boneyard bill

Tronvillain writes:

What would falsify materialism? Is there ever a point where you're going to prove the negative - that science won't ever come up with a reductive explanation? If science did come up with a reductive explanation I suppose someone could still argue for some kind of "mind-stuff." But the argument would be pointless.

We still have the problem with gravity too. We've never come up with a materialist explanation. So we say that gravity is simply a fundamental relationship regarding massive bodies. Once materialists accepted that they were able to move on instead of being stuck trying to explain gravity as some kind of vacuum or something.

But materialism doesn't have to prove that the mind is "the result" of physical processes in the brain. (Assuming you mean human mind.) It has to prove that the mind is physical processes in the brain. In the same way, for example, that electricity is the flow of electrons and nothing more.

I'm not denying that the human mind is "the result" of physical processes in the brain. I'm asking if the mind is the result of physical processes in the brain, what does that tell us about the nature of physical processes? Unless you can show that mind is a physical process and nothing else then you have to infer something about the nature of matter and material processes.

So I don't deny what you're saying. But what you're defending is not materialism.

I can't really respond to this because I'm not sure what your position is. If you're arguing that the evidence shows mind to be the result of physical processes, I don't disagree. But materialism carries a heavier burden than that, and materialism has failed to produce a materialist explanation, even in principle, for mental processes.

Gurdur

Polemical again, and as stated completely incorrect.
The so-called materialist explanation of mind may be incomplete, but it is dishonest to claim there is no explanation at all.

Out of interest, how does your explanation of mind, Boneyard Bill, explain the changing of mental states through external excitation or inhibition of specific sites of the brain, or the brain as a whole ?
(Examples: large severing of the corpus callosum, as in Sperry's experiments with such "split-brain" patients; the potentialization or inhibition of certain neurotransmitters; excitation through epilepsy-causing lesion with consequent pre-epileptic-episode aura; inhibition through selective anaesthetic)

Completing the system is not per se a real explanation.

And the same thing can be said of the materialist position on mind - with far more justice.

Again, does your theory actually explain anything?
Begging the question with presuppositions does not constitute explanatory power in any real terms.
As for working with an "explanation" - what evidence do you have for your theory?


And to add to tronvillain's point to you:

What insights have been gained with your theory that are not accessible with 'materialism' ?

[ February 07, 2002: Message edited by: Gurdur ]</p>

boneyard bill

Gurder asks:

The best evidence I have is that I am looking at this computer monitor right now and experiencing the data being posted. There is no materialist explanation for why I experience visual inputs. I infer from this that materialism is incomplete as an explanation. I can't prove that it will never be complete because I can't prove a negative that could go on to infinity.

But if I am searching for a complete explanation on the basis of the available evidence, I either have to infer that there is something supernatural about the mind or that the existence of my ability to experience visual inputs implies something about the nature of material and material processes. I choose the latter course because it offers the possibility of additional explanations that the supernatural assumption does not.

How is it begging the question? From the observation that mind exists in matter, I infer that mind exists in matter. I can't deny that the possibility exists that someone, someday will show that mind is material processes and nothing more. But I have no reason to assume that that will happen, and unless it does I have no reason to accept such a claim. So I will base my inferences on the available evidence. Physical processes in my brain enable me to experience visual inputs because there is something inherent in the nature of matter and material processes that enable that to happen.

Gurdur

In other words, you are relying on metaphor.
Just how do you get from that to 'a rock having mind-stuff' otherwise? Since when is over-extended analogy a real explanation ?

Polemical and wrong again.

Incompleteness not does equal absence.

Correct as of the time being. Just a shame that 'materialist' explanations can come up with predictions that can be tested, no?
Whereas your 'explanation' does not seem capable of that at all. tronvillain's point.

We shall see that very clearly, IMHO, as this discussion develops; I await your answers to my questions in my previous post with interest.

[ February 07, 2002: Message edited by: Gurdur ]</p>

excreationist

About falisfication of materialism and dualism...

I think that strict materialism can be falsified but not totally confirmed.

And dualism can be confirmed but not totally falsified.

Materialism can be falsified with things like poltergeists and verified OBE's (where the person is interviewed afterwards) and rocks coming alive and dancing around intelligently. (If you rule out practical jokes by advanced aliens)
It can't be fully confirmed since the spiritual dimension might just be hiding.

Dualism can be confirmed if the spiritual comes out of hiding (see earlier). But it can't be falsified since there's always a possibility that it might be hiding somewhere. (Like how leprechauns might actually exist and just be hiding somewhere)

boneyard bill:
It would take ages to explain. Just trying reading some stuff <a href="http://www.randi.org/cgi-bin/ubbcgi/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=4&t=000340" target="_blank">here</a>. I call myself JohnClay there.
To answer the clock question, read what you quoted carefully:
"I think aware systems are like little machines - like a clock or a see-saw."
So all of those things are kinds of machines. I would say that our bodily organs are also "machines" - just biological machines.

Well I think it makes sense since it is a mechanical explanation rather than a vague and mystical "explanation".

So what is God then? Is it a single person, like Yahweh? Why did it create the universe? You implied that you had a better explanation for things so please explain it then....

To go back to your questions on page 2:
Ok, what about belief systems in AI? It involves a program forming "beliefs" about the world based on limited experience. This set of beliefs are not what its creators believe since they have different experiences to the program. This set of beliefs was accumulated and used by the AI program. It is the *program's* beliefs. Do you think that computers use physical processes? Things like bees and probably ants would also have beliefs, except that they evolved on their own. (didn't they? Or did "God" direct evolution? - you implied that supernaturalism has a better explanation for things)

Have you read any books, that were published in the last 20 years or sooner about the mechanics of consciousness? If so, could you list what you have read. If you haven't read any books on the subject, how can you be so sure about your statement?

Synaesthesia

Bill,
Materialism isn’t really so much a putative explanation for the mind (and everything else) as a perspective on how to go about developing an explanation. So the fact that it hasn’t fully explained the mind tells us only that we haven’t explained our beliefs about our internal states, not that it cannot be done. (Very frequently materialism is being attacked here on the grounds that reality does not conform to some particular materialistic preconception aobut how the world works. The conceptual flaw in this approach is evident when we focus on the epistemic nature of materialism.)

excreationist

Boneyard Bill:
At the moment science also can't really explain the origin of life - does that mean that life is a fundamental force of matter? Did God cause life to appear?
There are probably many other things that science can't explain at the moment as well...

Vorkosigan

There simply isn't any materialist explanation for mind.

Well, there's not one you seem willing to accept. But that's not the same thing, is it?

In any case, it is clear that the mind evolved. I am currently reading Lea and Corballis' <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0198524196/internetinfidelsA/" target="_blank">The Descent of Mind : Psychological Perspectives on Hominid Evolution</a>, a collection of articles on the evolution of human and other minds.

Speaking of bees, bee cognition is more complex then we thought.

<a href="http://faculty.nl.edu/jste/Animal%20Behavior/bees.htm" target="_blank">Bees doing exciting things</a>

<a href="http://aix1.uottawa.ca/~damch/Cognition/cpthm.html" target="_blank">Another one</a>

As you can see from <a href="http://link.springer.de/link/service/journals/10071/bibs/1003004/10030227.htm" target="_blank">this</a>, the brain of the honeybee is well one its way to being completely understood. In purely materialistic terms....

In Google, just type "bees" and "cognition" and watch the articles fall out. Of course, spiders also exhibit many interesting cognitive abilities...in fact, there is a whole journal called the Journal of Insect Cognition, as well as the Journal of Insect Behavior, that covers these issues.

But in general animals are smarter than you think. Read the first article at the beginning of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0198524196/internetinfidelsA/" target="_blank">The Descent of Mind : Psychological Perspectives on Hominid Evolution</a>, entitled "The background to hominid intelligence." Human cognitive abilities lie at one end of contiuum. Some animals have cognitive abilities that blow human abilities away. Scatter-hoarding birds and mammals, like squirrels, have remarkable memories of where they left their food. Think you could remember the location of every acorn you buried several times a day over the course of several months? Such animals have enlarged hippocampuses, compared to animals in the same genus that are not scatter-hoarders. Since the hippocampus plays an important role in memory.....

I'll grant that supernaturalism doesn't get you very far as an explanation but it does complete the system.

It doesn't get you anywhere as an explanation, because you can't say anything useful about the behavior of the supernatural and its consequences for human cognition. Using the supernatural is the opposite of "explanation." It's a refusal to explain. You're just putting forth a "god of the gaps" argument.

Consider that positing the supernatural does not actually "solve" anything, but instead raises new issues....what role did the supernatural origin of mind play in the evolution of the mind? What are the rules for the interplay of natural and extranatural? Which parts of the brain interact with the supernatural? How is information transmitted and stored between the natural and the supernatural? How does the brain handle competing inputs from natural and supernatural events? If the supernatural is so important, why do routine events such as strokes, headaches, blows to the head, concussions, bullets and similar interfere in cognition? Why does brain death occur if the brain is plugged into some supernatural socket? Why do only humans have a broad set of really extraordinary cognitive capabilities, if everything is plugged into the supernatural? How, as tronvillian asked, could your hypothesis ever be falsified?

The mind is already amenable to explanation in a general way, as any good intro work on cognitive science would tell you. Why don't you read some of the books we've been posting here? Gurdur has generated some excellent lists. Here's one from me, the last is probably the most important:

<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/052148541X/internetinfidelsA/" target="_blank">Tools, Language and Cognition in Human Evolution</a>

<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0393318486/internetinfidelsA/" target="_blank">How the Mind Works</a>

<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0300083092/internetinfidelsA/" target="_blank">What Is Evolutionary Psychology : Explaining the New Science of the Mind (Darwinism Today)</a>

<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060976519/internetinfidelsA/" target="_blank">The Language Instinct</a>

<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0198524196/internetinfidelsA/" target="_blank">The Descent of Mind : Psychological Perspectives on Hominid Evolution</a>

<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0195101073/internetinfidelsA/" target="_blank">The Adapted Mind : Evolutionary Psychology and the Generation of Culture</a>

I tend to be more interested in evolutionary history than in neuroscience. No doubt Gurdur could supply you with some good texts in that area.

Michael

Gurdur

sigh, how can I refuse?

Deacon, Terrance W.
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0393317544//ref=sr_1_6_1/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">The Symbolic Species: The Co-Evolution of Language and the Brain</a>


Ornstein, Robert
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0671792245/qid=1011377971/sr=2-1/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">The Evolution of Consciousness: The Origins of the Way We Think</a>

Humphrey, Nicholas
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/detail/-/books/0387987193/reviews/qid=1011378058/sr=2-2/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">A History of the Mind: Evolution and the Birth of Consciousness</a>

Cotterill, Rodney
No Ghost In The Machine
Heinemann, London: 1989 hardcover
(out of print)

Johnson, Mark
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0226403181/qid=1012055105/sr=1-6/ref=sr_1_10_6/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">The Body In The Mind: The Bodily Basis Of Meaning, Imagination And Reason</a>

Plotkin, Henry
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0674001958/qid=1012055456/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_10_2/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">Evolution In Mind</a>


Plotkin, Henry
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0674192818/qid=1012055456/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_10_1/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">Darwin Machines and the Nature of Knowledge</a>


Dennett, Daniel Clement
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/068482471X/qid=1012056583/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_74_1/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">Darwin's Dangerous Idea : Evolution and the Meanings of Life</a>


Hofstadter, Douglas R. and Dennett, Daniel C. (Editor)
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0553345842/qid=1012056420/sr=2-2/ref=sr_2_75_2/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">The Mind's I: Fantasies and Reflections on Self & Soul</a>


Hofstadter, Douglas R.
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0465026567/qid=1012056353/sr=2-1/ref=sr_2_75_1/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">Gödel, Escher, Bach : An Eternal Golden Braid</a>

Hofstadter, Douglas R.
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0465045669/qid=1012056420/sr=2-3/ref=sr_2_75_3/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">Metamagical Themas : Questing for the Essence of Mind and Pattern</a>


Harrington, Anne
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0691024227/ref=ed_oe_p/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">Medicine, Mind, and the Double Brain</a>

Humphrey, Nicholas
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/detail/-/books/0387987193/reviews/qid=1011378058/sr=2-2/103-5947974-5670219" target="_blank">A History of the Mind : Evolution and the Birth of Consciousness</a>

<a href="http://www.u.arizona.edu/~chalmers/biblio.html" target="_blank">Contemporary Philosophy of Mind: A big Annotated Bibliography</a>

Not quite hard neuroscience, some of these, but all a damned good start.
____________

Now you see why a certain response to someone else is taking sooooooo long - just coding web-pages of the bibliographies alone takes me weeks of my spare time.
Sigh.
At least it's coming in useful.

[ February 07, 2002: Message edited by: Gurdur ]</p>

Gurdur

Web-resources on the evolution of consciousness:

<a href="http://faculty.washington.edu/wcalvin/bk8/" target="_blank">How Brains Think: Evolving Intelligence, Then and Now</a> (an online book by William H. Calvin)


<a href="http://www.cogsci.soton.ac.uk/cgi/psyc/newpsy?3.15" target="_blank">ON THE EVOLUTION OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND LANGUAGE</a>

<a href="http://www.shef.ac.uk/~phil/department/staff/carruthers/concevol.htm" target="_blank">The evolution of consciousness</a> (web-page by Peter Carruthers)