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The Loss of Secularism in Naturalism, Part 2: Unjustified True Beliefs

"Most of us have a worldview, an overarching context for life that helps to shape
our beliefs, goals and actions. This book explores the science-based worldview
known as naturalism – a comprehensive and fulfilling alternative to faith-based
religion and other varieties of dualism."

So begins the description of "Encountering Naturalism," by Thomas W. Clark,


founder and director of the Center for Naturalism and creator of Naturalism.Org.
http://www.naturalism.org/ This "worldview," this "overarching context for life"
was described in the "Syntopicon" http://www.thegreatideas.org/syntopicon.html as
"the search for the single intelligible object," which I took as the title for my
first book. [See "Academy Publications" on this page.] Such a world view often
goes by the title of "cosmology," and as a matter of fact it was the description
of cosmology in the "Syntopicon" that I took. Many books have been written on the
cosmology of religions, and of the way that science itself searches for a
"worldview," a single intelligible object.

But when it comes to a single worldview of naturalism, Dr. Quentin Smith,


http://www.wmich.edu/philosophy/index.php?content=smith_faculty_profile author of
"The Metaphilosophy of Naturalism",
http://www.philoonline.org/library/smith_4_2.htm says there are two views held in
academia, which he calls "informed" and "uninformed". This division, in his view,
is the reason for the rise in theist philosophy taking the place of, and sometimes
overwhelming, the secular purposes inherent in the subject of naturalism. This
secularity which, with exceptions including religious-based institutions, he says
was the hallmark of twentieth century colleges and universities.

"Due to the typical attitude of the contemporary naturalist," Smith writes, "[ ]
the vast majority of naturalist philosophers have come to hold (since the late
1960s) an unjustified belief in naturalism. Their justifications have been
defeated by arguments developed by theistic philosophers, and now naturalist
philosophers, for the most part, live in darkness about the justification for
naturalism. They may have a true belief in naturalism, but they have no knowledge
that naturalism is true since they do not have an undefeated justification for
their belief. If naturalism is true, then their belief in naturalism is
accidentally true. This philosophical failure (ignoring theism and thereby
allowing themselves to become unjustified naturalists) has led to a cultural
failure since theists, witnessing this failure, have increasingly become motivated
to assume or argue for supernaturalism in their academic work, to an extent that
academia has now lost its mainstream secularization."

With the rise of the evangelical movement in the U.S. it is little wonder that
theism has crept back into our colleges and universities. We hear talk everyday,
somewhere--in magazines, newspapers, tv or radio--that some form of religious
education ought to be taking place in our lower schools as well, from elementary
to high schools.

""Public schools can neither foster religion nor preclude it. Our public schools
must treat religion with fairness and respect and vigorously protect religious
expression as well as the freedom of conscience of all other students. In so doing
our public schools reaffirm the First Amendment..." Secretary of Education Richard
W. Riley But the manner in which this is done can easily violate the Second
Amendment and the historical separation of church and state which the Supreme
Court cited as Original Intent in 1878.

It would seem this ought to be enough to remove theist ideas from secular-based
education, but the situation, as Smith makes clear, is hardly that simple, and
constitutes the "uninformed" ranks of educators. As a matter of fact, the
situation is so misunderstood even by the naturalist philosophers that their
misunderstanding has allowed their secular subject to be overrun by realist
theists.

Smith defines an "uninformed" naturalist as one who has an unjustified belief in


his/her own subject. Such unjustified belief he attributes to ignorance of
"defeater" arguments against naturalism. Unjustified belief is not limited to the
naturalists only. He says that "most contemporary naturalists, as well as most
contemporary theists, hold defeated beliefs about the truth-value of naturalism."
Knowledge of naturalism can only be indefeasibly justified true belief when the
believer has knowledge of the arguments which can defeat it. So, even an ardent
naturalist can have an unjustifed belief when he/she cannot state the arguments
that lead to an undermining of the principles of naturalism. It is only when one
knows the arguments against his own beliefs and rejects them and can argue against
them that a belief can be justified.

It would seem there are those who fit the category of "informed" naturalists, (but
I have not read this book; I can only extrapolate from the review.) In Victor J.
Stenger's "Has Science Found God? The Latest Results in the Search for Purpose in
the Universe," Norman Levitt, Professor of Mathematics, Rutgers University writes,
" Responding with meticulous thoroughness to the hype of journalists, the
hucksterism of theocratic spin-doctors, and the wishful thinking of a few atypical
scientists desperate to salvage a remnant of traditional theology, Stenger
courageously reminds us that science endorses no other option than to come to
terms with a universe that owes us no favors and refuses to let us cheat reality."
[From the back cover.]

Stenger's book, released by Prometheus Books in 2003, was written after Smith's
entry in PHILO. At any rate, Smith's criticism of uninformed naturalists was used
in "Atheism: From the University to Society," by Edwin K. P. Chong as a "relevant
quote." http://www.engr.colostate.edu/~echong/talks/06/Atheism06quotes.pdf So it
would appear that there are "informed" naturalists in academia--Smith never claims
there are none--and perhaps their ranks are growing.

So let's take a look at Smith's "defeated justifiers," one at a time, and discover
how they affect each of us who may have "unjustified true belief" about our single
intelligible object.

The first one Smith calls "A (a defeated justifier). A is the argument that
contemporary science and naturalist philosophy are known to be probably or
certainly true, even though A includes no counterarguments against contemporary
arguments for theism."

To constitute a "justified true belief," "three conditions are necessary, and


jointly sufficient for "knowledge," writes Brett Watson, in "The Nutter Log."
http://www.nutters.org/log/jtb Belief itself is the first one: "[Y]ou do not know
something unless you also hold it as true in your mind; if you do not believe it,
then you do not know it."

Truth itself is next: "[T]here can be no knowledge of false propositions; belief


in a falsehood is delusion or misapprehension, not knowledge." But for the novice
thinker, it would be easy here to mistake what one normally thinks of as
"knowledge," i.e., general information that one thinks may come in relevant
someday, for the "knowledge" as defined by Watson. "Knowledge" in this context is
what you hold true in your thoughts. In this context, "knowledge" of false
propositions as something handy to hang on to for use in debates or just to amaze
or amuse your friends, is not "knowledge." I know many of the arguments used to
justify the existence of God. But I do not hold them as the truth about God. I
only hold as truth that such arguments exist. In this way, knowledge of false
propositions does not mean that I cannot "know" about what I consider to be false
propositions about God. It only means that I cannot hold those false propositions
as my own truths.

This fact leads to Smith's contention that many committed naturalists do not
understand even the false propositions about God.

"A [ ] problem with naturalist scientists is that they are so innocent of any
understanding of the philosophy of religion that they do not even know that they
are innocent of this understanding, as it witnessed by their popular writings on
science and religion," Smith says.

Third in our understanding of "justified true belief" is justification itself:


"[T]he belief must be appropriately supported; there must be sufficient evidence
for the belief," writes Watson.

And so, in our search for the world view, the single intelligible object, or what
Ayn Rand called in another context a "sense of life," we discover that when one
does not know the arguments that can defeat one's beliefs, those beliefs are
unjustified.

It would seem just as self-evident that many people, perhaps most people in this
world do not care to know the opposing arguments well enough to be "informed."
When such is the case, when someone believes in God, for example, but does not
study the critics of his beliefs yet knows such criticisms and arguments exist,
then "unjustified true beliefs" not only lose their truth, but their justification
as well.

When a belief has lost its justification, it is called faith. Nearly every
philosopher and theologian through out history has said in one way or another,
explicitly or implicitly, that faith is the abnegation of reason. Yet, if one is
to have a "justified true belief," it is reason that must be used to justify it.

That is why the Deist Founders of the United States, who vehemently hated any
organized religion, also devoutly believed in God, because in their logic there
could be no other device by which Man was given his Reason.

The Founders were Naturalists only to a degree, which is why Thomas Jefferson
wrote of the "Laws of Nature and of Nature's God" in the Declaration of
Independence, and why the signers let him get by with those words. It is even been
said that Franklin, who was looking over young Jefferson's shoulder the entire
time, may have suggested the wording himself.

They certainly shared the Naturalist position "that human life, physical, mental,
moral and spiritual, is an ordinary natural event attributable in all respects to
the ordinary operations of nature." http://www.ditext.com/runes/n.html
B.A.G.Fuller

They did not hold the Naturalist's concommitant principle "that man's ethical
values, compulsions, activities, and restraints can be justified on natural
grounds, without recourse to supernatural sanctions, and his highest good pursued
and attained under natural conditions, without expectation of a supernatural
destiny." ibid [italics added]

But this is the justified true belief advanced by the Academy of Metaphysical
Naturalism, and that specific stated philosophy as justifed true belief is the
purpose for the existence of the Academy. This is the Academy's overarching
worldview and single intelligible object.

Please send all comments to mailto:freeassemblage@gmail.com


The Free Assemblage of Metaphysical Naturalists is the sm (service mark) of the
Academy of Metaphysical Naturalism tm, which is the educational arm of the
Assemblage.
This publication © 2008 by Curtis Edward Clark and Naturalist Academy Publishing ®

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