Tag Archives: god

Are God and human rights self-evident?

Tom-of-the-coast-of-Maine-2

The second paragraph of the United States Declaration of Independence begins with these immortal and oft quoted words:

 

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

These statements may have been self-evident truths to Jefferson and many of the other founding fathers of this nation in 1776, but in the year 2015 (and for some considerable time before that) a great many people, while still holding that all human beings are of equal value and are possessed of the unalienable rights referred by the Declaration , no longer base that claim on the idea that there even is such a thing as a creator to endow anybody with anything.thomasjefferson_sm

The word “self-evident” in common English usage means something akin to “obvious.”  In the Declaration, Jefferson is making the claim that the existence of a creator is obvious.  He is also making the claim that this creator has intentions for humankind and bestows rights on us so that we might pursue those intentions.  Put another way, he is saying that it is obvious that there is a God/Creator, that this God has created human beings with rights and, by implication, these rights are not to be abridged because they are divinely bestowed. This argument is analogous to the argument for the divine right of kings to which the republicans of Jefferson’s time were so opposed.  Whether ruling by divine right or living as a free citizen by divine right,  Jefferson is saying that his conclusion is obvious.  But is it really?

One need not be an atheist or agnostic to have problems with the “obviousness” of the existence of a creator.  All three of the major Western religious traditions present themselves as “revealed” religions; i.e., dependent on God to reveal him/herself through a prophet or spokesperson of some sort.  They do not make the case that the particular God whom they reveal is in any sense self-evident.

What is obvious, however, is that many people belief in a divine creator and ground their notion of the rights of human beings on that belief.  Belief in a creator is much more self-evident than the existence of that creator and, I suppose, that is what Jefferson assumed when he penned the Declaration.  He no doubt hoped to make the case for the nascent United States an obvious one–a “no brainer,” so to speak.

The philosophical, theological and general intellectual framework of the early 21st Century no longer presupposes the existence of a creator God or any God at all for that matter.  Advances in physics and cosmology have raised all sorts of questions  about the nature of matter, energy, time and space.

The more we learn; the more things become less “self-evident.”  Once obvious observations about nature are demonstrated to be illusory as science delves deeper into the nature of the cosmos.

The Declaration of Independence is surely an important document in the history of our nation and political science in general, but since it grounds its claims on the existence of a creator (whose existence was once obvious but is no longer so), it should not be used as a cornerstone for building individual, social or political ethics.

In this post-modern, pluralistic age, building an ethic on the existence of a creator is to build that ethic on a highly debatable and not self-evident premise.  The two lines quoted above might better be put in something like the following form to avoid the use of a potentially false premise while still advocating for human equality and rights:

We hold these principles to be inviolable: all human beings are of equal value and that this equality entitles them to certain permanent rights among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

While my restatement may lack the historical ring of Jefferson’s famous lines, it avoids the assumption of the existence of God, establishes ethical principles as ideals affirmed by a people and avoids exchanging the divine right of kings for the divine right of a citizens.  In short, it separates church from state, as they should be.

 

If we conjure it, is it real?

Tom-of-the-coast-of-Maine-2In today’s New York Times, there is an interesting article by Stanford anthropologist T. M. Lurhman entitled, “Conjuring up our own Gods.”  In this article, Ms Lurhman reprises the notion that God is akin to an imaginary friend.  Following the thought of contemporary evolutionary biologists, she suggests that we humans conjure up the notion of God because we are “hard-wired” by evolution to do so and that spiritual practices, like some forms of meditation and prayer (individual or collective), can increase the sense of the presence of a conjured incorporeal entity like a ghost, angel or ultimately God.

The notion of God being a human creation has been around for some time. Freud, for example, argued that God was a projection of our need for a father figure.  In this sense, we create God rather than vice versa.

Without denying or affirming the existence of God per se, reflections on the existence of God of the type that Professor Lurhman raises in her article beg the question of what it means to “exist” at all.

The typical definition of “to exist” means to have objective reality.  What sort of reality is objective?  Objective reality refers to that reality which is not dependent on the mind for its existence; i.e., that reality which we do not only think or believe exists or that multiple people think exists but which is, at least in principle, “there” whether we think and or believe it to be or not. Something which is objectively real has an existence independent of the ideation of a thinker or observer.

Objective reality is often juxtaposed to subjective reality which is that reality that is dependent on the mind or an individual’s/group’s perception for its existence.  There is, therefore, little doubt that God exists subjectively; i.e.,  there are a large number of people who think/believe that such an entity exists.  The same, however, cannot, be said for the objective reality of God.

Those who believe in God believe that God is an objective reality.  They think that God’s existence is not dependent on anything.  The claim the believer makes is that he/she knows that God is an objective reality by subjective means.  They claim to know the existence of an objective reality “subjectively.”

This subjective knowledge of an objective reality is commonly called the “gift of faith.”  The Greek word usually translated as “faith” literally means “trust.”  In short, the believer trusts that what she/he thinks/feels subjectively is objectively the case.

Believers cite miraculous occurrences, purported answers to prayers, tradition (written and oral) and all manner of events serendipitous and not so serendipitous as indicators that their “trust” is well-founded.  As great a thinker as Blaise Pascal, thought that it made sense to live as though God were an objective reality because to decline to believe and be wrong would be catastrophic while believing and not being correct would have no dire consequences.

As human beings we cannot have unmediated and objective knowledge of the existence or non-existence of God.  We can choose to trust that what some of us as a result subjective experience is objectively true.  But, we cannot know whether God is objectively real or not.  All we can do is conjure God. The observation that God’s objective existence, as far as we are concerned, is dependent on our minds does not mean that God does not have an objective existence.  God may objectively exist but we have no way to know.  If we choose to believe, we are trusting in our own conjuring and the conjuring of our forebearers. If we decline to believe, we are only admitting that we cannot know and therefore accept our conjuring for what it is–at best provisional (agnostic) and at worst destructively delusional.

Dialogue & Ethical Decision Making in a Pluralistic Society (Part 2)

Tom-of-the-coast-of-Maine-2This is the second part of a two part essay on issues related to dialogue and ethical decision making in a pluralistic society.  Part I made the point that in order for real dialogue to take place between parties, those parties must be able to communicate clearly, understand one another and at least agree on the existence of the first principles that ground their view of reality.  Dialogue between believers and nonbelievers in “god” is problematic because nonbelievers do not think that “god” is anything more than an idea that some people have and in that sense does not exist and cannot serve as a referent in an argument.  Part 1 concluded with the idea that, perhaps the use of a thought experiment, following the model of the philosopher John Rawls, could serve to circumvent the first principles problem between those who believe and those who do not and allow for a continuation of meaningful dialogue and ethical decision making in a pluralistic society.

A thought experiment is the use of  imagination to investigate the nature of things. In a thought experiment, a person visualizes a situation with specific conditions, carries out an operation within the visualization, notices what happens or is what most likely to happen and then draws a conclusion from which further extrapolations are possible. One of the most famous thought experiments of all time was performed by Einstein who used his imagination and  “pursued a beam of light” to the discovery of the theory of general relativity.  The History of Science is replete with examples of thought experiments.  Click here to see some amusing illustrations.

The late political philosopher John Rawls used the device of an extended thought experiment to develop a theory of the nature of justice that he thought could be assented to in a pluralistic society (or world) where differing languages, cultures, belief systems and values made consensus on first principles on which to ground social dialogue difficult, if not impossible, to achieve. 

Rawls proposed the following thought experiment:

Imagine a condition in which human beings were brought together under what he called a “veil of ignorance” and given the task of deciding what basic rules should govern human social interaction and institutions in order, following the thinking of John Locke, that as free agents we be able both to have liberty and live together in harmony.  The “veil of ignorance” he proposed was the hypothetical situation in which all parties knew that social and personal inequalities existed but not which individual people or groups were advantaged or disadvantaged; i.e., a state where we knew that some people would be smarter than others, have more money or other resources than others, be more attractive or stronger than others etc. etc. but NOT which one of us was the stronger or weaker, richer or poorer, healthier or unhealthier.  We would not even know if we were a believer or not.

Assuming our hypothetical group accepted the task of answering the question of how our life as human beings should be arranged, Rawls argues that the first thing the group would do is to decide how to deal with fact that the group knew some members were advantaged and some disadvantaged but not who was in which category.  He concludes that the first rule the group would establish is one that establishes that whatever rules they arrive at cannot disadvantage the least advantaged in the group. Rawls continues that the first rule this hypothetical group would establish was that any rule they created could not adversely impact the liberty of the least advantaged among them.  

Or as Rawls put it more formally:  

Each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive total system of equal basic liberties compatible with a similar system of liberty for all.

Rawls calls this the first principle of justice.  A first principle arrived at in this way would be one that would be agreed to by both the believer and nonbeliever.  Under the “veil of ignorance” both believer and nonbeliever (since they did not who was who) would have to agree on a first principle which left either option (belief or non-belief) open and unconstrained.

Rawls moves on from the formation of this first principle to extrapolate a more elaborate theory of social justice in which the disadvantaged are always protected to one degree or another from being disadvantaged further by laws and social regulations. Space does not permit a full examination of Rawls and  his contractarian theory of justice. ( Click here for a summary of this 1971 publication.)  Suffice to say, that it is the use of a thought experiment and the “veil of ignorance” device that enables Rawls to circumvent the actual variations within the human family in reaching a formulation of a first principle that would likely be agreed upon by all members of the human family under the conditions of the experiment.  It is an also an ingenious way to get at a philosophical version of the Golden Rule.

While thought experiments and veils of ignorance may not be the route to the solution of all complex ethical discussions in which the parties have incompatible first principles, they do offer one avenue that could be explored much more widely in order to preserve pluralism (an thus liberty) in our society.  Imagine the thought experiment/veil of ignorance technique applied to a hot button issues like gay/lesbian marriage or stem cell research.

All this is of importance only if we are interested in preserving pluralism and the liberty that it implies.  Some may feel that it is their duty to work against pluralism and that humankind would be better off were there no difference of opinion on a topic like “god.”  Believers and nonbelievers may feel that the only proper course is to eradicate the view of the other through conversion or other means.  The historical record is filled with failed attempts to achieve social harmony by eradicating difference.  Tolerance and the nurture of what might be called “positive pluralism” with devices like thought experiments hold more promise for harmonious existence than social stalemates or the use force–social, intellectual or military–to build consensus.  Enforced consensus is an oxymoron of the first order.

In the end, the maintenance of a positive pluralism requires all parties to step back from their own position, at least momentarily, to find a common first principle from which to begin any discussion.  Believers, nonbelievers and agnostics may not always need to be at loggerheads when it comes to debating ethical issues.  Thought experiments are just one among a variety of methods but they worked well for Galileo, Einstein and John Rawls and have it all over war, genocide and social disintegration. 

Dialogue & Ethical Decision Making in a Pluralistic Society (Part 1)

Tom-of-the-coast-of-Maine-2This is the first of two essays on the issues related to ethical debate and decision making in a pluralist society.  This first essay examines how language and issues of defining what is real and what is not present unique problems.   The second essay examines John Rawl’s A Theory of Justice as offering one approach to dealing with the problems of pluralism described in this first essay.

There are a great many advantages to living in a country like the U.S. where we are ostensibly free to believe what we choose to believe and free to express those beliefs with only very modest restrictions.  Freedom of speech opens the door to dialogue between persons of  both similar and differing points of view.  We can discuss important matters as a society in an open manner and use the representative democratic process to regulate our society as a nation of laws.  In addition to being a nation that enjoys freedom of speech, we are also a very diverse nation made up of people from a large number to cultures, religious traditions, countries, political persuasions, educational backgrounds and an increasing number of  languages.  

In this sense, we are a pluralist nation.  In the US there is no official, national or established church as  in the United Kingdom or Spain.  There are a variety of political factions and conceptions of how a people should be governed (or govern themselves).  There are real political differences vying for public attention unlike in countries like the Peoples’ Republic of China or Myanmar where political disagreement and challenges to the government are suppressed, sometimes violently.  Issues are debated by politicians, in the press,  among individuals and interest groups.  Laws and regulations are challenged in courts. Arguments are made and judgments rendered. Our religions traditions range from Christian, Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist  Hindu, Naturist, Agnostic to Atheist.  There is no prescribed set of beliefs about the nature of humankind or the cosmos itself.  There are many views, some more powerful than others, but all are officially not only tolerated but also (with the exception of the most vile) generally welcomed.

In the main, this pluralism, to the extent that there is real sharing between and openness to  differing groups, enriches our society, expands the horizons of those who participate in that sharing and leads to a greater national solidarity and sense of purpose without the loss of each group’s or individual’s uniqueness. (e pluribus unum.) In fact, pluralism like this is one of the sine qua nons for a functioning democratic republic and in that sense a significant social good.

While essentially a social good, in practice pluralism presents a number of functional problems when it comes to engaging in productive problem solving and ethical decision making. One of the most significant of these problems, and the focus of this essay, is the problem of finding fundamental or central points of agreement upon which to build a coherent philosophical or political case that will be meaningful to all parties.

Some of the problems of communicating across differing groups are evident and well known.  Communication across differing groups can be limited by differences in language.  Spanish speakers may not understand English speakers and English speakers in turn may not understand French or Russian or  Mandarin speakers.  Interpreters can help but subtle nuances are often lost especially when the speakers use idiomatic language.

In cases where these superficial language barriers are worked through, communication can still remain only partial because of differences in the meanings of words in differing cultures.  For example, while a term like “marriage” in whatever language it is spoken may denote or name the same thing, connotative differences will remain from culture to culture.

For the sake of argument, assume that most, if not all, language and cultural barriers to clear communication could be overcome in the US and that as a consequence, citizens could communicate in a manner that everyone understood and that public debate was therefore carried on in a manner understood by almost everyone.  One road block to enjoying the full benefits of being a pluralistic society would certainly have been removed.

Clear communication would, however, not ensure that those engaged in public debate had similar values or even aims in life.  In addition, people vary in intelligence, articulateness and other important things like capacity for empathy.  Some of this variation would likely be a good thing as those who could now talk clearly with one another learned about others values, abilities, cultures and a multitude of other things.  In the course of this dialogue, some values would likely become more widely shared and even grow in the depth of their meaning.  At the same time, sharp differences in values and life aims would also likely arise.

Shared values and perspectives would bring our society closer together at the same time that sharply differing values and aims would contribute to lack of agreement and some degree of social fragmentation.   We would come to agree on the things we could agree on and continue to dispute those issues upon which we could not agree.  If decisions needed to be made on disputed issues, we would, and do, turn to the ballot box or the courts to settle a dispute for the moment.  For example, there remains substantial disagreement around the question of abortion.  The Supreme Court in the Roe v Wade decision determined that citizens have the right to privacy and that the question of whether or not to have an abortion was a private decision between a woman and her medical provider.  Those who do not agree with this decision generally abide by it even as they continue to forcefully articulate their point of view in public debate or the courts.

Differences of this sort are to be expected and they are part of what makes for vital society. Public debate, learning, growing, improving our arguments,  and abandoning misguided notions are all part of a free and vibrant community.  In this country, not everyone will always have his/her way but current social regulations and priorities will at least approximate the outcomes of the national conversation.

There is however one type of difference that provides a pluralistic nation unique difficulties.  Religious and non-believing people can agree in practice on a great deal.  For example, a religious and secular person could probably agree that it is good to be kind and at least less good to be indifferent to others.  However, they are unlikely to ever agree on the existence of a “god” who created the universe, has a personal plan for each of us, defines how we should treat one another (what is right and what is wrong) and yearns for our allegiance and devotion.

The theist/believer takes it on “faith” that this divine entity exists.  The believer believes that when he or she uses the word for “god” in whatever language they speak that they are referring to something that is “real” albeit in a spiritual sense.  Unlike Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny or any of a variety of other mythological beings, “god” is a “real.”  God “exists” maybe not quite like finite things, such as humans or trees, but “god” is “real” and when we refer to god we are not just talking about an idea.

For the secularist/non-theist, references to “god” refer only to an idea that some people have but to which there is no corresponding reality.  For the secularist, there is no actual entity referred to as “god,” and because of that it is literally nonsensical to refer to a “god” as the source or telos of anything.  “God” does not wish anything, create anything or guide anything because he/she/it/they is/are nonexistent in this or any other dimension of reality. “God” is a word without an existing referent.

The atheist or even agnostic and theist have very different first principles that seem to be irreconcilable.  One believes that something exists and starts from there while the other finds no empirical evidence for the existence of an entity named “god” and lacking evidence regards language that speaks about “god” to be speaking about a reality only in the sense that some, if not most, people believe in something for which their is no empirical evidence. For the atheist or agnostic “god” can have no authority because “god” is nonexistent for the former and of indeterminate existence for the latter.

Since there are numerous religious traditions in our pluralistic society there is an accompanying pluralism of “gods.” This godly pluralism further complicates social dialogue by pitting, from the atheist’s point of view, vying nonentities against one another and further obfuscating reality:  yielding  a multiplicity of delusions.

Believers and nonbelievers can, of course, agree that the difference in point of view I describe above is accurate; i.e., one regards “god” as “real” and the other as not “real.”  One regards “god” as having authority while the other regards “god” as having as much authority as any other non existent thing–none. Once this point is reached and if the interlocutors insist on building their arguments from their first principles, no real progress can be achieved.  The interlocutors might be able to reach similar conclusions using completely different methods:  one using what they feel is the inspired word of god and the other deductive reasoning.  We might, for example, agree that killing without justification is wrong in one moment  and in the next, when one party to the discussion concludes that a justification for killing is the commission of the sin of blasphemy, be in utter disagreement:  why execute someone for saying something insulting about something which does not exist!

Attempts have been made especially by the Roman Catholic ethical tradition to deal with this problem of first principles using the concept of the “natural law.”  Ironically, attempts at reconciling Christian Ethical thinking in this way had more to do with illustrating how Christian thought related to the great minds of the ancients like Plato and Aristotle

Aristole

Aristotle

than establishing a common ground for debate with contemporary nonbelievers.  The ancient Greek thinkers were widely revered in Renaissance Europe and the Church was keen to illustrate how its thought was supported by that of the ancients even those ancients that did not have the benefit of “knowing Jesus.”  What these thinkers of old could see, the Church argued, was the rational order placed into creation by the rational creator; i.e., god.  Reflection on this natural order could reveal a natural law which while only reflective of divine law was fully congruent with it.  As a consequence, they argued, those things contrary to the natural order–which could be easily seen by believer or nonbeliever–were immoral and vice versa.

Tomas Acquinas

The Dominican Friar Thomas Aquinas adapted Aristotle and contributed substantially to the Roman Catholic “natural law” tradition.

The appeal to “natural law” to enable ethical debate between believer and nonbeliever proved quite useful for several hundred years until views of what was clearly the natural order of things began both to diverge and become less clear.  A simple and current example of this divergence is the view of same gender relationships.  For years, both believers and nonbelievers alike thought of same gender relationships as contrary to nature.  Both believers and nonbelievers alike regarded this type of behavior as unnatural and perverse.  Believers had little need to turn to the authority of revelation in the Bible since natural law arguments sufficed.

Gradually, the scientific study of humankind has revealed that same gender orientation is perfectly natural; i.e., gender orientation is a function of the genetic structure of an individual and that approximately 10% of people are same gender oriented. Gender orientation is not a choice nor is it contrary to nature.  Natural law, which once sufficed to arbitrate the morality of same gender sexual behavior, could no longer fully support arguments against same gender relationships in our age.

Believers had to revert to divine authority to bolster their public case.  In practice, they therefor turned  to texts in which believers believe that “god” has revealed his (usually his) divine will.  These texts are taken by believers to be supremely authoritative and literally true.

Nonbelievers, of course,  think that since god does not exist he/she/it/they has/have never said anything.  Belief in these texts as authoritative is therefore as delusional  as the belief in the spiritual entity who is said to have inspired them.  Since “god” does not exist, communications from “god” do not exist either.  While there may be cultural history interest in understanding what the priestly authors of  Leviticus had to say or in what Paul of Tarsus

Famously pictured here by Caravaggio, Paul of Tarus was said to have been directly converted by God on the road to Damascus after which he spread Christianity widely in the Mediterranean Basin. Called, "The Apostle to the Gentiles."

Famously pictured here by Caravaggio, Paul of Tarus was said to have been directly converted by God on the road to Damascus after which he spread Christianity widely in the Mediterranean Basin. Called, “The Apostle to the Gentiles.”

said about homosexuality, pedophilia or slavery, there is nothing divinely authoritative about these texts if there is no “god” to have shared the divine will with us.

With progress in science and other fields of human study gradually whittling away at the Aristotelian and Catholic natural law tradition almost daily, it is becoming more and more difficult for believers and nonbelievers to find common first principles from which to build compatible ethical frameworks.  If there were no way around this problem, dialogue (at least on first principles) would cease and any sort of rational ethical consensus become much, much harder (if not impossible) to achieve.  “Conversion” of one group to the other group’s position would be the only solution and “pluralism” would be shaken at its roots.

Fortunately, philosophers are a creative lot and have offered a number of “ways-to-think-about-it” that hold some promise for enabling interlocutors who have fundamentally different understandings of reality–like believers and nonbelievers–to not only continue real dialogue but arrive at a point where they agree on a few first principles to which they can both assent.  One example of such a philosopher is the late political and moral philosopher John Rawls.

John Rawls

John Rawls

 The second part of this essay will explore Rawls’ approach to thinking about justice as a way of illustrating one technique which offers hope for potentially working around the believer/nonbeliever problem; i.e., the thought experiment.