{"id":8527,"date":"2013-08-28T15:12:03","date_gmt":"2013-08-28T15:12:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2013\/08\/28\/antony-flew-on-progress-in-philosophy\/"},"modified":"2013-08-28T15:12:03","modified_gmt":"2013-08-28T15:12:03","slug":"antony-flew-on-progress-in-philosophy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2013\/08\/28\/antony-flew-on-progress-in-philosophy\/","title":{"rendered":"Against Antony Flew on Progress in Philosophy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Antony Flew, There is a God<\/em>, pp. 40-41 (quoted from Appeared-to-Blogly<\/a>):<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

I came to see, as I would write in An Introduction to Western Philosophy, <\/em>that there can be progress in philosophy despite the general absence of consensus. The lack of consensus in philosophy is not an independently sufficient demonstration that the subject does not make progress. The attempt to show that there is no philosophical knowledge by simply urging that there is always someone who can be relied on to remain unconvinced is a common fallacy made even by a distinguished philosopher like Bertrand Russell. I called it the But-there-is-always-some-one-who-will-never-agree Diversion. Then there is the charge that in philosophy it is never possible to prove to someone that you are right and he or she is wrong. But the missing piece in this argument is the distinction between producing a proof and persuading a person. A person can be persuaded by an abominable argument and remain unconvinced by one that ought to be accepted.<\/span><\/p>\n

Progress in philosophy is different from progress in science, but that does not mean it is therefore impossible. In philosophy you spotlight the essential nature of deductive argument; you distinguish between questions about the validity or invalidity of arguments and questions about the truth or falsity of their premises or conclusion; you indicate the strict usage of the term fallacy; <\/em>and you identify and elucidate such fallacies as the But-there-is-always-someone-who-will-never-agree Diversion. To the extent that these things are accomplished with better reasoning and greater effectiveness, progress will be seen\u2014even as consensus and persuasion remain elusive and incomplete. (from Flew, There is a God<\/em>, pp. 40-41).<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Is Flew right?  I don't think so. <\/span><\/p>\n

That there is no consensus in philosophy among competent practitioners is a widely-accepted fact, one that cannot be reasonably<\/em> disputed.  I challenge anyone to give me a clear example of a philosophical problem that has been solved to the satisfaction of all competent practioners.  Of course, I am not talking about intramural or school-immanent solutions, but extramural or school-transcendent ones.  I trust you catch my meaning.  The Thomists think they have solved the problem of universals.   The competent practioners within that school agree on that solution and consider the problem solved.  But that intramural consensus means little given the existence of competing schools of thought with different solutions.  A solution that is school-relative or relative to a set of background assumptions is not a solution, period.  (This requires further discussion in connection with the views of N. Rescher, but not here.) <\/span><\/p>\n

For a second example, the logical positivists in their heyday thought they had definitively established that metaphysical assertions are cognitively meaningless.  They had no trouble persuading their own ilk.  But the rest of the philosophical world was flabbergasted at their philistinism, not to mention the self-refuting property of the positivist's verifiability criterion of cognitive significance.  Examples are easily multiplied.  <\/span><\/p>\n

So I take it to be a fact beyond reasonable dispute that there has been and is now no consensus in philosophy among competent practitioners.   What can be reasonably disputed is whether the fact in question gives us a good reason to think either that (i) there will be<\/em> no progress in philosophy, or that (ii) there can be<\/em> no progress in philosophy.  Flew blurs these two claims.  Let's consider the weaker one, (i).<\/span><\/p>\n

But first we need to address a logically prior question: what is progress in philosophy?  It is clear that we ought not identify progress in philosophy with the achieving of consensus, or with progress towards consensus.  Suppose consensus is reached as to the solution of some problem.  It might still be that the solution is incorrect.  Suppose the Thomists take over the world and enforce consensus by liquidating all dissidents and persuading the rest.  Their solution to the problem of universals, say, or the problem of change, might still be incorrect.  On the other hand, dissensus does not entail that no solution has been arrived at.  Maybe Karl Popper did solve the problem of induction despite his failure to convince all of his competent colleagues.<\/span><\/p>\n

Consensus does not entail philosophical knowledge; dissensus does not entail the lack thereof.  (Note that I am assuming, with Flew, that progress in philosophy is progress in knowledge.  This is not obvious, but this too cannot now be discussed. There are several ways in which philosophy has progressed even if no philosophical knowledge has been achieved.  If nothing else, there are more philosopy books in the world than ever before.)<\/span><\/p>\n

Entailment, then, fails.  Nevertheless, lack of agreement among competent practitioners<\/em> is good, albeit defeasible, evidence<\/em> that a solution has not  been attained.  Flew seems not to appreciate this point, and he seems to miss it because he erects a straw man:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

The attempt to show that there is no philosophical knowledge by simply urging that there is always someone who can be relied on to remain unconvinced is a common fallacy made even by a distinguished philosopher like Bertrand Russell. I called it the But-there-is-always-some-one-who-will-never-agree Diversion.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The fact there will always be people who disagree is not to the point.  For it may be that they disagree out of stupidity, or temporary confusion, or ignorance of the nature of the problem, or unfamiliarity with the terminology, or because they are sophists or quibblers or contrarians who have a perverse need to contradict.  This is why I used the phrase 'competent practitioners.'  These are people who have all of the intellectual and moral virtues, a high degree of intelligence, familiarity with the canons of logic, knowledge of relevant empirical facts, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n

So if anyone is committing a fallacy here it is Flew: he is committing the straw man fallacy.  No one "simply urges" that there is no philosophical knowledge because someone remains unconvinced.  The point is rather that even after such pesky varmints as the stupid, the confused, the ignorant, the intellectually dishonest, and their uncles and cousins have been excluded, there will still be diagreement, and that this disagreement cannot simply be discounted or ignored.  If you are a competent practitioner and you disagree with my solution to a problem, then that ought to give me pause: it is a good reason for me to doubt whether my solution really is one.  Of course, I might still be right.  But then how would I know this?  And if I don't know that my solution is correct, is it a solution?  (This  needs further discussion.  Compare: if I have a true belief about the way to Tucson, does it follow that I know the way?  If Seldom Seen Slim, a local, says you go thataway, when I think I ought to go thisaway, should that not give me pause if I don't have justification for my true belief?) <\/span><\/p>\n

It is telling that the only examples of philosophical knowledge that Flew provides, in the passage quoted leastways, are elementary points of logic.  This is not quite to the point since logic is a tool of philosophy but not philosophy proper.  I would like to see him give some examples from substantive branches of philosophy where he thinks we have philosophical knowledge. <\/span> <\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/a>Professor Antony Flew: philosopher (1923-2010)<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/fieldset>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Antony Flew, There is a God, pp. 40-41 (quoted from Appeared-to-Blogly): I came to see, as I would write in An Introduction to Western Philosophy, that there can be progress in philosophy despite the general absence of consensus. The lack of consensus in philosophy is not an independently sufficient demonstration that the subject does not make … Continue reading “Against Antony Flew on Progress in Philosophy”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8527","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-metaphilosophy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8527\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}