02.01. THE PRESUPPOSITIONAL CHALLENGE
Presuppositional Confrontations 1. The Presuppositional Challenge
Imagine that you are watching a game of tennis with me on television, although for our purpose it can be just about any kind of game - golf, basketball, football, or even chess. Now suppose that I know the rules of the game we are watching, which in this case is tennis, but you do not know the rules at all. Suppose further that we have muted the television, so that no verbal communication can be heard from the commentator of the game. Finally, suppose that no verbal communication is coming visually from the screen, so that not even the scores are shown. Now, my question is whether the game will be intelligible to you at all.
If I pay close attention, I should still be able to follow the game even without being presented with any visual or auditory verbal communication, because I already know the rules of the game. Likewise, the players themselves should be able to follow the game they are playing without constant assistance from the announcer or the scoreboard. On the other hand, although you are watching exactly the same game as I am, you will not be able to make sense out of what you are seeing, since you do not know the rules that correspond to the game.
What I have shown here is that when you are watching a game, what you see does not provide its own intelligibility and interpretation. Rather, for a game to be intelligible to you and for you to have the correct interpretation of what is happening, you must bring a considerable amount of knowledge to the act of watching the game, and this knowledge does not come from watching the game itself. If I had systematically explained the rules to you, or if I explain the rules to you as we are watching the game, then what you are watching will become intelligible, and you will be able to correctly interpret what you are seeing.
You may argue that it is possible to derive some of the rules of the game by observation. Even if this is possible, it would be much more difficult than most people think. For example, suppose you observe that after each instance of what we who know the rules of chess would call a "checkmate," the two players would walk away from the chessboard. What can you infer from this? You cannot infer that one of them had won unless you know the rules of the game. You need to know that it is a game in the first place, that it can be won or lost, and how it is won or lost. Even if I allow you to infer that one of them had won without all of this information, where do you obtain the categories of "winning" and "losing"? You cannot get them from observing the game itself; rather, you must bring these ideas to the act of observation.
How about the categories of time and causation? You cannot derive the very concepts of time and causation from watching the game, but you must bring them to the act of observation. You must also have some presuppositions about ethics. That is, you must assume that the players would not usually cheat, and that the players cannot get away with cheating, or else the game would not have sufficient regularity for you to derive any rules from it. But if a person cheats and gets away with it, how will you know that he is cheating, or if his action is just an exception allowed by the rules? If we take the time to enumerate, we can make explicit dozens, or more probably hundreds or even thousands, of presuppositions that you need to have in your mind for observation of the game to be intelligible when at the same time these presuppositions cannot come from the act of observation itself. To make matters more difficult, there are hundreds or thousands of arbitrary elements to every game that are not essential to the rules, and yet they are objects of observation. For example, if the particular chess game that you are watching is being played by two men who are wearing formal attire, what can you infer from this? Are you to infer that this is an essential rule of chess? And if so, must women also wear men’s suits, or are they allowed to wear formal dresses? Of course, you can say that people wear regular clothes when they are playing chess in other settings. But how do you know that they are not in violation of the rules, and that they are just getting away with it? Or do you assume without warrant that if they were indeed in violation, the proper rules would be always enforced against them? You may think that it is ridiculous to question all of these things that we usually assume, but what will you say when I demand justification for these presuppositions?
Without knowledge that comes apart from observation, observation itself can make no sense or communicate any information. The intelligibility and interpretation of observation presuppose knowledge about what you are observing, and such knowledge cannot come from the act of observation itself. That is, the intelligibility and interpretation of an experience is made possible by knowledge that comes apart from the experience. This knowledge may be something that you are born with, or it may be something taught to you by verbal communication.
If your mind is totally blank, so that you do not even have mental categories such as time, space, and causation, nothing that you observe will be intelligible, and there will be no way to interpret what you observe. In fact, if your mind is a total blank, without any knowledge that comes apart from observation, your world will be to you as a whirlwind of sensations with no way to organize them or interpret them. But if a prior non-observational knowledge of reality is required in order to properly interpret observation about reality, this means that the order and meaning you observe is imposed on what you observe, and never derived from what you see. This is another way of saying that the meaning of what you observe is governed by your presuppositions.
Returning to our initial illustration, what happens if you presuppose the rules of basketball or chess when you are watching the tennis game? Even if it appears that you are able to make sense of some of the things that you observe, because the wrong rules are presupposed, your interpretation of what is observed will be false. Therefore, it is not enough to recognize that non-observational presuppositions precede intelligible and meaningful observation, but we must realize that not all presuppositions are equal, and that they can be true or false. So far, I have established several possibilities regarding presuppositions when watching a tennis game:
1. The mind is totally blank, in which case nothing is intelligible, and interpretation is impossible.
2. The mind contains only basic categories with no knowledge of the rules of the game, so that it acknowledges concepts such as time, causation, ethics, and winning. Interpretation is still impossible.
3. The mind applies false presuppositions to the game, so that it may apply basketball rules to tennis. Interpretation is either impossible, or yields false results when attempted.
4. The mind contains the right presuppositions about the universe in general (the basic categories such as time and causation) and about tennis in particular. Correct interpretation is possible. The result is that two people can be observing exactly the same thing, but they will come up with contradictory interpretations. However, this does not need to result in relativism, since one person may indeed be correct and the other may indeed be wrong. It depends on which one has the correct presuppositions about the universe in general, and the thing that is under observation in particular.
Let me give you two biblical examples that illustrate what I have been saying. The first shows that observation is unreliable, and the second shows that our presuppositions determine the meaning or interpretation of what we observe, so that the wrong presuppositions will lead to a false interpretation. The first example comes from John 12:28-29. As Jesus exclaims, "Father, glorify your name!" the Scripture says, "Then a voice came from heaven, ’I have glorified it, and will glorify it again.’ The crowd that was there and heard it said it had thundered; others said an angel had spoken to him." The infallible testimony of Scripture says that the voice uttered a complete sentence: "I have glorified it, and will glorify it again." Yet some of those who were present, who observed the very same event, "said it had thundered." Therefore, observation is unreliable, and the truth cannot be conclusively settled by observation. The second example comes from Matthew 12:22-28, and concerns the authority of Christ to expel demons: "Then they brought him a demon-possessed man who was blind and mute, and Jesus healed him, so that he could both talk and see. All the people were astonished and said, ’Could this be the Son of David?’ But when the Pharisees heard this, they said, ’It is only by Beelzebub, the prince of demons, that this fellow drives out demons’" (Matthew 12:22-24). Based on their observation of the event, the general audience is prepared to consider at least the possibility that Jesus is the Christ, but the Pharisees, who had observed the same event, say that he expels demons by the power of Satan.
However, this does not lead to an impasse, nor does it reduce truth to relativism. Christ’s reply indicates that not all interpretations are correct:
Every kingdom divided against itself will be ruined, and every city or household divided against itself will not stand. If Satan drives out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then can his kingdom stand? And if I drive out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your people drive them out? So then, they will be your judges. But if I drive out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. (Matthew 12:25-28)
He first reduces their assertion to absurdity, and then he gives the right interpretation of the event, and concludes with an implication about the gospel.
Now, if the Pharisees had truly believed the Scripture, they should have arrived at the same interpretation about Christ as what Christ himself asserted about himself. But although they claimed to believe the Scripture, in reality they suppressed the truth about it. Although they had access to the right presuppositions or knowledge by which they could rightly interpret reality, because of their sinfulness they refused to accept these presuppositions and their implications, and thus they rejected the truth by suppressing and distorting it.
Paul says that this is what humankind has done with their knowledge about God. He states that some knowledge about God is innate, that is, every human being is born with some knowledge about God, but because man is sinful, he refuses to acknowledge and worship this true God, and thus suppresses and distorts this innate knowledge: For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse. For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God, or give thanks; but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. (Romans 1:18-21, NASB)
People often complain that there is insufficient evidence about God and Christianity, but the Bible says that they already know about this true God, only that they are suppressing this knowledge because they refuse to acknowledge or worship him. Knowledge about God is "evident within them," because he "made it evident to them." The problem is not a lack of evidence, but an artificially manufactured set of presuppositions that suppresses the evidence about God.
Some argue that this passage provides justification for saying that we can derive knowledge about God by observation and empirical arguments. However, we have already illustrated from the example about watching tennis, and confirmed it by biblical examples, that observation in itself can provide no intelligible meaning or information. Therefore, the passage cannot mean that observation, at least in itself, can provide knowledge about God; rather, there must be certain innate ideas that are already in the mind before any experience or observation. By our example about watching tennis, we have also shown that even having the basic categories necessary to intelligibility is insufficient, but there must be some actual content to our innate ideas. However, if the innate ideas or presuppositions already contain actual content about God, then the actual knowledge about God does not come from observation at all, but such knowledge is already in the mind prior to and apart from experience and observation.
If you already know the rules of tennis, watching tennis cannot give you additional information about the rules of tennis, but it can only stimulate you to recall and apply particular rules of tennis as you observe particular events within the game. Likewise, experience or observation at best can only stimulate you to recall and apply the innate knowledge that you have about God.
More than a few commentators seem to agree with this view. Here I will only cite Charles Hodge: "It is not a mere external revelation of which the apostle is speaking, but of that evidence of the being and perfections of God which every man has in the constitution of his own nature, and in virtue of which he is competent to apprehend the manifestation of God in his works."1 Accordingly, the NLT translates, or rather paraphrases, as follows: "For the truth about God is known to them instinctively. God has put this knowledge in their hearts." A later passage confirms our understanding that God has placed some knowledge about himself into the mind of man directly, that is, apart from experience or observation: For when Gentiles who do not have the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having the Law, are a law to themselves, in that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness, and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them, on the day when, according to my gospel, God will judge the secrets of men through Christ Jesus. (Romans 2:14-16, NASB). Do not misunderstand this to mean that some Gentiles are innocent. Rather, Romans 2:12 says, "All who sin apart from the law will also perish apart from the law, and all who sin under the law will be judged by the law." Paul is trying to show that both those who have the verbal revelation from God and those who do not are guilty of sin and subject to judgment. In addition, Paul is not saying that all men are saved because they already know God, nor is he saying that the innate knowledge about God carries enough content for salvation, if one will only acknowledge it. Rather, the point of the passage is that men are without excuse for denying the true God because they suppress the truth about God. Therefore, this passage cannot be used to justify world religions, as some morons have tried to do, but its point is precisely to condemn all non-Christian worldviews, especially non-Christian religions.
Although all of this is relevant, our particular interest at this point is in the innate knowledge about God present in the mind of man apart from experience or observation. The NASB has "instinctively" in Romans 12:14, which is good, and the NJB uses the term, "innate sense." But the phrase "a law to themselves" may be misleading. It does not mean that the Gentiles, since they do not have the Scripture, determine for themselves right and wrong; rather, it means what is already implied by "innate sense," so that J. B. Phillips translates, "they have a law in themselves." This confirms our contention that there are innate ideas in the mind of man, and that the contents of which consist not only in thought categories, but actual knowledge about God, rendering those who deny him without excuse.
I am not saying that people should not "see" God in nature - they should.2 But I am trying to explain why they do not, or at least why they say that they do not. Paul is saying that you have to suppress and distort the knowledge that is already in your mind in order to reject Christianity and to affirm a non-Christian religion, philosophy, or worldview. Only Christianity corresponds to what you already know in your mind, so that you will have to suppress and distort what you already know, and indeed deceive yourself, to accept something else other than a complete and distinctive Christian worldview or religion.
Some Christian apologists attempt to defend the faith by mainly using scientific arguments, such as those based on physics, biology, and archaeology. In other words, along with the unbelievers they assume the reliability of science and attempt to "do science" better than the unbelievers can. If what I am saying is correct - that is, if what Paul is saying is correct - then of course we are able to do science better than the unbelievers, since we have a set of presuppositions that corresponds to objective reality and morality. That said, I have argued elsewhere that the scientific method itself precludes the knowledge of truth,3 so that even with the correct presuppositions, science is completely incompetent as a way to discover the nature of reality. Ronald W. Clark comments, "Contemplation of first principles progressively occupied Einstein’s attention," and in such a context, he quotes Einstein as saying, "We know nothing about it at all. All our knowledge is but the knowledge of schoolchildren….the real nature of things, that we shall never know, never."4 Of course, he could only speak as a representative of science and not revelation.
Karl Popper, who had written a number of works on the philosophy of science, wrote as follows:
Although in science we do our best to find the truth, we are conscious of the fact that we can never be sure whether we have got it….In science there is no "knowledge," in the sense in which Plato and Aristotle understood the word, in the sense which implies finality; in science, we never have sufficient reason for the belief that we have attained the truth.…Einstein declared that his theory was false - he said that it would be a better approximation to the truth than Newton’s, but he gave reasons why he would not, even if all predictions came out right, regard it as a true theory.5
Scientists conduct multiple experiments to test a hypothesis. If observation is reliable, then why do they need more than one experiment? If observation is less than reliable, then how many experiments are enough? Who decides? Ignoring this problem for now, W. Gary Crampton explains the difficulty in formulating a scientific law by the method of experimentation: In the laboratory the scientist seeks to determine the boiling point of water. Since water hardly boils at the same temperature, the scientist conducts a number of tests and the slightly differing results are noted. He then must average them. But what kind of average does he use: mean, mode, or median? He must choose; and whatever kind of average he selects, it is his own choice; it is not dictated by the data. Then too, the average he chooses is just that, that is, it is an average, not the actual datum yielded by the experiment. Once the test results have been averaged, the scientist will calculate the variable error in his readings. He will likely plot the data points or areas on a graph. Then he will draw a curve through the resultant data points or areas on the graph. But how many curves, each one of which describes a different equation, are possible? An infinite number of curves is possible. But the scientist draws only one.6 The probability of drawing the correct curve is one over infinity, which equals zero. Therefore, there is a zero probability that any scientific law can be true. It is impossible for science to ever accurately describe anything about reality. Thus Popper writes, "It can even be shown that all theories, including the best, have the same probability, namely zero."7
If what is said above about scientific experiments is difficult for some people to understand, the problem of "affirming the consequent" may be more easily grasped. Consider the following form of argument:
1. If X, then Y
2. Y
3. Therefore, X This form of reasoning, called "affirming the consequent," is always a formal fallacy in logic; that is, we know that the argument is invalid just by noting its structure. Just because Y is true does not mean that X is true, since there can be an infinite number of things that may substitute for X so that we will still have Y. Correlation is not the same as causation - but can science even discover correlation? Thus if the hypothesis is, "If X, then Y," the fact that Y turns up does nothing whatever to confirm the hypothesis.
Scientists, of course, attempt to get around this problem by having "controlled" experiments, but they are faced again with an infinite number of things that may affect the experiment. How do they know what variables must be controlled? By other experiments that affirm the consequent, or by observation, which we have already shown to be unreliable?
Bertrand Russell was a celebrated mathematician, logician, philosopher, and wrote much against the Christian religion. So he was not attempting to endorse Christianity when he wrote the following:
All inductive arguments in the last resort reduce themselves to the following form: "If this is true, that is true: now that is true, therefore this is true." This argument is, of course, formally fallacious. Suppose I were to say: "If bread is a stone and stones are nourishing, then this bread will nourish me; now this bread does nourish me; therefore it is a stone, and stones are nourishing." If I were to advance such an argument, I should certainly be thought foolish, yet it would not be fundamentally different from the argument upon which all scientific laws are based.8
Yet many who speak this way refuse to draw the logical conclusion that all science is ultimately irrational and without justification. Most people feel compelled to respect science because of the practical success that it appears to achieve; however, we have noted that affirming the consequent may yield results but not truths. Remember what Popper said about Einstein: "He would not, even if all predictions came out right, regard it as a true theory." The typical college student would disagree, but the typical college student is not Einstein. Accordingly, although science is useful as a way to achieve practical ends, it has no authority to make any pronouncements concerning the nature of reality. If the scientist does not know his place, an informed believer should not hesitate to put him back in his place. Theology is the ruling intellectual discipline, not science.
Many people will think that this skepticism toward sensation and this low view of science are too extreme, but anyone who disagrees must first justify how knowledge comes from sensation and how the scientific method can function to discover truth. If you trust in science but cannot provide a rational justification for it, then how dare you call Christians irrational and gullible? You may attempt to advance your selective and arbitrary skepticism against Christianity on the basis of science, but if I can successfully apply a stronger and comprehensive skepticism to refute secular science and all world religions, but defend biblical revelation, then you better not dare call Christians irrational and gullible anymore.
It is only because you have been made in the image of God and thus have an innate knowledge about him that you can even speak of rationality in the first place, for without Christ - the Reason of God (John 1:1)9 - you have no foundation for even logic itself. On the other hand, from the Christian perspective, rationality characterizes the very structure of God’s mind, and the laws of logic describe the way he thinks. Since he has made us in his image, we are also able to use logic, and since the same God who created us also created the universe, logic corresponds to reality. If you reject Christian presuppositions, then on what basis do you use logic, and on what basis do you say that logic corresponds to reality? You attempt to use reason, but you deny Reason itself. You claim to think logically, but you deny the very person who has structured your rational mind in the likeness of his own rational mind. Thus in exalting reason without exalting God, you contradict yourself and incriminate yourself, and show that you have suppressed the truth about God.
Although, due to the nature of its method, science itself is incompetent and unreliable no matter what foundation you build it on, if we are correct about the reality of innate ideas and the unbeliever’s suppression of truth, then Christians can still do better science than non-Christians, since we explicitly affirm the correct presuppositions, including those in Scripture that are not part of the innate ideas present at birth. But at the same time, if we are correct about the innate ideas and presuppositions, then science is in fact a surface issue when it comes to the conflicts between opposing worldviews. Our presuppositions determine our interpretation of what we observe, so that we can observe exactly the same things and come up with different conclusions. Although I would say that non-Christian presuppositions cannot even support non-Christian conclusions, neither can they be used to provide conclusive support for Christianity, for the reason that non-Christian presuppositions really cannot support anything.10 Thus we come to the realization that ultimately, we must deal with the non-Christians on the presuppositional level.11 Do not underestimate this insight, which shows that unless the non-Christian can provide a foundation for knowledge without using Christian presuppositions, all his arguments are just so much noise. He is just trying to rationalize his way out of his innate knowledge that Christianity is true, and that only Christianity is true. Yet he cannot even rationalize without using Christian presuppositions. He chooses a non-Christian starting point for his philosophy and tries to convince himself that it is adequate, but he knows better, although he may not admit this even to himself. This knowledge haunts him, and so he suppresses his conscience and turns against the believers. But even suicide will not rescue him from his unhappy condition, since that will only finalize his doom, and he knows this deep inside (Romans 1:32). Paul writes in Romans 1:22, "Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools." Or, more plainly, "They think they are smart, but they are stupid." This is true of every non-Christian.
If you are a Christian, then God has chosen you and changed you, and he has enlisted you to issue this presuppositional challenge to the world. Paul commands us to hold out the straight standard of "the word of life" in this "crooked and depraved generation" (Php 2:15-16). Indeed, unbelievers are "crooked" in their thought and conduct, and they suppress and distort the truth about reality and morality. Nevertheless, God will show mercy to his elect and will convert them, and set straight their crooked paths. But the reprobates will resist, and be crushed by the Rock that is the foundation of Christianity (Luke 20:17-18).
Endnotes:
1. Charles Hodge, Romans; The Banner of Truth Trust, 1997 (original: 1835); p. 36.
2. The precise way of saying this is that they should be reminded of God when they observe nature.
3. Vincent Cheung, Ultimate Questions.
4. Ronald W. Clark, Einstein: The Life and Times; Avon Books, 1971; p. 504.
5. Popper Selections, edited by David Miller; Princeton University Press, 1985; p. 90, 91, 121.
6. W. Gary Crampton, "The Biblical View of Science," January 1997, The Trinity Review.
7. Karl Popper, Conjectures and Refutations; Harper and Row, 1968; p. 192.
8. Bertrand Russell, The Problems of Philosophy; Oxford University Press, 1998.
9. The logos, or Word, in John 1:1 can be just as accurately translated as Wisdom, Reason, or even Logic.
10. The strategic uses of scientific arguments are sometimes desirable, but never necessary, within the context of debates, but their only function is to show that even if science can discover truth, the unbeliever would still be wrong. It remains that Christians should not build their confidence on something as feeble as science. Christians should have higher intellectual standards than the non-Christians.
11. It is often urged that we must "look at the facts objectively." If this means that we should have no presuppositions, then we have shown that to be impossible, and it in fact makes the "facts" unintelligible. But if being "objective" means that we should look at the world as it truly is, then this is the very point at issue, and we are arguing that only when you begin with Christian presuppositions will you be able to look at the world as it truly is. "Facts" do not come with their own interpretations, and any interpretation requires presuppositions. However, not all presuppositions are equal, and thus we return to the point that arguments must ultimately be settled on the presuppositional level.