I challenge you: your best argument for materialism

[punshhh]

That's just another excuse, and raises the same problem: Idealism can be whatever you like, which means that there's no reason for it to be anything at all.

What it is in a persons mind is irrelevant, either it is the scenario, or it isn't. Whatever you say doesn't affect it, whatever I say doesn't affect it. Whatever science discovers, or explains, doesn't affect it.

You still don't seem to be aware of the issue, they are metaphysical perspectives dealing with the nature of existence. The physical reality out there in the world around us, does not inform the debate, because it would be the same either way. It is impossible to compare an idealist universe with a materialist universe, because we only have the one to observe and we don't know which one it is.

Now, you have accepted that idealism is a valid philosophical stance, discussion over.

In other words, an infinite sequence of excuses for why your idealist reality is actually a materialist one.

Idealist/materialist is a false dichotomy anyway when you get to grips with it. As I pointed out to you a few years back, it is actually the materialist who is a dualist, by denying the physicality of mind. The idealist has always been a monist, by accepting that mind and matter are different levels of the same substrate.

The world is what it is. The scenario doesn't change reality. The world is material, so materialism is true and idealism is false.

You've got your philosophers hat on I see.

Sure I can. I just did.

You don't seem to be aware of the caveats.

 

[PixyMisa]

You still don't seem to be aware of the issue, they are metaphysical perspectives dealing with the nature of existence.

Yes. And one of them is wrong.

The physical reality out there in the world around us, does not inform the debate, because it would be the same either way.

And that is also wrong.

It is possible to layer infinite excuses on top of idealism so that it looks the same as materialism. And when you have done that, it is materialism.

And our Universe is material.

Simple as that. Materialism is true and idealism is false.

It is impossible to compare an idealist universe with a materialist universe, because we only have the one to observe and we don't know which one it is.

Yes we do. It's material. Everyone knows that.

Now, you have accepted that idealism is a valid philosophical stance, discussion over.

It's valid insofar as it is internally consistent (which dualism, for example, is not). But it's not true.

Idealist/materialist is a false dichotomy anyway when you get to grips with it. As I pointed out to you a few years back, it is actually the materialist who is a dualist, by denying the physicality of mind.

As I pointed out to you, baloney. Minds are physical processes.

 

[marplots]

Oh, and consciousness is self-referential information processing.

And information is?

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_theory#Quantities_of_information

And also:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_information

Edit: If you're really interested, a good place to start is Shannon's classic paper, A Mathematical Theory of Communication. That single paper essentially gave birth to the modern age of computers and communication.

Well, that's extremely confusing. Are you saying I'm doing all that stuff in my brain?

I was thinking, when you said self-referential information, it had more to do with experiencing-experiences, as a critic or editor might reflect on some work. Looking those links over, it sounds like you meant some sort of mathematical process, which seems odd, since I couldn't give you a number for any of what I think of as information of the sort we call "things we know."

I suspect I have gone off track somewhere. My point was that idealism is very much a description of self-referential information processing as much as materialism is. The only difference is what we take to be generating the stimuli - internal or external, or, as I might prefer, external mediated by internal.

I'd say it's rather dubious to separate out the two and accept that we, as material beings, are deeply connected to the context in which we are embedded. In other words, the dichotomy of internal/external is largely a matter of drawing convenient lines.

 

[marplots]

Alright let's try this from a different angle.

The core argument seems to be can one provide evidence for a reality from within that reality?

Since we cannot, by definition, provide external evidence for reality, the argument seems to be that we cannot therefore assume it exists. Any evidence we provide for reality comes from our own framework within that reality and is therefore... tainted.

I find this logically faulty but it does seem to be the argument.

Yes, the "where do you stand" problem. Here are some ways we try:
1) Assuming that time gives us a different perspective, so that observing what happened in the past informs us about the present. In other words, we stand in a future and can "see" the past was real.
2) Making predictions as if we had an objective view, believing that our ability to predict the future verifies our understandings. Again, a kind of standing in different parts of time.
3) Asking others with the idea that we can't all be fooled in the same way, since each has a unique perspective in at least some part.
4) Arriving at conclusions by way of abstractions that follow certain rules - standing outside ourselves by way of imagination.
5) Asking God and trying to get His perspective.
6) Trying to play one sub-set of reality against another - the familiar process of modeling smaller parts of the universe.

None of these are entirely satisfactory, but they seem to suffice in some combinations. Oh, I almost forgot the most important method - not asking the question in the first place.

 

[Belz...]

it would be an idealist universe in which the level of concretisation of the manifestation of events would be equivalent to that which we currently observe as matter.

The who to the what, now ?

It is a fallacy to assert that anything in an idealist universe would be any different to the way it is currently experienced.

But why would the world be this way at all ? Under materialism I can see how randomly-generated physics lead to atoms, molecules, stars, planets and video games, but under idealism, everything being mind, there is no physics, no rules, so how come reality's so damned consistent ?

And where does the image come from ? I mean, I can't imagine things I've never had any sort of experience of, but somehow this consciousness can ?

 

[Brian-M]

Turing gave us software, but Shannon gave us hardware.

I thought Von Neumann gave us the hardware. Shannon gave us information theory and efficient digital communication.

 

[Lowpro]

I would suggest that using the word consciousness is too vague a concept and is treading too far on the materialist side, which may result in most of the sniping. Far better to use the word being, a being, a being is a living entity. This entity may have a mind, it may have some consciousness, but these are merely mechanisms exploited by the being, not to be confused with the being itself.

Oh dear God the homonculus has migrated to the Universe...

 

[PixyMisa]

Well, that's extremely confusing. Are you saying I'm doing all that stuff in my brain?

All that and more.

I was thinking, when you said self-referential information, it had more to do with experiencing-experiences, as a critic or editor might reflect on some work. Looking those links over, it sounds like you meant some sort of mathematical process, which seems odd, since I couldn't give you a number for any of what I think of as information of the sort we call "things we know."

Yes, I'm talking about information theory here - mathematics and physics - not psychology. This is happening at a level below what you are aware of; it is what makes you aware in the first place.

This is what Hofstadter covers in Godel, Escher, Bach in general terms, and then more specifically in I Am a Strange Loop. (Godel, Escher and Bach all made self-reference a theme in their work, which is why Hofstadter chose them to illustrate his point.)

I suspect I have gone off track somewhere. My point was that idealism is very much a description of self-referential information processing as much as materialism is. The only difference is what we take to be generating the stimuli - internal or external, or, as I might prefer, external mediated by internal.

Except that information is physical. Idealism only makes sense if you ignore everything we know. Literally everything.

 

[JoeMorgue]

This entire thought process seems to be an infinite nested special pleading.

Is there any possible state of reality you could exist in that you couldn't invalidate by claiming the existence of some larger reality that said original reality was part of it?

If we discover we're jacked into the Matrix and break free wouldn't we just immediatly then have to start questioning whether or not the "real world" the Matrix existed in was real? When you become unshackled from the wall of Plato's Cave wouldn't you just then have to start trying to be unshackled from the world you found yourself end? How do you know your not a brain in a jar having a simulated experience of being a brain in a jar? And so forth and so forth.

Is there any end to the "Turtles All The Way Down?" Do they finally end at the event horizon of the formless or do they keep going?

 

[Lowpro]

Except that information is physical. Idealism only makes sense if you ignore everything we know. Literally everything.

That part above is insanely important. One reason we can rely on models as true independent sources of evidence that are not sensory (idealists do not often address this) is because they are informational. Physical matter also is informational and it is that common ground that allows models to be explanatory without involving conscious experience. It's why we can safely say that reality is not determined by consciousness.

 

[tsig]

This entire thought process seems to be an infinite nested special pleading.

Is there any possible state of reality you could exist in that you couldn't invalidate by claiming the existence of some larger reality that said original reality was part of it?

If we discover we're jacked into the Matrix and break free wouldn't we just immediatly then have to start questioning whether or not the "real world" the Matrix existed in was real? When you become unshackled from the wall of Plato's Cave wouldn't you just then have to start trying to be unshackled from the world you found yourself end? How do you know your not a brain in a jar having a simulated experience of being a brain in a jar? And so forth and so forth.

Is there any end to the "Turtles All The Way Down?" Do they finally end at the event horizon of the formless or do they keep going?

This is more "Realities All the Way Up".

They can invent 'em faster than you can bust 'em but they're all still soap bubbles of the mind.

 

[marplots]

That part above is insanely important. One reason we can rely on models as true independent sources of evidence that are not sensory (idealists do not often address this) is because they are informational. Physical matter also is informational and it is that common ground that allows models to be explanatory without involving conscious experience. It's why we can safely say that reality is not determined by consciousness.

Could you expound on this a bit more? I want to grasp the meaning. For example, in what sense would an atom of iron be "informational"? Or, if that question is off track, go in a better direction.

 

[Nonpareil]

Idealist/materialist is a false dichotomy anyway when you get to grips with it. As I pointed out to you a few years back, it is actually the materialist who is a dualist, by denying the physicality of mind. The idealist has always been a monist, by accepting that mind and matter are different levels of the same substrate.

The levels of bull hockey on display here are staggering. But I do applaud you for having the guts to come out and state in such plain terms that you have not and will not read anything that has been said in the thread thus far.

 

[Lowpro]

Could you expound on this a bit more? I want to grasp the meaning. For example, in what sense would an atom of iron be "informational"? Or, if that question is off track, go in a better direction.

It's easier (and definitely NOT my field, though I am more familiar with Kolmogorov information than Shannon information) to discuss entropy with information, however I'm going to have to use my statistical interpretations. Pixy probably can give a better description of the theory rather than how I apply it. The information in a string (for model purposes, the information is the data) may have differences, variance. 2000 observations may have mostly similar data, but the small variances mean there's more information.

From a practical standpoint, we can create a model that has assumptions. One is that these observations are all independent in their variance, thus all the entropy, the differences in each observation, has nothing to do with what we're investigating. We can use different mathematical functions in our model to determine likelihoods of the dependent factors on the data along with its "entropy".

If you don't understand that, I don't blame you. A good takeaway is that information theory allows us to investigate interactions by determining the fidelity of observations; how much of the message is intrinsic entropy versus dependent changes due to the interactions.

EDIT: I didn't sleep last night, and I reread that...it's a strong 6/10 on the "useful description" scale which is a win for me, but if someone wants to give a better primer please do.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Science is (or is at least dependant on) the idea that the universe is understandable to at least some degree.

If want to shrug and go "Nothing you think is ever certain because this universe could be an illusion, we could all be part of a simulated reality, there could be an evil demon whispering in our ear, our sense could be outright lying to us*" or other such thought terminating nonsense that's fine and dandy but at that point you give up the right to ever have a concrete thought about anything ever. You can never have an argument or a discussion or make a statement or do anything in an intellectual capacity.

Long story you don't get to question other people's reality more then you question your own.

Reality is not pick and choose.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Double post (or perhaps a glitch in the Matrix that's inside Plato's Cave where we are all butterfly's dreaming we're brains in vats.)

 

[Lowpro]

Ya double posted there Joe. I wonder what information theory has to say about two strings with the same sequence(s).

 

[Belz...]

Double post (or perhaps a glitch in the Matrix that's inside Plato's Cave where we are all butterfly's dreaming we're brains in vats.)

Just a gleam in the eye of Set.

 

[marplots]

It's easier (and definitely NOT my field, though I am more familiar with Kolmogorov information than Shannon information) to discuss entropy with information, however I'm going to have to use my statistical interpretations. Pixy probably can give a better description of the theory rather than how I apply it. The information in a string (for model purposes, the information is the data) may have differences, variance. 2000 observations may have mostly similar data, but the small variances mean there's more information.

From a practical standpoint, we can create a model that has assumptions. One is that these observations are all independent in their variance, thus all the entropy, the differences in each observation, has nothing to do with what we're investigating. We can use different mathematical functions in our model to determine likelihoods of the dependent factors on the data along with its "entropy".

If you don't understand that, I don't blame you. A good takeaway is that information theory allows us to investigate interactions by determining the fidelity of observations; how much of the message is intrinsic entropy versus dependent changes due to the interactions.

EDIT: I didn't sleep last night, and I reread that...it's a strong 6/10 on the "useful description" scale which is a win for me, but if someone wants to give a better primer please do.

Thanks for the effort, but I have to admit that I do not understand what you are getting at. It does smell interesting though.

 

[Lowpro]

Thanks for the effort, but I have to admit that I do not understand what you are getting at. It does smell interesting though.

Yea I figured. I'm tired as hell so I'll just throw this here. There's plenty of places to read on what Information Theory is. Shannon Information evaluates the communication of a message and its fidelity, particularly with its transmission. It can reduce, or at the very least identify the uncertainty, the entropy, of a message. What I described above is how I use core principles of information theory in Bernoulli processes when I am investigating data. I mostly work in statistics which you would think would make it easy to discuss these principles but truth is while I feel my fundamental understanding is great, my ability to explain it from the ground up just sucks.

However I try to keep the discussion focused on models since that will be the crux of the argument with respect to examining reality with models. I know the idealist notion that any experience must necessarily be conscious and the suppose a reality based on consciousness is a "leap of faith" to quote jamest from RatSkep, Bernardo and taryablargh (I mean no offense, just tired). With models one can collect data and determine the interactions in reality sans our conscious experience. It's the ultimate way to evaluate what Douglas Adams said "Reality is what's left when you die". Models have no cognitive bias.

I know I slammed computer scientists earlier about their failings in using whatever they were doing to investigate a physiological phenomenon, and now I come before you, humble and tired, to offer a better explanation for information theory than what I can do. That means you Belz, dlorde, and Pixy (and others).