Video Transcript: Active and Passive Properties

We're now going to take a look at these senses of reduction that I mentioned.  Again, we're going to simplify it a bit. And I'm going to say that a reduction  argument is one that tries to show that there are only x, only this particular kind  of properties and laws, and everything is really this kind of thing. So of course,  that kind of thing has to be the nature of the Divine as well. So there's only that  kind of thing, then the Divine is to, or show that things whose nature is x,  whichever of these characters that produce all the other kinds of properties,  laws, if there are any other kinds. They're all produced by caused by the ones  whose nature things this nature is x, whichever x more. Whatever x stands for.  Now, I'm going to say that our Christian philosophy is going to resist all sorts of  rejections, we're going to want to take we want to take these as the the way that  God has created the world that we experienced before we go to make theories  about it. And that means that there's something wrong with trying to reduce  everything to one or another, in order to make that divine, because we know that none of them are, they're all creations of the only divinity, the true and living  God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. So there are three things, three ways that  these arguments can go awry, askew, in addition to to contradicting himself. So  I'm going to take this top part off here. And we're going to look at ways that  reduction arguments can fail. And then, at the very end of this course, the last  lecture is going to show you why every attempt to make any of these kinds the  nature of what is divine, minimally commits this one, and is an incoherent  argument. I'm telling you where it's going. So now let's take a look. What can go  wrong with an argument? Well, it can tend to contain a logical contradiction.  without really realizing it, people proposed theories that, in fact, contain logical  contradictions. So that in the end somewhere, they say that A is true, and A is  false. So as the argument stands, it can't be right. If it contradicts itself. It's  wrong. It can also assert logical contraries. contraries aren't quite contradictions. There are sentences such as no horses can be racehorses. All horses are  racehorses, neither those can both, and are both false. can't both be true. And if  you serve them both, that's on incoherence as well. So these are all things that  can go wrong with an argument, and I'm calling him incoherencies is what it  means for an argument to be incoherent, and can be logically incoherent. But  then there's another way it can be. And this is something we call self referential  incoherence that is a claim or a theory of viewpoint, says, everything's this way.  And when you apply that to itself, since it said, Everything includes itself, you  apply it to itself, it cancels itself. There's a weak and a strong sense of each of  these. So self referential incoherence in the weak sense, is going to be  something like this. All beliefs are caused by brain processes. There was an  article in magazine I read last summer, in which the author made that claim.  brain processes force us to believe what we believe we don't choose any  beliefs. They just occur. And we believe what we believe. And that's the end of it. And I pointed out in a letter to the, to that journal, that if that were true, it would 

be true of the claim that all beliefs are caused by brain process that too, would  be caused by brain processes. And it's not just all the other beliefs we could  know to be true, because they're just forced on us is that so it cancels itself. This is incoherent in the weak sense. Because it doesn't mean that that this claim  has To be false, it means that you could never know that it's true. That's the  weaker sense. It is such that if it were true, you could never know that it's true,  which is a terrible spot for a theory to be in. The theory is what's trying to explain thing it's trying to clear up mysteries, not make an assertion that cancels itself. It  could also be incoherent in a strong sense. And we can illustrate that pretty  easily as well. Take the sentence that's famous in the history of Taoism. Nothing  can be said of the Tao. The only way you can assert this is to say it. I think you  could write it or say it, but it says nothing can be said of the Tao, what did you  just do? You just said something of the Tao. So taken literally, which is not the  way it's intended in Taoism. And that was a by the way, I know that taken literally and without any explanatory background, that's self referentilly incoherent in the  strong sense. If it's true, it's false, therefore, it's false. That's the first additional  kind of incoherence. These are the ones that are saying can go wrong, in  addition to logical mistakes. The second one is self assumptive incoherence,  and it's who has a weak and a strong sense. Self assumptive incoherence  occurs when someone offers an explanation or a theory. And there's nothing in  the explanation that's incompatible with with itself or anything like the first one.  But there's the assumption that must be made for these premises to be true.  And the assumption is incompatible with a conclusion. For example, this is the  these are all examples of beliefs that have been affirmed, and are incoherent for this reason. I mean, they're real examples. There not just ones I made up. Okay, this two has a strong and a weak sense. Let's, let's look at the first one. The first  one, the weak sense is, somebody says, evolution was a random process. And  our brains are the products of evolution so that the products have a random  process. So what confidence have we, that our brains present to us realityais it  is. One thinker said, maybe there are no objects with properties out there. There are no things with properties. That's the way our brains present reality to it.  Maybe it's not there. Maybe they're not there. So put here. There are no things  with properties. Now maybe you can see already what's wrong with that. The  reason for concluding this was that we are the products of evolution. And it was  a random process. And it was a random process. There's no reason for us to  think that the randomness of it got things just right, we have a brain that really  shows us the way things are. But if you try to conclude from that, that we don't  know that there are things with properties that undercuts the assumption of  evolution, if there are no things with properties, there are no things, life forms,  that evolved. So you're giving us a reason for believing this. The theory of  evolution, the theory of evolution assumes there are things with properties.  That's incoherent self assumptively incoherent I'm calling it and so and it is so in

the weak sense. I'm sorry, that's it. So in the strong sense, if there are no things  with properties, then evolutions in place take place. If it did, then there are things with properties. So this has to be false. This is the strong sense in which the  conclusion turns out false. The weak sense is a little later, once again, the weak  sense means that the theory is such that we can't know it to be true even if it is  true. So it might be, but we can't know it. So let's take let's take again, the  example of that says, brain processes produce all our beliefs, we checked that  one before, that turned out to be self referentially incoherent, it's also self  assumptively incoherant. Brain processes produce all our beliefs. Therefore, we  can't know that the beliefs correspond to reality. But then we can't know the  brain processes produce all our beliefs either. brain processes are also things  that exist in the world. We can't see our own brain while we think. But we can  see somebody else's on a scope or by opening up their skull. Brains are real  objects. If they produce all our beliefs, than they produce our belief that they  produce all our beliefs, not a good spot to be in. So this is self assumptively  incoherent as well as self referentially. And it is so in the weak sense. Now. self  referential incoherence is pretty well known among philosophers, but not many  of them distinguish self assumptive incoherence, or self performing performative incoherence. So I want to spend a little time with them a little more time, just  because they've been overlooked so often. And I have to do some  housekeeping here. I've done the first two, I did a and b. So let's first do c and  then I'm going to come back to talk some more about them. Self performative.  What does that mean? That means the conclusion that you come to, or the  theory that you're trying to promote, is incompatible with some activity the  thinker has to do in order to arrive at that theory or that conclusion. So, for  example, it's very simple illustration. I've got a beaker with water in it. And I want to know what the temperature is. And somebody says to me, Oh, that's easy  comes along a plugs a thermometer in. And the thermometer reads 78 degrees.  Do I know that the water was 78 degrees before the thermometer was put in it?  No. There's all every reason to believe that the thermometer changed the  temperature of the water, the very act that you have to perform to get the  information wrecks the information. That's self performatively incoherent in the  weak sense. concluding that Now I have the temperature that the water was  before the thermometer went in it is incoherent in the weak sense, there's a  fraction of a chance it could be true. But you'll never know. It's, it's a claim that  you cannot know to be true, even if it is true. That's the weak sense. Self  performative in the strong sense, is what Descartes discovered, when he offered as an art as a sure and certain starting point for theory of knowledge that we  exist. Each of us when they we affirm our own existence, cannot be mistaken.  That's what he wanted something that just can't be wrong. And he doesn't  explain why it is we can't be wrong. But the argument amounts to saying this,  whatever I assert, in the first person, I talk about myself, and I say, I do not exist.

That has to be false, because I had to exist to assert it. That's the performance.  That's the action that the thinker has to take, asserting his nonexistence, and it's incompatible with the action. The action could only be done if I do exist. So  that's a strong sense. That sense of me makes it false. And that's what  Descartes wanted. He didn't explain its nature. He didn't say, Well, this is comes out that our own denying our own existence is incoherent in the self  performative way. And so it didn't, didn't do all of that. Nevertheless, he saw this  point, he had the insight with it without being able to explain it. So I'm suggesting that we've got some things to work with here. We've got self referential  incoherence, self assumptive, self performative and each in a weak and in a  strong sense. So in addition to logical criteria, here are six more. And again, I'm  telling you that the reason we're doing all this is when we get to the end and we  look at The arguments for some one of these being or two being the character,  the nature of the Divine, we're going to find that every such claim is minimally,  self performatively incoherent in the weak sense, and is therefore a terrible  proposal theory, we couldn't know to be true even if it weren't. That's where this  is headed. Some of this a little convoluted. And it may be so new to a lot of you  that you have a bit of a struggle with it. So I'm going to suggest that you rerun  this and look at it again, look at the explanation in your reading and see if you  can peg these in your own mind. These are things that can go wrong with an  argument or a theory. What are they? Well, if they can be logical incoherencies,  okay, fine, we contradict ourselves. What else, a claim we make, can cancel  itself. That is we make the claim that all beliefs are this way, that includes the  belief that all the beliefs are this way, and maybe it trashes it or we have a claim  or a theory. And its conclusion is incompatible with one of its assumptions.  There's nothing in any of the premises, that's incompatible. The conclusion,  maybe the conclusion, conclusion follows from them. But if one of the premises  has to assume, has to make this assumption, and the assumption is inconsistent with the conclusion, you've got another really bad proposal. And finally, of the  conclusion, or the of an argument, or the main claim of a theory could be such  that it's not consistent with not compatible with some activity of the thinker, some action the thinker has to perform in order to arrive at that conclusion. In that  case, it's self performatively incoherent, and all of those are really bad boys, you do not want to get stuck with a theory that's incoherent in any one of those  senses. Even the weak senses of them all are enough to do it in. If the theory is  such that even if it were true, you could know that it was true, it doesn't explain  anything. And if the theory is such that if it's true, it's false, then it's not worth the  time a day, it's not worth considering. I'm going to stop there and give you a  chance to think that over and then when I come back, we'll start a new topic, but before we do, I'll review this a bit again.