I'll be making a few more epistemological posts tonight. However I wish to first address what I feel is a crucial issue in the debate at hand. Over at Dangerous Idea Jason suggested I was avoiding the issue at hand. (He suggested it in a comment here as well) I think there is a fundamental fallacy going on. Put simply I think we have to distinguish between the reasoning an individual engages in and the reasons-giving they provide in a debate (or inquiry). I strongly feel that the folks at Dangerous Idea are conflating the two. Thus my (repeated) comments about being skeptical that how they represent Mormons is actually that common.
I think this conflation is unfortunately very common from those of us with an academic background. We've learned how to communicate in debate. We've learned how to present our thinking. Most people haven't. They get flummoxed in debate. They aren't skilled at, on the fly, being able to carefully and clearly present the details of their reasoning. Instead they respond with one or two points that seemed important. To confuse such responses with their reasoning is, in my opinion, simply very bad form.
I do think one can learn how one is reasoning. However it often takes time and careful questioning in a less stressful and non-confrontational environment. Put simply, most people don't respond well to debate. If we judge other people's reasoning as if they were fellow students in a philosophy class then we're simply engaging in bad hermeneutics.
This is part of a series of post relating issues of epistemology to LDS thought. I'm primarily taking a fairly Peircean approach but will hopefully touch on many issues. There are several posts related to this topic, listed below.
Mormon Epistemology: An introduction of the problem and why it is a problem.
Mormon Epistemology 2: A brief overview of the typical critique of the LDS position. In the comments I get at checks and balances and why I think "burning in a bosom" is largely irrelevant to the question at hand.
Reasoning and Reasons Giving: An important distinction to understand for the debate.
Fixation of Belief: I introduce the Peircean approach to the problem of epistemology.
Book of Mormon Evidence: The evidence for and against including spiritual experience. A rather involve and diverse set of discussions in the comments.
What Makes a Sign?: More discussion of Peirce and why I think it undermines the argument from emotion.
Hermeneutics and Semiotics 1?: Slight aside to explain hermeneutics, semiotics and abduction. I see these as key to understanding religious knowing.
Failure of Religious Experiences: When do religious experiences fail and how do we tell?
Alma 32: Discussion of what Alma's seed analogy is discussing.
In my first post I mentioned the above issue, but I wanted to bring out more clearly these hermeneutic issues. The example there, perhaps a bit ill chosen, was how we know we love our spouse. Admittedly, as Michael pointed out, we can just know by inspection akin to how we know our tooth hurts. Although I think there is a sense that makes things more complicated. For instance how do we distinguish real love from infatuation or other kinds of counterfeits of real love? In those cases then introspection can be very misleading.
That was originally why I brought it up as an analogy. Because the initial feeling or presentation can be a counterfeit of what is going on. Thus the feeling alone is insufficient to establish that we love the person in the sense of what we typically mean by love. And we've all seen examples of this in bad relationships among friends.
So let us say there were some flaws in what an outside observer sees in the relationship. Some plausible defeaters for the justification via feeling alone. Is the person who believes they are in love justified to merely appeal to the feeling? I'd say no. But I'd also suggest that for almost every person their belief and justification isn't tied purely to the feeling.
Clark, I fear this line of argumentation is not going to be that fruitful in establishing what you mean by reasoning and reason giving. For one thing you are talking about two different things: love and relationships. The young BYU student comes to you and says, I’m in love. You ask why. He replies she is beautiful and I want to rip her clothes off and make made passionate love to her (or something to that effect). You ask “will she make a good wife for you?” He replies “Hell yes, have you seen what she looks like and how she makes me feel?” In the beginning of any romantic relationship that’s about as far as one can expect it to go. He’s in love/infatuation. That’s OK. That’s how a romantic relationship begin. I think it is useless to try to determine is that love or infatuation? At that stage they are the same. It sounds like a lot of your BYU kids don’t go on to ask do they have the ability to create a lasting loving relationship. Those of us who are married know that at times that takes work. So are they in love? Yes. Are they infatuated? Yes. Is the difference important at this stag? No. Is this pure sensation? Yes. Is this rational? No. Is it supposed to be rational? No. Is this enough to make a successful marriage? No. They are two different subjects.
We also cannot expect people who have just fallen in love to have the same feelings we call love who have been in long-term relationships.
It seems to me that you are being asked when pressed into a logical corner is one justified in resorting to feelings when logic fails. You: “Put simply I think we have to distinguish between the reasoning an individual engages in and the reasons-giving they provide in a debate (or inquiry).” I think I understand the first part, it is the process one goes through to solve a problem. I’m not sure what you are trying to say with the second part. Are you saying a resort to feeling really hides a reasoning process that hasn’t yet been clearly thought out?
Rich
I think it is important to realize people may not always be able to articulate their reasoning. In fact as Rich's example points out, the level of ambiguity often makes two separate things appear similar.
I would tend to agree with Rich "a resort to feeling really hides a reasoning process that hasn't yet been clearly thought out." With testimony, I would go a bit further though. I would say spritual confirmations are a good way of making us more aware of our implicit conceptions of things. I could conceive of them like a hyper sense of fit that works very well with deep seated ambiguity.
I suspect critical thinking will never reduce religion out of things - I don't think one can realistically get beyond the type of ambiguity Rich talks about. Also I tend to think a possibility of pre-mortal existence complicates any reduction, making any definitive answer too dependent on contextual assumptions to be of much absolute use to anyone beside yourself.
Well, I disagree somewhat in that I think at the beginning of a relationship it isn't typically love. But you do catch where I'm going with things.
I'm basically working off of a more Peircean framework. We start with vagueness that then evolves and develops. What I was planning to bring up is how essential this understanding of vagueness is to the issue: something that I think was being neglected. (Indeed the two posts I plan for tonight are primarily about Peircean approaches)
But the examples I was more thinking of would be the person who has been married for several years and beats his wife. He says he is in love and by pure feeling would be. But the meaning of the terms (in Peircean terms) is in terms of their practical implications. (Roughly a quasi-verificationalist approach) In terms of those practical effects we can provide defeaters for the man's belief he loves his wife given the meaning of love.
This raises two issues. For one the debate inherently has a linguistic aspect. (i.e. the meaning of love) In the larger religious epistemology issue this would be the cultural senses of a vague theology along with more specific theologies the inquirer may bring to their interpretation. However the hermeneutic circle entails all those terms/theologies are up for evolution as inquiry proceeds. (i.e. the wife beater may have to acknowledge his understanding of the term "love" is mistaken)
The second issue is that the external evidence for or against the statement has to be considered. It doesn't mean that external evidence against is an ultimate defeater. (In the senses that it of itself entails disbelief as an "ought") Rather it just that there has to be a dialog between all these things. And that dialog is the hermeneutic circle.
"I think it is important to realize people may not always be able to articulate their reasoning"
That is the key issue I'm getting at. One can't assume that someone's presentation of their reasoning is actually their reasoning. Many approaches in epistemology assume they are. It seems that, in more extreme forms, this is the main point of the externalist critique of epistemology. Internalist forms of epistemology (which are by far the majority) assume one can alas do a self-presentation of reasons to provide justification. Indeed such a presentation of reasoning is what provides justifications. Thus if one can't provide such justifications one doesn't know. But that to me is simply nonsense for a variety of reasons.
My main point in my discussion though is that it is only through continuing inquiry that one can provide justication. That is one must always engage with such possible defeaters.
True enough. It would be rather naive to think along non-iterative lines.
Not to thread jack things, but I think the whole problem of ambiguity is poorly dealt with in general thinking. For instance, the whole field of educational inquiry seems stymied by it. Education is such a implicit part of our culture it could really be better interpreted with some quasi-religious like tools. Unfortunately I don't know how developed those areas of research are. From my limited perspective, they still seem rather crude. As a result we end up with overly precise ideas that are context dependent.
As a society I suspect we just need to put up with a higher base level of ambiguity - find the plank length for social inquiry as it were.
There's actually a lot written on vagueness but I'm of the opinion that many acknowledge what vagueness does and then promptly go on to reason from cases that don't involve a lot of vagueness. Peirce is obviously one figure for whom vagueness is key to his philosophy. In the context of education a lot's been written about Peircean approaches.
I'd check the list of online Peirce papers at Arisbe. Obviously a lot more has been written but there are some good ones there. Consider this paper on Peircean semiotics and education for example.
Clark (and hereafter): {{Put simply I think we have to distinguish between the reasoning an individual engages in and the reasons-giving they provide in a debate (or inquiry). [...] I strongly feel that the folks at Dangerous Idea are conflating the two.}}
If I was conflating the two, I _wouldn't_ have written: "We aren't asking you whether Mormon claims should be judged according to the misunderstanding of improperly trained missionaries... I agree that [this along some other things you address for qualification] _aren't_ unimportant topics, but they also _aren't_ the question we're asking you."
I probably also wouldn't have written comments (here and on DangIdea) being fairly charitable to the defense of people who are doing the best they can with what little they have, even if the little is a 'burning in the bosom', if I was simply conflating what a person is actually reasoning (internally) with what they overtly claim to be reasoning. (Not _entirely_ sure I wouldn't have done that anyway; but I _am_ sure that I wasn't conflating the two categories, since I recall clearly agreeing with you on the importance of distinguishing them.)
You have, however, clearly answered the question now, so my curiosity is satisfied. I wrote, in my previous comment, "[Do] you agree (with Victor, and myself) that it is improper as an evangelical tactic to make an appeal to this kind of feeling as a last resort over against unresolved objections that would certainly involve non-acceptance of belief for the person in question[?]"
You have answered, in direct relation to that question, "As a communication effort [i.e. as an evangelical tactic] it is mistaken since it will convince no one. However for the individual themselves if they actually had a series of religious experiences confirming some state of affairs then it seems perfectly acceptable to appeal to it [as a last resort over against unresolved objections that would certainly involve non-acceptance of belief for the person in question.]"
Thank you. That clarifies what you have been answering "several times now", to our repeated questions on this topic.
I do wish you had thought to include the contextual reference from my question, that I have supplied to your answer in brackets; as I have a slight initial worry that you are going to reply that this was not the answer and/or question you were trying to give after all. But since we have been quite consistent in what we are asking about, along this line, I will take you at your word for now that this is the answer you meant to give.
Since my interest was only in giving you every opportunity to clarify your answer, and since you have clearly done this now in a fashion that cannot be reasonably disputed by any of your opponents as being unclear (I think), my own part in the matter is concluded.
Except--I still get the impression that you don't really understand what it is we've been asking. For you then go on to write (apparently in reference to your answer to my question):
"But certainly "I've had an experience and you haven't" exchange done as you described is ultimately counterproductive."
But {sigh} _that wasn't what we were asking about_. This isn't at all what I was describing in my question. The evangelical tactic mentioned by Victor (and Paul Manata and others) on DangIdea, was not this, either. It was (borrowing this form as a paraphrase): 'If you have this experience, then none of these other objections matter.'
Since I anticipate that you're going to reply again that there has to be a distinction between the reasoning a person (actually) engages in and the reasons-giving they provide in a debate or inquiry: yes, I agree, such a distinction is important for several reasons. Let the distinction be made. Having made the distinction, we are back to asking the question: is this a proper evangelical tactic (including in actual internal reasoning, whether recognized as such or not by the individual)?
Rich (to Clark): "It seems to me that you are being asked when pressed into a logical corner is one justified in resorting to feelings when logic fails."
{hanging head in relief} AT LAST!!! How many times did _he_ have to read me to understand this?!?
I will add that I am on record as stating that a person drawing a conclusion from this data _IS STILL REASONING TO A CONCLUSION_ (I thought I might better emphasize this {g}). This does not change my question, which I thought Rich paraphrased rather well. Yes, I agree feelings frequently hide a reasoning process that hasn't yet been clearly thought out. Yes, I agree that when the process has been clearly thought out, even if it still only comes down to 'this feeling, therefore x', it's still a rational action to a conclusion drawn from evidential data (the data being 'this feeling').
Are you (Clark) saying that this is (or can be) enough, in principle, to responsibly outweigh what would otherwise be perceived by the person involved to be defeaters to proposition x?
I emphasize that I am distinguishing this from the question of whether "external evidence against is an ultimate defeater". Victor's question assumes that the external evidence is _already_ such as to be perceived to be a defeater. Is it proper for the person to make an appeal to an internal subjective feeling as data to veto, in favor of proposition x, what would otherwise be an established defeater to x? (In the sense that if the person accepts this other data and such-n-such implications from them, then he will believe y or anyway not-x.)
Jason Pratt
Sorry for the confusion. However when you said "the misunderstanding of improperly trained missionaries" that tended to imply that what was wrong wasn't the reasons-giving but the reasoning.
Further, as I said, I thought I was quite clear in my initial reply that all of the evidence has to be considered.
However I sense there is still some miscommunication. I earnestly feel like I'm trying to be put into one of two categories, neither of which fit. If I'm still misunderstanding you, my apologies in advance. But as I said I don't think that just because one has had a religious experience it renders any evidence against a position irrelevant. Rather I've been very clear that all the evidence has to be considered. So the role of the religious experience is not an either/or situation.
Victor's question did appear to assume that the external evidence already was a defeater but I think I rejected that position. So the issue then becomes what if something is taken to be perceived to be a defeater. i.e. it is a strong evidence against.
Obviously if something is actually a defeater then by definition it has defeated the justification. So one is simply setting up a tautology. I assumed Victor couldn't be saying that which just didn't make much sense. I was attempting to be charitable in my interpretation since it otherwise was a pretty loaded question.
Over on DangIdea, I've traced how the discussion got so off on other topics than what I was asking about, btw. Some interesting parallels. {g} (Interesting, not suspicious. {s})
{{However when you said "the misunderstanding of improperly trained missionaries" that tended to imply that what was wrong wasn't the reasons-giving but the reasoning.}}
Actually, I thought _you_ had brought up the misunderstanding of improperly trained missionaries first. I was only agreeing that this has to be taken into account, too, and that Mormon theology shouldn't be judged from that.
{{Victor's question did appear to assume that the external evidence already was a defeater but I think I rejected that position.}}
That may have been where things started going squirrely. {s}
{{Obviously if something is actually a defeater then by definition it has defeated the justification. So one is simply setting up a tautology. I assumed Victor couldn't be saying that which just didn't make much sense. I was attempting to be charitable in my interpretation since it otherwise was a pretty loaded question.}}
Only if Victor was trying to beg the question by positing from the outset that the case _was_ (by all possible valid analysis) already defeated. I don't think that was what he was asking about, though.
As I pointed out from my own experience, it is entirely possible for a person to be acknowledging, either tacitly or explicitly, that they themselves perceive a position to be in defeat--and then to appeal as a last-ditch effort to what amounts to a feeling as a way of getting around this. (I think Tom Wanchick does just this--except actually _before_ the fact!--in the opening comments of his recent debate against Richard Carrier, for example.)
This was the kind of situation Victor was asking about. It certainly does happen, and isn't only a tautology.
But, I agree you really have answered the question now, and I'm satisfied with it. Thank you for your patience.
Jason Pratt
Jason, as I said, my apologies for any misreadings on my part.
I think the confusion is ultimately what is or isn't a defeater and what makes it so. I tried to reply to your comment at Dangerous Idea but Blogger is its usual unreliable self and won't let me comment.
Basically the confusion, to me, can be found in this sentence fragment of yours: ". . . the impropriety of appealing to internal emotional data over against what would otherwise be considered (by the person in question) to be a conclusive case to believe not-x instead of x."
The key problem, as I see it, is that "what would otherwise be..." That is, how are we to take that otherwise? Do we take it as saying that the appeal to the experience is a dodge? I kind of cognitive dissonance as some critics seem to unfathomably charge? Or do we take it as saying that if there really was an experience that it changes the meaning of the evidence that would otherwise be taken as a defeater.
I think this is ultimately the place where the confusion is arising and how we all appear to manage to talk past one an other.
To me meaning (at least in this case) is context dependent. That is evidence doesn't have innate meaning but its meaning depends upon its roll in a network of other meanings and practices. Thus the same questions/facts can have different meanings depending upon what else we know. So I'm still note entirely sure what it is you are attempting to establish.
Alright, it's time I finally got back into this debate.
Now as to Clark's original post, I side, for the most part, with him. Reason giving is pretty much my definition of argumentation and debate. These do not necessarily or even usually coincide exactly with reasoning per se, however I think that Clark's reasoning may establish too great of a divide between the two. The critics are not simply engaging one unsuspecting and unthoughtful Mormon, but are instead engaging the entire tradition. I don't see the distinction which Clark draws between reasoning and reason giving to be adequate as an excuse for an entire tradition.
Perhaps the difference between the two (I'll call them reasoning and arguing) can be sourced to the distinct nature of each. Arguing pretty much assumes a foundationalist approach to knowledge whereas reasoning seems to me to be primarily coherentist in nature. Thus, while we cannot provide a foundationalist justification for a belief in argumentation, we "feel" and still believe some proposition because it coheres with our overall worldview better. To be honest, however, I'm not sure how reliable a coherentist account of justification can be when it is the very worldview itself which is being called into question.
As to the analogy between Mormon epistemology and love, I find such an analogy extremely unhelpful. In the case of Mormon epistemology an insight or flash of inspiration either is or is not from God. In the case of love, however, there is no such dichotomy. There is no "one true" kind of love and a bunch of imitations which might be confused for that one true kind.
Furthermore, love is an emotion which the agent him/herself creates, it is an action or engagement with the world. On the other hand, Mormons see inspiration as God's engaging with them. This is no to say that the Mormon is entirely passive, but it does suggest that the Mormon is not totally active either.
Just to elaborate a little more, the skeptic sees Mormon epistemology as being exactly like the case of love. The person creates for them self a feeling. They then interpret this feeling as happening to them when it is in fact a case of the person acting upon themselves as well as the world. They also begin to worry about whether the feeling which they have is "the real thing" or not when in fact there is no such "real thing" to aspire to. This is exactly how I interpret both love and Mormon testimony's to work.
Jeff & Clark: Here's my problem. Reducing the experience of testimony to a mere emotion (as Jeff does) or to a self-willed "feeling" of any sort doesn't do justice to the experience. The confirmation is a "knowing" that inherently includes the knowledge that one knows. However, it is different than other types of knowledge. Once I have expereinced seeing a car go by, I can have a memory of that exerience that is validating of that experience and, assuming that my faculties are functioning properly and I arrive at the experience in non-defeating trust circumstances, I have every reason to believe that my memory is accurate. However, a memory of once having had a testimony is not the same as having a testimony. The confirming experience of knowing that one knows is no longer any kind of knowledge once it isn't present as a living experience in the present. In that sense, "Knowing that" in terms of testimony is more like "conosciendo che" in the Latin sense of interpersonal knowledge than "sapendo che" which means to know facts. Inherent in testimony is that Christ lives as a present reality within -- and the reality is a present reality only when present. A mere memory of it is only the torture of once having had a presence.
To give an analogy, suppose that another were transmitting information directly to my cereberal cortex in the way a signal is sent to a particular receiver. I receive the signal and know that I am experiencing reception of the information. No one else has this experience and know one else knows what it is like to receive such information but me. However, the information is present only while I am acting as receiving and it leaves no memory of anything except having once received information tho the content of the information is no longer present since it cannot be captured in neural network form. that is something like what receiving such a spiritual confirmation is like.
Let me repeat, the experience of knowing that one knows because the knowledge is present within one's very mode of being cannot be reduced to mere emotion or feeling -- such a reduction misses the "knowing that" aspect of testimony and spiritual experience. Having a memory of once having received information is not the same as having the information. So I would reject Jeff's reductive explanation.
Jeff, I'd be the first to argue that in terms of giving reasons (i.e. formal epistemology) that the Mormon tradition hasn't done too well. There's just not a lot written on it, as I mentioned.
I don't think critics are necessarily engaging the entire tradition though, but even if they are, so what? I don't see how the community, who primarily are not philosophers engaged in debate, somehow are different in the reasons vs. reasons giving. I think Mormonism is founded on a kind common sensism which isn't terribly adept at providing reasons of the sort philosophers like. This is changing with the rise of more and more intellectual studies on Mormonism.
I'm not sure I agree with your characterization of coherentism vs. foundationalism. Arguing tends to focus on shared premises which is of course favorable to foundationalism. However most premises in a debate aren't really foundational in the normal epistemological sense that I can see. I also don't see that reasoning is coherentist either. It is, I believe hermeneutical. But one can adopt a developing sense of hermeneutics without necessarily adopting coherentism in the formal sense of the term. (Some might disagree with that - but I don't consider myself a coherentist for example)
I'd also disagree with the "flash of insight." Often looking back people people will judge that something was of God. But I think most people react pragmatically but don't necessarily judge what is or is not of God. I also don't think that necessarily relates to the spiritual experience issue regarding why people become Mormon. That is while I fully acknowledge the other aspects of revelation, I think they are a tad more complex than what I was discussing. That's not to say they aren't interesting and pose problems. Say what degree of inspiration a Mormon giving a priesthood blessing is operating under. But my inclination is to suggest that for these other cases Mormons are much open to a higher degree of fallibilism.
The reason I brought up the love example though was precisely because love isn't just a feeling. That is what we call love can and typically is distinguished from the feeling. The feeling is part of it but not sufficient. Thus we have the examples I brought up where we would feel characterizing things as love is in error. That's what's interesting to me. While I think people do characterize revelation in the terms you outline I think for reasons akin to discussions of love it is incorrect. Put succinctly it captures only a third of what is involved in the phenomena. (In Peircean terms the "feel" which is firstness but neglects the analysis of secondness and thirdness)
Blake, I fully agree with your point. And it is here that Peirce's dialogical approach is most fruitful. Cut off the dialog into something "static" and you've destroyed the phenomena. I had a post mostly written last night on that but just didn't have time to finish it.
I should add by way of caveat that I'm discussing the religious experience's implications rather than a testimony per se. But you may be right that broadening the topic would be wise of me.
I think Jeff G, above, raises some good points.
The epistemological issue here, as I see it, is one of aligning phenomena with the appropriate regional ontology. If I see a cup (to take a canonical example), there are all kinds of phenomenological guidelines for helping me separate the seen cup from the imagined cup. And although I can imagine a pink unicorn, it doesn't exist in the same way a cup does. Which leads me back to my question of yesterday: by what means does one distinguish a revelation from a hallucination?
This question becomes even more attenuated when dealing with the second-hand phenomenon-- by what criteria do I evaluate the various people (and books) claiming contradictory knowledge via revelation?
One possible solution to both problem types is to judge based on the content of the revelation-- this was suggested by several folks in response to my example of Abraham. In other words, if god tells me to kill my son I should see a shrink, but if god tells me to be a nice person, I can assume it is really god. This answer certainly has it's advantages, and in practical terms, it is one I often use in the second-hand case: I call it the "Hare Krishna/Jehovah's Witness principle." As in: "Krishna told you to shave your head and dance in the airport, and now I'm supposed to listen to him?" or "Jehovah wants you to go door to door annoying folks, and this is supposed to count in his favor?"
But ultimately, I find this to be an unsatisfactory solution-- if we are to respect the Otherness of the divine (which I assume is part of the gameplan), we have to be open to revelations that are not altogether comfortable. If we are only open to a god that fits our preconceptions, we have created god in our own image. (Needless to say, this goes against the main message of the Old Testament, where god seems to speak to people only when when he has an irrational (and often violent) task for them to perform.)
Are we to view the revelatory experiences of all people (regardless of religion) with equanimity? Is there any reason why "burning in the bosom" is a more "true" phenomenon than someone having a similar experince with Allah or Vishnu, or the Book of Mormon is any "truer" than the Koran (or any other book claiming to be a report of revelation)?
Michael, I think the point of LDS thought is there is no way independent of religious experience with implications of those experiences learned and developed to judge other religions. Without those experiences one rationally ought be highly skeptical.
So if we are looking for an external way of judging (what I'm calling the "objective") then we'll always fail.
Now some Christian apologists disagree which is why you see discussions like those recently at Dangerous Idea. But I just don't find them persuasive for the same reason that I think Pascal's Wager fails. They just don't provide a way of distinguishing religious traditions that don't involve begging the question. (At least in general)
As you say though, if God is always "convenient" then I think that is a compelling argument against the our inferences of experience. It seems to me that the "argument from surprise" is a compelling one in judging experience and inference. It has been quite fruitful in science, for example.
As to "revelatory experiences" clearly not all revelatory experiences are the same. It's just too broad a category. Some might be justifiable while others might not. But more significantly the experience in question includes the interpretive part of the experience. That is we're largely talking process rather than a static moment.
Blake,
There is nothing "mere" about emotions. Emotions are not mere feelings. Just as "love" has one's spouse as an object of intentional content, so too I argue that the emotional experience of a "testimony" has a particular proposition as an intentional object. I see this as being entirely in line with my view of a Mormon testimony as an emotional experience akin to love.
As to memory, I think you bring up some good points, but I don't see any of it as being in conflict with the account which I provide.
I think that you do bring up a very interesting point about the privacy of experience though. It is my position that emotions are not merely feelings, and as such are not entirely private. Take the example of love. I have no idea what love "feels like" to another person. Nevertheless, I have no hesitation in calling what I experience "love". I did not invent some private category "love" into which I filed my own experience, but rather I took my personal experience and filed it in a publicly available and preexistent category "love."
This can be generalized to a Mormon testimony. Assuming that a testimony is not a mere feeling, (a valid assumption in my opinion), the experience of a testimony is NOT entirely private. It is a preexistent and publicly available category into which Mormon file their experiences. In other words, these "testimony" experiences are NOT intrinsically inscrutable from a third person point of view.
I see this as contradicting much of what Clark asserts in such discussions.
Yeah, I wasn't trying to assert that there were some kind of foundation or basic beliefs which characterized argumentation. (My bad on this one for not being clear.) What I meant what that justification in terms of both formal and informal reasoning where in evidence is aimed at justifying some conclusion by way of some assumption(s). In argumentation justification for assertions comes by way of support from other propositions and entailment.
In reasoning, however, I see justification of belief as being a matter of whether a particular and/or potential belief increases or decreases the coherence of the belief system. Thus, people will feel justified in believing or disbelieving propositions in the context of reasoning which are may or may not be justified as assertions in the context of argumentation. This is all I was trying to get at.
However, I still think that justifying a worldview in terms of coherence is not going to go very far, primarily because coherence is almost entirely determined by the worldview which is already in place. It is for this reason that I see religionists as saying "I can't give an argument for my belief, I just know/believe it," because beliefs, as opposed to arguments, are determined by the worldview (in this case a religious one) which is already in place.
Regarding the cases of love being in error, I fully agree. However, whether an experience qualifies as love or not is determined by the boundaries of the category "love" which has been established by a particular community. I see this as being the very antithesis of what a Mormon testimony requires. I see the Mormon community as having created a "testimony" category into which they file experiences. They, on the other hand, see the category as being determined not by any community, but by the fact of the matter; i.e. the actual experience of God giving one a testimony.
It may be objected that there is no empirical difference between the two since the category exists independent of ourselves either way. True, but this only serves the skeptics position which is that one cannot be sure which of the two positions is true after all. You can't know that your emotional experience is from God or not.
I have to admit that I am really excited to see all those posts I did on emotions to be of value in some other area. Perhaps they weren't just one big waste of time after all. ;-)
Jeff, I'll have to reread your post on emotions at your blog. I suspect I'm misreading you over what constitutes emotion.
I do agree that testimony is not entirely private nor do I think religious experience is entirely private. I don't think anything is entirely private for a variety of reasons. That's why I've been careful to qualify the term "objective" when I use it. But clearly when we apply labels like "love" they hinge upon social normative sense of what those terms mean. Thus to have an experience of love entails a strong social component. In Heideggarian terms, language is the house of being.
Jeff, I'm not sure the Mormon position rejects the social aspects of testimony. And I think that's true from the earliest periods of LDS thought. Consider Lectures on Faith which is one of the few formal theological engagements with some of these issues. (Although the focus is faith rather than knowledge) Yet there is within those lectures a very strong social component. One whole lecture deals with the possibility of faith due to social transmission of ideas. That is that to exercise faith prerequires a social background of information to build off of. Likewise a few of the later lectures focus on language. While they obviously are somewhat primitive they do anticipate certain pragmatic approaches to the issue.
I just also don't think Mormons neglect the interpretive process. Indeed I frequently here this discussed at church. Yes there is a constant focus on "hearing." (i.e. the old radio analogy for revelation) But at least in the wards I've been in interpretation isn't neglected. I'd add that one of the most interesting discussions of the role of interpretation and revelation is found in the Book of Mormon. Admittedly that's a more complex issue simply because it is a shared and extensive dream that is taken as revelatory. But note the role interpretation plays in the narrative.
Well, it was actually like a dozen or so posts. If you go to my "mind" category you will be able to find most of them. In short:
Emotions are not merely feelings, although there is a feeling to having an emotion.
Emotions have intentional content.
Emotions are active engagements with the world in some way.
Emotions are intelligent and are usually rational.
Emotions are largely public (and and sharable, since the private "feeling" is not the main aspect of emotion.
Emotional repertoires are conditioned and determined by biology, culture as well as personal choice and experience.
We are largely responsible for our own emotional experience, for emotional experience is not a passive process.
Clark,
I'm not understanding the relevance of much of your last comment.
My comment was meant to suggest that the very category of "testimony" experiences is created by the Mormon community (as well as the Christian background from which it emerged). While I certainly acknowledge that the social transmission of ideas plays a role as well, I see my claim as being something much stronger. I am saying that the Mormon community create a rather objective testimony experience rather than receive some kind of objective emotional experience from "Elsewhere."
You lost me on the interpretations part of your comment.
By interpretation I'm more thinking in terms of significance. This might be wrapped up in your "emotions have intentional content" (which you don't have a link for) depending upon how you characterize intentions in that context.
Put simply an experience has content. But more significantly we can look to the content in terms of predictions and other implicature.
Roughly what I'm doing is taking meaning to be in terms of practical consequences, seeing experience as being meaningful, and suggesting that through inquiry we can judge via consequences the experience. This will be dialogical in nature. That is as we take a meaningful experience, analyze it and test it that will in turn change the meaning of future experiences. So we're always in a hermeneutical circle.
If I grasp you right you are allowing for meaning in experience but feel that it is dominated completely by our social expectations. That is the Church creates the meaning and it is not in this hermeneutical circle of inquiry and repetition. Put simply religious experience is given meaning it does not create meaning.
Clark,
The link which should have been with intentional content is actually the "largely public" link. My bad.
By intentional content, I meant intentionality. I'm pretty much agnostic on what beliefs and desires are, or how they get their meaning. Instead, I simply speak of world-mind and mind-world intentionality.
I've closed comments in order to avoid spam since I don't check this older blog as much anymore.
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