While we're on the subject of philosophy, and just in case a cab-driver ever asks your opinion on mechanistic determinism, I thought I should mention that the philosopher George Berkeley (1685-1753) was of the opinion that matter does not exist at all, and things only exist when they are being perceived.
It is doubtful whether he was a lunatic but then again a town in California was named after him, so we can't be sure, although I think the Hippy/Dippy/Gay/Fey/Happy/Clappy crowd only arrived at a much later date,and the University crowd are not mad, although some do seem a trifle strange. Anyway, in George Berkeley's opinion the fact that there is no such thing as matter was a weighty argument in favour of the existence of God, who would be required to perceive everything at all times, because if He didn't, we'd be forever coming and going and things would have a very jerky existence indeed.
The Catholic theologian Monsignor Ronald Knox summarized this view as follows:
There was a young man who said "God
Must think it exceedingly odd
If he finds that this tree,
Continues to be
When there's no one about in the Quad".
REPLY
Dear Sir,
Your astonishment's odd:
I am always about in the Quad,
And that's why the tree
Will continue to be, since observed by
Yours faithfully,
GOD
Well, I always knew Catholics priests had a sense of humour. That's why they had the sale of Indulgences (remission of sins for a cash payment). My, how they laughed!
Showing posts with label philosophy. Show all posts
Showing posts with label philosophy. Show all posts
Friday, 27 August 2010
Taxi-drivers and mechanistic determinism
The taxi driver who asked the philosopher Bertrand Russell what Life and the Universe is all about ('The old trouble returns', August 23rd) should really have known better than to look for guidance from such a source. Taxi drivers generally have a pretty good notion of what things are about, whereas no philosopher can distinguish his arras from a doorway in less than 3 chapters and 25 footnotes.
This may seem a trifle harsh, but it is I believe a widely held view, witness this week's New Scientist (28th August p.64) in which Richard Sutcliffe reports that his favourite road sign, often to be seen in Colorado is "Icy conditions may exist". He suggests this should be followed by the sign "Next philosopher 500 miles".
When I was in the Sixth form at school we used to have a subject called General Studies, where we were encouraged to ponder whether the statement "This sentence is false" is true or false, presumably to stop us thinking about big girls and their blouses.
It didn't work, and I retained a passing interest in both subjects until 1961 when I happened to be reading Philosophy XXXVI, pp.112- 127 by J.R. Lucas (as you do),and I came across the following arresting thought.
"Godel's theorem states that in any consistent system which is strong enough to produce simple arithmetic there are formulae which cannot be proved-in-the-system, but which we can see to be true. Essentially we consider the formula which says in effect 'This formula is unprovable-in-the-system.' If this formula were provable-in- the-system we should have a contradiction, for if it were provable-in-the-system then it would not be unprovable-in-the-system so that 'This formula is unprovable-in -the-system' would be false: equally if it were provable-in-the-system then it would not be false, but would be true since in any consistent system nothing false can be proved-in-the-system, but only truths. So the formula 'This formula is unprovable-in-the-system is not provable-in-the-system but unprovable-in-the-system. Further, if the formula 'This formula is unprovable in the system' is unprovable in the system, then it is true that that formula is unprovable in the system, that is 'This formula is unprovable' in the system is true".
It went on of course,.. and on,...and on, but after that I concentrated on the blouses.
I only mention this because some theologians now seem to be saying that since "the bogey of mechanistic determinism" has been overcome(see Philosopy XXXVI, p.112 if you're that interested) this shows there is a God! Crikey!
This may seem a trifle harsh, but it is I believe a widely held view, witness this week's New Scientist (28th August p.64) in which Richard Sutcliffe reports that his favourite road sign, often to be seen in Colorado is "Icy conditions may exist". He suggests this should be followed by the sign "Next philosopher 500 miles".
When I was in the Sixth form at school we used to have a subject called General Studies, where we were encouraged to ponder whether the statement "This sentence is false" is true or false, presumably to stop us thinking about big girls and their blouses.
It didn't work, and I retained a passing interest in both subjects until 1961 when I happened to be reading Philosophy XXXVI, pp.112- 127 by J.R. Lucas (as you do),and I came across the following arresting thought.
"Godel's theorem states that in any consistent system which is strong enough to produce simple arithmetic there are formulae which cannot be proved-in-the-system, but which we can see to be true. Essentially we consider the formula which says in effect 'This formula is unprovable-in-the-system.' If this formula were provable-in- the-system we should have a contradiction, for if it were provable-in-the-system then it would not be unprovable-in-the-system so that 'This formula is unprovable-in -the-system' would be false: equally if it were provable-in-the-system then it would not be false, but would be true since in any consistent system nothing false can be proved-in-the-system, but only truths. So the formula 'This formula is unprovable-in-the-system is not provable-in-the-system but unprovable-in-the-system. Further, if the formula 'This formula is unprovable in the system' is unprovable in the system, then it is true that that formula is unprovable in the system, that is 'This formula is unprovable' in the system is true".
It went on of course,.. and on,...and on, but after that I concentrated on the blouses.
I only mention this because some theologians now seem to be saying that since "the bogey of mechanistic determinism" has been overcome(see Philosopy XXXVI, p.112 if you're that interested) this shows there is a God! Crikey!
Monday, 23 August 2010
The old trouble returns
I'm feeling a bit peeliwally today (Whaddaya mean it's not in your dictionary? It's a perfectly good Scottish word isn't it?).
Anyway I'm usually perky but today I'm peaky, the reason being that I was unable to go to the blog yesterday. I had another bout of the old trouble, contingent syllogisms, and very painful they are too.
It started, as it so often does, with reading Christopher Howse discussing 'argument from design', which is the notion that since Nature is so complex and yet so orderly it must therefore be intelligently designed ('Bertrand Russell versus faith in God', Telegraph, Saturday August 21st, p 27). His general message seemed to be, insofar as any message at all could be gleaned from the philosophical flim-flam, that argument from design shows the need for an extra-cosmic intelligence and that sounds to him like 'God, our Lord'.
Well, that's a perfectly reasonable view, even though it's erroneous, but in order to reach it he had to take us on a tour of several intellectual punch-ups which various distinguished philosophers have had with Bertrand Russell, and that's what brought my old trouble back. At first I thought it was just a lack of moral fibre in my diet, but apparently it's all to do with whether one can 'deduce a necessary conclusion from a contingent premiss'.
Russell, you may recall, was the greatest philospher/mathematician of his age, but even he didn't have all the answers. A taxi-driver with a grasp of such matters, and they're more numerous than you might think, once remarked 'You know I had that Bertrand Russell in my cab yesterday and I said to him " Hallo, Bertie, Wot's it all abaht then?" and do you know he'd no bleeding idea!'
He was however fairly hot stuff on the question of syllogisms (see his 'History of Western Philosophy', pub. Allen and Unwin, 1946, p. 218).
Now a syllogism, as we all know, (and indeed in our Somerset village we talk of little else), is an incontrovertible logical deduction of the form
A+B = C+A, therefore B=C, or if you prefer 1+ 3 = x + 1, therefore x= 3.
You can't argue with that, can you? But was that good enough for Bertie? Oh no, he had to give us various forms of the wretched thing, thus:
1a. 'All men are mortal, Socrates is a man, therefore Socrates is mortal'.
1b. 'All men are mortal, all Greeks are men, therefore all Greeks are mortal'.
Then clever-clogs Bertie points out that Aristotle was mistaken because he did not distinguish between these two forms. Of course!
He goes on to distinguish between:
2. 'No fishes are rational, all sharks are fishes, therefore no sharks are rational'.
3. 'All men are rational, some animals are men, therefore some animals are rational'
4. 'No Greeks are black, some men are Greeks, therefore some men are not black'.
These four make up the 'first figure' to which Aristotle added a second and a third figure, and other philosophers later added a fourth although the three later figures, according to Bertie, can be reduced to the first by various devices.
You can see how my intellectual sphincter tightened, can't you.
I'm not entirely convinced Christopher Howse understands it either, but he should read my book 'Why Man Made Gods and Dogs' (ISBN 978-0-9565588-0-0) then he would at least understand the Anthropic Principle.
Anyway I'm usually perky but today I'm peaky, the reason being that I was unable to go to the blog yesterday. I had another bout of the old trouble, contingent syllogisms, and very painful they are too.
It started, as it so often does, with reading Christopher Howse discussing 'argument from design', which is the notion that since Nature is so complex and yet so orderly it must therefore be intelligently designed ('Bertrand Russell versus faith in God', Telegraph, Saturday August 21st, p 27). His general message seemed to be, insofar as any message at all could be gleaned from the philosophical flim-flam, that argument from design shows the need for an extra-cosmic intelligence and that sounds to him like 'God, our Lord'.
Well, that's a perfectly reasonable view, even though it's erroneous, but in order to reach it he had to take us on a tour of several intellectual punch-ups which various distinguished philosophers have had with Bertrand Russell, and that's what brought my old trouble back. At first I thought it was just a lack of moral fibre in my diet, but apparently it's all to do with whether one can 'deduce a necessary conclusion from a contingent premiss'.
Russell, you may recall, was the greatest philospher/mathematician of his age, but even he didn't have all the answers. A taxi-driver with a grasp of such matters, and they're more numerous than you might think, once remarked 'You know I had that Bertrand Russell in my cab yesterday and I said to him " Hallo, Bertie, Wot's it all abaht then?" and do you know he'd no bleeding idea!'
He was however fairly hot stuff on the question of syllogisms (see his 'History of Western Philosophy', pub. Allen and Unwin, 1946, p. 218).
Now a syllogism, as we all know, (and indeed in our Somerset village we talk of little else), is an incontrovertible logical deduction of the form
A+B = C+A, therefore B=C, or if you prefer 1+ 3 = x + 1, therefore x= 3.
You can't argue with that, can you? But was that good enough for Bertie? Oh no, he had to give us various forms of the wretched thing, thus:
1a. 'All men are mortal, Socrates is a man, therefore Socrates is mortal'.
1b. 'All men are mortal, all Greeks are men, therefore all Greeks are mortal'.
Then clever-clogs Bertie points out that Aristotle was mistaken because he did not distinguish between these two forms. Of course!
He goes on to distinguish between:
2. 'No fishes are rational, all sharks are fishes, therefore no sharks are rational'.
3. 'All men are rational, some animals are men, therefore some animals are rational'
4. 'No Greeks are black, some men are Greeks, therefore some men are not black'.
These four make up the 'first figure' to which Aristotle added a second and a third figure, and other philosophers later added a fourth although the three later figures, according to Bertie, can be reduced to the first by various devices.
You can see how my intellectual sphincter tightened, can't you.
I'm not entirely convinced Christopher Howse understands it either, but he should read my book 'Why Man Made Gods and Dogs' (ISBN 978-0-9565588-0-0) then he would at least understand the Anthropic Principle.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)