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Studies
Subjects
Empiricism Cannot Account For Knowledge
I. Many people say that they cannot believe anything unless they can see it for themselves.
This is one form of empiricism. Many hold to empiricism as their worldview. They declare that unless something can be tested
empirically, using our five senses, it is not true. The main problem with those types of statements is that they can’t be tested by sight or
the other four senses. Thus, they are self-refuting statements. The theory self-destructs under its own assertions. Another problem
surfaces because our senses are not one hundred percent accurate. They are fairly reliable, but cannot be fully trusted. Augustine pointed
out how a straight oar appears bent when it sin the water. Many of us when we drive during a hot day see mirages on the road up ahead.
If an elephant is a quarter mile up the road and I put my thumb in front of my eyes, the beast seems to be no larger than my thumb. In
Las Vegas, there are dozens of magicians who make a good living from tricking the empirical senses of their audiences. The hand is
quicker than the eye. Our eyes and other senses can deceive us. We cannot base our world and life view on them, and nobody can. Many
that claim that they only believe what they see do not and cannot follow this philosophy consistently. Their use of logic, induction, and
mathematics are not intelligible completely by the senses. They are nonmaterial entities that the material only claimant utilizes everyday.
God must be presupposed to make consistent sense out of this world.
II. The notion that all truth is ascertained using the senses cannot even justify two plus two is always four and that all animals die.
They cannot be in all places simultaneously where two plus two occur and they have not witnessed the death of all animals. The believer
can trust the basic reliability of the senses because a perfect infallible God that knows all things exhaustively has told us that we can. The
reason scientists repeat their tests and experiments over and over, sometimes hundreds of times, in large part is due to the unreliability
of the senses.
III. Men of science and industry have built instruments and machines to help bypass the inconsistency and unreliability of the senses.
Man’s five senses are partially unreliable because humans are not perfect and infallible. They do not have the ability to possess
exhaustive knowledge. Certain knowledge requires a man to depend on a being who is perfect, infallible, and has exhaustive knowledge,
God. The five senses can only provide awareness and information of some attributes of an object. Numerous people claim that they only
believe what they can see. Well, in one way, under their non-Christian worldview, they cannot see any object. Human eyesight cannot give
direct and immediate awareness and understanding of any object. Eyesight can provide information on some aspects and attributes of
any given object. But God can see all the millions of atoms, and He can fully understand the proton and electrons with exhaustive
knowledge. He has exact and exhaustive knowledge of the color, texture, size, weight, density, and complete physical makeup of all
objects in the universe. No human can have exhaustive and perfect knowledge of even one of those attributes, yet, he wants to trust His
eyesight and senses above the God who can understand all things and see in the cosmos.
IV. The senses are basically reliable.
We can know this because of God’s revelation in the Bible. We must have a transcendent source that “sees” everything and reveals to us
that the senses are basically reliable. The problem comes when one rejects God’s word and constructs a worldview based on our senses
alone. Our senses can routinely deceive us. Professional illusionists get paid good money to fool our eyesight. When in the desert your
eyes tell you there is water in the middle of the road and when you get closer the mirage disappears. Conversations between husbands
and wives can quickly reveal how unreliable the sense of hearing can be. Many taste-tests studies have demonstrated the sense of taste
is not always reliable. Recently, the Associated Press reported surgical medical teams leave clamps, sponges, and other tools inside
1,500 patients nationwide each year. These are highly trained teams with large potential lawsuits looming over them, and yet their senses
fail them at times. One cannot construct a reliable worldview based exclusively on the senses like many skeptics and scientists attempt to
do. It is impossible for them to avoid the truth of God, because even their theories, notes, and scientific conclusions utilize logic. Logic is
non-physical, therefore presupposes the God of scripture. Empiricism fails as a worldview every time you stub your toe or trip over a
rock. Our senses are basically reliable, but we cannot build a worldview on their reliability. God is the precondition for an intelligible
worldview which includes the basic trustworthiness of our five senses.
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