52. Three Sources of Modern Anti-Teleological Custom

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Lecture Notes

Main Topics #

The Power of Custom Over Argument #

• Custom is stronger than argument in determining what people believe
• Example from Socrates in Apology: people take what “they say” more seriously than what can be proven
• Max Planck on scientific paradigm shifts: new ideas accepted when old scientists die, not through convincing them
• What seems “naturally clear” to us is often determined by custom, not reasoning

Three Major Sources of Modern Anti-Teleological Custom #

1. Mercantile Origin of Modern Cities #

• Unlike Greek cities (founded by aristocracy), modern cities originated from medieval merchants
• Commercial ethos permeates modern civilization
• Example: Sunday evening movies sponsored by GMK dry cleaning service—advertising shaped media
• Contrast: Greek festivals (Sophocles, Aeschylus, Agamemnon) as religious competitions producing great tragedy
• Plato’s Symposium took place at dinner honoring the prize-winner for greatest tragedy
• Modern movies made to profit in box office, not for elevation of culture
• Comment on Ion: Socrates’ conversation with the rhapsodist Ion, who recites Homer

2. Mathematics of Natural and Technical Science (Most Important) #

• Union of natural science with mechanical arts in 17th-18th centuries
• Previously distinct: natural philosophy (natural order) vs. mechanical arts (order made in artificial matter)
• Modern science: inseparable union of science and technology
  • New techniques enable experiments impossible before
  • New theories suggest new techniques
  • Two become intertwined
• Mathematics enables this union because it abstracts from differences between natural and artificial
  • Four legs of chair: by art
  • Four legs of cat: by nature
  • Abstract number four: applies to both, abstracts the difference

Heisenberg’s Observation #

• Shifted attitude from contemplation (desire to understand) to pragmatism (“what can you do with it?”)
• Created practical, instrumental orientation toward nature

Historical Development #

• Mechanics: ancient part of modern physics (word from “mechanical arts”)
• Galileo and Kepler perfected mechanics
• Newton unified Galileo and Kepler; became model for all knowledge
• 17th, 18th, 19th centuries called “classical physics” or “Newtonian physics”
• Ernst Cassirer: everyone took Newton as model for all thinking
• Poet: “All was darkness; God said, ‘Let Newton be,’ and all was light”
• Descartes developed new mathematics; Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason attempted to understand Newtonian knowledge

Support from Commerce and Government #

• Modern science supported by business and government for practical reasons
• Example: chemist at Minnesota Mining—ideas belong to company
• Merchants use scientists; scientists’ labor-value extracted by commercial interests

3. Democratic Revolutions and Social Equality #

• Shift from hereditary aristocratic inequality to democratic equality
• Most striking: French Revolution (“Liberté, égalité, fraternité”)
• 18th-19th centuries saw increasing democratization
• Key text: Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America
  • Tocqueville came to America to study pure democracy (France still had aristocratic remnants)
  • Volume I: American institutions (local to federal government)
  • Volume II: Beautiful contrast of democratic vs. aristocratic customs
  • Volume II has four books covering: mind, morals/manners, government

Democratic Influence on Historical Understanding #

• Democratic historian: emphasizes mass movements; individuals are tools of mass movements
• If not that person, someone else would be pushed forward
• Aristocratic historian: emphasizes role of great men in changing history
• Example: Winston Churchill—questionable whether England wouldn’t have made peace with Germany without Churchill
• Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar: Cassius/Casca calls Brutus “the soul of Rome”
• Better to say Churchill was “the soul of Britain” in his moment

Democratic Influence on Literature and Religion #

• Aristocratic times: look to past for inspiration (Iliad set in mythical past when men were greater)
• Democratic times: look to future for inspiration (1984, Brave New World, Star Wars all future-set)
• Religion: democratic customs naturally suggest pantheistic ideas
• Observed in German philosophy and French literature
• 19th century Church documents repeatedly correcting Catholic German theologians for pantheistic tendencies
• Example: Karl Rahner slightly pantheistic; unnamed compatriot even more so

Mathematical Net Argument (Central to Understanding Modern Custom) #

Sir Arthur Eddington’s Analogy #

• Fisherman with net repeatedly catches only fish larger than mesh holes
• Concludes no fish smaller than holes exist
• Ichthyologist points out: net’s design prevents catching smaller fish, not their non-existence
• Similarly: man who only hears denies color exists (ear cannot catch color even if it exists)

Application to Mathematics and Purpose #

• Mathematical net cannot catch substance, sense qualities, or purpose
• Fact that purpose never appears in mathematical description ≠ purpose doesn’t exist
• Just as mathematical net not designed to catch purpose, even if it exists

Schrodinger’s Point on Matter #

• Erwin Schrodinger: developer of wave mechanics equation
• Same year as Schrodinger’s wave mechanics, Heisenberg published quantum mechanics scheme
• Both mathematical formalisms worked; Schrodinger showed their equivalence
• Schrodinger’s conclusion: “The modern atom consists of no stuff at all. It’s a purely mathematical theory of matter. It contains no stuff. There’s no matter there.”
• Compared to Plato’s mathematical theory of matter (Timaeus): geometrical figures for earth, air, fire, water—no matter there
• If we don’t deny matter exists because it’s not in mathematical net, shouldn’t deny purpose exists for same reason
• Soviet concern: Communist Party worried modern science wasn’t proving Marxism-Leninism (dialectical materialism) because matter seemed to disappear

The Inextricable Link of the Three Sources #

• First source (mercantile): might dispose people toward second source (science as profit-making tool)
• Industrial Revolution involves both
• Modern world: these forces work together creating unified anti-teleological worldview

The Mathematical Worldview’s Rejection of Key Metaphysical Categories #

Substance (ὑποκείμενον / substantia) #

• Descartes: denies material substance; replaces with extension (quantity, second category)
• Locke, Hume, Bertrand Russell deny substance
• Russell on accidents: “Mr. Smith’s accidents have no more need of a substance to exist in than the earth has need of an elephant to rest upon”
• Church reaction: Nicene Creed avoids word “consubstantial” (same substance); prefers vague “same being”

Sensible Qualities (ποιότης) #

• Modern philosophers and scientists deny sensible qualities exist in nature
• No redness, greenness, hotness, coldness out there—these are “mirages” of our perception
• Yet paradox: science requires using sense qualities to read instruments
  • Black marks on paper
  • Blue columns rising on graphs
  • Cannot do science without employing sense qualities, but scientific worldview denies their existence

Purpose (τέλος) #

• Mathematics has no end or purpose
• Example: don’t say geometrical sphere is smooth so it can roll away from danger
• Don’t say pyramid is pointed to protect itself like porcupine’s quills
• Triangle’s interior angles are just “that way,” not “better that way”

Conviction and Irrationality #

• Colleague converted to modern philosophy convinced sense qualities don’t exist
• Per modern philosophers: holding to reality of sense qualities is sign of irrationality
• Custom creates self-reinforcing epistemology: what science (mathematics-based) cannot know seems irrational to believe
• Those accustomed only to mathematical knowledge find talk of purpose seems “unscientific, irrational”
• Custom stronger than arguments in determining rationality itself

Examples of Custom Overriding Reason #

• Niels Bohr kept his paper on quantum atom locked in desk almost a year: feared being laughed at
• Louis de Broglie’s wave mechanics: called “Le Comédie Francaise” (comedy/mockery) by French scientists for not being customary
• Einstein’s support allowed de Broglie’s theory to be tested and confirmed (Bell Telephone Laboratories in New York)
• Wearing toga in modern class would be laughed at despite being customary in Greece

The Gap Between Great Minds and Their Followers #

• Great physicists (Niels Bohr, Heisenberg) remain open to purpose in living world
• Many biologists imitate physicists’ neglect of purpose despite biology’s subject matter suggesting it
• Recently: biologists like Michael Denton beginning to recognize purpose, but physicists already open to it
• Newton himself more cautious than reputation suggests: didn’t claim to know “why” apple falls, only how to calculate its fall
• Einstein admired Newton more for knowing what he didn’t know than for what he did know
• Followers often more dogmatic than originators

Important Distinctions #

Custom vs. Argument #

• Custom determines what seems “naturally obvious” to us
• Different ages take different things for granted
• Custom shapes perception before reasoning begins

Types of Knowledge #

• Contemplative: desiring to understand why (Greek festival model)
• Pragmatic: asking what can be done with it (modern commercial model)
• Modern shift: from first to second orientation

Examples & Illustrations #

Medieval vs. Modern Media #

• Sunday evening movie with GMK dry cleaning sponsor: 15 minutes of movie, 15 minutes commercials
• Advertising shape content and quality
• Contrast: Greek tragic festivals as religious competitions producing Sophocles, Aeschylus, Agamemnon
• Plato’s Symposium at dinner honoring yearly tragedy prize-winner Agathon

Literature and Historical Imagination #

• Past-oriented (aristocratic): Iliad set in mythical age when men were greater
• Future-oriented (democratic): 1984, Brave New World, Star Wars all set in future

Human Art and Commercial Interest #

• Chemist working for Minnesota Mining: his ideas belong to company
• Merchants using scientists for profit extraction

Notable Quotes #

“Custom is stronger than argument, for the most part, in our thinking.”

“The mathematical net is not designed to catch an end or purpose. Even if there’s one out there, the fact that end or purpose never showed up in a mathematical net is no reason to say there’s no such thing out there.”

“A mathematical net is not designed to catch a color, even if there’s color out there. The ear is not designed to catch a color. So you might say that a mathematical net is not designed to catch an end or purpose.”

“If you’re accustomed to this kind of knowledge, right, then you’re accustomed to seeing the world without any sense quality, right, and without any substance, you know, without any purpose.”

“[About Newton] ‘I don’t know why the apple falls to the ground or the stone falls to the ground, I can calculate the way in which they fall.’”

“‘All was darkness; God said, let Newton be, and all was light.’”

“It’s interesting how the great minds sometimes see better than their followers, their fawning or flattering or enthusiastic followers, see the limitations of their ideas.”

Questions Addressed #

Q: How can modern worldview deny sense qualities when we use them in instruments? A: This is a paradox. We must use sense qualities to read scientific instruments, yet the scientific worldview denies their existence in nature. This contradiction reveals how custom has created an inconsistent epistemology.

Q: Why do great physicists remain open to purpose in living things while many biologists deny it? A: Great minds like Bohr and Heisenberg maintain broader philosophical openness. Many biologists imitate the mathematical approach of older physics despite biology’s subject matter suggesting purposiveness. The followers can be more dogmatic than the originators.