Brute Facts Revisited: A Discussion on the Principle of Sufficient Reason

This is a short discussion I had with Jimmy Stephens and a few others on the Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR) and brute facts. I have talked about brute facts before and highlighted the problems it poses for non-Christian epistemology. Here, Jimmy presents another perspective on the issue of brute facts and its relation to the problem of skepticism.

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Jimmy:

I guess I would just make a much stronger claim.

It seems to me that rational enquiry at all, and so any kind of inference whatsoever, presupposes some norm identical or sufficiently analogous to the PSR.

If the PSR is false, there are brute facts.

If there are brute facts, there is a global skeptical defeater for any and all inferences that they're just brutely undermined.

Me:

What if one makes a distinction between epistemic PSR and metaphysical PSR

Jimmy: That's a good distinction. I briefly referred to that kind of distinction when I talked earlier about the universe accommodating an epistemic PSR.

It does us no good to hold to LNC [law of non-contradiction] if the universe cannot be classified accordingly anyway. Same with the PSR.

Me: Can’t one deny the metaphysical PSR [MPSR] while affirming the epistemic PSR [EPSR]?

“If there are brute facts, there is a global skeptical defeater for any and all inferences that they're just brutely undermined.”

Also, explain this more

Jimmy: 

“Can’t one deny the metaphysical PSR while affirming the epistemic PSR?”

At first glance, but there are problems. If the universe does not operate in a way predisposed to an epistemic PSR, then how is it ensured that I can think in terms of one?

Without a MPSR, affirmation of an EPSR could just as easily be a brute fact, not knowledge.

“Also, explain this more”

As in the above example, if there are brute facts, there is no way to access whether my distinctions between brute facts and rational facts is not itself brutely wrong.

Justin: What is the distinction between the epistemic PSR and the metaphysical PSR? Is the EPSR saying “we must believe that every fact has an explanation in order to be rational” and is the MPSR saying that “every fact has an explanation”?

Me: 

No

EPSR: for any belief/inference/rule or whatever, there must be a reason or rationale for holding to it

Jimmy: Yes, one's a law of thought, one's a cosmic law.

Sukka: 

EPSR: every belief requires an explanation

MPSR: every fact requires an explanation

Did I get that right?

Me: Basically.

Well swap “explanation” with “reason” in the EPSR

Jimmy: The explanations are going to be fundamentally different in this way, though.

^ What Daniel said

Belief explanations are always going to be some kind of epistemic reason.

Fact explanations are not.

Justin: So, the EPSR says that “every belief requires an epistemic reason for holding it”?

Me: Right.

Jimmy, is your argument that if there are brute facts, then we cannot rule out the possibility that there is a brute fact that undermines our beliefs/inferences, and this leads to global skepticism?

Jimmy: 

Yes, basically

If there are brute facts, there's no valid way to distinguish the status of our beliefs from global skepticism.

Any argument made would just beg the question.

Any a priori attempt would not have access to a rational system.

Me: There’s no way to tell the brute facts from the rational beliefs…

Jimmy: Right.

Me: But what if one posits the existence of just one brute fact. For example, the existence of the universe..?

Jimmy: 

The reasons to limit brute facts either beg the question against brute facticity or rely on an a priori source that doesn't control a rational system.

Think of brute facts as insects flying around. Only things caught in my web of reason are things I can account for.

Now, how am I to creep outside the web and figure out what's flying out there?

Using more web?

Using reason?

That doesn't work. These are brute facts. They don't follow the rules I employ when I reason.

Me:

I see

So if one’s system allows for the existence of even one brute fact, then all hell breaks loose

Jimmy: 

Yes

Brute facts are sort of like invisible objects in a house.

If all you have to go on is vision, you're in trouble.

These objects don't play by the rules of vision.

You have no way of dileneating how many or even what kind there are in the house, much less outside.

Me: Or what influence they have on your vision!

And all relativistic views (views without an absolute God) allow for the existence of brute facts.

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The main idea here is that brute facts (facts without explanation or reasons) introduce ultimate mystery into one’s metaphysics. Brute facts become these mysterious things that we have no epistemic access to. If brute facts are allowed to exist, then we as human thinkers can never know exactly which facts are brute and which facts have explanations/reasons behind them. Given brute factuality, any belief we take to be rationally held could very well be irrationally held (that is, epistemically brute). There’s no way to tell the difference. There’s no way to tell what influence these brute facts have on the system of knowledge we think we have built up.

In essence, the existence of brute facts serves as a defeater for any and all beliefs. For any belief, inference, or principle, one may ask whether it is simply a brute fact that it is false/incorrect. How can we non-arbitrarily answer such a question? There seems to be no argument—a priori or otherwise—that one can present to show that there is no brute fact out there that falsifies a certain belief or principle. The only ways to rule of such a possibility is through omniscience or the principle of sufficient reason. And without a way to rule out this possibility, we are left with global skepticism.

Brute facts arise as a result of the denial of the principle of sufficient reason. And all non-Christian worldviews, in one way or another, are committed to the existence of brute facts. On the Christian worldview, God is the explanation for all facts in the universe. No fact is brute because God has exhaustively interpreted the whole of reality and placed every fact in relation with every other. The Christian has no problem with brute facts, the unbeliever does.