I’ve been reading Gordon H. Clark’s (Clarke is a Dogmatist and Christian philosopher) book “Three Philosophies of Religion” recently, and one of the points he makes is that the senses are impossible to prove.
For example:
“How can one prove the reliability of memory? Any test designed to show
which memory is true and which is mistaken presupposes that a previous
memory is true - and this is the point in question. In large measure the
psychological force of my position derives from the impossibility of
empiricism.” - Gordon H. Clark
Another point Clark raises is that since the senses are within the mind, I can’t know that this computer I am typing at does not only exist in my head.
If so, can anyone prove the senses? Is there an answer to Skepticism?
Yes, the fact that I am answering your post right now does not really tell me or you that your post is real or posted, that I hit the submit button, that I am not sure how I remember my password so I can make this response.
Although I will agree him in general with the heavy problems with Empiricism (or foundationalism in general), the best way to respond to skepticism is almost always offensively.
Examine his argument closes, look for assumtions and such.
For instance, what theory of truth is he useing? It sounds to me like a corrispondance theory- for if he held a coherency theory then he would not be concered about a memory being wrong, as long as they all agreed.
He is questioning the senses, and seems he is suggesting the possibility of a world that has no referance to sesony things. To say something is possible, implies you know what in entials and does not contradict with any other truth you know. Does he explain what this possibility would entail.
The most distuirbing thing is how he talks about a skepticism provideing psychological force for his argument. He seems to be encourageing a fallacy. Namely the idea that if one popular theory is wrong, then it must be more likely that mine is right. This is only nessisarly true, when there are only two theories.
Other wise you could start out: 90% theory A, 7% theory B, and 3% theory C
Then after new info come to: 20% theory A, 77% theory B, and 3% theory C, for example.
Just remember that a skeptical argument is still an argument; it has no special status that prevents one from picking it apart like a steamed crab on a hot day- just like one does with every other argument.
Although I will agree him in general with the heavy problems with Empiricism (or foundationalism in general), the best way to respond to skepticism is almost always offensively.
Examine his argument closes, look for assumtions and such.
For instance, what theory of truth is he useing? It sounds to me like a corrispondance theory- for if he held a coherency theory then he would not be concered about a memory being wrong, as long as they all agreed.
He is questioning the senses, and seems he is suggesting the possibility of a world that has no referance to sesony things. To say something is possible, implies you know what in entials and does not contradict with any other truth you know. Does he explain what this possibility would entail.
The most distuirbing thing is how he talks about a skepticism provideing psychological force for his argument. He seems to be encourageing a fallacy. Namely the idea that if one popular theory is wrong, then it must be more likely that mine is right. This is only nessisarly true, when there are only two theories.
Other wise you could start out: 90% theory A, 7% theory B, and 3% theory C
Then after new info come to: 20% theory A, 77% theory B, and 3% theory C, for example.
Just remember that a skeptical argument is still an argument; it has no special status that prevents one from picking it apart like a steamed crab on a hot day- just like one does with every other argument.
Could you explain to me the two things you mention: the correspondence theory and coherency theory within this context or problem? I’d appreciate it very much.
Corrispondance theory states that a proposition is true iff it corriponds to the fact of the matter in the world. For instance, the proposition ‘It is raining’ is true iff it is indeed raining.
Biggest problem with is that it requires a world thats kinda seperate from us.
The Coherance theory states that a proposition is true iff it is coherent with our other true beliefs. So for instance if its true that ‘rain causes stuff to be wet’ and ‘the stuff is currently try’, then ‘it is not raining is true’. There is no referance to an outside world.
The Coherantist got together in response to the general failure of Reductive Empiricism (the thesis that all terms are just symbols for collections of experiances). There main task is to try to capture all our pre-theoretical notinos of truth in their non-intuitive theory. I haven’t really read too much, but it seems like an intrigueing notion.
W00t Empistomology class! (I needed the review. :-p )
Thank you very much. Much clearer. Now, it seems to me you are trying to expose Clark’s contradiction when you say that he must be using correspondence theory of truth, yet, according to you, he seems to suggest the possibility of a world that has reference to sensory things. If you are right, then this is a contradiction within Clark’s argument. Is this correct?
Well no not entirely. I don’t quite think there is a contradiction in that short paragraph, but as he explains furthure thats where I would look for one.
The classical view of a knowledge is a justified, true, belief. So looking into the interaction between the theory of truth and the theory of justification is going to be essential to discover if this guy is full of it.
I should really actually read the work if I’m going to try to comment on him anymore. Although, it seems he is simple rehashing some of the old and busted arguments for skepticism that have been aswered to. So picking up a general book of empistomolgy with a good section on skepticims may be of great help in seeing how others have already responded.
I guess the last point I want to make is skepticism is a very very strong claim. It’s the claim that it is impossible for one to know something in an area. Simply demonstrateing to me that a actually no nothing in that area is insuffient to show impossibility. It seems a lot of skeptics ask us to use the entirely perioullous induction from instance to go from “I don’t know anything right now” to “No one knows anything ever.” Very bad move.
I don’t think Gordon H. Clark is using the corrispondance theory. My understanding was that as a Christian, he believes everything we know of exists in the mind of God, including ourselves, or as the apostle Paul says, “in him we move and have our being.”
He essentially believes that any consistent series of dogma/axioms can be accepted, and that empiricism is not consistent.
I’m sorry…I don’t understand how the falibility of memory amounts to a critique of empiricism. Empiricists assume a rigorous use of the scientific method…which involves recording observations as they happen. Thus, knowledge based on experience is not necessarily knowledge based on memory.
It depends on the experiment. For instance, if you’re recording a reading from a spectrophotometer, you can always double check your figures on the machine–and that constitutes a test for whether or not the memory is correct. And the thing about experiments is that you can always re-do them. The charge was, “Any test designed to show which memory is true and which is mistaken presupposes that a previous memory is true.” That’s just not true. A reliable memory test invovles further observation. Of course, you then have to rely on the memory of the test…and that’s simply a pragmatic assumption; but it’s an assumption made with the knowledge that you can test your memory in the future…if you have to.
I think you may have a real point there Logo. He needs to show in some way we have sufficent cause to really doubt our memory. Although I really don’t think he is a pragmatist and would probably object to makeing a pragmatic assumtion.
Does it really matter if we can’t prove the existence of outside world? It is the only world we know, even if it were only illusionary it would be a shared illusion which would define rules like it does now. We perceive the outside world, or illusion of outside world, our perceptions are filtered through learned preconceptions residing in our brain/mind, we see this image in our head and act according to it, not according to ‘what’ is really out there. Because this image is an approximation of the illusion/whatever is really out there we can function in the world, otherwise I wouldn’t be able to write this post. I think it is a very low probability that our mind/brain should falsify the data so that we would perceive almost nothing of what really ‘is’. Anyways, it is my personal opinion that what is resides in the outside world and the image of it resides in our heads, and we act according to our image.
Of course we can reside in a tank somewhere, our mind being stimulated to deceive us and falsify our perceptions and some future robots hovering in the ‘real’ world, feeding from our brainenergy, but I think that is highly unlikely.
