A rearrangement of the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus

I had a look at Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus recently, and the format is crying out for expression with an outliner. I poked around on the internet for a while, and I couldn't find it. So, I did it myself. Here it is:

The Tractatus in an outliner.

Reading it this way brings out the coherence of some of the structure of this book. It's particularly impressive since Wittgenstein didn't have any such software to play around with.

I built it from a Project Gutenberg e-text, though I've corrected some typos and put in some sections that had been left out of the e-text. I've also cleaned up the notation for the mathematics, which had become mangled in the e-text version. The only major problem is that I couldn't include any of the diagrams from the original book. But this isn't too serious, as Wittgenstein doesn't rely very heavily on the diagrams.

It is clear that, on its own terms, the Tractatus is nonsense. Wittgenstein was well aware of this when he wrote it. The trouble is that most of it is in fact perfectly sensible use of language and so, not being nonsense, it shows itself to be false. We could, perhaps, imagine that Wittgenstein's project was more modest: To set up a bastion of sensible language without commenting on the sense of the remainder (with which that bastion is constructed). But even this fails, since the set-up of the bastion relies on a classical foundationalism which has been smashed by quantum mechanics, as I hope to explain in my next post.

An amusing diversion.

If I told you I didn't believe in rationality, what could you do to convince me? You could try to present an argument, but I, believing the argument to be necessarily irrational, would have no reason to accept it, or even listen to it. Your best bet would probably be to medicate me, though such techniques don't really fall under the banner of 'convincing'.

This is because rationality is so basic. Any proof that rationality exists must be in some sense circular, in that it must rely at some point on reason. This isn't a problematic kind of circularity, though, in that we simply rely on the proper function of reason in our brains to understand reasonable arguments. We don't, and can't, rely on our knowledge that we are rational in order to do this. But lack of proper care in thinking about this can lead to paradoxes.

It's much easier with the existence of things like tables. We have a sensible theory of the world into which tables snugly fit. More precisely, in this theory there is a role for tables as existing objects which fits pretty closely with our experience of them and of the world. To return to the theme of this post, our physical theories of the world give good reason to believe that continuing to use the word 'table', as we do, as if it were a noun, will not lead us into serious difficulty. So, according to that post, we shouldn't be at all surprised that we find ourselves, from time to time, making claims like 'tables exist'. There is no paradox here, despite the fact that tables have been widely used by those who put these theories together.

Let's pause at this point to notice the dizzy heights we haven't reached. The dalliance with the word 'exists' in the post referenced above gave no explanation at all of what existence is, or of what it is for a thing to exist. It was simply an observation about the linguistic use of a word, a piece of anthropology. Accordingly, we needn't worry about things relying for their existence on the ideas introduced there. This is good: It avoids vicious circularity - those ideas needn't rely on themselves for their own existence, for example. Bafflement easily ensues if this is not kept in mind.

In fact, there are quite a few things which exist, and whose existence may be explained in this very limited sense, but for which the explanation invokes the things themselves. The problem is only apparent, since what is explained is only the fact that, given the way we use language, we sensibly use the word 'exists' about those things. It is amusing to examine a few cases, and see how in each case familiar paradoxes are generated. I'll look at numbers, language, time, probability and deconstruction, but I'm sure you can think of your own examples.

Numbers

Although numbers aren't made of physical stuff in the same way as tables, our basic physical theories give us good reasons to accept that using the words for numbers nounishly will be unproblematic. For the world is generally divisible into discrete bits which we can count, and preservation of cardinality is a general rule which emerges from our understanding of how those bits of stuff behave. However, the more deeply we look into the behaviour of stuff and our understanding of it, the more we find that in order to explain what is going on we must make use of mathematics.

Because of the misunderstanding I outlined above, this phenomenon has often been taken to show that such explanations are circular and therefore inadequate. So the question of how our minds can interact with numbers has been singled out as a mystery. How can our minds, which are made of physical stuff, possibly interact with such abstract nonphysical entities? Even the brilliant thinker Roger Penrose has taken pains to express how baffling he finds this, in terms of a triangular structure of mental, material, and mathematical worlds, each enclosing the previous one:

In order to confront the profound issues that confront us, I shall phrase things in terms of three different worlds, and the three deep mysteries that relate each of these worlds to each of the others. The worlds are somewhat related to those of Popper (cf. Popper and Eccles 1977), but my emphasis will be very different.

The world that we know most directly is the world of our conscious perceptions, yet it is the world that we know least about in any kind of precise scientific terms. ... There are two other worlds that we are cognisant of ... One ... is the world we call the physical world ... There is also one other world, though many find difficulty in accepting its actual existence: it is the Platonic world of mathematical forms.

Language

Though we are far from completely understanding it, linguistics has given us a pretty good outline of how language emerged and how it is used in day to day life. Mundanely enough, in order to express this stuff even linguists must humbly rely on the very linguistic structures they are studying. Pulling a mystery from this banality, I've seen this fact used to reject the explanations of linguists as fundamentally unable to address the 'deep questions' of language, such as when a sentence is true. This misunderstanding is used to claim that there is a sacred territory here on which we must proceed philosophically barefoot.

Time

Great strides have been made in understanding what time is. Newton and others produced a sensible mathematical model into which time fits. Einstein showed that the model in question was slightly off (in a way that reflects our simple mental pictures of time), and proposed a better one. This better perspective has yet to be fully integrated into quantum mechanics, but there's no reason to suppose that this won't ever be achieved. In any case, we are close to having an understanding of how time exists (that is, of why using the word time as a noun doesn't screw us up) which is built on cunning maths which makes no reference to and doesn't rely on a prior concept of time.

Being human, though, when we consider these mathematical models, our brains (being so tied up in a primitive model of time) situate them in a kind of timeless present. Besides the obvious confusion this leads to (nonsense like 'Relativity implies the future already exists'), this has led to the claim that this present, for example, is prior to and in principle cannot be accounted for by scientific models. Once more, there is a purported need to abandon all our usual tools when addressing our day-to-day experience of time. I'm told Heidegger followed a line of this kind, but I haven't checked this in his writings.

Probability

This is a slightly odd special case. The normal way we introduce probability into scientific models is at the ground floor, with a variety of possible worlds whose actualities are assigned various prior probabilities. For this reason, like numbers, probability is difficult to explain except by exemplifying the proper use of the language (and remarkably it seems not to have been understood systematically until a few centuries ago).

To some extent this can be dealt with, though it normally isn't, by considering appropriate strategies for a limited reasoning being in a deterministic, patterned reality. Such a being could represent its ignorance about that world by assigning various probabilities to ways it reckons the world might be. So we can see how probabilistic language might become useful and how the probabilities of particular events could be said to exist without having to invoke probability in the explanation.

Unfortunately, though, as far as we can tell such 'probability-free' basic models aren't adequate to the behaviour of the world that we find ourselves in, where there appear to be genuinely random events if you look on a small enough scale. Quantum mechanics forces us to once more build in randomness at the bottom. Actually, the situation is a little more complicated still, in a way that is so outlandish that I'll have to leave an explanation to a later post.

Deconstruction

A lot of the language Derrida originally used when introducing deconstruction appears to fall into this category. I can't comment for myself on later postmodernists, since I haven't looked into them, but I'm told that to a large extent they were trying for something a little different. There is, as far as I can tell, no current systematic understanding of why 'differance', or 'trace', for example, are a sensibly nounish words. I can see that they are, but not in terms that I can explain without resorting to the vocabulary of Derrida, and even that isn't well enough developed to explain it thoroughly. This linguistic oddity may turn out to be explicable in other terms eventually, for example with an adequate development of neuroscience, or it may not. It almost certainly won't be done whilst I'm still alive.

Calling on the name of the Lord

In the last post, I mentioned that it would take a while to explain the correspondences between the use of the word 'God' outlined there and the more normal use. I'm going to have a go at doing that here; I'll also outline some differences. The normal use is relatively straightforward; the word is used, as a noun, to refer to a being who is believed to exist and have some particular properties. The use I am introducing is something you may well be less familiar with, so I'll take a moment to outline it before going on to detail the correspondences.

The more common use is often taken to be referring to the source who is encountered in spiritual experiences. For example, sometimes we get caught up in a spring day and feel that it is an exhuberant and creative expression pouring from beyond the simple mundanity of the matter constituting it. But I mean something a little broader than such specific experiences; and it need not be just the poetic. For example, when our heads bang up against questions like 'Why is there anything at all?' or 'Why is love good?' our brains are wired to assume that there is some answer to these questions, and get snarled up hunting for one where our usual methods do not apply.

Now, it may well be that there is no good answer to be found to these questions, so that our sense that there is one is a cognitive glitch. Equally, there may be nothing genuinely external being experienced in spiritual experiences. But even if that is the case it is helpful to keep the word 'God' for the illusory referrent, just as we may helpfully refer to a building as being 'on the horizon' or maintain the archaic and inaccurate language of 'sunrise' and 'sunset'. All that is implied is that a certain care must be taken about how the word is used.

Indeed, being careful in this way fits naturally with our experience of God (used in either sense): When we see Him, we are not normally in the mood to think analytically about Him, and there are certain questions which don't enter our heads in the presence of the divine. It is reasonable, then, that we should hang back from trying to articulate any answers to those questions. Any attempt to do so would be nonsense or blasphemy.

This strand of thought found expression to some extent in negative theology. There is a difference, though. In negative theology, at least as normally expressed, a statement like 'God is good' is, by the nature of language, inadequate and therefore false. But under the scheme I'm outlining it is not so much false as meaningless, or at least inappropriate use of language. This also applies to the opposite: 'God is not good'. It is something we should hang back from affirming or denying. The kind of attitude to these words I'm thinking of is that exemplified by the Buddha in a totally different context:

On one occasion Ven. Sariputta and Ven. Maha Kotthita were staying near Varanasi in the Game Refuge at Isipatana. Then in the evening, Ven. Sariputta emerged from his seclusion and went to Ven. Maha Kotthita and exchanged courteous greetings with him. After an exchange of friendly greetings & courtesies, he sat to one side. As he was sitting there, he said to Ven. Maha Kotthita, "Now then, friend Kotthita, does the Tathagata exist after death?"

"That, friend, has not been declared by the Blessed One: 'The Tathagata exists after death.'"

"Well then, friend Kotthita, does the Tathagata not exist after death?"

"Friend, that too has not been declared by the Blessed One: 'The Tathagata does not exist after death.'"

"Then does the Tathagata both exist and not exist after death?"

"That has not been declared by the Blessed One: 'The Tathagata both exists and does not exist after death.'"

"Well then, does the Tathagata neither exist nor not exist after death?"

"That too has not been declared by the Blessed One: 'The Tathagata neither exists nor does not exist after death.'"

Now, let's see how some of this works out when considered in relation to some of the standard attributes of God.

Infinite:

This is a nice easy attribute to begin with, since it is negative in form, and would fit neatly into negative theology: God is not finite. Indeed, when we encounter the divine we tend not to notice any limitation: We have other things on our minds. But the caveat I mentioned earlier applies; saying 'God is finite' is more silly or irreverent than false. The phrase 'God is infinite' can be saved for poetic language, where such truthguides are allowed. The rest of the time, we can come near enough by saying 'Well, I never noticed any limitation on Him'.

Omnivarious:

A similar lack of apparent limitation corresponds to the various unlimited aspects normally attributed to God, such as Omnipotence, Omnipresence and so on. Omnipresence in particular ties in well with our experience, for we find that wherever we look, even in the unexpected and mundane, even in the darkest places, there He is. A key expression of this in Christianity is seeing God even in the humiliating and ignominious mockery and defeat of raw goodness that we find in the crucifixion of Jesus (of which more later).

Unique (or multitudinous):

Under this view of God it is not so much that there is only one God, but that trying to count Him is inappropriate. In 'Wyrd Sisters', Terry Pratchett gives a description of a rather unusual standing stone:

The stone was about the same height as a tall man, and made of bluish tinted rock. It was considered intensely magical because, although there was only one of it, no-one had ever been able to count it; if it saw anyone looking at it speculatively, it shuffled behind them. It was the most self-effacing monolith ever discovered.

On the other hand, the reason why God is so hard to count is not that He is shy but that He is glorious; when we see Him we are more disposed to worship than to enumerate. We certainly aren't normally on the look out for distinguishing features by which we could distinguish the God we see from others. In response to this, simple numbers like 1 and `lots' have been chosen when the question 'How many Gods are there?' arose. The answer of negative theology, that God is 'divinely simple,' comes a little closer to what I'm getting at. Since the question 'How many?' doesn't arise in God's presence, there's no need for us to bother with such language in His apparent absence.

Love:

There's a slight difference here; with the usage I'm explaining, God is seen in love, rather than being love. This should be reasonably self-explanatory: Love is one of the main places where we see God. When we hear about or see love in action, we're often jolted into seeing God's hand in it. There's another strong link here: A common time when our brains point us to God is when we want to say thankyou, because behind the good that happens to us our brains point us to a caring guide. Our brains may be deluding us here, but it is still helpful to express our thanks to the loving God.

Relational:

Similar comments to those for 'Love' also apply to other attributes of God: Powerful, glorious, just, creative. These are relational attributes, and so taking a step back from this we might like to say 'God is relational' or 'God is personal'. But taking a step back from God is irreverent and unnecessary. Since the usage I'm introducing is for dealing with God in community, not nattering about Him, this kind of language doesn't fall into its scope. Rather than worrying about the question of whether God is relational, we should get on with the business of relationship with Him.

Just:

The way this aspect of God is often discussed goes beyond the merely relational, particularly in evangelical Christianity. For one odd bit of wiring in our brains is that we tend to believe the world is more just than it is. When we see evil, we expect a comeuppance. When we see good we expect a reward. But the world doesn't fit these expectations in a great many cases. This apparent lack of justice is therefore explained in terms of rewards or punishments being allotted after the death of those who deserve them. This glitch ties in closely with the others I've mentioned, so this is often expressed in terms of religious language, particularly in the west: 'Christ will come again to judge the living and the dead'. But this kind of language can't be fitted into the scheme I'm outlining, for two reasons. First, it overlaps too heavily with normal language: 'You won't get away with it' has a perfectly useful meaning already which it would be silly to override. So using language like this to express our potentially inaccurate sense of justice would be deeply confusing. Second, it is not particularly helpful in allowing people to live well in the world. Historically, two major uses of this kind of language have been to concentrate power in the hands of religious leaders and as an excuse for a lack of due attention to issues of justice prior to death. I can't see any way to preserve this kind of language without such abuses arising.

Incarnate:

Here, too, the usage departs sharply from that of evangelical Christianity. When I see God, it is normally in the particular. A kind or creative word or action. A dancing flame or a rushing foam. A startled treescape.

When through the woods and forest glades I wander
And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees,
When I look down from lofty mountain grandeur
And hear the brook and feel the gentle breeze,

Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to Thee:
How great Thou art, how great Thou art!
Then sings my soul, my Savior God, to Thee:
How great Thou art, how great Thou art!

But the mountain is a big pile of rock, and the breeze is an onslought of impure nitrogen. The trees have their roots in the muck, and the birds are piping 'Get off my land'. There's no élan vital setting these living things apart: They, you and I are all made of the same old stuff. And yet, there is God, transfiguring plain stuff and making it holy. Not just nice stuff, either. Less often seen, and shockingly, He's there in the broken and snarled-up. When injustice strikes, He can be seen, not laughingly ladling it out (at least I never saw Him there), but with those at the blunt end of the ladle. As a symbolic horizon of all this, He is degradingly butchered under the sneering epithet 'King of the Jews'. It seems a little beneath His dignity. But one thing I love about the Christian tradition is that it sees in this the glory and love of God, and falls to worship.

Playing God.

For a few months last year I had this quote on the wall of my room:

Now the inspirational aspect, the third aspect of religion, is what I would like to turn to, and that brings me to a central question that I would like to ask you all, because I have no idea of the answer. The source of inspiration today, the source of strength and comfort in any religion, is closely knit with the metaphysical aspects. That is, the inspiration comes from working for God, from obeying His will, and so on. Now an emotional tie expressed in this manner, the strong feeling that you are doing right, is weakened when the slightest amount of doubt is expressed as to the existence of God. So when a belief in God is uncertain, this particular method of obtaining inspiration fails. I don't know the answer to this problem, the problem of maintaining the real value of religion as a source of strength and of courage to most men while at the same time not requiring an absolute faith in the metaphysical system. You may think that it might be possible to invent a metaphysical system for religion which will state things in such a way that science will never find itself in disagreement. But I do not think that it is possible to take an adventurous and ever-expanding science that is going into an unknown, and to tell the answer to questions ahead of time and not expect that sooner or later, no matter what you do, you will find that some answers of this kind are wrong. So I do not think that it is possible to not get into a conflict if you require an absolute faith in metaphysical aspects, and at the same time I don't understand how to maintain the real value of religion for inspiration if we have some doubt as to that. That's a serious problem.

In this quote, taken from a 1963 lecture called 'the Uncertainty of Values' by Richard Feynman, and still deeply relevant today, he raises a very serious question which relates to the use of language in a religious context. On the one hand, this language is normally taken to be referring to, and grounded in, metaphysical reality. On the other hand, the language is used as part of religious practices that enable people to live out their values in the world. Normally, these two aspects are strongly linked, so that in order for the language to be useful in the second way it is necessary for the metaphysics to be believed in absolutely. Often the level of belief required (absolute certainty) not only goes beyond what is warranted by our current evidence but even lies outside the range of confidence that would be appropriate given the most compelling evidence we might hope to find. Feynman mentions one putative solution, only to dismiss it:

You may think that it might be possible to invent a metaphysical system for religion which will state things in such a way that science will never find itself in disagreement. But I do not think that it is possible to take an adventurous and ever-expanding science that is going into an unknown, and to tell the answer to questions ahead of time and not expect that sooner or later, no matter what you do, you will find that some answers of this kind are wrong.

I agree: I don't think a solution of this kind can be found. But I am hopeful that another kind of solution to this problem is being found at present; I don't know yet whether it will work out but I am certain that it is worth making the attempt. I'll explain the idea later in this post, but first I'll fill in some context.

For about 9 months, I have once more been regularly attending a church, namely Cambridge Unitarian Church. I went first of all out of interest; after all, most of my experience with Christianity is with evangelical congregations, and I wanted to see how an extreme liberal position could be held with integrity. The first week was the last before the return of the minister from his summer break, and the talk consisted of a summary of the various sermons which had been preached while the minister was absent. The diversity of ideas in the various talks attracted me, and I decided to come back the next week to hear what the minister had to say.

I'm glad I did, because what he said in the address was extremely thought-provoking: Enough to make me go back again and again. Almost every week the address has made me stop and think, and see the world from a new point of view. Of course, I disagree with what the minister (Andrew) says at least as much as I agree, but I think the questions he is addressing are deeply important. If you want to see some of what he is saying, most of the sermons are available on his blog.

During the time I have been attending the Church, there has been a change in Andrew's thinking. As far as I can tell, this is not a new phenomenon; he has been gradually shifting in view for the last few years. This is disconcerting for many of the congregation, but I appreciate the fact that he does not take his past conclusions for granted. Even when I first showed up, the metaphysics behind the addresses was by no means conventionally Christian. It did claim the existence of God, but this word was employed in the unconventional way introduced by Baruch Spinoza. Essentially, in life we encounter many individual things. The distinctions between these things are a little blurred; our division of the world into individuals is only an approximation. On the other hand, there is a unified world underlying our experiences: It is this world which we conceptually slice up. This world is referred to as God, and is all there is: It is transcended by no supernatural entities. Accordingly, this God, or nature, is not a person and has no personality. This is very far from the classic Judaeo-Christian arbiter who takes an intimate interest in human lives.

Give or take the redefinition of some words, this Spinozistic philosophy is atheistic. Andrew followed these ideas pretty closely, though his conception of God tended more towards pantheism. On the basis of these ideas, and the associated idea of the deep interconnectedness of all things, Andrew drew out some ethical conclusions. We should relate to the world as it is: A complicated, mixed up, irreducible whole. We shouldn't try to impose our ideals on it, but should interact with it conversationally, as we might with a person. Just as all people have intrinsic value simply because they are people, so any particular thing in the world has intrinsic value simply because it is that thing. Here he departed greatly from Spinoza, who denied that even animals have this kind of value.

This, then, could be taken to be a minimal metaphysics of the kind rejected by Feynman above. For it does involve some particular metaphysical certainty, and Feynman's objection does apply. However, the trend of the shift in Andrew's thinking since that time is what has led me to the idea which I hope will resolve the issue Feynman raised. He has held on to some of the language of Spinozistic philosophy (for example, referring to modes of being rather than to things), but this language is now not being used to express metaphysical propositions but to shift the listener's mind out of unhelpful ways of thinking about the world, and so to change the listener's 'way of being in the world', as he puts it.

This is not to say that Andrew has rejected metaphysics entirely: He still holds on to more basic metaphsical ideas which are hard to express but which the phrase 'We can trust the world' goes some way towards capturing. But it does introduce an interesting phenomenon. Language which had been useful for the expression of metaphysics can sometimes acquire a different purpose, and can be useful for that purpose even if it is not taken to be grounded in metaphysics. Like a Koan, the language can be used to pull away the rug from under ingrained habits of thought: To knock a person's soul off unhealthy but stable trajectories.

Herein lies the strategy I hope will allow us to avoid Feynman's problem: Perhaps religious language can be used in such a way as to provide inspiration without relying on any metaphysical certainty whatsoever. The Buddha may have been saying that some of his language is temporarily useful in this way when he talked about it in terms of a raft:

"Monks, I will teach you the Dhamma compared to a raft, for the purpose of crossing over, not for the purpose of holding onto. Listen & pay close attention. I will speak."

"As you say, lord," the monks responded to the Blessed One.

The Blessed One said: "Suppose a man were traveling along a path. He would see a great expanse of water, with the near shore dubious & risky, the further shore secure & free from risk, but with neither a ferryboat nor a bridge going from this shore to the other. The thought would occur to him, 'Here is this great expanse of water, with the near shore dubious & risky, the further shore secure & free from risk, but with neither a ferryboat nor a bridge going from this shore to the other. What if I were to gather grass, twigs, branches, leaves and, having bound them together to make a raft, were to cross over to safety on the other shore in dependence on the raft, making an effort with my hands & feet?' Then the man, having gathered grass, twigs, branches, & leaves, having bound them together to make a raft, would cross over to safety on the other shore in dependence on the raft, making an effort with his hands & feet. Having crossed over to the further shore, he might think, 'How useful this raft has been to me! For it was in dependence on this raft that, making an effort with my hands & feet, I have crossed over to safety on the further shore. Why don't I, having hoisted it on my head or carrying on my back, go wherever I like?' What do you think, monks: Would the man, in doing that, be doing what should be done with the raft?"

"No, lord."

"And what should the man do in order to be doing what should be done with the raft? There is the case where the man, having crossed over, would think, 'How useful this raft has been to me! For it was in dependence on this raft that, making an effort with my hands & feet, I have crossed over to safety on the further shore. Why don't I, having dragged it on dry land or sinking it in the water, go wherever I like?' In doing this, he would be doing what should be done with the raft. In the same way, monks, I have taught the Dhamma compared to a raft, for the purpose of crossing over, not for the purpose of holding onto. Understanding the Dhamma as taught compared to a raft, you should let go even of Dhammas, to say nothing of non-Dhammas."

The Buddha may have been saying something similar to what I am getting at here, or he may not. In fact, he may never have said anything like this at all. But for the purpose for which I am using the story here, that doesn't matter. This exemplifies another way language in a religious tradition may be useful without relying on the traditional associated certainties. Many of the stories in the Bible, about the life of Jesus for example, are useful for inspiration regardless of whether they are accurate accounts of the facts. I should clarify at this point that I am not simply talking about the potential use of these stories as metaphors. For the aim is not simply to point out facts in an obscure way, but to use the symbolism of the stories to structure the transformation of lives. Something of this kind is present in the proper use of mythology, and (I am told) of astrology.

To illustrate the hope more fully, I'll focus on a special case where the difficulties are particularly apparent: The word 'God'. This word is almost always used in the context of reference to an existing, transcendent being. It may not be clear how it could be used any other way without losing all of its force. But if the hope I expressed earlier is to be worked out within the Christian tradition then it is necessary to find such a use, or at least such uses. For without the unifying idea of a transcendent being, the various uses of the word are linked by weaker patterns and correlations, and there may be no definitive essence at all. I'll focus on just one use; for engaging with spiritual experiences.

Very often, in a spiritual experience, we sense that the event is not completely internal: That it reflects something outside and beyond ourselves, even beyond the world. Even when the experience occurs in the context of encountering the grandeur of nature (as is often the case), we sense that the behind the landscape is a deep creative presence which we only see transfigured through the prism of the world. I don't want to enter into the question here of whether this sense is accurate; at present it looks like it will eventually be possible to explain the arising of this sense without reference to an actual creative presence behind nature, by reference to the physiology of the human brain. But this language is not appropriate for engaging with the experience itself, just as we do not explain the workings of the optic nerve when we are trying to describe a view. Instead, language like 'I met God' or 'There I see God' is more appropriate, just as when talking about a straight straw in a glass of water it may be appropriate to refer to 'the kink in the straw'.

This links to what I was discussing in my previous post. For although some sentences involving the word 'God' are useful in this way, there are many sentences for which, if we were to put in the word 'God' as though it were a noun we would run into more trouble: Sentences like 'God is on our side', or 'God is three persons'. Notoriously, humans have run into serious and destructive disagreement whenever they have tried to use the words in this way, and our experience of this gives little reason to believe that there is some essence behind the word which would cause us, if we were more careful, to use it cohesively. But even without, in the terms of the previous post, saying that God exists, we can say something which is weaker, in a sense, only in degree: That the word 'God' is helpful and works coherently when used in some particular kinds of sentence. We might even hope that this use of the word God would still be helpful for inspiration.

There is, at this point, a danger of deception which must be carefully avoided. If anybody, particularly a Church community, uses the word God in this way then there is a danger that others, encountering them for the first time, will think that the word 'God' is being used in the more usual sense. This could lead to a great deal of confusion. There is also a danger that such a community could be exploited through cunning use of language. For these reasons there is need for both care and clarity in any community attempting to use the word 'God' in this sense.

You might think that these dangers can be circumvented by an alternative formulation, such as 'It is as if I saw God' rather than 'I see God'. There are at least three problems with this approach: First, it is not strictly an expression of the experience itself but of the feelings of the experiencer; it is language that has taken a step back. If we are to engage with spiritual experiences, we can't continually hold them at arms' length. Second, 'as if' language makes address to God impossible. This disrupts expression of a key part of religious experience, for a common way of engaging with what is seen as divine is by addressing ourselves to it. Finally, such language is a little clumsy, and adds an unnecessary element of awkwardness to religious practice.

Another possible worry is that it may be impossible to maintain the usage of language in this way without slipping into self-deception and confusion. But consider that we very often rely on indirectness of this kind without getting confused or deluded about what is going on. When we would like to enjoy ourselves and get to know one another in a group, we often do this indirectly, by playing a game. We temporarily use language and behave as though our main objective were (for example) to send a ball into a particular region of space. By doing this we get what we were really after - a good time and better relationships. Indeed, we could not have achieved those aims by the more straightforward method of willing ourselves to be happy and friendly.

This illustrates that there are some cases where, because of the way the human brain is wired up, we must proceed indirectly in order to achieve particular goals. From the outside, we can say (with a sense of superior understanding) that these behaviours are simply workarounds for the kluges nestled in our skulls. But this understanding does not exempt us from having to use the same workarounds; for though we may understand them a little we are stuck, for now, with the brains we have. Seeing that religion is useful as a crutch doesn't heal the limp.

Whilst I'm addressing possible objections, I'll deal with the idea that this use of the word 'God' does not correspond sufficiently closely with the standard usage to merit use of the same word. Why not use a new word, like 'Flob'? There is, in fact, a great deal of correspondence between the usage I have pointed to and the traditional understanding of God, which would take a while to explain here. It really needs another post; hopefully the next post here will cover it. For now, it is enough to say that if traditional Christian metaphysics is on the money then there really is something to be referred to behind spiritual experiences, namely God. So by using the word as referring in this way, without worrying about the question of whether it has a referrent, this use would precisely correspond to the old one: If there is a God, then someone using the word 'God' in the way I have outlined would be using it to refer to Him, which is a pretty conventional usage.

At the Unitarian Church in Cambridge, we are trying to explore how religious language can be used in such a way; without relying on any commitment as to the reality of the referent of that language. As I suggested at the end of the last paragraph, if this is done well, it will be possible for those in the community with strong metaphysical commitments to engage with us in a common usage of language. I sincerely hope that we can collectively build a language of religious expression which is as helpful for those who believe in God as for those who don't, or who just aren't sure. If we can find uses for the language that inspire independently of metaphysics, then we can unite in a common practice however strong our disagreements may be.

This is not to say that we will be free of religious identity. Instead our particularity will be at the level of practice rather than of belief. I don't think we can get by without the use of some particular workaround, some particular way of being. But if we recognise that that is what we are doing, we won't be quite as tempted to dismiss the other, utterly different workarounds that have flourished as religious expressions around the world.