Posted by John West  7/02/2018 2:25 pm | #21 |
Anyway, it doesn't matter. I actually think the questionable premise in the accidental property objection apodictic. I have a clear sense of what I mean by that, too, and it's probably not the same as what you mean by self-evident.
I don't think the impossibility of freak happenings (or, perhaps, coincidences) apodictic. (In fact, I think there are arguments for some kinds of brute facts. I made one of them in a post to UGADawg right after I got back a few months ago.)
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Posted by John West 7/02/2018 2:50 pm | #22 |
(To be fair, the discussion is kind of rigged in the skeptic's favour. I only need to argue that the dispute over the PSR's metaphysical significance is undecided (in the sense from a couple days ago) to argue that we should therefore suspend judgment and refuse to take sides in it. You have produce an argument that determines the dispute one way or the other. It's an interesting question whether an argument that isn't probative, and so leaves open the possibility of being overturned at some point in the future, can actually do that.)
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Posted by Miguel 7/02/2018 3:21 pm | #23 |
John West wrote:
Anyway, it doesn't matter. I actually think the questionable premise in the accidental property objection apodictic. I have a clear sense of what I mean by that, too, and it's probably not the same as what you mean by self-evident.
I don't think the impossibility of freak happenings (or, perhaps, coincidences) apodictic. (In fact, I think there are arguments for some kinds of brute facts. I made one of them in a post to UGADawg right after I got back a few months ago.)
I agree with the libertarian free will response to your argument.
I don't think so-called coincidences pose problems for strong PSR and I take strong PSR to be self-evident, but I think it's also important to keep in mind a difference between full blown PSR and a principle that requires explanations for the existence of contingent things. I think every contingent fact needs explanations, but someone who doubts that may still find reason (even of self-evidence) to accept a limited PSR. While someone may think there may be no sufficient reason for some contingent acts, they can still accept (even as self-evident) that no contingent thing can exist, let alone remain in existence, without a sufficient reason.
If someone thinks the accidental properties objection really is unimpeachable, perhaps they can doubt the classical theism inference rather than suspend judgment about brute facts. It would be another strategy. Though I don't see it as promising either, so I understand.
Last edited by Miguel (7/02/2018 3:42 pm)
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Posted by Miguel 7/02/2018 3:32 pm | #24 |
It's not the "circular" proof that is probative; the argument would stand on its own. It's an inference to the best explanation. What is assumed is that IBE is a legitimate form of argument. If, however, it turns out that IBE depends on PSR - and I think it does - then it would be circular.
Inferences to the best explanation aren't probative by definition. I'm, however, talking about any argument that is circular, whether it's a proof or not, if the PSR has the status we're supposing it does for the sake of conversation.
And I don't mean to insult with the word "magic", just convey how it seems to me in the context of PSR's self-evidence. After all, magic is basically a rejection of PSR and PPC; that a small wooden wand can somehow produce huge thunders and fireballs, a surplus effect coming from nowhere, etc.
What you're doing, whether you realize it or not, is relying on caricatures and hyperbole to make your case seem more plausible than it is. Is it really so implausible that, in our universe, there might be freak happenings? (If we have to take the PSR as a transcendental presupposition, that more or less explains why we don't experience any.) I don't think it is.
I realize the bad conotations of the word "magic", but I think it's appropriate. If it seems bad to accept something like "I suspend judgment about magic", I think that's suggestive of a tacit acceptance of PSR (or at least an inclination in its favor). Calling them "freak happenings" instead of magic doesn't make them any less bad; a contingent thing cannot exist without a sufficient reason, and an effect cannot be greater than its cause. I do find it completely absurd, and if I didn't, I'd have no serious objection to magic. And I'm talking metaphysics. If you think a contingent thing can really exist with no explanation whatsoever, well, that's you. I know I can't bring myself to reject PSR as a metaphysical principle, or suspend judgment.
"Any argument that is circular" like what? Perhaps I'm not understanding you. As I said, I take most arguments for PSR to be formulated like a dilemma. IBE is a great example. Is IBE justifiable without presupposing PSR as a metaphysical principle? If not, we should accept PSR, by modus tollens (or abandon IBE, but I take it that most people wouldn't want to do that); If it is, then we can make non-circular arguments for PSR from IBE. Then we'd have to see how PSR as "transcendental presupposition" fares against PSR as a metaphysical principle when it comes to explaining why contingent things don't just snap out of existence; why they don't pop into existence for no reason; why contingent things don't undergo unexplained changes, etc.
Last edited by Miguel (7/02/2018 3:40 pm)
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Posted by John West 7/02/2018 3:41 pm | #25 |
I agree with the libertarian free will response to your argument.
It's a good reply. (Dan is a smart guy.) But it throws you back into the accidental property objection and other oddities involved in reconciling Divine Simplicity and Divine Freedom.
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Posted by John West 7/02/2018 3:42 pm | #26 |
I don't think so-called coincidences pose problems for strong PSR and I take strong PSR to be self-evident, but I think it's also important to keep in mind a difference between full blown PSR and a principle that requires explanations for the existence of contingent things.
Sure, and I've replied with a PSR restricted to existence in mind until the post I linked the coincidence thread in. (I confess that after rejecting the two stronger versions of the PSR, I'm starting to wonder whether there isn't something even weaker, that doesn't lead to the conclusions you would like, that I should be looking for, though.)
If someone thinks the accidental properties objection really is unimpeachable, perhaps they can doubt the classical theism inference rather than suspend judgment about magic.
But I also find the existential proof and some of the other classical arguments persuasive. (I don't come at the existential proof from the perspective of someone doing natural theology. I come at it from the perspective of someone investigating the problem of Being.) So, I suspend judgment over theism as well.
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Posted by Miguel 7/02/2018 3:56 pm | #27 |
"I confess that after rejecting the two stronger versions of the PSR, I'm starting to wonder whether there isn't something even weaker, that doesn't lead to the conclusions you would like, that I should be looking for, though."
Like what? I've tinkered with many alternative principles over notes and arguments, and the best bets I could come up with were some modal principles of the sort "everything that can have an explanation, has an explanation". So if someone has independent reason for thinking there can be no explanation for the existence of contingent beings, they can avoid that and still maintain some level of metaphysical explicability in the world.
But such a principle would face many problems. One is the issue of how to account for local chance/order without admitting of general, cosmic chance/order (as Pruss argues in his article on probability and PSR); another is the arguments of modal uniformity by Rasmussen; other general problems would be the fact that the principle would have less explanatory power, by all its applications it should entail that nothing should exist; also the problem of persistence, etc.
There is also Kleinschmidt's proposal in "reasoning without the principle of sufficient reason" but it's insufficient to justify our predilections for explanations in many cases, and I think it'd also fall prey to the above issues.
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Posted by John West 7/02/2018 4:00 pm | #28 |
I realize the bad conotations of the word "magic", but I think it's appropriate.
Let's put aside the hyperbolic “magic” and just talk about what we're talking about: brute facts. If I suspend judgment over the metaphysical significance of the PSR, I thereby suspend judgment over the existence of brute facts. (It's not some additional act. It's the same and justified the same as the previous.) The PSR just is the claim that there are no brute facts over some domain.
If you think a contingent thing can really exist with no explanation whatsoever, well, that's you. I know I can't bring myself to reject PSR as a metaphysical principle, or suspend judgment.
Me and a lot of the most brilliant philosophers through time and space (which, of course, points to a traditional problem with making metaphysical judgments on the back of truths about one's self).
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Posted by Miguel 7/02/2018 4:05 pm | #29 |
I realize the bad conotations of the word "magic", but I think it's appropriate.
Let's put aside the hyperbolic “magic” and just talk about what we're talking about: brute facts. If I suspend judgment over the metaphysical significance of the PSR, I thereby suspend judgment over the existence of brute facts. (It's not some additional act. It's the same and justified the same as the previous.) The PSR just is the claim that there are no brute facts over some domain.
If you think a contingent thing can really exist with no explanation whatsoever, well, that's you. I know I can't bring myself to reject PSR as a metaphysical principle, or suspend judgment.
Me and a lot of the most brilliant philosophers through time and space (which, of course, points to a traditional problem with making metaphysical judgments on the back of truths about one's self).
Yes, and a lot of the most brilliant philosophers through time and space thought it *self-evident* that no contingent thing can exist without any explanation. Aquinas, Leibniz, Clarke, Spinoza and more are not bad company to be with. They'd take it as absurd that anyone could even suspend judgment about this issue.
It doesn't take away the legitimacy of self-evidence. Pruss also writes a bunch on this very topic in his book on PSR.
We (at least I do) take LEM to be self-evident even though there are some brilliant mathematicians who reject it. Should this fact take away LEM's self-evidence for those who find it self-evident? I don't think so.
Last edited by Miguel (7/02/2018 4:07 pm)
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Posted by John West 7/02/2018 4:18 pm | #30 |
"Any argument that is circular" like what? Perhaps I'm not understanding you. As I said, I take most arguments for PSR to be formulated like a dilemma. IBE is a great example. Is IBE justifiable without presupposing PSR as a metaphysical principle?
You might have lost the thread of the conversation. You wrote:
I think technically one might be able to construct arguments without assuming PSR, at least on the surface, but I'm not entirely sure if there's no assumption of PSR behind everything (for instance, it could be that appeals to principle of indifference, so common in many arguments, actually presuppose PSR).
I started my circularity argument: “Suppose it's true”, and meant “Suppose it's true that there is an assumption of PSR behind everything".
