Materialism - Devastator of Scientific Method! / Observer Delusion

[MRC_Hans]

Well, I'm thinking of starting one along the lines - "Integrated Information Theory - have scientists gone ◊◊◊◊◊◊* crazy or what?" IIT makes homeopathy, channelling, the Second Coming, and Reiki look thoroughly reasonable by comparison.

I mean how these loony Ph.Ds have the temerity to criticize homeopathy whilst believing in IIT is beyond me.

Whaddya think? Any mileage in it?

Well, you seem to be able to get mileage out of anything. You just don't seem to actually go anywhere.

Hans

 

[MRC_Hans]

Since you wrote this:

I assume you have a handle on it. If not, look it up.

I am aware of the semantics. However, the notion that mental states are different from brain states is purely speculative.

Hans

 

[Myriad]

Myriad,

It's just language. You start out observing and after a while realise there is just observation, not happening to anyone.

"Just observing," if it's not happening to anyone (in the category of "anyone" I include any limited group of people), is either not happening at all, or happening to everyone.

When I ask my wife, "what happened at work today?" she can answer, because she has observed events that I have not. When I look at photographs taken by others, I am being informed by observations that other people (and cameras) have already observed, that I have not. So, "happening to everyone" doesn't work in a practical way. You can get all mystical about how we are all one, but if I have not chopped wood and carried water and you have, then I will be cold and thirsty and you will not be.

If despite that, somehow, observation exists but observers do not exist, what about the object, the thing observed? Does that exist?

 

[Fudbucker]

I am aware of the semantics. However, the notion that mental states are different from brain states is purely speculative.

Hans

Wait, you claimed the "brain is not equal to the mind", but now you're saying it's pure speculation that mental states aren't brain states? Can you connect those two claims in a way that is non-contradictory?

 

[JoeMorgue]

Again it's a process versus the thing doing the process, which is not a hard concept in any other topic.

Let's say you are running a program on your computer. Someone walks over and turns off your computer. You yell "You turned off my program!"

Do you then immediately suffer a crisis off faith over the "computer not being equal to the program?"

No, unless you have a deep desire to figure out how many angels can dance on a split hair, you don't.

 

[Fudbucker]

If running isn't the same thing as legs (is merely caused by them), then how does running exist?

"Running" doesn't exist. It's a verb. The word exists to describe something the legs can do. Consciousness, however, does exist. It's a noun. It makes sense to say the brain produces consciousness. "The legs produce running" makes no sense. OTOH, it does make sense to say "you can run with your legs". It makes no sense to say, "you can conscious with your brain".

You can try and argue that the way we talk about our mind and awareness and experiences is all wrong (that "mind" is a verb instead of a noun), but the burden of proof is on you.

 

[JoeMorgue]

"Running" doesn't exist. It's a verb. The word exists to describe something the legs can do. Consciousness, however, does exist. It's a noun. It makes sense to say the brain produces consciousness. "The legs produce running" makes no sense. OTOH, it does make sense to say "you can run with your legs". It makes no sense to say, "you can conscious with your brain".

You can try and argue that the way we talk about our mind and awareness and experiences is all wrong (that "mind" is a verb instead of a noun), but the burden of proof is on you.

So basically "I'm right because I word things in the most obtuse way possible."

Gonna let you in on a little secret here and this might blow your mind... but the English language ain't exactly the most precise thing ever created. It's has some quirks.

 

[jond]

"Running" doesn't exist. It's a verb. The word exists to describe something the legs can do. Consciousness, however, does exist. It's a noun. It makes sense to say the brain produces consciousness. "The legs produce running" makes no sense. OTOH, it does make sense to say "you can run with your legs". It makes no sense to say, "you can conscious with your brain".

You can try and argue that the way we talk about our mind and awareness and experiences is all wrong (that "mind" is a verb instead of a noun), but the burden of proof is on you.

I disagree that conscious exists as anything other than a process. There is zero evidence of consciousness existing as an entity and mountains of evidence that it is only a brain process. It is, much like running, a term we use to describe a process.

 

[JoeMorgue]

So basically "I'm going to go for a run" is impossible because running is a verb not a noun.

Also catsup and ketchup can't be the same thing, because two different words describe it.

 

[MRC_Hans]

Wait, you claimed the "brain is not equal to the mind", but now you're saying it's pure speculation that mental states aren't brain states? Can you connect those two claims in a way that is non-contradictory?

Yes. The engine of your car is not equal to driving 90mph, but it is the engine that enables you to do it.

Hans

ETA: I'm here assuming that your engine is up to driving 90mph, but that's another matter

 

[Mojo]

"Running" doesn't exist. It's a verb.

Isn't it a gerund?

 

[Nick227]

Lol!

You're using the Wookie Defence to support homeopathy?

Ha ha. Like it. But in this case not really. Just pointing out that stuff scientists believe in is just as mad as stuff they're trying to outlaw on the grounds that it's mad.

It may be that human society is actually making some readjustments here.... as I've pointed out before, scientists, indeed "thinkers" in general, are actually in a worse position to understand consciousness than interested members of the public. Because they spend so much time attaching to thought it actually makes it less likely they can grasp the selfless reality that their researches into the brain point directly towards.

Consequently, the theories that emerge from these thinkers to account for consciousness get increasingly bizarre and crazy - see panpsychism in general and IIT specifically - because their minds can't deal with the notion of a selfless reality. They have to create increasingly convoluted theoretical explanations that avoiding dealing with this central reality.

And so it starts to slowly become apparent to the public that actually scientists really are pretty mad and maybe things like reiki and homeopathy are no worse than their lunacy.

Nice to think the great human system might be capable of rebalancing in this way.

 

[Nick227]

Let's stick to the term you used. What if they perceive it as working?

That's fine. They're not trying to make defining statements based on an illusory objective reality. If someone says "works for me" then that's good.

 

[Nick227]

please unpack this for me, especially regards the scientific method.

1. Model predicts behavior of apparent reality.
2. Model is tested to see if the predictions it makes are accurate
3. validity of model is in accuracy of predictions


I really do not follow what you are trying to say.

Measuring the scatter angle of alpha particles is a 'illusory social construct' how exactly?

The measuring is not illusory. As agreed, it's just a behaviour. It's the weight of significance that is applied to the results of scientific method that is problematic.

 

[Nick227]

Well, let's just consider two metal bars of the same material in a vacuum, not in direct physical contact with each (not touching each other) and at different temperatures. Each emits infrared radiation and each receives infrared radiation. If the system is closed so the total energy of the system doesn't change. Then the hotter bar tends to emit more energy than the cooler. As a result the cooler bar tends to gain energy and heat up as the hot bar tends lose energy and cool off. Eventually equilibrium is reached somewhere between the two temperatures of the bars at the start. In a physical sense this is because the bars can observe or interact with each other through infrared radiation. In the simplest physical sense that is all observation means, interaction. As a result of interaction changes in physical properties (in this case average energy and thus temperature) can occur. Naturally more complex systems can interact in, well, more complex ways but at its simplest basic physical form observation is just interaction.
Originally Posted by The Man View Post
I expect not as well. However, that is the material or materialistic basis of observation, changes in physical properties due to interaction. If whatever approach Nick227 wants to use to arrive at "observation" doesn't, at the very least, include that then it just isn't a material or materialistic approach.

I don't follow how this demonstrates that there must be someone experiencing life or consciousness. Or that the term observation means there must be an observer. Can you explain me more please?

 

[Nick227]

Seriously? You're going to decry self reporting in an attempt to support homeopathy? Self reporting of beneficial effects is all homeopathy ever had.

I'm not decrying self-reporting. I'm saying that you can't ban or marginalize treatments on the basis that there is only subjective evidence, or on the basis that their proposed method of action, if there is one, doesn't fit with existing science. Such a ban goes against what materialism is saying about the nature of objective reality.

How about "You should take this medication, and not that remedy, because that remedy makes your spleen fall out". Still "crossing a line"?

No, you can state what you like. If people want to buy into scientifically-evidenced medications there's no problem. It's just a behaviour and belief system

 

[Nick227]

I'm not so sure. I think one could make a case for the scientific method being a specific type of communication, without any additional burden placed upon it that "ordinary" communication lacks. Yearning for clarity and specificity in communication doesn't (at least to me) necessarily mean an appeal to Truth (tm).

I agree.

 

[Nick227]

Let me correct that for you a little...

P: "I was thinking of trying Homeopathy to fix my problem, but I heard its all bunk"

Nick227: Why do you want to try a medication that you believe is all bunk? Don't you want to get better?

 

[Nick227]

I just quibble here with the use of the passive voice. Language evolved, it was not 'created', was it, unless you are referring to vocabulary here.

Fair point. I stand corrected.

 

[Mojo]

That's fine. They're not trying to make defining statements based on an illusory objective reality. If someone says "works for me" then that's good.

Let's see that in context:

Can you explain how testing homoeopathy using controlled trials is invalid?

It's not invalid.

What if it finds that something "which people perceive as working for them" doesn't work?

Depends if the people asserting that it does work believe this.

Let's stick to the term you used. What if they perceive it as working?

That's fine. They're not trying to make defining statements based on an illusory objective reality. If someone says "works for me" then that's good.

What conclusion do you come to if their perception that it works is contradicted by the results of controlled trials, which you have accepted as a valid test of homoeopathy?