The Primacy of Existence Does NOT Prove Atheism!

Premise 1: If consciousness could be the only entity in existence, then there is no dichotomy between the primacy of existence and the primacy of consciousness. (the Objectivist argument for strong atheism)

Premise 2: It is at least possible in theory for consciousness to be the only thing in existence.

Conclusion: There is no dichotomy between the primacy of existence and the primacy of consciousness. Therefore the Objectivist argument for strong atheism fails.

The counterargument that a consciousness conscious of nothing but itself is a contradiction in terms merely presupposes it's own conclusion: That an "I" is distinct from a "something" to be conscious off.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• objectivism
• primacy of consciousness
• primacy of existence
• existence exists
• god
• strong atheism
• dannidandannikins
• consciousness
• mind
• question begging
• circular argument
• Ayn Rand
• Leonard
• Peikoff
• truth
• debate
• MrCropper
• Dhorpatan
• StudentOfObjectivism

[JohananRaatz]

@friedoctorock "can't prove the ability to prove using that ability."

Exactly. The catch is that you need to have certitude to have true knowledge, thus either we have an infinite regress of proofs, or at some level the knowledge is just innate (Platonic).

"basic axioms that are empirical"

This is ok, (to argue that what you see has and/or relates to SOME mode of existence), but you need to solve the problem of induction (which is a priori) to figure out what that is.

[friedoctorock]

@JohananRaatz the problem is you can't prove the ability to prove using that ability. You can't disprove what you can't know, and that means you cannot prove it either and it becomes arbitrary. What we can do is have basic axioms that are empirical that cannot be refuted because refuting them means you have to use them. This can be the non-arbitrary basis to empirical knowledge. One has no means to reach an a priori fact for knowledge of reality without observing it is arbitrary.

[JohananRaatz]

@Gnomefro Well I'd agree that about 99% of knowledge is empirical based. But that relies on the other 1% to justify it. In a way when you talk about scientific knowledge, you can't divorce a priori knowledge from it, because it's built into it at the foundation. Scientific knowledge isn't arbitrary, but that's because the scientific method is ultimately grounded a priori knowledge, which is also how it avoids circular justification.

[Gnomefro]

@JohananRaatz If I come at you and tell you about my a priori Truth channel to the magical Flathulensia who created everything, we're probably not going to have a very productive conversation. Science can lead to productive conversations though, because it's evidence based.(It's conceivable we could have fundamentally different experiences though, in which case all communication is impossible and our knowledge domains have no relevant to each other)

[Gnomefro]

@JohananRaatz This doesn't mean it can't be false of course, almost all claims about reality probably are. And that is why modern science always includes error bars and don't consider any knowledge it produces to be proven - merely useful. Calling all of scientific knowledge arbitrary because of this is to make the word meaningless.

[Gnomefro]

@JohananRaatz You can easily see that this is the case in practice if you look at the development of human knowledge. People hold beliefs, those beliefs turn out to be refuted by new evidence, new hypotheses are formulated to explain the new evidence and so on and so forth. Whatever is demonstrably useful and grounded in observation at any point in time is called knowledge because of the mutually reinforcing relationship between theory and demonstration.

[Gnomefro]

@JohananRaatz You have basically demonstrated the uselessness of trying to appeal to absolute, as opposed to probabilistic, knowledge. Namely that we can never know that our beliefs about reality are actually true anyway, which is why philosophy never got further than "I think, therefore I am".

All real knowledge about external reality is both probabilistic and is based on circular reasoning by the way. It's connections between beliefs that give them their strength.

[JohananRaatz]

@friedoctorock "not knowing"

I didn't say that. I'm saying we must first ground our empirical knowledge on a priori knowledge or else empirical knowledge would be arbitrary.

"what we sense"

Platonic or empirical sensation?

other than... empirical"

Not at all. How am I supposed to accept an arbitrary epistemology that empirical as opposed to a priori data is primary when there is no a priori justification for it?

"we sense is real"

That's circular reasoning =/= knowledge.

[friedoctorock]

@JohananRaatz so you would have everyone being constant skeptics, not knowing anything because anything could be true, we just can't sense it. This paves the way for someone to bring out their arbitrary metaphysics and say "prove me wrong." The context of our knowledge is what we sense.  To accept anything other than a theory based on empirical evidence is to accept an arbitrary claim that can't be proved wrong. This is why we can know that what we sense is real.

[JohananRaatz]

@friedoctorock (part 2) "it can be ignored on the basis of being arbitrary."

Ergo, if one claims knowledge of reality that all knowledge of reality is empirical and that reality = "what we sense", one can ignore this claim as arbitrary, since an absence of non-empirical reality can not be proven or disproven based on empirically sensed data. (to suggest otherwise is begging the question as to whether all reality is empirical or not)