From: esot@troi.cc.rochester.edu (Eric Sotnak)
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc,alt.atheism
Subject: Re: Faith
Date: 14 Sep 92 18:50:59 GMT
Organization: University of Rochester (Rochester, NY)

Graham Matthews writes:

}I am suggesting that the notion of "goodness" of an axiom is rubbish,
}not that "the denial of an axiom is equally good".

}[..W]ho says that prediction and explanation are the mark of
}a good axiom! Sounds like a guess on your part (or a hidden axiom!)

}I am just suggesting that we be honest about it. Theism, burnt-toastism
}etc are on an equal footing from a logical perspective. This does not
}make dialogue impossible, since often people share some ideas and
}discussion can proceed with these.

  We seem to be on slightly different tracks.  I agree that from a
(purely) logical perspective one axiom is as good as another.  But there
are, it seems to me, quite fundamental pragmatic reasons why we believe
things and not others.  I think that it is not merely the case that
people often share some ideas (by fortuitous circumstance), but that
people share ideas because people generally experience the world in much
the same way (because of similar biological makeup, etc.).  Call this an
axiom if you want to, but it is one that all but a very few people
share.  I also take it that speakers are generally able to communicate
successfully by language, even though it is another axiom that speakers
of the same language mean pretty much the same things by the same words;
enough so, at least, that we are even able, on many occasions, to
determine that we sometimes have been using words in different senses (I
cannot see how such a determination would be possible at all if there
were not SOME common ground).  You also agree: "often people share
some ideas". (An axiom, right?)
  As for explanation and prediction, the theistic hypothesis clearly
embraces them as criteria for evaluating an axiom (as does the
scientific hypothesis, and for the same basic pragmatic reasons, it
seems to me).  The theistic hypothesis is supposed to explain such
things as the creation of the universe, the purpose of human existence,
and so forth, and it is supposed to predict such things as what happens
to us when we die, what is the result of certain forms of behavior
(is killing other people rewarded or punished or neither?).
  The business of deciding what we should believe is, it seems to me, a
fundamental human activity.  Furthermore, it is important to most people
to form beliefs which are true.  Most people also believe that some
forms of behavior are more conducive to producing true beliefs than
others.  All logical systems are on equal footing from a purely
syntactic perspective, but if we want to make use of a logical system,
there are pragmatic grounds for preferring, for example, a logical
system which is truth-preserving.  That's why the propositional calculus
doesn't have any inference rules that will allow you to infer ~P from P.
It isn't, therefore, the logical considerations which make one axiom or
set of axioms better than another, but the pragmatic considerations.
Logically, one can reject pragmatic considerations as easily as any
otners (they're just more axioms).  But if you accept (and I'm not
claiming that there are any logical reasons that DEMAND one to accept)
that human beings are largely governed by shared pragmatic concerns,
then it seems to me that there are, indeed, grounds for evaluating
the axioms which determine our choice of world-view, and our choice of
explanatory and predictive hypotheses, and thus the choice of a theistic
or a non-theistic world-view.
  Sheesh, what a long-winded and ill-expressed answer.  Anyway, that's
all I have to say on the subject.  The last word is yours, if you want
it.
--
********************************************************************
Eric Sotnak                   |  One life.
esot@troi.cc.rochester.edu    |  One chance.