RE: Justification for Foundational Belief
July 26, 2012 at 6:31 pm
(This post was last modified: July 26, 2012 at 7:30 pm by genkaus.)
(July 25, 2012 at 3:18 pm)Skepsis Wrote: The issue of foundational belief has been a tough one for me, to say the least. Avoiding post modernism and radical skepticism isn't a simple chore, as the ticket to doing so for me is to justify the seemingly unjustifiable: foundational beliefs.
Beliefs of this nature are a priori issues and include self evident belief and axioms. Descartes established personal acknowledgement of reality with the cogito, but memory, induction (as dissected by Hume), sense-perception, and interpretation of the meaning of words ( I believe it was Wittgenstein who brought light to this) are all truths that humans intuitively assume and need in order to survive as a mentally and physically healthy individual.
The justification for many foundational beliefs is fairly simple, and I personally subscribe to it. The answer that has bubbled to the surface is, "You are either with me or against me in this world. Functioning in a world you don't believe to be real isn't healthy- some could say deadly or impossible. So I will assume these truths, all the while beings receptive to new information that contradicts these beliefs."
My issue with this is that I feel like I am shifting the burden of proof, waiting to be proven wrong. I had previously thought it to also be special pleading, however foundational belief is in another class from derived belief because it is an a priori issue that takes precedence over all other forms of belief.
That has been my very limited understanding of foundationalism and is what governs my evidentialist beliefs. My question to anyone and everyone is, am I justified?
Am I justified in making an assumption on the part of foundational beliefs?
Your question doesn't make mush sense. If you are capable of asking "am I justified?", it means you have already accepted certain beliefs based on which you determine that justification might be required. Like you said - these are a-priori beliefs. A question even more basic, i.e., if any justification is possible, already has some axioms at its basis. These beliefs are inherently unjustifiable since any justification provided would lead to circular reasoning.
However, there is an indirect test for validating these axioms. As you've said, these are foundational beliefs, i.e. ones which lie at the basis of every other belief that you hold. Therefore, in order to have a rational and logical world-view, all your beliefs must satisfy two conditions a) all of them can be logically derived from the foundational beliefs and b) none of them may contradict the foundational beliefs. If you can find a single belief in your system that logically follows the foundational one and still contradicts them, you have a good reason to question your assumption.
(July 26, 2012 at 11:16 am)Skepsis Wrote: I am asking this question in hopes of attaining philosophical justification for the truth of basic belief.
Let's see if I can help you with that. As an evidentialist, I assume that the following three would be the foundational axioms of your worldview.
1. I exist.
2. Reality exists.
3. I am perceiving reality.
The first one is pretty simple. The proposition "I don't exist" is self-defeating since the "I" here is referring to an entity that does exist. This doesn't come under the purview of validation or justification because its a statement that cannot be false.
In the second, reality refers to everything that exists around you. Now, since you are looking for the "truth" of this belief, you have to ask - what does "truth" mean. Suppose I point in a direction and say "there is a tree over there", what determines if my statement is true or not is whether there actually is a tree over there. It wouldn't matter is I were blind, if there is a tree, I'm telling the truth.
Truth is determined by whether the statement corresponds to reality of things as they are. If the statement "reality exists" isn't true, then the very concept of truth has lost its meaning. The statement "reality does not exist", therefore, is automatically false.
The third is the trickiest - the most common argument against it being the "brain in the vat" scenario, or in today's date, the matrix scenario. What if all of you sensory inputs are constructs of another intelligence. First of all, this statement would not contradict any of the previous axioms - you still exist and reality still exists - there is simply a perceptual disconnect between your reality and the actual reality. However, in that case, the rules would change significantly. You don't exist in the actual reality and the actual reality doesn't exist for you. Any statements you make regarding "truths" or "justifications" or "validations" would be based on your reality. The intelligence feeding you the sensory data would bear the responsibility of making your reality consistent and non-contradictory - even if that intelligence is your own. For example, in your dreams, "your" reality is often confusing, contradictory and therefore unlivable. While this does not solve the philosophical dilemma, it still gives a handy test for making answering the question.
