A question for scientists: Primary and Secondary qualities

[Dancing David]

BTW are the materialists on here happy with the notion that if a star trek transporter device were ever invented, then the person who is transported is literally the very same person as he was before s/he got transported? Just as much so as in our normal second by second existence in other words? Or do I need to argue for this extensively tomorrow?

Well, a cartoon transmogrifier is very different from a Star Trek transporter. I have a feeling that creatures being transported would suffer severe shock and most likely loose whatever was in thier midterm memory. The ability to take the particles of a being and tranmit them through space would not mean that all the states of those particles woulld reassemble in the correct state. Especialy given the HIP, the ability for particles to arrive at the destination in a meaningful sense would be questionable. ( I really think that the potential for chaotic heart motion would be a real problem upon reassembly)

So I for one would not want to go through a Star Trek transporter. No something that makes two seperate space continuous, that would be different. There you have a door and you don't have to be reassembled on the other side. So a Star Gate style transporter I would be cool with.

The Calvin and Hobbes transmogrifier is a cartoon, so it miracles an exact duplicate, very safe, a transporter that diasassembles your body, converts it to coded energy and then reassembles it, not so safe. IMO

 

[Interesting Ian]

Re: A question to Adam and others

Lets suppose we have the technology to precisely physically duplicate peoples' bodies. Let's imagine that someone were to offer you $10,000 if you allowed them to physically duplicate your body, but that they would kill the duplicate Adam 24 hours after duplication so that he only actually lives 24 hours. Let's further imagine that you never even get to see the duplicate Adam.

You would surely accept this offer because after all this duplicate Adam doesn't exist now, so when he gets killed after allowing him to live 24 hours, that cannot possibly make you worse off than you are now. So basically you would be getting $10,000 for nothing, right?

Another thought experiment Adam. This is exactly the same as above except it's the original Adam who gets killed 24 hours after the duplicate has been created, and the duplicate is allowed to live. The duplicate will receive the $10,000 and the duplicate will never get to see the original Adam. Of course this situation is precisely the same as the first one although one might not feel that it is.

 

[Dancing David]

Re: Self and abstraction

Dear Ian,

I really think the materialists here won't understand the same thing by a 'self' than you or I would. As far as I understand them, a self is nothing but an abstract description of purely physical structures or processes in the brain. As would go for any abstraction, it's a matter of degree whether one would call a self different or similar when compared to another self. As they're repeating here, the self who typed in this post is strictly speaking not the same self as the self who will read your response to it. For substantialists like ourselves that it is problematic, as for us the difference between two selves is absolute, and certainly not gradual. But that's the consequence of our substantialist views of the self, which obviously is not shared by materialism. We're talking about a very real, irreducible element in reality, whereas they're just talking about an abstract entity which does not really exist apart from the physical processes it's an abstraction from. The non-physical self is beyond materialism.

Titus

Very right on! The buddha was called the 'ultimate materialist' by some wit on this board. And this is exactly the buddha's counter argument to the concept of the atman. The things that comprise the illusion of the self are all transitory and impermanent, therefore there is no place for the 'self' to hang it's hat.

The body is different from moment to moment, etc, etc., So just as you can never step into the same river twice, you are never the same self twice.

That is why the buddha compares the c-word to a lamp in a room, the lamp lights and illuminates the room, but while the lamp is out the room is dark. If the room changes each time that the lamp is lit, then where does the self reside?

Mind is a similar concept, it is an illusion posed over the sperate processes of the brain.

 

[Titus Rivas]

Buddhist and materialist impersonalism

Dancing David,

Very right on! The buddha was called the 'ultimate materialist' by some wit on this board. And this is exactly the buddha's counter argument to the concept of the atman. The things that comprise the illusion of the self are all transitory and impermanent, therefore there is no place for the 'self' to hang it's hat.

Well, that's an important element reductive materialism and impersonalist buddhism have in common. This common ground makes it a bit less absurd that Susan Blackmore combines both philosophical systems in her outlook on life.
Please note by the way, that there are also personalist currents within Buddhism. In the West, we're mainly acquainted with dominant currents within Tibetan Buddhism which are impersonalist.

From an anti-impersonalist viewpoint, both impersonalist buddhism and reductive materialism suffer from the very fundamental error of declaring illusions themselves mere illusory phenomena.

Finally, let's not overlook the very fundamental differences between impersonalist buddhism and materialism.

Take care,

Titus

 

[fsol]

Titus,
Do you mean that to you the self is constant, but that it has access to aquired knowledge and experience.
So, say you learn how to speak Japanese. Your self doesn't change but it now has access to "speaking Japanese." So in Ians experiment the self doesn't change, it just has access to the new experience of "walking out the door." Is that right?

Ian, your analysis of your $10,000 thought experiment presupposes the correctness of your own worldview. To my mind, the two experiments have different outcomes. That isn't to say they are not both ethically dubious experiments in the first place.

 

[Interesting Ian]

Well, a cartoon transmogrifier is very different from a Star Trek transporter. I have a feeling that creatures being transported would suffer severe shock and most likely loose whatever was in thier midterm memory. The ability to take the particles of a being and tranmit them through space would not mean that all the states of those particles woulld reassemble in the correct state. Especialy given the HIP, the ability for particles to arrive at the destination in a meaningful sense would be questionable. ( I really think that the potential for chaotic heart motion would be a real problem upon reassembly)

So I for one would not want to go through a Star Trek transporter. No something that makes two seperate space continuous, that would be different. There you have a door and you don't have to be reassembled on the other side. So a Star Gate style transporter I would be cool with.

The Calvin and Hobbes transmogrifier is a cartoon, so it miracles an exact duplicate, very safe, a transporter that diasassembles your body, converts it to coded energy and then reassembles it, not so safe. IMO

David, the practical difficulties in creating such a duplicate is wholly irrelevant. It's a thought experiment to illuminate the implications of materialism.

OK won't be posting again today cos going to have a drink.

 

[Interesting Ian]

Ian, your analysis of your $10,000 thought experiment presupposes the correctness of your own worldview. To my mind, the two experiments have different outcomes. That isn't to say they are not both ethically dubious experiments in the first place. [/B]

Er . . .no. I am presupposing materialism!. In my world view one wouldn't get a living duplicate, one would just get a corpse. This is the whole point, to presuppose materialism to see where it leads us.

From the materialist perspective the 2 experiments are absolutely identical.

You can question my ethics if I ever actually perform the experiment

 

[fsol]

Er . . .no. I am presupposing materialism!. In my world view one wouldn't get a living duplicate, one would just get a corpse. This is the whole point, to presuppose materialism to see where it leads us.

From the materialist perspective the 2 experiments are absolutely identical.

From reading this thread it seems the materialists have denied that that is the case. It seems to me that it is you who is presupposing that his own view of the world is the correct one. The world where materialism means what you say it means, regardless of what the materialists actually say it means.

That is how I read this thread and your $10,000 experiments.

You can question my ethics if I ever actually perform the experiment

Heh, I should perhaps have used a smiley also.

 

[hammegk]

In my world view one wouldn't get a living duplicate, one would just get a corpse

And I would say, as a non-materialist monist, you might, or might not get a corpse.

Just as if you "built" a working model of the simplest Terran lifeform, and if it "lived", how would you tell if the "perceived-as-physical model" caused life, or if "life" chose to inhabit the (otherwise lifeless) model?

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Ian said:

You would surely accept this offer because after all this duplicate Adam doesn't exist now, so when he gets killed after allowing him to live 24 hours, that cannot possibly make you worse off than you are now. So basically you would be getting $10,000 for nothing, right?

Sure, while condoning murder.

~~ Paul

 

[Titus Rivas]

Substantialist personalism

fsol,

Do you mean that to you the self is constant, but that it has access to aquired knowledge and experience.

This is a fundamental question which hits at the very heart of substantialism. As defined by myself, ontological substances do change in their existence (in casu, their minds) but not in their identity with themselves as irreducible substances. Bolzano states that substances are what is needed if we want to conceive of any change whatsoever. So though they don't change their identity with themselves, they may change their properties, as the central modern notion of (ontological) substances is precisely that they cannot be reduced to their properties.
In other words, I do believe that the self changes in its mind, in that it acquires new knowledge and experience. But I don't believe the self would thereby stop being itself. In fact, I hold that the substantial constance of the self is necessary to speak of changes within one and the same person.

Titus

 

[fsol]

Thanks Titus,
I guess I have some things to ponder. I shall get back to you.

jr

 

[DanishDynamite]

Hi DD, glad to see you posting again. I have to say though that I so fundamentally disagree with everything you say I scarcely know where to begin!

Hi Ian. The feeling is mutual.

 

[DanishDynamite]

Titus Rivas:

The problem for me is that we've had quite some discussion going on about my position and everything what could be said about it, seems to have been said already .

After 28 pages, I would expect you are right.

But, essentially, I hold that though introspective reports may be flawed, introspection as an inner process is the only direct way to get access to our subjective experiences. Subjective experiences qua subjective experiences cannot be reduced to anything else. Now, if we accept the reality of subjective experiences, we must admit that at least these experiences cannot be ontologically reduced to anything physical in the brain. Additionally, I've given arguments against
epiphenomenalism (which are shared BTW by Stimpson, Ian and others) and the identity theory (which I'm glad to say were understood by Paul). My arguments against the identity theory can be found here.

Thanks for summing up. I'll have a look at your arguments against the identity theory later.

It's quite simple actually. I do accept the evidence but I don't accept its interpretation as evidence for materialism. I hold that the materialist interpretation is flawed, not the evidence itself.

Could you give an example of a flawed interpretation?

I'm afraid not But then again, I'm not a skeptic, but a dualist philosopher and psychical researcher, so it's less surprising than it may seem. I think there is both naturalistic and experimental evidence for phenomena which wouldn't make much sense in a reductive materialist world view, though Stimpson has said already that if any acceptable (for him) evidence would be found for some conscious entity which would survive physical death, he would accept the evidence, declaring that entity physical in the process.

Is this you?

Anyway, I would agree with Stimpy. (This happens so often I've been accussed of being his sockpuppet. )

 

[DanishDynamite]

Interesting Ian:

One could say my personality changes all the time yes. One day I might be in a bad mood, another day I might be in a good mood, sometimes I feel happy, sometimes sad etc.

When I used the term "personality", I was thinking of your sense of identity.

But if you're actually being serious about the idea that I literally cease to exist, to be replaced by another self springing into being, just because something happens which causes me to switch from a bad mood to a good mood, then I hardly think that this is intuitively compelling (remember you said materialism is intuitively right). It is much more intuitively compelling to suppose there is an unchanging self which simply feels differently at different times.

Again, I wasn't talking about changes in your mood. And your Self doesn't "cease to exist, to be replaced by another", it just gradually changes.

 

[DanishDynamite]

Interesting Ian:

I was responding to DD's assertion that I am not literally the same person as I was yesterday. So it seems that he is hinting at a self which ceases to exist to be replaced by another.

Again, it is not that one identity ceases to exist and a new is created. it is just gradual change. Just like your body is gradually changing.

 

[DanishDynamite]

Re: Self and abstraction

Dear Ian,

I really think the materialists here won't understand the same thing by a 'self' than you or I would. As far as I understand them, a self is nothing but an abstract description of purely physical structures or processes in the brain. As would go for any abstraction, it's a matter of degree whether one would call a self different or similar when compared to another self. As they're repeating here, the self who typed in this post is strictly speaking not the same self as the self who will read your response to it. For substantialists like ourselves that it is problematic, as for us the difference between two selves is absolute, and certainly not gradual. But that's the consequence of our substantialist views of the self, which obviously is not shared by materialism. We're talking about a very real, irreducible element in reality, whereas they're just talking about an abstract entity which does not really exist apart from the physical processes it's an abstraction from. The non-physical self is beyond materialism.

Titus

Well said!

 

[DanishDynamite]

Re: A question to Adam and others

Lets suppose we have the technology to precisely physically duplicate peoples' bodies. Let's imagine that someone were to offer you $10,000 if you allowed them to physically duplicate your body, but that they would kill the duplicate Adam 24 hours after duplication so that he only actually lives 24 hours. Let's further imagine that you never even get to see the duplicate Adam.

You would surely accept this offer because after all this duplicate Adam doesn't exist now, so when he gets killed after allowing him to live 24 hours, that cannot possibly make you worse off than you are now. So basically you would be getting $10,000 for nothing, right?

No, I wouldn't accept this offer as I would be a party to murder. Just because the duplicate is a copy of me doesn't mean he isn't an individual human being.

 

[DanishDynamite]

Re: Re: A question to Adam and others

Another thought experiment Adam. This is exactly the same as above except it's the original Adam who gets killed 24 hours after the duplicate has been created, and the duplicate is allowed to live. The duplicate will receive the $10,000 and the duplicate will never get to see the original Adam. Of course this situation is precisely the same as the first one although one might not feel that it is.

This situation would morally be OK. In theory, I would have no problem with this scenario.

 

[DanishDynamite]

Re: Substantialist personalism

Titus Rivas:

This is a fundamental question which hits at the very heart of substantialism. As defined by myself, ontological substances do change in their existence (in casu, their minds) but not in their identity with themselves as irreducible substances. Bolzano states that substances are what is needed if we want to conceive of any change whatsoever. So though they don't change their identity with themselves, they may change their properties, as the central modern notion of (ontological) substances is precisely that they cannot be reduced to their properties.
In other words, I do believe that the self changes in its mind, in that it acquires new knowledge and experience. But I don't believe the self would thereby stop being itself. In fact, I hold that the substantial constance of the self is necessary to speak of changes within one and the same person.

Sorry, but I don't quite understand. What exactly is the self if not it's properties?