P(R/N&E) There are two main propositions that purport to explain our origins. The first being that of a creation by an intelligent designer (herein called God) and the second being that evolutionary processes operating within the framework of naturalism produced life and all that exists. This article reflects my understanding of an argument presented by Alvin Plantinga. This article doesnt deal with the classical arguments in favor of one position over the other but looks at the issue as it concerns the development of reason. The existence of reliable cognitive skills in the Creation Model is easily explained and in fact would be expected. The question then becomes; [What is the contingent probability P that reason R would be the result of a system that was governed by naturalism N and evolution E?]. Reason as used here is meant to convey the idea of reliable cognitive skills that are likely to produce true beliefs. According to the current evolutionary theory as stated by Richard Dawkins and others: All appearance to the contrary the only watchmaker in nature are the blind forces of physics, albeit deployed in a very special way. A true watchmaker has foresight: he designs his cogs and springs, plans their interconnections, with the future purpose in his minds eye. Natural selection, the blind, unconscience automatic process which Darwin discovered, and which we now know is the explanation for the existence and apparently purposeful form of all life has no purpose in mind. It has no mind and no minds eye. It does not plan for the future. It has no vision, no foresight, no sight at all. If is can be said to play the role of watchmaker in nature, it is the blind watchmaker. Patricia Churchland says: Boiled down to the essentials, a nervous system enables the organism to succeed in the four Fs: feeding, fleeing fighting and reproducing. The principle chore of the nervous system is to get the body parts where they should be in order that the organism survive. … Improvement in sensorimotor control confer an evolutionary advantage: a fancier style of representing is advantageous so long as it is geared to the organisms way of life and enhances the organisms chance of survival. Truth, whatever that is, definitely takes the hinder most. This position causes some real problems for the naturalist. Darwin understood this problem and expressed his concerns in several letters, the content of which are often referred to as Darwins Doubt. Darwin says With me the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of a mans mind, which had been developed from the mind of lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy. Would anyone trust in the convictions of a monkeys mind, if there are any convictions in such a mind? Since there seems to be at least general agreement among these scientists that the purpose of the nervous system is the survival of the genome and not the product of any design to produce true beliefs, this should cause the naturalist some concern, as Darwin expressed. The naturalist appears to have three options concerning beliefs. (a) The beliefs of an organism do not cause their behavior and are invisible to evolution as proposed by Huxley. Such an option would produce very low probability of said beliefs being reliable since beliefs would have no impact on the four Fs of Churchland. (b) Beliefs do cause behavior, but only by virtue of their electro-chemical properties not by virtue of their content as proposed by Cummins. Once again there would be a exceedingly low probability that the content of these beliefs would be true or reliable since they have no impact on the four Fs. (c) A third possibility is that beliefs cause behavior by way of content but is maladaptive. Im not aware of anyone that endorses this possibility but it does exist as a possibility for the naturalist and once again would have a very low probability of producing reliable cognitive faculties. (d) The final choice is that beliefs both cause behavior and are also adaptive. The question remains whether this final option has a high or low probability of producing reliable cognitive faculties likely to produce true beliefs? Beliefs by themselves do not produce behavior but it is a combination of beliefs, desires, and other factors working together. As such clearly there will be any number of different combinations that will produce behaviors that will support the four Fs. Many of these beliefs could be utterly false but retained in the organism as long as the behavior is beneficial. Imagine a pre-historic hominoid. The exigencies of survival require that he display tiger avoidance behavior . There are a number of possibly appropriate behaviors that would normally result in survival. He could choose fleeing, hiding or any number of other tiger-avoiding behaviors. The question remains whether his beliefs would need to be true to produce these behaviors? Perhaps he very much wants to be eaten but each time he sees a tiger he runs off seeking a better prospect to eat him. Perhaps he believes that to keep in shape that the appearance of a tiger is his signal to run a mile as fast as he can. There are any number of false beliefs that would produce tiger-avoiding behaviors. Once again we see that there is a very low probability that naturalism and evolution would produce true beliefs via reliable cognitive skills especially in areas that are not essential to survival. Hereon is the problem for the naturalist. The very ideas of naturalism and evolution are not essential to survival. Since the very mechanism that the naturalist suggests produced the human mind has a very low probability of producing a mind with reliable cognitive faculties that would likely produce true beliefs. As such the naturalist has a defeater for his claim that his theory is reasonable. In fact he has an undefeated defeater for every belief that he holds. The traditional theist has no corresponding reason to doubt the veracity of his cognitive faculties. As such it is only the theist that has a high probability of forming true beliefs. The conclusion to be drawn, therefore, is that the conjunction of naturalism with evolutionary theory is self-defeating: it provides for itself an undefeated defeater. It is therefore unacceptable and irrational.
Posted on: Wed, 29 Jan 2014 16:29:34 +0000
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