"Is God a Taoist?" from The Tao is silent by Raymond M. Smullyan. (C) 1977 by Raymond M. Smullyan. Reprinted by permission of Harper & Row Publishers, Inc.
MORTAL: And therefore, O God, I pray thee, if thou hast one ounce
of mercy for this thy suffering creature, absolve me of having to
have free will!
GOD: You reject the greatest gift I have given thee?
MORTAL: How can you call that which was forced on me a gift? I have
free will, but not of my own choice. I have never freely chosen to have
free will. I have to have free will, whether I like it or not!
GOD: Why would you wish not to have free will?
MORTAL: Because free will means moral responsibility, and moral
responsibility is more than I can bear!
GOD: Why do you find moral responsibility so unbearable?
MORTAL: Why? I honestly can't analyze why; all I know is that I do.
GOD: All right, in that case suppose I absolve you from all moral
responsibility but leave you still with free will. Will this be
satisfactory?
MORTAL (after a pause): No, I am afraid not.
GOD: Ah, just as I thought! So moral responsibility is not the only
aspect of free will to which you object. What else about free will is
bothering you?
MORTAL: With free will I am capable of sinning, and I don't want to
sin!
GOD: If you don't want to sin, then why do you?
MORTAL: Good God! I don't know why I sin, I just do! Evil
temptations come along, and try as I can, I cannot resist them.
GOD: If it is really true that you cannot resist them, then you are
not sinning of your own free will and hence (at least according to me)
not sinning at all.
MORTAL: No, no! I keep feeling that if only I tried harder I could
avoid sinning. I understand that the will is infinite. If one
wholeheartedly wills not to sin, then one won't.
GOD: Well now, you should know. Do you try as hard as you can to
avoid sinning or don't you?
MORTAL: I honestly don't know! At the time, I feel I am trying as
hard as I can, but in retrospect, I am worried that maybe I didn't!
GOD: So in other words, you don't really know whether or not you
have been sinning. So the possibility is open that you haven't been
sinning at all!
MORTAL: Of course this possibility is open, but maybe I have been
sinning, and this thought is what so frightens me!
GOD: Why does the thought of your sinning frighten you?
MORTAL: I don't know why! For one thing, you do have a reputation
for meting out rather gruesome punishments in the afterlife!
GOD: Oh, that's what's bothering you! Why didn't you say so in the
first place instead of all this peripheral talk about free will and
responsibility? Why didn't you simply request me not to punish you for
any of your sins?
MORTAL: I think I am realistic enough to know that you would hardly
grant such a request!
GOD: You don't say! You have a realistic knowledge of what
requests I will grant, eh? Well, I'll tell you what I'm going to do! I
will grant you a very, very special dispensation to sin as much as you
like, and I give you my divine word of honor that I will never punish
you for it in the least. Agreed?
MORTAL (in great terror): No, no, don't do that!
GOD: Why not? Don't you trust my divine word?
MORTAL: Of course I do! But don't you see, I don't want to sin! I
have an utter abhorrence of sinning, quite apart from any punishments
it may entail.
GOD: In that case, I'll go you one better. I'll remove your
abhorrence of sinning. Here is a magic pill! Just swallow it, and you
will lose all abhorrence of sinning. You will joyfully and merrily
sin away, you will have no regrets, no abhorrence and I still promise
you will never be punished by me, or yourself, or by any source
whatever. You will be blissful for all eternity. So here is the pill!
MORTAL: No, no!
GOD: Are you not being irrational? I am even removing your
abhorrence of sin, which is your last obstacle.
MORTAL: I still won't take it!
GOD: Why not?
MORTAL: I believe that the pill will indeed remove my future
abhorrence for sin, but my present abhorrence is enough to prevent me
from being willing to take it.
GOD: I command you to take it! '
MORTAL: I refuse!
GOD: What, you refuse of your own free will?
MORTAL: Yes!
GOD: So it seems that your free will comes in pretty handy, doesn't
it?
MORTAL: I don't understand!
GOD: Are you not glad now that you have the free will to refuse
such a ghastly offer? How would you like it if I forced you to take
this pill, whether you wanted it or not?
MORTAL: No, no! Please don't!
GOD: Of course I won't; I'm just trying to illustrate a point. All
right, let me put it this way. Instead of forcing you to take the pill,
suppose I grant your original prayer of removing your free will--but
with the understanding that the moment you are no longer free, then you
will take the pill.
MORTAL: Once my will is gone, how could I possibly choose to take
the pill?
GOD: I did not say you would choose it; I merely said you would
take it. You would act, let us say, according to purely deterministic
laws which are such that you would as a matter of fact take it.
MORTAL: I still refuse.
GOD: So you refuse my offer to remove your free will. This is
rather different from your original prayer, isn't it?
MORTAL: Now I see what you are up to. Your argument is ingenious,
but I'm not sure it is really correct. There are some points we will
have to go over again.
GOD: Certainly.
MORTAL: There are two things you said which seem contradictory to
me. First you said that one cannot sin unless one does so of one's own
free will. But then you said you would give me a pill which would
deprive me of my own free will, and then I could sin as much as I
liked. But if I no longer had free will, then, according to your first
statement, how could I be capable of sinning?
GOD: You are confusing two separate parts of our conversation. I
never said the pill would deprive you of your free will, but only that
it would remove your abhorrence of sinning.
MORTAL: I'm afraid I'm a bit confused.
GOD: All right, then let us make a fresh start. Suppose I agree to
remove your free will, but with the understanding that you will then
commit an enormous number of acts which you now regard as sinful.
Technically speaking, you will not then be sinning since you will not
be doing these acts of your own free will. And these acts will carry no
moral responsibility, nor moral culpability, nor any punishment
whatsoever. Nevertheless, these acts will all be of the type which you
presently regard as sinful; they will all have this quality which you
presently feel as abhorrent, but your abhorrence will disappear; so you
will not then feel abhorrence toward the acts.
MORTAL: No, but I have present abhorrence toward the acts, and this
present abhorrence is sufficient to prevent me from accepting your
proposal.
GOD: Hm! So let me get this absolutely straight. I take it you no
longer wish me to remove your free will.
MORTAL (reluctantly): No, I guess not.
GOD: All right, I agree not to. But I am still not exactly clear as
to why you now no longer wish to be rid of your free will. Please tell
me again.
MORTAL: Because, as you have told me, without free will I would sin
even more than I do now.
GOD: But I have already told you that without free will you cannot
sin.
MORTAL: But if I choose now to be rid of free will, then all my
subsequent evil actions will be sins, not of the future, but of the
present moment in which I choose not to have free will.
GOD: Sounds like you are pretty badly trapped, doesn't it?
MORTAL: Of course I am trapped! You have placed me in a hideous
double bind! Now whatever I do is wrong. If I retain free will, I will
continue to sin, and if I abandon free will (with your help, of course)
I will now be sinning in so doing.
GOD: But by the same token, you place me in a double bind. I am
willing to leave you free will or remove it as you choose, but neither
alternative satisfies you. I wish to help you, but it seems I
cannot.
MORTAL: True!
GOD: But since it is not my fault, why are you still angry with me?
MORTAL: For having placed me in such a horrible predicament in
first place!
GOD: But, according to you, there is nothing satisfactory I could
have done.
MORTAL: You mean there is nothing satisfactory you can now do,
that does not mean that there is nothing you could have done.
GOD: Why? What could I have done?
MORTAL: Obviously you should never have given me free will in the
first place. Now that you have given it to me, it is too late--anything
I do will be bad. But you should never have given it to me in the first
place.
GOD: Oh, that's it! Why would it have been better had I never given
it to you?
MORTAL: Because then I never would have been capable of sinning at all.
GOD: Well, I'm always glad to learn from my mistakes.
MORTAL: What!
GOD: I know, that sounds sort of self-blasphemous, doesn't it? It
almost involves a logical paradox! On the one hand, as you have been
taught, it is morally wrong for any sentient being to claim that I am
capable of making mistakes. On the other hand, I have the right to do
anything. But I am also a sentient being. So the question is, Do, I or
do I not have the right to claim that I am capable of making mistakes?
MORTAL: That is a bad joke! One of your premises is simply false. I
have not been taught that it is wrong for any sentient being to doubt
your omniscience, but only for a mortal to doubt it. But since you are
not mortal, then you are obviously free from this injunction.
GOD: Good, so you realize this on a rational level. Nevertheless,
you did appear shocked when I said, "I am always glad to learn from my
mistakes."
MORTAL: Of course I was shocked. I was shocked not by your
self-blasphemy (as you jokingly called it), not by the fact that you
had no right to say it, but just by the fact that you did say it, since
I have been taught that as a matter of fact you don't make mistakes. So
I was amazed that you claimed that it is possible for you to make
mistakes.
GOD: I have not claimed that it is possible. All I am saying is
that if I make mistakes, I will be happy to learn from them. But this
says nothing about whether the if has or ever can be realized.
MORTAL: Let's please stop quibbling about this point. Do you or do
you not admit it was a mistake to have given me free will?
GOD: Well now, this is precisely what I propose we should
investigate. Let me review your present predicament. You don't want to
have free will because with free will you can sin, and you don't want
to sin. (Though I still find this puzzling; in a way you must want to
sin, or else you wouldn't. But let this pass for now.) On the other
hand, if you agreed to give up free will, then you would now be
responsible for the acts of the future. Ergo, I should never have given
you free will in the first place.
MORTAL: Exactly!
GOD: I understand exactly how you feel. Many mortals--even some
theologians--have complained that I have been unfair in that it was
I, not they, who decided that they should have free will, and then I
hold them responsible for their actions. In other words, they feel that
they are expected to live up to a contract with me which they never
agreed to in the first place.
MORTAL: Exactly!
GOD: As I said, I understand the feeling perfectly. And I can
appreciate the justice of the complaint. But the complaint arises only
from an unrealistic understanding of the true issues involved. I am
about to enlighten you as to what these are, and I think the results
will surprise you! But instead of telling you outright, I shall
continue to use the Socratic method.
To repeat, you regret that I ever gave you free will. I claim that
when you see the true ramifications you will no longer have this
regret. To prove my point, I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I am
about to create a new universe--a new space-time continuum. In this new
universe will be born a mortal just like you--for all practical
purposes, we might say that you will be reborn. Now, I can give this
new mortal--this new you--free will or not. What would you like me to
do?
MORTAL (in great relief): Oh, please! Spare him from having to
have free will!
GOD: All right, I'll do as you say. But you do realize that this
new you without free will, will commit all sorts of horrible acts.
MORTAL: But they will not be sins since he will have no free will.
GOD: Whether you call them sins or not, the fact remains that they
will be horrible acts in the sense that they will cause great pain to
many sentient beings.
MORTAL (after a pause): Good God, you have trapped me again!
Always the same game! If I now give you the go-ahead to create this new
creature with no free will who will nevertheless commit atrocious acts,
then true enough he will not be sinning, but I again will be the sinner
to sanction this.
GOD: In that case, I'll go you one better! Here, I have already
decided whether to create this new you with free will or not. Now, I am
writing my decision on this piece of paper and I won't show it to you
until later. But my decision is now made and is absolutely irrevocable.
There is nothing you can possibly do to alter it; you have no
responsibility in the matter. Now, what I wish to know is this: Which
way do you hope I have decided? Remember now, the responsibility for
the decision falls entirely on my shoulders, not yours. So you can tell
me perfectly honestly and without any fear, which way do you hope I
have decided?
MORTAL (after a very long pause): I hope you have decided to give
him free will.
GOD: Most interesting! I have removed your last obstacle! If I do
not give him free will, then no sin is to be imputed to anybody. So why
do you hope I will give him free will?
MORTAL: Because sin or no sin, the important point is that if you
do not give him free will, then (at least according to what you have
said) he will go around hurting people, and I don't want to see people
hurt.
GOD (with an infinite sigh of relief): At last! At last you see
the real point!
MORTAL: What point is that?
GOD: That sinning is not the real issue! The important thing is
that people as well as other sentient beings don't get hurt!
MORTAL: You sound like a utilitarian!
GOD: I am a utilitarian!
MORTAL: What!
GOD: Whats or no whats, I am a utilitarian. Not a unitarian, mind
you, but a utilitarian.
MORTAL: I just can't believe it!
GOD: Yes, I know, your religious training has taught you otherwise.
You have probably thought of me more like a Kantian than a utilitarian,
but your training was simply wrong.
MORTAL: You leave me speechless!
GOD: I leave you speechless, do I! Well, that is perhaps not too
bad a thing--you have a tendency to speak too much as it is. Seriously,
though, why do you think I ever did give you free will in the first
place?
MORTAL: Why did you? I never have thought much about why you did;
all I have been arguing for is that you shouldn't have! But why did
you? I guess all I can think of is the standard religious explanation:
Without free will, one is not capable of meriting either salvation or
damnation. So without free will, we could not earn the right to eternal
life.
GOD: Most interesting! I have eternal life; do you think I have
ever done anything to merit it?
MORTAL: Of course not! With you it is different. You are already so
good and perfect (at least allegedly) that it is not necessary for you
to merit eternal life.
GOD: Really now? That puts me in a rather enviable position,
doesn't it?
MORTAL: I don't think I understand you.
GOD: Here I am eternally blissful without ever having to suffer or
make sacrifices or struggle against evil temptations or anything like
that. Without any of that type of "merit", I enjoy blissful eternal
existence. By contrast, you poor mortals have to sweat and suffer and
have all sorts of horrible conflicts about morality, and all for what?
You don't even know whether I really exist or not, or if there really
is any afterlife, or if there is, where you come into the picture. No
matter how much you try to placate me by being "good," you never have
any real assurance that your "best" is good enough for me, and hence
you have no real security in obtaining salvation. Just think of it! I
already have the equivalent of "salvation"--and have never had to go
through this infinitely lugubrious process of earning it. Don't you
ever envy me for this?
MORTAL: But it is blasphemous to envy you!
GOD: Oh come off it! You're not now talking to your Sunday school
teacher, you are talking to me. Blasphemous or not, the important
question is not whether you have the right to be envious of me but
whether you are. Are you?
MORTAL: Of course I am!
GOD: Good! Under your present world view, you sure should be most
envious of me. But I think with a more realistic world view, you no
longer will be. So you really have swallowed the idea which has been
taught you that your life on earth is like an examination period and
that the purpose of providing you with free will is to test you, to see
if you merit blissful eternal life. But what puzzles me is this: If you
really believe I am as good and benevolent as I am cracked up to be,
why should I require people to merit things like happiness and eternal
life? Why should I not grant such things to everyone regardless of
whether or not he deserves them?
MORTAL: But I have been taught that your sense of morality--your
sense of justice--demands that goodness be rewarded with happiness and
evil be punished with pain.
GOD: Then you have been taught wrong.
MORTAL: But the religious literature is so full of this idea! Take
for example Jonathan Edwards's "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God."
How he describes you as holding your enemies like loathsome scorpions
over the flaming pit of hell, preventing them from falling into the
fate that they deserve only by dint of your mercy.
GOD: Fortunately, I have not been exposed to the tirades of Mr.
Jonathan Edwards. Few sermons have ever been preached which are more
misleading. The very title "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" tells
its own tale. In the first place, I am never angry. In the second
place, I do not think at all in terms of "sin." In the third place, I
have no enemies.
MORTAL: By that do you mean that there are no people whom you hate,
or that there are no people who hate you?
GOD: I meant the former although the latter also happens to be true.
MORTAL: Oh come now, I know people who have openly claimed to have
hated you. At times I have hated you!
GOD: You mean you have hated your image of me. That is not the same
thing as hating me as I really am.
MORTAL: Are you trying to say that it is not wrong to hate a false
conception of you, but that it is wrong to hate you as you really are?
GOD: No, I am not saying that at all; I am saying something far more
drastic! What I am saying has absolutely nothing to do with right or
wrong. What I am saying is that one who knows me for what I really
am would simply find it psychologically impossible to hate me.
MORTAL: Tell me, since we mortals seem to have such erroneous views
about your real nature, why don't you enlighten us? Why don't you guide
us the right way?
GOD: What makes you think I'm not?
MORTAL: I mean, why don't you appear to our very senses and simply
tell us that we are wrong?
GOD; Are you really so naive as to believe that I am the sort of
being which can appear to your senses? It would be more correct to
say that I am your senses.
MORTAL (astonished): You are my senses?
GOD: Not quite, I am more than that. But it comes closer to the
truth than the idea that I am perceivable by the senses. I am not an
object; like you, I am a subject, and a subject can perceive, but
cannot be perceived. You can no more see me than you can see your own
thoughts. You can see an apple, but the event of your seeing an apple
is itself not seeable. And I am far more like the seeing of an apple
than the apple itself.
MORTAL: If I can't see you, how do I know you exist?
GOD: Good question! How in fact do you know I exist?
MORTAL: Well, I am talking to you, am I not?
GOD: How do you know you are talking to me? Suppose you told
psychiatrist, "Yesterday I talked to God." What do you think he would
say?
MORTAL: That might depend on the psychiatrist. Since most of them
are atheistic, I guess most would tell me I had simply been talking to
myself.
GOD: And they would be right!
MORTAL: What? You mean you don't exist?
GOD: You have the strangest faculty of drawing false conclusions!
Just because you are talking to yourself, it follows that I don't
exist?
MORTAL: Well, if I think I am talking to you, but I am really
talking to myself, in what sense do you exist?
GOD: Your question is based on two fallacies plus a confusion. The
question of whether or not you are now talking to me and the question
of whether or not I exist are totally separate. Even if you were not
now talking to me (which obviously you are), it still would not mean
that I don't exist.
MORTAL: Well, all right, of course! So instead of saying "if I am
talking to myself, then you don't exist," I should rather have said,
"if I am talking to myself, then I obviously am not talking to you."
GOD: A very different statement indeed, but still false.
MORTAL: Oh, come now, if I am only talking to myself, then how can
I be talking to you?
GOD: Your use of the word "only" is quite misleading! I can suggest
several logical possibilities under which your talking to yourself does
not imply that you are not talking to me.
MORTAL: Suggest just one!
GOD: Well, obviously one such possibility is that you and I are
identical.
MORTAL: Such a blasphemous thought--at least had I uttered it!
GOD: According to some religions, yes. According to others, it is
the plain, simple, immediately perceived truth.
MORTAL: So the only way out of my dilemma is to believe that you
and I are identical?
GOD: Not at all! This is only one way out. There are several
others. For example, it may be that you are part of me, in which case
you may be talking to that part of me which is you. Or I may be part of
you, in which case you may be talking to that part of you which is me.
Or again, you and I might partially overlap, in which case you may be
talking to the intersection and hence talking both to you and to me.
The only way your talking to yourself might seem to imply that you are
not talking to me is if you and I were totally disjoint--and even then,
you could conceivably be talking to both of us.
MORTAL: So you claim you do exist.
GOD: Not at all. Again you draw false conclusions! The question of
my existence has not even come up. All I have said is that from the
fact that you are talking to yourself one cannot possibly infer my
nonexistence, let alone the weaker fact that you are not talking to me.
MORTAL: All right, I'll grant your point! But what I really want to
know is do you exist?
GOD: What a strange question!
MORTAL: Why? Men have been asking it for countless millennia.
GOD: I know that! The question itself is not strange; what I mean
is that it is a most strange question to ask of me!
MORTAL: Why?
GOD: Because I am the very one whose existence you doubt! I
perfectly well understand your anxiety. You are worried that your
present experience with me is a mere hallucination. But how can you
possibly expect to obtain reliable information from a being about his
very existence when you suspect the nonexistence of the very same
being?
MORTAL: So you won't tell me whether or not you exist?
GOD: I am not being willful! I merely wish to point out that no
answer I could give could possibly satisfy you. All right, suppose I
said, "No, I don't exist." What would that prove? Absolutely nothing!
Or if I said, "Yes, I exist." Would that convince you? Of course not!
MORTAL: Well, if you can't tell me whether or not you exist, then
who possibly can?
GOD: That is something which no one can tell you. It is something
which only you can find out for yourself.
MORTAL: How do I go about finding this out for myself?
GOD: That also no one can tell you. This is another thing you will
have to find out for yourself.
MORTAL: So there is no way you can help me?
GOD: I didn't say that. I said there is no way I can tell you. But
that doesn't mean there is no way I can help you.
MORTAL: In what manner then can you help me?
GOD: I suggest you leave that to me! We have gotten sidetracked as
it is, and I would like to return to the question of what you believed
my purpose to be in giving you free will. Your first idea of my giving
you free will in order to test whether you merit salvation or not may
appeal to many moralists, but the idea is quite hideous to me. You
cannot think of any nicer reason--any more humane reason--why I gave
you free will?
MORTAL: Well now, I once asked this question of an Orthodox rabbi.
He told me that the way we are constituted, it is simply not possible
for us to enjoy salvation unless we feel we have earned it. And to earn
it, we of course need free will.
GOD: That explanation is indeed much nicer than your former but
still is far from correct. According to Orthodox Judaism, I created
angels, and they have no free will. They are in actual sight of me and
are so completely attracted by goodness that they never have even the
slightest temptation toward evil. They really have no choice in the
matter. Yet they are eternally happy even though they have never earned
it. So if your rabbi's explanation were correct, why wouldn't I have
simply created only angels rather than mortals?
MORTAL: Beats me! Why didn't you?
GOD: Because the explanation is simply not correct. In the first
place, I have never created any ready-made angels. All sentient beings
ultimately approach the state which might be called "angelhood." But
just as the race of human beings is in a certain stage of biologic
evolution, so angels are simply the end result of a process of Cosmic
Evolution. The only difference between the so-called saint and the
so-called sinner is that the former is vastly older than the latter.
Unfortunately it takes countless life cycles to learn what is perhaps
the most important fact of the universe--evil is simply painful. All
the arguments of the moralists--all the alleged reasons why people
shouldn't commit evil acts--simply pale into insignificance in light
of the one basic truth that evil is suffering.
No, my dear friend, I am not a moralist. I am wholly a utilitarian.
That I should have been conceived in the role of a moralist is one of
the great tragedies of the human race. My role in the scheme of things
(if one can use this misleading expression) is neither to punish nor
reward, but to aid the process by which all sentient beings achieve
ultimate perfection.
MORTAL: Why did you say your expression is misleading?
GOD: What I said was misleading in two respects. First of all it is
inaccurate to speak of my role in the scheme of things. I am the
scheme of things. Secondly, it is equally misleading to speak of my
aiding the process of sentient beings attaining enlightenment. I am
the process. The ancient Taoists were quite close when they said of me
(whom they called "Tao") that I do not do things, yet through me all
things get done. In more modem terms, I am not the cause of Cosmic
Process, I am Cosmic Process itself. I think the most accurate and
fruitful definition of me which man can frame--at least in his present
state of evolution--is that I am the very process of enlightenment.
Those who wish to think of the devil (although I wish they wouldn't!)
might analogously define him as the unfortunate length of time the
process takes. In this sense, the devil is necessary; the process
simply does take an enormous length of time, and there is absolutely
nothing I can do about it. But, I assure you, once the process is more
correctly understood, the painful length of time will no longer be
regarded as an essential limitation or an evil. It will be seen to be
the very essence of the process itself. I know this is not completely
consoling to you who are now in the finite sea of suffering, but the
amazing thing is that once you grasp this fundamental attitude, your
very finite suffering will begin to diminish--ultimately to the
vanishing point.
MORTAL: I have been told this, and I tend to believe it. But
suppose I personally succeed in seeing things through your eternal
eyes. Then I will be happier, but don't I have a duty to others?
GOD (laughing): You remind me of the Mahayana Buddhists! Each one
says, "I will not enter Nirvana until I first see that all other
sentient beings do so." So each one waits for the other fellow to go
first. No wonder it takes them so long! The Hinayana Buddhist errs in a
different direction. He believes that no one can be of the slightest
help to others in obtaining salvation; each one has to do it entirely
by himself. And so each tries only for his own salvation. But this very
detached attitude makes salvation impossible. The truth of the matter
is that salvation is partly an individual and partly a social process.
But it is a grave mistake to believe--as do many Mahayana Buddhists
--that the attaining of enlightenment puts one out of commission, so to
speak, for helping others. The best way of helping others is by first
seeing the light oneself.
MORTAL: There is one thing about your self-description which is
somewhat disturbing. You describe yourself essentially as a process.
This puts you in such an impersonal light, and so many people have a
need for a personal God.
GOD: So because they need a personal God, it follows that I am one?
MORTAL: Of course not. But to be acceptable to a mortal a religion
must satisfy his needs.
GOD: I realize that. But the so-called "personality" of a being is
really more in the eyes of the beholder than in the being itself. The
controversies which have raged, about whether I am a personal or an
impersonal being are rather silly because neither side is right or
wrong. From one point of view, I am personal, from another, I am not.
It is the same with a human being. A creature from another planet may
look at him purely impersonally as a mere collection of atomic
particles behaving according to strictly prescribed physical laws. He
may have no more feeling for the personality of a human than the
average human has for an ant. Yet an ant has just as much individual
personality as a human to beings like myself who really know the ant.
To look at something impersonally is no more correct or incorrect than
to look at it personally, but in general, the better you get to know
something, the more personal it becomes. To illustrate my point, do you
think of me as a personal or impersonal being?
MORTAL: Well, I'm talking to you, am I not?
GOD: Exactly! From that point of view, your attitude toward me
might be described as a personal one. And yet, from another point of
view --no less valid--I can also be looked at impersonally.
MORTAL: But if you are really such an abstract thing as a process,
I don't see what sense it can make my talking to a mere "process."
GOD: I love the way you say "mere." You might just as well say that
you are living in a "mere universe." Also, why must everything one does
make sense? Does it make sense to talk to a tree?
MORTAL: Of course not!
GOD: And yet, many children and primitives do just that.
MORTAL: But I am neither a child nor a primitive.
GOD: I realize that, unfortunately.
MORTAL: Why unfortunately?
GOD: Because many children and primitives have a primal intuition
which the likes of you have lost. Frankly, I think it would do you a
lot of good to talk to a tree once in a while, even more good than
talking to me! But we seem always to be getting sidetracked! For the
last time, I would like us to try to come to an understanding about
why I gave you free will.
MORTAL: I have been thinking about this all the while.
GOD: You mean you haven't been paying attention to our conversation?
MORTAL: Of course I have. But all the while, on another level, I
have been thinking about it.
GOD: And have you come to any conclusion?
MORTAL: Well, you say the reason is not to test our worthiness. And
you disclaimed the reason that we need to feel that we must merit
things in order to enjoy them. And you claim to be a utilitarian. Most
significant of all, you appeared so delighted when I came to the sudden
realization that it is not sinning in itself which is bad but only the
suffering which it causes.
GOD: Well of course! What else could conceivably be bad about
sinning?
MORTAL: All right, you know that, and now I know that. But all my
life I unfortunately have been under the influence of those moralists
who hold sinning to be bad in itself. Anyway, putting all these pieces
together, it occurs to me that the only reason you gave free will is
because of your belief that with free will, people will tend to hurt
each other--and themselves--less than without free will.
GOD: Bravo! That is by far the best reason you have yet given! I
can assure you that had I chosen to give free will, that would have
been my very reason for so choosing.
MORTAL: What! You mean to say you did not choose to give us free
will?
GOD: My dear fellow, I could no more choose to give you free will
than I could choose to make an equilateral triangle equiangular. I
could choose to make or not to make an equilateral triangle in the
first place, but having chosen to make one, I would then have no choice
but to make it equiangular.
MORTAL: I thought you could do anything!
GOD: Only things which are logically possible. As St. Thomas said,
"It is a sin to regard the fact that God cannot do the impossible, as a
limitation on His powers." I agree, except that in place of his using
the word sin I would use the term error.
MORTAL: Anyhow, I am still puzzled by your implication that you did
not choose to give me free will.
GOD: Well, it is high time I inform you that the entire
discussion--from the very beginning--has been based on one monstrous
fallacy! We have been talking purely on a moral level--you originally
complained that I gave you free will, and raised the whole question as
to whether I should have. It never once occurred to you that I had
absolutely no choice in the matter.
MORTAL: I am still in the dark!
GOD: Absolutely! Because you are only able to look at it through
the eyes of a moralist. The more fundamental metaphysical aspects of
the question you never even considered.
MORTAL: I still do not see what you are driving at.
GOD: Before you requested me to remove your free will, shouldn't
your first question have been whether as a matter of fact you do have
free will?
MORTAL: That I simply took for granted.
GOD: But why should you?
MORTAL: I don't know. Do I have free will?
GOD: Yes.
MORTAL: Then why did you say I shouldn't have taken it for granted?
GOD: Because you shouldn't. Just because something happens to be
true, it does not follow that it should be taken for granted.
MORTAL: Anyway, it is reassuring to know that my natural intuition
about having free will is correct. Sometimes I have been worried that
determinists are correct.
GOD: They are correct.
MORTAL: Wait a minute now, do I have free will or don't I?
GOD: I already told you you do. But that does not mean that
determinism is incorrect.
MORTAL: Well, are my acts determined by the laws of nature or
aren't they?
GOD: The word determined here is subtly but powerfully misleading
and has contributed so much to the confusions of the free will versus
determinism controversies. Your acts are certainly in accordance with
the laws of nature, but to say they are determined by the laws of
nature creates a totally misleading psychological image which is that
your will could somehow be in conflict with the laws of nature and that
the latter is somehow more powerful than you, and could "determine"
your acts whether you liked it or not. But it is simply impossible for
your will to ever conflict with natural law. You and natural law are
really one and the same.
MORTAL: What do you mean that I cannot conflict with nature?
Suppose I were to become very stubborn, and I determined not to obey
the laws of nature. What could stop me? If I became sufficiently
stubborn even you could not stop me!
GOD: You are absolutely right! I certainly could not stop you.
Nothing could stop you. But there is no need to stop you, because you
could not even start! As Goethe very beautifully expressed it, "In
trying to oppose Nature, we are, in the very process of doing so,
acting according to the laws of nature!" Don't you see that the
so-called "laws of nature" are nothing more than a description of how
in fact you and other beings do act? They are merely a description of
how you act, not a prescription of of how you should act, not a power
or force which compels or determines your acts. To be valid a law of
nature must take into account how in fact you do act, or, if you like,
how you choose to act.
MORTAL: So you really claim that I am incapable of determining to
act against natural law?
GOD: It is interesting that you have twice now used the phrase
"determined to act" instead of "chosen to act." This identification is
quite common. Often one uses the statement "I am determined to do this"
synonymously with "I have chosen to do this." This very psychological
identification should reveal that determinism and choice are much
closer than they might appear. Of course, you might well say that the
doctrine of free will says that it is you who are doing the
determining, whereas the doctrine of determinism appears to say that
your acts are determined by something apparently outside you. But the
confusion is largely caused by your bifurcation of reality into the
"you" and the "not you." Really now, just where do you leave off and
the rest of the universe begin? Or where does the rest of the universe
leave off and you begin? Once you can see the so-called "you" and the
so-called "nature" as a continuous whole, then you can never again be
bothered by such questions as whether it is you who are controlling
nature or nature who is controlling you. Thus the muddle of free will
versus determinism will vanish. If I may use a crude analogy, imagine
two bodies moving toward each other by virtue of gravitational
attraction. Each body, if sentient, might wonder whether it is he or
the other fellow who is exerting the "force." In a way it is both, in a
way it is neither. It is best to say that it is the configuration of
the two which is crucial.
MORTAL: You said a short while ago that our whole discussion was
based on a monstrous fallacy. You still have not told me what this
fallacy is.
GOD: Why, the idea that I could possibly have created you without
free will! You acted as if this were a genuine possibility, and
wondered why I did not choose it! It never occurred to you that a
sentient being without free will is no more conceivable than a physical
object which exerts no gravitational attraction. (There is,
incidentally, more analogy than you realize between a physical object
exerting gravitational attraction and a sentient being exerting free
will!) Can you honestly even imagine a conscious being without free
will? What on earth could it be like? I think that one thing in your
life that has so misled you is your having been told that I gave man
the gift of free will. As if I first created man, and then as an
afterthought endowed him with the extra property of free will. Maybe
you think I have some sort of "paint brush" with which I daub some
creatures with free will and not others. No, free will is not an
"extra"; it is part and parcel of the very essence of consciousness. A
conscious being without free will is simply a metaphysical absurdity.
MORTAL: Then why did you play along with me all this while
discussing what I thought was a moral problem, when, as you say, my
basic confusion was metaphysical?
GOD: Because I thought it would be good therapy for you to get some
of this moral poison out of your system. Much of your metaphysical
confusion was due to faulty moral notions, and so the latter had to be
dealt with first.
And now we must part--at least until you need me again. I think our
present union will do much to sustain you for a long while. But do
remember what I told you about trees. Of course, you don't have to
literally talk to them if doing so makes you feel silly. But there is
so much you can learn from them, as well as from the rocks and streams
and other aspects of nature. There is nothing like a naturalistic
orientation to dispel all these morbid thoughts of "sin" and "free
will" and "moral responsibility." At one stage of history, such notions
were actually useful. I refer to the days when tyrants had unlimited
power and nothing short of fears of hell could possibly restrain them.
But mankind has grown up since then, and this gruesome way of thinking
is no longer necessary.
It might be helpful to you to recall what I once said through the
writings of the great Zen poet Seng-Ts'an:
If you want to get the plain truth,
Be not concerned with right and wrong.
The conflict between right and wrong
Is the sickness of the mind.
Raymond M. Smullyan. An Epistemological Nightmare
From Philosophical Fantasies by Raymond M. Smullyan, to be published by St. Martins Press, N.Y., in 1982.
Scene 1. Frank is in the office of an eye doctor. The doctor
holds up a book and asks "What color is it?" Frank answers, "Red." The
doctor says, "Aha, just as I thought! Your whole color mechanism has
gone out of kilter. But fortunately your condition is curable, and I
will have you in perfect shape in a couple of weeks."
Scene 2. (A few weeks later.) Frank is in a laboratory in the
home of an experimental epistemologist. (You will soon find out what
that means!) The epistemologist holds up a book and also asks, "What
color is this book?" Now, Frank has been earlier dismissed by the eye
doctor as "cured." However, he is now of a very analytical and cautious
temperament, and will not make any statement that can possibly be
refuted. So Frank answers, "It seems red to me."
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Wrong!
FRANK: I don't think you heard what I said. I merely said that it
seems red to me.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: I heard you, and you were wrong.
FRANK: Let me get this clear; did you mean that I was wrong that
this book is red, or that I was wrong that it seems red to me?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: I obviously couldn't have meant that you were wrong
in that it is red, since you did not say that it is red. All you said
was that it seems red to you, and it is this statement which is
wrong.
FRANK: But you can't say that the statement "It seems red to me"
is wrong.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: If I can't say it, how come I did?
FRANK: I mean you can't mean it.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Why not?
FRANK: But surely I know what color the book seems to me!
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Again you are wrong.
FRANK: But nobody knows better than I how things seem to me.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: I am sorry, but again you are wrong.
FRANK: But who knows better than I?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: I do.
FRANK: But how could you have access to my private mental states?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Private mental states! Metaphysical hogwash! Look,
I am a practical epistemologist. Metaphysical problems about "mind"
versus "matter" arise only from epistemological confusions.
Epistemology is the true foundation of philosophy. But the trouble with
all past epistemologists is that they have been using wholly
theoretical methods, and much of their discussion degenerates into mere
word games. While other epistemologists have been solemnly arguing such
questions as whether a man can be wrong when he asserts that he
believes such and such, I have discovered how to settle such questions
experimentally.
FRANK: How could you possibly decide such things empirically?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: By reading a person's thoughts directly.
FRANK: You mean you are telepathic?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Of course not. I simply did the one obvious thing
which should be done, viz. I have constructed a brain-reading
machine--known technically as a cerebroscope--that is operative right
now in this room and is scanning every nerve cell in your brain. I thus
can read your every sensation and thought, and it is a simple objective
truth that this book does not seem red to you.
FRANK (thoroughly subdued): Goodness gracious, I really could have
sworn that the book seemed red to me; it sure seems that it seems read
to me!
EPISTEMOLOGIST: I'm sorry, but you are wrong again.
FRANK: Really? It doesn't even seem that it seems red to me? It
sure seems like it seems like it seems red to me!
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Wrong again! And no matter how many times you
reiterate the phrase "it seems like" and follow it by "the book is red"
you will be wrong.
FRANK: This is fantastic! Suppose instead of the phrase "it seems
like" I would say "I believe that." So let us start again at ground
level. I retract the statement "It seems red to me" and instead I
assert "I believe that this book is red." Is this statement true or
false?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Just a moment while I scan the dials of the
brain-reading machine--no, the statement is false.
FRANK: And what about "I believe that I believe that the book is
red"?
EPISTEMOLOGIST (consulting his dials): Also false. And again, no
matter how many times you iterate "I believe," all these belief
sentences are false.
FRANK: Well, this has been a most enlightening experience. However,
you must admit that it is a little hard on me to realize that I am
entertaining infinitely many erroneous beliefs!
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Why do you say that your beliefs are erroneous?
FRANK: But you have been telling me this all the while!
EPISTEMOLOGIST: I most certainly have not!
FRANK: Good God, I was prepared to admit all my errors, and now you
tell me that my beliefs are not errors; what are you trying to do,
drive me crazy?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Hey, take it easy! Please try to recall: When did I
say or imply that any of your beliefs are erroneous?
FRANK: Just simply recall the infinite sequence of sentences: (1) I
believe this book is red; (2) I believe that I believe this book is
red; and so forth. You told me that every one of those statements is
false.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: True.
FRANK: Then how can you consistently maintain that my beliefs in
all these false statements are not erroneous?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Because, as I told you, you don't believe any of them.
FRANK: I think I see, yet I am not absolutely sure.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Look, let me put it another way. Don't you see that
the very falsity of each of the statements that you assert saves you
from an erroneous belief in the preceding one? The first statement is,
as I told you, false. Very well! Now the second statement is simply to
the effect that you believe the first statement. If the second
statement were true, then you would believe the first statement, and
hence your belief about the first statement would indeed be in error.
But fortunately the second statement is false, hence you don't really
believe the first statement, so your belief in the first statement is
not in error. Thus the falsity of the second statement implies you do
not have an erroneous belief about the first; the falsity of the third
likewise saves you from an erroneous belief about the second, etc.
FRANK: Now I see perfectly! So none of my beliefs were erroneous,
only the statements were erroneous.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Exactly.
FRANK: Most remarkable! Incidentally, what color is the book really?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: It is red.
FRANK: What!
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Exactly! Of course the book is red. What's the
matter with you, don't you have eyes?
FRANK: But didn't I in effect keep saying that the book is red all
along?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Of course not! You kept saying it seems red to
you, it seems like it seems red to you, you believe it is red, you
believe that you believe it is red, and so forth. Not once did you
say that it is red. When I originally asked you "What color is the
book?" if you had simply answered "red," this whole painful discussion
would have been avoided.
Scene 3. Frank comes back several months later to the home of the
epistemologist.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: How delightful to see you! Please sit down.
FRANK (seated): I have been thinking of our last discussion, and
there is much I wish to clear up. To begin with, I discovered an
inconsistency in some of the things you said.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Delightful! I love inconsistencies. Pray tell!
FRANK: Well, you claimed that although my belief sentences were
false, I did not have any actual beliefs that are false. If you had not
admitted that the book actually is red, you would have been consistent.
But your very admission that the book is red, leads to an
inconsistency.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: How so?
FRANK: Look, as you correctly pointed out, in each of my belief
sentences "I believe it is red," "I believe that I believe it is red,"
the falsity of each one other than the first saves me from an erroneous
belief in the proceeding one. However, you neglected to take into
consideration the first sentence itself. The falsity of the first
sentence "I believe it is red," in conjunction with the fact that it is
red, does imply that I do have a false belief.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: I don't see why.
FRANK: It is obvious! Since the sentence "I believe it is red" is
false, then I in fact believe it is not red, and since it really is
red, then I do have a false belief. So there!
EPISTEMOLOGIST (disappointed): I am sorry, but your proof obviously
fails. Of course the falsity of the fact that you believe it is red
implies that you don't believe it is red. But this does not mean that
you believe it is not red!
FRANK: But obviously I know that it either is red or it isn't, so
if I don't believe it is, then I must believe that it isn't.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Not at all. I believe that either Jupiter has life
or it doesn't. But I neither believe that it does, nor do I believe
that it doesn't. I have no evidence one way or the other.
FRANK: Oh well, I guess you are right. But let us come to more
important matters. I honestly find it impossible that I can be in error
concerning my own beliefs.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Must we go through this again? I have already
patiently explained to you that you (in the sense of your beliefs, not
your statements) are not in error.
FRANK: Oh, all right then, I simply do not believe that even the
statements are in error. Yes, according to the machine they are in
error, but why should I trust the machine?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Whoever said you should trust the machine?
FRANK: Well, should I trust the machine?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: That question involving the word "should" is out of
my domain. However, if you like, I can refer you to a colleague who is
an excellent moralist--he may be able to answer this for you.
FRANK: Oh come on now, I obviously didn't mean "should" in a
moralistic sense. I simply meant "Do I have any evidence that this
machine is reliable?"
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Well, do you?
FRANK: Don't ask me! What I mean is should you trust the
machine?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Should I trust it? I have no idea, and I couldn't
care less what I should do.
FRANK: Oh, your moralistic hangup again. I mean, do you have
evidence that the machine is reliable?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Well of course!
FRANK: Then let's get down to brass tacks. What is your evidence?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: You hardly can expect that I can answer this for
you in an hour, a day, or a week. If you wish to study this machine
with me, we can do so, but I assure you this is a matter of several
years. At the end of that time, however, you would certainly not have
the slightest doubts about the reliability of the machine.
FRANK: Well, possibly I could believe that it is reliable in the
sense that its measurements are accurate, but then I would doubt that
what it actually measures is very significant. It seems that all it
measures is one's physiological states and activities.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: But of course, what else would you expect it to
measure?
FRANK: I doubt that it measures my psychological states, my actual
beliefs.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Are we back to that again? The machine does measure
those physiological states and processes that you call psychological
states, beliefs, sensations, and so forth.
FRANK: At this point I am becoming convinced that our entire
difference is purely semantical. All right, I will grant that your
machine does correctly measure beliefs in your sense of the word
"belief," but I don't believe that it has any possibility of measuring
beliefs in my sense of the word "believe." In other words I claim that
our entire deadlock is simply due to the fact that you and I mean
different things by the word "belief."
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Fortunately, the correctness of your claim can be
decided experimentally. It so happens that I now have two brain-reading
machines in my office, so I now direct one to your brain to find out
what you mean by "believe" and now I direct the other to my own brain
to find out what I mean by "believe," and now I shall compare the two
readings. Nope, I'm sorry, but it turns out that we mean exactly the
same thing by the word "believe."
FRANK: Oh, hang your machine! Do you believe we mean the same thing
by the word "believe"?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Do I believe it? Just a moment while I check with
the machine. Yes, it turns out I do believe it.
FRANK: My goodness, do you mean to say that you can't even tell me
what you believe without consulting the machine?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Of course not.
FRANK: But most people when asked what they believe simply tell
you. Why do you, in order to find out your beliefs, go through the
fantastically roundabout process of directing a thought-reading machine
to your own brain and then finding out what you believe on the basis of
the machine readings?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: What other scientific, objective way is there of
finding out what I believe?
FRANK: Oh, come now, why don't you just ask yourself?
EPISTEMOLOGIST (sadly): It doesn't work. Whenever I ask myself what
I believe, I never get any answer!
FRANK: Well, why don't you just state what you believe?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: How can I state what I believe before I know what I
believe?
FRANK: Oh, to hell with your knowledge of what you believe;
surely you have some idea or belief as to what you believe, don't
you?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: oOf course I have such a belief. But how do I find
out what this belief is?
FRANK: I am afraid we are getting into another infinite regress.
Look, at this point I am honestly beginning to wonder whether you may
be going crazy.
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Let me consult the machine. Yes, it turns out that
I may be going crazy.
FRANK: Good God, man, doesn't this frighten you?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Let me check! Yes, it turns out that it does
frighten me.
FRANK: Oh please, can't you forget this damned machine and just
tell me whether you are frightened or not?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: I just told you that I am. However, I only learned
of this from the machine.
FRANK: I can see that it is utterly hopeless to wean you away from
the machine. Very well, then, let us play along with the machine some
more. Why don't you ask the machine whether your sanity can be saved?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Good idea! Yes, it turns out that it can be saved.
FRANK: And how can it be saved?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: I don't know, I haven't asked the machine.
FRANK: Well, for God's sake, ask it!
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Good idea. It turns out that...
FRANK: It turns out what?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: It turns out that...
FRANK: Come on now, it turns out what?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: This is the most fantastic thing I have ever come
across! According to the machine the best thing I can do is to cease to
trust the machine!
FRANK: Good! What will you do about it?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: How do I know what I will do about it, I can't read
the future?
FRANK: I mean, what do you presently intend to do about it?
EPISTEMOLOGIST: Good question, let me consult the machine.
According to the machine, my current intentions are in complete
conflict. And I can see why! I am caught in a terrible paradox! If the
machine is trustworthy, then I had better accept its suggestion to
distrust it. But if I distrust it, then I also distrust its suggestion
to distrust it, so I am really in a total quandary.
FRANK: Look, I know of someone who I think might be really of help
in this problem. I'll leave you for a while to consult him. Au
revoir!
Scene 4. (Later in the day at a psychiatrist's office.)
FRANK: Doctor, I am terribly worried about a friend of mine. He
calls himself an "experimental epistemologist."
DOCTOR: Oh, the experimental epistemologist. There is only one in
the world. I know him well!
FRANK: That is a relief. But do you realize that he has constructed
a mind-reading device that he now directs to his own brain, and
whenever one asks him what he thinks, believes, feels, is afraid of,
and so on, he has to consult the machine first before answering? Don't
you think this is pretty serious?
DOCTOR: Not as serious as it might seem. My prognosis for him is
actually quite good.
FRANK: Well, if you are a friend of his, couldn't you sort of keep
an eye on him?
DOCTOR: I do see him quite frequently, and I do observe him much.
However, I don't think he can be helped by so-called "psychiatric
treatment." His problem is an unusual one, the sort that has to work
itself out. And I believe it will.
FRANK: Well, I hope your optimism is justified. At any rate I sure
think I need some help at this point!
DOCTOR: How so?
FRANK: My experiences with the epistemologist have been thoroughly
unnerving! At this point I wonder if I may be going crazy; I can't
even have confidence in how things appear to me. I think maybe you
could be helpful here.
DOCTOR: I would be happy to but cannot for a while. For the next
three months I am unbelievably overloaded with work. After that,
unfortunately, I must go on a three-month vacation. So in six months
come back and we can talk this over.
Scene 5. (Same office, six months later.)
DOCTOR: Before we go into your problems, you will be happy to hear
that your friend the epistemologist is now completely recovered.
FRANK: Marvelous, how did it happen?
DOCTOR: Almost, as it were, by a stroke of fate--and yet his very
mental activities were, so to speak, part of the "fate." What happened
was this: For months after you last saw him, he went around worrying
"should I trust the machine, shouldn't I trust the machine, should I,
shouldn't I, should I, shouldn't I." (He decided to use the word
"should" in your empirical sense.) He got nowhere! So he then decided
to "formalize" the whole argument. He reviewed his study of symbolic
logic, took the axioms of first-order logic, and added as nonlogical
axioms certain relevant facts about the machine. Of course the
resulting system was inconsistent--he formally proved that he should
trust the machine if and only if he shouldn't, and hence that he both
should and should not trust the machine. Now, as you may know, in a
system based on classical logic (which is the logic he used), if one
can prove so much as a single contradictory proposition, then one can
prove any proposition, hence the whole system breaks down. So he
decided to use a logic weaker than classical logic--a logic close to
what is known as "minimal logic"--in which the proof of one
contradiction does not necessarily entail the proof of every
proposition. However, this system turned out too weak to decide the
question of whether or not he should trust the machine. Then he had the
following bright idea. Why not use classical logic in his system even
though the resulting system is inconsistent? Is an inconsistent system
necessarily useless? Not at all! Even though given any proposition,
there exists a proof that it is true and another proof that it is
false, it may be the case that for any such pair of proofs, one of them
is simply more psychologically convincing than the other, so simply
pick the proof you actually believe! Theoretically the idea turned out
very well--the actual system he obtained really did have the property
that given any such pair of proofs, one of them was always
psychologically far more convincing than the other. Better yet, given
any pair of contradictory propositions, all proofs of one were more
convincing than any proof of the other. Indeed, anyone except the
epistemologist could have used the system to decide whether the
machine could be trusted. But with the epistemologist, what happened
was this: He obtained one proof that he should trust the machine and
another proof that he should not. Which proof was more convincing to
him, which proof did he really "believe"? The only way he could find
out was to consult the machine! But he realized that this would be
begging the question, since his consulting the machine would be a tacit
admission that he did in fact trust the machine. So he still remained
in a quandary.
FRANK: So how did he get out of it?
DOCTOR: Well, here is where fate kindly interceded. Due to his
absolute absorption in the theory of this problem, which consumed about
his every waking hour, he became for the first time in his life
experimentally negligent. As a result, quite unknown to him, a few
minor units of his machine blew out! Then, for the first time, the
machine started giving contradictory information--not merely subtle
paradoxes, but blatant contradictions. In particular, the machine one
day claimed that the epistemologist believed a certain proposition and
a few days later claimed he did not believe that proposition. And to
add insult to injury, the machine claimed that he had not changed his
belief in the last few days. This was enough to simply make him totally
distrust the machine. Now he is fit as a fiddle.
FRANK: This is certainly the most amazing thing I have ever heard!
I guess the machine was really dangerous and unreliable all along.
DOCTOR: Oh, not at all; the machine used to be excellent before the
epistemologist's experimental carelessness put it out of whack.
FRANK: Well, surely when I knew it, it couldn't have been very
reliable.
DOCTOR: Not so, Frank, and this brings us to your problem. I know
about your entire conversation with the epistemologist--it was all
tape-recorded.
FRANK: Then surely you realize the machine could not have been
right when it denied that I believed the book was red.
DOCTOR: Why not?
FRANK: Good God, do I have to go through all this nightmare again?
I can understand that a person can be wrong if he claims that a certain
physical object has a certain property, but have you ever known a
single case when a person can be mistaken when he claims to have or not
have a certain sensation?
DOCTOR: Why, certainly! I once knew a Christian Scientist who had a
raging toothache; he was frantically groaning and moaning all over the
place. When asked whether a dentist might not cure him, he replied that
there was nothing to be cured. Then he was asked, "But do you not feel
pain?" He replied, "No, I do not feel pain; nobody feels pain, there is
no such thing as pain, pain is only an illusion." So here is a case of
a man who claimed not to feel pain, yet everyone present knew perfectly
well that he did feel pain. I certainly don't believe he was lying, he
was just simply mistaken.
FRANK: Well, all right, in a case like that. But how can one be
mistaken if one asserts his belief about the color of a book?
DOCTOR: I can assure you that without access to any machine, if I
asked someone what color is this book, and he answered, "I believe it
is red," I would be very doubtful that he really believed it. It seems
to me that if he really believed it, he would answer, "It is red" and
not "I believe it is red" or "It seems red to me." The very timidity of
his response would be indicative of his doubts.
FRANK: But why on earth should I have doubted that it was red?
DOCTOR: You should know that better than I. Let us see now, have
you ever in the past had reason to doubt the accuracy of your sense
perception?
FRANK: Why, yes. A few weeks before visiting the epistemologist, I
suffered from an eye disease, which did make me see colors falsely. But
I was cured before my visit.
DOCTOR: Oh, so no wonder you doubted it was red! True enough, your
eyes perceived the correct color of the book, but your earlier
experience lingered in your mind and made it impossible for you to
really believe it was red. So the machine was right!
FRANK: Well, all right, but then why did I doubt that I believed
it was true?
DOCTOR: Because you didn't believe it was true, and unconsciously
you were smart enough to realize the fact. Besides, when one starts
doubting one's own sense perceptions, the doubt spreads like an
infection to higher and higher levels of abstraction until finally the
whole belief system becomes one doubting mass of insecurity. I bet that
if you went to the epistemologist's office now, and if the machine were
repaired, and you now claimed that you believe the book is red, the
machine would concur.
No, Frank, the machine is--or, rather, was--a good one. The
epistemologist learned much from it, but misused it when he applied it
to his own brain. He really should have known better than to create
such an unstable situation. The combination of his brain and the
machine each scrutinizing and influencing the behavior of the other led
to serious problems in feedback. Finally the whole system went into a
cybernetic wobble. Something was bound to give sooner or later.
Fortunately, it was the machine.
FRANK: I see. One last question, though. How could the machine be
trustworthy when it claimed to be untrustworthy?
DOCTOR: The machine never claimed to be untrustworthy, it only
claimed that the epistemologist would be better off not trusting it.
And the machine was right.
D. C. Dennett. Reflections
If Smullyan's nightmare strikes you as too outlandish to be
convincing, consider a more realistic fable--not a true story, but
surely possible:
Once upon a time there were two coffee tasters, Mr. Chase and Mr.
Sanborn, who worked for Maxwell House. Along with half a dozen other
coffee tasters, their job was to ensure that the taste of Maxwell House
stayed constant, year after year. One day, about six years after Mr.
Chase had come to work for Maxwell House, he cleared his throat and
confessed to Mr. Sanborn:
"You know, I hate to admit it, but I'm not enjoying this work any
more. When I came to Maxwell House six years ago, I thought Maxwell
House coffee was the best-tasting coffee in the world. I was proud to
have a share in the responsibility for preserving that flavor over the
years. And we've done our job well; the coffee tastes today just the
way it tasted when I arrived. But, you know, I no longer like it! My
tastes have changed. I've become a more sophisticated coffee drinker. I
no longer like that taste at all."
Sanborn greeted this revelation with considerable interest. "It's
funny you should mention it," he replied, "for something rather similar
has happened to me. When I arrived here, shortly before you did, I,
like you, thought Maxwell House coffee was tops in flavor. And now I,
like you, really don't care for the coffee we're making. But my
tastes haven't changed; my... tasters have changed. That is, I think
something has gone wrong with my taste buds or something--you know, the
way your taste buds go off when you take a bite of pancakes and maple
syrup and then go back to your orange juice? Maxwell House coffee
doesn't taste to me the way it used to taste; if only it did, I'd still
love it, for I still think that taste is the best taste in coffee.
Now, I'm not saying we haven't done our job well. You other guys all
agree that the taste is the same, so it must be my problem alone. I
guess I'm no longer cut out for this work."
Chase and Sanborn are alike in one way. Both used to like Maxwell
House coffee; now neither one likes it. But they claim to be different
in another way: Maxwell House tastes to Chase the way it always did,
but not so for Sanborn. The difference seems familiar and striking, yet
when they confront each other, they may begin to wonder if their cases
arc really all that different. "Could it be," Chase might wonder, "that
Mr. Sanborn is really in my predicament and just hasn't noticed the
gradual rise in his standards and sophistication as a coffee taster?"
"Could it be," Sanborn might wonder, "that Mr. Chase is kidding himself
when he says the coffee tastes just the same to him as it used to?"
Do you remember your first sip of beer? Terrible! How could anyone
like that stuff? But beer, you reflect, is an acquired taste; one
gradually trains oneself--or just comes--to enjoy that flavor. What
flavor? The flavor of that first sip? No one could like that flavor!
Beer tastes different to the experienced beer drinker. Then beer
isn't an acquired taste; one doesn't learn to like that first taste;
one gradually comes to experience a different, and likable, taste. Had
the first sip tasted that way, you would have liked beer
wholeheartedly from the beginning!
Perhaps, then, there is no separating the taste from the response
to the taste, the judgment of good or bad. Then Chase and Sanborn might
be just alike, and simply be choosing slightly different ways of
expressing themselves. But if they were just alike, then they'd
actually both be wrong about something, for they each have sincerely
denied that they are like the other. Is it conceivable that each could
have inadvertently misdescribed his own case and described the other's
instead? Perhaps Chase is the one whose taste buds have changed, while
Sanborn is the sophisticate. Could they be that wrong?
Some philosophers--and other people--have thought that a person
simply cannot be wrong about such a matter. Everyone is the final and
unimpeachable arbiter of how it is with him; if Chase and Sanborn have
spoken sincerely, and have made no unnoticed slips of language, and if
both know the meanings of their words, they must have expressed the
truth in each case. Can't we imagine tests that would tend to confirm
their different tales? If Sanborn does poorly on discrimination tests
he used to pass with flying colors, and if, moreover, we find
abnormalities in his taste buds (it's all that Szechuan food he's been
eating lately, we discover), this will tend to confirm his view of his
situation. And if Chase passes all those tests better than he used to,
and exhibits increased knowledge of coffee types and a great interest
in their relative merits and peculiar characteristics, this will
support his view of himself. But if such tests could support Chase s
and Sanborn's authority, failing them would have to undermine their
authority. If Chase passed Sanborn's tests and Sanborn passed Chase's,
each would have doubt cast on his account--if such tests have any
bearing at all on the issue.
Another way of putting the point is that the price you pay for the
possibility of confirming your authority is the outside chance of being
discredited. "I know what I like," we are all prepared to insist, "and
I know what it's like to be me!" Probably you do, at least about some
matters, but that is something to be checked in performance. Maybe,
just maybe, you'll discover that you really don't know as much as you
thought you did about what it is like to be you.
