I’ve
been reading Logic: A God-Centered Approach to the Foundation of Western
Thought, by Vern Poythress.
i) The
best thing I can say about the book is that there are Christians (e.g.
Clarkians) who think logic begins and ends with Aristotle. The “three laws of
logic”; “If all men are mortal, and Socrates is a man…”
If they
read his book, it will disabuse them of that quaint, simplistic narrative. For
he reviews the history of logic, and brings it more up-to-date.
ii) That
said, my preliminary impression of the book is that it’s a huge missed
opportunity. A basic problem is his target audience. He tries very hard to
pitch his new book on logic to the average Christian layman. I think that’s a
fundamental misstep. On the one hand, I seriously doubt most non-philosophy
majors are going to slog through a 708-page monograph on logic, even if
Poythress bends over backwards to make it user-friendly.
On the
other hand, the treatment is too popular, too rudimentary, to satisfy
philosophy majors, much less fully trained philosophers. It’s too much for the
layman, and too little for the pro. It’s a book without a realistic audience. An
editorial compromise that won’t satisfy anyone.
iii) The
book has lots of juicy chapter titles, but when you dip into the chapters, the
actual treatment is very sketchy. His basic style of writing is almost
sermonic. I’m struck by the very loose quality of reasoning. He will take a
Biblical prooftext, then assert that this relates to something in logic. And
that’s about it. There’s very little intensive argumentation. It’s largely
reverent claims with illustrative prooftexts.
iv)
Ideally, a 708-page Christian monograph on logic would present a detailed case
for the theistic foundations of logic. Ideally, each chapter would contribute
to a cumulative case for the theistic foundations of logic. Poythress would
slowly but steadily construct his argument, a piece at a time.
Ideally,
he would compare and contrast his theistic model with secular models.
But from
my reading, the chapters aren’t related to each other in that linear,
progressive fashion. He isn’t building an argument from chapter to chapter. It
doesn’t really add up.
Rather,
each chapter discusses a different topic by giving a cursory overview. So the
overall treatment is fairly superficial. The analysis never digs down very far.
Instead,
it’s written like a home Bible study, or one-year devotional, with study
questions at the end of various chapters.
This is
disappointing, if not entirely unexpected. I’m sure he’s capable of operating
at a much higher level. He’s a Caltech grad with a doctorate in math from
Harvard. He studied logic under Hilary Putnam and Saul Kripke. And he’s clearly
been researching and ruminating on these issues for many years.
However,
I don’t think the popular audience is necessarily the only explanation for the
surface-level treatment. I think his Van Tilian view of divine
incomprehensibility severely limits how far he thinks we can or ought to
explicate the theistic foundations of logic. Analogy is the glass ceiling, and
the ceiling is low. Doesn’t take much to bump your head against the glass
ceiling of the Creator/creature distinction, or the immanence/transcendence
distinction. I think that’s the basic reason his analysis tends to peter out so
soon.
For him,
analogy is almost like a natural, impenetrable barrier. It conceals as much as
it reveals.
v) This
goes to a basic tension in his overall position. For instance, he says:
Something similar to this argument can be found in James N. Anderson and Greg Welty, “The Lord of Non-contradiction: An Argument for God from Logic.” But it appears to me that this article does not take into account the presence of analogy and the Creator-creature distinction in logical reasoning about God (69n4).
Now this
is the paragraph the footnote goes to:
In addition, let us remember that we are speaking of logic as it really is, not merely our human guesses and approximations. Logic in this sense is an aspect of the mind of God. All God’s attributes will therefore be manifested in the real laws of logic, in distinction from our human approximations of them (69).
So does
he think it’s possible to discuss logic in itself, or not? Isn’t he making a
statement about logic in itself, in contrast to mundane exemplifications of
logic? But in that case, mustn’t he sneak across the border to discuss logic
from the other side of the boundary? Isn’t that what he’s implicitly doing?
Hi Steve,
ReplyDeleteWhat would you suggest as an introductory primer on Logic and Critical Thinking for the lower-division undergrad instead?
Reason and Argument by P. T. Geach
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