# The "Biola Turn" in Christian Philosophy (Or, a return from relativism)



## RamistThomist (Sep 5, 2019)

Goal: to critique variants of postmodernism, provide an argument for epistemic realism, and conclude with observations on Protestant conversions to Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy.

I have several goals in this paper. I utilize Dallas Willard’s metaphysical realism to rebut post-Kantian idealism. I also challenge James K. A. Smith’s quasi-Derridean view of interpretation.

In “How Concepts Relate the Mind to its Objects: The God’s Eye View Vindicated,” Dallas Willard defends a robust realism in the face of various post-Kantian proposals. While criticisms of Kant are common and always welcome, this paper takes a different turn. It is a response to the various “creational hermeneutics” by men like James K. A. Smith who appear to posit an endless deferral of meaning. To be fair, Smith doesn’t advocate a strict Derridean view. He assumes meaning is possible. Rather, he advocates that every hermeneutical event is always (already?) situated by our finitude. We never approach the realm of “pure interpretation.”

Further, Smith isn’t a Kantian. He isn’t saying (as far as I am aware) that our minds create reality. In this case, many of Willard’s remarks won’t directly apply to him. There are some parallels, though. Both Kant and Smith function as though there is a “wall” between our minds and reality.

On one level that seems true enough. I don’t even know what a pure interpretation unsullied by presuppositions would look like. I think there is something more, though. It’s not enough that Smith wants to avoid a Derridean relativism or something like an endless deferral of meaning. Well and good. I fear, though, that his epistemology is underdeveloped and if pursued consistently, will in fact lead to relativism.

In a new chapter to Fall of Interpretation Smith responds to criticisms of Derrida. He says Derrida does affirm that communication takes place. However, it only takes place within “communal discernment” (Smith 215-216). Indeed, communities “fix meanings.” We will come back to this claim later.

Dallas Willard’s article provides a summary of how the mental process works. He discusses what a concept is and how the nature of a concept (which always includes intentionality, relations, etc) avoids what he calls the “Midas touch” of post-Kantianism. Followers of Kant see the concept as an activity of the mind. As Willard explains, “It [the Kantian view] always turns the ‘mediation’ of the relation between the mind and world into a form of making: the object which comes to stand before the mind is in some essential way made by a ‘grasping’ of something other” (Willard 2-3).

_The Structure of the Knowing Act_

While Willard’s article decisively rebuts Kantianism, it does have a small payout for the “Derridean Christian Philosophers.” If what Willard says is true on how the mind knows, then it doesn’t matter if we posit that our knowledge is “mediated” or “structured” by communal knowings.

_Survey of the Material_

Kant: what comes before the mind as objects are products of the action of the mind (Willard 4). Evidently, there is some amorphous sludge that is present before our mind. Our mind then categorizes it and “out comes the perceived object.”

_Beginning of the Case_

Willard’s main argument is that all knowing acts involve “intentionality,” which is the “about-ness” or “of-ness” of something. If I know a dog, this dog, then “there must be something about each of the terms (my thought of my dog, my dog) that my thought of my dog is “together with” or pairs up with my dog” (5).

_What is a Concept? _

A concept is acquired, applies to or is “of” something (extension), has intension (inherent properties), is transpersonal. If there is anything that “mediates” between our minds and the outside objects, it is concepts, not endless linguistic deferrals or “communal” interpretations. 

Further, concepts are properties, not acts or events. As such, they don’t “do” anything. A concept also has a “nature.” This means it has properties, relations, and an overall place “in the scheme of things” (8). Since it is a universal, it is exemplified in time and space but itself is not in time or space. 

With all of this in mind (no pun intended), we can see that intentional properties are concepts which form a bridge between thought and its object. I do not think of the intentional properties but “of what is before my mind through them” (10). The intentional properties of a concept are not identical with “the properties which things must have to fall under the concept” (11).

We can try to say it another way: there is an intentional affinity (the of-ness or about-ness of a concept) between the concept and the properties of the concept. They are related in such a way that the intensional properties “always come to mind upon the instancing of the property which is the concept, but not by being instanced in the thought along with the concept” (12). In other words, the concept is before our mind, not simply the inherent structure of the concept. The following diagram might help:

Thought of a dog (exemplifies) concept of a dog (has natural affinity with) properties making up caninity (exemplified in) Dogs (Fido, etc). (Willard 13).

Thought --> concept --> properties of caninity --> dog-exemplification

_The Pay off_

If the above is true then the objects of thought do not take on any character. They aren’t changed in structure from an amorphous sludge to a dog. Therefore, we are not “locked inside language” (14).

How does this work with the Radical Orthodox type crowd which posits an intermediate communal meaning? At the most basic level it makes it irrelevant. Let’s take the concept of a dog. I read about a dog in a text. How does placing “the communal interpretation of the faith-community” between myself and the dog “make” the text correct? 

That might be somewhat trivial. Let’s take a theological dictum. If all the RO guys are saying is that we must read in conjunction with fellow believers, then there really isn’t a problem. A more hard-line approach would be “the church’s interpretation is our interpretation.” Only Protestant converts to Roman Catholicism or Eastern Orthodoxy say anything that silly. It’s common enough, though. Let’s look at it. What mediates the church’s reading of the text and the text itself? It doesn’t work to say the church, for that is no different from their own characterization of Protestantism writ-large. Further, it’s no different from the very foundationalism they eschew.

But if the church doesn’t mediate between the church’s interpretation and a given fact of experience, then who does? We are then thrown back to the individual believer’s responsibility to interpret the world, receive data, and make judgments. These judgments aren’t infallible, but they are still warranted. He can accept many of them as basic beliefs (in the absence of overriding defeaters).


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## py3ak (Sep 5, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> Further, concepts are properties, not acts or events. As such, they don’t “do” anything. A concept also has a “nature.” This means it has properties, relations, and an overall place “in the scheme of things” (8).



If a concept _is _a property, can it also _have _properties?


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## RamistThomist (Sep 5, 2019)

py3ak said:


> If a concept _is _a property, can it also _have _properties?



Generally, no. Only a concept that is also a substance would. I don't think the "relations" within and among concepts count as properties.


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## py3ak (Sep 5, 2019)

Interesting. I have to admit that rather undermines my feeling that I understood the section, _What is a Concept?_


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## RamistThomist (Sep 5, 2019)

py3ak said:


> Interesting. I have to admit that rather undermines my feeling that I understood the section, _What is a Concept?_



And some of my own thoughts could be underdeveloped. This was a particularly dense essay by Willard.


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## py3ak (Sep 6, 2019)

It sounded pretty dense from your review!


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## jwright82 (Sep 7, 2019)

Great post! I do have to object to the linguistic stuff. After all you had to know language to post it.


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## jwright82 (Sep 7, 2019)

In Smith's defense I don't think "pure interpretation" is an actual thing. It's like an "essence", merely a confusing linguistic device.

Reactions: Like 1


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## jwright82 (Sep 7, 2019)

Also I don't know what epistemic realism has better than postmodernism, other than conceptually. I don't know, do any of these questions make sense post Wittgensteinian's later philosophy? Postmodernism at least got us to step back and reevaluate our thinking. Great post though.


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## jwright82 (Sep 8, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> Goal: to critique variants of postmodernism, provide an argument for epistemic realism, and conclude with observations on Protestant conversions to Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy.
> 
> I have several goals in this paper. I utilize Dallas Willard’s metaphysical realism to rebut post-Kantian idealism. I also challenge James K. A. Smith’s quasi-Derridean view of interpretation.
> 
> ...


I don't see the problem with being "locked inside language". Also didn't Derrida mean by infinite deferral that we have to use words to describe what we mean by other words, and then other words to describe the description and so on and so forth.
Also how does the quoted post you wrote get beyond communal meanings of words in a postWittgensten era?


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## jwright82 (Sep 8, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Great post! I do have to object to the linguistic stuff. After all you had to know language to post it.


To elaborate here the linguistic problem is I have to use language to describe a nonlinguistic state of affairs. So it's a self referential problem, "there's nothing outside the text" or more appropriately the "context", hence we're stuck in language.


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## RamistThomist (Sep 30, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> I don't see the problem with being "locked inside language"



Language isn't the same thing as consciousness. If we are locked inside language, then we can either (a) not have access to essences or (b) identify language with the essence.


jwright82 said:


> After all you had to know language to post it.



No one is saying not to use language.


jwright82 said:


> Also how does the quoted post you wrote get beyond communal meanings of words in a postWittgensten era?



Paul Helm illustrated the problem in _Faith and Understanding_. “For [the communalist] religion is essentially a practice or set of practices, a way of life, and the beliefs that are religious are identified by such practices, and can only be understood in relation to, this form of life” (Helm 65).

So what is the problem with it? We can try to list several:

1) It is impossible to critique any other position, as one would necessarily be outside that position and not sharing in its liturgical practices.

2) We do not have so much a religion, but a set of religious practices.

2.1) What about prayer? This is the most basic of religious practices. Yet, as Helm notes, could we even expect an answer to prayer, since that would involve empirical issues (69ff)? Indeed, petitionary prayer “connects the activity and value of religion with how things go.”


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## jwright82 (Sep 30, 2019)

Ok my point is, albeit tongue in cheek, is you can't describe conciessness without language. A child's first lesson in getting along with the world is learning to talk. We are locked in language but who cares it's how we survive. I don't see it as a problem.


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## RamistThomist (Sep 30, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Ok my point is, albeit tongue in cheek, is you can't describe conciessness without language. A child's first lesson in getting along with the world is learning to talk. We are locked in language but who cares it's how we survive. I don't see it as a problem.



That's neither what the linguistic turn guys or their critics are saying. Locked-in means we don't have access to an extra-linguistic world. Jesus' human nature isn't simply a function of language. It really exists. True, we describe it with language, but that's not the same thing.


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## jwright82 (Sep 30, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> That's neither what the linguistic turn guys or their critics are saying. Locked-in means we don't have access to an extra-linguistic world. Jesus' human nature isn't simply a function of language. It really exists. True, we describe it with language, but that's not the same thing.


That's not what the linguistic turn was saying. No one ever denied a real world out there, they denied that we aren't stuck without a linguistic way of describing it. Its a self referential paradox, you have to use language to describe a non linguistic state of affairs. Hence stuck in language, there's nothing outside the text.


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## jwright82 (Sep 30, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> Language isn't the same thing as consciousness. If we are locked inside language, then we can either (a) not have access to essences or (b) identify language with the essence.
> 
> 
> No one is saying not to use language.
> ...


Being locked inside language doesn't mean you can't have access, whatever that means, to essence (if they exist). I'm highly critical of traditional metaphysics outside of a functional or pragmatic use in describing things.


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## RamistThomist (Sep 30, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> essence (if they exist



I hope essences exist, like Jesus' two essences. Or his two natures which exemplify the essences of humanity and divinity. 

If the linguistic guys deny essences (which Quine did), then it is not clear what language is referring to.


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## jwright82 (Oct 1, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> I hope essences exist, like Jesus' two essences. Or his two natures which exemplify the essences of humanity and divinity.
> 
> If the linguistic guys deny essences (which Quine did), then it is not clear what language is referring to.


Yeah but the language has a functional or pragmatic role. Essence language refers to something what that something is who knows?


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## RamistThomist (Oct 1, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Yeah but the language has a functional or pragmatic role. Essence language refers to something what that something is who knows?



That's ambiguous. Are you saying:

(1) We can't know what the term essence means.
(2) We can know what the term essence means, but not what it means RE God.
(3) Similar to (2), we can know that God has an essence but not what it s.

(1) is clearly false. The Christian church has always known what it meant by substance. It is a subject with properties. 

(2) is unclear and can go either way.
(3) is the historic Christian position.


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## jwright82 (Oct 1, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> That's ambiguous. Are you saying:
> 
> (1) We can't know what the term essence means.
> (2) We can know what the term essence means, but not what it means RE God.
> ...


Good reply and good questions. Anyone can know how the term essence is used, without having to give an approximate explanation. Yes i wholeheartedly affirm the creeds and their language but that doesn't that mean as a Christian i cannot do metaphysics or theology without first affirming Greek metaphysics. I view the language as useful tools in affirming and explaining the doctrines that the creeds use.
I also do not agree with changing the creedal language because of the tools they use. We can know God's as he has revealed it to us, albeit as a creature. Human language is just that human. We pick the most useful words to describe these great mysteries. 
Since we know the meaning of words based on how they are used we can know how the term essence is used without having to have a grand substance metaphysics to go along with it.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 1, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> we can know how the term essence is used without having to have a grand substance metaphysics to go along with it.



The problem is that the Fathers more or less held to a substance metaphysics. They didn't always see the need to go with Aristotle on his distinction between primary and secondary substance, but substance metaphysics (of some sort) was the game in town. I outlined the analytic here. You really can't understand Chalcedon without embracing its substance metaphysics. 

Ousia: Essence, substance, being, genus, or nature.

Physis: Nature, make up of a thing. (In earlier Christian thought the concrete reality or existent.)

Hypostasis: The actual concrete reality of a thing, the underlying essence, (in earlier Christian thought the synonym of physis.)

Prosopon: The observable character, defining properties, manifestation of a reality.

Even at first sight it is clear that the words bear a range of meanings that overlap in some areas so as to be synonymous. This is particularly so with the terms Physis and Hypostasis which in the fifth century simultaneously bore ancient Christian meanings and more modern applications.. In relation to Physis, Cyril tended to use the antique meaning, Nestorius the modern. In relation to Hypostasis the opposite was the case.”

McGuckin, 138-139.

7. “Ousia is the genus of a thing. Once can think, for example of the genus ‘unicorn.’ Such a genus exists, but only theoretically, not practically or concretely. It does not exist, that is, ‘in reality’ as we would say today. Nonetheless, it makes sense to talk of the necessary characteristics of a unicorn such as its magical horn, its horse like appearance, its whiteness, its beard and lion’s tail, and so on. Thus the genus of unicorn is the ousia, that which makes up the essential being of a thing.. The notion of the physis of our unicorn is intimately related to this. It connotes what we might call the palpable and ‘physical’ characteristics of a unicorn such as outlined above-but always understanding that his possession of a physis-nature still does not necessarily imply that such a creature is real…In some circles, especially those represented by the Christian thinkers of Alexandria following Athanasius, the word physis signified something slightly different from this sense of ’physical attributes’ and had been used to connote the physical existent-in the sense of a concrete individual reality. In the hands of Cyril the word is used in two senses, one in what might be called the standard ‘physical usage where it connotes the constituent elements of a thing, and the other in which it serves to delineate the notion of individual existent-or in other words individual subject. This variability in the use of a key term on Cyril’s part goes some way to explaining Nestorius’ difficulties in following his argument over the single Physis of the Incarnate Word (Mia Physis tou Theou Logou Sesarkoene). By this Cyril meant the one concrete individual subject of the Incarnated Word. Whereas Nestorius heard him to mean the one physical composite of the Word (in the sense of an Apollinarist mixture of fusion of the respective attributes of the natures of man and God.)

McGuckin, 139-140.

“The prospon is the external aspect or form of a physis as it can be manifested to external observation and scrutiny. It is a very concrete, empirical word, connoting what appears to outside observation. Each essence (ousia) is characterized by its proper nature (physis), everything that is, which makes it up, and in turn every nature that is hypostatically real presents itself to the scrutiny of the senses in its own prosopon-that list of detailed characteristics or ‘propria’ that constitute this thing individually and signal to the observer what nature (physis) it has and thus to what genus (ousia) it belongs. In the system Nestorius is following, every nature has its own prosopon, that such of proper characteristics (idiomata) by which it is characterized in its unique individuality and made known to others as such. The word carried with it an intrinsic sense of ‘making known’ and appeared to Nestorius particularly apt in the revelatory context of discussing the incarnation.”

McGuckin, 144.


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## jwright82 (Oct 2, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> The problem is that the Fathers more or less held to a substance metaphysics. They didn't always see the need to go with Aristotle on his distinction between primary and secondary substance, but substance metaphysics (of some sort) was the game in town. I outlined the analytic here. You really can't understand Chalcedon without embracing its substance metaphysics.
> 
> Ousia: Essence, substance, being, genus, or nature.
> 
> ...


Well correct me if I'm wrong but are you suggesting that someone who is critical of substance metaphysics denies the creeds de facto, even if they affirm what it says? Two do you feel that substance metaphysics is the best and/or only metaphysics that a Christian should look too, because the church fathers utilized it? All this despite massive critiques and abandonment of it long ago? I know these questions sound harsh but they're not meant to be but only to narrow down where we stand for the sake of good conversation.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 2, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Well correct me if I'm wrong but are you suggesting that someone who is critical of substance metaphysics denies the creeds de facto, even if they affirm what it says?



The creeds affirm two natures. If you think "natures-metaphysics" isn't good, it's not sure that you can honestly recite the creeds.

The Shorter Catechism says, "Same in substance, equal in power and glory." So, when it says substance pertaining to God, do you agree with the Shorter Catechism or disagree? If you agree, you affirm substance metaphysics in practice. If you disagree, well......



jwright82 said:


> do you feel that substance metaphysics is the best and/or only metaphysics that a Christian should look too, because the church fathers utilized it?



Yes, but not because the Fathers utilized it.


jwright82 said:


> All this despite massive critiques and abandonment of it long ago?



I remain unfazed.


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## jwright82 (Oct 2, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> The creeds affirm two natures. If you think "natures-metaphysics" isn't good, it's not sure that you can honestly recite the creeds.
> 
> The Shorter Catechism says, "Same in substance, equal in power and glory." So, when it says substance pertaining to God, do you agree with the Shorter Catechism or disagree? If you agree, you affirm substance metaphysics in practice. If you disagree, well......
> 
> ...


Fair enough. I see no problem with affirming the creeds and confessions while at the same time being critical of substance metaphysics. Its a tool and it has its uses. Unfazed of what?


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## RamistThomist (Oct 2, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> I see no problem with affirming the creeds and confessions while at the same time being critical of substance metaphysics.



Do you mean what Westminster means when it speaks of the persons as "same in *substance*?"


jwright82 said:


> Unfazed of what?



Criticisms of classical-based metaphysics. It's possible to read Kant and Derrida and think they are wrong. I have done so.


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## jwright82 (Oct 2, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> Do you mean what Westminster means when it speaks of the persons as "same in *substance*?"
> 
> 
> Criticisms of classical-based metaphysics. It's possible to read Kant and Derrida and think they are wrong. I have done so.


Well yes I affirm the creeds and confessions. How that means I must affirm substance metaphysics is beyond me considering I asked questions you didn't answer. 
But in all fairness if you answer the questions I laid out I will give you my critique of substance metaphysics. If a person tragically gets cut up into pieces does that mean their substance gets divided as well? Considering a substance can't be divided, how does that work? 
Is their substance tied to their physicality and it gets divided or is it some ideal picture in someone's mind and so persists? Plato vs Aristotle. Also what exactly does accidents imply about Essence? As Sartre pointed out my essence is what I do. 10 years ago my essence was a construction worker, today it is a dollar tree employe. Did my essence change? 
Accidents are always relative. Where does the line stop and become essence, or substance? Also as Hume and Berkley pointed out substance is merely an a priori assumption we lay on reality to make sense of it.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 3, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> If a person tragically gets cut up into pieces does that mean their substance gets divided as well? Considering a substance can't be divided, how does that work?



A substance is a subject with properties. They retain there essence. They retain their soul. Some of the faculties' powers then go dormant.


jwright82 said:


> Is their substance tied to their physicality and it gets divided or is it some ideal picture in someone's mind and so persists?



The unity of a substance isn't simply an aggregate of the parts. Your objection presupposes some form of nominalism.



jwright82 said:


> Also what exactly does accidents imply about Essence?



Modern defenses of essentialism use "properties" instead of accidents. We have essential and non-essential properties. De re and de dicto.


jwright82 said:


> As Sartre pointed out my essence is what I do.



That's an assertion. If applied consistently then we don't have identity through time.


jwright82 said:


> Where does the line stop and become essence, or substance? Also as Hume and Berkley pointed out substance is merely an a priori assumption we lay on reality to make sense of it.



Essence and substance aren't the same thing. A substance is a subject with properties. Essence can be that but it can also be a universal. Here's a thought experiment: apply Hume's comment to Jesus.

Hume cannot escape the reality of universals, as Bertrand Russell pointed out (Russell 96ff). If we deny, for example, the universals of “whiteness” and “triangularity,” we will still, in order to form an idea of a triangle, imagine a patch of whiteness and a three-sided figure and say that anything meeting these criteria is white and a triangle--we say that the resemblance must hold. We will also say that the resemblance must hold among many white 3-sided things. We will say that the resemblances must resemble each other. We have made “resemblance” a universal.

As Russell pointed out, Hume failed to note that not only are qualities universals, but so are relations.

Modern philosophy has also given some devastating defeating-defeaters to Hume. Samuel Johnson's refutation of Berkeley is a legend in philosophical studies.

But seriously, you raise some questions dealing with mereology. I want to address those but it might take another thread.


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## jwright82 (Oct 6, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> A substance is a subject with properties. They retain there essence. They retain their soul. Some of the faculties' powers then go dormant.
> 
> 
> The unity of a substance isn't simply an aggregate of the parts. Your objection presupposes some form of nominalism.
> ...


Ok then what is a substance? Traditionally it is a sub stratum of some kind that undergirds reality, either collectively or individually (Plato vs Aristotle). But how do "know" it's there? If your assuming it for some metaphysical reason than you're arguing transcendentally for it. 
If you're making a distinction between traditional and modern substance metaphysics than fine but how does modern attempts beat critiques of traditional theories? If there the same than it doesn't really matter.
As far as Jesus goes, does his two distinct substance have a bear substance with properties attached in some way to it?


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## RamistThomist (Oct 6, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Ok then what is a substance?



A subject with properties. I've stated that about 3 or 4 times.


jwright82 said:


> As far as Jesus goes, does his two distinct substance have a bear substance with properties attached in some way to it?



Strictly speaking, he doesn't have two substances, but essences or natures. A substance is that which has properties but itself is not a property.



jwright82 said:


> But how do "know" it's there?



Simple. I take myself. I am a subject with properties.


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## jwright82 (Oct 6, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> A subject with properties. I've stated that about 3 or 4 times.
> 
> 
> Strictly speaking, he doesn't have two substances, but essences or natures. A substance is that which has properties but itself is not a property.
> ...


What exactly is the difference between a subject with properties vs a sub stratum with properties? A subject isn't an object and since objects are what we're talking about lets stick with that language. 
About Jesus are you saying that he has two nature's but no substance's? I have no problems with different nature's but how must i subscribe to substance metaphysics to affirm that? 
What happens when you strip away all the properties of an object, what are you left with? Essence or bare substance? If you say anything about it than your talking about a property. 
Subject object distinction, which one are you?


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## RamistThomist (Oct 6, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> What exactly is the difference between a subject with properties vs a sub stratum with properties?



The substratum wasn't differentiated, which is why speaking like that fell out of favor.


jwright82 said:


> A subject isn't an object and since objects are what we're talking about lets stick with that language.



I am only saying how the term has always been used. I'll stick with the language in the scholarly literature.


jwright82 said:


> About Jesus are you saying that he has two nature's but no substance's?



That's not what I said. Jesus' case is a bit different since his person enhypostasized a human nature. However, that human nature wasn't a subject (since we aren't Nestorians).


jwright82 said:


> I have no problems with different nature's but how must i subscribe to substance metaphysics to affirm that?



Do you believe in essences, universals, etc.? Are you able to affirm the Westminster Shorter Catechism on the Trinity?


jwright82 said:


> What happens when you strip away all the properties of an object, what are you left with?



Some properties are contingent, some are essential. See Jay Wesley Richards' _Untamed God_. He explains the logic behind modal logic and God.

Some substances have de re modality in terms of their properties. Those properties can't be abstracted from the subject. 

The definition of essence is a set of properties that an entity exemplifies (Richards 64). A property is some fact or truth about an entity in the world. In our usage we want to say that Socrates has necessary/essential properties without saying that Socrates is necessary to every possible world. We would say it like this:

“S has P and there is no W in which S has the complement ~P of P. 

Property actualism states that S has no properties in worlds in which he does not exist.

□(x)(P(x) → E(x))



jwright82 said:


> If you say anything about it than your talking about a property.



I have no problem with that. Not every property can be a subject. The color red (or redness) doesn't go around doing stuff. 


jwright82 said:


> Subject object distinction, which one are you?



I don't know what you are asking.


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## jwright82 (Oct 7, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> The substratum wasn't differentiated, which is why speaking like that fell out of favor.
> 
> 
> I am only saying how the term has always been used. I'll stick with the language in the scholarly literature.
> ...


I think we're talking over eachother, a substance is a bear something with properties attached, used to be called accidents. Now you seem to be saying that the sum total of the properties is the substance of a thing, which is merely a linguistic difference.
Why use the word substance in a way different than Aristotle did, and the one Berkley and Hume criticized, and call that traditional substance metaphysics? If your using term differentially than state that. I'm using it the way those guys used it, Locke too and Spinoza.
But that does bring up an interesting critique of traditional substance metaphysics, that of individuality. How does an object, or the subject of a statement (which seems to be the way you're using the term subject, contra Sartre), have a different substance from something of the same species? What makes Fido different from Lassie? If its merely different properties than why even bother with the term substance? Substance is an empty placeholder until you fill it with it properties, if so get rid of the confusing term substance. 
You admitted that the sub stratum talk fell out of favor, only proving my point about a difference between a distinction between traditional substance metaphysics and contemporary ones. Make the distinction and let's move on. 
As far as essence goes it has linguistic use and that's it. Its not nearly as empty as substance but fine if used in a linguistic setting, the essence of a thing (conversation, different dogs etc). But the "Essence" of a conversation is used differently from an "Essence" of dogs.
I have no qualms about the confessions using the tools of substance language to describe deep mysteries. But they are only tools.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 7, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> a substance is a bear something with properties attached, used to be called accidents. Now you seem to be saying that the sum total of the properties is the substance of a thing, which is merely a linguistic difference.



That is not what I said. You are giving a nominalist version of substance. Simply put, a substance is a continuant that remains through change. If it is simply an aggregate of properties, then it cannot remain the same through change.

A substance has an inner nature that includes its ordered structural unity of ultimate capacities.


jwright82 said:


> Why use the word substance in a way different than Aristotle did, and the one Berkley and Hume criticized, and call that traditional substance metaphysics?



I am in the same ballpark as he is. I am only tweaking it at points.


jwright82 said:


> and Spinoza.



Not really. Spinoza said there is only one substance and an infinity of modes.


jwright82 said:


> You admitted that the sub stratum talk fell out of favor, only proving my point about a difference between a distinction between traditional substance metaphysics and contemporary ones.



Substratum isn't the entire whole of substance metaphysics. It was one way some ancient thinkers spoke about it. I can reject that talk without jettisoning the whole project.


jwright82 said:


> Substance is an empty placeholder until you fill it with it properties, if so get rid of the confusing term substance.



No traditional substance thinker ever thought that. They were realists, not nominalists.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 7, 2019)

As to your other questions:



jwright82 said:


> How does an object, or the subject of a statement (which seems to be the way you're using the term subject, contra Sartre), have a different substance from something of the same species? What makes Fido different from Lassie?



They aren't the same primary substance. They all have the same nature or essence, though. I've said this several times now.


jwright82 said:


> As far as essence goes it has linguistic use and that's it. Its not nearly as empty as substance but fine if used in a linguistic setting, the essence of a thing (conversation, different dogs etc).



This is textbook nominalism. I don't see how you can affirm much of the Westminster standards. You say they are just tools. That's precisely the opposite of what the writers meant. You can't say "I believe what Westminster believes on God" and also "but the concepts they used are just linguistic tools."

I'll summarize: adherence is explained by inherence. This is the Christian view on substance.


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## jwright82 (Oct 7, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> That is not what I said. You are giving a nominalist version of substance. Simply put, a substance is a continuant that remains through change. If it is simply an aggregate of properties, then it cannot remain the same through change.
> 
> A substance has an inner nature that includes its ordered structural unity of ultimate capacities.
> 
> ...


Cannot remain the same through change without a substance? Of course it it does everyday. To assume that an unknowable substance must exist to account for the "seeming unchable" in things is a transcendental argument. I seem to remember you not liking those.
Your "tweeking it at points" isn't that the same as changing it? But if your changing it how can I be the only unconfessional one here? The contemporary version of substance metaphysics your presenting is not the same as the framers of the creeds and confessions would have known. Accusing me of being unconfessional is below the belt. 
Also you throw the words realist and nominalist out there as if those are the only two options but that's not true. Calling the whole game rigged means you aren't on either team. Saying that someone sitting in the sidelines is really on this team or that is prima facie absurd. 
By tools I mean conceptual tools for making sense of things. You seem to tie the life or death of Chritianity to an outmoded highly criticized metaphysics. Its like a contemporary evangelical defending the correspondence theory of truth despite all the critiques. Why not throw them both out and be done with it?


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## RamistThomist (Oct 7, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Cannot remain the same through change without a substance? Of course it it does everyday.



That's because on my account, pace nominalism and linguistic philosophies, an entity derives its unity from an internal, substance account. Nominalism, as you have outlined in many of your posts, sees an entity as an aggregate of properties.


jwright82 said:


> o assume that an unknowable substance must exist to account for the "seeming unchable" in things is a transcendental argument.



Who said it is unknowable? That's poisoning the well. My posts have been quite clear that substance is knowable and I haven't seen any good argments to the contrary. As to transcendental arguments, That's not immediately obvious. If it is, it is in a Husserlian account.


jwright82 said:


> Your "tweeking it at points" isn't that the same as changing it?



There were substance metaphysics besides those of Aristotle. I just don't think his account of primary/secondary substance is all that clear. I also don't believe that the universal is contained in the matter.



jwright82 said:


> The contemporary version of substance metaphysics your presenting is not the same as the framers of the creeds and confessions would have known.



It's close to it. Aristotle knew about modal logic. He just didn't spend a lot of time on it. All of the Reformed divines knew the discussions about counter-factuals, as they had to combat Molinism. 


jwright82 said:


> Accusing me of being unconfessional is below the belt.



Do you agree with the divines "same in *substance*?" I do. My view of substance, like theirs, sees a substance as a continuant that remains the same through change because of an inherent structural unity. The divines agree. I agree.


jwright82 said:


> Also you throw the words realist and nominalist out there as if those are the only two options but that's not true.



There are shades of realism. Plato is purer than Augustine, who is purer than Anselm, who is purer than Aristotle, who is purer than Suarez.

There are shades of nominalism. Scotus is better than Ockham. Okham is better than Hobbes. 


jwright82 said:


> outmoded highly criticized metaphysics.



You can't say you agree with the divines on the doctrine of God and make statements like that. You can say that classical metaphysics is outmoded. I've rebutted every argument to the contrary (although there haven't been that many arguments).


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## RamistThomist (Oct 7, 2019)

And Locke didn't reject the idea of substance. He posited, unlike me, a pure substratum existing apart from all properties (Essay 2.23.1ff). I don't hold that view. You are trying to attribute that view to me, and then noting that Locke refuted substance talk. That's actually Locke's own view.


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## jwright82 (Oct 12, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> That's because on my account, pace nominalism and linguistic philosophies, an entity derives its unity from an internal, substance account. Nominalism, as you have outlined in many of your posts, sees an entity as an aggregate of properties.
> 
> 
> Who said it is unknowable? That's poisoning the well. My posts have been quite clear that substance is knowable and I haven't seen any good argments to the contrary. As to transcendental arguments, That's not immediately obvious. If it is, it is in a Husserlian account.
> ...


I reject the nominalist/realist distinction so calling me one or the other is pointless. I affirm the use of substance metaphysics in the service of the church in defining the reality of the trinity and the incarnation without buying into the whole thing. Citing two unique examples and applying it to ordinary things is a fallacy of a false analogy. 
The only argument I've seen is your TA argument from a necessity to save SM from itself. 
You didn't show how a substance can be known outside of that. Also I'm assuming yes to my question, you never answered, about Christians being required to be substance metaphysics believers to be orthodox. So I don't know how that works? I take SM as being one of many, but the most truthful, form of descriptive metaphysics in our creeds and confessions but not one we must tie ourselves to. I don't believe you answered Hume's critique at all, if I'm wrong point to the post and I'll answers it. 
Also is it your personal SM that people must believe in to be orthodox or a changing historical tradition that must be believed to be orthodox (changing implying not the same)?


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## RamistThomist (Oct 12, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> I affirm the use of substance metaphysics in the service of the church in defining the reality of the trinity and the incarnation without buying into the whole thing.



Either you affirm God and substance, or you don't.


jwright82 said:


> You didn't show how a substance can be known outside of that.



Yes I did.


jwright82 said:


> Also I'm assuming yes to my question, you never answered, about Christians being required to be substance metaphysics believers to be orthodox.



Sure you can be orthodox. I don't think you can consistently affirm the creedal propositions since they affirm SM.


jwright82 said:


> I don't believe you answered Hume's critique at all, if I'm wrong point to the post and I'll answers it.



I'm fairly certain I did. Hume's metaphysics is a joke. I refuted him and showed how his criticisms didn't hold. I'll look for the post.


jwright82 said:


> Also is it your personal SM that people must believe in to be orthodox or a changing historical tradition that must be believed to be orthodox (changing implying not the same)?



You already asked me that. I answered it. You can be orthodox and not hold to SM. I think it will have negative consequences down the road (e.g., see James KA Smith's career).

Reactions: Rejoicing 1


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## RamistThomist (Oct 12, 2019)

In post #32 you alluded to Hume, Berkeley, and Locke. You said (but did not demonstrate) that they refuted substance metaphysics. In light of no demonstration, I can only guess what you mean.

I then demonstrated that Locke himself held to the view of substance that you said Locke attacked to refute SM.


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## jwright82 (Oct 14, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> And Locke didn't reject the idea of substance. He posited, unlike me, a pure substratum existing apart from all properties (Essay 2.23.1ff). I don't hold that view. You are trying to attribute that view to me, and then noting that Locke refuted substance talk. That's actually Locke's own view.


Never said Locke refuted it. I grouped him and Spinoza together and Berkley and Hume to show that Locke and Spinoza were part of that tradition they criticized. 
I can't seem to find any post where you refute Hume outside merely asserting it. The arguments you've presented are TA argument, the you're not orthodox unless you agree with me, and accusing me of holding views I outright reject. 
As far Smith goes he seems to be pretty comfortable in his career. I've never accused you of being unconfessional or unorthodox.


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## TylerRay (Oct 14, 2019)

@jwright82, do you believe that you are the same entity today as you were yesterday?


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## RamistThomist (Oct 14, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> I can't seem to find any post where you refute Hume outside merely asserting it.



Since you didn't present Hume's specific challenge, I didn't need to present a specific refutation of Hume. If you want to outline and make a Humean-style argument, go ahead. 


jwright82 said:


> I've never accused you of being unconfessional or unorthodox.



Why would I be unorthodox? I'm the one presenting what the Confession (and almost all of church history) taught on substance and God.

As to TA-arguments, they aren't wrong per se. The problem is when Van Tillians misuse them into "bywhatstandard?bywhatstandard?bywhatstandard?bywhatstandard?" instead of dealing with the tough philosophical issues in metaphysics.


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## jwright82 (Oct 14, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> Since you didn't present Hume's specific challenge, I didn't need to present a specific refutation of Hume. If you want to outline and make a Humean-style argument, go ahead.
> 
> 
> Why would I be unorthodox? I'm the one presenting what the Confession (and almost all of church history) taught on substance and God.
> ...


1 Van Til never said that, if you demand I get your POV right don't other people deserve that too?
2 you claimed to have demolished his arguments but now are admitting you didn't actually do that. I will pull out my Hume book to provide the argument. In the future if you claim to have demolished an argument, actually do it.
3 I see nothing wrong with affirming the creeds and questioning the basis of SM. Must i have the bible in one hand and the Philosopher's metaphysics in the other to be orthodox? I know you don't actually believe that but it was worth pointing out, give me a couple of days to find the book and we can continue the conversation. Fair enough?
4 I affirm Christ's two nature's in one person as well as God's three persons but one essence.


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## jwright82 (Oct 14, 2019)

TylerRay said:


> @jwright82, do you believe that you are the same entity today as you were yesterday?


Last time I checked. Is a substance the only way to account for that? Or does that problem merely arise because of the choice of concepts? If SM is true than yes substance is the only way to deal with that. If the conceptual scheme is flawed than it's a false question. Also that's more of a memory problem. But nice question!


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## RamistThomist (Oct 14, 2019)

I'll give a simple modus tollens argument to prove I am a substance.

If I am not a substance, then I am not the same "I" as I was a few moments before.

I am the


jwright82 said:


> 1 Van Til never said that, if you demand I get your POV right don't other people deserve that too?



Presumably you are referring to my analysis of his TAG. He wasn't as crude as his modern disciples are, but yes, he certainly did advocate that position.


jwright82 said:


> you claimed to have demolished his arguments but now are admitting you didn't actually do that. I will pull out my Hume book to provide the argument. In the future if you claim to have demolished an argument, actually do it



I have on blog posts. I thought I had transferred them here. Anyway, here goes:

_Problems with Hume_
A) 

As Owen Barfield and others have pointed out, if all we can know are sense-impressions, then Hume’s three qualities of association fail the test: “resemblance, contiguity, and causation” are not sense-impressions, or did not originate as such (Barfield 25). Of course, this is the same criticism Hume offered of causality. But why stop at causality? Why not apply it to the other two? 


[2] It is here that Hume’s nominalism becomes vicious. How are ideas “in the mind” held together? Hume says they are “bundled” together, but doesn’t bundling imply some sort of unity or association? If Hume’s criticism of causality holds, then it must also hold to any form of association. Thus examining the mental process, Hume is left with an array of facts that cannot relate to each other in any possible way. “All is flux.”


[3] This critique is not so much a refutation of Hume but points toward an ambiguity. During the mental act I perceive an object, we will say the sensory impression of touch, to which it comes back to my mind as the idea of touch. When I reflect upon the ideas “in my mind,” I do so in visual categories. But what does the visual category of “touch” even mean? [sidenote: As Wolterstorff pointed out, this is more a criticism of Locke than Hume].


[4] Hume cannot escape the reality of universals, as Bertrand Russell pointed out (Russell 96ff). If we deny, for example, the universals of “whiteness” and “triangularity,” we will still, in order to form an idea of a triangle, imagine a patch of whiteness and a three-sided figure and say that anything meeting these criteria is white and a triangle--we say that the resemblance must hold. We will also say that the resemblance must hold among many white 3-sided things. We will say that the resemblances must resemble each other. We have made “resemblance” a universal.

As Russell pointed out, Hume failed to note that not only are qualities universals, but so are relations.

[5] Per Thomas Reid and N. Wolterstorff, Hume needs to explain how a physical sensation can cause a mental apprehension (Wolterstorff 2004).

[6.1] Hume’s analysis of perception and reflection seems to privilege visual ideas. Perhaps that can work. Such has been the tendency of philosophy since Plato. Yet when we move to the other senses Hume’s analysis breaks down. How does my idea (weakened sensation) of touch bear any resemblance to the apple I just touched? Even worse, doesn’t the phrase “mental idea” connote visuality? Could this possibly work on ideas like “touch”?

[7] As Thomas Reid pointed out, it seems Hume has lumped all mental reflection (sensation/though) under the label of “perception” in the mind. How does Hume make a distinction between the “idea” of sight and the “idea” of touch (Reid 301ff)?

[8] Hume said I cannot be directly aware of any object unless that object is an impression, But (2) I am not an impression;Therefore (3) I cannot be directly aware of myself. But this is absurd.



jwright82 said:


> I see nothing wrong with affirming the creeds and questioning the basis of SM.



That's no different than saying "I believe Jesus had two of what philosophers have always called natures, but I don't believe in natures the way the guys who wrote the creeds do."


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## RamistThomist (Oct 14, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Is a substance the only way to account for that?



Hume thought so, which is why he denied both substance and identity (same with Locke). And that's why those who reject the soul today don't really like saying we persist through time. Instead of "persons" or "substances," they use the less-than-euphonic phrase "Phase-sortals." We are only a sortal of what just existed.


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## TylerRay (Oct 14, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Last time I checked. Is a substance the only way to account for that? Or does that problem merely arise because of the choice of concepts? If SM is true than yes substance is the only way to deal with that. If the conceptual scheme is flawed than it's a false question. Also that's more of a memory problem. But nice question!


Yes, as far as I can tell, it's the only way. If your essence is indistinguishable from what you do, or your properties, then you're constantly changing what you are. What is the constant?

In denying substance metaphysics, you're really denying certain properly basic beliefs.

Do you believe that there is a real universal concept of humanity, or are you and I utterly distinct things? After all, we have different qualities and do different things.

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## jwright82 (Oct 15, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> I'll give a simple modus tollens argument to prove I am a substance.
> 
> If I am not a substance, then I am not the same "I" as I was a few moments before.
> 
> ...


Wonderful post, I have no problem with natures, which is what the creeds affirm, only substance. But since that was a critique of his epistemology not his ontology it doesn't count, but his epistemology had to do with doubting substance, that quote in no way dealt with his critique of the idea of substance. Only his general position. Leaving Van Til assidde, without a TA you have no argument but a conceptual scheme to make sense out of stuff. But a conceptual scheme is just that.


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## jwright82 (Oct 15, 2019)

TylerRay said:


> Yes, as far as I can tell, it's the only way. If your essence is indistinguishable from what you do, or your properties, then you're constantly changing what you are. What is the constant?
> 
> In denying substance metaphysics, you're really denying certain properly basic beliefs.
> 
> Do you believe that there is a real universal concept of humanity, or are you and I utterly distinct things? After all, we have different qualities and do different things.


Your inventing a problem.


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## TylerRay (Oct 15, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Your inventing a problem.


No, sir, I'm pointing one out.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 15, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Wonderful post, I have no problem with natures, which is what the creeds affirm, only substance. But since that was a critique of his epistemology not his ontology it doesn't count, but his epistemology had to do with doubting substance, that quote in no way dealt with his critique of the idea of substance. Only his general position. Leaving Van Til assidde, without a TA you have no argument but a conceptual scheme to make sense out of stuff. But a conceptual scheme is just that.



Then set forth Hume's critique. You are simply saying "Hume doubted substance," but you aren't really telling me anything.


jwright82 said:


> Leaving Van Til assidde, without a TA you have no argument but a conceptual scheme to make sense out of stuff. But a conceptual scheme is just that.



I have no idea what this means.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 15, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Your inventing a problem.



He is not. He is summarizing the academic discussions and literature surrounding property dualism, identity through time, substance dualism, physicalism, etc. These are very real issues.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 15, 2019)

This free seminary course will explain the problem.
https://archive.org/details/J.P.MorelandMetaphysicsOfSubstance


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## RamistThomist (Oct 15, 2019)

Another note: I am not making any transcendental argument. A TA specifically deals with the preconditions of intelligibility. What must be the case before knowledge is possible? I am not asking that. I am running internal critiques.


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## jwright82 (Oct 21, 2019)

TylerRay said:


> No, sir, I'm pointing one out.


Ok, when you place a conceptual scheme on reality and it doesn't fit you run into problems, such as substance metaphysics. That's all I meant.


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## jwright82 (Oct 21, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> Then set forth Hume's critique. You are simply saying "Hume doubted substance," but you aren't really telling me anything.
> 
> 
> I have no idea what this means.


Hume pointed out that you can't know substance in anyway. It's just assumed. You are positing a thing as a precondition for making sense of reality, a TA.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 21, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Hume pointed out that you can't know substance in anyway. It's just assumed



Hume asserted it. He didn't offer any non-self refuting constructive cases.

I am a substance. I know myself in a self-presenting way. Chisholm took Hume apart on this point.



jwright82 said:


> You are positing a thing as a precondition for making sense of reality, a TA.



No, I am not. I have given good reasons for why I believe in substances. I have shown that those like Hume who deny substance end up in very bad places, philosophically.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 21, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Ok, when you place a conceptual scheme on reality and it doesn't fit you run into problems, such as substance metaphysics. That's all I meant.



He is pointing out the problem of identity in time. This is a controversial and well-discussed issue in philosophy and legal theory. He isn't making up things.


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## jwright82 (Oct 21, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> He is pointing out the problem of identity in time. This is a controversial and well-discussed issue in philosophy and legal theory. He isn't making up things.


Do you have a problem with recognizing yourself over time? Whether or not a substance exists? I'm thinking not. Why invent a problem that's not there?


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## jwright82 (Oct 21, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> He is pointing out the problem of identity in time. This is a controversial and well-discussed issue in philosophy and legal theory. He isn't making up things.


Legal theory, really. Ok identity over time is a temporal thing we recognize in things over time. Why a substance to sustain that?


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## jwright82 (Oct 21, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> Hume asserted it. He didn't offer any non-self refuting constructive cases.
> 
> I am a substance. I know myself in a self-presenting way. Chisholm took Hume apart on this point.
> 
> ...


What good reasons?? You quoted history and the church fathers as far as I can tell, what reasons?


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## RamistThomist (Oct 21, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Ok identity over time is a temporal thing we recognize in things over time



I don't know what the qualifier "a temporal thing" adds to it. Research the Ship of Theseus problem.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 21, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> What good reasons?? You quoted history and the church fathers as far as I can tell, what reasons?


 I gave logical reasons in post #31. See the second half of it.
https://puritanboard.com/threads/th...urn-from-relativism.99182/page-2#post-1216755


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## RamistThomist (Oct 21, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Do you have a problem with recognizing yourself over time?



No.


jwright82 said:


> Whether or not a substance exists?



That's the whole point of the debate. I say it exists.


jwright82 said:


> I'm thinking not.



And I think you are wrong.


jwright82 said:


> Why invent a problem that's not there?



I am not doing that.


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## TylerRay (Oct 21, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Legal theory, really. Ok identity over time is a temporal thing we recognize in things over time. Why a substance to sustain that?


If essence is what you do, and you do different things at different times, what makes you the same thing/person while you are going about changing what you do? Are you not changing your essence?

If you and I do different things (and we do), are we different kinds of entities, as far as our very essence is concerned?


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## jwright82 (Oct 22, 2019)

TylerRay said:


> If essence is what you do, and you do different things at different times, what makes you the same thing/person while you are going about changing what you do? Are you not changing your essence?
> 
> If you and I do different things (and we do), are we different kinds of entities, as far as our very essence is concerned?


Correct, one more problem for SM. Another is if I take a tree with a singular substance and chop it up into many pieces does the singular substance remain or has the substance divided somehow? If so than how? Outside of being a conceptual scheme what more use does it Have? But conceptual schemes can be revised. I prefer Dooyeweerd's aspects as a scheme. It doesn't have the same problems.


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## jwright82 (Oct 22, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> I don't know what the qualifier "a temporal thing" adds to it. Research the Ship of Theseus problem.


Well aware of that problem. In post 31 you say that an essence is "exemplified" by it's properties but in post 33 you say a substance in the thing is the "continuation" of a thing over time. Are you making a distinction between essence and substance? If so what's the difference? They can't be both. 
I prefer Dooyeweerd's scheme for understanding objects. I hope that makes more sense. He was no nominalist and neither am I. But SM ends in nominalism that's my point. That's Hume's point as well.


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## TylerRay (Oct 22, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Correct, one more problem for SM. Another is if I take a tree with a singular substance and chop it up into many pieces does the singular substance remain or has the substance divided somehow? If so than how? Outside of being a conceptual scheme what more use does it Have? But conceptual schemes can be revised. I prefer Dooyeweerd's aspects as a scheme. It doesn't have the same problems.


Do you believe that there is a constant principle that constitutes your identity through time?


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## jwright82 (Oct 22, 2019)

TylerRay said:


> Do you believe that there is a constant principle that constitutes your identity through time?


Yes, me. My soul. But now you're calling it a principle. What's the difference between an essence, a substance, or now a principle? But those are just linguistic differences. My metaphysics is an awkward mixture of Dooyeweerd and the later Wittgenstein. Neither are nominalist.


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## TylerRay (Oct 22, 2019)

.


jwright82 said:


> Yes, me. My soul. But now you're calling it a principle. What's the difference between an essence, a substance, or now a principle? But those are just linguistic differences. My metaphysics is an awkward mixture of Dooyeweerd and the later Wittgenstein. Neither are nominalist.


What makes your soul the same thing today as it was yesterday?


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## jwright82 (Oct 22, 2019)

TylerRay said:


> .
> 
> What makes your soul the same thing today as it was yesterday?


I believe that the soul is mystical in nature beyond our comprehension. But an essence, substance, or principle is an unnecessary assumption to acheive what a certain conceptual scheme labels a problem, there are other conceptual schemes that don't have that problem.
We must choose the best conceptual scheme that is the most useful and least problematic to think, talk, and make sense of the world. To choose one as the king of all schemes and say we have to go by this, problems and all, or else we're not orthodox is an unhealthy mixture of a particular philosophy and theology.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 22, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> Are you making a distinction between essence and substance? If so what's the difference? They can't be both.



Haeccity. A substance is _this _essence.


jwright82 said:


> But SM ends in nominalism that's my point. That's Hume's point as well.



No, it doesn't. And you haven't successfully demonstrated it. I have rebutted every one of your challenges from Hume. And Hume was a nominalist.


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## RamistThomist (Oct 22, 2019)

jwright82 said:


> What's the difference between an essence, a substance, or now a principle?



Leaving principle aside for now, an essence is the structure of a thing. A substance is the this-ness of that essence. 

This "unnecessary assumption," as you call it, is the backbone of historic Christian metaphysics. Tread at your own peril. To quote Nicholas Wolterstorff, as he denied the historic view of God and time, which he admitted, "Until you have mastered the tradition, don't reject it" (leaving aside the question whether Wolterstorff mastered it).

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## jwright82 (Oct 23, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> Haeccity. A substance is _this _essence.
> 
> 
> No, it doesn't. And you haven't successfully demonstrated it. I have rebutted every one of your challenges from Hume. And Hume was a nominalist.


And I rebutted every attempt, or lack thereof, of yours to show how we know a substance is there. But the explicit and implicit ad hominems keep coming. I've offered alternative explanations for you, ie TA, but you regect that. I think I'm bowing out. Have fun.


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## jwright82 (Oct 23, 2019)

BayouHuguenot said:


> Leaving principle aside for now, an essence is the structure of a thing. A substance is the this-ness of that essence.
> 
> This "unnecessary assumption," as you call it, is the backbone of historic Christian metaphysics. Tread at your own peril. To quote Nicholas Wolterstorff, as he denied the historic view of God and time, which he admitted, "Until you have mastered the tradition, don't reject it" (leaving aside the question whether Wolterstorff mastered it).


I've also offered an alternative conceptual scheme, to which you didn't comment, for this issue. Again bowing out.


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