The Dangerous Myth of So-Called Intellectual Autonomy

Circular Reasoning’s Greatest Hits

It’s a common accusation in academic circles… reasoning from the Bible is “circular,” because it starts with Scripture and then uses Scripture to defend itself. Professors of logic or literature often dismiss biblical reasoning on these grounds, claiming it violates philosophical rigor.

But as theologian Cornelius Van Til famously argued, all human reasoning is, in fact, circular. Everyone, even the most self-assured rationalist, begins with unprovable presuppositions. The difference lies in whether one is honest about them.

A quick example would be denying that you need the logical laws of identity and individuation. If you don’t start by knowing that you are not a rock, that you are not a microbe or a triangle, how could you begin any intellectual endeavor? Even old Archimedes knew he needed a place to stand.

Human beings are finite. We can’t know everything, so we must start somewhere. But here’s the uncomfortable fact for all human autonomous thought: we all start with foundational beliefs we accept on faith. These presuppositions are not proven; they are assumed. They shape how we interpret everything else. Whether you begin with Scripture or with human reason, you’re standing on faith in something.

Reason’s Deep Religious Roots

Many overlook the fact that presuppositions are not isolated, logical starting points. Rather, they’re deeply religious starting points. They address the most significant questions imaginable: Where did we come from? What is our purpose here? Is there a God? What’s right? What’s wrong?

Whether a person claims to believe in God or only in autonomous human reason, they are operating from some type of framework of faith. Even the most devout secularist lives by belief… belief in his or her reason, in the consistency of the universe, and in the trustworthiness of human observation.

The rationalist who claims to stand above Scripture in order to judge it needs a place to stand, a starting point, as I’ve pointed out above. But even here, using autonomous human reason, he is caught in the same circular trap he accuses the Christian of. He presupposes that raw reason itself is autonomous and self-sufficient. That it can stand alone, but that assumption is not provable. It’s simply an article of his faith.

The Problem with Autonomy

This idea of autonomous human reason… the belief that man can arrive at truth independently, has deep historical roots. It’s as old as the fall in Genesis, where man sought to “be as gods, knowing good and evil for himself.”

Ancient philosophers like Plato and Aristotle posited a god or gods who were finite. Aristotle’s god (the unmoved mover), for example, was unable to communicate with humanity in any meaningful way. These gods, embedded in a chaotic universe, could offer no reliable knowledge or moral certainty. Again, Aristotle called his god… “thought thinking itself.” An absolute absurdity.

By contrast, the God of Scripture is both sovereign and communicative. Because He is omniscient and omnipotent, He can reliably reveal truth to human beings. When a modern secularist rejects this God, he embraces an awkward alternative…  a self-sufficient intellect floating in a universe governed either by impersonal laws or random chance.

But this raises a contradiction… if the universe is ruled by chaos and chance, how can it also be rationally intelligible? How can there be uniformity?

Empirical Science and Its Limits

Many modern thinkers attempt to escape this tension by appealing to science. They claim that the universe is governed by natural laws that are discoverable through observation and experimentation. But science, too, rests on presuppositions… it assumes the uniformity of nature, the reliability of human senses, and the capacity of human reason to interpret data accurately, without sin or any impartiality for that matter.

None of these can be proven through science itself. In fact, philosophers of science have acknowledged that science cannot prove or disprove anything with absolute certainty. Only a few years ago, “science” told us the COVID-19 vaccine was safe and effective.

Here’s the thing: Science can only operate within a worldview that assumes the universe is ordered… a worldview grounded, ironically for some, in biblical theism.

When anyone tries to preserve the rationality of the universe while denying the God who gives it meaning, he always ends up with an interesting contradiction: a rational world created by chance. But in a chance universe, nothing is predictable. Laws of nature could change tomorrow. Causality could break down. Knowledge itself becomes not just meaningless but impossible.

The Flight from God and the Death of Meaning

Some who champion classical thought attempt to salvage this dilemma by appealing to ideals like Justice, Truth, or Beauty, as Plato and Aristotle did. But these, too, are presuppositions—non-physical realities that are assumed to exist without any empirical proof.

And, when Empiricists try to ground these ideals in sensory experience, they fail as well. You cannot touch or see justice. You don’t get up in the middle of the night and stub your toe on Beauty. The result of this mindless pursuit has been a philosophical decline into skepticism. This is the belief that we can’t know anything for sure. College professors will tell your kids or grandkids that you can’t know anything for sure. But, of course, they know that for sure. Doubt them and get an F in their class. Hypocrites and idiots.

Once you dethrone God as the source of knowledge, you end up doubting even your own mind’s ability to know any truth whatsoever. Anyone who begins by denying the verifiability of God will end up losing confidence in the verifiability of anything. And we wonder why so many people commit suicide.

The Christian, by contrast, begins with a God who speaks. The heavens declare His glory, and the creation reflects His order. From this foundation, knowledge becomes possible. The secularist who claims to “know” has to borrow this foundation without acknowledging it. He then smuggles in biblical assumptions while claiming to be autonomous. He suppresses the truth in unrighteousness, as we’re told in Romans.

Freedom Without Morality

Modern man doesn’t stop at epistemology. Heck, he’s just getting started. He then applies his assumed autonomy to politics and ethics, declaring himself free. But freedom, in the absence of moral law, becomes license. Thinkers like Hobbes, Rousseau, and Machiavelli redefined freedom not as liberty under God’s law but as the ability to do whatever one wills. This view of “free will” is animalistically Darwinian… nothing more than an unrestrained gratification of “natural” desires.

The truth is, without objective moral standards, every man becomes a law unto himself. Justice becomes whatever the powerful say it is. The weak suffer. Moral distinctions collapse. Abortion becomes a “right,” and private armies form as a rational response to political fear. (Warlord culture) As long as actions are justified by personal desire, anything goes, and only the strongest survive.

This descent into moral relativism produces two types of men: the “inner-self,” who retreats into a tiny, self-contained world of personal gratification. Or the “outer-self,” who seeks to impose his desires on everyone else. The inner-self may preach tolerance, but only until his comfort level gets bent out of shape. The outer-self, by contrast, flexes and exerts power… manipulating, coercing, and even destroying in the name of “freedom.”

Collectivism as a Mask for Control

Now, not all modern secular thinkers promote radical individualism. Many advocate collectivism… central planning, social engineering, and economic control. Under the banners of science and progress, these ideologues claim to be building a better world. That’s why we all had to get the vaccine, remember?

But without moral absolutes, they have no basis for restraining their power. Their systems are not grounded in truth, only in their own subjective preferences which are nothing more than masks for total power. Whether labeled Marxist, Fascist, or Progressive, the goal is the same: to control society in accordance with their vision of utopia and to carve out their place at the top of that heap.

Even when the methods are milder… through federal planning or judicial activism… the result is the same: a “standardization without standards,” a culture shaped not by moral truth but by bureaucratic whim and masked ambition. And, when they lose politically… they key Teslas.

The Road to Ruin… or Renewal

This is the tragic dance of modern man. Creatures who long to “fly like an eagle to the sea” become apex predator, birds of prey instead. By declaring himself autonomous, man has revolted against the biblical foundations that built Western civilization. The result has been moral confusion, political chaos, and cultural decay.

But this is not the end or a sign of the rapture. The decline of the West is not inevitable. Watch Gangs of New York. There’s always been ebbs and tides, cultural ups and cultural downs.

But today, there seems to be signs of awakening…at least for some. I really believe the whole COVID hoax has helped in the sense that many people now question false narratives and the foundations of modern thought in general. As creatures, made in God’s image, they long for something deeper, more grounded, more true.

A return to biblical principles is needed… not to sentiment or tradition for its own sake, but to the God who made the world, speaks truth, and defines justice. Only by embracing the God of Scripture can we find true knowledge, genuine freedom, and enduring dignity.

Otherwise, modern, autonomous man will remain trapped in the very circular reasoning he tries so hard to escape, spinning endlessly in a dance of chaotic self-destruction.

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