Evil God at Chez Alice
Spencer offered the following summary of Stephen Law’s Evil God argument:
1) Either EG can be rationally rejected on the basis of observational evidence or not.
2) If EG can be rationally rejected on the basis of observational evidence, then GG can also be rejected on the basis of observational evidence (and hence the POE succeeds).
3) If EG cannot be rationally rejected on the basis of observational evidence, then if it is to be rejected, it must be rejected on some other basis.
He then commented:
The first route — rejecting EG on the basis of observational evidence — comes at the cost of conceding the POE. The second — rejecting EG on some other basis — comes at the cost of adopting untenable a priori arguments in order to do so (e.g. moral argument).
These comments are of especial note because Law then commented: “Thanks Spence, you’ve got it right.”
In other words, Spencer got the imprimatur of the master. So we should pay special attention to this reconstruction.
Now first a warning. As I write this I am sitting at Chez Alice in Princeton, NJ. (No, that’s not me in the window. It’s a pink cake you doofus.) And that immediately makes me smarter than usual.
Here’s the first problem with 1). It is ambiguous. It could be referring to actual evidence or possible observational evidence which could arise. Let’s consider the latter claim first.
I have no problem with that. In other words, it is possible that observational evidence could arise which could confirm GG. For example, Jesus comes back and ushers in his kingdom.
It is also easy to conceive possible observational evidence that confirms EG. Imagine, for example, that tomorrow a voice thunders through the heavens saying “I am evil God. I have allowed you worms to enjoy limited pleasures but now you will all suffer for eternity, and your suffering will be even more intense because of the limited pleasures I granted you for a time. Har Har Har dee Har!!” At that moment we are plunged into flames where we writhe in agony. As I was twisting in unimaginable torment I would surely agree that I was now in possession of observational evidence that would make belief in EG rational and belief in GG irrational. Not that Spencer, or Stephen, or I would care very much.
So belief in GG and EG are both such that they could possibly be confirmed observationally beyond any reasonable doubt. In this regard they differ from a claim like “Everything just doubled in size” which couldn’t be confirmed observationally (though it could be confirmed in other ways, such as divine testimony: e.g. God tells us “I just doubled everything in size.)
(I’ve been working with a particular interpretation of “observational evidence” as non-linguistic evidence gathered through the senses.)
So now let’s revise 1) for actual evidence:
1′) Either EG can be rationally rejected on the basis of present observational evidence or not.
And here I say: not. In other words, by the definition of “observational evidence” that I provided the evidence is presently insufficient to reject EG. This doesn’t mean that Christians don’t reject it. It just means that they reject it for a broader set of reasons or grounds than direct observational evidence. Should Jesus come back tomorrow then I’ll change that assessment.
And with this, I turn to 3). Of course Christians reject it on some other basis. However, they don’t reject it based on “untenable a priori arguments”. They reject it because they already believe in the existence of GG.
At this point Law would need to argue against proper functionalist and reliabilist accounts of Christian belief. Let’s say that a Christian holds the belief “God loves me”. This claim is incompatible with EG. If the Christian can hold “God loves me” as a properly basic belief (and Law’s attempt to argue otherwise in his book Believing Bullshit is unsuccessful as I argued in my extended review) then the Christian has a defeater for the existence of EG. In the same way the properly basic belief that “The sun is shining through the cafe window” is a defeater for the thesis “It is overcast outside”.
In conclusion, do Spencer and Stephen have a defeater for Descartes’ skeptical demon? I hope so! Otherwise maybe they should become Pyrrhoian skeptics.
1) Either Descartes’ skeptical demon hypothesis can be rationally rejected on the basis of observational evidence or not.
2) If Descartes’ skeptical demon hypothesis cannot be rationally rejected on the basis of observational evidence, then if it is to be rejected, it must be rejected on some other basis.
Tags: Chez Alice, Descartes' evil demon, epistemology, evil god, problem of evil, Stephen Law
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Brad Haggard says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 3:20pm
Could someone also attack the concept of an evil god as incoherent based on the considerations of the ontological argument? That wouldn’t be an untenable a priori.
randal says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 3:34pm
Such a rebuttal could work for the Christian but probably not for the skeptic. That is, a Christian may argue that they can see that the concept of God can be exemplified in at least one possible world. The atheist may counter that he can’t see it. And in that case the Christian might find himself with an argument that can serve as a defeater for the evil god hypothesis even if the atheist doesn’t consider it a good defeater.
This is, of course, one more example of the reality that there is no unanimity on where good arguments are to be found.
Spencer says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 3:51pm
Randal,
The EGC boils down to the following: what arguments should Christians employ against EG? The moral argument is one option, but it is terribly weak. What is another? You say:
“However, they don’t reject it based on “untenable a priori arguments”. They reject it because they already believe in the existence of GG.”
All you’re saying here is that Christians reject EG because they reject EG, which doesn’t answer the question: on what basis *should* Christians reject EG? Later, you give a clearer answer:
“Let’s say that a Christian holds the belief “God loves me”. This claim is incompatible with EG. If the Christian can hold “God loves me” as a properly basic belief (and Law’s attempt to argue otherwise in his book Believing Bullshit is unsuccessful as I argued in my extended review) then the Christian has a defeater for the existence of EG.”
Your argument, then, is the following:
1) Belief in GG is properly basic.
2) If belief in GG is properly basic, then belief in GG is significantly more reasonable than EG.
3. Therefore, belief in GG is significantly more reasonable than EG.
Of course, the problem is justifying the premises. How would you argue for them? Compare 1) with:
1)* Belief in EG is properly basic.
How would you argue against 1)*?
randal says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 8:33pm
“All you’re saying here is that Christians reject EG because they reject EG, which doesn’t answer the question….”
That’s not what I said. I said Christians reject EG because they already have justified beliefs which are logially incompatible with EG. If you want to dislodge those beliefs you need to show either that those beliefs are not in fact justified or provide a positive case for the existence of EG.
“How would you argue against 1)*?”
Spencer, your problem is that you consistently use epistemological terms like “reasonable” as if they had a single application, e.g. p is reasonable to believe or p is not reasonable to believe. The lack of nuance in your analysis is fatal. Reasonable or not reasonable for which person in which situation relative to which experiences and background set of beliefs?
Is it possible that there could be a community relative to which belief in EG is a prima facie properly basic belief? Sure, that’s possible. So if I want to dislodge the justification the people have for that prima facie justified belief I need to present rebutting or undercutting evidence (i.e. defeaters) to it. And likewise if a child is raised by atheists to hold the properly basic belief “No God exists” I need to present rebutting or undercutting defeaters for that belief.
Brap Gronk says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 3:49am
“And likewise if a child is raised by atheists to hold the properly basic belief “No God exists” I need to present rebutting or undercutting defeaters for that belief.”
Now there’s a topic for a blog post I suspect a lot of folks would be interested in seeing, assuming it doesn’t end up in a stalemate between two opposing yet properly basic beliefs.
randal says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 4:16pm
I’ll see what I can do.
Spencer says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 3:08pm
“So if I want to dislodge the justification the people have for that prima facie justified belief I need to present rebutting or undercutting evidence (i.e. defeaters) to it. ”
Okay, so what “undercutting evidence” could you present against the properly basic belief that EG exists? Would you appeal to empirical considerations? If so, what are they? If not, then what?
Spencer says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 3:30pm
Btw, WLC didn’t just reject EG as false, he rejected it as *absurd.* It’s one thing to claim that one is warranted in rejecting EG because belief in GG is properly basic, but it’s quite another to claim that one is warranted in rejecting EG as *absurd.*
Randal, do you agree with WLC that EG is absurd (not merely false)? If so, how would you *demonstrate* the absurdity?
Spencer says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 3:58pm
Randal,
Two questions:
1) Would you agree that during the debate between WLC and Law, WLC was *not* able to overcome the EGC via the arguments he presented?
2) Assuming there is a re-match debate, what arguments should WLC employ to dispose of the EGC? Should WLC argue that belief in GG is properly basic? In other words, what route should the Christian take?
randal says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 8:35pm
Having listened to the end of the first rebuttal (I blog immediately after I listen) I can say that Craig could have been more forceful in his rebuttal of EG. I think he also should have been more honest in conceding the prima facie problem of natural evil in animal suffering. That’s one reason I don’t like debates. Because you’re arguing a “side” you’re forced into the role of the president’s press secretary.
Spencer says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 3:10pm
Specifically, what *arguments* should WLC employ (next time) to dispose of the EGC?
David P says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 3:16pm
An intuition pump is only as strong as the well you’re drawing it from. Not everyone finds it equally plausible that, obviously we can dismiss EG on the basis of surveying goods in the world.
Spencer says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 3:20pm
True, WLC didn’t find it obvious that EG can be rejected on the basis of observational evidence, but he still needed to explain why belief in GG is significantly more reasonable than belief in EG. He only attempted to do that via the (failed) moral argument.
I’m trying to push Randal to explain what other arguments WLC could have used against the EGC.
Ed Babinski says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 5:00pm
Hi Randal,
I spent some time in Princeton myself, decades ago. I used to frequent The Lamplighter (a Christian bookstore), which closed in 2002 but became Wilson’s Books run by the Christian Union. Beautiful little town.
The EG argument only demonstrates the flexibility of philosophical argumentation and its spectrum of possible interpretations of different “God” hypotheses.
Does a Good or Evil God exist?
How can we know?
For that matter how can we know to what extent Good and to what extent Evil?
A possible mixture perhaps?
The cosmos seems to remain in equilibrium between life and death of living organisms with the vast majority of the cosmos deadly toward life, and with species, planets and even stars having both beginnings and endings (though stars can burn for billions of years).
What about a neutral God, a cosmic programmer or cosmic tinkerer that is in some ways beyond Good and Evil?
Or what about what Robert Anton Wilson proposed? “I don’t believe anything, but I have many suspicions…I strongly suspect that a world ‘external to,’ or at least independent of, my senses exists in some sense. I also suspect that this world shows signs of intelligent design, and I suspect that such intelligence acts via feedback from all parts to all parts and without centralized sovereignity, like Internet; and that it does not function hierarchically, in the style an Oriental despotism, an American corporation or Christian theology. I somewhat suspect that Theism and Atheism both fail to account for such decentralized intelligence, rich in circular-causal feedback.”
randal says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 8:39pm
It is a very scenic place, like walking through an admissions brochure. Unfortunately the narrow streets are very busy and it is apparently terribly expensive to live here. Bottom line: it is tough to beat a New England autumn for scenic beauty.
Crude says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 11:07pm
What about a neutral God, a cosmic programmer or cosmic tinkerer that is in some ways beyond Good and Evil?
And this sort of reply backs up my view of Stephen Law’s approach. It is absolutely fatal, it is threatening, it is devastating… to the atheist.
If Loki exists, if an evil God exists, if a deistic God exists, if multiple gods exist, if [...] exist… atheism is false.
The Atheist Missionary says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 5:16pm
Ah … properly basic beliefs. The axiomatic solution pulled out in desperation by Christian apologists when all else fails (Randal doesn’t pull out the other favorite – Going Nuclear). Please Randal – do tell. Why is belief in a good god properly basic and yet belief in an evil god not?
randal says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 8:41pm
As I pointed out below to Spencer, relative to another doxastic community belief in EG could be properly basic absent defeaters. And relative to an atheistic community the non-existence of God could be properly basic absent defeaters. This has absolutely nothing to do with “going nuclear”. It has to do with understanding epistemological concepts and theories.
Robert says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 3:28pm
I’ve said this before: Beliefs are not islands, at some point in the history of this universe Randal was an infant and his mind started to believe that some things exist and others don’t. These thoughts occurred by links of cause and effect.
In this world – a world where beliefs are created by links of cause and effect – where is room for proper basicality? When do properly basic beliefs pop into existence inside a human mind without any cause to justify them?
Crude says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 9:52pm
In this world – a world where beliefs are created by links of cause and effect – where is room for proper basicality? When do properly basic beliefs pop into existence inside a human mind without any cause to justify them?
I imagine they come from the same place axioms come from.
Really, this doesn’t make any sense. First of all, atheists aren’t universally keen on universal declarations of cause and effect such that every effect has a cause. Some aren’t even keen on there actually being ‘beliefs’ as such. And if you argue that no belief can be taken as foundational or axiomatic and instead every belief has to be justified in terms of something non-axiomatic, you’re going to encounter some problems.
Robert says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 11:39pm
Even axioms are not unconditional. If reality were different than what it actually is, we would have ended up with different axioms.
See: http://lesswrong.com/lw/jr/how_to_convince_me_that_2_2_3/
Robert says:
Thursday, October 27, 2011 at 4:06am
If you read the comments on that post, you’ll see that a lot of people disagreed with Yudkowsky. Here is the money quote, I think :
I’m pretty sure Randal will disagree with that, but I don’t know how.
Crude says:
Friday, October 28, 2011 at 2:01am
“Even axioms are not unconditional. If reality were different than what it actually is, we would have ended up with different axioms.”
Make your case about this to me making use of no axioms. You’re not going to be able to do it – whether stated or unstated, they’re going to be there.
If axioms “only make sense” given cartesian dualism, that’s a powerful argument for cartesian dualism right there. Even “2 + 2 = 4″ requires axioms.
Honestly, that page really comes across as the rantings of a guy who’s been in his echo chamber too long.
Robert says:
Friday, October 28, 2011 at 2:45pm
Maybe this is clearer: “Even beliefs about axioms are not unconditional.”
I do not deny axioms as facts that describe reality; They are both true and useful and I use them.
My denial is that these facts pop into our minds without being constrained by experiences of reality in the first place. From inside a human mind, it might seem that reflection on a self-evident truth occurs in a vacuum, but this is a mistake. We have no idea what thinking in a vacuum of experiences could be like. We don’t have that kind of perspective, and I think we never will.
To say it differently: Process of thought occurs in the brain as far as I can tell. Our brains are not an islands. They are shaped by experiences that constrain the outputs of our so-called self-evident thoughts.
If our thought processes are constrained by reality, they too are evidence. They might be strong evidence, they might be weak evidence. But either way, they occur conditionally even if they feel self evident or unconditional from the inside.
Robert says:
Friday, October 28, 2011 at 2:53pm
Maybe the inferential gap is too large for you right now.
Walter says:
Tuesday, October 25, 2011 at 11:46pm
Randal, have you ever read Wes Morriston’s take on the Evil God Hypothesis?
http://www.colorado.edu/philosophy/wes/demonism.pdf
randal says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 4:06pm
Not yet, but I will. Thanks for the link.
randal says:
Friday, October 28, 2011 at 1:52pm
Read it now. He says basically what I say at much greater length and precision. Thanks for this.
BenYachov says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 4:51am
If one is a Theistic Personalist or Neo-theist then Law’s Evil God has bite.
If one is a Scholastic, a Thomist and a true believe in the Classic View of God then Law’s Evil God is a non-starter.
http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2010/10/laws-evil-god-challenge.html
If I stopped believing in God tomorrow I would still think the Law’s Evil God is a meaningless argument to a strict Thomas.
Sort of like giving a devastating refutation of YEC to a person who is a Theistic Evolutionist and expecting him to care.
David P says:
Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 11:06am
Make sure to check out this argument map of the debate if you haven’t already.
Frank says:
Wednesday, November 2, 2011 at 4:47pm
I just read this post, as well as the Morriston article.
The biggest flaw made by Randall is to allow the preference of GG over EG in the absence of any rationale explanation. He re-configures 1) to read “Either EG can be rationally rejected on the basis of present observational evidence or not”. He then sides with “not” on the basis that instead Christians reject EG “Of course” not “based on ‘untenable a priori arguments’ but rather because they already believe in the existence of GG”.
However, the belief in the existence of GG is in itself an untenable a priori argument.
Randal puts forward the parallel example that a belief that “The sun is shining through the cafe window” is a defeater for the thesis “It is overcast outside”. No, it is not. Either the sun is shining or it is overcast: there is a real objective answer to that question which means that one’s belief is rationally rejected based on observable evidence. The problem, invariably, with these real world examples is that they don’t hold up
as true parallels for the existence of non-material alleged beings like gods or fairies. The existence of GG is subject to all of the same criticisms of the existence of EG, and the rational position to take is that in the absence of objective evidence for either, both should be rationally rejected. The comparison is even weaker in the assertions “God loves me” and”there is an EG”. Not only is there no reason to prefer one over the other without objective evidence, but what is worse, there is no reason to accept either one. At least I know there is a sun.
And “present” observational evidence doesn’t help either. It is irrational to live one’s life on the basis of some unknown thing that, while its existence isn’t proven today, it might be someday…
Morriston in his article makes the same fundamental flaw to find that there is an objective reason to accept GG over EG:
“It’s true, of course, that there is a lot of evil in the world. But evil hasn’t triumphed over goodness. As Hume’s Cleanthes says in a somewhat different context: ‘Health is more common than sickness; pleasure than pain; happiness than misery. And for one vexation which we meet with, we attain, upon computation, a hundred enjoyments.’ How could this be so if the world were ruled by an omnipotent, omniscient, omnimalevolent demon?”
OK. Look around. Human misery abounds. Cleanthes, who lived to be 99, may have felt that live was pretty good, but I daresay that the 1 billion who live on less than a dollar a day may have a more Hobbessian perspective or a nasty brutish and short life. Sure there is great pleasure and wonder in the world too. But if there were no god, then how would the world be any different then it is now., with its combination of goodness and evil?
Morriston fails to realize that world we live in is far better accounted for by no sentient being (NG) then either GG or EG. Put another way, how is the Problem of Good any different then the Problem of Evil? Neither can be logically addressed, and therefore both fail.
randal says:
Wednesday, November 2, 2011 at 11:35pm
You say “the belief in the existence of GG is in itself an untenable a priori argument.”
Belief in GG is not an argument. It is a belief. It is not “untenable a priori”. Rather, it is properly basic absent defeaters.
You then seem to present a defeater based on the problem of evil. But how do you know that God does not have adequate reasons for allowing the evil we see in the world? We recognize the fact that a loving agent can allow another agent to be subjected to suffering for morally sufficient reasons. For example, the pain of receiving a flu shot and the mild side effects are far outweighted and justified by the good achieved through the flu shot. How do you know God doesn’t have adequate reasons for allowing the evils in the world that he allows?
You don’t. Therefore, your defeater fails.
Now you could do one of other things. Either try another defeater or present an argument directly against the proper basicality of belief in god. You seem to do the latter by writing: “It is irrational to live one’s life on the basis of some unknown thing that, while its existence isn’t proven today, it might be someday…” I’m not even sure what that statement means however. Whatever it means it begs the question because it assumes that one cannot know God exists in a properly basic way which is precisely what you need to argue.
Frank says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 2:41am
Semantics. Belief in GG is equal to the argument “GG exists”. People can and do believe in all kinds of strange things. However, I don’t care or begrudge them that. The important question is, is it rational to have such a belief. In the absence of any valid evidence the answer is no.
I don’t need to pose any defeaters for propositions you make, or any wild assertions anyone makes. If you state that the moon is made of green cheese, I have no onus to disprove your assertion, you have the onus of establishing it. My very point was that by supposing a GG or an EG, you are first presupposing a god at all, with no reason to do so in the first place. Then you go on to try to explain what circumstances may explain the existence of a GG while there is evil in the world. Get to first base before we debate whether you are safe or out at home base!
“For example, the pain of receiving a flu shot and the mild side effects are far outweighted and justified by the good achieved through the flu shot.”
Please complete these sentences:
- The pain of starving to death as a 3-year old in Ethiopia is far outweighed and justified by _____.
- The death and destruction occasioned by the terror attacks of 9/11 are far outweighed and justified by _____.
- The mass murder of the [insert any of the many many examples of human mass murder here] are far outweighed and justified by _____.
Robert says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 2:49am
This is justified by ______?
randal says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 2:54am
“Semantics. Belief in GG is equal to the argument “GG exists”.”
Well unfortunately Frank you actually do have to pay some attention to semantics. In other words, you have to consider how words are defined. While the technical definition of belief can be dicey, we can define it for our purposes as “assent to a proposition”. But an argument is not “assent to a proposition”. It is a chain of reasoning that involves premises and a conclusion.
“The important question is, is it rational to have such a belief. In the absence of any valid evidence the answer is no.”
It sounds like you’re drinking from the well of William K. Clifford. So I presume you are well familiar with the self-defeating problems of that kind of unqualified evidentialism and thoroughly adept to refute them. I await your defense with interest (but alas, not high hopes).
Frank says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 3:09am
No, I am not a philosopher or theologian, and therefore am clearly not “thoroughly adept to refute” your world view, Randal. I work during the day (and sometimes, like now, at night) and spend my scant free time thinking about life, the universe, and everything, as I imagine most of the population of this good-god-blessed planet does from time to time; that is, unless they are otherwise engaged in eking out a mere subsistence and staying alive another day.
So I am no expert on “unqualified evidentialism” and “scientism”. However, I suspect that these are terms which have been created in order to, as Mark Twain put it, permit “believing what you know ain’t so”.
By the way, thank you for the compliment regarding William Clifford, who stated “It is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence”. He was a tireless opponent of the sectarian battles which cause needless suffering in our world, a true humanist who died too young.
randal says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 3:20am
“I am not a philosopher or theologian, and therefore am clearly not “thoroughly adept to refute” your world view, Randal.”
I’m not asking you to “refute my worldview”. I’m asking you to defend the unqualified evidentialism which you endorsed, an evidentialism which has been universally refuted and rejected by epistemologists.
Frank, listen to yourself. You write: “However, I suspect that these are terms which have been created in order to, as Mark Twain put it, permit “believing what you know ain’t so”.”
This really makes you look foolish. With no evidence you suggest that the entire field of epistemology (the philosophy of knowledge) is populated by individuals who have perversely invented terms and positions simply to defend their own irrationality.
Associating you with Clifford’s principle isn’t a compliment since it is self-defeating.
So the best I can suggest to you is to exercise a little bit of humility about fields that you have no expertise in (or even modest acquaintance with). Do a little reading and familiarize yourself with the relevant issues and arguments before you stride into the field guns blazing.
I am quite sure you’d expect as much from others ignorant in the fields in which you are acquainted. I’m merely asking for the same courtesy.
Robert says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 4:25am
Randal, Yudkowsky has defended evidentialism, if you label this “evidentialism”: He says “a belief is only really worthwhile if you could, in principle, be persuaded to believe otherwise. If your retina ended up in the same state regardless of what light entered it, you would be blind. Some belief systems, in a rather obvious trick to reinforce themselves, say that certain beliefs are only really worthwhile if you believe them unconditionally – no matter what you see, no matter what you think. Your brain is supposed to end up in the same state regardless. Hence the phrase, “blind faith”. If what you believe doesn’t depend on what you see, you’ve been blinded as effectively as by poking out your eyeballs.”
This is preceded by and followed by many posts starting with The Simple Truth, An Intuitive Explanation of Bayes’ Theorem, and A Technical Explanation of Technical Explanation, then finally Map and Territory and (for the over-achievers) Mysterious Answers to Mysterious Questions.
Now, I’m not suggesting that you or any other theist must read a book’s worth of Yudkowsky to say why the rationalist virtue of empiricism is false. But it might save you time in the long run to go ahead and do it. Until someone explains where Yudkowsky has gone wrong in the sequences, I remain convinced by them.
Robert says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 5:13am
Come to think of it, this post gets to the heart of the matter: http://lesswrong.com/lw/k2/a_priori/
Okay, I’ll stop spamming this thread with links. I’m done now.
randal says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 11:15am
Robert, unfortunately your entire comment is irrelevant to the current point of discussion for three reasons:
First, we are discussing not evidentialism simpliciter but rather W.K. Clifford’s evidentialism which is the same position that Frank affirmed (apparently without knowing he was doing so).
Second, Yudkowsky’s statement is not evidentialism. Evidentialism, simply put, is the view that you need access to evidence of some sort in order rationally to assent to the truth of a proposition. Yudkowsky doesn’t say that in the quoted passage. Rather, he talks about beliefs which are evidentially defeasible. That’s a very different issue.
Third, the real point at issue is not evidentialism or Clifford’s evidentialism but rather Frank’s ignorant rejection of the entire field of epistemology followed by his refusal to defend his ill-formed opinions.
***
Footnote 1: In this quote “a belief is only really worthwhile if you could, in principle, be persuaded to believe otherwise” I don’t know what “worthwhile” is supposed to mean.
Footnote 2: Nor am I sure what “in principle” is supposed to mean (pertaining to the defeasibility of belief). But I will say that it strikes me as wildly wrong. I think “1+1=2″ and “It is wrong to rape babies for pleasure” are both true and could not be shown to be false because they are necessarily true. I also think that they’re very worthwhile beliefs. Do you disagree? Seriously?
Footnote 3: For some reason you seem to conflate evidentialism and empiricism. Please keep them distinct.
Robert says:
Friday, November 4, 2011 at 3:06am
Much to respond to. I’ll start with Frank.
I agree that you wanted to make this point. In the process, you asked for a defense of unqualified evidentialism, something that Frank may not be able to give, yet I am not convinced he’s wrong to think that rational beliefs must always be fueled by evidence.
Years ago, one might have come to me and said “It’s naive to believe in this thing called “truth”. What do you even mean by the word “truth”?
I would not have been able to answer in exquisitely rigorous detail. Nonetheless it would have been stupid to abandon the concept of ‘truth’. This is Frank’s position now.
A Christian apologist believes that someone living long ago was both fully God and fully human and rose again and maybe walked on water, etc, etc. The Christian then says to Frank: “No, really! Sometimes we can form accurate beliefs without evidence!” (Is this a straw-man? Isn’t this your true position?)
Frank thinks. He cannot refute Mr. Christian in exquisitely rigorous detail. This frustrates Frank. He goes off to burn a few ants with a magnifying glass. That feels better, but still Frank might sense a strain in the back of his mind where something about the other man’s position seems forced. What to do?
I have advice for Frank: Don’t yet abandon the concept of truth even if you have never read a single scholarly article about it. And don’t ignore that strain you feel when someone says evidence is not required this time.**
Of course evidence is not needed when someone wants you to believe that you’ll get 72 virgins in eternal bliss! (Yes, some actually believe this) Of course evidence is not required to believe that God exists! (Yes, I’m equating the two for a bit of rhetoric.)
Randal, maybe you and I really did wake up in a universe where human minds have a dump of a priori knowledge about reality. Maybe we can sometimes just know because we know because we know. Maybe Plantinga is right: God is ‘properly basic’ absent defeaters. Hell, maybe Dr. Craig is right: he has a Spirit of God giving him an unquestionable inner witness about certain metaphysical truths.
And then again, maybe not.
My belief today is that there are many links of cause and effect around me. I don’t understand them all. I never will. But that does not mean I should think the ones hard to unravel are places where the laws of physics we actually do observe break down and obey the will of ontologically basic mental entities. You say it’s perfectly fine to belief in ontologically basic mental entities as long as we find no strong defeaters. Okay, but might I ask: Why do you privilege that hypothesis?
*** FOOTNOTE: *** I’m not recommending that Frank avoid the work of philosophers. I’m saying that the strain he probably feels is a fast-perceptual judgement that can be rationally held until he has time to reflect on these issues with slower, deliberative judgements.
*** FOOTNOTE 2: *** I’m not making fun of Frank with the burning ants business. I identify with him and so I used his name to tell my own story: Sometimes I walk away from a conversation with Randal where I feel something about his position is very wrong, but I don’t have near as much philosophical background to communicate as Randal has. When this leaves me feeling frustrated, I go look for a really big magnifying glass. This game never helps, but at least it’s more interesting than Philosophy papers!
randal says:
Saturday, November 5, 2011 at 3:38am
“yet I am not convinced he’s wrong to think that rational beliefs must always be fueled by evidence.”
As I said in another comment, unqualified evidentialism leads to an infinite regress of justification and thus skepticism.
“You say it’s perfectly fine to belief in ontologically basic mental entities as long as we find no strong defeaters. Okay, but might I ask: Why do you privilege that hypothesis?”
You presumably believe in the existence of matter, even though everything in your experience can be explained by appeal to a mental substance alone. And that is, after all, a simpler hypothesis because it requires less explanatory posits. So why do you privilege your “hypothesis” of an external world of material substance?
Everybody privileges something as a starting point. Even Robert. And most certainly Frank.
“When this leaves me feeling frustrated, I go look for a really big magnifying glass.”
That’s not the best way to channel your frustration. Might I suggest a punching bag or dart board with my face?
Robert says:
Friday, November 4, 2011 at 3:14am
Hmm, maybe I picked the wrong quote. Nonetheless, I’m pretty sure that Yudkowsky teaches all beliefs need evidence.
Note that his view of evidence includes physical observation, mental visualization, social agreement, testimony, and even reflection on how our brains process information. There are many kinds of evidence. Some are generally strong and others less strong.
randal says:
Saturday, November 5, 2011 at 2:40am
Obviously evidence is important for a broad range of beliefs. But an unqualified evidentialism leads to an infinite regress which terminates in skepticism. We can’t evidentially justify every belief before we accept it.
Robert says:
Friday, November 4, 2011 at 3:21am
I also think they are necessarily true. This does not make my belief unconditional. You are confusing the map and the territory to think that things necessarily so are the same as beliefs about things being necessarily so. There is a sharp and important distinction.
randal says:
Saturday, November 5, 2011 at 5:46am
Robert, I agree that “I believe p is necessarily true” does not itself necessarily map onto “I have no doubt about p” (assuming that that is what you mean by p is not unconditional). Nonetheless, I really do have no doubt about those two truth claims. Do you?
(If you mean something else by “unconditional” then please illumine me.)
Frank says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 3:52am
“[A]n evidentialism which has been universally refuted and rejected by epistemologists”.
But not by scientists.
It feels to me like the philosophical claim for the existence of God is under attack from a swath of scientific discoveries (the “God of the gaps” point, that there is an ever-decreasing need for a god/sky fairy/deity to explain our universe) on one hand, and the “new atheists” strong demonstrable claims that the thousands-years experiment of religion and belief in a higher power has been devestatingly bad for us,on the other. I don’t fear to look foolish, but I suspect that those epistemologists who use their arguments to defend god (I would think a minority of them) are now entering the panicked last-ditch attempts to justify themselves.
“So the best I can suggest to you is to exercise a little bit of humility about fields that you have no expertise in (or even modest acquaintance with).”
And there we have it. The elitist view of the epistomological philosopher, that the ordinary person cannot possibly comprehend god and religion and belief without the doctoral thesis. The disdain for those not part of the exclusive club of academia. I now leave you in your tower, I have a growing fear of heights.
David Parker says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 3:58am
Frank,
To be fair, you showed up and started making philosophical arguments. You critiqued a published article by a professional philosopher. You used words like “a priori” and concluded…not something scientific mind you…but “Neither can be logically addressed, and therefore both fail.”
You laid this entire debate out philosophically. No need to play that card now. It makes you look ridiculous.
Science will never prove or disprove evidentialism because evidentialism is a philosophical problem. Given the nature of the problem, science is not the appropriate tool for solving it.
Check out Hume’s problem of induction for a good summary of why science cannot speak to the matter of what constitutes good evidence.
If we had scientific evidence that we should believe things based only on adequate evidence, that evidence itself would already presuppose what it tried to prove.
Robert says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 4:34am
“Science” can’t prove or disprove evidentialism, but (I think the argument goes) that Bayes’ Theorem can. Uncertainty is in the mind, and the rules for dealing with uncertainties are given by probability theory and decision theory.
If someone wants to take exception to needing evidence, they would need to show that they have some other way at resolving uncertainties that does boil down to math. Good luck with that.
No One Can Exempt You From Rationality’s Laws
Robert says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 5:18am
does *not* boil down to math
randal says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 11:27am
Oh, I didn’t see this erratum.
So let’s see: “If someone wants to take exception to needing evidence, they would need to show that they have some other way at resolving uncertainties that does not boil down to math.”
Are you saying that deontologists and utilitarians should be using math to sort out their ethical differences?
Robert says:
Friday, November 4, 2011 at 3:24am
No,
But of course, for those of us who believe that the universe works according to low level physical laws that do not change at the will of ontologically basic mental entities, the math does exist.
randal says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 11:18am
“If someone wants to take exception to needing evidence, they would need to show that they have some other way at resolving uncertainties that does boil down to math. Good luck with that.”
Can you restate this? I’m not sure what you’re claiming here.
Robert says:
Friday, November 4, 2011 at 3:39am
I’m saying that uncertainties cannot be resolved by random process. When a mind feels uncertain, there is evidence to be found and calculated.
I explained above that we can rarely calculate probabilities on real world problems down to precise answers, but that does not give us a free ticket to plug in whatever the heck we want.
There are rules of rational thought. No one can excuse you from those rules because these rules are not just social rules. They are like math. If we fail to properly weigh evidence, we will, on average fail to calibrate our beliefs and expectations with reality. Mother nature has a way of slapping us upside the head when we mis-calibrate. Therefore, try harder.
randal says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 11:05am
Let’s see Frank. I asked you to exercise a bit of humility in fields in which you have no expertise or even modest acquaintance, not least because you would expect as much from others ignorant in the fields in which you are schooled. Rather than agree, you now impute to me an idiotic claim, “the ordinary person cannot possibly comprehend god and religion and belief without the doctoral thesis.” How did you get that statement out of the plea that you read before shooting off your mouth? You don’t have to get a doctoral degree but you could at least try reading a Wikipedia article before you find yourself up to your neck in your own foolish bravado.
Frank says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 4:52am
“If by dint of extraordinary persuasiveness you convince all the physicists in the world that you are exempt from the law of gravity, and you walk off a cliff, you’ll fall.”
Love it. Thanks Robert.
randal says:
Thursday, November 3, 2011 at 11:23am
Yes, and if by dint of extraordinary persuasiveness you convince all the epistemologists in the world that you can reasonably hold Clifford’s maxim, you’ll still have a self-defeating position.
Love it. Thanks Randal.
The Atheist Missionary says:
Monday, November 7, 2011 at 11:44am
Law responds to Craig.