Lundahl (2022s) Again Uses Improper Definitions and Makes Groundless Proclamations about Logic
Kevin R. Henke
October 17, 2022
In Henke (2022b), I stated:
“No gods, angels, demons or a Bible are also needed to figure out how people should try to function in our environments. We should develop rules (morality) through reason and not Biblical dogma so that we can live peacefully with each other and our environment.”
Lundahl (2022j) then replies to my statements:
“The morality is here said to be rooted in reason. Now, the question is not whether an agency external to our reason is needed to enlighten it - it may be the case, and as Christians, both Lewis and I believe after the fall each has some kind of need of that. The questions are rather:
· where do universally valid rules of reason come from?
· does reason deal with any moral rules prior to its own developing of moral rules?
The point of chapters 3 and (I think) 4 is, the laws of chemistry and electronics and physics and the constraints of evolution do not put us into the reach of discovering what is universally valid. For our reason to do this, we need to be more than that. The sentence ‘[o]ur brains, thoughts and surroundings are all ultimately controlled by the laws of chemistry and physics,’ needs to be false, at least if implying ‘and nothing else.’”
In Henke (2022ay), I answered Mr. Lundahl’s question: “Where do universally valid rules of reason come from”:
“The “universally valid rules of reason” that Lundahl (2022j) references are solely human discoveries. There’s no need for anything beyond human reason (Dennett 2006). The rules are “universal” because they happen to work in a variety of circumstances from generation to generation. In ancient times, humans learned to develop morals so that members of the tribe could get along with each other. Otherwise, the tribe would fall apart. People needed to cooperate with each other to survive. They also learned how to make spears, avoid the berries that were poisonous, develop strategies for hunting, etc. Both of their technological and socialization (moral) skills came from reasoning and they passed that knowledge onto their children. Their children added to the knowledge and passed that onto their children, etc. In other words, ancient people discovered morality in the same way that they discovered how to make a spear – through reason and trial and error.
In more modern times, we discovered that slavery was not a good idea from rational debate and empathy for our fellow human beings, and certainly not from prayer and the Bible (Avalos 2011). We also learned that it’s not a good idea to dump toxins into the atmosphere and oceans. Through physics, chemistry and biology, we learned that pollution may not just “go away.” Each generation learns valuable and often painful lessons through reason, trail and error, and debate, and we try to pass that wisdom and knowledge unto the next generation along with our positive technological advances. There’s no evidence that any of our advances in reasoning and technology came from God or something ‘beyond Nature.’
As for the Fall of Adam and Eve that Lundahl (2022j) and Lewis (1960) mention, there’s not a shred of evidence to support it. The young-Earth creationist version of the Fall is especially silly, where stars in distant galaxies supposedly become supernovae solely because Adam and Eve listened to a Talking Snake in Genesis 3, ate the wrong piece of fruit, and plunged the entire Universe into chaos and destruction.
When humans rationalize, we first observe and identify a problem or a mystery. We then thoroughly confirm our observations with more and independent observations from other humans. Did they really do or say that? Did that really happen? Over time through testing, trial and error, and being empathetic to our fellow humans, we developed “universally valid rules of reason”, which are the products of human activity. We then use the rules we’ve learned to solve additional problems and mysteries. The evidence indicates that we humans have no gods, angels or extraterrestrial intelligences helping us. We are alone and we are most effective in solving mysteries and problems when we work together and engage in science, evaluate historical data for accuracy, develop and use mathematics/logic, and strive to come to a consensus through rational debate and not through prayer, prophecy, astrology or other nonsensical methods.” [my emphasis]
Lundahl (2022s) then replies to my bolded section:
“Once these go beyond the environment, surroundings, and no, this does not mean the universe, this already presupposes the existence of universal validity for rules of logic. And that universal validity cannot be guaranteed by human activity.”
Mr. Lundahl is again making groundless proclamations in a vain attempt to convince himself and our readers that there needs to be something “beyond” to explain the universal validity of logic. There doesn’t. As I also explained in Henke (2022aw), Henke (2022hp), and Henke (2022ht), for the purpose of this debate, Mr. Lundahl cannot restrict the terms “environment” and “surroundings” to an individual’s immediate surroundings at any particular time. We must consider the observations of other humans if Mr. Lundahl is ever going to actually demonstrate that there’s anything “beyond.” These observations would include the work of scientists on everything from subatomic particles to galaxies billions of light years away, and information going back to the just after the Big Bang. In other words, our “environment” is the known Universe. Furthermore, I’ve demonstrated that all of the evidence indicates that the laws of chemistry and physics are universal, including Newton’s Universal Law of Gravitation (e.g., Henke 2022ai). Counting, other mathematics and logic are also human inventions that effectively describe how our Universe operates and I listed a number of peer-reviewed articles in Henke 2022ck and Henke 2022hs that discuss how logical thinking developed during human evolution and how the human brain by itself uses logical thinking. There’s no evidence that anything paranormal or supernatural is required. If Mr. Lundahl has good physical evidence of something beyond our Universe, I’m interested. Otherwise, I don’t want him to argue that because China is beyond his immediate surroundings in Paris, France, that we can’t have a natural explanation for the origin of logic (i.e., Henke 2022hp). Mr. Lundahl clearly wants to create a mystery where there is no evidence of one so that he can desperately invoke a god-of-the-gaps fallacy and try to justify his need for the supernatural to exist. For once, Mr. Lundahl needs to look up my recommended references.
References:
Avalos, H. 2011. Slavery, Abolitionism, and the Ethics of Biblical Scholarship: Sheffield Phoenix Press: Sheffield, UK, 331pp.
Dennett, D.C. 2006. Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon: Viking Penguin: London, UK, 448pp.
Lewis, C.S. 1960. Miracles, 2nd ed., printed 1974: Harper One: HarperCollinsPublishers, 294pp.