I believe in the power of love, and that is immaterial. I suppose you mean to discount concepts that have a relevance to those things which exist like hormones. But then what about infinities, I mean true infinities. I believe they exist in that I can conceive of examples or proofs that show existence or validity of something in maths, but are not physical. I know for a fact some people can’t even understand the concept, given a 60 page thread on .999…=1.
Personally I think language is ill defined to tackle things that are conceptual but that model some sort of reality, the wave function springs to mind, is it real, does it exist? I am pretty sure then that things that don’t have any correlation with reality and don’t as far as is known exist fall afoul of the same problem but to an even greater extent; how can you make guesses about things that you have no knowledge about, does my imagination of ghosts exist. Do qualia exist? Is the moon still there if I stop looking at it?
If a tree falls in the forest and there is no one around does it make a sound? How would I prove that it doesn’t? Seems like what you are asking is: can you show me the impossible, if you can’t then surely it exists? The answer is no by definition, and no it doesn’t mean it exists, that’s the only conclusion you can make. Like the invisible pink unicorn, it is pink but it is also invisible and ineffable. Seems like logic is all you have really.
An example of this I saw recently on another thread Is the strong anthropic principle, is existence based on consciousness? If it is then how do I falsify it? In fact either way isn’t it just a pointless question. Is the anthropic principal true?
Well the conception inheres in the semantics of the thing - which is why the semantics of such things are important and so often hotly contested. To say, in this case, that it’s “JUST” semantics might be to do the issue an injustice, given the way that phrase is generally thrown about. But if you examine the issue closely enough, and you reject dualism, then you eventually reach the point where the stuff (whatever it is) just is what it is and the question of how we conceive of it IS a question of how we speak about it. As 3x points out at length above, materialism isn’t necessarily the simplistic view that what we call matter is the end-all-be-all substrate of everything - it’s more about the physicality of all things, the potential for measurability, and the fact that everything that exists is sensible in one way or another. We can subdivide any category we want to place everything under, that’s not a problem - but for scientific purposes, it should all be under one category - just like ice, water and steam (which are all material in various capacities). Now take brain, mind and thought and place all of them in that same category - doesn’t mean we don’t conceive of them differently (just as we conceive of ice, water and steam each differently), and it doesn’t mean they are all ultimately composed of hard, clunky matter, but rather that they all have the potential to be examined in terms of physical forces and energies …
yes, there is no matter as such, so to speak, because matter, too, falls under the same category as everything else- which is why i say it’s the same thing to posit that all things are ultimately immaterial as it is to posit that they are all material - it’s still all one thing, you are simply (or complicatedly) changing the words you use to refer to it.
As for an intelligence underlying it all, chances are that’s simply another way of talking about the awe-inspiring subtlety and intricacy with which all materiality organizes itself …
Sure. Hence the need for a workaround to allow the dialogue to move forward rather than get stymied on a non-issue.
Agreed. Admittedly, the materialists does overreach slightly. Many of the things which we have classically considered to be immaterial are either considered not to exist in a materialist framework (like gods, souls, and all that) or have direct material causes/correlates (like the mind). In the case of the former, there really can be no dialogue between materialists and their adherents because they simply hold contradictory assumptions about the nature of reality. They are mutually exclusive and you just can’t go forward. The latter category offers a little more wiggle-room. There are those who do not find the evidence compelling that, for example, the mind supervenes on/is identical to/shares identity with the nervous system. Personally, I find the evidence very compelling but since both parties generally have access to the same information and have come to separate conclusions it isn’t a matter of logical analysis (unless the logic of one of the parties is flawed in some way) but rather a matter of rhetoric.
A few things to consider:
An appeal to ignorance is usually considered to be very shaky grounds on which to build a proof.
The BIV argument, I think, puts the rest to the ad HP Lovecraft that you seem to be using here. Since we are all limited to a human perspective, we cannot meaningfully discuss things which lie outside of it. Indeed, we could never know whether they are real or not. That being the case, from a philosophical standpoint it makes sense for us not to talk about them (Witty’s idea) or to treat them as though they did not exist since they are functionally equivalent to that condition (Putnam’s idea).
The sort of cold materialism you are talking about here is embraced by relatively few materialists because it is, in itself, a post-Greek phenomenon. Matter is dead and needs an immaterial psyche or soul to animate it. If we accept this worldview and then remove the notion of an immaterial soul, we are left with the conclusion that everything is dead. But that involves giving credence to and sharing assumptions with a system that we are explicitly rejecting. So of course it results in a meaningless contradiction!
I don’t recall whether you took part in the discussion but this thread deals with some of the distinctions I am talking about. There are other examples as well.
I’d generally say that parsimony is a good trait to have in any given system. Parsimony for parsimony’s sake, of course, is useless, so we have to look at the ends to which we are driven. It becomes a discussion about values as well as other concerns that press on the issue but in a more subtle manner. When I am driving to visit my parents, I take a route that is a good 100 miles longer than I could. But in so doing, I avoid driving through Chicago (with all its attendant difficulties) and end up shaving a lot of time off my trip. Which route is better? It is admittedly tricky. In the case of a belief in the immaterial, I have yet to be convinced that it has sufficient value for me to deviate from the most parsimonious course. An appeal to tradition has a very soft spot in my heart, but in this case I don’t find it sufficient.
You have struck at the very spirit of this thread. I deliberately openned it with the onus on the responder, for I deliberately make no claim. I only say I’m not convinced of the materialist’s. You can take the burden or leave it - it’s your choice - but I invite you to, and I hope you take it up as perhaps a challenge.
Well, that certainly brodens the definition of ‘matter’, but I don’t know that it’s enough to lump all manner of ‘isms’ under materialism. For instance, does it allow for a platonist to be labelled a materialist? An idealist? Perhaps it’s the clinging to a form of dualism that’s the problem? Perhaps it’s our understand of ‘natural’, for are Plato’s Forms necessarily supernatural?
Well, it doesn’t seem to follow from the fact that we can’t observe something that it doesn’t exist. Also, the notion of ‘energy’ remains a little vague. Could there be unobservable energy? Could there be ‘spiritual’ energy? Could God be a sort of energy?
I think this very much relates to the point I address to UPF (about the semantics and conceptions of ‘matter’ and ‘non-matter’). It might be better if you read that and got back to me on whether, or how much, it relates to your point here before I comment on it further.
In the meanwhile, I’ll say this much: A) seems perfectly reasonable to me, but B) reflects more our desire to understand. Sure, it might be desirable to unify everything under one simple concept (or as few as possible), but the universe doesn’t care about what we desire.
I think, for the most part, we might be in agreement. I say we might agree because it still depends on how we resolve the conception of this one ‘stuff’ that everything is made of (my previous post to UPF should clarify this). The problem lies in the vagueness of the terms we’re throwing around. If matter is more than merely ‘mechanical’, ‘clunky’, ‘deterministic’ stuff, then how are we to conceptualize it? You offer an ‘energy’ model, which is perhaps a step in the right direction, but it needs further refinement. Take Descartes’ dualism, for example. Even if we reject dualism, could we still make comments on his conception of what ‘mind-stuff’ is? Could it be considered a form of energy? Surely, if we’re going to be monists, we would have to reject either this ‘mind-stuff’ or the more familiar material stuff, but either one qualifies as a substance, as a ‘one thing’ that all else might reduce to. Are we just saying that ‘matter’ is just whatever turns out to be this one thing? If so, fine - but then we face the task of fleshing out the details defining the precise nature of this substance and what it is more specifically - and as far as I’m concerned, it very well may turn out to be such that we feel the word ‘matter’, maybe even ‘energy’, is highly inapropriate (if for no other reason than that it carries so much misguided conceptual baggage).
Ah, the good ol’ .9[bar] thread. That’ll never die, I think.
Now, you’re comment obviously takes us in the opposite direction from where the thread is intended to go - I’m looking to be convinced of materialism, not skeptical of it - but you probably are aware of that.
I would certainly think that the proof of materialism is indeed impossible, but you’d be surprised at how many attempt it anyway.
Perhaps, but how do you go from not talking about them or talking as if they didn’t exist to actually believing it?
Let me take a simpler example: let’s say we agreed that the best thing to believe is that which makes us happy. So, for example, a belief in an eternal afterlife of absolute bliss for everyone might bring us much comfort in this life, and so we deem it the best thing to believe. But it’s one thing to believe that
a) the best belief is one in an afterlife of eternal bliss.
and another to believe that
b) there is an afterlife of eternal bliss.
The considerations of what is best to believe, much like the considerations you mentioned above, get as as far as a), but making the leap from a) to b) requires something extra, and I’m inclined to say a lot extra. Under certain conditions, I may be able to stretch myself far enough to agree with you that “from a philosophical standpoint it makes sense for us not to talk about them (Witty’s idea) or to treat them as though they did not exist since they are functionally equivalent to that condition (Putnam’s idea)”, but I have no clue how to allow this belief to erradicate my belief (if I were to hold one) in immaterial things.
I think I made it clear in my OP that the point of this thread is not to convince me that I should pretend to not believe in the immaterial, but that the immaterial indeed doesn’t exist.
Your other points (1 and 3) are well taken.
Parsimony may be a good trait to have, but the same point can be made here as above. That is, I can’t say that I know that materialism is true, although I would certainly agree that it is more parsimonious than dualism (or polyism).
That presumes that a belief in the non-material comes prior in all cases. It needn’t and, in the manner in which I was raised, didn’t. So the problem of the privileged place of non-material belief could simply be fixed by not teaching it to subsequent generations.
Well, this assumes that the condition of the afterlife exists in vacuo. It almost never does, instead it exists as part of an enmeshed philosophical doctrine with particular practices associated with it. Engage in those practices and they will become habit. Habits shape and to a large extend determine who we are, so from habit comes belief.
No one sits down and in a flash of inspiration realizes something. Instead conditions align which provide inklings which translate to actions, which leads to further inklings in a virtuous (or vicious, depending on your perspective and the habit in question) cycle.
Sure, but given our own human perspective on the issue I’m not actually sure what the distinction between those two are given the absence of the immaterial in an active form. If I were in danger of getting hit by an immaterial bus on my way home from work, there would be a meaningful assay whereby we could separate the statements “pretending imaginary buses don’t exist” and “imaginary buses don’t exist.” Since we have no such assay, I am unconvinced that those two statements aren’t lexically equivalent.
Sure. All I’m arguing is that disbelief in the immaterial is more useful than belief in the immaterial. “Useful” here meaning that it can be used to meaningfully construct predictive systems and/or hypotheses for predictive systems. I’ll add onto that statement that this sort of utility is the only assay whereby we can judge the truthfulness of a belief, so it may as well be synonymous with the truth.
So it is both more parsimonious and more useful. That shrinks the cloud of reasons justifying belief in the immaterial down to a pretty small size. There is always room for doubt, of course. But does that doubt on its own actually do anything? Or is doubt only useful insofar as it allows for paradigm shifts in light of new information (which, by definition, we don’t have access to right now). I would gladly reevaluate my stance on the immaterial if new information came to light. Progress is a balancing act. We believe certain things and use those to move forward. If our beliefs become too certain, they veer into dogmatism which prevents progress. Doubt represents a powerful cure for dogmatism. However, if our doubt becomes too strong we become paralyzed by it and trapped in inaction. The balancing act is that we have to be certain in our beliefs while implementing them but willing to change them as new information arises.
But what about those who do believe it, like me? If the goal were to convince them that their immaterial beliefs are wrong, it’s going to take a lot more than to say that it’s better not to talk of immaterial things or to act as if you didn’t believe in them.
Okay, so you have a method for going from a) to b). However, the point I was getting at is that the method we usually rely on (or think we rely on) is some means by which statements like b) are shown to be true. For example, you could have a reliable method by which all manner of false ideas are ingrained into a subjects head (we call this brainwashing), but most would agree that this method bears little relation to the truth of such ideas. But if the method by which we come to believe were some kind of domenstration of the truth, we would naturally say that it is believed because it is true. To say that one ought to believe such-and-such because it makes us happy or because it is useful is more akin to the former, whereas the reason I’m looking for is more akin to the latter. I’m asking that if a statement like a) is accepted (say that materialism is useful to believe), how can I also demonstrate its truth such that I can make my way to b)?
You’re right that we’re stuck with our own human perspective, but this perspective only puts limits on our knowledge of the immaterial. No one has a right to say they know the immaterial exists (or doesn’t exist, for that matter), but we’re not limited in our ability to conceive a universe featuring immaterial things, nor for that matter to believe it on faith. This, for me, marks the difference between ‘pretending’ not to believe in immaterial things and actually not believing. There wouldn’t be any difference, in principle, between the manifest behaviors and speech of two individuals, one pretending not to believe and the other actually not believing, but there would be a marked difference in how they experience such mental states internally. To me, it would be a whole other experience to actually disbelieve in the immaterial than to pretend to disbelieve. The challenge I’m laying down is to give me grounds to establish in my mind the former state and not the latter.
That last point is unwarranted in my view. I still maintain there’s a difference between judging the truthfulness of a proposition and it actually being true. There are some propositions, I’m convinced, that may be true without a means for us to test it.
I’m glad you recognize the need for doubt. In that case, our disagreement may come down to something as simple as the degree of doubt we each hold in materialism. Yours seems to be so marginal that it becomes more practical to ‘round off’ your doubt to zero, whereas I feel that such rounding would be irrepresentative of the degree of doubt I hold. Whatever the case though, I stay clear of paralyzing doubt. I seek the golden mean.
This physical entity that comprises you (self), that material essence … are we to talk of it as if it were separate from the totality of the universe or totality of nature, or whatever you want to call it? If the ‘self’ is a product of thought, say, a high order abstraction which thought uses to perpetuate itself, we may have the possibility of an illusion here. The illusion of the self. To where and how far will thought go with this self? To where and how far can it?
Let’s say it is the thought that has created the body, a separate entity, and tells that this has a beginning, this has an end: this is the end that is the beginning. It has created the space. Thought creates the space, thought creates the time. So it cannot conceive the possibility of anything outside the field of space and touch. Actually, the thought is the one that has created the space and experiences the space, but actually there is no such thing as space at all. What is there is a space-time-energy continuum, which is a continuum, but it has no end. The thought cannot conceive of the possibility of a movement without a beginning and without this point where it is going to arrive someday or sometime. So there is the problem of the thought; its actions are limited to its perpetuation, its continuity, its permanence. But anything it says about anything – dealing with, or experiencing the life of the entity and its relevance with the immaterial, or even understanding anything that pertains to the living entity – it cannot, because thought is something inanimate and inadequate.
You asked for proof that immaterialism or dualism or woo woo ism or whatever they call it these days was false. I said you can’t prove that. You seem to now be asking if materialism can be proved, that’s a pretty sly goal post change. But yes materialism can easily at least prove that it is the only game in town, ie the only philosophy with any physical evidence. I’d let science decide personally. We have two competing theories, one that is incomplete but has plenty of evidence and one that is full of arm waving speculation, which doesn’t explain anything we can ever measure, and in fact often says that you cannot measure what it attempts to validate; whos protagonist even seem to have no viable argument philosophically, except to invoke entities that are entirely imaginary, being as they reside in the ineffable, which is their safe zone: if you can’t explain something then make claims that are ineffable in lieu of argument. Which would you chose? As someone said the teapot on the other side of the Sun or the scientific theory? To use Pauli’s cutting condemnation of pseudo-science, “your theory is not even wrong.” That goes equally for the philosophy which is basically little more than a religion.
This is an example of nebulous thinking that dualist indulge in. The self is an illusion, prove it? Is that even a contention that has any sort of philosophical reason or are you just using your imagination, to deny physicalism as a theory. Sloppy stuff, but pretty much the extent of the dualist camp these days. Claim things that no one can argue with, and then attack materialism for not being a complete theory. It’s another example of creationist mentality which clearly indicates the dualist philosophy is a religion. Since the logic it uses rely on the same theological devices of ineffability as the major religions.
In other words in order to disprove it you would have to stand separate from consciousness, outside of space and time, since that is consciousness. Great, do you guys not see that you are merely engaging your imagination in something no one will ever be able to contend with, just like theology. You should can the pretence of being philosophers and just form some churches.
There’s a good question!
Given that Plato took them from empirical geometry, the answer should be no. Except Plato himself seems to have thought otherwise.
Best thing would be to stop referring to forms, which are basically universally appearing products of physical necessity, as belonging to Plato.
all forms which are not reducible to the natural operations of a materialist constitution of energetic forces would be “supernatural”. all these labels are just words, but in the end its about having the right conception in mind, the right mental vision of depth, clarity, differentiation and flow… lacking that, a theory will never penetrate into reality, and will only float above it in fantasy.
true. but, in the absence of any experiential or logical reasons, believing in nonobservables is unjustified.
yes, on all accounts. none of that contradicts materialism.
energy is just a term capturing an essential capacity/potential for force, which usually manifests as motion/change.
in that case, what you say in that post, your notion of immaterialism would be what i am talking about; a quantum-type view of matter as reducible to particle motion, and particle motion reducible to energetic forces always in motion and fundamentally dispersed across space and time (at the smallest Planck levels).
consider Deleuze’s materialism (and feel free to read my signature as well to this effect):
Deleuze thinks about self-relation through the concept of an assemblage (or desiring-machine), i.e. the minimal unit of a material system capable of modifying itself. By materializing self-relation, its representationally paradoxical properties are neutralized. . .
. . .On the face of it, however, Deleuze’s materialism, his transcendental empiricism, is not phenomenological at all: it is transcendental precisely because in it the empirical is understood neither within the structures of phenomenality and objecthood nor at their limit as the (merely) unrepresentable condition of representation – be it a Heideggerian ek-stasis of Being or Henry’s en-static and sub-reflective immanence of affect. . .
. . .Deleuze’s empiricism is transcendental because it migrates the transcendental machinery of object-production beyond the phenomenal realm into that of the thing in itself, the Real, the transcendental unconscious.
matter is far more than either a clunky mechanical absolute or a ideal form; universal and particular is a false dichotomy. true materialism is a flowing, energetic constitution of forces emergent from fundamental self-reducible forces, i.e. the “minimal unit of a material system capable of modifying itself” and which, according to quantum mechanics, exist in the past, present and future all at once, as well as at many “points” of space simultaneously. energy on this level is always “becoming” in a Nietzschean or Deleuzean sense, conflicting and interacting/merging/overcoming other forces on that level, as everything is in motion:
My idea is that every specific body strives to become master over all space and to extend its force (its will to power) and to thrust back all that resists its extension. But it continually encounters similar efforts on the part of other bodies and ends by coming to an arrangement (“union”) with those of them that are sufficiently related to it: thus they then conspire together for power. And the process goes on–
Friedrich Nietzsche; trans. Walter Kaufmann , The Will to Power, §636 (1888)
A is self-evident; B results from Occham’s Razor, but in truth is unnecessary to falsify a dualist perspective, as A is sufficient for this task. yet B still holds for its own reason: why posit more than one entity to explain a phenomenon when one entity can be posited to do the job just as well (or more easily)?
youre right that its more than just “semantics”, in that language is not that which reality derives from, nor is it ONLY that which our understanding of reality derives from (but it is a big part of it, certainly); semantics, or language in general, is to blame for the dualist tendancy we have when categorizing the world around us, but the subject/object division we posit is not fundamental to reality itself— fundamental reality, that which is most universal or irreducible only to itself, is its own subject and object at the same time, not the least of which is because it exists in its own past and future at the same moment, thus “becoming” what it “is”, as well as doing all that fun entanglement/tunneling/superposition stuff that we read about in quantum mechanics.
in true materialism, everything is, by definition, a form of energy, therefore whatever ‘mind stuff’ is, it is also a form of energy. this is a good link that Peachy Nietzsche posted that shows how we may be able to account for ‘mind stuff’ in material-scientific terms. other quantum theories of consciousness go a long way to demonstrating that we do not need to posit a Descartes-type fundamental split between body and mind to understand human consciousness or thought/intention/will.
true, indeed we need new words other than material, matter, physical, energy… they are too laden with misconceptions and false or negative connotations. however, part of the problem with language is precisely this, that higher conceptualization and understanding requires that we surpass such linguistic boundaries. deconstruction is helpful in this, but its also important to remember that words are just symbols for concepts, and we should focus more on the concept itself, the mental image that we generate, a sum or totality of relations and visual/spatial/logical ‘images’ in our minds that are generated when we think about these things, such as physics and metaphysics.
also, monism is another example of language muddying the waters of the discussion. dualism as understood commonly in philosophy (idealism, Platonism, phenomenologicalism, metaphysicalism, supernaturalism, spiritualism, etc) is false, but that doesnt mean that monism is all thats left: true materialism is NOT “monist” at all, and realizing and understanding this fact is a very important step to take on the way to understanding how we can best conceive of reality.
The self need not be seperate from the totality of nature, nor the body, but this says nothing of whether there are immaterial things in existence nor whether the uniting of self with nature implies that the whole is reducible to matter or that matter is reducible to something more fundamental. Is the self an illusion? Well, as simplistic and perhaps out-dated as it may be, I think Descartes settle this one: cogito ergo sum. We may, nonetheless, say that certain of our preconceived notions of ‘self’ - how it works and what precisely it is - may be in error, and on that basis the self may be an illusion, but nonetheless there must exist some entity we call ‘the self’ even if it turns out to be none other than the physical body.
I’m not sure I understand your point. Are you saying that because thought is so limited, it cannot even conceive the immaterial?
Any proof that immaterialism is wrong is a proof that materialism is right. No changes in goal posts here.
You can’t have evidence that materialism is right. You can only have evidence that physical things exist. If there’s anything in addition to that - anything that, by definition, can’t be detected - then there’s no way to prove it doesn’t exist.
Two points:
A proposition need not be verifiable in order to be true (see Godel’s Incompleteness Theorem).
I’ll assume you’re falling back on Wittgenstein for your claim that the unverifiable is ineffable. I reject Wittgenstein.
It sounds like you’re saying that if two things (substances?) are irriducible one to the other, only one of them can be natural and thus the other supernatural. I don’t quite see the reasoning behind this, but I can offer this alternative rendition which is essentially equivalent: if two substances are irriducible one to the other, then any interaction that takes place between them must be supernatural, for it is the nature of two distinct substances to have no natural means by which to interact.
I have conceded that there is no experiential evidence for the immaterial, but I do have some logical reasoning. It’s a little too complicated to spell out here, but you can read about it at mm-theory.com. It’s not exhaustively deductive through-and-through, but I feel it has a reasonable degree of logic and rationality backing it up. I’ve always felt that so long as you can make a relatively plausible case for some proposition, it is reasonable to believe, at least, that it is possible. Absolutely certainty, on the other hand, is a rare thing to come by.
We may be talking about the same thing after all, but what if I were to tell you that my conception of this one universal substance can take the form of, not only the material objects that we see, but truth, beauty, love, value, morality, etc. Would you be willing to categorize all those under the heading ‘material’?
If you read my website (which is a monumental task, I understand, if for no other reason than it is the equivalent of a 500 page book - so I don’t expect you to), you’ll understand my reasoning. You’ll understand that my main divergence from the typical materialist account of the mind/matter debate is in the direction of reduction. That is, the materialist typically reduces the mind to the brain, whereas I would do the reverse: reduce the brain to the mind (and all matter to a universal and continuous consciousness). In other words, the brain as a material object - that is, material as the layman is familiar with the term (clunky, cold, mechanical) - is a sensory representation of the universal substance which comprises all things. In effect, I say matter is a form of mind - in particular, it is sensory experience. But of course, it is continuous with, and convertable to, all other forms of mental experience. Thus we get the empirical experiences of brains (and all other material things) being converted into knowledge or thought (which projects as truth) or into beauty (as when seeing a beautiful woman) or into value (as when experiencing something painful or pleasant) or into morality (as when painful or pleasant experiences, after converting to value, are further converted to an imparative to do something about it - as in retribution). Now, the materialist would like to reduce all these mental states to physical states of the brain, saying that they correspond to neural and chemical events, one giving way to another, and that is how he accounts for the flow, or the conversion, from one to the other. But in my view, the neural and chemical events in the brain are merely representational. They are reducible to the very experiences of truth, value, beauty, morality, etc. that we typically call ‘mental’. The mental is the real substance, I say. It can take the form of matter (as when we sense material things) but it can also transcend this form and become truth, value, beauty, etc. It can also take on forms we as humans are incapable of experiencing. This is when the forms in question constitute parts of the universal consciousness that are represented by physical systems other than the brain, and when these physical systems impinge on our senses, I say this represents such forms being converted back into sensation, allowing us to ‘see’ those physical systems in material form.
Now all this need not contradict what you said earlier - that whatever the one universal substance is, we can label it ‘matter’ or ‘energy’ as a simple nomenclatural device. But I’m not sure this mental stuff I’m refering to is even worthy of the title ‘substance’. Is truth a substance? Is value? I coined a term: transubstance. It may be a transubstance, meaning that one of the forms it can take on is the more familiar ‘substance’ we are aquainted with (matter, energy), but it can transcend this form, which is to say it can transcend even substance. On the other hand, if you consult the Aristotilean doctrine of substance, which basically defines it as that which ‘stands under’ all the particular forms it takes on, you see that the term may very well be fitting after all. Needless to say, I’m undecided on whether to call it a substance or not. Maybe thinking of it as ‘energy’ rather than ‘matter’ would be more conducive.
But again, the universe cares not for simplicity in our ideas. Occham’s Razor is a heuristic for deciding between two competing theories in the absence of a method for verifying their truth. That is, if we can’t decide which one’s true, we might as well go with the simpler, even though the more complex one may turn out to be true after all.
In any case, the rest of your post is well taken, and I’m more or less on board with it. There is this one comment of yours, however, that I’d like to question:
It isn’t??? Doesn’t monism just mean that everything is reducible to one substance even though it can manifest in a variety of different forms?
I’m afraid not, unless you just mean completely demolishing the whole theory by say showing things with no physical substance exist. But showing something is false about materialism doesn’t mean the whole theory is false.
You seem to be fixated on proving things can’t exist, despite that being totally impossible? Why ? Even the assertion that things beyond perception can be proved not to exist is quite frankly idiotic.
That’s not what materialism says, it just says only material things exist, you probably need to study what materialism maintains first. Things exist, to prove non material things exist you’d need evidence, thus in the category of things that exist, only things with evidence can be considered, if that is only material things then it makes materialism the only game in town. This is an example where you can at least show that materialism at least is not falsified until a contradiction to its tenet that only physical things exist is shown. If there’s only one explanation with any evidence then its not even a choice.
Materialism maintains only material things exist, ie things based on matter (matter/energy)
all objects we know of or can find evidence of are material
Therefore materialism is true.
yeah but dualism is not Godels incompleteness theorem, and I could contend with that as well if you like. What you have is a religion posing as philosophy.
Yes I know logic appears to be your major weakness here. We don’t have to know anything about anything we can just make it up. Yeah I get it, it’s pointless and taken to extremes makes philosophy rather worthless, but hell after smoking too much of the old weed, or taking psychedelics, I bet it even starts to make sense. If you’re talking about proving something by showing the alternative is false, then the problem is here of course, you can’t prove materialism is false with rhetoric alone. You’d either have to show the alternative is true or produce an exception to its assertion of material being everything there is, so you are left nowhere and with nothing atm. Let’s face it though evidence, logic, arguments are just inconvenient, why not make everything up and pretend it exists instead? Surely that’s the more rational approach? Throw in a materialism can’t explain x, God of the gaps argument and its creationism all over again. Oh and you can’t just reject something arbitrarily because: this is not what I believe.
Except that evolution and creationism aren’t the only theories in town. What do you think the ‘im’ in immaterialism connotes? Materialism states that only material things exist. Immaterialism states that not only material things exist. There can’t be any other options than those two. Thus, if one is true, the other must be false. Aristotle settled that one over 2000 years ago - perhaps you’ve heard of the law of contradiction?
Who said that??? Certainly not me.
Only rank prejudice can lead one to conclude that just because I don’t embrace materialism, I must be a dualist.
How does the ‘evidence’ rule out all immaterial theories? What in ephiphenomenalism would contradict the finding that there are brain events that determine behavior? What in idealism? There are tons of immaterial theories that survive the evidence.
Your argument is about as coherent and robust as someone who thinks he’s disproved the existence of an invisible man on the grounds that he can’t see him.
Again, I’m not dualist.
More blatant misconceptions of my position, Sid.
Everything is made up to begin with - some things can go on to be verified, some things not. Doesn’t mean that if it is unverifiable, it isn’t true. The unverifiable might even be based on a great deal of cogent philosophical reasoning. You have no reason to believe that my views aren’t.
Seriously, Sid, if you’re going to take on this challenge, you’re going to have to do more than just misjudge me as a dualist, say that I’m making shit up willy-nilly, assume that I think that a lack of proof in materialism is proof in immaterialism, fail to even understand what your ‘evidence’ is evidence of, say that logic is not my strong point, accuse me of smoking weed, and whatever other rash conclusions you impulsively jump to with no good reason. I can’t work with this shit. It’s irrational flaming. You’re basically throwing a tantrum. Get back to me when you’ve gained your composure and are willing to be reflective enough to actually investigate my claims and arguments and interpret them with more care. If I don’t see signs of this in your future posts, don’t be surprised if I don’t respond.
This is just you constantly changing your position. I can’t be bothered with this, what with you changing your argument every five minutes and your conditions, and the fact that the OP was pretty stupid and had no point, I don’t think I have the will to post any more. Too much arm waving and goal post shifting for my liking. I’ve said everything I need to say anyway. I don’t think you’ve made any sort of point at all here. If you don’t want people to get bored of this nonsense, you need to start making some sense.
This isn’t a challenge its a complete waste of time.
I clarified what I meant fine you meant if one is false completely the other is true, you seem to like making ambiguous claims though.
Fine you’re not a dualist, your an immaterialist, but not a conventional one, whatever the hell that is. Can’t say I care any more to be honest.
Ah, the good ol’ .9[bar] thread. That’ll never die, I think.