Apostate Dale Tuggy tries to short-circuit Christian theology by appealing to his list of 20 "self-evident truths":
In this first part, I discuss the 20 self-evident truths below. If they really are so, then you can use them in judging between rival speculations about God, his Son, and his spirit.And if they really are self-evident, then it is not “begging the question” to appeal to them when some Trinity theory or other is at issue, for what is self-evident will typically be more evident overall than some planks of that theory. To sacrifice the less evident in favor of the more evident is to yield to reason. To maintain a pet claim against what is obvious is to stubbornly resist reason.
Before discussing some specific examples, I'll make a general observation regarding Tuggy's philosophical prejudice. There's a philosophical bias that's especially common in naturalism. Many atheists invoke Occam's razor. They regard ontological simplicity as a philosophical virtue. Examples include monism (physicalism), finitism (in math and modality), the uniformity of nature (pace miracles).
Ironically, unitarianism reflects the same prejudice. Intellectual impatience and hostility regarding metaphysical complexity (e.g. the Incarnation, the Trinity) and hermeneutical complexity (e.g. the OT subtext of NT Christological claims).
In the history of ideas, there's an opposing bias: the principle of plenitude. Abstract objects. Possible worlds. The multiverse.
Newtonian physics is simpler than Relativity and quantum mechanics. The math is simpler, and it has a simpler view of physical reality. But that doesn't make it true.
Now let's review some of Tuggy's "self-evident truths":
#6. According to NT authors, the Father and the one God are one and the same.
i) It's philosophically inept for Tuggy to classify that as a self-evident truth, for even if it were true, it's not a truth of reason, but a revealed truth. Not something we can know a priori or intuitively.
ii) Dale means the Father is the one God exclusive of the Son.
#7. The “spirit of” a self is not supposed to be a different self than that self.
i) Is that self-evident or idiomatic?
ii) How does Tuggy's assertion compare with these statements?
The spirit of Elijah rests on Elisha. (2 Kgs 2:15).he [John the Baptist] will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah (Lk 1:17).
If Elisha and John the Baptist exemplify the spirit of Elijah, yet the “spirit of” a self is not supposed to be a different self than that self, then by Tuggy's logic, Elisha, Elijah, and John the Baptist are the same self or individual. Does Tuggy subscribe to reincarnation?
iii) If the Spirit of God is not a different self from God himself, whom Tuggy equates with the Father, then the Father and the Spirit are the same self or individual. But in that event, what are we to make of statements like:
16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, 17 even the Spirit of truth...26 But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name... (Jn 14:17,26).10 these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God (1 Cor 2:10-11).
If the Spirit of God is synonymous with the Father, according to Tuggy's equivalence, then these passages reduce to:
16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Father, to be with you forever, 17 even the Father…26 But the Father, whom the Father will send in my name... (Jn 14:17,26).10 these things Father has revealed to us through the Father. For the Father searches everything, even the depths of the Father (1 Cor 2:10-11).
Does that make a lick of sense?
#20 The “Holy Spirit” in the NT is never portrayed as or taught to be an appropriate object of religious worship.
i) How is that self-evident? Did Tuggy intuit that? Even if we grant his interpretation for the sake of argument, how is appealing to the way the NT portrays the Holy Spirit a self-evident truth?
ii) That's simple-minded. We don't need a specific command to worship the Spirit. Rather, that's inferable from a truth about the nature of God's Spirit. If the Spirit of God is divine, then the Spirit is a proper object of worship, because God is a proper object of God.
iii) If, according to Tuggy's equivalence, the Spirit is identical to the Father or the one God (since the "spirit of X" is not a different X from X), then it follows by Tuggy's own logic that the Spirit is a proper object of worship, since the Spirit of God is indistinguishable from God.
#19. The “Holy Spirit” in the NT is never portrayed as enjoying an interpersonal relationship with the Father or with Jesus.
i) How is that a self-evident truth? Surely that's not an analytical truth. Self-evidence is typically defined as needing only to be understood to be known. Tuggy is resorting to a very idiosyncratic definition of self-evidence.
ii) In addition:
26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. 27 And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God (Rom 8:26-27).
If the Spirit is an intermediary between the Father and Christians in prayer, if the Father knows the mind of the Spirit, how can that fall short of an "interpersonal relationship" with the Father? Or take this passage:
10 these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. 11 For who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God (1 Cor 2:10-11).
If the Spirit searches the depths of God, how is that not an interpersonal relationship with the Father? Moreover, notice Paul's comparison, where the Spirit's relationship to God is analogous to introspection: how the mind engages in self-reflection. But if Paul describes the Spirit as God's consciousness or self-consciousness, how can that be anything less than an interpersonal relationship with the Father?
#13. No self is composed of other selves. (Selves can’t combine to form compound selves.)
i) What makes that a self-evident truth? Consider debates about personal identity and temporal parts. Endurantism or perduratism.
ii) Recently, I happened to be walking past an elementary school during recess. It had fenced-in playground right by the sidewalk. That suddenly reminded me of when I was in grade school, 50+ years ago. My older self-remembering my younger self. In my mind's eye, I can see my younger self on the playground. In so doing, I assume a third-person viewpoint in relation to…me! The perspective of an outside observer. And that's not just psychological. Rather, that's an objective distinction, for my older self exists outside the timeframe of my younger self. Different years. Different decades. Am I one self or a composite self? A competing theory of persistence might be mistaken, but it can't be discounted by a magisterial dismissal ("My position is self-evident. Nya, nya, nya, nya, nya!").
Steve, simplicity a desideratum - of course, not the only one - of theory-making in science, and really, just in common life. All other things being equal, we all prefer a simple explanation to a more complex one, e.g. in solving a crime.
ReplyDeleteIt is true, of course, that people vary in how patient they are willing to be with wild speculations in christology and in theology. One can, on the face of it, be either too dismissive, refusing to listen, or too indulgent, endlessly cutting slack to speculations just heavily beset with difficulties.
"#6. According to NT authors, the Father and the one God are one and the same.
i) It's philosophically inept for Tuggy to classify that as a self-evident truth, for even if it were true, it's not a truth of reason, but a revealed truth. Not something we can know a priori or intuitively."
It's a common error to confuse first principles or self-evident truths with truths know a priori (i.e. not on the basis of any experience, but only through conceptual analysis). The above truth is not one of those, of course, but is something an unbiased reader simply discerns in the NT texts. It's no harder than understanding that one character in a novel is supposed to be a different person (and so, being) than another character. As another example, Reid would say, when you are looking at apple right in front of you (in a well lit room, and your eyes are working, etc) that it is self-evident to you then that there is an apple right there. Notice the dependence on the visual experience. In my case, there is a dependence on reading, with basic comprehension.
"If Elisha and John the Baptist exemplify the spirit of Elijah, yet the “spirit of” a self is not supposed to be a different self than that self, then by Tuggy's logic, Elisha, Elijah, and John the Baptist are the same self or individual. Does Tuggy subscribe to reincarnation?"
ReplyDeleteSteve, this is convoluted - you're typing too fast or something. Using "the spirit of X" to mean the power that was operative in X - that is wholly consistent with my point that the spirit of X isn't supposed to be someone in addition to X. That's just another usage, in addition to the common one I linked in the Psalms in the post, where you talk about "the spirit of X" meaning just, X himself, or inner part or aspect of him - again, not an additional self.
"If the Spirit of God is not a different self from God himself, whom Tuggy equates with the Father, then the Father and the Spirit are the same self or individual."
Yes, IF in that instance the "spirit" was meant to be a self. But often, it is a power or aspect of the one whose spirit it is. Admittedly, biblical spirit-talk is confusing to us.
"16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, 17 even the Spirit of truth...26 But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name... (Jn 14:17,26).
10 these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God (1 Cor 2:10-11)."
The solution here is simple: God's spirit is being personified here, being spoken of as if it were a self. As with, e.g. God's wisdom in Pr 8 and elsewhere. If you think this "does make a lick of sense," I wonder why you think personification is so... senseless.
Not only is personification (talking about something other than a self as if it were a self) common, but also, we can do the opposite - we can talk about self as if it were not. This is why the disputes about how to understand talk of "the holy spirit" in the NT have been so seemingly intractable. One could, in principle, describe a self as "falling on" people, "being poured out" on people, and people getting "dunked in it." The question is, though, which view best makes sense of the whole biblical witness.
Steve, you throw quite a fit about "the holy spirit" never being an object of worship in the NT. But again, this is simple reading comprehension - and many have pointed this out, whatever their theological commitments. It is just an observable fact about the texts. Sure, you can deduce that the h.s. should be worshiped from his literally being a self, and his being a "fully divine" self - further dubious deductions from the texts. But it is a glaring fact that "he" or it is simply left out of the worship scenes and discussions of worship. What, overall, is the best explanation of that? It seems to us, that it is that early Christians thought this was not a self in addition to God and Jesus.
ReplyDelete"#19. The “Holy Spirit” in the NT is never portrayed as enjoying an interpersonal relationship with the Father or with Jesus."
So, it becomes evident upon simply reading the NT, with basic comprehension. Where does the h.s. speak to them, obey them? Why does it lack a proper name? Where is it portrayed as literally cooperating with God and Jesus, in the way they are taught, e.g. in John, to be working as one?
I think those passages you cite are about the closest anyone can come to challenging #19. If the spirit is literally an intermediary, he's got to be a literal self - only a self can do that. But, it is not clear that this is to be taken literally - notice that your 1 Cor 2 passage compares God's spirit to ours - but clearly, "the spirit of Steve" is not someone in addition to Steve! It's just Steve, or an aspect or part of him, which is not literally a self.
It is important, I think, not to cherry pick just these vivid personifying passages. We must look at all the talk of God's "spirit" or "Spirit" in the NT, and much of it seems impersonal.
ReplyDelete"#13. No self is composed of other selves. (Selves can’t combine to form compound selves.)"
"i) What makes that a self-evident truth? Consider debates about personal identity and temporal parts. Endurantism or perduratism."
I explain this in the episode. It strikes me that we always, in all practical affairs, and basically in any context whatever outside of extreme sci-fi and trinitarian speculations, refuse to consider selves as combining. I don't claim to know this as a necessary truth, because I don't see that its falsehood is obviously impossible. But, I am claiming that we do (absent defeaters acquired by speculation or tradition) know this.
Now, I had in mind only parts-at-a-time. But yes, I think that as stated, this is contradicted by theories of personal identity on which, e.g. Steve is really composed of Steve-stages - thought of as selves existing each at a single moment on the timeline. This, in my view, is wrongheaded for so many reasons. But yes, some metaphysicians are willing to take such views seriously. But, and this is important, you should know going in that many philosophers will run roughshod over the truths of common sense - just look at Reid's list, various elements of which were contradicted by the speculations of people like Berkeley, Descartes, Leibniz, and Spinoza.
In general, "But some philosopher disagrees!" is not a good reason to reject what, otherwise, you have reason to think is a principle of common sense. Basically, for any seemingly obvious truth whatever, you can find, if you dig hard enough, some very smart and creative philosopher whose pet theories require that claim to be false.
"ii) Recently, I happened to be walking past an elementary school during recess. It had fenced-in playground right by the sidewalk. That suddenly reminded me of when I was in grade school, 50+ years ago. My older self-remembering my younger self. In my mind's eye, I can see my younger self on the playground. In so doing, I assume a third-person viewpoint in relation to…me! The perspective of an outside observer. And that's not just psychological. Rather, that's an objective distinction, for my older self exists outside the timeframe of my younger self. Different years. Different decades. Am I one self or a composite self? A competing theory of persistence might be mistaken, but it can't be discounted by a magisterial dismissal ("My position is self-evident. Nya, nya, nya, nya, nya!")."
Steve, honestly, you don't have a developed, coherent position on the sameness of human selves through time.
About the "nya" taunt, my position is the same as Reid's. Obviously, that I say something is self-evident doesn't make it so. We can argue about whether or not such and such is really a principle of common sense, and he gives some criteria to look out for - but I won't go into those here. Those are in the second podcast in the recent Reid series.