sodium

To eh,

So, in your version of materialism, souls are allowed, as long as they are given a position in space, and are therefore "matter". And you say that Karmic forces are also materialistic, as long as they operate on matter. I guess God would be allowed as well, as long as He is viewed as a natural force. It would surprise me if anyone using this definition would bother to call himself a materialist. It seems to indicate almost nothing.

But I'm wondering about the question at hand. Jon1 believes that sensations are not explicable as the operation of physical particles, as we understand them today. Sensations have some kind of reality beyond this.

Now, it isn't clear to me whether these sensations have a position in space or not, or exactly what this would mean. So, is this theory consistent with materialism?

sodium

And that is how I view sensations like pain as well. But I'm curious about your view of wetness. What does wetness mean to you? It seems to me, that when we say something is wet, we just mean it has a lot of water molecules. We might also be describing some of the effects of this, like a reduction in friction. But I don't really understand what wetness could be, beyond the presence and operation of water molecules. It doesn't surprise me that you think pain is irreducible, and I can anticipate some arguments you might use, but it does surprise me that you have this view of wetness.

Sharif

What you are saying is wrong is pretty much what I believe to be correct. That is, the mental is the first person description of what brain processes are like while the material brain is the third person description. It's the same thing from two different perspectives.

contracycle

"brickness is a useful label in our own heads, to use when communicating amongst ourselves, even as symbol in a set of relationships which we can imagine. But that does not seem to me to imply that brickness is a property of the external universe.

I think thats fair enough. What do you feel might be problematic in this?

This seems to me to suggest that the phenomenon we encounter have some prior, higher order identity which precedes our exposure to them. Why should this be so?n I would point out that you, as a baby, interacted with a wide variety of physical objects well before you were capable of constructing any conscious model of them; indeed at the time your percepetion was probably rather shaky itself. It seems to me that accepting the materiality of the universe is the simplest of the available solutions.

jon1

"What you are saying is wrong is pretty much what I believe to be correct. That is, the mental is the first person description of what brain processes are like while the material brain is the third person description. It's the same thing from two different perspectives."

How could it possibly be the same thing? You can't tell me you don't see the radical difference between qualia and brain processes. I'm not a Cartesian Dualist here or anything like that but I think consciousness is an emergent phenomenon of an extremely complex system (the brain). Of course the question will always come back "why does such a phenomenon emerge?" because after all there is no conceptual connection between the brain and consciousness. The same question might be asked of any higher level property such as wetness, "why does wetness happen to emerge from that particular behavior of particles and not something else or even why anything at all?" In my opinion you just have to accept the brute facts. I don't think it's within our capacity to possibly explain such a thing, it's like trying to explain why the speed of light is what it is and not something else. Of course I fully support the developing field of neuroscience, don't get me wrong, but it's not like they're actually trying to explain why subjective experience accompanies brain processes.

"It seems to me, that when we say something is wet, we just mean it has a lot of water molecules."

Then what were people referring to when they talked about the macroscopic property of wetness when they weren't aware of a microscopic level?

Sharif

I don't really understand what you are asking me, because my answer seems like it would just be a restatement.

I'm saying that when one person is the brain processes they experience it from a different perspective (first person) than one looking at their brain (third person).

Also, I'm not sure why you have asked me about qualia unless you are illustrating yourself the difference I'm talking about; qualia - first person, looking at brain processes - third person.

John Page

Agreed, it is a property of reality w.r.t. the mind that perceives the "brickness".
Infinite regress (along the supposed causal chain).
Maybe I'm wrong but materiality implies there is some "solid stuff" out there, whereas investigations by physicists point to a "less concrete" reality where some stuff can pass right through other stuff. I'm not denying that we are beings with a concrete existence, its just that some things are more concrete than others.

Cheers, John

John Page

jon1:

I don't understand what you mean by "no conceptual connection".

Cheers, John

jon1

"I'm saying that when one person is the brain processes they experience it from a different perspective (first person) than one looking at their brain (third person).

Also, I'm not sure why you have asked me about qualia unless you are illustrating yourself the difference I'm talking about; qualia - first person, looking at brain processes - third person."

I concede your point. I don't think I fully thought out what you said before. It was a late night last night. My apologies.

jon1

"I don't understand what you mean by "no conceptual connection."

Meaning brain processes without consciousness are conceivable.