The Truth; You Exist

[FallentoReason]

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The worry can be put as follows. According to orthodox Darwinism, the process of evolution is driven mainly by two mechanisms: random genetic mutation and natural selection. The former is the chief source of genetic variability; by virtue of the latter, a mutation resulting in a heritable, fitness-enhancing trait is likely to spread through that population and be preserved as part of the genome. It is fitness-enhancing behavior and traits that get rewarded by natural selection; what get penalized are maladaptive traits and behaviors. In crafting our cognitive faculties, natural selection will favor cognitive faculties and processes that result in adaptive behavior; it cares not a whit about true belief (as such) or about cognitive faculties that reliably give rise to true belief. As evolutionary psychologist Donald Sloan Wilson puts it, “the well-adapted mind is ultimately an organ of survival and reproduction” (Wilson 2002, 228). What our minds are for (if anything) is not the production of true beliefs, but the production of adaptive behavior: that our species has survived and evolved at most guarantees that our behavior is adaptive; it does not guarantee or even make it likely that our belief-producing processes are for the most part reliable, or that our beliefs are for the most part true. That is because our behavior could perfectly well be adaptive, but our beliefs false as often as true. Darwin himself apparently worried about this question: “With me,” says Darwin,

the horrid doubt always arises whether the convictions of man's mind, which has been developed from the mind of the lower animals, are of any value or at all trustworthy. Would any one trust in the convictions of a monkey's mind, if there are any convictions in such a mind? (Darwin 1887)

We can briefly state Darwin's doubt as follows. Let R be the proposition that our cognitive faculties are reliable, N the proposition that naturalism is true and E the proposition that we and our cognitive faculties have come to be by way of the processes to which contemporary evolutionary theory points us: what is the conditional probability of R on N&E? I.e., what is P(R | N&E)? Darwin fears it may be rather low.

We can state the argument schematically as follows:

1. P(R | N&E) is low.
2. Anyone who accepts N&E and sees that (1) is true has a defeater for R.
3. Anyone who has a defeater for R has a defeater for any other belief she holds, including N&E itself.
Therefore

Anyone who accepts N&E and sees that (1) is true has a defeater for N&E; hence N&E can't be rationally accepted.

Source: Plantinga (I'm pretty sure)

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Evolution and natural selection don’t care about what the truth is. We did not evolve to be able to comprehend what the truth is, but merely have the right tools just for survival. This raises the question of whether we are capable of actually knowing the truth. This can be expressed as the probability that (R | N&E) is true, which seems quite low. Therefore we are almost inclined to accept that our cognitive faculties don’t have the capabilities of knowing the truth.

From a perspective of pure reasoning, we can in fact demonstrate that our cognitive faculties are indeed capable of comprehending the truth, regardless of N&E. We can show this by the hypothetical case that if something, deemed X, is X and can also be non-X, then the truth does not exist. This is so because one cannot state the truth about the nature of X. This line of reasoning refutes itself as it shows that the argument itself is found to be true. Therefore we have shown that a) the truth exists and b) one derived this conclusion through one’s cognitive faculties. Therefore, one can comprehend the truth.

Something to realise is that although we are able to comprehend the truth, this doesn’t necessarily mean we know that we actually know the truth. For example, let’s assume that the sun has just imploded. My cognitive faculties would tell me that the sun is actually still there because the light hasn’t reached my eyes. Therefore, I don’t have sufficient information to be able to know that the sun has just imploded. Therefore, I don’t know that I don’t know the truth. I know only of the apparent truth. So, if our ability to know that we definitely know the truth is impaired by the information we receive, what can be said about our entire experience of reality? How much do we really know that is actually true? This throws into question one’s ability to know what we know is actually true.

Rene Descartes became aware of this problem and therefore started questioning his very own existence. He realised that by default there is one thing that he knew for certain to be true beyond doubt. It was in fact, his existence; ‘I think, therefore I am’. He realised that the very fact that he was able to think about whether he existed or not must mean he exists. This serves as the starting point of what one knows to be 100% true. As for the rest of reality, it seems we are at the mercy of the universe.