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My argument against materialism

More of those question games. Tsssk tsssk. Just believe Ken without question. Who needs maths or proof?
 
Probably Not said:
I'm not even sure what it is that he'd be right about. Electromagnetism doesn't play a role in keeping solids together and impermeable? That gravity knows when it needs to stop pulling in a planet somehow? An object in motion will tend to stay in motion unless it sort feels like stopping? And General Relativity! Quantum!!

Ken, I really do want to understand where you're coming from. Help me out here. :(
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That is a good point. I don't even know what Ken thinks that he is right about.
 
dafydd said:
It is sad,isn't it? Ken couldn't be more wrong if he tried. Elaborate troll? I'm beginning to smell a rat.
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I'm leaning more towards a few bricks shy of a load; or a load of bricks fell on someone's head and scrambled things in there.
 
Anyone want to talk about materialism and how awesome it is to actually be able to learn and understand things about the universe? :D
 
Probably Not said:
Anyone want to talk about materialism and how awesome it is to actually be able to learn and understand things about the universe? :D
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Part of me wishes the universe was actually all my own dream, because I don't like how my life is going and I'm a bit too lazy to make vast personal changes.

Then I remember that's stupid and make phone calls to the companies that haven't yet told me to stop calling them about job opportunities.
 
ehcks said:
Then I remember that's stupid and make phone calls to the companies that haven't yet told me to stop calling them about job opportunities.
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This explains why there aren't more Zen masters posting on JREF.

ZEN MASTER'S TO DO LIST
Figure out the meaning of life.
Discover the horizon of the infinities.
Proclaim the truth of the illusion of reality.

Fetch water.
Build fire.
Make soup.
 
AlBell said:
I'm leaning more towards a few bricks shy of a load; or a load of bricks fell on someone's head and scrambled things in there.
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You may be right. On his site he says that cows speak in tongues which we all know is not the case. On the topic,surely everything in the universe is material? Do photons count as material?
 
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dafydd said:
You may be right. On his site he says that cows speak in tongues which we all know is not the case. On the topic,surely everything in the universe is material? Do photons count as material?
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Er, well, being an ontological idealist, I could ask for your understanding of what "material" actually means, but we can agree that whatever it "is", it's never been demonstrated to disobey epistemological analysis and prediction based on our current understanding of math, physics, etc. :p

ps. Anyone arguing the contrary has lost contact with reality, whatever 'reality' may actually be.
 
AlBell said:
Er, well, being an ontological idealist, I could ask for your understanding of what "material" actually means, but we can agree that whatever it "is", it's never been demonstrated to disobey epistemological analysis and prediction based on our current understanding of math, physics, etc. :p

ps. Anyone arguing the contrary has lost contact with reality, whatever 'reality' may actually be.
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Being a thick blighter,I would say that material is "stuff''. :D
 
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As is everyone, until forced to become Clarice and contemplate: "First principles, Clarice. Simplicity. Read Marcus Aurelius. Of each particular thing ask: what is it in itself? What is its nature? What does he 'it' do, this man 'stuff' you seek?" :)
 
But that's okay, isn't it?

Sure, sound is vibration. It's not really a thing, it's a thing that happens to things. But when someone talks about "a sound" as if it were something in itself, we understand what's meant. Is it important that what we feel as being a solid is really countless interacting electrical fields surrounding countless atoms? Or that consciousness itself is chemical and electrical interactions taking place inside a brain?

All 'stuff' is doing, sure, but I don't think there's anything wrong with talking about stuff as just.. stuff. :boxedin:
 
What stuff does is the subject of epistemology. What stuff is, is not; ontology, in other words.
 
AlBell said:
I'm leaning more towards a few bricks shy of a load; or a load of bricks fell on someone's head and scrambled things in there.
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It's evasion by diversion via misinterpretation and misdirection.

When pixy asks about objects with charges, he conveniently 'assumes' electrically charged dipoles -and diverts with a lengthy explanation of dipoles and why they don't exist. When EM repulsion countering gravity is mentioned, he strawmans it (every noun can be verbed) into some kind of global EM force, or some kind of anti-gravity.

Yet he knows that if he steps into a mineshaft the force of gravity will cause him to plummet towards the centre of the Earth, because there's nothing solid to oppose the force of gravity on him. He knows that if he stands on a stone pillar, he won't plummet to the ground because the pillar provides resistance - by holding together, by staying solid, it resists the force of gravity on him. He knows that what holds the pillar together, keeps it solid, resists the force of gravity acting on him, are EM forces. These are the forces that give the pillar strength under compression, hold it together under the force of gravity acting on his mass, countering it. These are the forces that hold the pillar atoms & molecules together in their structures, and his own atoms and molecules in their organic structures; bind them tightly enough together that his matter and the pillar matter can't inter-penetrate. Molecules unable to squeeze between molecules, atoms unable squeeze between atoms. The forces that resist that penetration, stop him and the pillar collapsing, resist the force of gravity, stop him plummeting to ground? EM forces.

But by denying the result, he's dug himself a hole; it seems too deep to climb out, so he's going to keep on digging until he finds another way out.
 
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