Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
Claire Berlinski, Ed. ·
Oct 1, 2011 at 5:38am
The prize: Signed copies of The Devil's Delusion.
The proposition, from Christopher Hitchens:
What can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof.
Prizes for the best argument in favor, or against.
My father will be judging the contest.
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Comments :
Oct '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
"My father will be judging the contest."
Now that's just bald-faced intimidation! [:-)
I don't reckon my ego is all that delicate, but I'm not sure I want to press the edge of that envelop with your Dad anytime soon. Can I instead send him my copy in a SASE and get him to sign it?
Aug '11
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
Bad argument. It confuses "not proving" (simply asserting) with "there is no proof." Under Mr Hitchen's rule, I'd never be able to do basic math since I can't really do proofs. (I read Mr Berlinski's book, 123, but I'd need to read it a few more times!) Also, what does Hitchen's argument do for statements like "I love you" and "What you said to me was hurtful and mean"? "Proof" just lays out the standards of reasoning we are willing to accept. We apply different levels of scrutiny based on a variety of factors. Some "proofs" aren't actually "proofs" at all in other contexts. "Proof" doesn't have that much force at all. At best his argument means very little, at worst it's fallacious.
Jan '11
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
One, divine intervention, give a self-standing rationale for the universe, the other, atheism, could not exist without the first, and, using the first, it attempts to prove a negative. Therefore, both must depend on faith - and that's religion, either way you look at it.
Aug '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
'Proof' is merely an act of connection: "If a is true, then b is true". It takes you back one step in a chain, but it cannot anchor the chain.
Then, either it's turtles all the way down, or you have some anchor truths that you accept without proof: axioms, self-evident truths, or faith. Like the faith that there is a world outside our own mind that contains other minds.
Even then, if I understand the incompleteness theorem (and I really don't), all sufficiently complex formal systems contains propositions that are true, but not provable. So 'proof alone' not only can't get you started on a search for truth, it will not let you explore the full terrain of truth once you get started.
To assert that everything unproven can be dismissed ,then, is simply solipsistic nihilism: in this worldview, everything can be dismissed. It might be defensible, but frankly, it is boring. I can't imagine why someone as lively as Mr. Hitchens would attend a party so bereft of fun.
Aug '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
It is a unfalsibile. Both the current wording and the inverse wording are true due to the operative word "can" as opposed to "could" meaning "ought".
Claire Berlinski, Ed.
Re-wording the to the negative. "What can be asserted without proof can be dismissed with proof."
Proof of the Inverse. Flat Earthers refuse to believe the world is round, despite many many proofs. If the world were not round, then the 'horizon effect' would not exist - meaning you would see the entirety of a sailing ship until it exceeds your visual acuity, rather than having it disappear below the horizon, until only the topmasts are in sight then disappearing entirely.
Since both versions of the statement are true, it is not falsible and not to the scientific standards Hitchens pretends to.
Flat Earthers are under no compulsion to accept that the earth is round, largely because there is no consequence for their rejection. They can dismiss with proof.
Hitchens' statement is an affirmation of the intellect to willfully disbelieve.
Edited on Oct 1, 2011 at 7:02amApr '11
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
To recognize that the proposition being asserted has been proved, you must first recognized the nature of the proposition for which you are demanding proof. It is pointless to demand a physicalist, sense-based, standard of proof for what is an essentially metaphysical, reason-based argument.
That we accept the Pythagorean Theorem as having been proved is not because we have measured every possible rectilinear triangle but rather because we recognize it as an abstract, mathematical proposition and tailor our standard of proof accordingly. Then, having examined a sequence of statements regarding triangles, we consider the proposition a-squared + b-squared = c-squared as "proved" because the conclusion follows "necessarily" from the series of preceding statements. Moreover we recognize that the Pythagorean Theorem would remain true even if the physical universe never existed.
Christopher Hitchens tends to equate disproof with disbelief. But since the time of Bacon we recognize that our knowledge of the physical is contingent and subject to change based on new information. What today is dismissed as fancy becomes tomorrow's conventional wisdom. So to Mr. Hitchens I say, "Proof? You want proof? You can't handle the proof!"
Edited on Oct 1, 2011 at 7:22amSep '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
I believe that the Final Solution was premised on the same argument if you substitute the unique and inviolable right to life for the Jew for what can be asserted. And it certainly applies to the unborn in the Dr. Kermit Gosnell case. Its worth noting that the common law tradition in the West recognizes the "bear in the woods" scenario for manslaughter convictions: if you shoot at something moving in the woods thinking its a bear, but not knowing its a bear, and it turns out be a man, then you're guilty of manslaughter.
Your lack of proof its a man or a bear doesn't beat a murder rap either in Philadelphia or Nuremberg. I've never met Mr. Hitchens and therefore have no proof that he actually exists. For all I know, as an Atheist Delusion Truther, I can dismiss notice of his passing in the obituary column since other than interviews of someone purporting to be him I can't be sure he was ever alive.
Sincerely,
Alan Turing's Cat
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
Hitchens’ statement is an unprovable assertion which is either self-negating or the proof of the converse. QED. (I'm not eligible for the book, and bought it when it came out anyway. I'm just goofing around.)
Oct '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
What can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof.
Mr. Hitchens is making an assertion about the nature of truth. He believes truth is propositional and verifiable using the “scientific method.” But this is really a proposition in its own right: the proposition that truth is subject to verification using our five senses—that truth resides in a material reality. In reality, material reality resides in material reality. Truth lies elsewhere.
Can love, for instance, be dismissed because it can’t be proved? Love has enormous power over material actions (as anyone paying college tuition knows), although there is no material proof for its existence. So too does the opposite of love have enormous power, that being not ‘hate’ as some presume but indifference. Most deaths in the Holocaust and other inhumane acts of the Nazi regime were due to indifference rather than to hate. But the point here is that love, hate, indifference are assertions without proof that cannot, pace Hitchens, be dismissed.
Finally, it’s worth noting that there are very few people who live their life having dismissed all that cannot be proved by material reference. I doubt Mr. Hitchens is one of them.
Oct '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
"What can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof."
I argue in favor of the proposition but am opposed to the nihilistic world view from which it is proposed. It is a form of self justification: What the heart believes the mind justifies.
Because Mr Hitchins does not believe in the existance of transcendant truth, he therefore, puts forth propositions which support his presuppositions, proving he is incapable of self abnegation. His apparant lack of circumspection with regard to transcendance is remarkable for a man peering into the void.
Jul '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
Not to change the subject -- well, actually, I am -- but your dad ought to get that book reprinted. They are charging outrageous prices for used copies on the internet, and I doubt he sees a pfennig from it.
Aug '11
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
Since Mr. Hitchens provides no proof for his assertion that, "What can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof", I hear-by dismiss with no proof. And instantly, I disappear down the recursive rat-hole.
Sep '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
I love my little girl. As Tupak Shakur told Vanity Fair when asked how he felt about the mother of his children: “I'd take a bullet for her.” Is either statement proof of anything? Must each be dismissed rather than considered? Must I, to “prove” I love my little girl, pay a gang of hoodlums to pounce on her precious body so that I can intervene and actually take a bullet for her? Even then, would I have proved that I loved her or, rather, that I was a grandiose egoist? And wouldn't every single observer’s consideration of the event be a flawed proof of either? Must love, being something known yet unknown, be dismissed? Or must we do as the Puritans did and demand certain physical manifestations as proof of that assertion? I suspect the slogan is Hitchens’s response to Paul’s description of faith as the substance of things hoped for. But is his assertion that human beings inherently know the difference between right and wrong not subject to dismissal on the very same terms? This is why he cannot see support for big government for what it actually is: an act of faith.
Edited on Oct 1, 2011 at 9:11amJan '11
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
Blame it on Occam.
“Occam’s Razor” advises that when several explanations are possible, we should choose the simplest, i.e., the one that requires the fewest entities. That’s great as far as it goes, and it has certainly helped science.
But it’s a short hop from that to: “if you don’t absolutely have to believe in something, don’t.” That’s Occam’s mutant corollary. It advises that you should only believe what you can prove. This masquerades as intellectual discipline, but it’s simply arrogance. It’s hubris to over-trust the power of “proof,” and dismiss everything else.
Hitchens’ comment exploits the emotional comfort of the word “proof.” Proof claims that doubt is impossible or seriously unlikely. We freely admit that our beliefs can’t be proved absolutely. Big deal. So what? Faith isn’t belief without reason, or believing without cause. Instead, faith is a commitment you make, even though there’s doubt.
If Hitchens wants to stand aloof from reality until it bites his intellectual ass, that’s his choice. But he has no right to demand that the rest of us withhold belief until our butts are bitten.
Jul '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
Most of life is equivocal, and the wisdom of doing something is never a given. If you wanted a proof of the success of an action before you took it, you'd never do anything. Hitchens's argument is not directed to daily living but, probably, a dismissal of the Judeo/Christian tradition, a rationalization to dismiss those Claims.
We want to claim the rationality of our actions, that they somehow rise to a level of certitude. The Man of Galilee said "This generation is an evil generation. It seeks a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah." Luke 11:29. Rational behavior is much more than proofs, but proofs are one of our generation's current signs.
Less somber, Steve Jobs is quoted as saying "Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward, you can only connect them looking backward. So you have to trust that dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something - your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life."
Thanks, Claire, for ruining my Saturday morning work.
Nov '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
"What can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof."
Actually, absolute "proofs" only exist in mathematics. And yet, we accept a multitude things every day without absolute proof. The natural world in which we live is mostly dependent on probability rather than proof. If absolute proof were required to live then we wouldn't get out of bed in the morning.
I submit that supernatural or metaphysical or spiritual "proof" is not probabilistic. My faith in the existence of God and His plan for me is not in anyway like my "faith" that the chair that I am sitting on will continue to hold me up. My faith in the chair's support structure is merely probabilistic but my faith in God is absolute because its Source is not in my experience. "For by grace are you saved, through faith and that not of yourselves it is God's gift." And this Mr. Hitchins cannot know without the proof being Divinely imparted to him. It is interesting and causes one to stand in awe of God that Christopher's brother possesses that proof from God while he does not.
Oct '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
KC brings the decision into focus. Bottom line; Faith is the decision to believe we are created beings, owing our existence to our Creator.
Atheism is the "faith" to believe that we are an accident and owe no allegiances at all.
Faith accepts a universe of reason.
Atheism accepts a universe of chaos.
In the end, so to speak, our butts are our own to bite.
Christopher Hitchens is taking a gamble on oblivion, the only realistic future for the atheist.
Accepting accountability to our Creator is the inverse proposition.
In the words of Milton Freedman, in another context, we are Free To Choose.
Sep '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
Just to be clear, I'm not going to rehash The Liar's Paradox, Saul of Tarsus's invocation of its Greek origin in Titus, Tarski, Godel, Russel or Frege, Medieval Insolubles, or Thomistic or Weaverian demolitions of Ockham's nominalism, or the Medieval Problem of the Universals because the comboxes are small and this life is short.
Edited on Oct 1, 2011 at 9:45amSep '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
Euclid's Elements, the first rigorous treatment of geometry in history, begins by stating five postulates--assertions without proof--and goes on to prove the familiar theorems of plane geometry based on these postulates. The fifth postulate, known as the "parallel postulate," says, in brief, that given a line L and a point not on that line, there is exactly one line L' that is parallel to it. This seems so obvious that few people questioned it until a few mathematicians--Bolyai, Lobachevski, and Gauss--showed that one can assert a different "parallel postulate" and come up with a perfectly good, "non-Euclidean" geometry. This was a fairly important intellectual revolution which began quietly among a few mathematicians and eventually led to Riemannian geometry and Einstein's General Theory of Relativity.
One might say that in this case, what was asserted without proof was dismissed without proof--Euclid's parallel postulate was replaced by another, without "disproving" the original postulate. But this would be a superficial judgment. Euclid's parallel postulate seemed so self-evident that it was not until Bolyai et al proved that a self-consistent non-Euclidean geometry was possible that people felt free to reject it.
Sep '10
Re: Weekend Contest: The Devil's Delusion
To continue more generally: what is asserted without proof can be something that seems so self-evident that merely dismissing it without proof is not an intelligent judgment by itself. As people often say, "the burden of proof is on you" if you reject propositions like that. You'd better have a very good argument for rejecting it; otherwise, blank dismissal is indistinguishable from mere stupidity.