Post 4400475 - Re: Why Plantinga's EAAN fails (Why Plantinga's EAAN fails)

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Why Plantinga's EAAN fails

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Declension
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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 4:33 pm Post subject:

Ironically, Plantinga's mistake is the exact same mistake that many hyper-Darwinists make. He overestimates the extent to which evolution should be expected to provide nice "stories" for how things are the way they are. Not every aspect of human behaviour can be taken in isolation and analysed from a Darwinian viewpoint. It is much more likely that, when you have a sufficiently complicated brain, complicated behaviours emerge that were never selected for. It even seems plausible to me that language was never selected for.

simon_says
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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 4:43 pm Post subject:

AngelRho wrote:

simon_says wrote:

Personal relationships are a function of real world brain chemistry and likely evolved as survival strategies, like any social animal.

How you leapt from assigning special status to human relationships, to that being the "nature of the universe" (?) and then that into evidence of a personal creator was amazing. An olympic caliber leap.

But evolution doesn't demand that there even BE social animals. It's difficult to relate a wide range of emotions to mere survival strategy. Evolution isn't an emotional process. It is an impersonal force and fails to explain cognitive behaviors other than those specifically designed for survival. Art and music contribute absolutely nothing to adaptation, and human beings seem to be the only creatures who are self-creative to that degree. It is rarely seen unless humans themselves train other animals to do tricks that otherwise have no biological value.

It makes more sense if a personal creator is responsible for a personal creation and that the personal nature of the human mind is reflective of that personal creative force. This is not an argument against evolution, just a suggestion that if macroevolution is true it had a nudge from someone who knew what He was doing.

Some animals protect their offspring, some don't. There is a range of behavior for a range of animals in a range of environments. . At one extreme we call it love. Just as forming alliances and packs help aid survival. Monkeys do it. It's one thing to say you hope or wish for magical causes. Or can imagine an alternative explanation. But it's not that difficult to understand the concept of natural selection or how it might relate to bonding and successfully passing on genes. I'm sure you understand the concept.

As for the new topic, art and music, we have large brains and are not the only animals who engage in play. We simply have more advanced brains and can obviously do more things with them. Large brains, free time and the division of labor that allows time for advanced art and music don't prove god, gods, goddesses or the like. Sorry.

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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 5:00 pm Post subject:

simon_says wrote:

AngelRho wrote:

simon_says wrote:

But you haven't shown how its necessary that independent creativity is necessarily a product of evolution. I believe elephants have bigger brains than humans. Why aren't we getting pwned in art an music by elephants? Bigger/more advanced brains don't seem to have really that much to do with it. I've had rodent infestations with mice that were obviously smarter than me, so a big part of me getting the better of them had to do with studying their habits to learn where best to set traps. Our exterminator couldn't figure out how I managed to do it since mice are adept at quickly learning how to avoid or escape traps (I have had one or two escape, though they would eventually end back up in traps by accident). If size/advancement of the brain isn't really an indicator of how ONE animal (human beings) happened to develop personality or personal identity and independent creativity, then what is? An impersonal force (evolution), while arguably explaining a number of things in nature, simply doesn't cut it in that area.

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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 5:14 pm Post subject:

Larger than earlier man-apes. More advanced in general, as I also said. Don't waste my time with silliness about elephants. Humans arent the only protective mothers. And humans arent the only alliance makers or pair bonders. You can say that animals don't feel what you feel and in degree maybe they don't. But I see a process that makes sense from a gene passing on perspective. I don't have to invoke magic or spirits. I see a process that makes sense. At some point you have a brain that simply has enough additional capacity to begin to explore advanced play, art, etc. Those things didnt happen overnight.

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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 5:17 pm Post subject:

Picture resized These birds (bowerbirds) construct elaborate nests using objects of bright or attractive colors. Essentially they are making art to attract mates. Art is not unique to humans, nor is tool making, compassion, or planning I would argue that bowerbird art is superior to a lot of the tripe that passes for "modernistic" art _________________ Opportunities multiply as they are seized. -Sun Tzu Nature creates few men brave, industry and training makes many -Machiavelli You can safely assume that you've created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do

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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 6:38 pm Post subject:

Vigilans wrote:

Picture resized

These birds (bowerbirds) construct elaborate nests using objects of bright or attractive colors. Essentially they are making art to attract mates. Art is not unique to humans, nor is tool making, compassion, or planning

I would argue that bowerbird art is superior to a lot of the tripe that passes for "modernistic" art Razz

Showing that animals are capable of aesthetic appreciation or sense doesn't prove anything, though. With evolution, there is no such thing as "beauty." It takes a perceptive mind to see it as such. Maybe the bowerbird really is capable of perceiving beauty and using it in some way to its advantage. But there are also a lot of naturally occurring beautiful patterns which human artists tend to recreate in their own artwork. With most animals, form tends to follow function. "Art for art's sake" seems to be uniquely human.

(For what it's worth, I agree with your last statement and would even extend that to a lot of postmodern art as well. I LOVE pomo art, but even I have my limits)

91
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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 9:16 pm Post subject: Re: Why Plantinga's EAAN fails

Firstly, it is worth clarifying that the EAAN is not Plantinga's case against naturalism. It is a small part of it. His whole discussion of naturalism can be found in the second book of his three part series on Warrant, entitled "Warrant and Proper Function". A good place to start is Chapter 11.

01001011 wrote:

To conclude, while our cognitive facilitates are evolved to form beliefs that are useful for survival, thanks to the hardworking of scientists, mathematicians and philosophers in the last 3000 years, one can find out when the same facilities can be adapted to produce true belief, and when to avoid the pitfalls of our intuition.

Here is the first place you went wrong. Plantinga does not propose that by using the EAAN that one will conclude that naturalism false or logically incoherent (his discussion of proper function in Chapter 11 attempts that). Rather, the EAAN exists to show that adopting naturalism is irrational to accept. This is a very important distinction, rather like the induction paradox to God, where an atheist attempts to show that regardless of whether or not God exists or is logically consistent, it is irrational to believe in him. As such showing that naturalism 'can' develop develop accurate beliefs is a non-sequitur. Plantinga by using a probability frame work, is accepting, for the sake of this particular argument, that the conceptions of 'naturalism' and 'accurate belief' given 'evolution' are to some extent coherent. If Plantinga were to argue from proability and then (in the same argument) that the two concepts were logically incoherent, he would refute his own work. Plantinga, being one of the world's best philosophers, is simply not doing that. Therefor, showing that the three concepts can be coherent does nothing to refute the EAAN at all.

01001011 wrote:

(EAAN) One's cognitive facilities cannot reliably form true beliefs because forming true beliefs does not confer evolutionary advantage.

That is not the central claim of the EAAN. What Plantinga is claiming is that evolutionary advantage does not reliably confer true forming beliefs.

01001011 wrote:

To quote Plantinga himself:
“I pointed out that this behavior could be produced by a large number of different belief-desire pairs.” [1, p.9]
“Or perhaps he thinks the tiger is a large, friendly, cuddly pussycat and wants to pet it; but he also believes that the best way to pet it is to run away from it. ... Clearly there are any number of belief-cum-desire systems that equally fit a given bit of behavior...” [2, p.225-226]

What Plantinga is doing here, is demonstrating many ways in which evolutionary advantage can lead to false beliefs that are not true. Hence he is claiming that from this one cannot reliably claim that one's beliefs are reliably truth forming 'because' they are the product of evolution.

01001011 wrote:

(T) under theory of evolution, the ability to form true beliefs arises as a by-product.

Yes, if they were to appear at all, they would do so accidentally; what Plantinga shows is that the accident is so absurdly unlikely, that no rational person would be able to make the lead from 'they can be reliable' to 'they are reliable' without first assuming that that accident occurred to them. For a person to do this, it would obviously be an unjustified leap from one proposition to the other, a leap that the methodology of naturalism, simply does not allow for.
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91
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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 9:18 pm Post subject:

Declension wrote:

Ironically, Plantinga's mistake is the exact same mistake that many hyper-Darwinists make. He overestimates the extent to which evolution should be expected to provide nice "stories" for how things are the way they are.

I think that may be the point he is trying to make. I don't think he overestimates anything, it is his intention to show that evolutionary theory when applied to warrant, one should not expect it to provide nice stories for how things the way they are.
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Declension
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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 9:28 pm Post subject: Re: Why Plantinga's EAAN fails

91 wrote:

he is claiming that from this one cannot reliably claim that one's beliefs are reliably truth forming 'because' they are the product of evolution.

91 wrote:

Yes, if they were to appear at all, they would do so accidentally; what Plantinga shows is that the accident is so absurdly unlikely

Here is the dichotomy which is playing a hidden role in the discussion: If we are indeed good at truth-tracking, and evolution is true, then either
(1.) truth-tracking is something which was selected for, or
(2.) we are good at truth-tracking "by accident".

I don't accept the dichotomy. I don't think that truth-tracking was selected for, and I also don't believe that we are good at it "by accident".

Instead, I want to say that having a powerful brain was selected for, and powerful brains are good at tracking truth, simply because of what they are.

Here is an analogy. Imagine that instead of creatures evolving, we have a whole lot of natural numbers, competing with each other. Every now and then, there is a "mutation", and one of the numbers increases by one. For example, a 67 becomes a 68. The higher numbers are better at surviving than the smaller numbers. So size is selected for.

However, after this experiment has been running for a long time, you will notice something. It is almost certain that all of the numbers that have survived are composite numbers, not prime numbers. But being-a-composite-number was never selected for! Are they just all composite numbers "by accident"? No. It's because large numbers tend to be composite.

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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 9:45 pm Post subject: Re: Why Plantinga's EAAN fails

Declension wrote:

91 wrote:

he is claiming that from this one cannot reliably claim that one's beliefs are reliably truth forming 'because' they are the product of evolution.

91 wrote:

Yes, if they were to appear at all, they would do so accidentally; what Plantinga shows is that the accident is so absurdly unlikely

This.

Also, Plantinga posits that our beliefs are mostly correct. If you study a bit of psychology, you can see how flawed human judgement can be on a very basic level. Therefore, this creates a theological problem of how could a God who creates us in his image could create humans with such flawed judgement.
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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 10:11 pm Post subject: Re: Why Plantinga's EAAN fails

Declension wrote:

To be honest, I like the way you are thinking about this, it is actually very sophisticated, so I will respond in kind.

Take Plantinga's formulation R (Reliability) on N (Naturalism) &E (Evolution). The naturalist who wishes to preserve R, would be moved to pick a value of E that allows them to affirm E with N&R. This is essentially what you are attempting and it is a fair point to make. The question is, do you have a defeater from N & E form the underlined statement. Essentially what you are saying is that maybe modus ponens is useful for avoiding tigers and for understanding physics. So what you are proposing (take it to be P) is that P(R/N&E&P). Do you see what is occurring here and why it does not work as a defeater for the defeater? If as Plantinga points out that R is low given N and E, if you grant the conjunction that R functions as a defeater for N and E, then inserting P as an extra point and then referring to it, actually violates the rules of philosophy.

See that you want us to conclude your proposition that 'brains are are meant to be powerful and that powerful brains are truth tracking' but you are actually inserting it alongside Naturalism and Evolution and then concluding that 'brains are powerful and truth tracking'. Hence, by inserting the proposition into the argument you are actually just side stepping the argument that R is low given N & E. Essentially you are placing R as predicate given P and concluding that R is high given P. In essence you are doing two things profoundly wrong here. One you are essentially roping off R from N and E through P, which would constitute special pleading and secondly you are begging the question. As I was discussing with Techstep a couple of days ago, the old formulation of the ontological argument did this through accepting existence as predicate then it reasoned to existence given existence and it was profoundly mistaken when it did so.
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91
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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 10:14 pm Post subject: Re: Why Plantinga's EAAN fails

puddingmouse wrote:

Also, Plantinga posits that our beliefs are mostly correct. If you study a bit of psychology, you can see how flawed human judgement can be on a very basic level. Therefore, this creates a theological problem of how could a God who creates us in his image could create humans with such flawed judgement.

I think that you raise an interesting point here, but I would prefer to keep specifically to the EAAN at this point as it does not follow that because the EAAN is successful that one has to embrace Plantinga's theistic position. I think a good argument can be made for theism but I think the EAAN and defeaters for naturalistic world-views are actually worth discussing on their own.
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Declension
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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 10:47 pm Post subject: Re: Why Plantinga's EAAN fails

I'm frantically trying to figure out some of this jargon! Sorry if I am barking up the wrong tree. I think that maybe I did not appreciate how "meta" this topic is. I'm going to try to cast it in my own language. So, the problem is that some of my beliefs themselves undercut whether or not you should listen to my beliefs. It's like me telling you "I am not very good at saying correct things." If I am correct, then why would you be listening to me? So, if I claim that E and N are true, then I have already undermined my own credibility, so why should you listen to me when I say P? Is this sort of what you mean? I feel like I am out of my depth here. EDIT: Consider my proposition P, which says "powerful brains are good at tracking truth". I don't intend this proposition to be used as an "extra" thing thrown into Plantinga's argument. Rather, P gives me the suspicion that whatever Plantinga's argument is, there is a hole in it. In other words, I need to look at his argument more closely and see if I can find a hole. I am not trying to "patch" the argument, I am trying to find out what is wrong with it.

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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 11:04 pm Post subject: Re: Why Plantinga's EAAN fails

Declension wrote:

I'm frantically trying to figure out some of this jargon! Sorry if I am barking up the wrong tree.

Let me know if you have any specific questions. I am not a particularly advanced student of epistemology but I do get the basics.

Declension wrote:

So, if I claim that E and N are true, then I have already undermined my own credibility, so why should you listen to me when I say P?

The point of the EAAN is to say that N & E leads to the unreliability of R. Your basic point was quite good, that there may be a double effect from evolution (E) that creates a greater reliability of one's faculties (R). It is fair to dispute that the argument leads to to a lack of trust in R from E. What you did was argue that your double effect proposition was that reliability was high. But you did this by accepting that reliability was predicate, established by double-effect from P. So when arguing the exception (P) you inserted it into the premises discretely and then concluded from it through the statement:

"powerful brains are good at tracking truth, simply because of what they are."

What you did was rope off R from N and E through P without actually addressing the problems raised through the EAAN. I am not saying that the EAAN necessarily works, or that your objection is not promising but I am saying the way you argued it was mistaken.

Declension wrote:

Consider my proposition P, which says "powerful brains are good at tracking truth". I don't intend this proposition to be used as an "extra" thing thrown into Plantinga's argument. Rather, P gives me the suspicion that whatever Plantinga's argument is, there is a hole in it. In other words, I need to look at his argument more closely and see if I can find a hole. I am not trying to "patch" the argument, I am trying to find out what is wrong with it.

If you want to argue that double effect P creates a high value for R, then you need to show that having a powerful brain entails producing a large amount of true beliefs, I don't think that this is a given, because it is susceptible to the same objection as the argument is without double effect, you still need to deal with those points. Because of some very deep problems within naturalistic epistemology (theory of knowlege), I personally don't think this can actually be done. What the EAAN does, is tap into a large amount of work that questions whether a naturalistic epistemology can actually establish true beliefs.
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Last edited by 91 on Mon Feb 13, 2012 11:07 pm; edited 1 time in total

Declension
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Posted: Mon Feb 13, 2012 11:05 pm Post subject:

Okay, I finally think that I understand what Dr King means. I take back my previous way of explaining my position. Instead, I want to say that the problem here is with R. I don't think that R is a well-defined idea. R means "our minds are good at generating truths", or maybe "most of the claims that our minds generate are true". I deny that this means anything at all. Our minds are not claim-factories, they do not simply generate claims like bubbles frothing in boiling water. It is not even clear what it means for a person to "believe" something. There are many methods for creating claims, and only some of these methods are ever claimed to be reliable in some sense. The methods that are viewed as the most reliable are exactly those methods that are not at all like the idea of the mind randomly generating claims. EDIT: I am now watching Plantinga on Youtube. He just said, "Once you have a defeater for the proposition that your cognitive faculties are reliable, then you have a defeater for any proposition that you take to be produced by your cognitive faculties, that is to say, all [propositions]. I mean, where else would they come from?" That is exactly the point that is now bothering me. I'll keep watching and see if he elaborates.

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