Hermeneutics and Anselm's Ontological Argument: Lessons for Lawyers and Others On Existential Proof

When lawyers and others explore the limits of logical proof in proving matters of existence, it's quite useful to explore St. Anselm's Ontological Argument purporting to prove God's existence as a matter of pure logic. Grasping how the argument might might work on a purely hermeneutic level while possibly failing on the pragmatic level helps explain the need for meaning to work in the face of experience. We can also gain much insight on these points by exploring how a common objection to Anselm's argument fundamentally fails. As we'll see, hermeneutics must be pragmatic in the sense discussed below, and this straightforwardly makes the case for hermeneutic pragmatism as best philosophy.

Starting with a common objection to Anselm's argument, it seems but common sense that things either exist or they don't apart from pure logic. For example, as the objection might go, my keyboard I'm using now would exist even if no one knew logic. How, then, can pure logic prove anything exists? Well, the objection and example assume that existence as we commonly understand the term is something simply there apart from language. But that is error. Existence is a concept created by our language (or more precisely our semiotics). That is, existence itself is hermeneutic and things can meaningfully "exist" within countless conceptual schemes of the world that we might construct. Hilary Putnam's exploration of "internal realism" sheds further light here. How, then, is existence less subject to logical proof within conceptual schemes than other concepts like that of God offered by St. Anslem? 

All that said, we of course cannot accept that God must transcendentally exist simply because we can deductively prove God's existence within Anselm's (or any one else's) conceptual worldview. First, this ignores the hermeneutics just discussed: we can have countless concepts of God which may or may not be compatible within the countless potential conceptual world schemes we might use. Second, any such purely deductive ontological argument would ignore a critical element of good reasoning. Our concepts must work in the face of all experience: they must help us predict, organize, and improve such experience in ways that sufficiently handle (for the purposes we have) all experience (including moral experience). If we wish to fully "prove" anything, we must therefore not only successfully prove how concepts flow within a conceptual scheme. We must also demonstrate the pragmatic workability just discussed. This is the real lesson of Anselm's argument and the flaws in the common objection to Anslem noted above. Thus, as theologians wishing to prove the existence of God must address both hermeneutics and pragmatism (and thus embrace hermeneutic pragmatism), so must lawyers wishing to prove matters of existential dispute. 

Anselm's no less fascinating Cur Deus Homo also invites useful instruction in hermeneutic pragmatism. Hopefully soon, I plan to sketch out a more modern rewrite also in question form. In addition to allowing such further exploration of good hermeneutic pragmatism, I hope this will also help too-insular lawyers see how deep explorations of areas beyond the law can make them better lawyers.

My Common Thread

Though the subject matters of my writing may seem quite diverse, there is a common thread. What is it?

That common thread is a hermeneutic pragmatism which explores meaning that is workable (morally and otherwise) through time as more particularly set forth in (for example) my "Making Good Sense: Pragmatism’s Mastery of Meaning, Truth, and Workable Rule of Law." As a philosopher and experienced lawyer, I explore "diverse" matters which on closer examination uniformly involve hermeneutic pragmatism for proper analysis. Such matters include the inseparability of theory and practice in law and life; workable semiotics (including semantics, hermeneutics, and pragmatics) in law and life; originalist claims as to interpretation and construction; conceptual metaphor in law and life; the cognitive nature of emotion in law and life; the role of virtue in legal and other analysis; the interrelation of law and the humanities (including classical rhetoric and parallels between lawyers and poets); and the need for legal education reform consistent with thoughtful explorations of the matters set forth above. 

Wake Forest Law Review Publishes "Revisiting Langdell: Legal Education Reform & The Lawyer's Craft"

The Wake Forest Law Review has published its 2015 Legal Education Reform Symposium volume entitled Revisiting Langdell: Legal Education Reform & The Lawyer's Craft.  The volume can be purchased here and I hope it will make a positive difference in legal education reform. 

My introductory article in the volume highlights longstanding, substantial damage Christopher Columbus Langdell has inflicted on law schools and legal education. Much of this damage stems from three of Langdell’s wrong and counterintuitive notions: (1) law is a science of principles and doctrines known with certainty and primarily traced through case law; (2) studying redacted appellate cases is “much the shortest and best, if not the only way” of learning such law; and (3) despite Langdell’s own roughly fifteen years of practice experience, practice experience taints one’s ability to teach law. I briefly highlight problems with, and harms resulting from, each of these wrong notions. Among other things, I briefly explore: (A) contradictions, oversights, and wrong assumptions in Langdell’s views; (B) how the very meanings of “theory” and “practice” reject Langdell; (C) how the necessary role of experience in meaning itself rejects Langdell; (D) parallels between Langdell and unworkable Cartesian dualism; and (E) how the necessary role of framing in the law rejects Langdell. I also briefly survey some remedies suggested by reason, experience, common sense, and modern cognitive psychology. These include rejecting the redacted appellate case method as a primary mode of instruction, recognizing the necessary fusion of theory and practice, recognizing the need for practice experience in law professors, recognizing the embodied nature of meaning and the resulting role of practice and simulation in good legal education, embracing the humanities (including classical rhetoric) in legal education, abandoning meaningless distinctions such as distinctions between “doctrinal” and “non-doctrinal” courses, and abandoning “caste” systems demeaning those with law practice experience and elevating those who lack such necessary experience.  My introduction can be found here.

Langdell Defends Langdell With A Villanelle (An Addition To "The Apology Box")

Though I've gone after Langdell several times in prose (Exercising Common Sense, Razing Langdell, and Days of Auld Langdell), I've not attempted it in verse till now.  The Villanelle seemed a good form and I felt he would speak of himself in the third person were he writing it.  Of course, even in the more polished form of a villanelle, I still disagree with Langdell's thoughts on casebooks, experienced teachers, law's nature, and more.  Law is not a certain science.  Law practice experience makes better, not worse law professors.  Theory is blind if separated from practice.  Practice is empty without theory.  Law schools are therefore elevated rather than "dumbed down" by teaching practice and theory both.  The hypocrisy of Langdell's practicing for fifteen years while saying practice taints is of course not lost on me either.  I couldn't bear including a photo of the man so I have instead substituted a page from his infamous contracts casebook.

Beyond Rawls’ Fiction: The Veil of Ignorance Is Real

Archive of Blog Originally Posted 3/2/2016 in The Huffinton Post

Justice Scalia, Queen Anne, and the Pragmatics of Interpretation

Archive of Blog Originally Posted 2/18/2016 in The Huffinton Post

Poets and Lawyers: Birds of a Feather

Archive of Blog Originally Posted 12/15/2015 in The Huffinton Post

Letter to the Class of 2014

Archive of Blog Originally Posted 4/29/14 in The Huffinton Post

From Days of Auld Langdell: Crisis and Reform in Modern Legal Education

Archive of Blog Originally Posted 4/25/14 in The Huffinton Post

Religious Hypocrites and Their Timeless Tactics: McCrory, Tartuffe, and HB 2

Pat McCrory’s HB 2 reminds me of Molière’s Tartuffe. In both cases unwitting victims are fleeced by people pretending to be virtuous. Tartuffe fleeces a wealthy man named Orgon. With HB 2, Pat McCrory fleeces every worker of employment protections including the right to sue in state court for discrimination based on “race, religion, color, national origin, age, sex or handicap.” (Those still doubting that please click here.) In both cases, the same ancient three-part strategy is used against unwitting victims who can admire (at least at first) the very man that fleeces them. Using Molière’s classic tale to explore this ancient strategy not only arms us against the McCrorys of the world. It also reminds us how classics not only entertain but teach and prepare us as well. Please follow me—this won’t take long.  Click here.

Cicero and Classical Rhetoric: A Good Man Is Still Fluent Dead

Much needless suffering (including physical carnage) flows from our inability to persuade with words rather than force.  Much of that verbal inability comes from a lack of basic instruction in the rhetorical arts that the Greeks and Romans perfected long ago.  Their manuals (such as the Rhetorica ad Herennium and Artistotle's Rhetoric) lie too often untouched  though freely available online and in libraries all around us.  Ignoring such works makes no sense, and I hope one day the vast majority of us will rediscover and value what the ancient rhetoricians have given us.  I wonder how Cicero might speak to us now about the power of word over sword (of dropping the "s" from "sword" and using the resulting "word"), and about the need to read, ponder, and perfect the teachings his earlier generations have kindly left us.  I've written the following sonnet hoping to capture some wisdom from that man of words who was murdered by men of swords and whose hands and head were cut off and nailed up for public view.

Overview of Wake Forest Law Review Legal Education Reform Symposium

Wake Forest Law Review Symposium Overview:

“Revisiting Langdell: Legal Education Reform and the Lawyer’s Craft”

By: Steven Verez

On October 23^rd 2015, The Wake Forest Law Review held a symposium entitled:  “Revisiting Langdell: Legal Education Reform and the Lawyer’s Craft.”  Over 200 persons attended the event.  The symposium was hosted by Wake Forest University School of Law Professors Harold Lloyd, Associate Professor of Legal Analysis and Writing and Christine Coughlin, Director of Legal Analysis, Research & Writing.  A symposium edition published by the Wake Forest Law Review containing articles by most of the speakers will be available soon.  A brief overview of some of the speakers’ topics and discussions is set out below.