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My argument against materialism

Dancing David said:
Um, you do know that part of critical thinking is actually undersatnding the arguements being made, there is no box. To understand an idealist or theist argument one can not dismiss it apriori, one needs to understand it to critique it. many here have considered these ideas at great depth.

Many here know a great deal about a variety of ideas and thoughts, it is usually the ones who come here to bait and argue that are in a box.
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Yes, I was thinking of some of the skeptical thinking I encountered earlier on in my experience on this forum. If folk are prepaired to give concepts space and time to be understood, that's fine with me.
 
Halfcentaur said:
The material world does not go away just because it becomes irrational in places to human understanding. The idea that there are finite boundaries to the universe, or an infinite universe, or a period without time pre Big Bang,... this doesn't mean the material world is suddenly able to be thrown out and spiritual answers or theistic answers are fair game once those topics come up.

It just demonstrates the human mind developed to only understand part of the universe. Using symbolic concepts, like math, we can transcend those limits. But there are barriers to rational thought due in part to us being an animal who developed to judge the distance between tree limbs and later balance on two legs and until very recently nothing more. We find fruit and occasionally meat. Once we learned about meaning and we learned to make things important, we learned that some things have purposes and reasons. We evolved to be animals that use meaning and purpose the same way birds evolved to fly and use their wings. As a result, humans have a tendency to look for meaning everywhere we look. Your foot got wet because you stepped in a puddle. Things just happen. The gods did not arrange for you to step in a puddle. The same applies to all things that exist. But your human instinct wants to find purpose and meaning in it. But just because you find things like infinity and before the Big Bang to not make rational sense, doesn't mean they fall outside of the natural material universe.

It doesn't matter what is before or after the universe, or if we're in a void or in a chamber. Those are still behaviors of material reality that just break the mold of human limits. We're stuck looking at things through linear time and logic.

You say you straddle both, but this other view you're espousing is nothing but imagination and fancy. It's not real. It's just novelty. And it's wrong to compare it with what we can verify.

I love mythology and fantasy and every crazy idea under the sun. I paint fairies and elves and dwarfs all day. But I care about the truth and knowing what's real way more than I care about what makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside.
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Are you an anthropologist? I am familiar with this line of thinking. However I see nothing addressing the existence or not of 'God'.

Verification gives a warm fuzzy feeling, I too am a truth seeker. However aspects of reality which can be verified scientifically are only one of a number of avenues of enquiry I use.
 
PixyMisa said:
Why?
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Because I am and have been from a young age, a philosopher.
My main concern is the nature of the paradox of existence and I seek and consider everything that has been said on the subject. Alongside a consideration of the experience of being me and all that can be implied from my personal interaction with reality from day to day.
 
Halfcentaur said:
If you haven't watch it yet, I recommend you watch the BBC's Secret Life of Chaos. At least to the part with the flame and the video feedback. I found it to be quite an eye opening introduction.
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This chaotic feedback forms part of Douglas Hofstader's musings on the origins of consciousness in 'I Am A Strange Loop'.
 
PixyMisa said:
Similarly, if you break your leg you can go to a doctor, or you can go to a faith healer. The doctor will put you in an itchy uncomfortable cast, and in a few weeks you'll be walking again. If you go to the faith healer, well, maybe you get lucky at at least not get an infection and die, but that's the best you can hope for.
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As Sean Lock said, "Alternative medicine? If I'm in an accident, I want to hear sirens, not wind-chimes..."
 
yy2bggggs said:
You're not using the word, but you are in fact addressing agency.
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I said specifically that consciousness is not the agent. That's the limit of "adressing" that I'm doing.

1. A part of the brain makes decisions.
2. A part of the brain is conscious.
3. A part of the brain is aware of itself.
4. A part of the brain is aware of decisions.
5. The part of the brain that is aware of itself does not make decisions.
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So far, so good.

Now, you're referring to a "you" that is conscious (the part in 2), and this "you" is aware of itself (the part in 3), and this "you" is aware of decisions (the part in 4) but has no say in them (is not the part in 1, per 5).

Is that correct?
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Well, "you" is the sum total of all of those parts. But the part of "you" that is conscious isn't the one making the decisions, so yes.

If so, that "you" is probably agency. If not, tell me which part you disagree with.
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Which "you" is agency ? The part in 1 ? I wasn't refering to that.
 
Belz... said:
Well, "you" is the sum total of all of those parts. But the part of "you" that is conscious isn't the one making the decisions, so yes.
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Can "you" that is conscious report that it is conscious?

ETA: Here's where I'm going with this.

If there's a part of the brain that is conscious, and that part of the brain can influence decisions; and there is a part of the brain that makes decisions, then wouldn't it simply be a semantic argument as to whether consciousness is the part that is aware, or the part that is aware plus the part that is making decisions?

That's not exactly what I'm proposing though--I think it's more complex than this even.

EATA:

In short, I think there are high level, medium level, and motor level intentions (<- not the philosophical sense); that the high and medium level are things we can be "aware that we are aware" of but are not necessarily aware of (but we can and are "aware we are aware" post-hoc upon being prompted); the motor intentions (which are the carrying out of programs that, let's say, translate "teleological" concerns like reaching for a cup into all of the nitty gritty details such as flex this muscle this much while relaxing that one and flexing this other one, adjust for this thing, and so on) we're probably not aware of; and that the thing people tend to report as their "selves" has sensations of authorship, initiation of action, and so on that nominally stem from the selection of motor programs. Among all of this mess is something that semantically makes sense for you to call an agent that is both aware of and initiates actions; furthermore, there are parts of us that are "aware of itself" that are not accessible to this agency--and whether you choose to call those parts conscious or not I have no particular opinion on.
 
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Moonshine said:
So, what is your basis here? Do you have one? ----- and his reply is, the physical universe operates according to 'cause and effect', we can see this, we base everything upon this as a consistent behaviour of physical things. The uncaused agent, by defintion of forfilling the necesasry criteria for creating the physical, is NOT physical and is not subject to cause and effect (it is uncaused), and why should it be in the same way thay the physical universe is.... it is NOT physical, so why expect it to be subject to physical laws, it is only logical to expect physical things to be subject to laws observed to pertain to physical things. He says to think otherwise is illogical.

And I don't know what's wrong with his logic? It doesn't satisfy me, I feel hoodwinked, but I can't see why, and I do think he has a point. Any good people help me?
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The things within the universe operate according to cause and effect. It is not necessarily the case that the universe itself does.

Things within the universe operate via cause and effect because they are subject to time. Time is part of the universe, and therefore, as far as we know, there is no time outside of the universe. Thus the universe was not necessarily caused, because there is no time in which a cause-effect relationship could occur. In fact, until we have evidence that there is time outside the universe, the only logical conclusion is that the universe did not have a cause, since without time, there can't be a cause.

punshhh said:
Because I am and have been from a young age, a philosopher.
My main concern is the nature of the paradox of existence and I seek and consider everything that has been said on the subject.
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What paradox is this, exactly?
 
Moonshine said:
And I don't know what's wrong with his logic? It doesn't satisfy me, I feel hoodwinked, but I can't see why, and I do think he has a point. Any good people help me?
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His solution doesn't really answer the question, it's magical thinking. It defines an entity with specifically those properties required to solve the problem, by defining it as not subject to causality. It's saying "I don't know, lets just invent something that solves the problem by definition - a creative uncaused agent. Oh, and while we're at it, lets make it anthropomorphic, and with superpowers..."

But on second thoughts, if we're just going to define a solution, why not just say "Hey, maybe universes don't have to have a cause?" That's the same solution, but without the complication of God and all the additional problems & contradictions He introduces. It's not a very satisfying solution, but at least it avoids a redundant deity.

All this ignores other, equally valid hypothetical solutions to this problem, such as a universe with no beginning (debate the literal meaning of 'the beginning of time'), and so-on.

All speculation. If we don't know the answer, we should not be afraid or embarrassed to say "We don't know the answer, and we will probably never know". We can speculate, but how high on the list of interesting speculations should magical omnipotent, omniscient, emotionally human superbeings be? Don't we have Marvel Comics & DC Comics, etc., to satisfy that fantasy?
 
yy2bggggs said:
Uhm... I might take a guess that punshhh saw it by clicking on it and the associated additional pieces, here:

...some time after Halfcentaur posted it in #410 of this thread.

I won't take a gander at the drug question, but I suspect it's not so important.
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Haha, my bad. Didn't read Halfcentaur's post.
 
punshhh said:
Because I am and have been from a young age, a philosopher.
My main concern is the nature of the paradox of existence and I seek and consider everything that has been said on the subject. Alongside a consideration of the experience of being me and all that can be implied from my personal interaction with reality from day to day.
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There is no paradox, we exist. (Or appear to exist.)
 
tsig said:
So god's a little seed that grew into us? You seem to be saying that if consciousness didn't exist we wouldn't be conscious.
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I think you meant to say "if some other consciousness didn't already exist, then our consciousness couldn't have come about any other way."

And yes, I think that's exactly what he's getting at. He seems to be saying that consciousness can only come from another consciousness. So where did God's consciousness come from? I guess it's turtles all the way down.
 
yy2bggggs said:
Among all of this mess is something that semantically makes sense for you to call an agent that is both aware of and initiates actions
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Well, aparently not. Although this is not entirely conclusive, Libet's experiments strongly suggest that the part with agency is not self-aware and the part that is self-aware is not an agent. There's some very clever mental sleight-of-hand going on to make it look like your mind is one cohesive whole rather than a synthesis of a whole bunch of subsystems that don't always see eye to eye.
 
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dlorde said:
His solution doesn't really answer the question, it's magical thinking. It defines an entity with specifically those properties required to solve the problem, by defining it as not subject to causality. It's saying "I don't know, lets just invent something that solves the problem by definition - a creative uncaused agent. Oh, and while we're at it, lets make it anthropomorphic, and with superpowers..."
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Yep, that's one of the two logical fallacies - it's special pleading. Everything has a cause - oh except this one thing.

The other one is equivocation - causality relates to time, and time is a property of the Universe, so the cause of the Universe itself, if the expression means anything at all, need have no relation to the way causality works within the Universe.

But on second thoughts, if we're just going to define a solution, why not just say "Hey, maybe universes don't have to have a cause?" That's the same solution, but without the complication of God and all the additional problems & contradictions He introduces. It's not a very satisfying solution, but at least it avoids a redundant deity.

All this ignores other, equally valid hypothetical solutions to this problem, such as a universe with no beginning (debate the literal meaning of 'the beginning of time'), and so-on.

All speculation. If we don't know the answer, we should not be afraid or embarrassed to say "We don't know the answer, and we will probably never know". We can speculate, but how high on the list of interesting speculations should magical omnipotent, omniscient, emotionally human superbeings be? Don't we have Marvel Comics & DC Comics, etc., to satisfy that fantasy?[/quote]
 
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