Gangadean at Grand Canyon University, Part 2

The is part 2 of the series on Gangadean's recent lecture at GCU.

4. Humans as distinct from non-humans on the basis of being rational. Most of us believe that there's something special about humans. Arguably, it's rationality--although one needn't define 'rationality' the way that Gangadean does. But I don't know how a thing like this can be proven. Remember, Gangadean calls us all to a standard of proof--we can't just take for granted what seems to be right, or agreeable, or common sensical. We need proof because belief without proof is fideism according to Gangadean. As far as I know, Gangadean never actually presents a proof for the claim that humans are by definition, rational animals (particularly, 'rational' as he defines it).

5. Around the 40 minute mark, he talks about the moral law (the ten commandments). His claim here is that this is a source of unity, because the ten commandments (in some form) are derivable from reason alone. But he never explains how we get to each of them via the use of our reason alone. Neither in his book nor in this talk. For instance, just how can one deduce from reason alone that one ought to keep the Sabbath day holy or that you should not commit adultery? It's one thing to proclaim that these are clear to reason, and another thing to show that this is so. Furthermore, what right does Gangadean have to help himself to the particular reading (which to no surprise fits his own philosophical committments) of the various passages he cites?  How does he know (with certainty) that Moses was speaking of knowing the moral law via reason as opposed to say via intuition or divine revelation. The passages are ambiguous at best. Here's the relevant passage from Deuteronomy 30.

Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. 12 It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, “Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?” 13 Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, “Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?” 14 No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.

Gangadean would like you to believe that what Moses is without a doubt saying here is that the moral law is deducible via valid rules of inference, from "basic things." That would fit nicely with Gangdean's worldview at large. But while that could be what Moses is saying, the reading is far from forced on us. So Gangadean owes us an argument--just why we should pick up his interpretation?

6. Gangadean complains that Thomas Jefferson took too much to heart the common sense realism of Thomas Reid. And what he means by that is that Jefferson took too much to be "self-evident". Gangadean grants that there are some self-evident truths, but that for instance, God's existence is not among them. The problem of course is that this puts the onus of proof on Gangadean to show us how we are to distinguish between the self-evident and the non-self-evident. He's inclined to fall into talk of transcendentals---what is self-evident is that which makes the very act of questioning possible--so that it cannot be questioned. But I wonder how we to know when a thing makes the very act of questioning possible? Is it not possible that a claim merely seems to us to make questioning possible, without actually be so? I'm not sure how an argument that this is impossible would even start. From my past conversations with Gangadeanians they essentially claim that we "just know" when something makes questioning possible and this sounds an awful lot like knowing by way of intuition, but when I press this point, they merely insist that "it's different" somehow.

7. At the 50 minute mark, Gangadean claims that rational presuppositionalism is the most consistent system. But as I've argued throughout this blog, that is far from true. Gangadean's approach often suffers the same problems (and worse) of other approaches--it's just Gangadeanians seem to have a big blindspot when it comes to critically examining their own basic beliefs.

8. At 1:05:45, Gangadean speaks of repentance in connection to restoration of the world/culture. He cites, the words of Christ, "Repent for the kingdom of God is near." Then he makes the claim that the what we are to repent of (according to his reading of Jesus' words) is "root sin" which according to Gangadean is not seeking and not understanding what is clear about God.

As I noted in part 1 (point 1 and 2), Gangadean's God is quite the monster. He makes it (metaphysically?) impossible for some of his creatures to know him (creates them in an unregenerated state and leaves them that way), and yet according to Gangadean demands of them to repent for not knowing what is clear. It seems to me that Gangadean's God is the one that needs to repent.

One certainly shouldn't take for granted Gangadean's interpretation of Christ's words, here. Whether it is in accordance with scripture that there is a difference between "root sin" and "fruit sin" as Gangadean likes to claim is something that needs to be argued for. Gangadeanians will likely claim that "thinking presuppositionally" will show us that there is such a distinction, but I've yet to hear anything resembling a proof in this regard. There's a more general point here--often Gangadean interprets scripture in a way that suits his worldview--but we need not follow him in this and should not without sufficient proof on his part that his way is the only rational way to interpret the relevant text.

In the next and final installment of my comments on Ganagadean's lecture, we'll get into the question and answer session of the talk. Among other things, Gangadean presents his argument for how we can know that a (human) soul is not eternal--and I think it's a pretty crappy argument, so stay tuned!