In Human Action Mises states that if God existed he couldn't act since one acts to eleviate felt uneasiness. And to act would show that he wasn't perfect and hence not God. This has been responded to by saying Mises conflated instrumental with constitutive mean. Could someone give me an account of that argument?
The atoms tell the atoms so, for I never was or will but atoms forevermore be.
Yours sincerely,
Physiocrat
I haven't seen that argument against Mises before. On the other hand, Rothbard critiqued Mises's idea that one acts to alleviate felt uneasiness. I think he saw it as misleading and perhaps a tad psychologistic. Instead, men act in order to exchange a less satisfactory state of a affairs for a more satisfactory state of affairs. I'm not sure that would affect Mises argument here though.
Yours in liberty,Geoffrey Allan Plauché, Ph.D.Adjunct Instructor, Buena Vista UniversityWebmaster, LibertarianStandard.comFounder / Executive Editor, Prometheusreview.com
Mises clearly didn't take theology very seriously or he would have put more thought into his argument. Mises's problem is anthropomorphism: he assumes God is just another man. Just because man acts out of uneasiness doesn't mean God does, too. Some of man's characteristics are similar to God's because, as the Bible says, he created us in his image. But many of our traits bear no relationship to God, nor to all of God's attributes find a counterpart in man. While mankind can know some things about God that are true, that doesn't mean we can understand God exhaustively. If we could, he would be no more than another man, maybe a superman, but still man. For God to be God, he must have some attributes that we can't understand. An analogy might be the differences between a parent and young children, although the gap between us and God is much greater. Theologians have often said that God creates because that it is in his nature to create things.
Roger McKinney:Theologians have often said that God creates because that it is in his nature to create things.
Which might be the basis for the instrumental vs. constitutive means argument? I myself haven't seen it but perhaps this is how it goes.
But what is God? Thus, I think Rand's critique of the idea of God is much better and more fundamental than Mises. I can summarize it for those who are not familiar with it.
No need for a summary I suppose. I found the relevant quotes in an old email. The Objectivist argument against God trades on the Law of Identity.
They claim that they perceive a mode of being superior to your existence on this earth. The mystics of spirit call it "another dimension," which consists of denying the present. To exist is to possess identity. What identity are they able to give to their superior realm? They keep telling you what it is not, but never tell you what it is. All their identifications consist of negating: God is that which no human mind can know, they say - and proceed to demand that you consider it knowledge - God is non-man, heaven is non-earth, soul is non-body, virtue is non-profit, A is non-A, perception is non-sensory, knowledge is non-reason. Their definitions are not acts of defining, but of wiping out. - Ayn Rand, For the New Intellectual, "Galt's Speech," p. 148. ...the concept "God." It is not a concept. At best, one can say it is a concept in the sense in which a dramatist uses concepts to create a character. It is an isolation of actual characteristics of man combined with the projection of impossible, irrational characteristics which do not arise from reality - such as omnipotence and omniscience. Besides, God isn't even supposed to be a concept: he is sui generis, so that nothing relevant to man or the rest of nature is supposed, by the proponents of that viewpoint, to apply to God. A concept has to involve two or more similar concretes, and there is nothing like God. He is supposed to be unique. Therefore, by their own terms of setting up the problem, they have taken God out of the conceptual realm. And quite properly, because he is out of reality. The same applies to the concept "infinity," taken metaphysically. The concept "infinity" has a very definite purpose in mathematical calculation, and there it is a concept of method. But that isn't what is meant by the term "infinity" as such. "Infinity" in the metaphysical sense, as something existing in reality, is another invalid concept. The concept "infinity," in that sense, means something without identity, something not limited by anything, not definable. Therefore, the measurements omitted here are all measurements and all reality. - Ayn Rand, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, pp. 148-9. Every argument for God and every attribute ascribed to Him rests on a false metaphysical premise. None can survive for a moment on a correct metaphysics. For instance, God is infinite. Nothing can be infinite, according to the Law of Identity. Everything is what it is, and nothing else. It is limited in its qualities and in its quantity: it is this much, and no more. "Infinite" as applied to quantity does not mean "very large": it means "larger than any specific quantity." That means: no specific quantity - i.e., a quantity without identity. This is prohibited by the Law of Identity. Is God the creator of the universe? There can be no creation of something out of nothing. There is no nothing. Is God omnipotent? Can he do anything? Entities can act only in accordance with their natures; nothing can make them violate their natures... "God" as traditionally defined is a systematic contradiction of every valid metaphysical principle. The point is wider than just the Judeo-Christian concept of God. No argument will get you to a world contradicting this one. No method of inference will enable you to leap from existence to a "super-existence." - Leonard Peikoff, "The Philosophy of Objectivism," lecture series (1976), Lecture 2.
Physiocrat: In Human Action Mises states that if God existed he couldn't act since one acts to eleviate felt uneasiness. And to act would show that he wasn't perfect and hence not God.
"Perfection" is a widely misused concept in the theological sense. To say that an entity is "perfect" implies a moral evaluation of that entity relative to its value to a conceptual being. A diamond is not perfect or imperfect per se - it is just a rock. Perfection can only be ascribed to it because human beings value a certain configuration of that rock. As it applies to human beings, perfection is the degree to which we are true to our nature - as a rational, mortal animal. Because the idea of God does not have a nature to be true to, no such concept can apply to him.
Ayn Rand does makes a similar argument to Mises in the Virtue of Selfishness, where she says that an immortal being would not have any basis for values, and therefore for action.
To make this point fully clear, try to imagine an immortal, indestructible robot, an entity which moves and acts, but which cannot be affected by anything, which cannot be changed in any respect, which cannot be damaged, injured or destroyed. Such an entity would not be able to have any values; it would have nothing to gain or to lose; It could not regard anything as for or against it, as serving or threatening its welfare, as fulfilling or frustrating its interests. It could have no interests and no goals... Only a living entity can have goals or can originate them. And it is only a living organism that has the capacity for self-generated, goal-directed action. ("The Objectivist Ethics," The Virtue of Selfishness, 16.)
Tara Smith expounds:
If a person were assured of going on forever, what sense could it make to regard some states of affairs as better than others? I am not merely imagining a person's life being extended by decades or centuries. Rather, imagine his life being literally endless. He is indestructible and will live for all eternity. Whatever the person did this afternoon, he would have an infinite amount of time to do other thing things. He would incur no loss by choosing one activity rather than some other.... Whatever a destruction-proof robot or immortal being does is not sustaining its existence since that is already guaranteed. Where survival is inherently assured and death is impossible, then, we are no longer talking about life. Rand's robot is not a living being; that is why she calls it a robot. (Viable Values, pp. 87-88, 89.)
There is an essay which applies this concept to Christianity here.
Kinsella discusses Mises' and Rand's argument here.
Physiocrat: In Human Action Mises states that if God existed he couldn't act since one acts to eleviate felt uneasiness. And to act would show that he wasn't perfect and hence not God. This has been responded to by saying Mises conflated instrumental with constitutive mean. Could someone give me an account of that argument?
The Lord isn't one. The Lord is Lord. Sorry, praxeology cannot explain anything about God. Praxeology is the study of Human Action. God is not Human, ergo, God is not applicable to being studied as a Human.
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But is God a rational agent? I think the action axiom applies, at least in its essence, to all rational agents. If he's not a rational agent, what is he?
Again, I believe you are thinking on human terms. Isn't being rational the ability to reason? Being able to reason has to do with forming conclusions or judgements. I would argue that God Himself is the conclusion of most arguments that start with the question why. Being able to reason, and being the source of the creation of every single atom in the universe (stop and think about that for a sec), seem to be discussions on different levels of reality.
God created mankind to bring glory to Himself. Is God imperfect because He wants more glory? I don't think so - need / want / needs more/ are human terms. I know it is a popular crutch - God is not human so he cannot be defined. Try explaining the fiat money system to a baby who is a week old by showing him a greenback. That is about the same divide that is between us and God.
Mavriel,
If God is not a rational agent but is rather a conclusion, and does not act, then how did he create? Which, must I point out, is an action?
See, your response to me above, and I'm betting any future response you'll make to explain away creation in God's case as somehow not an action, only serve to further prove Rand's argument. God has no identity, therefore he doesn't exist.
Niccolò:The Lord isn't one. The Lord is Lord. Sorry, praxeology cannot explain anything about God. Praxeology is the study of Human Action. God is not Human, ergo, God is not applicable to being studied as a Human.
Mises more or less said this exact thing in Human Action: That praxeology cannot describe any sort of superhuman action which we cannot comprehend.
Anyways, the argument just states that God would not "act" in the same way as us. If he can predict everything and is utterly timeless, then his one act of creation is indistinguishable from any other "acts" he may perform. If I wrote a program to solve a specific problem, and it functioned perfectly (because, say, I was a god-like and perfect programmer), then I'd have no reason to act on the program at all; I'd just let it run. But that doesn't mean I wouldn't exist!
As many have pointed out, we cannot conceive of a perfect being having any incentives to act at all. But we cannot conceive of there being an "incentive" or cause of creation at all. Why does anything exist? Recursive questions seem pointless to me.
mavriel: I know it is a popular crutch - God is not human so he cannot be defined. Try explaining the fiat money system to a baby who is a week old by showing him a greenback.
I agree that as an undefinable entity, any argument which claims to define or apply human concepts to God is fallacious. But I am more consistent about it than theists. If you can't use reason about God's nature, then you can't make any conclusion about him at all - including supposed attributes like omnipotence or existence. Arbitrary concepts have no basis in reality at all. Absent rational proof, all theism must ultimately resort to emotionalism - "I feel that my deity exists." But there is no non-rational source of knowledge. An emotion is just the unconscious product of your own ideas and values. You need God to exist to affirm your worldview. I don't.
My apologies... this is my first day posting, and I do not know how to quote and such.
gplauche - I believe God did act. He created everything out of nothing about 6000 years ago. It is why He acted that we are discussing, and if the very act of him acting is a cause for His non-existence.
gplauche & HeroicLife - God's true existence is a mystery to us. Even those who don't believe there is a God, say that if there was one, He would exist on a level that even we could not comprehend. However, God has revealed himself to us in two way. General revelation - the creation around us; and specific relelation - The bible, or His word to us. Through the bible, God defines himself as best possible in human terms.
On the last point, you are right HeroicLife. If you don't believe the bible, there is no basis for a discussion. In order for any conversation, you need a point of reference. My starting point is God, yours is an explosion 600 billion years ago. And if you believe that (minute possibility) is how the world came to being, then you are more a man of faith than I.
Wow, a real young earth creationist. I won't comment.
Grant: Niccolò:The Lord isn't one. The Lord is Lord. Sorry, praxeology cannot explain anything about God. Praxeology is the study of Human Action. God is not Human, ergo, God is not applicable to being studied as a Human. Mises more or less said this exact thing in Human Action: That praxeology cannot describe any sort of superhuman action which we cannot comprehend.Anyways, the argument just states that God would not "act" in the same way as us. If he can predict everything and is utterly timeless, then his one act of creation is indistinguishable from any other "acts" he may perform. If I wrote a program to solve a specific problem, and it functioned perfectly (because, say, I was a god-like and perfect programmer), then I'd have no reason to act on the program at all; I'd just let it run. But that doesn't mean I wouldn't exist!As many have pointed out, we cannot conceive of a perfect being having any incentives to act at all. But we cannot conceive of there being an "incentive" or cause of creation at all. Why does anything exist? Recursive questions seem pointless to me.
Me too.
Too many points being made to comment on all of them separately, but here are a few observations. Rand, and others try to define God away. Hayek wrote about socialists that it's very easy to define terms in such a way that your argument automatically wins. When a person spends most of their space narrowly defining terms, I suspect that's what they're trying to do.
The other mistake people are making is the absolute dichotomy: if not X, then nothing at all. As with the mistake above, the purpose is to limit the debate and make sure the opposition can't respond.
Historically, God has been the explanation for the existence of the universe and mankind. We could understand from the universe something about the power, size and age of God by seeing him as great, large and old enough to have created the universe. The whole purpose of the theory of evolution was to dethrone God and that's why it became so popular long before any evidence for it existed. And that's why many Christians have fought the idea of evolution and other religions haven't. Christianity is verifiable. If evolution is true, then the God of Christianity is reduced to a very small being, if he exists at all. Most other religions don't stake their validity on history or science.
But even if evolution is true, it can't explain some things about mankind, such as our self-awareness, rationality, and ideas about morality, love, and meaningfulness, ie.those things that separate us from animals. So we still have to look for a cause sufficient for the effect that is mankind. It's simple cause and effect; the effect cannot be greater than the cause and be rational. And it's only reasonable to assume that God shares at least some of the unique characteristics of mankind.
Reason can only lead us so far in understanding God. For example, how much would a child learn about a parent if he never communicated with the parent. Humans value communication, so if God exists, wouldn't it be reasonable to assume that he has at some point communicated with mankind? Religion is a history of such communications. Of course, then you have to wade through the world's religions to determine which ones have the most truth, but that's another post.
As I wrote before, a false rationality demands that we be able to understand everything about God or he doesn't exist. Hayek defined such a false rationality with respect to socialism in "The Fatal Conceit." True reason is humble. We can know some things about God that are true, but our intelligence is limited, in the same way that a dog can understand some things about humans, but never fully grasp what humans are.
By the way, I'm a young earth creationist, too.
It's a mistake to interpret Rand's argument as a purely epistemological one. It is fundamentally a metaphysical one as it trades on the Law of Identity.
mavriel:My starting point is God, yours is an explosion 600 billion years ago.
Actually, it's reality. And it's 13.4 billion years ago. I know that, because I can see the stars, measure the speed of light with my microwave and a few marshmallows, and then measure the distance to the stars via stellar parallax. But feel free to take the ranting of a prehistoric mystic over your eyes.
The God that is revealed in the Bible is about the most evil creature imaginable, routinely killing and slaughtering utterly innocent people because of his jealousy. This slaughter even included the death by drowing of every man, woman and child -- yes, utterly innocent babies included -- (except for Noah's family) just because God didn't like what was in their imagination.
So, yes, God does "define himself" in the Bible -- and if that is what you regard as virtuous, well then we know what you are.
In the first place, you're judging God by your own personal standards of right and wrong. But if God actually created mankind, does he not have the authority to do with them as he wishes and determine who is good and evil? Even if you assume that the Bible is fiction, then you should judge the character of God from the perspective of the author, which is that God created mankind and as the creator is the only one with the moral authority over mankind to determine good and evil and to carry out punishment for evil.
On what grounds do you call " routinely killing and slaughtering utterly innocent people" evil? As the great philosophers of history have recognized, good and evil are religious terms and when you eliminate God, those categories disappear, too. A chief reason for that is the fact that no man has moral authority over other men, so any concept of ethics becomes nothing more than personal opinion. In fact, I would argue that what passes for "ethics" today are the table scraps left over from a religious heritage.
The old natural law tradition did the best job of anyone I have read at coming up with a moral code based on reason, but even they had to admit that if those principles weren't in agreement with God, they were nothing but opinions and not enforceable.
Without God, good and evil don't exist. What people do is what is natural to them, whether killing others for no reason or feeding a hungry person. Neither is more or less moral than the other.
Well, sometimes I think, folks should go back to the roots and read the first Book of Moses, where some Mystics described the way, mankind some 600-odd years ago conceived the epistemological process of becoming mankind.
My favorite translation has been made by Martin Buber et al., slightly controversial, but clarifying, because there is no Christian influence in it. Gorgeous language skill, if you ask me, but I digress.
The first memories of mankind are of living in a paradise-like naïvity. Man was not to be held responsible for his actions, as he was not aware of the difference between good and bad. It was "god(s)" who wanted to hold man this way. One of them disagreed and gave man the power to recognize good and bad, thus developing in him the power that makes him a "god" himself.
This is being expressed in the Thorah in a much clearer way than in the Christian translations. There is a direct link to Erich von Däniken's assumtions, that the "gods" were nothing but humanoids, non-humans, who were present on Earth for a while. There seemed to have been a war between then, that's the cause for the commandment "You may not recognuize other gods except Yahve Shebaoth". The commandment is not "There ARE NO OTHER GODS" - because there WERE. What caused them to visit our mudball or what caused them to leave, I have no idea. But Bronze age men would have conceived them as gods for their powers. What they did to man was to add abilities to his brain and speed up mankind's development.
So there is no divine monopoly, any being, capable of cognition, can be a "god".
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Roger McKinney:Without God, good and evil don't exist. What people do is what is natural to them, whether killing others for no reason or feeding a hungry person. Neither is more or less moral than the other.
Dead wrong. Without abolities of cognition, you won't know about good or evil even if both were sitting on your lap and started to nibble on your necktie. Any being can tell, more or less, what's good and what's bad. H. sapiens can do it. Staphylococcus aureus can do it with slightly restricted capabilities of relection, but they know what#s food and what ain't.
Wrong. See the arguments of the natural law philosophers and theologians, for example.
Regarding the Garden of Eden story, I like the interpretations given in the two quotes at the beginning of this blog post.
Rhotair: Roger McKinney:Without God, good and evil don't exist. What people do is what is natural to them, whether killing others for no reason or feeding a hungry person. Neither is more or less moral than the other. Dead wrong. Without abolities of cognition, you won't know about good or evil even if both were sitting on your lap and started to nibble on your necktie. Any being can tell, more or less, what's good and what's bad. H. sapiens can do it. Staphylococcus aureus can do it with slightly restricted capabilities of relection, but they know what#s food and what ain't.
The question is has does one decide what is good or bad without an absolute reference point? If one does not you cannot pronounce on whether an action is good or bad. Even if you argue that there is no right or wrong you need an absolute reference point to objectivel argue this.
On natural law- I consider Hans Hoppe's argumentational ethics and Rothbard's Aristotilean arguments against the state the best examples of these however neither ultimately justify their positions. Even with Hoppe's, even assuming it is entirely accurate (it has the problem if one argues God....), it says anarchism is the only justifiable society however even if it is it does not say why I should be an anarchist. Further it begs the question why is argumentation as it is? Likewise Rothbard's arguments assume that survival is a given good; but why is that so?
Ultimately no naturalistic argument can solve the is ought dichotomy or have an objective foundation for morality. Richard Dawkins recently admitted this.
In Eden becoming gods does not refer to knowing good and evil but deciding what is good or evil. Even though it uses the word knowing the context suggests it has heavy connotations of deciding. Since before eating the fruit Adam knew what was good and evil- eating from every tree apart from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was good; eating it was not. So unless you argue that this a piece of appallingly written literature the conclusion must be that in the context knowing means deciding.
On the refutation of Mises' argument Roderick Long emailed me this:
I retract the my point on the is ought dichotomy. It can never be crossed even in a theistic world view. Not even argumentational ethics, even if it is entirely correct, cannot do it.
Physiocrat:The question is has does one decide what is good or bad without an absolute reference point? If one does not you cannot pronounce on whether an action is good or bad.
I don't see how God could be such an absolute reference point seeing as how he cannot be defined and no evidence for him exists. On the flipside, I don't see that there is no absolute reference point in the absence of a God.
Physiocrat: On natural law- I consider Hans Hoppe's argumentational ethics and Rothbard's Aristotilean arguments against the state the best examples of these however neither ultimately justify their positions.
I agree that Hoppe's and Rothbard's theories ultimately fail. These are not the only natural law theories, however. There are older ones and other contemporary ones. For some more successful contemporary theories I recommend Roderick Long's, Douglas Rasmussen and Douglas Den Uyl's, and my own (which synthesizes the two). One last point, I wouldn't consider Hoppe's theory a version of natural law.
Physiocrat:Ultimately no naturalistic argument can solve the is ought dichotomy or have an objective foundation for morality. Richard Dawkins recently admitted this.
Physiocrat:I retract the my point on the is ought dichotomy. It can never be crossed even in a theistic world view. Not even argumentational ethics, even if it is entirely correct, cannot do it.
With all due respect, I think this is a bunch of bull and Dawkins does not know what he is talking about. Don't be so quick to uncritically accept and echo the allegedly insurmountable is-ought gap, along with the alleged fact-value dichotomy and Moore's Open Question Argument and Naturalistic Fallacy. They only have any legitimacy if one accepts the positivistic world-view (as Hoppe does), but this world-view cannot be sustained and has many trenchant critics. I recommend the works of Henry Veatch and Liberty and Nature by the Dougs, for starters.
The problem is not the "is-ought" gap. It's that whatever an man comes up with is just opinion. Sure anyone can determine what he considers good and evil; that's trivial. The real question is "Why should anyone care about what you think?" Socialists have considered it good to murder opponents. Are they right? The think they are doing what's best for mankind. The real problem is that no man has authority over any other man in the area of morals. It's very much like when kids fight because one is trying to force another to do something they don't want to do and one of the kids yells "You're not my mom!" Kids understand the role of authority very well. So ethicists can come up with any rules they want, just as children do, but how will other people respond? With the classic "Who died and made you God?" Classic natural law writers understood this too well and claimed that they were merely using reason to discover God's principles. Modern ethicists ignore the problem, but that doesn't mean it has gone away.
And I'm not saying that nonbelievers are automatically evil people. Mankind has an instinctive moral sense, so that most atheists are decent people why some "believers" are bad. I'm saying that when atheists act morally and advocate moral positions, they're contradicting their own declared philosophy. It's really sad that people have forgotten philosophical greats like Sartre and Camus. They pointed out the problem of morals with atheism very well and forcefully. Philosophers who followed agreed, then went on buidling ethical systems as if they hadn't heard what Sartre and Camus had said. They didn't even bother to argue about it; they have simply ignored it.
Roger, can't you imagine that people have a moral code of their own, derivedfrom their own experiences, developed in their own mind? That people don't have to claim some supernatural power because they themselves can THINK?
It is a poor attitude to hide behind an invisible playmate. Stand up and say "I think, so I am". THat's all. You on your feet, no god or devil around.
Rhotair:Stand up and say "I think, so I am".
Or better, a very Aristotelian: "I am, therefore I must think."
gplauche:a very Aristotelian: "I am, therefore I must think."
Is that really Aristotle? In Atlas Shrugged, Rand says "I am, therefore I'll think"
HeroicLife:Is that really Aristotle? In Atlas Shrugged, Rand says "I am, therefore I'll think"
Aristotle is usually associated with naive empiricism, whereas Descartes is the father of Platonic rationalism. Whoever said it, it is Aristotelian.
I'm aware of that. Note that I didn't write something like 'Aristotle said' but rather 'Aristotelian'. The previous poster beat me to it, but what I was going to say is that it in terms of philosophical traditions it is a very Aristotelian thing to say (as opposed to Cartesian, for example). I don't think Rand would have objected to this characterization, although maybe she would want me to cite her.
I know 'naive empricism' is a technical term, but personally the word 'naive' has a negative connotation. My preference would be to call it common-sense empiricism. This too might be confusing, however, given the modern connotations of empiricism, which don't apply to Aristotle.
Roger McKinney:The problem is not the "is-ought" gap. It's that whatever an man comes up with is just opinion.
As opposed, I presume, to what God "came up with" (assuming the divine command theory, which not a few theologians don't accept); or, more accurately, somes guys claimed God "came up with."
Roger McKinney:Sure anyone can determine what he considers good and evil; that's trivial. The real question is "Why should anyone care about what you think?" Socialists have considered it good to murder opponents. Are they right? The think they are doing what's best for mankind. The real problem is that no man has authority over any other man in the area of morals.
In that case, neither does God because Christian morality is in the final analysis up to men anyway: to determine, to enforce, etc. The secular natural law ethicists answer: Reason has authority.
I can't help but note the many divisions within Christianity as to how to interpret the Bible, Christian morality, and so forth.
Roger McKinney:Classic natural law writers understood this too well and claimed that they were merely using reason to discover God's principles.
And many of them also argued that natural law moral principles would be true, and man could still discover them by reason, even if God did not exist.
I'd like to see God's arguement against the existance of Mises.