Q&A: 2 Questions About the Physico-Theological Argument
2 Questions About the Physico-Theological Argument
Question
Hello Michi. Two questions that came up for me following your lectures on this argument:
- The principle of causality is a priori. That means that if complex things are supposed to have a component, this should apply to all things, including those outside our experience. However, in your formulation, the third premise of the argument says that “every complex thing in our experience is supposed to have a cause.” But if this principle is a priori, why assume that? It’s clear to me that we need to avoid an infinite regress, but then wouldn’t it be more correct to formulate the premise this way: “Every complex thing is supposed to have a cause, whether in our experience or not in our experience, except for one object (or several) that began a certain causal chain, since causal chains cannot be infinite.”
- One could argue that the first link in the chain of complex things is something mechanical—for example, that the singular point always existed, and when it “exploded,” the laws of nature were created. Your answer was that according to the principle of sufficient reason, we should ask about something, even if it always existed, what the sufficient reason for its existence is. But this question assumes that an object with will (God) does not need a sufficient reason. So again, the opponents could say that the first object (for example, the singular point) does not need a sufficient reason, just as you assume that an object with will does not need to have a sufficient reason. As I see it, the only way to deal with this is simply to say that in our world, for everything that does not have will we look for a cause, whereas for a person’s choice we do not look for a cause (because he has will, choice). And from this one can extrapolate that even if something always existed, as long as it does not have will it would require a reason, whereas something with will (God) would not require a reason. What do you think of my analysis? Is there another way to answer an atheist on this?
And also, if we connect the issue of reason to the issue of the third premise, one could argue that the premise in its most precise form should be the following: “Everything needs to have a sufficient reason (or cause or reason), whether it is in our experience or not in our experience, except for the object or objects that began a causal chain, or such things as provide a reason for the particularity of certain things (for example, a reason for the Big Bang or for the laws of nature, if these always existed).
Thank you!
Answer
1. That is the correct formulation. What I meant to say is that the necessity of positing causality is with regard to things in our experience. As for the others, that remains open. And preventing regress forces us to say that there are things that have no cause. But then the physico-theological argument collapses, since it is possible that the thing that has no cause is matter in the world (the singular point in the Big Bang). That is why it is important for me to note that this has to be something not in our experience. And the explanation is that the fact that the principle is a priori does not contradict the claim that there is a difference between what is in our experience and what is not in our experience. The a priori principle deals with certain kinds of objects and not with all of them. Moreover, when I say a priori, I mean an intuition that is itself a way of looking at the world, only not through the senses. All this has been explained here more than once.
Discussion on Answer
1. So in effect, according to what you’re saying, every a priori principle is only about things in our experience? According to that, angels, demons, and likewise things in other possible worlds, would not necessarily have to have a cause.
2. I understand. But is there an argument that only something non-material/mechanical does not require a sufficient reason, or is this an intuition, a kind of assumption that doesn’t require proof?
1. That’s what you’re saying, not me.
2. Intuition. It may be that it has no sufficient reason (not that it necessarily doesn’t).
But from what I understand from what you wrote, you apply a priori intuitions only to things in our experience (since with them we “see” it), and from this it follows that things in other worlds or things not in our experience—for example angels or things in other worlds (if there are such)—are not subject to those same a priori intuitions.
Where am I not understanding you correctly?
Apply.
I didn’t write that anywhere. I said that there can be intuitions that pertain only to things in experience. I didn’t say they all do.
Apply, of course. Thanks for the correction.
And okay, so the intuition about causality is an example of an intuition that applies only to experience?
What intuition applies to all things, including those not in our experience?
And what distinguishes between them? That is, what differentiates intuitions that apply to all possible things (including those not in our experience), and intuitions that do not apply to things not in our experience (like causality)?
The content of the intuition. The intuition that everything has a cause also applies to everything. But if one has to make an exception, it is more reasonable to make an exception for an entity not in our experience. The idea that simplicity is a criterion for correctness (Occam’s razor) is, for example, a general intuition. Intuitions about God are intuitions about what is not in our experience.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1eNgWk2Zc0EUrOf6MnmLCcLjDzCFxyPcL/view?usp=sharing
I’d be glad to hear your thoughts on the article in the link in the previous comment.
Thanks.
I like making people happy, but I don’t work for you, and ever since first grade I haven’t really liked homework. If there’s some argument you’d like to discuss, formulate it and present the problem you want to discuss.
Heaven forbid—I value your opinion, and I thought the article presented things in the most precise way, but I’ll try to formulate it.
So the article deals with the source of human cognition and presents the fact that Hume showed that the principle of induction is not valid,
which leads to the conclusion that one cannot infer on the basis of observation.
After that it presents Gödel’s theorem, which proved that mathematical truth cannot be enclosed within any formalist scheme. Then it presents Kant’s a priori causality, and this leads him to this:
“In modern language, a highly sophisticated computer
(which can perform all logical operations) is not capable of formulating laws of nature,
even when all possible experimental data are available to it. Human beings can see
truths that cannot be derived from experience algorithmically (see Gödel’s theorem!).”
He then talks about Popper, who said that we should view all laws and theories as hypothetical or conjectural, and that turns them into deductive claims—but that is exactly what Gödel ruled out.
In practice this shows that there is no rational way to arrive at any scientific cognition, and everything deals with hypotheses that can be replaced by delusion, but no end of observations will bring us to proof, and we cannot know how narrow the picture is that our theory explains—like Newton and Einstein’s revolution, which showed that Newton’s theory does not function well enough under high gravity like that of the sun’s mass, for example.
After that he talks about the biblical approach in Judaism, where basically he says that man was created in the image, and thanks to the “divine intellect attached to him, for he is in the image of God and in His likeness…” (Guide for the Perplexed),
we have the possibility of scientific apprehension, and if I understand correctly this resolves our ability to learn from reality.
In practice reason is the image of God and enables us to make scientific discoveries.
There are of course more arguments in the article, but this is the general picture as I understand it. Do you think it holds water?
Absolutely not. Especially today in the AI era, you can see how many of the things we do can be mechanical. I have columns on AI versus humans, and it will be explained there.
There are also lots of mistakes here in the scientific descriptions.
Hume did not show that induction is incorrect (“valid” is not a relevant term here), only that it does not derive from observation.
Gödel’s theorem is limited to certain axiomatic systems, not all of them.
A computer certainly can formulate laws of nature, and it in fact does so.
Popper, who claims that a theory is hypothetical, is simply wrong.
And if his unclear wording (or yours) claims that man has the ability to reach conclusions, how does that fit with Hume and Popper? So are our theories true or hypothetical?
First, thanks for the response.
The author is Professor Benjamin Fine.
The claim is not that this is supposed to fit with Hume and Popper; the claim is that through Hume, Kant, Popper, and Gödel, it is hard to show how a person arrives at scientific cognition.
I’m pretty new to studying these topics, but again, the claim is that the principle of induction does not derive from observation (I agree that’s more precise), so we have a problem being able to base scientific cognition on observation, right?
I think Popper means hypothetical in the sense that we have no ability to prove that a given theory describes reality as it is, like the example of Newton and Einstein, and that seems right to me because it really stands at the foundation of science.
As for computing, that’s a quote, but I think the intention is that man, unlike a computer, has an active role in shaping the laws of nature (this is derived from Kant).
Bottom line, the claim is that in a world without God we have difficulty developing scientific cognition; we can only refute or rule out, and not prove or verify, whereas in the biblical view man was created in the image of the Creator and the world was created through speech—“The world was created through ten utterances.”
The “word” itself becomes reality (“Let there be light,” and there was light), which indicates that reality too is truly intelligible because it is rational.
A person arrives at scientific cognition not only on the basis of observations but also on the basis of a priori intuitions. What is the problem with that?
Obviously there is no way to prove a scientific theory. So what? There is a way to confirm it.
From this point on these are words I do not understand.
People have philosophical intuitions that, due to lack of skill, they present incorrectly. In the fourth talk in The First Cause, I explained the proof I called the proof from epistemology, which is based on these things, but that is a different argument and it requires additional precision. See there.
I don’t see a problem with learning from a priori intuition about reality—on the contrary. The question, I think, is where this capacity for learning comes from, because out of the total set of theories a person could arrive at that explain things, the chance of arriving specifically at ours is negligible.
Creating a new basic theory is something that seems to arise, as it were, from nothing, and in my opinion this calls into question our ability to learn about reality, and I think this is the more plausible possibility:
“I would like to bring here a metaphor taken from physics: in practice, the physical world
is composed of matter and light. Now imagine that we know nothing about the existence of light,
and suddenly we notice that strange things are happening in the world of matter. Matter is not conserved. Here and there
matter is created out of nothing, and in different places matter disappears. But the world stops seeming strange
when one takes light into account. Light can create matter, and matter can turn into light.
What do I mean to say through this metaphor? Matter is our world, and that includes
the human mind and everything that exists in it. Light is God.”
I think this can also be looked at through the lens of the complexity description of the world: the probability of arriving at a scientific theory that we managed to validate is so low/complex that it is more likely that the basic laws of nature led to the creation of man with reason / “created in the image,” behind which stands a Creator.
And still, we have no ability to know that these are the basic laws of the universe, only that these laws explain certain phenomena.
I’ll read what you recommended, thanks.
That is exactly what I answered here. I don’t see what is added by your last remarks. We have the ability to observe reality not only through the senses. That is how we sort out the correct theory from among all possible theories. Why does that say something about God or about anything else?
2. As I explained, it is not reasonable that the first link is material or mechanical. I argued that this primary object might not have a sufficient reason (not that this is necessarily so), unlike other objects.