Atheist Epistemology

Con seems to be making an argument that says that a naturalistic (or atheistic) epistemology is self-defeating because within materialist models mental capacities arose due to evolution. They seem to be saying that if our minds originated due to purely physical processes then they cannot be reliable and we cannot know if we are able to see reality as it is. I will seek to show how natural selection necessitates cognitive faculties which view the external world as it truly is, as it is essential to survival. Second, con makes a claim that knowledge is immaterial and that since it is immaterial it cannot be properly taken into account within a naturalist framework. I will be arguing for something called structural supervenience. This can be defined as essentially where a mental state is that which is caused by the right inputs, meaning the brain state is totally describable in physical language. The new mental state may need a new concept to describe it but it must be a pattern of lower entities. Reliable Cognitive Faculties Are More Favorable for Survival Than Those That Are NotI am defining reliable cognitive faculties here as those which generate true beliefs about the world (a necessity in epistemology). Natural selection changes the heritable traits as time passes, since only the genes which produce offspring continue. I will show how reliable cognitive faculties have more survival values than those that are not reliable. If I see a black mamba in front of me, knowing that it could cause me great pain or even death, what kind of beliefs would most greatly ensure my survival? Would it be those that make me believe there is a black mamba in front of me or those that make me think it is something else (that will cause me to run)? I think it is clear that the belief that it is actually a black mamba has more survival value. True beliefs about the external world can be applied universally. What I mean is that in any scenario where I encounter something dangerous if I truly view the thing for what it is then I am most likely to survive in a variety of situations. If I run as fast as I can from an aggressive black mamba because I know it can travel quickly (for a snake) and that its bite could kill me in just a few hours, I will most likely survive. But notice that the action of me running is due to what I believe concerning the snake. What about if I encounter a bear? If my cognitive faculties are reliable I would know that I should not run away from a bear. It is this particular knowledge of the behavior of bears which helps me survive. I could give many more examples. If my cognitive faculties were unreliable and I simply ran from everything that was dangerous I would be less likely to survive than someone who had reliable cognitive faculties with specific true beliefs concerning the danger in question. If one argued that for each peculiar instance that my mind conjured up something that was not true, but enabled me to survive, it would still not be as good as having reliable cognitive faculties. So if I thought the black mamba was a ghost which caused me to run, or if whenever there was a bear nearby my mind convinced me that I was on a narrow platform elevated hundreds of feet above so I would not move, it still would not be as good as having true beliefs concerning the danger in question. Not only would the mind have to do mental gymnastics (which seems to be very inefficient), but also that key beliefs ensuring survival would be lost. For example, if I simply ran because my mind deceived me into thinking the snake was a ghost then I would be out of luck as to how to handle a situation in which I was actually bit. If I kept running after getting bitten then I would decrease the chance of my survival, because I would be increasing the rate at which venom is circulating through my body. If I had proper belief concerning the snake I would know to get away from the snake and stand still. It seems clear that reliable cognitive faculties are necessitated by natural selection, or at least highly probable. Knowledge Can Be Described in Purely Physical TermsCon says that knowledge is not material, so if an atheist affirms knowledge then their naturalist epistemology must be false. I will argue that knowledge can be taken into account in purely physical terms, for in my case it must be able to, since nothing lies outside of the scope of scientific explanation (within a naturalist epistemology). The naturalist epistemic attitude says that our world is a system of objects which are related causally. Thus, if knowledge is a real thing then it must be something that can be described physically in this system of objects. This epistemology dictates an ontology which says that the only entities allowed are those that can be described scientifically. We are yet to find anything which falls outside of this scope, so there should be no reason for us to believe that our mental states are any different. Before continuing I must also note that I will be arguing for beliefs being the result of physical processes, as knowledge is traditionally seen in the tripartite analysis of knowledge as being justified true belief. Modern science seems to be consistent with this in that we see human consciousness, personality, memory, etc. are dependent on the brain. Changes within the brain's physical matter will cause changes in mental states. This implies that if we took two brains and made them completely identical physically then the arising mental states would also be completely identical. So if we took the black mamba case above and had two completely identical persons (physically), they would have the same exact beliefs and responses. Con will be hard pressed to show what else must be added if these beliefs would not necessarily be the same and cannot be described in purely physical language, in light of our current understanding of the physical relation between the brain and mental states. By doing so con will have to somehow break conservation of matter and energy which dictates the way in which different objects interact. It seems clear that beliefs must fit within a physicalist framework due to both our understanding of the mind and the way the universe seems to work.