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1/08/2016 7:42 pm  #1


Feser's Articles on Islam

I know that these articles are not yet a month old, so I don't want to engage in substantive discussion, but if anybody hasn't read them yet the following articles that he posted recently are quite excellent:

http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2015/12/christians-muslims-and-reference-of-god.html

http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2016/01/canine-theology.html

http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2016/01/liberalism-and-islam.html

I felt like he hit a dry spot for most of December, and then these things appeared. The last one I would be willing to call magisterial- well exceeding the scope of its given topic and delving into things such as the natural relationship of theology to the state.

Go read them all. Read them right now. Don't come back until you do.

Last edited by iwpoe (1/08/2016 7:43 pm)


Fighting to the death "the noonday demon" of Acedia.
My Books
It is precisely “values” that are the powerless and threadbare mask of the objectification of beings, an objectification that has become flat and devoid of background. No one dies for mere values.
~Martin Heidegger
 

1/09/2016 6:17 am  #2


Re: Feser's Articles on Islam

Also, I recently engaged in a similar conversation about reference between Muslims and Christians with Feser's articles as supporting references, and I was literally told (by someone clearly totally confused by the distinction being made):

"You are confused, but your pride won't let you find clarity. In the privacy of your room, get on your knees and say out loud: Jesus is my Lord and Savior."


Fighting to the death "the noonday demon" of Acedia.
My Books
It is precisely “values” that are the powerless and threadbare mask of the objectification of beings, an objectification that has become flat and devoid of background. No one dies for mere values.
~Martin Heidegger
     Thread Starter
 

1/09/2016 8:26 am  #3


Re: Feser's Articles on Islam

Alexander wrote:

iwpoe wrote:

Also, I recently engaged in a similar conversation about reference between Muslims and Christians with Feser's articles as supporting references, and I was literally told (by someone clearly totally confused by the distinction being made):

"You are confused, but your pride won't let you find clarity. In the privacy of your room, get on your knees and say out loud: Jesus is my Lord and Savior."

I'm not sure you're picking the best people with whom to debate philosophical points.  

You get all kinds of people in all kinds of different places. Other people in the discussion were much better than that, but few still grasped the ulimate point, despite any number of examples. In terms of being able to find a good audience, this is one of the worst philosophical debates I've ever had. Popularly very few people seem to understand that you can be dead wrong about what you're referring to and still be referring to the same thing as somone who is right about it.

Last edited by iwpoe (1/09/2016 8:29 am)


Fighting to the death "the noonday demon" of Acedia.
My Books
It is precisely “values” that are the powerless and threadbare mask of the objectification of beings, an objectification that has become flat and devoid of background. No one dies for mere values.
~Martin Heidegger
     Thread Starter
 

1/09/2016 10:42 am  #4


Re: Feser's Articles on Islam

I think the debate over whether Christians and Muslims worship the same God is very difficult and ultimately of little consequence. Your interlocutor is an example of that tendency; a lot of Protestants seem to worry that if you admit that someone else worships the same God, then you are admitting that they are doing what is sufficient for salvation.

I like Bill Vallicella's commentary on the topic. I don't think the question has an easy resolution. Bill even doubts that Christians and Jews worship the same God, on the basis that Judaism might preclude the Trinity. I don't think that's defensible.

I imagine a conversation between a Jew and Christian in the first millenia might go something like this:

Christian: The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob has revealed himself in the person of Jesus Christ.
Jew: I do not think that is the case; God could not be human, so I do not see how that is possible.

They might each characterize their dispute as one over the nature of the God of Abraham. It would seem odd if either accused the other of disbelieving in his God, which each believes to be the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

It's much less obvious to me that sharing classical theism is sufficient for commonality of reference. Sometimes it seems to be. Suppose Christianity and classical theism are both true, and an argument like Aquinas's First Way is sound. Then, perhaps, Aristotle would have contemplated the Christian God, for his argument is substantially similar to Aquinas's, and he learned of the Unmoved Mover's existence through that argument. The Christian, then, acknowledges that Aristotle's argument succeeds, and that there would be a problem for Christianity if the Unmoved Mover exists but isn't the God of Christianity. That Aristotle may have thought some things about the Unmoved Mover that Christianity denies doesn't undermine this.

 

1/09/2016 10:49 am  #5


Re: Feser's Articles on Islam

Consider also this post by Bill Vallicella. He proposes an aporetic triad:

A. Worship Entails Reference:  If S worships x, then S refers to x.
B. Reference Entails Existence: If S refers to x, then x exists.
C. Worship Does Not Entail Existence: It is not the case that if S worships x, then x exists. 

He says that A is "above reproach," but the only support he adduces for it is the following:

While there is much more to worship than reference, and while reference to a god or God can take place without worship, it is surely the case that whatever one worships one refers to, whether publicly or privately, whether in overt speech or in wordless thought.

But if reference entails existence, that doesn't seem obvious and unimpeachable at all. If reference entails existence, then all genuine reference is successful reference. I suppose that (A) would only be plausible if corresponding principles for other propositional attitudes are. But if you think that all genuine reference is successful reference, then mentioning doesn't entail reference, nor does believing, or else Vallicella's triad here is not per se about worship at all.

 

1/09/2016 11:10 am  #6


Re: Feser's Articles on Islam

Greg wrote:

But if reference entails existence, that doesn't seem obvious and unimpeachable at all.

I agree. Suppose I belong to a religion that claims to worship the present King of France (as the true incarnation of God the Son, for example). Vallicella's A and B together would entail that, since there is no such entity, we can't really be worshipping what we say we're worshipping. That may be true in an objective sense (i.e. it's not the case that a relation of "worshipping" obtains between us and a real object), but it's certainly not true according to our subjective intentions. My suspicion is that there's an equivocation on "reference" here and that the implication fails for "subjective" reference based on intention (and intension).

It seems to me, that is, that A is "unimpeachable" only with regard to what I've called subjective reference, but B holds only for objective (what you call "successful") reference. I think that's equivalent to what you're suggesting.

And in that case, of course, A and B together don't imply ~C, so there's no apory.

Last edited by Scott (1/09/2016 7:01 pm)

 

1/09/2016 6:14 pm  #7


Re: Feser's Articles on Islam

Greg wrote:

It's much less obvious to me that sharing classical theism is sufficient for commonality of reference. Sometimes it seems to be. Suppose Christianity and classical theism are both true, and an argument like Aquinas's First Way is sound. Then, perhaps, Aristotle would have contemplated the Christian God, for his argument is substantially similar to Aquinas's, and he learned of the Unmoved Mover's existence through that argument. The Christian, then, acknowledges that Aristotle's argument succeeds, and that there would be a problem for Christianity if the Unmoved Mover exists but isn't the God of Christianity. That Aristotle may have thought some things about the Unmoved Mover that Christianity denies doesn't undermine this.

Maybe this is just an artifact of how I got into this, but I think that classical theology is more than sufficient to have you correctly oriented such that you've got common reference. (How is reference usually cashed out? I think I have some artifact in my head of Heidegger on the phenomenology of pointing and orientation guiding me here, & I don't want to talk past the analytic people.)

The reason I think this is, and there's some debate about this but it seems quite obvious that this is the idea, is because all of the classical arguments are fundamentally oriented towards demonstrating some aspect or another of a unifying transcendent / transcendental ground of all that is. This is a definite and particular metaphysical space, and anything that could be God in the sense that the Abrahamic religions are talking about would have to fill it. I'm inclined to think that you've got that orientation even if you don't have full blown classical theism. As long as what you're aiming at when you're talking about God is fundamental reality, and not say just some super being, then you've got enough to be in the same place that the Greeks the Jews the Arabs and the Latins got to, and I take that to be sufficient to constitute common reference, even if, for instance the arguments don't work. One takes one's object of demonstration before one commences the argument, not the reverse.


Fighting to the death "the noonday demon" of Acedia.
My Books
It is precisely “values” that are the powerless and threadbare mask of the objectification of beings, an objectification that has become flat and devoid of background. No one dies for mere values.
~Martin Heidegger
     Thread Starter
 

1/17/2016 2:25 pm  #8


Re: Feser's Articles on Islam

Greg wrote:

It's much less obvious to me that sharing classical theism is sufficient for commonality of reference. Sometimes it seems to be. Suppose Christianity and classical theism are both true, and an argument like Aquinas's First Way is sound. Then, perhaps, Aristotle would have contemplated the Christian God, for his argument is substantially similar to Aquinas's, and he learned of the Unmoved Mover's existence through that argument. The Christian, then, acknowledges that Aristotle's argument succeeds, and that there would be a problem for Christianity if the Unmoved Mover exists but isn't the God of Christianity. That Aristotle may have thought some things about the Unmoved Mover that Christianity denies doesn't undermine this.

 
In my view, classical theism, if it means anything (and I strongly believe it does), then it should serve as the basis to clarify whether a certain religion or spiritual system refers to this or that kind of g/God.. Therefore I would dispute any doubts that classical theism is sufficient to commonality of reference.

edit: Classical theism as a philosophical system is like a tool of general linguistic analysis. All people have a language. However, "dog", if the word exists in those languages, doesn't necessarily refer to the same thing, and if the languages have a word for dog, the word doesn't necessarily look or sound the same. But all languages can refer to a dog. Whether a particular word in a particular language refers or doesn't to a dog can be figured out by means of general linguistic analysis. Similarly, classical theism has a concept of God and means of analysing whether a certain spiritual philosopher/theologian is referring to it or not. Not all Christians do and not all Muslims do. It's highly dubious to say Christianity does but Islam does not, as if there were one single, presumably Catholic, Christianity. What about the Orthodox and Protestants? What about the oldest Christian nations, namely Ethiopia and Armenia? Catholic (or any other) theology does not translate straightforwardly into classical theism and classical theism does not translate straightforwardly into Christianity. Professor Feser occasionally drops the distinction between them, but the distinction matters. /edit

Towards the beginning of his longest post on the subject, professor Feser distinguishes God-of-the-philosophers (as best defined in the philosophy of classical theism, we all agree I assume) from Christian God, but later in the same blogpost he names Christianity where classical theism would be more appropriate. He contrasts Christianity and Islam sharply, wishing to prove Christianity right and Islam wrong (this is most evident in the "canine theology" piece, where all other religions miss a leg in comparison with Christianity).

My point is, if God-of-the-philosophers is a thing - a thing more relevant to socio-political considerations for the State than Christianity - then canine theology is not a thing and there should have been no blog post about it.

As much as I respect professor Feser's philosophical analysis of religions and ideologies, I have little respect for his politics and economics. And in this case even his philosophical analysis is limping a leg. I will probably say more about it in a month.

Last edited by seigneur (1/17/2016 2:38 pm)

 

1/17/2016 5:36 pm  #9


Re: Feser's Articles on Islam

I think the canine theology post merely means to settle an internal conflict amongst Christians about what it would mean *to Christians* to accept that Muslims worship the same God. Tons of Christians think, essentially, this admission would make Christianity redundant for Muslims, as a computer makes a typewriter redundant with respect to typing.


Fighting to the death "the noonday demon" of Acedia.
My Books
It is precisely “values” that are the powerless and threadbare mask of the objectification of beings, an objectification that has become flat and devoid of background. No one dies for mere values.
~Martin Heidegger
     Thread Starter
 

1/18/2016 3:36 am  #10


Re: Feser's Articles on Islam

Alexander wrote:

I don't read Feser as trying to prove Christianity right and Islam wrong. Obviously, he does think Christianity is right, and Islam is wrong, but I don't think you would need to accept such a view to agree with much of what he says in the posts (I think it's perfectly compatible with a neutral position toward both).

His posts are neutral, if you ignore much (even most) what he writes. In several paragraphs, he writes "Christianity" or even "Catholicism" where "classical theism" would be more appropriate and more balanced.. And he writes "Islam" instead of "Wahhabi/fundamentalist Salafi". I must assume that he either means what he writes or he is occasionally overlooking important distinctions on a host of delicate and nuanced topics, so that he ends up presenting a pro-Catholic spin where it's inappropriate.

Christianity is definitely more than Catholicism and classical theism is emphatically not peculiar to Christian doctrines and violence/injustice is not somehow more inherent to Islam than to Christianity, yet several of his passages seem to be repeatedly asserting the contrary on all these points. For example he says that crusades were essentially a defensive affair. In reality, the fourth crusade sacked Constantinople and went no further (meaning, the slogan of defence of Holy Land was empty propaganda). Constantinople never properly recovered from the crusade, Muslims eventually conquered it and stood soon enough at Vienna. So there.

I am unwilling to read professor Feser by way of misrepresentation. I will assume he meant what he wrote. What he wrote weakens my trust for the way he sees politics. He writes about liberalism, Christianity, and Islam as political forces. While I agree with much that he writes about the nature of liberalism, as soon as he mentions some names of supposed liberals, I am at loss. In what way is Sam Harris, a very loud proponent of G. W. Bush's crusade (G. W. Bush's own term), a liberal? Probably Feser labels Harris liberal because Harris is atheist (even though he isn't, he is a sneaky advocate of vulgarized/de-spiritualized/profaned Buddhist doctrine of emptiness), but how is atheism sufficient or inherent to liberalism? Etc.

 

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