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The study of atoms in the brain doesn't explain the redness of red;Materialism = FAKE

Investigating whether or not reductionism is true or not does seem to me to be investigating reality.
 
Robin said:
So you think that you can investigate reality without forumulating any ideas about it?
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I think I can determine whether a thing is real or not while not harbouring significant ideas about it, yes. Inasmuch as a human being is capable of not harbouring ideas in the first place. In fact, the scientific method works in part because it is independent of any ideas I may harbour about a thing.
 
arthwollipot said:
I think I can determine whether a thing is real or not while not harbouring significant ideas about it, yes. Inasmuch as a human being is capable of not harbouring ideas in the first place. In fact, the scientific method works in part because it is independent of any ideas I may harbour about a thing.
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So by "real" you mean that it persistently behaves in a consistent manner?
 
Seems to me that the core of the scientific method is "formulate an idea about the world, then find a way to test if that idea is true".

General relativity is an idea about the world.
 
Robin said:
Seems to me that the core of the scientific method is "formulate an idea about the world, then find a way to test if that idea is true".

General relativity is an idea about the world.
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I see where you're coming from now.

Yes, to do science properly you have to start with a hypothesis. That is correct. Now, do I have any chance of getting my question answered?
 
David Mo said:
No, man. I'm having a little fun with your fear of getting caught without knowing what you're talking about.
But I have no problem giving my definition of science if you agree to give yours then.
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I'll take that as a final refusal to answer the question. Let me remind you of the question:

Dave Rogers said:
David Mo said:
Nowhere is it written that science is the only method (if one single exists) of examining reality.
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Using the definitions of words that you used to formulate the passage above, can you offer one other useful method than science of examining reality?
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You've chosen to respond to the question by demanding to know how I define the words in your statement. I therefore conclude that either you do not know the definitions of the words in your statement ("your statement", for the avoidance of any imaginary ambiguity that you will then use as the basis for further evasion, being the quote in this post correctly attributed to you), in which case you literally do not know what you are talking about, or that you are trying to get away with making vague pronouncements to sound deep and realise that you have been caught.

In neither case is your reply worth reading.

Dave
 
MohamedTaqi said:
Yes, philosophers probe all those phenomena you are talking about :

What is time? what is matter? what is space? why is there something rather than nothing? all of these are questions in ontology, a branch of metaphysics.

They certainly don't ask how does Hydrogen turn into Helium, because physics answered that particular question.

But they ask what is the fundamental nature of reality? What is existence? and whether nothingness is logically possible or not?

These are questions that are as puzzling to philosophers as consciousness.
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These are indeed good questions.

How many of them have philosophers found the answers to in the thousands of years they have been 'probing' them, and what were those answers?
 
arthwollipot said:
I see where you're coming from now.



Yes, to do science properly you have to start with a hypothesis. That is correct. Now, do I have any chance of getting my question answered?
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I thought it was. Which question do you think you don't think has been answered?
 
arthwollipot said:
Are you attempting to gotcha me into admitting that I'm doing philosophy? I still haven't got an answer to my question.
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Again, I thought I had given a straightforward answer. What question do you say you haven't had an answer for?
 
Robin said:
Again, I thought I had given a straightforward answer. What question do you say you haven't had an answer for?
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The same one I haven't. Since you're prepared to agree on a working definition of science, can you give an example of other tools than science for investigating reality? We know that philosophy is a good tool for formulating ideas about reality; what tools are there, other than science, for investigating reality?

Dave
 
MohamedTaqi said:
Yes, philosophers probe all those phenomena you are talking about :

What is time? what is matter? what is space? why is there something rather than nothing? all of these are questions in ontology, a branch of metaphysics.
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I asked a philosophy professor teaching general philosophy I .a mainstream university whether or not philosophers study why there is something rather than nothing.

He said that in his 25 years in the field the question had not even come up once. He said it sounded more like a question for science.

I did a search on the literature and "why is there something rather than nothing" only comes up as one step in one argument for one particular philosooher. In the seventeenth century.

I can find no evidence that philosophers have ever pondered such questions.
 
Dave Rogers said:
The same one I haven't. Since you're prepared to agree on a working definition of science, can you give an example of other tools than science for investigating reality? We know that philosophy is a good tool for formulating ideas about reality; what tools are there, other than science, for investigating reality?

Dave
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And I gave the answer "philosophy"

I gave the example of reductionism as a matter where the definition had been clarified and a pretty reasonable conclusion reached.
 
Robin said:
And I gave the answer "philosophy"

I gave the example of reductionism as a matter where the definition had been clarified and a pretty reasonable conclusion reached.
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And yet, as we can see in this thread, philosophy allows a random person to claim "There HAS to be something more to consciousness" and when asked to just repeat the claim as if that would help.

So, you're wrong, again..:rolleyes:
 
RedStapler said:
And yet, as we can see in this thread, philosophy allows a random person to claim "There HAS to be something more to consciousness" and when asked to just repeat the claim as if that would help.

So, you're wrong, again..:rolleyes:
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Damn you philosophy for allowing such a loose ontology.
 
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