The Big Problem with Religious Arguments

Summary

In this thought-provoking video, the script explores David Hume's skeptical approach to theism and atheism through his 'Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion'. It delves into the limits of human reason in understanding the divine, the constraints of knowledge and truth, and the metaphysically possible. The video challenges viewers to reconsider the certainty of their beliefs about God's existence and nature, emphasizing the value of skepticism in theological and philosophical debates.

Takeaways

• 😀 David Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion explores the limits of human knowledge about the divine, advocating a skeptical approach to theism and atheism.
• 🤔 Hume challenges the use of analogy in arguments for the existence of God, suggesting that the universe may not be similar enough to its parts to justify such reasoning.
• 🧐 Pho, a character in Hume's dialogue, questions the justification for analogical reasoning in theological arguments, pointing out the potential for disanalogy between a set and its members.
• 📚 Hume is known for his skepticism about human certainty, emphasizing the limits of what we can know and the potential for our senses and reason to mislead us.
• 🤓 Pho introduces doubt into common theological reasoning, focusing on the limits of reasoning by analogy and the comprehensibility of God's nature.
• 🧐 Pho argues that if God is infinite, He is likely beyond human comprehension, which complicates the idea of believing in one definite God.
• 🤨 Pho critiques the balance between God's greatness and His knowability, suggesting that a theistic worldview must be careful not to render God incomprehensible.
• 📉 Pho's critique extends to natural theology, questioning the plausibility of using abductive reasoning to explain the universe's order or fine-tuning by an intelligent designer.
• 🚫 Hume asserts that knowledge is limited to matters of fact and relations of ideas, implying that discussions about God's existence or nature may fall outside the realm of what can be known.
• 💭 Pho encourages epistemic self-awareness, asking how sure we can be of our theological reasoning and the extent to which we can know anything about the divine.
• 🔍 The script suggests that skepticism is valuable in philosophical inquiry, prompting us to consider the limits of our knowledge and the strength of our epistemological foundations.

Q & A

What is the main theme of the video script discussing David Hume's views on religion?

The main theme of the video script is exploring David Hume's skeptical approach to religious debates, particularly his agnostic perspective on the existence of God and the limits of human reason in understanding the divine.

What does the script suggest about the role of analogy in human reasoning?

The script suggests that analogy plays a significant role in human reasoning, especially in inductive reasoning, but also points out its limitations when used to make broad generalizations about the universe and God, as in the argument from design.

How does the script describe David Hume's approach to the question of God's existence?

The script describes David Hume's approach as that of a skeptic, not taking the position of an atheist or theist but rather questioning the limits of what can be known about God and the validity of the arguments used to discuss the divine.

What is the script's stance on the argument from design?

The script challenges the argument from design by highlighting the potential fallacy of drawing analogies between the complexity of the universe and human-made objects like watches, suggesting that such reasoning may not be justified.

What is the relationship between knowledge and truth as discussed in the script?

The script discusses the relationship between knowledge and truth in the context of human understanding of metaphysics, suggesting that our knowledge is constrained by our ability to perceive and comprehend truth, especially in matters related to the divine.

How does the script address the problem of understanding God's nature?

The script addresses the problem by suggesting that if God is infinitely great, then He may be almost entirely beyond human comprehension, which in turn raises questions about the certainty of any beliefs about God's nature.

What is the script's view on the role of skepticism in philosophical and theological discussions?

The script promotes skepticism as a valuable tool for questioning the limits of human knowledge and understanding, especially in discussions about the existence and nature of God, and encourages a cautious approach to making definitive claims.

How does the script relate Hume's philosophy to the wider debate around agnosticism?

The script relates Hume's philosophy to the wider debate around agnosticism by highlighting his skeptical inquiries into the limits of human reason and the extent to which we can know or understand metaphysical concepts like God.

What is the significance of the script's discussion on the limits of analogy in arguments for God's existence?

The significance lies in challenging the certainty of such arguments by pointing out that analogies may not be a reliable basis for understanding the universe or God, as they can be subject to exceptions and may not accurately represent the divine.

How does the script suggest we should approach questions about the metaphysical possibilities beyond our experience?

The script suggests that we should approach such questions with caution and skepticism, acknowledging the limitations of our knowledge and experience, and recognizing that our judgments about metaphysical possibilities may be uncertain at best.

What is the script's perspective on the value of skepticism in understanding the world and its mysteries?

The script views skepticism as valuable for encouraging epistemic self-awareness and for questioning the extent of our knowledge and understanding, especially in areas where our experience is limited, such as the nature of the universe and the divine.

Outlines

00:00

📜 Introduction to Agnosticism and Sponsorship Acknowledgement

The script opens with gratitude to Squarespace for sponsoring the video and a brief teaser about the content to follow. It introduces the topic of religious debates, highlighting the common dichotomy between atheists and theists, with notable figures like Richard Dawkins and William Lane Craig representing their respective sides. The video promises to explore a less-discussed perspective: agnosticism, as exemplified by David Hume's 'Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion.' Hume's skepticism and his examination of the limits of human reason regarding the divine are set to be the focal points. The script also touches on the importance of the relationship between knowledge and truth, and the need to reassess our metaphysical beliefs. Lastly, the video's sponsor, Squarespace, is introduced as a platform for building professional websites with ease, offering a discount code for the audience.

05:01

🔍 The Limits of Analogical Reasoning in Theology

This paragraph delves into the use of analogy as a reasoning tool in theological arguments, particularly in the context of the argument from design and the cosmological argument. It critiques the assumption that the universe's complexity necessitates a designer, questioning the justification for drawing parallels between the universe and its components. The character Pho from Hume's dialogue challenges the security of such analogies, suggesting that the properties of a set's members do not always belong to the set itself. The critique extends to the broader issue of the limits of human reason in understanding the divine, emphasizing the need for caution when making metaphysical inferences.

10:01

🤔 The Problem of Understanding God's Nature

The script discusses the challenges of comprehending God's nature, especially when conceived as having infinite properties. It contrasts natural theology, which seeks to understand God through the world, with revealed theology, which relies on divine revelations like scripture. The character Philo criticizes the tendency to balance God's greatness with human comprehension, using the example of a beetle's inability to understand Shakespeare's works to illustrate the gap between the finite and the infinite. This leads to a broader debate on whether believers truly believe in one definite God or merely entertain various possibilities of what God could be.

15:02

🔄 The Challenge of Abduction in Explaining the Universe

This paragraph examines the use of abduction, or inference to the best explanation, in natural theology arguments, such as the argument from design and the fine-tuning argument. Cleanthes, a character in Hume's dialogue, posits that the universe's order suggests the existence of an intelligent designer. However, Pho counters this by questioning the basis of our plausibility judgments, given our limited experience with anything beyond our own universe. Pho argues that our everyday reasoning might not apply to the metaphysical origins of the universe, introducing skepticism about the certainty of our beliefs regarding the divine.

20:03

📚 Hume's Epistemological Framework and the Limits of Knowledge

The script presents David Hume's epistemological framework, dividing knowledge into matters of fact and relations of ideas, and dismissing anything outside these categories as either nonsensical or beyond human comprehension. It discusses the implications of this framework for the debate between atheism and theism, which are ontological claims about what exists. Agnosticism, in contrast, is presented as an epistemological position, focusing on what can be known rather than what is the case. The value of Hume's work is highlighted in prompting a reevaluation of the certainty of our theological reasoning.

25:03

💭 Knowledge, Belief, and the Value of Skepticism

In the final paragraph, the script reflects on the value of skepticism in philosophical inquiry, as exemplified by Hume's challenge to question the limits of what we can know. It contrasts the practical concerns associated with skepticism, such as solipsism or the brain-in-a-vat scenario, with the deeper value of understanding the limits of human knowledge. The script concludes by encouraging epistemic self-awareness in all areas of inquiry, including theology, and suggests that a healthy dose of agnosticism might be beneficial in acknowledging the limits of our understanding.

Keywords

💡Agnosticism

Agnosticism is the philosophical position that the existence of the divine or God is unknown or unknowable. In the context of the video, agnosticism is presented as a middle path between atheism and theism, emphasizing the limits of human knowledge regarding metaphysical claims. David Hume's skepticism is highlighted as a form of agnosticism, questioning the certainty of our beliefs about the divine.

💡Analogy

Analogy is a reasoning process where similarities between two things are used to infer that they share other properties. The script discusses how analogy is underappreciated in human reasoning and critiques its use in arguments for the existence of God, such as the argument from design, by pointing out that the universe may not be sufficiently similar to its parts to make such inferences valid.

💡Natural Theology

Natural theology is a philosophical discipline that attempts to understand God through reason and observation of the natural world, rather than through divine revelation. The video script contrasts natural theology with revealed theology, highlighting how natural theology seeks to infer the properties of God from the order and complexity observed in the universe.

💡Cosmological Argument

The cosmological argument is a philosophical argument that posits that everything with a beginning has a cause, and since the universe began, it must have a cause. The script examines this argument through the lens of analogy, questioning whether it is reasonable to infer a cause for the universe based on our experiences with other causal relationships within the universe.

💡Epistemology

Epistemology is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature and scope of knowledge. The video emphasizes epistemology in its discussion of agnosticism, focusing on what can be known about God's existence and nature. It explores the limits of human understanding and the relationship between knowledge and belief.

💡Ontology

Ontology is the philosophical study of being, existence, or the nature of reality. The script touches on ontology when discussing the nature of God and the universe, and how our beliefs about what exists (ontology) are influenced by what we can know (epistemology).

💡Skepticism

Skepticism in the philosophical sense is the method of questioning beliefs to determine their validity. The video uses Hume's skepticism to challenge the certainty of beliefs about the divine, advocating for a cautious approach to metaphysical claims and the limits of human reason.

💡Inference to the Best Explanation

Inference to the best explanation, or abduction, is a reasoning process where the best explanation for an observation is considered likely to be true. The script critiques this method when applied to arguments about God, suggesting that our everyday experiences may not provide a reliable basis for judging plausibility in metaphysical contexts.

💡Plausibility

Plausibility refers to the quality of being convincing or seeming reasonable. The video discusses the challenges of determining plausibility when discussing the nature of the universe or God, given our limited experience and understanding of such vast and abstract concepts.

💡Divine

The term 'Divine' refers to anything relating to a deity or god, possessing religious, spiritual, or supernatural significance. The script uses the concept of the divine to explore the limits of human understanding and the nature of belief in a higher power, particularly in the context of Hume's skepticism.

💡Metaphysics

Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that deals with the first principles of things, including the nature of reality and the relationship between mind and matter. The video delves into metaphysical questions about the existence and nature of God, the origins of the universe, and the limits of what is metaphysically possible.

Highlights

Sponsor appreciation for Squarespace and its website building services.

Introduction to David Hume's skepticism and his approach to theism and atheism.

The importance of examining the limits of human reason and knowledge in metaphysics.

Discussion on the use of analogy in reasoning, especially in arguments for the existence of God.

Critique of analogical reasoning in the argument from design and cosmological argument.

Philo's challenge to justify the analogy between the universe and its contents.

The problem of understanding God's nature given His supposed infinite properties.

Critique of natural theology and the balance between God's greatness and comprehensibility.

Exploration of the implications of God's infinite nature on human comprehension and belief.

Introduction to epistemic logic and its relevance to belief and the consideration of possibilities.

Hume's challenge to the plausibility of abductive reasoning in explaining the universe's order.

Critique of the fine-tuning argument and the limitations of plausibility judgments about the universe.

Philo's skepticism about the ability to make definite judgments on metaphysical questions.

Hume's division of knowledge into matters of fact and relations of ideas, with a challenge to what lies beyond.

The value of skepticism in assessing the limits of knowledge and its application to theological debates.

Encouragement of epistemic self-awareness and the importance of questioning the limits of knowledge in various inquiries.

Final thoughts on the necessity of humility in our pursuit of knowledge and understanding of the world.

Transcripts

thank you to Squarespace for sponsoring

this video more about them in just a

moment a wise man proportions his belief

to the evidence religious debates are

often framed as a clash between atheists

and theists on the one hand there are

the Dawkins harrises and Hitchens of the

world and on the other there are the

aquinus the phasers and the Craigs but

seldom does the middle path get nearly

as much consideration there are not many

who will boldly take to the stand to say

I'm not sure about the whole God thing I

uh I haven't made my mind up but luckily

David Hume will come to our rescue in

his dialogues concerning natural

religion he looks at the question of God

not just through the eye of an atheist

or a theist but rather an outright kinly

skeptic who wishes to show the limits of

what we could ever know about the Divine

get ready to learn the constraints of

human reason the importance of the

relationship between knowledge and truth

and why we could all stand to reexamine

our ideas of what is metaphysically

possible as always bear in mind that I'm

only really scratching the surface of

hume's philosophy and The Wider debate

around agnosticism here and there are

responses to each of his points which I

won't have time to examine in detail

just know that they are there none of

hume's arguments are knockdown

objections but before any of that I want

to thank the very kind sponsor for this

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website but anyway back to God one the

limits of analogy out of all of the

tools of human reasoning I think analogy

is one of the least appreciated it's

very cool and in some ways I don't know

what we would do without it in the

beauty of intricate formal systems and

probabilistic inductive reasoning we can

forget the amazing fact that we can go

this thing is a bit like this other

thing maybe it will behave in the same

way and we rely on this thinking a fair

amount for good reason in some way

straightforward inductive reason often

relies on analogies just like this for

instance we make generalizations about

watches because we know that watches are

all alike in a whole host of ways thus

it makes sense to group them under the

term watch and start to make

semi-universal statements about the

class of watches and a huge amount of

arguments for belief in God rely on some

form of analogical reasoning classically

the argument for design often goes a bit

like this in general life whenever we

encounter something sufficiently complex

we tend to infer that there is some

designer py famously uses the example of

a watch on a beach if we came across

such an object we would not think wow I

wonder how this watch came to be via the

interaction of the sand the wind and the

Sea we would instead think someone must

have made this watch there must have

been a watch maker however the universe

itself is vastly more complex than a

watch so much so that even our most

advanced mathematical theories cannot

come up with a complete description of

it so because the universe is a bit like

a significantly more intricate and

complicated watch should we not by the

same token infer that it too must have a

designer for another example we might

take a particular formulation of the

cosmological argument this might say

that since everything we've observed in

the universe has a beginning and also a

cause and the universe is also a thing

analogous to all of the objects we've

already observed then that must also

have a cause in both cases there is the

general idea that the universe itself is

similar enough to the stuff in the

universe that we can generalize from

observations about interest Universe

objects to the universe itself it's a

bit like a suppressed premise in the

argument I want to note here that there

are versions of both of these arguments

that are not analogical in this way but

they also tend to rely on a priori

metaphysical principles that are open to

question and required defense you can

check out my video on St Thomas aquinus

is five ways if you want to learn a

little bit more about that however one

of the characters in hume's dialogue Pho

throws this type of reasoning into

question he asks whether we can actually

justify our analogy here are arguing

that at best we have very limited

reasons to think that the universe

itself must be like anything within it

after all there are plenty of instances

where the members of some set have

properties that do not belong to the set

itself think of a square made up of two

triangles while everything inside the

square has the property of having three

sides the square itself obviously does

not or to take a Starker example

everything in the set of reptiles is an

animal but the set of reptiles isn't

anything living at all we see these

disanalogies between groups and their

members all the time it might be the

case that no individual member of a

community is self-sufficient but the

community itself may be perfectly

self-sufficient many single-colored

objects can form a multicolored

composite and so on the point Philo is

getting at is that the analogic leap the

theist makes in the argument from design

or the cosmological argument are not

nearly as secure as we might initially

think it's worth noting here that this

is not a positive argument for atheism

at all it's not suggesting that the

analogy definitely does not hold whereas

something like the problem of evil

attempts to identify a positive tension

in the proposed properties of God and

thus make an active argument for his

nonexistence Pho is simply introducing

doubt into the common patterns of our

theological reasoning this is sort of

emblematic of hume's General approach

David Hume is one of the closest things

we find in modern philosophy to a proper

skeptic he spent much of his life

attempting to find the limits of what

humans can be certain of and the extent

to which our senses reason and thoughts

can lead us astray his essays on a huge

number of topics all make the same broad

Point our reasoning is much less clear

than we think it is and this attitude

makes him a fantastic spokesman for

something like agnosticism in effect Pho

wants to know what the limits of

reasoning by analogy are and how we know

when we've gone too far his proposed

answer is actually very intuitive

reasoning by analogy holds just to the

extent to which the objects of

comparison are similar in the relevant

ways so if we are reasoning about

movement then we can expect two things

of similar weight and shape to move in

similar ways but then the question this

raises for the theist is this how

similar can we truly say the objects in

the universe are to the universe itself

and thus how Justified is this

analogical reasoning for the record

pho's criticisms do not just apply to

religious answers but just any sort of

response to the question what was there

before the universe or what caused the

universe or any question that addresses

things outside of the world we Habit in

many ways his attack is not actually on

theism itself but rather the

comprehensibility of the question that

theism has set out to answer this is

going to become a bit of a theme Philo

is far more a skeptic than an atheist he

is less concerned with whether the

theism is a good theory but more with

whether this sort of metaphysical Theory

crafting even makes sense and having

taken issue with the arguments for the

existence of God Pho then moves to

attack God's nature if you want to help

me make more videos like this then

please consider consider subscribing to

my patreon the link is in the

description two the problem of

understanding God to massively simplify

some fascinating history in medieval

Christian thought there were two primary

types of theology revealed theology

which dealt with direct Revelations from

God like scripture and natural theology

which attempted to find out about God

through the world itself that is

revealed theology dealt with his words

and natural theology dealt with his

works and it is worth saying this was a

huge part of theology much of St Thomas

aquinus is sum theologica arguably the

greatest work of Christian theology in

history is about inferring the

properties of God from nature and

natural theology has numerous strengths

that revealed theology does not quite

have access to for instance if a

Christian Theologian is talking to

someone who does not already believe in

the divine inspiration of the Bible then

they are unlikely to be amenable to

arguments from revealed theology but

almost everyone believes the natural

world exists so it's a fantastic place

to start the two other main characters

in dialogue cleanthes and DEA both make

natural theological arguments at various

points in particular DEA wishes to argue

for a Transcendent god with infinite

properties he is not just good but

infinitely good not just intelligent but

infinitely intelligent he is boundless

and eternal and woven through everything

in existence in itself this is a

slightly esoteric but not too unorthodox

characterization of God a lot of

conceptions of a theistic deity make

many of his properties infinite and

almost all of them make him

significantly greater than humans this

makes a lot of sense what would be the

point of worshiping something that was

not a whole lot greater than us but this

is where Philo begins his critique he

points out that a theistic worldview

must be very careful to balance two

properties of God on the one hand he

must be so much greater than us mere

humans but on the other he must remain

comprehensible to us in some way after

all if we could not know anything about

God then a theistic worldview would not

be that much different from an atheistic

one it would simply amount to saying

well there is something out there but I

don't know what it is but Pho is quick

to remark that God's greatness is at

odds with his knowability an example

might help illustrate what he means for

instance imagine that you were not you

but instead a beetle and you were

happily crawling around the floor when

one day you come across the complete

works of Shakespeare from one

perspective you now know the complete

works of Shakespeare exists as a

physical object but from another you

only do so in a highly limited way you

cannot tell that it's a book but

basically treat it like you would a

brick you cannot understand the language

contained within nor the meter nor the

dramatic beats in fact you can't really

get any of the information encoded

inside at all there is a sense in which

Beatle youu would not believe in the

complete works of Shakespeare but

instead only that there is some object

on the floor and that its details will

be forever beyond your grasp pho's

argument is essentially that if God is

as great as the reports claim and is

infinite then he must be almost entirely

Beyond human comprehension after all to

understand a finite amount of an

infinite being would still be to

understand only an infinitesimally small

amount about him in some ways Pho Echoes

what many Christian theologians have

themselves stated according to Christian

Legend St Augustine was once admonished

by an Angel who told him that attempting

to understand God's trinitarian nature

via human reason was like attempting to

fit the entire ocean in a small hole on

the beach others have said that when we

call God kind or loving or talk of his

wroth we must be speaking by analogy

we're just saying the closest thing that

humans can think of however for Pho this

means that the theist is not really

believing in one definite God at all

this point is going to get a bit

technical so bear with me let's think

about belief in terms of considered

possibilities then we can say that what

you believe is what you think is true in

every possibility you are considering so

if I believe that London is the capital

of the UK then that means that in every

possibility I will consider London will

be the capital of the UK I won't

consider any possibilities in which this

is not true because then my belief could

not serve as the basis for decisive

action on the other hand if something is

an open possibility for me then it will

be true in at least one of the

possibilities that I'm considering so if

I know that my friend John is either in

Manchester or in Birmingham but I don't

know which then they are both open

possibilities for me one of the

possibilities I'm considering has John

in Birmingham and the other has him in

Manchester funnily enough I did my

Master's thesis in epistemic logic and

this is pretty much how logicians tend

to treat belief mathematically pho's

point is partly that if God remains

mostly incomprehensible then the theist

does not really believe in one whole

definite God but rather considers a

whole load of different gods as open

possibilities corresponding to all of

the possible qualities of God that are

forever beyond their reach at its

extreme end this approach is something

that is atheism adjacent like what we

were saying earlier about someone

believing that there is something out

there but they don't know what it is but

pho's problem is really one of gradation

the greater the god the more difficult

he would be to comprehend but the more

difficult to comprehend the harder it is

to believe in anything definite it's a

fun little conundrum though I I do think

there are solutions to it in practice

most religions get around this by using

revealed theology if you are a Christian

then God has informed you about himself

directly through holy texts but Hume is

largely concerned with natural theology

here for the reasons I gave at the

beginning of the section whether or not

you agree with it this is quite a cool

argument to think about because it helps

illustrate the connection between

ontology and epistemology ontology is

the study of what is whereas

epistemology is the study of how we come

to know things on the traditional

Aristotelian picture epistemology rests

upon ontology and this makes sense how

we gain knowledge will depend on how the

world is and thus on ontology however

Hume points out a flip side to this the

ontology that we can believe in rests

upon what we can know and what we can

comprehend in other words what it is

possible to believe depends on what it

is possible to understand and thus Hume

raises an interesting question for

theists even if we grant that God exists

to what extent must we remain agnostics

about his nature and furthermore does

this mean that we would not be believing

in one definite God but rather gesturing

at a whole host of possible gods and

saying well one of them must exist that

was all pretty heavy-going stuff and to

anyone who's interested I would truly

recommend looking into epistemic logic

it's a fascinating field next next we

will look at a different but related

idea that Hume raises at numerous points

during his dialogue how should our

reasoning change when we are talking

about things so far outside the realm of

our ordinary experience three

possibilities plausibility and you to

return to the concept of natural

theology many arguments in that field

tend to go something like this You

observe a property in the world and then

you ask what would be the most plausible

way to explain this and then you

conclude something about God or just the

mere fact that God exists this is a very

familiar pattern of reasoning known as

abduction or an inference to the best

explanation for instance if I had left

my laptop in public and it was gone when

I came back any number of things could

have happened a group of pigeons could

have coordinated to carry it away a gust

of wind could have blown it to where I

cannot see it but The Disappearance of

my laptop is probably best explained by

the hypothesis that someone has stolen

it cleanthes makes many such arguments

of this structure in the dialogue most

notably he uses a variant on the

argument from design and the fine-tuning

argument to show God's existence and his

Supreme intelligence cleanthes first

points out that the Universe has an

astonishing amount of order in it the

natural laws keep everything reliable

and predictable if anything was even

slightly off then there would be total

and complete chaos it could have been

that gravity was slightly different and

as a result planets would not hold

together it could have been the case

that natural laws were unstable and

unreliable they could have stopped one

day in 1350 and destroyed the universe

in that very moment cleanthes then says

that the best way to explain such a

delicate balance is that there is a

highly intelligent agential designer who

carefully crafted these laws and we call

that design a God the alternative is

that they came about by chance and that

just seems absurd so God is the most

sensible option thus via abduction it is

rational to believe in God there is

something very appealing about this line

of argument but pho in classic fashion

raised some important skeptical

challenges in his view there is a

significant impediment to using

abductive reasoning to answer questions

about God or the ultimate causes of the

universe and it essentially arises from

a parcity of data for Pho the reason

that abduction works in the world of

everyday life is because we have an

awful lot of experience to draw from to

compare different explanatory theories

take the example of my laptop I know

from previous encounters with pigeons

that they are unlikely to have

coordinated to nickit because I'm not

even sure that they could do such a

thing and even if they could they would

not have anything to gain by doing so

likewise the idea that a gust of wind

specifically blew my laptop out of sight

while leaving the surrounding area

untouched seems implausible because I

know that that's not the type of thing

that wind does on the other hand I know

that when people leave things unattended

sometimes they are stolen it is a much

more plausible hypothesis than the other

two options I was considering

essentially underlying my abductive

reasoning is a whole load of ground

knowledge and defeasible rules that I

rely on to make the inference function

the philosopher John Norton calls these

things material rules and he uses them

quite a lot in his own theory of

induction but then Pho raises a pretty

sensible question what can we possibly

base our plausibility judgments on in

arguments like the fine-tuning one a

premise of the fine-tuning argument is

that the Universe could have been a

whole host of other ways there is a

sense in which this is true it is

logically possible that the Universe

could have been made entirely out of

cheese or consist only of math or any

number of things but all that says is

that it wouldn't be contradictory for

the universe to be like this but to say

something is non-contradictory and to

say that it could have metaphysically

happened are two different things in

effect Pho is saying that we have no

idea about the possible ways the

universe could have been because we only

have access to this one for all we know

this is the only way the universe could

have ever been or it is in fact the

worst organized out of all of the

possible universes that could be Pho is

not saying that either of these is the

case he is just saying we have no way of

telling again it is less an atheist

Point than an agnostic one Pho is

throwing his skeptical Gauntlet down at

any sort of talk about the way the

universe could have been because

according to him we have no experience

of the material rules at play here so we

cannot really make any judgments about

possibility plausibility or probability

moreover he points out these same

arguments can be applied to an

intelligent God as the best way to

explain how the universe is

since we've never seen anything outside

the universe how can we say that an

intelligent God is more plausible than

other competing theories offhandedly Pho

raises a whole set of alternative

hypotheses to explain why the world

might be orderly including God is just

very prolific and came to the

orderliness of this universe via trial

and error the universe was formed via a

committee of a whole load of

intelligences or the universe was not

made by an agent at all but instead a

supremely sophisticated mechanistic

Force now now cleanthes and indeed any

theist could respond here by saying that

the hypothesis of an intelligent God

just seems simpler and more plausible

but pho's whole point is that our

plausibility judgments formed from our

experiences in this world are entirely

inappropriate to discussing what is

plausible outside of this world it would

be like me learning to play football and

assuming that every other game must

follow the same rules again Pho is not

saying that God definitely doesn't exist

his scope is so much broader than that

he is suggesting that our epistemic

position is so limited that almost any

definite judgment we make about the

metaphysical beginnings of the universe

or its alleged Creator are going to be

tentative at best and complete guesses

at worst his issue is not with the

theistic hypothesis in particular but

rather with this sort of metaphysical

theorizing in general and I want to

finish by examining this point in

further detail because I think it

presents very interesting questions that

often go unacknowledged in theological

discussions but nonetheless ones we

might want to approach before we start

making broad proclamations or asserting

theories four knowledge belief and doubt

perhaps David hume's most famous idea is

that all knowledge can be divided into

matters of fact which are contingent

observations about the world which we

can in principle check and relations of

ideas which are mathematical and logical

truth that we can know simply by

analyzing the definitions of the

concepts involved he then declared that

anything that does not fall into one of

these two camps is either nonsense or

just beyond human comprehension and so

it must be committed to the flames and

this is classic Hume he was just as much

concerned with what we can know as what

is the case of course fundamentally the

debate between atheism and theism is

about what is the case one side has the

proposition there is no God and the

other side has the proposition there is

a God it's a very familiar structure

it's just two propositions that

contradict ICT one another just how I

might argue with someone over whether

aliens exist or over whether my table

exists however in a lot of ways

agnosticism seems slightly different

because a committed agnostic if that

makes any sense at all is not making a

claim about what exists but rather what

can be known its scope is

epistemological rather than ontological

it also seems like someone can be

agnostic to a greater or lesser extent I

would be agnostic in as much as I would

think someone cannot be confident in

their answer to the question of God's

existence the positions of Pho in hume's

dialogue are mostly in this

epistemological vein rather than the

ontological one and I think the value of

this work is mainly in how it encourages

us to sit back and ask just how sure we

can be of our theological reasoning do

our analogies between the material world

and the immaterial one hold can we make

sensible judgments about plausibility or

possibility outside the universe but

this General approach is not just

valuable in the realm of theology it is

a fantastic weapon in our philosophical

toolbox if we look at almost any

contemporary debate either philosophical

or non-philosophical we are almost

always watching a clash between two

sides one side argues that euthanasia is

moral and the other argues that it's not

one side believes in the immortality of

the soul and the other doesn't one group

of people think that Jesus rose from the

dead while the other disagrees in each

case here we are mainly looking at which

proposition is true is euthanasia moral

or isn't it is the soul Immortal or does

it perish but running parallel to each

of these debates is the question of our

own certainty for every what is the case

there is a corresponding how would we

know what is the case and moreover how

sure is our epistemic process Beyond

this we can ask what are the kind of

things it is possible for us to know and

which can we only guess or estimate at

the beginning of the video I use David

Humes quote the wise man proportions his

belief to the evidence but another way

of phrasing this same point is your

beliefs about ontology depend on the

strength of your epistemology and this

is a very helpful bit of advice Hume

challenges us not just to think about

what we believe but also the extent to

which we believe it and to keep one eye

on our own limitations at all times when

we're investigating the world because

something both the theist and the

atheist agree on is that the world is

greater than us possibly to the extent

that we will never fully understand it

we are using the fallible tools of our

own reasoning to engage with it and to

that extent we can never be 100%

confident in what we believe we are

constantly making these tiny gambles

with each and every decision we make or

belief we take on skepticism gets a

really bad R these days and it is for

pretty good reason it's associated with

people wondering whether we are brains

invat or if the universe exists at all

in other words things of seemingly

little practical consequence however the

true value of skepticism runs far deeper

than this hume's style of skepticism is

not to raise idle worries that we we are

wrong about everything but instead to

Simply ask what are the limits of the

things we can know and he places quite a

lot of questions quite near the

periphery of possible knowledge for

instance Hume is a phenomenalist about

the external world meaning that he just

says we cannot know if it exists all we

know is that our observations are

ordered as if such an external world

exist so it's a very good working model

likewise pho's position is essentially

that whatever our purported Answers to

Religious questions might be we must be

so unsure of them that there will always

be a healthy amount of agnosticism mixed

in with either our atheism or our theism

Pho is skeptical not just of the

existence of God but the answerability

of the very questions God is supposed to

help with for him the honest answer to

questions about the metaphysical

underpinnings of the universe or the

origins of it or the nature of the

Divine is just a gentle shrug and and I

don't know and there is a part of me

that strongly Rebels against this

conclusion these are some of the most

important questions to answer the issue

of eternal life is on the table and Hume

just says we can't know but for him that

is just tough luck the limits of our

knowledge do not care what is important

to us and it just so happens that since

we have no precedent for arguing about

what is outside the universe we are a

bit stuffed when it comes to having

knowledge about it of course we don't

have to agree with hum I've not had

space in this video to examine the

criticisms of hume's position but

suffice to say there are many but I want

to end by highlighting the key question

that I really do think is worth asking

when we are addressing an issue any

issue be it philosophical or material or

observational it might be worth

occasionally stepping back and asking

what are the limits of what we can know

here from Socrates saying all I know is

that I know nothing to dayart deciding

to test the limits of his certainty

philosophy has a rich history of

encouraging epistemic self-awareness

perhaps we could do with a bit more of

the AG tic spirit in our inquiries both

within Theology and outside of it but of

course alongside agnosticism there are

further debates to be had about whether

God even can exist or whether his

properties are contradictory and if you

want to check out that question I have a

video about it right here and stick

around for more on thinking to improve

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