Materialism and Logic, mtually exclusive?

Piscivore said:
Just a quibble, AtaraX (and welcome, also):

The tree displaces air, creating waves of disturbance, but without the proper sensory apparatus to translate such disturbance into a electochemical signal to a brain there is no "sound".
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If a squirrel has a "WTF was that?" reaction there's a sound, and where is there a forest without squirrels? Just a quibble. :)
 
Piscivore said:
Just a quibble, AtaraX (and welcome, also):

The tree displaces air, creating waves of disturbance, but without the proper sensory apparatus to translate such disturbance into a electochemical signal to a brain there is no "sound".
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Woah, now I get it. The universe is melting away around me. All is one....titties..*Doh* I lost it. What were we talking about?
 
I less than three logic said:
You have not shown that you or I are anything more than matter. So if you or I can confuse things, and we are 100% matter, then apparently matter can confuse things. You are still assuming the P1 of your proof is true. Yet you have presented no support for it. Simply asserting it, or relying on fallacy won't cut it.
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This is not the point of the thread. You do understand that if materialism is shown to be contrary to logic, then materialism is false - regardless of any counter-example to it?

I less than three logic said:
Also, I have said nothing about causality, perhaps your matter should not confuse me with other posters.
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My mistake.
 
zaayrdragon said:
Material stuff breaks down at the macro and micro level. It just happens. Crystals crack, mountains erode, rivers dry up... brains sometimes just don't work.
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When "material stuff breaks down" is it doing something it shouldnt do? When a crystal cracks, has it done something outside the realm of what crystals do?

zaayrdragon said:
It doesn't denigrate the nature of materialism that this is true. Materialism doesn't assume that all complex materialist systems are going to work 100% of the time. If anything, the fact that minds can 'break' or 'be sick' is more proof, not less, of the material nature of thought and reason. After all, if our minds were immaterial spirit stuff, why would any brain status affect them? Why would a bullet through part of our grey matter cause us to change personality, or lose the ability to identify ourself, or cause us to forget all of our past, etc., etc???
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And if something material isnt doing what it is supposed to be doing... then what is it doing?

zaayrdragon said:
Until such time as stillthinkin' can demonstrate the existence of any immaterial stuff, the obvious natural assumption is that everything is material, and that includes humans. Hence, logic is not only compatible with materialism, it would require materialism.
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Apparently you are not familiar with reductio argumentation. I do not need to "demonstrate the existence of immaterial stuff" in order to disprove materialism.

zaayrdragon said:
What I wonder, is what university did ST attend? Please don't say Sussex...
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Keep working on those ad hominem approaches. Eventually they have to pan out, right? In the mean time, you look into that formal logic course...
 
stillthinkin said:
And if something material isnt doing what it is supposed to be doing... then what is it doing?
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Material things can only do what material things do. Even if it seems to us that they shouldn't be doing them. Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.
--Holmes (AKA Doyle).
 
Actually, yes, the only way to disprove materialism, is to demonstrate the existence of immaterial 'stuff'.

That's it.
 
Marquis de Carabas said:
Ask any parent what it takes to make a brain. It's still irrelevant.
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I am a parent, and am familiar with the details of accomplishing human reproduction - but I have no idea what it takes to make a brain. Even less do I know what it took to make the persons who are my children.
 
Grandfathers

To those who have paused to welcome me, I give my somewhat belated but appreciative "Thanks."

Before I go any further, I have to confess how much I like RandFan's tag:
RandFan said:
Just because my grandfather didn't rape the environment and exploit the workers doesn't make me a peasant. And it's not that he didn't want to rape the environment and exploit the workers, I'm sure he did. It's just that as a barber, he didn't have that much opportunity!" --Roger Cobb, All Of Me.
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Although often enough cynical, I'm not a cynic.

The tag is bittersweet, however. I've long wished to exclude my maternal grandfather from the charge/observation. He wasn't a barber. True, as the equivalent of a tenant farmer, he didn't have much opportunity. Still, I cling to the belief - not certainty - that he didn't - at least on his better days - wish to rape the environment and exploit the workers.

But leaving aside the more personal, I do have something to add, if not contribute, to the thread.


I shan't presume to speak for others, but I tend to think there is a distinction worth making between "materialism" as a claim saying, e.g.,
1. all things are material and only material.​

and
2. everything is explainable wholly in terms of matter.​
(Forgive the roughness of expression, I don't have time to deal with proper refinements this evening. Nonetheless, I'm confident that most of you get the gist of what I'm saying and thus that this will suffice for now.)

Anyway, one of the points I had in mind before starting this post was simply this. Re the 2nd statement, I would say it is true that if everything is explainable wholly in terms of matter, then logic is explainable wholly in terms of matter. And saying this I would be talking about materialism as a claim to be the explanatory theory.

My foregoing comment presumes that logic - in one of its core meanings as I understand it (and presumably many many others do [save for later]) - is a (forgive the word) phenomenon inviting explanation and thus a phenomenon a materialist explanation will need to address.

However, it is possible for someone advocating a materialist - or even other - explanation to treat logic (i.e. as I and many others understand it) as illusory. That is to say, it is possible to say that there really isn't such a pheonomenon (i.e. as I and many others understand it) and thus that materialism bears no burden of explanation in this regard.

[[Btw, who paradigmatically will provide (deliver on) the materialist explanation? The philosopher? Uhh, I'm not awfully keen on this response. Too abstact. The gaps remain unfilled. The physicist? Is she interested? Even if she is, isn't she limited to her specialization? Otherwise, isn't she in much the same boat as the philosopher? Who else? Individually or collectively, somebody has to deliver (creating the explanatory chain), otherwise....

Maybe I'm wrong. But I don't think this is merely a sociological issue.]]

But coming back to my rough articulation of two concepts of materialism, I'm now wondering whether some of the debate thus far has slipped back and (sometimes) forth between the two statements offered above.

Then, again, maybe I've I've just missed the boat and the dispute isn't so much over the sufficiency of certain explanatory principles (e.g. "matter") but more over the phenomena to be explained. If it is the latter, I'm not sure how will we find a common point of departure (ad idem). And this worries me.

But it is late.

Cheers,

FTB
 
Kiss

Fifty Thousand Bucks said:
To those who have paused to welcome me, I give my somewhat belated but appreciative "Thanks."

But leaving aside the more personal, I do have something to add, if not contribute, to the thread.


I shan't presume to speak for others, but I tend to think there is a distinction worth making between "materialism" as a claim saying, e.g.,
1. all things are material and only material.​
and
2. everything is explainable wholly in terms of matter.​
(Forgive the roughness of expression, I don't have time to deal with proper refinements this evening. Nonetheless, I'm confident that most of you get the gist of what I'm saying and thus that this will suffice for now.)

Anyway, one of the points I had in mind before starting this post was simply this. Re the 2nd statement, I would say it is true that if everything is explainable wholly in terms of matter, then logic is explainable wholly in terms of matter. And saying this I would be talking about materialism as a claim to be the explanatory theory.

My foregoing comment presumes that logic - in one of its core meanings as I understand it (and presumably many many others do [save for later]) - is a (forgive the word) phenomenon inviting explanation and thus a phenomenon a materialist explanation will need to address.

However, it is possible for someone advocating a materialist - or even other - explanation to treat logic (i.e. as I and many others understand it) as illusory. That is to say, it is possible to say that there really isn't such a pheonomenon (i.e. as I and many others understand it) and thus that materialism bears no burden of explanation in this regard.

[[Btw, who paradigmatically will provide (deliver on) the materialist explanation? The philosopher? Uhh, I'm not awfully keen on this response. Too abstact. The gaps remain unfilled. The physicist? Is she interested? Even if she is, isn't she limited to her specialization? Otherwise, isn't she in much the same boat as the philosopher? Who else? Individually or collectively, somebody has to deliver (creating the explanatory chain), otherwise....

Maybe I'm wrong. But I don't think this is merely a sociological issue.]]

But coming back to my rough articulation of two concepts of materialism, I'm now wondering whether some of the debate thus far has slipped back and (sometimes) forth between the two statements offered above.

Then, again, maybe I've I've just missed the boat and the dispute isn't so much over the sufficiency of certain explanatory principles (e.g. "matter") but more over the phenomena to be explained. If it is the latter, I'm not sure how will we find a common point of departure (ad idem). And this worries me.

But it is late.

Cheers,

FTB
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I am new too but welcome just the same. If I may venture to make a suggestion. Come down into the fray with the rest of us. Don't nest your opinions in so many tentitive clauses.

When you have something to say just come out and say it. It isn't like you are telling us our mother just died. You are just telling us if you agree with us or not. Believe me, we can take it if you are a little curt.
 
Marquis de Carabas said:
No. Nor do I keep a box of it handy when I f:Dk. So, building humans or computers, no immaterial stuff.
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That is your "choice", so to speak.

Unless, of course, somebody wants to show some proof of it.
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Hint: argument from ignorance is not proof
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Materialists and immaterialists both have that problem. Do quarks "exist"?

Randfan said:
Material things can only do what material things do. Even if it seems to us that they shouldn't be doing them. Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.
--Holmes (AKA Doyle)
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Given your choice of materialism=True, that's correct. Given the choice of immaterism=True, it's also correct. (Until Darat provides the third, logical alternative .... and the crickets continue to chirp awaiting his , or anyones' response... :) )
 
Problem is, is there really any functional difference between immaterialism and materialism, Ham? Other than allowing for what might exist - since in both cases, everything could exist with some foundation in 'basic stuff' - and if that basic stuff is true either way...

Yeah, what is the difference, functionally, between materialism and immaterialism?

(Obviously, what ST is arguing for is some form of dualism...)
 
hammegk said:
Materialists and immaterialists both have that problem.
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It's rather immaterial to me whether the stuff that exists is material or immaterial. That's only even a useful distinction if there's more than one type of stuff. So I continue to wait for someone to show either a) some other type of stuff exists, or b) the type of stuff we know about is not up to the task of explaining some phenomenon, so some other form of stuff must exist.

ETA: Er, what zaayr just said.
 
stillthinkin said:
This is not the point of the thread. You do understand that if materialism is shown to be contrary to logic, then materialism is false - regardless of any counter-example to it?
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I understand that just fine, what I fail to understand is how you can possibly think you’ve accomplished that task. Your proof rests on a premise that requires the proof of a negative, and that has been solely supported with fallacy. The only thing you’ve shown to be contrary to logic so far is your proof.
 
AtaraX said:
The interior angles of a triangle will still add up to 180 degrees whether anyone is there to percieve it or not.
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[nitpick]
That is only true in Euclidean geometry. Take away the parallel postulate, and the interior angles of a triangle can assume any value from just above zero to just below 180 degrees.
[/nitpick]
 
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I less than three logic said:
I understand that just fine, what I fail to understand is how you can possibly think you’ve accomplished that task. Your proof rests on a premise that requires the proof of a negative, and that has been solely supported with fallacy. The only thing you’ve shown to be contrary to logic so far is your proof.
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Where do I claim I have accomplished the task? Are you confusing me with another poster again?

The very simple argument I presented only requires one counter-example to be defeated. No valid counter-example has been found, though many were offered right from the start of this thread... they have been easily dismissed. The case of a human being is not valid because when it is offered it begs the question of the hypothesis. So, let us say that the argument asks a question: what is a valid example of something material which combines premises by logical inference to reach conclusions?

And please, lets avoid the fallacy of begging the question.
 
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