The Principle of Sufficient Reason: Arguments For & Against

Final Project, PHS 611 Logic and Epistemology (Dr. P. Yates.), Spring 2019.

[jacobadkins]

Why wouldn’t a nessicary explication be valid, why must a contingent explanation be the only valid explanation.

[subspecieaeternitatis]

''The Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR) says that everything has an explanation. If you reject the PSR, it either means that you are claiming that things always happen without an explanation (hence we live in an unintelligible, inexplicable universe of miracles, magic, and things happening for no reason), or you are positing a bizarre dualism whereby some things have explanations and other don’t.'' - From the book: Mad World: The Seduction of Insanity by Mark Romel

[Google_Censored_Commenter]

The idea that if the PSR is false, then it undermines *only* arguments against its existence, is simply not logically valid reasoning. If reason is unreliably, then that applies equally to all arguments for and against any proposition, including the PSR. No special pleading should be allowed here.

[frogandspanner]

3:45 Modern science is about _prediction_ *not* _explanation_ .

I prefer to use the term _post hoc prediction_ rather than _explanation_ as it ironically describes the scientific trajectory.

[peterrobinherbert]

As usual the people who put this together make the faulty assumption that it has to be either everything has explanation or nothing has explanation. It shows how philosophers really don't think these things through.

[ApologeticsSquared]

Random note: "Pruss" as in Alexander Pruss rhymes with "loose."
Have a nice day! :)

[duskhorizon]

Book suggestion: ''Causation and the Principle of Sufficient Reason by Mike Hockney''

[Florianuus]

7:37 Mind-projection fallacy. Because I can conceive of some 'x' without some preceding cause of 'x' doesn't entail that some uncaused 'x' is instantiated.

[DarthMakroth]

7:37 I don't think you really can imagine a coffee cup without an efficient cause

[epicchrist]

Great video, just realised this was a school project lol.

[sorenjune]

It seems like there is an "all or nothing" problem here. Why does it need to be universally true rather than just true for some things? If it's the case that the PCR is universal wouldn't we be forced to accept that there is an infinite regress of causes?

[markwrede]

As arithmetic is more inconsistent than incomplete, testing for sufficiency is faulty.

[nerdineverythingnerdinnoth]

Explanation is too human for me. It can mean totally different but specific things at different times, be it a cause, or a motive, that is differently many causal links behind. With motives we know that conscious things can have them, and we can relate best to them because we are conscious beings ourselves. So I find it mislead to press a motivation on everything that has ever happened. Instead I will focus purely on causes.
I also think we just shouldn‘t make it that EVERYTHING should be caused, and search a rule for everything that is caused that can explain everything equally well. It wouldn‘t be special pleading since *both* are one assumption that haven‘t been proven mathematically.
I‘ve thought about about what specifically a longer time, and talked to a few other people, but I don‘t study/haven‘t studied philosophy, so to it‘s correctness is probably a long way to go. Here is what I‘ve got:

Every constellation has causes in accordance to entropy.

[DarrenMcStravick]

Why only analyse the weak arguments for the PSR when there's strong deductive cases for it as well? This is a missed opportunity

[Sapientiaa]

What are the arguments for the arguments against PSR? I’ve heard about the Münchhausen trilemma, and of course Gödels theorem.

[bouncycastle]

Not sure why people think that it's everything has sufficient reason or nothing does. There's a hell of a lot of middle ground that's being ignored.

[ThestDukeDroklar]

Sounds like cause and effect. Is there any question about this?

[DarthMakroth]

1:08 every contingent fact has an explanation. Not every fact

[metolse]

I disagree with Feser.

1) Suppose the conception of the universe is a brute fact, which is governed by strict physical laws.
2) This entails that anything inside the universe is also governed by strict physical laws.
3) Hence, when the PSR is rejected, it is no longer the case that anything inside the universe is inexplicable.
4) Therefore, we can reject the PSR without losing the knowledge of cause and effect.

[antoniomoyal]

Quantum mechanics is no denial of PSR because particles behave absolutely un a regular fashion. Therefore they are not absurd, even if we cannot explain the cause of such behaviour, by principle.