Bertrand Russell's Critique of St. Thomas Aquinas

[Ben_Sinner]

What are your thoughts on this?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Aquinas#Modern_influence

He does not, like the Platonic Socrates, set out to follow wherever the argument may lead. He is not engaged in an inquiry, the result of which it is impossible to know in advance. Before he begins to philosophize, he already knows the truth; it is declared in the Catholic faith. If he can find apparently rational arguments for some parts of the faith, so much the better; if he cannot, he need only fall back on revelation. The finding of arguments for a conclusion given in advance is not philosophy, but special pleading. I cannot, therefore, feel that he deserves to be put on a level with the best philosophers either of Greece or of modern times.[136]

 

[SighGuy]

There is a truth. St. Thomas Aquinas argues from within its context. Some other philosophers do not. This is why they often do not go anywhere, or come to false conclusions.

It should not be totally beyond our reckoning that there is knowledge which is superior to the human mind, and cannot be sounded by human reason. If this knowledge has been offered, or revealed, to us, it is not a handicap to use it.

Besides, it’s not as though Aquinas puts his fingers in his ears and says “I’m just running with this faith thing and only making arguments that are applicable to Christians.” Indeed, he claims that anyone who does not accept revelation is in error and that they can be taught if they will listen. He does start within the context of Christianity, but he is willing to go all the way back to square one to prove the existence of God.

newadvent.org/summa/1001.htm

I’d read Article 8, here.

 

[PseuTonym]

I am thinking about Principia Mathematica by Russell and Whitehead.

Bertrand Russell does not set out to follow wherever the argument may lead. Before he begins to deduce theorems in Principia Mathematica, he checks to make sure that mathematicians believe that those theorems are true.

The finding of arguments for what is generally accepted as true is not comparable to discovering a proof for conjectures that have not yet been resolved.

Nor is research that is advertised as being an investigation into the foundations of mathematical truth actually in harmony with the advertisement when an investigator fails to remain open to the possibility of reaching a conclusion that is not yet part of mainstream mathematics. In Principia Mathematica, Russell is engaged in an inquiry, the result of which is known in advance.

Mathematicians do not accept the Principle of Mathematical Induction or any other genuine axiom based on the reputation of some writer. Ideally, the book Principia Mathematica would have been published anonymously, so that it would be judged based on the content, and nothing but the content.

 

[thinkandmull]

I wonder if his Principles of Mathematics was even correct in what it said. After he and Whitehead wrote it, Russell said he could not think as clearly. At least that is what my teacher in college said

 

[Linusthe2nd]

What are your thoughts on this?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Aquinas#Modern_influence

He does not, like the Platonic Socrates, set out to follow wherever the argument may lead. He is not engaged in an inquiry, the result of which it is impossible to know in advance. Before he begins to philosophize, he already knows the truth; it is declared in the Catholic faith. If he can find apparently rational arguments for some parts of the faith, so much the better; if he cannot, he need only fall back on revelation. The finding of arguments for a conclusion given in advance is not philosophy, but special pleading. I cannot, therefore, feel that he deserves to be put on a level with the best philosophers either of Greece or of modern times.[136]

Just spouting steam. Russell was a noted atheist who hated the Catholic Church and anything which would lead one to believe in God. That is why he hated the philosophy of St. Thomas and Aristotle.

Why are you interested in what Russell thinks? Hadn’t you better find out what Thomas actually taught first and what arguments he used. He certainly did not start from Divine Revelation and he did not start from Catholic teaching. In fact he started with Aristotle, who was a pagan.

Just once I would like to see you defend Catholic teaching and Thomistic philosophy.
If you must persist in your doubting, at least use your own reasoning power, don’t trapse after characters like Russell.

Pax
Linus

 

[AnimalSpirits]

I wonder if his Principles of Mathematics was even correct in what it said. After he and Whitehead wrote it, Russell said he could not think as clearly. At least that is what my teacher in college said

It’s initial goal was to provide a set of axioms which could assess all mathematical statements as true or false- a goal which would later be proven impossible by Godel. But even so, it was a huge contribution to mathematical logic.

 

[TarkanAttila]

What are your thoughts on this?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Aquinas#Modern_influence

He does not, like the Platonic Socrates, set out to follow wherever the argument may lead. He is not engaged in an inquiry, the result of which it is impossible to know in advance. Before he begins to philosophize, he already knows the truth; it is declared in the Catholic faith. If he can find apparently rational arguments for some parts of the faith, so much the better; if he cannot, he need only fall back on revelation. The finding of arguments for a conclusion given in advance is not philosophy, but special pleading. I cannot, therefore, feel that he deserves to be put on a level with the best philosophers either of Greece or of modern times.[136]

I initially thought this was fairly accurate - until I remembered, as someone mentioned above me, that Aquinas was operating on the logically deductible idea that the Divine Revelation of the Church, in Scripture and Tradition, can be trusted.

If God’s Word can reasonably be shown to be trustworthy - and Aquinas demonstrates this - that alone is logic enough for anything God says to be reasonable.

I don’t know Russell’s position on scientists. But a scientist does not enter into his experiments merely “following the argument wherever it may lead”. The scientist has an idea of what he thinks is the truth, and he works to demonstrate that his hypothesis is true. If he cannot, he discards the hypothesis.

Philosophers and scientists both must be able to imagine what connects two ideas before they can have an inquiry about how those two are really connected. If I can see a connection between a hawk and a handsaw, I can discover what real connection there might be between the two.

 

[Bahman]

What are your thoughts on this?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Aquinas#Modern_influence

He does not, like the Platonic Socrates, set out to follow wherever the argument may lead. He is not engaged in an inquiry, the result of which it is impossible to know in advance. Before he begins to philosophize, he already knows the truth; it is declared in the Catholic faith. If he can find apparently rational arguments for some parts of the faith, so much the better; if he cannot, he need only fall back on revelation. The finding of arguments for a conclusion given in advance is not philosophy, but special pleading. I cannot, therefore, feel that he deserves to be put on a level with the best philosophers either of Greece or of modern times.[136]

It is very hard to justify this. Sometimes we are capable of fooling ourselves to the edge of madness: given a accepted false principle we can fit any logical argument within. I study some of his work and found them weak or wrong.

 

[PseuTonym]

But a scientist does not enter into his experiments merely “following the argument wherever it may lead”. The scientist has an idea of what he thinks is the truth, and he works to demonstrate that his hypothesis is true.

Yes, that is an important point. It would be odd for somebody to accuse Andrew Wiles of having failed to devote more time and effort to an attempt to prove that Fermat’s Last Theorem is false.

Philosophers and scientists both must be able to imagine what connects two ideas before they can have an inquiry about how those two are really connected. If I can see a connection between a hawk and a handsaw, I can discover what real connection there might be between the two.

Yes, it could be a connection between a hawk and a handsaw, or a connection between Peking and probability. (Of course, nowadays the same city is referred to in English as “Beijing”).

For some reason, many people claim in online discussion forums that any given two ideas are “not relevant to each other”, as though there could be no question about it. It would be easy to imagine Descartes proposing the ideas of analytic geometry in an online discussion forum and being dismissed with the statement that he is “confused and failing to understand that geometry and algebra are two different branches of mathematics.”

 

[TarkanAttila]

That being said, simply because there is a connection, does not mean that is the end of the story, either.

Rather, we can be much more sure something is correct if multiple connections are made - the more, the better. Science thrives on the connecting of things to each other, and of connecting isolated fields of knowledge to each other.

That’s what makes Aquinas, among others naturally, so brilliant - and Calvin so dangerous.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Anything Russell says about religion is suspect because he has already decided in advance that religion is not rue. How is it that Russell, purportedly such a great philosopher in his own mind, could not see that what he said about Aquinas could as easily be said about him?

All you have to do is read Russell’s “Why I Am Not a Christian” to see that in matters of religion he was among the shallowest of philosophers.

He had become an unbeliever at the age of 15, so all future comments on religion were colored by that fact. Does that mean he should not be ranked among the otherwise great philosophers of his day?

 

[mdleagedguy]

Russell was not a very good philosopher. He was a dogmatist. I prefer Wittgenstein and Aquinas. Tractatus Logico-Philosphicus is brilliant and Russell knew that Wittgenstein was the far brighter light. The quote presented demonstrates that Russell found arguments for the conclusion he wanted. He dismisses Aquinas simply because he is a Catholic rather than addressing the arguments. The Summa demonstrates the existence of God using many arguments that do not appeal to scripture. These arguments are easily updated to a modern scientific context, and I did so when I taught RCIA. For example, the argument from design he presents can be adapted to current knowledge in biochemistry regarding DNA, cellular structure, and protein folding, and the second law of thermodynamics to demonstrate that cellular structure reveals an intelligent design that could not have arisen randomly. People who subscribe to Russell and similar philosophies (actually dogmatisms rather than philosophies) dismiss such arguments with trite statements that miss that point. The most typical is that “of course the universe has to be this way, or we wouldn’t see it this way” which is no explanation, or argument against the argument from design at all.

 

[PseuTonym]

The most typical is that “of course the universe has to be this way, or we wouldn’t see it this way”

It’s a funny argument. Suppose that Russell had been told that the five-year old who would later become Russell’s grandfather had flown to the moon and back simply by flapping his arms.

No surprise!

After all, it would be sufficient for somebody to have pointed a gun at the future grandfather and ordered him to fly to the moon and back by flapping his arms. If the future grandfather had not obeyed, then the five-year-old would have been shot and killed before having children. In that case, Russell would not have been born.

 

[AnimalSpirits]

Russell was not a very good philosopher. He was a dogmatist. I prefer Wittgenstein and Aquinas. Tractatus Logico-Philosphicus is brilliant and Russell knew that Wittgenstein was the far brighter light. The quote presented demonstrates that Russell found arguments for the conclusion he wanted. He dismisses Aquinas simply because he is a Catholic rather than addressing the arguments. The Summa demonstrates the existence of God using many arguments that do not appeal to scripture. These arguments are easily updated to a modern scientific context, and I did so when I taught RCIA. For example, the argument from design he presents can be adapted to current knowledge in biochemistry regarding DNA, cellular structure, and protein folding, and the second law of thermodynamics to demonstrate that cellular structure reveals an intelligent design that could not have arisen randomly. People who subscribe to Russell and similar philosophies (actually dogmatisms rather than philosophies) dismiss such arguments with trite statements that miss that point. The most typical is that “of course the universe has to be this way, or we wouldn’t see it this way” which is no explanation, or argument against the argument from design at all.

It’s not that the universe had to be this exact way, but it did have to be capable of supporting the development of intelligent life in order for intelligent life to observe it. The probability of the universe being capable of developing life, when you are life that developed in that universe, is 100%.

Also, the second law of thermodynamics bit is simply wrong. No theory for the origin of life that I’ve encountered has suggested that life or pre-life reversed entropy in a closed system. That is quite literally the only way a theory could run afoul of the second law of thermodynamics.

 

[mdleagedguy]

It’s not that the universe had to be this exact way, but it did have to be capable of supporting the development of intelligent life in order for intelligent life to observe it. The probability of the universe being capable of developing life, when you are life that developed in that universe, is 100%.

Also, the second law of thermodynamics bit is simply wrong. No theory for the origin of life that I’ve encountered has suggested that life or pre-life reversed entropy in a closed system. That is quite literally the only way a theory could run afoul of the second law of thermodynamics.

It’s not that life reversed entropy. It’s that entropy makes it highly improbable that life would have arisen without an intelligence behind it. Think of how highly ordered life is on a biochemical basis. The entropy barrier to life is so enormous that it defies reason to suggest it arose randomly. I say this as someone who did calculations on protein folding in a graduate level biochemistry class.

 

[oldcelt]

Attempting to prove your philosophy by “divine revelation” that only you are privy to is…well…you can finish the rest.

John

 

[Charlemagne_III]

It’s not that the universe had to be this exact way, but it did have to be capable of supporting the development of intelligent life in order for intelligent life to observe it. The probability of the universe being capable of developing life, when you are life that developed in that universe, is 100%.

Yes, but the universe did not** have **to be created to support the development of life. There were an infinite variety of possible universes that could have been created, and the capacity for supporting life did not have to exist in any of those universes. So is it by design or by pure accident that this universe came in to being with the capacity to support life?

This is a question that science cannot begin to answer. We have to fall back on philosophy to even consider it.

 

[AnimalSpirits]

It’s not that life reversed entropy. It’s that entropy makes it highly improbable that life would have arisen without an intelligence behind it. Think of how highly ordered life is on a biochemical basis. The entropy barrier to life is so enormous that it defies reason to suggest it arose randomly. I say this as someone who did calculations on protein folding in a graduate level biochemistry class.

Improbable how? Each cubic millimeter near or on the surface of the planet had some probability of forming life at each instance. I agree that each of these little trials had a very tiny chance at success. Given hundreds of millions of years and 400 billion galaxies containing hundreds of billions of stars each, some very unlikely things are going to happen.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Russell was not a very good philosopher. He was a dogmatist.

Russell was sometimes a good philosopher, if not a very good philosopher, and part of that reason you have given. He claimed to be a relativist, but he did it in such a dogmatic way that he probably did not fool anyone but the fools who wanted to believe him.

In his little book “the Conquest of Happiness” he essayed to offer wisdom for the common man. It is a beautiful book except for one glaring fault. As I recall, God is never mentioned once. It was as if he was afraid to mention his views on God because it would bring down the volume of sales on the book. And indeed, that would have happened, because there is no wisdom in fighting God when you are trying to promote happiness among the multitudes.

 

[mdleagedguy]

Improbable how? Each cubic millimeter near or on the surface of the planet had some probability of forming life at each instance. I agree that each of these little trials had a very tiny chance at success. Given hundreds of millions of years and 400 billion galaxies containing hundreds of billions of stars each, some very unlikely things are going to happen.

I don’t think you understand how entropy works in biochemical reactions. It is not a measure of probability of something happening. It’s a measure of the energy that it takes to create order. This amount can be lowered by using a catalyst. That is what the cellular apparatus does. It reduces the entropy barrier to formation of proteins, DNA, etc. Without the cellular apparatus, the reactions have a huge entropy barrier such that the odds of the reaction taking place are akin to the odds of all the air in the room randomly moving to one side and suffocating a person on the other side who now finds themselves in a vacuum. By your reasoning, we should expect supercomputers to assemble themselves somewhere else in the universe without being constructed by an intelligence. You can shake up a box of computer parts and subject them to heat trying to overcome the entropy barrier and you will never get a computer to randomly assemble itself in billions of years. Even if you shake up parts for billions of computers for billions of years the parts will never assemble into a computer. It takes an intelligence to do that. The entropy barrier to life self-assembling from nature is akin to that. Intelligence acts as a catalyst by creating a non-random process that overcomes entropy barriers. This is how you get 747’s and microwave ovens. They never come about due to mere chance. Neither does life. Now of course you could argue that yes, 747’s and microwave ovens and computers do come about out of random chance, and we are how they come about. But then you’re accepting that intelligence plays a role without referencing the intelligence, or positing that intelligence itself came about randomly. And when you’ve done that, you admit the fact that intelligence plays a role, and that God in fact arose out of random chance.