>
>[...]
>
>CC>Jones has even gone
> >so far (following similar claims by Johnson) as to claim that ultimate
> >starting points must be simply assumed, ...
>
>Indeed! If Chris disagrees how does he propose to arrive at an *ultimate*
>starting point except by, in the end, assuming it?
Chris
I left it as an "exercise for the reader" to answer this question in my
last post on this topic, in the hopes that it would prompt a few people to
think about it. I've answered it before, at some length, if I remember, but
I'll answer it again below, more briefly.
>Since reason works from premises to conclusions where does Chris get his
>ultimate premise from? If he bases it on another reason then that must rest
>on a yet more ultimate premise, unless he starts to reason in a circle.
>
>This is not to say that one's ultimate premise cannot be critiqued - it can
>and be replaced by another ultimate premise. To that extent Chris is
>misconstruing what Johnson (and I) are saying by prefacing "assumed"
>with "simply". The process at arriving at an ultimate premise does not have
>to be simple, but in the end an ultimate premise must indeed be assumed.
>
>An *ultimate* premise cannot, by definition, be supported by any reasons
>more ultimate than itself:
>
> "By not asking the last question, Leff in effect placed the death of
> God, in the place of God. In his system, the absence of a
> supernatural evaluator was a premise so far beyond question that it
> could not be doubted even when it pointed to a conclusion. Leff
> desperately wanted to escape, even a conclusion he acknowledged
> to be false. If we know that totalitarian mass murder is evil, and
> that those who acquiesced in it deserved damnation, then we know
> something about the absolute evaluator as well. Leff offered no
> reason for protecting modernism's founding premise from the
> brilliant sceptical analysis that he directed at everything else.
> To a
> theist this must seem indefensible, but Leff could not have done
> otherwise without ceasing to be a modernist. A system's ultimate
> premise is always beyond question; that is what it means to say that
> is an ultimate premise. The most interesting aspect of any argument
> is not what it explicitly states, but what it implicitly assumes. A
> rationalistic culture teaches us to think that truth is the
> product of a
> process of logical reasoning. When we are dealing with
> intermediate or detailed truths, this model is correct. The model
> breaks down, however, when we try to apply it to the fundamental
> premises themselves. This is because logic is a way of getting to
> conclusions from premises. By its very nature, a logical argument
> cannot justify the premises upon which it rests. When these
> premises are questioned, they have to be justified by a different
> logical argument, which rests upon different premises. We may
> follow this process forever, and we will still never encounter
> anything but another logical argument, which will itself be based
> upon premises. But then what is the ultimate premises, the
> Archimedean fulcrum on which intellect can sit and judge all the
> rest? If we try to answer that question by employing logic we lapse
> into the absurdity of circular reasoning. Reasoning has to start
> somewhere. Any attempt to justify the ultimate starting point
> necessarily fails. Because it only establishes a different starting
> point. Hence, the really important step in any argument is apt to be
> the unexplained, unjustified, and often unstated starting point."
> (Johnson P.E., "Nihilism and the End of Law", First Things, March
> 993, No. 31.
> http://id-www.ucsb.edu/fscf/LIBRARY/JOHNSON/nihilism.html)
>
>Chris no doubt dislikes this simple truth because he seems to fancy himself
>as something of a rationalist. But *pure* rationalism is a delusion. In the
>end one must chose one's ultimate premises by *faith* based on the best
>available, but necessarily limited, evidence. And of course one is strongly
>biased by what one *wants* to be true (see tagline).
>
>And of course if one is wrong in one's choice of ultimate premise then all
>one's conclusions based on that premise are wrong too. For example,
>if Chris' ultimate premise is (say) that there is no God, and there is,
>then all
>his reasons about evolution and Christianity are, to that extent, wrong (and
>of course vice-versa).
>
>This is the *real* reason for the intractable differences in philosophies
>among
>humans. It is not that those one disagrees with are "irrational" (as Richard
>naively imagines) but that we are all rational and have *chosen* different
>ultimate starting points.
>
>We can of course debate these ultimate starting points and indeed
>we do. But what *is* irrational is to deny that such ultimate starting points
>must necessarily exist and/or that they have to be, at the end of the
>day, *assumed*.
>
>[...]
>
>Steve
>
>--------------------------------------------------------------------------
>"Multiple hypotheses should be proposed whenever possible. Proposing
>alternative explanations that can answer a question is good science. If we
>operate with a single hypothesis, especially one we favor, we may direct
>our investigation toward a hunt for evidence in support of this hypothesis."
>(Campbell N.A., Reece J.B. & Mitchell L.G., "Biology," [1987],
>Benjamin/Cummings: Menlo Park CA, Fifth Edition, 1999, p.14)
>Stephen E. Jones | Ph. +61 8 9448 7439 | http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
>--------------------------------------------------------------------------
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Nov 09 2000 - 07:17:37 EST