The Dueling Metaphysics Thread
by JoyI was not going to acquiesce to keiths' request for a separate thread for the metaphysical magic poof "thought experiment" Raevmo first made in the Thinking about Allen MacNeill's Argument thread. It has since intruded on TP's retrocausality thread, and shows no signs of going away.
All keiths and Raevmo wanted to do was disrupt ongoing topical discussions with ridiculous assertions having nothing to do with the subjects. But since the disruption isn't going away, this is the place to put it.
Have fun, y'all!
June 21st, 2007 at 2:13 pm
To open, I'll respond to this post from TP's thread.
Raevmo said:
Amazingly enough, this appeal to Young Earth Creationism in order to try and make a metaphysical materialist point does not seem to bother Raevmo at all. Hmmm…
So should we all now presume that if metaphysical materialism is true, it grants legitimacy to Creationism and YEC views? In the not-so thoughtful experiment of copying me atom-for-atom in my sleep, Raevmo assumes the role of omnipotent creator. Something he is not at all averse to claiming for himself, btw.
Where is the evidence that it is a purely physical configuration? Last I checked, neuroscience had not established such a thing, though electrical stimulation of surface areas of the cortex does evoke certain memories during 'awake' brain surgery, the mechanisms for this are not known. Nor are the storage constructs known. Memory appears to be diffuse, evoked by re-creating the original sequence of events in various neurons, synapses and underlying organizational structures. This apparently can be stimulated by conscious will or by electrical probes.
Memories are not strictly dispassionate third-person observations, but involve sensory qualia as well. Qualia are not physical structures, but appear to be experientially irreducible to matter. When evoking a memory of Grandma's house that summer when you were five, you may smell the lilacs by the front porch, the peach pie in the oven, feel the wetness of the grass that morning between your toes, etc. It's not just "I visited Grandma when I was five, she lived in a white house."
The never-ending zombie debates are ongoing, reflecting the perennial pastime of dueling metaphysics. Merely insisting that everyone here accept your metaphysical assertions as 'given' truths won't work. It has never worked. So don't go there - qualify your beliefs as beliefs, your assumptions as assumptions.
That brain damage damages brains does not prove that 'self' and all attributes of consciousness are reducible to undamaged brains. It demonstrates that consciousness relies upon physical mechanisms to express itself here - where it is physically manifest [embodied] in 4D space-time. That memories may be electrically evoked (consequently involving all the original nonlocalized operations) does not prove memory is any particular arrangement of atoms or neurons. It demonstrates that brains themselves can recreate operational sequences that will evoke a given memory.
This discussion is entirely metaphysical, so let's not pretend not so. If these matters were already settled philosophers and scientists would not still be arguing about it, AI-guys wouldn't be spending hundreds of millions of dollars buying scientific examination of the situation. They'd be MAKING money with it.
Comment by Joy — June 21, 2007 @ 2:13 pm
June 21st, 2007 at 2:25 pm
Thank you for your consideration. I appreciate it.
I hope you guys don't mind if I resist joining in and just check in every once in a while.
Comment by Thought Provoker — June 21, 2007 @ 2:25 pm
June 21st, 2007 at 5:42 pm
Here is an interesting essay by Walter J Freeman dealing with the concept of representations: here
Comment by Mertens — June 21, 2007 @ 5:42 pm
June 21st, 2007 at 6:07 pm
Some simple questions…
1. Are Ideas reducible to their physical representation? 2. What is the relationship between Ideas and the mind? 3. What do your answers about 1 and 2 imply about the relationship between mind and brain?
Comment by Mertens — June 21, 2007 @ 6:07 pm
June 21st, 2007 at 6:09 pm
Because keiths requested this thread so he could "present the evidence" he believes to support a materialist metaphysic concerning consciousness and 'self', I linked to Chalmers' zombie page and a short paper of his outlining the issues. I suggested it be read by interested parties because it offers insight on this angle of the consciousness debates in philosophy (and don't be fooled - it's philosophical, not scientific).
It would also help prepare interested people to read Selmer Bringsjord's 1996 paper The zombie attack on the computational concept of mind, 36 pages of analysis of John Searle's take-down of Daniel Dennett's materialist arguments. Hint: Dennett doesn't fare so well…
But zombies aren't what Raevmo proposed - they are a much more rational mind-construct because zombies are at least conceivable while poof-Joy is not. For scientific reasons. Before I get into the actual specifics of physical history and quantum states maintained over time, there's something to be said about what life *is* from the viewpoint of time itself. Or, our FAPP experience of it - a function of consciousness.
One interesting paper is from David Keirsey [R&D, Intelligent Systems] and entitled The Relations between Replication and Duplication regarding Life and Existence, from the Proceedings of the 29th International Systems Science Society in 2004.
The paper expands upon Ilya Prigogine's view of life as existing in time delicately balanced on a razor's edge between order and chaos - dissipative structures. From the 'introduction':
Keirsey offers some strong arguments. It's philosophical rather than an assembly of detailed evidence from the fields, a starting place. Empirical evidence that may be applicable is out there - I'll hopefully be presenting some in support of my contention that the range of quantum states maintained in life forms at any given slice of time makes Raevmo's magical poof experiment a total non-starter. We can argue about whether time is actually continuous or proceeds in discrete 'nows', a role the postulated instanton plays in such discussions considering quantum and sub-quantum processes in the exercise.
One thing we do know from empirical evidence - or just the equations that work so darned well - is that the time factor at the quantum level is non-directional. Retrocausality on the instanton scale might seem dismissible, but if Penrose can suggest gravitons as his operator in OR, instantons are no weirder and no more unlikely. They also provide a discrete boundary that may have relevance to the subject. IOW, if time is 'grainy' and proceeds in discrete moments (so that Raevmo's magic act could be even remotely conceivable), there exists a boundary in between moments. boundaries can change the rules, or add all sorts of hidden values that will influence events.
Anyway, here's the link for those interested.
Comment by Joy — June 21, 2007 @ 6:09 pm
June 21st, 2007 at 6:20 pm
Mertens - Thanks for that link, Mertens! Just the sort of more empirical discussion I'm talking about. From it:
I'm putting "finds" in a folder, in case they're needed here… §;o)
Comment by Joy — June 21, 2007 @ 6:20 pm
June 21st, 2007 at 8:20 pm
It was asserted in the discussions so far of the poof-Joy experiment that memory - the entire experiential history of a person - is somehow contained in the specific arrangement of atoms of matter in brains, such that Raevmo's poof-Joy would awaken *as* me, with the full range of my experiential memory (a version of "Last-Thursdayism").
So here are a couple of good sources on memory. First, a talk by Nobel Laureate Eric Kandel on the increasingly likely role of prions (beta proteins that are virtually indestructible) in the brain as elements of long-term memory and learning. Prions are the beta proteins that spread Mad Cow disease and other TSEs, functioning as pathogenic agents. They may also be closely akin or even responsible for beta "plaque" diseases like Alzheimer's, that also eat neurons and destroy brains, starting with long term memory.
In assigning this role to some particular beta prions in normal brain operations, one could think of them as sort of neural pathway (and synoptic, in this particular instance) "markers" encoded with information to allow retracing of (new or established) synaptic, multi-neuronal connective pathways upon an input request for a given memory or store of learned knowledge.
This does not constitute evidence for Raevmo's "atomic arrangement" scenario, since creating new synaptic connections and encoding the pathways with prions establishes a fully entangled complex of multi-stage and multi-component memory, any part of which may be pulled in isolation and added to a whole new experiential coding or plan for the future (memory in this case being highly related to brain plasticity). The sheer biochemical and biophysical complexity here makes the "atomic arrangement" supposition look mind-numbingly Duh.
And for added material for my own illustrative purposes, I offer an overview by neurologist and synesthesia researcher Richard Cytowic from Psyche [1995] entitled Synesthesia: Phenomenology and Neuropsychology.
I offer this because I myself am a synesthete. Worse, I was known in my early life to have a rather prodigious memory, which managed to get me through a lot of technical subjects in school that my tendency to dyslexia would never have let me pass had it not been for the fact that I could memorize things (without having to master the details - such as actually learning to read music). My talent for spatial recall was specifically trained from a very young age.
From the Psyche paper:
From his list of 'what is known' per the 1995 paper for Psyche, Cytowic had formed certain opinions about the phenomenon he's the predominant expert in. Deal is, he had been dealing with synesthetes up until 2000 or so (as detailed case histories in his books describe) who he met because they had sought help for certain problems in their life caused by their synesthesia. Once he got a web page up, published in Psyche and started connecting with other interested cog-sci guys about the subject, he discovered that synesthesia wasn't so rare after all - he just wasn't aware of all the 'normal' synesthetes until they started self-identifying at his and other sites.
Now Cytowic is of the opinion that all human babies are born synesthetic, and that the segregation of sensory processing and qualia is something we learn as toddlers. I think that's largely true. He has also learned that synesthetic perception can itself be learned - I've taught it to many people, only a few of them related by blood. They invariably tell me "it feels like remembering." This supports the new position that humans are born synesthetes. In conclusion to section 2 of the paper 'what is known' -
Anyway, these examples will come into play in an argument about "atomic arrangement" explaining sensory percepts, brain wiring, memory, etc. There is a lot going on and it's unimaginably complex. Nobody's clear on what qualia are, and consciousness follows closely. I see the brain as a tool, our physical means of experiencing reality in 4D space-time. This does NOT mean consciousness and 'self' reduce to the particular arrangement of atoms in our brains at any given moment (or boundary) of time.
Whew! This is almost worse than the UA course in Consciousness Studies' reading list! Only I haven't made you all read Relativity, The Rainbow and the Worm, Six Not-So Easy Pieces, In Search of Schrodinger's Cat and all three of Penrose's mind-books. Count yourselves lucky! §;o)
Comment by Joy — June 21, 2007 @ 8:20 pm
June 21st, 2007 at 9:57 pm
Actually, not. Duplicating a person is perfectly conceivable, but a philosophical zombie is not. The whole zombie nonsense is of a piece with other antimaterialist arguments like Searle's Chinese Room, and have been amply refuted by Dennett and others.
Comment by mtraven — June 21, 2007 @ 9:57 pm
June 21st, 2007 at 10:30 pm
mtraven:
Not buying it. Duplicating a person atom-for-atom (the assertion of god-like powers) would produce a rotting corpse, and might kill the person being copied unless the collective state reductions were mere guesses on the sustained probabilities, in which case the copy wouldn't be atom-for-atom. A human without qualia or will [a.k.a. Zombie] is every materialist's idol.
I see you haven't bothered to read Bringsjord's paper previously linked. Ample refutations exist ten ways to sideways on these subjects, so pure appeals to authority won't work.
So. Have anything of your own to offer per the supposed evidence that poof-Joy would a) be alive, and b) *be* me? I'll just go ahead and reiterate Firesign's sage koan…
How can you be in two places at once if you're not anywhere at all?
Comment by Joy — June 21, 2007 @ 10:30 pm
June 21st, 2007 at 10:37 pm
Doesn't the Chinese Room merely attempt to show the difference between intelligence/information processing and conscousness?
IOW, if consciousness is merely a function of a certain amount and arrangement of information processing, then how many logic gates does it take to reach consciousness and can I theoretically build a conscious being with mechanical logic gates?
Comment by CJYman — June 21, 2007 @ 10:37 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 12:55 am
Let's say Joy weighs exactly 126.00 lbs. My trusty biology book lists the following natural elements which occur in the human body:
Oxygen, Carbon, Hydrogen, Nitrogen, Calcium, Phosphoros, Potassium, Sulfur, Sodium, Chlorine, and Magnesium, the ordering here being from the highest percentage to the lowest.
Additionally, there are 14 trace elements in miniscule quantities, less than .01 percent.
So the idea is to use as raw material a heterogenous mixture composed of just the exact right about of these elements, and then combine them properly such that they will form molecules and proteins that exactly copy Joy, and this mixture will start firing off chemical reactions and be alive?
Comment by AnaxagorasRules — June 22, 2007 @ 12:55 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 2:11 am
Joy
I think his point was, (and yes, I'm too lazy to go back and check) that if we posit the need for a soul, it presents certain odd problems, i.e., when your double comes to life it will either need to share your soul, or a new soul gets cloned along with the atoms. He then demands how we are to account for that absurdity, as though that weren't putting the cart before the horse. Thus, I pointed out it is highly probable we will never have to.
Brian Killian
Only because they have identical memories and a subjective assumption that they are Joy. Remember, there isn't really anything that is a self, just a conglomeration of memories and brain tricks that make us feel as though there is someone in here.
Because the brain is everything. Two brains cannot experience as one.
It's not really about the body, it's about the brain.
mtraven? raevmo?
From what I've heard, some scientists have searched long and hard for any area of the brain where memory is stored and they can't find it. They destroyed and removed every conceivable part, as well as whole halves of brains. I'm not sure that applies to all types of memory, such as short term memory.
Comment by onething — June 22, 2007 @ 2:11 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 4:12 am
Well, I would have hoped for a more gracious (and accurate) introductory post from you, Joy, given that you are the one demanding evidence for the materialist view, and given that Raevmo and I did you the favor of correcting your comical misunderstanding of human beard growth:
LOL. I hope you learned something from what happened there:
1. You were absolutely sure that you were right.
2. You were absolutely sure I was "full of it," and said so.
3. You didn't bother to check a reliable source, because you were so sure you were right.
4. You were absolutely wrong.
5. You made a fool of yourself.
Lessons:
1. Confidence does not equate to knowledge. You can be wrong, even if you're certain that you're right.
2. If you don't like the taste of crow, it pays to double-check before labeling someone else as "full of it."
(Speaking of false accusations, Joy, you can blame stunney, not Raevmo and me, for bringing the "atomic duplication" discussion to TP's retrocausality thread.)
Comment by keiths — June 22, 2007 @ 4:12 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 4:17 am
Some prefatory remarks before I begin presenting evidence in favor of the materialist view of mind:
1. The mind/body problem is a religiously loaded one. Some people have religious reasons for believing in a soul, or in an immaterial component of the mind. Some people hang onto the idea of a soul because it gives them hope of eternal life.
2. The mind/body problem is morally loaded. Some people have trouble with the idea that humans are worthy of praise or blame, reward or punishment unless there is an immaterial component of the mind which has what they see as "true free will."
3. The mind/body problem is emotionally loaded. Some folks feel that if our minds are really just brains in action, then our humanity is somehow demeaned — "we're just machines", is how they sometimes put it.
4. Some people are incredulous. They simply can't believe that something as complex as the human mind could, at its base, reduce to the playing out of the laws of physics in a network of neurons.
5. Our intuition tells us that we are more than our bodies, and that the essence of what we are just inhabits our bodies for now. People throughout history and across cultures have believed that there is a part of us which is separable from our bodies, which is why belief in ghosts is so widespread. Studies show that even very young children conceive of the mind as being separate from the brain.
I mention these five things because they are all bad reasons, on their own, for rejecting materialism. If we are truly interested in the truth about mind and brain, then we need to be conscious of the pull these factors have on us (as well as any that would unfairly bias us toward a materialist view). We have to be careful to hold ourselves to rigorous standards of evidence and reason.
I also mention these things because they reflect the fact that most members of the general public are dualists, and that when they are exposed to the evidence for materialism, their first instinct is not to ask which explanation best fits the data — as it should be — but rather to ask how they can interpret the data to fit their dualism, or vice-versa.
An example of this is the popular "brain-as-radio" metaphor, in which the brain "transmits" sensory data from the body to the soul, and "receives" commands that are "transmitted" from the soul to the body. In this model, the self resides in the soul, and the brain is chiefly a way station for brain-body communication.
This metaphor is incompatible with the evidence, as I will show, but many people cling to it as a way of accommodating the fact that brain damage impacts the mind. Their view of brain damage is that the "receiver" has been broken and is either no longer able to receive the soul's commands perfectly, or that it is no longer perfectly able to relay those commands to the rest of the body.
I'll explain the problem with this metaphor later, but I mention it now to remind folks that the question is not "How can I reinterpret this new data so that it is compatible with my pre-existing beliefs?", but rather "What is the hypothesis that best explains all of the data I am aware of?"
Another point: Science deals in probabilities, not certainties. No amount of evidence can prove beyond any doubt that a soul exists. Nor can it prove that a soul does not exist. I maintain that the evidence strongly favors the materialist view, but don't ask me to prove it. In return, I won't ask you to prove that the soul exists.
Final caveat: I tend to refer to myself as a materialist, but there are nuances to that stance, one of which I want to mention now. While I believe that cognition, sensation, emotion, memory, planning, will, etc., are functions of the brain, I am still agnostic on the issue of conscious awareness itself (the "Hard Problem", as David Chalmers dubbed it).
The dilemma is this: on the one hand, we know of no mechanism by which matter can give rise to awareness. We don't know how to get from the third-person perspective of describing the brain as a complex physical object to the first-person perspective of explaining its awareness. This creates the temptation to invoke something beyond matter to explain awareness.
On the other hand, consciousness is so tightly bound to the brain, so utterly and completely affected by physical changes, that invoking a separate, utterly unexplained locus of awareness seems less economical than invoking some unknown mechanism by which consciousness can arise from matter.
The point is to declare, up front, that I have some sympathy for a limited, Chalmers-like form of dualism, where conscious awareness itself may somehow exist separately from the brain (but utterly dependent on it). Note that in this form of dualism, consciousness is causally impotent. It thinks it's running the show, exercising its will, but it is really a spectator.
It is not a form of dualism that most dualists would be comfortable with.
Comment by keiths — June 22, 2007 @ 4:17 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 7:00 am
Are you looking at living cells when you gaze at another's skin, hair…?
Comment by Bradford — June 22, 2007 @ 7:00 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 7:18 am
Bradford,
Nobody claimed that hair was living tissue. That was Joy's confusion, as usual.
Here's what I wrote:
You'll have to ask Joy how she managed to leap from that statement to the false conclusion that I thought hair was living tissue.
Comment by keiths — June 22, 2007 @ 7:18 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 7:40 am
Comment by stunney — June 22, 2007 @ 7:40 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 8:27 am
What is it for one material something to cause another material something?
If the right answer is along the general lines of, 'There's a lawlike observed correlation between A things happening and their soon being followed by B things happening', how would that account of causation rule out mental states causing physical states?
If instead the right answer is along the lines of 'A things have an intrinsic causal power, ICP, to make B things happen', how would that account of causation rule out mental states having an intrinsic causal power, MICP, to make certain physical states happen?
It strikes me as silly to ask for an explanation of how an immaterial thing can cause a physical state to occur, if by 'explanation' you mean a physical explanation, since such explanations are all explanations of physical things and immaterial things aren't physical things. Hence immaterial things don't cause their activity's effects the same way physical things, like rocks, cause their effects.
For example, a set's mathematical properties are not generally regarded as being physical properties. How then can they be in causal contact with brains? And if you think you can shortcut that question by identifying sets and their properties with human brain states, be aware of the fact that a mathematical proof can be given for there being an infinite number of such sets and properties. So, one would have to do an awful lot of work to show why there are not really an infinite number of such sets and properties. The Quine-Putnam indispensability thesis is that we need to posit sets because our best scientific theories require us to posit them in rather like the way we posit other strictly non-observable theoretical entities (such as certain fields, superpositions of particles, etc), especially given how much reliance science places on mathematics and how important set theory is to mathematics.
The problem lies in thinking that mind or personhood reduces to successive more basic configurations of matter. The motivation for thinking that minds/persons do reduce to such configurations stems from the idea that minds/persons can only be understood by figuring out the workings of sub-mental, sub-personal material parts and processes. But why think such a thing?
Asking for a mechanistic process that 'causes' or 'produces', say, a particular conscious thought is like asking what are the inner mechanistic workings of a particular fundamental particle. But there just aren't any inner mechanisms or parts that combine to 'cause' or 'produce', say, the property of electrons being negatively charged. (I'm assuming for the sake of the argument that electrons are fundamental particles, or fundamental quanta of the electromagnetic field. One can use strings instead if strings are the truly fundamental physical things. Or one can use quanta of any ultimate energy field, whatever those may be.) In other words, regardless of whether materialism is true or not, some things must have their nature, or essential properties, and must engage in the activity that is specified by that nature or essential properties, not in virtue of some underlying parts and processes that 'enable' or 'cause' that nature or activity, but immediately, directly, and hence non-mechanically. Otherwise one must posit an infinite regress of underlying parts, processes, causes, and mechanisms.
An objection to the anti-materialist position usually takes the form of posing a question: how can an irreducibly mental state cause physical behavior? I have explained before why, in the absence of a satisfactory account of the wavefunction 'collapse' problem, it is not unreasonable to suppose that irreducibly mental phenomena play a role. (One possibility, which I think is more Ockhamist than the many-worlds interpretation, is that the wavefunction is collapsed by just one mind—God's. That is how interpret what Dummett says in the final chapter of his latest book, Thought and Reality. The idea that God does the collapsing raises the question of whether the universe is a 'closed system'. Some recent scientific theorizing suggests that it might well not be. And another theory that has a similar relevance is occasionalism.
But leaving the details of speculative quantum, string, braneworld, and occasionalist theorizing to one side for the moment, I think the answer to the 'how do minds cause bodies to move' issue will depend on what your theory of causation in general is; and it's well known that the concept of causation is the subject of very longstanding, very vigorous, and ongoing debate.
But suppose you believe, as most people do, that qualia are real. Well here's what I regard as a compelling example of a quale causing some physical behavior, in some reasonable sense of 'cause':
A comedian tells a joke, which results in the following composite mental state: you understand the joke and find it very funny. Call that mental state M. M then causes you to laugh, which is an instance of bodily behavior. Call that behavioral state L. A couple of plausible claims are that 1) a necessary property of M is that it be a conscious state; and that 2) states essentially involving consciousness, in particular qualia, are irreducible to states of matter. (An epiphenomenalist would standardly accept both 1 and 2.) One can in many contexts make a distinction between what something is"“–the 'real nature' of a thing–"”and how it contingently appears to us, such as how the moon appears to wax and wane. Of course's the moon itself isn't really waxing and waning as much as it appears to. But in the case of states whose nature, unlike lunar states, essentially involves consciousness, such as qualia states, there logically can't be a distinction between the 'real' nature of such states and how such states contingently appear to us. In these cases, the reality of the state and its appearance to conscious minds are, in effect, one and the same thing. To take Kripke's famous example, if one leaves out of a list of pain's essential, constitutive properties (the properties that go to make something actually be pain) the phenomenal property of how pain feels, one would be leaving out the crucial, most essential property pain has. If some state S doesn't feel painful, S just isn't a state of pain. Or, as Kripke famously put it: "For a sensation to be felt as pain is for it to be pain."
Now, one may adapt this reasoning to my example: if one leaves out of a list of M's essential, constitutive properties, its amusing feel—-its 'funny' quale—-then one would have left out a property that is essential to M's being the mental state of 'understanding a joke and finding it very funny'.
And here's the punchline: what would have happened if that quale had not been part of M? Would you still have laughed—would the behavioral state L still have occurred? By far the most plausible answer to that is, no. But then it seems very plausible to say that the state of M including the 'finding it funny' quale—which, like qualia in general, is not reducible to states of matter—caused L; or, more accurately, was one of the causes of L (with brain signals, throat muscles, etc also being involved).
Now, there is a typical type of materialist answer to this type of example, and that is to say that in fact what happened was that you laughed first and only then experienced the funny quale. Obviously, that is prima facie implausible. But I wouldn't say it's out of the question, because it is often the case that we react first behaviorally to something, and only consciously process it after a moment or so. However, it's important to distinguish the occurrence of qualia on the one hand, and an ability to think about, and accurately report on, one's own qualia. The former is far fom being equivalent to latter.
Libet's experimental data are often cited in support of the purely acausal, epiphenomenalist account of mental states. But as I explain here, this inference is unwarranted and Libet's data are far from decisive. Consider also that sometimes you hear a joke and don't 'get' it right away. You think for a few moments, then you 'get' it, then you think, boy, that is funny, and then you feel a pleasant mental awareness of rising amusement, and then you decide to refrain from laughing because you're in church for your mother's funeral, and the joke was told by the priest, and so you sit rigidly out of fear that bursting out laughing at your mum's funeral will be considered to be in bad taste, and then you hear others trying to stifle some sniggers, and only then do you roar with laughter, as does the rest of the congregation, the priest, your mum (she's in heaven), and Jesus (he's there too with your mum).
Oh, the joke? The joke was about these two materialists who walked into a bar. It was an iron bar, you see. And in between squealing because of their pain qualia while in the ER where your mother was attending to them in her capacity as a nurse, they congratulated each other on 'once again' confirming materialism.
Another major problem materialism has is with intentionality. A theistic anti-materialist takes intentionality (God's for starters) as ontologically foundational and an explanatorily primitive concept. An atheistic materialist obviously takes unintentional materiality to be ontologically foundational and an explanatorily primitive concept instead. A key thing about a paradigm intentional state such as a belief state is that it is about what philosophers call a content, and that belief-content can be true or false, accurate or inaccurate, rational or irrational, etc. Belief states can have lots of different kinds of content, such as mathematical content, or observational content, or content about bodily sensations, or moral content, or content about the future, or content about what would have happened in the past if some contrary-to fact event had occurred, or content about logical necessity, or content about physical possibility, or content about probabilities, or content about time, etc. Beliefs can, but it is extremely hard to explain how a material state can possess content in this sense, and hence it's extremely hard to see how belief states can be just material states.
Appeals to 'natural indicators of meaning' don't do the trick. A man's weight may indicate that he's eating too much, but the man's weight does not have any belief about how much he's eating. A string of Roman alphabet letters on your computer screen may indicate that your grandfather just died while on his eighth honeymoon. But that string has no beliefs about gramps. And a speedometer plus the shape of the road may indicate that you are driving too fast to be able to take the upcoming bend safely. But the speedometer plus the bend in the road don't possess the belief that you are driving too fast to be able to take the upcoming bend safely.
And, here's the key point: configurations of brain-matter are just like a man's overweight body, or some letters on a computer screen, or a speedometer plus a roadbend in that they may indicate something, and may be part of a causal process that may be, or become, causally related to belief states; but they don't themselves possess beliefs about any given content, however causally connected to acquiring such beliefs those brain states may be.
At best, the brain is like a large library containing lots of books. But large libraries containing lots of books don't believe anything. No matter how many books they contain, libraries have no beliefs. By contrast, a mind that has read, understands, and remembers the contents of those books will likely have a lot of beliefs.
Comment by stunney — June 22, 2007 @ 8:27 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 8:28 am
Still no evidence for memory being (partially) non-material. Here's what so schizophrenic about ID-adherents going on about human memories being non-material: IDists love to use the computer analogy as an argument for the cell's information-processing machinery having been designed. But for some obscure reason the analogy between fully material computer memory and human memory is not a valid argument in favor of the view that human memories are encoded in the material configuration of the brain. What's up with that?
Comment by Raevmo — June 22, 2007 @ 8:28 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 9:23 am
Raevmo wrote:
Depending on how precisely one defines 'memory', I do not think an anti-materialist need be committed to denying that memory is material. I personally wouldn't feel committed to denying it.
If 'memory'=def: an information-retrieval system, then I would agree that it is material.
However, I also believe that information-retrieval systems, including computer memory systems, are intelligently designed and don't just happen spontaneously and unintentionally, because they involve code.
Another definition of memory might include memory-qualia. And I do not believe computers have memory-qualia, or that memory-qualia are reducible to material states.
What has Blair done?
Comment by stunney — June 22, 2007 @ 9:23 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 10:05 am
On Blair:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/fron...
Comment by Raevmo — June 22, 2007 @ 10:05 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 10:14 am
Joy wrote (in TP's thread):
Joy,
That entire paragraph is a bluff. There is no superconduction in human bodies, and nothing disastrous happens in condensed matter physics at the time of wavefunction collapse. Electron sharing is not imperiled either; if it were, molecules would fly apart if you simply measured their velocity.
Who do you think you're fooling?
Besides, even if you were right, the question is not whether it's technically feasible to create quantum-scale duplicates of people. The question is, given such a duplicate, would it be alive, would it be conscious, would it share your memories, would it have your personality, would it think it was you, etc.
Joy, Searle is a materialist himself.
Regarding Eric Kandel's ideas about the role of prions in memory:
Prions are physical entities. So are brains, neurons, synapses, glia, cerebrospinal fluid, etc. All are made up of atoms, arranged in a particular way. Why would you think that this conflicts with materialism?
Comment by keiths — June 22, 2007 @ 10:14 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 10:34 am
keiths:
Um… nope. Hair does not replace atoms in its structure one-by-one (or molecule-by-molecule). It's nonliving matter. Great-grandpa's baby hair has the same atoms it had when it was cut from his baby head and put in the family album 150 years ago. Though he may have died before you were born.
Trimming the beard is a cop-out. The atoms in the bottom of the hairs of Billy Gibbons' beard (ZZ Top) are as old as they (and their powerful disulfide bonds) were was when that portion of the hair first emerged from his face. And the atoms in the hair shafts all the way up to the face are as old as they were when they emerged too.
This is not at all difficult conceptually, chemically or physically. Why you want to deny this is a total mystery to me, other than to get off some cheap shots before you start. If that's how it's going to go in this thread, I can always cut it off right now. Would that serve your purposes?
Comment by Joy — June 22, 2007 @ 10:34 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 10:53 am
Thanks for the Blair link. His wife and kids are Catholic, so it doesn't surprise me.
Unfortunately, it's too late for him to have applied Catholic just war doctrine, because if he had, he couldn't have justified the dreadful, immoral misadventure of the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
Comment by stunney — June 22, 2007 @ 10:53 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 11:41 am
Maybe the belief in ghosts is widespread because so many people have seen them. . .
I haven't seen any ghosts, but I have talked with a medium and gotten very interesting confirmatory information. Of course, what I did was not in any sense a scientific experiment, although it was suggestive. However, triple-blinded scientific experiments have shown that some mediums can produce genuine veridical information even when they have no possible way to guess or cheat and know nothing about the sitters. Of course many "mediums" are fraudulent, but one would expect that few of those would choose to expose themselves to laboratory testing.
I would suggest that the belief in materialism is widespread because it seems to make sense at a most basic level (I am my body, and things that happen to brains affect consciousness) and because most materialists have not investigated very much of the contraindicatory evidence. Speaking of which, an aside to mtraven — I have copied the book chapter I promised you and will send it out on Monday.
Of course, the fact that brains are connected to consciousness does not prove materialism, any more than the fact that a damage to radio affects the music, or changes the station, proves that the songs are "stored" inside the radio. Materialists seem convinced that only the "ipod" interpretation of the brain is possible.
Comment by mcromer — June 22, 2007 @ 11:41 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 11:56 am
Hi keiths,
You wrote:
This is little more than an article of faith on your part.
Just to be clear, you are defending the argument that raw chemicals can self-organize into Johann Sebastian Bach, and experience the qualia of "beauty" in minute differences in air pressure. Can you invoke chemical reactions to explain why Bach's "Mass in B Minor" makes me cry? (pleeeaase don't tell me it's some adaptational survival advantage)
My hope was that you had something more than "invoking some unknown mechanism by which consciousness can arise from matter."
Comment by chunkdz — June 22, 2007 @ 11:56 am
June 22nd, 2007 at 12:00 pm
Go ahead and show it.
That is an unsophisticated model of the mind-brain relationship that reflects a materialistic concept of the soul held by materialists and also many non-materialists.
I find the concept of "soul" fairly unhelpful. Instead I think a better word to use is "consciousness". Much of what we call "our decisions" and the like clearly is related to the nature of our brains. For example, brains that are damaged tend to be much more likely to make poor decisions, such as poor impulse control, verbal tics, etc. But that only means that decision-making is strongly influenced by the structures of the material world — something sophisticated non-materialists would never deny. However consciousness and volition can also influence brain functionality, and even markedly rewire damaged brains to recover functionality. I would additionally suggest that certain thought patterns will tend to rewire the brain in negative ways to perpetuate themselves, such as long-term negative thinking.
Keiths I would love a straight answer from you, how come no one has ever been able to demonstrate how episodic memory is encoded, stored and retrieved in the brain? Is it possible that the answer is that episodic memory is not stored in the brain at all?
Comment by mcromer — June 22, 2007 @ 12:00 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 12:06 pm
Under many circumstances yes, but there is also a great deal of evidence that consciousness can be exist apart from the brain, such as in circumstances close to death or risk of death, and after death.
It's just that people like Keiths refuse to accept any of that evidence, since it goes against their preferred metaphysics. That's why materialism is very much like a kind of religion — it has to throw away vast amounts of evidence that its propositions are incorrect in order to continue to hold sway over people's consciousness.
Some of them even refuse to read academic writings and research that casts doubt on their materialist faith. Reminds me very much of the bible-thumpers who are afraid of certain books being allowed in their libraries. In any event, such an attitude of avoiding uncomfortable facts and their implications is the exact opposite of scientific.
Comment by mcromer — June 22, 2007 @ 12:06 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 12:31 pm
I think materialists miss the point of the radio metaphor.
It's not a model of how the mind and brain work, but an example of why reductionism doesn't logically follow from the fact that the mind is affected by brain damage.
It's an illustration of the difference between necessary and sufficient causes. You can cite all the affects of brain damage in the world, and it won't get you to the conclusion of reductionism.
What I would like to see, is a genuine philosophical argument for materialism.
Comment by Brian Killian — June 22, 2007 @ 12:31 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 1:02 pm
Comment by chunkdz — June 22, 2007 @ 1:02 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 1:21 pm
There have been a few comments about mind-body in this thread and others, to the gist of that the mind is the brain in action, that the mind is biologically based. However, there is something very obvious to me that for some reason is not shared by anyone else that posts here (that I'm aware of).
First off, it's entirely logical to believe that the mind is produced by the body. I have no problem with that. In the collection of conventions, arrangements, and patterns that I've formulated into my beliefs, it is a valid argument.
However, why isn't it self-evident to everyone here that these conventions have no basis in reality? What I mean is this: if you put a rock next to another rock (in effect 'spatially' arranging two mental constructs identified as 'rocks'), one could say, "There are two rocks." But this would be false, because there are no rocks, only conventions. Conventions are not reality.
This might make me sound like a Zen Buddhist monk or something, but this is very self-evident to me. Before the ancient atomists were proven to be onto something, I agree that it would be normal to think that the reality was the two rocks. But now, after what is known about matter and the subatomic particles? Reduce everything to the particles and it becomes more obvious that the patterns are only illusions. In the case of the two rocks, it would be more correct to realize that there were not two rocks, and to really find out what it is, well, close up the biology books because the answer is not there, and open up your physics book…those folks are still searching for the Truth about our conventions about matter.
Comment by AnaxagorasRules — June 22, 2007 @ 1:21 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 1:30 pm
keiths:
??? I set the rules in this thread in the first post. I can do this because it's my thread. You may want to go back and read it over again, but if not here's the pertinent point:
This means that when you make assertions of your insufficient knowledge or personal beliefs, they should be qualified. "To my knowledge…" "Far as I know…" etc. Simply waving your hands and pretending to absolute knowledge won't work. I also insist on a basic modicum of civility, which seems to become very difficult for you to maintain. Here you must do it anyway.
Do you understand this? Are you capable of following these rules? If not, let me know now so I'll know what to do with your posts.
The conceivability of the thought experiment's premise is entirely pertinent. We can agree to assume Raevmo's magic powers in order to contemplate the resulting paradox, but if the magic trick violates basic laws of physics it's a waste of time. Zombies - people with no will or qualia (no higher functions of consciousness) ARE conceivable, thus endless metaphysical arguments about whether humans are zombies in fact can proceed.
You and Raevmo want me to accept the atom-for-atom copy because it being atom-for-atom identical to me is vital to the assertion that position of atoms *is* identity (and entire physical/existential history) of the person. But if an atom-for-atom copy is not conceivable in anybody's reality, then conscious "I" cannot be in two bodies at once. Conscious identity is unique.
If you can manage to curb your rudeness, we can frame our arguments around the conceivability angle. This means your task is to establish that the position of atoms *is* identity complete with physical and existential history. Merely asserting it as 'given' isn't an argument. It's a statement of faith.
I am sending all your rude, off-topic garbage straight to the hole. If you want to waste your time, go ahead. I can move ALL of your posts to the hole or you can get a grip. Your choice.
So what? If materialists disagree strongly on these subjects, it highlights that your bald assertions (statements of faith) are NOT 'givens' even among materialists. This is certainly pertinent to my position. I have never claimed that consciousness and the whole rest of life in time are not entirely dependent on the physics and chemistry of the material world. This is what "embodiment" means. The issue is one of fundamental causation, and whether that belongs entirely to the classical 4D domain. I believe more is going on.
[Notice how I used the word "believe?" That's a qualification of my assertions.]
I didn't say it conflicts with materialism. I contend that a purely materialistic account of the real 'me' makes poof-Joy inconceivable from the git-go. Poor experimental design.
I introduced an overview of prion research as an aspect of memory (which you and Raevmo contend is entirely contained in positions of atoms that could be copied and transferred to poof-Joy in a version of Last-Thursdayism) to demonstrate that it's not what you think it is - it contains considerable degrees of freedom under the direct control of conscious will. Memory is not well understood, but we do know a few things and suspect a few more.
Why don't you trace your atomic pathway for this supposedly hardwired memory that would be present in the position of atoms in poof-Joy. Then we can trace the degrees of freedom subject to will, to see if this is conceivable.
Comment by Joy — June 22, 2007 @ 1:30 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 2:36 pm
Joy:
Let's be fair here: as if you always qualify your unfounded statements like that. Why, your posts would become twice as long. It's also interesting to note that you limit your demands of civility strictly to those who disagree with you. Perhaps you should be careful that in the process of slaying mind-tyrants you do not become one yourself.
Comment by Raevmo — June 22, 2007 @ 2:36 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 2:37 pm
Brian Killian wrote:
Brian, never mind, er, sorry, brain the brain. (Good job I didn't mispell your name, huh?:wink:)
What about the sun? If that disappeared tomorrow, a lot of mental states would be affected.
And yet, oddly enough, only a few materialists think that minds are really just stars.
Comment by stunney — June 22, 2007 @ 2:37 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 2:53 pm
No, they aren't. In fact, I find it difficult to conceive of people like Joy who are able to conceive of zombies. The entire concept is senseless, and I don't see how anybody can take it seriously.
BTW, I did scan that paper, and while I don't have the patience to parse all the complex modal logic, I don't believe formal logic proves anything useful if your initial premises are broken. It looks like he is attacking a formal computational model of mind, which is not the same as materialism. I would agree that minds are not Turing machines.
Comment by mtraven — June 22, 2007 @ 2:53 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 3:20 pm
Brian Killian:
I probably miss it too, Brian. I don't understand where the transmitter is if it's spatially and temporally apart from the receiver. And besides, brains seem as often to be transmitters themselves when thoughts, emotions, etc. are processed through them. Perhaps a field phenomenon having to do with electrical activity generating an EM field?
John Joe McFadden has a theory of consciousness as an EM field, which despite its shortcomings at least explains global entanglement (binding) without appealing to quantum processes.
From the UniSci story:
But this sure wouldn't support the idea that it's all about the particular placement of atoms, even though an EM field is a material phenomenon.
Comment by Joy — June 22, 2007 @ 3:20 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 3:28 pm
Raevmo:
Am I to take this complaint as an indication that you do not intend to abide the rules I have established for this thread? Simple yes or no question.
mtraven:
It's poof-Joy that believes in zombies. You can aim your insults at her, since she has no power to send your comments to the hole. All I insist upon are the simple rules I have established for this thread. If you cannot abide them, go elsewhere.
Comment by Joy — June 22, 2007 @ 3:28 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 3:40 pm
Excellent.
Indeed, I would suggest that there are no correct "models" possible for explaining consciousness in terms of material entities and concepts, because all material entities and concepts are objects within consciousness (or I would say within Consciousness).
Certainly stepping back and examining one's "self" will make this clear after an investigation.
Comment by mcromer — June 22, 2007 @ 3:40 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 4:49 pm
It's pretty funny to observe how believers in supernatural woo have to set up all kinds of defense mechanisms to prevent their worldview from being challenged. Stunney resorts to insults when he runs out of argument, and joy tries to set rules for discourse that only apply to those who disagree with her. So, she gets to make whatever metaphysical assertions she wants, while those who disagree with her are bound by some stricter set of rules.
stunney:
No, the brain is more like a computer than a set of books. Computers do not only contain information, they act on it. In a very limited sense, they understand information, in that they convert it into actions. They are causally connected to the world, meaning their contents can be correlated with states of the world and said to represent the state of the world.
I would really like to know explicitly what non-materialists believe, other than materialism is false. If beliefs don't reside in the brain, where are they, what are they, and how do they manage to interact with the brain and body?
Comment by mtraven — June 22, 2007 @ 4:49 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 5:08 pm
Stunney
Well this is certainly the question I've been bringing up and it doesn't seem to generate much interest…I can't imagine how people are speaking of immaterial things as though they know something about them when it seems by definition unknowable.
I think what you are saying is that if there are in infinite number of possible sets, that our finite brains couldn't interact with them all. But these infinite sets are not all entertained by our brains. Only the ones which come to our attention will be. And also, even if we have a theoretical set, say all even numbers, and we concede that the concept of "all even numbers" is not a material thing, nonetheless it is based upon material things, which is why we understand it.
Perhaps not a mechanism, but why not suppose that the negative charge is a result of its motion or shape?
That seems a pretty obvious possibility.
Well, they are intimately linked. What concerns me more is, how does God cause a universe to move, how do minds communicate via ESP, or any other suchlike phenomena that you may or may not think have merit, such as healing, water into wine, telekinesis, not being burned in fire, or what have you. Is it the same mechanism by which a mind causes its own body to move?
It sounds to me, Stunney, like you're saying it is nonmaterial, anda therefore has no mechanism, or we don't have to question it. But don't we have to question how the atoms of our bodies are able to respond to this nonmaterial mind and do its bidding? How is a material thing to be touched by the nonmaterial?
Raevmo,
Wait aminute, you were given some evidence. You said even a shred would do…
but I don't accept particularly, that there is anything nonmaterial. Maybe there is, I just can't understand how. Memory may not be stored in the brain. Why does this mean it is immaterial? I like to hope that no information in the universe is lost.
Comment by onething — June 22, 2007 @ 5:08 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 6:08 pm
Onething wrote:
We have to question how a material thing can cause another material thing to behave in a certain way! Hume thought that was a colossal mystery. Apparently every particle in the galaxy Andromeda is exercizing gravitational pull on your eyelashes. How do those particles manage to do that? They are two million light-years away.
As I said at the beginning of my post:
What is it for one material something to cause another material something?
If the right answer is along the general lines of, 'There's a lawlike observed correlation between A things happening and their soon being followed by B things happening', how would that account of causation rule out mental states causing physical states?
If instead the right answer is along the lines of 'A things have an intrinsic causal power, ICP, to make B things happen', how would that account of causation rule out mental states having an intrinsic causal power, MICP, to make certain physical states happen?
An electron's specific amount of charge has no known cause, yet it somehow manages to repel protons. How does that happen? They exchange messengers. How do they do that? And so on. Eventually you come to the following answer:
That's just the way it is.
Why is that answer unavailable for the case of mind-body interaction? After all, the causal relations we are paradigmatically familar with are those obtaining between our own mind and our own body. You'll notice this when you decide to type a blog comment. And, anti-materialists have long said that the reason is the same in both cases: the ultimate, fundamental particles (whatever they turn out to be) are simple, partless things that interact without any further underlying process needed, and acts of willing are simple, partless things that interact without any further underlying process needed.
As I also said, a theistic anti-materialist takes intentionality (God's for starters) as ontologically foundational and an explanatorily primitive concept. An atheistic materialist obviously takes unintentional materiality to be ontologically foundational and an explanatorily primitive concept instead. But consider the following piece of evidence as to which is more difficult or 'mysterious', intentional acts or material interactions:
Humans have been performing intentional voluntary bodily actions for millenia without difficulty. But it took those same millenia to figure out how to make a cellphone.
On the question of sets, try here.
Comment by stunney — June 22, 2007 @ 6:08 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 6:36 pm
stunney wins the non sequitur award for the day:
Matter was interacting causally with other matter for billions of years before something evolved that could exhibit intentionality.
Comment by mtraven — June 22, 2007 @ 6:36 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 6:50 pm
mtraven wins another illogical dunce's hat:
Hilarious. Just hilarious.
The question wasn't what's been around longer, but rather, what's more difficult to understand.
You accuse me of making a non-sequitur, and in doing so make a colossal doozie yourself.
And they say music hall is dead!:lol:
But hey, that's 'brights' for ya.:smile: Maybe they need a new name. How about, The Gang That Couldn't Think Straight?
Too long perhaps. But still, you know, it's apt.
Comment by stunney — June 22, 2007 @ 6:50 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 7:27 pm
mtraven:
You got that right! I've been amazed and amused for days now by this silly supernatural poof-Joy that's supposed to somehow 'prove' that the laws of physics don't apply to me - I really CAN be in two places at once!
If consciousness is matter, it cannot occupy two locations at the same time, just as two particles of matter cannot occupy the same location at the same time. At least, not in classical reality.
Conversely, if consciousness is not matter, no particular arrangement of atoms can account for it. Either way, "I" cannot be in two places at once.
I can understand a materialist assertion that consciousness is an illusion, something that does not objectively exist at all - we're all Zombies. That's of course a metaphysical proposition. Belief, not science.
It's when materialists make supernatural woo assertions, claiming they are somehow 'scientific' and supported by empirical evidence as well as accepted theory that I just have to laugh out loud. I agree it's a defense mechanism to prevent their worldview from being challenged.
But I go ahead and challenge it anyway.
I presume that you are referring to some particular, unqualified, metaphysical assertions I have made in this thread. Because I do not recall making any such assertions, please identify them (the first one you encounter will suffice).
Comment by Joy — June 22, 2007 @ 7:27 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 7:31 pm
What you are saying makes little sense no matter what spin you put on it, but you were originally speaking in the context of what is ontologically foundational, not what is easier to understand. There's no reason to think that one implies the other. I guess this is the fundamental bug of religion — it's a lot easier to understand folktales about the Big Daddy in the sky than the intricate mathematical abstractions of scientific cosmology, so naturally wishful thinking leads one to believe that Daddy is the foundation of being. So much easier than trying to puzzle through Calabi-Yau manifolds and the like.
The temporal priority of inanimate matter over animate, conscious beings also does not necessarily prove that matter is more foundational than mind, but it's a pretty good piece of evidence.
Comment by mtraven — June 22, 2007 @ 7:31 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 7:46 pm
Examples of Joycean metaphysics:
Comment by mtraven — June 22, 2007 @ 7:46 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 7:49 pm
Some thoughts about intentionality.
Time for a drink.:cool:
Comment by stunney — June 22, 2007 @ 7:49 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 8:02 pm
mtraven, as I said recently, you and I are in agreement that nothing answering to your conception of God exists in reality. That's because your conception is a childish caricature and generally sucks.
Hence, you're wasting bandwidth by telling this side over and over how you think of God. I doubt if anyone believes in your God.
Now, I really, really must have that drink. Heck, maybe even some food at some point.
Comment by stunney — June 22, 2007 @ 8:02 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 8:06 pm
mtraven quoting me:
I don't get it, m. There are two clauses in this sentence, the second one very clearly qualified by the words "appear to be." Do you not understand what those words mean? Or are you saying that qualia ARE physical structures?
If qualia are physical structures, show me one. If you're just whining to make a nuisance of yourself, stay away. If it's just that you don't understand English there's not much I can do to help you out.
Comment by Joy — June 22, 2007 @ 8:06 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 8:55 pm
I'm whining? You're the one who can't seem to talk about anything about how the meanies are violating your rules of discourse.
Then there's stunney who one minute is calling everybody who disagrees with him stupid, then can't keep track of what he said five minutes ago, then claims that nobody really believes in an anthropomorphic God because he doesn't, except when he does.
BTW, I did make a substantive point related to the paper you cited, but I've yet to see a response from you or anyone else.
I still do not understand how anybody can find zombies conceivable. The idea supposes that an organism without consciousness can act exactly like an organism without consciousness. I find this not merely inconceivable but nonsensical. I wish I could give you some better arguments, but I find the whole idea so ridiculous I don't even know where to begin.
Here's Dennett:
Comment by mtraven — June 22, 2007 @ 8:55 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 9:12 pm
Stunney,
My idea of gravity is that it is caused by the motion of particles, which create a pull, a kind of vortex, but at any rate, we just don't know enough to answer that question but I hope we will. When we know how gravity works or why an electron is negatively charged, we can begin to answer that question.
I didn't cut and paste this part because I agree with it.
Because it is unsatisfying in both cases. So it's not available!
Yes, they are fundamentals, but that doesn't mean we can't understand what it is about the fundamental particle that gives it its properties. This is one reason I like string theory. Whether it turns our true or not, I like the principle of it. Anything that is made up of components can be broken down further into those components. And you've got to reach bottom somewhere, to a fundamental that has no parts and is formless, pure potential.
Certainly, I agree that Consciousness, will/intentionality are foundational. What I am questioning is how those fundamentals bring about their effects if they are truly nonmaterial? In what sense do we label them nonmaterial? What can it mean to exist, but be nonmaterial? As compared to, say, nothingness, what is consciousness? How can we speak of consciousness interacting with the physical and yet not be physical? How is this a silly question? It must be a silly question, because I have brought it up on about three threads now, and get little response.
C'mon Stunney, Mcromer, cure me of my materialism. I need to be healed.
Yes, I had read that before. You are saying that sets are a mental construct. I'm not sure I accept that, but never mind.
Did I misunderstand your point that there is a logical problem with identifying the perception of the properties of a set with brain states, because it would require an infinite number of such brain states?
At any rate, if it takes a mind to see a set, that mind only sees it because of its interaction with the material world. Is the mind dependent on matter to understand abstract concepts?
Comment by onething — June 22, 2007 @ 9:12 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 9:57 pm
mtraven:
If you'd go ahead and try to act civil your behavior wouldn't be an issue. And since you couldn't come up with a single unqualified metaphysical assertion that I've made in this thread, there's no excuse for it. It's really quite simple. Now why don't you see if you can manage to keep to those simple rules?
Do you mean this post? If so, you said…
"It looks like he is attacking a formal computational model of mind, which is not the same as materialism. I would agree that minds are not Turing machines."
In what way is a materialist model of mind non-computational? Or do you just mean that a computational model of mind doesn't match YOUR materialist model? There are certainly a variety of hypotheses out there. What's yours?
There are many philosophers both materialist and dualist who DO think zombies are logically conceivable, or they wouldn't have been arguing about them for the last 30+ years (or all the way back to Leibniz if you want to stretch a metaphor). But you don't have to believe they're logically conceivable. I don't mind.
The only real zombies I've ever heard of are in Haiti, and I don't think anyone would mistake them for a normally conscious human being. While they might be interesting to pharmacologists and B-movie producers, they don't participate much in philosophy of mind debates.
Yeah, I know just what you mean. Raevmo's got this crazy supernatural poof-Joy idea that just slays me. Can YOU make any sense of it? §;o)
Comment by Joy — June 22, 2007 @ 9:57 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 10:16 pm
mtraven
Beliefs may be held in the brain, but are not a part of the makeup of the brain. It's a question of mind/matter. Materialists like to assume that all we are, and all that we think, and all that we believe are simply a part of brain mechanics.
If you want to use your analogy of the brain as a computer, fine: that works. All that a computer contains as far as information is fed into it by the user or the manufacturer. When computers are first assembled they contain none of that information. All they consist of are the circuitry and hardware that keep them running. They do not actually become working computers until the software (information) are fed into them by programmers.
So the mind, then is more than simply the mechanics of the brain, but the collective information that is fed into us as we learn and grow. Our emotions are separate from the workings of our brain, becuase emotions are reflections of our experiences - quite often.
If we take the materialist notion to its extreme, then holocaust survivors live in fear not because of something external to themselves such as an actual holocaust, but because of a disfunction of the brain/mind. So you can see the limits of a materialist conception of consciousness.
Actually though, there are some times when the brain has an imbalance, and ceases to function adequately, such as in the case of mental illness or emotional distress or trauma.
What you then call "non-materialists," then, is a misnomer. Most people are materialist to one extent or the other; it goes without saying. Most believers in God have some materialistic assumptions. The difference is that theists do not leave all phenomenon to a materialistic explanation as materialists do.
Your materialist ideology becomes apparent with the above statement. That computers can "understand" information in the same way as a human can is an extremely stretched assumption.
Comment by Randy — June 22, 2007 @ 10:16 pm
June 22nd, 2007 at 11:39 pm
I also don't understand why you think that the duplication scenario is so crazy. I seem to recall a couple of Star Trek episodes where the trnsporter malfunctioned and Kirk or someone got duplicated. Which doesn't prove it's possible, of course, but it proves it's
enough to serve as the premise of a network TV show. Whereas a TV show about a zombie who acted just like a regular person would be a pretty hard sell, although I suppose The Twilight Zone might hav