Derren Brown vs psi

In this otherwise-exceptional Svengali video (at the 50:00 mark), the highly-skilled illusionist and brilliant skeptic Derren Brown explains why clairvoyance doesn't exist. "Of course it doesn't," he asserts. His reasoning/evidence? The participants from the audience (who never claimed to have had any clairvoyant experiences and did not previously demonstrate clairvoyance under experimental conditions) lo and behold failed to exhibit any clairvoyance on stage. Those people (on stage), under those circumstances, were unable to show any clairvoyance. That's it. That's Derren's argument against the possibility (or at least for the extreme unlikelihood) of clairvoyance.

Unfortunately, he is very ignorant of the psi literature. I strongly encourage Derren to read the following (among others that should be included at some point):

-- Cardena, E. (2018). The experimental evidence for parapsychological phenomena: A review. American Psychologist, volume 73, issue, 5, p 663-677. (official journal of the APA)

-- Storm et al (2010). A meta-analysis with nothing to hide: Reply to Hyman (2010), Psychological Bulletin, Volume 136, Issue 4, Jul 2010, pages 491-494. (This paper is on their prior work in the area of Ganzfeld and Ray Hyman's objections to it, which isn't what Derren was talking about, but I thought I'd share it since he also touches on ways to fake/simulate the appearance of telepathy)


-- Hodgson, R. (1892) A record of Observations of Certain Phenomena of Trance, Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, volume 8, pages 1-167;


-- Hodgson, R. (1898) A Further Record of Observations of Certain Phenomena of Trance, Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, volume 13, pages 284-582


-- Braude's 2003 book "Immortal Remains" (here) and Sudduth's 2016 book "A Philosophical Critique of Empirical Arguments for Postmortem Survival" (here). Both books are surprisingly skeptical, with Braude claiming that the survival hypothesis just barely beats the best alternative and Sudduth claiming that the best alternative is at least equally plausible. Sudduth is ultimately unconvinced by the evidence, but he and Braude both agree that the best alternative explanation of the relevant data is a (non-afterlife) paranormal interpretation (psi functioning among living people that mimics the appearance of an afterlife). In other words, the best and strongest cases that survivalists offer as evidence for an afterlife cannot be explained away with stereotypical mundane physicalist scenarios. Instead, if one wants to remain a skeptic of the afterlife, then one must conclude that these cases involve psychic functioning among living people. Braude and Sudduth's summaries of the cases are fair, accurate, and clear.
Here's the gist: The most Derren has demonstrated is that these particular individuals, under these particular circumstances, did not produce any psi effects. This is no more impressive than demonstrating that particular football players, under very particular circumstances, cannot score touchdowns. The latter merely states the obvious, whereas the former poses a serious challenge to the reality of psi effects only if we grant (ahead of time) certain assumptions about when and why psi effects occur, assumptions that are not consistent with reports from the general population and (since those reports don't prove anything) also with many the methodologically-sound studies that Derren has never refuted or even mentioned.

To further elaborate on the football example, Braude (2014) has offered a helpful conceptual analysis on whether we should categorize psi effects as universally-distributed capacities (like the capacity to breathe) or instead as abilities or skills. These aren't word games; how we conceptualize psi effects influences our expectations on when these effects should be observed and when their absence should be taken as proof of their non-existence. But not every man can produce an erection on the spot in front of hundreds or thousands of people (many porn stars can't even do that!), not every baseball player can score a homerun in every play, and (to connect abilities/skills with capacities:) not every swimmer can hold their breath for the same length of time in every race. None of this counts as evidence against the existence of the capacity/ability/skill in question. Again, the only way for Derren to reasonably interpret his failure to demonstrate clairvoyance as proof against the existence of clairvoyance is if we grant (ahead of time) certain assumptions about its natural history and about when/why it occurs, but these assumptions betray reports from the general public as well as sound data to the contrary. See Braude's 2014 book "Crimes of Reason" for in-depth discussions on these and related issues.

I genuinely respect and appreciate his work, but Derren really dropped the ball here. While one can find experts on both sides of the debate, it seems that Derren rarely (if ever) interviews actual experts who disagree with him (rather than buffoons like "medium" Joe Power, who is a fraud in my own opinion).

The status quo of atheism vs theism, with emphasis on the atheist side

In my last post I criticized christian apologist Ravi Zecharias for trying to reverse the anti-theistic argument from evil as an ironic argument for the existence of God. Zecharias alleges that the argument presupposes a background of objective morality (independent of human opinion) by which we can judge various acts and situations as "evil," which then raises the question of what is the best candidate for grounding objective moral values. I criticized Zecharias for missing a version of the argument that doesn't presuppose objective morality. He simply doesn't even mention it, let alone refute it. 

But in this post I want to instead criticize some anti-theistic arguments that were addressed to me on the Instagram page of Christian apologist (and debate moderator) Cameron Bertuzzi, who recently posted a picture of the book "Two Dozen Arguments for God" edited by Walls and Dougherty. One atheist commented on the picture claiming to be able to "logically disprove the existence of God." I was very intrigued and asked them to do so. Some time went by without any response, and so I gently nudged/reminded that person about their comment.

Still no response from that person. That's fine; people don't have to indulge me if they don't want to. However, another atheist replied back to me by saying, "I can!" (I.e. "I can logically disprove God"). I asked them to please do so, and what follows are their two replies to me (which are somewhat redundant, but I'd rather share both of their initial replies).

Here, in full, are their two replies to my request that they logically disprove the existence of God.

[QUOTE] Every God in human history was fabricated to fill in knowledge gaps. For example, we didn't know what causes lighting, we made up zeus and thor. Now we don't know what happened before the big bang and after out death and we give credits to a God. 2nd, there is no proof that a God exists. The Bible is the claim, not the proof. 3rd, there have been more that 20.000 gods in human history? How are you sure that yours is correct? Now give me a reason that God is true [SECOND  COMMENT:] The fact that there is a lack of evidence alone should debunk theism, or religions .Especially when theism is always there to fill in knowledge gaps. Every time science found out how something that was accredited to God works, a God dies, just like zeus, thor and a lot of deities. And that's the same that happens now. We don't know what happens when we die (or we can't accept that nothing happens and everything will be like it was before we were born), so we have some Gods like the Christian God who sents you to heaven and hell, and other gods doing different things. I can't completely debunk theism, but i can debunk every religion that exists on earth. Also, 99% of people's religious beliefs are dependent of the place they are born, which means that(if there is a God, there is only one) you will believe in the true God only if you happen to be born in a certain place. [-- END OF QUOTATION] 

I really don't mean to single out or pick on this person in particular, but I singled out his replies because they perfectly capture what I regard as standard atheist rebuttals, not just online but also among the general public. These kinds of comments are usually what I encounter, although I should also clarify that, in my experience, the typical believer doesn't fare any better in the other direction! The status quo of theist-vs-atheist debates is very disappointing.

(Also, I should note that there are some atheist philosophers of religion who provide much better arguments and assessments, such as JL Mackie, William Rowe, Graham Oppy, and others. I don't mean to dismiss their work, but in fact have learned a lot from them.)

So my plan here is to share my response so that I can refer back to this link in the future in order to clear up misunderstandings without having to repeat myself. I'll go through the arguments one at a time. Everything below the line is my response to the atheist above. With some links added to the embedded text. 

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My reply may sound harsh, but I sincerely do not intend any offense. I’m also going to repeat much of what I’ve said elsewhere. You’re talking as if serious philosophers of religion haven’t already anticipated (and thought about/through) your objections. You’re also talking to me as if I haven’t, but I’m an agnostic who *obsesses* over these questions. You’re also commenting on a picture of pro-theism book edited by (and with contributions from) academic philosophers who’ve thought long and hard about your objections a who have put forth several arguments in favor of theism, but you’ve failed to engage (or even mention!) these arguments. If you’ve actually read the book then please post a review. Also, it’s quite silly to expect somebody to convince you of theism via discussion in the Instagram comments section. 

 Every God in human history was fabricated to fill in knowledge gaps. For example, we didn't know what causes lighting, we made up zeus and thor. Now we don't know what happened before the big bang and after out death and we give credits to a God. Every time science found out how something that was accredited to God works, a God dies, just like zeus, thor and a lot of deities. And that's the same that happens now. 

These are examples of (polytheistic) gods being offered a sort of (pseudo) scientific hypothesis later replaced by a more accurate scientific understanding. You cited these examples as if they somehow pose a challenge to (or at least place doubt upon) classical theism. 
However:

(1) We need to clear up ongoing confusions over concepts. Classical theism is not and has never been a scientific proposal and is also qualitatively (not merely quantitatively) different from the concept of polytheism. Science restricted to the/ our spacetime arena (and even then, only some aspects of the spacetime arena), whereas classical theism is about what (IF anything) the spacetime arena is contingent upon. The gods of polytheism are conceptualized as (a) contingent entities (b) within the universe, (c) with an origin of their own, and as (d) existing alongside natural objects. This narrative is precisely what classical theism denies about God. The fact that both concepts can be discussed using the word “god” causes some very unfortunate confusion. We may need to talk about the concept of classical theism using a different word. 

Classical theism (and even non-classical but still traditional monotheism) says that all of reality—including the collection of other and all spacetime arenas /multiverse—is contingent upon and reducible to (and perhaps even emanates from) a single indivisible Source, which is itself not contingent upon or reducible to anything else. Classical theism goes further by insisting that this Source has (or, depending on who you ask, perhaps just is) consciousness. Classical theism concerns the ground of reality, or the ground of being, or the bottom level of reality, whereas polytheism concerns entities that are contingent upon this prior ground of being. 

Feel free to disagree or be skeptical, but also be sure to familiarize yourself with the arguments in favor of this position (which I’ll mention later). Some of these arguments were developed under the assumption that the universe is eternal and beginningless, so your quip about the Big Bang is completely irrelevant. The arguments aren’t susceptible to scientific evidence for a grand eternal megaverse.

(Note: When I said everything is “reducible” to this Source I didn’t mean physically reducible) 

(2) The gods of polytheism are (at least mostly) examples of pseudo-scientific hypotheses used to fill in gaps within our scientific knowledge, but the philosophical arguments for classical theism aren’t susceptible to scientific confirmation or disconfirmation. Again, this is a philosophical concept and isn’t susceptible to scientific confirmation or disconfirmation, even in principle. It’s not a scientific question AT ALL, so no amount of scientific discovery can undermine it. You need to deal specifically with the philosophical arguments. I’m sorry for being redundant, but this point can’t be overemphasized given the constant misunderstanding, which is sometimes peddled by ignorant believers themselves. Nonetheless, what I’m describing is the God of the early church, Aquinas, Augustine, St John (most likely), the author of Genesis (most likely), Ed Feserm the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, David Bentley Hart, etc. In fact, many of the standard arguments for classical theism are grounded in a philosophical framework that is arguably presupposed by any possible science (see this and this for expositions on this point). 

Quick side note: Classical theism isn’t the same as theistic personalism, which is what you find in works by William Lane Craig, Alvin Plangtinga, Gregory Boyd, etc. (see here, here, here, etc) But these two versions of God have enough of an overlap that the aforementioned points about polytheism vs monotheism still apply.

there is no proof that a God exists.  

There are a variety of worthwhile philosophical arguments that, if sound, take you to an indivisible Source of all contingent reality with additional side arguments suggesting that it may be conscious. But perhaps the arguments are not sound. I’m still trying to figure it out for myself. Either way, some of the arguments are at least worth reflecting on. 

 The Bible is the claim, not the proof. 

Who’s talking about the Bible? Most Christian philosophers of religion do NOT make pro-theistic arguments based on the Bible. In fact, some Christian philosophers (including WLC!) will grant, for the sake of the argument, that the gospels may contain historical errors and even some myth. They argue that, using the standard methods /approaches of conventional historiography, one can nevertheless make a case for the historicity of the person of Jesus, the empty tomb, and his postmortem appearances (with some atheists granting this point, but then explaining these in naturalistic terms, like the last chapter of this book). I’m not agreeing with them or endorsing their views. My point is that this is the closest they come to using the Bible in an argument. Otherwise their arguments are not based on scripture at all. See here, here (and watch Q/A), here, and here for more on the resurrection debate.

Unless we’re talking about naïve YECs. But YECs are usually not academic philosophers. I’m talking about (and Cameron’s post is talking about) philosophers of religion who offer purely philosophical arguments...

Now give me a reason that God is true

 I’m agnostic, but Feser’s versions of the arguments from change and PSR, the neoplatonic argument, the Augustinian argument, etc (e.g. here, here, here, etc). IMO these are among the most interesting arguments. David Bentley Hart’s version of the argument from contingency is also pretty good, although not as rigorous or formal as Feser. 

I think the moral argument is weak because it relies entirely on intuition, but if it were to go through then IMO it would take you *either* theism or Wielenberg’s godless normative realism, unless I’m missing something (which is possible). Here is a debate between WLC and Wielenberg on theism vs godless normative realism. Though, again, I don’t (yet?) accept the moral argument. I’m just sharing my own views with you.

IMO the kalam argument is weak because it presupposes a tensed theory of time, which seems like a hard case to make given certain findings from special and general relativity—although WLC has indeed gone to *great* lengths to argue for the tensed theory elsewhere, such as his “Tensed Theory of Time: A Critical Examination,”, his “Tenseless Theory of time: A Critical Examination,” and his “Time and the Metaphysics of Relativity.” However, the physicist James Fodor has written a very extensive and damning critique of WLC’s arguments in chapter two of his book “Unreasonable Faith: How William Lane Craig Overstates the Case for Christianity.” I’m still trying to decide for myself on this issue, but leaving heavily towards Fodor’s position. There is a purely philosophical version of the kalam based solely on the alleged impossibility of an actually-infinite number of things. See pages 103-125 of the 2009 Blackwell Companion to Natural Theology, or p 4-35 in the book “Theism, Atheism, and Big Bang Cosmology” co-authored with atheist philosopher Quentin Smith. WLC’s lectures are not as in depth as his academic written work, but click here for a lecture that covers a slice of his work (I copied the url at the time when Craig begins his philosophical discussion of the infinite).

IF WLC is right about the tensed theory of time and about the actual infinite, and IF the PSR is true, then I think the philosophical considerations in WLC’s more academic formulations of the kalam would indeed take you back to a first Source that is personal. But, again, I’m skeptical of these steps. Also, consider how WLC’s presentism may undermine his own arguments about infinity. Still, IMO, the standard internet atheist rebuttals to the kalam are pretty bad, and I say that as a skeptic myself. 

In any case, YOU posted these comments on the picture that Cameron posted--a picture of Walls and Dougherty’s book on “Two Dozen Arguments for God”— so YOU should engage the arguments contained in the book. Have you even read it? I’m not endorsing it by the way.

 We don't know what happens when we die (or we can't accept that nothing happens and everything will be like it was before we were born)

See Braude’s 2003 book and Sudduth’s 2016 critique of the empirical arguments for an afterlife. Braude concludes that the scales are just barely tipped in favor of the afterlife interpretation of the best cases, while Sudduth is ultimately more skeptical and thinks that the best alternative interpretation is at least equally plausible (if not more so). But both books provide very nice and charitable overviews of the evidence, some of which is pretty damn good, at least for something paranormal going on. Sudduth is absolutely persuasive that the strongest “afterlife” cases can’t be dismissed with the mundane and stereotypical physicalist interpretations; the best alternative interpretation is itself a (non-afterlife) paranormal interpretation (living agent psi/LAP hypothesis). I’m agnostic on the afterlife, but some of these cases have played a role in convincing me that psi phenomena occur.

In any case, an afterlife wouldn’t imply theism and theism doesn’t imply an afterlife, but I understand your point about theists tricking themselves into accepting theism because it erases their fear of death. I get the point, and it’s worth reflecting on. 

Also, 99% of people's religious beliefs are dependent of the place they are born  

Yes, good point. Though, it’s also true that people are more/less likely to accept evolution and the theories of relativity depending on where they’re born, which has no bearing on whether these ideas are correct. 

which means that(if there is a God, there is only one) you will believe in the true God only if you happen to be born in a certain place.

Yes, and that’s irritating and has relevance to the idea that God would arrange for people to suffer eternal torment for failing to have the right beliefs before dying, but it has no relevance to whether or not the philosophical arguments for classical theism go through. 

Also, just for the record, some Christian philosophers and theologians (including "Bible believing" Christians) have made what I regard as persuasive arguments for a form of Christ-mediated universalsim whereby everyone who has ever lived will be reconciled to God and to each other in heaven because of Jesus. See here, here, here, and here. Also see this forthcoming book. 

A lot more could and should be said, but my reply is already too long. 

Ravi Zecharias and the problem of evil

Ravi Zecharias recently appeared on The Sunday Special hosted by Ben Shapiro of the Daily Wire. Here is a clip of Ravi talking about the infamous problem of evil for believers in traditional monotheism. (Everything below was originally written as YouTube comment, but it was too long so I decided to move it here. Keep in mind that this is not a formal academic essay, so I did not fill in the sorts of details and analyses that I would in something more formal. There are links added to highlighted words that will take you to more detailed expositions. Below is just a glorified YouTube comment...)

Ravi invites the audience to think more clearly about what it means to complain about the existence of "evil" in the first place. The skeptic (the person skeptical of theism) is absolutely right in denouncing evil wherever and whenever it occurs. But what is "evil"? Ravi's point seems to be that skeptics are highlighting examples of things/events/actions that they regard as objectively wrong-- they deviate from objectively binding standards. These things are wrong regardless of human opinion (e.g. rape). Ravi goes on to suggest that if something can be objectively wrong in this sense then it implies that things can be objectively good, and these together imply the existence of a standard that transcends human opinion or imagination, which (Ravi argues) implies some sort of higher order law. Ravi suggests that this in turn requires a moral law giver.

So Ravi turns the argument back against the skeptics as a way of unintentionally arguing for the existence of God, given the premise that actually-objective moral values exist.

Here the skeptic must be honest and acknowledge that the existence of actually-objective moral values cries out for explanation, either in terms of theism, Wielenberg's godless normative realism (i.e. "moral platonism"), or maybe something else. For the sake of argument, let's grant that monotheism definitely has an explanatory advantage here.

(Click here for a good debate on the Euthyphro dilemma, which IMO fails as a serious challenge to modified divine command theory). However, I would argue that Ravi et al (as brilliant as they may be) have missed a yet deeper problem involved here. A skeptic does not have to cite objectively-evil things in order to run a successful PoE argument. We don't need to ask about the co-existence of objective evil with the all-loving God of traditional monotheism. Instead, a skeptic could argue that that the existence of gratuitous suffering (not objective evil, but gratuitous suffering) is inconsistent with the God of traditional monotheism. The argument may still fail, but it's not vulnerable to Ravi's rebuttal here. Here's a different way of phrasing it: A skeptic needn't invoke objective moral evil, but instead may argue that there is an internal tension or an internal inconsistency within the system(s) of traditional monotheism-- this system says that God is simultaneously (1) all-loving or omnibenevolent, which arguably entails wanting the best for his creation and creatures, or at the very least entails that God would not want his creatures to suffer gratuitously (2) all-powerful, which prima facie seems to entail having the power to bring about the best for his creation and (3) omniscient, which seems to entail knowing how to bring about the best for his creation. Ravi adds (4) that God is all-sovereign which arguably is slightly different from (2). But this last point isn't too relevant. In any case, the internal inconsistency concerns the following: (5) Gratuitous suffering exists Notice that (5) doesn't require objective evil in order for the argument to go through. In other words, citing the problem of evil does not require that the skeptic is committed to the existence of objective moral values, and it's also not the case that the skeptic's lack of belief in objective moral values somehow weakens the skeptic's argument. The real issue (or at least another issue) is whether or not the system of traditional monotheism contains within itself an internal inconsistency or tension.
At this point Ravi may be inclined to argue that free will explains much of the suffering, even if it's gratuitous, because free will can be used for evil. (We can get into the intrinsic value of free will and how it applies to this debate if need be, but let's just grant this point to Ravi) In order for a person to be able to freely choose the good then he/she must by the same logic be able to choose bad, including the bad choices of inflicting suffering on others. God won't intervene because doing so would violate their sacred free will. To be fair, what I just wrote is a pathetic summary of the richer free will defenses in the literature, but my point is that for the sake of argument I am granting Ravi the free will defense as far as it goes. Let's just give it to him.

However, this too misses the mark, because it completely and utterly fails to account for the gratuitous suffering of conscious animals (non-human animals) that die slow and agonizing deaths in naturally-occurring forest fires, drownings, predation, etc. It also wouldn't explain the existence of naturally-occurring diseases from parasites, fungi, viruses, etc-- free will doesn't cause animal suffering or disease. Nor could any person's free will cause a six year old child to have bone cancer. At this point Ravi may wish to claim that Adam and Eve's sin caused these natural evils by directly changing the fabric of reality (somehow), resulting in a transformation of the laws of physics, etc. But Adam and Eve, even if they existed, were most certainly not the first human beings, period; the science here is persuasive to anyone except the most closed minded YECs. Extreme animal suffering and diseases were occurring long before (and still long after) humans first came on the scene, and, once more, no human's free will could explain naturally-occurring bone cancer in six year old children.

So, prima facie, there is an internal inconsistency in the concept of traditional monotheism as conceived and outlined by Ravi himself. One does not need to appeal to actually-objective moral evils to make the point. There may be a rebuttal to everything I just said, but Ravi didn't even address this deeper problem, which is unaffected by his analysis. tl;dr: Ravi's response doesn't account for why an all-powerful, all-loving, sovereign God would allow gratuitous suffering in nature -- animals suffering from naturally-occurring ailments and situations, human children getting leukemia, etc. Again, the skeptic doesn't have to label these things "objectively evil" in order for the argument to have force. The idea is rather that there is an internal inconsistency within the system of traditional monotheism, regardless of whether or not these instances of gratuitous suffering are objectively evil.