I don’t have the answers to any of this, but I remain a kind of doubting Thomas. I find it difficult to see why meaning must be grounded in necessity or guaranteed by something absolute. Could it be that humans are unrealistically impressed by reason, treating it as the highest or even only valid form of understanding? But reason is just one tool among many, and has limited use. It struggles with emotions, ambiguity, and subjective experiences. It's clear that no logical argument can fully capture grief, happiness, aesthetic appreciation, or empathy. I wonder if we overestimate its power, forgetting that perhaps it evolved for survival, not for solving metaphysical puzzles or guaranteeing truth.

I enjoyed reading this post, it laid out some of my thinking in a clear way. I agree about the limitations of human thought. For me meaning, or guaranteed by something absolute etc are not important. Likewise my, or our ability to understand these different questions about our lives. Rather, I am concerned with way, of life, way of living and philosophy and mysticism enables this to be refined. Also that there is an opportunity that the mind can be opened to the complexities in nature and our historical heritage of philosophy and mysticism. Which can be brought into the present of life. So as to develop a wisdom in the present. Also an openness to any divine or teleological possibility, action, or grounding.

So - magical? Well, I think not, but something even greater in some respects
— Wayfarer
This is what I see as an enormous problem in your position. It depends on uncritically accepting the existence of magic (or "something even greater"). I've seen no justification for this other than arguments from authority (the ancients had this view) and arguments from ignorance (physicalism's explanatory gap). — Relativist

:fire:

reason might be derived from experience through a particularly structured cognitive apparatus which has limitations. Isn’t that a point Kant makes? I’m no Kantian, but doesn’t Kant discuss transcendental illusions (systematic errors built into our reasoning) and emphasise that humans face clear limits in how reason can be used? — Tom Storm

You’re right to bring up Kant’s emphasis on the limits of reason—and his account of transcendental illusion is precisely where he acknowledges that reason has a built-in tendency to overreach. It poses questions—about God, freedom, the soul—that it can’t answer with the tools of empirical or discursive knowledge. But, as you say, these are not silly questions. They arise from the very structure of rationality itself.

Kant’s famous dictum is that "percepts without concepts are blind, concepts without percepts are empty"—meaning that experience needs conceptual form, and concepts need experiential grounding. But what this leaves out—or perhaps leaves implicit—is whether there are other forms of knowing that don't fit neatly into that structure.

Some of Kant’s critics (like Hegel, Schleiermacher, and later thinkers like Maritain or even Vervaeke today) have argued that Kant’s model closes off the possibility of what you might call “higher insight” or participatory knowledge—knowledge that arises not from external observation or deduction, but from engagement, transformation, or direct acquaintance. (See this reference on John Vervaeke’s distinction between propositional, procedural, perspectival, and participatory knowing.)

So when Kant says that God is “beyond all possible experience,” that’s true within the bounds of his system. But that’s also the crux of the critique: what if those bounds are too narrow? What if there are legitimate forms of insight that don’t conform to his propositional model? Mystical traditions, contemplative practices, and certain strands of idealist or existentialist philosophy have all tried to develop alternatives to that constraint. Which is not to reject Kant but to broaden the context in which his questions are considered.

In that sense, the question isn’t just “what can we know?” but “what counts as knowing?” And that’s still very much a live question.

I wasn't trying show that evolution necessarily accounts for rationality, I was identifying the glaring flaw in Plantinga's Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism (EAAN). , — Relativist

What you identified as the 'fatal flaw' was this:

In order to survive, every organism needs a functionally accurate perception of its environment to successfully interact with it. Primitive rationality is exhibited when animals adapt there hunting behavior when necessary, doing things that work instead of those that don't. The evolution of abstract reasoning would have been an evolutionary dead end leading to extinction, if it worsened our ability to interact with the environment. — Relativist

My criticism of this is that it misconstrues the nature of reason in a typically reductionist way. It treats reason as on a par with adaptive behavior—the ability to respond flexibly to environmental cues. But as I pointed out, many organisms manage this just fine without any capacity for abstract reasoning. Cockroaches and crocodiles are paradigms of evolutionary success, they've survived for hundreds of milions of years, and yet we don’t credit them with logic, mathematics, or philosophical reflection.

What Plantinga argues is not that evolution couldn’t produce minds, but that if all mental life—including reason—is understood solely in terms of material and efficient causes, then we’ve undermined the very basis on which we make rational inferences. Logical relations are not physical events; they are intelligible structures, the relations between ideas. If belief is just the result of brain chemistry shaped by fitness, not by the ability to grasp truth, then the rational basis of naturalism loses its warrant. This is how physicalism is self-undermining (which is a consequence of having excluded the subject who brings reason to the picture, in the first place.)

This is what I see as an enormous problem in your position. It depends on uncritically accepting the existence of magic (or "something even greater") — Relativist

You realize this was a reference to reason? I'm saying that ability to reason resides in the capacity to see the relationships between ideas which is basic to language and rationality. And considering what h.sapiens has been able to achieve by virtue of reason and language - that is something that I am saying is even greater than magic.

And I will always reference what previous philosophers have said. This is a philosophy forum, and such citations are perfectly appropriate in the context.

What Plantinga argues is not that evolution couldn’t produce minds, but that if all mental life—including reason—is understood solely in terms of material and efficient causes, then we’ve undermined the very basis on which we make rational inferences. — Wayfarer

That is not Plantinga's EAAN. Plantinga argues that evolution selects for behavior, not reliable belief. The Wikipedia article I linked to summarizes it, or you could read this paper by Plantinga.

I will always reference what previous philosophers have said — Wayfarer

Why are you so reluctant to state what you actually believe? The only thing that's clear is that you believe materialism is false. Please describe what you DO believe. Reference philosophers to explain your position, if necesary - but please describe your position- even if it's open ended (e.g everything except materialisn is a life possibility)

From the paper:

The ultimate source of our cognitive faculties is natural selection, and natural selection is interested (so to speak) only in adaptive behavior, not in true belief. A given belief, therefore, will have a certain causal role to play in the production of adaptive behavior; but whether it is true or false is irrelevant from this perspective. So the naturalist who accepts evolutionary theory has a defeater for the proposition that our cognitive faculties are reliable.

which is as I said.

Although I will add,. I'm not arguing in support of Plantinga's religious conclusions, only the more general point about the non-physical basis for rational inference.

Why are you so reluctant to state what you actually believe? — Relativist

I've spelled it out in depth and detail. To recap: physics is based on a useful abstraction, which has yielded enormous physical powers, but at the expense of excluding fundamental aspects of human existence.

I've spelled it out in depth and detail. To recap: physics is based on a useful abstraction, which has yielded enormous physical powers, but at the expense of excluding fundamental aspects of human existence.

Quite, a world of philosophical zombies could have played the role acted out by humanity. And yet a cockroach and a crocodile have more self awareness, or sentience, than a philosophical zombie.

[P]hysics is based on a useful abstraction, which has yielded enormous physical powers, but at the expense of excluding fundamental aspects of human existence. — Wayfarer

Even if this 'claim' is true – of course there's no evidence for it – so what? Physics explains many fundamental aspects of the physical world and not (yet) others; "human existence" is tangentally something else entirely outside modern physics' remit. Why do you persist on blaming physics for not doing something that physicists don't use it for? Re: materialism – You're (still) shadowboxing with a burning strawman, Wayf.

. Why do you persist on blaming physics for not doing something that physicists don't use it for? Re: materialism – You're (still) shadowboxing with a burning strawman — 180 Proof

Are you familiar with D M Armstrong? His book Materialist Philosophy of Mind presents the kind of philosophical materialism that I’m criticizing. And Relativist cites Armstrong as an exemplary philosopher. Armstrong was Head of Dept where I studied philosophy. So no straw man arguments here.

Are you familiar with D M Armstrong? — Wayfarer

Yes, decades ago.

Even if this 'claim' is true – of course there's no evidence for it — 180 Proof

What, pray tell, would constitute evidence for this argument?

It's an unsupported assertion, not an argument. Besides, I concede the point in order to make my objection to your other assertion about physics.

When God is described as the Ground of Being, this typically means that God is the fundamental reality or underlying source from which all things emerge. — Tom Storm

Let me tell y'all about my god (who's still around, by the way).

I go with the theory that once upon a time, nothing existed. Then all of a sudden, something came into existence. Whatever entity caused the creation of existence is my god. Since nothing existed, my god had to use itself for materials/energies to create with, so I am literally a part of my god. If you go with the Big Bang theory, a few hundred million years after the universe started, at the end of the hot plasma phase, the first OG atom, hydrogen, was created. Those hydrogen atoms are still in existence since they don't die. Those billions of years old hydrogen atoms are within our bodies today. We are physically linked to our universe's origin.

sure but that begs the question of where did this God come from.

Let me tell y'all about my god (who's still around, by the way).

I go with the theory that once upon a time, nothing existed. Then all of a sudden, something came into existence. Whatever entity caused the creation of existence is my god. Since nothing existed, my god had to use itself for materials/energies to create with, so I am literally a part of my god. If you go with the Big Bang theory, a few hundred million years after the universe started, at the end of the hot plasma phase, the first OG atom, hydrogen, was created. Those hydrogen atoms are still in existence since they don't die. Those billions of years old hydrogen atoms are within our bodies today. We are physically linked to our universe's origin. — alleybear

Your "god" sounds a lot like Aristotle's First Cause/Prime Mover, which was a logical necessity, not an emotional source of succor & sanction. In other words, it's the "god of the philosophers", not the God of theologians. Although you mentioned physical evidence, your "entity" is also not a Nature God aiming lightening bolts at evil-doers.

Instead, your Creation Causer sounds more like A.N. Whitehead's PanEnTheistic principle*1, both immanent and transcendent. That's also how I view my own god-model, which I like to describe functionally as a Programmer*2. Since I don't have any reliable direct or prophetic revelations of this philosophical Principle, or any "higher insight" & "participatory knowledge", all I know about this logical necessity is that something like it is logically necessary to understand how we, and our world, evolved from mathematical Big Bang Singularity to biological Nature-as-we-know-it, and to human Culture that is on the verge of becoming interplanetary, and to little ole me & you.

Is any of this interpolation close to your god-model? :smile:


*1. Whitehead's God :
Although he uses a theistic term for the creator of our evolving world, I think his concept of “God” is not religious, but philosophical. Whitehead’s associate Charles Hartshorne⁵ labeled his theology as : PanEnDeism⁶. This deity is not imagined on a throne judging the creation, but everywhere, including in the material world, participating in the on-going process of Creation.
https://bothandblog8.enformationism.info/page46.html

*2. G*D :
An ambiguous spelling of the common name for a supernatural deity. The Enformationism thesis is based upon an unprovable axiom that our world is an idea in the mind of G*D. This eternal deity is not imagined in a physical human body, but in a meta-physical mathematical form, equivalent to LOGOS. Other names : ALL, BEING, Creator, Enformer, MIND, Nature, Reason, Source, Programmer. The eternal Whole of which all temporal things are a part is not to be feared or worshiped, but appreciated like Nature.
I refer to the logically necessary and philosophically essential First & Final Cause as G*D, rather than merely "X" the Unknown, partly out of respect. That’s because the ancients were not stupid, to infer purposeful agencies, but merely shooting in the dark. We now understand the "How" of Nature much better, but not the "Why". That inscrutable agent of Entention is what I mean by G*D.
[ see post 64 ] [ see Programmer God at sidebar ]
https://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page13.html

Then all of a sudden, something came into existence. — alleybear

This is in time; 'Nothing' has no properties at all; 'it' can't even be meant.

Let me tell y'all about my god (who's still around, by the way). — alleybear

I'm not sure if you are being serious or satirical, but I'll assume you are serious. I'm curious what this God means to you?

I go with the theory that once upon a time, nothing existed. Then all of a sudden, something came into existence. — alleybear

Nonsense. "Nothing" necessarily cannot "exist".

[A]ll I know about this logical necessity ... — Gnomon

... except, sir, you don't seem to grasp that "logical necessity", as you say, does not scientifically have anything to do with dynamics in or the development of the physical world.

... how we, and our world, evolved from mathematical Big Bang Singularity

The BBT is a model of physical processes; (the) "mathematical" is merely abstract and, therefore, cannot "evolve".

:up:

which is as I said. — Wayfarer

No, it isn't. You said this is what Plantinga was saying: "if all mental life—including reason—is understood solely in terms of material and efficient causes, then we’ve undermined the very basis on which we make rational inferences."

My objection to HIS ARGUMENT stands.

I've spelled it out in depth and detail. To recap: physics is based on a useful abstraction, which has yielded enormous physical powers, but at the expense of excluding fundamental aspects of human existence. — Wayfarer

Then explain what you meant by this:

life and consciousness are not anomalies to be explained away—they’re clues to what physicalist ontology has left out. — Wayfarer

Life seems anomolous to me, because it's a very rare, and miniscule part of the universe. What facts am I overlooking?

Elaborate on these "clues". What conclusions do you think I should draw from this? How should it influence my philosophical analysis? Does this somehow entail teleology? The problem (IMO) is that it's a negative fact (what consciousness is NOT), rather than a positive fact that has broader relevance.

What I'm suspicious of is using it as an excuse to embrace some spirituality paradigm. I'm fine with other people doing that, for whatever benefits it gives them, but I see no relevance to me.

Life seems anomolous to me, because it's a very rare, and miniscule part of the universe. What facts am I overlooking? — Relativist

The fact that you’re alive would be a good start. You’re demonstrating the very point at issue: the sense in which physicalism excludes the subject, for whom ‘the physical’ is real. As I said at the very beginning of this exchange: physicalism relies on an abstraction. It then becomes so embedded in that worldview that it can’t see anything outside it, which is precisely the blind spot of physicalism.

The ultimate source of our cognitive faculties is natural selection, and natural selection is interested (so to speak) only in adaptive behavior, not in true belief. A given belief, therefore, will have a certain causal role to play in the production of adaptive behavior; but whether it is true or false is irrelevant from this perspective. So the naturalist who accepts evolutionary theory has a defeater for the proposition that our cognitive faculties are reliable. — Alvin Plantinga

Which I paraphrased as follows:

if all mental life—including reason—is understood solely in terms of material and efficient causes, then we’ve undermined the very basis on which we make rational inferences." — Wayfarer

On review, I agree it was not an accurate paraphrase. It would have been better expressed as follows: ‘If our cognitive faculties are ultimately the product of unguided natural selection, which only accounts for behaviors that promote survival and reproduction, then we have no good reason to trust that our beliefs, including the belief in naturalism itself, are actually true.’

In either case, your original criticism of Plantinga’s argument, that it was ‘fatally flawed’ because it didn’t allow for how important adaptive behaviour is to survival, still missed the point. He is arguing that evolutionary biology may account for how animals adapt and survive, but that this in itself does not provide grounds for us to believe that an argument is true, when, according to those criteria, it might simply be adaptive.

He is arguing that evolutionary biology may account for how animals adapt and survive, but that this in itself does not provide grounds for us to believe that an argument is true, when, according to those criteria, it might simply be adaptive. — Wayfarer

Why is that a requirement? What a strange thing to demand of a scientific theory. Why do we have to sit around and wait for for an origin story to life before we can believe that an argument is true?

Here’s Plantinga’s paper.

Two questions:

1. Are you making the claim that naturalism undermines reason per se? Because that does not seem to be Plantingas claim in the paper.

2. Do you reject foundationalism and subscribe to Plantingas epistemology of properly basic beliefs and defeaters? It is an important part of his argument.

Plantinga was mentioned in passing and I expressed the view that Relativist’s depiction of his argument was based on a misinterpretation. That’s all I have to say on Plantinga.

That’s all I have to say on Plantinga. — Wayfarer

Poor man, he's over 90 and here you are picking him up and discarding him like a human shield.

physicalism relies on an abstraction. It then becomes so embedded in that worldview that it can’t see anything outside it, which is precisely the blind spot of physicalism. — Wayfarer

Physicalism is indeed embedded in my worldview. What truths does this blind me to? The only obvious implication is that there may be some non-physical aspects of reality. It provides no clue as to what they may be - what truths it leads me to ignore.

As I explained, I embrace physicalism because (AFAIK) it's the best general answer to the nature of reality. I don't have some undying faith in it, and I know it has its limitations. But I treat it pragmatically as the premise when analyzing everything in the world, and this includes consideration of mental activity. Even if I grant that there are aspects of the mind that are intractable to a materialist paradigm, I see no means of applying this information to any philosophical analysis - because, as I said, it's just a negative fact - and doesn't give me any useful information that I should consider. It just tells me that a materialist analysis doesn't necessarily give a correct answer, but provides no clue to a better answer.

I embrace physicalism because (AFAIK) it's the best general answer to the nature of reality. I don't have some undying faith in it, and I know it has its limitations. But I treat it as the premise when analyzing everything in the world. This seems the most pragmatic approach — Relativist

I agree. Idealism, antirealism, immaterialism ... quantum woo-woo, etc are much poorer alternatives. :up:

:smirk:

I go with the theory that once upon a time, nothing existed. — alleybear

As others have so helpfully pointed out, "nothing" cannot or does not exist. That's why the concept of Zero took so long to catch-on with mathematicians*1. The relevant point here is that No-Thing means no physical existence, hence no usefulness for Science or Mechanics. But the meta-physical concept of Nothingness*2 is useful for philosophical purposes.

Those who challenge your god-concept are imagining the Deity as a physical material substantial entity. In that sense it makes sense to ask "who created your God?" But Aristotle defined his notion of Substance, as not the material thing, but the immaterial Essence or Form of the thing. And Plato defined his Forms*3 as eternal & self-existent. Hence, essential & fundamental, not objective or optional.

So, in the interest of clarity, perhaps you could explain that the God of Philosophers is not an Idol of gold-plated wood or flesh-covered bones, but a meta-physical concept, similar to Infinity (∞), which also does not exist in the real physical world. If such a God is woo-woo nonsense, then so is Zero & Infinity. Unfortunately, an impotent Nothingness could not create a universe from scratch. So you'd have to add the concept of Potential*4, which also does not exist physically, until Actualized. :smile:


*1. Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea :
Even though zero is a fundamental idea for the modern science, initially the notion of a complete absence got a largely negative, sometimes hostile, treatment by the Western world and Greco-Roman philosophy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero:_The_Biography_of_a_Dangerous_Idea

*2. Metaphysical Nothingness :
Since metaphysics is the study of what exists, one might expect metaphysicians to have little to say about the limit case in which nothing exists. . . . .
Let’s begin with a question that Martin Heidegger famously characterized as the most fundamental issue of philosophy. . . . .
1. Why is there something rather than nothing?
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/nothingness/

*3. Essential Form :
Plato's theory of Forms posits that the Forms are self-existent and independent of the physical world or individual minds
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=plato+form+self+existent

*4. Potential is Unreal :
The statement "potential does not exist" is a philosophical point, not a scientific one. In physics, potential is a measurable quantity related to stored energy or the ability of a system to do work. In other contexts, potential refers to unrealized abilities or possibilities. While "potential" in the sense of a future reality may not be physically present, the capacity for that future to exist is often acknowledged as real.
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=potential+does+not+exist
Note --- A creator God is real & measurable, only if the creation is physical & material. According to Cosmologists, there was a beginning point in Time, when our material universe did not exist. But the Energy & Laws that cause & govern our world, necessarily pre-existed the beginning of physical evolution. That's what Aristotle called First & Final Cause (Ability & Purpose). God is the "capacity" for cosmic creation.
.

It does see that way. I'm fine with acknowledging that materialism may not have all the right answers, but no alternatives seem any better - even in the murky area of the mind. As I said in my earlier post, I'm suspicious of using this explanatory gap as an excuse to believe in some sort of spiritualism.

I'm suspicious of using this explanatory gap as an excuse to believe in some sort of spiritualism. — Relativist

:up: Same here. In my book this "excuse" amounts to appeal to ignorance (i.e. woo-of-the-gaps).

If such a God is woo-woo nonsense, then so is Zero & Infinity. — Gnomon

Well, not only doesn't that follow (category error), but all three concepts are mere abstractions; what makes any of them "woo woo nonsense" is attributing causal – physical – properties to any of them like "creator" "mover" ... "programmer". :eyes:

:up: