One of the arguments against TAG is the “tit-for-tat skeptic” argument. It goes a little something like this: “So you say that I cannot have knowledge of anything without God? Well, that’s just like Descartes’ evil demon scenario. You’re just using a skeptical threat argument against me except this time the evil demon is a benevolent Spirit. Your argument would slice against us both.”
This argument was recently used against Gene Cook of The Narrow Mind by a caller recently. www.tnma.blogspot.com
This ‘rebuttal’, of course, is either a misunderstanding of TAG or commits the straw-man fallacy. TAG is NOT a skeptical threat argument, but rather, it is an ANTI-skeptical argument. Its aim is to show the unbeliever that *his* worldview is the one that ***logically leads to global skepticism***. Stated very plainly, the unbeliever has misidentified the skeptic. It is the unbeliever who is the epistemological skeptic!
Just like Plantinga’s EAAN (i.e. evolutionary argument against naturalism) which many presuppositionalists use as part of TAG, TAG shows that, given the presuppositions of the unbeliever, the unbeliever undermines himself and destroys any possibility of warranted justified belief (again, given the presuppositions of the unbeliever’s worldview). Given the presuppositions revealed in Scripture, however, the Christian has every reason to believe in the possibility of knowledge. To state it again, it is the unbeliever who has misidentified the skeptic who is none other than the unbeliever himself!
Let’s take atheistic materialism, for example. Materialism states that everything that exists is matter, plain and simple. This also means that everything has a material cause, but of course, this would include the materialist and his thoughts! To quote Francis Crick, the co-discoverer of DNA and a materialist:
“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 behaviour of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules.” –Sir Francis Crick, The Astonishing Hypothesis (New York: Touchstone, 1994), p.3.
Thus, you are nothing more than a lump of molecules that churns away according to natural law. *You are nothing more that a cog in the machine of the cosmos.* Thus, you, that is, your cognitive self-ego, are nothing more than an illusion. Indeed, it would be more apt to refer to you as ‘you’, and instead of saying, “You are…,” it would be correct to say, “ ‘You’ is…” since the ‘you’ is nothing more than a non-teleological assortment of atoms banging away in a non-teleological universe yielding non-teleological thoughts. To quote the population geneticist and materialist, J.B.S. Haldane:
“If my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of atoms in my brain, I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true…and hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms.” –J.B.S. Haldane, Possible Worlds (1927; reprint, New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers, 2001).
This means that your thoughts are also illusions as well, and if your thoughts are illusions, then the thought that your thoughts are illusions is itself an illusion. Of course, this means that the thought of the thought that your thoughts are illusions of illusions is also illusory, and on and on it goes. Reductio ad absurdum. Q.E.D. The unbeliever’s worldview is self-refuting.
It is the materialist’s worldview which leads to the denial of the cognitive self-ego which, in turn, inevitably leads to the impossibility of knowledge. Indeed, it is like this for every worldview which teaches in an impersonal universe. It is only on the assumption of a Personal beginning to the universe from an eternal, self-conscious, Personal Being that man can be anything more than a cog in the machine of the cosmos. God must exist. Otherwise, knowledge is impossible. To quote Van Til, “If you cannot believe in God, then you cannot logically believe in anything else.”
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5 comments:
Otherwise, knowledge is impossible.
Even if we were to assume that knowledge is only possible with God, how are you planning to show that knowledge is possible?
If you cannot demonstrate this claim, then your claim that God exists falls down limp.
Your entire argument assumes knowledge is possible (or that your opponent presupposes that knoweledge - to your absurd level - is possible), but I havn't seen you demonstrate this, hence... you ain't getting nowhere.
To quote Van Til, “If you cannot believe in God, then you cannot logically believe in anything else.”
The problem you are facing is that believing in God doesn't change the problem. Van Til is simply wrong here.
The entire dilemma you are desperately trying to solve (and failing, even with the help of "God") stems from a fundamentally incorrect definition of "knoweledge".
/Z
Z,
You still don't understand the scope of our argument, and I doubt that you ever will.
'Presupps' don't say that Christianity is true by definition. Rather, we say (and argue the point) that either Christianity is true or NOTHING is true. Either the ontological Trinity revealed in Scripture is true in order for knowledge to be possible OR knowledge of any kind is impossible. You have the choice between Christianity and existentialism taken to the extreme (which is its logical conclusion).
The very fact that the top atheist philosophers of epistemology (Richard Rorty for example) have admitted this fact should be proof enough of the validity of our argument. Give it up, dude.
BTW: There is no other definition of "knowledge". If knowledge is not a warranted (doesn't have to be infallible, just have justification) true belief, then the knowledge that you supposedly have is nothing. Also, as I showed in the post, your atheism would undermine any probabalistic forms of knowledge (which are subjective anyway).
If you want to remain in a worldview that makes impossible any form of knowledge and thus, results in global skepticism, then go ahead. But if you do, then you could never attack Christianity or anything else since nothing could be true or false.
'Presupps' don't say that Christianity is true by definition. Rather, we say (and argue the point) that either Christianity is true or NOTHING is true.
To your absurd standard, no synthetic proposition is true.
Either the ontological Trinity revealed in Scripture is true in order for knowledge to be possible OR knowledge of any kind is impossible.
...which of course is an arbitrary assertion on your part. What in tarnation does *trinity* have to do with anything?
Absolutely nutti'n
The very fact that the top atheist philosophers of epistemology (Richard Rorty for example) have admitted this fact should be proof enough of the validity of our argument. Give it up, dude.
No, you are misunderstanding Richard Rorty; his point is that that type of "truth" is incoherent.
BTW: There is no other definition of "knowledge". If knowledge is not a warranted (doesn't have to be infallible, just have justification) true belief, then the knowledge that you supposedly have is nothing.
To your absurd standard, we have no "knoweledge" of synthetic propositions.
But you are looking at the problem wrong; the error is not with our "knoweledge", but the impossible definition of knoweledge you question-begginly cling to.
Redefine knoweledge to something that actually can exist, and your problems go away.
Also, as I showed in the post, your atheism would undermine any probabalistic forms of knowledge (which are subjective anyway).
Baloney.
If you want to remain in a worldview that makes impossible any form of knowledge
It does not in any way shape or form. It only makes knoweledge of synthetic propositions probabalistic. It defines knoweledge as something which is actually attainable, unlike your worldview.
But if you do, then you could never attack Christianity or anything else since nothing could be true or false.
Of course things can be true or false. Again, there are analytic propositions, and they can trivially be shown to be absolutely true, or absolutely false.
Like for example the analytic proposition that absolute knoweledge about synthetic propositions is unattainable is absolutely true, and there is no contradiction there.
/Z
Z,
Is your synthetic/analytic distinction synthetic or analytic?
[Hint: The reason why logical positivism died out was because it was self-referentially absurd (as shown above). If you tried to use the synthetic/analytic dichotomy in any philosophy school, you'd receive a chuckle from the professors.]
TAG is a form of a Transcendental Argument. These kinds of arguments are universally recognized as a valid type of argument.
Last, your materialism, since it denies (by logical conclusion) the existence of the cognitive self-ego, undermines any kind of probabalistic notion of knowledge. You wouldn't even be able to guess at what the probabilities of the probabilities are in the first place since 'you' don't actually exist and all of your thoughts are physically determined.
BTW:
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2006/11/bayesian-probability-theory.html
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2006/11/miracles-prior-probabilities.html
I think that I'll do a few posts on the failure of probability epistemology in the future, and if you don't get it by then...well...
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