Anderson's Latest Response: where it goes wrong.

The discussion in the comments of the youtube video of Gangadean's talk, continues. In fact, Anderson recently posted a longish response on his blog. He mentions me and I suspect much of what he writes is meant to be directed at me. As he notes, the video is getting an uptick in views, which I agree is a good thing. Even some bad ideas can benefit the listeners because in diagnosing where arguments go wrong, we learn something true. I wanted to comment on some of what I take to be directed towards me. Anderson writes,

But if one of the persons involved isn’t sure that ‘a’ is ‘a,’ then they won’t be able to go to that next step. They wouldn’t be able to affirm if a word is a word, what they are thinking is what they are thinking, their question is a question, a word is a word, a mind is a mind, eternal is eternal, a reply is a reply, or an argument is an argument (Emphasis mine).

The reason that this stands out to me is that a number of Gangadeanians with whom I've spoken have lodged some version of this "challenge" to me over the years. Truth be told, I'm starting to grow tired of this bit. Regardless of how many times this has been repeated, the only thing it achieves is that it displays ignorance, a lack of integrity as well as the absence of care that Gangadeanians like Anderson show in engaging with critical ideas. The reason that I placed 'sure' and 'affirm' in bold is that all of the force of the above passage fades once we place into focus the fact that there are at least two definitions or senses of those terms. Let me explain. 

The point about being sure or unsure about something like the law of identity (that a is a) in the context of my debate with Gangadean concerns whether some things (like the law of identity) are "clear to reason." Now, there's a perfectly ordinary notion of clear just as there is a perfectly ordinary notion of "being sure/unsure of something" in the English language. I'm sure of lots of things and unsure of a lot, too. I'm sure that I've got two hands. I'm sure that I'm typing on a computer at this very moment. I'm sure that I woke up next to my partner this morning (as opposed to a convincing facsimile). I'm sure that kicking infants for fun is wrong. I'm sure of my date of birth as well as my place of birth (despite not having been able to verify those things first-hand). What is more, I take myself to be rational in being sure about these things. But the sense of sure or certain that is common to many of these ordinary beliefs, is not the sense that Anderson or Gangadean are interested in. They stipulate a rather technical and idiosyncratic notion of what it means to be sure, certain, or when some proposition is clear. In other words, each of these notions or expressions means something very special for Anderson and Gangadean that doesn't do justice to the way people ordinarily use the words (including other philosophers). Once we keep this in mind, that there are at least two different definitions of 'sure' and 'unsure' (and the aforementioned cognates), and we keep these distinct, we see that Anderson's comment loses all of its bite as a challenge for my position. The long and short of it is this: what seems crazy and bizarre to most people is for someone to be unsure of something so mundane as the law of identity. Or to think that we can't be certain that "a thing is what it is." But that's only when we think of those notions (unsure and certain) in the ordinary sense. Once we swap out those ordinary notions with what Gangadean and Anderson have in mind, the purported absurdity that's supposed to be obvious in Anderson's quote, goes away. Basically, when I say I'm not sure or certain that the law of identity is true, what I'm really saying is that I'm not sure (or certain) in the way that Gangadean and Anderson require.  

So how is it that they are using the offending words or concepts? Well, some proposition is clear according to Gangdean if and only if, it's impossible (in the strongest sense) for it to be false. But the natural question then is how do we know when something couldn't possibly be false? On the Gangadeanian worldview there is only one of two ways. 

(i) We know it via a sound, (and non-question begging) deductive proof which demonstrates by the rules of logical inference, that the claim in question is (necessarily) true. 

(ii) We determine that it is self-attesting or self-evident (which is to say the claim in question makes questioning possible). 

So, to reiterate, when I say that I am not sure that 'a is a' or that it isn't clear that it is so, what I'm questioning/doubting is that 'a is a' can satisfy either (i) or (ii). Given how 'a is a' is supposed to be transcendental, every proof is going to presuppose the law is true for Gangadean, so (i) just won't apply on pain of circularity. So why am I doubtful that the law of identity can satisfy (ii)? Well, because I'm not sure that the expressions, "self-attesting" or "self-evident" (again in the way that Gangadean employs them) have any meaning to begin with (again, what Thomas Jefferson meant by 'self-evident' is not necessarily what Gangadean means by it). What is more, as I've said repeatedly, Ganagdean owes us a theory about how we can determine or know when something "makes questioning possible." Not only that, but he also needs to explain what "makes questioning possible" has to do with truth. 

Anderson is claiming above, that in questioning or being unsure that 'a is a,' one cannot (consistently) affirm "if a word is a word, what they are thinking is what they are thinking, their question is a question, a word is a word, a mind is a mind, eternal is eternal..." And that certainly sounds like a crazy consequence. But once we disambiguate between the very special notion of unsure that Anderson/Gangadean are inclined to employ, from the more ordinary notion, this seemingly absurd consequence simply doesn't follow. Just because I don't think that 'a is a' can be proven without begging the question, or just because I call into question Gangadean's blanket assertions that "some claims are true because they make questioning possible or are self-attesting/evident" doesn't entail that I can't consistently and in the same breathe, affirm that a word is a word, a mind a mind, and the like. At the very least, Anderson has failed to show how this follows. 

For good measure, you'll see that I also made bold the word 'affirm'. That's because we might worry that Anderson/Gangadean are playing the same game (failing to flag that they have a technical notion in mind that differs from the ordinary sense) with that word as well. And that's going to make a difference to whether, the consequences that Anderson purports, actually follow as well as whether we should worry if they do follow. Does it follow that if I am unsure or uncertain that the law of identity (as an exceptionless law) is true, that consistency then demands that I not affirm "a word is a word, a mind a mind"? The quick answer is, no. This is the case on either definition of "sure/unsure". The only way it might follow is if by 'affirm' Anderson means, "accept as certain." So then we can recapitulate Anderson's remarks in this way. 

But if one of the persons involved isn’t sure that ‘a’ is ‘a,’ then they won’t be able to go to that next step. They wouldn’t be able to be sure that a word is a word, what they are thinking is what they are thinking, their question is a question, a word is a word, a mind is a mind, eternal is eternal, a reply is a reply, or an argument is an argument. 

But now the purported absurdity of "my position" disappears. So what, if a person that isn't sure that 'a is a' also cannot be sure that "a word is a word, or mind a mind?" They can consistently eschew certainty altogether. What's wrong with that? They can still come to form rational beliefs, come to know things, neither of which requires certainty. For some reason, Anderson and Gangadean have a difficult time with the idea that we just don't need the kind of certainty that they are after, in the first place. They try to make it seem like all sorts of absurdities will follow without clarity/certainty, but they don't do so by honest argument. Instead, they just say that it is so, equivocate on key terms and try to pump the intuitions of their naive followers. I have yet to see anything resembling a sound argument for why we need certainty/clarity (or why we have to be "sure" in the Gangadeanian sense) at any level.

In fact, I think this response to Anderson's remarks works on either of the definitions of 'sure' or 'certain,' but it's significantly stronger on the Gangadeanian definition of those terms because his concepts are so ridiculous. That is, it's harder to care about the kind of technical certainty that Gangadean claims is so crucial and important to knowledge, thought and dialogue.

One more thing. Anderson also writes, 

Many have told me they are surprised to see that a skeptic will go so far as to think ‘a’ is ‘a’ is fallible. We can watch and see if a skeptic can also have integrity with that profession. What would it look like to be consistent with saying each word in my sentence or question does not mean what it means? If you would like to discuss this with me, or why an eternal mind would have infinite knowledge and not be subject to memory loss or decay, follow my blog as I will update it.

This is likely a jab at me, but again it's a misguided one. In the first place, it's making a category mistake. The fallibilist about knowledge maintains that we can know things via fallible means/reasons. That is, our justification is the sort of thing that is fallible or infallible, and not the proposition in question. Propositions aren't the sorts of things that can be fallible or infallible (they can be true or false, have intentional content). Further, I'm no skeptic--it's only because Anderson defines knowledge in a special way (so that it requires certainty), that anyone that is even doubtful that certainty is possible turns out to be a skeptic. As if that weren't enough, Anderson is also making a rather egregious error by conflating two different facts and he should know better. 

(A) Someone doubts/questions that 'a is a' is clear to reason in the special way that Gangadean conceives of "clear to reason."  

(B) Someone affirms that the law of identity is positively false (so that a sentence does not mean what it means). 

(A) and (B) are very different states of affairs, but he's running them together--he should know better. Not only because of the points concerning the definitions that we've just discussed, but also because to doubt that we can be certain of a proposition is not the same as affirming the opposite of the proposition (the conflation here is quite serious because he's opposing "belief that not-P" with "doubt about whether or not we can be certain that P"). If you come to me and say that we can be absolutely certain that it will rain tomorrow. and I doubt that such certainty about whether or not it will rain tomorrow is felicitous, that doesn't commit me to the position that it will not rain tomorrow. That's a non sequitur. In a similar vein, a subject can even doubt that P, without believing that P is false. Suppose you come to me and tell me that you are 100% certain that it will rain tomorrow. I can doubt or question whether it will rain tomorrow, without positively affirming that it will not rain (the difference here is between doubt that P and believing that ~P). What I doubt is that we can have Ganagdeanian certainty, which is not the same as believing or affirming that the law of identity is false. 

We can apply the same diagnosis for Anderson's other remarks in his latest response. He says that his recent dialogue with Spencer has shown us where questioning becomes incoherent. But again, Anderson is simply presupposing rather than showing that we need certainty (in the Gangadeanian sense) of basic things in order for questioning to be coherent either because he's running together (A) and (B), or because he's defining 'affirm' in a strange and unmotivated way, such that in order to affirm anything we have to be certain (in the Gangadeanian manner) at the basic level. 

Finally, I noticed that Anderson accuses me of "regularly slandering" him and other Gangadeanians. He suggests that Spencer has been referring to my stuff and given that I regularly slander Anderson and others, there's a question about Spencer's motives. That's a strange worry to have. What does my moral character have to do with Spencer's motives in carrying out a dialogue and more importantly, whether the objections are good ones or not? The connection is tenuous at best. What is more, I'm thinking that Anderson's use of 'slander' also departs from ordinary language. That is, unless of course, pointing out problems in a person's bad philosophical ideas, and discussing worrisome features/practices of a fundamentalist religious cult to which they belong, counts as slander. I suspect falsely accusing someone of slander is closer to slandering than anything I've done.