Trick(Bad) Questions

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I have engineering student friends who periodically ask me questions about the faith. Attempting to respond as comprehensively and instructively as possible, I may typically provide a longer-than-expected answer. In one such conversation, one of them retorts something to the effect of, "See that's the problem with theology majors, you ask them a question and they give the longest answer and don't answer the question". The problem though is often the reality a question investigates cannot be put in the terms or expectations of the question. For example, when people ask how salvation happens and the questions asked is either faith or works, the truth is it is neither only one, but in fact, is an organic unity of the two in a life of grace, Wherever the question breaks down in the answer, it is a bad question, and where "both...and..." is in the answer to an "either...or..." question, the question presents a false dichotomy.
In science, we are inclined to ask questions, form a hypothesis, test it, revise the hypothesis in the conclusion, and repeat it. Sometimes, however, when we restrain the terms of our conclusions to the terms of the question or initial hypothesis, we can easily find our understanding is still more complex than the reality itself is. To resolve this apparent issue, we can use the principle put forth in Albert Einstein's saying, "If you cannot explain it simply, you do not yet well enough understand it" (may have been expressed in slightly different words of grammar but having the same meaning). As a precipitate of the discussion, our questions need to start out complex and perhaps focus on the wrong details, to help us find not only the correct details but word choice, perspective, and image, in describing it well in the most efficient way. In other words, we have to get really complex, if we are to accurately describe nuanced realities. This may be said to be the greatest success of Thomas Aquinas. So when our answer breaks down the question, we know that the question was not conformed to reality, but also, that we have learned something. 

Often in theology, contrarians like to posit dilemmas, such require "either...or..." language. As a result, the one answering the question may strain themselves trying to avoid affirming falsehoods or denying truths. The question (no pun intended) "begs the question". When this happens, it is better, philosophically, to set the question aside and ask one that is not binary. "Is what we need to live the Christian life found in scripture or tradition?" It is not singularly either, but truly both. The better question would be "What is needed to live the Christian life outside me?" This question would deserve its own post, but the answer would seem to be it includes, but is not limited to, scripture and tradition. After all, we cannot do it alone, salvation derives from more than informational intake and outward recitation of the information. Here it is apparent that the better question penetrates better into reality than the first.

In conclusion, there is no meaningful reality that a bad question is not worth asking about. A good question is indeed better, but "anything worth doing is worth doing poorly" (Attributed to Chesterton). Nevertheless, it is paramount that whether science or otherwise, we do not limit the language of the answer to the first question raised, and we do not imprison our perspective on a subject to questions that assume something of the answer. Very often, questions that do restrain use "beg the question" i.e. assume something not proven. Meaningful questions have clear and meaningful answers that encourage further investigation, rather than closer. Analytically minded folks can find themselves restrained by their own epistemology, unable to investigate nuanced realities because they are looking at the question in the wrong way, unable to obtain gradation.

Written by Carter Carruthers & also available soon at Missio Dei


I am a created entity, not a person.

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