The Pitfalls of Eloquence

What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence.

This is one of those bold assertions for which Hitchens is famous. It is billed by him as an ‘elementary rule of logic’, but if he seriously believes it, he is committed to a very exotic philosophy. For there is a class of assertions for which we cannot provide evidence, but which would be reluctant to dismiss lightly. Moral statements (‘It is wrong to murder’, ‘You should tell the truth’, you know the kind of thing) cannot be supported by anything like evidence. Of course you might tell a story about how we have evolved to be moral, or you could point out the prudential advantages of a moral life. But this very far from being evidence that you must be moral now.

If moral statements are in some sense true and at the same time cannot rely on evidence, we have to be very meticulous as to how exactly they differ from religious claims. Now there might be a case for treating religious and moral claims differently; but it is a case that must be made. Assertions that lack evidence cannot be dismissed by fiat, by the power of a well turned aphorism.

Another aphorist once said that 'the good is outside the space of facts'. This is a claim that lacks factual corroboration (how could it not), but it is very beautiful, and perhaps even true.