and descent. No one would doubt that such a library is closely analogous to productions of human intelligence, despite its differences.
Cleanthes suggests that in the comparison between these hypothetical scenarios and the universe, the universe is shown to be an even more promising candidate for the effect of intelligence, because there is more evidence of design in an animal than in a book. Either a rational volume is not a proof of a rational cause, or the works of nature have a cause similar to the works of art.
Far from being weakened by Philo's skeptical arguments, Cleanthes says, the inference is strengthened by them. Skeptics are supposed to adhere to inferences that exhibit natural force, even if they are not to assent to them dogmatically. The design inference, however, conveys exactly this natural force. Those who look at the marvelous structure of the eye, and all its contrivance, find it suggesting the idea of a contriver. The conclusion that it has a designer is not something that comes in only at the end of an arduous and tormented line of reasoning. It is suggested immediately, and it is Philo's skeptical reasonings that are better candidates for arduous and tormented reasoning. When we look at male and female, how they correspond in instinct and passion, how they live, we are struck immediately by a teleology, the natural interpretation of which is that nature intends the propagation of the species. The cases mount up easily.
And at this, we reach a curious point in the argument, one that has thrown many people into needless puzzlement. Philo is "a little embarrassed and confounded." He has no ready answer to Cleanthes. But you and I know why this is so -- and, indeed, must be so.
Recall that I suggested that we think of the Dialogues as a game with three players. It had a set of concessions and commitments made by the players that are analogous to rules, and also a set of initial positions marking out the territory the players initially are inclined to defend. The rules are:
(1) Cleanthes and Philo are playing a game of which Demea is not wholly aware, because Cleanthes knows that Philo is half-joking in his support of Demea, whereas Demea thinks that Philo is wholly on his side.
(2) Philo concedes to Cleanthes that skeptics like himself must recognize the natural force of arguments from sense and experience.
(3) Cleanthes has introduced the crucial issue of scientific conclusions, and pointed out that they show that the skeptic can't restrict the natural force of arguments from sense and experience to arguments with conclusions devoted wholly to matters of everyday life.
(4) Demea has made the distinction between arguing for God's existence and arguing that He has certain attributes, and Philo has agreed to it completely.
(5) Cleanthes has presented the particular argument to be discussed. This argument is an argument from sense and experience, and it is in particular an analogical argument from sense and experience.
The initial positions are:
(6) Cleanthes has committed himself entirely to this argument as the one and only argument he can accept.
(7) Demea's immediate reaction to the argument is to protest its 'a posteriori' character.
(8) Philo's immediate reaction to the argument is to protest its analogical character.
Now the notable thing about the opening game is that Cleanthes has won it. And he has to given the rules, i.e., given the concessions already made. He has forced Philo into a position where he cannot move without contradicting his concession in (2). This was essential to Philo's defense of skepticism against Cleanthes: skeptics accept (skeptically, but they do accept) the position on which the argument has the greater natural force. But when we compare the design inference to skeptical doubts about it, the latter are not what have greater natural force. They are less obvious, more difficult to accept, and they do not, unlike the design inference, seem to flow in immediately. Philo has allowed himself to be checkmated.
That is not, of course, the whole story. If it were, we'd have a short and interesting, but hardly striking dialogue. The fact of the matter is that there is more than one game in play. Philo has lost one, and it is because he made the mistake of attacking the analogy. Remember, he insisted that the dissimilarity of the cases was so great that no comparison or inference could be made. This is effectively to deny that the inference can establish the existence of something. But Demea had drawn the distinction between inferring existence and inferring nature, and Philo agreed with it. Philo's mistake was in attacking the first. He is not a position to do so on the principles he has stated. Indeed, Hume's own account of analogy in the Treatise rules out the sort of tactic with which Philo starts, since on that account (1) analogical inferences are based on analogies between cases and (2) analogies cannot be refuted. Philo's attempt to refute the analogy, to deny that it is there to allow the sort of inference Cleanthes wants, is doomed on Humean principles.
So both Philo's principles and Hume's force Philo into confusion; his skeptical attack on Cleanthes's design inference is inconsistent and untenable. But to this point Philo has simply attacked the analogy itself. There is another path open to him, made possible by the distinction between inferring existence and inferring nature. He cannot beat Cleanthes on the ground of the former. But there is a still a game to be played in the latter field. No sooner is Philo confounded than Demea interrupts and performs his most essential function in the dialogue: he begins to play the other game. The game is on again, and Philo has the opportunity play the game from Demea's initial position.
But more of all this in the next post in this series.
Cleanthes has set up an argument in which an analogy between the universe and a machine licenses the inference that, just as the latter has an intelligent cause, so (probably) does the first. Philo's first major move in the Dialogues is to argue that the dissimilarity between the universe and products of human intelligence is so great as to "bar all comparison and inference." In particular, he notes that in applying conclusions of experience to similar cases, every alteration of circumstances introduces a doubt about the legitimacy of the inference, requiring that we gather new information in order to make sure that the new circumstances are not important. There are, however, a vast number of differences between the universe and the products of intelligence that we know. This is particularly true given that the inference requires a move from a part (the products of intelligence) to the whole (the universe). Philo goes even further and denies that one part is a good analogy for another. Even more than this, we know so little about the universe at all, that it seems presumptuous to say something about its origin.
Philo continues piling on points, "somewhat between jest and earnest," when signs of impatience from Cleanthes cause him to stop. Cleanthes responds that someone might say the same with the Copernican system. (Note its reappearance as an example. We will see it again.) Someone inclined to cavil might reject the arguments for it by similar reasoning.
Philo responds that the difference is that we have experience of other planets. We see the moon turn on its center, and likewise Venus. [Venus, of course, does rotate; but Hume is wrong to use it as an example, since the cloud cover for Venus is so thick that it cannot be seen to rotate, and there was no more than a suspicion of its rotation before radio wave experiments in the 1950s penetrated the clouds and showed that Venus does, in fact, rotate. However, by Hume's time the phases of Venus would certainly have been known, and it is likely that he is confusing the two phenomena.] And so one with many other bodies in the solar system. So there are a great many mutually reinforcing analogies in favor of the Copernican system. Indeed, Philo goes further and says that [at the time of the discussion, of course] that they are the only basis for it; Cleanthes would need to have a similar set of strong analogies. Indeed, if we look at Galileo's Dialogue on the systems of the world, we find that a great deal of it is devoted to attacking the distinction between mundane and celestial matter, showing that the earth and the moon were similar in a vast number of details. This allowed one to build the sort of system of analogies that support the Copernican view of the solar system.
Philo ends Part II with a challenge to Cleanthes: "[C]ite your experience and deliver your theory."
Cleanthes is utterly unimpressed by this argument. He opens Part III by noting that the only reason Galileo and others had to devote so much effort to refute the distinction between mundane and celestial matter was that this distinction had so taken hold of people's prejudices that they denied the similarity. The similarity between the works of nature and the works of art, on the other hand, is straightforward and immediate, "self-evident and undeniable." They exhibit "the same matter, a like form": this is precisely what is required for analogies of the strongest sort. Philo's argument is like the argument against motion; the proper reponse to it is not serious argument, which it does not deserve, but "illustrations, examples, and instances."
In order to clarify this point, Cleanthes presents two hypothetical scenarios, the articulate voice and the natural library, in which we would all recognize that a similar inference obviously holds, and which Philo's argument does not have the resources to treat differently.
(1) The Articulate Voice: Suppose, says Cleanthes, that an articulate voice, exceeding what human beings could produce, were to be heard in the clouds, at the same instant, over every nation, and that this voice was heard by every people in their own language and dialect to speak words that were not only meaningful but salutary, worthy of a benevolent being superior to human beings. We would instantly assign to it an intelligent cause on the basis of analogy with human articulate voices, even though the nature of the voice shows clearly that it is very different from any human voice. No one would say that the articulate voice was just accidentally produced by "some whistling in the clouds" rather than from intelligence. Even so in the case of the universe.
(2) The Natural Library: But let's suppose a case that bears an even stronger resemblance to the universe. Suppose two things: (1) that there is a natural, universal, invariable language, common to every human being; and (2) that books are natural objects, perpetuating themselves like plants through reproduction and descent. No one would doubt that such a library is closely analogous to productions of human intelligence, despite its differences.
Cleanthes suggests that in the comparison between these hypothetical scenarios and the universe, the universe is shown to be an even more promising candidate for the effect of intelligence, because there is more evidence of design in an animal than in a book. Either a rational volume is not a proof of a rational cause, or the works of nature have a cause similar to the works of art.
Far from being weakened by Philo's skeptical arguments, Cleanthes says, the inference is strengthened by them. Skeptics are supposed to adhere to inferences that exhibit natural force, even if they are not to assent to them dogmatically. The design inference, however, conveys exactly this natural force. Those who look at the marvelous structure of the eye, and all its contrivance, find it suggesting the idea of a contriver. The conclusion that it has a designer is not something that comes in only at the end of an arduous and tormented line of reasoning. It is suggested immediately, and it is Philo's skeptical reasonings that are better candidates for arduous and tormented reasoning. When we look at male and female, how they correspond in instinct and passion, how they live, we are struck immediately by a teleology, the natural interpretation of which is that nature intends the propagation of the species. The cases mount up easily.
And at this, we reach a curious point in the argument, one that has thrown many people into needless puzzlement. Philo is "a little embarrassed and confounded." He has no ready answer to Cleanthes. But you and I know why this is so -- and, indeed, must be so.
Recall that I suggested that we think of the Dialogues as a game with three players. It had a set of concessions and commitments made by the players that are analogous to rules, and also a set of initial positions marking out the territory the players initially are inclined to defend. The rules are:
(1) Cleanthes and Philo are playing a game of which Demea is not wholly aware, because Cleanthes knows that Philo is half-joking in his support of Demea, whereas Demea thinks that Philo is wholly on his side.
(2) Philo concedes to Cleanthes that skeptics like himself must recognize the natural force of arguments from sense and experience.
(3) Cleanthes has introduced the crucial issue of scientific conclusions, and pointed out that they show that the skeptic can't restrict the natural force of arguments from sense and experience to arguments with conclusions devoted wholly to matters of everyday life.
(4) Demea has made the distinction between arguing for God's existence and arguing that He has certain attributes, and Philo has agreed to it completely.
(5) Cleanthes has presented the particular argument to be discussed. This argument is an argument from sense and experience, and it is in particular an analogical argument from sense and experience.
The initial positions are:
(6) Cleanthes has committed himself entirely to this argument as the one and only argument he can accept.
(7) Demea's immediate reaction to the argument is to protest its 'a posteriori' character.
(8) Philo's immediate reaction to the argument is to protest its analogical character.
Now the notable thing about the opening game is that Cleanthes has won it. And he has to given the rules, i.e., given the concessions already made. He has forced Philo into a position where he cannot move without contradicting his concession in (2). This was essential to Philo's defense of skepticism against Cleanthes: skeptics accept (skeptically, but they do accept) the position on which the argument has the greater natural force. But when we compare the design inference to skeptical doubts about it, the latter are not what have greater natural force. They are less obvious, more difficult to accept, and they do not, unlike the design inference, seem to flow in immediately. Philo has allowed himself to be checkmated.
That is not, of course, the whole story. If it were, we'd have a short and interesting, but hardly striking dialogue. The fact of the matter is that there is more than one game in play. Philo has lost one, and it is because he made the mistake of attacking the analogy. Remember, he insisted that the dissimilarity of the cases was so great that no comparison or inference could be made. This is effectively to deny that the inference can establish the existence of something. But Demea had drawn the distinction between inferring existence and inferring nature, and Philo agreed with it. Philo's mistake was in attacking the first. He is not a position to do so on the principles he has stated. Indeed, Hume's own account of analogy in the Treatise rules out the sort of tactic with which Philo starts, since on that account (1) analogical inferences are based on analogies between cases and (2) analogies cannot be refuted. Philo's attempt to refute the analogy, to deny that it is there to allow the sort of inference Cleanthes wants, is doomed on Humean principles.
So both Philo's principles and Hume's force Philo into confusion; his skeptical attack on Cleanthes's design inference is inconsistent and untenable. But to this point Philo has simply attacked the analogy itself. There is another path open to him, made possible by the distinction between inferring existence and inferring nature. He cannot beat Cleanthes on the ground of the former. But there is a still a game to be played in the latter field. No sooner is Philo confounded than Demea interrupts and performs his most essential function in the dialogue: he begins to play the other game. The game is on again, and Philo has the opportunity play the game from Demea's initial position.
But more of all this in the next post in this series.
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
St. Joseph the Worker
Since today is the feast of St. Joseph the Worker, it seems fitting to point to Aquinas's account of manual labor in order to celebrate the memory of the humble carpenter in Nazareth.
[ST 2-2.187.3]
And with regard to that fourth end, you might consider sending a few dollars the way of Saint Joseph the Worker Job Services in Phoenix, Arizona. SJW is a small charitable organization devoted to helping the homeless find employment. It helps with resumes and with computer access for job postings, it lends decent outfits for interviews, it provides telephone and mailing services relevant to job hunting, it assists with transportation problems -- all these things are things you and I can afford to take for granted, but which the homeless cannot. I worked with some of the volunteers in the office there for a short period a number of years back, so I can attest to some of the excellent work they do.
Manual labor is directed to four things.
First and principally to obtain food; wherefore it was said to the first man (Genesis 3:19): "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread," and it is written (Psalm 127:2): "For thou shalt eat the labors of thy hands."
Secondly, it is directed to the removal of idleness whence arise many evils; hence it is written (Sirach 33:28,29): "Send" thy slave "to work, that he be not idle, for idleness hath taught much evil."
Thirdly, it is directed to the curbing of concupiscence, inasmuch as it is a means of afflicting the body; hence it is written (2 Corinthians 6:5-6): "In labors, in watchings, in fastings, in chastity."
Fourthly, it is directed to almsgiving, wherefore it is written (Ephesians 4:28): "He that stole, let him now steal no more; but rather let him labor, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have something to give to him that suffereth need."
[ST 2-2.187.3]
And with regard to that fourth end, you might consider sending a few dollars the way of Saint Joseph the Worker Job Services in Phoenix, Arizona. SJW is a small charitable organization devoted to helping the homeless find employment. It helps with resumes and with computer access for job postings, it lends decent outfits for interviews, it provides telephone and mailing services relevant to job hunting, it assists with transportation problems -- all these things are things you and I can afford to take for granted, but which the homeless cannot. I worked with some of the volunteers in the office there for a short period a number of years back, so I can attest to some of the excellent work they do.
A Guide to the Argument of Hume's Dialogues, Parts I&II
The structure of Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, I would suggest, is simple and straightforward on the face of it, but somehow seems to escape most of its readers, perhaps through lack of practice in reading dialogues. So I'm starting a series to help guide people through the argument of the work. This post will look at how things are set up in Parts I and II.
Part I introduces the characters, Cleanthes, Demea, and Philo. The discussion when the dialogue has opened has turned to religious education, and Demea has claimed that the mind needs to be brought into submission to religious principles by emphasis on the uncertainties, obscurities, and confusions that plague all forms of human reason. Philo praises this idea, saying that if this recommendation is cultivated, we would learn not to give much credit to frail reason on topics so sublime and difficult as theological ones. Demea takes this straightforwardly as praise; Cleanthes sees at once that Philo is engaging in "some raillery or artificial malice". Much of the rest of the Dialogues is an expansion of this: Demea takes Philo naively, Cleanthes sees Philo is engaging in a bit of mockery. But Cleanthes and Philo keep up the game throughout (which is important), and Cleanthes replies to Philo's speech that he is proposing to ground religion on philosophical skepticism, and jokes that we'll see how deep Philo's skepticism runs when the company breaks up and Philo goes out the door rather than window and assumes throughout that gravity will hold his body to the ground. Nature overrules the artificial principles of the Skeptics, just as it overrules the artificial principles of philosophical schools like the Stoics.
Philo concedes that this is so, and the fact that he does so is extremely important for the course of the argument, so keep it in mind. However, he notes that while the principles of the Stoics may have been artificial, impossible to maintain outside of the highest flights of philosophical contemplation, nonetheless, by accustoming themselves to these principles in one part of their life (namely, philosophical reasoning), they developed a disposition that carries over into other parts of life -- only partially and imperfectly, it is true, but which allowed the Stoic school to produce some outstanding examples of virtue. Likewise, says Philo, when someone accustoms himself to thinking about the limits and failings of human reason, something of this disposition carries over into other aspects of life. The Skeptic's position is simply that in an "abstract view" reason exhibits contradictions in its very nature. There are, however, views other than the abstract, and in ordinary life the Skeptic's arguments don't have the force to counterbalance the natural conclusions of sense and experience. But some fields are very far from these natural conclusions of sense and experience, and one of those fields is natural religion, which deals with things like God and the eternity of the world.
Cleanthes is unconvinced. Skeptics, whatever they may say, don't merely adhere to conclusions in ordinary life; they do so in abstract philosophy as well. And this is all to the good: it would be absurd not to adhere to solid scientific conclusions, however abstract, even if one does not attribute to them a complete certainty. The examples Cleanthes gives are Newton's analysis of the rainbow and the arguments put forward by Galileo and Copernicus for the motion of the earth. These examples are not picked out at random; they are carefully selected by Hume, and they, too, will affect the course of the argument. But at the moment Cleanthes's point is simply that in actual practice, through most of philosophy and science, philosophical skeptics are necessarily skeptics about particular questions, each of which has to be taken on a case-by-case basis, and not about whole fields. So why, Cleanthes asks, does the philosophical skeptic suddenly change tactics in religious matters? There is no legitimate distinction to be made between one field of philosophy and another, or between philosophy and common life. The arguments are similar in each; and in each they carry the same force. No one is so silly as to reject physics simply because it's difficult and often far removed from sensory experience; so the fact that a field has these qualities is simply not an adequate reason for rejecting the ability of human reason to handle it. The arguments still must be considered point by point.
Part II continues to set up an argument; immediately we get another distinction that is essential for understanding the future course of the argument. Demea points out that it is one thing to be skeptical about our knowledge of the divine being, i.e., the existence of God, and another thing to be skeptical about our knowledge of the divine nature. Demea takes the former to be simply self-evident; the latter, however, is altogether unknown to us by our "finite, weak, and blind" reason. The greatest impiety is to deny that God exists; the second greatest is to pry into God's nature and affairs. Philo agrees that the two matters are distinct, and then says something very important:
This passage in particular needs to be read closely; and keeping it in mind as you go through the Dialogues will keep you from falling into the common misunderstandings of what Philo is doing. We will see again the points made here.
Cleanthes turns to Demea and tells him how he conceives the matter, and in the course of doing so he gives the argument that will be under discussion for the rest of the book:
Three things in particular need to be noted about this argument. First, it is an argument based on the rules of analogy. Second, it is 'a posteriori', i.e., from sense and experience. Third, Cleanthes commits himself to appealing only to this argument. All three of these points are essential to understanding the discussion that will ensue, and many people have been lead into serious misinterpretation of the argument by failing to remember one or more of these points.
Demea immediately rejects Cleanthes's approach, because he finds it shocking that anyone would claim that God's existence cannot be rigorously demonstrated; that it is not follows from the second and third of the points I just mentioned. Philo's immediate reaction, on the other hand, is to focus on the first of the three points, and immediately he goes on the attack against analogical arguments from experience. What strikes him about Cleanthes's argument is not that it appeals to experience (which is what strikes Demea) but that it makes use of the most uncertain possible appeal to experience, analogy. Surely, he says, the analogy between the universe and a house is not a very close analogy.
Cleanthes in reply to these insists that his argument makes the existence of God more than a guess or conjecture; that the analogy is fairly close, although imperfect; and that imperfect analogies can ground inferences that are much more than mere conjectures.
There is more to Part II, but I want to save the rest in order to talk about it together with Part III. This will suffice for now. To recap, I've identified the following key issues that are important for understanding the argument:
(1) Cleanthes and Philo are playing a game of which Demea is not wholly aware, because Cleanthes knows that Philo is half-joking in his support of Demea, whereas Demea thinks that Philo is wholly on his side.
(2) Philo concedes to Cleanthes that skeptics like himself must recognize the natural force of arguments from sense and experience.
(3) Cleanthes has introduced the crucial issue of scientific conclusions, and pointed out that they show that the skeptic can't restrict the natural force of arguments from sense and experience to arguments with conclusions devoted wholly to matters of everyday life.
(4) Demea has made the distinction between arguing for God's existence and arguing that He has certain attributes, and Philo has agreed to it completely.
(5) Cleanthes has presented the particular argument to be discussed. This argument is an argument from sense and experience, and it is in particular an analogical argument from sense and experience.
(6) Cleanthes has committed himself entirely to this argument as the one and only argument he can accept.
(7) Demea's immediate reaction to the argument is to protest its 'a posteriori' character.
(8) Philo's immediate reaction to the argument is to protest its analogical character.
Most of the rest of the dialogue plays out masterfully like a well-ordered game. (1)-(5) are its rules. (6)-(8) are the initial positions of the characters at the opening of the game. Now the game is on, and Philo has the first move. More on that in the next post in the series.
Part I introduces the characters, Cleanthes, Demea, and Philo. The discussion when the dialogue has opened has turned to religious education, and Demea has claimed that the mind needs to be brought into submission to religious principles by emphasis on the uncertainties, obscurities, and confusions that plague all forms of human reason. Philo praises this idea, saying that if this recommendation is cultivated, we would learn not to give much credit to frail reason on topics so sublime and difficult as theological ones. Demea takes this straightforwardly as praise; Cleanthes sees at once that Philo is engaging in "some raillery or artificial malice". Much of the rest of the Dialogues is an expansion of this: Demea takes Philo naively, Cleanthes sees Philo is engaging in a bit of mockery. But Cleanthes and Philo keep up the game throughout (which is important), and Cleanthes replies to Philo's speech that he is proposing to ground religion on philosophical skepticism, and jokes that we'll see how deep Philo's skepticism runs when the company breaks up and Philo goes out the door rather than window and assumes throughout that gravity will hold his body to the ground. Nature overrules the artificial principles of the Skeptics, just as it overrules the artificial principles of philosophical schools like the Stoics.
Philo concedes that this is so, and the fact that he does so is extremely important for the course of the argument, so keep it in mind. However, he notes that while the principles of the Stoics may have been artificial, impossible to maintain outside of the highest flights of philosophical contemplation, nonetheless, by accustoming themselves to these principles in one part of their life (namely, philosophical reasoning), they developed a disposition that carries over into other parts of life -- only partially and imperfectly, it is true, but which allowed the Stoic school to produce some outstanding examples of virtue. Likewise, says Philo, when someone accustoms himself to thinking about the limits and failings of human reason, something of this disposition carries over into other aspects of life. The Skeptic's position is simply that in an "abstract view" reason exhibits contradictions in its very nature. There are, however, views other than the abstract, and in ordinary life the Skeptic's arguments don't have the force to counterbalance the natural conclusions of sense and experience. But some fields are very far from these natural conclusions of sense and experience, and one of those fields is natural religion, which deals with things like God and the eternity of the world.
Cleanthes is unconvinced. Skeptics, whatever they may say, don't merely adhere to conclusions in ordinary life; they do so in abstract philosophy as well. And this is all to the good: it would be absurd not to adhere to solid scientific conclusions, however abstract, even if one does not attribute to them a complete certainty. The examples Cleanthes gives are Newton's analysis of the rainbow and the arguments put forward by Galileo and Copernicus for the motion of the earth. These examples are not picked out at random; they are carefully selected by Hume, and they, too, will affect the course of the argument. But at the moment Cleanthes's point is simply that in actual practice, through most of philosophy and science, philosophical skeptics are necessarily skeptics about particular questions, each of which has to be taken on a case-by-case basis, and not about whole fields. So why, Cleanthes asks, does the philosophical skeptic suddenly change tactics in religious matters? There is no legitimate distinction to be made between one field of philosophy and another, or between philosophy and common life. The arguments are similar in each; and in each they carry the same force. No one is so silly as to reject physics simply because it's difficult and often far removed from sensory experience; so the fact that a field has these qualities is simply not an adequate reason for rejecting the ability of human reason to handle it. The arguments still must be considered point by point.
Part II continues to set up an argument; immediately we get another distinction that is essential for understanding the future course of the argument. Demea points out that it is one thing to be skeptical about our knowledge of the divine being, i.e., the existence of God, and another thing to be skeptical about our knowledge of the divine nature. Demea takes the former to be simply self-evident; the latter, however, is altogether unknown to us by our "finite, weak, and blind" reason. The greatest impiety is to deny that God exists; the second greatest is to pry into God's nature and affairs. Philo agrees that the two matters are distinct, and then says something very important:
But surely, where reasonable men treat these subjects, the question can never be concerning the Being, but only the Nature, of the Deity. The former truth, as you well observe, is unquestionable and self-evident. Nothing exists without a cause; and the original cause of this universe (whatever it be) we call God; and piously ascribe to him every species of perfection. Whoever scruples this fundamental truth, deserves every punishment which can be inflicted among philosophers, to wit, the greatest ridicule, contempt, and disapprobation. But as all perfection is entirely relative, we ought never to imagine that we comprehend the attributes of this divine Being, or to suppose that his perfections have any analogy or likeness to the perfections of a human creature.
This passage in particular needs to be read closely; and keeping it in mind as you go through the Dialogues will keep you from falling into the common misunderstandings of what Philo is doing. We will see again the points made here.
Cleanthes turns to Demea and tells him how he conceives the matter, and in the course of doing so he gives the argument that will be under discussion for the rest of the book:
Look round the world: contemplate the whole and every part of it: you will find it to be nothing but one great machine, subdivided into an infinite number of lesser machines, which again admit of subdivisions to a degree beyond what human senses and faculties can trace and explain. All these various machines, and even their most minute parts, are adjusted to each other with an accuracy which ravishes into admiration all men who have ever contemplated them. The curious adapting of means to ends, throughout all nature, resembles exactly, though it much exceeds, the productions of human contrivance; of human designs, thought, wisdom, and intelligence. Since, therefore, the effects resemble each other, we are led to infer, by all the rules of analogy, that the causes also resemble; and that the Author of Nature is somewhat similar to the mind of man, though possessed of much larger faculties, proportioned to the grandeur of the work which he has executed. By this argument a posteriori, and by this argument alone, do we prove at once the existence of a Deity, and his similarity to human mind and intelligence.
Three things in particular need to be noted about this argument. First, it is an argument based on the rules of analogy. Second, it is 'a posteriori', i.e., from sense and experience. Third, Cleanthes commits himself to appealing only to this argument. All three of these points are essential to understanding the discussion that will ensue, and many people have been lead into serious misinterpretation of the argument by failing to remember one or more of these points.
Demea immediately rejects Cleanthes's approach, because he finds it shocking that anyone would claim that God's existence cannot be rigorously demonstrated; that it is not follows from the second and third of the points I just mentioned. Philo's immediate reaction, on the other hand, is to focus on the first of the three points, and immediately he goes on the attack against analogical arguments from experience. What strikes him about Cleanthes's argument is not that it appeals to experience (which is what strikes Demea) but that it makes use of the most uncertain possible appeal to experience, analogy. Surely, he says, the analogy between the universe and a house is not a very close analogy.
Cleanthes in reply to these insists that his argument makes the existence of God more than a guess or conjecture; that the analogy is fairly close, although imperfect; and that imperfect analogies can ground inferences that are much more than mere conjectures.
There is more to Part II, but I want to save the rest in order to talk about it together with Part III. This will suffice for now. To recap, I've identified the following key issues that are important for understanding the argument:
(1) Cleanthes and Philo are playing a game of which Demea is not wholly aware, because Cleanthes knows that Philo is half-joking in his support of Demea, whereas Demea thinks that Philo is wholly on his side.
(2) Philo concedes to Cleanthes that skeptics like himself must recognize the natural force of arguments from sense and experience.
(3) Cleanthes has introduced the crucial issue of scientific conclusions, and pointed out that they show that the skeptic can't restrict the natural force of arguments from sense and experience to arguments with conclusions devoted wholly to matters of everyday life.
(4) Demea has made the distinction between arguing for God's existence and arguing that He has certain attributes, and Philo has agreed to it completely.
(5) Cleanthes has presented the particular argument to be discussed. This argument is an argument from sense and experience, and it is in particular an analogical argument from sense and experience.
(6) Cleanthes has committed himself entirely to this argument as the one and only argument he can accept.
(7) Demea's immediate reaction to the argument is to protest its 'a posteriori' character.
(8) Philo's immediate reaction to the argument is to protest its analogical character.
Most of the rest of the dialogue plays out masterfully like a well-ordered game. (1)-(5) are its rules. (6)-(8) are the initial positions of the characters at the opening of the game. Now the game is on, and Philo has the first move. More on that in the next post in the series.
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