Re: knowledge & proof [was "wee people"]

Dave,

I acknowledge the validity and appropriateness of your views when the target "audience" is the intellect. Philosophy dominantly targets the intellect, but religion targets the whole person, the spiritual person.

I assert that whole persons in whom there is a balance between gut and intellect are not going to question the existence of useful knowledge or whether a world exists outside their psyches. Such people daily use such knowledge to navigate such world, so such doubts as a rule would seem ridiculous to them. Those who do question such things are obviously allowing their intellects to dominate.

Balance in all of us is in continuous flux: Sometimes the intellect dominates, sometimes the belly, sometimes the genitals, etc. When we do science or philosophy, the intellect dominates. When my own intellect dominates, I can contemplate my religious experience somewhat objectively. When I do, I recognize that it is unconventional and therefore must be tested to see whether it might have been simply a manifestation of some pathological condition and hence not genuine. It would have been ridiculous to have tested it while it was going on. At that time I was in balance as a whole, spiritual person. But when intellect dominated afterwards, I recognized the possibility that I could have been mistaken, so self-examination was appropriate.

If I can satisfy myself intellectually that the experience was not pathological but genuine, I can then allow myself to come back into balance as a human being. As a balanced person not dominated by intellect I then recognize that my sense of reality derives from interactions with others (actually, with both persons and things) rather than from contemplating my thinking.

That said, I suspect I'm annoying you by saying such things, so I don't expect your further response on this. But thanks for your feedback. It's been more useful to me than you think, I'd guess.

Don

  ----- Original Message -----
  From: D. F. Siemens, Jr.<mailto:dfsiemensjr@juno.com>
  To: dfwinterstein@msn.com<mailto:dfwinterstein@msn.com>
  Cc: asa@calvin.edu<mailto:asa@calvin.edu>
  Sent: Friday, November 05, 2004 10:04 AM
  Subject: Re: knowledge & proof [was "wee people"]

  Unfortunately, Don, this compares apples with metric nuts. If you go back to Augustine, you will find his response to the skeptics who claimed that all knowledge is impossible. He noted that, however much was doubted, they could not doubt their own individual existence. This information is internal and accompanies (as you imply) every conscious moment. All other elements have an external aspect which may be illusory. So one may doubt the existence of all other entities, though one cannot doubt the immediate experience. You cannot conflate the internal and external as equal elements in awareness.
  Dave

  On Fri, 5 Nov 2004 00:56:22 -0800 "Don Winterstein" <dfwinterstein@msn.com<mailto:dfwinterstein@msn.com>> writes:
    Dave,

    I thought of another approach. I hope you find this more congenial, because I appreciate the thoughtful feedback I often get from participants on this list. Also, your comments below helped me see things in a new way:

    Dave: ...Begin from the fact that solipsism cannot be disproved, though Descartes' /cogito/ stands. The rest of Descartes is rationalization, the importation of what he had learned from medieval philosophy and claimed to reject. Solipsism is incompatible with the existence of a deity other than oneself. This directly contradicts your claims to know that God exists as surely as you know your own existence.

    Don: How do we really know we exist? It's true that it's possible to know we exist from contemplating our own thinking, but in the real world people know they exist long before they're even able to contemplate their thinking. So, to get closer to the truth, Descartes' /cogito ergo sum/ needs to be modified: I interact, therefore I exist. The newborn infant interacts with his parents: they touch, clean, caress, feed, hold, etc., and in so doing they convey the message to the child that he is real. He gets his identity largely through interacting with his parents and other caregivers. "I'm real because real people treat me as though I'm real." Personal interactions reinforce personhood.

    My strong claims for knowledge of God's existence have similar roots. The child knows that his parents are at least as real as he is, because he gets his sense of reality from them. By interacting intimately with him they define him. God has interacted intimately with me in such a way that I'm similarly convinced of his reality. Through interaction God redefined me in a manner somewhat similar to the way in which my parents defined me originally. All my personal assurances about personal existence have their roots in these interactions. It would not normally even occur to me to try to get such assurance from contemplating my thinking.

    These arguments don't satisfy the solipsism objection, but solipsism's an abstract philosophical concept that I can't take seriously. If that means my dues don't get paid, so be it. Your argument, I think, is that the most compelling way for me to know I exist is to contemplate my thinking; consequently, because of the solipsism possibility, I necessarily know my own existence more compellingly than the existence of any other entity. The above thoughts indicate I don't believe this is how the world works.

    In any case, the above thoughts say what I mean when I make strong claims for knowledge of God's existence. If a person outside yourself gives you your sense of personal reality, that person must be as real as you are.

    Don
Received on Mon Nov 8 02:42:57 2004