tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post9120339368724140975..comments2024-03-27T17:15:37.606-04:00Comments on Triablogue: Hearing a broken recordRyanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17809283662428917799noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-87108742511025330222009-05-06T22:37:00.000-04:002009-05-06T22:37:00.000-04:00"One of the mistakes I think we non-Clarkians have...<I>"One of the mistakes I think we non-Clarkians have made, is assuming that every aspect of the "system" has been laid out by Clark. I no longer think this is true"</I>Which non-Clarkians? My experience has been that the non-Clarkians I'm familar with have been pleading with Clarkians to spell out their system more rigourously. Part of the problem, as I (and others) see it, is that the system has *not* been laid out.<br /><br />Furthermore, I'm more concerned with how contemporary Clarkians think Clark should be taken (Clark himself is ambigious at many places). Given that, I find it hard to square any of your 1-10 with what various Scripturalists themselves have said.<br /><br />So, let's begin with Robbins, a stipulative expert Clarkian exegete:<br /><br />********<br /><br />Robbins summarizes his and Clark’s position: “Epistemology: The Bible tells me so… Scripturalism does not mean, as some have objected, that <B>we can know only the propositions of the Bible. We can know their logical implications as well…</B> Now, most of what we colloquially call knowledge is actually opinion: We “know” that we are in Pennsylvania; we “know” that Clinton - either Bill or Hillary - is President of the United States, and so forth. Opinions can be true or false; we just don’t know which. History, except for revealed history, is opinion. Science is opinion. Archaeology is opinion. John Calvin said, “I call that knowledge, <B>not what is innate</B> in man, nor what is by diligence acquired, but what is revealed to us in the Law and the Prophets.” Knowledge is true opinion with an account of its truth.<br /><br />**********<br /><br />So, again, I must say that your interpretation of Clark is out of line with Clark's best interpreters. And I find it hard to square with what you say Robbins admitted and what he clearly admits above.<br /><br />Further claims by Scripturalists:<br /><br />*********<br /><br />It may very well be that William Clinton is President of the United States, but I do not know how to prove it, nor, I suspect, do you. In truth, I do not know that he is President, I opine it.<br /><br />Sean’s Scripturalist friend on the puritan board: “Yes, from a Scripturalist worldview, if a proposition can not be deduce from Scripture, then we can’t “know” if it’s true or false.”<br /><br /><br />Gerety says knowledge is limited to: “that which can be known to Scripture and all those things necessarily deducible from Scripture.”<br /><br /><br />Vincent Cheung: “”All knowledge comes from biblical propositions and their necessary implications”<br /><br />Gary Crampton in his review of Reymond shows his disagreement: “And more than once he refers to knowledge being justified by means of history and experience (478, 678), whereas Scripture alone is the sole means of justifying knowledge,…”<br /><br /><br />***********<br /><br /><br />So, again, I find it confusing why you wouldn't want to beat this dead horse since Scripturalists defeat themselves every time they open their mouths and propose claims that are supposed to have positive epistemic status but, on their terms, clearly do not.<br /><br />Furthermore, it seems enough to point out the self-referentially incoherent nature of their system, repeatedly if needs be. It points out that Scripturalism is just as obviously false as Humean empiricism. Both get to the same destination, ironically.<br /><br />Now, if a Scripturalist wants to come along and claim that Robbins, Gerety, Crampton, Cheun et al have all been wrong; well, then, I'm all ears!Errorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10615233201833238198noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6789188.post-26391078406057751912009-05-06T21:26:00.000-04:002009-05-06T21:26:00.000-04:00It is my attempt to fill out the tacit steps in th...It is my attempt to fill out the tacit steps in the Clarkian position. It would not bother me in the slightest if my attempt could be improved upon, either by a Clarkist, or a sympathetic non-Clarkian. To evaluate the system, I want the most robust statement of it that is possible.<br /><br />One of the mistakes I think we non-Clarkians have made, is assuming that every aspect of the "system" has been laid out by Clark. I no longer think this is true. I think he has argued for several of the steps (e.g. my 1-5), but left others unspecified (e.g. 6-10). This is probably because he was not ready to commit to the others. He may have thought that there are several possible ways to flesh out the system. He insisted on those points that he felt confident about. I got (6), for example, from an informal discussion with Robbins a few years ago. Perhaps Clark himself wanted to leave the "mechanism" flexible.<br /><br />Certainly, he argued for (5) in a variety of places.<br /><br />Clark argued for (2) in a variety of places; the second half would be confirmatory in terms of the "axiom."<br /><br />The exposition of the system has to be bootstrapped at some point. Why not allow a meta-discussion in which the principles can be elucidated? Perhaps, as you say, "an axiomatic model fall[s] prey to conventional objections to classical foundationalism" -- but then, why not focus the critique on that point?<br /><br />Likewise, if the Clarkian grants (6), then your question, "Wouldn’t this form of divine illumination render Biblical revelation superfluous? Who needs a historic, verbal revelation if we enjoy innate knowledge equivalent to the content of Scripture?" would be a good one to focus on.<br /><br />To your points to #9: I don't think Clark would wither at the accusation of fideism, properly defined. Moreover, "sincere falsehoods" would be deplored by everyone, but shouldn't we concede that every humanly-articulated system probably contains at least one falsehood? The focus should be on how to minimize the assertion of falsehoods, not caricature that lamentable situation as "ethically obligatory."<br /><br />It seems like Clark will grant that some deliverances of reason are inescapable. Again, this is in the category of meta-system.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com