Freethought & Rationalism Archive

contracycle · 07-22-2003, 04:19 AM

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I have stated previously that I use the term "matter" to refer to both matter and physical processes.

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You've already accepted something other than materialism. But aside from that, how would you measure a "mentalling" without some physical processes?

Why do you think there is not a physical process? We can see bits of the brain light up on medical scanners.

Primal · 07-22-2003, 10:07 PM

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Qualia is not a radical new substance. But to claim it cannot be defined as not material is to claim that it must be material to start with and that makes no sense.

I never said Qualia was a radical new substance, I simply said you cannot define so that it is composed of a radical new substance from the get-go. Also I would not define Qualiar as material unless I had evidence. My evidence is parsimony, induction and more coherence in a materialist explanation, what is yours?

Defining Qualia as immaterial is just as circular as if we were to define life as "created by God" or a horse as immaterial.

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Qualia are fundamental. We all know what they are because we all experience the world. Qualia constitutes what the knower of the world is. Without qualia, we know nothing at all. If they are not fundamental and are composed somehow of something else, it remains for the person making that claim to what the more fundamental units or processes of qualia actually are.

That argument was complete equivocation, basically Qualia is fundamental to epistemics, thus it must be ontologically? W

Likewise how is saying Qualia is material saying it is composed of "something else?" That assumes qualiar is immaterial from the onset. The argument you make seems circular.

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This is not a reductive explanation. This is a law-like explantion. A law-like explanation doesn't give you materialism, it gives you property dualism. How many times do I have to point this out?

Come on. Your "reductive" vs "law-like" explanation is totally ad hoc.

Also how does the "law-like" explanation give me dualism?

That merely seems to be like making epillipticals i.e. supporting a questionable claim with another, unexplained, questionable claim.

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Who's doing the finding and how do they know? Human beings are doing the finding and they know through observations, either directly or by observing measuring instruments. And they now the results of their researches because of qualia. That is what their observations are. So they don't have to look for a substance totally unlike matter. Their own observations are that substance.

That's totally begging the question at this point "No you're wrong cause I'm right."

I am not saying human beings don't have minds, observations or knowledge. I am merely saying that such things are material.

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Primal:Sure we may not know absolutely, I have already admitted that. But in terms of probability such a belief is far stronger then its counter-parts. Making such a belief more established and considered correct.

Is this the argument from faith again? Or is it an argument from authority? Probably both.

I don't know. Did you stop beating your wife?

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Of course there is. But it starts with what is basic. If the assumptions or presuppositions of your system are incorrect it doesn't matter where you go from there, you're not going to get it right. And if your basics are correct, it still doesn't matter if you don't ferret out all of the implications of your starting point.

Ok then, on what basis are we unable to infer monist materialism from the actual existence of matter, and lack of evidence for the existence of other substance (besides mere ignorance)?

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I'm not arguing for pluralism. I'm arguing for a mind/matter monism that is somewhat unfortunately referred to in philosophy as property dualism. And the problem isn't a lack of perfect understanding of the mind. The problem the absence of an "in principle" explanation not the lack of detailed one.

Dualism is a pluralism....

But in any event what exactly do you mean that there is no materialist explanation "in principle"?

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Your point here is just a variation on the argument from faith. Science just needs more time to come up the answer. Aside from the fact that the answer, if there is one, needn't necessarily come from science; it is quite obvious that science could just as easily take us further away from a reductive explanation as that it could bring us closer. So this argument is only convincing to someone who is already a convinced materialist.

What are you talking about? Seriously that is a totally and completely vaccuous analogy.

I am not talking about scientists finding answers to things in the future, only that given what we know now it is more parsimonious to presume an object who's processes we do yet fully understand is made of matter then it is made of another substance.

I for example don't know the exact workings of a Planet far, far away, but I know it is made of matter.

Your argument is equivalent to a "God in the Gaps" type, except it is "Immaterial substance in the gap" i.e. don't know everything about how some specific phenomenon works? Must not be material.

Your argument is basically based on some sort of relativism as well i.e. scientific truths are at any times 50/50. They *may* get us closer, they *may* bring us farther, totally ignoring probability and focusing on mere possibility: which is not where my argument comes from.

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I saying that materialism has no explanatory power with respect to sentient experience . Materialism can explain how the information related to the senses reaches our brain, and I assume that neuro-scientists can explain the pathways and map the brain according to certain areas for certain functions. But the exerience itself is unexplainable.

Oh now we are definately begging the question here.

Why can't the mind be material? Because the is impossible.

Why can't matter be an explanation for the mind? Because it is unexplainable.

You are now saying that the unexplained is inexplicable, and that is simply fallacious.

I imagine 19th century vitalists would have felt the same way, but simply saying "It is just fundamentally different" does not make it so.

It seems to me your argument comes down to this: dualism is self-evidently true.

In which case, I suppose you can say that, but I would insist then that it obviously and self-evidently is not. Just as a 19th century vitalist would say "Vitalism is self-evidently true" and I would reply "nope, you are self-evidently wrong."

Now I am not mocking you, as I do believe some truths are self-evident. Dualism is simply not one of them imo, neither is materialism.

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How the visual information from a yellow object reaches my brain is explainable through materialism. But my actual experience of the color yellow (the qualia) is not.

Then what is it? Your mind ultimately would have to be made of something as opposed to nothing. And that something is either matter or a radical new substance.

Unless you are saying somehow something can exist...made out of ntohing.

boneyard bill · 07-23-2003, 10:12 PM

contracycle writes:

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Why do you think there is not a physical process? We can see bits of the brain light up on medical scanners.

You miss my point. If there are "mentallings," as Selby puts it that are unassociated within any physical process; we wouldn't know about it. We have no way of measuring such a thing. So the fact that we don't find them is unsurprising.

The fact that bits of brain light up on medical scanners suggests that there is a law-like relationship between physical processes and mentation. It does, however, provide a reductive explanation for sentience.

boneyard bill · 07-23-2003, 10:36 PM

Primal writes:

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My evidence is parsimony, induction and more coherence in a materialist explanation, what is yours?

Let me repeat this for the umpteenth time. THE IS NO MATERIALIST EXPLANATION FOR SENTIENT EXPERIENCE. SUCH AN EXPLANATION MUST OF NECESSITY, ON THE MATERIALISTS' OWN TERMS BE A REDUCTIVE EXPLANATION.

If you think you have a reductive explanation for sentience then please give it to us. If you don't want to share it with us, you should at least share it with someone because it would probably be good for a Nobel prize.

Since materialism has no explanation for sentience it can't have a coherent one. I suppose you could argue that no explanation is parsimonious.

The whole point of treating qualia as fundamental is that they cannot be explained in terms of anything else.

boneyard bill · 07-23-2003, 10:39 PM

Primal writes:

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That argument was complete equivocation

No. It was a call to produce a materialist explanation. Just like my last post.

boneyard bill · 07-23-2003, 10:43 PM

Primal writes:

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Come on. Your "reductive" vs "law-like" explanation is totally ad hoc.

Hardly. I've just switched from saying "you've used a postulate" to saying "you've given a law-like explanation" in hopes that this new terminology will make the point the clearer.

If you don't understand what a reductive explanation is, please re-read my previous posts. I'm tired of explaining it and re-explaining it every time someone new enters the conversation.

boneyard bill · 07-23-2003, 10:46 PM

Primal writes:

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Also how does the "law-like" explanation give me dualism?

If x causes y, but is not the same thing as y and y is not reducible to x; then you have two things: x and y. Two makes a dualism.

boneyard bill · 07-23-2003, 10:48 PM

Primal writes:

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I am not saying human beings don't have minds, observations or knowledge. I am merely saying that such things are material.

Prove it.

boneyard bill · 07-23-2003, 10:53 PM

Primal writes:

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Ok then, on what basis are we unable to infer monist materialism from the actual existence of matter, and lack of evidence for the existence of other substance (besides mere ignorance)?

There is another substance. (Using "substance" in the philosophical sense as a translation of the Greek term ousia which also means essence). That substance is sentience. It is not material, and it is not reducible to any material process.

Please re-read some of these previous posts. All this has already been explained.

boneyard bill · 07-23-2003, 10:57 PM

Primal writes:

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But in any event what exactly do you mean that there is no materialist explanation "in principle"?

Again. Go back and read what has been already posted. It's not my job to bring you up to speed on what's being discussed. You're just re-hashing arguments I've already dealt with on this thread.

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