Recently I came across an article that was written as a response to a broader discussion regarding the nature of consciousness and the mind. The scientist writing the article took the position that all mental activity, and therefore all subjective experience, is just neurochemistry. That is, all thought can be reduced down to the motions of molecules in the brain.
His point was that we can trace neural pathways in the brain, and because we can do this we have discovered the source of consciousness. In making this assertion he was arguing against the possibility of consciousness being a separate entity apart from the measurable neurochemistry in the brain. His reasoning was that there was no evidence that human consciousness operated independent of the neuron activity in the brain. From a scientific stand point he has a very strong argument. There is no evidence that has ever been measured of human consciousness operating independent of a human brain. As he put it, "default hypothesis must be that brains cause consciousness." There is nothing to prove otherwise.
In making his argument that there is no evidence for consciousness independent of a functioning brain, he gave the following challenge in the form of a question.
"Where is the evidence for consciousness being fundamental to the cosmos?"
We must acknowledge that we have not yet observed free floating consciousnesses in the universe. We cannot look through a telescope, or in a particle accelerator, or in a microscope and observe a consciousness apart from the neural activity in our brains. So what evidence is there for consciousness in the universe?
That it exists.
Right now as you are reading this you are aware of your own existence. That fact alone is evidence that there is at least one consciousness, and that it is fundamental to the universe. You may also realize that you cannot observe, experience or measure my consciousness. You can observe the effects of my consciousness in how I act and talk, but you cannot directly observe my consciousness. (As a side note, if you were to insist that yours was the only consciousness in the cosmos and that everyone else were just clever machines then you would be slipping into the philosophy of solipsism.) So when the author of the article asked what evidence there was for consciousness being fundamental, the evidence is that it exists.
While his arguments may seem modern with their emphasis on neurochemistry, this argument is actually quite old and has been debated as far back as the ancient Greek philosophers. I can tell someone is a conscious being because of the way they act. I can observe their actions and how they react to language and conclude that they are an independent thinking being. All we have done with modern neuroscience is to do the exact same thing, but now with fancy equipment. It's a bit like inventing a car or an airplane and then concluding, "Now we have solved the puzzle of human motion! We now know how humans move!"
No, all we have done is take the same fundamental problem and wrapped it in a new shinier, more complex skin.
We have not solved the problem of consciousness. We still have not observed consciousness. We can observe the motions that result from consciousness, but we have not observed someone's self awareness. We may be closer to solving the riddle of human consciousness but we have not yet done it. Until then the idea that "brains cause consciousness" is not the "default hypothesis". To insist that "brains cause consciousness" is to assume a conclusion for which there is no evidence, while our own self-awareness is evidence that our consciousness is independent of our own neurochemistry,
Until we know what consciousness, or self-awareness, is, and not just its effects, we cannot say that we have no evidence of consciousness outside the measurable motions of neurochemistry. But we do have evidence that consciousness exists. Just think about it.
Showing posts with label Intelligence. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Intelligence. Show all posts
Sunday, September 18, 2016
Friday, November 13, 2009
On How We Know: The Sixth Sense
This is a continuation of my series On How We Know. The introduction can be found here, and a full listing of articles can be found here.
In considering the knowledge we gain from sense experience the question arises, where do feelings of the Spirit or Holy Ghost fit into this. As we learn from one passage in the Doctrine and Covenants the feelings or knowledge imparted by the Spirit can be described as a "burning in our bosom". Feeling the Spirit can also be described as enlightening our understanding, or simply enlightening. So the question that we might consider is how feeling the Spirit or the influence of the Spirit relates to our other senses.
Some people choose to define it as a sixth sense that we have. In other words, when we feel the Spirit we feel it through our "spiritual sense organ" much in the same way we sense anything else through our other five senses. Without elaborating I will say that this always seemed a little ridiculous to me. While it may be useful to talk about the Spirit in this way so that those who do not understand can begin to understand, I think that it is not ultimately useful or even instructive to talk about feeling the Spirit in terms of having a sixth sense. So what is it then?
Better yet is the approach expressed by Joseph Smith as explained by Truman G. Madsen,
"On the senses, a colleague at an eastern university said to me one day, "Yes, I've heard you Mormons have a sixth sense. You do. It is the sense that enables you to swallow this nonsense called Mormonism." Even if you conclude with certain scientific naturalists that anything that is nonsensory is nonsense, that is an endorsement, in a measure, of your heritage. Said Erastus Snow, referring to the Prophet,
"Joseph taught that the Spirit of the Lord underlies all our natural senses, that is seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching. The Spirit communicates with the spirit of man and enlivens all the other senses. [BYU Special Collections, MSS. 44, Folder 5]"
Thus the sensations of the spirit and the feeling we have from the Spirit are the same things that connect all our normal senses to our spirit. It is the stuff of spirit, and when the Holy Ghost speaks to us it is directly to our own spirit, that which is the repository of knowledge and awareness. Thus the sensations of the Spirit are the sensations of sense itself.
In considering the knowledge we gain from sense experience the question arises, where do feelings of the Spirit or Holy Ghost fit into this. As we learn from one passage in the Doctrine and Covenants the feelings or knowledge imparted by the Spirit can be described as a "burning in our bosom". Feeling the Spirit can also be described as enlightening our understanding, or simply enlightening. So the question that we might consider is how feeling the Spirit or the influence of the Spirit relates to our other senses.
Some people choose to define it as a sixth sense that we have. In other words, when we feel the Spirit we feel it through our "spiritual sense organ" much in the same way we sense anything else through our other five senses. Without elaborating I will say that this always seemed a little ridiculous to me. While it may be useful to talk about the Spirit in this way so that those who do not understand can begin to understand, I think that it is not ultimately useful or even instructive to talk about feeling the Spirit in terms of having a sixth sense. So what is it then?
Better yet is the approach expressed by Joseph Smith as explained by Truman G. Madsen,
"On the senses, a colleague at an eastern university said to me one day, "Yes, I've heard you Mormons have a sixth sense. You do. It is the sense that enables you to swallow this nonsense called Mormonism." Even if you conclude with certain scientific naturalists that anything that is nonsensory is nonsense, that is an endorsement, in a measure, of your heritage. Said Erastus Snow, referring to the Prophet,
"Joseph taught that the Spirit of the Lord underlies all our natural senses, that is seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching. The Spirit communicates with the spirit of man and enlivens all the other senses. [BYU Special Collections, MSS. 44, Folder 5]"
Thus the sensations of the spirit and the feeling we have from the Spirit are the same things that connect all our normal senses to our spirit. It is the stuff of spirit, and when the Holy Ghost speaks to us it is directly to our own spirit, that which is the repository of knowledge and awareness. Thus the sensations of the Spirit are the sensations of sense itself.
On How We Know: "Why do you doubt your senses?"
This is a continuation of my series On How We Know. The introduction can be found here, and a full listing of articles can be found here.
In the book A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, the ghost of Jacob Marley confronts the character Ebenezer Scrooge, and after introducing himself the ghost and Scrooge have a rather interesting conversation. I will include the first few lines here:
"You don't believe in me," observed the Ghost.
"I don't," said Scrooge.
"What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of your own senses?"
"I don't know," said Scrooge.
"Why do you doubt your senses?"
"Because," said Scrooge, "a little thing affects them. A slight disorder of the stomach makes them cheats. You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. There's more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!"
In this exchange the ghost of Jacob Marley asks a rather interesting question, "What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of your own senses?" Essentially Jacob Marley is asking, "Is there any other possible way for you, or anyone else, to gain knowledge of reality than through your senses?" and the natural conclusion to this thought is that if there is no other way to gain knowledge of reality then, "Why do you doubt your senses?"
Scrooge's response is anything but unique. It is the response of sceptics and philosophers from many ages of Western Philosophy. Perhaps the one who expressed it better than anyone else, and is best known for it, is Rene Descartes. His particular approach even has its own name, the method of doubt. In applying the method of doubt, Descartes had a specific goal in mind, to find the foundations of reality, but unintentionally his method of doubt started a tradition that has continued and influenced us to this day. It introduced into not just Western Philosophy, but all of Western Culture a fundamental distrust of our senses. I have heard Descartes', and Scrooge's, arguments repeated over and over by college professors, by high school teachers and even by elementary school children. Even though most people live and act as if their senses are a good indication of what is real, the same people will immediate express doubt in their own senses, and especially those of others, when what they sense does not agree with what they already "know". There is always some other explanation that explains what someone saw or otherwise sensed. These doubts are given particular force because of the tradition we have of doubting or senses.
So let us consider this doubt, do we have any reason at all to doubt our senses? Essentially the argument of Descartes, and Scrooge, is that there exist well known instances where our senses cannot be relied upon. The classic example is dreams. We can "sense" things in our dreams that are not really there. This is not confined to our dreams but occasionally, as Scrooge points out, our senses can be cheated by other things, such as indigestion or other substances. So the question is, "Where do we draw the line?" How do we determine which sensations are real and which are false? The answer of Descartes was essentially, "Because I don't know where the line is I am going to assume that there is no line and that I can't trust any of the sensations I have." While Descartes ultimately acknowledges that this approach is insane, the damage was done and he had introduced the idea that because there is some doubt as to where the dividing line is between two things, in this case sensations corresponding to reality and those that do not, then we cannot assume that any of our sensations correspond to reality and we must doubt everything.
Effectively what Descartes has done is to confuse the ocean for a continent because he was standing on the beach and did not know where "dry land" ended and the water began. The method used by Descartes and the argument of Scrooge is like someone standing on a beach and wondering where the land ends and where the water begins. After puzzling over it for a while this person concludes that there is no such thing as land because they cannot clearly discern the boundary between a continent and an ocean. They then head inland away from the ocean and begin to talk to people and tell them that they are not standing on dry land but that they are actually in the middle of the ocean. In their defence they point to the presence of lakes, rivers and even glasses of water to prove that we do not live on a continent but that we live in the ocean. If someone actually attempted this and spoke like this then they would quickly be picked up by the authorities and taken to a "safe place" with padded walls. But in the case of philosophers instead of being ignored as insane they are called great and have their works and ideas spread around like manure.
Just because the boundary between an ocean and a continent is not well defined to someone standing on the beach does not mean that there is not a distinct, well definable and immediately recognizable difference between the two. Doubting the existence of a continent because the waves are washing your feet is an act of severe intellectual dishonesty. In the same way, doubting all our senses because a few of them may not actually correspond to anything in reality is also an act of severe intellectual dishonesty.
Continuing with this analogy we note that on continents there are lake and rivers which some will use to cast doubt on our assertion. These I will liken to physical injury, drugs and other mind altering substances. The fact that I can mention them in the context of "mind altering" indicates that there is a distinct, well definable and immediately recognizable difference between normal sensations and those arising from drugs or physical conditions. Again there is no reason to doubt the veracity of all sensations, or the existence of a continent, just because you are dabbling your feet in a river or a lake.
Related to this is the misguided approach of trying to "discover" something about reality by deliberately partaking in mind altering drugs. This would be akin to stating a desire to understand the rocks and dirt of a continent and then promptly going for a swim and spending your time staring at a fish.
So how do know to distinguish between between sensations that give us knowledge of reality and those that do not? The answer to that question is inextricably bound up with the answer to the question "How do we gain knowledge?" which is the purpose of these essays. So we know the limit or boundary by applying the selfsame modes of knowing that lead us into all knowledge. As for giving a more exact answer I would ask, "How do we recognize the boundary between land and water?" Understand that and you can learn to recognize the boundaries between sensations that give us knowledge of reality and those that do not.
In the book A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, the ghost of Jacob Marley confronts the character Ebenezer Scrooge, and after introducing himself the ghost and Scrooge have a rather interesting conversation. I will include the first few lines here:
"You don't believe in me," observed the Ghost.
"I don't," said Scrooge.
"What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of your own senses?"
"I don't know," said Scrooge.
"Why do you doubt your senses?"
"Because," said Scrooge, "a little thing affects them. A slight disorder of the stomach makes them cheats. You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. There's more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!"
In this exchange the ghost of Jacob Marley asks a rather interesting question, "What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of your own senses?" Essentially Jacob Marley is asking, "Is there any other possible way for you, or anyone else, to gain knowledge of reality than through your senses?" and the natural conclusion to this thought is that if there is no other way to gain knowledge of reality then, "Why do you doubt your senses?"
Scrooge's response is anything but unique. It is the response of sceptics and philosophers from many ages of Western Philosophy. Perhaps the one who expressed it better than anyone else, and is best known for it, is Rene Descartes. His particular approach even has its own name, the method of doubt. In applying the method of doubt, Descartes had a specific goal in mind, to find the foundations of reality, but unintentionally his method of doubt started a tradition that has continued and influenced us to this day. It introduced into not just Western Philosophy, but all of Western Culture a fundamental distrust of our senses. I have heard Descartes', and Scrooge's, arguments repeated over and over by college professors, by high school teachers and even by elementary school children. Even though most people live and act as if their senses are a good indication of what is real, the same people will immediate express doubt in their own senses, and especially those of others, when what they sense does not agree with what they already "know". There is always some other explanation that explains what someone saw or otherwise sensed. These doubts are given particular force because of the tradition we have of doubting or senses.
So let us consider this doubt, do we have any reason at all to doubt our senses? Essentially the argument of Descartes, and Scrooge, is that there exist well known instances where our senses cannot be relied upon. The classic example is dreams. We can "sense" things in our dreams that are not really there. This is not confined to our dreams but occasionally, as Scrooge points out, our senses can be cheated by other things, such as indigestion or other substances. So the question is, "Where do we draw the line?" How do we determine which sensations are real and which are false? The answer of Descartes was essentially, "Because I don't know where the line is I am going to assume that there is no line and that I can't trust any of the sensations I have." While Descartes ultimately acknowledges that this approach is insane, the damage was done and he had introduced the idea that because there is some doubt as to where the dividing line is between two things, in this case sensations corresponding to reality and those that do not, then we cannot assume that any of our sensations correspond to reality and we must doubt everything.
Effectively what Descartes has done is to confuse the ocean for a continent because he was standing on the beach and did not know where "dry land" ended and the water began. The method used by Descartes and the argument of Scrooge is like someone standing on a beach and wondering where the land ends and where the water begins. After puzzling over it for a while this person concludes that there is no such thing as land because they cannot clearly discern the boundary between a continent and an ocean. They then head inland away from the ocean and begin to talk to people and tell them that they are not standing on dry land but that they are actually in the middle of the ocean. In their defence they point to the presence of lakes, rivers and even glasses of water to prove that we do not live on a continent but that we live in the ocean. If someone actually attempted this and spoke like this then they would quickly be picked up by the authorities and taken to a "safe place" with padded walls. But in the case of philosophers instead of being ignored as insane they are called great and have their works and ideas spread around like manure.
Just because the boundary between an ocean and a continent is not well defined to someone standing on the beach does not mean that there is not a distinct, well definable and immediately recognizable difference between the two. Doubting the existence of a continent because the waves are washing your feet is an act of severe intellectual dishonesty. In the same way, doubting all our senses because a few of them may not actually correspond to anything in reality is also an act of severe intellectual dishonesty.
Continuing with this analogy we note that on continents there are lake and rivers which some will use to cast doubt on our assertion. These I will liken to physical injury, drugs and other mind altering substances. The fact that I can mention them in the context of "mind altering" indicates that there is a distinct, well definable and immediately recognizable difference between normal sensations and those arising from drugs or physical conditions. Again there is no reason to doubt the veracity of all sensations, or the existence of a continent, just because you are dabbling your feet in a river or a lake.
Related to this is the misguided approach of trying to "discover" something about reality by deliberately partaking in mind altering drugs. This would be akin to stating a desire to understand the rocks and dirt of a continent and then promptly going for a swim and spending your time staring at a fish.
So how do know to distinguish between between sensations that give us knowledge of reality and those that do not? The answer to that question is inextricably bound up with the answer to the question "How do we gain knowledge?" which is the purpose of these essays. So we know the limit or boundary by applying the selfsame modes of knowing that lead us into all knowledge. As for giving a more exact answer I would ask, "How do we recognize the boundary between land and water?" Understand that and you can learn to recognize the boundaries between sensations that give us knowledge of reality and those that do not.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
On How We Know: The Prerequisite of Reason
This is the second in my series of On How We Know. The introduction can be found here, and a full listing of articles can be found here.
It might be said that the role or use of reason is a doubled edged sword which can greatly help or hinder those who use it. On the one hand, reason is something that is necessary for our existence as it is an integral part of our identity and allows us to understand, solve and overcome many of the problems of life. It give us our quality of life and allows us to understand and comprehend things beyond our own experience. In this respect it is one of the most powerful tools at our disposal. It is a tool to make all tools. But this powerful tool can be mislead and misguided. If we use it at the exclusion of all of the other modes of knowing, then our own reasonings can lead us into erroneous conclusions from which it can be difficult to extract ourselves. Now not all false reasonings will lead us into such a dismal mire of intellectual quicksand, but very rarely will you find quicksand on dry, solid ground.
To begin the process of understanding the proper role of reason let us consider two examples. The first is an experience that I had a few weeks ago while teaching some of my students about Newton's Laws. My students were performing an experiment to prove Newton's first law. The experiment consisted of balancing different forces in order to achieve equilibrium. In discussing the lab with some of my students I asked them about the uncertainty associated with the lab, as in, how much certain variables could change and they would still get the same result. At this point I asked my students which of the two important variables they were measuring had a greater effect on the overall uncertainty of the experiment (to get an idea of what I am talking about, imagine flying in an airplane from New York to Los Angeles. To get there I need a bearing (direction) and a distance. If I am off by one mile in the distance it is not as critical, but if I am off by one degree I could end up missing my target by more than 50 miles. In this case the uncertainty in the bearing is more important than the uncertainty in the distance.). So I asked my students to tell me which of the variables they were dealing with was more important to the uncertainty, and after I got some answers with an explanation of their reasoning I asked the question, "How do you know that?" At that point I got blank and dumbfounded stares from my students, as if to say, "What do you mean, "How do we know that"?" This group of students had just given me their answer, they had thought it through, given me their reasons as for why they thought they were correct and then when I asked them to back up their reasoning with "proof" (i.e. another mode of knowing) they were floored. It was as if it had never occurred to them that thinking about something and coming up with a good "reason" was not sufficient "proof".
The attitude of my students is hardly an isolated incident, but is indicative of a more general attitude found among those who commonly use reason to understand the world. A more striking example of this type of attitude can be found in the early works of Ludwig Wittgenstein. In the famous introduction to his book Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus he states, "the truth of the thoughts communicated here seems to me unassailable and definitive. I am, therefore, of the opinion that the problems have in essentials been finally solved." So firm was his conviction that in his short book he had managed to solve all of the problems of philosophy and logic that he thereafter left his studies at Cambridge and did not return for eight years.
In both of these examples the common element is a firm belief that what has been reasoned out is correct and there is no more need to continue with an investigation or even to reason further. Certainly there is the temptation that when we have thought about something to a sufficient degree and come to a resolution, we think that there is no further need to reason it out and understand it more, let alone use any of the other modes of knowing to confirm our reasoning. Like Wittgenstein there is the tendency to think that when we have come to the logical conclusion of our thoughts then there is no more and nothing further to be understood or considered about the topic.
So what is the remedy for this way of thinking? How do we escape this way of approaching learning, which if unchecked will result in our misunderstanding the nature of things? The answer, though simple, is almost unheard of, or even entirely unheard of, in the realm of epistemology. Quite simply, the remedy for these ailments is humility. In a brief search of The Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, not a single article about humility is given, and most references to humility are under the category of religion, and not knowledge. There is a reference to humility in a article on wisdom but humility is ultimately written off as "not promising". This is unfortunate because if humility was taken as the necessary prerequisite to reason then that would solve most, if not all, philosophical problems.
So why humility? Why would I call it a prerequisite for reason? In explaining this I will give my reasons for thinking this, but without considering the full implications, the rest is left as an exercise to interested reader.
Humility is a necessary prerequisite to reason because it is what allows us to use reason and to learn from it. Using reason without humility is an ineffectual exercise of the mind, yielding no useful results. To give a personal example, I once was considering a philosophical problem well known for its difficulty, it had to do with the issue of Divine knowledge and free will. In my mind there was an irreconcilable conflict between the two. It was something that I could not, for all the time and effort I put into thinking about it, reconcile what I considered to be an impenetrable barrier separating me from the answer. I even discussed the idea with others but to no avail. Some simply resorted to calling it a mystery and refused to discuss it further. But I was not content.
Many years later I had the opportunity to take a class on general relativity. After wading through six months of a rather difficult class, the teacher paused to point out a minor result that came from a rather complex set of equations. It was in that instant that my troubles with the issue of Divine knowledge and free will were dispelled. Now, what my professor pointed out did not give the answer or the solution to the problem, but at least in my mind, I now understood that it was possible for there to be a solution. It was as if I were standing on the top of a very tall mountain and I suddenly understood the extent of the intellectual journey I would have to take to finally reach the answer, but at least I knew that there was a resolution.
To give you the scope of the understanding that I came to, from the time that I had first seriously considered the problem, to when I had my "Aha!" moment, five years had passed. I was most of the way through an undergraduate degree in physics. I had embarked on a course of study that required me to learn general relativity, arguably one of the most difficult concepts in all of physics, and only after all that could I come to the point where I could say, "Aha! There is an answer." Even though I did not know what the answer was I could know that there was an answer.
Now you may be wondering how a class on general relativity resolved one of the most difficult problems in all of Western Philosophy. To answer that you would need a degree in physics, and to take a good course in general relativity, not to mention years of considering the problem and personally considering all the options. But for those who don't have the time or the desire to receive a degree in physics, the only other option available to resolve issues similar to the conflict between Divine knowledge and free will, is humility.
There were several things I learned from this experience and I will mention a few of them here. First I learned that humility was a necessary prerequisite to learning anything through reason. Without humility we cannot begin to understand things beyond our own experience, which is the whole purpose and end of our reason. Second I learned that the answers to specific questions may come from unexpected sources, and this recognition is intrinsically related to humility. When I first considered the issue of Divine knowledge and free will I had no idea that I would have to learn a lot of math and a lot of general relativity before I could resolve that issue in my mind. But as I had asked for the answer from Someone who knew how to give it, it was in effect the perfect method to answer my question. This taught me that, I as the student, the one who did not know the answer, could not dictate the answer to the Teacher, the One who knew the answer. Again this proved to me that humility is the prerequisite to learning by reason.
So what do we do when we have humility? With humility we acknowledge our weakness and ignorance, and begin the process of being taught by One who knows. Then, as Joseph Smith put it, ". . . Having a knowledge of God, we begin to know how to approach Him, and how to ask so as to receive an answer. When we understand the character of God, and know how to come to Him, He begins to unfold the heavens to us, and to tell us all about it. When we are ready to come to Him, He is ready to come to us.”9 (From Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith, Ch. 2)
It might be said that the role or use of reason is a doubled edged sword which can greatly help or hinder those who use it. On the one hand, reason is something that is necessary for our existence as it is an integral part of our identity and allows us to understand, solve and overcome many of the problems of life. It give us our quality of life and allows us to understand and comprehend things beyond our own experience. In this respect it is one of the most powerful tools at our disposal. It is a tool to make all tools. But this powerful tool can be mislead and misguided. If we use it at the exclusion of all of the other modes of knowing, then our own reasonings can lead us into erroneous conclusions from which it can be difficult to extract ourselves. Now not all false reasonings will lead us into such a dismal mire of intellectual quicksand, but very rarely will you find quicksand on dry, solid ground.
To begin the process of understanding the proper role of reason let us consider two examples. The first is an experience that I had a few weeks ago while teaching some of my students about Newton's Laws. My students were performing an experiment to prove Newton's first law. The experiment consisted of balancing different forces in order to achieve equilibrium. In discussing the lab with some of my students I asked them about the uncertainty associated with the lab, as in, how much certain variables could change and they would still get the same result. At this point I asked my students which of the two important variables they were measuring had a greater effect on the overall uncertainty of the experiment (to get an idea of what I am talking about, imagine flying in an airplane from New York to Los Angeles. To get there I need a bearing (direction) and a distance. If I am off by one mile in the distance it is not as critical, but if I am off by one degree I could end up missing my target by more than 50 miles. In this case the uncertainty in the bearing is more important than the uncertainty in the distance.). So I asked my students to tell me which of the variables they were dealing with was more important to the uncertainty, and after I got some answers with an explanation of their reasoning I asked the question, "How do you know that?" At that point I got blank and dumbfounded stares from my students, as if to say, "What do you mean, "How do we know that"?" This group of students had just given me their answer, they had thought it through, given me their reasons as for why they thought they were correct and then when I asked them to back up their reasoning with "proof" (i.e. another mode of knowing) they were floored. It was as if it had never occurred to them that thinking about something and coming up with a good "reason" was not sufficient "proof".
The attitude of my students is hardly an isolated incident, but is indicative of a more general attitude found among those who commonly use reason to understand the world. A more striking example of this type of attitude can be found in the early works of Ludwig Wittgenstein. In the famous introduction to his book Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus he states, "the truth of the thoughts communicated here seems to me unassailable and definitive. I am, therefore, of the opinion that the problems have in essentials been finally solved." So firm was his conviction that in his short book he had managed to solve all of the problems of philosophy and logic that he thereafter left his studies at Cambridge and did not return for eight years.
In both of these examples the common element is a firm belief that what has been reasoned out is correct and there is no more need to continue with an investigation or even to reason further. Certainly there is the temptation that when we have thought about something to a sufficient degree and come to a resolution, we think that there is no further need to reason it out and understand it more, let alone use any of the other modes of knowing to confirm our reasoning. Like Wittgenstein there is the tendency to think that when we have come to the logical conclusion of our thoughts then there is no more and nothing further to be understood or considered about the topic.
So what is the remedy for this way of thinking? How do we escape this way of approaching learning, which if unchecked will result in our misunderstanding the nature of things? The answer, though simple, is almost unheard of, or even entirely unheard of, in the realm of epistemology. Quite simply, the remedy for these ailments is humility. In a brief search of The Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, not a single article about humility is given, and most references to humility are under the category of religion, and not knowledge. There is a reference to humility in a article on wisdom but humility is ultimately written off as "not promising". This is unfortunate because if humility was taken as the necessary prerequisite to reason then that would solve most, if not all, philosophical problems.
So why humility? Why would I call it a prerequisite for reason? In explaining this I will give my reasons for thinking this, but without considering the full implications, the rest is left as an exercise to interested reader.
Humility is a necessary prerequisite to reason because it is what allows us to use reason and to learn from it. Using reason without humility is an ineffectual exercise of the mind, yielding no useful results. To give a personal example, I once was considering a philosophical problem well known for its difficulty, it had to do with the issue of Divine knowledge and free will. In my mind there was an irreconcilable conflict between the two. It was something that I could not, for all the time and effort I put into thinking about it, reconcile what I considered to be an impenetrable barrier separating me from the answer. I even discussed the idea with others but to no avail. Some simply resorted to calling it a mystery and refused to discuss it further. But I was not content.
Many years later I had the opportunity to take a class on general relativity. After wading through six months of a rather difficult class, the teacher paused to point out a minor result that came from a rather complex set of equations. It was in that instant that my troubles with the issue of Divine knowledge and free will were dispelled. Now, what my professor pointed out did not give the answer or the solution to the problem, but at least in my mind, I now understood that it was possible for there to be a solution. It was as if I were standing on the top of a very tall mountain and I suddenly understood the extent of the intellectual journey I would have to take to finally reach the answer, but at least I knew that there was a resolution.
To give you the scope of the understanding that I came to, from the time that I had first seriously considered the problem, to when I had my "Aha!" moment, five years had passed. I was most of the way through an undergraduate degree in physics. I had embarked on a course of study that required me to learn general relativity, arguably one of the most difficult concepts in all of physics, and only after all that could I come to the point where I could say, "Aha! There is an answer." Even though I did not know what the answer was I could know that there was an answer.
Now you may be wondering how a class on general relativity resolved one of the most difficult problems in all of Western Philosophy. To answer that you would need a degree in physics, and to take a good course in general relativity, not to mention years of considering the problem and personally considering all the options. But for those who don't have the time or the desire to receive a degree in physics, the only other option available to resolve issues similar to the conflict between Divine knowledge and free will, is humility.
There were several things I learned from this experience and I will mention a few of them here. First I learned that humility was a necessary prerequisite to learning anything through reason. Without humility we cannot begin to understand things beyond our own experience, which is the whole purpose and end of our reason. Second I learned that the answers to specific questions may come from unexpected sources, and this recognition is intrinsically related to humility. When I first considered the issue of Divine knowledge and free will I had no idea that I would have to learn a lot of math and a lot of general relativity before I could resolve that issue in my mind. But as I had asked for the answer from Someone who knew how to give it, it was in effect the perfect method to answer my question. This taught me that, I as the student, the one who did not know the answer, could not dictate the answer to the Teacher, the One who knew the answer. Again this proved to me that humility is the prerequisite to learning by reason.
So what do we do when we have humility? With humility we acknowledge our weakness and ignorance, and begin the process of being taught by One who knows. Then, as Joseph Smith put it, ". . . Having a knowledge of God, we begin to know how to approach Him, and how to ask so as to receive an answer. When we understand the character of God, and know how to come to Him, He begins to unfold the heavens to us, and to tell us all about it. When we are ready to come to Him, He is ready to come to us.”9 (From Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Joseph Smith, Ch. 2)
Sunday, September 13, 2009
On How We Know: Introduction
This is something that I have been thinking about for some time now, but until now I have not tried to write it all down. I had even chosen the current title for this work that I have been planning to write, but I could not find a proper way of approaching it until I recently came across a talk (mp3) by Truman G. Madsen, which coincidentally had the same title (and subject) of my current essay. When I heard that talk it was as if I were listening to the words that I had been trying to say for some time but could not quite find the correct way of expressing them.
In approaching this topic I will focus on what Brother Madsen referred to as "five main modes" of knowing "that have been appealed to in all the traditions, philosophical or religious". These five modes or ways of knowing and the emphasis that each one gets, by and large are what distinguishes and differentiates different philosophical or religious traditions. This is to say that a particular philosophy or religion can be defined by which of the five modes that tradition either promotes or dismisses as invalid. I find it interesting that as Brother Madsen points out, "I can report, too, that from my judgment those five modes are harmonized and balanced in our living tradition more effectively than in any other tradition I know." I find this statement particularly important to understanding not only our LDS tradition but also in understanding all other traditions. In this respect I will cover topics not addressed by Brother Madsen and mention specific traditions and how they relate to these five modes. This post is intended to be an introduction to which I will later take a more in depth look at each one of these five modes of knowing.
As explained by Brother Madsen the five modes of knowing found in all of philosophical and religious tradition are: "an appeal to reason, an appeal to sense experience, to pragmatic trial and error, to authority--the word of the experts--and, finally, to something a bit ambiguous called 'intuition.'"
First, appeal to reason. As a formal tradition this goes back to the Greeks especially Plato, but the most modern and widely known tradition founded on appeals to reason is that of Kantianism, or the philosophy of Immanuel Kant. To put it briefly, an appeal to reason insists that we know or gain knowledge about the world by "using our minds", or "philosophical reflection" as Plato put it, to figure out how things are. A more common name for reason would be "book-learning". This is to say that if it can be read in a book, and learned from a book then it can be used as an appeal to reason. This is particularly evident in our schools as they are inherently geared towards a reasoning environment. We should not misunderstand and think that this means reason is simply reading enough books and being able to repeat back verbatim what is written, but that reason has its basis in the written word, or in the "Great Conversation" that has been going on for several thousand years now. Those that hold strongly to this tradition are known as Rationalists.
The key here is that we are attempting to use reason to figure out how the world works, and that includes both finding out facts about the world and being able to fit them together in a way that makes sense.
Second, sense experience. This mode of knowing encompasses the five senses, or as some in religious traditions might say the six senses, with the sixth sense frequently referring to the feelings of either the Spirit or one's spirit. This aspect of knowing focuses on one's personal sensory experiences, and has been the subject of doubt, debate and inquiry from the likes of Rene Descartes, David Hume and other skeptics.
To give a simple example of the different approaches between an appeal to reason and an appeal to sense experience I will use an example of a triangle. An appeal to reason would teach what a triangle is by saying that it is a three sided figure made up of three straight lines. An appeal to sense experience would show a drawing of a triangle and say, "This is a triangle." The merits and problems of both these approaches forms the basis of many of the great philosophic debates on how we know. I will not dwell on those debates here, but I will point out as I mentioned before that the purpose of this essay is to show how all five modes are harmonized and balanced in the LDS tradition.
Thus to put it succinctly, and appeal sense experience is anything that deals with the five senses.
Third, pragmatic trial and error. Those that hold strongly to this tradition and that of sense experience are known as Empiricists. This method of discovering the world is the foundation of modern science. In science, no matter how good an idea is, there is no support for any idea, theory or reasoning until there is "empirical evidence" to prove it. This means that the ultimate recourse of our knowledge is founded in the real world and that something is not true simply because it is "logical" or even because it is a good idea. It must stand up to a trial or comparison to what we observe in the world. Of necessity this is related to sense experience but is distinct from it in that pragmatic trial and error does not begin with sense experience but rather with reason. This is to say that a pragmatic approach begins in the same way as an appeal to reason but ultimately it differs from it in that there must also be agreement with sense experience which is the "ultimate court of appeal" for the pragmatic approach.
This difference is the defining characteristic of the endless debate between Rationalists and Empiricists. On the one hand Rationalists argue that all things must be reasoned out in one way or another and that therefore reason is the foundation of knowledge. Empiricists counter that thinking is useless (or even impossible) without sense experience and that ultimately all things must be brought back to sensory data and thus sense experience is the foundation of knowledge.
As I pointed out in the beginning, an emphasis of any one (or more) of these modes of knowing at the expense of or in lieu of any of the others is what distinguishes and differentiates different philosophical or religious traditions. We can see this with the debate between Empiricists and Rationalists, but as Brother Madsen pointed out in LDS thought all modes of knowing "are harmonized and balanced", meaning that the distinctive feature of LDS theology is an acceptance of all of the modes of knowing. The importance of this mode of knowing in LDS theology is seen in our emphasis on having our own experience and also why it was necessary for Christ to gain experience through the atonement.
Fourth, "authority--the word of the experts". This mode of knowing is fairly self-explanatory and it would be more illuminating to show how it is and is not used. From an external point of view all of religious knowledge would be authoritative, or being derived from authoritative sources. This has a lot of truth in it due to the authoritative nature of scripture, and thus the need to cite scripture tie everything back to some authoritative statement. In some cases this is a major criticism of religious thought because an appeal to authority, especially religious authority, does not allow for debate, criticism or dissent.
In contrast scientific inquiry is filled with appeals to authority but with the oft stated caveat that even the authorities and experts can be wrong. In fact, in science classes when ever a scientific principle is taught authoritatively it is always tempered with the reminder that the current theory replaced a previously authoritative theory. This is the principle of scientific progression. The equivalent "progression" is apparently lacking in religion, and this is the main source of criticism of the authoritative nature of religion.
Thus to an outsider religious doctrine takes on the appearance of being authoritative because it was said by someone who had authority, and they had authority because they made authoritative statements. In stark contrast with this is LDS thought which readily accepts and uses appeals to authority but with the critical difference that the statements can be proven and are open to independent and personal verification. The key here is that the authoritative statements are fundamentally related to our interaction with reality and thus are subject to all the other modes of knowing.
And last, intuition. This is a difficult one as it is so hard to define and to predict. As Brother Madsen says it is "a bit ambiguous". It would seem that the reason for this ambiguity would seem to be that one must have an intuitive understanding of intuition in order to understand it. The circularity of intuiting intuition has been the source of many headaches in philosophy. I will not cover intuition to any degree here (I will cover it later) but I will mention how it comes up in LDS theology.
The general view is that intuition is all of the accumulated knowledge that we possess prior to our birth. This view requires the understanding that we lived, learned and grew as spirits before we were born. With this perspective it is natural that the ideas and principles that we knew prior to this life would continue with us here and that so much of our learning is just relearning, or re-cognition of what we have previously known. One manifestation of intuition is where we hear something said or explained and it instantly makes perfect sense to us. It is as if we are hearing the word that we have been trying to say for some time but have been unable to find the correct words to say it. That happened to me when I first heard the talk by Truman Madsen on how we know, and it was that talk that gave me a framework in which to place my thoughts to begin this process.
So those are the five basic ways of knowing. I should stress that I do not consider these five ways to be fundamental, or that the fact that there are five is fundamental, but rather this framework is just convenient for explaining how we know things. The purpose of this and future essays is to show that the five modes of knowing are harmonized and balanced in LDS thought and that all are valid forms of knowing. Also it is my intention to show that much of the philosophical and religious confusion that exists is due to the fact that different traditions tend to over-emphasize one or more of these modes at the expense of the others or even actively disparage one or more of these modes. It is my assertion that none of these modes of knowing can be ignored without denying yourself some aspect of how we know.
In approaching this topic I will focus on what Brother Madsen referred to as "five main modes" of knowing "that have been appealed to in all the traditions, philosophical or religious". These five modes or ways of knowing and the emphasis that each one gets, by and large are what distinguishes and differentiates different philosophical or religious traditions. This is to say that a particular philosophy or religion can be defined by which of the five modes that tradition either promotes or dismisses as invalid. I find it interesting that as Brother Madsen points out, "I can report, too, that from my judgment those five modes are harmonized and balanced in our living tradition more effectively than in any other tradition I know." I find this statement particularly important to understanding not only our LDS tradition but also in understanding all other traditions. In this respect I will cover topics not addressed by Brother Madsen and mention specific traditions and how they relate to these five modes. This post is intended to be an introduction to which I will later take a more in depth look at each one of these five modes of knowing.
As explained by Brother Madsen the five modes of knowing found in all of philosophical and religious tradition are: "an appeal to reason, an appeal to sense experience, to pragmatic trial and error, to authority--the word of the experts--and, finally, to something a bit ambiguous called 'intuition.'"
First, appeal to reason. As a formal tradition this goes back to the Greeks especially Plato, but the most modern and widely known tradition founded on appeals to reason is that of Kantianism, or the philosophy of Immanuel Kant. To put it briefly, an appeal to reason insists that we know or gain knowledge about the world by "using our minds", or "philosophical reflection" as Plato put it, to figure out how things are. A more common name for reason would be "book-learning". This is to say that if it can be read in a book, and learned from a book then it can be used as an appeal to reason. This is particularly evident in our schools as they are inherently geared towards a reasoning environment. We should not misunderstand and think that this means reason is simply reading enough books and being able to repeat back verbatim what is written, but that reason has its basis in the written word, or in the "Great Conversation" that has been going on for several thousand years now. Those that hold strongly to this tradition are known as Rationalists.
The key here is that we are attempting to use reason to figure out how the world works, and that includes both finding out facts about the world and being able to fit them together in a way that makes sense.
Second, sense experience. This mode of knowing encompasses the five senses, or as some in religious traditions might say the six senses, with the sixth sense frequently referring to the feelings of either the Spirit or one's spirit. This aspect of knowing focuses on one's personal sensory experiences, and has been the subject of doubt, debate and inquiry from the likes of Rene Descartes, David Hume and other skeptics.
To give a simple example of the different approaches between an appeal to reason and an appeal to sense experience I will use an example of a triangle. An appeal to reason would teach what a triangle is by saying that it is a three sided figure made up of three straight lines. An appeal to sense experience would show a drawing of a triangle and say, "This is a triangle." The merits and problems of both these approaches forms the basis of many of the great philosophic debates on how we know. I will not dwell on those debates here, but I will point out as I mentioned before that the purpose of this essay is to show how all five modes are harmonized and balanced in the LDS tradition.
Thus to put it succinctly, and appeal sense experience is anything that deals with the five senses.
Third, pragmatic trial and error. Those that hold strongly to this tradition and that of sense experience are known as Empiricists. This method of discovering the world is the foundation of modern science. In science, no matter how good an idea is, there is no support for any idea, theory or reasoning until there is "empirical evidence" to prove it. This means that the ultimate recourse of our knowledge is founded in the real world and that something is not true simply because it is "logical" or even because it is a good idea. It must stand up to a trial or comparison to what we observe in the world. Of necessity this is related to sense experience but is distinct from it in that pragmatic trial and error does not begin with sense experience but rather with reason. This is to say that a pragmatic approach begins in the same way as an appeal to reason but ultimately it differs from it in that there must also be agreement with sense experience which is the "ultimate court of appeal" for the pragmatic approach.
This difference is the defining characteristic of the endless debate between Rationalists and Empiricists. On the one hand Rationalists argue that all things must be reasoned out in one way or another and that therefore reason is the foundation of knowledge. Empiricists counter that thinking is useless (or even impossible) without sense experience and that ultimately all things must be brought back to sensory data and thus sense experience is the foundation of knowledge.
As I pointed out in the beginning, an emphasis of any one (or more) of these modes of knowing at the expense of or in lieu of any of the others is what distinguishes and differentiates different philosophical or religious traditions. We can see this with the debate between Empiricists and Rationalists, but as Brother Madsen pointed out in LDS thought all modes of knowing "are harmonized and balanced", meaning that the distinctive feature of LDS theology is an acceptance of all of the modes of knowing. The importance of this mode of knowing in LDS theology is seen in our emphasis on having our own experience and also why it was necessary for Christ to gain experience through the atonement.
Fourth, "authority--the word of the experts". This mode of knowing is fairly self-explanatory and it would be more illuminating to show how it is and is not used. From an external point of view all of religious knowledge would be authoritative, or being derived from authoritative sources. This has a lot of truth in it due to the authoritative nature of scripture, and thus the need to cite scripture tie everything back to some authoritative statement. In some cases this is a major criticism of religious thought because an appeal to authority, especially religious authority, does not allow for debate, criticism or dissent.
In contrast scientific inquiry is filled with appeals to authority but with the oft stated caveat that even the authorities and experts can be wrong. In fact, in science classes when ever a scientific principle is taught authoritatively it is always tempered with the reminder that the current theory replaced a previously authoritative theory. This is the principle of scientific progression. The equivalent "progression" is apparently lacking in religion, and this is the main source of criticism of the authoritative nature of religion.
Thus to an outsider religious doctrine takes on the appearance of being authoritative because it was said by someone who had authority, and they had authority because they made authoritative statements. In stark contrast with this is LDS thought which readily accepts and uses appeals to authority but with the critical difference that the statements can be proven and are open to independent and personal verification. The key here is that the authoritative statements are fundamentally related to our interaction with reality and thus are subject to all the other modes of knowing.
And last, intuition. This is a difficult one as it is so hard to define and to predict. As Brother Madsen says it is "a bit ambiguous". It would seem that the reason for this ambiguity would seem to be that one must have an intuitive understanding of intuition in order to understand it. The circularity of intuiting intuition has been the source of many headaches in philosophy. I will not cover intuition to any degree here (I will cover it later) but I will mention how it comes up in LDS theology.
The general view is that intuition is all of the accumulated knowledge that we possess prior to our birth. This view requires the understanding that we lived, learned and grew as spirits before we were born. With this perspective it is natural that the ideas and principles that we knew prior to this life would continue with us here and that so much of our learning is just relearning, or re-cognition of what we have previously known. One manifestation of intuition is where we hear something said or explained and it instantly makes perfect sense to us. It is as if we are hearing the word that we have been trying to say for some time but have been unable to find the correct words to say it. That happened to me when I first heard the talk by Truman Madsen on how we know, and it was that talk that gave me a framework in which to place my thoughts to begin this process.
So those are the five basic ways of knowing. I should stress that I do not consider these five ways to be fundamental, or that the fact that there are five is fundamental, but rather this framework is just convenient for explaining how we know things. The purpose of this and future essays is to show that the five modes of knowing are harmonized and balanced in LDS thought and that all are valid forms of knowing. Also it is my intention to show that much of the philosophical and religious confusion that exists is due to the fact that different traditions tend to over-emphasize one or more of these modes at the expense of the others or even actively disparage one or more of these modes. It is my assertion that none of these modes of knowing can be ignored without denying yourself some aspect of how we know.
On How We Know: Table of Contents
- Introduction
- Reason
- Sense Experience
- Pragmatic Trial and Error
- Authority
- Intuition
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)