Saturday, September 24, 2016

McGrew on Van Til

Timothy McGrew recently raised some fundamental objections to Cornelius Van Til:

In his Christian Theistic Evidences, Van Til spends several chapters critiquing a broadly evidentialist methodology of the kind I endorse, using Butler's Analogy of Religion as a foil:

Hume's empiricism was far more critical and consistent than that of Butler. We proceed to see what happens to the conception of probability on the basis of Hume's empiricism. If all knowledge is based upon experience, and experience is interpreted without the presupposition of the "Author of nature" as Hume claims it is, we cannot expect that one thing rather than another will happen in the future. From the point of view of logic, one thing as well as another might take place in the future.
As for reported miracles, Van Til claims that Hume undermined the credibility of miracle reports chiefly by showing that, on empiricist grounds, "there is no reason to think that a God who could work miracles can be proved to exist." In particular, according to Van Til, Hume demolished the empirical arguments–cosmological and teleological–for the existence of God in his Dialogues concerning Natural Religion…For anyone who, like Van Til, has fallen under the spell of the great Scottish skeptic and acquiesced in these melancholy conclusions, I have good news. Hume was wrong. He was wrong about inductive inference and his critique of induction, influential as it was, displays the poverty of his own understanding of probable inference. He was wrong in the objections he raised against the credibility of reported miracles and was resoundingly refuted on this subject by his own contemporaries, as even some modern agnostics have realized…[Hume] is mired in a deductivist framework... Four Views on Christianity and Philosophy, 108-09.

i) I agree with McGrew that Hume was wrong. However, it seems to me that in this instance, his objection to Van Til rests on a misinterpretation of Van Til. At least to judge by what he quoted, Van Til isn't making a statement about empiricism in general or empiricism per se, but naturalistic empiricism, which reduces everything to contingency. Van Til is remarking on what happens when you take empiricism to a logical extreme after denying the Creator. 

ii) In addition, although I myself affirm sense knowledge, it's dubious whether sensory perception alone is an adequate basis of knowledge. I think sense knowledge has to be supplemented. 

McGrew continues:

When someone starts out on the wrong foot, as I believe Van Til has done by his concessions to Hume, it is not surprising that problems tend to resurface throughout his philosophical system. To pick just one illustration, Oliphint quotes with apparent approval Van Tils' criticism of the non-Christian for whom
the law of contradiction is, like all other laws, something that does not find its ultimate source in the creative activity of God.
I find this sort of radical logical positivism unintelligible. I have no idea what it would even mean for what is logically possible and impossible to be the result of a creative act of God; the very notion of action seems to presuppose distinctions between actor and action that are intelligible only in terms of fundamental principles of logic. Ibid. 109-110.

Here McGrew seems to be on firmer ground. Van Til's statement about logic, in the passage quoted, does indeed appear to be nonsensical. 

McGrew goes on to say:

It is painful to have to point out things like this, since Van Til has inspired so many ardent and loyal disciples. But in my view, deep problems pervade almost every aspect of Van Til's thought–his epistemology, his history of philosophy, his description of the position of non-Christians, and his exegesis of Scripture. It is my considered opinion that there is no point in trying to correct his system pice by piece. One must simply start over on very different principles. Ibid. 110. 

Whether that's true or false would depend on McGrew successfully elaborating his allegations. I myself use different philosophers for different spare parts.

McGrew has his own package. I don't think we have to take it or leave it. We can disassemble the package and select some choice spare parts which we combine with spare parts from other thinkers. 

7 comments:

  1. McGrew says, When someone starts out on the wrong foot, as I believe Van Til has done by his concessions to Hume, it is not surprising that problems tend to resurface throughout his philosophical system.

    I think it's those who don't begin with God's providence who are actually conceding to Hume too much. Van Til was just exposing that and the deleterious effects that has on apologetics as a consequence. I do think Van Til was unwise or wrong (or at least unclear) in his repeated statements in which he implied or stated that the laws of logic are a product of God's creativity. Maybe he meant our finite creaturely myopic use of the laws of logic as opposed to the laws as they are known to God and part of God's own nature.

    But in my view, deep problems pervade almost every aspect of Van Til's thought–his epistemology, his history of philosophy, his description of the position of non-Christians, and his exegesis of Scripture.

    I do think the greatest area of VanTillian apologetics that needs further development is the area of epistemology. Sye Ten Bruggencate and his "Sye-Clones" have been exposed as weak in this area from both non-Christians and the more sophisticated presuppositionalists.

    ...his history of philosophy...

    Yeah, sometimes Van Til seems to oversimplify opposing philosophies and methods to the point of strawmanning them. Clark and Clarkians have documented some cases of that (e.g. regarding Aquinas). Even Van Til freely admitted that Clark was a better philosopher than he was.

    ...his description of the position of non-Christians...

    I think McGrew makes this statement due to his non-Calvinistic position and/or his insufficiently Biblical view of depravity and its noetic effects. I think Van Til pretty much is correct on this.

    ...and his exegesis of Scripture...

    By Van Til's own admission and with agreement of his disciples like Bahnsen and (especially) Frame, he didn't sufficiently ground and support his positions based on Biblical exegesis as much as he should have. Bavinck at least attempted to cite many Biblical passages that supported his position (even if some of them were questionable or sometimes amounted to near spooftexting).

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  2. "repeated statements in which he implied or stated that the laws of logic are a product of God's creativity."

    So the laws of logic are not created by God? Or do you mean that they are in fact 'simply' a part of who God is? Sorry, I am not trying to argue, just seeking to understand.


    "more sophisticated presuppositionalists."

    Who would some of these be (Bahnsen, Frame, Oliphant)? Again, just wanting to grow, as I am somewhat of a (rank amateur) Van Til fanboy.

    Thanks

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    1. "So the laws of logic are not created by God? Or do you mean that they are in fact 'simply' a part of who God is?"

      To say the laws of logic are created by God would be heretical. That would mean we could make logically contradictory statements about God. God is good and evil. God exists and doesn't exist. Nothing would be true or false about God.

      The correct position is that God's rationality constitutes the laws of logic. The laws of logic are necessary, because they reflect the structure of God's mind. Something like that.

      "Who would some of these be"

      Unfortunately, the talent pool for sophisticated Van Tilians is shallow, but it would include John Frame, James Anderson, and Vern Poythress. Other candidates include Don Collett and David Byron. I don't know of William Davis (philosophy prof. at Covenant College) is a Van Tilian.

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    2. I agree with everything Steve said. BTW, I make my criticism as a Van Tillian/Vantillian myself. That's why I wish Van Tillianism would prosper and further developed/refined. Less sophisticated Van Tillians (and Clarkians) for example are often ignorant of epistemological issues regarding fallibilism vs. infallibilism and externalism vs. internalism. If I recall correctly, Paul Manata once took "Sye-Clones" to task here on Triablogue for their naive insistence of requiring non-Christians to have an internalist and infallibilist constraint on knowledge. Which would imply Christians would need to too.

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    3. Richie, see for example Aquascum's criticism of Clarkian Scripturalism here:

      http://www.proginosko.com/aquascum/http://www.proginosko.com/aquascum/

      I'd begin with Aquascum's critique of Vincent Cheung's Modified Clarkian Scripturalism at the following link to see what disastrous effects on apologetics results from an internalist and infallibilist Christian position:


      A Response to Vincent Cheung
      http://www.proginosko.com/aquascum/cheung.htm

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  3. Thanks to both of you for the responses. I will work through the linked articles; pretty heady stuff for me.

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  4. It would be contrary to everything else Van Til says, including in this same book, to understand him to mean that God creates the law of contradiction. The contrast he is making is between the source of the law of contradiction being God, who creates the world in accordance with it, and those who deny that the world is God's creation and make the mind of man the source of the law of contradiction. Because the law of contradiction has its origin in God, there can be apparent contradictions because humans don't know all the facts, only God does. Therefore humans cannot declare some things impossible, like God's predestination of the responsible acts of men, because humans can't figure out how it is possible. But if the law of contradiction has its origin in the mind of man, then man can use the law of contradiction to exhaustively determine what is possible and not possible in the world. As Van Til writes earlier in this same book (Common Grace and the Gospel), "Faith abhors the really contradictory; to maintain the really contradictory is to deny God. Faith adores the apparently contradictory; to adore the apparently contradictory is to adore God as one's creator and final interpreter."

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