Awesome! I’m still there; just finished my first year, and I took forms of philosophical skepticism with Conant. UChicago is a great place - a little too continental/ history/ German idealist for me but a great place nonetheless!
Nice. I love his essay on that subject. Going to include it in my dissertation! Chicago redeemed analytic philosophy for me, because I appreciated having the historical arc. But I had other analytic experience before that, so it’s definitely worth supplementing with other things!
"Wittgenstein thought that these other forms of discourse, while they could not say anything verifiable or meaningful, were the realm of the only things that mattered."
That was his view! The logical positivists thought that only scientific discourse had meaning. Meaningful sentences stated mirror facts about the world. Therefore, they excluded, moral sentences from the realm of the meaningful.
The early Wittgenstein accepted this restriction on meaning, but said that these other realms were the ones that mattered.
His later views gave up on restricting meaning in this way.
This is interesting, Joel. A couple thoughts. First, the Plantingian project is compatible with disinterested inquiry; it isn't a form of dogmatism, at least in a sense of 'dogmatism' that rules out honest inquiry. A bit of evidence: Plantinga makes all sorts of natural theological arguments for the existence of God! Indeed, his project is to show that Christian belief is irrational only if its false, and that suggests precisely the need for inquiry about Christianity's truth! Second, if I'm understanding what you mean by 'non-dogmatic', very few philosophers throughout history have been non-dogmatic in the full-throated sense you are suggesting. For example, you seem to think--correct me if I'm wrong here!--that hunting for "grounds" is a tell-tale sign of a dogmatist. And basically all of philosophy until the last couple hundred years was hunting for grounds for things... I mention this because I think it's worth recognizing how *substantive* the dispute between, say, Wittgenstein and Moore or McDowell and Evans (who was no quietist!) really was about these sorts of methodological questions. Our metaphilosophy requires the same sort of disinterested inquiry for which you're advocating in other areas!
Thanks, Tim! I mean the charge of dogmatism to apply technically to asserting that a premise is basic and that there is no common, worldview-neutral method for examining even our foundational beliefs. Plantinga does that with the basicality of theistic belief, even if elsewhere he says there are "a dozen (or so) theistic arguments". :)
I'm also referring to the Kuyperian line that Plantinga takes in "Advice to Christian Philosophers." He suggests that the Christian simply brings the concerns of the Christian community to bear as opposed to secular community. What goes missing is again the common and human, which is where I admire the common work of Wittgenstein and Wittgensteinians, from Strawson to Anscombe, and Austin to Phillips.
As far as grounds, I don't think I'm against them, though I did take a stand here against grounding moral truth in something metaphysical (an "Ought" upon an "Is"). Rather, I think the difference *is* the difference between Moore and Wittgenstein, as explored in On Certainty. Plantinga's common sense realism mirrors that of Moore to my mind, baldly asserting "There IS a hand!" Wittgenstein argues that "There is a hand" is as much nonsense as staring at one's hand and wondering, "but is there *really* a hand?" It's a subtle difference, but I think emblematic of a difference in attitude.
And what is the McDowell-Evans dispute? I really need to know! My dissertation is on, among other things, their writing on reference and content externalism. Thanks for jumping into the fray here.
Appreciate that reply, Joel. I guess my thought about Plantinga was that, in his thinking, there's no substantive relationship between a belief's being basic/foundational and it's inability to be examined, critiqued, even rejected. And all of that can happen on "worldview-neutral" grounds. (I think I know what "worldview-neutrality" means, at least roughly, but I confess that the notion gets very slippery for me when I really give it a run!) I guess I don't read "Advice" as suggesting otherwise. He's just pointing to another role that philosophy plays, one that operates fundamentally *within* the Christian community. But that's compatible with a different role for philosophy that operates fundamentally in a "secular" space. Anyway...
On McDowell and Evans. As I'm sure you know, The Varieties of Reference (which was of course unfinished with Evans died, and so is a bit of a mess lol) is committed to non-conceptual content (as McDowell discusses in M&W, maybe in the Afterword??). And so McDowell rejects Evans's view---which does seem to be looking for a kind of ground for meaning/reasons outside of the conceptual---as making a mistake at least very, very close to the Myth of the Given. And that Myth, I take it, is something like what McDowell's Wittgensteinian quietism is meant to work around. For what it's worth, a million years ago when I was actually thinking about these things, I was helped by Jonathan Weinberg's Nous review of M&W, which is (if memory serves) what first got me thinking about the McDowell-Evans differences.
That's all a bit fast, but I hope it's helpful for seeing what I was getting at! These issues are very tricky, I think, though I confess that my sympathies lie apart from the Wittgensteinians (as I'm sure you sense!).
Very interesting. I have some reading to do, but I really like the idea of non-dogmatism within philosophy. I think it speaks to what I have been saying about not uniting primarily in faith or hope—one cannot be dogmatic and united in love but also love is the most truthful existence we could ever hope for, so we achieve the end goal of what dogmatism was supposed to achieve but was doomed to fail and, indeed, worked continually against.
I hope you also note that the view that your seminary gave you was false of other kinds of philosophy, too. Bertrand Russell was very much not a nihilist. Nor was Daniel Dennett.
My impression is that “scientism” is deeply rare amongst philosophers in general. For example, if you consider someone like Will MacAskill of “effective altruism” fame, then it’s clear that his worldview is deeply influenced by scientific modes of thinking, in that he focuses largely on what he can quantitatively measure. But it’s also clear that he has some beliefs that go beyond science. I’m sure he would readily concede that his decision to donate anything he earns above twenty-six thousand pounds a year is based on considerations that go beyond what can be scientifically proven.
None of this is to deny that the question of how Christian philosophers should interact with atheist ones is deeply interesting and important. More generally, I would say that philosophy does not and probably cannot have a general answer about how to include all worldviews in a discussion. But this then makes it even more important to notice when a meta-description of how to make worldviews talk to each other is able to cross a difficult boundary of this type.
I’m currently about halfway through Charles Taylor’s “A Secular Age,” which has a whole different way of reaching out to a broader audience as a Christian philosopher. Taylor takes a historical view, analysing nuances in how philosophy and society have changed in tandem over the past 500 years or so. He is concerned with showing that secularism, as a phenomenon, is contingent upon societal conditions instead of being merely the basic truth that emerges after all the other false viewpoints are removed.
I’m impressed by Taylor. He’s alert to nuances, and portrays viewpoints that he disagrees with in a sensitive fashion. He is making me think a lot more about what the link really is between science and atheism; I take it for granted that there is one. I agree with Taylor, however, that this link is not one of necessity. One may be deeply respectful of the ability of science to determine certain kinds of truth without becoming an atheist in the process. The question then becomes, which worldview changes did lead to atheism for many people, and why? I remain convinced that the link between science and atheism is deeper than Taylor seems to think, but I am going to have to mull for a while before I can fully articulate what I want to say on the matter.
Gemma, very important observations, and I do agree. Most analytic philosophers today are moral realists, and whatever their views, they usually have strong, liberal, moron, political convictions they cannot attribute these to science, though some try.
Christine Korsgaard’s Sources of Normativity is a good example of how the scientism operates. She is defending moral realism throughout the book, and a version of Kantianism, but at the end, her position basically collapses into Humeanism. Hume’s is the naturalistic position, according to which even moral motivation must simply be another natural passion or drive.
Philosophers who defend morality or the manifest image end up, trying to assimilate it to the sciences. She even brings it in as “The Scientific Worldview.”
But as you mentioned with Taylor, there is no necessary connection between the practice of science and the naturalistic conclusions. Still, the original point is that only a minority of naturalistic philosophers are driven to nihilism or anything of the sort! (there are plenty of moral anti-realists in analytic philosophy, but they are not the majority.)
I am not convinced that there is a nondogmatic philosophy (other than universal skepticism) because I am not convinced there is a universally shared human experience. Mcdowell's argument does depend on several presuppositions that are not indubitable. Can one speak abouts reasons or causes at all? Is argument even meaningful? And plenty of reasonable philosophers do believe that it is possible to reduce reasons and beliefs to the physical. This seems absurd to me, but they believe it all the same, and it doesn't seem absurd to them.
Every argument has premises, and eventually one must end a chain of reasoning with a premise one does not choose to prove. But such a premise can always be doubted, hence it is a dogmatic premise, since it is possible to rationally reject said premise.
I have spent the last decade struggling with universal skepticism (maybe it comes from OCD, which has been called a disorder of hyperbolic doubt), and I have yet to find a fully satisfying solution. Until I find such an answer, it seems to me that it is dogmatism all the way down. In the end all our reasoning is reduced to faith.
In the end, everything is mysterious and inexplicable. It is miracle to me that objects fall when they are dropped.
I am with Wittgenstein on this one, that universal skepticism itself depends on a philosophical picture by which we are held captive. Philosophy must serve as a therapy to free us from the picture.
His On Certainty would be my strong recommendation for you. He points out that there is a whole body of propositions that are beyond the realm of questioning. They are the solid ground from which we question anything in the first place.
G.E. Moore tried to prove the external world by holding up his hand and saying “there is a hand.” But Wittgenstein sees this as just as ridiculous as doubting the existence of one’s hands. Not all sentences have the same status as premises that we can doubt, and that means that there are starting points for thought in the common human understanding.
But I have experienced doubting them, or at least I think I have! I will look into reading On Certainty. I generally haven't read much 20th century philosophy.
Being somewhat philosophically illiterate, is there a school of thought along the lines of what I would call “mystical naturalism” which rejects most if not all supernatural claims but believes or is open to there being a God or other “ultimate reality” or “higher power” that invests the natural world with objective meaning and purpose? This is very muddled but I don’t have the philosophical chops to express it better.
That’s a great question - I guess I’m on the look out for such philosophies. Wittgenstein is a candidate; Iris Murdoch very likely - both of whom influence McDowell, who isn’t very mystical, but is a moral realist of sorts. I find myself meeting with the secular U of Chicago philosophers in the middle on that one. (Though actually many of them are becoming Christians or believing Jews.)
I uphold the view that a good metaphysical position is the handmaid of theology. Yet, philosophy itself will not have the enlightenment necessary without faith.
Thanks for the question, Joe! I would say that the content of Christianity includes good (correct) conclusions: God exists, there is a moral law, Jesus rose, etc. But philosophy is about good methodology - careful, humble, non-dogmatic thought.
Christianity that is believed on the basis of bad methodology can be more like the Pharisees’ faith; Christianity believed by patient, philosophical method is Christlike.
I think another aspect of the weakness of The Christian Worldview™ is the extent to which it papers over very significant differences within Christianity.
Even treating something like "God exists" as a basic belief is skipping over more fundamental questions like "what is God?" that are not at all universally agreed upon among Christians, never mind the world at large. For example, theistic personalists and classical theists mean something completely different by the word "God" to begin with.
To treat the teachings of Christianity-as-understood-by-me as totally beyond evaluation or justification is essentially the same move as treating the traditions of some specific church as infallible, just with less honesty about what I'm doing, or where my ideas come from.
TL; DR: The Christian Worldview™ is infallible magisterium for people who don't like saying the word "tradition".
Go Maroons!! What class with Conant did you take?
Kant’s Transcendental Deduction! What was your experience at U of C?
Awesome! I’m still there; just finished my first year, and I took forms of philosophical skepticism with Conant. UChicago is a great place - a little too continental/ history/ German idealist for me but a great place nonetheless!
Nice. I love his essay on that subject. Going to include it in my dissertation! Chicago redeemed analytic philosophy for me, because I appreciated having the historical arc. But I had other analytic experience before that, so it’s definitely worth supplementing with other things!
Excellent exposition. One curious matter:
"Wittgenstein thought that these other forms of discourse, while they could not say anything verifiable or meaningful, were the realm of the only things that mattered."
Things can matter without being meaningful?
That was his view! The logical positivists thought that only scientific discourse had meaning. Meaningful sentences stated mirror facts about the world. Therefore, they excluded, moral sentences from the realm of the meaningful.
The early Wittgenstein accepted this restriction on meaning, but said that these other realms were the ones that mattered.
His later views gave up on restricting meaning in this way.
This is interesting, Joel. A couple thoughts. First, the Plantingian project is compatible with disinterested inquiry; it isn't a form of dogmatism, at least in a sense of 'dogmatism' that rules out honest inquiry. A bit of evidence: Plantinga makes all sorts of natural theological arguments for the existence of God! Indeed, his project is to show that Christian belief is irrational only if its false, and that suggests precisely the need for inquiry about Christianity's truth! Second, if I'm understanding what you mean by 'non-dogmatic', very few philosophers throughout history have been non-dogmatic in the full-throated sense you are suggesting. For example, you seem to think--correct me if I'm wrong here!--that hunting for "grounds" is a tell-tale sign of a dogmatist. And basically all of philosophy until the last couple hundred years was hunting for grounds for things... I mention this because I think it's worth recognizing how *substantive* the dispute between, say, Wittgenstein and Moore or McDowell and Evans (who was no quietist!) really was about these sorts of methodological questions. Our metaphilosophy requires the same sort of disinterested inquiry for which you're advocating in other areas!
Thanks, Tim! I mean the charge of dogmatism to apply technically to asserting that a premise is basic and that there is no common, worldview-neutral method for examining even our foundational beliefs. Plantinga does that with the basicality of theistic belief, even if elsewhere he says there are "a dozen (or so) theistic arguments". :)
I'm also referring to the Kuyperian line that Plantinga takes in "Advice to Christian Philosophers." He suggests that the Christian simply brings the concerns of the Christian community to bear as opposed to secular community. What goes missing is again the common and human, which is where I admire the common work of Wittgenstein and Wittgensteinians, from Strawson to Anscombe, and Austin to Phillips.
As far as grounds, I don't think I'm against them, though I did take a stand here against grounding moral truth in something metaphysical (an "Ought" upon an "Is"). Rather, I think the difference *is* the difference between Moore and Wittgenstein, as explored in On Certainty. Plantinga's common sense realism mirrors that of Moore to my mind, baldly asserting "There IS a hand!" Wittgenstein argues that "There is a hand" is as much nonsense as staring at one's hand and wondering, "but is there *really* a hand?" It's a subtle difference, but I think emblematic of a difference in attitude.
And what is the McDowell-Evans dispute? I really need to know! My dissertation is on, among other things, their writing on reference and content externalism. Thanks for jumping into the fray here.
Appreciate that reply, Joel. I guess my thought about Plantinga was that, in his thinking, there's no substantive relationship between a belief's being basic/foundational and it's inability to be examined, critiqued, even rejected. And all of that can happen on "worldview-neutral" grounds. (I think I know what "worldview-neutrality" means, at least roughly, but I confess that the notion gets very slippery for me when I really give it a run!) I guess I don't read "Advice" as suggesting otherwise. He's just pointing to another role that philosophy plays, one that operates fundamentally *within* the Christian community. But that's compatible with a different role for philosophy that operates fundamentally in a "secular" space. Anyway...
On McDowell and Evans. As I'm sure you know, The Varieties of Reference (which was of course unfinished with Evans died, and so is a bit of a mess lol) is committed to non-conceptual content (as McDowell discusses in M&W, maybe in the Afterword??). And so McDowell rejects Evans's view---which does seem to be looking for a kind of ground for meaning/reasons outside of the conceptual---as making a mistake at least very, very close to the Myth of the Given. And that Myth, I take it, is something like what McDowell's Wittgensteinian quietism is meant to work around. For what it's worth, a million years ago when I was actually thinking about these things, I was helped by Jonathan Weinberg's Nous review of M&W, which is (if memory serves) what first got me thinking about the McDowell-Evans differences.
That's all a bit fast, but I hope it's helpful for seeing what I was getting at! These issues are very tricky, I think, though I confess that my sympathies lie apart from the Wittgensteinians (as I'm sure you sense!).
Very interesting. I have some reading to do, but I really like the idea of non-dogmatism within philosophy. I think it speaks to what I have been saying about not uniting primarily in faith or hope—one cannot be dogmatic and united in love but also love is the most truthful existence we could ever hope for, so we achieve the end goal of what dogmatism was supposed to achieve but was doomed to fail and, indeed, worked continually against.
thanks! Yes, dogmatism tries to secure an end goal, but from a place of anxiety rather than patience and confidence, not to mention love.
I hope you also note that the view that your seminary gave you was false of other kinds of philosophy, too. Bertrand Russell was very much not a nihilist. Nor was Daniel Dennett.
My impression is that “scientism” is deeply rare amongst philosophers in general. For example, if you consider someone like Will MacAskill of “effective altruism” fame, then it’s clear that his worldview is deeply influenced by scientific modes of thinking, in that he focuses largely on what he can quantitatively measure. But it’s also clear that he has some beliefs that go beyond science. I’m sure he would readily concede that his decision to donate anything he earns above twenty-six thousand pounds a year is based on considerations that go beyond what can be scientifically proven.
None of this is to deny that the question of how Christian philosophers should interact with atheist ones is deeply interesting and important. More generally, I would say that philosophy does not and probably cannot have a general answer about how to include all worldviews in a discussion. But this then makes it even more important to notice when a meta-description of how to make worldviews talk to each other is able to cross a difficult boundary of this type.
I’m currently about halfway through Charles Taylor’s “A Secular Age,” which has a whole different way of reaching out to a broader audience as a Christian philosopher. Taylor takes a historical view, analysing nuances in how philosophy and society have changed in tandem over the past 500 years or so. He is concerned with showing that secularism, as a phenomenon, is contingent upon societal conditions instead of being merely the basic truth that emerges after all the other false viewpoints are removed.
I’m impressed by Taylor. He’s alert to nuances, and portrays viewpoints that he disagrees with in a sensitive fashion. He is making me think a lot more about what the link really is between science and atheism; I take it for granted that there is one. I agree with Taylor, however, that this link is not one of necessity. One may be deeply respectful of the ability of science to determine certain kinds of truth without becoming an atheist in the process. The question then becomes, which worldview changes did lead to atheism for many people, and why? I remain convinced that the link between science and atheism is deeper than Taylor seems to think, but I am going to have to mull for a while before I can fully articulate what I want to say on the matter.
Gemma, very important observations, and I do agree. Most analytic philosophers today are moral realists, and whatever their views, they usually have strong, liberal, moron, political convictions they cannot attribute these to science, though some try.
Christine Korsgaard’s Sources of Normativity is a good example of how the scientism operates. She is defending moral realism throughout the book, and a version of Kantianism, but at the end, her position basically collapses into Humeanism. Hume’s is the naturalistic position, according to which even moral motivation must simply be another natural passion or drive.
Philosophers who defend morality or the manifest image end up, trying to assimilate it to the sciences. She even brings it in as “The Scientific Worldview.”
But as you mentioned with Taylor, there is no necessary connection between the practice of science and the naturalistic conclusions. Still, the original point is that only a minority of naturalistic philosophers are driven to nihilism or anything of the sort! (there are plenty of moral anti-realists in analytic philosophy, but they are not the majority.)
I am not convinced that there is a nondogmatic philosophy (other than universal skepticism) because I am not convinced there is a universally shared human experience. Mcdowell's argument does depend on several presuppositions that are not indubitable. Can one speak abouts reasons or causes at all? Is argument even meaningful? And plenty of reasonable philosophers do believe that it is possible to reduce reasons and beliefs to the physical. This seems absurd to me, but they believe it all the same, and it doesn't seem absurd to them.
Every argument has premises, and eventually one must end a chain of reasoning with a premise one does not choose to prove. But such a premise can always be doubted, hence it is a dogmatic premise, since it is possible to rationally reject said premise.
I have spent the last decade struggling with universal skepticism (maybe it comes from OCD, which has been called a disorder of hyperbolic doubt), and I have yet to find a fully satisfying solution. Until I find such an answer, it seems to me that it is dogmatism all the way down. In the end all our reasoning is reduced to faith.
In the end, everything is mysterious and inexplicable. It is miracle to me that objects fall when they are dropped.
I am with Wittgenstein on this one, that universal skepticism itself depends on a philosophical picture by which we are held captive. Philosophy must serve as a therapy to free us from the picture.
His On Certainty would be my strong recommendation for you. He points out that there is a whole body of propositions that are beyond the realm of questioning. They are the solid ground from which we question anything in the first place.
G.E. Moore tried to prove the external world by holding up his hand and saying “there is a hand.” But Wittgenstein sees this as just as ridiculous as doubting the existence of one’s hands. Not all sentences have the same status as premises that we can doubt, and that means that there are starting points for thought in the common human understanding.
But I have experienced doubting them, or at least I think I have! I will look into reading On Certainty. I generally haven't read much 20th century philosophy.
Being somewhat philosophically illiterate, is there a school of thought along the lines of what I would call “mystical naturalism” which rejects most if not all supernatural claims but believes or is open to there being a God or other “ultimate reality” or “higher power” that invests the natural world with objective meaning and purpose? This is very muddled but I don’t have the philosophical chops to express it better.
That’s a great question - I guess I’m on the look out for such philosophies. Wittgenstein is a candidate; Iris Murdoch very likely - both of whom influence McDowell, who isn’t very mystical, but is a moral realist of sorts. I find myself meeting with the secular U of Chicago philosophers in the middle on that one. (Though actually many of them are becoming Christians or believing Jews.)
Interesting article. Much food for thought.
I uphold the view that a good metaphysical position is the handmaid of theology. Yet, philosophy itself will not have the enlightenment necessary without faith.
Would you say Christianity is good philosophy though?
Thanks for the question, Joe! I would say that the content of Christianity includes good (correct) conclusions: God exists, there is a moral law, Jesus rose, etc. But philosophy is about good methodology - careful, humble, non-dogmatic thought.
Christianity that is believed on the basis of bad methodology can be more like the Pharisees’ faith; Christianity believed by patient, philosophical method is Christlike.
I gave an illustration of this you might enjoy at the beginning of A Falsifiable Faith: https://open.substack.com/pub/joelcarini/p/a-falsifiable-faith?r=k9yk0&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
I think another aspect of the weakness of The Christian Worldview™ is the extent to which it papers over very significant differences within Christianity.
Even treating something like "God exists" as a basic belief is skipping over more fundamental questions like "what is God?" that are not at all universally agreed upon among Christians, never mind the world at large. For example, theistic personalists and classical theists mean something completely different by the word "God" to begin with.
To treat the teachings of Christianity-as-understood-by-me as totally beyond evaluation or justification is essentially the same move as treating the traditions of some specific church as infallible, just with less honesty about what I'm doing, or where my ideas come from.
TL; DR: The Christian Worldview™ is infallible magisterium for people who don't like saying the word "tradition".