John Wisdom’s Parable of the Gardener AS Philosophy God and the World – Seeing as hns adapted from richmond

John Wisdom was interested in what is going on when two people disagree as to whether there is a God In particular Wisdom wants to know whether the disagreement is a dispute about the facts of the matter; or about what explains those facts (the ‘god hypothesis’ versus the atheist’s hypothesis); or about how we see the world hns adapted from richmond

The Parable of the Gardener Wisdom asks us to consider the following parable: two people see a neglected garden. One person notices the flowers and the organisation of the plants and takes this as evidence that someone has been caring for the garden. The other person notices the weeds and the disorder and concludes that no one has been tending the garden. The second also points out that none of the neighbours has seen any gardener, although the first responds by suggesting that the gardener comes at night. hns adapted from richmond

“Each learns all the other learns about the garden. Consequently, when after all this, one says ‘I still believe a gardener comes’ while the other says ‘I don’t’. Their different words now reflect no difference as to what they have found in the garden, or would find in the garden if they looked further” hns adapted from richmond

Wisdom’s point is that although two people can be presented with exactly the same empirical evidence (it is the same garden they have come across) their perspectives can be completely different One person sees the garden as neglected, the other as cared for by a gardener In the same way the atheist sees the universe as a place without God (they may point to natural disasters, to terrible injustices, to pointless suffering); but the believer points to the order and beauty of the world and sees this as evidence of the work of divine intelligence. hns adapted from richmond

What do you think of this analogy? hns adapted from richmond

Duck/rabbit The difference between this example of ‘seeing-as’ and the example of the duck-rabbit is that the optical illusion has been deliberately designed to be ambiguous, to enable the observer to see it as a rabbit in instance, as a duck the next The question as to which it is can be resolved empirically – we can discover whether the intentions of the artist (Joseph Jastrow) were to draw something that looked like both a duck and a rabbit But, for Wisdom, in the case of the believer and the atheist there is no further empirical evidence that could be used to say which perspective is correct Wisdom argues that the two are not disagreeing about the facts they observe, nor about any future observations There is nothing, no experiment or observation, that could verify and confirm either of their conclusions But in this case their claims that there is or is not a God cannot be claims that are straightforwardly about the world As with the examples we looked at previously (clouds, duck-rabbit etc.), whether someone sees the world as a divine creation, or a meaningless lump of rock emerges from their existing set of beliefs, from their expectations, from the suggestions of other people’s words and thoughts and from their current emotional state. hns adapted from richmond

How might a religious believer and atheist view the following?: – The design of the world – The complexity of the human eye – Evil – Good – Natural disasters – The solar system’s movements – morality – God/a divine being hns adapted from richmond

Feelings vs perspectives Wisdom does not believe that believers and atheists are simply reporting their feelings about the world If the difference were simply a difference of feelings then there would be no genuine dispute – as the difference would no longer concern what is or is not the case in the world but rather the emotional state of the observers Wisdom believes that there is more bite to the dispute than this, and that the believers and non-believers are genuinely talking about the world, and not simply their feelings. So he is arguing that believers and atheists are not making ‘experimental hypotheses’ that can be tested against empirical observations They observe the same facts about the world but have different perspectives on the world and draw different conclusions Believers see the world as evidence for God’s existence, atheists see the world as evidence for the non- existence of God But for Wisdom, even though their dispute is not like a scientific dispute, they are still talking about the world, and what is needed is a procedure for settling the issue. hns adapted from richmond

Views can shift Wisdom is arguing that believers and atheists are not making ‘experimental hypotheses’ that can be tested against empirical observations They observe the same facts about the world but have different perspectives on the world and draw different conclusions Believers see the world as evidence for God’s existence, atheists see the world as evidence for the non-existence of God But for Wisdom, even though their dispute is not like a scientific dispute, they are still talking about the world, and what is needed is a procedure for settling the issue. To help determine what that procedure might be Wisdom gives another example of 2 people looking at a piece of art – one says it’s beautiful the other says ‘I don’t see it that way’ Here, as with the garden and as with religion, the 2 people are encountering the same thing but seeing it different ways. But the debate can shift, and people’s beliefs can change, according to the power of the different connections, patterns and relationships with other things that can be brought to bear on the debate Our opinions about a work of art can be changed when someone draws out connections we hadn’t previously seen; or enable us to see a relationship with another picture or theory; or forces us to abandon a set of prejudices or bad reasoning For Wisdom the procedure needed to resolve the dispute between the believer and atheist is similar to that needed in the dispute over the work of art The procedure will involve further discussion between the two, with the aims of connecting and disconnecting their current observations to and from other beliefs and observations, each person ‘presenting and representing the features favouring his hypothesis each emphasising the pattern he wishes to emphasise’ Wisdom, himself a believer, is making the assumption that through this type of discussion the atheist will gradually come to see the world as having been created by God. hns adapted from richmond

What do you think of this theory? hns adapted from richmond

Criticism Wisdom opened up a theological can of worms by proposing that religious claims about the world (such as there is a God) are not claims that have any empirical basis, but are an individual’s perspective on the world This seems to undermine both the teleological argument (which makes the claim that observations about the world support the hypothesis that God exists) and the problem of evil (which claims that observations about the world support the hypothesis that God does not exist) The atheist might not be too fussed if it turns out they can’t say anything meaningful about God, as they don’t believe in God in the first place and would be glad for a release from these kinds of never-ending discussions. But for the believer the consequences of Wisdom’s argument are very worrying. If Wisdom is correct and if religious claims cannot be shown to be true and false according to any facts, then there is a question about whether religious statement and discussions have any meaning at all Wisdom does not accept that religious statements are meaningless, but Anthony Flew thinks this is exactly where Wisdom’s approach is heading. hns adapted from richmond

How damaging is this criticism? hns adapted from richmond