Applying Logic to Kitcher

The NYT Stone has the following conversation between Gary Gutting, interviewing, and Philip Kitcher, Atheist. I have skipped down to the middle, where the meat of the conversation resides. The following comments are from Kitcher, except for one response from Gutting:

Kitcher:
The clear message of all the conflicting doctrines of the world’s religions, when treated nonmetaphorically, is that, even if a “transcendent” should exist, all our categories for describing it are woefully inadequate. To borrow a phrase from the late, great philosopher Bernard Williams, any modestly literal thought about it is “one thought too many.” We should therefore reject substantive religious doctrines, one and all, even the minimal ones (“an intelligent source of the world’s order,” “a creator”).

P1: IF [ there are conflicting doctrines of the worlds religions], THEN [“all our categories for describing {the transcendent} are inadequate].

C1: non sequitur; fallacy of False Association / Hasty Generalization..

P2: IF [any thought about it is “one thought too many”], THEN [all doctrines should be rejected, including “an intelligent source of the world’s order,” “a creator” ].

C2: Antecedent is not a fact in any sense of the word; no true conclusion can follow.

Kitcher:
But let me try to be more explicit. Why reject the “transcendent” rather than simply taking no stance on the issue of its reality? I start from the idea that all sorts of human inquiries, including but not limited to the natural sciences, have given us a picture of the world, and that these inquiries don’t provide evidence for any transcendent aspect of the universe. Epistemic humility should incline us to believe that our picture is incomplete, but if someone proposes that proteins fold into their three-dimensional configurations with the help of an army of ghostly beings, I don’t think I’m dogmatic in rejecting their suggestion. So why should I take a different attitude toward the proposal that there’s a “transcendent”?

P3: IF [there is no human inquiry/natural scientific evidence of “any transcendent aspect of the universe”], THEN [ Epistemic humility should incline us to believe that our picture is incomplete ].

C3: Valid and true IFF materialism is presumed. However, Physicalist Materialism is not the case for quantum experimental knowledge, which is leading to conscious-driven existence, rather than physically self-extant and self-explained. Given that, this conclusion is still true, but cannot be construed to eliminate physical transcendence as the final existential truth.

P4: IF [ ghostly beings are proposed as the force for folding proteins ], THEN [ rejection is warranted ].

C4: Valid and true, because it is material and is materially falsifiable, and is in a valid format.

P5: IF [ C4 ], THEN [ “why should I take a different attitude toward the proposal that there’s a “transcendent”? ].

C5: (a) not an argument, it is a question requiring an answer; (b) first answer: This is a Black and White Fallacy; (c) second answer: the proposed conclusion is not material and not falsifiable.

Kitcher:
To my mind, the experiences labeled “religious” come in two main types. There are some best understood in psychiatric terms. There are others, perhaps the overwhelming majority, that happen to people when they feel a great sense of uplift, often at the rightness of things. After all, experiences of this sort are felt by completely secular people who classify them without appeal to religious language. As Dewey pointed out, referring such experiences to some special aspect of reality is gratuitous speculation.

P6: IF [ “some” religious experiences might be explained in psychiatric terms ], THEN [ None are true ].

C6: Fallacy of False Association/ Hasty Generalization.

P7: IF [ they feel “a great sense of uplift” ], AND [experiences of this sort are felt by completely secular people ], THEN [ uplift sensation is not religious ].

C7: False; the second premise in the conjunction cannot be known, and is speculated only, thus invalidating the conclusion being drawn.

Also, Dewey’s statement is opinion without evidence; it is also a Category Error if “reality” is material only, and for the Atheist Materialist, it is.

…

Kitcher:
Even if people want to say that they feel a “divine presence” on these occasions, that seems to testify to the pervasive religious ideas that surround them, rather than to any reality beyond the mundane world.

P8: IF [ people claim to feel a “divine presence”], Then [ that “seems” to be because of religious ideas ].

C8: Completely non sequitur; there is no evidence for this, or even possible evidence for this. The only reason to believe that this is true is due to maintaining an Atheist, materialist worldview. The only reason to make this statement is for rhetorical prejudice.

Kitcher:
Rational theology proceeds partly on the basis of principles also used in areas of rigorous inquiry (logical principles, for example) and partly on the basis of metaphysical additions, frequently varying across traditions. To my mind all these metaphysical add-ons are dubious. Indeed, many of them seem purpose-built to generate the desired conclusions. Concepts like that of a “necessary being” are problematic outgrowths of particular parochial traditions. We should think of the arguments of rational theology as supplements to a faith whose sources lie elsewhere (as, I believe, many theologians have always taken them to be).

Gutting’s answer suffices:

Gutting:
I agree that no theistic arguments are compelling, but I don’t agree that they all are logically invalid or have obviously false premises. I think the best arguments (especially, sophisticated versions of the cosmological argument) are dubious only in the sense that they use premises (e.g., any contingent thing requires a cause) that are not obviously true but that a rational person might properly believe.

In fact, contingency is tautological with “requiring a cause”; it is necessarily true. I wish Gutting had pursued the issue of the rational, rule-based universe being contingent on something prior to the Big Bang, and the nature of that something. Nonetheless, Kitcher has made a general statement of opinion, which he acknowledges is opinion, regarding facts which could be logically addressed; it is doubtful, in my own opinion, that he has logically refuted the arguments he dismisses, using disciplined logical procedures. So his statement here is just a rhetorical tactic, not a valid, fact-based conclusion.