Basic Beliefs

Our third axiom was that people communicate.  This is really not a very precise statement for a number of reasons.  To communicate seems to imply community- we need a recipient and a communicator.  We might be tempted to say that built into that axiom is the assumption that other people exist.  Built into that might be the assumption that a world beyond ourselves exists.  But for anyone who knows anything about the history of philosophy since the Enlightenment, these assumptions would be unacceptable because one of the principle questions since Descartes has been "on what basis can we claim to know these things?"  I'm going to give a whirlwind history of Modern Philosophy based on that question:

Rene Descartes marks the starting point of Modern Philosophy.  He argues that we can, via the rational process, move from a starting point of certain knowledge- that I exist- to the existence of everything else that we "know" to exist.  We can construct rational arguments that establish with certainty the existence of the material, external world and other persons with whom we communicate.  The problem is Descartes reasoning is circular and few have accepted his arguments.

Baruch Spinoza follows Descartes in claiming that we come to our knowledge by the "rational process" of constructing arguments.  But he modifies the conclusion a bit- we don't have knowledge of a world of matter existing outside our minds, we have knowledge of a world of ideas in our minds (think the Matrix).

John Locke isn't satisfied with Descartes.  He thinks we come to all our knowledge not by reasoning but through our empirical/sensory experiences.  But through those experiences we really do know the external, material world as it is.

George Berkeley offers a critique of Locke that ends up with a similar conclusion as that of Spinoza- our experience doesn't show us an external, material world, it shows us a world of ideas in our minds.

David Hume critiques this entire project by claiming that the categories necessary for us to put together our "knowledge" of the world cannot be demonstrated rationally or empirically.

Immanuel Kant responds to Hume by acknowledging that the categories cannot be demonstrated empirically to exist beyond our minds but then claims that they are part of our subjective experience- we understand the world through the grid our minds create using these categories.

Now, this whirlwind tour is based on a rigorously academic method called "squinting" (technical term given by Miroslav Volf).  There are a lot of details left out of this story and that's because for our purposes right now the details aren't as significant.  There are just a couple of things that I want to draw attention to.  First, I want to note the back and forth between "realism" and "idealism" that happens in this history- the claim that we can really, with certainty know what the material, external world is like using a particular method gives way each time to a weaker claim- we can know a world of ideas through that method.  Both Spinoza and Berkeley want to argue that this world of ideas is the real world, but with Kant we get a change: the world of ideas that our minds put together is not the same world as the external world that exists beyond us.  The difference between the two creates a "transcendental divide" between our experience and reality- we always know our experience, we do not know the world beyond our experience.  This has essentially gotten us back to the first axiom. 

Second, I want to notice what Kant suggests about the categories through which we understand the world.  First I have to acknowledge that there are some differences of interpretation here.  Some of Kant's followers, such as Hegel and many of a more analytic persuasion, want to extract from Kant a way of knowing what the "real world" is- Hegel by means of an idealism not entirely unlike that of Spinoza or Berkeley (at least on my best attempt at reading Hegel, who is a strong contender for most confusing philosopher ever), others by means of something like what Locke and Descartes wanted to do before Hume got a hold of them.  I think in both of these cases that the project is headed in the wrong direction and the essential insight Kant gives us has been missed, the first axiom ignored or overlooked.  Perhaps this is because on the basis of that axiom it does not really seem like we can know anything- my first person experience could be a complete illusion, like Descartes feared.  If I am only able to know my first person experience, how will I ever escape the possibility that it is an illusion?  I think what Kant says about the categories is actually extremely helpful in answering that question.  What Kant seems to suggest is that we cannot operate in a "world" in which that possibility is true.  In other words, there are some beliefs that are so central to our understanding of the world that we have to accept them even if there is no definitive (or empirical) proof of their being true.  By writing his Meditations, Descartes betrays that he believes an external world exists that contains people who can understand what he wrote.  He may hypothetically call that world into doubt, but he has not really doubted it so long as he continues to write for it.  That Hume picks up a pen to write his critique of causation betrays that he actually believes in causes, else why does he think that the ink will actually reach the page?  Before I am accused of a logical fallacy here, the point is not that such assumptions invalidate their arguments about our hypothetical doubt of these things.  The point is to give credence to the idea that we simply cannot do anything without these assumptions being present.

The conclusion of this is that while we are viewing the world subjectively, from a first person perspective that could in fact be an illusion, the possibility of it being an illusion, the possibility of it being completely false, is one that we need not entertain seriously.  There are certain beliefs, beliefs we might call basic beliefs, that are so central to our understanding of the world that we simply must believe them if we want to make sense of anything else.  So our third axiom can stand- we can believe that there is a world beyond us and that it contains people with whom we communicate because without such beliefs we simply cannot make sense of anything in the world.  It will be up to a later post to explore a bit more what the third axiom might imply and how we might use it.

Response to Peter Millican's Critique of Aristotle

Reading Hume on Human Understanding

Realizing that this is ambitious, I'm going to take on Oxford's Peter Millican (click the link above to see his book which I have not read...). I have been listening to a recent pod-casting of his lectures from the course "General Philosophy" which covers the emergence and development of Modern/Enlightenment thought.

Honestly, I have been quite disturbed by his presentation of the critique of Christian and Aristotelian thought by the early moderns. Millican makes a strong effort to associate the Christian/Aristotelian view with a particular, Ptolemaic view of the cosmos. He then argues that the rise of mechanistic view of the universe beginning with Galileo and Descartes results in an essential undermining of the religious viewpoint.

It certainly seems to be the case that Modern philosophy developed in large part due to a reaction against the religious wars associated with the Reformation. In that sense, it was, as Millican argues, largely aimed at finding a philosophy of reason that could stand over and above the competing religious ideologies of the day. At the same time, a more mechanistic view of the universe emerged. Where I might differ with Millican is that it seems the rise of the mechanistic model had less to do with problems with Aristotelian philosophy as with the reaction of the Church.

Let me elaborate: Aristotle proposed a certain cosmological model of the universe, this much Millican has correctly asserted. However, this model is not the entirety of Aristotle's metaphysics. In fact, I would argue (and now I am in conflict with Millican) that the model is nothing more than a particular manifestation of the more foundational metaphysical principles that Aristotle argued for. Those principles, especially the ideas of an empirical basis for knowledge, constancy in nature, etc, played a huge role in the science of the Enlightenment. In fact, the new Astronomy proposed by Galileo, I would argue (against Millican), offers no real conflict to Aristotle's metaphysics, merely to a particular cosmological model that embodied his metaphysics. Unfortunately, the Church had become attached to that model and the ensuing conflict, which was utterly pointless, has led to a great deal more of conflicts between science and religion since then. So essentially, here is my beef with Millican. It seems to me that Millican has adopted a straw man by conflating the metaphysics of Aristotle with his cosmology and arguing that if we lose one, so with the other. I am arguing that this kind of reasoning only works in one direction- if we drop Aristotle's metaphysics, then certainly his cosmology will make little sense. However, the opposite is not true. Aristotle's cosmology is dependent on his metaphysics, but not the other way around. We can drop the cosmology and keep the metaphysics by pairing it with a better understanding of cosmology. Historically, of course, this was not really done.

This is because Modern philosophy ends up parting with ways with Aristotle on at least one point- teleology has been dropped for a mechanistic view of nature. Millican's presentation here is again a bit biased. Millican offers two arguments against Aristotle's teleology: First, that it is tied to a particular cosmological model (we have already seen that this is a straw man argument), and second, that it is redundant. Essentially, Millican argues that Aristotle's teleological explanations are merely restating the description of the phenomenon in question: this object does this because it is striving to do this. This is why Modern philosophy opts for a more mechanistic view, Millican claims. But what's good for the goose is good for the gander. If we clear up some of Millican's straw man language a little and give a more concrete example of teleology, we can see that that a mechanistic view gives no greater explanatory power. A rock falls, Aristotle would say, because the essence of the rock is to be drawn toward the earth. Later Modern thinkers will say that the rock falls because a unobserved force exists which pulls the rock towards the earth. In both cases, we have described the phenomenon, and in both cases I would argue we have given something of an explanation for why it happens (essence or unobservable force). If one of these lines of reasoning provides no explanation, I would argue neither does the other and Millican has gotten us nowhere. A more plausible explanation for the adoption of the mechanical view over the teleological one is the desire of the Enlightenment to break with religion and exalt the reasoning of man.

It is at this point that I take a great deal of issue with Modern philosophy- the mechanistic view cannot be sustained, I want to argue. Ironically, the mechanistic view, I believe, makes it impossible to escape the skepticism of Hume and causes the entire Enlightenment project to come crashing down on itself. Better to keep with Aristotle in terms of teleology. Yes, the model we use must be updated to reflect more recent observations, but metaphysically this presents no conflict except to those who wish to escape the need of the supernatural and continue to exalt the reason of man.