The Limits of Possible Explanation
March 12, 2009 at 10:17 am
(This post was last modified: March 12, 2009 at 10:21 am by Mark.)
I argue here that there can be no explanation of the set of all things that exist, considered as a totality. This point is important, since religious believers often advance the proposition that a god is necessary to explain the physical universe. A frequently-encountered version of this argument is that "something cannot come from nothing." I do not argue that everything considered as a totality came from nothing (which would be an explanation) but that necessarily, there can be no explanation of this totality. To ask the explanation, or the cause, of the set of all existing things is a category mistake, akin to asking how happy an orange is.
My argument is quite simple: explanation accounts for something by relating it to something else. My house is red because yesterday I had painters come and make it so; the earth orbits the sun because of countervailing centrifugal and gravitational forces; John's wife is angry at him because he forgot their anniversary; I had a good day fishing because I got up early, chose a good spot and used a good lure; and so on and so forth. You cannot construct an explanation that does not relate one thing to another, and I would go further and say that you cannot construct an acceptable explanation of an existing thing that does not relate it to another existing thing. People would laugh if you seriously attributed the little holes in the side of your garage to Woody Woodpecker, the cartoon character.
So to explain anything that exists, we seek to uncover its relation to one or more other things that exist. For example, "God created the physical universe" is, in principle, an acceptable explanation of the physical universe, supposing God exists.
Turning then to the set of all existing things, clearly this is not the sort of thing that can be explained. Definitionally, nothing exists outside this set, so there is nothing to which it can be related. Explanation simply does not apply to this object.
Admittedly, this is difficult for the human mind to grasp. It is in our nature to seek explanation, and since we live within a seemingly boundless field of things, we are conditioned to think that anything must have an explanation. The set of all existing things is something that can be conceived of, but it can't practically be beheld, so it's a bit difficult to reckon with. But it remains, as I have shown, that this set is not something that can be explained.
Coming back to the supposed god, the question of his existence equates to the question of whether he is among the Totality of Things. But whether or not this set includes a god, and whether or not the supposed god did indeed cause all other elements of this set, it remains the case that the Totality of Things can have no explanation. Thus for example, if the god of the Christians exists, one thing that this entity cannot do is explain why he exists.
There may perhaps be some reasons to posit a god that is separate from the physical universe and responsible for its creation, but to account for the existence of all things cannot possibly be one of them. For the supposed god himself has no explanation, unless he himself has a creator and so on ad infinitum. Personally I see no reason to posit such a god, preferring to admit into the set of existing things only those things that are actually known to exist by direct observation. Since some great set of things must be taken as sufficient unto itself, why not the Cosmos?
My argument is quite simple: explanation accounts for something by relating it to something else. My house is red because yesterday I had painters come and make it so; the earth orbits the sun because of countervailing centrifugal and gravitational forces; John's wife is angry at him because he forgot their anniversary; I had a good day fishing because I got up early, chose a good spot and used a good lure; and so on and so forth. You cannot construct an explanation that does not relate one thing to another, and I would go further and say that you cannot construct an acceptable explanation of an existing thing that does not relate it to another existing thing. People would laugh if you seriously attributed the little holes in the side of your garage to Woody Woodpecker, the cartoon character.
So to explain anything that exists, we seek to uncover its relation to one or more other things that exist. For example, "God created the physical universe" is, in principle, an acceptable explanation of the physical universe, supposing God exists.
Turning then to the set of all existing things, clearly this is not the sort of thing that can be explained. Definitionally, nothing exists outside this set, so there is nothing to which it can be related. Explanation simply does not apply to this object.
Admittedly, this is difficult for the human mind to grasp. It is in our nature to seek explanation, and since we live within a seemingly boundless field of things, we are conditioned to think that anything must have an explanation. The set of all existing things is something that can be conceived of, but it can't practically be beheld, so it's a bit difficult to reckon with. But it remains, as I have shown, that this set is not something that can be explained.
Coming back to the supposed god, the question of his existence equates to the question of whether he is among the Totality of Things. But whether or not this set includes a god, and whether or not the supposed god did indeed cause all other elements of this set, it remains the case that the Totality of Things can have no explanation. Thus for example, if the god of the Christians exists, one thing that this entity cannot do is explain why he exists.
There may perhaps be some reasons to posit a god that is separate from the physical universe and responsible for its creation, but to account for the existence of all things cannot possibly be one of them. For the supposed god himself has no explanation, unless he himself has a creator and so on ad infinitum. Personally I see no reason to posit such a god, preferring to admit into the set of existing things only those things that are actually known to exist by direct observation. Since some great set of things must be taken as sufficient unto itself, why not the Cosmos?
