I challenge you: your best alternate to materialism

[Belz...]

What if matter is effect and energy is undefined by its very existence?

Energy isn't actually a thing.

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

No, it's irrelevant: your feelings do not give you information about anything other than themselves. They cannot be used to conclude anything about the world about you. For instance, if you're afraid of tuna sandwitched, it doesn't tell you anything about the nature of tuna.

This isn't a matter of opinion.

So objectivity is better than subjectivity and feelings and better is an objective better. I.e. there is an international scientific measurement standard for better.

 

[Belz...]

So objectivity is better than subjectivity and feelings is an objective better. I.e. there is an international scientific measurement standard for better.

That has nothing to do with what I said.

I said you cannot reach conclusions about objective questions from your feelings about said question.

 

[Nonpareil]

The only way to do that is to ask the person, which was my point.

And our point is that, while in the vast majority of situations, simply asking is more than ample evidence, you could actually verify it with a brain scanner.

That the information "I like country music" is a subjective

Objective. "X likes country music" is an objective statement.

The physical body of that entity is non the wiser.

No.

Philosophically it is irrelevant, as we are concerned with what can and cannot be said about existence intellectually. Physical material is unimportant in this, as it is a product of that existence, whatever that existence may be.

Assuming the conclusion.

But philosophical stances on existence are useless in the wider world, because the world resulting from them would be identical in either case.

Not without a series of impractical and unwarranted special clauses.

The universe behaves exactly as though it is material in nature. Any claim other than materialism has no reason for the universe to behave that way, or even any way at all; they often lack coherent definitions, and what definitions they do have don't actually show why the universe looks the way it does. We would, in fact, expect it not to act this way.

There's no reason for an idealist universe to look like a materialist one, except that idealists have such a fuzzily-defined position that they can have it say anything they want.

I would appreciate it if we focus on only one or two points at a time as
I am pressed for time at the moment.

It's a forum. You have all the time you want. The posts are not going anywhere.

The only conclusion in materialism is what is dictated to it by science, as such you are delivering Scientism. To take materialism any further than this, i.e. Into the realms of a discussion on ontologies and broader philosophical questions is an assertion.

This is wrong.

Materialism stands as follows:

• The universe behaves in every way exactly as though it is material in nature. This is corroborated by science, yes.
• Thus, the universe is material in nature. This isn't even really a leap. It's just the definition of "is".

Yes, it's that short, yes, it's that simple, and yes, it's that easy. And it remains that easy even when discussing ontology.

No idealism is the most rational*

Someone else - I believe it was PixyMisa - has pointed out in previous threads that ideas like idealism only meet the criteria for rationality when you first discard all notions of evidence. Which is entirely correct.

And as I have already pointed out in this thread, idealism is only rational if you try and hide behind solipsism to declare that nothing you experience can ever be used to draw any ontological conclusion.

And solipsism falls apart as soon as you have any functional definition of "exists".

materialism is the most practical

It is this also, yes.

and yet if it is based on Scientism, it is blinkered and is not a rounded philosophy anyway. It doesn't address the broader philosophical questions.

It addresses literally every question worth addressing on the matter, because it is correct.

It just might not do so in a way you like.

The subjective content of the mind may be dependent on the physical action of the brain, but it is an emergent individual phenomena with a subjective life of its own, so to speak.

That is not what "subjective" means.

What you are suggesting is equivalent to studying the world of television by tabulating the transistors, diodes, capacitors etc to be found in the Television, rather than discussing the programmes shown on it.

No, what I'm saying is that, given enough power, scanning speed, and a complete enough list of what all possible transmissions might mean, you can figure out what's showing on the telly by looking at the state of the circuitry.

Which is true. It's not always practical, and certainly not the only way to watch television, but that's not the point. What's relevant here is that it can be done.

*Idealism is the most rational because it only assumes the most direct aspect of existence, our personal experience of existing. While recognising that all else is peripheral phenomena of some kind, which we may not be in a position to fully understand.

Which is not a rational thing to do, because we can demonstrably understand it.

I.e. in effect subjectively true is and is not true from every frame of reference.

Statements about other statements can be objectively true, yes, even if the statement being referred to is only subjectively so. You just look at the truth value of each statement separately.

Now I am not going to be nice or what ever.

I'm terrified.

So would you please explain to me what international scientific measurement standard and which relevant measurement devices I should use for the word real to I can replicate according to science the objective observation of a real world.

You wouldn't trace the word "real" to find all brain states related to observing the real world (though you'd definitely want to be able to do it as part of that experiment). What you'd want is a full-brain scanner.

Let us play brain scanner - a scanner is a measurement device and the brain works a measurement device in part. I get that - now can some please explain objectively how I objectively according to a scientific measurement standard calibrate my brain.

Not every device constructed includes a means of calibration. In fact, the human brain not having one is one of the main problems with it. Have you never heard of mental illness?

So in practice for one of you as this we in "We fight for the truth", I can repeat/replicate that statement so it makes sense. The problem is that the statement is subjective, it is a normative statement and not a objective and scientific statement.

You don't understand what those words mean.

So all of this "we, objectively" is nothing but in part a physical, biological, cultural and so on statement within the population of Homo Sapiens Sapiens and if you really have to reduce this "we" down to biology it is a we versus them for the replication of the fittest genome as in part for the 4 F's - feed, fornication, fight and flight.
"We, the scientists" are not outside evolution and you don't an objective point of view, when it comes to being inside evolution.

Again, this is indecipherable. The words all make sense, but if you have a point, it's lost somewhere in there, and I can't get it out.

In other words I get the you for "I don't like philosophy".

No, actually, I quite like philosophy.

I dislike many philosophers, because they are demonstrably bad at their jobs.

BTW truth is not reality as such.

You don't understand what that word means either, then.

So objectivity is better than subjectivity and feelings is an objective better. I.e. there is an international scientific measurement standard for better.

Yes.

It's called "being right".

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

That has nothing to do with what I said.

I said you cannot reach conclusions about objective questions from your feelings about said question.

So you can refer to a peer-reviewed study that all human conditions are reducible to answers to objective questions?
I don't want philosophy BTW

 

[Belz...]

So you can refer to a peer-reviewed study that all human conditions are reducible to answers to objective questions?

Again, what does this have to do with what I said ? You seem to be fundamentally unable to understand my point: you CANNOT use your feelings as evidence of anything except that you have feelings. This has nothing to do with your post quoted here.

I don't want philosophy BTW

Neither do I.

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

...
It's called "being right".

Being right is not science nor answerable objectively.

Let me explain - being right takes place in a given brain. If you scan 2 or more brains, you will find if the amount of scanning done is sufficient 2 or more contradictory versions of being right. You can't solve that objectively for being right, because there is no objective measurement standard or device for being right. I.e. the meaning of being right can only be subjectively true and never objectively true.

 

[Nonpareil]

Being right is not science nor answerable objectively.

You do not understand any of the terms you just used.

And you are wrong.

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

So you as scientists can solve this one without feelings and subjectivity:
http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/psp/101/2/366/

The moral domain is broader than the empathy and justice concerns assessed by existing measures of moral competence, and it is not just a subset of the values assessed by value inventories. To fill the need for reliable and theoretically grounded measurement of the full range of moral concerns, we developed the Moral Foundations Questionnaire on the basis of a theoretical model of 5 universally available (but variably developed) sets of moral intuitions: Harm/Care, Fairness/Reciprocity, Ingroup/Loyalty, Authority/Respect, and Purity/Sanctity. We present evidence for the internal and external validity of the scale and the model, and in doing so we present new findings about morality: (a) Comparative model fitting of confirmatory factor analyses provides empirical justification for a 5-factor structure of moral concerns; (b) convergent/discriminant validity evidence suggests that moral concerns predict personality features and social group attitudes not previously considered morally relevant; and (c) we establish pragmatic validity of the measure in providing new knowledge and research opportunities concerning demographic and cultural differences in moral intuitions. These analyses provide evidence for the usefulness of Moral Foundations Theory in simultaneously increasing the scope and sharpening the resolution of psychological views of morality. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved)

You can in effect answer Harm/Care, Fairness/Reciprocity, Ingroup/Loyalty, Authority/Respect, and Purity/Sanctity without the use of any sort of feelings???
Please to refer to a peer reviewed study of how that is done?

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

Can any of you point me to the scientific law of normative ethics?

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

You do not understand any of the terms you just used.

And you are wrong.

How do you know that another human is wrong?

 

[Nonpareil]

So you as scientists can solve this one without feelings and subjectivity:
http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/psp/101/2/366/


You can in effect answer Harm/Care, Fairness/Reciprocity, Ingroup/Loyalty, Authority/Respect, and Purity/Sanctity without the use of any sort of feelings???
Please to refer to a peer reviewed study of how that is done?

Tommy.

I'm going to say this again.

You do not understand what "objective", "subjective", or "normative" means. It is becoming more and more obvious that you have equally little understanding of "true", "false", "scientific", and "right". Your questions and assertions make little to no sense because of this. The questions you ask, when they have meaning at all, are so trivial that there was really no point in asking in the first place.

You even made a thread recently attempting to "call me out" on this very subject, and you weren't coherent then, either. I attempted to explain to you there what they meant, but apparently it didn't work.

Until you actually do understand what those words mean, you have no grounds to make any sort of argument like this. Your posts, like this one, are so incredibly wrong that the only answer I can give is "mu".

You're demanding an answer to a normative question, one that is necessarily defined by feelings, without the use of feelings. You then try to act as though you've scored some sort of point. Do you see the issue here?

Go and do some reading on truth values, objectivity and subjectivity. I'd explain it myself - again - but...

...No, that's just it. I'd be explaining it again.

And I'm getting tired of doing that.

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

Tommy.

I'm going to say this again.

You do not understand what "objective", "subjective", or "normative" means. It is becoming more and more obvious that you have equally little understanding of "true", "false", "scientific", and "right". Your questions and assertions make little to no sense because of this. The questions you ask, when they have meaning at all, are so trivial that there was really no point in asking in the first place.

You even made a thread recently attempting to "call me out" on this very subject, and you weren't coherent then, either. I attempted to explain to you there what they meant, but apparently it didn't work.

Until you actually do understand what those words mean, you have no grounds to make any sort of argument like this. Your posts, like this one, are so incredibly wrong that the only answer I can give is "mu".

You're demanding an answer to a normative question, one that is necessarily defined by feelings, without the use of feelings. You then try to act as though you've scored some sort of point. Do you see the issue here?

Go and do some reading on truth values, objectivity and subjectivity. I'd explain it myself - again - but...

...No, that's just it. I'd be explaining it again.

And I'm getting tired of doing that.

So the scientific method can't directly be used on normative questions, rather only when someone has defined right and wrong can he/she use science for the practical aspects of - how do I do it?!!

Yet some of you claim you (we, the scientists) only use knowledge based on a scientific methodology and natural science is the only form of knowledge, there is. And here you, Nonpareil, admit that is not possible for normative ethics, which all humans with a certain cognitive level use in practice every day.
So much for objective, subjective and "we, the scientists, can explain reality". Yet you can't produce a scientific law of normative ethics.
So everything in reality except normative ethics can be explained by science. So there is something we all do day in and day out which in practice works as real life falsification of "I can reduce everything down to a scientific explanation".

With regards

PS Keep that in mind next time you play "Everything is physical". In practice that has its limits.

 

[Nonpareil]

So the scientific method can't directly be used on normative questions, rather only when someone has defined right and wrong can he/she use science for the practical aspects of - how do I do it?!!

Yes, that's right. You can't use the scientific method on normative questions, because, by definition, normative questions are undefined. The only way you can get any answer to them is to make it up.

The moment you have a definition, you can use the scientific method and get an objectively true answer to whatever question you ask.

We have been here before.

Yet some of you claim you (we, the scientists) only use knowledge based on a scientific methodology and natural science is the only form of knowledge, there is.

People use "knowledge" gathered by non-scientific methods all the time.

It's called making things up.

Applied rational skepticism is the only way to get valid answers.

And here you, Nonpareil, admit that is not possible for normative ethics, which all humans with a certain cognitive level use in practice every day.

No. In fact, I say exactly the opposite of that, as shown above, but you insist on putting words in others' mouths because you don't understand what is actually being said to you.

So much for objective, subjective and "we, the scientists, can explain reality". Yet you can't produce a scientific law of normative ethics.

Because normative ethics is made up, Tommy. It is entirely arbitrary. That is what normative means.

PS Keep that in mind next time you play "Everything is physical". In practice that has its limits.

It actually doesn't. You just don't understand what's being said.

 

[Belz...]

Being right is not science nor answerable objectively.

Let me explain - being right takes place in a given brain.

OK, you officially have no clue about anything you discuss here.

Either make some effort to understand the topics and terms used, or stop trying to discuss these topics. You are in way over your head.

Can any of you point me to the scientific law of normative ethics?

No, and yes.

As Nonpareil has said, you can't have science on normative questions because these questions are undefined -- or, as PixyMisa said, they make assumptions that are not revealed. "Should" is an "is" with hidden assumptions. Once all assumptions are defined and explained, then you can do science on normative questions.

For instance, if I ask "is murder wrong", you cannot answer unless you know what "wrong" means. Once the term is fully defined in an objective manner, then you can answer it. The answer, of course, is only within the context of your definition of "wrong". Under a different definition, the answer will be different.

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

...

Because normative ethics is made up, Tommy. It is entirely arbitrary. That is what normative means.

Made up of what? Non-physical stuff, maybe? I BTW would like evidence that is entirely arbitrary and not subject to cause and effect.

 

[Tommy Jeppesen]

OK, you officially have no clue about anything you discuss here.

Either make some effort to understand the topics and terms used, or stop trying to discuss these topics. You are in way over your head.



No, and yes.

As Nonpareil has said, you can't have science on normative questions because these questions are undefined -- or, as PixyMisa said, they make assumptions that are not revealed. "Should" is an "is" with hidden assumptions. Once all assumptions are defined and explained, then you can do science on normative questions.

For instance, if I ask "is murder wrong", you cannot answer unless you know what "wrong" means. Once the term is fully defined in an objective manner, then you can answer it. The answer, of course, is only within the context of your definition of "wrong". Under a different definition, the answer will be different.

So I subjectively define what wrong means objectively?!! I get it! BTW you can't objectively define something subjective, you can describe and hope that the person you are describing it to has the cognitive and emotional ability to understand you, but that is not a given.

 

[Belz...]

So I subjectively define what wrong means objectively?!! I get it!

No you don't. You never do.

Think of moral values as variables in an equation. They don't have set values, and each one of us has a more-or-less unique set of values to the various moral variables. Once you know what those values are, you CAN do the equation, but the results will vary from one individual to the next.

BTW you can't objectively define something subjective

Of course you can. Do me a favour and look for the definition of "subjective".

 

[Nonpareil]

Made up of what? Non-physical stuff, maybe?

Either you don't understand the difference between "consisting of" and "arbitrary" or you are deliberately equivocating between the two in order to... make yourself look foolish, I suppose.

I BTW would like evidence that is entirely arbitrary and not subject to cause and effect.

"Arbitrary" does not mean "not subject to cause and effect".

You do not understand the words you are trying to use.

So I subjectively define what wrong means objectively?!! I get it!

No, you don't.

You do not grasp the concept of a meta-statement. The fact that statements about other statements exist, and can be objective or subjective independent of the statement they concern, seems to escape you.

And you still don't understand what "objective" or "subjective" actually means in the first place.

BTW you can't objectively define something subjective

You can.

No one else necessarily has to have the same definition that you do. But you can.

 

[Myriad]

You are expressing the dangers in the analysis of the contents of experience as there are plenty of opportunities to misdiagnose (ie a shadow for a ghost or a toy gun for a real gun), and opportunities to add value to an experience that may not be there (ie Divine). However, it is possible to look to the mechanics of "pure experience", even the non thunderous mundane experience like holding a pencil, and inquiring into that experience. For example, I pick up a pen, and figuratively putting that pen (content) aside, I ask What is the substance I am experiencing? I then pick up a banana, and again figuratively putting that content aside, What is the substance of my experience? I look to the trees outside . . . it's all the same substance and that substance is in awareness. I must confess Materialism is the most rational explanation for experience, but it is totally counter-intuitive.

That's as may be, but what understanding of anything does experiencing the pen (except for the part about the pen) lead to?

What is the substance you are experiencing when you dream about a pen that is also a snake that rolls away from you when you drop it on a train and when you crouch down to look for it you realize you're surfing in the Grand Canyon?

What is the substance you are experiencing when you're not holding a banana but you wish you had one?

Since everything we experience is necessarily "framed" by the act of experiencing, it is tempting, and it is also quite possible, to more or less adequately explain the universe using models in which the act of experiencing is the origin of everything experienced. The most parsimonious and self-consistent of such models is solipsism, but that fails to explain the apparent similarities between our own and others' experiences. So the most popular models of that type end up including a unifying entity, a universal mind or first experiencer. The partial subordination of our individual experiences to the unifying entity's explains their similarities to one another.

Those models, which I'll loosely equate with mysticism, are almost perfect inversions of the materialistic one, to the point where in many ways they're almost equivalent and lead to some of the same destinations, including certain ideas about the nature and boundaries of the self and the meaning of death. This is generally unappreciated, in large part because most materialists haven't gone far enough in following up the logical implications of the materialist model. That's something I have to write an essay about soon, though it's looking like a monumental task.