All the Myriad Ways

David Deutsch has written a book called The Fabric of Reality which constructs a unified theory of reality out of quantum physics, evolution, epistemology, and information theory. He picks up Hugh Everett's theory of a multiverse and runs with it. I'm impressed by his breadth of vision and the scope of his imagination, even though I disagree with his final outcome.

Metaphysics asks, "how many futures are there?" Deutsch offers a daring answer--all possible futures exist.

Deutsch's multiverse model has some attractive features. It provides a satisfying solution to the questions raised by the Intelligent Design movement. Intelligent Design argues that biological systems contain features that cannot be explained on the basis of mere time and chance. Deutsch provides infinitely more time and chance for evolution to play with--in his theory, the world we live in one of an uncountable infinity of parallel worlds. Not only does our improbable world exist, there are even greater improbabilities--worlds where monkeys type the text of Shakespeare. If it is physically possible, Deutsch says it exists.

Deutsch defines "physically possible" as "permitted by quantum physics," which means that all possible worlds exist. He envisions people playing quidditch in Harry Potter universes, where all the laws of physics still apply, but an endless string of improbabilities permits people to fly on brooms.

Deutsch is consistent about the implications of his theory--which tends to defeat his purpose. A Harry Potter universe just seems unthinkable. I'm not dismayed by the counter-intuitive nature of the concept, but there's more about Deutsch's model that makes it incompatible with humanity, whether or not it is scientifically sound.

The most profound counter to Deutsch is Larry Niven's classic short story, "All the Myriad Ways." As BookThink explains:

Larry Niven's story "All the Myriad Ways" features police detective Gene Trimble sitting at his desk and considering the implications of an escalating wave of senseless crimes and suicides that started soon after the Crosstime ships started traveling to alternate parallel worlds. The story ends with Trimble sitting at his desk and considering the business end of his service revolver. As written, the story has ten different, parallel endings, representative of the essentially infinite number of endings possible under the Everett Interpretation.

One of those endings, of course, is that Trimble pulls the trigger and kills himself--becoming just one more of the senseless suicides that started his investigation.

As physics goes, Deutsch's theory is mostly unobjectionable. Yet I don't see it catching on with the general public. It answers the question of "how we got here" but it tells us nothing (or way too much!) about where we are going.

If the general public believed what Deutsch says, I would predict a wave of senseless crimes and suicides--except among the "old-fashioned" religious believers who still clung to some outdated sense that there is a Higher Power who will hold them to account for their actions.

Deutsch's theory of multiversal quantum Darwinism, if it ever became widely accepted, could tempt so many people to kill themselves that the only people left to continue civilization would be fundamentalists who still believe in a God who punishes suicide.

Rationalism, Empiricism, Subjectivism

John M. Frame suggested a new framework for knowing what knowledge is in 1982. (This philosophical sub-discipline is called "epistemology.") He begins by listing three general types of epistemology throughout the history of philosophy:

The first tendency is rationalism or a_ priorism, which I shall define as the view that human knowledge presupposes certain principles known independently of sense-experience, principles by which, indeed, our knowledge of sense-experience is governed. The second tendency is empiricism, the view that human knowledge is based upon the data of sense-experience. Thirdly, there is subjectivism, the view that there is no "objective" truth, but only truth "for" the knowing subject, verified by criteria internal to the subject.

I tend towards empiricism, myself, with a healthy respect for rationalism, but I have long despised "subjectivism." Frame's description of subjectivism convicts me of intellectual snobbery:

Then comes the third member of the triad, human nature, which correlates with philosophical "subjectivity." Self-knowledge has always been philosophically difficult. As Hume and Wittgenstein especially have pointed out, the self is not one of the things we see as we look on the world. Yet it is through our­selves that we come to know everything else. All we know, we know through our own senses, reason, feelings, through what we are. And it is thus in knowing other things that we come to know the self. The self seems to be everywhere and nowhere. We know it, but only as we know other things.

Frame does not take two opposing principles and merge them into one synthesis, as Hegel would do with his dialectic. He affirms three different perspectives as co-equal--like the three dimensions of physical space.

My approach to knowledge, up until now, seems two-dimensional at best? Has my epistemology been just a cardboard cut-out with no subjective depth to it?

What is Perspectivalism?

What Is Perspectivalism?

"Perspectivalism" is a post-modern way of thinking about thinking that has been articulated by Vern Poythress and John M. Frame. Frame's brief Primer on Perspectivalism outlines the method.

Frame starts by observing that every (human) act of knowing takes place from some limited perspective. Recognizing this makes us more humble about the extent our own knowledge and more eager to increase it.

One way to increase our knowledge and our level of certainty is by supplementing our own perspectives with those of others. When our own resources fail us, we can consult friends, authorities, books, etc. We can travel to other places, visit people of other cultures. Even to get a good understanding of a tree, we need to walk around it, look at it from many angles.

It often happens that someone’s idea will seem ridiculous when we first encounter it; but when we try to understand where that person is coming from, what considerations have led him to his idea, then our evaluation of it changes. In such a case, we are trying to see the issue from his perspective, and that perspective enriches our own.

Perspectivalism Is Not Relativism

Perspectivalism seems safer than absolutism and wiser than relativism. Friedrich Nietzsche captured the core of relativism in The Will to Power:

There are many sorts of eyes. The sphinx too has eyes; consequently, there are many sorts of "truths," and consequently there is no truth. (Will to Power, section 540)

Perspectivalism does not confuse the blind stone eyes of the sphinx with the many sorts of eyes that really see.

Perspectivalism Is Not Absolutism

Perspectivalism is not absolutism because it does not confuse any (finite) individual's ideas with "Truth." This is not to say that Frame and Poythress deny the existence of absolute truth--they are both theology professors (Poythress is at Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, Frame is at Reformed Theological Seminary near Orlando). Perspectivalism distinguishes between the finite perspective of any created being with space and time, and the ultimate perspective of the Creator of space and time.

The Power of Perspectivalism

This humble but hopeful theory of knowledge could be a breakthrough in epistemology (which seems to have fallen on hard times recently). It could also provide a "grand unified theory" of ethics, by fusing deontology, teleology, and existential ethcs.