Imagine, in fact, the entire contents of the world to be once for
all irrevocably given. Imagine it to end this very moment, and to
have no future; and then let a theist and a materialist apply their
rival explanations to its history. The theist shows how a God made
it; the materialist shows, and we will suppose with equal success,
how it resulted from blind physical forces. Then let the pragmatist
be asked to choose between their theories. How can he apply his test
if the world is already completed? Concepts for him are things to
come back into experience with, things to make us look for
differences. But by hypothesis there is to be no more experience and
no possible differences can now be looked for. Both theories have
shown all their consequences and, by the hypothesis we are adopting,
these are identical. The pragmatist must consequently say that the
two theories, in spite of their different-sounding names, mean
exactly the same thing, and that the dispute is purely verbal. [I am
opposing, of course, that the theories HAVE been equally successful
in their explanations of what is.]
For just consider the case sincerely, and say what would be the
WORTH of a God if he WERE there, with his work accomplished arid his
world run down.
Pages:
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91