Some naturalistic thinkers assume what we could call a "shopping list" way to do metaphysics (remember that metaphysics studies the nature and constitution of reality). This means that they assume metaphysical naturalism (roughly, the view that the physical world, and only the physical world, exists) and from this they begin his metaphysical "shopping". (In the above picture, you can imagine a list including "evolution", "planets", "intelligent design", "near-death experiences", and the naturalist marking only evolution and planets, but ignoring near-death experiences and intelligent design)From the assumption of naturalism, they try to explain the facts of the world, selecting carefully only the facts that fit their worldview. Physical facts fit perfectly and easily in this naturalistic worldview, but other facts or putative facts like consciousness, intelligence, moral values, mathematical objects, paranormal phenomena, etc. don't fit well or easily in this worldview. As consequence, shopping list naturalistic thinkers are forced either to DENY the existence of these phenomena, or alternatively, accept them as BRUTE (unexplained) facts. (Note that in both cases, the naturalistic position cannot be refuted, whatever the facts. The facts are twisted, renamed, modified, redefined or altered in any way as to fit the naturalistic-atheistic worldview. This kind of naturalists are intellectual cowards).
This is the position of many online atheists, some writers for infidels.org website, popular atheist writers and, generally, unsophisticated thinkers. A fine example of this egregious intellectual unsophistication by a naturalist is Michael Shermer and his Shermer's Last Law (see my post about it here).
In contrast, serious and sophisticated metaphysical naturalistic thinkers, even if beginning also from naturalism, realize the shopping list approach makes their position largely unfalsifiable, and in order to avoid such self-delusion, they explicitly DRAWS the implications of naturalism and confront these implications with the facts. If the facts fit the implications, naturalism survives; if not, naturalism is refuted. These naturalists are honest enough as to put their worldview under empirical and philosophical test. They're intellectually honest.
These naturalists have used the concept "The Location Problem" precisely as a name for the problem of placing certain facts or phenomena in the naturalistic framework.
First-rate naturalistic philosopher and metaphysician Crispin Wright comments on this problem in this way:
"A central dilemma in contemporary metaphysics is to find a place for certain anthropocentric subject-matters—for instance, semantic, moral, and psychological—in a world as conceived by modern naturalism: a stance which inflates the concepts and categories deployed by (finished) physical science into a metaphysics of the kind of thing the real world essentially and exhaustively is. On one horn, if we embrace this naturalism, it seems we are committed either to reductionism: that is, to a construal of the reference of, for example, semantic, moral and psychological vocabulary as somehow being within the physical domain—or to disputing that the discourses in question involve reference to what is real at all. On the other horn, if we reject this naturalism, then we accept that there is more to the world than can be embraced within a physicalist ontology—and so take on a commitment, it can seem, to a kind of eerie supernaturalism". (Wright's brilliant contribution to the book Conceivability and Possibility. p. 401. Emphasis in blue added)
Please, read slowly and carefully again Wright's argument, because it contains a very powerful insight and goes straight to the core of the problem.
Let's comment it in more detail:
1-Wright realizes the problem of placing certain phenomena or facts (which he calls anthropocentric subject-matters, like semantic, moral and psychological facts) in a naturalistic worldview which, ultimately and essentially, is NOT anthropocentric. In a different terminology, I've discussed the same problem in a previous post about worldviews which are "person-relative" (like theism) and "impersonal" (like naturalism).
You can formulate the problem like this: in a world conceived by scientific naturalism, the world is essentially insentient, impersonal, mechanistic and hence NOT anthorpocentric (= non-personal). So, where are you to place in that worldview, person-relative (anthropocentric) facts and phenomena like consciousness, semantic properties, moral values, mathematical objects only known through rational minds, free will, the causal efficacy of intention, etc.?
Can you understand the problem? If not, please read again all the section above, because it is essential to the following argumentation.
2-Confronted with these problematic facts, the consistent naturalists have only two plausible choices (while remaining fully consistent naturalists), which put them in a dilemma:
a)Reduction: To identity the facts in question with physical facts (e.g. psychological facts with certain physical behaviours, or semantic properties with brain processes).
b)Denialism: To deny that those facts exist.
Note that the option "reduction" is very unlikely. Consider moral values like "honesty" or "impartiality". These values are not physical entities nor properties (even though they can be instantiated in persons and in personal situations). By themselves, they have not matter, energy, not location in space or time. If they exist, they certainly are not physical objects.
Or consider semantic properties that include "propositional content" and intentionality (=the property to refer to things outside themselves). The statement "Jime's blog is great" refers to Jime's blog (note that the statament is in your mind, but my blog is outside your mind, so your mind is referring to something outside the mind itself).
Physical objects don't "refer" to anything. They're connected simply in virtue of physical laws and causality, not by semantic relations of "reference" (reference being a property of concepts and propositions, which exist in people's minds; and causality and physical laws being properties of physical-mechanical objects).
Note that "reduction" of semantic properties to neurophysiological processes won't work, because these cerebral processes (like any other physical process) is governed by physical laws of causality, not by "reference" or intentionality. So, instead of explaining reference, it is actually explained AWAY by the reductive naturalistic method.
As naturalistic philosopher Alex Rosenberg concedes: "It is of course obvious that introspection strongly suggests that the brain does store information propositionally, and that therefore it has beliefs and desire with “aboutness” or intentionality. A thoroughgoing naturalism must deny this, I allege. If beliefs are anything they are brain states—physical configurations of matter. But one configuration of matter cannot, in virtue just of its structure, composition, location, or causal relation, be “about” another configuration of matter in the way original intentionality requires"
A configuration of matter, just in virtue of its physical properties, cannot "refer" to anything. They can only be "connected" with something in virtue of physical laws. Hence, the actual relation of "reference" (in the samantic sense) cannot be accounted for by scientific naturalism.
The option of "denialism" is simply to say that such objects or entities like moral values, mathematical entities, etc. don't exist. We'd have a bunch of beliefs (e.g. moral beliefs) about a non-existent and purely illusory reality (e.g. a moral reality). This is the option taken, for example, by Keith Augustine, Richard Dawkins, Michael Ruse, and other naturalists about moral values.
But note that, at the end, the method of "reduction" and the method of "denialism" have the same consequence: namely, they don't provide an explanation for the facts. Reduction only is a trick to appear to explain something, without explaining it really.
3-Finally, Wright considers the possibility that, confronted with these person-relative facts and having been unsuccesful with the methods of redution and denialism, we have to accept that naturalism is false and hence, some version of supernaturalism has to be true. (The word "supernaturalism" is disliked by many people, including many supernaturalists. If you don't like the word, you can substitute it by a "spiritualistic" or "personalistic" worldview, i.e. a worldview based on persons, not on mechanical matter).
The supernaturalism is implied by the existence of person-relative properties, because these properties prove that there is more to the world than can be embraced within a physicalist (naturalistic) worldview.
Theism as an alternative worldview:
Theism (the worldview based on God's existence) is a personalistic worldview which, if true, implies and predicts the existence of person-relative properties in the world:
1.It predicts the existence of consciousness (because God, the creator, is itself a conscious being)
2-It predicts the existence of intelligence and rationality (because God, the creator, is itself an infinitely intelligent and rational being).
3- (As consequence of point 2) It predicts the existence of semantic properties, because in order to be rational you have to think logically, and logic connects propositions which in turn have semantic content.
4.It predicts the existence of an universe which is rationally intelligible (because God, the creator of the universe, is rational)
5-It predicts the existence of spirits (because God, the creator, is essentially a spirit and his whole creation was intented to allow the spiritual evolution of the spirits created by God). So, spiritual phenomena fit perfectly in this framework.
6-It predicts the existence of objective moral values (because God, being the creator of all reality, is also the creator of the moral reality, and being greatest possible being, is also the greatest possible moral being and hence the locus and source of value, the paradigm of the "good", and his creation has an objective, mind-independent moral dimension for morally sensible, rational and free entities created in it by God).
7-It predicts the causal efficacy of consciousness and intention (because God, being the spiritual creator, actually created the world using his own intentions. It implies that in theism, the causal efficacy of intention and consciousness is a basic property of them. So we would expect that finite, imperfect creatures like us, sharing in a limited form some of God's properties, also enjoy of a limited portion of his causal powers). The placebo effect, bio-feedback and our common experience (e.g. lifting an arm at will) is evidence for this. Psychokinesis would be a more dramatic and less common example of this.
Note that naturalists could try to explain one problematic fact appealing to the other, but it wont' help them (because the explanatory fact appealed to is itself a fact implied by theism and at variance with naturalism).
For example, naturalists could explain morality appealing to rationality (e.g. morality is what a rational agent would do), but rationality itself is a person-relative property implied by theism, not by naturalism.
Naturalists could try to explain objective moral values appealing to sentience or consciousness, but sentience and consciousness are person-relative properties implied by theism, not by naturalism.
So, this strategy actually pushes the problem a step back and doesn't help the naturalist, because the explanatory entity used as explanation-(rationality, sentience, consciousness) are themselves evidences for theism and in tension with naturalism.
Clearly, theism seem to be a far better overall explanation for ALL the facts of our experience.
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