Announcement

Collapse

Apologetics 301 Guidelines

If you think this is the area where you tell everyone you are sorry for eating their lunch out of the fridge, it probably isn't the place for you


This forum is open discussion between atheists and all theists to defend and debate their views on religion or non-religion. Please respect that this is a Christian-owned forum and refrain from gratuitous blasphemy. VERY wide leeway is given in range of expression and allowable behavior as compared to other areas of the forum, and moderation is not overly involved unless necessary. Please keep this in mind. Atheists who wish to interact with theists in a way that does not seek to undermine theistic faith may participate in the World Religions Department. Non-debate question and answers and mild and less confrontational discussions can take place in General Theistics.


Forum Rules: Here
See more
See less

Does Materialism Destroy Rationality?

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Originally posted by Stoic View Post
    What really distinguishes materialists (aka physicalists) from others is their answer to the mind-body problem, where they contend that the mind is made up of the same physical matter as the body (the other main positions being Cartesian dualism and Idealism).

    I still don't see how a thought "about" London for instance is a physical thing.
    Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

    Comment


    • Originally posted by Sparko View Post
      You can take an area of space, remove all matter and the space will still be there. And time actually slows down in the presence of matter (the more gravity the slower time flows) so without matter time still exists and flows even faster than with matter around.
      As with most philosophical questions, there are two schools of thought on this subject: relationism and absolutism. Absolutists think of space as you and I do, in the sense that it's something that is there whether or not there is any material within it. Relationists think that space is "a mathematical representation of the infinity of different spatial relations that particles may have to each other." General relativity appears to have given the absolutists the upper hand, but I don't think the relationists have given up.

      Comment


      • Originally posted by seer View Post
        I still don't see how a thought "about" London for instance is a physical thing.
        I've seen the question before, and I realize that it's supposed to be a "showstopper" in the sense of a question that can't be answered even in principle, but I honestly don't understand why it would be. Obviously, if you want an exact answer, it's going to require a lot more neuroscience to be done, and I'll grant that we may not get to that point in our lifetimes.

        But in principle, it doesn't seem to me much different than asking how a subroutine in a computer program can be run "about" a particular object. The answer might be something like, "Well, you obviously can't pass the physical object itself to the subroutine, so you represent the object with a structure that resides at a particular memory location, that contains all the relevant information about the object, and then you create a pointer to that memory location and pass the pointer to the subroutine."

        Comment


        • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
          One obvious possibility would seem to be at the level of quantum physics. Some versions of it posit interactions with other dimensions / universes. Perhaps one or more of those have quite different properties to ours. Perhaps in one of those universes, consciousness and qualia are fundamental properties of that universe in the same sort of way that sub-atomic particles are in ours. Perhaps evolution in this universe discovered by chance that it could get a lot more bang for its buck if it organized the brain synapses in such a way that they happened to use this quantum effect to draw on the properties of that other universe. In the same way as you'd get a laptop to establish a remote connection to a supercomputer to get a whole lot more computing done than you otherwise could, perhaps evolution has happened upon this method of connecting to a universe with mental properties and so is able to evolve much smarter beings much more easily than it otherwise would have. They'd have superior survival value. But their mental functions would not actually be occurring in this material universe, merely connected to it.
          Nevertheless, although interesting, all of this remains very much in the realm of hypothetical speculation.

          Another completely different way of considering it, is if I were to suppose that this universe might be a computer game, and we were players in it - like The Sims, or The Matrix, or a VR game, or any computer game. Asking how the two interact from the perspective of the in-game universe is potentially unanswerable because true reality is the out-of-game universe which might run according to an extremely different set of physics rules to the in-game universe. e.g. if we consider it from the point of view of say, Mario, in Super Mario Bros, he might ask "by what combination of blocks and pipes does my 'game' world interact with the 'real' universe?", but actually that's a meaningless question because the out-of-game universe doesn't run on the blocks and pipes Mario's familiar with and those are completely simulated by software, and that software runs on computer hardware that obeys nothing like the physics that his in-game universe follows.
          I quite agree that we may well be living in a virtual universe of some sort, like a computer game, and this concept is supported by several physicists – Neil deGrasse Tyson being one and cosmologist Alan Guth being another. Some argue that it is more likely than not.

          I know it's tempting to assume that if something else interacts with the material world it must itself be 'material'... but in general it's not true that just because two things interact that they are the same kind of thing. You could have a set of mathematical rules explaining how the interactions affect both entities without the entities themselves being the same kind of things. I don't think it's helpful to go down the path of 'everything that interactions with matter, even via quantum physics, even from other universes with very different properties, is, by definition, 'material'', because it tends to make the meaning of the words 'material' and 'immaterial' meaningless.
          The problem is the actual mechanics of HOW an immaterial entity such as a ‘mind’ or ‘soul’ can actually connect and interact with a material entity such as a biological brain so as to exert influence. This is a logically incoherent concept.
          “He felt that his whole life was a kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.” - Douglas Adams.

          Comment


          • Originally posted by Stoic View Post

            I've seen the question before, and I realize that it's supposed to be a "showstopper" in the sense of a question that can't be answered even in principle, but I honestly don't understand why it would be. Obviously, if you want an exact answer, it's going to require a lot more neuroscience to be done, and I'll grant that we may not get to that point in our lifetimes.

            But in principle, it doesn't seem to me much different than asking how a subroutine in a computer program can be run "about" a particular object. The answer might be something like, "Well, you obviously can't pass the physical object itself to the subroutine, so you represent the object with a structure that resides at a particular memory location, that contains all the relevant information about the object, and then you create a pointer to that memory location and pass the pointer to the subroutine."
            The argument depends on qualia, or intentionality i.e. first person subjective experience - as far I know there is no analogous ability in computers.
            Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

            Comment


            • Originally posted by Tassman View Post
              I quite agree that we may well be living in a virtual universe of some sort, like a computer game, and this concept is supported by several physicists – Neil deGrasse Tyson being one and cosmologist Alan Guth being another. Some argue that it is more likely than not.
              If that is the case then intelligence and consciousness would be behind it all. A creator or creators if you will...
              Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

              https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

              Comment


              • Originally posted by seer View Post
                The argument depends on qualia, or intentionality i.e. first person subjective experience - as far I know there is no analogous ability in computers.
                I assume you are referring to arguments like those given here. Qualia and consciousness are considered separately from meaning and intentionality. And you'll notice that for each argument there are usually multiple responses, and responses to the responses, etc. I seriously doubt that you and I are going to get any closer to agreement than the professional philosophers do.

                I don't have a lot of training in philosophy (I took one introductory course, and have read a number of books, and done some browsing at philosophy websites), so the arguments tend to be hard to follow. I don't have much incentive to do a deep dive into the subject as long as there are some philosophers who agree with me. And there appear to be plenty who agree with me about physicalism.

                Comment


                • Originally posted by seer View Post
                  I quite agree that we may well be living in a virtual universe of some sort, like a computer game
                  If that is the case then intelligence and consciousness would be behind it all. A creator or creators if you will...
                  They would only be creators of the computer game, not of the reality they themselves live in. And they would be us or people like us.

                  Worshipping the creators of a computer game while playing that computer game seems a hilariously stupid thing to do.
                  "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                  "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                  "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                  Comment


                  • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                    They would only be creators of the computer game, not of the reality they themselves live in. And they would be us or people like us.

                    Worshipping the creators of a computer game while playing that computer game seems a hilariously stupid thing to do.
                    Would they though? Be like us? They would have total control and power over our lives, down to the detail. That is rather god like. Besides this is getting very close Berkeley's Idealism.
                    Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

                    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

                    Comment


                    • Originally posted by seer View Post

                      If that is the case then intelligence and consciousness would be behind it all. A creator or creators if you will...
                      WE may well be the "intelligence and consciousness" that is behind it all". In short, our universe may be a simulated virtual universe and our predecessors its "creator". This makes as much sense as speculating that 'god did it'. More sense, actually.

                      "Do We Live in a Simulation? Chances Are about 50–50".

                      https://www.scientificamerican.com/a...e-about-50-50/





                      “He felt that his whole life was a kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.” - Douglas Adams.

                      Comment


                      • Originally posted by seer View Post
                        Would they though? Be like us?
                        Well if the analogy is a computer game, then yes, the computer games I play are programmed by people like me. I've even programmed a computer game before myself (a simple Spider-Solitaire-like card game), so in that sense the programmer would be exactly like me.

                        They would have total control and power over our lives, down to the detail.
                        Again, if you were playing a computer game and worshipped the programmer, that would be generally viewed as indicating something very mentally wrong with you. Most Christians would get very offended at the idea of you worshipping another human.

                        Besides this is getting very close Berkeley's Idealism.
                        Um, so what? I commonly describe myself as an Idealist (in the Berkeley / Mind-Body sense of the term) as I've mentioned lots on tweb.
                        "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                        "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                        "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                        Comment


                        • Originally posted by Tassman View Post
                          WE may well be the "intelligence and consciousness" that is behind it all". In short, our universe may be a simulated virtual universe and our predecessors its "creator". This makes as much sense as speculating that 'god did it'. More sense, actually.

                          "Do We Live in a Simulation? Chances Are about 50–50".

                          https://www.scientificamerican.com/a...e-about-50-50/
                          I think it's definitely worth distinguishing between two really different forms of the simulation hypothesis:

                          1. One is the computer game hypothesis, where we are players who exist in the higher-level universe in which the computer game has been made, and while playing the game live a 'life' inside the in-game universe. Upon 'death' inside the game we would then either 'respawn' with another life in the in-game universe, or fall out of the game and back into our real lives in the higher level universe. In this scenario our existence is independent of the game.

                          2. A second, very different scenario, is that someone in the higher-level universe is running a simulation, and we are entirely constructs of the simulation and live entirely within the simulation universe. When we die in the simulation, we die for real, as we have no existence in the higher-level universe. The creator of the simulation may not realize we exist, as they might have created the simulation to study intergalactic clusters, or supernovas, or something else that interests them, and not even realized that the quantum physics they fed into their supercomputer for the simulation had given rise to evolution and humans and thinking beings. They might be utterly shocked and horrified to know they'd created and killed trillions of thinking beings with their little science experiment. I think it's probably okay to call this second hypothesis 'deism' so long as we realize that does not imply any level of knowledge or intentionality on the part of the 'creator'.
                          "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                          "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                          "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                          Comment


                          • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                            I think it's definitely worth distinguishing between two really different forms of the simulation hypothesis:

                            1. One is the computer game hypothesis, where we are players who exist in the higher-level universe in which the computer game has been made, and while playing the game live a 'life' inside the in-game universe. Upon 'death' inside the game we would then either 'respawn' with another life in the in-game universe, or fall out of the game and back into our real lives in the higher level universe. In this scenario our existence is independent of the game.
                            Nick Bostrom presents an analysis of the possibility that we might all be living in a computer simulation. He concludes that it is not only possible, but rather probable. He argues that it is future generations of humanity, who have created this simulated universe specifically for our post-human selves based upon the enormous amounts of computing power that will be available in the future. Hence, those inside the “computer-game” are our future selves.

                            2. A second, very different scenario, is that someone in the higher-level universe is running a simulation, and we are entirely constructs of the simulation and live entirely within the simulation universe. When we die in the simulation, we die for real, as we have no existence in the higher-level universe. The creator of the simulation may not realize we exist, as they might have created the simulation to study intergalactic clusters, or supernovas, or something else that interests them, and not even realized that the quantum physics they fed into their supercomputer for the simulation had given rise to evolution and humans and thinking beings. They might be utterly shocked and horrified to know they'd created and killed trillions of thinking beings with their little science experiment. I think it's probably okay to call this second hypothesis 'deism' so long as we realize that does not imply any level of knowledge or intentionality on the part of the 'creator'.
                            Your argument seems to be that either that we are constructs within a simulation and live and die entirely within the simulation-universe for reasons of which we have no knowledge or which we cannot discern.

                            OR

                            that we are an accident – an unwitting or unknown byproduct of the esoteric intentions of a MUCH higher intelligence. But, in either scenario, we really have no idea whether or not this is so. Nor can it affect our lives except as an unverifiable belief.







                            Last edited by Tassman; 08-01-2021, 02:10 AM.
                            “He felt that his whole life was a kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.” - Douglas Adams.

                            Comment


                            • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                              Well if the analogy is a computer game, then yes, the computer games I play are programmed by people like me. I've even programmed a computer game before myself (a simple Spider-Solitaire-like card game), so in that sense the programmer would be exactly like me.

                              Again, if you were playing a computer game and worshipped the programmer, that would be generally viewed as indicating something very mentally wrong with you. Most Christians would get very offended at the idea of you worshipping another human.

                              Um, so what? I commonly describe myself as an Idealist (in the Berkeley / Mind-Body sense of the term) as I've mentioned lots on tweb.
                              Except his idealism leads to God, the divine mind - as a matter of fact such a mind it necessary, I'm not sure how you can have his idealism without it.

                              Berkeley claims that an inspection of our ideas shows that they are causally inert. Since there is a continual succession of ideas in our minds, there must be some cause of it. Since this cause can be neither an idea nor a material substance, it must be a spiritual substance. This sets the stage for Berkeley’s argument for the existence of God and the distinction between real things and imaginary things.

                              https://iep.utm.edu/berkeley/

                              Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

                              https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

                              Comment


                              • Originally posted by Tassman View Post

                                WE may well be the "intelligence and consciousness" that is behind it all". In short, our universe may be a simulated virtual universe and our predecessors its "creator". This makes as much sense as speculating that 'god did it'. More sense, actually.
                                And how do you know that God didn't create the simulation?

                                Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

                                https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

                                Comment

                                Related Threads

                                Collapse

                                Topics Statistics Last Post
                                Started by whag, Yesterday, 03:01 PM
                                14 responses
                                53 views
                                0 likes
                                Last Post rogue06
                                by rogue06
                                 
                                Started by whag, 03-17-2024, 04:55 PM
                                21 responses
                                129 views
                                0 likes
                                Last Post Hypatia_Alexandria  
                                Started by whag, 03-14-2024, 06:04 PM
                                78 responses
                                414 views
                                0 likes
                                Last Post tabibito  
                                Started by whag, 03-13-2024, 12:06 PM
                                45 responses
                                303 views
                                1 like
                                Last Post Hypatia_Alexandria  
                                Working...
                                X