tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post4387388927095869338..comments2024-03-27T17:15:37.606-04:00Comments on Triablogue: Pre-Wired for Atheism or Theism?Ryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809283662428917799noreply@blogger.comBlogger60125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-56745056710327242062010-08-03T08:28:32.960-04:002010-08-03T08:28:32.960-04:00David B. Ellis said:
Would you care to finally ad...David B. Ellis said:<br /><br /><b>Would you care to finally address the plausibility issue I raise (yet again) above and which you still have not addressed? The one which Irredenta was also asking you to deal with when he/she asked:<br /><br /><i>Patrick and Crude, if you think it's possible to have a model of the world which is wrong in every particular yet generates correct bahaviors and is consistent with sense perception, would you be so kind as to explain how it would work?<br /><br />No stories about tigers, please.</i><br /><br />I'm wondering about that as well.</b><br /><br />1. Since I don't think "it's possible to have a model of the world which is wrong in every particular yet generates correct bahaviors [sic] and is consistent with sense perception," there's nothing to which I need respond.<br /><br />2. BTW, as a friend points out: "He [Ellis] also talks about the senses working properly, but that's not part of the *cognitive* faculties. The relevant cognitive faculty here would be covered by *perception*, i.e., the *beliefs* produced by or held on the basis of the senses." <br /><br /><b>You seem, in this whole discussion, to be ignoring that it's Plantinga who is making a claim which is strongly counter-intuitive (to the point of sounding absurd). So it is he who has the burden of supporting that claim. A burden he has failed to met.</b><br /><br />You seem, in this whole discussion, to be ignoring that it's you who initiated the criticism of the EAAN here. Sure, you could say in the wider public arena of academic scholarship and so forth Plantinga shoulders a burden of proof. But as far as this combox is concerned, since you're the one who initiated the debate, it's on you to make good on your initial criticism.Patrick Chanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16095377877712197984noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-5044014972590972062010-08-02T18:37:28.287-04:002010-08-02T18:37:28.287-04:00DAVID B. ELLIS SAID:
“Never having been a bee or ...DAVID B. ELLIS SAID:<br /><br />“Never having been a bee or ant I can't be sure if they have consciousness or are merely biological automata. Either way, though, it seems that they must use their sensory inputs to model their environment with reasonable accuracy to navigate it successfully.”<br /><br />You initially responded by casting the issue in terms of beliefs, cognitive faculties, information processing, mental models, conscious life, and minds. You later contrasted mindless trees with gazelles.<br /><br />But bees and ants can’t “mentally model” their environment unless they have minds. There has to be something behind the sensory inputs to interpret the sense data. <br /><br />So are you attributing “true beliefs” to social insects? Do they have the brainpower to entertain beliefs?<br /><br />If you reject physicalism, what’s your alternative? Substance dualism? Panpsychism? <br /><br />Unless you can justifiably impute mental states to ants and bees, you can’t attribute mental models to ants and bees. You can’t say they survive due to their adaptive beliefs about their environment. As such, you can’t say natural selection selects for true beliefs. So do true beliefs/models confer a survival advantage or not?stevehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16547070544928321788noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-53412998138111613892010-08-02T18:06:09.319-04:002010-08-02T18:06:09.319-04:00This comment has been removed by the author.Steve Rublehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10354805604015803912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-52617342913065051132010-08-02T17:51:31.518-04:002010-08-02T17:51:31.518-04:00This comment has been removed by the author.Steve Rublehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10354805604015803912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-81771506717086298552010-08-02T13:21:40.101-04:002010-08-02T13:21:40.101-04:00Unlike a tree, social insects have to navigate the...<b><br />Unlike a tree, social insects have to navigate their environment. Does this mean bees and ants have true "beliefs" about their environment?<br /></b><br /><br />Never having been a bee or ant I can't be sure if they have consciousness or are merely biological automata. Either way, though, it seems that they must use their sensory inputs to model their environment with reasonable accuracy to navigate it successfully.<br /><br /><br /><b>Isn't that a problem for physicalism, which reduces minds to brains? What's the brainpower of an ant?</b><br /><br />I don't see why that would be a problem for physicalism. But even if it were, not being a physicalist, it's no problem for me.<br /><br />I'm agnostic on the metaphysical question of what the most basic "stuff" of reality is. I don't know and I don't see any evidence anyone else knows either.David B. Ellishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09468191085576922813noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-51618408006804645872010-08-02T09:43:44.542-04:002010-08-02T09:43:44.542-04:00DAVID B. ELLIS SAID:
Do you really have such diff...DAVID B. ELLIS SAID:<br /><br />Do you really have such difficulty recognizing that plants and animals have radically different survival needs?<br /><br />A tree does not navigate it's environment. It stands rooted in one spot and it's cells just carry on doing what they do.<br /><br />A gazelle, on the other hand, must find water, find food, avoid danger obstacles, avoid predators and so on. It is not reasonable to suppose that this can be done if that gazelle is acting on a grossly inaccurate model of it's environment. The fact that trees survive without minds in no way changes this utterly obvious fact.<br /><br />*********************************<br /><br />And what about social insects like bees and ants? Unlike a tree, social insects have to navigate their environment. Does this mean bees and ants have true "beliefs" about their environment? <br /><br />Isn't that a problem for physicalism, which reduces minds to brains? What's the brainpower of an ant?stevehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16547070544928321788noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-44373949346675009512010-08-02T07:59:52.356-04:002010-08-02T07:59:52.356-04:00This comment has been removed by the author.Steve Rublehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10354805604015803912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-81810355255306768492010-08-02T07:59:08.875-04:002010-08-02T07:59:08.875-04:00This comment has been removed by the author.Steve Rublehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10354805604015803912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-56817269694671458542010-08-02T07:58:25.512-04:002010-08-02T07:58:25.512-04:00I am irredenta. I configured my blogger account to...I am irredenta. I configured my blogger account to give me a real name.<br /><br />Crude, you're really unpleasant to talk to. You don't seem to have any interest in actually thinking about your opponents positions, or trying to address the strongest version of your opponents arguments. You also veer off into irrelevant tangents and bizarre sarcastic personal attacks ("atheistic, left-leaning car"?), which makes understanding your points even more difficult.<br /><br />I don't know why you're bringing "panpsychism" into this conversation, or why you think it's important to dispute whether thermometers have beliefs. It doesn't matter whether Roomba builders put beliefs into Roombas, as no one here is arguing that Roombas are the kinds of things which have beliefs. Everyone here agrees that <i>humans</i> have beliefs, and that's what we're discussing.<br /><br />Humans have beliefs which model the world and are developed and updated through sensory observation and reflection. We generate behaviors by imagining potential behaviors and checking the outcomes based on our internal models. We are quite often wrong in our predictions, sometimes because our models are missing aspects of the world, sometimes because we don't think things through. Nevertheless, David and I are arguing that such models must track reality to some degree. We argue this because we think it is terminally implausible that a human could have a model of the world <i>which is entirely wrong</i> and still generate behaviors which are survival enhancing. We've asked you repeatedly for some argument to the effect that such a thing is possible or plausible, which you have repeatedly failed to provide. Instead you talk about how things without beliefs don't need beliefs (we agree), and have completely missed the point.<br /><br />You came very close to understanding when you said, "...on N+E, it's the act which is selected for, not the content of belief that precipitated the act." We know. What we're arguing is that you have given us no reason to think that beliefs which have utterly incorrect content can consistently precipitate survival enhancing acts. Why do you disagree, and what reasons do you have?Steve Rublehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10354805604015803912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-35076430653734238742010-08-02T07:58:11.883-04:002010-08-02T07:58:11.883-04:00I am irredenta. I configured my blogger account to...I am irredenta. I configured my blogger account to give me a real name.<br /><br />Crude, you're really unpleasant to talk to. You don't seem to have any interest in actually thinking about your opponents positions, or trying to address the strongest version of your opponents arguments. You also veer off into irrelevant tangents and bizarre sarcastic personal attacks ("atheistic, left-leaning car"?), which makes understanding your points even more difficult.<br /><br />I don't know why you're bringing "panpsychism" into this conversation, or why you think it's important to dispute whether thermometers have beliefs. It doesn't matter whether Roomba builders put beliefs into Roombas, as no one here is arguing that Roombas are the kinds of things which have beliefs. Everyone here agrees that <i>humans</i> have beliefs, and that's what we're discussing.<br /><br />Humans have beliefs which model the world and are developed and updated through sensory observation and reflection. We generate behaviors by imagining potential behaviors and checking the outcomes based on our internal models. We are quite often wrong in our predictions, sometimes because our models are missing aspects of the world, sometimes because we don't think things through. Nevertheless, David and I are arguing that such models must track reality to some degree. We argue this because we think it is terminally implausible that a human could have a model of the world <i>which is entirely wrong</i> and still generate behaviors which are survival enhancing. We've asked you repeatedly for some argument to the effect that such a thing is possible or plausible, which you have repeatedly failed to provide. Instead you talk about how things without beliefs don't need beliefs (we agree), and have completely missed the point.<br /><br />You came very close to understanding when you said, "...on N+E, it's the act which is selected for, not the content of belief that precipitated the act." We know. What we're arguing is that you have given us no reason to think that beliefs which have utterly incorrect content can consistently precipitate survival enhancing acts. Why do you disagree, and what reasons do you have?Steve Rublehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10354805604015803912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-67141935515700327922010-08-01T17:18:03.334-04:002010-08-01T17:18:03.334-04:00David, you've already conceded that the natura...<b><br />David, you've already conceded that the natural world is filled to the brim with organisms who are successful survival-wise despite having in your view *no* beliefs, and which I point out can be expanded to either *no* beliefs or *wildly incorrect* beliefs.<br /></b><br /><br />Do you really have such difficulty recognizing that plants and animals have radically different survival needs?<br /><br />A tree does not navigate it's environment. It stands rooted in one spot and it's cells just carry on doing what they do.<br /><br />A gazelle, on the other hand, must find water, find food, avoid danger obstacles, avoid predators and so on. It is not reasonable to suppose that this can be done if that gazelle is acting on a grossly inaccurate model of it's environment. The fact that trees survive without minds in no way changes this utterly obvious fact.<br /><br />Again, something you would almost certainly acknowledge without reservation if it weren't for the fact that an argument by a prominent Christian apologist depends on denying it.David B. Ellishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09468191085576922813noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-48875921942897893382010-08-01T16:03:39.168-04:002010-08-01T16:03:39.168-04:00What I'm saying is something so obvious none o...<i>What I'm saying is something so obvious none of you would be disputing it if it hadn't been associated with an argument from a well-known Christian apologist:<br /><br />that acting on a grossly inaccurate model of the world is likely to quickly result in death.</i><br /><br />David, you've already conceded that the natural world is filled to the brim with organisms who are successful survival-wise despite having in your view *no* beliefs, and which I point out can be expanded to either *no* beliefs or *wildly incorrect* beliefs.<br /><br />So think about the two claims you're making here:<br /><br />1) Acting on a grossly inaccurate model of the world is likely to quickly result in death!<br />2) Acting with absolutely no model of the world is compatible with survival and evolutionary success!<br /><br />I'm pointing out that this is ridiculous. I'm also pointing out, not merely with Plantinga but *with naturalists*, that whether the model is accurate or inaccurate means diddly according to natural selection. Acts are what are selected for, based on the Darwinian model - even those borne of inaccurate or false beliefs, so long as they encourage acts which contribute to survival. And arguing that, hey, it just so happens that true beliefs confer across the board positive fitness, is sacrificing naturalism. Not that anyone cares anymore, it seems.<br /><br /><i>Would you care to finally address the plausibility issue I raise (yet again) above and which you still have not addressed? </i><br /><br />The hell I haven't! I spelled it out again for you above: You're telling me that life which does, in your view, zero modeling whatsoever is capable of thriving and surviving. But somehow, the moment you think the organisms are capable of making a model, those models *must be true largely and for the most part*. Surviving with zero beliefs, not counterintuitive. Surviving with false beliefs, counterintuitive.<br /><br />I find that... counterintuitive. And honestly, if all you've got for me now is "Well... I find that hard to believe! I see no problem with evolution being rigged to favor truth and true beliefs across the board!", then what more is there to say here? You've got nothing but an inconsistent position and incredulity. You can have 'em. Hell, evolution may select for acts borne of that!<br /><br />And as I keep saying: Hey, if you want to dig in your heels and defend an evolutionary theory re-imagined such that truth and true beliefs are on the whole always favored over false beliefs, you do that. You'll have plenty of company. Just, it'll be at Biologos, or the Templeton Foundation, and among some Intelligent Design theorists.<br /><br />One more time: If your answer to Plantinga is to claim that it's tremendously counterintuitive to you that evolution does not operate in a teleological manner, Plantinga's argument has done its job.Crudehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04178390947423928444noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-69819236556534201932010-08-01T15:40:33.639-04:002010-08-01T15:40:33.639-04:00Irredenta,
Crude, do you feel like you are arguin...Irredenta,<br /><br /><i>Crude, do you feel like you are arguing consistantly and in good faith? I ask because your switch from claiming emphatically that you Roomba has no beliefs to finding it plausible that thermometers may have beliefs makes it look like you don't care what you say, as longv as it makes you feel correct.</i><br /><br />Baloney!<br /><br />First, I didn't say I found it plausible. I said I found it wild! But I also admitted that I know of no way to verify such, nor does anyone else apparently.<br /><br />Second, the point of the Roomba example was that the good people at iRobot aren't in the business of constructing subjective beliefs for the Roomba to have it function adequately. It is purely a third-person, extrinsic, mechanical endeavor for them. That remains the case whether the Roomba has no subjective consciousness / beliefs, or somehow some.<br /><br />If you want to tell me that thermometer manufacturers have to be panpsychists who take into account the thermometer's consciousness to create a thermometer, by all means do so. In that case, though - how would you like to own an atheistic, left-leaning car? Yours for a very low price of half a mill. It looks like a kind of beat up Toyota I haven't driven in a while, but what can I say - you seem like someone who knows value when you see it.Crudehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04178390947423928444noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-70798482634367391192010-08-01T09:56:39.123-04:002010-08-01T09:56:39.123-04:00All you're saying is that you believe in your ...<b><br />All you're saying is that you believe in your heart of hearts that if a given organism is capable of making a model or having a belief, then that model or belief is going to be truthful and accurate far more often than not.</b><br /><br />What I'm saying is something so obvious none of you would be disputing it if it hadn't been associated with an argument from a well-known Christian apologist:<br /><br />that acting on a grossly inaccurate model of the world is likely to quickly result in death.<br /><br /><b><br />But Plantinga, and many others, give plenty of examples where acts born of false belief or even no belief can be adaptive.</b><br /><br />And no one disputes this. What's disputed is whether globally inaccurate models of the world wouldn't tend to be eliminated by natural selection. Again, Plantinga has merely raised a logical possibility. He has done nothing to address plausibility (which is unsurprising---doing anything but gloss over this issue only makes it obvious how absurd his argument is).<br /><br />Would you care to finally address the plausibility issue I raise (yet again) above and which you still have not addressed? The one which Irredenta was also asking you to deal with when he/she asked:<br /><br /><i>Patrick and Crude, if you think it's possible to have a model of the world which is wrong in every particular yet generates correct bahaviors and is consistent with sense perception, would you be so kind as to explain how it would work?<br /><br /> No stories about tigers, please.</i><br /><br />I'm wondering about that as well. You seem, in this whole discussion, to be ignoring that it's Plantinga who is making a claim which is strongly counter-intuitive (to the point of sounding absurd). So it is he who has the burden of supporting that claim. A burden he has failed to met.David B. Ellishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09468191085576922813noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-23124503465139625422010-08-01T08:52:19.694-04:002010-08-01T08:52:19.694-04:00Dusman, if you're willing to reduce Plantinga&...Dusman, if you're willing to reduce Plantinga's argument to the trivial claim that people have mistaken beliefs and that mistaken beliefs can improve survival rates, I'm quite willing to go along with you. However, that does remove the force of Plantinga's argument, as it gives us no reason to think that our underlying belief-forming processes are fundamentally unreliable. <br /><br />To say, with Dawkins, that <i>some</i> heuristics under <i>some</i> circumstances generate beliefs which have historically been survival-enhancing but do not correspond to reality as we understand it today is not to say that <i>all</i> belief forming processes are terminally unreliable. To say otherwise is equivalent to saying that any belief forming process which ever produces false beliefs must be discarded, which leaves you a Cartesian skeptic.<br /><br />Plantinga's story about the Paul and the tiger is stupid because, while it purports to be part of an argument about belief-forming processes, it speaks only to the possibility of the existence of incorrect beliefs, and not at all to how those beliefs came to exist. It therefore has nothing to do with the argument. <br /><br />No evolutionary biologist tells stories about "dinosaurs turning into birds, fish turning into lizards, and people coming from rocks", as I'm sure you know. It's your bedtime stories, after all, which describe people coming from rocks - "the dust of the ground" I think it's called.Steve Rublehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10354805604015803912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-76170859836493388992010-08-01T08:26:08.764-04:002010-08-01T08:26:08.764-04:00Irrendenta,
You said,
"Plantinga's stu...Irrendenta,<br /><br />You said, <br /><br /><i>"Plantinga's stupid story about Paul and the tiger . . ."</i><br /><br />and <br /><br /><i>"No stories about tigers, please."</i><br /><br />O.k., we won't tell anymore stories about tigers as long as you don't tell us stupid bedtime stories about dinosaurs turning into birds, fish turning into lizards, and people coming from rocks.<br /><br />Regarding your question, if you want an atheist to make Plantinga's point for him, just go to Chapter 5 in <i>The God Delusion</i> where Richard Dawkins argues that *false* religious beliefs have led to adaptive behavior that produced survival value.<br /><br />If you don't like Plantinga's "stupid story about Paul and the tiger", then don't appeal to the stupid evolutionary fairy tales that come from your own atheistic backyard. <br /><br />DusmanDusmanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18050174688923887698noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-78922813459468916762010-08-01T06:25:43.416-04:002010-08-01T06:25:43.416-04:00Patrick and Crude, if you think it's possible ...Patrick and Crude, if you think it's possible to have a model of the world which is wrong in every particular yet generates correct bahaviors and is consistent with sense perception, would you be so kind as to explain how it would work?<br /><br />No stories about tigers, please.Steve Rublehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10354805604015803912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-17911460806745307292010-08-01T05:52:30.767-04:002010-08-01T05:52:30.767-04:00Crude, do you feel like you are arguing consistant...Crude, do you feel like you are arguing consistantly and in good faith? I ask because your switch from claiming emphatically that you Roomba has no beliefs to finding it plausible that thermometers may have beliefs makes it look like you don't care what you say, as longv as it makes you feel correct.Steve Rublehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10354805604015803912noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-37263435870396080252010-08-01T02:25:25.987-04:002010-08-01T02:25:25.987-04:00David B. Ellis said:
Yes, the idea that "bei...David B. Ellis said:<br /><br /><b>Yes, the idea that "being generally "truth-tracking" is an excellent path to survivability" is an assertion rather than an argument.<br /><br />And would you like to know why I felt absolutely no need to make an argument for it:<br /><br />because it's a) obviously true, and b) not something Plantinga disputed.</b><br /><br />1. You've got it completely wrong. Looks like Crude already dealt with you here though.<br /><br />2. Honestly, have you read Plantinga's EAAN? Or at least the Wikipedia article on the EAAN? Are you making all this up on the fly (e.g. Googling every time a new term comes up you're not familiar with)? That's what it seems like you're doing.<br /><br />3. At this point, you're just repeating yourself despite what I and others have already pointed out is faulty in your thinking.<br /><br />4. In addition, even though you're essentially repeating yourself, I'll point out you're likewise backing down from your original claims in this combox. What you say in later comments is weaker than what you've originally contended. Sorta like a chorus singing the same old song but with a diminishing voice.Patrick Chanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16095377877712197984noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-49568649288490270492010-08-01T00:28:07.292-04:002010-08-01T00:28:07.292-04:00You raise a good point. Bacteria, plants and other...<i>You raise a good point. Bacteria, plants and other nonconscious life survive despite not forming mental models of their environment of any kind---accurate or inaccurate. </i><br /><br />Nonconscious? We know they're nonconscious now? Since when?<br /><br />There are philosophers and physicists who say freaking thermometers are / may be conscious, to say nothing of cells and plants and such. Sounds kinda wild to me, but I also haven't seen anyone come up with a way to check out their claims. That problem of other minds gets set aside for convenience's sake, not because it's solved.<br /><br />For all we know, thermometers and plants and bacteria have conscious thoughts. Maybe even beliefs! But if they do, they are treated as epiphenomenal as far as evolutionary theory + naturalism is concerned. And I think that extends to animal life as well.<br /><br /><i>So, obviously, some life can survive without modeling it's environment. I accept then that this requires a minor revision in what I said:</i><br /><br />Minor revision? Seems a lot more than minor to me. Conceding that there are large classes of life which can thrive and adapt, yet their "minds" are either non-existent or non-important as far as NS is concerned is pretty big. It's illustrating that on N+E, it's the act which is selected for, not the content of belief that precipitated the act. <br /><br />All you're saying is that you believe in your heart of hearts that if a given organism is capable of making a model or having a belief, then that model or belief is going to be truthful and accurate far more often than not. But Plantinga, and many others, give plenty of examples where acts born of false belief or even no belief can be adaptive. Hell, "widespread delusion leading to adaptive behavior" is a regular skeptic schtick. <br /><br />But we're supposed to believe that evolution happens to be set up in such a way where, while it's possible for organisms with no beliefs to adapt and thrive, and possible for organisms with deceptive or untrue beliefs to adapt and thrive, the whole process is skewed in such a way that guarantees the overall perfection and selection of truth? And also that this is just hunky-dory on naturalism, the metaphysic which (at least once upon a time) was committed to the view that minds and the mental aren't privileged in nature?<br /><br />As I said, pull the other one.<br /><br /><i>Again, it's not that it's "ordered toward truth". It's that inaccurate cognitive models of the environment are an obstacle to survival and would tend to be eliminated by natural selection.</i><br /><br />And again: Six of one, half a dozen of another. It's teleological evolution, it's front-loading, it's non-naturalistic evolution. It is an inclusion of direction in the evolutionary process on a fundamental level.<br /><br />It's also just the tip of the iceberg for the EAAN, since getting beliefs and mental causation into the physical world without gutting the sort of naturalism Plantinga is talking about (materialism, prior to panpsychism and various flavors of dualism being relabeled "materialism") is damn difficult on its own. But the fact that Plantinga's EAAN puts some naturalists in the position of having to argue that fundamental concerns skew the trajectory of evolution towards truth and true beliefs is enough to make it a successful argument.Crudehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04178390947423928444noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-60843744298671250692010-07-31T23:28:47.520-04:002010-07-31T23:28:47.520-04:00"Accurate modeling of one's environment&q...<b><br />"Accurate modeling of one's environment"? So when biologists study bacteria that thrive in a given environment, those biologists are talking about the bacteria's subjective beliefs? Pull the other one!</b><br /><br />You raise a good point. Bacteria, plants and other nonconscious life survive despite not forming mental models of their environment of any kind---accurate or inaccurate. <br /><br />So, obviously, some life can survive without modeling it's environment. I accept then that this requires a minor revision in what I said:<br /><br />It is not that accurate mental models are necessary to all life forms for their survival (it can't be since some don't have minds). But for beings who DO have minds and form mental models of their environment it is not plausible that they could be using grossly inaccurate models and still have much chance of surviving in it. This is pretty obvious (it's why the argument from reason is so counter-intuitive) and I don't think Plantinga's EAAN has provided any reason to doubt that this is so. And lacking any reason for thinking this idea false the reliability of cognitive faculties presents no problem for naturalism.<br /><br /><b><br />He's pointing out that conceiving of evolution as a process ordered towards truth and towards producing agents with true beliefs is as "naturalistic" as a Tiplerian or DeChardinian Omega Point.</b><br /><br />Again, it's not that it's "ordered toward truth". It's that inaccurate cognitive models of the environment are an obstacle to survival and would tend to be eliminated by natural selection.David B. Ellishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09468191085576922813noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-48648397846684234282010-07-31T22:02:53.622-04:002010-07-31T22:02:53.622-04:00Except, of course, that I'm saying nothing of ...<i>Except, of course, that I'm saying nothing of the sort. It's not truth that occupies a privileged status. It's survival.</i> <br /><br />Six of one, half a dozen of another. To say 'Survival is all that matters! And coincidentally, true beliefs are universally privileged with regards to survival!' is simply to restate what I've said. Mmm, teleological evolution. It's the future, you know.<br /><br />Your reworking of natural selection is a natural selection that fits poorly with naturalism. And there's that horn.<br /><br /><i>Truth-tracking (in broad strokes, at least: accurate modeling of one's environment) is just the only plausible way known for the "goal" of survival to be achieved.</i><br /><br />And this is obfuscation about the sort of truth and belief Plantinga is talking about. "Accurate modeling of one's environment"? So when biologists study bacteria that thrive in a given environment, those biologists are talking about the bacteria's subjective beliefs? Pull the other one!<br /><br />"Accurate modeling" in that situation would reduce to bare act devoid of subjective belief. And that reduction goes far beyond bacteria.<br /><br /><i>Having sensory apparatus and cognitive processes that reliably "model" the world (again, within limits---it's hardly a secret that we're capable of cognitive errors) is the only way we know of for long-term survival to be plausible (and I rather doubt that there are others waiting to be discovered).</i><br /><br />This is mere obfuscation. Your "reliable sensory apparatus and "models"" reduces to bare conditioned act and nothing more. You can argue that my Roomba "accurately models its environment" because its algorithms are set up in such a way to perform a good to very good job when cleaning floors (maximizing coverage, etc). But unless you want to walk down a panpsychist or similar, the roomba has no beliefs, "true" or otherwise. It doesn't think "This a very efficient method for cleaning Crude's floor!" <i>Nor does it have to</i>. It just has to clean the floor.<br /><br />You can apply certain beliefs to my Roomba in an extrinsic manner - you can talk about how it has "great truth tracking" and "reliable sensory apparatus", if by truth tracking you mean a code it follows without thought and mechanisms that do what the good people at iRobot designed them to do. But you haven't introduced truth or true beliefs or even beliefs at all to my roomba intrinsically. And you haven't gotten them into nature either.<br /><br />Plantinga does not deny that evolution can produce beings and populations that act in ways which are conducive to survival. In fact, it's central to his argument. Nor is he arguing that no type of evolutionary development or history can accomplish this. He's pointing out that conceiving of evolution as a process ordered towards truth and towards producing agents with true beliefs is as "naturalistic" as a Tiplerian or DeChardinian Omega Point.Crudehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04178390947423928444noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-28130914060626058272010-07-31T21:32:10.034-04:002010-07-31T21:32:10.034-04:00And arguing that "truth" occupies a priv...<b><br />And arguing that "truth" occupies a privileged place in natural selection is to wreak havoc on naturalism. <br /></b><br /><br />Except, of course, that I'm saying nothing of the sort. It's not truth that occupies a privileged status. It's survival. Truth-tracking (in broad strokes, at least: accurate modeling of one's environment) is just the only plausible way known for the "goal" of survival to be achieved.<br /><br />Which is why this "problem":<br /><br /><b><br />And therein lies a major problem. Natural selection selects for survival, period. Not truth, certainly not true beliefs.</b><br /><br />is no problem at all. <br /><br />Having sensory apparatus and cognitive processes that reliably "model" the world (again, within limits---it's hardly a secret that we're capable of cognitive errors) is the only way we know of for long-term survival to be plausible (and I rather doubt that there are others waiting to be discovered).<br /><br /><b><br />Now, we can certainly augment natural selection and evolutionary theory, such that "true beliefs" are somehow arranged in a particularly and privileged slot, either universally ("Natural selection always and everywhere on average favors acts tied to true beliefs over false ones") or particularly ("For beings which reach cognitive threshold X, natural selection will always and everywhere on average favor acts tied to true beliefs over false ones").</b><br /><br />Accurate modeling of the world and how it works is needed for survival. And accurate modeling of the world allows, once beings become intelligent enough for abstract thinking of a high order, for people to check their beliefs against observation.<br /><br />I'm not at all, and most naturalists would agree, saying that people are inclined toward true beliefs without qualification. Quite the contrary. Human beings are inclined toward believing a host of falsehoods.<br /><br />But the groundwork necessary to survival, accurate modeling of one's environment, makes correction of the errors toward which we are prone correctible (much of the history of human intellectual progress has been precisely in ever more refined methods of correcting our natural cognitive errors and flaws).<br /><br />And, finally, I think it's worth noting the absence of engagement with modern cognitive science, evolutionary psychology or any other relevant scientific fields in Plantinga's stumbling through this territory. There is little indication in anything I've read by him on this topic that shows that he's even bothered learning the basics about the complex scientific disciplines directly relevant to this issue.David B. Ellishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09468191085576922813noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-23110129353208129032010-07-31T20:21:26.534-04:002010-07-31T20:21:26.534-04:00Yes, it cares only for survival. The problem for P...<i>Yes, it cares only for survival. The problem for Plantinga's argument is that being generally "truth-tracking" is an excellent path to survivability.</i><br /><br />This response relies on some tremendous obfuscation about what Plantinga is talking about, and ignores the heart of what Churchland herself is highlighting. And arguing that "truth" occupies a privileged place in natural selection is to wreak havoc on naturalism. That's not "unfortunate" for his argument, it's a horn for the naturalist to be impaled on.<br /><br />Let's say that engaging in act X confers a net survival advantage to species A. Does engaging in act X only work if members of species A has true beliefs about what they are doing? Say act X is, as is the popular example, "runs away from tigers". Will act X only work if members of species A run away from tigers because "that tiger is going to eat me!"? What if they engage in act X because "that tiger is a pterodactyl in disguise!" or "it's a lot of fun"?<br /><br />No. If act X confers a survival advantage, the beliefs or reasons for engaging in act X don't matter. Simply engaging in act X matters, for whatever reason - true or false or even no conscious reason at all.<br /><br />And therein lies a major problem. Natural selection selects for survival, period. Not truth, certainly not true beliefs.<br /><br />Now, we can certainly augment natural selection and evolutionary theory, such that "true beliefs" are somehow arranged in a particularly and privileged slot, either universally ("Natural selection always and everywhere on average favors acts tied to true beliefs over false ones") or particularly ("For beings which reach cognitive threshold X, natural selection will always and everywhere on average favor acts tied to true beliefs over false ones"). Rather like how Conway Morris argues that there are certain environmental niches that always exist and will inevitably be filled, such that human life is actually pretty much inevitable evolutionary speaking.<br /><br />But this saves evolution by knifing naturalism in the gut. Now, far from being a blind, indifferent process without goals or guidance, now we have a rigged game - true beliefs are particularly favored. Evolution now looks one hell of a lot more teleological, guided, front-loaded, etc.<br /><br />Again, people seem to forget that part of Plantinga's argument is that evolution is *acceptable for the non-naturalist*. It isn't an argument against evolution, it's an argument against a naturalistic rendering of evolution. Come up with a way for truth and true beliefs to be favored by evolution, sure. You haven't defeated Plantinga's argument. You've succumbed to it.Crudehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04178390947423928444noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-43887539930908224952010-07-31T19:28:19.398-04:002010-07-31T19:28:19.398-04:00That wasn't what I said, I said, "from th...<b><br />That wasn't what I said, I said, "from the standpoint of atheism . . .", which of course assumes naturalism and evolution. <br /></b><br /><br />The atheist is not, however, obligated to prove that his cognitive faculties are reliable. Both Plantinga and naturalists share the belief that they are---it is not a point in dispute. The question is whether Plantinga is right in thinking that his argument provides a good case for thinking this a problem for naturalism.<br /><br /><b><br />But it was you who brought up the reliability of the senses in your initial comment as a means to bolster the idea that given naturalism and evolution our cognitive faculties are reliable...</b><br /><br />The question of the reliability of sense perception is not the same thing as the problem of induction. I can see how you might have made that sort of error---they're similar sorts of issues. But, regardless, not really the same problem.<br /><br /><b><br />I was simply pointing out that the problem of induction is a defeater for your defeater-defeater for the EAAN.</b><br /><br />Please elaborate when you get the chance. And I'm not so much presenting a defeater as simply arguing that Plantinga doesn't make his case on a crucial point---he only points out the logical possibility of globally unreliable cognitive faculties that result in consistent survivability rather than making a case for it's plausibility.<br /><br />At least I'm not aware of him ever doing so. If you know of anywhere he does please quote him doing so (again, when you get the chance---no hurry).David B. Ellishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09468191085576922813noreply@blogger.com