Laws and Reality

I am going to be brief but broad. It is a plausible thesis that reality requires laws: nothing can exist and not be subject to natural law. This applies to the mind as well as the physical world. Laws make things what they are; you cannot detach the laws and expect the particulars to remain the same. You can’t have the same particulars existing in a possible world and yet the laws of nature are completely different. The same goes for natural kinds: the kinds of the actual world necessarily obey the laws (or similar laws) they actually obey. Particulars, kinds, and laws are inextricable. Lions can’t obey the laws of spiders (they wouldn’t be lions) and iron can’t obey the laws of rubber (it wouldn’t be iron). So, the physical world must obey some physical laws, even if not the ones we now accept; and similarly for the mental world. But it is a further question how strict these laws are, or must be: must they be strict and exceptionless or can they be non-strict and allow exceptions? It is difficult to accept that all the laws could be non-strict—some must be strict, though not all must be strict. The most reasonable position is that all sectors of reality must have both strict laws and non-strict laws. In addition, we may assume that they also have non-lawlike true generalizations (e.g., “All the coins in my pocket are dimes”). So, physical things must fall under strict laws, non-strict laws, and non-lawlike generalizations. Basic physics, folk physics, and coincidences.

Is the same thing true of the mind? Yes, it must be, because the mind also is a part of nature—a natural object. It would be widely agreed that the mind obeys non-strict psychological laws—such as the law that people tend to act on their desires. But does the mind also obey strict laws? Is there a basic psychology as there is a basic physics? That is not so clear. If it doesn’t, it must obey strict laws of some sort, by our earlier considerations. A reason to think the laws cannot be purely psychological is that the mind is always being affected by things outside of it—psychophysical causal connections. Let’s suppose this to be true: all purely psychological laws are non-strict. That doesn’t imply that the mind obeys no strict laws—those laws might be physical or psychophysical. The first alternative can be ruled out, because these would not be laws of the mind—just physical laws of associated physical things, such as the brain. So, the laws would have to be psychophysical, linking the brain to the mind presumably. Therefore, there are strict psychophysical laws. This doesn’t mean that all psychophysical laws must be strict; some no doubt are not strict. But some must be strict: there must be exceptionless laws connecting the mind to the physical world outside the mind, presumably the brain. This is a rather strong result: there are strict laws of nature connecting what happens in the brain with what happens in the mind. These laws coexist with non-strict psychophysical laws, perhaps underlying them in some way.

This opens up an intriguing possibility. Given that we don’t know of any strict psychophysical laws, or very few, there must be other laws, hitherto unknown, that connect mind and brain (or mind and body, or mind and world). There must be (strict) psychophysical laws that we don’t know. And if our present nomological knowledge of mind and brain is far from providing any strict laws, as seems likely, then the necessary strict psychophysical laws must be quite far removed from current knowledge. Let’s accept that proposition: then we can say that mind and brain must satisfy descriptions (have properties) not currently anticipated in our conceptual scheme. We have no idea of the strict laws that connect mind and brain, but such laws must exist. We thus obtain a kind of mysterianism from the assumption of the universality of strict laws (combined with their current absence in the psychophysical case). Even if we have an inkling of the required law in some cases, it is still true that every non-strict law presupposes the existence of a strict law, so there will be many cases of strict psychophysical laws that we don’t know. This would mean, for example, that intentional action must fall under strict psychophysical laws that we don’t know—or even know how to find. Ordinary belief-desire psychology only gives us non-strict laws, but these must point to other laws that are strict. But what might those be? Not laws of belief-desire psychology presumably, because they yield only non-strict laws. The strictness requirement leads to a rather startling admission of ignorance, if not mystery. Intuitively, desires never necessitate, so there must something else of a psychological nature that underlies desires—this thing being what the strict laws concern. The mind must be made of something other than beliefs and desires where action is concerned. Other types of psychophysical link would yield the same kind of conclusion given that we only have non-strict laws as things are (e.g., laws linking stimuli and percepts, or emotions and emotional reactions). It may equally be true that the brain must have states other than those currently postulated, in order to provide the needed psychophysical laws. The brain must be made of more than our present picture of it indicates. Strict laws need appropriate descriptions, but we don’t now possess such descriptions, so there must be descriptions we don’t know. The world is inherently law-governed, both strictly and non-strictly, so there has to be more to it than we suppose. And not just a little more but a lot more, because the gap is wide, the ignorance profound. In a word: laws imply mystery.[1]

[1] I am obviously using some of the terminology and apparatus that Davidson introduced in “Mental Events”.

Annoying Atoms

I have come to a rather grim conclusion: I don’t like atoms. Never have, never will. There is something so annoying about them. I wonder if I can get you to see it that way. This is not a phobia on my part, or a prejudice, but a considered judgment. It just isn’t cool that the universe is made of atoms—not nice, not delightful, not fun. I will make a list of all the things I don’t like about atoms. There are way too many of them to start with; no rarity value. There is far too much empty space inside them with nothing of interest going on. They are monotonous, samey, devoid of originality. They are dull, dull, dull. They are distressingly simple, lacking in interesting complexity. Their parts are even simpler: an electron is simple to the point of being virtually nothing (or if electrons have parts, these parts are irritatingly simple). They are invisible, which doesn’t endear them to our senses, and suggests reticence. They are arbitrary in their make-up: why should they be composed of a nucleus surrounded by revolving electrons? Who said that was the way things should be? They are annoyingly opaque, puzzling, secretive. They are depressingly reductive, breaking everything down into the same monotonous units. They are not beautiful. They are lifeless, machine-like. They can be used to make terrifying bombs and may one day annihilate all life on Earth (this I can’t forgive them for). Above all, to my mind, they never change, never evolve, never improve, never branch out, never surprise. They are tedious. They just stay stolidly the same, complacently, as if perfectly content with themselves. They have no history worthy of the name, no drama, no narrative arc. They just are, dully, unchangeably. They make the truth about the universe boring. They are just tiny mindless, lifeless, bits of nothing (“matter”). They have mass and charge (or their constituents do), but that is about all they can manage in the way of an inner nature. I suspect that if we could see them, we would never give them a second glance, like drab gray bricks in a building. They are like bores at a party, faceless functionaries, the least interesting things in the universe.

In case my anti-atom rhetoric has failed to move you (defenders of the dull), let me remind you of some more interesting things. Animals are a lot more interesting, and so are plants. So, even, are bacteria. We contemplate these things with interest and delight in our eyes (maybe not bacteria)—all of us, not just zoological and botanical specialists. But it takes an atomic physicist to light up when atoms are mentioned; no ordinary person loves the atom. No one wants atoms as pets or decorations (“I have some fine atoms over here”). Nature documentaries about atoms don’t have the viewership of wildlife documentaries. The atom is not audience-friendly, except to people of a particular type. It is more enjoyable to be a zoologist than an atomic physicist (of course, they will deny this). Atoms just don’t have the aesthetic properties of animals and plants. Who could love an electron? Who wants pictures of the hydrogen atom on their wall (please don’t say physics students)? Even pebbles are more aesthetically appealing—round, shiny, rubbable. Insects are more interesting and attractive (except perhaps termites, which resemble atoms in their quantity and uniformity). Black holes are more attention-grabbing. In the astronomical world asteroids approach atoms most closely in their intrinsic dullness: shapeless bits of rock and dirt wandering aimlessly through the void, of only scientific interest (is there any asteroid art?). Molecules are slightly more appealing than atoms, the more complex the better (DNA is pretty interesting). At least molecules introduce some variety into the world, instead of the monotonous homogeneity of the atomic world (a point-like nucleus surrounded by a varying number of electrons).[1] To get us interested in atoms physicists have used the analogy of the solar system, or anthropomorphized the constituents—or else restless minds would wander. I am not saying that atoms have no scientific interest; I am saying they have no human interest. They have no human meaning. Or precious little—they are after all what the Mona Lisa is made of, which is something. Imagine if the atoms of the universe had never clumped together but floated around in a formless gas—wouldn’t that be the dreariest thing imaginable? No animals, no plants, no stars, no planets—just a soup of miserable atoms. What a world to live in! Atoms are redeemed by what they can compose, but in themselves they are nothing to write home about (“Saw some helium atoms today—nothing interesting to report”). The more I think about it, the more I resentthe fact that atoms constitute the basic truth about the world—couldn’t things have been a bit more fun, a bit livelier? Is that the best the big bang could come up with, or God? Thanks a lot, one wants to say. Thanks for nothing.

If I have still failed to persuade you of the utter bankruptcy of atoms, their affront to the sensitive discerning mind, then let me drive the final nail into their coffin as objects of refinement and quality. For they seem almost gratuitously uninteresting and intrinsically disappointing (they need to apologize for themselves). Things were not as lowering before they came along (or our knowledge of them did). Physical science was not always so dire, so dismal, so dispiriting (am I overdoing it now?). What I have in mind is the physical universe as conceived before the atomic theory became the accepted truth: the four elements of earth, water, air, and fire. These have human significance, they form part of our lived experience, they have interesting natures (bees compared to termites). We live on the earth, derive our nourishment from it, gaze upon it; we drink water, bathe in it, play with it; we breathe air, feel it on our face, can’t do without it for long; we use fire to cook and warm ourselves, it is spectacular, it must be carefully managed. This is our life-world. It is not a humanly indifferent alien world of tiny faceless particles glued tenuously together. Animals know nothing of this abstract lifeless world, as our ancestors knew nothing of it. The world was a lot more agreeable when it was conceived in the richer terms of the four elements. Nature had variety and contrast, but now it is just a vast heap of invisible particles differing only quantitatively. We woke up one day to find that nature was no longer our friend and collaborator but a kind of desert—bland, blank. The atom is the ultimate expression of nature’s indifference to us and all life. It knows nothing of life and could care less. It could kill us all and not bat an eyelid. If it does kill us, it will just continue on its mindless, pointless way. The atom is fundamentally psychopathic. It isn’t even our enemy. I might almost say that the atom proves the non-existence of God—for why would God put such a colorless, dead, dreary, drab, prosaic, humdrum thing at the very foundation of human (and animal) life? I know that atoms exist, but I don’t have to like it. I know I am made of atoms, but I don’t have to celebrate the fact. I wouldn’t mind if they all disappeared and were replaced by something more to my taste. Away drab and dire atoms![2]

[1] Aren’t strings the most boring thing imaginable? The universe is made of bits of string! Say it isn’t so.

[2] I can imagine Hamlet giving an impassioned speech about atoms, condemning their lumpy fatuity (“Oh, callous atom!”, etc.) To be an atom, or not to be an atom… Why must everything revolve around such dreadful things? Atoms are a downer, no doubt about it. Even rats are more congenial. It’s about time humanity declared its distaste for the atomic. And let’s not forget that atoms are radioactive. They are (potentially) poisonous.

Gods

Let’s imagine a theological dispute of a different color: the question is which of two possible Gods, called Yum and Yam, exist. Yum and Yam are very similar—they are standard-issue Gods—but they do differ in certain particulars. Yum’s chosen people are the Dutch while Yam favors the Armenians, Yum’s day of rest is Saturday while Yam’s is Sunday, and they differ with respect to their minions. There is enough difference for theologians to get their teeth into and for different traditions to be formed. We can suppose there is a lively debate about which one is real and which a fake. Maybe there are extreme sects that impose punishments on people who make the wrong choice. Possibly there are some people who stop believing in one and go over to the other (much frowned upon by those attached to the God who has been spurned). This dispute has been going on for centuries, sometimes coolly and sometimes heating up. There might be subdivisions within the two religions, centering on the day of rest, or the roster of minions. Imagine you grew up in this religious atmosphere—how would you choose? There doesn’t seem to be any solid evidence favoring one God over the other, just a lot of rhetoric and appeals to family loyalty. It seems arbitrary which one you choose—a matter of “personal preference”, as they say. What you do know is that you are required to make a choice. You can’t be an agnostic, or believe in both, or neither, or some third God (Yom). You feel flummoxed.

Obviously, this is absurd. You have no basis to decide; it would be irrational to choose one over the other (though it might be pragmatically sensible to go one way rather than the other). You might be forgiven for agnosticism, or deplored for atheism, or tolerated for bi-theism, or cheered for neo-theism; but it would be bonkers to believe that one of these Gods is real and the other unreal. That is just not an epistemic option. The case has been set up so that nothing can decide the question. Indeed, we might suppose that this is literally true: the whole thing is a massive psychology experiment designed to study irrationality! We are subjects in this experiment, which has been devised by advanced aliens from another galaxy; the experimenters are interested in how irrational the human species can be. They set things up in such a way that the subjects are asked to choose between options between which it is impossible rationally to choose. They have even provided rival bibles, rival churches, rival preachers. It is a long-term experiment and has already been going on for over two thousand years. A high point, scientifically, was that period when the two religions began persecuting each other to the death—it being deemed heresy to proclaim the day of rest falsely. The correct opinion, by stipulation, is that neither Yum nor Yam exist—they were made up by the experimenters and then foisted on the human population. Atheism with respect to Yum and Yam is true (whatever may be the case for other putative Gods, e.g., Yahweh).

Amusing, you might say, possibly instructive—but what does this have to do with us as we actually are, historically? The answer is obvious: we are in essentially the same boat. Which God exists—the God of the Old Testament or the God of New Testament (the old religious text or the new one)? They are clearly not the same (jealous and vengeful versus emotionally mature and gentle). Is it the God of the Roman Catholic Church or the God of the Protestant Church—again, quite different Gods. What about Allah—should we believe in him or the God we call “God”? Also, we have Gods drawn from non-Jewish traditions and accepted in other parts of the world. The criteria of identity for Gods are clear enough to declare that not all these Gods are identical. I just sharpened the issue with my imaginary thought experiment. But even if you think there is a rational basis for believing in one God rather than another, it is surely disturbing to acknowledge that such a case is possible—and that it would be preposterous to insist that one theistic belief had to be true rather and the other false. The obvious fact is that neither of these beliefs is true—Yum and Yam are fictions, fakes. The theology in my imaginary scenario is a theology about nothing. That is exactly what atheists say about our actual theology—polytheism versus monism, the holy trinity, etc. These are all debates about chimera.[1]

[1] I wonder whether, in the age of polytheism (still not dead), there were people who believed firmly in some gods and just as stoutly denied the existence of others—the Sun god yes, the Moon god no; the weather god yes, the sea god no. The impression one gets, say with respect to the Greek gods, is that the believers were all in. If one god exists, then all do. Curious, no? It seems unduly credulous.

Dreams and Religion

There is a peculiarity of religion that is not often (if ever) remarked: its combination of the serious and the silly. I might even say commingling: the way the serious and the silly are interwoven, inextricably joined. Serious themes run through religion—life and death, right and wrong, cosmology. But at the same time, we find superstition, fantasy, fairy tales, risible rituals, preposterous costumes, and a general sense of absurdity. To an outsider much of religion seems silly, childish, hard to take seriously. The Catholic Church is a prime example, prompting attempts at silliness reduction over the centuries. One might even say that the serious-silly nexus is the essence of religion. I am not against silliness, still less seriousness, but the combination strikes me as anthropologically interesting; it bears examination. So, let’s take a scientific naturalistic attitude towards it—what is its psychological meaning? What does it tell us about the human mind? Can we explain it?

It is hard to find any convincing parallels to it. Plenty of things are serious, and plenty of things are silly—but the combination? One might think of pantomime and fairy tales—rich in silliness, yes, but rather lacking in seriousness (psychoanalysis notwithstanding). Still, worth keeping in mind; there is a kinship here. The closest cultural parallel I can think of is opera: the gaudiness, the costumes, the absurdities—yet the depth of the themes, their resonance. But the parallel is not close, or particularly illuminating. Opera shows that the human mind can tolerate, even welcome, the serious-silly nexus, but it would be pressing a point to suggest that opera is the model for religion (or religion the model for opera). Perhaps comedy could be adduced, its jokiness combined with (sometimes) serious themes: think of Monty Python’s The Life of Brian, some of Charlie Chaplin, or Shakespeare’s comedies (e.g., A Midsummer Night’s Dream). But here too the parallel is not that close—laughing in church is really not on. Religion is characteristically humorless: priests are not comedians (God is not the funniest man ever). Is there anything in the human psyche that could be regarded as a precursor to religion, its psychological precondition? My title suggests an answer—dreams are the clearest analogue to religion. For they too combine the serious and the silly—stirring themes, preposterous performances. Wacky stuff occurs, nonsense obtrudes, yet there is an atmosphere of seriousness—there isn’t much laughter in the church of dreams. Nor is there much skepticism. Miracles occur, natural laws get flouted, people fly about, evil lurks, nonsense is rampant (verbal and physical)—not unlike religion. Fear and exhilaration coexist. There is the giddy feeling of being in contact with another world. In religious ceremonies people can go into a trance, as if possessed or hypnotized, but the same is true of dreams—a trancelike state in which the usual rules are suspended. A church is a dreamy place, full of other-worldly icons, spectacle, strange adventures. Dreams are vivid, but so are biblical stories, with all the illogic of dreams. And the Bible is full of dreams and dreamlike happenings. In dreams we take the silliness in our stride, not separating it from the seriousness; we don’t wonder how the two things can go together. In fact, they harmonize seamlessly. Thus, dreaming prepares us for religion; it provides the psychological foundation. It makes the religious experience possible. We already know how to combine the serious and the silly, because we are born dreamers. That is the hypothesis.

But there is another aspect of dreaming that really drives the analogy home. This is that the dream state is the primary arena for what might be called credulity enhancement. In dreams we don’t question what we experience—what the dream tells us. We just accept it, absurdity and all. In the waking state we would take ourselves to be hallucinating or undergoing an imagination malfunction, but in dreams we are utterly credulous—the dreamer is no skeptic. Sheer silliness is no impediment to abject credulity. We believe whatever is dished up to us, no questions asked. Isn’t this just like religious belief? People believe what they are told, or what is vividly depicted, or what is performed in front of them (miracle healings and the like). They might be more skeptical outside of the trance-inducing place of worship, but their critical faculties go into abeyance when the chanting starts, the stained-glass windows dazzle, and the lure of the fantatic beckons. They enter a kind of dream state in which the silly is transmuted (miraculously!) into conviction—what is called religious belief. We have faith in our dreams, as we have faith in our religious instruction. We don’t have evidence for rational belief in our dreams, and nor do we in the religious case—we are primed to believe, set up for it. Even hardboiled scientists have faith in their dreams. Thus, the religious state of mind resembles the dreaming state of mind in its susceptibility to belief formation. Dreaming is a pre-religious state of silliness acceptance: miracles occur in dreams and the dreamer blithely accepts them as real; ditto for the religious believer (note the term). In dreams we are all true believers, easily taken in; in religious contexts we are likewise highly susceptible to invitations to believe. And the silly stuff mingles with the serious to add weight to the pressure to believe; it isn’t just silly (though it can be very silly). This is where the power to persuade comes from in religious contexts—it mimics the dream state. Children, of course, are particularly susceptible to the persuasive power of dreams, having little in the way of critical faculties. But the same is notoriously true in the case of religion—which is why we get them when they are young. Imagine if the adults around you as a child were to reinforce the messages (as they might call them) contained in your dreams—about bogey men, ghosts, lurking killers. You would end up completely in the sway of your dreams. As it is, we say “It was only a dream”. But we don’t say “It was only religion” in order to temper the child’s natural credulity. Religion is like a socially sanctified dream, driving home the silliness. The reason the silliness is accepted is that dreams are full of it yet excite belief. Of course, believers don’t think it is silly, or at least they strive to overcome that feeling; and the reason for this is that they are psychologically primed to overlook silliness in dreams. Note that many cultures have believed that dreams are to be taken seriously, as containing important information about reality; they might be said to have a dream-based religion. They have achieved a total merger of the two. Silliness generally promotes skepticism, but not in certain areas of psychic activity. The person who was once religious and now rejects religion is like someone emerging from a dream: what once seemed real is now seen as so much fantasy. He might wonder at his prior state of mind, shaking his head in disbelief; it might comfort him to be told that he was living in a dream. Are deeply religious people unusually prone to vivid and compelling dreams? Are natural atheists lacking in dream experience? Do people who never dream (if there are such) put up more resistance to religious indoctrination? Is religion more likely to gain control of a person during a period of life in which dreams are particularly powerfui? These are all empirical questions, capable of investigation. In any case, dreams provide a prelude to religious conversion, or a platform from which to launch religious belief. Dreams provide a precursor of that ability to combine the serious and the silly that is so characteristic of religion as we know it.[1]

[1] Do we need religion? Do we have an appetite for it, possibly innately given? Can we be happy without religion? There is some evidence to suggest that this is so. If it is, the dream hypothesis explains it: for we do need to dream. Studies have shown that people deprived of dreaming become disconsolate and depressed. Why this should be so is not clear, but it seems to be a fact. We might try to fulfill the need by adopting some other equivalent activity—say, science. We make a religion out of science (including philosophy). We will need to ensure that we supply the silliness quotient as well as the seriousness quotient. Quantum mechanics might come in handy, or the big bang, or panpsychism, or possible world semantics—something seemingly preposterous. It will help to have scientific churches and a priestlike brotherhood (professors in universities). The need for religion might thus be met by something other than religion. However, it is not at all clear that the need to dream could be met by anything else (movies comes closest). Religious psychology is an underdeveloped branch of the science of psychology. We could call it the “religious faculty” and undertake an investigation of it analogous to our study of the language faculty: where does it come from, is it modular, what kind of pathologies beset it, what is its neural basis? It is clearly an aspect of the human mind (and brain), so it ought to have a psychology. I can imagine a book entitled The Religion Instinct, or a journal called The Journal of Experimental Religious Psychology, or a society of “Rel-Sci” devotees. There could be a natural science of supernatural belief.