Being completely objective about your worldview (as if that were possible)
In the past I have had my great frustrations with John Loftus and his Outsider Test of Faith. Shall I count the reasons? For starters, it is arbitrarily imposed upon people who hold a set of claims that are “religious” as a means to test those claims when a more consistent application would present it as a means to test the basic worldview assumptions of all people. Further, Loftus treats it as a one-off test. (If my beliefs pass this test then I’m okay). In fact, our beliefs should be subjected to ongoing review. For an illustration of how important this is, think about a meat-packing plant which receives one scheduled visit from government inspectors. Imagine that inspectors told the plant that they had passed and as a result the inspectors would never return for another visit. The plant is supposedly good for all time. Once you knew that they were no longer subject to scheduled or random government inspections, how quick would you be to buy their deli meat?
So how does one go about being objective in their worldview? Well for starters, one needs to consider whether that worldview provides an explanation for the things one encounters in the world. This is important because the human tendency is not to explain recalcitrant facts but rather to explain them away.
Interpreting facts
But here’s our first difficulty. How can one draw up an objective list of what one sees in the world? This is not as easy as it might sound because inevitably the set of beliefs we already presuppose prior to this empirical inventory will shape the kinds of facts we are willing to acknowledge at the outset. A racist decides to evaluate his beliefs in the moral and intellectual superiority of his race. But every time somebody of another race shows kindness, intelligence or capability, he interprets his experience by tacitly assuming they have an agenda, or perhaps are “the exception that proves the rule”. So all the abundant counter evidence gets screened out. And we shouldn’t fool ourselves when it comes to our great ability to fool ourselves.
Another difficulty, perhaps an even greater one, is in deciding just how to interpret experience. In Philosophical Investigations Ludwig Wittgenstein gives an example with the picture of a stickman walking up a steep hill. Or is he sliding down the hill? Who decides? Either way, it is an interpretation. And then there is the Psychology 101 example of the duck. Or is it a rabbit? You can bet that Daffy and Bugs will disagree on that one.
Levels of explanation
Let’s also keep in mind that various phenomena have levels of explanation. This is crucial to remember because often people fall into the erroneous assumption that to have provided one level of explanation is to have provided explanation all the way up (or down).
For example, take the experiences of a mystic like Teresa of Avila. In 1560 she reported a visit from an angel which is
captured in Bernini’s famous marble scuplture (imagine carving that billowing fabric out of marble). She later wrote: “In his hands I saw a long golden spear and at the end of the iron tip I seemed to see a point of fire. With this he seemed to pierce my heart several times so that it reached to my entrails. When he drew it out I thought he was drawing them out with it, and he left me completely afire with a great love of God.” Oliver Sacks has offered a neurological account of her experiences. Is that an adequate account all the way up? One can’t assume that it is any more than one can assume that a neurological account of tasting peppermint is an adequate explanation all the way up for the conscious experience of tasting peppermint.
Drawing upon background information
And then I have this question: to what extent can or should one bring in other facts or background information in interpreting the world? If I go to a magic show you can bet that I am not going to add immediately to my inventory of facts to be explained the purported fact that people can be sawed in two and yet survive. And that certainly seems legitimate. But when is it appropriate to draw on background information in taking our belief inventory? Is it okay to dismiss claims to a resurrection a priori because obviously just as people cannot be sawed in two by a magician so they cannot be resurrected?
A word on agnosticism
Finally, let’s remember this: agnosticism with respect to various purported facts can be the most reasonable response in some cases. In other words, it is okay to recognize that some purported facts are recalcitrant to our available explanations. And we recognize that eventually something’s gotta give, but we may not know at the time whether that thing is the putative fact or our interpretive framework which finds it inexplicable.
By the same token it is also important to remember that agnosticism is not always justified. Sometimes the evidence for a putative fact is such that we really need to revise our worldview in light of it and that means turning a critical eye on our agnosticism. Sometimes not believing is nothing more than irrational intransigence.
Triumphalism out the window
All that provides merely some preliminary qualifications. But they should be sufficient, I hope, to warn us against naive triumphalism regarding our worldview. Instead we need to go from here to evaluate carefully, diligently, and continually, putative facts as they come to us.
Tags: agnosticism, John Loftus, justification, outsider test of faith, rationality, worldview
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Ray Ingles says:
Sunday, February 6, 2011 at 5:06am
Which is why I only tend to have any confidence in claims and ideas that can be tested.
randal says:
Sunday, February 6, 2011 at 5:12am
Erk! I take it you have confidence in the claim that you ought only to have confidence in claims that you can test. If that is the case, how do you test that claim?
Brap Gronk says:
Sunday, February 6, 2011 at 12:58pm
I prefer the outcomes that occur as a result of people believing claims that can be tested vs. the outcomes that occur as a result of people believing claims that cannot be tested. Sagan’s discussion of that subject in “The Demon Haunted World” (for instance, persecutions for witchcraft) actually left me somewhat depressed and scared for humanity.
randal says:
Sunday, February 6, 2011 at 2:18pm
“I prefer the outcomes that occur as a result of people believing claims that can be tested vs. the outcomes that occur as a result of people believing claims that cannot be tested.”
I suspect this statement doesn’t accomplish what you’re after. After all, a person could meet this standard by believing only testable claims but doing so without having tested those claims or even by holding them after they have been tested and found to be false. So I think what you’d really want to say here is you like the result of people who subject their claims to testing where appropriate.
The underlying difficulty is that our most basic beliefs cannot be tested: they must simply be accepted. So the challenge is to discern which of our beliefs should be subjected to testing and what that testing looks like and how much evidence contrary to our belief should be sufficient for us to abandon it.
Ray Ingles says:
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 6:21pm
The notion that I should only have confidence in claims I can test is not a first-order claim. I have first-order assumptions like “(a) an outside world exists, and (b) it’s possible to discover some truth aboutthat outside world.” But I hold those claims because their negation implies automatic futility.
Now, working from those assumptions, I can work with evidence from my senses, and those show that it’s possible for me to be mistaken. Indeed, that humans are terrible guessers in areas where they lack experience, and still make flubs even in areas where they have a lot of experience.
So, from those fundamental assumptions, and experience, I can agree with Richard Feynman: “The first principle is that you must not fool yourself – and you are the easiest person to fool.” And from there… testing claims.
randal says:
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 6:27pm
“But I hold those claims because their negation implies automatic futility.”
Of course this is not epistemic justification. Rather, it is merely a pragmatic justification. By the same token, if I have to give a speech to a bunch of Mensa eggheads it may be pragmatic for me to believe I’m the smartest guy in the room because if I believe the contrary I’ll fall to pieces (i.e. automatic futility). That hardly means that it is epistemically justified for me to believe I’m the smartest guy in the room even if it is pragmatic for me to do so.
So you leave us only with pragmatic justification which is a complete and sweeping epistemological skepticism.
Another thing. It is simply false to assume that automatic futility follows from the denial of claims such as “there is an external world”. Idealists (that is, a person who believes that the “external world” simply consists of the activities of minds) are quite successful at navigating the world. Some even get tenure in universities. So claiming pragmatic justification fails on two counts.
Brap Gronk says:
Tuesday, February 8, 2011 at 2:29am
Does God exist if an external world does not exist? If not, is it accurate to say that anyone who believes God exists shares a common assumption (specifically, that an external world exists) with anyone who believes the sun exists? What would be the theist’s epistemic justification for that assumption about the external world?
randal says:
Tuesday, February 8, 2011 at 2:54am
“Does God exist if an external world does not exist?”
Interesting question because George Berkeley argued that idealism is true and provides an argument for God’s existence! In other words, Christian theism is compatible with both realism (the view that the external world exists) and idealism (the view that it only exists as mental events in brains).
Brap Gronk says:
Tuesday, February 8, 2011 at 12:55pm
Is it accurate to say that any realist who believes God exists shares a common assumption (specifically, that an external world exists) with anyone who believes the sun exists? What would be the realist theist’s epistemic justification for that assumption about the external world?
randal says:
Tuesday, February 8, 2011 at 2:39pm
On your first question, a realist about the external world probably believes the sun exists, but the existence of the sun is not a necessary entailment of realism. (That is, realism doesn’t specify what the external world consists of (though naive realism does). It only specifies that there is an external world.)
On your second question, I believe my belief in an external world is justified as an immediate deliverance of cognition. I am what has been called a “common sense” realist, namely one who takes common sense beliefs as truth-conducive unless we have a reason to believe otherwise. It is certainly common sense to accept the external world and so I accept that it exists until someone gives me a strong reason to believe otherwise.
Shawn says:
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 2:24am
I was wondering when I’d see this post appear (being a relative newcomer and all).
As usual, those who don’t want to honestly compare their theistic belief system against another theistic belief system, try and discredit the process itself, rather than just admit they can’t make a case for why their God/religion/sect is more believable/reliable/valid than another person’s God/religion/sect.
It’s unarguable (although you can’t seem to even admit this) that two people following different religions hold incorrect “worldviews” on the subject of theism, according to the other. e.g. between Hindus and Christians.
It’s equally unarguable that each one has made (and continues to make, as you rightly point out) a discernment in favor of their God/religion/sect.
What is incredulous/frustrating to an “outsider” like me, is that you are unable and/or unwilling to outline on what basis this discernment is made, and have the other person’s religion tested against these same criteria.
Yes, John expresses it differently. i.e. that you explain why the other person’s religion is invalid first. However, my suggestion of starting with the determinative basis of your “worldview” is skinning the same cat.
As an atheist I can tell you specifically how I arrived at my worldview on theism and religion, and am happy to test it against all known (by me)Gods and religions.
This request for an explanation to a person whose blog encourages deep thought and debate on the subject on Christian evangelicalism doesn’t appear to be unreasonable or difficult to me.
You don’t need to be able to provide a list of every objective fact in the universe (or try and divert the question by arguing philosophically that there aren’t any) in order to undertake it.
You need only consider what YOU have used as the inputs (facts, allegations, blind faith or otherwise) in your decision to follow your God/religion/sect.
But here’s the important bit not to miss IF you want to convince yourself or others that your “worldview” is more intellectually substantial than “what my parents told me to believe”:
You can’t use any inputs which would be equally valid for someone else (like a Hindu) to rely on, otherwise you end up with “I’m right because I believe I’m right”.
Which is probably why you don’t want to “take the test”.
randal says:
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 1:32pm
Shawn: “As an atheist I can tell you specifically how I arrived at my worldview on theism and religion, and am happy to test it against all known (by me)Gods and religions.”
Please tell me this! Do two things for me. First tell me what atheism means to you, i.e. what is the set of claims about the basic structure of reality that you accept as being true. Next, tell me how you arrived at that set of beliefs. Once you’ve done that I’ll submit your account to critical appraisal.
Shawn says:
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 10:46pm
Will do. Just give me a couple of days for a comprehensive explanation.
Shawn says:
Wednesday, February 9, 2011 at 8:44am
Here is my answer to your challenge.
http://whygodisntnecessary.blogspot.com/p/how-i-ended-up-atheist.html
Appraise away
randal says:
Thursday, February 10, 2011 at 3:50pm
Thanks, I’ll take a look.
Shawn says:
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 2:49am
“Instead we need to go from here to evaluate carefully, diligently, and continually, putative facts as they come to us”.
The outsider test of faith is asking you to explain HOW you did exactly that.
randal says:
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 1:37pm
The outsider test for faith is arbitrary, self-serving and inadequate for meeting the demands of a truth-seeker as I point out here.
Shawn says:
Tuesday, February 8, 2011 at 10:40am
Randal, the only arguments you have made here are that the test should be applied wider than solely to theistic beliefs and that it should be applied more than once.
That hardly qualifies as a determinitive or substantial argument against it’s methodology or efficacy.
randal says:
Tuesday, February 8, 2011 at 2:24pm
Actually, the point I make is that we don’t need any “outsider test” at all. All we need is to seek to be objective in our assessment of our own beliefs and those of others in all things. If you like you can call that the “outsider test for life” but by that point it is something very different from what John Loftus has proposed.
Shawn says:
Tuesday, February 8, 2011 at 7:56pm
What John is saying is that if you are TRULY wanting to be objective in your choice of religion, then surely you must apply a consistent set of criteria to both yours and other religions, which would affirm yours and reject the others?
That so unreasonable?
If I choose to drive a Porsche instead of a Ferrari and I’m claiming I’m being objective about it, surely I must be able to provide some decision criteria which applies only to the Porsche and not to the Ferrari?
I can’t claim it’s because I can’t buy a red Ferrari and only Porsche’s come in red.
randal says:
Tuesday, February 8, 2011 at 8:16pm
Shawn, let’s say I’m an anarchist. That is, I believe in “no rule”. So I issue a challenge: everyone who believes there ought to be a rule — be it a monarchy, republic or whatever — should recognize that they probably hold those views because of their socio-historical circumstances. So they must submit their beliefs to an outsider test. And if they do they too will become an anarchist.
Nobody would take that seriously. (At least I hope not.)
Shawn says:
Wednesday, February 9, 2011 at 2:47am
Erroneous and misleading use of an analogy again Randal.
If you were an anarchist and you are claiming you have made an objective decision in this regard, you should be able to explain on what criteria you have chosen anarchy and why that criteria would lead you to reject the other political/societal systems such monarchy, democracy, theocracy, etc.
Conversely, if you are a monarchist you should be able to provide the criteria for why you have so decided. Obviously such criteria could not equally lead you to be an anarchist (or democratic, etc).
Seems pretty straightforward and reasonable to me.
The outsider test of faith simply asks you to provide objective criteria (to yourself) for why you are a Protestant Christian and not a Muslim/Hindu/Buddhist/Catholic/Methodist/Jew/Scientologist?
You could add atheist if you like.
It’s OK to admit you can’t find any OBJECTIVE or RATIONAL criteria Randal (like you just “know” this is the right religion for you, and the other’s aren’t).
That’s what the test is designed to uncover.
I might simply “like” the design of a Porsche better than a Ferrari.
It’s just that I am then prevented from claiming it is an objective or rational decision.
Shawn says:
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 3:23am
“Is it okay to dismiss claims to a resurrection a priori because obviously just as people cannot be sawed in two by a magician so they cannot be resurrected?”
Not only is it OK, it’s a requirement if you want to live according to 21st century logic and science.
In further support of my position, there were many claims of resurrection in ancient history (sorry, Jesus doesn’t have the monopoly) but there aren’t as many now, and not a single one has been independently substantiated.
It boils down to whether you believe that everything that is imaginable is physically possible on earth, or that it is limited to “laws” (or whatever you like to call them) of physics/biology/nature.
i.e. it is possible to levitate (i.e. defy gravity) without aid of additional devices, or it is not.
That is possible for anyone to act outside these “laws” has yet to be independently proven. There has been a $1mil prize on offer for several years now if anyone can.
Does it not appear inconsistent that only (clearly biased) accounts of your human Jesus acting outside these “laws” can be treated as credible, whilst the thousands of other equally unproven supernatural allegations should be considered false?
I live according to the known and tested laws of nature. It is safer that way.
Shawn says:
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 4:25am
Forgot to add this.
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/richard_carrier/resurrection/lecture.html
randal says:
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 1:43pm
Shawn, Ken Hamm also had a $1 million dollar prize (or thereabouts) to anyone who could “prove evolution”. And I have a $1 million prize to anybody who can prove I exist. In each case the problem is that the person who decides whether the evidence provided is adequate to win the prize is the person offering the prize.
Please explain what it is about “21st century logic and science” which makes it impossible that a person be resurrected. I suspect that what you’re really claiming is that 21st century logic and science forces a person to atheism. So please let me know how that is.
Shawn says:
Monday, February 7, 2011 at 11:45pm
Whilst according to skeptical philosophically no-one can prove anything actually exists or happens (one of the arguments for philosophy being a waste of time) if we all lived our lives according to this understanding (or lack of it) nothing would ever get done, and you would indeed have true anarchy.
So, we can either accept there is some meaningful baseline for agreeing what exists and what is physically possible in the world in which we live, or we live in fairyland and jump off cliffs believing we can fly, or kill our children by praying for disease cures instead of seeking modern medical treatment.
If you are requiring me to prove you exist as a precedent to logically and scientifically analyzing the allegations of the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth, you are clearly (and somewhat desperately)just obstructing to avoid rational analysis (or refusing to take the field).
As to 21st century logic and science making it impossible for a person to be resurrected, I would have thought that pretty self evident.
Provide one medical professional, or scientist who can demonstrate, theorize, or show evidence of how it is physically possible that any dead human (as opposed to appearing dead or in a state of suspended organ function) can be returned to a living state after 2-3 days, using current technology/science (much less 30AD equivalent). One that had been crucified and speared through their internal organs would also be necessary.
I posit that I could provide thousands that would argue the opposite with physical evidence.
You see, in the year 30AD there were probably many respected learned professionals who would have believed it possible (via some supernatural God), much like they believed all sorts of supernatural rubbish that you and I now accept was superstitious myth.
That is the difference between 30AD science and intellect, and the 2011 equivalent.
Yes, you can still argue 2011 science can’t disprove “a God could have done it”.
But it also can’t disprove that Satan didn’t, or the flying spaghetti monster.
It doesn’t try because there is no credible evidence that these things can or do exist.
If you want your worldview to include physical actions and beings which no science or logical intellect over the history of humanity has been able to provide independent credible evidence for (like it reliably does for many other things in the universe), then so be it.
Just don’t try and argue it’s a view which has any logical or scientific basis or merit.