On 29 Feb 96 13:04:40 EST you wrote:
[...]
JB>Naturalistic smuggling is evident, first of all, in the realm of
>epistemology, the study of knowledge. The naturalistic view of mind
>is so deficient that you wonder how a scholar in any field can keep
>on searching for truth with such a humble instrument as the human
>brain. The naturalist smuggles in a high regard for the operation of
>the mind, a regard that fits more comfortably with the
>synthetic-metaphysical approach of Plato and Augustine than with the
>analytical-empirical approach of Hume and Russell. A naturalist
>starts out thining and then ends up by undermining all thought. He
>must use his mind to prove his philosophy, but then his philosophy
>affirms that all reasoning is mere cerebration by a physical brain.
>If reasoning is just an electro-chemical operation in the material
>brain, then why should a naturalist ask anyone to accept his thoughts
>as "true"?...
Agreed. Johnson in RITB pp63-66 discusses "Materialist Theories of
the Mind":
"It is in the nature of explanation that one thing is explained in
terms of something else that is assumed valid, and to explain the
latter as nothing more than a product of the former is to create a
logical circle. Yet naturalistic metaphysics is so seductive that
eminent scientists and philosophers frequently do employ their own
minds to attempt to prove that the mind is "nothing but" a product of
physical forces and chemical reactions. One of these is Francis
Crick, the biochemist who as codiscoverer of the structure of DNA is
almost as famous as Hawking himself. In his later years Crick has
been drawn to the problem of consciousness and he expressed his
thoughts in the 1994 book The Astonishing Hypothesis. Here is how
Crick states his own starting point:
`The Astonishing Hypothesis is that "You," your joys and your sorrows,
your memories and your ambitions, your sense of personal identity and
free will, are in fact no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of
nerve cells and their associated molecules.... The hypothesis is so
alien to the ideas of most people alive today that it can truly be
called astonishing.' (Crick F., "The Astonishing Hypothesis: The
Scientific Search for the Soul", Scribner's, 1994, p3)
Johnson continues with a reductio ad absurdum of Crick's reductionism:
"The conflict with common sense would become apparent if Crick had
presented his hypothesis in the first-person singular. Imagine the
reaction of his publisher if Crick had proposed to begin his book by
announcing that "I, Francis Crick, my opinions and my science, and
even the thoughts expressed in this book, consist of nothing more than
the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated
molecules." Few browsers would be likely to read further. The
plausibility of materialistic determinism requires that an implicit
exception be made for the theorist."
JB>The naturalist compounds the difficulty just discussed if he
believes in
>determinism--and logically he should. If all things, including our thoughts,
>are mechanically determined, then objective science is impossible, for the
>scientist automatically selects the data he evaluates....No scientist should
>be congratulated for his brilliant thinking, for he just secreted what was
>inevitable--his work just oozed out of the brain, so to speak. For all we know
>these complex systems of thought may have been caused by something like red
>beans or ulcers of the duodenum....Freedom, objectivity, transcendence--none
>of these ingredients crucial to a viable epistemology is inherent in
>naturalism. Someone must have smuggled them in.
Yes. Where *did* they come from? Dawkins claims:
"In a universe of electrons and selfish genes, blind physical forces
and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other
people are going-to get lucky, and you won't find any rhyme or reason
in it, nor any justice. The universe that we observe has precisely
the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no
purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but pitiless indifference....DNA
neither cares nor knows. DNA just is. And we dance to its music."
(Dawkins R., "God's Utility Function", Scientific American, Vol. 273,
No. 5, November 1995, p67).
The point is that if Dawkins is just dancing to the music of *his*
DNA, why should we take what he says seriously? What makes his
DNA better than mine?
JB>Naturalistic smuggling is even more evident in axiology, the realm
>of values,
>not only in aesthetics, but especially in ethics....Naturalists claim they use
>only the scientific method; they exclude other kinds of truth. Yet when you
>come to ethics you can't establish OUGHT from IS.
A consistent naturalist can only believe that the "ought" is simply
that which has survival value. Yet, all men esteem self-sacrifice as
the highest value of all, as William Lane Craig points out:
"And the same applies to acts of self-sacrifice. A number of years
ago, a terrible mid-winter air disaster occurred in which a plane
leaving the Washington, D.C. airport smashed into a bridge spanning
the Potomac River, plunging its passengers into the icy waters. As
the rescue helicopters came, attention was focused on one man who
again and again pushed the dangling rope ladder to other passengers
rather than be pulled to safety himself. Six times he passed the
ladder by. When they came again, he was gone He had freely given his
life that others might live. The whole nation turned its eyes to this
man in respect and admiration for the selfless and good act he had
performed. And yet, if the atheist is right, that man was not
noble-he did the stupidest thing possible. He should have gone for
the ladder first, pushed others away if necessary in order to survive.
But to die for others he did not even know, to give up all the brief
existence would ever have what for? For the atheist there can be no
reason. And yet the atheist, like the rest of us, instinctively
reacts with praise for this man's selfless action. Indeed, one will
probably never find an atheist who lives consistently with his system.
For a universe without moral accountability and devoid of value is
unimaginably terrible." (Craig W.L., "Reasonable Faith: Christian
Truth and Apologetics", Crossway Books: Wheaton Ill., Revised
Edition, 1994, p68).
God bless.
Stephen
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