Part of what Pollack is saying here is clearly correct. Arguments have premises, and no argument can prove its own premises. (An argument may have one of its premises as its conclusion, in which case the argument is circular, but no circular argument can be said to prove or establish its conclusion.) So the premises of an argument require support from a source external to the argument. That support might come from a separate argument. Thus if argument A's premises are P1 and P2, argument B can be adduced to support P1 and argument C to support P2. But such a procedure cannot go on indefinitely on pain of a vicious infinite regress.
There must be some propositions, therefore, whose acceptance is not based on any inference. But does it follow that they are accepted on faith? I don't see that it does. If a proposition is known noninferentially it does not follow that it is taken on faith given the way Sam Harris and Pollack appear to be using 'faith.' I know my own mental states directly and noninferentially but without any "act of faith." Thus if I feel tired, I know this to be the case directly and not by inferring it from other propositions.
Outer sense perception, too, is presumably a source of noninferential knowledge: I perceive that a streambed is dry, that a tree is in bloom, that a rattlesnake is rattling directly and noninferentially.
Paradoxically, certain logical truths are known, but not 'logically,' i.e., not by any process of inference. Something as basic as the law of non-contradiction cannot be known via (noncircular) inference from propositions better known. It is plausible to say that one knows a truth such as LNC neither by inference not by inner or outer sense but by a sort of intellectual intuition is which the truth of the proposition known becomes self-evident.
Finally, suppose I accept a proposition on the basis of the testimony of a trusted witness. Here again my acceptance seems to be neither inferential nor based on faith if faith is supposed to be devoid of justification. To believe something on the say-so of a reliable witness or witnesses is to believe with justification, though not with as much justification as is provided by direct perception.
Take the collapse of the Trade Towers in NYC on 9/11/01. I believe that those events occurred and I believe with justification: it is not a mere act of faith. I saw the events unfold on TV. That is not direct outer perception although it is close: it is more like accepting on the authority of a reliable system of reporting. I assume that there were transducers (cameras) at the other end of my satellite feed that were providing the input and recording actual events. Here too there is noninferential acceptance of a proposition but with justification.
What I am suggesting is that there are perhaps five sources of belief/knowledge: inference, inner sense, outer sense, intellectual intuition, and testimony. Each source provides justification of the proposition believed or known. To that extent, nothing like faith in Harris' sense is involved.
Technorati Tag: logic
2. Disallowing comments from a particular person, or deleting an offensive, off-topic, or otherwise substandard comment, has nothing to do with censorship. People who think otherwise confuse censorship with lack of sponsorship. I am under an obligation not to interfere with anyone's exercise of legitimate free speech rights. But I am not under any obligation to aid and abet anyone's exercise of free speech rights, legitimate or illegitimate.
3. The Comments area is not an open forum for anyone to say anything about any topic. As the name implies, it is primarily for commenting on the author(s)' posts. But to comment on them, one must have read them. And if I have spent three hours on a post, a reader will not understand it in thirty seconds. Secondarily, the Comments area is to facilitate civil discussion between and among commenters as long as the discussion remains on-topic.
4. Some undesirables: The skimmers, those who cannot read but only read-in. The sophists who, abusing argument, argue for the sake of argument. The ideologues, those who are out for power, not truth. The uncivil. The illogical. The politically correct. Worst of all, perhaps, are those who exemplify the anti-Socratic property: those who think they know what they don't know. If Socrates was famous for his learned ignorance, these types are marked by their ignorant unlearnededness.