…and this is a 
Give me creaturely over preacherly any day
Category: Books • Godlessness • Media
Posted on: February 19, 2006 7:05 PM, by PZ Myers
You can tell when a dogmatic theist has to review a book by an unapologetic atheist: there's a lot of indignant spluttering, and soon the poor fellow is looking for an excuse to dismiss the whole exercise, so that he doesn't have to actually think about the issues. That's the case with Leon Wieseltier's review of Dennett's Breaking the Spell—it's kind of like watching a beached fish gasp and flounder, yet at the same time he apparently believes he's the one with the gaff hook and club.
It's full of self-important declarations that reduce to incoherence, such as this one:
You cannot disprove a belief unless you disprove its content. If you believe that you can disprove it any other way, by describing its origins or by describing its consequences, then you do not believe in reason. In this profound sense, Dennett does not believe in reason. He will be outraged to hear this, since he regards himself as a giant of rationalism. But the reason he imputes to the human creatures depicted in his book is merely a creaturely reason. Dennett's natural history does not deny reason, it animalizes reason.
One moment he's telling us that just tracing the origins of an idea is insufficient to disprove it (sadly for Mr Wieseltier's argument, there is no sign that Dennett disagrees), the next he's telling us that the origin of Dennett's reason is "creaturely" and "animalized", and therefore of a lesser or invalid kind. I had no idea we could categorize reason by the nature of its source (I'd like to know what varieties of reason he proposes: "creaturely", "human", "divine"? Is there also a "vegetable reason"?), but even if we could, by his initial premise, it wouldn't matter: he needs to address its content, not carp against it because it is the product of natural selection rather than revelation.
Then there's this rather bewildering build-up. Wieseltier carefully builds a case that he has caught Dennett in an internal contradiction, an idea he pounces on with a kind of petty triumphal glee…but all it shows is that he doesn't know what he's talking about.
Like many biological reductionists, Dennett is sure that he is not a biological reductionist. But the charge is proved as early as the fourth page of his book. Watch closely. "Like other animals," the confused passage begins, "we have built-in desires to reproduce and to do pretty much whatever it takes to achieve this goal." No confusion there, and no offense. It is incontrovertible that we are animals. The sentence continues: "But we also have creeds, and the ability to transcend our genetic imperatives." A sterling observation, and the beginning of humanism. And then more, in the same fine antideterministic vein: "This fact does make us different."
Then suddenly there is this: "But it is itself a biological fact, visible to natural science, and something that requires an explanation from natural science." As the ancient rabbis used to say, have your ears heard what your mouth has spoken? Dennett does not see that he has taken his humanism back. Why is our independence from biology a fact of biology? And if it is a fact of biology, then we are not independent of biology. If our creeds are an expression of our animality, if they require an explanation from natural science, then we have not transcended our genetic imperatives. The human difference, in Dennett's telling, is a difference in degree, not a difference in kind—a doctrine that may quite plausibly be called biological reductionism.
To declare that we are not limited by our genetic imperatives does not in any way contradict the statement that we are material, biological beings with behaviors that can be explained scientifically, without recourse to the supernatural or any other kind of immaterial vitalism. Opposing simplistic genetic reductionism—which, by the way, is good to see from Dennett, because he has a bit of a reputation for being far too narrowly reductionist in his views—is not the same as denying a natural, biological basis for behavior. When Wieseltier tries to insist that genetic determinism is the same as biology, he's just flaunting his own ignorance.
The whole review reads this poorly, and I suppose I could take it on paragraph by paragraph…but nah. Brian Leiter has already torpedoed it, so even this much seems like excess. The New York Times really needs to do a better job of finding qualified reviewers—it seems in this case they just found a guy anxious to posture against the ungodly, with no competence to actually judge the book.
Comments
I saw the review. I was tempted to take it on myself, but unfortunately the technical difficulties preventing me from posting to my ScienceBlogs blog made me decide that it wasn't worth the effort.
Posted by: Orac | February 19, 2006 7:22 PM
Reading such material, and finding little within that particularly strongly resembles a coherent argument, I tend to assume the actual line of reasoning followed by the author appears nowhere in the work, and is quite simple:
1. This work contradicts a popular prejudice I happen to hold,
2. Therefore, I must attack it.
... that the arguments used for said attack might be spurious well beyond the point of absurdity is of no great concern. It's a popular prejudice, so the author and the editorial board may safely assume there will be ample applause. Indeed, enough readers will applaud the righteous smiting of the cheeky infidel that squeaks of 'but your criticisms make exactly no sense', however well-reasoned those squeaks might be, may just as safely be ignored.
Posted by: AJ Milne | February 19, 2006 7:40 PM
To declare that we are not limited by our genetic imperatives does not in any way contradict the statement that we are material, biological beings with behaviors that can be explained scientifically, without recourse to the supernatural or any other kind of immaterial vitalism.
That's exactly what I thought, too. All that bluster and build-up, then a conclusion that just doesn't compute.
As the ancient rabbis used to say, have your ears heard what your mouth has spoken?
Er, right, Mr Wieseltier, and my mouth is agape that you so neatly conclude that Dennett's recanting on his humanism. Is it that hard to understand that human consciousness has developed to a point that we're able to observe and analyze our own behavior, then modify our own behavior, formulate moral guidelines (for better or worse) etc?
Interesting, too, that Wieseltier casts his ire as a defense of philosophy and not just religion. Philosophy is great. Sometimes it may even be helpful in real world terms. But some philosophy is junk, too, and however enjoyable the mental calisthenics involved in philosophizing may be, it certainly helps if they're rooted in reality. And science is the discipline that seeks to determine reality.
Seems Wieseltier's review has been met quite favorably across the blogosphere, too. Guess I shouldn't be surprised. But his simply adopting a withering and erudite tone does not make him correct. I'm sure the clergy railed against Galileo with similar erudition. Which is not to say that Dennett's arguing scientific theory in his book or that his position is above criticism. Just to say that those on the side of fiction and superstition are quite capable of some impressive speechifying when doing so.
Posted by: Robert S. | February 19, 2006 7:45 PM
Well, what do you mean by a "scientific explanation of a behavior"? I know what Pinker and Dennett think it is, but what do you mean by it? You don't seem to buy their EP adaptationist stories. You don't have to assume a supernatural force or being to doubt whether most complicated human behaviors like religion have a "scientific meaning".
Posted by: Jonathan Badger | February 19, 2006 7:56 PM
I wish Wieseltier had done a better job but a Dennett's a purblind idiot.
With that in mind:
Why do you insist on arguing logic with priests? Priests begin from their definition of all meaning being social. They argue not only from tradition but from the moral imperatives of tradition: you arguing that blood can not not become wine is irrelevant. And yet you and Dennett wonder why you cannot convince the faithful? That's simply illogical.
You're more interested in the world than in perception, but then perception is how we experience the world. Computers don't perceive, animals do, and you're an animal. Those of us who are observant animals- who do not therefore pretend to be machines- pay close attention to and question ourselves, our motives and intentions. We try to remind ourselves to doubt, lest we begin to respond only out of reflex or habit. Scientists are not science any more than policemen are the law. Dennett doesn't understand that simple fact and Wieseltier doesn't respond to that arrogant stupidity clearly enough. But he's right.
Science does not explain Brian Leiter's fixation on academic social status or his unwillingness to respond to the blatant contradictions between his semi-leftist politics and his dedication to the academic priesthood. He's a Nietzschean snob. His tastes and manner define him more than his 'philosophical ideas.'
Why is Brad DeLong so god damn phobic of anything that has to do with Noam Chomsky, when the have so much in common? Delong's responses are frankly irrational. He goes of like a loon. Science can't explain that. Or perhaps it can, but it's not a science that we have access to.
Try to explain out loud to yourself why we defend the rule of law and not of men. Laws are nothing but traditions written on parchment. Why not just have people like you or Dennett make decisions for us? Why go through all this absurd ritual? Since lawyers are nothing but amoral craftsmen (and con-men) why not have scientists debate among themselves to resolve court cases?
Think about what the rule "of law" means and why we have it.
Then go back and take a high school literature class.
Philosophy is for adults son. Grow the fuck up,
and we can talk.
Posted by: Seth Edenbaum | February 19, 2006 8:16 PM
Wow Seth. I have to say that was one of the least coherent arguments that I have ever read. I will have to read it again but there might not have been a single well formed idea in the entire screed. Maybe you could try that again if you have time.
Posted by: brent | February 19, 2006 8:30 PM
Slight nitpick that might be a "No true Scotsman" fallacy, Robert S.: Philosophy, at least the type my brother's gotten a degree in, is actually about critical thinking, sometimes using it to untangle paradoxes. The problem with the perception of philosophy is that there's a lot of pseudophilosophy out there, not interested in discussing the steps of logic, just like pseudoscience isn't willing to discuss evidence or methods of gathering that evidence.
It was once painful to my brother's psyche when he asked if there was a philosophy section in a bookstore. The ditzy employee he asked responded, "Well, we've got a New Age section."
Posted by: BronzeDog | February 19, 2006 8:32 PM
I got an email today from the publisher via my blog address offering me a free copy for review.
I hope I get a copy.
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February 19, 2006 8:33 PM
I'm struck by Seth's insistence that "science doesn't explain..." certain things. Does he have some other canon of explanation he'd like to propose? All I see in his remarks are dubious interpretations like: "He's a Nietzschean snob. His tastes and manner define him more than his 'philosophical ideas.'"
It's easy to hurl brickbats-- but Leiter is entirely right when he points out that the etiology of a belief matters. And the point of Dennett's book is to argue that there are naturalistic etiologies for religious belief, etiologies which already explain far more and fit far better with our scientific understanding (the only understanding of the world that actually passes any empirical tests) than any religious metaphysics.
As for the rule of law, I think we have a very clear case of 'red herring' there. It has very little to do with science or religion-- it's more a matter of common sense: Do you trust individuals to get things right reliably and fairly? Which individuals? In any large and complex society, a system of rules we can rely on to structure these processes (and use to ensure our own point of view is heard) is way more reliable and resistant to abuse. Sadly, nothing can stop individual humans from undermining any such system (look at Bush and Cheney's over-reaches and the supine response of your Congress...). But we do the best we can despite them.
Posted by: Bryson Brown | February 19, 2006 8:45 PM
I had read this review on Saturday, and was waiting to hear what you would say. I think I took away something different from Wieseltier's review than you did. Perhaps it was because I was reading Roger Penrose the previous evening. In The Road to Reality, Penrose says that
The patterns of the Mandelbrot set ( and I suppose he would extend this to all of mathematics)
I take that to mean that that we humans have the ability to do mathematics is to be explained by biology, but that mathematics transcends our particular biological facts and mathematics is objective in that any biology (or electronics) that can do math. will arrive at the same mathematical facts. Mathematical truth cannot be explained by biology.
Since science is concerned with physical existence, perhaps biology can explain our science. But I take it that Penrose's argument is that it cannot explain mathematics.
Thus, when it came time to ascribe meaning to "to have the ability to transcend our genetic imperatives?" I took it to mean a similar thing - namely, to have access to something objective that transcends our biology, that would be the same for another biological or electronic entity with similar capabilities though of vastly different design.
---
I think this also makes it clear as to what the reviewer is objecting to:
If everything we value has been endorsed by natural selection, then we haven't transcended our genetic imperatives, have we?
And the above quote doesn't square with the theory of evolution as I understand it. I thought that in general biological pathways, organs, organisms have a versatility far greater than the qualities acted upon by natural selection, which is how complexity can increase. Thus our brains and ultimately our behavior, while selected upon to optimize survival in an African savannah setting or wherever, might be capable of far more than that. All we can say is that the extra stuff didn't give us a significant selection disadvantage. If science and math and music did not exist during the bulk of our evolutionary formative period - if e.g., humans 60,000 years ago were essentially biologically indistinguishable from ourselves - then how can we say that science and math and music abilities were determinative in our evolution? Rather, evolution has fashioned a brain that turns out to have a much richer repertoire than what was selected for, and again, we have transcended our genes.
Posted by: Arun | February 19, 2006 9:00 PM
The problem with the perception of philosophy is that there's a lot of pseudophilosophy out there, not interested in discussing the steps of logic, just like pseudoscience isn't willing to discuss evidence or methods of gathering that evidence.
Good point, BronzeDog. And I certainly would've groaned along with your brother had I heard that New Age remark!
Posted by: Robert S. | February 19, 2006 9:41 PM
I haven't read Dennett's book and I certainly haven't agreed with everything he's said in the past, so I have no opinion on that.
But I notice that Wieseltier hauls out an accusation of "scientism" in his third sentence. I've found that, while scientism as usually defined--the treatment of science as a kind of religion--is a genuine fallacy that it might in principle be useful to accuse people of, in practice when somebody throws around accusations of scientism it is a remarkably reliable marker of pious crankery. The word's been terribly debased.
Posted by: Matt McIrvin | February 19, 2006 9:41 PM
Just to let you know, P.Z., but there most certainly is "vegetable reason." I use it all the time to find the right light and soil conditions! *LOL*
Posted by: Bourgeois Nerd | February 19, 2006 10:48 PM
Silly Humans has another good fisking of this review.
Posted by: coturnix | February 19, 2006 10:55 PM
I'm 3/4ths of the way through Breaking the Spell, and what strikes me about it is the way Dennett bends over backwards to try not to put off people like Wieseltier. The book is punctuated with asides that beseech the thoughtful religious who might be reading not to put it down. I wonder how soon Wieseltier put (or threw) the book down?
His review is the standard theistic response to an intellectual criticism of theism. Much ado is made over the person making the criticism ("In his own opinion, Dennett is a hero."; "Dennett flatters himself that he is Hume's heir."), over perceived flaws in the form of the criticism ("It is not based, in any strict sense, on empirical research."), or the unpleasant thoughts that they associate with atheism ("They cannot fortify you, say, after the funeral of a familiar intentional system.") -- but not once does he actually provide a positive defense of theism, because there is none. There never was, and there never will be. The same goes for the recent religion threads here.
Posted by: Pete | February 20, 2006 12:09 AM
There's a difference between having a "meaning" and being explainable.
Religion doesn't have to have a meaning to be perfectly explainable by science - all it needs is to not conflict with the observed laws of nature in any way ... and for people to have percieved things they didn't understand, and/or tell people such is hardly contrary to science.
Any likely scientific "explanation" of religion will be fundamentally unsatisfying, since it would be equivalent, in some ways, to a scientific "explanation" of why I chose the clothes I did today, for instance.
It basically boils down to: "There's no reason it couldn't happen, and thus, well, did."
Perhaps it's better to compare it to "explaining" why, when rolling this die, I got a "3". Fundamentally, it boils down to: "Something had to happen. Why not that?"
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February 20, 2006 12:50 AM
If you would shield young minds from men of wit
Who wield the pow'r of nature's subtle lore...
Recasting the Wieseltier Spell
Posted by: Virge | February 20, 2006 1:56 AM
"You cannot disprove a belief unless you disprove its content. If you believe that you can disprove it any other way, by describing its origins or by describing its consequences, then you do not believe in reason."
I think this has gone on long enough. We need to take a nice, heavy textbook on reasoning, one with a nice solid explanation between deductively disproving a proposition and inductively arguing against a proposition's likelihood of being true, and beat this man senseless with it.
This absolute inability to grasp the difference between the two simply cannot continue.
"One cannot disprove an idea (an idea like, perhaps, a religion) by describing its origins. However, one can make a decent argument against that religion's likelihood of being true if one can prove that the religion originated with the statements of someone who, upon examination, doesn't seem very credible."
That wasn't that hard. Honestly.
Posted by: Patrick | February 20, 2006 2:20 AM
I certainly don't have any objection to evolutionary theory or thinking, but I do take objection to Dennett's version of it. He claims that evolution by natural selection is an "algorithmic process". Hello? I should use that as a pick up line. And it should be perfectly obvious that religion is not a natural phenomenon; chimpanzees don't have religion. Religion is a response to a problem set that only emerges with the linguistic reduplication of the world and the insistency of symbolic thinking, together with the integration and transmission of social orders. It's a socio-cultural phenomenon and it's not obvious that it requires or is amenible to natural-scientific explanation. It's in our alienation and not in our genes. And though I wouldn't want to revert to a Kantian style dualism, there's much to be said in favor of the distinction between facts and norms, which Dennett tends to subvert, which, in however a muddled and wishful way, I think the reviewer was trying to get at. The delimitation of different questions and different applicable criteria is something the rationality of science itself can not do without.
Posted by: john c. halasz | February 20, 2006 2:37 AM
"You cannot disprove a belief unless you disprove its content."
Oh yeah?
How about my first testable principle then, namely:
"No god is detectable (even if that god exists)"
Unless, and until someone can detect a god, or a valid, repeatable message or communication from that god, then the valid assumption must be that the god does not exist.
Put up, or (preferably) shut up, believers!
Posted by: G. Tingey | February 20, 2006 3:03 AM
Oh, and "Vegatable reason" ...
How about Andrew Marvell in "To his coy mistress ....
" Vaster than empires, and more slow, our vegetable love should change and grow ...."
Posted by: G. Tingey | February 20, 2006 3:09 AM
And it should be perfectly obvious that religion is not a natural phenomenon; chimpanzees don't have religion.
It should be perfectly obvious that hairlessness is not a natural phenomenon; chimpanzees are not hairless.
It should be perfectly obvious that walking upright is not a natural phenomenon; chimpanzees don't walk upright.
It should be perfectly obvious that prominent breasts are not a natural phenomenon; chimpanzees don't have big tits.
etc...
Posted by: windy | February 20, 2006 3:24 AM
John Cornwell has a similar attempt at smothering Dennett in the Sunday Times. Apparently it is an insidious book because it proceeds from "emotive, ill-informed prejudice" and is therefore combatted by wheeling out Nazism and Stalinism - even if this were apt, it is a tu quoque.
Cornwell himself seems driven by pique at the playful suggestion that the Communion wine be DNA tested and the genome of Christ obtained. It is clearly a splendid idea. Despite the accession of the Catholic church to scientific advances made in recent times, the refusal to recognise the metaphor of transubstantiation strikes me as a perfect example of how the faithful miss, or more accurately are directed to miss, the whole point.
The Eucharist is part of an ancient, 'multilayered' doctrine - multilayered being Cornwell's nod to doctrinal schism spanning centuries wherein the only actual bodies broken and blood spilt were all too human.
Posted by: dirk | February 20, 2006 7:26 AM
Let's put it this way - the reviewer says that Dennett is arguing that "religion is an artifact of our biology". Then equally, reason, science and mathematics are also artifacts of our biology.
Then it is time to read Coturnix's articles on reductionism.
Posted by: Arun | February 20, 2006 7:30 AM
I don't usually like Dennett, but this argument of his:
"This fact does make us different. But it is itself a biological fact, visible to natural science, and something that requires an explanation from natural science"
touches on a point I don't see made often enough. Evolution has given humans capacities and freedoms that it has not given to other creatures. You do not need a transcendent source to get these capacities.
For example, genes give horses hooves, and genes give humans hands. We have no choice in the matter. Both are defined by evolution, but the horse is constrained to about six simple hoof-behaviors, whereas humans are gifted with an essentially infinite array of hand-behaviors. We didn't evolve piano-playing per se, but we did evolve hands capable of piano-playing.
Posted by: John Emerson | February 20, 2006 7:36 AM
Vegetable reason, PZ?
Of course! Haven't you read anything produced by the Discovery Institute? Hail Great Pumpkin, designer of the Patch.
Posted by: bill | February 20, 2006 7:40 AM
Throughour nature we see traits seected for one thing being adapted and co-adapted for things they weren't originally selected for. Our evolution produced an animal capable of high level social interaction (culture). Everything else that flows from that ultimately *depends* on our genes, not on "transcending" our genes.
Posted by: Graculus | February 20, 2006 7:47 AM
John Halasz: cultural processes are a subset of natural processes and are not shared by all species. Biological reductionists miss this, but there's nothing paradoxical or difficult about saying that the capacities for language and culture are hereditary and limited to one species.
Posted by: John Emerson | February 20, 2006 7:49 AM
Is there also a "vegetable reason"?
I think you just saw it in action in the review.
Actually, "vegetable reason" sounds like a perfect description of how logic and critical thinking is taught to school children. To clarify, let me propose an experiment:
Step 1) Find out who in your area is in charge of setting curriculum standards.
Step 2) Write them a letter asking if it is a requirement for graduation that high school kids know what a sophistry, a fallacy and an argument are.
Step 3) Evaluate the response.
My hypothesis, based on personal experience,is that you will get the following response or some version of it.
"Thank you for your interest in the education system of _____________(insert region here). While we do not require that branch of philosophy or even offer it, we are always interested in encouraging critical thinking by students. I am sure they get that kind of thing in language arts class, or math or something."
Vegetable reason - Plant the seeds and hope for the best. It is sort of like teaching reading by hurling heavy books at students from a great height.
Posted by: Apesnake | February 20, 2006 7:51 AM
"Despite the accession of the Catholic church to scientific advances made in recent times, the refusal to recognise the metaphor of transubstantiation strikes me as a perfect example of how the faithful miss, or more accurately are directed to miss, the whole point."
Indeed. I've discussed this with a Catholic philosopher who fancies himself as a bit of a modernising liberal and who claims not to believe in transubstantiation. Nevertheless he defends it as not prima facie absurd, despite the fact the doctrine claims a) the wafer and wine do literally turn into the body and blood of Christ, b) transubstantiation is not metaphor or symbolism, and c) the wafer and wine do not physically (or in any observable way) change. Now I'm not a philosopher, but I really can't see how all three can be true. His attempt to explain it consisted of comparing the wafer to a table that you crouch under in the rain, turning it into an umbrella. Never mind that the use of 'umbrella' in this context is a metaphor.
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February 20, 2006 8:06 AM
Everyone (neurologically normal) has philosophical opinions, but not everyone has spent the time to be informed about some of them, much less make an attempt at a synthesis of many of them. The funny thing is, though, a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing, here, for the same reason it is in pseudoscience. Pseudophilosophy is just as dangerous and I suspect, as people get stuck between "old and new" increasingly, it will only increase.
Posted by: Keith Douglas | February 20, 2006 8:25 AM
John C. Halasz "[Religion is] a socio-cultural phenomenon and it's not obvious that it requires or is amenible to natural-scientific explanation."
All functions of society are socio-cultural phenomena and one cannot simply use one such function to analyze another. Or rather one can argue for a scientific explanation of religious belief but that will never eliminate its roots in our animal tendency to pattern thought based on previous experience. My point about Leiter is that the tastes and manners that precondition his contradictory arguments are the equivalent of faith.
The laws of science are not socio-cultural phenomena, but the uses to which science is put are. What atheist humanists and religionists both are offended by in Dennett's form of secular anti-humanism is the putting forth of the tools od science as themselves answers to questions of morality. But his claims to observational clrity are belied by the fact that he can't realize that religion only concerns itself marginally with the study of the world: it's primary interest is in law and social order. To hear him lecturing the faithful is akin to listening to a mathematician lecture fans of literature for reading lies.
"What's with you people. Don't you know, stories aren't real!!?"
The defense of religion is the defense of social order. Dennett argues that science can displace that order- displacing an order of language with one of number- and be both moral and just. But the activity of scientists- as opposed to the "laws" of science- is a social activity and as much an order of language as is religion or a court of law. Human beings experience life as a function of a social reality. We do no experience the world as number and computers do not 'experience' the world at all.
Religion is not the problem, it is those who claim unmediated access to the 'real' world whether the world of numbers or of gods. Dennett makes Nino Scalia's arguments for clarity and order but bases them on science rather than Catholic doctrine.
Big fucking shit. It still don't fucking work.
That I should have to explain this shit to adults...
Posted by: Seth Edenbaum | February 20, 2006 8:33 AM
PZ Myers wrote:
Again, you and I take away a different meaning from the reviewer. Note that I haven't read Dennett's book, and cannot say whether Dennett does what the reviewer charges him with. Nor can I speak for the reviewer; I speak only for the meaning I received from reading the review.
Consider me, reasoning (don't laugh!). One day science will be able to explain in terms of brain structures and neuro-transmitters the entire process going on inside my head, and the origin of all these things in terms of evolution. However, the validity of reasoning doesn't depend on this description. Indeed, we wouldn't be able to arrive at this description without a priori taking reason to be valid, independent of the details of my brain apparatus.
When the reviewer says Dennett is animalizing reason, he charges that Dennett is making the validity of human reasoning be contingent on whether evolution brought about the right structures in our brain or not.
YMMV, and I look forward to hearing your take on it.
Posted by: Arun | February 20, 2006 8:39 AM
That's not what Dennett does at all. In previous books (I have yet to read this one), Dennett goes out of his way to stress that morality (should) is separate from biology (is), even though the former is generated by the latter. In a similar manner on a meme-based view of culture the popularity of an idea is not based on the reproductive benefits it provides to its holder, but rather on the meme's own reproductive ability. What he's saying is that the tools of science can help us understand how human morality came to be, and thus help us shed dangerous illusions (in this case, morality comes from this book because the invisible sky monster says so) about the nature of morality. Understanding the biological origin of morality/religion does not dictate what our morality/metaphysics should be, but it lets us better use our reason to make that judgement.
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February 20, 2006 8:51 AM
Hey Ginger Yellow. Transubstantiation is explained by simple aristotelian logic. All substance has an unchanging essence and changeable accidents. You know, water changes phase, but it is still water. So in the miracle of the eucharist, the wafer changes its essence without changing its accidents. Only a heretic would fail to see that obvious truth. (I don't know smileys, but just imagine that I have inserted a sign for sarcasm.)
Posted by: David | February 20, 2006 8:52 AM
Why is our independence from biology a fact of biology? And if it is a fact of biology, then we are not independent of biology.
I'm guessing this guy has never worked with computers. Computers, like humans, are set up so that not everything they can do and achieve has to be hard-wired into them (although a few basic processes are). I know from experience that computers, again like humans, don't work too well if you stick a pickaxe through them*. A computer's independence from electronic engineering is a fact of electronic engineering. This is not self-contradictory.
If Mr Wieseltier feels that in fact this is self-contradictory, may I suggest that he test his hypothesis by putting a pickaxe through his computer?
* My experience here is of course with computers not humans. It's very stress-relieving.
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February 20, 2006 9:02 AM
....there most certainly is "vegetable reason."
Actually, it's the name of one of Santayana's earlier and more obscure works, written while he was still working out the basics of his ideas ;-).
Posted by: lt.kizhe | February 20, 2006 9:09 AM
"If Mr Wieseltier feels that in fact this is self-contradictory, may I suggest that he test his hypothesis by putting a pickaxe through his computer?"
Why not his head, if he's so confident?
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February 20, 2006 9:12 AM
John C. Halasz writes:
I think I know what Dennett means by "an algorithmic process" and I don't understand your objection to it.
"Lather, rinse, repeat" is an algorithmic process, too. (Albeit less clearly so than "mutate, select, repeat" because it's usually assumed that the instructions are decoded by an intelligent interpreter.)
I don't see what's wrong with pointing out that natural evolution is reasonably viewed as a naturally-occurring instance of a genetic algorithm. It can be illuminating, e.g., in a discussion of evolution as a heuristic search system, where the heuristics emerge from a brutally algorithmic "implementation."
(This has been useful to me, in understanding the effectiveness of natural evolution compared to most genetic algorithms; evolution through randomly-varied and randomly-connected environments reduces the greediness of the search by reducing premature committment. It is also useful, for many audiences, in de-mystifying evolution by showing how utterly mechanical and trivial processes can indeed implement sophisticated searches of "design space.")
If you have some good argument against this view, it'd be better to come out and state it than to simply ridicule it, as though it was just patently wrong and stupid. It seems to just be your "this guy is so dumb..." prelude to making similarly unclear objections to other things. That reminds me of the tone of the NYT review, and makes me wonder if you understand what Dennett is actually getting at.
Posted by: Paul W. | February 20, 2006 9:18 AM
No, that's backwards. Genetic algorithms were specifically created to *simulate* our understanding of natural selection. But so what? Anything can be simulated on a computer. Ever play SimCity? Does that mean cities are algorithms too?
Posted by: Jonathan Badger | February 20, 2006 9:28 AM
Well, I'm not sure there is, but I should have used consistent terminology. "Scientific explanation" it is.
Exactly my viewpoint.
Posted by: Jonathan Badger | February 20, 2006 9:43 AM
"[Religion is] a socio-cultural phenomenon and it's not obvious that it requires or is amenible to natural-scientific explanation."
Well, it's nice of Dualism to show up.
Posted by: jbark | February 20, 2006 10:23 AM
I don't think that's right. I don't think that either historical priority or the simulated/real distinction is crucial. (Or even as tenable as many people assume.)
Genetic algorithms are not just simulations of physical/biological evolution; they are actual examples of evolution in a more general sense. The principles of evolution are not intrinsically tied to the substrate of the original examples.
Consider addition. Addition in a computer is not just a simulation of addition in my head---and addition in your head is not just a simulation of counting on your fingers.
Likewise, when physicists talk about light waves, that's not just a metaphor; light waves are not merely analogous to waves on the surface of water---there's a general class of phenomena that was first recognized in one context, but literally occurs in other contexts as well. The naming of these concepts is done by linguistic metaphor, but the resulting named concepts are not just metaphors for (or simulations of) the initial kinds of examples. When physicists talk about waves of light, these days, they're not just making an analogy about water motion.
It just doesn't much matter in which context a general phenomenon was discovered.
If I use a genetic algorithm to evolve a digital electronic circuit design, I'm not just simulating evolution or simulating designs. And I'm certainly not simulating biological evolution. I'm actually using evolution to search for actual designs.
More subtly, when Robert Axelrod uses evolutionary algorithms to explore basic issues of the evolution of cooperation, he's not just simulating biology. The principles he's exploring apply to things besides biology, e.g., anthropology and economics. He's studying how certain abstract patterns of interaction can emerge from other abstract patterns of interaction, given certain formal properties, irrespective of the underlying medium. (E.g., microbes, humans, multinational corporations.) His "simulations" aren't just simulations---they're examples of those very general kinds of things, which can be interpreted as models of other things.
Whether something is a literal example of something, or a model of something else, is generally a matter of interpretation.
This is even true when using biological models. For example, if I'm studying fish fighting and cooperating in aquaria in a lab, presumably I'm not just interested in how fish fight and cooperate in aquaria in a lab. I am hoping that is a reasonably accurate model of phenomena that occur in the wild as well---and likely with different kinds of fish, or even entirely different kinds of organisms.
(When Darwin wrote so much about barnacles, his main points were not "barnacle science." The main utility of barnacles to Darwin was that they were an easily-studied "natural experiment," i.e., a naturally-occuring simulation of what happens with many other kinds of organisms.)
To the extent that you explore general, abstract principles with specific, concrete examples, you are using one thing to simulate another. This is what makes the simulated/real distinction a whole lot weaker than it seems at first.
That's one of Dennett's basic points, and I think is a good one. Too many people miss that basic point, and think he's just wantonly conflating things. He's generally not; he's got very good reasons for discounting certain distinctions that most people overrate.
Posted by: Paul W. | February 20, 2006 10:43 AM
The myth of a unipolar consciousness "I say what I mean and I mean what I say" is as American as Henry Ford and 'can-do' anti-intellectualism. And of course, the parallel to Dennett is not Scalia but Posner's Law and Economics. And Posner and Leiter are buddies of course.
But the rule of law is not the rule of reason; we choose the former because the latter is impossible. Dennett attacks not only religion but language itself; language which can not escape ambiguity.
Under the rule of reason, if it were possible, no one would ever get off on a technicality.
I looked up the Dr. Seuss reference just to make sure I was right, and look what I found: "A plea for the Humanities." by another Seth too!
I guess god must be smiling on me today.
Posted by: Seth Edenbaum | February 20, 2006 10:55 AM
LEON WIESELTIER wrote:
Dictionary.com defines superstition:
It isn't clear which definition he might be using. The only one that would not be absurd in this context is 2c, which would still be quite a stretch.
Posted by: wamba | February 20, 2006 11:04 AM
Addition is different because it is a process that has nothing to do with the physical world. Mathematicians have a set of axioms and operations that allows one to perform the operation "addition". Because it can be defined exactly, the results can be perfectly performed by a computer.
Natural evolution can't be, because it is something that we have only a very imperfect knowledge of. Any algorithm that we can make is going to different from the real thing. It's the same problem that economists and weathermen have -- they can't predict recessions and rain with any real accuracy because their models are flawed simulations of the real world.
Posted by: Jonathan Badger | February 20, 2006 11:13 AM
"Under the rule of reason, if it were possible, no one would ever get off on a technicality."
Again, continuing what is apparently my own little personal crusade, I'd like to remind everyone of the existance of INDUCTIVE REASONING.
Those "technicalities" exist for two reasons, generally speaking.
First, because they guide our inductive assumptions away from tempting but generally incorrect inductive conclusions (example, no bringing up the rape victim's sexual history because people frequently conclude that a girl who has sex with men at all has sex with any man at any time and can't be raped),
and second, because sometimes there are values more important than a conviction at a trial (convicting a man of a crime is generally considered less important than stopping the police from torturing confessions out of people, so we risk losing the former by excluding confessions produced by the latter).
Once you accept that not all reasoning is deductive, these make perfect sense.
Posted by: Patrick | February 20, 2006 11:37 AM
I have no idea what your point is here. Dennett has written several books attacking the idea of a unipolar consciousness. And I really fail to see how Dennett is attacking either language or the rule of law.
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February 20, 2006 11:40 AM
there's nothing paradoxical or difficult about saying that the capacities for language and culture are hereditary and limited to one species.
The other point being missed is that recent research in animal behaviours shows that a) all of them develop some language specific to their needs and b) all of them have some level of culture. What differentiates humans from other animals is not the capacity to form these, but the level of complexity that can be developed, and the physical capacities to do so. If a chimpanzee had the vocal cords for human speech they would easilly manage language equal to that of a severally mentally retarded person, and they can manage a lot of the socializations we can. On the other hand, some parrot can't develop the complex social system, but can do complex problem solving, are better at math than apparently most fast food cash register operators and only lack the memory for an understanding of language equal to that of a chimp. Other animals are all across the board, with some huge gaps in capacity, but at the same time having significant jumps in ability in other areas. It just that for most of the time, since the rules of science where seriesly codified and applied, people like Leon Wieseltier where defining what we should *expect* to find in other animals. If you don't look for something, you obviously are not going to find it and for a long time no one wanted to find social systems, complex problem solving or language in "mere" animals.
Posted by: Kagehi | February 20, 2006 12:21 PM
I think that's a red herring. Exactitude isn't, or shouldn't be, the issue, if the question is whether something is merely a simulation, rather than an actual instance of something.
A simulation is simply a process interpreted as a model of another process, and most kinds of models are not exact.
What makes something a simulation is the interpretation. Being a simulation is not an intrinsic property of one thing, or an exact thing, but a statement about its interpretation, relative to something else.
Most practical genetic algorithms do not simulate anything else, even if the process is sometimes misleadingly called "simulated evolution." They are not simulations at all, and what's going on in the computer is as real as anything else.
If that's not real evolution, what is it?
I think many people tend to think of computers as simulation tools, and think that what happens in a computer isn't real. They don't realize that for something to be a simulation, it also has to be a real thing of some sort; what goes on in a computer isn't imaginary, or intrinsically about something else. (No more than barnacles are about other kinds of parasites, even if Darwin chose to use them as that sort of model.)
You might say that what happens in genetic algoritms not real biological evolution by natural selection, but I don't think that should matter. For example, if somebody evolves microbes in a lab by rigging the selection factor, we don't say it isn't evolution. The theory of evolution clearly transcends whether the "natural selection" is literally and purely natural.
Likewise, I think it transcends whether the things being evolved are biological. For example, if we discovered complex replicating patterns of electron flux evolving by natural selection on the surface of a neutron star, we'd say that was evolution, even if the entities weren't "biological" in our earthly sense---they might have no cells, nothing corresponding directly to metabolism, etc. But if we saw the general pattern of mutation and selection of replicators leading to complexity, function, and diversity, we couldn't withold the term "evolution"---and wouldn't want to. (We'd say: see, it even happens to wildly different kinds of things in wildly different environments.)
Evolutionary theory is about what happens to replicators, given mutations and selection pressures.
Those things can happen to patterns inside computers, too, without their being a simulation of something else, so I don't understand why anybody would think that's not real evolution.
Posted by: Paul W. | February 20, 2006 12:25 PM
Time for an experiment. A test.
Get some horsies. then mechanically alter their germ line to give them voice boxes and improved versions of the neural structures connected to homo sapien sapien's Higher Powers. No mere copying of human genes! First principal DNA mechanics only!
Tinker away over the generations until the first principles are clear and the horsies are all acing the SAT's (in the special hanicappied administered test sessions, since the horsies haven't been given digits and opposable thumbs.)
Then sit back and have all the clowns explain how there is no mechanical basis for the horsies' souls and waxin on about Reason, citing authority that goes waaaaay back and is wrong as it ever was. Proving once again by geometric logic that what exists does not.
What will have been tested is the human capacity to twist and distort truth to whatever the inferior human is comfortable with. Mileage will vary. I predict.
I also predict Jesuits will prove to have the greatest capacity as a social (and therefore non-mechanical in the fools' view) gang of refuse to believe the truthers. But this is not for certain, what with fatwas here and there and Buddhists who evade the whole issue.
The bottom line: when a believers religion is threatened by evidence, the believers lash out to remove the threat by any means necessary to maintian their self acknowledged supremacy based on their belief. Leave God out of it.
Posted by: r | February 20, 2006 12:42 PM
I know all y'all are into defending science and stuff, and perhaps LW gave DD an uncharitable read, but it seems to me that LW's review can be given a more charitable read than what I'm seeing here. Set DD and the great promise of scientific research aside for a minute and consider LW's main points:
(1) The hypothesis that everything can be explained by natural science is just that, a hypothesis, and
(2) to assume that that this hypothesis is true is not to make a scientific assumption but a philosophical one, and
(3) to assume that everything can be explained by natural science is ultimately self-refuting.
I've yet to see any of these points really addressed here.
In other words, as I read LW's review it is not about DD or the details of his particular philosophical project (we're talking about the NYT, here, not the APA), but the general worldview DD's book evokes. That worldview (not inappropriately called "scientism" or "scientific reductionism" to a broadly educated audience) is self-refuting.
We've seen persistent but self-refuting theories before. Logical positivism was one -- if it were true it would have been an exception to the logical positivist rule that all true statements are empirically verifiable. Positivism died, and LW is pointing out that scientific reductionism will die too--only, for whatever reasons (prejudice? knee-jerk protection of one's intellectual idols?) it sometimes takes a long time for incoherent theories to go away.
Posted by: Philosophy Prof | February 20, 2006 12:50 PM
...The hypothesis that everything can be explained by natural science is just that, a hypothesis...
Natural science refers to everything that has effects. Unless you know of something that can explain stuff without dealing with effects, I don't see a problem.
Posted by: BronzeDog | February 20, 2006 1:01 PM
John Cornwell is utterly bewildering here:
Whatever you may think of the term "meme", this sentence gets things completely backwards! Under Dennett's usage this sentence could be rewritten like this:
"Religion persists because it is a meme: it is evidently human to believe in something beyond what one can perceive, just as it is human to dance, to make music, paint pictures, and tell stories."
..because being infected with memes (or "passing on ideas" or whatever other meme-neutral term you wish to use) is precisely what we humans have going for us. Cornwell thinks his usage of "it is human to X" somehow means something different than Dennett's usage of "X is a meme" -- when in fact they mean the same thing!
Posted by: Pete | February 20, 2006 1:04 PM
r says: "when a believers religion is threatened by evidence, the believers lash out to remove the threat by any means necessary to maintian their self acknowledged supremacy based on their belief"
No doubt LW would agree. He's pointing out that scientism is a religion, and the reaction of certain of its believers on this site might confirm r's point.
Posted by: Philososphy Prof | February 20, 2006 1:29 PM
3) I don't get it. I'd rather you made your point before I tried to respond to it.
Posted by: wamba | February 20, 2006 1:31 PM
"Natural science refers to everything that has effects. Unless you know of something that can explain stuff without dealing with effects, I don't see a problem."
I suppose, our language being conventional, you could define natural science so that it is the same thing as philosophy generally. But most people think natural science has as its object everything natural (physical) and their natural effects. Natural science doesn't include logic (concepts in and conceptual effects) and it doesn't include mathematics (mathematical objects and their effects) and it doesn't include metaphysics (beings whether physical or not, and their effects). Of course natural science can and should draw on logic, mathematics, and metaphysics in appropriate ways, the way optics draws on geometry, biology draws on chemistry, etc. But you can't define natural science as if it were the science of everything -- that's just the mistake that LW points out. And I don't see what any scientist would have to gain by it.
Posted by: Philosophy Prof | February 20, 2006 1:37 PM
wamba: That everything is testabl