The Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism - Stephen Law, Tyler McNabb, and others

This Theist/Atheist Discussion features a number of guests, most notably Tyler McNabb and Stephen Law (who recently had an exchange on Unbelievable? on the subject of Reformed Epistemology). The other guests joining are: Cameron Bertuzzi (myself), Josh Parikh, Perry Hendricks, Brett Lunn, Ben Watkins, Ben Bavar.

The topic of discussion is Alvin Plantinga's (in)famous Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism. The argument roughly states that the probability our cognitive faculties are reliable given Naturalism & Evolution is low. Hence, the person that believes N&E has a defeater for all of their beliefs, including belief in N&E. Belief in N&E is therefore self-referentially incoherent and cannot rationally be accepted.

Tyler McNabb - Currently teaches at HBU, has published several articles defending Plantinga's work

[CoffeePhilosophy]

I’ve decided to go through all the videos and podcasts of CC. I’m really enjoying this livestream.

[gleon]

Perry Hendricks has a good argument against abortion

[snuzebuster]

First, Plantinga is right of course that evolution selects for adaptability not truth. However, truth means accurate mapping to reality, and obviously accurate maps are more adaptable than inaccurate maps. Yes, it is possible that false ideas could lead to adaptive behaviors in certain situations, but it is likely that they would fail in other situations, while true ideas would be adaptive in a much broader range of situations. This is a major flaw in his tiger thought experiment because Plantinga offers it as if living creatures meet just one survival challenge in their lives and then if they survive that they pass on their genes, which is ludicrous.

It's also ludicrous to treat the worldview of naturalism in the same way one would treat the musings of apparently deranged, uneducated savage. Sure, I would agree that the biologically evolved mental apparatus that produces our "common sense" ideas about the world is prone to some amount of error and that error increases sharply as we move away from the level of phenomenon that were pertinent to our survival when were just another beast of the field. However, most of the knowledge that we possess now is not the product of our own individual cognition but learning that has been socially passed to us through education. This is largely the product of social evolution. One of these socially evolved pieces of knowledge, actually a whole set of ideas, is the scientific method. The scientific method is exactly a socially developed method for correcting for the deficiencies of our "common sense." Since the development of the scientific method among other advances in human communal knowledge building like writing, printing and public education there has been an absolute explosion in human knowledge.

In final analysis I would say that far from being the random musing of an uneducated savage, which is something I would agree would warrant great skepticism, especially if it was concerning the ultimate nature of reality, naturalism is the near consensus worldview of the modern scientific community, which is lead by the best and brightest among us standing on the shoulders of the intellectual luminaries of the past, armed with the scientific method and a vast body of knowledge accumulated over the past few centuries of scientific endeavor. As such I see little reason to be skeptical of it. It could still be wrong, I suppose, but the EAAN doesn't give me much if any pause in embracing it as most likely true.

[paulkelly]

Why think adaptable beliefs are true? Isn't science full of theories that are empirically adequate but literally false? In fact, we know that certain perceptions are species specific and that certain "useful" beliefs are false. Who knows how wide the scope of empirically adequate but false faculties are the likely subregions within the space of all possible empirically adequate possibilities within the total space of possibilities that mere adaptation would grant us?

[faysal]

The young boy in brown was smart tho and added to the discussion

[samsimpson]

Stephen Law sweeps all before him in this discourse. Akin to pyroclastic flow.

[MaverickChristian]

semantic content = [P₁ or P₅ or P₄₂...]

We can still ask whether a belief causes stuff by virtue of its physical properties rather than by its semantic content (i.e. by virtue of belonging to the disjunction). It seems to be the former, i.e. the fact that a person's NP (neurophysiological) properties belong to some disjunctive set (viz. the semantic content) doesn't really have anything to do with why the NP properties cause the stuff it does.

To illustrate why, consider the following thought experiment: suppose reductive materialism is true (i.e. semantic contents _just are_ the physical properties) and a mad scientist inserts a belief interface device (BID) in Smith’s brain that acts as a new interface between Smith’s belief and behavior. For example, the mad scientist configures the BID so that when Smith believes _I am thirsty_ the physical properties (i.e. the NP properties) of this belief electrochemically affect the BID and the BID subsequently causes Smith’s body to get a drink of water. The mad scientist can configure the BID at will so that any given belief can cause just about any behavior. For instance, the mad scientist configures the BID so that the NP properties of the belief _Drinking water will kill me and I don’t want to die_ trigger an electrochemical reaction that (thanks to the BID) causes Smith’s body to get a drink of water. The mad scientist configures the BID again so that the NP properties of the belief that _I will never see a Nicolas Cage movie_ cause Smith to go see a Nicolas Cage movie and the physical properties of the belief _Grass is air_ cause Smith to eat coconut ice cream after a fish dinner. All this would be possible on reductive materialism because a human’s belief causes stuff by virtue of its NP properties, not its semantic content, even if it were the case that beliefs are just physical properties.

The BID scenario illustrates that it is a belief’s physical properties and how those properties interact with the rest of the physical system that determines our behavior. The BID may be science fiction, but even in our own naturally-occurring belief interface system, it is a belief’s physical properties and how those properties interact with the rest of our physiology that determines our behavior. The fact that physical properties belong to some disjunctive set (semantic content) doesn't seem to have anything to do with why beliefs cause stuff.

At the very least, something _functionally equivalent_ to semantic epiphenomenalism seems true on naturalism, i.e. it's conceivable for beliefs severely unrelated to what's going on to cause behavior, such as the NP properties of the belief _Grass is air_ causing Smith to eat coconut ice cream. If that's true, then it's very difficult to avoid the force of the EAAN.

I really wish I could have been part of this discussion!

[LtDeadeye]

The tiger thought experiment can be traded for an actual example such as our inability to naturally see the full spectrum of light waves, but only the waves which are useful to aid in our survival.

[faysal]

A lovely topic, but there was really no serious opposition argument to epiphenoma . He took all the kids to school 🏫

[paulkelly]

Proponents of the argument have to find some gap between causality and truth to run the EAAN. To assume there could be some rupture just seems circular because it is inherently dualistic. It is the inverse problem of trying to establish mathematical platonism via the indispensability argument!

[tooskepticool]

Didnt descartes and darwin talk about this?

[CesarClouds]

Everyone overlooked, including Plantinga, that although evolution doesn't select for us to specifically ascertain truth nor does it prohibit it. Hence, the EAAn is refuted.