In a previous blog entry, I embedded the TED talk given by Sam Harris — I’ll embed the video again for reference:
He apparently got both a lot of flak and a lot of praise that he thought came from misunderstandings. Moral Confusion in the name of “Science” | Project Reason. He wrote quite a long essay, but I’ll quote from just a part near the beginning.
Sam writes:
My intent was to begin a conversation about how we can understand morality in universal, scientific terms. Many people who loved my talk, misunderstood what I was saying, and loved it for the wrong reasons; and many of my critics were right to think that I had said something extremely controversial. I was not suggesting that science can give us an evolutionary or neurobiological account of what people do in the name of “morality.” Nor was I merely saying that science can help us get what we want out of life. Both of these would have been quite banal claims to make (unless one happens to doubt the truth of evolution or the mind’s dependency on the brain). Rather I was suggesting that science can, in principle, help us understand what we should do and should want—and, perforce, what other people should do and want in order to live the best lives possible. My claim is that there are right and wrong answers to moral questions, just as there are right and wrong answers to questions of physics, and such answers may one day fall within reach of the maturing sciences of mind.
I’ve been trying to think of where I can distinguish my thoughts from Sam’s — and the only real question where I think we could have divergent opinions would be in trying to pin down what exactly he means by promoting the well-being of conscious creatures. But, since he isn’t trying to parse things at a level that would be controversial to me (nor does he seem to have the inclination), I doubt there’s much disagreement. I will admit that he mentioned the possibility of brain scans as a way of discovering well-being in the future, and that sounded weird to me. I can follow the implicit logic easily enough: if the concern is the well-being of conscious beings, and if the mind depends on the brain, and if the brain is scannable in some meaningful way regarding overall well-being and happiness, then in the future being able to scan the brains of people in a particular society or belief system will be possible and instructive. It’s not obviously wrong to me, but I’m not convinced I’ve thought about it enough to come down clearly on the issue just yet.
Sam also mentions that he is frequently met with hostility to these ideas by people in academia — which I have found the case to be with me, as well. The largest source of disagreement between my fellow atheists and I come on the issue of moral relativism. I have long defended the notion that there exist such a thing as moral facts — in that sense I’m a moral realist. I have also found it an odd point of agreement between many of the theists that I argue with that moral relativism is incorrect. Although, since I think that Yahweh’s ordering his followers to commit genocide is morally wrong — it’s interesting to see a Biblical literalist start to argue that genocide is only sometimes wrong.
Anyway, I’m still forming my thoughts on these issues — let me know what you think!
I wrote a previous entry which was based off a comment I sent to a theologian that I’ve been chatting with. He responded to me here.
Theologian RD says: Mathematics maps onto the world but our intuition of which mathematics maps on is not infallible. The problem is with Conversational Atheist’s apparent view that mathematics does not map onto the world at all. That’s the view that needs defending.
Whether mathematics maps onto the world is a very interesting question. Of the infinite number of mathematical models that are able to be constructed, a few map onto the world in very useful ways. If you come up with a mathematical model, the question immediately becomes: DOES your abstract mathematical model map onto the world?
Re-read a section from the comment that prompted this entry:
Conversational Atheist says: However, Einstein, placed in a box before the first experiments in quantum mechanics were done, would never end up CONCLUDING Quantum Mechanics. He might, given infinite time, detail hundreds of thousands of possible physics on small scales [mathematical models] that includes our modern conception of QM, but he would be in no position to choose one from the others with any confidence at all. He might even pick what he thinks is the most beautiful physics at small scales, but what counts is not beauty or arguments, per se, but whether his physics [mathematical model] matches reality. — Emphasis and [mathematical note] added
What counts is whether your mathematical model matches reality. That’s the $64,000,000 question for a physicist. Long ago a person could have come up with the mathematical framework of modern day quantum mechanics by doing math. Lots of math. Now, that person hasn’t done PHYSICS unless he is either consulting data others have taken, or going out and doing experiments himself.
To answer some of your questions raised in the entry itself:
RD: How do we gain knowledge of this realm? That appears very mysterious, indeed somewhat revelatory.
Are you equally perplexed by how we gain knowledge of chess? It doesn’t seem very mysterious to me. We consider the relationships and interactions between entities in chess-space. Are these relationships, rules, interactions all contained in a self-consistent chess-realm similar to the relationships, rules, and interactions in the self-consistent mathematical-realm? Yes. Does this mean that there is a supernatural chess-realm, mathematical-realm, tic-tac-toe-realm, and scrabble-realm? Um… only in the most abused sense of the word “supernatural”. The chess-realm does not exist in any physical way.
Is the pawn, real? Well, you can hold a wooden piece in your hand that people call “pawn”, but then you should realize that you are just holding a representation of a pawn. Does this upset anyone? It shouldn’t.
Is 7 real? Well, you can hold 7 apples in a bag and call it “seven”, but then you should realize that you are just holding a representation of a number. Does this upset anyone? Apparently, yes.
RD: Second, what is the ontological status of this realm?
I’d say that mathematics has the same ontological status as the game of chess.
RD: And if you accept the existence of abstract numbers and their relations which are irreducible to and independent of the physical world, what about other entities like souls, spirit beings, and God? What rational reason does Conversational Atheist have to believe the supernatural realm, like the natural realm, does not far transcend his limited experiences?
If a pawn is irreducible to and independent of the physical world, what about other abstract entities like souls, spirit beings, and God? — Sure. I’d say they have the same status as “real pawns”. Could there be a supernatural pawn out in the “vast supernature of things that I don’t fully comprehend”?
Sure. He might be playing Chinese Checkers with God and the Easter bunny.
But seriously, considerations in the fully abstract might have something to do with external reality — but you have to actually check to have any confidence that your favorite abstract reasoning maps onto external reality in a useful way.
A somewhat more philosophical post than I usually do… I wrote this up during an exchange w/ a theologian differentiating two ways we can gain knowledge.
To a theologian:
Let’s start with mathematical truths — I think that they are true and in a very real sense constitute knowledge. Knowledge about something that is abstract, however. One of the features of abstract subjects, in my view, is that it is quite possible to make real progress in them without new inputs. Euler, an amazing mathematician, placed in a shielded box and given enough time could make real progress in mathematics.
I mean this to contrast methods of inquiry about external reality. When it comes to external reality — how stars work, the rules that govern the motions of the planets, etc., a physicist in a box could make lots and lots of models and guesses and arguments… but, unless he re-analyzes data from before he came into the box, he won’t make progress in physics.
For example, Einstein, with the data of Mercury’s weird orbit and the results from Michelson, could be put in a box, and with enough thinking could come up with General Relativity.
However, Einstein, placed in a box before the first experiments in quantum mechanics were done, would never end up concluding quantum mechanics. He might, given infinite time, detail hundreds of thousands of possible physics on small scales that includes our modern conception of QM, but he would be in no position to choose one from the others with any confidence at all. He might even pick what he thinks is the most beautiful physics at small scales, but what counts is not beauty or arguments, per se, but whether his physics matches reality.
That brings me to what I think is our main point of conflict between our approaches.
I fully acknowledge that progress can be made in all areas of mathematics and much of philosophy from internal reflection and argument without any new data coming into a person’s head. When a person thinks that this abstract knowledge can tell us something specific about external reality, the existence of God for example, they are simply making a category error.
Can theology reason out the attributes of what would be a perfect being? Sure. Can abstract reasoning alone tell us something about external reality? Possibly… although I’m having a hard time thinking of an example where it’s happened before.
Keep thinking about the difference between math and physics. If you wander too far away from direct measurement and experience, you can do a lot of work, and convince yourself of quite a lot… although you won’t learn much about external reality.
I’m not expecting this to be unanimously agreed upon — comments?
Friend of mine shared this quote with me, and it made me smile…
“So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence.”
- Bertrand Russell
British author, mathematician, & philosopher (1872 – 1970)
In reflecting on it a bit, I think that perhaps he should have said something besides intelligence — perhaps: education, questioning, learning about the world, critical thinking, logic…
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=48f43f2a-1a53-4bca-a653-f33e473ef3b4)
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=b8f35b7f-4c01-4a7b-aee5-91edfce23a1b)
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=73692250-e49a-4820-bfaa-1de4d7973965)
