Posted on 02/27/2005 12:55:27 PM PST by betty boop
My bad. Ill do my research before posting from now on :)
I guess I somehow associated him with linguistics since he took on the Chomskyites.
"Blank Slate" - thats the book I was thinking of. There was a review I read of it somewhere which praised how he destroys the postition of the Left that there is no such thing as human nature. Its been on my Amazon wish list ever since ;)
Yee-hah!!! The battle is (finally) joined! :^)
To put morality on a “rational basis” would be to make man, not God, the validating source of morality. And given that different men will have different rational concepts, there is no one “tie that binds” in the moral universe. What there is, is an endless series of competing claims about the value (or lack thereof) of moral responsibility and what it consists of.
And Kant himself tips us off — in the “by your will” language of the Categorical Imperative — that we might expect that “by will” is the manner in which such questions will be settled. Either by means of the “popular will” of the ballot box, or the “general will” of totalist systems as articulated by the dictator. We have Communist China, Islamofascism, the Third Reich, and today’s variegated genocidal tyrannies in the Third World, notably in the Middle East and Africa, Southeast Asia, et al., as evidence of what “morality” turns out to be “when man gets to decide what morality is.”
Not to mention more “entrepreneurial” approaches to the problem of morality by individual rational (or irrational when you come right down to it) thinkers in terms of making moral law a “sui generis proposition.” (E.g., “if it feels good, do it.”)
Kant probably never explicitly foresaw this development. But the logic of his Imperative has been played out in history repeatedly, and continues to curse and scourge the human race to this day (as it always has done in human history, come to think of it).
[Kant] posited the necessity of God and the immortality of the soul as necessary for humans to reach the highest pinnacle of virtue, which was unobtainable in a finite lifespan. But it does appear that much of the invocation of God in his works was partly to keep himself out of further trouble with the authorities; and partly because he wasn't able to bring himself to abandon his Christianity.
There is truth in what you say here, RWP; but it is a truth pertaining to surface appearance, not to the depth of the problem. Kant here was merely recapitulating ancient doctrines of Christianity; but it seems for him, the true spirit of that doctrine had already been largely eclipsed by the “pulls” of the age in which he lived, which valued Reason above all things, even above the maker and sustainer of all Being, to Whom (it seems to me) we humans owe infinite gratitude.
An orthodox Christian might say that Kant had constructed an “idol” that displaced God as his first love. Just to think that God might be imagined as reducible to human categories of thought is to put such categories into First Place in terms of one’s love and fealty.
The fact is there is no way in which God can be conceived in terms of purely human categories and still be God. God is not to be defined by us. Such categorization produces only the reflection of the man who is making it.
Saint Anselm of Canterbury succinctly states the problem: “O Lord, you are not only that than which a greater cannot be conceived, but you are also greater than what can be conceived.” [My itals]
And so Anselm prays: “Speak to my desirous soul what you are, other than what it has seen, that it may clearly see what it desires.” [And believe it or not, but the Lord does “speak” to “desirous souls.”]
Now here’s the “ghost in the machine” rearing its ugly head in the imaginations of our contemporary “intellectual elites.” The soul, our natural extension into the realm of the Spirit, is either outright denied as absurd, or locked up in the attack like a crazed, senile, ancient maiden aunt…who is an embarrassment to us.
And yet I believe that every human person who is born into this world comes equipped with a “spiritual center” that we call the soul. It is present as the fundamental, paradigmatic quality of our most intimate being and, as such, is something that we need to come to terms with.
I think all people are at least dimly aware of this “presence” in themselves. What people do with this awareness largely determines what people become. There are many strategies for dealing with the soul. We can deny its existence outright — as e.g., Dawkins, Pinker, Lewontin, and a legion of other of our “brightest lights” do. We can admit we have one, but stipulate that it has nothing to do with God. Or we could simply recognize it for the divine gift that it is, and give thanks and praise to its Grantor.
But if we do admit that we have a soul, and yet deny God, then we are “free” to fill up this “spiritual space” at the center of our very being with whatever we want to fill it with.
I do not now recall whether it was Chesterton or Lewis who articulated this insight, which I can only paraphrase from memory right now: When a man ceases to believe in God, that does not mean that he has ceased to believe in anything. It means that he can believe in anything. We can "stuff" the soul to the gills with whatever "junk food" we want to feed it on, so to speak.
But unfortunately, the problem is not that simple, nor is that particular "option" harmless, either to ourselves, or to our wider extensions in the worlds of nature and society.
In conclusion, I don’t think morality is “irrational” at all. It is the creation of the same Creator who ensouled us and endued us with reason in the first place. And for us rational humans to recognize, with St. Anselm, that there are questions that go so beyond our rational capabilities as to be unanswerable in this life, seems not to be “irrational” at all.
Well, FWIW, Professor! Thank you so much for writing.
God created both moral and natural laws un-miraculously so we may only know phenomenal and not noumenal world.
I particularly admired this:
Of course, the intelligence or information in any living creature is de-centralized, each cell has its own core which carries either its own store of logic and memory, or the address of that store, but for these individual cells to assemble themselves into the creature we recognize, a cat for example, there must exist a blueprint for a cat somewhere, which this DNA code accesses by some means. This blueprint might be on-board somewhere, embedded in the DNA, or accessed by means of the DNA calling up subroutines elsewhere, or there might be a platonic catness-field that its ISP accesses by some means. How it happens is beyond my faculties, but the blueprint must exist. If there aren’t enough bits in a DNA string, then the information must be stored elsewhere.
Oh marron, I think we are on the same wavelength regarding these problems. So perhaps you won't be surprised to learn that I think your essay is simply sublime. You express so beautifully, so concisely, so cogently, so elegantly what I have been struggling to articulate for quite some time now. I am happy and grateful to be in your debt, dear man.
Methinks you may be some kind of "second coming" of Heraclitus (4th century B.C.) who had a profound intuition that the ultimate nature of Life in general, and living systems in particular, refers to that which does not change within the medium of constant change. That is to say, in life there is always that which persists (i.e., remains the same) connected to a "broken symmetry" (i.e., that which changes). It was the ancient Greeks who first noticed this, and it seems to me that Christianity affirms the observation.
Thank you oh so very much for this beautiful article, dear marron!
Well that would be an eminently reasonable supposition/conclusion, RWN!!! I grant you, if he's debating with Chomsky, he must know a pretty good deal about linguistics. :^)
Thanks so much for writing!
I am taken aback at the proposition that there are different 'rational concepts'. Surely not. Logic is logic; it is not subjective. If A entails B, and B entails C, then A entails C. I don't care if you're American or Bantu.
And Kant himself tips us off — in the “by your will” language of the Categorical Imperative — that we might expect that “by will” is the manner in which such questions will be settled.
I can settle this immediately. What you posted was a misquotation.
This is Abbott's translation of the Critique of Practical Reason. Abbott's translation is, I believe, authoritative.
Hit find with the argument 'FUNDAMENTAL LAW OF THE PURE PRACTICAL REASON' and you will get
Act so that the maxim of thy will can always at the same time hold good as a principle of universal legislation.
(My German is just OK, but this seems to be an accurate translation of Kant's Handle so, daß die Maxime deines Willens jederzeit zugleich als Prinzip einer allgemeinen Gesetzgebung gelten könne)
All this really means is that you should only act as if the rule according to which you act could be taken as a universal principle.
Now I'll be first to find you 10 examples of how this can be an impractical and too-inflexible moral stricture; but IMO for a one-sentence moral compass, it surpasses anything else anyone has come up with. And it's not too far from your Mom's favorite 'What would happen if everyone did that?'.
Skipping over a lot of good stuff, let me deal with your summary
In conclusion, I don’t think morality is “irrational” at all. It is the creation of the same Creator who ensouled us and endued us with reason in the first place. And for us rational humans to recognize, with St. Anselm, that there are questions that go so beyond our rational capabilities as to be unanswerable in this life, seems not to be “irrational” at all.
The proposition that there exists a category of experience or entities invulnerable to, or beyond reason is almost by definition unprovable, and I think it contradicts everyday experience. Moreover, while (in direct contradiction to your first paragraph) reason is common to us all, revelation, or whatever you call your mode of interacting with the ineffable, is quite subjective. Despite the efforts of Huxley and James and the like to unite Meister Eckert with the Sufis and Gautama Buddha and Timothy Leary and getting drunk down in Harvard Yard, in general people disagree, and often come to blows, about the authenticity of each other's connection with the great irrational. There is after all, no god but Allah, and Muhammed is his prophet. Hare Rama, Rama Krishna.
Somebody told me about a study they did in a hospital where several patients had reported 'out-of-body' experiences. They put some LEDs about 6 feet above the bed, hidden from below but visible from above, and spelling out a message. None of the patients who thought they had left their bodies and drifted through the ceiling saw the LEDs, let alone read the message.
Mathematics, and particularly geometry, is full of universals. So is physics: dualities, mirror symmetries. It is called "the unreasonable effectiveness of math".
Information, the subtext of this essay, is a universal too. It is mathematics. The beginning of geometries (space/time) regardless of cosmology is also based on the math. These observations absolutely scream that the physicalist, materialist, atheist, metaphysical naturalist worldview is hopelessly myopic.
God is the only possible uncaused cause - no other can concurrently be beyond yet aware and transcend "all that there is". There is no other rational cause for absolute, objective Truth – including what is Good and what is evil.
Sure, a person can deny that God exists but he must do it on faith, blindfolded and ears plugged to the existence and significance of universals.
Gen 1:27 So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.
The only objective morality is rational and so is it's basis. Validation does not come, because of some particular source. Validation comes from the morality itself, the content and how rationally consistent it is in serving it's purpose, and most importantly what that purpose is. The purpose is to protect Life, Freedom and rights. In the same breath that God tells the world He gave the gift of Life, He tells us He did so by giving us the fullness of His image and likeness.
Rationality and logic is to be judged on the truth presented, not on the basis of who is it's source. The tie that binds is the purpose behind the morality. Protecting the Life, Freedom and rights of the individual, regardless of who it is.
" What there is, is an endless series of competing claims about the value (or lack thereof) of moral responsibility and what it consists of. "
If it doesn't honor individual Life, Freedom and rights, it is a subjective claim concocted to usurp Life, Freedom and rights from someone else. These subjective claims are exactly a violation of both God's law and man's law that holds individual Life and sovereignty of will to be inviolate. Violating them is theft perpetrated for their own glory and profit.
"...Either by means of the “popular will” of the ballot box, or the “general will” of totalist systems as articulated by the dictator. ...as evidence of what “morality” turns out to be “when man gets to decide what morality is.” "
Regardless of who creates and perpetrates the evil, it's still evil. Notice the will of a few is imposed on the others for their own benefit and personal reasons. That is the fundamental violation that makes all their claims evil. Note C.S. Lewis tossed the do gooding nannies in as in with the worst tyrants.
"making moral law a “sui generis proposition.” (E.g., “if it feels good, do it.”) "
That isn't a moral law, because it protects nothing. It is simply a reason to do something.
"Just to think that God might be imagined as reducible to human categories of thought is to put such categories into First Place in terms of one’s love and fealty. "
Gen 1:27 says that this is not so. God gave men His own capacity. To demean the capacity of human's is to do the equivalent with God's. All that is to be demeaned is the choices and values of evil, which God did not choose. Men choose them, diliberately, or out of failure to use the capacity God gave them.
" The fact is there is no way in which God can be conceived in terms of purely human categories and still be God. God is not to be defined by us. Such categorization produces only the reflection of the man who is making it. "
I suppose the term purely acts as a disclaimer. Jesus is a man. He is God. Is that just my reflection, or the reflection of the Father too?
"you are also greater than what can be conceived."
It's the saint's praise, but it's not rational. How would she know this?
" Now here’s the “ghost in the machine” rearing its ugly head in the imaginations of our contemporary “intellectual elites.” The soul, our natural extension into the realm of the Spirit, is either outright denied as absurd, or locked up in the attack like a crazed, senile, ancient maiden aunt…who is an embarrassment to us."
The soul is the machine that has the function of supporting life. The body supports life in this world. That's all there is here. Historically life was thought to be due to the functioning of a soul, or etherial spirit. It is the body, which was and is thought by some folks to be some sort of a corrupting influence of the soul.
All that's important is the Life. It is that alone with it's will, rights choices and values that is. Whether the life arises from a body, or a soul, all that matters is the Life, not the machine. Jesus and His Father proved that beyond a shadow of a doubt.
Gen 3:19 By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return."
Our life arises out of dust. Man is to do his own providing. The Bread in the Lord's Prayer is the Holy Spirit. The knowledge and understanding that comes from science arises out of His gift of Life accompanied by His capacities. He gave us Freedom and came to teach. He came to teach, not science, but how interact with one another and tell us who He is personally. Science is that which can provide for the answers to prayer in accord with Gen 3:19.
"a “spiritual center” that we call the soul. It is present as the fundamental, paradigmatic quality of our most intimate being and, as such, is something that we need to come to terms with. "
That is sentient intelligence, the body provides that function. What matters is the function and science has provided knowledge and understanding of how the machine provides it. Science is a method and the body of knowledge collected by that method. It's not any particular man, or group of them. Most importantly, The moral code doesn't rest on mechanics.
I had one of those once after many gallons of beer, as a youth. It was to duck and get out of the way of the raging volume coming up the 'ole pipe.
Poincare would be pleased:
"In considering what constitutes “life” versus “non-life”, I often consider what it would take to design a cat. Strictly speaking, it shouldn’t be too difficult. Cats don’t do much.
It gets easier if I don’t have to have all of the processing capability on board the cat, if I could put most of it in my desk-top and the cat’s brain would control the direct mechanical functions while the decision-making could be handled in a larger machine and downloaded by wireless connection. My cat could do almost anything a real cat could do.
It wouldn’t be “alive”, though, unless I could solve two problems. One, that it could regenerate itself as time took its toll on its gingham fabric and the stuffing started to come out; and secondly, that it could make a new cat, itself. I could make a new one by recreating the blue-print for the previous one, but even I could not make one sprout from a seed, from a single cell, or even from a single cell fertilized from another. ... I take that as my litmus test for life.
Is it so outlandish to postulate a dimension as real as the temporal or spatial, and call that other 'life'? Many of the limitations being tossed about and so admirably dealt with in your paradigm can become minor points if a dimension not time and not space is the repository of this 'data' for 'being'. And that leads to the fourth dimension over which I ponder, the dimension from whence emanates Spirit, the dimensional complexity which separates humans from the rest of the specie. [I still think there are 'beings' such as Angels, inhabiting continua not as 'slow' as out planar present realm. But that is grist for another discussion ... or for the ridicule so easily doled by a few of the self-promoted 'wise ones'. BTW, thank you so very much for posting your essay ... took courage and was of deep and resonating insight, to this old mind.]
"Don't do unto others what you would have them do unto you. Your tastes may be different."
-George Bernard Shaw
Been there. Done that. Sometimes intentionally.
Dum vivimus, vivamus--Horace
As this is a thread about life.
For me, your musings on Random Processes and the art of Engine Manufacture and DNA as ISP are particularly engaging thought experiments.
I did not mean to disparage God's investiture. Only man's use of it; i.e., of the free gift conferred on the human race by God's very Word. Particularly in view of the fact that instantly after God brought forth Adam, he gave him and his progeny "dominion" over the creaturely world, as his stewards in creation. This to me suggests a responsibility of cosmic, not merely individual, social, or natural importance. Man seems to be "underperforming" in regard to the discharge of the responsibilities that come with divinely-endued stewardship these days....
On the other hand, I don't believe God created man to be just as He is. Gen 1:27 says that God gave men His own capacity. But how can a statement like this be understood? Dooes it mean that in the beginning, God intended to propagate a species of "godlets?" Or only that God endued man with some of his attributes, namely reason and free will?
But it's late where I am now, and I was just signing off before turning in. I'll be thinking more about what you write here, and hope to be speaking with you again soon.
For now, thank you! and good night, spunketts.
Definitions tell us about the meanings of words in our language, as opposed to telling us about the nature of the world. In the case of life, scientists are interested in the nature of life; they are not interested in what the word "life" happens to mean in our language. What we really need to focus on is coming up with an adequately general theory of living systems, as opposed to a definition of "life."
But in order to formulate a general theory of living systems, one needs more than a single example of life. As revealed by its remarkable biochemical and microbiological similarities, life on Earth has a common origin. Despite its amazing morphological diversity, terrestrial life represents only a single case. The key to formulating a general theory of living systems is to explore alternative possibilities for life. I am interested in formulating a strategy for searching for extraterrestrial life that allows one to push the boundaries of our Earth-centric concepts of life.
I think she would like the Shannon model - it is not prejudiced against non-carbon based life forms. LOL!
The fact is there is no way in which God can be conceived in terms of purely human categories and still be God. God is not to be defined by us. Such categorization produces only the reflection of the man who is making it.
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