The cosmological argument, which I wrote about last Monday, is but one argument for the existence of God. It's also an argument for the existence of multiple gods. As Greer writes in A World Full of Gods: most arguments for the existence of one god also work in favor of multiple gods because nothing in the argument requires exactly one god. Indeed, the only monotheist argument that fails for polytheism without objection is the ontological argument, which rests upon the idea of one greatest conceived being. But the ontological argument is a strange flight of logic. I doubt many people use it to convince themselves of anything they don't already believe. It's so abstract—so philosophical—it doesn't seem to apply to real life. Suffice it to say I'm not going to write about it here.
But Greer's point goes further. Other theist arguments don't work equally well for monotheism and polytheism; some work better for polytheism. For example, take the moral argument. Claims that there exist objective moral values are incongruent with our experiences of the real world. Consider the case of someone having to decide between two virtues, say, honesty and kindness. Sometimes you can be honest or kind but not both. Sometimes we are conflicted. Such moral conflicts are hard to reconcile with the existence of an omnipotent and omnibenevolent entity without diluting the meaning of omnipotence or omnibenevolence. But if the universe is as traditional polytheists say and the gods are limited and in contention with one another, then moral trade-offs probably result as a routine matter. That is, the world we see matches the world we expect.
A multiplicity of gods explains a lot about the real world. The atheist argument from evil, which argues against the existence of God based on the presence of evil, fails against polytheism because the gods' limitations allow for the existence of evil. Indeed, some gods may willingly be a source of our problems!
Can it be that simple? I acknowledge the polytheist makes defensible claims, but is he saying anything meaningful? What does it tell me that the heavens roil with a chaos that matches our own world's? How am I wiser by knowing this? Take the following passage in A World Full of Gods.
Thus it's perfectly valid to say of gods and neutrinos alike that while we don't know if they actually exist, the universe appears to work as though they do.
This sounds nothing like the religions I was taught growing up. The passage has a scientific flavor—I doubt the reference to neutrinos is an accident. Just as science doesn't prove anything but instead offers best guesses to explain what we see, is polytheism too offering mere best guesses? Again, polytheism shows itself to be founded on experience, not theology. As for what's gained by theorizing gods into existence, I hope that's covered somewhere in the second half of the book.
5 comments:
I'm not prepared to make a formal argument, but I think it's interesting to consider not just the problem of evil (which is far more troubling than many believers are willing to admit) as a counter-argument to the existence of God, or at least of a Good God. It is not often that athiests consider the problem of good...where does true compassion, self-giving, and the like come from, especially when these traits are not "beneficial" to the good person.
I find myself wondering why a move towards being content that we don't have all the answers isn't prevalent in relation to religion/existance. I suppose that may mean that people are just opposed to indifference.
Another good post cmb
Josh— Few people if any believe in an omnipotent, omnimalevolent God, so the problem of good doesn't challenge many people's beliefs—atheists included. Probably, Good comes from the same place Evil does.
Also, many atheists and theists alike disagree with your assertion that good traits are not beneficial to the good person. Prisoner's dilemma is an example of a scenario where it's in a person's self-interest to “act good.”
Bobby— More generally, your question raises a timeless quandary: How content should we be with anything? As a working answer, I think we ought to be somewhere in the middle between satisfied and unsatisfied with our level of understanding the universe.
I don't assert that good traits are not beneficial to a person. They often are in our self interest, and they are always to our spiritual benefit. But from a materialist standpoint, certain altruistic acts that entail true self-sacrifice are, I think, "problematic" to that view.
Also, in your original post you describe a "conflict" between moral values. I think you oversimplify considerably when you suggest that the only way to resolve this is by diluting the meaning of omnipotence or goodness. One approach that comes to mind is a hierarchy of values. Another one I am having trouble formulating here, so I will perhaps return with it when I can think of a way to articulate it better. I'm sure Aquinas dealt with this somewhere in a decisive fashion.
Josh— Now I understand your first comment. You're not talking about cases whereby a good deed is beneficial to the person doing the deed; you're talking about cases whereby a good dead is detrimental to the person—e.g., taking a bullet to save a stranger's life. How are these cases explained materialistically?
As you know, the gold standard for materialist explanations for behavior is the theory of evolution. Also as you know, altruism hasn't stumped evolutionary biologists, though they're in dissensus on the matter, often disagreeing on the relative importance of any given model. Two cases in point are: kin selection and multilevel selection. A quick Google search for these terms will reveal a wealth of articles, so please accept my terse explanations here. Kin selection is the idea that altruism allows an individual to propagate copies of his own genes in the individuals he helps. Multilevel selection is the idea that selection acts not only on individuals but also on groups, so you can't concern yourself only with an individual's fitness when determining the value of a trait. Both of these models allow for altruism.
I'll also point out natural selection runs without purpose and rarely if ever yields optimal genes. Instead, it yields good enough genes—in the surviving species, anyway. So another angle from the materialist perspective is that just because a trait exists doesn't mean the trait is beneficial. Granted, we observe altruism in too many species and too many individuals for it not to confer a benefit some of the time. But perhaps in some cases altruism is indeed detrimental to the individual. Such “waste” is within an evolutionary explanation, though I'm not an expert and can't quantify this. This is just a point to keep in mind.
As far as observing altruism in other species, this raises my counter-question to you. You imply that for an individual to behave altruistically some spiritual benefit must be realized by that individual. Are you then asserting that any altruistic individual, including an insect, has a spiritual side? For all I know, insects do have spiritual sides, but I wouldn't have suspected you to believe they do. I'd like to hear your thoughts. I may have inferred too much.
As for conflicts between moral values and how they relate to omnipotence and omnibenevolence, that's a good idea for its own post. Perhaps next Monday?
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