Talk Smart

I take you now to an overview of Hermeneutics and Linguistics as excellently defined by Glenn Miller:

Introduction Religious language is growing respectable again. It had fallen on hard times after the rise of Empiricism, being relegated to the status of "sophistry and illusion," and the forced segregation of religious language from 'this-worldly' language in Kant fairly banished it to the realm of fairy tales. If this were not enough, the positivist label of "meaningless" appeared on it for some time. Ridiculed, segregated, and stripped of value and diplomatic recognition, religious language was the persona non grata of the linguistic world. But in more recent times its worth has been re-asserted. Although still assigned to a separate "language-game", it is now placed on a par with other language games, such as science--which is quite a gain in a world where the scientist has become the religious authority! It is claimed to be the expression of "ultimate commitment" or "way of ordering experience." It is said to have hermeneutic significance to man's being. In this age, in which the messianic character of science is becoming less credible, religious language is growing in respectability.
But although its worth is again recognized, its meaningfulness is still under severe fire. Indeed, religious language is useful but not either true or false. It expresses commitment not correspondence. But religious language has always had its supporters. There have always been those who have held to and defended its cognitive status. Augustin, Anselm, Aquinas, Calvin all defended the right of religious language to claims of truth- value. And in the history of the battle, the issue of analogy was, and is, central. Macquarrie begins a discussion of analogy noting this fact:
The problem of analogy is a very old one in theological discussion, but it seems to me that it lies very near the centre of the current debates, not only about language but about God and the meaning of the basic Christian doctrines. It is probably the case that many of those engaged in these debates do not explicitly recognize the relevance of the problem of analogy to their work, and may even think that it belongs to an older way of doing theology. In any case, the tendency nowadays is to talk of 'models' rather than 'analogues'--at least amoung British theologians, perhaps influenced by Ian Ramsey. But whatever terminology may be employed, we seem driven to something very like the problem that has been traditionally considered under the heading of analogy. (1) It is interesting to note that in the above text MacQuarrie virtually equates 'model-talk' and 'analogue-talk.' This relationship is important to note in that the trilemma of equivocity, univocity, or analogy is not transcended by any model-talk that aims at cognivity. Ian G. Barbour is even more explicit in this relationship as he gives a definition of model: "A theoretical model, then, is an imagined mechanism or process, postulated by analogy with familiar mechanisms or processes and used to construct a theory to correlate a set of observations." (2) Because of this relationship, a defense of the validity of model-language of God (or science for that matter!) rests ultimately on a defense of the validity of analogical language of God (or science). But this is often simply a defense of analogy in general, over against claims of univocity of 'other' language realms.
In Defense of Analogy
With the critical importance of analogy for religious language in mind, a defense of analogy in all language may prove a sufficient ploy to cause hesitation among the skeptics long enough to allow us to pursue an investigation of the basis of analogy in theological language. If analogy should prove essential to most (if not all) areas of discourse, we can question the respective areas as to their basis for analogy, provoking them to study while we investigate our own area. This we will attempt.
Its necessity for theology can easily be shown, but this is of no weight to the critics, of course. Macquarrie has a pointed statement of its importance to theology (including non-evangelical theology): "This means that unless we can produce some reasonable account of the logic of analogy, there is no support for our other ways of talking of God, except the via negativa; and, taken in isolation, this leads straight to atheism." (3)
Science fares little better than theology does in this, as is apparent from the dependence of scientific discovery and explanation on theoretical models. Even though philosophers of science are divided on the nature of scientific models, all are agreed that they play a central role in the scientific enterprize. (4) And given the relation of model and analogy accepted above, science is seen to be also dependent on analogy in language and thought.
Theology and science are joined by philosophy at either the intellectual gallows or at the Royal Academy of Science, depending upon the reliability of analogy. Nothing could be more obvious in either the so-called non-metaphysical philosophies which focus on 'seeing as' (an explicit statement of simile !!!) or the deliberately- metaphysical thinkers. Obitts notes that
For those thinkers with metaphysical sensitivities, the 'seeing-as' approach typically develops into the view that metaphysical theories are analogies.(5) He goes on to quote Dorothy Emment:
As analogies of being, their metaphysical theories seek to say something about 'reality' transcending experience, in terms of relations found within experience. As co-ordinating analogies, they seek to relate diverse types of experience by extension of a key idea derived from some predominant intellectual or spiritual relation.(6) This dependence on analogy seems strangely unsuited to a discipline which claims to be so rigorous. Yet the dependence is there--acknowledged or not. In a recent article exploring this relation Paul de Man of Yale has expressed this question of dependency as a dilemma:
"It appears that philosophy either has to give up its own constitutive claim to rigor in order to come to terms with the figurality of its language or that it has to free itself from (figuration altogether. And if the latter is considered impossible, philosophy could at least learn to control figuration by keeping it, so to speak, in its place, by delimiting the boundaries of its influence and thus restricting the epistemological damage that it may cause."(7) The writer examines key epistemological texts from Locke, Condillac, and Kant. Finding even the distinction between the figural and the "proper" to be expressed and discussed in these philosophers in figurative terms, de Man arrives at the conclusion that it "turns out to be impossible to maintain a clear line of distinction between rhetoric, abstraction, symbol, and all other forms of language.(8) Of striking significance is his lucid conclusion at the end of the discussion of Kant's Critique of Judgment (section 59):
"If the distinction between a priori and symbolic judgments can only be stated by means of metaphors that are them- selves symbols, then Locke's and Condillac's difficulties have not been overcome. Not only our knowledge of God, to which the passage under examination returns at the end, but the knowledge of knowledge is then bound to remain symbolic." (9) Having argued that theology, science, and philosophy are all critically dependent on analogy, let me merely note other aspects of our cognitive life that are bound up with analogy.
Quine claims that all language acquisition is dependent on recognizing analogous contexts for use of a word.(10) Mascall points out that the application of the transcendental terms (i.e. being, truth, good, life, etc.) to anything requires analogy.(11) Burrell, in an excellent treatment of the subject, points out that in actuality there is no adequate division between univocal and analogous.(12) This last point comes close to saying that all language is analogical. Indeed, more and more research is pointing in that direction.(13) A quote by Cassirer is representative of much linguistic study on the issue:
"But if this is indeed the case--if metaphor, taken in this general sense, is not just a certain development of speech, but must be regarded as one of its essential conditions--then any effort to understand its function leads us back, once more, to the fundamental form of verbal conceiving." (14) Some Observations
If analogy is an inescapable literary feature of language, then it becomes epistemologically necessary. In the Biblical worldview this necessity is correlated with man's ontological structure. Hence, we are built to function in this way--another aspect of our ontological status as derivative persons (imago dei).
The very concept of univocity in a referential act can be seen as a special case of analogy. This was, in substance, the remark of Quine above. In the case of naming the same type of object on two separate occasions, the objects are not identical, but are still properly called the term. The same term (formally) is applied to two different contexts If it be objected that this is not a change in the modus significandi, the objector would be hard pressed to even explain this charge. Mascall has explored this in his famous example of 'cabbage- life' and 'human-life'.(15) In applying the term 'life' to both cabbages and men, who could univocally delineate what the difference is, in the modi of cabbage and men? The only way to distinguish the modi significandi is by using the phrases "according to cabbage-ness" and "according to human-ness." Mascall recognizes the problem as one of infinite regress and tries to solve it by balancing an analogy of attribution with an analogy of proportion. This solution has not reduced the concept any further, of course.
What emerges from this argumentative path, is that all predication using a generic term is analogy.(16) If this is granted, then the univocal cases of predication (N.B. not definition) are only 'apparently univocal' cases. And once analogy is allowed to stand as epistemologically legitimate--by default-- then no point in heaven or earth is safe from analogical description.
Epistemological certainty might be understood in this reference frame. The model concept in science is often associated with 'epistemological immediacy' and vividness. Ramsey's phrase "when the penny drops" points to the self- authenticating character of mediated concepts. Although development of a full-blown epistemology is far beyond the scope of this paper (and probably of its author as well), this area of discussion could provide fertile ideas for such a development. Such a system would certainly contain the following basics:
All predication and understanding involve analogy-: a univocal generic and an irreducible modus significandi;
Epistemic certainty is mediated by analogy that relates closest to our apprehension of the modus (i.e. relates to the felt character of human existence);
These analogies could hit the modus by which we process language (basis for 'deduction' and deductive certainty) or the modus by which we navigate through the sea of other objectivities (i.e. basis for 'induction' and inductive certainty);
Apparently univocal predication and abstract calculi would be seen as cases of "ellipical analogy" in which the structures were analogous to other disciplines (e.g. geometry) and the contents were filled inductively.
The "simple ideas" which were so problematic for Locke, in that they were foundational but not definable, would be understood here as cases of analogy wherein the univocal element was only a 'naming' of the corresponding modus significandi; as such they would defy univocal specification yet provide epistemic vividness and immediacy in its reference to the defining traits of our analogical, derivative existence; and lastly
No matter how far we pressed precision in analogy by defining and describing new aspects of experience, all work at the boundaries of predication would remain analogical, as the figurative terms used to discuss epistemology and philosophy of language, for examples, show; but in this system this would no longer hinder the pursuit of certainty, but rather explain the nature of that truth and certainty.
Whether or not this proposal could stand bears little relation to the point that generated the above propositions. The point was that if certainty could be mediated through analogy, then the notion of a certain knowledge of God, cognitively mediated through language might be possible.
A simple but significant observation is that the validity of analogical predication is undeniable. If all language using generics (whether explicit, semantic ones such as nouns, or implicit, syntactical ones such as grammatical conventions) is analogical, then any statement denying analogy would be self-stultifying. So a skeptic can no longer legitimately deny a knowledge of God because of the analogical character of God-talk, Rather, he is now forced to object that the analogy we use is an improper one (implying that there may be a proper one somewhere and the knowledge required to judge propriety!).
This understanding of analogy as composed of a generic, transcategorical, univocal element and an undefinable irreducible modus significandi, also provides a base from which to understand the common epistemic basis of all disciplines. Analogy allows a statement such as "that statement is true" to apply to all "realms" of statements such as ethics, meta-physics, science. And coupled with the linguistic tool of transformational grammar, we see analogy as providing a base context for even discussing other more specific "contexts of meaning" (Nygren) and a language-game in which to discuss specific other "language-games" (Wittgenstein). Each area of more specificity would be descriptive of a set of analogical statements with similar modi.
It is important to realize that all future penetration into the subject of analogy will presuppose the validity of analogy as a truth-vehicle. This is similar (if not integral) to the facts that any discussion of epistemology presupposes its validity and that any discussion of the ability of language to convey correspondent truth presupposes that.
The Character of Analogy
(In the light of our above observation, it is interesting to note that the inescapability of analogy is demonstrated in the title, or any paraphrase thereof, of this section.)
The essential elements in an analogy are the univocal definition (generic) and the specific application. These elements can be seen in relation in Geisler's statement:
"For generic concepts are univocal when abstracted but analogical when asserted of different things, as man and dog are equally animal but are not equal animals. That is, "animal" is defined the same way (say, as "a sentient being"), but animality is predicated differently of Fido and of Socrates. Socrates possesses animality in a higher sense than Fido does.(17) In this statement we see that all predication involving generics involves analogy, for all generics are, by definition, univocal. When the concept of the generic is correlated with the theory of verbal types, there does not appear to be any a priori reason to distinguish between finite and infinite as belonging to the class. (18) The class is defined only by the decisive traits, not how they are "possessed" by those objects. And if someone argues that the "how" can be placed into the generic term, then (1) a higher level generic term can be found in which that particularity can be transcended (bringing the problem up again) and (2) we can press the arguer to specify univocally the content of the "how" (without generics!).
If, then, analogy does not preclude the class of infinite typological "targets" by definition or nature, then infinite- talk is not really "extension of finite language to infinite concepts." Both finite and infinite analogical language may stand on the same ground of legitimacy. In fact, it can be forcefully argued that the finite references are parasitic on the infinite references. St. Augustin was one of the first to argue this and Aquinas defined his ascription of simple perfections to God in similar fashion.(19) Packer assets this point by arguing that such "extension" is really the function of language (and hence not extension proper):
By depicting God as the first language user, Genesis shows us that human thought and speech have their counterparts and archetypes in Him. By telling us of Adam, ~ve, and their descendents listening and responding to God, Genesis shows us that references to the Creator do not 'stretch' ordinary language in an unnatural way; rather such 'stretching' is actuality language's primary use.(20) (Notice that Barth's basic disavowal of analogy as being an extension of the human into the divine falls to the ground within this context. (21))
The Basis for Analogy
The basis of analogy is well-known to be similarity or likeness. (MacQuarrie's view of affinity is not strong enough to provide the univocal basis of the generic.(22)) But even the basis of analogy cannot be discussed without the use of analogy. For example, in the concept of "likeness" or "similarity" the concept is one of "possession" of identical "properties" So it may be that in investigation of the basis we may end in only uncovering another necessary presupposition to language (i.e. similarity as basis for analogy).
Now the notion of "similarity" is surprisingly deceptive, for as often as you attempt to define it, you invariably come up with something like "the basis for analogous predication"! Imagine the following dialogue:
A: "How would you define 'similarity' kind sir?"
B: "Well...similarity is when two objects have something in common."
A: "Oh, so it is a time period, eh?"
B: "No, No. Similarity is a relationship. Its a relation between objects that have a common property"
A: "Oh, like gravity. Its a relation between two objects both having mass in common, eh?"
B: "No, no, not that kind of 'between' relation. Its more the fact that each entity has the same property."
A: "I think I see...similarity is a proposition stating that two objects have a common property, eh?"
B: "Not quite...similarity is not linguistic but ontological--more a state of affairs reflected by the proposition"
A: "This is a little confusing, sir. You tell me it is an ontological state but you cannot define it other than by referring to affirmation of its reality. All it thus seems to be is a reason for making the affirmation. Try an example, instead. What is the similarity between a green leaf and a green shirt?"
B: "The similarity is that they both possess 'greeness'."
A: "Wait a minute...What is the last part of your statement but two disjoint, unrelated predications--'the leaf is green' and 'the shirt is green'--merged together using transformational grammar? You seem to be saying that a similarity is the reason for joining the two predications--'A has x' and 'B has x'--into the logical form 'A and B have x'. A basis for applying conjunction and the distributive law on the linguistic form? You seem to be saying only that similarity is the ontological basis for making analogical statements. Have you said anything different than this?"
B: "I don't suppose so, but I thought I meant more than that when we began this discussion. Hmm...are you any kin to that rascally fellow Socrates...?"
The point is that similarity presupposes analogy and vice versa.
If we know that we can speak analogically of x and y, then we can posit a similarity, even if we cannot specify or conceptualize the point of identity beyond what is already stated in the predications. To affirm 'similarity' is thus only to affirm an analogy. But notice this important fact: similarity if entirely independent of the other properties of the relata. This means that the modus significandi (corresponding to the modus essendi) in an analogy does not affect the ontological similarity--the modi are not considered in the univocal element of the generic.
Similarity of God and the World
The first thing to note here is an observation from the above conclusion. Similarity can exist regardless of the diversity of the modus essendi. That means that God can be similar to the world even though He is infinite and archetypal and the world finite and ektypal.
With this in mind, the acute necessity of similarity as expressed by Lyttkens need not cause alarm:
"The theological significance of analogy may be summarized by saying that some connexion between God and the world is essential. We are then speaking of the analogy based on and implying a real likeness between God and creation.(23) There have been throughout the history of Christian thought many attempts to explicate the similarity of God and the world. Lyttkens does a good job in tracing changing conceptions of this from Augustin through Anselm, Alexander of Hales, Bonaventura, Albertus Magnus and finally St. Thomas. He points out that Augustin based his analogy (i.e. affirmation of similarity) on the concept of the creature's participatio in God.(24) Anselm was the first to use analogy as a formal category and Alexander of Hales tied participatio to the cause-effect relation.(25) Bonaventura was the first to distinguish Modus from res but it was Albertus Magnus (St. Thomas' mentor) who taught that 'all that exists in anything does so in accordance with its special mode (modus) of existence.' (26).
When we arrive at St. Thomas, we see him using several types of analogy and basing the similarity squarely upon the fact that the effects pre-exists in the cause.(27) This doctrine has come under attack often, forcing a careful statement of the position. A philosopher sympathetic to Thomist thought has offered this careful and precise statement:
"In summation, the analogy between creature and Creator based on causality is secured only because God is the principal, intrinsic, essential, efficient cause of the being and perfections of the world. In any other kind of causal relationship an analogical similarity would not necessarily follow. But in an analogy of being similarity must follow, for being communicates only being, and perfections or kinds of being do not arise from an imperfect being. Existence produces only after its kind, viz. other existences. (28) In this scheme, the transcendentals (ens, res, unum, aliquid, verum, bonum) are not only in God but are God. That is, God's essence is the standard or reference point for being, truth, life, etc. Personal predicates (wise, holy-, etc.) are likewise intrinsic to God, but not just in that God is wise or holy but that His character is wisdom or holiness. As ontologically ultimate, He is the epistemologically univocal. Thus the perfections of the creature find their standard and definition in the character of God--a univocal point. But the efficient (as opposed to material) causality of God creates the differences in the modi significandi.
Whereas Thomist thought related everything back to God as Cause, later Reformed Scholastics related everything back to God as Intellect. We find statements like this: "The divine ideas of the things created are forms existing in the divine mind from eternity, not really distinct from the divine essence, but which are actually the same as the divine essence." (29) While this comes dangerously close to making the forms eternal and necessary, still this does provide formal similarity of creature and Creator. (How the problems are handled would be of critical importance, of course.)
This idea, if placed into a Thomist frame of God's self- knowledge, would imply that God's knowledge of Himself (and hence of the world as pre-existing in the Cause) produced forms in God's intellect that were structurally identical with created reality. How could this be?
If God's intellect knows the effects (including their form) because He knows Himself as their cause, then this knowledge of the creation is included in but is not identical to, God's self-knowledge. In other words God's essence includes the potential (not potency) for ad extra works--potential for creating (i.e. hypostasizing or reifying) relations. Since the creature cannot be related to God's essence (or it would be necessarily existent and hence God), it is related to God's intellect/will as Designer/Chooser from among other possible worlds. With an infinite number of possible worlds, God's essence then includes the forms of all possible worlds. Thus God's essence can be seen as including infinite potential for ad extra works (to be distinguished from Thomist potency/act categories) and hence, self-knowledge would include the forms (identical with essence) of this created reality. The similarity is shown to reside in the knowledge which God has of Himself--the ultimate reference point of all predication.
Although there may be better ways to configure this situation, the point seems clear. The Thomist cause/effect scheme provides for similarity between the essence of God and the creature; the relation between God's intellect and nature provides the univocal point for analogy. And the creation of derivative subjectivities and objectivities after the pattern existing in the divine essence and actualized by the decision of the Intellect, created the access path of analogy by creation of the first different modus essendi.
Conclusion
All language and knowledge is analogical. We are analogical beings, ontologically and epistemologically, created by a God who 'theomorphized'. Skeptics who would repudiate religous language as being 'only analogical' must now try another tack. They- too use analogy in every generic statement and to provide an ontic basis for this is very difficult in the skeptic's anti-theist system! This relegation of all language to analogy is not loss but gain to the believer, for although it might seem to undermine some univocal statements, it rather guarantees a univocal element in all discourse. A special language of God is not required.
Similarity is seen to be the basis of analogy and only univocal definition can orient us to the content of the identity. The similarity of God to the world can be seen in different perspectives, with God as Cause and Intellect providing an adequate basis for analogical religious language.
The believer need not wear the 'persecuted minority' group feeling. Both he and his language of God fit in an analogical universe.
ENDNOTES:
1. John MacQuarrie, God-Talk: An Examination of the Language and Logic of Theology (London: SCM Press Ltd, 1967), reprinted by Seabury Press in 1979, page 212.
2. Ian G. Barbour, Myths, Models, and Paradigms, (New York: Harper and Row, 1974),p. 30.
3. MacQuarrie, pp. 214-5.
4. Barbour, pp.29-48.
5. Stanly Obitts, "The Meaning and Use of Religious Language" in Gundry and Johnson, Tensions in Contemporary Theology (Chicago: Moody Press, 1976), p.133.
6. Dorothy Emment, The Nature of Metaphysical Thinking (London: Macmillan, 1957),page 215, cited in Gundry and Johnson, Tensions, p.133.
7. Paul de Man, "The Epistemology of Metaphor" in Sheldon Sacks' On Metaphor (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1978), p.11.
8. de Man, p.26.
9. ibid.
10. William van Orman Quine, "A Postscript on Metaphor" in Sacks, On Metaphor, p.160.
11. Eric Mascall, "The Doctrine of Analogy" in Religious Language and the Problem of Religious Knowledge, edited by Ronald E. Santoni (Bloomington,Ind.: Indiana University press, 1968), pp. 157-158.
12. David Burrell, Analogy and Philosophical Language (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1973) ,p.220.
13. see the entire volume referenced above in note 7.
14. Ernst Cassirer in Language and Myth, cited in the forward to Sacks On Metaphor.
15, Mascall, pp. 161ff.
16. It could even be argued (if one were willing to tackle Heraclitus) that proper names also were analogous when applied to the same being who was never exactly the same twice. Defenders of univocal predication would have to answer Heraclitus first.
17. Norman Geisler, Philosophy of Religion, (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1974),p.281.
18. E.D.Hirsh, Validity in Interpretation (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967), pp. 49ff.
19. Hampus Lyttkens, The Analogy between God and the World: An Investigation of its Background and Interpretation of its Use by Thomas of Aquino (Uppsala: Almquist and Wiksells Boktwyckeri AB, 1952) ,p.120; Battista Mondin, The Principle of Analogy in Protestant and Catholic Theology (The Hague: Nijhoff, 1963) pp.95-96.
20. J.I. Packer, "The Adequacy of Human Language" in Geisler's (ed.) Inerrancy (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1979), p.214.
21. This objection is summarized in MacQuarrie, P.48.
22. MacQuarrie, P.220.
23. Lyttkens, p.477.
24. ibid, pp.113-120.
25. ibid, pp.122-124.
26. ibid, pp.150,154.
27. Mondin, pp.85-87.
28. Geisler, Philosophy of Religion, P.285.
29. Heinrich Heppe, Reformed Dogmatics (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1978) ,p.192.

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Self-Stultifying Arguments (Unfinished)
[A MAJOR disclaimer!The following material is VERY tentative at this point, was written several years ago, and lacks the rigor and precision that is in its future. I have NOT incorporated precise terminology for the components of speech acts, conversational implicature, theory of abstract objects at this point. There are many iterations of critique that I will go through on this material, but I consider the basic approach to be worthy of research. (I recently 12/94 found a published reference with a similar approach--Karl Otto-Apel "The Problems of Philosophical Foundations in light of a Transcendental Pragmatics of Language" in Philosophy: End or Transformation? (eds. Baynes, Bohman, McCarthry: MIT, 1993)
There is also material that I have just started digesting in Stephen Bartlett's Reflexivity: A Source Book in Self-Reference, North-Holland, 1992. His work validates the general approach of this 'schoolboy' paper, and has many more examples as well as a pointer to a bibliography of over 1,200 works on self-reflexivity. Many/most of these examples, btw, will be exempt from the standard Tarski-esque responses.
As such, I welcome ALL feedback, biblio references, and pointers/advice from those working in this area. Thanks.]
Let's Start with Breakfast...Imagine the following comical scenario.
A fellow Earthman runs up to you, with glazed and feverish eyes, and proceeds to explain how he has discovered a fundamental and absolute truth about himself. When you ask him to tell you this awesome truth, he blurts out this: "The fundamental truth is that I cannot pronounce or write the word 'breakfast'!" You are not sure you heard him correctly, and so you ask him to write the truth down on a sheet of paper. He then writes legibly on the sheet: "I cannot pronounce or write the word 'breakfast'."
There is something obviously wrong here (other than the fact that the guy's elevator doesn't go all the way to the top floor!) and what the obvious wrong is is clear--the speaker contradicted himself in the process of speaking. He rendered his 'truth' ineffective--he stultified himself.
This is a special case of reductio ad absurdum -- but the absurdity was that "what he said" (the words, pronunciation, the speech act itself) contradicted the "what he said" (the content, the intention, the meaning).
Now let's generalize this type of argument.
The Nature of Self-Stultifying StatementsA self-stultifying statement is a statement that contradicts:
itself;
the case it advances as proof (if any);
the presuppositions inherent in the subject matter being discussed;
the presuppositions inherent in the speech act.Let's illustrate these cases with a simple example.
Case 1: Contradicting itself ("Even though a horse is black, it is not black.")
Case 2: Contradicting the proof ("This black horse is not black")
Case 3: Contradicting the subject matter ("This horse is black half of the time"--horses don't change color often.)
Case 4: Contradicting the speech act ("I am a black horse"--semantic acts, of the English variety at least, are not performed by horses.)Cases 1 and 2 do not occur very often, and Case 3 often produces "standard" reductio ad absurdum refutations. Case 4, however, is not as obvious (except with the guy who couldn't say 'breakfast'). Case 4 requires 'unpacking' of the presuppositions in speaking or discourse or language or communication, to see if what is being said (explicitly in the statement) is contradicting what is being said (implicitly in the presuppositions).
One last example before we turn to history for a moment.
Try "All sentences are meaningless." The obvious question to ask here is "including this one?" The statement (no meaning) contradicts the presupposition (sentences are adequate vehicles for meaning). The position is self-stultifying. It cannot be even stated without contradicting itself--it 'pulls the rug out from under itself.' This contradiction will necessarily arise from this statement, and the obvious thing learned is that it is impossible to deny that 'some sentences are meaningful.' This is the value of looking for self-stultifying arguments -- we find undeniable truths or absolutes. We may not be able to produce an air-tight proof for the position, but the fact that they cannot be denied at all can be seen as such a proof.
This is a clear example of Type #4 (contradicting the presuppositions in the speech act). Speakers normally presuppose that their utterances convey meaning (we will explore this more when we get to Zen) before they 'go around uttering them.'
We need to articulate some of these speech-act presuppositions at this point. Each semantic act (sentence, paragraph, chapter) is a semantic unit. As such, the beginning of the unit forms the context for each succeeding part of the unit. The context must be retained (by the reader/audience), building until the end, in order for the unit to have its intended meaning. The semantic unit presupposes an audience -- either an actual audience, or a theoretical one (we fashion our word choices and structure with an intended audience in mind).
Examples From HistoryThere are three examples in history that illustrate usage of this type of argument: Aristotle, the Verification Principle of the Logical Positivists, and the Liar's Paradox.
Aristotle, in The Metaphysics IV.4, is discussing the principle of Contradiction/Non-contradiction. This principle says that one cannot say that something is both A and non-A at the same time. Aristotle argues that this principle does not need proof, because it cannot be argued against. Let's look at his argument in three parts:
Part I: "We can, however, demonstrate negatively even that this view is impossible, if our opponent will only say something; and if he says nothing, it is absurd to seek to give an account of our views to one who cannot give an account of anything, in so far as he cannot do so. For such a man, as such, is from the start no better than a vegetable." In part I, Aristotle argues that we can demonstrate the truth of the principle of non-contradiction if the opponent will only say something. In other words, if he commits a speech-act, we can show the truth of the principle. (Aristotle closes the part with a little Ad Hominum (or should we say Ad Vegetablum) slur.)
Part II: "Now negative demonstration I distinguish from demonstration proper, because in a demonstration one might be thought to be begging the question, but if another person is responsible for the assumption we shall have negative proof, not demonstration." Here Aristotle argues that a proper demonstration/proof of non-contradiction would itself assume the principle of non-contradiction ("begs the question"). And that, whoever brings the assumption up, provides us with the negative proof.
Part III: "the starting-point for all such arguments is not the demand that our opponent shall say that something either is or is not (for this one might perhaps take to be a begging of the question, but that he shall say something with is significant both for himself and for another..." Aristotle finishes this argument by pointing out that it is not important what the person says (content), but that he says anything at all (commits a speech-act). This is, at its heart, a refutation by self-stultification.
The Verification Principle for the Logical Positivists is another interesting example in history. Logical Positivism was an early 20th-century philosophical school of thought that was decidedly anti-metaphysical. It scorned statements like "reality is spiritual" or "beauty is significant form" as being cognitively empty. It advances its famous Verification Principle as a way of determining whether statements were cognitively meaningful or meaningless.
The principle basically said that for a statement to be meaningful it must either be 1) analytic (tautological) or; 2) empirically verifiable. This principle was mainly used in its second case (empirically verifiable) to dismiss all "non-scientific" claims as being neither true nor false, but rather, nonsensical.
There were (and are) many, many criticisms and restatements of this principle; so many perhaps that it might be argued that it "died the death of a thousand qualifications." Our focus here, however, is simply on one of these criticisms: that the principle was self-stultifying. When the principle was 'turned back on itself,' it proved to be neither analytic nor empirically verifiable. It basically rendered itself meaningless!
The Liar's Paradox is one of the best known and most celebrated of the logical paradoxes. It shows up in various forms in intelligence tests, for example. The basic paradox goes as follows:
"The statement I am now making is false."The 'paradox' in this can be seen by developing the outcomes. If the statement is true, then it is false. If it is false, then it must be true. This is a circularly-destructive statement.
Another form of this, closer to Aristotle's type of refutation, would be as follows:
A person who always lies, says "what I am now saying is true."In this instance the 'contradiction' is between the character of the speaker (always speaking falsely) and the content of the statement (speaking truly this once).
(The Liar's paradox has been the study of many an epistemologist and many a semanticist. There is no commonly accepted 'solution' to it.)
Self-Stultification and Critical ThinkingThe point of developing the ability to detect self-stultifying arguments is to be able to construct Aristotle's 'negative demonstrations' of truth-claims. If an epistemological position (or political or semantic or whatever position) can be shown to be self-stultifying, then it cannot be even advanced for serious consideration. We can then proceed to draw the implications of this inability as a 'negatively demonstrated' absolute. This will not help us at all in verifying or falsifying any position which passes this test, of course, but as we shall see, it will narrow the field considerably, if we use it correctly.
What this amounts to is the ability to stop an argument before it launches and to draw conclusions (negative demonstrations) from that 'stopping.' What we end up with are absolutes--in the sense of undeniables, not ultimates--in human language!
Practice Test One (or "Fun with Sentences")Let's examine several examples to see this work out in various forms.
No Truth: "There is no such thing as truth." Then, obviously, this sentence is not true, and therefore, there really might be something like truth. You should recognize this as a slight variation of the Liar's Paradox, akin to "all sentences are false." (This assumes that the statement is not about truth as having some type of ontological/physical/metaphysical existence; in which case our approach does not generally apply.) Implication: It is undeniable that some sentences are true.
No Certainty. "You can never know anything for sure." Does the speaker know that for sure? If he does, then it is self-stultifying. If the speaker doesn't know it for sure, then maybe some things can be known for sure. Implication: It is undeniable that some things can be known for sure--certainty is possible.
Sentences and Reality. "Sentences never describe reality, only the speaker's mental states." When we turn this back on itself, the question is obvious: does that sentence say anything at all about sentences or is it only about the speaker's state of mind?! (You should be able to see the pattern emerging by now: any sentence saying something about all sentences is saying something about itself.) Implication: .It is undeniable that sentences can describe reality.
Generalizations. "All generalizations are false." As a sentence of the "all X are..." form, this is itself clearly a generalization. And...we net out with a lair's paradox again--"all generalizations are false (including this one)."
The Next Level -- More Epistemological ExamplesKant-an-Sich. "Something exists external to ourselves, but they cannot be known--only phenomena from them can be known." In the Kantian world, the objects around us 'send out data' towards us as knowers. This data is called phenomena and only this data can we know--we can never get back to the real object itself. Now, applying the self-stultification theme to this statement/position, we ask: "does this statement describe the objects or just phenomena?" The position distances itself from both the things and the phenomena, and in so doing, stultifies itself--it makes knowledge claims about both phenomena and objects. Implication: It is undeniable that we can know objects, and not just their phenomena.
Dewey. "Truth is only that after verification." This is a similar to the Verification Principle. If you apply it back onto itself, it stultifies itself. Is Dewey's statement only true after verification, or is it simply an indefensible definition? Is it not making any truth claims? In other words, Dewey is trying to set up a criterion for truth--before verification! If truth is only truth after verification, then Dewey's statement is not true. Implication:. It is undeniable that there can be truth statements that are 'true' prior to verification.
Marx. "Thought is a reflex of the brain for material life processes related to economics." The problem with all types of 'brain-reflex' positions is that the thoughts produced are related only to the knower's brain, and not at all to the objects 'being known.' Theoretically, I could have a brain-reflex about a cat being in front of me at any time, whether or not a cat was actually in front of me. When we apply Marx's statement back on itself, we arrive at the conclusion that his thought has no relation to reality, but only to the state of Marx's brain at that point. The statement cannot be describing 'real thought' because it is merely about brain-reflexes, not about 'real thoughts.' Implication: It is undeniable that thought is not solely a brain reflex.
(Note also that this applies to any position that says that thought-about-something is a product of something other than the object-being-thought-about. If I construct a position "Thought is not a function of an external object, but of my X" the criticism applies to it mercilessly. The "X" can be anything other than the object-itself and the criticism applies:
My Brain-reflex-in-relation-to-Economics (Marx)
My social programming (Social Constructionists)
My mood at the time
My gender/race/religion
My position on the Globe
The SPF of the sunscreen I am wearingIf the thought is not dependent on the external object (in some direct way), then its truth claims about the object are irrelevant at best.
Universalism. "All worldviews are true." How about the worldview that says "no worldviews are true"--is it true as well? This obviously cannot be the case. This is the inverse of a form of the Liar's paradox -- 'all worldviews are false.' Notice that the generalizations 'all are true' and 'all are false' cancel one another out, leaving only their implications around. Implication: It is undeniable that some worldviews might be false, and that some worldviews might be true.
Predatory Paradigms. "In the final analysis, there is no truth, only perception. We are all trapped in the walls of our own paradigms, and there are no doors." This is a position in considerable vogue today. Paradigms are 'ways at looking at things,' a set of rules, of expectations, of frameworks. They are very similar to models or extended analogies and are extremely useful in science, in art, and in explanation ('its a lot like X'). The problem is that idol-creating man likes to take something of power (bulls, angels, money, moons, paradigms) and make them into gods with absolute power. It is no exception here--paradigms are seen as absolute in reach and almost oppressively restricting (a la Genesis 3:2-4). From a self-stultification standpoint, the problem is simple: what paradigm allows us to discuss paradigms? The above statement actually includes two problems. The first one is in its first sentence--if there is no truth, obviously that statement is not true (we have seen this before, remember). The second is in the second sentence--if we are trapped in our paradigm, how can we escape it momentarily to objectively see that paradigm? Being trapped in such a paradigm would mean access to only perceived truth, not 'real' truth -- the Kantian problem. The position ultimately destroys itself in its relativistic starting point. Implication: It is undeniable that some paradigms may give access to 'real truth' and not just to perception.
Truth and Propositions. "Truth cannot be expressed in propositions-- it can only be experienced and/or pointed to." (This actually should be in the beginner section, but I thought I would wait to let you pounce on this one!) To utter a proposition, claiming to be true, that truth cannot be stated in propositions, is a perfect example of self-stultification. Implication: It is undeniable that truth can be expressed in propositions.
Cognition versus Emotion. "Truth is not something you know--it's something you feel." This is simply a combination of the preceding (truth is non-propositional) and of the brain-reflex case (truth is related to me, not to the object known). The self-stultification is obvious: how can you know that truth is not something you know? Is the author simply 'feeling' that truth is not knowable? Implication: It is undeniable that truth has cognitive content.
Coherence Theory of Truth. "Truth is not correspondence to some state of affairs, but simply logical consistency within a set of statements or calculus." The message here is that statements are not true because they describe something in reality (states of affairs), but because they do not contradict other statements which are assumed to be true. (We will explore this more in depth in later sections.) There are several problems with the position, but we want to focus only on the self-stultification problems here. And the problem should be obvious: to use a sentence, claiming to be true, to describe a state of affairs (sentences being true or not) and then deny that truth is not related to 'states of affairs' is viciously self-defeating. Implication: It is undeniable that statements referring to states of affairs can be true.
Deus Obscurus. "God is indescribable, beyond the reach of our puny language and logic." If this looks strangely like "Breakfast is indescribable, beyond the reach of our puny language" it is because it is! It is 'highly irregular' (if not pure self-stultification) to 'describe God' as being 'indescribable.' Enough said. Implication: It is undeniable that anything (God, breakfast, concepts) can be described, at least minimally.
Exploring the Speech ActThe preceding examples all had words like truth, sentence, knowledge, thought, worldview, and generalization. In these cases, it is clear how to 'turn the argument back onto itself.' The statement itself was a member of the class of statements being referred to in the statement. If the statement's subject was 'all sentences,' then that subject (the class of all sentences) obviously included the statement itself (as a sentence, it was a member of that class).
All of these were fairly obvious, but these examples illustrate various and different 'parts' of the speech act:
P01: All of the statements were sentences.
P02: All of the statements implicitly claimed to be true.
P03: All of the statements 'were about' or referred to something outside of themselves.
P04: All of the statements were linguistic expressions of an author's thought.
P05: All of the statements implicitly claimed to be something the author knew.
P06: All of the statements made a generalization about a universal class.Most of these 'parts' were implicit or assumed in the examples, and actually provided us with 'a place to stand' in examining each argument for self-stultification. But what are some other assumptions in the speech act, and where might they lead us? Let's look at some more, and construct self-stultifying positions from them:
P07: All of the statements used words.We could easily construct the following statements as examples of self-stultification:
"All words are misleading."
"Words don't point to things, they are merely 'grunts' of our emotive state."
"Common language is inadequate to describe reality."
"Only mathematical terms (as opposed to words) are precise."Let's expand P07 into:
P08: All of the statements used more than one word, and at least two of the words were different.This may seem a bit trivial, but it has some surprising implications. Take, for example, the following position:
"All differences are illusionary."The fact that different words were necessary to construct the position, and that those differences were essential to even making the statement, stultifies the position. Implication: It is undeniable that real differences 'exist.'
I remember well the first time I experienced this line of reasoning. I was in another epistemological discussion, this time with a Ph.D in anthropology. She was vigorously defending a Zen version of the Eastern philosophy of maya--that all differences were illusionary--and that these illusionary differences actually stopped us from seeing the 'real truth' of oneness. I drew her to the implication that, if that were the case, then the very language she used to articulate her position added to the problem. In other words, she multiplied these 'illusionary differences' with her every sentence and in so doing, actually hindered our progress toward "awareness of oneness." I pointed out that if language did so lead us away from the 'real truth,' then the voluminous Vedic literature that she based her beliefs on were major contributors to the problem (not to mention the confusion her lengthy doctoral dissertation must have caused!).
Now let's try another.
P09: All of the statements had an author.
This generates some interesting self-stultification positions:
"I do not exist."
"I am a horse."
"People do not exist."
"Nothing exists."The first of these has particular relevance to my very first epistemic debate. It could have gone like this:He: How do you even know you exist?!
Me: Because it is self-stultifying for me to assert that I do not.(Notice this would not answer the question "how do I even know you exist?" -- although we will examine this later.)
Let's try one more before we go on to the advanced examples.
P10: All of the statements had an intended audience.There are a couple of points to be made about this. First, the author always has an intended audience in mind--it determines what language he uses, how technical the terms are, what the slant of the argument takes, what assumptions can be agreed on, and so forth. This is independent of whether or not the argument is actually delivered to anyone. (Even if the author were the last person alive on the planet, he would still presuppose an audience for each utterance.) Secondly, this applies only to the types of statements (philosophical positions) we are discussing here--not rhetorical questions or artistic soliloquy (although it may be perfectly applicable to those cases). Third, this makes statements into social events, subject to shared external norms of linguistic usage. Fourth, language has a dynamic character and has the means to create new expressions and phrases within itself to address virtually any possibility or concept. It can create extremely narrow/precise expressions, or very general/abstractive notions.
What are some self-stultification positions from this?
"Other minds don't exist" (or "have never existed")
"Communication is impossible"
"All languages are private, not shared"
"Knowledge can only come from yourself, not from others" Let's look at two examples in a little more detail; one, from Lewis Carroll, and the other from older anthropology textbooks.
In Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass, Alice has a linguistic skirmish with Humpty Dumpty (Acting Ultimate Reference Point for All Predication). He: There's glory for you.
She: I don't know what you mean by 'glory' there.
He: When I use the word 'glory' I mean 'knock-down argument.'
She: But 'glory' doesn't mean that!
He: When I use it, it does.
She: The question is whether you can make a word mean anything you want.
He: No, the question is who's to be the master, that's all (he said with a contemptuous smile).HD hit the issue on the head--who controls the language, the speaker or the language. The answer is obviously not the speaker-only. The language itself exerts force and control over the statements, even thought we can create the desired expression out its building block material. Implication: It is undeniable that this statement is a shared, and publicly accessible act.
The second example comes from older college anthropology textbooks. In discussing the power of culture and language over man's thought, the example is often given about some tribe somewhere that doesn't have a word for the human wrist. The most precise word they have is 'forearm.' This example is unfortunately used as proof that they do not even have a concept of 'wrist' or that they cannot 'know' anything about it.
I have two problems with this. The first is that they have obviously deified culture by ascribing absolute power and immutability to it. The second is that every language has the ability to refine and narrow a concept by continuing to heap adjectives, adverbs, and other phrases on top of one another. In the case of wrist, it is so simple to create a phrase like 'that section of the forearm at the end by the hand, in which resides the joint that allows the hand to move at an angle to the forearm, etc.' until the meaning is obvious. Implication: It is undeniable that language provides enough flexibility for an author to express his position.
Storming Small Fortresses...With this methodology of searching the individual speech act for points of contact with the content of that individual speech act, let's try some advanced examples.
Heraclitus' Unchanging Sentence. "All things are in flux--nothing is the same from moment to moment." Heraclitus was, of course, the waterproof philosopher of ancient Greece (not to be confused with the waterproof captain of the Nautilus)--he couldn't step into the same river twice, because it never was the same river twice. Everything in Heraclitus' world changed ever-so-slightly from moment to moment, and therefore, was never the same (and couldn't be called by the same word). So Heraclitus' position was that time changes everything, and that nothing stays the same even for an instant.
How can we apply this back onto his position to test for self-stultification? Where is 'time' in the speech act of Heraclitus' position? There is 'time' in at least two elements. Speech acts occur at specific times (e.g., noon on Friday, the 3rd day of 505 B.C.) and speech acts take time to deliver, in that the words flow sequentially and after one another. It is this second element that freezes Heraclitus in this tracks.
In a sentence, each successive word builds on the accumulated context of the preceding words. This growing context narrows the range of possible meanings for each word until the end of the sentence is reached. If the words uttered in the first few micro-seconds of a sentence were ever changing, we would never get a context for the end of the sentence. We would never get closure. We would never get to a meaning for the statement. Hence, Heraclitus could never articulate his position. Self-stultification. (Notice that Heraclitus' problem is not how long a time, but the presence of time at all.) Implication: It is undeniable that some things can remain constant through some periods of time.
Historical Knowledge. "You can never know what happened in the past." This is a basic position of skepticism in historical knowledge. There is an implicit belief that only knowledge of the immediate present is possible and certain, and that as soon as something slips into the past, it becomes less certain as less "unknowable."
Many of you will have already attacked and dismembered this one, based upon the arguments against Heraclitus. The obvious approach is to apply the 'through-time' character of the speech act back onto itself. In other words, by the time the author gets to the word "past" in the sentence, where are the preceding words (and context)?--obviously in the unknowable past!
This type of reasoning would obviously apply to similar arguments against memory. (Some might make a distinction between the immediate past and the more remote past, but I do not think these can bear up under scrutiny. The distinction between short-term memory, long-term memory, memory with memory helps, memory incarnated in writing, memory incarnated in cultural artifacts is a matter of degree, not of nature.)Implication: It is undeniable that some of the past can be known.
Self Identity through Time. "The Self has no continual existence through time; it is merely an unrelated succession of states of consciousness." Sometimes this position allows for small periods of existence before the self dissolves (Whitehead's process philosophy said the self existed for 1/16 of a second before disintegrating).
The self-stultification approach would be to restate the position is such a way as to include the author: "The author which began this sentence is not the author who finished it." The key here is to understand what gives a statement its semantic unity--it's the author. The author intends a meaning and constructs a semantic 'whole' to convey that. It is the author who 'holds together' the discrete elements of the sentence until its united expression is complete. The author is presupposed or 'embedded' in the developing context of the words of each statement. The author's meanings, purposes, contexts are present in each word--to change authors in mid-stream is to change the unchangeable past. Implication: it is undeniable that a self can exist through an interval of time.
Pushing the BordersLet's look at some statements that are not as clear, but that might yield results after more study.
"Experience cannot be trusted." From a self-stultification standpoint, the author is obviously trusting experience in making the decisions concerning word choice, language, assumptions, and so on. So much experience is using in communicating (or even attempting to communicate) that this seems an obvious self-stultification.
It's not quite that simple, however, and the complexity shows up when we try to formulate the implication. Proposed Implication:: It is undeniable that experience can be trusted in some cases. The problem here concerns whether we said anything or not! If you don't know which cases, how can you trust experience? Some of the problem occurs with the flex in the word 'trust' and some of the problem has to do with the flex in the word 'experience.' (We will look at this in more detail in a later chapter.)
"Personality is illusionary." This sometimes is a conclusion of various types of reductionism, in which personality is dissected into its alleged components of brain impulses, hormones, trained animal behaviors, oat bran, tidal cycles, economic conditions, quantum mechanics, and whatever else researchers propose.
The self-stultification approach to this problem would be to get a definition of personality from the author, and see if semantic ability were a component. For example, if an author agreed that personality consisted of volition and cognition, then it would be rather straightforward to show that
P11: All the statements were made through an author's cognition and at his volitional discretion. (He did not have to say it at all.)This would effectively constitute a refutation of the position. If, however, personality is defined in ways that do not have implications for speech acts (and I do not see how that could occur, quite frankly), then this approach would not be applicable.
"Communication across (pick one: languages, cultures, worldviews, religious persuasions, socio-economic status, paradigms) is impossible." This seems to be self-stultifying in that no two people have exactly the same languages, etc., but that an author presupposes that he/she can cross this divide in each position advanced. At the same time, the author does not admit that this 'translation' radically compromises his message. In other words, she/he assumes that the content can be reformulated in other languages, cultures, etc.
This has many, many implications ranging from Bible translation, hermeneutics, exposition, Van Til's discussions between Messrs White, Grey, and Black, scientific argumentation, evangelism, and position conversions.
The Ultimate Test Case?Throughout the history of philosophical theology there have been proponents of what might be call the 'presupposed God' position. This position basically argues that God forms the assumption under all existence, predication, virtue, etc. As such, the position maintains, all statements such as
"Something exists."
"Something is good"
"Something is beautiful"all presuppose the existence of an Ultimate Personality.
(to be continued....)
http://www.christian-thinktank.com/stult2.html

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/mind.html

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/priming.html

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/episout.html

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/wvmore.html

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/fideism.html

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/bile1.html

http://www.christian-thinktank.com/convert.html

Again, these are simply links and articles regarding Hermeneutics and Linguistics. I direct you to Mr. Glenn Miller because he does a much better job of defining these all inclusive issues than I myself personally could. I also provided a link to some other important issues that many people are not understanding of, which is evidential support of the Supernatural!

God bless,
Casey Powell