TSAWTB Section 6 - Interlude - A Miscellany of Items

280 Section 6 - Interlude
world. A “rationalist” uses only reason, denying that spiritual revelation
exists. )
It is the belief of many that the only purely rational approach to life is
through the discipline of “science”. With its aura of deduction from the hard
facts of experimental results, all other approaches to life are considered to
retain elements of emotion and philosophical or theological preconceptions.
Science is only one of the many facets of life that impinge upon a person’s
awareness. It claims, by inference, to be pre-eminently the most rational of all
the disciplines, but we will demonstrate that its efforts to isolate itself from
external preconceptions is itself irrational.
This is the conclusion of Godel’s Theorem in which he proved that a system
of axioms can never be based on itself. In order to prove its validity,
statements from outside the system must be used. The implications of this are
profound and affect all disciplines of life. On this basis, Science is possible
only within a larger framework of non-scientific issues and concerns. This
subject has been well set out by Ancil (Anc) upon whom much of what
follows is based.
The important point to grasp is that no system can validate itself by referring
only to its own statements. Its authenticity or validation can only come from
some other area that is outside and superior to itself. Let us look at some
simple examples.
(i) There is the well known conundrum of the Cretan making the statement,
“All Cretans are liars.” If the statement is true, then he also is lying, which
makes the statement false. Therefore, if it is true it must be false. The only
way in which it can be checked is by someone outside the Cretans
investigating their honesty.
(ii) J.B.S. Haldane said:
If my mental processes are determined wholly by the motion of
atoms in my brain, I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are
true... and hence I have no reason for supposing my brain is
composed of atoms.
From this, the process of thinking, being merely the movement of atoms in
our brain, means that anything, even rational thinking, cannot reflect what is
really true. This undermines the whole metaphysical basis that science claims
it possesses, for it contends its announcements, based upon logical thinking, is
an accurate portrayal of the real world. Haldane, however, takes the concept
even further by saying that the idea that thinking is solely due to atomic
motions in the brain is based upon “scientific” experiments. But we have just
seen that thinking is only atomic motion and therefore can prove nothing.
Thus, we cannot even be sure that atoms even exist in our brains. We need
something outside of ourselves to accept “scientific facts”.
(iii) C.S. Lewis showed that thinking is a very special process:
All arguments about the validity of thought make a tacit, and
illegitimate, exception in favour of the bit of thought that you are
doing at that moment. It has to be left outside the discussion and
simply believed in, in the simple old-fashioned way. Thus the
Freudian proves that all thoughts are due to complexes except the
thought which constitutes the proof itself. The Marxist proves that
all thoughts result from class conditioning - except the thought he
is thinking while he says this. It is therefore impossible to begin
with any other data whatever and from there find out whether
thought is valid. You must do exactly the opposite - you must