COMMENSAL ISSUE 97

97^th Mensa Informal Discussion Conference at Braziers 7-9 May 1999

Incorporating the Philosophical Discussion Group and ISPE

Reflections by Leslie Haddow

The weekend brought together a group of most interesting people from a wide range of backgrounds who actively participated in some very challenging philosophical topics. I am now trying to understand why, on my way home and since, I recall it with some disappointment. It is not that we failed to settle such questions as Free Will v. Determinism: - even the professionals after centuries of debate have not got far with that question

Part of the problem was in the presentation. Michael Nisbet got off to an awkward start on Free Will by relying on random jottings in a notebook, and seemed to lose himself as well as us before he had finished. Had he written out his talk, like some of his well-structured articles in Commensal, this might not have happened.

Frank Luger tried to pack too much into the time available, and I was confused from a third way through. Theosophy has never been one of my serious interests, although it was much in the air when I was growing up in pre-War India when the ideas of Mme Blavatsky and Annie Besant became somehow mixed in with Gandhi’s movement. But I would have been interested to hear how someone who had spent a lifetime in the study of the sciences, and much else, was now drawn to its ideas.

Alan Mayne also tried to pack too much in. His style was to catalogue a plethora of themes, mainly "New Age", (each of which he claims to be "very significant / very interesting") which somehow obscured any underlying message, with the result that there was very little discussion of his talk.

Presentation was not a problem with Theo Todman’s talk ("Is it Rational to be Religious?") - in fact, I think his six-page handout was a model discussion document, and the issue of Rationality v. Religion deserved to be the high-light of the weekend. The problem was organisational. No time was set aside for its discussion, and we did not return to it in any of the later sessions. A lesson here for future meetings.

Roger Farnworth’s talk "The Meaning of Life without Belief" was also based on a handout, and might have been discussed in conjunction with Theo’s, as the themes are complementary. Whereas Theo’s approach was analytical, breaking the subject down into a multiplicity of facets, Roger seemed to be searching for a synthesis through metaphor and almost poetic imagery. I liked, in particular -

• ". . . our skill and purpose must be to surf the breaking wave of the present",
• "This wave that emanates from the big existential bang carries the conundrum of its origin for ever . . ."

Philosophical essays of these kinds are not for light entertainment. Much thought and reflection goes into their preparation. Likewise, we, the audience, usually need time to think and reflect on them before entering into their discussion (hence the desirability of handouts in advance). But eventual group discussion, with the rapid cross-fire of comment and criticism is, in my view, the whole point of a Braziers weekend. One-to-one arguments during meals and coffee breaks will often follow, but they are no substitute for the real thing.

Perhaps the most delightful session was after coffee on the Sunday morning, when the sun came out, and we all moved out on the Terrace for Malcolm Burn’s quick talk on the two "Omnies". Omniscience implies that God has all knowledge of the future, as well as of the past. But that means that God has no power to change the future, which is what Omnipotence implies. If God were looking on, as we presume he was, he must now realise that he cannot have it both ways. Using a flip chart, Malcolm illustrated this with what he called an Argand diagram of Power against Knowledge. This confused the mathematicians among us, especially when he explained that each quantity was at its maximum at the origin, where God was located, and got less as one moved to the right or upwards. On this chart he then drew a hyperbola-like curve, below which it was logically impossible to have both power and knowledge, and above which it was logically possible to have varying degrees of each. A new-born child was at the top right, both innocent and helpless, and various characters from history (including Genghis Khan) were dotted about.

The popular image of scientists is that they claim to be all-knowing and all-powerful, thereby displacing the role of God. This claim is not supported by scientists themselves, and, implicitly, Alan Edmonds explored this in his talk on the Philosophy of Science. He led us through from Newton’s laws of motion, and the then heretical concept of action at a distance, to Einstein’s relativity, Maxwell’s equations of electromagnetism and quantum mechanics. None of this suggested omniscience, and Alan has little time for transcendental interpretations. But I felt that there are many aspects of modern science which have important implications for us today, and which deserve philosophical analysis, and these did not get much of an airing in his talk or in the short discussion which followed.

In re-introducing my paper on Crime, Punishment and Society I had hoped that members of this group would turn their philosophical minds away from furthest-away areas of human speculation, and towards some of the problems in the here-and-now of our fast-changing world. From earliest times such questions as to whether moral responsibility can be compatible with human behaviour which is determined, or largely influenced by, environment has been the very stuff of philosophy. Consideration of crime and punishment might have been a way of our focusing on these problems. Instead, the discussion turned on simpler issues, like whether there were inherently criminal classes, and whether crime would be reduced if more money were spent on education.

During much of the weekend, I was puzzled why so much attention was being paid to esoteric matters. Can it be that, in the face of ever-expanding knowledge of the world, and of scientific insight into such matters as personality and consciousness, the traditional religious basis of morality no longer seem appropriate. Instead, we appear to be trying to relate the meaning and purpose of life to cosmological events like the Big Bang, Quantum Mechanics and the mathematical theory of chaos.

This conference was notable in drawing members from three sources - the original Mensa-at-Braziers group, the Mensa Philosophical Discussion SIG, and ISPE - with some common membership of all three. It was also notable for the range of places from which they came -

Of these, eight had been before, and eleven were new to Braziers. All have promised to come again. It was also one of the largest attendances of recent years, and three members had to be boarded out, and two lived locally.

In conclusion, I enjoyed the philosophical weekend, catching up with old friends and meeting new ones, and I hope the experiment is repeated next year with improvements resulting from this year’s experience.

Leslie Haddow

Leslie : I have some comments & reflections to add to yours above. I think these events are as much "experiences" as efficient means of arriving at the truth. This was, as well, an experimental conference. While much could be made of the lack of professionalism or excessive ambition of the speakers, I have attended events where the fare has been much worse. I’m sure I’ll remember Michael Nisbet’s animation when delivering his case for free-will long after I’d have forgotten his arguments had they been clearly presented.

Your brief commentary on Frank Luger’s talk betrays the bemusement most of us felt. He didn’t mention any of the theosophical notables. I'm sure he had a lot to say, but the presentation of his thoughts to sceptics was not easily achievable in the time at his disposal. He seemed to polarise the audience. Those who didn't understand a word of what he was saying were most impressed & applauded at the end. Those who understood his words, but couldn't understand his argument (because there didn't seem to be one - and maybe couldn't be, given the time limitation and the breadth of his canvass) thought he was trying to blind the ignorant with science. Maybe this was a misjudgement, but we must see his arguments in detail to be convinced.

It’s a moot point whether the conference should have had a theme, or spared the time to follow up on particular topics. I’m glad you thought my talk was worth while, if I understand your comments correctly, but it’s difficult to know in advance how interested people will be and how much of the programme one has a right to monopolise. We can always follow up these themes in subsequent years, or in Commensal in this case.

Malcolm Burn has the reciprocals of Power & Knowledge on his axes, though I don’t think the mathematics should be pressed too far in this obscure subject. I did feel that his argument depended on God being locked in time with his foreknowledge rather than being outside of spacetime, in the Augustinian sense. God must be allowed to know a manifold of possible futures depending on his use of omnipotence. I do think, though, that God is logically incapable of affecting the past.

I tweaked the table of attendees you supplied, so must lay claim to any errors that remain !

Theo