Saturday, March 3, 2012

A Funeral Procession for my Procrastination: Part II

What's up, you saucy Throng?

Previously, on Are You There God? It's Me, Atheist...

With terror mounting and time running out, our hero battled through a plethora of fire-drenched obstacles, overcame a paralyzing childhood fear of squishy green plush toys, and managed to dismantle a bomb set by the blood-soaked zombie horde. All in order to deliver on his noble promise to finally begin doing what he was supposed to do all along: Blog his way through some books. Caving to the pressure of his trusted aides, our dear savior chopped what was intended to be one blog post into three. This is the second. Will he make it to the third?


The Authors: Peter Kreeft and Ronald Tacelli

The Book: Handbook of Christian Apologetics

The Chapter: 1 - The Nature, Power, and Limitations of Apologetics

Last time, we looked at the relationship of faith and reason. Continuing in a similar "faith and reason are allies" vein, Kreeft and Tacelli (KT from here on) attempt to show that "nonrational arguments" are not the same as "irrational arguments." Here they provide a list of ways in which reason is a "friend" to these non-rational arguments. For example, they claim that:
  1. "Reason is the friend of divine authority, which can neither deceive nor be deceived, but not necessarily of human authority, fads, and fashions." 
  2. "Reason is the friend of faith in this divine authority, but not of naivete. Thus reason leads to the faith and away from the cults."
  3. "Reason is the friend of hope, but not of human wishful thinking." 
  4. "Reason is the friend of agape (love) but not of eros (selfish passion)." 
  5. "Reason is the friend and complement to imagery, symbol and myth, which also reveal truth, but not to impossible imaginings, esoteric fantasies or misty pseudomysticisms" (17). 
All of these appear to make distinctions without much of a difference. Generally speaking, we can ask of each assertion, how do we know we've grasped the one true faith and aren't somehow mistaken or clouded by our faith, hope, and love of our own particular religion, authority, community, etc.

In particular, we might ask the following:
    Jesus
1.  How can we possibly know which divine authority is the one true divine authority? How do we gain access to that divine authority so that we can confirm its truth and divinity for ourselves? Is it not reported (as in the Bible, the Koran, and virtually every other sacred text) by other human authorities who set and/or follow other fads and fashions as established by their own psychological predispositions and cultural milieu? Also, how do we know this divine authority "can neither deceive nor be deceived?" Aren't there passages in the Bible where God hardens Pharaoh's heart and deceives via lying spirits? Finally, doesn't Paul admonish us to obey human authorities as they are established by God? It's a right kerfuffle.

2.  Again, how do we know whether we're in "the faith" (which is supposedly a friend of reason) or in one of "the cults"? What if I'm in a cult, but I'm confident that I've used reason to get there and stay there? And what of the other intelligent authorities in my cult who assure me that I'm in "the faith" while you are in one of "the cults"? Also, isn't it a bit tautologically circular to assume that reason leads to your particular faith and away from other faiths? Besides, one can cite passages of the Bible that are absurdantithetical to reason, and/or make the use of reason and evidence seem irrelevant and unnecessary. Other passages make faith sound hostile to doubting and questioning which are integral components of reason. Finally, isn't faith a gift from God? If so, there seems to be nothing we atheists can do to be brought to salvation. Our balls are in God's court. And if faith is a gift from God, how can you say another person's faith is mistaken? Can't they just claim their faith is a gift from their God while yours is a sham? Spot of bother, that.

File:Birthday-wish.jpg
3.  What is the difference between hope and human wishful thinking? The two have very similar definitions in the dictionary and are often used as synonyms for each other. Perhaps a bit more explanation can be given so that the differences between the two might be more apparent. Either way, as I pointed out before, hope seems to be an emotional bias that can corrode rationality. Also, why include "human" in reference to wishful thinking but not hope? Is hope not just as much a human activity as wishful thinking? My, what a pickle.

4.  Agape, by definition either has to do with the love of God for humanity or unselfish, sexless love that humans might have for one another. The first may or may not be based in reality. Regardless, isn't it rather circular (again) to assume God exists when faith in God is one of the questions under investigation? The second may be noble, virtuous, and boring as hell, but I have no quarrel with it. I agree that we can have hints, clues, and pieces of evidence that support the decision to make a commitment, either to a lifelong partner or to the betterment of humanity. That said, I'll take barbaric, bacchanalian, debauched, savagely splooging, eros over agape any day. 

Griffin5.  Do you take the stories of the Bible to be imagery, symbol, and myth revealing truth? Or impossible imaginings, esoteric fantasies, and misty pseudomysticism? From within a particular faith or cult, one's sacred texts might seem to reveal truth, perhaps via imagery, symbol, and myth. However, from an outsider's perspective, the same text might obviously appear to be comprised of the impossible imaginingsesoteric fantasies, and misty pseudomysticisms KT warn against. How might one go about examining one's own faith from an outsider's perspective? One might begin by taking John Loftus' Outsider Test for Faith. Merciful Meatball Problems!

I'm beginning to feel like a Negative Nelly, so let me break this thing down for a second and offer a brief note of agreement. KT offer a mini-lesson in logic that I couldn't support more strongly. Here they offer a very clear, concise description of logical arguments and an explanation for how they plan to operate throughout the book. This is all pretty cut and dried, so it would be difficult to disagree with anything they're saying here. However, what I really like is that they come across as a couple of sassy-asses! Want a few examples? You got it!

"These are the essential rules of reason, in apologetics and in any other field of argument. They are not rules of a game that we invented and can change. They are the rules of reality" (17).

File:600px Donkey on Blue.png"To disagree with the conclusion of any argument, it must be shown that either an ambiguous term or false premise or a logical fallacy exists in the argument. Otherwise, to say 'I still disagree' is to say 'You have proved your conclusion true, but I am so stubborn and foolish that I will not accept this truth. I insist on living in a false world, not the true one'" (18).

To those who scorn reason for being too intellectual, abstract, and rational and for being of lesser importance than life, love, morality, and sanctity, KT say, "Those who reason this way are right; they just don't notice that they are reasoning. We can't avoid doing it, we can only avoid doing it well" (20-21).

They're such bad-asses! KT are like the honey badger. They don't care. They don't give a shite! They'll kick your ass and not give a frak! They're so nasty!

Alas, this brief interlude of happy agreement and sass-assery is all too short-lived. Once again citing 1 Peter 3:15, KT insist that a Christian's "refusal to give a reason for faith is disobedience to God." And again, they accuse reason of being friends with faith. As they contend, (paraphrasing Jude 3) "Faith educates reason and reason explores the treasure of the 'faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints.'" Quoting Arthur Holmes, they claim "All truth is God's truth" and "unfaith is untrue" (22).

It'll be interesting to see how they define and flesh out their understanding of faith in its relationship with reason. But for now, I'm particularly troubled by the tautological notion that "all truth is God's truth" and that "unfaith" is somehow "untrue." Such assertions seem to beg the question of God's existence and presuppose the falsity of atheism, when it could very well be that God doesn't exist, in which case, truth would simply be truth and it would be right not to have faith in fictional deities. KT's pronouncements must be the conclusion, not the starting point, of a very rigorous analysis of the arguments. Otherwise, these assertions can serve to strengthen our biases in a foregone conclusion to such an extreme that it can be difficult, nigh impossible, to wriggle free from them.
File:Vanilla Ice.jpg

All right, start! Ventriloquate and glisten,
Pudge is back with a brand new commission!
Nuthin' grapples with me so slightly,
Flap like a mermaid, circadian? Perennially!
Grill it over what?
Bruh, I use charcoal!
Snuff out the blaze, and I'll sparkle!



So bum-rush the stage and see what's up in the final installment. Check y'all peeps later.

-Pudge-Zilla izzle out!

4 comments:

  1. Re: "3. What is the difference between hope and human wishful thinking?"

    I've wondered the very same thing many times throughout my life, and unfortunately, I used to dwell on and get tripped up in the wishful-thinking part of my namesake. Finally, I discovered that there are actually two definitions of "hope" -- (1) the wishful-thinking, fingers-crossed, emotional kind of "hope" that you referred to; and (2) the confident, expected, promised "hope" that carries us through. we can't experience or comprehend the later without releasing the former. faith and hope go hand in hand... not to mention love that surpasses both.

    as an experiment a couple years ago, i asked my friends to consider "hope" in honor of my birthday... http://hoped.blogspot.com/2010/03/consider-hope.html#comments

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    Replies
    1. Hey Hope!

      I really appreciate your taking the time to visit us here and drop some knowledge. You're prolly right, but just for gits and shiggles, I'll try to defend my wrongitude.

      It seems to me that even if you're correct, hope (as you've defined it) still has an emotional component that can corrode the process of rational investigation. If a scientist is conducting an experiment, he or she might be confident and expectant of a particular outcome, which may blind him/her to other possibilities and/or realities. Such a scientist may unwittingly neglect or ignore possible (plausible) objections.

      Similarly, one who is confident that God exists and has promised them/us hope may see the invisibly divine hand at work in all things. This form of hope seems very similar to confirmation bias, thereby making hope appear to be even more stridently at cross purposes with reason.

      Also, you speak of a "promised 'hope' that carries us through." However, who is the one doing the promising? Do you have God in mind here? If so, why does God seem to renege on this promise to some people?

      Again, in a rational discussion of the existence of God, it seems problematic to begin with the assumption that God exists. Of course, I agree that we ought to have some form of hope (some drive, some motivation) to carry us through, but I don't think it is in any way promised to us.

      Many religious/spiritual people do in fact operate on your first definition of hope, which you say must be released in order to experience and comprehend the second. Yet, if you asked them, these people would quite likely claim they possessed the second version of hope as well.

      Are you saying they're wrong? Or is it possible that the two are actually compatible and that you've overstated your case, maybe just a little bit?

      Finally, you say "faith and hope go hand in hand...not to mention love that surpasses both." How are you defining faith here? How is it different from how you've defined hope? I hate to keep pointing this out (and I swear I'm not opposed to emotions and all that crap), but introducing love only further clouds things in an attempt to rationally discuss/investigate the existence of God.

      I anticipate (confidently, expectantly) the correction of my many errors.

      Sinceriously,
      Rev. Funkmuffin

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  2. Some stabs at simple definitions of Faith, Hope and Love, as I understand how they're used in christian theological texts and catechisms:

    Faith = the collective aggregate of individual beliefs, Dogmas and Tradition
    Hope = the projected outcome, or telos, of those beliefs (usually in reference to salvation, eschatology & afterlife, which itself may be codified within the faith)
    Love = the practical application of Faith

    It may be more useful to use the term charity instead of love, or even better caritas to distinguish the theological use of love over the common, and grossly misused meaning of the word as "affection." Caritas, at least within the Christian tradition, and more specifically the Roman Catholic tradition from which I speak, is concretely summed up in Christ's teaching "Love one another as I have loved you. There is no greater love than this, that a man should lay down his life for his friends."

    To practice Caritas is to live according to one's faith, following God's commandments which generally involve self-sacrifice, laying down one's life: whether encapsulated in the "Shalt nots"
    "Thou shalt not act according to one's anger and murder those who've wronged you or have neat stuff that you want."
    "Thou shalt not think with thy penes or pudenda but reign thine horniness to copulating with thy spouse alone." (all sorts of Deuteronomical and Levitical goodness)
    or in the positive commandments, characterized by the Sermon on the Mount
    "Give to him who asks of you, and do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you." (Mt 5:41)
    "Be subject to one another." (Eph 5:21)
    "Give up anything that might upset the brethren." (1 Cor 8:13).
    Best summed up "Love the Lord, your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your strength; and love your neighbor as yourself."

    So caritas, Love, is being in right relationship to one's deity and others according to one's Faith. In that sense of love, there is possibly very little emotional content to the theological virtue. Ideally one would perform the commandment(s) to love God and love neighbor with affection, but the intellectual assent is not necessarily predicated by emotional affection, especially when one of the commandments is to "love your enemies" (Mt 5:44), and one could hardly call them enemies if you have warm fuzzies for them.

    I might even argue that Faith (assent to the dogmas and traditions) doesn't have to be predicated on emotion if one intellectually based on accepting the Authority that presents the Faith. If said Authority seems to have studied the faith from theological, ethical, and sociological points of view and corrected hypocritical applications of Faith over time, proved Faith's consistency and corroboration (or lack of invalidation) with Natural Law, and demonstrated that the Faith's origins have historical basis according to the extant historical sources, then assenting to the faith on those grounds could hardly be called an emotional event.

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  3. From your comment above: "in a rational discussion of the existence of God, it seems problematic to begin with the assumption that God exists" ... this is not just problematic, it's outright begging the question. One simply cannot start out this way.

    As for hope vs. wishful thinking. Perhaps I can provide the Christian perspective. The author is not making a semantic argument, but a religious one. Amongst the religious, hope would be an expected outcome based on facts. So, for instance, if you have been faithful to god, and you have prayed for something, you might reasonably hope that it will happen, god willing. But to expect something to happen despite having done nothing to bring it about would be disregarding the facts, and therefore wishful thinking. Thus the author's assertion that reason is a friend of hope; hope must, in the Christian sense, be based upon some fact, so the author asserts that reason, also being based upon fact, is a friend of hope.

    However, this is fundamentally a religious argument, and therefore still smacks of begging the question.

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