David Hume (1711-1776)

A. Part I: Reason, Science, and Religion

1. Introductory remarks

2. Demea and Philo: Pessimism about natural reason aka skepticism

3. Cleanthes: Optimism about natural reason

4. Reason and "animal faith": two kinds of skepticism

5. Two views of natural science

B. Parts II-V: The Argument from Intelligent Design

1. Obscurantism asserted by Demea and Philo

2. The argument

3. First-level objections and replies

4. Second-level objections: metaphysical attributes

C. Parts IX-XI: The Metaphysical (A Priori) Argument

1. The argument

2. Objections and replies

3. God's moral attributes and evil: Exit Demea

D. Part XII: Religion and Society

1. Cleanthes: religion as a positive influence

2. Philo: religion as a baneful influence

3. Reprise: skepticism and faith

• 1. Introductory remarks


• Literary genre: Who speaks for Hume?


• Philo's strategy: play Demea and Cleanthes off against one another


• Three realms:


• Common life and experience


• Natural science


• Metaphysics (including natural theology)
  
  

• 2. Demea and Philo: Pessimism about natural reason (aka skepticism)
  
  
  • Read from pp. 3-5 as Philo explains why a two-course philosophy requirement is a really bad thing.
    
    

• 3. Cleanthes: Optimism about natural reason
  
  
  • Read from pp. 5-6 as Cleanthes explains why skeptics are laughable:
    
    "What will it be, the door or the second-story window? Either way, you lose. Sure, we can work ourselves up into a skeptical frenzy, but it can't last very long. Furthermore, how can you doubt the great advances made in recent science, e.g., Newton's analysis of the rainbow? And yet this science is no less subtle, no less abstract, no less esoteric than natural theology. (And, surely, you do not want to align yourself with those who reject subtle reasoning of any sort and then embrace 'the most absurd tenets which a traditional superstition has recommended to them'.)"
  
  Note in passing Cleanthes's invocation of John Locke's principle that we ought always to proportion our assent to the evidence. Is this principle compatible with Christian faith or any other that reveres its martyrs?
  
  In reply Philo implicitly distinguishes two kinds of skepticism -- one good, the other bad -- and two ways of thinking about natural science -- one of which is just an extension of "animal faith," the other of which is open to theoretical skepticism.
  
  

• Metaphysical or speculative skepticism:
  

• Reason cannot give a theoretical or speculative demonstration of any important metaphysical or moral thesis -- or of any common sense belief, for that matter. On Philo's view this sort of skepticism is true, but, lucky for us, we have good enough cognitive and affective "animal instincts" to help us get by in the ordinary affairs of life.
  

• Moral or practical skepticism:


• The resolve to snuff out any "animal faith" that leads us to accept as practically certain what cannot be demonstrated by speculative reason. This would indeed be dangerous, but is not at all what Philo (or Demea, for that matter) is recommending.

• Realist view:


• Accepting a scientific theory involves believing with a high degree of certitude that the unobservable structure of reality is as the theory says it is -- the aim of natural science is to get to real causes

• Empiricist view:


• Accepting a scientific theory should involve believing only that the theory is an accurate guide to what is observable and what will be observable in the future --the aim of natural science is just to order our experience and not to get to real causes
  
  

• We can bring these last two sections (4 and 5) together as follows:


Let
(i) = common life and experience
(iia) = natural science with respect to its empirical part, where it is simply common life and experience writ large
(iib) = natural science with respect to its speculative (theoretical) part
(iii) = metaphysics, including natural theology


Then,


• according to Philo, we have animal faith regarding (i) and (iia), but no speculative certitude with respect to any of (i), (iia), (iib), or (iii). On this view, we are best off never having troubled our minds with philosophical inquiry. (The combination of (1) deep pessimism with respect to natural reason and (2) the abandonment of the search for wisdom as beyond our capabilities is sometimes called pragmatism, whereas the combination of (1) deep pessimism with respect to natural reason and (2) firm belief in revealed religion is sometimes called fideism. At this point Philo could go either way.)


• according to Cleanthes, since we have speculative certitude with respect to (iib), there is no reason in principle why we can't have speculative certitude regarding (iii) in at least some of its parts

• 1. Obscurantism asserted by Demea and Philo [previously intimated on pp. 4, 7, & 8].


• Read from pp. 13-14



• 2. The argument



(1) The universe resembles the productions or effects of human intelligence. [premise]

(2) Similar effects proceed from similar causes. [premise]

(3) So the universe is the production or effect of some intelligent being. [from (1) and (2)]

(4) But the universe is much more complex than any production of human intelligence. [premise]

(5) So the production of the universe required an intelligence much greater than human intelligence. [from (2) and (4)]

Therefore, there is a designer of the universe whose intelligence far surpasses ours. [from (2) and (5)]





• 3. First-level objections and replies



These objections are aimed at (1), the application of (2) to the present case, and the inference from (1) and (2) to (3).



• OBJECTIONS:
  
  
  
  • Objection 1: The analogy between the universe and human artifacts is weak. [pp. 16-18]
  
  
  • Objection 2: Intelligence is only one of the active causes in the world. [p. 19]
  
  
  • Objection 3: Even if intelligence is everywhere operative now, we cannot properly ascribe it to the origins of the universe. [p. 20]
  
  
  • Objection 4: The origin of the universe is a single unique case and so analogies are pointless. [p. 21]
  
  
  
• REPLIES:
  
  
  Note: The general form of Cleanthes's replies is to show that Philo's objections prove too much, since exactly the same objections could be proposed even with regard to effects that no sane person would deny have an intelligent cause. So since no one would take Philo's objection seriously in these cases, neither should they take them seriously in the case at hand.
  
  
  • Reply to 1: The voice in the clouds [pp. 23-24]
  
  
  • Reply to 2: The vegetating library [p. 25]
  
  
  • Reply to 3: The eye [p. 25]



• 4. Second-level objections: metaphysical attributes


Here the objections accept the conclusion of the argument, but argue that the being whose existence is proved is either incomprehensible or finite.


• Anthropomorphism vs. Obscurantism (Mysticism) [pp. 28-29]


• The fruits of anthropomorphism: A FINITE GOD


The big objection: In the absence of an independent argument for the designer's perfection, the design argument does not necessarily yield -- nor does Cleanthes want it to (p. 29) -- a being who is infinite in perfection (or power or knowledge or goodness, etc.) or indefectible or one or eternal or necessary or incorporeal ..............

• 1. The argument


(1) For any contingent being x, x's existing requires a causal explanation that is ultimate.

(2) To attribute x's existing to a, b, c .... is not ultimate if each of a, b, c .... is itself a contingent being.


[For in that case the composite fact of a's existing and b's existing and c's existing itself requires an explanation.]

(3) So any ultimate explanation of x's existing must invoke the existence of a being whose own existence neither requires nor admits of a causal explanation.

(4) Every being in the material universe is contingent, and every temporal being is contingent, and every composite being is contingent

Therefore, there is an immaterial, eternal, and non-composite being that is the cause of existence for every contingent being



• 2. Objections and Replies


• OBJECTIONS:
  
  
  • Objection 1: The being in question can be conceived not to exist (p. 55).
    
  
  
  • Objection 2: Why can't matter be the being in question? (p. 56)
  
  
  • Objection 3: An explanation for each element of a series just is an ultimate explanation for the whole series (p. 56).
  
  
  • Objection 4: Why not several necessary beings?
  
  
  • Objection 5: The argument does not inspire a movement to piety (p. 57).
  
  
  
• REPLIES:
  
  
  • Reply to 1: Can it really? In any case, what's conceivable or imaginable need not be metaphysically possible.
  
  
  • Reply to 2: A separate argument must be given to rule out this possibility. (Recall St. Thomas's natural theology.)
  
  
  • Reply to 3: This is not at all obvious once I ask why there is something (contingent) rather than nothing.
  
  
  • Reply to 4: Same as reply to 2, including parenthetical remark
  
  
  • Reply to 5: Why think that this is a criterion for the success of the argument?

• 3. God's moral attributes and evil: Exit Demea

• Is pessimism with respect to the human condition the friend or foe of religion? [Part X: Demea vs Cleanthes]


• Is the mere existence of evil compatible with the existence of an all-knowing, all-powerful, and perfectly good God?

Philo in the end admits that there is no incompatibility, but the point that he's really after is that, given our epistemic position, the existence of evil makes the thesis that there is an all-knowing, all-powerful, and perfectly good God less probable than its contrary. (This becomes clear at the beginning of Part XI.)


• The visitor from another world (Part XI): two possible starting points


• antecedent belief in a perfect creator


• antecedent neutrality with respect to the existence of a perfect creator
  
  
• QUESTION: WHICH STARTING POINT IS OURS?
  
  
• Four puzzles about the world (in effect, Philo is pointing out why, with sufficient power, he could have done a much better job creating and governing the world than God is reputed to have done):
  
  
• Why any pain at all?
• Why govern in accord with general laws that are beneficial to species but not to individuals?
• Why such skimpiness in the allocation of powers to creatures?
• Why so many defects in workmanship?
  
  
• Four hypotheses (p. 75): The first causes are either


1. all good (Christian view) or
2. all malevolent or
3. some good and some malevolent (cosmological dualism of a Manichean sort) or
4. indifferent (the view of the Epicureans)
   
   
• A surprising possibility: Is Christianity as a whole easier to defend than classical theism, which is a proper part of it? (St. Francis and the contemporary problem of understanding him.)

• 1. Cleanthes: religion as a positive influence


• Fear of eternal punishment and hope for eternal reward [p. 82].


• Consolation in the midst of suffering and in the face of death [p. 86].  The alternative is a sort of default Epicureanism that sees great pain and suffering as meaningless and that, in the face of death and without hope of immortality, recommends striving for a "comfortable" existence until one dies.  One could argue that such a view leads to excessive individualism and weakens one's desire to make sacrifices for others.
  
  CONCLUSION: Religion, however much corrupted, is an important positive influence in society. So the disagreements between believers and skeptics are not merely verbal. There is potentially a big difference between the sort of social conditions produced by religious faith, on the one hand, and by religious skepticism, on the other.
  
  

• 2. Philo: religion as a baneful influence


• Eternal reward and punishment hold sway only over those who are willing to sacrifice "natural virtue" for fanaticism [pp. 83-85]


• Religion is too morbid to hold sway over common people -- devout people are "gloomy and melancholic." [p. 87]  And when Philo points out that the tenets of morality often diverge from the demands of one's religious philosophy, it must be said that in certain Protestant understandings of atonement there is a very unclear connection between being saved and being morally upright. This is what Philo is talking about here.
  
  
• Notice that Philo's position is based on the assumption that human beings have preponderant "natural motives of justice and humanity" (p. 84) and that it is these benevolent "natural motives" that tend to be corrupted by religion.  From a Christian perspective this constitutes an outright denial of the doctrines of original sin and of the consequences of original sin (disordered sentient desire, ignorance, weakness, and malice).  Moreover, even non-Christian classical moral philosophies of the sort propounded by Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics and even the Epicureans begin from the assumption that our souls are disordered from the beginning and that we need to work hard to make our motives benevolent and other-directed.  Also, there is an interesting contrast here between Philo's views and those of Alexis de Tocqueville in his Democracy in America.

CONCLUSION: Since religion is always found in a corrupted state, society is better off without it.

• 3. Reprise: skepticism and faith


• Religious skeptics as the favorites of God after philosophical theists [p. 86]


• Skepticism as a prelude to accepting Christian revelation [p. 89]

QUESTION: What's going on here at the end of the Dialogues?!?