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brain/mind

davidsmith73 said:
Physical things are entailed by relationships. There are no relationships that entail qualities.
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Qualities? Those abstractions built up in our physical minds based on physical stimuli from physical phenomena?

Yeah, nothing physical there.
 
davidsmith73 said:
Physical things are entailed by relationships. There are no relationships that entail qualities.
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2 entail, implicate

impose, involve, or imply as a necessary accompaniment or result; "What does this move entail?"

3 entail, imply, mean

have as a logical consequence; "The water shortage means that we have to stop taking long showers"
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I do not think that word means what you think it means.

Why?
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Oh dear, oh dear. Here's some information you are apparently missing about the real world. A physical thing can have an effect on other things, and those effects can be observed, leading us to state that the physical thing really is a physical thing and does actually exist. Anything that has an effect on something else is a physical thing. If a thing is "non-physical" that means it does not have effects on other things. It therefore makes absolutely no difference to the rest of the world is that thing exists or not. It is completely pointless to assume it is real because not only is there no way of ever finding out, but there are absolutely no consequences of it existing.

If a thing exists, it can be measured. If a thing can be measured, it exists. If a thing is "non-physical" it cannot be measured and therefore does not exist.
 
davidsmith73 said:
Physical things are entailed by relationships. There are no relationships that entail qualities.
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Um, er, qualities are relative relationship. The brain can be capable of thinking about itself. A quality is a value judgement or descrioption used to describe a physical state.
Why?
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There is no proof of 'non-physical' existance?
 
davidsmith73 said:
Would you therefore require a reason (as you are usind the word above) for non-physical existence?
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I would ask for evidence that the non-physical exists, which is different than reason or intent or purpose.

So far all events brought to evidence can be assumed to exist in the material framework.(Not exactly proof but not exactly not proof. Ontology can not be proved.)
 
I think what for me is the more interesting question has not been much considered - why do people have in investment in wanting to believe that the mind is "supernatural" - or that anything is supernatural? Why is supernatural better - more meaningful, more inspiring and so on. Why does believing or knowing something has its source in the physical or the corporeal make it less meaningful? and is the argument for the supernatural that things happen without mechanisms for them happening or is it that there is another set of supernatural mechanisms? Does the supernatural have its own physics? and why would those physics be any more meaningful or significant than natural ones? Yes, I have a thing for redundancy.
 
Cuddles said:
I do not think that word means what you think it means.
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I don't understand where you think I have gone wrong. I'll try explaining what I mean again. What we label as physical must be entailed by relationships. That is, the "physical thing" must be completely, and logically, a consequence of relationships. In other words, something is labelled as physical by necessity of relationships. That is how I understand the term physical in its most fundamental sense anyway.

Oh dear, oh dear. Here's some information you are apparently missing about the real world. A physical thing can have an effect on other things, and those effects can be observed, leading us to state that the physical thing really is a physical thing and does actually exist. Anything that has an effect on something else is a physical thing. If a thing is "non-physical" that means it does not have effects on other things. It therefore makes absolutely no difference to the rest of the world is that thing exists or not. It is completely pointless to assume it is real because not only is there no way of ever finding out, but there are absolutely no consequences of it existing.

If a thing exists, it can be measured. If a thing can be measured, it exists. If a thing is "non-physical" it cannot be measured and therefore does not exist.
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That's an interesting, but not uncommon, belief system you have.

Firstly, I can pick out an agreement that we have at least. You say that anything that has an effect on something else is a physical thing. If something "has an effect" then this, by definition, means that we are talking about relationships. So we agree that "physical" must involve relationships.

Now, my question really is this. If non-physical existence makes absolutely no difference to knowledge of the physical world, then why are you using physical concepts like "finding out" and "lack of consequence" to disprove its existence?
 
billydkid said:
I think what for me is the more interesting question has not been much considered - why do people have in investment in wanting to believe that the mind is "supernatural" - or that anything is supernatural? Why is supernatural better - more meaningful, more inspiring and so on. Why does believing or knowing something has its source in the physical or the corporeal make it less meaningful? and is the argument for the supernatural that things happen without mechanisms for them happening or is it that there is another set of supernatural mechanisms? Does the supernatural have its own physics? and why would those physics be any more meaningful or significant than natural ones? Yes, I have a thing for redundancy.
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I think the major thing is fear. Everyone knows that they're going to die. Everyone knows what happens to your body when you die. People generally aren't too happy about this. It is hard to concieve of a world without yourself in it, and it is certainly not nice to think that no matter what you do, one day you will no longer exist. If the mind is not part of your body then this is no longer a problem, the mind can happily live forever even after you die. Who needs things like evidence when you can have comfort?
 
Dancing David said:
Um, er, qualities are relative relationship. The brain can be capable of thinking about itself. A quality is a value judgement or descrioption used to describe a physical state.

I don't really understand this. Can you elaborate? If a quality is a value judgement or description of a physical state then all that is needed is quantity not quality.

There is no proof of 'non-physical' existance?
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Absolutely! The concept of proof can only be applied to the "physical world". So, why should you require proof or evidence of non-physical existence?
 
cyborg said:
The models built by our brain mechanisms in order to perform cognitive manipulations about cogent groupings of experienced stimuli.
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But models are not qualitative, they are quantitative. You are using the word "quality" to refer to something physical while I am using it to refer to something non-physical. When it comes to qualitative aspects of reality, all talk of brain mechanism, mental representations, cognitive manipulations of this and that, is all a red herring.
 
davidsmith73 said:
Absolutely! The concept of proof can only be applied to the "physical world". So, why should you require proof or evidence of non-physical existence?
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As I have stated many times I am a material nihilist. All human concepts and notions are equaly false and equaly true. However through the method of science and aggregate observation( a equaly true and equaly false notion) it would appear that approximations can be made which have predictive validity towards the apparent 9if illusiory) reality that we seem to find ourselves possibly in.

So all human thoughts being equaly true and equaly false I personaly tend to follow the path of observable predictability. So while all concepts are equally true and equally false some seem to have greater validity in predicting the behavior of the observed universe.

So while non-physical entities may exist, i see no reason that they would have a higher observational validity that the materilsit assumption of ontology.

If you have data which is observationaly valid that gebnerates a better approxiamtion of observed reality than the materialist model then by all means please present it. It would be very cool if imoratal things and spirits existed, but i have yet to see evidence that would indicate observable predictions that can be made regarding said entities.

So again I assume:
1. All human thoughts are equally true and false.
2. There is an observable reality which we seem to be participating in, whatever it's ontology.

I conclude
3. The model of science appears to predict the behavior of the observable reality.

My expectation:
4. I am waiting for data or predictions that would demonstrate the observable reality to have characteristics that are non-material.
 
davidsmith73 said:
But models are not qualitative, they are quantitative. You are using the word "quality" to refer to something physical while I am using it to refer to something non-physical. When it comes to qualitative aspects of reality, all talk of brain mechanism, mental representations, cognitive manipulations of this and that, is all a red herring.
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You have to prove that a model can not be qualatative, you can have spectrum models and models that are analog models, they do not have to be quantitative.

Show your work!
 
davidsmith73 said:
But models are not qualitative, they are quantitative.
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As if the later precluded the former.

You are using the word "quality" to refer to something physical while I am using it to refer to something non-physical.
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No, I am merely pointing out the fact that the concept of something having a 'quality' can only come from the physical - it cannot stand alone.

When it comes to qualitative aspects of reality, all talk of brain mechanism, mental representations, cognitive manipulations of this and that, is all a red herring.
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I'm sure you think so.
 
Cuddles said:
I think the major thing is fear. Everyone knows that they're going to die. Everyone knows what happens to your body when you die. People generally aren't too happy about this. It is hard to concieve of a world without yourself in it, and it is certainly not nice to think that no matter what you do, one day you will no longer exist. If the mind is not part of your body then this is no longer a problem, the mind can happily live forever even after you die. Who needs things like evidence when you can have comfort?
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If people thought about it at all they would find the prospect of never being able to stop existing far more frightening.
 
davidsmith73 said:
Absolutely! The concept of proof can only be applied to the "physical world". So, why should you require proof or evidence of non-physical existence?
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Perhaps because you made the claim, and addressing the claim required a discussion of proof and evidence.

A lot of people find it a waste of time to believe in non-physical things. If you choose to do that, where do you draw the line? Do you believe that the entire universe resides inside the eyeball of a giant (non-physical, of course) goldfish swimming through the (non-physical) ether? If not, then why not?

I think you'll find that the non-physical things people believe in are defined entirely by a need to believe, and as such the belief is based on an inherently biased viewpoint. Basing a belief on evidence is much more useful and reliable.
 
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