Final proof that Stimpson J Cat is wrong

[hammegk]

The entire field of metaphysics is based on the faulty premise that our intuition is actually a useful tool for guessing the fundamental nature of reality. Once you reject this premise, it all becomes pointless blind speculation.
Dr. Stupid

Gee, and here I thought metaphysics involved the use of logic.

Try thinking through the two possible and binarily incompatible monist positions, and see which one more closely mirrors your thinking about "what-is". Is that not a viable exercise? Truth? No. Best thinking? Yes!

 

[Interesting Ian]

Well let's make a list of all the comments in this thread shall we?

I think that consciousness is a physical process in the brain.

It (ie consciousness) is a physical process.

Conscious states are physical states.

The physical states are the conscious states. I do not think it is possible for me to be any more clear about this.

Well, that is not what I say. I say that conscious states are a type of physical state.

In principle, the existence of the phenomena we think of as consciousness (thought, awareness, etc...) can be logically derived from the physical brain activity, because these phenomena are brain processes.

The far more parsimonious theory is that consciousness is just a particular class of brain processes.

Clearly I think that consciousness is reducible to brain processes.

I'm sure there's many more, but that will do. I would say this definitely makes you a physicalist wouldn't you agree. Certainly these statements go far beyond the naturalism expounded in your 3 points.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



I have already explained this to you several times. The above are conclusions drawn from observations using the scientific method, not metaphysical assumptions.

First thing. Those quotes clearly show you espouse physicalism. They go beyond your 3 points which only imply naturalism.

Second thing. There is nothing we can observe which vindicates physicalism. We can only ever observe correlations between mental events and brain events. Saying that mental events are brain events goes way way way beyond that.

I haven't even read the rest of your incredibly long post. I just don't feel that we have anything useful to say to each other. I think you're completely beyond all reason, that you continually contradict yourself, that whenever you find yourself in a bit of difficulty in an argument (which is often) you go off on a tangent and start to go on about our argument is being simply a semantic one And you do all these things with DavidSmith too.

I've had enough. No, allow me to correct myself there, I've had more than enough.

 

[Stimpson J. Cat]

Ian,

First thing. Those quotes clearly show you espouse physicalism. They go beyond your 3 points which only imply naturalism.

Second thing. There is nothing we can observe which vindicates physicalism. We can only ever observe correlations between mental events and brain events. Saying that mental events are brain events goes way way way beyond that.

I haven't even read the rest of your incredibly long post. I just don't feel that we have anything useful to say to each other. I think you're completely beyond all reason, that you continually contradict yourself, that whenever you find yourself in a bit of difficulty in an argument (which is often) you go off on a tangent and start to go on about our argument is being simply a semantic one And you do all these things with DavidSmith too.

I've had enough. No, allow me to correct myself there, I've had more than enough.

That's fine, because I have already addressed these points to you many times.

Have fun in your magical fantasy world.

Dr. Stupid

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Hammegk said:

Try thinking through the two possible and binarily incompatible monist positions, and see which one more closely mirrors your thinking about "what-is". Is that not a viable exercise? Truth? No. Best thinking? Yes!

Like masturbation, perhaps pleasant, but otherwise sterile.

~~ Paul

 

[hammegk]

Like masturbation, perhaps pleasant, but otherwise sterile.

~~ Paul

Mental, yes, perhaps pleasant, yes, but sterile? I think not. Your choice of which answer you deem correct -- mind, or matter -- should define the questions posed for examination by the scientific method.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Hammegk said:

Mental, yes, perhaps pleasant, yes, but sterile? I think not. Your choice of which answer you deem correct -- mind, or matter -- should define the questions posed for examination by the scientific method.

Any question is fair game for science. That is, assuming there is really any question at all.

~~ Paul

 

[hammegk]

Hammegk said:
Any question is fair game for science. That is, assuming there is really any question at all.

~~ Paul

Yup. Unfortunately the validity of your answer to "is there really any question at all" may at times be defined apriori by your choice in the mind-matter dichotomy...

 

[Tricky]

I've had enough. No, allow me to correct myself there, I've had more than enough.

No one can best Stimpy, either in logic or endurance. Ian hits the canvas with a thud.

 

[Stimpson J. Cat]

hammegk,

Gee, and here I thought metaphysics involved the use of logic.

Try thinking through the two possible and binarily incompatible monist positions, and see which one more closely mirrors your thinking about "what-is". Is that not a viable exercise? Truth? No. Best thinking? Yes!

What makes you think there are only two? There are an infinite number of possible, but mutually exclusive, monistic positions. Materialism and Idealism are just the only ones that are intuitively compelling.

Furthermore, neither of them more closely mirrors my thinking about "what is", because my own position is perfectly compatible with either of them. More to the point, the metaphysical assumptions that Idealism and classical Materialism make are completely superfluous to my position. They add nothing of meaning to it.

If I start with an Idealistic or Materialistic metaphysical basis, and then add on the axioms of science, I am no better off than if I just start with the axioms of science. The metaphysical speculation adds nothing useful. There is no way for me to verify that the metaphysical claims are correct, and no difference that the truth or falsehood of those metaphysical claims could ever make to me. They are, in the truest sense of the word, completely irrelevant.

I am interested in knowing that which is knowable. I have no interest in pretending to know things which are unknowable.

Like masturbation, perhaps pleasant, but otherwise sterile.

~~ Paul
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mental, yes, perhaps pleasant, yes, but sterile? I think not. Your choice of which answer you deem correct -- mind, or matter -- should define the questions posed for examination by the scientific method.

On the contrary, such metaphysical speculation cannot have any relevance at all to the questions examined by the scientific method. At the most, it effects our choice of words when talking about science, but it does not have any effect on the content.

Any question is fair game for science. That is, assuming there is really any question at all.

~~ Paul
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yup. Unfortunately the validity of your answer to "is there really any question at all" may at times be defined apriori by your choice in the mind-matter dichotomy...

No, it is defined by whether or not the question can be meaningfully expressed within the language of the logical framework of science. If it can, then science can attempt to answer the question (it may or may not be able to do so in practice). If it cannot, the question has no meaning within the context of science.

The only thing which limits the range of topics that the scientific method can be applied to, is the axioms of the scientific method itself. When you allow your metaphysical preconceptions to dictate that a particular area of study is "off limits" to science, then you are essentially doing the same thing as a fundamentalist who claims that God put the dinosaur bones in the ground to test our faith.


Dr. Stupid

 

[Interesting Ian]

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
I've had enough. No, allow me to correct myself there, I've had more than enough.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


No one can best Stimpy, either in logic or endurance. Ian hits the canvas with a thud.

No-one can beat him in endurance, sure. Logic? What logic might this be?? Are you actually able to point out any?? Please point to any example in this thread where he has utilized logic to outargue me on any single point. He never says anything new, but continually repeats himself saying private mental experiences are really objective and hence effectively defining the subjective out of existence, and then when someone like myself or David says no they are subjective, we're playing semantic games!

It's funny isn't it. Other intelligent people agree entirely with my sentiments. You agree with Stimpy. Yet you have never given any indication whatsoever that you have understood anything of our conversation. If you had you would realise that Stimpy is just making a fool of himself.

Ok this is a challenge. If you think that Stimp has gotten the better of me you should be able to say what is wrong with the postion I have articulated, right? So please do so. If you don't I know you're full of sh!t.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Ian said:

It's funny isn't it. Other intelligent people agree entirely with my sentiments. You agree with Stimpy. Yet you have never given any indication whatsoever that you have understood anything of our conversation. If you had you would realise that Stimpy is just making a fool of himself.

You know, Ian, you really should stop debating this with us. If you think that anyone who doesn't agree with you is a fool or an idiot, then you are debating a bunch of foolish idiots. Only a fool would do that.

~~ Paul

 

[Dancing David]

First thing. Those quotes clearly show you espouse physicalism. They go beyond your 3 points which only imply naturalism.

Second thing. There is nothing we can observe which vindicates physicalism. We can only ever observe correlations between mental events and brain events. Saying that mental events are brain events goes way way way beyond that.

You know Ian , this is beyond even the normal drivel thresh-hold for you. Would you please point out where there is any case of consiousness outside of a brain process, I have asked you this question before. Just because it COULD be does not mena that it is. If consiousness is not a brain process then why does alcohol get you drunk?

 

[hammegk]

...If consiousness is not a brain process then why does alcohol get you drunk?

Let me ask you a question.

Do you have faith that your "ego-memory-subconscious brain functions-etc" are actually that part of you that "is life & conscious"? If so, why?

Pharmaceuticals do screw with what we perceive as physical brain functions, that's for sure. So what?

 

[Dancing David]

WEll it shows that consiousness is dependant on brain chemstry, at least to my limited intelligence.

Take one fully functioning capable human being, test them for consiousness, say ability to drive a motor vehicle. Which I think requires some level of consiuosness. Administer grain alcohol one ounce every fiveteen minutes. As time passes and the subjects bood alcohol level rises there will be changes in consiousness for every ounce of alcohol consumed.

Consiousness is effected by drugs and brain damage, there fore I assume that the two are casually linked. If conssiousness was not dependant on brain chemistry then I don't think we would have to sleep.

Thats my two cents, if you can demostrate that consiousness is not effected by alcohol then you disprove the link between the brain and consiousness. mind you I am limiting myself to the consiousness we generaly aspcribe to a human being.

 

[Interesting Ian]

If consiousness is not a brain process then why does alcohol get you drunk? [/B]

Because there is a correlation between brain processes and mental processes.

Now I've just started drinking now. At the moment I can detect a very slight effect. Which therefore means my brain processes also have changed. As I drink more and more it will effect my conscious states more and more. But this means that if My I is to be equated with conscious states and therefore physical states of the brain, then I literally am not the same person now as before I first started drinking, and I will again be a literally different person after a few more sips.

But it certainly doesn't seem this way now does it? It seems my I is the same, but I just feel differently. More gregarious perhaps? More prone to getting into a bad mood. Maybe more prone to laughing at peoples' jokes. But still it seems that I have the same *I* but just that I feel differently. This must be so otherwise it would be irrational for me to say look forward to a night out drinking since it wouldn't literally be me enjoying the night out!

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Okay, so Hammegk and Ian are saying that *I* is not the thing affected by drugs or alcohol. What is affected is something else, brain function or the mind or *me* or whatever. The *I* remains constant throughout the taking of drugs or alcohol or the onset of brain damage.

I wonder if my Alzheimer's-ridden mother would have thought the same thing.

Maybe we should ask people coming out of comas whether their *I* was still doing a happy dance during the thing.

You guys are going to call anything that is affected by external influences *me* and leave whatever is left, however undefinable and undetectable, to be *I*. It's a nonfalsifiable marvel.

~~ Paul

 

[Dancing David]

Well Ian, you just proved the buddha's point that the self is a fiction, there is no self, there is a body, there are thoughts and feelings, there are sensations and habits. All of which we pretend to call the self.

But the fact that you can drink yourself to s state of unconsiousness proves that consiousness is not correlated to brain process, it is dependant on them.

If your consiousness did not depend on the brain then why would alcohol effect you to the point you pass out. (assuming for the sake of discussion that you would drink until you passed out, hopefully just a thought experiment)

 

[davidsmith73]

David,

The issue that Ian and I are calling into question is what the brain and alcohol really are. If reality is experiential then the brain and alcohol do not objectively exist. They are experiences themselves and are thus on the same playing field of reality as the the experience of drunkeness they are assumed to cause.

 

[hammegk]

Okay, so Hammegk and Ian are saying that *I* is not the thing affected by drugs or alcohol. What is affected is something else, brain function or the mind or *me* or whatever. The *I* remains constant throughout the taking of drugs or alcohol or the onset of brain damage.

I wonder if my Alzheimer's-ridden mother would have thought the same thing.

Maybe we should ask people coming out of comas whether their *I* was still doing a happy dance during the thing.

I regret your loss and the unhappy events preceding it.

However, my position does not imply any happiness for the *I* that "thinks" in such a perceived body. (My hope would be that *I* would be unaffected but we(each *I* + *me*) will apparently never know. )

You guys are going to call anything that is affected by external influences *me* and leave whatever is left, however undefinable and undetectable, to be *I*. It's a nonfalsifiable marvel.~~ Paul

You, and some others continue to discuss the implications of mind vs matter at the level of human consciousness. Some of us,me included, are not limiting our discussion to homo sap.

What makes you think there are only two? There are an infinite number of possible, but mutually exclusive, monistic positions. Materialism and Idealism are just the only ones that are intuitively compelling.

Sure, and so far as I currently see things, all devolve on logical analysis to life(mind)vs non-life(matter).

Furthermore, neither of them more closely mirrors my thinking about "what is", because my own position is perfectly compatible with either of them. More to the point, the metaphysical assumptions that Idealism and classical Materialism make are completely superfluous to my position. They add nothing of meaning to it.

The meaning -- if any -- would be found in the questions you would prefer Science to pursue. Of course your choice (and I really don't believe that you are 50/50 on which is correct -- you tend strongly towards "matter is the answer" imo) can only be based on logic; i.e. philosophy.

 

[Stimpson J. Cat]

Hammegk,

What makes you think there are only two? There are an infinite number of possible, but mutually exclusive, monistic positions. Materialism and Idealism are just the only ones that are intuitively compelling.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sure, and so far as I currently see things, all devolve on logical analysis to life(mind)vs non-life(matter).

First of all, I do not see why you keep equating life to mind and non-life to matter. That makes absolutely no sense to me. Trees are mindless. Trees are alive. What's the deal? If you are asserting that all forms of life have consciousness, then why not non-living things too?

Second, not all monistic positions devolve to mind vs matter. Not unless you just arbitrarily throw all monistic positions which do not hold that mind is primary into the "matter" category.

The problem is that, as human beings, we have a very difficult time thinking of things in terms other than "mind and matter". If anything, that is a good reason to discard metaphysics. Any metaphysical possibilities we could dream up are necessarily going to be based on our intuitive preconceptions. Odds are that whatever the "true" nature of reality is, it bears no resemblance to anything human beings are going to dream up.

Furthermore, neither of them more closely mirrors my thinking about "what is", because my own position is perfectly compatible with either of them. More to the point, the metaphysical assumptions that Idealism and classical Materialism make are completely superfluous to my position. They add nothing of meaning to it.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The meaning -- if any -- would be found in the questions you would prefer Science to pursue. Of course your choice (and I really don't believe that you are 50/50 on which is correct -- you tend strongly towards "matter is the answer" imo) can only be based on logic; i.e. philosophy.

I am not 50/50 on which is correct. I am 0/0. I do not think that either ontological materialism, or Idealism, have any significant chance of being true. Ditto for any of the other metaphysical fantasies we can dream up.

My position only bears a superficial resemblance to ontological materialism, in that I claim that human and animal consciousness is a set of brain processes. I make no claim about any hypothetical consciousness that may have created the Universe, or dreamed it up, or whatever, other than to say that there is no evidence to support that hypothesis. I also make no claim about the possibility that human consciousness dreamed up the physical world, and just did it in such a way as to make it appear that consciousness is a brain process, other than to say that this is an unfalsifiable hypothesis, and thus completely pointless unverifiable speculation.

As for the questions I prefer science to pursue, I think that science should pursue all questions that it can be used to answer. Of course, we have to prioritize. Those priorities are based on philosophy, but not metaphysical philosophy. For me, it is based on humanism. Science should first attack those questions which are relevant to the welfare of mankind.


Dr. Stupid