Review by skeptic Gerald Woerlee of Chris Carter's book Science and the Psychic Phenomena: The Fall of the House of Skeptics and Carter's reply

In a previous post, I published a review by skeptic Gerald Woerlee of Chris Carter's book Science and Near-Death Experience, with Carter's reply. Now, Woerlee has published another Amazon review, this time of Carter's first book titled Science and Psychic Phenomena (previously  published as Parapsychology and the Skeptics). I'll publish this review, with Carter's reply. Draw your own conclusions (but read the book first!).

Gerald Woerlee's review

I purchased this book with my usual open mind when I read of this work being a definitive end to all discussion of the reality of the paranormal / psychic phenomena. Unfortunately I received a rude shock upon reading the blurb on the back cover....

"Carter reveals how the doctrine of materialism - in which nothing matters but matter - has become an infallible article of faith for many scientists and philosophers, much like the convictions of religious fundamentalists. Consequently, the possibility of psychic abilities cannot be tolerated because their existence would refute materialism and contradict a deeply ingrained ideology. By outlining the origin of this passionate debate, Carter calls on all open-minded individuals to disregard the church of skepticism...."

I began to suspect the worst. Was this book no more than a heated polemic by a true member of the congregation of the Church of Paranormalia? The foreword written by Rupert Sheldrake did little to reassure me, for here I read much the same:

"From my own experience talking to scientists and giving seminars in scientific institutions, dogmatic skeptics are a minority within the scientific community. Most scientists are curious and open-minded, if only because they themselves or people they know well have had experiences that suggest the reality of psi phenomena. Nevertheless, almost all scientists are aware of the taboo, and the open-minded tend to keep their interests private, fearing scorn or ridicule if they discuss them openly with their colleagues." (Page xii)

This opinion was supported by the statistics presented on pages 131-132 where two surveys of 500 to 100 scientists during the 1970's revealed that the majority (56-67%) believed ESP to be an established fact or likely probability. This type of statistic is similar to stating that one hundred thousand lemmings can't be wrong. However, undeterred by this foolishness, I continued bravely in the true spirit of skepticism as defined by Chris Carter on page 43:

"Many writers have pointed out that true skepticism involves the practice of doubt, not of simple denial,..."

I consider myself a true skeptic, even though many label me a pseudoskeptic - whatever that may be. Chris Carter's discussions of the various experiments and discussions employed to convince the reader of the reality of the phenomena discussed reminded me strongly of my own beliefs in the reality of these phenomena until I passed 40 years of age. A referral back to a previous mindset. Fascinating to read, and mull over how I too once thought in a similar manner, spending many hours working out possible drug combinations to pharmacologically enhance paranormal perceptive abilities.

Carter spares no effort to convince the reader of the reality of these phenomena. Throughout the book he derides "establishment" science, and the "fear" most scientists seem to have to express their true belief in psychic phenomena. Such statements seem to be standard in this type of work, and remind me strongly of similar even more rabid statements in "The Spiritual Brain", a book written by Mario Beauregard and Denyse O'Leary. This sort of polemic does nothing to advance the cause of Chris Carter. Instead, such statements generally repel the true skeptic and other open-minded readers, by informing them of the equally intransigent attitudes of the "Church of Paranormalia".

The book deviates from its course of attempting to convince readers of the reality of psychic phenomena, by dragging in some of the other "usual suspects" as a sort of smokescreen to hide the poverty of convincing material: the mystery of consciousness, and quantum mechanics. My only thought on reading this was, "Oh dear....":

1. Consciousness is not understood. True. But that does not mean it is something mysterious and located outside the body. It is simply not understood as yet. To explain it otherwise is to use the tired old "God of the gaps" explanation as first formulated by the evangelist Henry Drummond during 1904, and dismissed by him as a sad form of reasoning.

2. Quantum mechanics is a possible mechanism proposed for paranormal perception, and as such is irrelevant in a book whose purpose is to demonstrate the reality of these phenomena.

Then we come to the main problem of this book. On pages 111 and 133 Chris Carter states that parapsychological research is underfunded. Again the usual suspects are trotted out, especially on page 133, where we read:

"Psychologist Sybo Schouten compared the funding directed toward parapsychology over the one hundred years spanning 1882 to 1982 and found that it was approximately equal to the expenditures of two months of conventional psychological research in the United States in 1983."

The implication is evident. Parapsychology is underfunded, which is why no unequivocal and conclusive proof has been provided sufficient to convince even skeptics. I find this very curious. Recent polls reveal that about 50% people in modern Western countries believe in paranormal phenomena, and about 10-15% of all people in modern Western countries claim to have experienced paranormal perceptions. This means paranormal perceptions such as:

- telepathy,
- clairvoyance,
- precognition,
- retrocognition,
- and psychokinesis,

are very common indeed. This was also known by the founders of the British Society for Psychical Research in 1882, and the founders of the similar American Society for Psychical Research in 1885. The founders of these societies believed that because these phenomena and experiences were so common, that scientific proof of the reality of these phenomena was a mere formality and rapidly achieved. But what is the current situation 130 years later, after vast effort by capable scientists, and rigorously controlled studies? The reality of paranormal phenomena is still doubtful and unproven. Expensive funding is not needed to prove the reality of something as ostensibly common as paranormal sensory abilities. The reality of these sensory abilities should be clearly evident after 130 years. This is why hard-headed financers of such research understandably say the following; "130 years of research has failed to convincingly demonstrate the reality of what you claim are really very common sensory abilities. This means a number of things:

- paranormal sensory abilities and psychic phenomena do not exist,
- people have been using the wrong testing procedures for 130 years,
- these sensory abilities and phenomena are very different to what people have defined and believe them to be."

This is why the funding of parapsychological research is drying up. This is why chairs of parapsychology are disappearing from universities all over the world. And this book by Chris Carter does nothing to dispel these facts.

Furthermore, as I pointed out in a book, "Mortal Minds" during 2003, the world about us provides abundant proof of the absence of paranormal perceptions. Many hundreds or even thousands of books teach people how to develop their supposedly dormant paranormal senses. Equally many people and organizations offer courses teaching people to develop these same supposedly dormant paranormal senses. So many people believe paranormal senses can be developed. According to the World Health Organization, there are about 314 million people alive on this world with a visual impairment, of which 45 million are totally blind (WHO statistics). According to the World Health Organization statistics, there are about 278 million people alive on this world with moderate to profound hearing loss in both ears (WHO statistics). Yet blind and deaf people are not offered courses to train any dormant paranormal sensory abilities. Nor do blind and deaf people spontaneously develop any dormant paranormal sensory abilities. So ages-old common knowledge teaches us that deaf and blind people live in a dark and silent world. Their information about this world, and their perceptions of this world, are derived only from their remaining physical senses, modified by their memories of the world as they experienced it when they still possessed the ability to see and hear. The blind and the deaf are living proof that people possess no paranormal sensory abilities, and this knowledge supplements the lack of conclusive proof of more than 120 years of research into paranormal sensory abilities. Blind and deaf people prove popular belief in paranormal abilities to be no more than a deeply rooted ancient delusion!

True, studies revealing the absence of "something", do not mean that "something" is absent. Nonetheless, such studies do reveal that if such perceptive abilities do exist, they function entirely differently than defined. This means that paranormal abilities such as telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, etc.: if they exist, definitely do not possess the properties defined by parapsychology as it now exists. So if there is anything at all, then it is a form of anomalous perception, and definitely part of the normal perceptive abilities of humans and the laws of statistics and chance. Such is the attitude of the founders of chairs of "anomalous psychology", a way of looking at these poorly understood apparent aberrations in normal physical perceptive abilities.

It would have been better had Carter simply acknowledged these basic facts. "Science and Psychic Phenomena" would then have made a true contribution to the study of such fascinating poorly understood possible perceptive anomalies. Ultimately, I can only concur with Shaun Mason, one of the 2009 reviewers of the first edition of this book:

"The day that ESP is proven to exist under scientific conditions with no chicanery, parlor tricks, or stage magic, you won't have to read about it in obfuscated rhetoric by pseudoscientists like this, it will be unavoidable front-page news. Despite all the claims in this book, that day has not arrived. Save your money."

Chris Carter's reply

I will start with the quote with which Gerry ends his review of my book:

"The day that ESP is proven to exist under scientific conditions with no chicanery, parlor tricks, or stage magic, you won't have to read about it in obfuscated rhetoric by pseudoscientists like this, it will be unavoidable front-page news. Despite all the claims in this book, that day has not arrived. Save your money."

This is an obviously naïve view of the way that science - or any human enterprise for that matter - actually works. Here is an excerpt from my book that illustrates the issue involved here:

"As our theories change, what was once considered extraordinary can become quite ordinary-as, for instance, has happened with the acceptance of meteorites, continental drift, and quantum mechanics. What makes the claims of the psi researchers so extraordinary to the skeptics is the supposed inconsistency of psi with all of modern science. This misconception, probably more than any other factor, explains the continuing refusal of the skeptics to accept the best of the latest evidence as conclusive, even when they have run out of counterexplanations.

It also explains why the controversy has continued for as long as it has. In any other field, the debate would have ended long ago. Back in 1951, the psychologist Donald Hebb wrote:

`Why do we not accept ESP as a psychological fact? Rhine has offered enough evidence to have convinced us on almost any other issue. . . . Personally, I do not accept ESP for a moment, because it does not make sense. My external criteria, both of physics and of physiology, say that ESP is not a fact despite the behavioral evidence that has 186 Would the Existence of Psi Contradict Established Science? been reported. I cannot see what other basis my colleagues have for rejecting it . . . Rhine may still turn out to be right, improbable as I think that is, and my own rejection of his view is-in the literal sense-prejudice.'

Four years later, in 1955, George Price wrote that `Believers in psychic phenomena . . . appear to have won a decisive victory and virtually silenced opposition. . . . This victory is the result of careful experimentation and intelligent argumentation. Dozens of experimenters have obtained positive results in ESP experiments, and the mathematical procedures have been approved by leading statisticians.'

Yet later in the same article, after writing that "ESP is incompatible with current scientific theory, he offers his conclusion:

`My opinion concerning the findings of the parapsychologists is that many of them are dependent on clerical and statistical errors and unintentional use of sensory cues, and that all extrachance results not so explicable are dependent on deliberate fraud or mildly abnormal
mental conditions.'

Here we have two skeptics in effect admitting that if this were any other field of inquiry - that is, one with results less threatening to a worldview based on seventeenth-century science - then the experimental data would have carried the day by 1950." [Carter, p. 186]

Gerry delivers what he plainly considers to be a coup de grace:

"Furthermore, as I pointed out in a book, "Mortal Minds" during 2003, the world about us provides abundant proof of the absence of paranormal perceptions. Many hundreds or even thousands of books teach people how to develop their supposedly dormant paranormal senses. Equally many people and organizations offer courses teaching people to develop these same supposedly dormant paranormal senses. So many people believe paranormal senses can be developed. According to the World Health Organization, there are about 314 million people alive on this world with a visual impairment, of which 45 million are totally blind (WHO statistics). According to the World Health Organization statistics, there are about 278 million people alive on this world with moderate to profound hearing loss in both ears (WHO statistics). Yet blind and deaf people are not offered courses to train any dormant paranormal sensory abilities. Nor do blind and deaf people spontaneously develop any dormant paranormal sensory abilities. So ages-old common knowledge teaches us that deaf and blind people live in a dark and silent world. Their information about this world, and their perceptions of this world, are derived only from their remaining physical senses, modified by their memories of the world as they experienced it when they still possessed the ability to see and hear. The blind and the deaf are living proof that people possess no paranormal sensory abilities, and this knowledge supplements the lack of conclusive proof of more than 120 years of research into paranormal sensory abilities. Blind and deaf people prove popular belief in paranormal abilities to be no more than a deeply rooted ancient delusion!"

Gerry wrote above that "many people believe paranormal senses can be developed." What many people believe is in this context completely irrelevant. Whether or not psi abilities are capable of being developed is an empirical matter, and thus can only be determined by controlled observation and experiment.

Regardless, he goes on to conclude that "The blind and the deaf are living proof that people possess no paranormal sensory abilities." But again, whether or not the blind and deaf have greater telepathic or clairvoyant abilities than the unimpaired is an empirical question, and thus cannot be settled with a priori arguments. At the present time no research has been conducted into this matter, and so the question remains unanswered.

As Gerry pointed out, parapsychology is a poorly funded branch of science, and if it were not for the campaigns of ridicule carried out by "skeptical" materialist organizations such as CSI/CSICOP, then funding would be available to answer questions such as this.

For the record I should reveal that "Gerry" is in fact Gerald Woerlee, a fanatical materialist and militant atheist, author of the book The Unholy Legacy of Abraham.

Why are there so many "skeptics" such as Gerald Woerlee eager to debunk not just reports of psychic phenomena, but also phenomena such as the near death experience?

As I discuss in my book, this militant opposition is something peculiar to Western societies, and it is basically due to the historical conflict in the West between secular and religious members of society.

Genuine skepticism plays an important role in science; but genuine skepticism involves the suspension of belief, not the refusal of belief. So, individuals such as Woerlee are not genuine skeptics, but rather pseudo-skeptics strenuously defending the theory of materialism from the data which refute it. As Karl Popper stressed, science progresses with the refutation of theories; it follows from this that defending a theory by strenuously denying the data which refute it must be one of the defining characteristics of pseudo-science.

Essentially, this debate is not primarily about evidence. Rather, the debunkers and deniers are defending an out-moded world view in which psychic phenomena and out-of-body experiences are simply not allowed to exist. It is essential to realize that most of the deniers and phony-skeptics are militant atheists and secular humanists. For instance, the world's leading "skeptical" organization, The Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP) was founded in 1976 by atheist philosopher Paul Kurtz, at a meeting of the American Humanist Association. For various reasons, these people have an ideological agenda which is anti-religious and anti-superstitious. One of the main pillars of their opposition to religion and superstition is the doctrine of materialism: that is, the doctrine that all events have a physical cause, and that the brain therefore produces the mind. If they conceded the existence of psychic abilities such as telepathy, and of the Near Death Experience as a genuine separation of mind from body, then this pillar of their opposition to religion would crumble. Hence, their dogmatic denial of the evidence that proves materialism false.

The words of C. D. Broad, the Cambridge philosopher of science, are appropriate here. In his 1962 "Lectures in Psychical Research," Broad wrote: "Anyone who at the present day expresses confident opinions, whether positive or negative, on ostensibly paranormal phenomena, without making himself thoroughly acquainted with the main methods and results of the careful and long-continued work may be dismissed without further ceremony as a conceited ignoramus."

And it should be noted that Woerlee and I have tangled before. In fact, his "review" of my book is obviously a petty attempt at revenge. I embarrassed him recently in The Journal of Near Death Studies, Fall 2011 issue 30(1), in which he tried and failed to discredit the famous Pam Reynolds near death experience.

Chris Carter

Sources

Hebb, D. O. "The Role of Neurological Ideas in Psychology." Journal of Personality 20 (1951): 39-55.

Price, George R. "Science and the Supernatural." Science 122, no. 3165 (1955): 359-67. 

Jime's additions:

-Insider's confession by a former skeptic about organized skepticism.

-My posts on Jime's Iron Law about the cognitive faculties of hard-core atheistic materialists.

You have to keep in mind that a consequence of Jime's Iron Law is the hard-core atheist's simplistic and illogical mindset and full unability to grasp complicated arguments (specially if they're posed against atheism or materialism). As an example of this, Woerlee misrepresents one of Carter's arguments for consciousness being (ontologically) independent of the brain as an "God of the gaps" argument.

According to Woerlee's misinterpretation of Carter's case: "Consciousness is not understood. True. But that does not mean it is something mysterious and located outside the body. It is simply not understood as yet. To explain it otherwise is to use the tired old "God of the gaps" explanation as first formulated by the evangelist Henry Drummond during 1904, and dismissed by him as a sad form of reasoning."

If you have read carefully Carter's book, you know that nowhere Carter is arguing FROM the lack of understanding of consciousness TO the conclusion that consciousness is "mysterious" or "located outside of the body". It would be a massively stupid argument that not intelligent person (let alone, a Oxford-trained philosopher like Carter) would defend. (Note: Richard Dawkins is a trained scientist from Oxford, but he has defended massively stupid arguments... see here for evidence).

On the contrary, Carter is arguing from what IS POSITIVELY KNOWN about consciousness (from quantum mechanics, parapsychology, near-death experiences, etc.) to the conclusion that consciousness is ontologically independent of the brain. Carter is not appealing to the lack of understanding of consciousness, but to POSITIVE evidence and data about the nature and functioning of consciousness in order to show that that positive evidence is, overall, best explained by the transmission hypothesis than by the productive (materialistic) one. (Note that no "gaps" is part of Carter's argumentation, therefore, not "God of the gaps" exists in his case).

The God of the gaps argument has the following logical structure: Science lacks understanding of X, therefore God explains X. No intelligent and sophisticated theist in the history of thought has been so stupid as to defend an argument like that. But hard-core atheists, intellectually incapable of subtle thinking and logic argumentation, will blindly repeat again and again the "God of the Gaps" objection against any argument for the existence of God (and, for that matter, for any argument against materialism, including arguments for the paranormal and the afterlife, as Woerlee did).

As example, just watch this question posed by a member of the audience (and the reply by theistic philosopher William Lane Craig) about the "God of the gaps" argument in an academic debate about the existence of God a few years ago:

Don't try to explain this to a hard-core atheistic materialist, because Jime's Iron Law predicts that they won't get it.

The Scole Experiment: Scientists try to find evidence for the afterlife

For five years a group of mediums and scientists witnessed more phenomena than in any other experiment in the history of the paranormal, including: recorded conversations with the dead, written messages on sealed film, video of spirit faces and even spirit forms materializing.

Atheist philosopher and biologist Maximo Pigliucci on Lawrence Krauss (aka Mr.2+2=5 atheist genius or Mr.Nothing = Unstable something)

After his debate with William Lane Craig, atheist Lawrence Krauss became in some online circles known as 2+2=5 atheist genius. But after the publication of his book "A Universe from Nothing", some prefer call Krauss "Mr.Nothing = Unstable Something", because Krauss main thesis is that the universe came from some basic or fundamental something (a "something" that Krauss, contrary to the common and philosophical use of the words, prefers to call "nothing").

I've explained in other posts that the atheist conflation of "something" with "nothing" (which by no means is exclusive of Krauss, and can be seen also in many atheist "intellectuals" like Richard Dawkins, John Loftus, Stephen Hawking, Victor Stenger and many others) is a symptom and consequence of a empircal law wich holds for most hard-core atheists and that I've called Jime's Iron Law.

Fortunatley, not all atheists are affected by my law, that is, some of them seem to have escaped from it, at least regarding its most dramatic manifestations. Some of them seem to be completely unaffected by the law in question (see for example, atheist philosopher Daniel Came, who clearly realizes the fallacies and imbecilities of contemporary atheism, specially the Dawkins' branch).

An example is another atheist who seems to be free from the constraints imposed by Jime's Iron Law is atheist biologist and philosopher Maximo Pligiucci. Even though not a very sophisticated philosopher, he's at least CONSISTENT with his worldview (see evidence here) and is not intellectually afraid of holding the implications of his beliefs.

In his blog, Pigliucci correctly castigates the intellectual imbecility of Krauss as shown in the latter's lastest book on "nothing". Pigliucci realizes the conflation of "somehting with nothing" is seen commonly in the works of contemporary physicists: "I don’t know what’s the matter with physicists these days. It used to be that they were an intellectually sophisticated bunch, with the likes of Einstein and Bohr doing not only brilliant scientific research, but also interested, respectful of, and conversant in other branches of knowledge, particularly philosophy. These days it is much more likely to encounter physicists like Steven Weinberg or Stephen Hawking, who merrily go about dismissing philosophy for the wrong reasons, and quite obviously out of a combination of profound ignorance and hubris (the two often go together, as I’m sure Plato would happily point out). The latest such bore is Lawrence Krauss, of Arizona State University."

Pigliucci observes: "Here is another gem from this brilliant (as a physicist) moron: “Philosophy is a field that, unfortunately, reminds me of that old Woody Allen joke, ‘those that can’t do, teach, and those that can’t teach, teach gym.' And the worst part of philosophy is the philosophy of science; the only people, as far as I can tell, that read work by philosophers of science are other philosophers of science. It has no impact on physics what so ever. ... they have every right to feel threatened, because science progresses and philosophy doesn’t.”

Okay, to begin with, it is fair to point out that the only people who read works in theoretical physics are theoretical physicists, so by Krauss’ own reasoning both fields are largely irrelevant to everybody else (they aren’t, of course). Second, once again, the business of philosophy (of science, in particular) is not to solve scientific problems — we’ve got science for that (Julia and I explain what philosophers of science do here). To see how absurd Krauss’ complaint is just think of what it would sound like if he had said that historians of science haven’t solved a single puzzle in theoretical physics. That’s because historians do history, not science. When was the last time a theoretical physicist solved a problem in history, pray?"

Pigliucci's remarks are of common sense. In any person who is not affected by hidden irrationality factors would understand those points. But these points are clearly beyond Krauss' intellectual powers. He simply cannot grasp them.

In a postcript to his post, Pigliucci comments "As people have pointed out, Krauss has issued an apology of sorts, apparently forced by Dan Dennett. He still seems not to have learned much though. He confuses theology with philosophy (in part), keeps hammering at a single reviewer who apparently really annoyed him (in the New York Times), and more importantly just doesn't get the idea that philosophy of science is NOT in the business of answering scientific questions (we've got, ahem, science for that!). It aims, instead, at understanding how science works. Really, is that so difficult to understand, Prof. Krauss?"

I don't want to sound as a defender of Krauss, but to Pigliucci's question, I have to answer YES: It is very difficult (for Krauss) to understand that, because he suffers from Jime's Iron Law. What Pigliucci doesn't understand  is that atheists affected by this law are intriniscally IMPAIRED to understand certain things (specially difficult and subtle concepts related to God or spirituality, and the concept of "nothing" is one of them because God is supposed to be creator of the universe from nothing... so the concept "creation of out nothing", implied by the absolute origin of the universe, is far beyond the intellectual reach of hard-core atheists. Jime's Iron Law forces them to misunderstand the concept of nothing in order to avoid the theologically charged concept of creation out of nothing). 

Now, Pigliucci correctly complains that physicists in particular seems to be affected by the "nothing=something" confusion and ignorance of philosophy. Another philosopher, Edward Feser, also makes the same observation.

They're a right. But I think the imbecility of the "nothing is something" view is attached to more to the atheist's mindset than to a concrete discipline. The proof of this is that atheists who are NOT physicists also commit the same stupidity. Just consider zoologist Richard Dawkins and atheist writer John Loftus:

If the "nothing is something" confusion were induced by particular training in physics, we won't see non-physicists arguing like that (moreover, we would see these people  REALIZING that what they're sayings is a straightforward imbecility whick makes them look like idiots and causes laughs in observers or readers).

Now, Jime's Iron Law can be seen not only in the "nothing is something" confusion, but in the "What caused God?" question too (or similar ones, like "God is not an explanation, because God himself remain unexplained", which is even more stupid than the "What caused God?" question). Dawkins is a leading exponent of this kind of first-rate stupidity:

Clearly, we're in presence of a phenomenon which goes beyond any field or discipline. It has to do with ATHEISTS as such.

Only people armed with Jime's Iron Law will understand (and predict) these things.

People like Krauss and Dawkins have destroyed their own intellectual credibility for ever.

More evidence for Jime's Iron Law: Richard Dawkins on the meaning of "nothing" and creatio ex nihilo (creation out of nothing)

As I've explained before, one of the most powerful evidences for the veracity of Jime's Iron Law is the absolute and astonishing intrinsic unability of hard-core atheists to understand what nothing (=not anything= absence of something) means. Something in the spiritual and intellectual nature of atheists simply prevent them to understand the concept of "not anything". 

As you can watch in the above video, the public laugh aloud about the stupid atheist re-definition of "nothing" as "something which is simple or basic".   However, Dawkins doesn't understand the (obvious) motive of laughs and ask "Why is that funny?" Look in Dawkins' face: Personally I think Dawkins is being HONEST in his question: He simply doesn't understand why people laugh on this, because for him it is very obvious that "nothing" is a very simple "something".

You can think that it is astonishing, and it does. But, from a scientific and spiritual perspective, it tells us A LOT about the veracity of Jime's Iron Law and the atheist's mindset.

People don't affected by Jime's Iron Law (=non-atheists, i.e. over the 97% of people on Earth) will agree with Edward Feser's illustration of the atheistic "nothing is something" fallacy: "Let me explain how this whole house is held up by nothing.  Consider the floor, which is what I really mean by ‘nothing.’  Now, the rest of the house is held up by the floor.  Thus, I’ve explained how the whole house is held up by nothing!”  Well, no you haven’t.  You’ve “explained” at most how partof the house is held up by another part, but you’ve left unexplained how the floor itself is held up, and thus (since the floor is itself part of the house) you haven’t really explained at all how the house as a whole is held up, either by “nothing” or by anything else.  Furthermore, you’ve made what is really just sheer muddleheadedness sound profound by using “nothing” in an eccentric way."

Don't expect that hard-core atheists will understand this. If Jime's Iron Law is true, they WON'T.

Edward Feser vs William Lane Craig on Divine Simplicity

The controversial theological doctrine of Divine Simplicity holds that God is essentially a simply entity, with no metaphysical parts. It implies that God's attributes are really identical (e.g God's goodness = omniscience = eternity = necessity = etc.)

Thomistic philosopher Edward Feser defends this view in his excellent introductory book Aquinas. He says:

"For Aquinas, God is simple in the sense of being in no way composed of parts... One famous implication of this doctrine is that though we distinguish in thought between God's eternity, power, goodness, intellect, will and so forth, in God himself there is no disctintion between any of the divine attirbutes. God's eternity is his power, which is his goodness, which is his intellect, which is his will and so on. Indeed, God himself just is his power, his goodmess, and so on, just as he just is his existence, and just is his essence" (p.126-127)

The obvious and most common objection to the implication mentioned by Feser is that God's attributes are different, not identical. For example, by "eternal" we mean that God has not beginning nor end. By omniscience, we mean that God knows every and only true propositions, etc.

But Feser has two replies to this objection. He comments:

"we can ackowledge that the expresions "the morning star" and the "evening star" differ in sense while consistently affirming that they refer to one and the same thing (the planet Venus), so too  can we acknowledge the obvious fact that "power", "goodness", "intellect" and so on differ in sense while insisting that when applied to God they refer to the one and the same thing" (p.129)

This first reply is based on the concepts of sense and reference, and how many concepts with different senses have the same referent.

William Lane Craig, a critic of Divine Simplicity, rejects the above reply and says "being the morning star and the evening star are distinct properties, both possesed by Venus; the same entity has these two distinct properties. In the same way, being omnipotent and being good are not two different senses for the same property (as are, say, being even and being divisible by two) but are clearly two distinct properties" (Creation Out of Nothing, p.178)

I agree with Craig. I see no compelling reason to think that omniscience (for example) is the same property than "eternity",  but with a different label. They seem to be clearly two different properties, not the same property. The example of the "morning star" and the "evening star", while referring to the same thing (Venus), also refer to different properties of that same thing.  In other words, they describe two different properties of the same thing. 

Likewise, omnipotence and eternity, while being attributes of the same God, refers to distinct properties of God (note that a property, like eternity, can be predicated of things other than God, like numbers and other  abtsract objects for example. Therefore, prima facie, it seems impossible that eternity, which can be predicated of non-divine objects, be identical to omnipotence which only can be predicated of God. This simple fact suffices to think that eternity and omnipotence are two different properties).

Feser also have a second reply to the objection based on Aquinas' doctrine of analogy: "While the terms we apply to created things do not apply to God in either equivocal or univocal sense, they do apply in analogical senses. So, while it of course would be absurd to say that power, goodness, intellect,  and so forth are identical to God if we were using these terms in exactly the same sense in which we apply them to ourselves, it is not absurd to say that there is in God something that is analogous to power, something analogous to goodness, something analogous to intellect, and so on, and that these "somethings"  all turn out to be one and the same thing." (p.128)

Again, I find Feser's reply unconvincing. First, Feser says that the terms that we apply to ourselves cannot apply to God in any equivocal or univocal sense. Fine. But what about terms that ONLY apply to God like omnipotence and omniscience? These terms clearly don't apply to "created things", let alone to finite and imperfect human beings. These terms apply exclusively to God.

And in this case, again, each term seems to refer to distinct properties, not to just one. Omniscience is the property of knowing all and only true propositions. And omnipotence is the power of bringing about everything which is logically possible. Clearly, we're talking of two different properties here, and the distinction between them have nothing to do with how we apply these terms to created things (e.g. human beings) since these specific terms DO NOT apply to them at all (only apply to God).

On the other hand, that there is something "analogous" to power, intellect, eternity, etc. which turn out to be one and the same thing only can be accepted if we have an account and definition of exactly what that "something" is. As far I know, no clear definition of that "analogous something" (which is identical to all the divine attributes) has been provided. How could be "eternity" defined analogously in a way that make it identical to omnipotence or to aseity?

In conclusion, and being largely an "outsider" in theological questions, I side provisionally with Craig in his rejection of the doctrine of Divine Simplicity.

In any case, I fully recommend Feser's books (including Aquinas), and a careful reading and study of his blog. 

You'll learn a lot of good, erudite and sophisticated philosophy in Feser's works.

Leah Libresco: Atheist blogger schocked the secular community with her announcement that she's converting to Christianity

According to this website, "Libresco details her personal struggles with understanding the root of moral law... For Libresco, this ideal has come full-circle, as she inevitably arrived at an understanding that aligns with a Christ-centered world-view".

Libresco comments "I believed that the Moral Law wasn’t just a Platonic truth, abstract and distant.  It turns out I actually believed it was some kind of Person, as well as Truth.  And there was one religion that seemed like the most promising way to reach back to that living Truth.  I asked my friend what he suggest we do now, and we prayed the night office of the Liturgy of the Hours together (I’ve kept up with that since).  Then I suggested hugs and playing Mumford and Sons really, really loudly."

As I've explained in other posts, it is hard to make sense of the ontology of objective moral values in a  worldview which is non-personalistic. Naturalism and many Eastern wordviews are essentially, fundamentally and radically, non-personalistic (i.e. the fabric of reality is fundamentally non-personal). But moral values are essentially personal (i.e. related intrinisically with PERSONS endowed with free will, consciousness, rationality and so forth). Hence, in a personalistic worldview (i.e. a worldview rooted in am ultimate person who is the creator of all reality, like God), moral values are expected to exist and be a intrinsic, essential, ultimate and objective part of such created reality.

This powerful philosophical insight underlies the so-often misunderstood and intentionally misrepresented moral argument for God's existence.(This argument doesn't says or entails that moral values are arbitrarily imposed and enforced by God's commands... the argument only says that moral values, if objective (i.e. instrinsically constitutive of reality), fit better in a theistic wordlview because it is a radically personalistic worldview which makes sense of person-relative properties like moral values, and related person-relative phenomena like moral responsability, consciousness, free will, rationality, purpose, decision-making, etc. The common idea that the moral argument postulates an arbtrary decision or imposition by God is a straw man created by atheists who are impaired to understand correctly arguments for theism = another consequence of Jime's Iron Law).

Once you grasp clearly the radical difference between personalistic and non-personalistic worldviews, and the essentially personalistic nature of moral values and their presupossitions of efficacy (consciousness, free will, rationality, purposeness, etc.), you'll realize (even in an intuitive level) the cogency of the moral arguments for God's existence.  Do objective, essential and intrinsic personal properties fit better in a personalistic wordlview than in a intrinsically impersonalistic one? I think the answer is pretty obvious.

Even in spiritual-oriented circles (e.g. New Age cirlces) informed by Easter philosophies, objective moral values cannot be grounded in any person and turn out to be illusory. Some of these philosophies say, for example, that we live in a world of "duality" (e.g. good and evil, you and me), of illusion, of shadows, "egos" etc. which are not fundamental to reality and that the TRUTH is beyond all duality (including all good and evil) whatsoever, etc. 

Obviously, such morally neutral wordlview cannot ground objective moral values in anything, because such values are illusory products of the dualistic way in which we perceive the world. Objective moral values don't exist in a substantial, intrinsic sense and "persons" are also by-product of these illusions. The "truth" (so argues the followers of these views) is beyond all of this.

This is a spiritual, non-materialistic version of the impersonalistic worldview of naturalism (they are different in their principles, but they have THE SAME impersonalistic consequences and hence don't make room for essential, intrinsic, ultimate person-relative properties or entities).

It is not surprising that Libresco, after deep reflection on morality, renunced her atheistic position. Many other people, including atheistic philosophers who have defended for decades a secular morality, have realized the ontological insufficience of atheism (in all its versions, specially in its contemporary naturalistic version) for grounding moral values, and the superiorioty of its leading competitor (personalistic theism) in this regard. (See for example the confession of atheist moral philosopher Joel Marks). If they keep being atheists, they consistently become moral relativists or nihilists; or if they stick to objective moral values, they consistently become theists.

See also the view about morality and moral problems by leading atheist intellectuals here.

I think the moral argument, when properly understood in its implications and worldview pressupositions, is one of the most convincing arguments for theism.

The main reason why some atheists don't concede this point is that they're so hostil to theism, that they don't want to make any major concession (specially any moral concession) to it. Another reason is that they strongly misunderstand the argument; and another reason is that they conflate the argument with the claim that atheists are inmoral (which is NOT the argument... the argument is not about the moral beliefs of atheists or theists, but about competing WORLDVIEWS and how objective moral values fit in them).

Does Romans 1 contain a precursor of Jime's Iron Law?

A Christian reader wrote to me commenting that Jime's Iron Law is, in a sense, already contained in the New Testament. 

Specifically, according to my reader, in Romans 1, Paul argues like this:

¹⁸ The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, ¹⁹ since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. ²⁰ For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

²¹ For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 

Now, at face falue, I don't think the above passages are identical to what Jime's Iron Law describes. Let me explain a couple of differences:

1-Jime's Iron Law says that hard-core atheists are stupid, irrational, positively illogical and wishful thinkers. This law applies to hard-core atheists SPECIFICALLY, not to "unbelievers" (=skeptics of Christianity) in general. So my law is specific of hard-core atheists.

2-Jime's Iron Law doesn't link the atheist's irrationality and imbecility to "wickedness" and "foolish hearts". A reason for this is that, in this moment, Jime's Iron Law is purely descriptive (this law is a factual description of the intellectual faculties of hard-core atheists), but it is still undeveloped regarding the mechanisms underlying the operation of such a law.

However, I strongly suspect that the mechanisms have connection with spiritual and psychological matters, but it is pure speculation and not part of my law yet.

Now, keep in mind that in Paul's view, the unbelievers "suppress the truth by their wickedness". In other words, the atheist suppress the truth BECAUSE his wickedness (the latter being the hidden motivation of the suppression of the truth). 

Even though such a consideration doesn't belong to Jime's Iron Law, certainly Paul's view seems to apply in a straigforward way to many hard-core atheists (I don't know about other kind of "unbelievers"). Just take a cursory look in the blogs of atheists like PZ Myers, or the Forum of Richard Dawkins, or of "skeptics" forum. Clearly, you can watch there bad people, intentionally dishonest sophists and charlatans, people of very low and questionable integrity and ethics. They certainly seem to be "wicked" people in a certain sense. They're bad persons.

Evidence:

In order to see this point more carefully, let's to mention some cases of hard-core atheists to whom Paul's view seems to apply. When you check this evidence, ask yourself: Do these people belong to the "good, honest people with good will", or rather to the "wicked" people with darkened hearts? (Try to think hard about it, not letting your Christian or anti-Christian ideas to colour your assesment of the evidence).

1)Recently, James Randi has been the center of a polemic, in which his ethical principles have been fully exposed. (See here for more information). Does he fit Paul's view?

2)Consider Richard Dawkins views on infanticide:

 3)Consider this "insider" confession by a former skeptic: "But such is the character of skepticism that good intentions quickly get swamped by bad ones. Look past the crocodile tears on any online debunking forum, and you'll quickly find that the majority of visitors are not drawn there by concern for the victims of irrationality, but by contempt. They're there to laugh at idiots. I'm not going to plead innocence here: I've often joined in with the laughter, at least vicariously; laughing at idiots can be fun. But in the context of skeptic sites, the laughter takes on a bullying and unhealthy tone. It's never pleasant to watch a group of university graduates ganging up to sneer at people denied their advantages in life, especially when for some of them it's a full-time hobby... It's an increasingly acknowledged fact that the skeptic community is rife with sexism -- especially in the wake of the "elevator guy" controversy, about which more later. Women are a small minority in the skeptic world, and the few who get involved get shit thrown at them constantly by their skeptic peers. Every day, they suffer the whole gamut of attitudes from sneering to leering."

Does the above description of skeptics fit better with the notion of wicked, bad, mean people of dark hearts, or rather with the notion of good people of clear hearts and good will?

4)Consider the evidence that I've provided regarding Prometheus Books (the leading American publishing house of books on skepticism and atheism) and its explicit and implicit promotion of sexual perversions.

I have no doubts that Paul's view applies to many hard-core atheists and secularists. They certainly seem to be people of darkened hearts, questionable morality, unreliable ethical principles, self-centered egocentrism (which obviously doesn't promote good will towards others) and, in many cases, straighforward wickedness.

I think Paul's view is clearly different of Jime's Iron Law, but I have to recognize that thinking hard about Paul's point and comparing it with hard-core atheists have provided me with new insights.

I don't agree with Paul that his view applies to "unbelievers" in general, but I suspect that it applies to a large portion of hard-core, hard-nosed atheists, secularists and "skeptics" in particular.

Perhaps Jime's Iron Law will be expanded to include something like Paul's view, provided the evidence for the atheist's irrationality be clearly linked to moral deficiences or impairments.