Cogito ergo sum. Thoughts and the act of thinking is (probably) the most powerful proof of my own existence.
If I think, then I exist. Therefore, I need thoughts to be sure about my own existence and circumstances.
Deleted UserFebruary 22, 2022 at 06:49#6577610 likes
Cogito ergo sum. Thoughts and the act of thinking is (probably) the most powerful proof of my own existence.
If I think, then I exist. Therefore, I need thoughts to be sure about my own existence and circumstances.
Now consider where your thoughts come from. What is the source and origin of thoughts?
javi2541997February 22, 2022 at 06:58#6577630 likes
Empiricism. I was taught when I was a kid the act of reasoning. Then, I elaborate my own thoughts. I'm not going to say they are "inherent"
The experience itself has taught me a basic principle that if I have thoughts then I can prove my existence.
Deleted UserFebruary 22, 2022 at 07:02#6577650 likes
Empiricism. I was taught when I was a kid the act of reasoning. Then, I elaborate my own thoughts. I'm not going to say they are "inherent"
The experience itself has taught me a basic principle that if I have thoughts then I can prove my existence.
Ah, but what entity is responsible for generating the conceptual framework of Empiricism? After all, Empiricism is little more than a cluster of coherent thoughts that are formed into an actionable group of concepts. So, where the hell do thoughts come from? From what computational device do they arise to be formulated into those concepts?
javi2541997February 22, 2022 at 07:20#6577690 likes
Those concepts come from the act of understanding. We need being taught through a good education what is the meaning of the world which is surrounded to us. "thoughts" could be a general terms which involves many aspects of our ordinary lives.
For example: you mix with and black to get grease colour. This act came from the pure act of thinking but probably we weren't aware of it. Nevertheless, we were taught in class what is going on with the mix of colours
Reply to ZzzoneiroCosm Are there determinate entities we might call "thoughts". I would say 'no' because thinking is a process. There is certainly thinking. When we say there are determinate entities it is usually because we can look at and examine them. Can we do this with thoughts? I don't think so, thoughts are known only in the thinking of them, or reflexively known only in remembering that we have thought them; which amounts to thinking them again.
Michael SolFebruary 22, 2022 at 09:17#6577900 likes
I'm with the WTF group. Thoughts are your experience of Neural Activity, there is nothing mysterious about them.
And if a Consciousness proves your own existence, how about this? The Existence of your Consciousness proves the existence of the Objectively Extant, Material Universe that evolved you, for there is no way to create a consciousness through natural process except by evolving them in a Material World.
Created consciousness do not exist, and the notion that Consciousnesses were created by some powerful, non-material Being we've never had any proof of is just silly, and ignores the regression problem of the Creators Creators.....
So, the real Meditation One is I think, and therefore, All You Zombies exist.
javi2541997February 22, 2022 at 09:50#6577940 likes
And if a Consciousness proves your own existence, how about this?
It proves your existence because thinking and reasoning are acts which involve human nature. It one of the aspects which differ from all the species in the world. I guess a dog does not realize he does "exist". We the humans are concern about it
Deleted UserFebruary 22, 2022 at 13:17#6578280 likes
Those concepts come from the act of understanding. We need being taught through a good education what is the meaning of the world which is surrounded to us.
"thoughts" could be a general terms which involves many aspects of our ordinary lives.
For example: you mix with and black to get grease colour. This act came from the pure act of thinking but probably we weren't aware of it. Nevertheless, we were taught in class what is going on with the mix of colours
Well, I'll stop hitting you with questions. I'm drawing attention to thet fact that, although you're correct, you are correct because you are equipped with computational hardware that in fact produces thought, understandings, datat accrual, and the production of concepts, among many millions of other things. I am of course talking about the brain. And, generally that's correct about colors/ There are numerous pathways that are used to interpret sight, the thalamus, a couple visual cortexes, and the occipital lobe all work togethor to piece things to gather rapidly in accordance with the natural properties of that being processes in sight.
However, given the nature of the original question, can such a question be applied to 'sight?' Is is 'sight' "real" or is it a self-contained, non-corporeal process? What do you think about that kind of question?
And, generally that's correct about colors/ There are numerous pathways that are used to interpret sight, the thalamus, a couple visual cortexes, and the occipital lobe all work togethor to piece things to gather rapidly in accordance with the natural properties of that being processes in sight.
What is your position on Mary's Room?
javi2541997February 22, 2022 at 15:17#6578630 likes
Is is 'sight' "real" or is it a self-contained, non-corporeal process? What do you think about that kind of question?
I see your point and the article you shared is so interesting. They develop a scientific theory which explains what is going on when our sight receives lights and pixels. Yes I am agree that how our brain works in this context is innate. But, whether you would not believe it or not, empiricism takes part with big importance for the following argument:
What our eyes recieve in the nature is composed by a vocabulary created by the humans to establish an order. Thus, Jonh Locke, call them as "primary emotions" and "secondary emotions". We can say "light" or the pixels themselves are primary while the colours are secondary. The interesting fact comes when we match up the colours. Check this: imaginary color
Specially the following paragraph:
If we match up the color wheel with the electromagic spectrum of light, we have a considerable puzzle, for in the latter there is only one way to get from blue to red, and it passes through all the other colors, but not through purple. Violet may look a bit like purple, but it has nothing to do with red. What is going on? The discipline we need to understand this is not physics or art, but physiology. The eye has certain receptors on the retina that detect color, the "cones." These come with three different sensitivities. Hence the three "primary" colors. True purple, for which there seems to be no place in the physical spectrum, is something we see when the cones sensitive to blue and red are both stimulated, giving us something like an imaginary color.
1.Mary knows everything there is to know about brain states and their properties.
2.It is not the case that Mary knows everything there is to know about sensations and their properties.
3.Therefore, sensations and their properties are not the same (?) as the brain states and their properties.
Premise 1 and 2 of this proposition are contradictory according to modern neuroscience, therefore not true and invalid respectively: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211124720311177
Or
1. Mary (before her release) knows everything physical there is to know about other people.
2. Mary (before her release) does not know everything there is to know about other people (because she learns something about them on her release).
3. Therefore, there are truths about other people (and herself) which escape the physicalist story
This proposition relies on the objective fact values that are implicit, i.e. "before her release." You see? This version of the proposition has objective reality as an implicit characteristic of its argument.
So, it needs real revision.
Deleted UserFebruary 22, 2022 at 16:43#6578900 likes
I see your point and the article you shared is so interesting. They develop a scientific theory which explains what is going on when our sight receives lights and pixels. Yes I am agree that how our brain works in this context is innate.
So, Cosm and I have been going back and forth about this for over week, on what appeared to him to be incompatible propositions. Such being: thoughts exist as opposed to thoughts do not exist. It took a bit, but I have explained to him that what we generally use the term "thoughts" to describe, are actually neuronal processes of computation by the brain, and that perception of those computations is also a function of the brain provide by the pre-frontal cortex. That the processes are objective and corporeal, but the perception that is "thoughts" themselves are not. But, it turns out that functionally, the two are the exact same process and can be embodied through behavior, which is why the brain produces them in the first place.
What our eyes recieve in the nature is composed by a vocabulary created by the humans to establish an order.
No, what our eyes recieve is data derived from naturally emergent material forces of nature, which are composed of matter, energy, quanta, time, and space, and language is the conceptual framework that consciousness develops as one of many means to navigate that domain of perceptual data to achieve and/or maximize homeostasis of the individual conscious perceiver(s) within the context of that domain.
Thus, Jonh Locke, call them as "primary emotions" and "secondary emotions". We can say "light" or the pixels themselves are primary while the colours are secondary.
John Locke was thinking well on the subject, but incorrect. "Emotion" is a computational system of interworking systems within the brain used to reinforce behavior. This is done primarily through the pleasure seeking mechanisms, for which there are many, including the ventral tegmental area which is comprised of about 70% dopiminergic neurons that coordinates behavior with the thalamus and the motor cortexes. And which also uses pain as a metric for its determination of what constitutes pleasure, interestingly enough. The more pleasurable, the more "primary" in the Lockean manner. The more displeasurable, the more such an experience is catalogued into the "domain of disinterest" protocols, as it were, and the more such disinterest is reinforced by negative emotions. Disgust being a very, very powerful emotion regarding disinterest and behavior thereby informed.
We can say "light" or the pixels themselves are primary while the colours are secondary.
Yes, there's data accrual which is basic information relay, or Primary, so to speak. Then there is distribution of data to numerous structures of the brain for computational assessment. Those assessments build actionable coherence in regards to said data, which informs more behavior, and thus more experience and the whole process strats again ad infinitum in feedbackloop. Which is why you need to take habitualiztion very seriously.
If we match up the color wheel with the electromagic spectrum of light, we have a considerable puzzle, for in the latter there is only one way to get from blue to red, and it passes through all the other colors, but not through purple. Violet may look a bit like purple, but it has nothing to do with red. What is going on? The discipline we need to understand this is not physics or art, but physiology. The eye has certain receptors on the retina that detect color, the "cones." These come with three different sensitivities. Hence the three "primary" colors. True purple, for which there seems to be no place in the physical spectrum, is something we see when the cones sensitive to blue and red are both stimulated, giving us something like an imaginary color.
Very cool idea. Color itself is imaginary. It's a bit like asking if thoughts are real. If color is not something that actually exists, but is instead correspondent to frequency of waves, then what do we make of the perception? Well, you determine of such a distinction made by the brain has actionable utility. Which, of course, color does to the perceiver, it allows us to understand reality with more clarity in the only way the brain has been developed to map those distinctions to perception itself for its own benefit. It's fucking amazing.
John Locke was thinking well on the subject, but incorrect.
You are correct. Sorry, I was mistaken. Emotion is not the correct word here. What I wanted to argument were qualities. I think what Jonh Locke pretend to explain is that there are two groups of realties: Those with primary qualities (the first perception we have through the eyes) and then secondary qualities (when we match up colours and then we are able to even create imaginary colour as Violet, a pretty different colour from Magenta). Again, I want to quote John Locke:
2dly, Such Qualities, which in truth are nothing in the Objects themselves, but Powers to produce various Sensations in us by their primary Qualities, i.e. by the Bulk, Figure, Texture, and Motion of their insensible parts, as Colours, Sounds, Tasts, etc. These I call secondary Qualities. [An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Book II, Chapter VIII]
Counterpunch: In my view, construing colour as subjective in nature is a product of the "subjectivism industry" that characterises most of philosophy, religion, politics, the humanities, literature, culture.
Conclusion: Despite the fact there is a physiological study of the stimulus we receive. We the humans also create imaginary and subjective aspects through empiricism.
Deleted UserFebruary 22, 2022 at 17:28#6579030 likes
So computation is the basis for thoughts (and presumably consciousness)?
As far as what is currently understood in modern cognitive neuroscience, and by that I mean every single piece of available data when analyzed together, beyond any question. There is literally not a single piece of evidence that suggests otherwise. And I have an absolute payload of research on hand to demonstrate it.
HeracloitusFebruary 22, 2022 at 17:31#6579040 likes
Is this where you're coming from?
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/computational-mind/
Awesome question, dude. So, no, CTM is not where I'm coming from as an exclusive point of origin. CTM is an essential element of my philosophy that will, one day, have its own page on standford itself. Where I am coming from is my newly emergent, neuro-ethical, psycho-epistemological philosophy that is informed by much of what you'll find in sources of this kind:
Reply to ZzzoneiroCosm Of course thoughts exist. They exist as certainly as anything can.Any argument against their existence would have at least one premise less plausible than the reality of thoughts and thus is doomed to fail.
And someo who thinks thoughts don't exist has, of course, demonstrated their own view to be false.
javi2541997February 22, 2022 at 18:04#6579170 likes
You are correct. Sorry, I was mistaken. Emotion is not the correct word here. What I wanted to argument were qualities. I think what Jonh Locke pretend to explain is that there are two groups of realties: Those with primary qualities (the first perception we have through the eyes) and then secondary qualities (when we match up colours and then we are able to even create imaginary colour as Violet, a pretty different colour from Magenta). Again, I want to quote John Locke:
Yes, of course. Keep in mind I don't fault him on this, it's just we've only recently started really understanding the nature of cognition. But, yeah, from a low-resolution apprehension of the mind, it works well.
Counterpunch:In my view, construing colour as subjective in nature is a product of the "subjectivism industry" that characterises most of philosophy, religion, politics, the humanities, literature, culture.
Yes, subjectivity, which is actionable data accrual and production, is dependent on objective computational hardware (the brain), meaning subjectivity as a stand alone concept is quite literally bullshit. I have a play on words I made a while back:
Nothing is subjective.
Meaning, nothing in existence is subjective, but is instead objective. And the only thing that is subjective is the concept of nothing itself. What do you think?
Despite the fact there is a physiological study of the stimulus we receive. We the humans also create imaginary and subjective aspects through empiricism.
Yep, no question. Meaning subjectivity is dependent on objective facts.
Reply to Garrett Travers I would say that Mary has complete knowledge of seeing red iff she has seen red. Learning the physical facts of seeing red alone is not sufficient. This seems irrefutable to me. It's the old saw that a blind person can read up on seeing as much as they want, but they'll still have no idea what seeing actually is until they experience it.
I am somewhat stumped by the physicalist move of the ability argument- Mary doesn't learn new information, she gains a new ability: what seeing red is. I tend to believe that after she sees red, she does have new propositional knowledge: seeing red [the broad experience] is like seeing red [Mary's experience], but this seems too tautological to be considered some new fact about that world. It also might not be true, since Mary doesn't know what seeing red [in the broad sense] is like. None of us do. We only have access to our own particular experiences.
Learning the physical facts of seeing red alone is not sufficient.
Red is an experience, not a fact. It is a data integration on the part of the brain. It isn't itself real, it is the representation of a wavelength that brain can detect and differentiate objective fact values with.
but this seems too tautological to be considered some new fact about that world.
All sound and all valid arguments are tautological. It is your first clue that you're on to something that could be objective. If the argument is sound, then it is objective, which is exactly what I pointed out to you in the syllogisms. The first one was invalid entirely, and the second one had to incorporate it being sounds, actually true, for it to work. Meaning all that was done with the syllogism was prove that only that which is true is true, which is exactly what logice demonstrates to us.
It also might not be true, since Mary doesn't know what seeing red [in the broad sense] is like. None of us do. We only have access to our own particular experiences.
Sure, but there's nothing to be drawn from an observation that cannot be tested. It cannot be tested because thoughts and perceptions are not themselves real, they are functions of the brain.
Now consider where your thoughts come from. What is the source and origin of thoughts?
I understand where you are coming from. But you redirected the intent of the OP, to change the controversial subject to one less debatable. OP seems to assume the existence of brains. So his question regards the conditional existence of "thoughts" -- e.g. what do they consist of?. If mental phenomena are included in your personal model of reality. in what sense do they exist? Is there more than one way to be? If thoughts are not existent in some sense, why do we have a noun name for them? It's a theoretical philosophical query, not an empirical scientific slam-dunk.
Some people go so far as to reverse the hierarchy of material existence, postulating that Mind is more fundamental than Matter. Of course, they have no empirical evidence to support that position. So, it's just another age-old philosophical conundrum. Why then, does the notion of an immaterial aspect of reality persist in this day & age? It's easy to haughtily label such childlike questions as coming from ignorance or stupidity. But some proponents of a separate realm for invisible & intangible Ideas & Thoughts are manifestly of high IQ. Some are even highly credentialed mathematicians. Are they insane, or is there some philosophical meat to chew on?
My personal worldview is not Either-Or, but BothAnd. So, I can see the reasoning behind both perspectives. Which is why I accept that both Science and Philosophy have valid roles in human culture. And Quantum queerness has just added fuel to that long-burning fire. So, why can't we have an adult conversation about an idea that won't go away? :smile:
Mathematical Reality : Andreas Albrecht of Imperial College in London, called it a "provocative" solution to one of the central problems facing physics. Although he "wouldn't dare" go so far as to say he believes it, he noted that "it's actually quite difficult to construct a theory where everything we see is all there is".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_universe_hypothesis
I understand where you are coming from. But you redirected the intent of the OP, to change the controversial subject to one less debatable.
The OP is literally a response to a discussion him and I had for over a week on the axact same subject. And yes, it is less debatable, because that happens to be what is going to our knowledge.
All evidence points to no corporeal existence. That they are themselves perceptions of the computations of the brain, which is the material aspect of thought.
If thoughts are not existent in some sense, why do we have a noun name for them?
Oh, because of Kant, and Heroclitus, and Descartes, and all manner of people who didn't understand that mind and body weren't seprate, but the very same entity. Thus, the term thoughts is just a name we gave to a phenomenon we didn't understand was actually the brain perceiving its own computations.
But some proponents of a separate realm for invisible & intangible Ideas & Thoughts are manifestly of high IQ.
Not when they posit assertions with no evidence of any kind to ever emerge in the history of science to support them. Then, they manifest a high level of the opposite of intelligence.
Precisely. Their preoccupation with symbolic figures that may or may not correspond to reality has led them to abandon reason in other regards. Case in point: String Theorists.
If your philosophical meat leads you to concluded that reality is not real, or that elements of reality imply its own negation with absolutely no evidence, you are no longer in the realm of philosophy, but mysticism. Kind of like how when you start thinking made-up start shapes in the sky can tell you things about your life, you've left physics. Or, again, String Theorists.
"it's actually quite difficult to construct a theory where everything we see is all there is".
But, be damned if it ain't so that that's all we can seem to find, or have ever observed. An abundance of "aLl ThErE Is." Again, reduction fallacies, argument from ignorance fallacies, it's all the non-materialists have to go on. It's complete bullshit. No man, it is moronic to conclude that complexity and vastness of reality isn't sufficient to explain all there is. There's just no way that that ocean is only filled with that amount of water. Yep, sure is, it's quite a lot, too.
theRiddlerFebruary 23, 2022 at 02:50#6580990 likes
Explain how the brain functions if you're going to insist it functions in such a way that everything is perfectly as it seems (to you.)
You're a little ant building a hill, oblivious to the mountain behind you.
Agent SmithFebruary 23, 2022 at 03:09#6581010 likes
"To say there are no thoughts" (which is a thoight) would be as nonsensical as someone saying 'I do not exist'.
:up: Is Wittegenstein relevant? p-zombies? Does a computer that displays the string "I'm not thinking" or plays the prerecorded message "I'm not thinking" thinking? Re: Descartes' cogito ergo sum.
Is Wittegenstein relevant? p-zombies? Does a computer that displays the string "I'm not thinking" or plays the prerecorded message "I'm not thinking" thinking? Re: Descartes' cogito ergo sum.
Maybe.
No.
No. No.
:chin: Rather: cogitatio fit, ergo cogitatio est. (P. Gassendi?)
Agent SmithFebruary 23, 2022 at 06:46#6581310 likes
Explain how the brain functions if you're going to insist it functions in such a way that everything is perfectly as it seems (to you.)
You're a little ant building a hill, oblivious to the mountain behind you.
If everything looks perfect then there is nothing that needs explaining. The mountain is not my problem.
javi2541997February 23, 2022 at 09:45#6581540 likes
Reply to 180 Proof
:up: :100: dicens, advena fui in terra aliena. :flower:
Explain how the brain functions if you're going to insist it functions in such a way that everything is perfectly as it seems (to you.)
You're a little ant building a hill, oblivious to the mountain behind you.
Oh, am I a little ant? Are we sure the little segmented insect isn't the person who just used such an absurd insult to someone instead of just making an argument? Let me help you little spiny orb:
The brain is the apex manifestation of computation in all the known universe. It is an evolutionarily produced and adapted, multi-structural, interlocking-network of computational systems of bodily regulation, data integretagtion, behavioral information and conveyance, and conceptual abstraction that is responsible for ALL human capacitance, including consciousness itself. It is composed of particularly white and gray matter, neurons, proteins, water, blood vessels, and glial cells, all arranged into different specialized structures with sophisticated pathways of transmission between themselves, that relay information to one another via electromagnetic and chemical processes that when operating together in symphony produce the whole of individual human experience as the emergent will; self-sustaining, self-regulating, and self-motivated.
There's the short rub of how it works, boychik. For individualized operations regarding currently known and observed neural phenomena, you may ask me in specificity on a given topic and will find you something available to discuss. Otherwise, proceed to your own research about the subject and you will quickly discover the truth of everything I'm telling you, and have been telling people about the brain for a very long time. You can start here if you would like:
Oh, because of Kant, and Heroclitus, and Descartes, and all manner of people who didn't understand that mind and body weren't seprate, but the very same entity.
If mind & body are the same entity, shouldn't they have the same properties? Yet, we give them different names & meanings because we perceive a significant difference between them. The body/brain has physical properties, and the mind has "non-physical" qualities. We detect the existence of physical objects via our 5 senses. But we infer the existence of "non-physical" non-things by deduction from circumstantial evidence.
I don't know anyone who denies that there is a causal relationship between Brain & Mind. But, the function of a machine is "non-physical", so we can't see it, and only know it by what it does. Which is how we know there's such a thing as Energy. It has no physical properties, only physical effects. That's also why Kant, Descartes, et al, made a categorical philosophical distinction between Mind & Body.
The Mind/Body problem only arises when some people attribute "non-physical" properties to Mind/Soul that are not rationally inferred, but emotionally imputed : such as Immortality & Ghosts. It's those unverifiable attributions that are debatable, not the intuitive functions such as verbally communicable Thoughts and Ideas. Yet, we can't find physical evidence to support or deny "non-physical" existence.
We simply take other people's thoughts for granted, because of our personal experience with the phenomenon of thinking. But, lacking direct experience with Immortality, we can only argue its existence by comparing opinions & beliefs. We may debate the mysterious hows & whys of Ideal existence, but that's also true of such presumably physical objects as Quarks & sub-quantum Strings. :smile:
Deleted UserFebruary 23, 2022 at 19:31#6583580 likes
If mind & body are the same entity, shouldn't they have the same properties?
The do in chemical and elemental nature, or material. But, no, the individual human being is a complex system of systems with different structures and functions, all contained to the same entity and regulated by the brain. There is no distinction.
Yet, we give them different names & meanings because we perceive a significant difference between them.
Most of our language has been in use long before we understood what I just relayed to you, which is consistent with every piece of experimental data in modern cog-sci.
The body/brain has physical properties, and the mind has "non-physical" qualities.
No, it doesn't. It only has physical qualities that produce the integration of data recieved from other physical properties in the world to inform behavior. The process, just like all processes in the universe that we know, or have any evidence of, are all physical properties and functions.
We detect the existence of physical objects via our 5 senses. But we infer the existence of "non-physical" non-things by deduction from circumstantial evidence.
Senses are a neuronal function. And if your inferences lead you to deduce the existence of non-things, you are not deducing anything, and just playing make-believe, exclusively. There is no such thing as non-things.
The Mind/Body problem only arises when some people attribute "non-physical" properties to Mind/Soul that are not rationally inferred, but emotionally imputed : such as Immortality & Ghosts.
All non-physical properties are make-believe, and come from 2000 years of Christian vitiation and oppression of actual philosophy. And is predominantly the inspiration for most modern systems of ethics, even the one's that claim atheism.
It's those unverifiable attributions that are debatable, not the intuitive functions such as verbally communicable Thoughts and Ideas
The thoughts are in fact the functions. There are no "thoughts," just computations which are observed through executive function, another brain function. It's a trick of the light you see. It's like saying movement is somehow different from the brain function in humans, it's completely not true.
We simply take other people's thoughts for granted, because of our personal experience with the phenomenon of thinking. But, lacking direct experience with Immortality, we can only argue its existence by comparing opinions & beliefs.
We actually can't even do that. There is no argument for it, any premise generated will be one from ignorance, or a fabrication of some kind. Which is to say "opinions and beliefs," devoid of correspondence.
We may debate the mysterious hows & whys of Ideal existence, but that's also true of such presumably physical objects as Quarks & sub-quantum Strings.
Everything but Strings, yes. The domain of ideal existence exploration is here, right here on earth, with me, with you, with facts, reason, evidence, data, empiricism, and the primacy of the Human Consciousness as an inviolable entity. That's where our only hope lies, and the hour is late. I say we get to it, brother.
Red is an experience, not a fact. It is a data integration on the part of the brain. It isn't itself real, it is the representation of a wavelength that brain can detect and differentiate objective fact values with.
The experience of seeing red certainly is real. So is being in pain. To deny the reality of experience is extremely counter-intuitive, and something I can't get on board with. I think your claim is more along the lines of experiences are illusions. Is that more accurate? Very Dennettian, if so!
Deleted UserFebruary 23, 2022 at 19:46#6583680 likes
Same thing. Pain is a mechanism used to accurately determine that which constitutes homeostasis inducing experience, or reinforce the avoidance of homeostatic disruptions. It is in fact the computations of the hardward itself that is the real thing. The neuronal processes that send the messages.
To deny the reality of experience is extremely counter-intuitive, and something I can't get on board with.
I don't deny experience. I deny the strange amorphis reduction that is "experience isn't neural function," but is instead some thing, without corporeal form that we feel, and is real itself, with material properties, that are never described by anyone at all, including any known science. I regard experience as MORE valuable than most people, because I understand where it comes from, how it is detected by us, at why it is happening as an instrinsic function of our nature. My perspective is far more beautiful, poetic, liberating, and marvelous than some quack mind/body dichotamy that has never made any sense other than, "well, that's the only way I can imagine it, so it must be true." It isn't.
I think your claim is more along the lines of experiences are illusions. Is that more accurate?
No, experiences are the result of 3.5 billion years of evolution to produce a computation piece of organic hardware more sophisticated than any in the known universe in accordfance with natures strictures, that it may use such experiences to not on achieve homeostasis, but maximize it for, not just the individual experiencer, but all who were willing to participate in the reality which fashioned us its beholders. You seeing what I'm saying to you know, brother? Perhaps it will really sink in if you spend a day, just one day, dedicated to trying to disprove this thesis with experimental research reports on these matters. I guarantee you that you will find nothing that contradicts what I have said here that isn't motivated by an agenda, reductionist, ignorance fallacy laced, or just plain woo. I beseech any and all to join me in the marvelling at this actual miracle that we were designed by the objective laws of reality to be and enjoy.
For a biologist there may be no distinction, because he's interested in mechanisms, not functions. But for psychologists and philosophers, the meaning in a mind is the "difference that makes a difference". :nerd:
No, photons have mass, what are you talking about? Light and energy are material forces.
Photons only have mass when they slow down and transform into matter. Besides, Mass is not a material object, but a mathematical function otherwise known as "inertia". It's defined as a "property" of matter, but not as matter per se. A property is a mental attribution, a thought.
Energy-in-general likewise transforms into mass only when it slows from lightspeed into velocities our senses can detect. They are different forms of the same fundamental force, which is neither light nor matter, but the potential for both. Their distinct measurable properties are how scientists distinguish between each form and give it a special name. For example, an electron is intermediate between photon and matter. Hence, deserves its own designation.
Unfortunately, Mind & Thought have no measurable properties apart from their associated material or energetic forms. Their existence must be inferred indirectly. :smile:
What is Mass? : mass, in physics, quantitative measure of inertia, a fundamental property of all matter. It is, in effect, the resistance that a body of matter offers to a change in its speed or position upon the application of a force.
https://www.britannica.com/science/mass-physics
"But, the function of a machine is "non-physical", so we can't see it, and only know it by what it does" — Gnomon
No. You need to brush up on cog-sci, this is an utterly unscientific assertion. Yes, we can see it through functional mri.
That assertion is a category error. It confuses the function of an MRI machine --- to display the Effects of a magnetic field on the iron molecules in blood --- with brain functions. MRI images require a human Mind to interpret that feedback in terms of malfunctions. :worry:
Yep, and they were wrong, all of them. I wish I could say it to their faces.
It's too bad that you can't argue with dead white men. But you could in theory tell Neurobiologist Christof Koch that he's wrong about The Feeling of Life Itself. The "feeling" he refers to is not a physical object, or a neuronal computation, but something else entirely. He calls it a "hack", but it's essentially an emergent Quality, which can't be measured, but can be experienced. He even toys with the notion of Panpsychism (i.e. widespread). Is he "wrong", in your expert opinion? You could suggest that he "brush-up on cog-sci". :wink:
The Feeling of Life Itself : Why Consciousness Is Widespread but Can't Be Computed
https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/feeling-life-itself
The thoughts are in fact the functions. There are no "thoughts," just computations which are observed through executive function, another brain function.
A "function" is a mathematical concept, not a tangible object. See the Koch quotes above & below for his opinion on thoughts as computations. In what sense is a computation a material thing? :grin:
Confessions of a Romantic Reductionist :
[i]What links conscious experience of pain, joy, color, and smell to bioelectrical activity in the brain? How can anything physical give rise to nonphysical, subjective, conscious states? . . .
In which I muse about final matters considered off-limits to polite scientific discourse: to wit, the relationship between science and religion, the existence of God, whether this God can intervene in the universe, the death of my mentor, and my recent tribulations[/i]
http://cognet.mit.edu/book/consciousness
That's because that which does not exist leaves no evidence of itself having not existed, except the absence of evidence existence itself.
You, perhaps deliberately, missed the point of "non-physical existence". If ideas & thoughts are experienced in your reality, then they have an existence of some kind. It's just a question of labeling. Consciousness researchers refer to "ideas", not as material things, but as immaterial "representations" of both objective things and subjective thoughts. Long after the idea or feeling is gone, we can recall then in the form of Memories, which are also subjective Thoughts. :nerd:
Representationalism : philosophical theory of knowledge based on the assertion that the mind perceives only mental images (representations) of material objects outside the mind, not the objects themselves.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/representationism
Everything but Strings, yes. The domain of ideal existence exploration is here, right here on earth,
Are you denying the existence of "Strings" & "Loops". You may not be able to see them, even in principle, but the idea of such entities certainly "exist" as thoughts or feelings in the functioning minds of earth-bound mathematicians. They don't attempt to prove their existence empirically, but merely ask you to take it on faith, until they are eventually able to use the power of Strings to cause changes in the real world. Meanwhile, their only evidence is long strings of abstract numbers & symbols that are intended to "represent" unseen things. :joke:
Deleted UserFebruary 24, 2022 at 02:27#6585380 likes
For a biologist there may be no distinction, because he's interested in mechanisms, not functions. But for psychologists and philosophers, the meaning in a mind is the "difference that makes a difference".
Thought, all thought, what you call the "mind," is a function of the brain. There remains no distinction, until one can be shown. Philosophy does not ignore established science, it abstracts from it and applies it to the philosophical framework with which he/she is operating. For this "difference that makes a difference," to be anything other than other than fabricated woo, each difference is going to have to be clearly explained, and then shown to exist outside of neural function. I'll wait for any explainer on earth to provide me this information. Hint: I'll not be getting any.
Photons only have mass when they slow down and transform into matter. Besides, Mass is not a material object, but a mathematical function otherwise known as "inertia". It's defined as a "property" of matter, but not as matter per se. A property is a mental attribution, a thought.
Mm, no. Mass is a desginated term to describe the functional, objectively verifiable effect that matter has upon space and time as a ubiquitous propert of all matter, stick with science, it's better than make believe. But, it doesn't need to be defined "as matter, per se," to be a property of matter, just like your brain is matter. A property is a mental attribute. Mental attributes are generated by the brain.
Energy-in-general likewise transforms into mass only when it slows from lightspeed into velocities our senses can detect. They are different forms of the same fundamental force, which is neither light nor matter, but the potential for both. Their distinct measurable properties are how scientists distinguish between each form and give it a special name. For example, an electron is intermediate between photon and matter. Hence, deserves its own designation.
You're doing nothing but describing the properties of matter, which is what I said, all variations of which have mass and relate to eachother in material terms . Mass is itself energy. I don't understand where this is going. There is nothing in reality that is non-material.
Unfortunately, Mind & Thought have no measurable properties apart from their associated material or energetic forms. Their existence must be inferred indirectly.
Right, they have to be measured to the best of human ability from the perspective of their source, which is the brain according to all scientific observation. Any ideas what else it could be, if not the organ that regualtes all functions of the body?
That assertion is a category error. It confuses the function of an MRI machine --- to display the Effects of a magnetic field on the iron molecules in blood --- with brain functions. MRI images require a human Mind to interpret that feedback in terms of malfunctions.
Is this an argument? We already know which areas of the brain are which. We use fMRI's to investigate the functions of those areas. Are you actually implying that, not only are these methods not permissible evidence of function, but that such an assertion is an argument for brain functions not producing what you don't want them to be responsible for producing? Is that what you're getting at here?
He calls it a "hack", but it's essentially an emergent Quality, which can't be measured, but can be experienced
An emergent quality, for which he can provide no evidence to demonstrate the existence this hack with, but it is understood that if his brain stops functioning, then it stops emerging....... He should probably replace the h with a q.
Is he "wrong", in your expert opinion? You could suggest that he "brush-up on cog-sci".
That would help him very much, yes this is clearly complete bullshit. I see minds in every place except the one that seems to be the source and is in contol of all other bodily functions, emotional regulations, and behavioral patterns. Yes, dear fellow, it's the definition of complete bullshit, and science can no longer help him if he does much more than entertain this. In fact, it's probably science keeping him from doing so, as it would with all reasonable people who don't believe made-up concepts.
Because computation happens via chemical and electromagnetic interactions, comprise of elements and energy, in material structures through material fibers. Just like how when your computer turns of, it has no more function. Bit like that, same thing happes to your brain when its material functions stop, just teensy exponetial bit more complex than a computer.
What links conscious experience of pain, joy, color, and smell to bioelectrical activity in the brain? How can anything physical give rise to nonphysical, subjective, conscious states? . . .
In which I muse about final matters considered off-limits to polite scientific discourse: to wit, the relationship between science and religion, the existence of God, whether this God can intervene in the universe, the death of my mentor, and my recent tribulations
Luckily the answer is, there's no such thing as non-physical. Subjectivity is the result of individual data accrual from an individual brain, within individual environmental conditions, just like all variations in reality. And this is exactly the mysticism clouding your mind here, this god business. There is none.
If ideas & thoughts are experienced in your reality, then they have an existence of some kind. It's just a question of labeling. Consciousness researchers refer to "ideas", not as material things, but as immaterial "representations" of both objective things and subjective thoughts. Long after the idea or feeling is gone, we can recall then in the form of Memories, which are also subjective Thoughts. :nerd:
Yes, that's because with Emperor Constantine, Christians took state power in Rome and murdered the Empiricists who had postulated consciousness as a physical process over a thousand years ago, and since then, science, philosophy, and language have been burdened by mystic nonsense that keeps them from understanding that "ideas," are functions of a brain that controls everything else in the body, and no longer performs those functions when key structures of it are traumatized, or cessation of operation happens. And a big part of this problem is that, of 320 million or so people that live in America, abot 240 million are Christian, and the rest are some form of variation of religious, and to learn that consciousness was a physical process, would be the end of their worldview. So, all of those old ideas originally given rise to by mysticism, are all still here ruining everything. And memory recall and storage are functions of the brain. This is all retrievable information.
If you can't compare opinions and beliefs, what are we doing on this forum? Are we teleporting physical objects over cyber-space?
I cannot functionally compare a belief with or opinion with no substance with anything. One can simple play negation, which isn't comparing, or debating. Which is what that anti-realists do here quite a bit. And no, your teleporting virtual representations of code through material, using material laws of physics.
You may not be able to see them, even in principle, but the idea of such entities certainly "exist" as thoughts or feelings in the functioning minds of earth-bound mathematicians.
The functions do. Theories are concepts, they don't exist, they have to be embodied, or employed upon the objective world in behavior. It's why you can't fly, even if you generate a theory of you having wings. See how that works, there?
They don't attempt to prove their existence empirically, but merely ask you to take it on faith, until they are eventually able to use the power of Strings to cause changes in the real world.
Um... No. No, is my answer to that request. When they can demonstrate, I'll change my tune immediately.
Meanwhile, their only evidence is long strings of abstract numbers & symbols that are intended to "represent" unseen things.
Sounds just like a bible verse I know about... You know the one, eh? Something... Something is the reassurance of that which goes unseen..... Something like that?
For this "difference that makes a difference," to be anything other than other than fabricated woo, each difference is going to have to be clearly explained, and then shown to exist outside of neural function. I'll wait for any explainer on earth to provide me this information. Hint: I'll not be getting any.
I agree with that last prediction. You won't be getting any empirical evidence for mental phenomena. Not due to absence of evidence, but to categorical rejection of Reasoning as evidential. It's also a rejection of common sense & intuition as evidence of something unseen, but obvious. Such hard-evidence skepticism is a good policy for scientific exploration of classical physical phenomena. But it breaks down at the Quantum level, where the evidence is mostly inference from circumstances. For example, atom-smashers don't directly reveal sub-atomic particles. Instead the existence & properties of such things must be inferred from circumstantial evidence (e.g. tracks in a cloud chamber). So, scientific knowledge of such ephemeral entities depends on agreement between the opinions of experts doing the experiments. The rest of us must take their word for the existence of Quarks & Neutrinos. They can't show us the evidence, because it exists only as subjective ideas in their minds.
Likewise, no-one can show us direct evidence of other minds, because it's circumstantial & inferential. We know our own minds directly by the feeling of thinking (cogito ergo sum). The epistemological question of Solipsism only arises when we look for tangible evidence of Other Minds. We can cut their skulls open to see if they have a brain. But, even zombles have brains; which is, presumably, why they have to eat brains to keep their resurrected bodies going. Since you are holding out for empirical evidence of res cogitans, the only evidence you will find is for res extensa. That's why nobody doubts the existence of Brains, but a few hyper-skeptics will demand sensory evidence of Minds. They take their own thinking-thing for granted, but demand objective proof for all other minds. That's what we call Solipsism.
A solipsist seems to think of himself as a machine, running a program. In which case, he is a robot, and has no Will of his own. His cause & effect logic is impeccable, except that he denies the First Cause : the Programmer. Are you self-programmed? Do you think for yourself, or as directed by some outside force, such as Destiny? The Mind/Body problem turns on the question of Free Will. They go hand-in-hand. If you doubt your own Willpower, you will also doubt your own Mind. But, that's OK. According to the Constitution, brain-eating Zombies have equal rights with law-minding citizens. Except for the brain-eating thing : in a court of law, the mindless defense will not get you off for a murder rap . :confused:
Clear explanation of The Difference :
https://www.informationphilosopher.com/solutions/scientists/bateson/
circumstantial evidence, in law, evidence not drawn from direct observation of a fact in issue.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/circumstantial-evidence
problem of other minds, in philosophy, the problem of justifying the commonsensical belief that others besides oneself possess minds and are capable of thinking or feeling somewhat as one does oneself.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/circumstantial-evidence
Why do most neuroscientists remain strict materialists? :
[i]There is no evidence to suggest otherwise. Neuroscientists, like all scientists, are quantitatively driven. If you can't measure it, it doesn't exist. Since you can't measure mind, you can't quantify mind—so by definition, it's not physical. . . .
This debate dates back to the early 1900’s and the quantum era, when physicists like Einstein and Heisenberg were exploring the tools we have to measure objective reality, and realized that there is a point where humans can never transcend their subjective assessment of reality. It’s impossible. There is no way out of that matrix, if you will.[/i]
___Dr. Jay Lombard, neurologist
Deleted UserFebruary 24, 2022 at 19:04#6589200 likes
You won't be getting any empirical evidence for mental phenomena.
No, you misunderstand, I have loads of empirical evidence of that. I need empirical evidence that would suggest that not only is all of the current empirical evidence for my position not applicable, but that it in fact is another source of mental phenomena for which evidence can also be provided, you see? You'll need both sets of data. Or, it is nothing but woo.
but to categorical rejection of Reasoning as evidential.
You can't do that, because you just used your reason to state a fact about evidence, therefore your reasoning cannot be trusted in this assertion of yours on the nature of evidence, as reason is not evidence and cannot be used to conclude such a fact about evidence. The actual truth, is that reason does contitute evidence, and I'll be needing to see some for woo to stop being woo. I'll wait.
But it breaks down at the Quantum level, where the evidence is mostly inference from circumstances.
No, it does not. There are aspects of quantum mechanics that are not understood yet, ut nothing about the nature of empiricism breaks down, and nothing about our models of reality break down. Quantum mechanics is an incorpoarted aspect into the existing paradigm of physics conducted to this point that has been verified, and it is specifically empiricism that reveals any understanding whatsoever about the nature of quantum mechanics, which is a compatible feature of the macroscopic reality to which it contributes. Furthermore, a break down, even if it did exist, would not constitute evidence of wherever you think this non-coporeal source of consciousness is, you will still need to provide evidence of that to make the claim, not just negate empiricism, which you have done in no way.
The rest of us must take their word for the existence of Quarks & Neutrinos. They can't show us the evidence, because it exists only as subjective ideas in their minds.
Mm, no, dude. The evidence is empirically observed and is being verified more and more each year. There is only the concensus in the scientific community that the universe is material. Particularly material as opposed to anti-material. You're just making things up. Stop it: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/04/200415133657.htm
Likewise, no-one can show us direct evidence of other minds, because it's circumstantial & inferential.
No, it isn't. Cognitive neuroscience has revealed to us that the brain controls everything about the body. There is no reason why anyone would conclude that it is not the source of the "mind," or whatever it is you mean by such. This is mainstream shit:
Since you are holding out for empirical evidence of res cogitans, the only evidence you will find is for res extensa.
No, it is exactly you who are holding out for evidence of something, and me demanding that you present evidence for your claim. My claim has already been established by science, with no need to add anything else to the model.
That's why nobody doubts the existence of Brains, but a few hyper-skeptics will demand sensory evidence of Minds.
The brain and the mind are not different, never been. The brain is the source of ALL functions of the body, and there is no evidence to suggest otherwise.
In which case, he is a robot, and has no Will of his own.
Any evidence of that? Sounds like reduction. What would make him a robot, your feelings on the subject? Your mere assertion? You have to qualify the shit you assert, dude. You'll not be getting away with just saying things with me, your talking to the real deal here.
Are you self-programmed? Do you think for yourself, or as directed by some outside force, such as Destiny? The Mind/Body problem turns on the question of Free Will.
Yes. No. And, no it doesn't, there never has been a free will or mind/body issue. Will is the manifestation of any and all functions of the individual brain that is equipped with self-generating conceptual hardeware used to navigate reality, and no evidence suggests otherwise.
There is no evidence to suggest otherwise. Neuroscientists, like all scientists, are quantitatively driven. If you can't measure it, it doesn't exist. Since you can't measure mind, you can't quantify mind—so by definition, it's not physical. . . .
See empirical evidence to the contrary here, and come back when you have some evidence of something:
The truth is, something so abstract can't be meaningfully defined by its physicality.
Says who? We're talking about the single most complex and sophisticated system in the known universe, which we know governs every other function of the body. What would lead us to conclude that the brain isn't producing it, with no evidence to negate the established body of evidence that suggests as much, but conclude something else is responsible for it without providing evidence to support the assertion, or even describe what we mean as the separate source itself? You have to see how irrational that is.
theRiddlerFebruary 24, 2022 at 21:52#6589850 likes
The body cogoverns with assistance from the outside world. The brain isn't just some powerhouse that wanted a cool body. The flesh keeps the blood warm; the brain tells the heart to pump because it receives blood from the heart, and without a skeleton your organs would rebel against you.
It isn't saying anything to say the brain produces consciousness. All the evidence points to us not having a comprehensive understanding of the insides of or what is outside the body. It's very shortsighted to draw conclusions about all the properties of consciousness at this juncture.
We don't know what energy or the physical are. People have been taking the most myopic approach and calling that reality for thousands of years, and nine times out of ten they're wrong.
And you disgruntle me by saying the brain produces consciousness. That tells us nothing about the brain or consciousness and there are a myriad of forces that could be at play here.
Everything is connected, and consciousness no lesser so. Perhaps it is produced by the brain. Perhaps the brain is a transducer for a field of consciousness. Perhaps matter is just how mind happens to seem.
It bothers me when people claim to have solved these mysteries with no concrete proof, as if there could even be concrete proof, and is a hurdle to open-minded, scientific exploration.
You're just claiming to know how everything works.
No, you misunderstand, I have loads of empirical evidence of that
Your usage of "Empirical" seems to go beyond the literal meaning, to include Theoretical inferences. So, we are, as usual, talking past each other ; using different vocabularies (Science vs Philosophy). Empirical evidence would be a list of observed facts (theory-neutral raw data). But an interpretation of those facts (pro-or-con-Mind) would be a conjectural postulation, since no "load" of reductive empirical data will prove the physical existence of something holistic & hypothetical. So, the electro-chemical activities of neurons would be empirical, but attribution of a thought, connected to that behavior, would be theoretical. (Until MRIs can read minds directly, rather than by human inference, that is) Therefore, as non-specialist non-scientists, we can only discuss various theories about Brain & Mind, not empirical facts.
You can give me a list of experts who conclude Mind = Brain, and I could give you a list of experts who conclude Brain does not equate to Mind. The difference is not necessarily in the data, but in the interpretation. And It's not simply Materialism versus Spiritualism (as you may presume), but more like Classical Physics versus Post-Classical. Yet the primary difference between your theory of Mind and mine, is Reductionism (empirical trees) versus Holism (conceptual forest).
As an example of a classical approach to Mental phenomena, Behaviorism expected to explain Consciousness without resort to any Theory of Mind. But, while it produced some useful facts, it never explained how Matter could become aware of its environment, or of itself. Since I'm not a specialist, I can only say that in my skeptical opinion, the "loads of evidence" you refer to does not add-up to a holistic hill-of-beans -- an explanation for the phase transition from numb & dumb Matter to self-aware Conscious Matter. Instead, the reductionist Materialism & Behaviorism theories actually took the conclusion as a premise. But, the current wave of Holistic theories (e.g. I.I.T) are looking beyond the bare facts toward a rational inference, that actually explains the distinction between a thinking brain, and an isolated brain-in-a-vat. :nerd:
PS___If we took a vote of all Brain-Mind experts right now, I suspect that your side would win. But my experts are "on the side of the angels". :joke:
.
It is argued that a scientific theory, together with its concepts, is simply a postulated system of logical categories for conceptualizing a theory-neutral experimental datum. This entails that the mind-body problem is a methodological rather than an empirical or even a metaphysical issue regarding the logical adequacy of one or another theoretical framework for construing the relation between mental, bodily, and environmental categories.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF03394144
Science as we know it can’t explain consciousness – but a revolution is coming : In fact, we should not be surprised that our standard scientific method struggles to deal with consciousness. As I explore in my new book, Galileo’s Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness, modern science was explicitly designed to exclude consciousness. Phillip Goff, Gallileo's Error
https://theconversation.com/science-as-we-know-it-cant-explain-consciousness-but-a-revolution-is-coming-126143
Why is behaviorism wrong? : In this version of history, there was something wrong with behaviorism in the 1970s and 1980s – it became too focused on specific problems and lost the big picture.
Note -- the Reductionist approach has failed, so Holistic approaches, such as Tononi/Koch's Integrated Information Theory are now the cutting-edge of Mind Science.
Deleted UserFebruary 25, 2022 at 02:51#6590760 likes
The body cogoverns with assistance from the outside world. The brain isn't just some powerhouse that wanted a cool body. The flesh keeps the blood warm; the brain tells the heart to pump because it receives blood from the heart, and without a skeleton your organs would rebel against you.
You seem to be under the impression that you are talking about different things. The body and all of its organs are a singular manifestation, the functions of which are all governed and controlled by the brain. You've got a reduction fallacy going, the system is more complex than individual parts being analyzed as separate. Livers don't just spring out of holes in the ground. You're talking 3.5 billion years of evolution, it doesn't play by rules of mere logical assembly. Its all one system of complex, interdependent, functional, networking, structures, whose central hub of control is the brain: a multistructural, multifunctional, network of computational systems of unrivaled sophistication, that corresponds to each individul functional structure to provide the necessary information to do provide functionality to the entire organism. The outside world is the domain in which it has evolved to exist within, and navigate through while maintaining homeostasis. This kind of analysis simply isn't gonna cut it.
It isn't saying anything to say the brain produces consciousness. All the evidence points to us not having a comprehensive understanding of the insides of or what is outside the body. It's very shortsighted to draw conclusions about all the properties of consciousness at this juncture.
No, it's shortsighted to deny what is clearly supported by science, because of one's perceived ignorance on the subject, which is also a fallacy you have going on. Saying the brain produces consciousness is simply relaying what the evidence supports as a theory, with no evidence to the contrary whatsoever; again, gaps in knowledge neither negates anything about my position, nor validates anything about yours. You still have to provide both and explanation that is plausible -which is unclear at this moment, you haven't explained what your asserting as an alternative - and evidence to support that explanation. Hasn't happened from anybody that has ever argued with me about this topic since I came to this website over a month ago. Period.
Apply this standard to everything you believe and what you'll find is that nothing will ever pass your contradictory standard, because it is contradictory and not a standard. Your standard of knowledge is itself ignorance. So, what I'll simply respond here with is basic: Yes we do, and here's an introduction: https://byjus.com/chemistry/properties-of-matter/#:~:text=Any%20characteristic%20that%20can%20be,are%20considered%20properties%20of%20matter.
People have been taking the most myopic approach and calling that reality for thousands of years, and nine times out of ten they're wrong.
Name one person; what did they say, and has it been empirically observed and experimented with? Otherwise I'm going to have to apply this statement specifically to the person who made it, who hasn't said what he regards anything to be other than "we don't know, shortsighted, not having comprehensive understanding, or myopic." In other words no argument for anything, other than your inclination towards nothingness.
And you disgruntle me by saying the brain produces consciousness. That tells us nothing about the brain or consciousness and there are a myriad of forces that could be at play here.
All of the functions of the body, including executive function, that we have found evidence for, are all governed by the brain. It's pretty elementary stuff in cog-sci, too. Here's a cool intro overview on it with pictures and explanations, and some sources at the bottom for you to research have you any conclusions based on what you haven't understood:https://kids.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frym.2021.534184
In short, what I actually did was disgruntle your brain's perception of itself, lol. But, it will relax once the threat passes.
Yeah, I mean, all of the evidence suggests as much. And seriously, go try to find research that actually suggests that the brain doesn't control a function of the body, it's not there. There are competing theories based on ignorance fallacies, and old mystic issues from Christianity, but no actual research suggests anything other than what I have told you.
It bothers me when people claim to have solved these mysteries with no concrete proof, as if there could even be concrete proof, and is a hurdle to open-minded, scientific exploration.
Who claimed to have solved anything? I claimed that the research suggests nothing else than what I have relayed, not that anything is "solved." And, for the record, the "solved" part of what you're eluding to, are actually centuries old, unscientific claims made about the mind derived from the 1000 year reign of Christian induced ignorance and SkyMan Talking-Donkey worship. It's never been anymore of a mystery than naturally emergent production, just as Epicurus postulated hundreds of year before Constantine ushered in the age of Christianity.
These are not different vocabularies. To omit the current scientific data from your philosophical analysis, is to committ the disregarding known science fallacy: This fallacy is committed when a person makes a claim that knowingly or unknowingly disregards well known science, science that weighs against the claim. They should know better. This fallacy is a form of the Fallacy of Suppressed Evidence.
https://iep.utm.edu/fallacy/#DisregardingKnownScience
I don't know where people keep coming up with this fake standard, but don't continue doing it with me. You're gonna need to actually contend with my position if you wanna hang, bud. You're talking with the real thing when speaking to me, bud, you gotta step it up. You've been cordial so far with me, so I'll be as well, but this is the kind of assertion that isn't going to fly.
So, the electro-chemical activities of neurons would be empirical, but attribution of a thought, connected to that behavior, would be theoretical.
No, it wouldn't. It's mainstream empirical science that suggest nothing else: https://www.pnas.org/content/112/37/11732.full?sid=b9968895-810f-4713-8887-ae0445dfa79b
https://www.aau.edu/research-scholarship/featured-research-topics/tracking-thoughts-moving-through-brain
https://opentextbc.ca/introductiontopsychology/chapter/3-2-our-brains-control-our-thoughts-feelings-and-behavior/
You're years behind the field here. The empirical data supports the theory that the brain controlls every function of the body, including thought and behavior.
Since I'm not a specialist, I can only say that in my skeptical opinion, the "loads of evidence" you refer to does not add-up to a holistic hill-of-beans -- an explanation for the phase transition from numb & dumb Matter to self-aware Conscious Matter.
So, what you're saying is you believe things for no reason.You could have openned with that.
By this standard, empirical evidence provided to you that would explain the "transition from numb & dumb Matter to self-aware Conscious Matter," would " add-up to a holistic hill-of-beans," because you're a "numb & dumb," "explanation" "specialist."
But, the current wave of Holistic theories (e.g. I.I.T) are looking beyond the bare facts toward a rational inference, that actually explains the distinction between a thinking brain, and an isolated brain-in-a-vat.
Lol, you poor child. Here, buddy, go see how without imperical data, IIT is woo. Now, IIT has some good concepts, but not when dissociated from funtional theories:
In short, it is specifically the function of recurrent neural processes of computation that give rise to anything that can be postulated in IIT, which is not a scientific theory, but more a conceptual framework for certain types of systems. But, they've got some stuff right.
PS___If we took a vote of all Brain-Mind experts right now, I suspect that your side would win. But my experts are "on the side of the angels"
That's correct. The study above from 2019 explains exactly that, with experimental data, predictions, and comparisons between computation theories, and causal theories of consciousness. Now, get outta here and get to reading, you ole Explanation Specialist, we need you to be properly explaining stuff.
theRiddlerFebruary 25, 2022 at 03:58#6590940 likes
The brain manages, not governs.
theRiddlerFebruary 25, 2022 at 04:02#6590950 likes
We are whole bodies, out of our minds. We're not just a nervous system, as is self-evident
theRiddlerFebruary 25, 2022 at 04:03#6590960 likes
The abstraction of the body can't be found inside of the brain. In fact it's barely aware.
Deleted UserFebruary 25, 2022 at 05:47#6591370 likes
We are, out of our minds, as is self-evident.... is ... We're system... No brain... barely aware .... whole bodies nervous.... abstraction found inside....
Just wondering how many forum members are prepared to say there are no thoughts. Thanks for playing!
It is at first, a simple question confirmed by the presence of thought in the asking of the question itself. The trouble rises when you want to reduce thought to something that is not thought. This reduction, however, presupposes thought.
If you want to say there is no thought, you are going to have to live with a contradiction. Thought cannot be reduced.
By this standard, empirical evidence provided to you that would explain the "transition from numb & dumb Matter to self-aware Conscious Matter," would " add-up to a holistic hill-of-beans," because you're a "numb & dumb," "explanation" "specialist."
GT, I appreciate your willingness to engage in a principled philosophical exchange of views on a controversial topic, without resorting to (much) name-calling and ad hominem aspersions. At least you mostly attribute my "numb & dumb" explanations to mere ignorance & stupidity instead of intentional malice.
Unfortunately, unlike empirical Science, theoretical Philosophy is not progressive but circular. We are still arguing about the same issues that Aristotle articulated 2500 years ago. And no impasse is more contentious than Physics versus Meta-Physics, AKA Science vs Religion. I am not a practicing scientist, and I don't practice any religion. But in this thread my arguing position is somewhere in between Materialistic Scientism and Spiritualistic Religionism. I suppose you could label it as Philosophism.
My purpose for exposing my heterodox worldview to opposing orthodox views is to help me weed-out my own ignorance & misunderstandings. That's how I learn to see both sides of many disputes. But my moderate stance places me in the middle of a circular firing squad. My religious family think I have gone over to Satan's side, while my scientific friends suspect that I may be a closet New Age nutcase. Se la vie. I can see where both are coming from, but I took the path less traveled by true-believers on either side. Thanks for playing the philosophy game of Virtual Dialogue. :smile:
"There are no 'good' or 'bad' people. Some are a little better or worse. but all are activated more by misunderstanding than malice."
___Tennessee Williams
[i]I've looked at life from both sides now
From win and lose and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all[/i]
___Joni Mitchell
". . . . since the human mind is capable of dealing with both empirical reality and intangible imagination. In fact, most people do indeed manage to hold both idealistic worldviews (religious myths, romantic stories, hypothetical conjectures) and pragmatic views (technical knowledge, scientific models of reality), although in discrete mental compartments. So in order to understand the whole truth of our existence, we need to look at both sides of every polarized worldview. In the non-fiction world, we don’t always have to choose either Good or Evil, but we can look for a moderate position near the Golden Mean, the sweet spot I call BothAnd."
____BothAnd Glossary
theRiddlerFebruary 25, 2022 at 19:03#6593530 likes
The brain and the body are so codependent that the brain is a part of the body. This attempt to dwindle people down to a singular body part sounds like it was invented by a sociopath.
Deleted UserFebruary 25, 2022 at 19:10#6593570 likes
THere's no intellectual contention there. Just one group holding on to no evidence, and the other having all of the evidence that has been accrued so far.
But my moderate stance places me in the middle of a circular firing squad.
In which case, I will gladly apologize for being insulting. You have no idea how often people simply deny facts of reality on this website. I respect this position, I've been there. It's part of the philosophical journey.
My religious family think I have gone over to Satan's side, while my scientific friends suspect that I may be a closet New Age nutcase.
Yep, welcome to the family brother, glad to have you. If religious people are willing to claim you are evil for searching for answers, as mine did, it may be best for you to begin rethinking their fixed place in your life. Just something to keep in mind as a topic of exploration. As far as New Age nutcase, what views are they specifically criticizing?
This attempt to dwindle people down to a singular body part sounds like it was invented by a sociopath.
No, the attempt to relegate the complexity of the brain so as to be defined by nothing, is exactly what was invented by murderous sociopaths. Epicurus posited the idea of an organ producing consciousness through natural processes, whose legacy has never been associated with psychopathic tendencies. Look that up.
theRiddlerFebruary 25, 2022 at 19:23#6593660 likes
It's sociopathic to try and force people to believe all that they are is an organ in the vat of the body. We are whole people, found out here, out of our minds, in the cosmos. Not inside some dying brain.
theRiddlerFebruary 25, 2022 at 20:41#6593920 likes
I'm not even against the role of the brain in, at least, regulating consciousness. I believe it isn't just some useless thing. But do I determine that our awareness is perfectly linear and within the scope of human understanding? No, I certainly do not.
Deleted UserFebruary 25, 2022 at 21:52#6594200 likes
It's sociopathic to try and force people to believe all that they are is an organ in the vat of the body. We are whole people, found out here, out of our minds, in the cosmos. Not inside some dying brain.
No, it's sociopathic to attempt to convince them that they aren't controlled by the single most sophisticated and complex system in the known universe which is capable of producing consciousness. Has nothing to do with brains is vats, that's not how our universe is. I would never argue such a thing. But, most assume that's what I mean. I'm complimenting the human brain with its proper majesty, not relegating to some theoretical domain of non-corporeal ether.
As far as New Age nutcase, what views are they specifically criticizing?
You can find the Black vs White critics replying to my BothAnd posts all over this forum. They try to push me to their side of the absolute Truth spectrum. Fortunately, most posters are somewhat humble & flexible in their philosophical opinions. Only a few are absolutely certain of their scientific or religious Truth.
Apparently, the Yin-Yang symbol is a badge of NewAgeism, even though Aristotle advised a similar middle-of-the-road approach, in order to avoid the Either/Or Fallacy. I try not to be peremptory (dogmatic) about Science vs Religion, or Real vs Ideal. There is good & bad on both sides. So, I get to sample the best of both worlds, without getting stuck in a pile of dogma. :joke:
Note -- There's an old saying : "I must be doing something right, if I get criticized from both extremes".
Both/And Principle :
[i]My coinage for the holistic principle of Complementarity, as illustrated in the Yin/Yang symbol. Opposing or contrasting concepts are always part of a greater whole. Conflicts between parts can be reconciled or harmonized by putting them into the context of a whole system.
* The Enformationism worldview entails the principles of Complementarity, Reciprocity & Holism, which are necessary to offset the negative effects of Fragmentation, Isolation & Reductionism. Analysis into parts is necessary for knowledge of the mechanics of the world, but synthesis of those parts into a whole system is required for the wisdom to integrate the self into the larger system. In a philosophical sense, all opposites in this world (e.g. space/time, good/evil) are ultimately reconciled in Enfernity (eternity & infinity).
* Conceptually, the BothAnd principle is similar to Einstein's theory of Relativity, in that what you see ? what’s true for you ? depends on your perspective, and your frame of reference; for example, subjective or objective, religious or scientific, reductive or holistic, pragmatic or romantic, conservative or liberal, earthbound or cosmic. Ultimate or absolute reality (ideality) doesn't change, but your conception of reality does. Opposing views are not right or wrong, but more or less accurate for a particular purpose.
* This principle is also similar to the concept of Superposition in sub-atomic physics. In this ambiguous state a particle has no fixed identity until “observed” by an outside system. For example, in a Quantum Computer, a Qubit has a value of all possible fractions between 1 & 0. Therefore, you could say that it is both 1 and 0.[/i]
BothAnd Glossary
Deleted UserFebruary 26, 2022 at 01:37#6594960 likes
Any truth that could be found in the not absolute category, would at that moment constitute a place in the absolute state of truth. It's completely reductive.
Go check out General Systems Theory, and Informationa Integration Theory to compliment some of the understandings you placed underneath this banner. They're all similar, some more scientific, others more topical. The universe is fundamentally a system of systems with no exceptions, and the point from which things should be viewed.
When considering the human body, its activities, and what it expresses, nothing called a “thought” can be found there. There are no sentences or images in the body, no such object or set of objects measurable in the sensible world, and no expression not already covered by better terms.
It is a useful term, though, in matters of folk psychology. It’s not a feature of grammar but people will point to a number of clauses or sentences and call that a “thought” with little objection. Some biological activity may occur and someone could say “I had a thought”, and we understand what she means. But there is nothing called a “thought” on the plane of existence.
Any truth that could be found in the not absolute category, would at that moment constitute a place in the absolute state of truth. It's completely reductive.
The last part of this assertion belies the first part. The "absolute category" would be inherently all-encompassing & Holistic, hence not piecemeal & Reductive. Which reminds me that these politically polarized threads (e.g. FreeWill vs Determinism : Mind vs Brain) tend to begin as philosophical dialogs with sharing of information & opinions. But they quickly devolve into political sniping across the dividing line. The opposing poles can be labeled as either Reductive or Holistic. But the BothAnd philosophy crosses the no-man's-land to unite those disparate worldviews. Unfortunately, the politicization of the discussion forces each participant to retreat into an Either/Or stance. :angry:
Go check out General Systems Theory, and Informationa Integration Theory to compliment some of the understandings you placed underneath this banner.
To "complement" your mis-understanding, you could check-out the BothAnd Blog to discover how Systems Theory and Information Theory are integrated into the BothAnd Principle of Complementarity. You may be surprised that your interlocutor is not quite as ignorant as your political jibes make him out to be. Of course, your Conservative vs Liberal dichotomy might be offended by the fraternization of opposing worldviews, such as Religion and Science. The moderate BA position doesn't accept the dogma of either side, but it does try to understand how they became entrenched in their defensive postures. :cool:
PS__ Are you politically conservative to match your conservative Science=Truth ideology? :joke:
BothAnd Blog :
[i]* Individuals may have strong beliefs & principles. But interpersonal endeavors require more flexibility. So, this blog is an argument for Relativism, Negotiation, Compromise, & Cooperation.
* The usual alternative to these wavering wimpy ways is the unyielding dominant stand-point of Absolutism, Conflict, and Competition. Royal and Imperial political & religious systems tend to adopt an autocratic stance of “my way or the highway”. Whereas, In more democratic and egalitarian systems, the marketplace of ideas will determine truths and values.
* Nationalism is a modern pseudo-democratic off-shoot of Royalism, with its divine right to rule a nation of pawns. Democracy and Socialism are imperfect attempts to accommodate the needs & wishes of all citizens from top to bottom.
* The Blog assumes that we will always have people on both sides of every issue. Yet, we can still have our private beliefs, even as we make public concessions to necessity.[/i]
BothAnd Glossary
BothAnd-ism : An inclusive philosophical perspective that values both Subjective and Objective information; both Feelings and Facts; both Mysteries and Matters-of-fact; both Animal and Human nature.
HOLISM IS COMPLEMENTARY
REDUCTIONISM IS INCOMPLETE
Deleted UserFebruary 26, 2022 at 19:00#6597240 likes
The last part of this assertion belies the first part. The "absolute category" would be inherently all-encompassing & Holistic, hence not piecemeal & Reductive.
You didn't take time to highlight the NOT absolute category. Let's try this argument again, this time include the NOT part.
Which reminds me that these politically polarized threads (e.g. FreeWill vs Determinism : Mind vs Brain) tend to begin as philosophical dialogs with sharing of information & opinions. But they quickly devolve into political sniping across the dividing line. The opposing poles can be labeled as either Reductive or Holistic. But the BothAnd philosophy crosses the no-man's-land to unite those disparate worldviews. Unfortunately, the politicization of the discussion forces each participant to retreat into an Either/Or stance.
I have no place in this analysis. I don't give a shit about politics, except where it violates my freedom.
To "complement" your mis-understanding, you could check-out the BothAnd Blog to discover how Systems Theory and Information Theory are integrated into the BothAnd Principle of Complementarity.
Is said to "compliment" the ideas, because they are compatible. Not because you "need" to have your views increased. I was agreeing with those statements, dipshit.
You may be surprised that your interlocutor is not quite as ignorant as your political jibes make him out to be. Of course, your Conservative vs Liberal dichotomy might be offended by the fraternization of opposing worldviews, such as Religion and Science.
....Huh? Fuck all of those ideologies, they're all the same people who simply want to use power to violate my rights, and are both fucking clueless about history, philosophy, and science. (science not an ideology)
The moderate BA position doesn't accept the dogma of either side, but it does try to understand how they became entrenched in their defensive postures.
Religions have a way of being dogmatic, my friend. Best to avoid them altogether and pursue individual accrual of knowledge, happiness, and proficiency.
Individuals may have strong beliefs & principles. But interpersonal endeavors require more flexibility. So, this blog is an argument for Relativism, Negotiation, Compromise, & Cooperation.
* The usual alternative to these wavering wimpy ways is the unyielding dominant stand-point of Absolutism, Conflict, and Competition. Royal and Imperial political & religious systems tend to adopt an autocratic stance of “my way or the highway”. Whereas, In more democratic and egalitarian systems, the marketplace of ideas will determine truths and values.
* Nationalism is a modern pseudo-democratic off-shoot of Royalism, with its divine right to rule a nation of pawns. Democracy and Socialism are imperfect attempts to accommodate the needs & wishes of all citizens from top to bottom.
* The Blog assumes that we will always have people on both sides of every issue. Yet, we can still have our private beliefs, even as we make public concessions to necessity.
BothAnd Glossary
BothAnd-ism :
An inclusive philosophical perspective that values both Subjective and Objective information; both Feelings and Facts; both Mysteries and Matters-of-fact; both Animal and Human nature.
Exactly. Just don't shoot me any conclusions that have zero evidence to support them. I can play with assertions and theories all day.
I have no place in this analysis. I don't give a shit about politics, except where it violates my freedom.
I referred to political polarization because you seem to be defending an ideological position, which some refer to as "Scientism". I'm reluctant to use such categorical labels, but your insistence on empirical evidence --- for Philosophical concepts that are not amenable to reductive dissection --- is a mis-application of a good policy. You portray my not-yet-orthodox cutting-edge "evidence" as in-admissible. But a Mind is not a lab rat.
In this thread, we are discussing a phenomenon (Thought) that is invisible & intangible -- only inferrable & theoretical -- yet you demand empirical evidence for its existence. Since, after 2500 years of speculating, there is no hard evidence forthcoming; from your ideological perspective this thread is an exercise in futility -- except as a political arena to display the superiority of the Scientism party. I apologize for using a shorthand label for your view. But, it omits the very essence of Philosophical Evidence : subjective experience & rational appraisal, in cases where objective testing is not applicable. Unfortunately, that includes most of the topics that politicians come to blows about. :cool:
PS__Even on Scientific forums, pioneering theories, such as Strings & Loops, are hotly debated, because the only evidence is mathematical (mental), not empirical (material). Some opponents say such theories are "not even wrong", but that's also true of all perennial philosophical questions. So why do we bother with philosophy anyway? Philosophy is not Natural Science, it's Cultural Science. :smile:
Phenomenon : 1. a fact or situation that is observed to exist or happen, especially one whose cause or explanation is in question.
Empirical vs Theoretical evidence : Empirical: Based on data gathered by original experiments or observations. Theoretical: Analyzes and makes connections between empirical studies to define or advance a theoretical position.
https://coloradocollege.libguides.com/c.php?g=286871&p=1911416
Scientism :
[i]“Scientism is a matter of putting too high a value on natural science in comparison with other branches of learning or culture.”
“Science, modeled on the natural sciences, is the only source of real knowledge.”[/i]
https://sciencereligiondialogue.org/resources/what-is-scientism/
Philosophical Evidence : In philosophy, evidence has been taken to consist of such things as experiences, propositions, observation-reports, mental states, states of affairs, and even physiological events, such as the stimulation of one's sensory surfaces.
https://iep.utm.edu/evidence/
Philosophical Evidence : According to the phenomenal conception of evidence, only one's experiences can serve as evidence.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/evidence/
Evidence-based Medicine :
My sister has been suffering from a mysterious debilitating ailment that mainstream doctors have not been able to correctly diagnose & treat for over 40 years. It forced her to give-up her work toward a Phd. The affliction has been given various labels, such as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Another, non-mainstream label, is Toxic Mold Syndrome. Her doctors have tried to treat it as a typical allergy with no success. Some people with this syndrome go to live in tents in the desert, to avoid contact with ubiquitous mold. So, she has been desperately seeking relief via "alternative medicine", which at least took her subjective-suffering-with-little-objective-evidence seriously.
Only recently has her quest found significant relief from a common vitamin (niacinamide), that is reputed to stimulate the energy-producing mitochondria in human cells. Ironically, one of the alternative non-MDs claims that his treatment is "evidence based", even though it is not reviewed or approved by the FDA. I tend to be somewhat skeptical of much "alternative" medicine. But for me, the evidence that counts is that she is a completely different person from the shell-of-a-self that has been dragging around for all those years. That's subjective, not empirical evidence.
To mirror your apolitical expression above : I don't give a sh*t about medical politics, except where it marginalizes what works subjectively as non-empirical.
Deleted UserFebruary 27, 2022 at 02:15#6598670 likes
I referred to political polarization because you seem to be defending an ideological position, which some refer to as "Scientism". I'm reluctant to use such categorical labels, but your insistence on empirical evidence --- for Philosophical concepts that are not amenable to reductive dissection --- is a mis-application of a good policy. You portray my not-yet-orthodox cutting-edge "evidence" as in-admissible. But a Mind is not a lab rat.
I don't know what any of this means. Science, as per basic philosophical understanding, is never to be dismissed and should inform one's philosophical theories. Period, no ifs, ands, or buts. My insistence isn't on empirical evidence, it's on any evidence whatsoever other than talking. Another philosophical understanding that is basic. The mind is not a lab rat..... Hm, why would someone say that to the guy who's been explaining that the brain is the most complex system in the universe........? No answers for that....
yet you demand empirical evidence for its existence.
You claim it is invisible, but we understand definitively that thoughts are generated by the brain..... No, I'm saying you have no evidence of your claim, at all. And that the reason you don't, is because the evidence that exists suggests thoughts are a perception of computation. Perceptions themselves are not things, not unless you're talking about the actual functions you are yourself perceiving. And nobody on this site has been able to argue against that.
Since, after 2500 years of speculating, there is no hard evidence forthcoming; from your ideological perspective this thread is an exercise in futility -- except as a political arena to display the superiority of the Scientism party.
No, just participating in the answering of a thread question with facts, evidence, reason, and data. Scientism is just something you tossed in here and rode with, just like your "objectively real" thoughts that nobody can see.
I apologize for using a shorthand label for your view. But, it omits the very essence of Philosophical Evidence : subjective experience & rational appraisal, in cases where objective testing is not applicable. Unfortunately, that includes most of the topics that politicians come to blows about.
That's fine, no worries. People misunderstand eachother and insult eachother all the time. Luckily I didn't feel too insult because I could clearly detect that I hadn't gotten something across through these messages. But I reiterate, I am the single most anti-political human being I know of. I regard all politics as evil, and the people who participate to be completely fucking duped by bullshit.
PS__Even on Scientific forums, pioneering theories, such as Strings & Loops, are hotly debated, because the only evidence is mathematical (mental), not empirical (material).
Yes, which is fine if they want to debate it from the perspective of theorization. They do not, however, get to call it science. Any more than IIT get's to call their framework science. IIT has been empirically falsified now a number of times. That doesn't mean there's nothing of interest, or important, or elements that are compatible with the real stuff there. It's just, we don't get to call it real yet.
Some opponents say such theories are "not even wrong", but that's also true of all perennial philosophical questions.
Right, in logic, one can make an argument that is consistently valid, and yet never sound. The same thing goes for theoretical frameworks. I can fit anything into a theoretical framework of anykind. And if it is shown to be wrong, all I have to do is incorporate that particular thing that I was wrong about into the framework and voila! all better. It was Karl Popper who brought us falsifiability in science. If it cannot be falsified, it is not science.
In philosophy, evidence has been taken to consist of such things as experiences, propositions, observation-reports, mental states, states of affairs, and even physiological events, such as the stimulation of one's sensory surfaces.
Notice how all of these have an element if individual verification? This presentation is not an argument for providing no evidence whatsoever.
That's subjective, not empirical evidence.
To mirror your apolitical expression above : I don't give a sh*t about medical politics, except where it marginalizes what works subjectively as non-empirical.
No, dude. That's empirical. It's just not established science. That's most certainly empirical evidence of something changing due to medication, how do you not understand that? That is TWO people verifying something they are perceiving and testing with multiple treatments. It may not be good evidence for any argument, honestly his argument was pretty good in the sense that all he knows is the she isn't a damn zombie anymore. That is certainly imperical evidence for such, by definition. What I am asking for..... is any evidence at all. Of any kind...
Reply to ZzzoneiroCosm
Thoughts, they are such a fickle thing. Now most people will not deny the "validity" of the process and product of thought, however they will surely debate the nature of this thought. In what way does a thought exist, what kind of thought exists? What does it mean for the thought to exist? I say anything distinguishable in the human experience from another thing, is something which exists and is real. So yes, there are thoughts, and they are the one of the closest (it is close to us to access) manifestations of the incorporeal or the immaterial.
I don't know what any of this means. Science, as per basic philosophical understanding, is never to be dismissed and should inform one's philosophical theories. Period, no ifs, ands, or buts.
That is a pretty good summary of the authoritarian worldview called "Scientism". Technically, it's not a religion, but a dogmatic philosophical position, based on the absolute authority of some intangible entity called "Science". However, it may be described as "puritanical", in that it rejects such unreal impurities as "theories" and "opinions". Scientism may be considered political, in that it is identified mostly with Left Wing political views. Until now, I had never concerned myself with Scientism, partly because those who espouse the gospel of materialistic Science, don't think of themselves as political or religious, just as Orthodox believers in scientifically revealed Truth.
Scientism preaches a narrow definition of Science, and rejects most of the "soft sciences", especially, the Humanities, such as Philosophy. Coincidentally, I read a Scientific American article this morning on the topic of Anthropology & Paleontology, comparing "Neanderthal Thinking" with modern human beliefs and behaviors. From examining ancient bones the "scientists" concluded that those cave men had primitive forms of symbolic art and religious rituals. But, if you demand to see their falsifiable evidence, you would be disappointed to learn that it consists mainly of expert interpretations (inferences ; opinions) from vague data such as scratches on bones, and holes in eagle claws that resemble a necklace. You could say that they had hard (petrified) evidence for the soft thoughts of long dead people.
In philosophical dialogs, arguments from Final Authority are a win-lose strategy. Hence, there is no incentive for someone with different views to play their no-win game. Except perhaps, for those who enjoy sharpening their flexible philosophical skills on the unyielding rock of flawless Diamond-Hard Science. :cool:
The Curse of Scientism : Not only is current scientific knowledge treated as gospel, but non-scientific knowledge is considered oxymoronic. At best, this means that we can never verify any knowledge that could not be verified through scientific methods.
https://www.calais.news/lefts-strange-morality-and-problem-scientism
Dogmatic Philosophy : To be dogmatic is to follow a set of rules no matter what. The rules might be religious, philosophical, or made-up, but dogmatic people would never waver in their beliefs so don't even think of trying to change their minds.
https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/dogmatic
Science as Ideology : Scientism. Finally, it is worth noting a sense in which science itself can form a basis of an ideology. When science is credited as the one and only way we have to describe reality, or to state truth, such restrictive epistemology might graduate into scientism.
https://iep.utm.edu/sci-ideo/
Hard science and soft scienceare colloquial terms used to compare scientific fields on the basis of perceived methodological rigor, exactitude, and objectivity. Roughly speaking, the natural sciences are considered "hard", whereas the social sciences are usually described as "soft".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_and_soft_science
Why did Karl Popper reject positivism? : Popper disagreed with the positivist view that science can be reduced to a formal, logical system or method. A scientific theory is an invention, an act of creation, based more upon a scientist's intuition than upon pre-existing empirical data. “The history of science is everywhere speculative,”
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/the-paradox-of-karl-popper/
Deleted UserFebruary 27, 2022 at 19:03#6602850 likes
That is a pretty good summary of the authoritarian worldview called "Scientism". Technically, it's not a religion, but a dogmatic philosophical position, based on the absolute authority of some intangible entity called "Science". However, it may be described as "puritanical", in that it rejects such unreal impurities as "theories" and "opinions". Scientism may be considered political, in that it is identified mostly with Left Wing political views. Until now, I had never concerned myself with Scientism, partly because those who espouse the gospel of materialistic Science, don't think of themselves as political or religious, just as Orthodox believers in scientifically revealed Truth.
No it's just not making a "disregard for known science fallacy" one learns in basic logic: This fallacy is committed when a person makes a claim that knowingly or unknowingly disregards well known science, science that weighs against the claim. They should know better. This fallacy is a form of the Fallacy of Suppressed Evidence.
That's it. https://iep.utm.edu/fallacy/#DisregardingKnownScience
No it's just not making a "disregard for known science fallacy"
If you are going to insist on referring to "known science", you should at least cite book, chapter & verse. Where is it written that "there are no Thoughts or Minds, only Neural Nets & Brains"? Is that from the Authorized Version, or the Revised Standard Version? The non-specific Appeal to Authority is also a fallacy.
Back to the topic of this thread : Thought. Steven Pinker, a prominent expert in the "soft science" of Psychology, wrote a popular book (not authorized by any ruling power) entitled, The Stuff of Thought. In the chapter on metaphor, he quotes Lakoff & Johnson's Philosophy in the Flesh, the Embodied Mind : "the mind is inherently embodied". To which statement-of-fact Pinker suggests an alternate "we offer the metaphor that the mind is inherently embodied " He goes on to note that, "in the very act of advancing their thesis, they presuppose transcendent notions of truth, objectivity, and logical necessity, that they ostensibly seek to undermine". Note : Pinker is as scientific & empiricist as possible for someone who writes about Mind Stuff.
The abstract notion of Mind, is also a metaphor, imagined as a container for similarly abstract thoughts. But abstractions are like skeletons : de-fleshed. :smile:
Philosophy in the Flesh review : It's funny that, given the authors' explication of metaphors in all the world's philosophies, they should blatantly ignore the metaphorical assumptions which they make themselves. Specifically, they denounce all the metaphysicians for assuming that "there is a category of all things that exist"
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31856.Philosophy_in_the_Flesh
Opinion :
"Western philosophy, then,is not an extended debate about knowledge, ethics, and reality, but a succession of conceptual metaphors." ___Steven Pinker, The Stuff of Thought
Don't waste your time arguing against the omniscient.
As a wrap-up review -- to this and the Non-Physical thread -- what do you think of my assessment that the opposing positions are viewed as A> Real Science vs un-real Pseudo-science by conservative hard-liners, but as B> Reductive Science vs Holistic Science by more progressive pioneers of unexplored territory ? The result of such binary framing is that we end-up debating different questions from polarized positions. Unfortunately, the Science=Truth posters, don't accept that there is another way to do scientific research. And of course, it's easy to go wrong, when you go beyond "settled science" into open-ended questions. But that's the difference between tinkering Technology and Progressive Science, otherwise known as Pure Science or Basic Research.
What I'm labeling as a Holistic approach to science, or Systems Science, would in theory include most reductive evidence, but not be limited to it. Yet, some on the holistic side could go the the extreme of "disregard for known science fallacy", as GT put it. However, the pro-thought posters on this thread seem to be merely more interested in "Soft Science" with theoretical evidence (concepts), than in "Hard Science" with empirical evidence (things).
Another way to frame the debate is between Inductive & Deductive reasoning. Empirical science is supposed to be strictly Deductive from direct experience (experiment). But a lot of modern science, especially the Soft Sciences, have little hard evidence to work with, so most of their reasoning is Inductive, from a general hypothesis to a more developed theory (what if?). Yet again, trying to prove a prior belief, without skeptical pruning can result in a self-fulfilling prophecy. So, I can't blame the Realists for their hard interrogation. In fact, that why I invite such challenges for my somewhat fringey notions. :nerd:
Holism in science, [i]and holistic science, is an approach to research that emphasizes the study of complex systems. Systems are approached as coherent wholes whose component parts are best understood in context and in relation to one another and to the whole.
This practice is in contrast to a purely analytic tradition (sometimes called reductionism) which aims to gain understanding of systems by dividing them into smaller composing elements and gaining understanding of the system through understanding their elemental properties.[1] The holism-reductionism dichotomy is often evident in conflicting interpretations of experimental findings and in setting priorities for future research.[/i]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holism_in_science
Empirical vs Theoretical evidence : Empirical: Based on data gathered by original experiments or observations. Theoretical: Analyzes and makes connections between empirical studies to define or advance a theoretical position.
https://coloradocollege.libguides.com/c.php?g=286871&p=1911416
Inductive vs Deductive reasoning : The main difference between inductive and deductive reasoning is that inductive reasoning aims at developing a [new] theory while deductive reasoning aims at testing an existing theory.
https://www.scribbr.com/methodology/inductive-deductive-reasoning/
As a wrap-up review -- to this and the Non-Physical thread -- what do you think of my assessment that the opposing positions are viewed as A> Real Science vs un-real Pseudo-science by conservative hard-liners, but as B> Reductive Science vs Holistic Science by more progressive pioneers of unexplored territory ?
Another way to frame the debate is between Inductive & Deductive reasoning. Empirical science is supposed to be strictly Deductive from direct experience (experiment). But a lot of modern science, especially the Soft Sciences, have little hard evidence to work with, so most of their reasoning is Inductive, from a general hypothesis to a more developed theory (what if?).
C S Pierce also included abductive reasoning - reasoning from effect to probable cause. But the issue is that underlying 'scientism' is 'positivism' - that being, in a loose sense, the view that science and mathematical extrapolations of empirical observations are the sole forms of valid knowledge.
Are there determinate entities we might call "thoughts". I would say 'no' because thinking is a process. There is certainly thinking. When we say there are determinate entities it is usually because we can look at and examine them. Can we do this with thoughts? I don't think so, thoughts are known only in the thinking of them, or reflexively known only in remembering that we have thought them; which amounts to thinking them again.
Great point. In phenomenology, thought is a negative, meaning it has has no actuality. In other words, thought belongs to possibility and is that which determines what is possible. The only connection that thought has to the actual is in approximating its possibilities (with more or less certainty).
So computation is the basis for thoughts (and presumably consciousness)?
— RogueAI
As far as what is currently understood in modern cognitive neuroscience, and by that I mean every single piece of available data when analyzed together, beyond any question
There is nothing computed in the brain. This is a common misconception. The brain (be it that of an ant or that of people) resonates selectively with structures in the world. These structures leave traces, memories. And because of these structured traces, all structures in nature can resonate in the brain. But nothing is computed, as nothing is computed in nature. Only computers compute.
?Gnomon
Is it your position – extrapolating from Pinker's objection to Lakoff & Johnson's thesis ("metaphor") – that mind is disembodied?
No. Just that non-physical Mind & physical Body are philosophically distinct concepts. The latter is subject to empirical investigation, but the former is subject only to theoretical exploration. Philosophers only do thought experiments, which are always debatable. That may be why Mind is more interesting to them than Brains. You don't have to get your hands mucky.
The notion of a disembodied soul is a legitimate topic for philosophical discussion, but would be absurd for empirical dissection. Personally, I'm skeptical of ghosts & afterlife & reincarnation, but I'm willing to discuss such topics on an intellectual level, without eye-rolling. My interest would be why so many people with normal brains find the notion of disembodied Souls intuitively believable. :smile:
C S Pierce also included abductive reasoning - reasoning from effect to probable cause. But the issue is that underlying 'scientism' is 'positivism' - that being, in a loose sense, the view that science and mathematical extrapolations of empirical observations are the sole forms of valid knowledge.
Sure. But Positivism was mainly concerned with weeding-out Metaphysics. And most of modern Philosophy falls in that non-physical category, by default. If it ain't physical, it's metaphysical (i.e. religious faith). Which is why many philosophers try to dissociate themselves from Scholastic Metaphysics. :cool:
Positivism : a philosophical system that holds that every rationally justifiable assertion can be scientifically verified or is capable of logical or mathematical proof, and that therefore rejects metaphysics and theism.
Metaphysics : It is not easy to say what metaphysics is. Ancient and Medieval philosophers might have said that metaphysics was, like chemistry or astrology, to be defined by its subject-matter: metaphysics was the “science” that studied “being as such” or “the first causes of things” or “things that do not change”. It is no longer possible to define metaphysics that way, for two reasons. First, a philosopher who denied the existence of those things that had once been seen as constituting the subject-matter of metaphysics—first causes or unchanging things—would now be considered to be making thereby a metaphysical assertion. Second, there are many philosophical problems that are now considered to be metaphysical problems (or at least partly metaphysical problems) that are in no way related to first causes or unchanging things—the problem of free will, for example, or the problem of the mental and the physical.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/metaphysics/
PS___That's why I'm still searching for another simple term, besides "metaphysics" to distinguish the scope of Philosophy from that of Physical Sciences. So far, "non-physical" is a candidate. But even that discrimination seems to elicit negative reviews from those for whom "physical" means Real, and non-physical means un-real, hence non-existent. In what sense does Mind exist, if not as an illusory figment of imagination? It seems to be a no-win contest of perspectives. :sad:
But Positivism was mainly concerned with weeding-out Metaphysics
It's broader than that, although though that is part of it. 'A philosophical system recognizing only that which can be scientifically verified or which is capable of logical or mathematical proof, and therefore rejecting [anything that is not]'. Few will admit to being positivist, although many implicitly are, although spelling it out sounds like an accusation, when really it's just a description. In fact for a lot of people it's simply common sense. (Which is fair enough, but then it shouldn't be mistaken for philosophy proper.)
It's been discussed a lot but I always say, never loose sight of its connection to Aristotle, for whom the term was coined. Otherwise metaphysics becomes a catch-all term for any kind of woo. That is why I try and understand topics within the context of history of ideas and comparative religion - it provides some context. I've grown to understand the Western metaphysical tradition through understanding something about Platonism and Aristotelianism. (Feser has helped in that.)
In what sense does Mind exist, if not as an illusory figment of imagination?
There's a key insight from non-dualism here, which is very hard to spell out because it's not a concept, but a shift in perspective. Kind of like a gestalt shift. The way I try and explain it is that mind is never an object of cognition (which seems obvious to me, but which seems to cause all manner of confusion). But it is real as the subject of experience. It is something which is central to Asian philosophy, but you have to feel your way into it - realise it, I suppose you could say.
The problem with "Western" thinking generally is that it is utterly confined to the symbolic-conceptual mode of thought. Of course it has power within its scope but there are entire domains that it is blind to. But seeing through that takes philosophical therapy. That's what it is for.
Philosophers [s]only[/s] do thought experiments, which are always debatable. That may be why Mind is more interesting to them than Brains.
Nonsense. This preferred "interest" may be only true – symptomatic – of idealists, platonists or cartesians. You need to study (more) modern philosophy such as works by Spinoza, Hume, Peirce/Dewey, Jaspers, Merleau-Ponty, Dennett, Flanagan, Maturana/Varela, Hofstadter, Lakoff/Johnson, Damasio, Metzinger ... also some synopses (e.g.) neurophilosophyandneurophenomenology. Get your mind's "hands mucky", Gnomon. :eyes:
The notion of a disembodied soul is a legitimate topic for philosophical discussion...
Easy to say; make a conceptually coherent, logically sound case for this "notion's" "legitimacy" (i.e. that "disembodied soul" (or disembodied mind) is not vacuous, just-so, woo-woo). Show me, intellect to intellect, G, don't just tell me (bloviate). :sweat:
It's been discussed a lot but I always say, never loose sight of its connection to Aristotle, for whom the term was coined. Otherwise metaphysics becomes a catch-all term for any kind of woo.
Yes. For the purposes of my Enformationism thesis, I typically define "metaphysics" in terms of the topics Aristotle discussed in the second volume of his treatise in Nature. There, he was not describing physical things, but ideas about things, or about Nature in general, including the human Mind and its Thoughts. Volume 1 was the primitive forerunner of modern Science, while volume 2 was the prescient ancestor of modern Philosophy. :smile:
Meta-physics :
[i]The branch of philosophy that examines the nature of reality, including the relationship between mind and matter, substance and attribute, fact and value.
1. Often dismissed by materialists as idle speculation on topics not amenable to empirical proof.
2. Aristotle divided his treatise on science into two parts. The world as-known-via-the-senses was labeled “physics” - what we call "Science" today. And the world as-known-by-the-mind, by reason, was labeled “metaphysics” - what we now call "Philosophy" .[/i]
BothAnd Blog Glossary
As usual, you missed the point of my description of what distinguishes Philosophy from Science. Some professional scientists with mucky hands, also do some philosophical speculation on the side. Apparently, you think that Philosophers should be required to present empirical evidence for their conjectures.
Do you consider yourself a Philosopher, perhaps an amateur like me? If so, what "mucky" physical experiments have you done? Do you tinker with real stuff in your basement? Or do you simply express personal opinions as Facts on forums? Do you simply quote the Scriptures of Science as evidence for your claims of what's Real, and what's not? :joke:
Science vs Philosophy : The main difference between science and philosophy is that science deals with hypothesis testing based on factual data whereas philosophy deals with logical analysis based on reason.
https://askanydifference.com/difference-between-science-and-philosophy/
Do you consider yourself a Philosopher, perhaps an amateur like me?
I consider myself a freethinker (and naturalist) who studies philosophy.
If so, what "mucky" physical experiments have you done?
Three years of graduate lab work (Cognitive Science / Psychology). Engineering projects and physics + chemistry lab work as an undergrad. Paralegal and mortgage underwriting work for decades (pre-pandemic). Left-Green political activism for decades (pre-9/11). I'd say I've been quite "mucky" in various ways ...
Do you tinker with real stuff in your basement?
I don't have a basement.
Or do you simply express personal opinions as Facts on forums?
I cite publicly available, corroborable evidence and fact-based interpretations which support my "personal opinions" in the spirit of inviting dialectical challenges (against which "personal opinions" like the usual woo-of-the-gaps, such as yours, sir, that usually does not hold up under the slightest scrutiny).
Do you simply quote [s]the Scriptures of Science as[/s] evidence for your claims of what's Real, and what's not?
I only cite findings of science to corroborate my challenges to the pseudo-science woo-of-the-gaps silliness graffitied on these fora by you hordes of "amateur philosopher" poseurs. My own speculations – what I call "the Real" – are open to being challenged. I welcome the dialectic, but like you, Gnomon, most retreat back into their own self-consoling, "scripture" quoting, "personal opinions" (i.e. dogmas) instead.
Three years of graduate lab work (Cognitive Science / Psychology). Engineering projects and physics + chemistry lab work as an undergrad. Paralegal and mortgage underwriting work for decades (pre-pandemic). Left-Green political activism for decades (pre-9/11). I'd say I've been quite "mucky" in various ways ...
As an untrained dilettante philosopher, I bow before your self-proclaimed Omniscience. But, I still don't appreciate your "dogmatic" (your word) True-Believer-in-Scientism shtick on this non-ideological forum. Most of us amateurs are well-informed about modern science in general, but we are not narrowly-focused specialists in any particular sub-field. So, our worldviews may be broader and more inclusive than yours. If that open-mindedness is what you call "woo", then woo-hoo give me a tattoo! :joke:
TPF Site Guidelines :
[i]Types of posters who are welcome here:
Those with a genuine interest in/curiosity about philosophy and the ability to express this in an intelligent way, and those who are willing to give their interlocutors a fair reading and not make unwarranted assumptions about their intentions
Types of posters who are not welcome here:
Evangelists: Those who must convince everyone that their religion, ideology, political persuasion, or philosophical theory is the only one worth having.[/i]
As an untrained dilettante philosopher, I bow before your self-proclaimed Omniscience. But, I still don't appreciate your "dogmatic" (your word) True-Believer-in-Scientism shtick on this non-ideological forum.
Well, your "untrained dilettante" ad hominems, sir, miss their mark by a wide country mile with projections of your own philosophical defects. :sweat:
Just wondering how many forum members are prepared to say there are no thoughts.
The path with flowers on it is that of the rejection of the existence of thoughts. This is not the rejection of language, which would be even more offensively absurd. Nor is it strictly a denial. It is rather a trial, in which the stuff of the final ghost sorry (go story) is found guilty.
Comments (111)
Cogito ergo sum. Thoughts and the act of thinking is (probably) the most powerful proof of my own existence.
If I think, then I exist. Therefore, I need thoughts to be sure about my own existence and circumstances.
Now consider where your thoughts come from. What is the source and origin of thoughts?
Empiricism. I was taught when I was a kid the act of reasoning. Then, I elaborate my own thoughts. I'm not going to say they are "inherent"
The experience itself has taught me a basic principle that if I have thoughts then I can prove my existence.
Ah, but what entity is responsible for generating the conceptual framework of Empiricism? After all, Empiricism is little more than a cluster of coherent thoughts that are formed into an actionable group of concepts. So, where the hell do thoughts come from? From what computational device do they arise to be formulated into those concepts?
Those concepts come from the act of understanding. We need being taught through a good education what is the meaning of the world which is surrounded to us.
"thoughts" could be a general terms which involves many aspects of our ordinary lives.
For example: you mix with and black to get grease colour. This act came from the pure act of thinking but probably we weren't aware of it. Nevertheless, we were taught in class what is going on with the mix of colours
And if a Consciousness proves your own existence, how about this? The Existence of your Consciousness proves the existence of the Objectively Extant, Material Universe that evolved you, for there is no way to create a consciousness through natural process except by evolving them in a Material World.
Created consciousness do not exist, and the notion that Consciousnesses were created by some powerful, non-material Being we've never had any proof of is just silly, and ignores the regression problem of the Creators Creators.....
So, the real Meditation One is I think, and therefore, All You Zombies exist.
It proves your existence because thinking and reasoning are acts which involve human nature. It one of the aspects which differ from all the species in the world. I guess a dog does not realize he does "exist". We the humans are concern about it
Maybe not determinate entities. But there are thoughts. Thoughts exist.
Well, I'll stop hitting you with questions. I'm drawing attention to thet fact that, although you're correct, you are correct because you are equipped with computational hardware that in fact produces thought, understandings, datat accrual, and the production of concepts, among many millions of other things. I am of course talking about the brain. And, generally that's correct about colors/ There are numerous pathways that are used to interpret sight, the thalamus, a couple visual cortexes, and the occipital lobe all work togethor to piece things to gather rapidly in accordance with the natural properties of that being processes in sight.
However, given the nature of the original question, can such a question be applied to 'sight?' Is is 'sight' "real" or is it a self-contained, non-corporeal process? What do you think about that kind of question?
https://www.salk.edu/news-release/brain-recognizes-eye-sees/
What is your position on Mary's Room?
I see your point and the article you shared is so interesting. They develop a scientific theory which explains what is going on when our sight receives lights and pixels. Yes I am agree that how our brain works in this context is innate. But, whether you would not believe it or not, empiricism takes part with big importance for the following argument:
What our eyes recieve in the nature is composed by a vocabulary created by the humans to establish an order. Thus, Jonh Locke, call them as "primary emotions" and "secondary emotions". We can say "light" or the pixels themselves are primary while the colours are secondary. The interesting fact comes when we match up the colours. Check this: imaginary color
Specially the following paragraph:
Quoting javi2541997
Thinking, therfore thinking exists. :smirk:
Proposition:
1.Mary knows everything there is to know about brain states and their properties.
2.It is not the case that Mary knows everything there is to know about sensations and their properties.
3.Therefore, sensations and their properties are not the same (?) as the brain states and their properties.
Premise 1 and 2 of this proposition are contradictory according to modern neuroscience, therefore not true and invalid respectively: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2211124720311177
Or
1. Mary (before her release) knows everything physical there is to know about other people.
2. Mary (before her release) does not know everything there is to know about other people (because she learns something about them on her release).
3. Therefore, there are truths about other people (and herself) which escape the physicalist story
This proposition relies on the objective fact values that are implicit, i.e. "before her release." You see? This version of the proposition has objective reality as an implicit characteristic of its argument.
So, it needs real revision.
So, Cosm and I have been going back and forth about this for over week, on what appeared to him to be incompatible propositions. Such being: thoughts exist as opposed to thoughts do not exist. It took a bit, but I have explained to him that what we generally use the term "thoughts" to describe, are actually neuronal processes of computation by the brain, and that perception of those computations is also a function of the brain provide by the pre-frontal cortex. That the processes are objective and corporeal, but the perception that is "thoughts" themselves are not. But, it turns out that functionally, the two are the exact same process and can be embodied through behavior, which is why the brain produces them in the first place.
Quoting javi2541997
No, what our eyes recieve is data derived from naturally emergent material forces of nature, which are composed of matter, energy, quanta, time, and space, and language is the conceptual framework that consciousness develops as one of many means to navigate that domain of perceptual data to achieve and/or maximize homeostasis of the individual conscious perceiver(s) within the context of that domain.
Quoting javi2541997
John Locke was thinking well on the subject, but incorrect. "Emotion" is a computational system of interworking systems within the brain used to reinforce behavior. This is done primarily through the pleasure seeking mechanisms, for which there are many, including the ventral tegmental area which is comprised of about 70% dopiminergic neurons that coordinates behavior with the thalamus and the motor cortexes. And which also uses pain as a metric for its determination of what constitutes pleasure, interestingly enough. The more pleasurable, the more "primary" in the Lockean manner. The more displeasurable, the more such an experience is catalogued into the "domain of disinterest" protocols, as it were, and the more such disinterest is reinforced by negative emotions. Disgust being a very, very powerful emotion regarding disinterest and behavior thereby informed.
Quoting javi2541997
Yes, there's data accrual which is basic information relay, or Primary, so to speak. Then there is distribution of data to numerous structures of the brain for computational assessment. Those assessments build actionable coherence in regards to said data, which informs more behavior, and thus more experience and the whole process strats again ad infinitum in feedbackloop. Which is why you need to take habitualiztion very seriously.
Very cool idea. Color itself is imaginary. It's a bit like asking if thoughts are real. If color is not something that actually exists, but is instead correspondent to frequency of waves, then what do we make of the perception? Well, you determine of such a distinction made by the brain has actionable utility. Which, of course, color does to the perceiver, it allows us to understand reality with more clarity in the only way the brain has been developed to map those distinctions to perception itself for its own benefit. It's fucking amazing.
So computation is the basis for thoughts (and presumably consciousness)?
You are correct. Sorry, I was mistaken. Emotion is not the correct word here. What I wanted to argument were qualities. I think what Jonh Locke pretend to explain is that there are two groups of realties: Those with primary qualities (the first perception we have through the eyes) and then secondary qualities (when we match up colours and then we are able to even create imaginary colour as Violet, a pretty different colour from Magenta). Again, I want to quote John Locke:
2dly, Such Qualities, which in truth are nothing in the Objects themselves, but Powers to produce various Sensations in us by their primary Qualities, i.e. by the Bulk, Figure, Texture, and Motion of their insensible parts, as Colours, Sounds, Tasts, etc. These I call secondary Qualities. [An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Book II, Chapter VIII]
The las year I had the same debate with @counterpunch in this thread: John Locke's imaginary colours. A psychical or physiological study?. I want to quote a good phrase from counterpunch that was so interesting:
Conclusion: Despite the fact there is a physiological study of the stimulus we receive. We the humans also create imaginary and subjective aspects through empiricism.
As far as what is currently understood in modern cognitive neuroscience, and by that I mean every single piece of available data when analyzed together, beyond any question. There is literally not a single piece of evidence that suggests otherwise. And I have an absolute payload of research on hand to demonstrate it.
Nope. Thoughts come into awareness and they drift away. So does all phenomena. The only thing you need to be sure about your existence is awareness.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/computational-mind/
Awesome question, dude. So, no, CTM is not where I'm coming from as an exclusive point of origin. CTM is an essential element of my philosophy that will, one day, have its own page on standford itself. Where I am coming from is my newly emergent, neuro-ethical, psycho-epistemological philosophy that is informed by much of what you'll find in sources of this kind:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroeconomics
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6043598/
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2018.00359/full
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5586212/
http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Field_theories_of_consciousness
https://thebrain.mcgill.ca/flash/i/i_03/i_03_p/i_03_p_que/i_03_p_que.html
https://qbi.uq.edu.au/brain/brain-functions/visual-perception
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK542184/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10870199/
And someo who thinks thoughts don't exist has, of course, demonstrated their own view to be false.
No. Awareness is made about thoughts. These precede to the first one. I think, therefore I exist.
Without thoughts I can get into awareness
Yes, of course. Keep in mind I don't fault him on this, it's just we've only recently started really understanding the nature of cognition. But, yeah, from a low-resolution apprehension of the mind, it works well.
Yes, subjectivity, which is actionable data accrual and production, is dependent on objective computational hardware (the brain), meaning subjectivity as a stand alone concept is quite literally bullshit. I have a play on words I made a while back:
Nothing is subjective.
Meaning, nothing in existence is subjective, but is instead objective. And the only thing that is subjective is the concept of nothing itself. What do you think?
Quoting javi2541997
Yep, no question. Meaning subjectivity is dependent on objective facts.
I am somewhat stumped by the physicalist move of the ability argument- Mary doesn't learn new information, she gains a new ability: what seeing red is. I tend to believe that after she sees red, she does have new propositional knowledge: seeing red [the broad experience] is like seeing red [Mary's experience], but this seems too tautological to be considered some new fact about that world. It also might not be true, since Mary doesn't know what seeing red [in the broad sense] is like. None of us do. We only have access to our own particular experiences.
Yes, that's called a sound argument in basic logic. That's right, for something to be, it must be.
Quoting RogueAI
Red is an experience, not a fact. It is a data integration on the part of the brain. It isn't itself real, it is the representation of a wavelength that brain can detect and differentiate objective fact values with.
Quoting RogueAI
Yes, it's a function of the brain. Either you have it, or you don't. A bit like paralysis. Either your brain still has access, or it does not.
Quoting RogueAI
All sound and all valid arguments are tautological. It is your first clue that you're on to something that could be objective. If the argument is sound, then it is objective, which is exactly what I pointed out to you in the syllogisms. The first one was invalid entirely, and the second one had to incorporate it being sounds, actually true, for it to work. Meaning all that was done with the syllogism was prove that only that which is true is true, which is exactly what logice demonstrates to us.
Quoting RogueAI
Sure, but there's nothing to be drawn from an observation that cannot be tested. It cannot be tested because thoughts and perceptions are not themselves real, they are functions of the brain.
I understand where you are coming from. But you redirected the intent of the OP, to change the controversial subject to one less debatable. OP seems to assume the existence of brains. So his question regards the conditional existence of "thoughts" -- e.g. what do they consist of?. If mental phenomena are included in your personal model of reality. in what sense do they exist? Is there more than one way to be? If thoughts are not existent in some sense, why do we have a noun name for them? It's a theoretical philosophical query, not an empirical scientific slam-dunk.
Some people go so far as to reverse the hierarchy of material existence, postulating that Mind is more fundamental than Matter. Of course, they have no empirical evidence to support that position. So, it's just another age-old philosophical conundrum. Why then, does the notion of an immaterial aspect of reality persist in this day & age? It's easy to haughtily label such childlike questions as coming from ignorance or stupidity. But some proponents of a separate realm for invisible & intangible Ideas & Thoughts are manifestly of high IQ. Some are even highly credentialed mathematicians. Are they insane, or is there some philosophical meat to chew on?
My personal worldview is not Either-Or, but BothAnd. So, I can see the reasoning behind both perspectives. Which is why I accept that both Science and Philosophy have valid roles in human culture. And Quantum queerness has just added fuel to that long-burning fire. So, why can't we have an adult conversation about an idea that won't go away? :smile:
Mathematical Reality :
Andreas Albrecht of Imperial College in London, called it a "provocative" solution to one of the central problems facing physics. Although he "wouldn't dare" go so far as to say he believes it, he noted that "it's actually quite difficult to construct a theory where everything we see is all there is".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_universe_hypothesis
The OP is literally a response to a discussion him and I had for over a week on the axact same subject. And yes, it is less debatable, because that happens to be what is going to our knowledge.
Quoting Gnomon
All evidence points to no corporeal existence. That they are themselves perceptions of the computations of the brain, which is the material aspect of thought.
Quoting Gnomon
As expressions of the human being, the human will. All expression for the entirety of the brains existence and operation.
Quoting Gnomon
Be? Yes. Be the entity that exists? No.
Quoting Gnomon
Oh, because of Kant, and Heroclitus, and Descartes, and all manner of people who didn't understand that mind and body weren't seprate, but the very same entity. Thus, the term thoughts is just a name we gave to a phenomenon we didn't understand was actually the brain perceiving its own computations.
Quoting Gnomon
Not when they posit assertions with no evidence of any kind to ever emerge in the history of science to support them. Then, they manifest a high level of the opposite of intelligence.
Quoting Gnomon
Precisely. Their preoccupation with symbolic figures that may or may not correspond to reality has led them to abandon reason in other regards. Case in point: String Theorists.
Quoting Gnomon
If your philosophical meat leads you to concluded that reality is not real, or that elements of reality imply its own negation with absolutely no evidence, you are no longer in the realm of philosophy, but mysticism. Kind of like how when you start thinking made-up start shapes in the sky can tell you things about your life, you've left physics. Or, again, String Theorists.
Quoting Gnomon
But, be damned if it ain't so that that's all we can seem to find, or have ever observed. An abundance of "aLl ThErE Is." Again, reduction fallacies, argument from ignorance fallacies, it's all the non-materialists have to go on. It's complete bullshit. No man, it is moronic to conclude that complexity and vastness of reality isn't sufficient to explain all there is. There's just no way that that ocean is only filled with that amount of water. Yep, sure is, it's quite a lot, too.
You're a little ant building a hill, oblivious to the mountain behind you.
:up: Is Wittegenstein relevant? p-zombies? Does a computer that displays the string "I'm not thinking" or plays the prerecorded message "I'm not thinking" thinking? Re: Descartes' cogito ergo sum.
Maybe.
No.
No. No.
:chin: Rather: cogitatio fit, ergo cogitatio est. (P. Gassendi?)
:confused:
Quoting Agent Smith
Ah, Latin classes! Good memories when I was in school.
ego sum alpha et omega, initium et finis.
[i]In nomine Patris
et Filii
et Spiritus Sancti ...[/i] wtf.
If everything looks perfect then there is nothing that needs explaining. The mountain is not my problem.
:up: :100:
dicens, advena fui in terra aliena. :flower:
We have eyes, therefore we cannot see -> we have brains, therefore we cannot think.
Requiescat in pace! :death: :flower:
:rofl: Now, now 180 Proof, be nice to the religious nutcases! :rofl:
Si vis pacem, para bellum:eyes:
Miseram pacem vel bello bene mutari! :zip:
quod nullum est, nullum producit effectum :death:
:broken:
Oh, am I a little ant? Are we sure the little segmented insect isn't the person who just used such an absurd insult to someone instead of just making an argument? Let me help you little spiny orb:
The brain is the apex manifestation of computation in all the known universe. It is an evolutionarily produced and adapted, multi-structural, interlocking-network of computational systems of bodily regulation, data integretagtion, behavioral information and conveyance, and conceptual abstraction that is responsible for ALL human capacitance, including consciousness itself. It is composed of particularly white and gray matter, neurons, proteins, water, blood vessels, and glial cells, all arranged into different specialized structures with sophisticated pathways of transmission between themselves, that relay information to one another via electromagnetic and chemical processes that when operating together in symphony produce the whole of individual human experience as the emergent will; self-sustaining, self-regulating, and self-motivated.
There's the short rub of how it works, boychik. For individualized operations regarding currently known and observed neural phenomena, you may ask me in specificity on a given topic and will find you something available to discuss. Otherwise, proceed to your own research about the subject and you will quickly discover the truth of everything I'm telling you, and have been telling people about the brain for a very long time. You can start here if you would like:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroeconomics
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6043598/
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2018.00359/full
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5586212/
http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Field_theories_of_consciousness
https://thebrain.mcgill.ca/flash/i/i_03/i_03_p/i_03_p_que/i_03_p_que.html
https://qbi.uq.edu.au/brain/brain-functions/visual-perception
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK542184/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10870199/
Plenty here to demonstrate what I said.
If mind & body are the same entity, shouldn't they have the same properties? Yet, we give them different names & meanings because we perceive a significant difference between them. The body/brain has physical properties, and the mind has "non-physical" qualities. We detect the existence of physical objects via our 5 senses. But we infer the existence of "non-physical" non-things by deduction from circumstantial evidence.
I don't know anyone who denies that there is a causal relationship between Brain & Mind. But, the function of a machine is "non-physical", so we can't see it, and only know it by what it does. Which is how we know there's such a thing as Energy. It has no physical properties, only physical effects. That's also why Kant, Descartes, et al, made a categorical philosophical distinction between Mind & Body.
The Mind/Body problem only arises when some people attribute "non-physical" properties to Mind/Soul that are not rationally inferred, but emotionally imputed : such as Immortality & Ghosts. It's those unverifiable attributions that are debatable, not the intuitive functions such as verbally communicable Thoughts and Ideas. Yet, we can't find physical evidence to support or deny "non-physical" existence.
We simply take other people's thoughts for granted, because of our personal experience with the phenomenon of thinking. But, lacking direct experience with Immortality, we can only argue its existence by comparing opinions & beliefs. We may debate the mysterious hows & whys of Ideal existence, but that's also true of such presumably physical objects as Quarks & sub-quantum Strings. :smile:
The do in chemical and elemental nature, or material. But, no, the individual human being is a complex system of systems with different structures and functions, all contained to the same entity and regulated by the brain. There is no distinction.
Quoting Gnomon
Most of our language has been in use long before we understood what I just relayed to you, which is consistent with every piece of experimental data in modern cog-sci.
Quoting Gnomon
No, it doesn't. It only has physical qualities that produce the integration of data recieved from other physical properties in the world to inform behavior. The process, just like all processes in the universe that we know, or have any evidence of, are all physical properties and functions.
Quoting Gnomon
Senses are a neuronal function. And if your inferences lead you to deduce the existence of non-things, you are not deducing anything, and just playing make-believe, exclusively. There is no such thing as non-things.
Quoting Gnomon
No. You need to brush up on cog-sci, this is an utterly unscientific assertion. Yes, we can see it through functional mri.
Quoting Gnomon
No, photons have mass, what are you talking about? Light and energy are material forces.
Quoting Gnomon
Yep, and they were wrong, all of them. I wish I could say it to their faces.
Quoting Gnomon
All non-physical properties are make-believe, and come from 2000 years of Christian vitiation and oppression of actual philosophy. And is predominantly the inspiration for most modern systems of ethics, even the one's that claim atheism.
Quoting Gnomon
The thoughts are in fact the functions. There are no "thoughts," just computations which are observed through executive function, another brain function. It's a trick of the light you see. It's like saying movement is somehow different from the brain function in humans, it's completely not true.
Quoting Gnomon
That's because that which does not exist leaves no evidence of itself having not existed, except the absence of evidence existence itself.
Quoting Gnomon
We actually can't even do that. There is no argument for it, any premise generated will be one from ignorance, or a fabrication of some kind. Which is to say "opinions and beliefs," devoid of correspondence.
Quoting Gnomon
Everything but Strings, yes. The domain of ideal existence exploration is here, right here on earth, with me, with you, with facts, reason, evidence, data, empiricism, and the primacy of the Human Consciousness as an inviolable entity. That's where our only hope lies, and the hour is late. I say we get to it, brother.
The experience of seeing red certainly is real. So is being in pain. To deny the reality of experience is extremely counter-intuitive, and something I can't get on board with. I think your claim is more along the lines of experiences are illusions. Is that more accurate? Very Dennettian, if so!
No, it's a computational perception, or sensation. It is the computation itself that is real, which gives rise to sensation.
Quoting RogueAI
Same thing. Pain is a mechanism used to accurately determine that which constitutes homeostasis inducing experience, or reinforce the avoidance of homeostatic disruptions. It is in fact the computations of the hardward itself that is the real thing. The neuronal processes that send the messages.
Quoting RogueAI
I don't deny experience. I deny the strange amorphis reduction that is "experience isn't neural function," but is instead some thing, without corporeal form that we feel, and is real itself, with material properties, that are never described by anyone at all, including any known science. I regard experience as MORE valuable than most people, because I understand where it comes from, how it is detected by us, at why it is happening as an instrinsic function of our nature. My perspective is far more beautiful, poetic, liberating, and marvelous than some quack mind/body dichotamy that has never made any sense other than, "well, that's the only way I can imagine it, so it must be true." It isn't.
Quoting RogueAI
No, experiences are the result of 3.5 billion years of evolution to produce a computation piece of organic hardware more sophisticated than any in the known universe in accordfance with natures strictures, that it may use such experiences to not on achieve homeostasis, but maximize it for, not just the individual experiencer, but all who were willing to participate in the reality which fashioned us its beholders. You seeing what I'm saying to you know, brother? Perhaps it will really sink in if you spend a day, just one day, dedicated to trying to disprove this thesis with experimental research reports on these matters. I guarantee you that you will find nothing that contradicts what I have said here that isn't motivated by an agenda, reductionist, ignorance fallacy laced, or just plain woo. I beseech any and all to join me in the marvelling at this actual miracle that we were designed by the objective laws of reality to be and enjoy.
For a biologist there may be no distinction, because he's interested in mechanisms, not functions. But for psychologists and philosophers, the meaning in a mind is the "difference that makes a difference". :nerd:
Quoting Garrett Travers
Photons only have mass when they slow down and transform into matter. Besides, Mass is not a material object, but a mathematical function otherwise known as "inertia". It's defined as a "property" of matter, but not as matter per se. A property is a mental attribution, a thought.
Energy-in-general likewise transforms into mass only when it slows from lightspeed into velocities our senses can detect. They are different forms of the same fundamental force, which is neither light nor matter, but the potential for both. Their distinct measurable properties are how scientists distinguish between each form and give it a special name. For example, an electron is intermediate between photon and matter. Hence, deserves its own designation.
Unfortunately, Mind & Thought have no measurable properties apart from their associated material or energetic forms. Their existence must be inferred indirectly. :smile:
What is Mass? :
mass, in physics, quantitative measure of inertia, a fundamental property of all matter. It is, in effect, the resistance that a body of matter offers to a change in its speed or position upon the application of a force.
https://www.britannica.com/science/mass-physics
Quoting Garrett Travers
That assertion is a category error. It confuses the function of an MRI machine --- to display the Effects of a magnetic field on the iron molecules in blood --- with brain functions. MRI images require a human Mind to interpret that feedback in terms of malfunctions. :worry:
Quoting Garrett Travers
It's too bad that you can't argue with dead white men. But you could in theory tell Neurobiologist Christof Koch that he's wrong about The Feeling of Life Itself. The "feeling" he refers to is not a physical object, or a neuronal computation, but something else entirely. He calls it a "hack", but it's essentially an emergent Quality, which can't be measured, but can be experienced. He even toys with the notion of Panpsychism (i.e. widespread). Is he "wrong", in your expert opinion? You could suggest that he "brush-up on cog-sci". :wink:
The Feeling of Life Itself :
Why Consciousness Is Widespread but Can't Be Computed
https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/feeling-life-itself
Quoting Garrett Travers
A "function" is a mathematical concept, not a tangible object. See the Koch quotes above & below for his opinion on thoughts as computations. In what sense is a computation a material thing? :grin:
Confessions of a Romantic Reductionist :
[i]What links conscious experience of pain, joy, color, and smell to bioelectrical activity in the brain? How can anything physical give rise to nonphysical, subjective, conscious states? . . .
In which I muse about final matters considered off-limits to polite scientific discourse: to wit, the relationship between science and religion, the existence of God, whether this God can intervene in the universe, the death of my mentor, and my recent tribulations[/i]
http://cognet.mit.edu/book/consciousness
Quoting Garrett Travers
You, perhaps deliberately, missed the point of "non-physical existence". If ideas & thoughts are experienced in your reality, then they have an existence of some kind. It's just a question of labeling. Consciousness researchers refer to "ideas", not as material things, but as immaterial "representations" of both objective things and subjective thoughts. Long after the idea or feeling is gone, we can recall then in the form of Memories, which are also subjective Thoughts. :nerd:
Representationalism :
philosophical theory of knowledge based on the assertion that the mind perceives only mental images (representations) of material objects outside the mind, not the objects themselves.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/representationism
Quoting Garrett Travers
If you can't compare opinions and beliefs, what are we doing on this forum? Are we teleporting physical objects over cyber-space? :cool:
Quoting Garrett Travers
Are you denying the existence of "Strings" & "Loops". You may not be able to see them, even in principle, but the idea of such entities certainly "exist" as thoughts or feelings in the functioning minds of earth-bound mathematicians. They don't attempt to prove their existence empirically, but merely ask you to take it on faith, until they are eventually able to use the power of Strings to cause changes in the real world. Meanwhile, their only evidence is long strings of abstract numbers & symbols that are intended to "represent" unseen things. :joke:
Thought, all thought, what you call the "mind," is a function of the brain. There remains no distinction, until one can be shown. Philosophy does not ignore established science, it abstracts from it and applies it to the philosophical framework with which he/she is operating. For this "difference that makes a difference," to be anything other than other than fabricated woo, each difference is going to have to be clearly explained, and then shown to exist outside of neural function. I'll wait for any explainer on earth to provide me this information. Hint: I'll not be getting any.
Quoting Gnomon
Mm, no. Mass is a desginated term to describe the functional, objectively verifiable effect that matter has upon space and time as a ubiquitous propert of all matter, stick with science, it's better than make believe. But, it doesn't need to be defined "as matter, per se," to be a property of matter, just like your brain is matter. A property is a mental attribute. Mental attributes are generated by the brain.
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/mass.html
Quoting Gnomon
You're doing nothing but describing the properties of matter, which is what I said, all variations of which have mass and relate to eachother in material terms . Mass is itself energy. I don't understand where this is going. There is nothing in reality that is non-material.
Quoting Gnomon
Right, they have to be measured to the best of human ability from the perspective of their source, which is the brain according to all scientific observation. Any ideas what else it could be, if not the organ that regualtes all functions of the body?
Quoting Gnomon
Is this an argument? We already know which areas of the brain are which. We use fMRI's to investigate the functions of those areas. Are you actually implying that, not only are these methods not permissible evidence of function, but that such an assertion is an argument for brain functions not producing what you don't want them to be responsible for producing? Is that what you're getting at here?
Quoting Gnomon
Why would the term "white," make its way into this statement?
Quoting Gnomon
An emergent quality, for which he can provide no evidence to demonstrate the existence this hack with, but it is understood that if his brain stops functioning, then it stops emerging....... He should probably replace the h with a q.
Quoting Gnomon
That would help him very much, yes this is clearly complete bullshit. I see minds in every place except the one that seems to be the source and is in contol of all other bodily functions, emotional regulations, and behavioral patterns. Yes, dear fellow, it's the definition of complete bullshit, and science can no longer help him if he does much more than entertain this. In fact, it's probably science keeping him from doing so, as it would with all reasonable people who don't believe made-up concepts.
Quoting Gnomon
No, it's this, this is the definition: an activity or purpose natural to or intended for a person or thing.
Let's stop the bullshit dude.
Quoting Gnomon
Because computation happens via chemical and electromagnetic interactions, comprise of elements and energy, in material structures through material fibers. Just like how when your computer turns of, it has no more function. Bit like that, same thing happes to your brain when its material functions stop, just teensy exponetial bit more complex than a computer.
Quoting Gnomon
Luckily the answer is, there's no such thing as non-physical. Subjectivity is the result of individual data accrual from an individual brain, within individual environmental conditions, just like all variations in reality. And this is exactly the mysticism clouding your mind here, this god business. There is none.
Quoting Gnomon
No, I missed the evidence, thought I made that clear.
Quoting Gnomon
Yes, that's because with Emperor Constantine, Christians took state power in Rome and murdered the Empiricists who had postulated consciousness as a physical process over a thousand years ago, and since then, science, philosophy, and language have been burdened by mystic nonsense that keeps them from understanding that "ideas," are functions of a brain that controls everything else in the body, and no longer performs those functions when key structures of it are traumatized, or cessation of operation happens. And a big part of this problem is that, of 320 million or so people that live in America, abot 240 million are Christian, and the rest are some form of variation of religious, and to learn that consciousness was a physical process, would be the end of their worldview. So, all of those old ideas originally given rise to by mysticism, are all still here ruining everything. And memory recall and storage are functions of the brain. This is all retrievable information.
Quoting Gnomon
I cannot functionally compare a belief with or opinion with no substance with anything. One can simple play negation, which isn't comparing, or debating. Which is what that anti-realists do here quite a bit. And no, your teleporting virtual representations of code through material, using material laws of physics.
Quoting Gnomon
Are you providing any evidence of the existence of strings and loops?
Quoting Gnomon
The functions do. Theories are concepts, they don't exist, they have to be embodied, or employed upon the objective world in behavior. It's why you can't fly, even if you generate a theory of you having wings. See how that works, there?
Quoting Gnomon
Um... No. No, is my answer to that request. When they can demonstrate, I'll change my tune immediately.
Quoting Gnomon
Sounds just like a bible verse I know about... You know the one, eh? Something... Something is the reassurance of that which goes unseen..... Something like that?
I agree with that last prediction. You won't be getting any empirical evidence for mental phenomena. Not due to absence of evidence, but to categorical rejection of Reasoning as evidential. It's also a rejection of common sense & intuition as evidence of something unseen, but obvious. Such hard-evidence skepticism is a good policy for scientific exploration of classical physical phenomena. But it breaks down at the Quantum level, where the evidence is mostly inference from circumstances. For example, atom-smashers don't directly reveal sub-atomic particles. Instead the existence & properties of such things must be inferred from circumstantial evidence (e.g. tracks in a cloud chamber). So, scientific knowledge of such ephemeral entities depends on agreement between the opinions of experts doing the experiments. The rest of us must take their word for the existence of Quarks & Neutrinos. They can't show us the evidence, because it exists only as subjective ideas in their minds.
Likewise, no-one can show us direct evidence of other minds, because it's circumstantial & inferential. We know our own minds directly by the feeling of thinking (cogito ergo sum). The epistemological question of Solipsism only arises when we look for tangible evidence of Other Minds. We can cut their skulls open to see if they have a brain. But, even zombles have brains; which is, presumably, why they have to eat brains to keep their resurrected bodies going. Since you are holding out for empirical evidence of res cogitans, the only evidence you will find is for res extensa. That's why nobody doubts the existence of Brains, but a few hyper-skeptics will demand sensory evidence of Minds. They take their own thinking-thing for granted, but demand objective proof for all other minds. That's what we call Solipsism.
A solipsist seems to think of himself as a machine, running a program. In which case, he is a robot, and has no Will of his own. His cause & effect logic is impeccable, except that he denies the First Cause : the Programmer. Are you self-programmed? Do you think for yourself, or as directed by some outside force, such as Destiny? The Mind/Body problem turns on the question of Free Will. They go hand-in-hand. If you doubt your own Willpower, you will also doubt your own Mind. But, that's OK. According to the Constitution, brain-eating Zombies have equal rights with law-minding citizens. Except for the brain-eating thing : in a court of law, the mindless defense will not get you off for a murder rap . :confused:
Clear explanation of The Difference :
https://www.informationphilosopher.com/solutions/scientists/bateson/
circumstantial evidence, in law, evidence not drawn from direct observation of a fact in issue.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/circumstantial-evidence
problem of other minds, in philosophy, the problem of justifying the commonsensical belief that others besides oneself possess minds and are capable of thinking or feeling somewhat as one does oneself.
https://www.britannica.com/topic/circumstantial-evidence
Why do most neuroscientists remain strict materialists? :
[i]There is no evidence to suggest otherwise. Neuroscientists, like all scientists, are quantitatively driven. If you can't measure it, it doesn't exist. Since you can't measure mind, you can't quantify mind—so by definition, it's not physical. . . .
This debate dates back to the early 1900’s and the quantum era, when physicists like Einstein and Heisenberg were exploring the tools we have to measure objective reality, and realized that there is a point where humans can never transcend their subjective assessment of reality. It’s impossible. There is no way out of that matrix, if you will.[/i]
___Dr. Jay Lombard, neurologist
No, you misunderstand, I have loads of empirical evidence of that. I need empirical evidence that would suggest that not only is all of the current empirical evidence for my position not applicable, but that it in fact is another source of mental phenomena for which evidence can also be provided, you see? You'll need both sets of data. Or, it is nothing but woo.
Quoting Gnomon
You can't do that, because you just used your reason to state a fact about evidence, therefore your reasoning cannot be trusted in this assertion of yours on the nature of evidence, as reason is not evidence and cannot be used to conclude such a fact about evidence. The actual truth, is that reason does contitute evidence, and I'll be needing to see some for woo to stop being woo. I'll wait.
Quoting Gnomon
No, it does not. There are aspects of quantum mechanics that are not understood yet, ut nothing about the nature of empiricism breaks down, and nothing about our models of reality break down. Quantum mechanics is an incorpoarted aspect into the existing paradigm of physics conducted to this point that has been verified, and it is specifically empiricism that reveals any understanding whatsoever about the nature of quantum mechanics, which is a compatible feature of the macroscopic reality to which it contributes. Furthermore, a break down, even if it did exist, would not constitute evidence of wherever you think this non-coporeal source of consciousness is, you will still need to provide evidence of that to make the claim, not just negate empiricism, which you have done in no way.
Quoting Gnomon
Which the conduct using reason and empiricism.
Quoting Gnomon
Mm, no, dude. The evidence is empirically observed and is being verified more and more each year. There is only the concensus in the scientific community that the universe is material. Particularly material as opposed to anti-material. You're just making things up. Stop it: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/04/200415133657.htm
Quoting Gnomon
No, it isn't. Cognitive neuroscience has revealed to us that the brain controls everything about the body. There is no reason why anyone would conclude that it is not the source of the "mind," or whatever it is you mean by such. This is mainstream shit:
https://www.ninds.nih.gov/Disorders/Patient-Caregiver-Education/Know-Your-Brain
https://opentextbc.ca/introductiontopsychology/chapter/3-2-our-brains-control-our-thoughts-feelings-and-behavior/
Quoting Gnomon
No, it is exactly you who are holding out for evidence of something, and me demanding that you present evidence for your claim. My claim has already been established by science, with no need to add anything else to the model.
Quoting Gnomon
The brain and the mind are not different, never been. The brain is the source of ALL functions of the body, and there is no evidence to suggest otherwise.
Quoting Gnomon
And what call what you're claiming to believe, is religion. And no, that's not what solipsism is, bud:
solipsism: the view or theory that the self is all that can be known to exist.
I'm claiming the exact opposite.
Quoting Gnomon
Any evidence of that? Sounds like reduction. What would make him a robot, your feelings on the subject? Your mere assertion? You have to qualify the shit you assert, dude. You'll not be getting away with just saying things with me, your talking to the real deal here.
Quoting Gnomon
Yes. No. And, no it doesn't, there never has been a free will or mind/body issue. Will is the manifestation of any and all functions of the individual brain that is equipped with self-generating conceptual hardeware used to navigate reality, and no evidence suggests otherwise.
Quoting Gnomon
What are these? Aren't these mythological creatures?
Quoting Gnomon
See empirical evidence to the contrary here, and come back when you have some evidence of something:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6043598/
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2018.00359/full
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5586212/
http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Field_theories_of_consciousness
https://thebrain.mcgill.ca/flash/i/i_03/i_03_p/i_03_p_que/i_03_p_que.html
https://qbi.uq.edu.au/brain/brain-functions/visual-perception
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK542184/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10870199/
The physical world is only as strong as the string. The truth is, something so abstract can't be meaningfully defined by its physicality.
The physical world is what produces the physical string in that physical world.
Quoting theRiddler
Says who? We're talking about the single most complex and sophisticated system in the known universe, which we know governs every other function of the body. What would lead us to conclude that the brain isn't producing it, with no evidence to negate the established body of evidence that suggests as much, but conclude something else is responsible for it without providing evidence to support the assertion, or even describe what we mean as the separate source itself? You have to see how irrational that is.
It isn't saying anything to say the brain produces consciousness. All the evidence points to us not having a comprehensive understanding of the insides of or what is outside the body. It's very shortsighted to draw conclusions about all the properties of consciousness at this juncture.
We don't know what energy or the physical are. People have been taking the most myopic approach and calling that reality for thousands of years, and nine times out of ten they're wrong.
And you disgruntle me by saying the brain produces consciousness. That tells us nothing about the brain or consciousness and there are a myriad of forces that could be at play here.
Everything is connected, and consciousness no lesser so. Perhaps it is produced by the brain. Perhaps the brain is a transducer for a field of consciousness. Perhaps matter is just how mind happens to seem.
It bothers me when people claim to have solved these mysteries with no concrete proof, as if there could even be concrete proof, and is a hurdle to open-minded, scientific exploration.
You're just claiming to know how everything works.
Your usage of "Empirical" seems to go beyond the literal meaning, to include Theoretical inferences. So, we are, as usual, talking past each other ; using different vocabularies (Science vs Philosophy). Empirical evidence would be a list of observed facts (theory-neutral raw data). But an interpretation of those facts (pro-or-con-Mind) would be a conjectural postulation, since no "load" of reductive empirical data will prove the physical existence of something holistic & hypothetical. So, the electro-chemical activities of neurons would be empirical, but attribution of a thought, connected to that behavior, would be theoretical. (Until MRIs can read minds directly, rather than by human inference, that is) Therefore, as non-specialist non-scientists, we can only discuss various theories about Brain & Mind, not empirical facts.
You can give me a list of experts who conclude Mind = Brain, and I could give you a list of experts who conclude Brain does not equate to Mind. The difference is not necessarily in the data, but in the interpretation. And It's not simply Materialism versus Spiritualism (as you may presume), but more like Classical Physics versus Post-Classical. Yet the primary difference between your theory of Mind and mine, is Reductionism (empirical trees) versus Holism (conceptual forest).
As an example of a classical approach to Mental phenomena, Behaviorism expected to explain Consciousness without resort to any Theory of Mind. But, while it produced some useful facts, it never explained how Matter could become aware of its environment, or of itself. Since I'm not a specialist, I can only say that in my skeptical opinion, the "loads of evidence" you refer to does not add-up to a holistic hill-of-beans -- an explanation for the phase transition from numb & dumb Matter to self-aware Conscious Matter. Instead, the reductionist Materialism & Behaviorism theories actually took the conclusion as a premise. But, the current wave of Holistic theories (e.g. I.I.T) are looking beyond the bare facts toward a rational inference, that actually explains the distinction between a thinking brain, and an isolated brain-in-a-vat. :nerd:
PS___If we took a vote of all Brain-Mind experts right now, I suspect that your side would win. But my experts are "on the side of the angels". :joke:
.
It is argued that a scientific theory, together with its concepts, is simply a postulated system of logical categories for conceptualizing a theory-neutral experimental datum. This entails that the mind-body problem is a methodological rather than an empirical or even a metaphysical issue regarding the logical adequacy of one or another theoretical framework for construing the relation between mental, bodily, and environmental categories.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF03394144
Science as we know it can’t explain consciousness – but a revolution is coming :
In fact, we should not be surprised that our standard scientific method struggles to deal with consciousness. As I explore in my new book, Galileo’s Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness, modern science was explicitly designed to exclude consciousness. Phillip Goff, Gallileo's Error
https://theconversation.com/science-as-we-know-it-cant-explain-consciousness-but-a-revolution-is-coming-126143
Why is behaviorism wrong? :
In this version of history, there was something wrong with behaviorism in the 1970s and 1980s – it became too focused on specific problems and lost the big picture.
Note -- the Reductionist approach has failed, so Holistic approaches, such as Tononi/Koch's Integrated Information Theory are now the cutting-edge of Mind Science.
You seem to be under the impression that you are talking about different things. The body and all of its organs are a singular manifestation, the functions of which are all governed and controlled by the brain. You've got a reduction fallacy going, the system is more complex than individual parts being analyzed as separate. Livers don't just spring out of holes in the ground. You're talking 3.5 billion years of evolution, it doesn't play by rules of mere logical assembly. Its all one system of complex, interdependent, functional, networking, structures, whose central hub of control is the brain: a multistructural, multifunctional, network of computational systems of unrivaled sophistication, that corresponds to each individul functional structure to provide the necessary information to do provide functionality to the entire organism. The outside world is the domain in which it has evolved to exist within, and navigate through while maintaining homeostasis. This kind of analysis simply isn't gonna cut it.
Quoting theRiddler
No, it's shortsighted to deny what is clearly supported by science, because of one's perceived ignorance on the subject, which is also a fallacy you have going on. Saying the brain produces consciousness is simply relaying what the evidence supports as a theory, with no evidence to the contrary whatsoever; again, gaps in knowledge neither negates anything about my position, nor validates anything about yours. You still have to provide both and explanation that is plausible -which is unclear at this moment, you haven't explained what your asserting as an alternative - and evidence to support that explanation. Hasn't happened from anybody that has ever argued with me about this topic since I came to this website over a month ago. Period.
Quoting theRiddler
Apply this standard to everything you believe and what you'll find is that nothing will ever pass your contradictory standard, because it is contradictory and not a standard. Your standard of knowledge is itself ignorance. So, what I'll simply respond here with is basic: Yes we do, and here's an introduction: https://byjus.com/chemistry/properties-of-matter/#:~:text=Any%20characteristic%20that%20can%20be,are%20considered%20properties%20of%20matter.
Quoting theRiddler
Name one person; what did they say, and has it been empirically observed and experimented with? Otherwise I'm going to have to apply this statement specifically to the person who made it, who hasn't said what he regards anything to be other than "we don't know, shortsighted, not having comprehensive understanding, or myopic." In other words no argument for anything, other than your inclination towards nothingness.
Quoting theRiddler
All of the functions of the body, including executive function, that we have found evidence for, are all governed by the brain. It's pretty elementary stuff in cog-sci, too. Here's a cool intro overview on it with pictures and explanations, and some sources at the bottom for you to research have you any conclusions based on what you haven't understood:https://kids.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frym.2021.534184
In short, what I actually did was disgruntle your brain's perception of itself, lol. But, it will relax once the threat passes.
Quoting theRiddler
Yeah, I mean, all of the evidence suggests as much. And seriously, go try to find research that actually suggests that the brain doesn't control a function of the body, it's not there. There are competing theories based on ignorance fallacies, and old mystic issues from Christianity, but no actual research suggests anything other than what I have told you.
Quoting theRiddler
Who claimed to have solved anything? I claimed that the research suggests nothing else than what I have relayed, not that anything is "solved." And, for the record, the "solved" part of what you're eluding to, are actually centuries old, unscientific claims made about the mind derived from the 1000 year reign of Christian induced ignorance and SkyMan Talking-Donkey worship. It's never been anymore of a mystery than naturally emergent production, just as Epicurus postulated hundreds of year before Constantine ushered in the age of Christianity.
Quoting theRiddler
And you're just claiming to know literally nothing. So, I'm not entirely sure why were here speaking to one another.
No, theories are postulated, then evidence is gathered that either supports it, or not. That's what I mean by empirical.
Quoting Gnomon
These are not different vocabularies. To omit the current scientific data from your philosophical analysis, is to committ the disregarding known science fallacy: This fallacy is committed when a person makes a claim that knowingly or unknowingly disregards well known science, science that weighs against the claim. They should know better. This fallacy is a form of the Fallacy of Suppressed Evidence.
https://iep.utm.edu/fallacy/#DisregardingKnownScience
I don't know where people keep coming up with this fake standard, but don't continue doing it with me. You're gonna need to actually contend with my position if you wanna hang, bud. You're talking with the real thing when speaking to me, bud, you gotta step it up. You've been cordial so far with me, so I'll be as well, but this is the kind of assertion that isn't going to fly.
Quoting Gnomon
No, it wouldn't. It's mainstream empirical science that suggest nothing else: https://www.pnas.org/content/112/37/11732.full?sid=b9968895-810f-4713-8887-ae0445dfa79b
https://www.aau.edu/research-scholarship/featured-research-topics/tracking-thoughts-moving-through-brain
https://opentextbc.ca/introductiontopsychology/chapter/3-2-our-brains-control-our-thoughts-feelings-and-behavior/
You're years behind the field here. The empirical data supports the theory that the brain controlls every function of the body, including thought and behavior.
Quoting Gnomon
So, what you're saying is you believe things for no reason.You could have openned with that.
By this standard, empirical evidence provided to you that would explain the "transition from numb & dumb Matter to self-aware Conscious Matter," would " add-up to a holistic hill-of-beans," because you're a "numb & dumb," "explanation" "specialist."
Quoting Gnomon
Lol, you poor child. Here, buddy, go see how without imperical data, IIT is woo. Now, IIT has some good concepts, but not when dissociated from funtional theories:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/333802932_The_Unfolding_Argument_Why_IIT_and_Other_Causal_Structure_Theories_Cannot_Explain_Consciousness?_iepl%5BgeneralViewId%5D=XOXNj2v6I9Yz8KgyF10N1JC29S24WcYKbrTV&_iepl%5Bcontexts%5D%5B0%5D=searchReact&_iepl%5BviewId%5D=jc0F0Vc6tYeftKvss7HVlfzMPnU5YYDU03HS&_iepl%5BsearchType%5D=publication&_iepl%5Bdata%5D%5BcountLessEqual20%5D=1&_iepl%5Bdata%5D%5BinteractedWithPosition1%5D=1&_iepl%5Bdata%5D%5BwithoutEnrichment%5D=1&_iepl%5Bposition%5D=1&_iepl%5BrgKey%5D=PB%3A333802932&_iepl%5BtargetEntityId%5D=PB%3A333802932&_iepl%5BinteractionType%5D=publicationTitle
In short, it is specifically the function of recurrent neural processes of computation that give rise to anything that can be postulated in IIT, which is not a scientific theory, but more a conceptual framework for certain types of systems. But, they've got some stuff right.
Quoting Gnomon
That's correct. The study above from 2019 explains exactly that, with experimental data, predictions, and comparisons between computation theories, and causal theories of consciousness. Now, get outta here and get to reading, you ole Explanation Specialist, we need you to be properly explaining stuff.
No, the govenor brains the manager. It's in the study up there.
The abstraction.....can't be found.... in the brain..... Well.. Where the hell is it, then??
Quoting ZzzoneiroCosm
It is at first, a simple question confirmed by the presence of thought in the asking of the question itself. The trouble rises when you want to reduce thought to something that is not thought. This reduction, however, presupposes thought.
If you want to say there is no thought, you are going to have to live with a contradiction. Thought cannot be reduced.
GT, I appreciate your willingness to engage in a principled philosophical exchange of views on a controversial topic, without resorting to (much) name-calling and ad hominem aspersions. At least you mostly attribute my "numb & dumb" explanations to mere ignorance & stupidity instead of intentional malice.
Unfortunately, unlike empirical Science, theoretical Philosophy is not progressive but circular. We are still arguing about the same issues that Aristotle articulated 2500 years ago. And no impasse is more contentious than Physics versus Meta-Physics, AKA Science vs Religion. I am not a practicing scientist, and I don't practice any religion. But in this thread my arguing position is somewhere in between Materialistic Scientism and Spiritualistic Religionism. I suppose you could label it as Philosophism.
My purpose for exposing my heterodox worldview to opposing orthodox views is to help me weed-out my own ignorance & misunderstandings. That's how I learn to see both sides of many disputes. But my moderate stance places me in the middle of a circular firing squad. My religious family think I have gone over to Satan's side, while my scientific friends suspect that I may be a closet New Age nutcase. Se la vie. I can see where both are coming from, but I took the path less traveled by true-believers on either side. Thanks for playing the philosophy game of Virtual Dialogue. :smile:
"There are no 'good' or 'bad' people. Some are a little better or worse. but all are activated more by misunderstanding than malice."
___Tennessee Williams
[i]I've looked at life from both sides now
From win and lose and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all[/i]
___Joni Mitchell
". . . . since the human mind is capable of dealing with both empirical reality and intangible imagination. In fact, most people do indeed manage to hold both idealistic worldviews (religious myths, romantic stories, hypothetical conjectures) and pragmatic views (technical knowledge, scientific models of reality), although in discrete mental compartments. So in order to understand the whole truth of our existence, we need to look at both sides of every polarized worldview. In the non-fiction world, we don’t always have to choose either Good or Evil, but we can look for a moderate position near the Golden Mean, the sweet spot I call BothAnd."
____BothAnd Glossary
This disconnection in your mind is a big issue. One has to inform the other, or it isn't philosophy.
Quoting Gnomon
THere's no intellectual contention there. Just one group holding on to no evidence, and the other having all of the evidence that has been accrued so far.
Quoting Gnomon
Only one has any evidence, the other is just feelings.
Quoting Gnomon
This is what it is all about. But, there is only empirical methods to reveal those to you.
Quoting Gnomon
In which case, I will gladly apologize for being insulting. You have no idea how often people simply deny facts of reality on this website. I respect this position, I've been there. It's part of the philosophical journey.
Quoting Gnomon
Yep, welcome to the family brother, glad to have you. If religious people are willing to claim you are evil for searching for answers, as mine did, it may be best for you to begin rethinking their fixed place in your life. Just something to keep in mind as a topic of exploration. As far as New Age nutcase, what views are they specifically criticizing?
Quoting Gnomon
It's what I'm here for, for the time being. :smile:
This is correct.
Quoting theRiddler
No, the attempt to relegate the complexity of the brain so as to be defined by nothing, is exactly what was invented by murderous sociopaths. Epicurus posited the idea of an organ producing consciousness through natural processes, whose legacy has never been associated with psychopathic tendencies. Look that up.
No, it's sociopathic to attempt to convince them that they aren't controlled by the single most sophisticated and complex system in the known universe which is capable of producing consciousness. Has nothing to do with brains is vats, that's not how our universe is. I would never argue such a thing. But, most assume that's what I mean. I'm complimenting the human brain with its proper majesty, not relegating to some theoretical domain of non-corporeal ether.
You can find the Black vs White critics replying to my BothAnd posts all over this forum. They try to push me to their side of the absolute Truth spectrum. Fortunately, most posters are somewhat humble & flexible in their philosophical opinions. Only a few are absolutely certain of their scientific or religious Truth.
Apparently, the Yin-Yang symbol is a badge of NewAgeism, even though Aristotle advised a similar middle-of-the-road approach, in order to avoid the Either/Or Fallacy. I try not to be peremptory (dogmatic) about Science vs Religion, or Real vs Ideal. There is good & bad on both sides. So, I get to sample the best of both worlds, without getting stuck in a pile of dogma. :joke:
Note -- There's an old saying : "I must be doing something right, if I get criticized from both extremes".
Both/And Principle :
[i]My coinage for the holistic principle of Complementarity, as illustrated in the Yin/Yang symbol. Opposing or contrasting concepts are always part of a greater whole. Conflicts between parts can be reconciled or harmonized by putting them into the context of a whole system.
* The Enformationism worldview entails the principles of Complementarity, Reciprocity & Holism, which are necessary to offset the negative effects of Fragmentation, Isolation & Reductionism. Analysis into parts is necessary for knowledge of the mechanics of the world, but synthesis of those parts into a whole system is required for the wisdom to integrate the self into the larger system. In a philosophical sense, all opposites in this world (e.g. space/time, good/evil) are ultimately reconciled in Enfernity (eternity & infinity).
* Conceptually, the BothAnd principle is similar to Einstein's theory of Relativity, in that what you see ? what’s true for you ? depends on your perspective, and your frame of reference; for example, subjective or objective, religious or scientific, reductive or holistic, pragmatic or romantic, conservative or liberal, earthbound or cosmic. Ultimate or absolute reality (ideality) doesn't change, but your conception of reality does. Opposing views are not right or wrong, but more or less accurate for a particular purpose.
* This principle is also similar to the concept of Superposition in sub-atomic physics. In this ambiguous state a particle has no fixed identity until “observed” by an outside system. For example, in a Quantum Computer, a Qubit has a value of all possible fractions between 1 & 0. Therefore, you could say that it is both 1 and 0.[/i]
BothAnd Glossary
Any truth that could be found in the not absolute category, would at that moment constitute a place in the absolute state of truth. It's completely reductive.
Quoting Gnomon
That's about right.
Quoting Gnomon
Go check out General Systems Theory, and Informationa Integration Theory to compliment some of the understandings you placed underneath this banner. They're all similar, some more scientific, others more topical. The universe is fundamentally a system of systems with no exceptions, and the point from which things should be viewed.
It is a useful term, though, in matters of folk psychology. It’s not a feature of grammar but people will point to a number of clauses or sentences and call that a “thought” with little objection. Some biological activity may occur and someone could say “I had a thought”, and we understand what she means. But there is nothing called a “thought” on the plane of existence.
The last part of this assertion belies the first part. The "absolute category" would be inherently all-encompassing & Holistic, hence not piecemeal & Reductive. Which reminds me that these politically polarized threads (e.g. FreeWill vs Determinism : Mind vs Brain) tend to begin as philosophical dialogs with sharing of information & opinions. But they quickly devolve into political sniping across the dividing line. The opposing poles can be labeled as either Reductive or Holistic. But the BothAnd philosophy crosses the no-man's-land to unite those disparate worldviews. Unfortunately, the politicization of the discussion forces each participant to retreat into an Either/Or stance. :angry:
Quoting Garrett Travers
To "complement" your mis-understanding, you could check-out the BothAnd Blog to discover how Systems Theory and Information Theory are integrated into the BothAnd Principle of Complementarity. You may be surprised that your interlocutor is not quite as ignorant as your political jibes make him out to be. Of course, your Conservative vs Liberal dichotomy might be offended by the fraternization of opposing worldviews, such as Religion and Science. The moderate BA position doesn't accept the dogma of either side, but it does try to understand how they became entrenched in their defensive postures. :cool:
PS__ Are you politically conservative to match your conservative Science=Truth ideology? :joke:
BothAnd Blog :
[i]* Individuals may have strong beliefs & principles. But interpersonal endeavors require more flexibility. So, this blog is an argument for Relativism, Negotiation, Compromise, & Cooperation.
* The usual alternative to these wavering wimpy ways is the unyielding dominant stand-point of Absolutism, Conflict, and Competition. Royal and Imperial political & religious systems tend to adopt an autocratic stance of “my way or the highway”. Whereas, In more democratic and egalitarian systems, the marketplace of ideas will determine truths and values.
* Nationalism is a modern pseudo-democratic off-shoot of Royalism, with its divine right to rule a nation of pawns. Democracy and Socialism are imperfect attempts to accommodate the needs & wishes of all citizens from top to bottom.
* The Blog assumes that we will always have people on both sides of every issue. Yet, we can still have our private beliefs, even as we make public concessions to necessity.[/i]
BothAnd Glossary
BothAnd-ism :
An inclusive philosophical perspective that values both Subjective and Objective information; both Feelings and Facts; both Mysteries and Matters-of-fact; both Animal and Human nature.
HOLISM IS COMPLEMENTARY
REDUCTIONISM IS INCOMPLETE
You didn't take time to highlight the NOT absolute category. Let's try this argument again, this time include the NOT part.
Quoting Gnomon
I have no place in this analysis. I don't give a shit about politics, except where it violates my freedom.
Quoting Gnomon
Is said to "compliment" the ideas, because they are compatible. Not because you "need" to have your views increased. I was agreeing with those statements, dipshit.
Quoting Gnomon
....Huh? Fuck all of those ideologies, they're all the same people who simply want to use power to violate my rights, and are both fucking clueless about history, philosophy, and science. (science not an ideology)
Quoting Gnomon
Religions have a way of being dogmatic, my friend. Best to avoid them altogether and pursue individual accrual of knowledge, happiness, and proficiency.
Quoting Gnomon
Yes, states are evil and irredeemable, I know.
Quoting Gnomon
Exactly. Just don't shoot me any conclusions that have zero evidence to support them. I can play with assertions and theories all day.
I referred to political polarization because you seem to be defending an ideological position, which some refer to as "Scientism". I'm reluctant to use such categorical labels, but your insistence on empirical evidence --- for Philosophical concepts that are not amenable to reductive dissection --- is a mis-application of a good policy. You portray my not-yet-orthodox cutting-edge "evidence" as in-admissible. But a Mind is not a lab rat.
In this thread, we are discussing a phenomenon (Thought) that is invisible & intangible -- only inferrable & theoretical -- yet you demand empirical evidence for its existence. Since, after 2500 years of speculating, there is no hard evidence forthcoming; from your ideological perspective this thread is an exercise in futility -- except as a political arena to display the superiority of the Scientism party. I apologize for using a shorthand label for your view. But, it omits the very essence of Philosophical Evidence : subjective experience & rational appraisal, in cases where objective testing is not applicable. Unfortunately, that includes most of the topics that politicians come to blows about. :cool:
PS__Even on Scientific forums, pioneering theories, such as Strings & Loops, are hotly debated, because the only evidence is mathematical (mental), not empirical (material). Some opponents say such theories are "not even wrong", but that's also true of all perennial philosophical questions. So why do we bother with philosophy anyway? Philosophy is not Natural Science, it's Cultural Science. :smile:
Phenomenon :
1. a fact or situation that is observed to exist or happen, especially one whose cause or explanation is in question.
Empirical vs Theoretical evidence :
Empirical: Based on data gathered by original experiments or observations. Theoretical: Analyzes and makes connections between empirical studies to define or advance a theoretical position.
https://coloradocollege.libguides.com/c.php?g=286871&p=1911416
Scientism :
[i]“Scientism is a matter of putting too high a value on natural science in comparison with other branches of learning or culture.”
“Science, modeled on the natural sciences, is the only source of real knowledge.”[/i]
https://sciencereligiondialogue.org/resources/what-is-scientism/
Philosophical Evidence :
In philosophy, evidence has been taken to consist of such things as experiences, propositions, observation-reports, mental states, states of affairs, and even physiological events, such as the stimulation of one's sensory surfaces.
https://iep.utm.edu/evidence/
Philosophical Evidence :
According to the phenomenal conception of evidence, only one's experiences can serve as evidence.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/evidence/
Evidence-based Medicine :
My sister has been suffering from a mysterious debilitating ailment that mainstream doctors have not been able to correctly diagnose & treat for over 40 years. It forced her to give-up her work toward a Phd. The affliction has been given various labels, such as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Another, non-mainstream label, is Toxic Mold Syndrome. Her doctors have tried to treat it as a typical allergy with no success. Some people with this syndrome go to live in tents in the desert, to avoid contact with ubiquitous mold. So, she has been desperately seeking relief via "alternative medicine", which at least took her subjective-suffering-with-little-objective-evidence seriously.
Only recently has her quest found significant relief from a common vitamin (niacinamide), that is reputed to stimulate the energy-producing mitochondria in human cells. Ironically, one of the alternative non-MDs claims that his treatment is "evidence based", even though it is not reviewed or approved by the FDA. I tend to be somewhat skeptical of much "alternative" medicine. But for me, the evidence that counts is that she is a completely different person from the shell-of-a-self that has been dragging around for all those years. That's subjective, not empirical evidence.
To mirror your apolitical expression above : I don't give a sh*t about medical politics, except where it marginalizes what works subjectively as non-empirical.
I don't know what any of this means. Science, as per basic philosophical understanding, is never to be dismissed and should inform one's philosophical theories. Period, no ifs, ands, or buts. My insistence isn't on empirical evidence, it's on any evidence whatsoever other than talking. Another philosophical understanding that is basic. The mind is not a lab rat..... Hm, why would someone say that to the guy who's been explaining that the brain is the most complex system in the universe........? No answers for that....
Quoting Gnomon
You claim it is invisible, but we understand definitively that thoughts are generated by the brain..... No, I'm saying you have no evidence of your claim, at all. And that the reason you don't, is because the evidence that exists suggests thoughts are a perception of computation. Perceptions themselves are not things, not unless you're talking about the actual functions you are yourself perceiving. And nobody on this site has been able to argue against that.
Quoting Gnomon
No, just participating in the answering of a thread question with facts, evidence, reason, and data. Scientism is just something you tossed in here and rode with, just like your "objectively real" thoughts that nobody can see.
Quoting Gnomon
That's fine, no worries. People misunderstand eachother and insult eachother all the time. Luckily I didn't feel too insult because I could clearly detect that I hadn't gotten something across through these messages. But I reiterate, I am the single most anti-political human being I know of. I regard all politics as evil, and the people who participate to be completely fucking duped by bullshit.
Quoting Gnomon
Yes, which is fine if they want to debate it from the perspective of theorization. They do not, however, get to call it science. Any more than IIT get's to call their framework science. IIT has been empirically falsified now a number of times. That doesn't mean there's nothing of interest, or important, or elements that are compatible with the real stuff there. It's just, we don't get to call it real yet.
Quoting Gnomon
Right, in logic, one can make an argument that is consistently valid, and yet never sound. The same thing goes for theoretical frameworks. I can fit anything into a theoretical framework of anykind. And if it is shown to be wrong, all I have to do is incorporate that particular thing that I was wrong about into the framework and voila! all better. It was Karl Popper who brought us falsifiability in science. If it cannot be falsified, it is not science.
Quoting Gnomon
Notice how all of these have an element if individual verification? This presentation is not an argument for providing no evidence whatsoever.
Quoting Gnomon
No, dude. That's empirical. It's just not established science. That's most certainly empirical evidence of something changing due to medication, how do you not understand that? That is TWO people verifying something they are perceiving and testing with multiple treatments. It may not be good evidence for any argument, honestly his argument was pretty good in the sense that all he knows is the she isn't a damn zombie anymore. That is certainly imperical evidence for such, by definition. What I am asking for..... is any evidence at all. Of any kind...
Thoughts, they are such a fickle thing. Now most people will not deny the "validity" of the process and product of thought, however they will surely debate the nature of this thought. In what way does a thought exist, what kind of thought exists? What does it mean for the thought to exist? I say anything distinguishable in the human experience from another thing, is something which exists and is real. So yes, there are thoughts, and they are the one of the closest (it is close to us to access) manifestations of the incorporeal or the immaterial.
That is a pretty good summary of the authoritarian worldview called "Scientism". Technically, it's not a religion, but a dogmatic philosophical position, based on the absolute authority of some intangible entity called "Science". However, it may be described as "puritanical", in that it rejects such unreal impurities as "theories" and "opinions". Scientism may be considered political, in that it is identified mostly with Left Wing political views. Until now, I had never concerned myself with Scientism, partly because those who espouse the gospel of materialistic Science, don't think of themselves as political or religious, just as Orthodox believers in scientifically revealed Truth.
Scientism preaches a narrow definition of Science, and rejects most of the "soft sciences", especially, the Humanities, such as Philosophy. Coincidentally, I read a Scientific American article this morning on the topic of Anthropology & Paleontology, comparing "Neanderthal Thinking" with modern human beliefs and behaviors. From examining ancient bones the "scientists" concluded that those cave men had primitive forms of symbolic art and religious rituals. But, if you demand to see their falsifiable evidence, you would be disappointed to learn that it consists mainly of expert interpretations (inferences ; opinions) from vague data such as scratches on bones, and holes in eagle claws that resemble a necklace. You could say that they had hard (petrified) evidence for the soft thoughts of long dead people.
In philosophical dialogs, arguments from Final Authority are a win-lose strategy. Hence, there is no incentive for someone with different views to play their no-win game. Except perhaps, for those who enjoy sharpening their flexible philosophical skills on the unyielding rock of flawless Diamond-Hard Science. :cool:
The Curse of Scientism :
Not only is current scientific knowledge treated as gospel, but non-scientific knowledge is considered oxymoronic. At best, this means that we can never verify any knowledge that could not be verified through scientific methods.
https://www.calais.news/lefts-strange-morality-and-problem-scientism
Dogmatic Philosophy :
To be dogmatic is to follow a set of rules no matter what. The rules might be religious, philosophical, or made-up, but dogmatic people would never waver in their beliefs so don't even think of trying to change their minds.
https://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/dogmatic
Science as Ideology : Scientism. Finally, it is worth noting a sense in which science itself can form a basis of an ideology. When science is credited as the one and only way we have to describe reality, or to state truth, such restrictive epistemology might graduate into scientism.
https://iep.utm.edu/sci-ideo/
Hard science and soft science are colloquial terms used to compare scientific fields on the basis of perceived methodological rigor, exactitude, and objectivity. Roughly speaking, the natural sciences are considered "hard", whereas the social sciences are usually described as "soft".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_and_soft_science
Why did Karl Popper reject positivism? :
Popper disagreed with the positivist view that science can be reduced to a formal, logical system or method. A scientific theory is an invention, an act of creation, based more upon a scientist's intuition than upon pre-existing empirical data. “The history of science is everywhere speculative,”
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/the-paradox-of-karl-popper/
No it's just not making a "disregard for known science fallacy" one learns in basic logic: This fallacy is committed when a person makes a claim that knowingly or unknowingly disregards well known science, science that weighs against the claim. They should know better. This fallacy is a form of the Fallacy of Suppressed Evidence.
That's it. https://iep.utm.edu/fallacy/#DisregardingKnownScience
If you are going to insist on referring to "known science", you should at least cite book, chapter & verse. Where is it written that "there are no Thoughts or Minds, only Neural Nets & Brains"? Is that from the Authorized Version, or the Revised Standard Version? The non-specific Appeal to Authority is also a fallacy.
Back to the topic of this thread : Thought. Steven Pinker, a prominent expert in the "soft science" of Psychology, wrote a popular book (not authorized by any ruling power) entitled, The Stuff of Thought. In the chapter on metaphor, he quotes Lakoff & Johnson's Philosophy in the Flesh, the Embodied Mind : "the mind is inherently embodied". To which statement-of-fact Pinker suggests an alternate "we offer the metaphor that the mind is inherently embodied " He goes on to note that, "in the very act of advancing their thesis, they presuppose transcendent notions of truth, objectivity, and logical necessity, that they ostensibly seek to undermine". Note : Pinker is as scientific & empiricist as possible for someone who writes about Mind Stuff.
The abstract notion of Mind, is also a metaphor, imagined as a container for similarly abstract thoughts. But abstractions are like skeletons : de-fleshed. :smile:
Philosophy in the Flesh review :
It's funny that, given the authors' explication of metaphors in all the world's philosophies, they should blatantly ignore the metaphorical assumptions which they make themselves. Specifically, they denounce all the metaphysicians for assuming that "there is a category of all things that exist"
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/31856.Philosophy_in_the_Flesh
Opinion :
"Western philosophy, then,is not an extended debate about knowledge, ethics, and reality, but a succession of conceptual metaphors." ___Steven Pinker, The Stuff of Thought
METAPHORS & ANALOGIES ARE "TRANSCENDENT NOTIONS"
I am not sure how this relates to my post, may you clarify the connection to me?
Sorry. I may have clicked on your link by mistake when I meant to link back to the OP. :yikes:
As a wrap-up review -- to this and the Non-Physical thread -- what do you think of my assessment that the opposing positions are viewed as A> Real Science vs un-real Pseudo-science by conservative hard-liners, but as B> Reductive Science vs Holistic Science by more progressive pioneers of unexplored territory ? The result of such binary framing is that we end-up debating different questions from polarized positions. Unfortunately, the Science=Truth posters, don't accept that there is another way to do scientific research. And of course, it's easy to go wrong, when you go beyond "settled science" into open-ended questions. But that's the difference between tinkering Technology and Progressive Science, otherwise known as Pure Science or Basic Research.
What I'm labeling as a Holistic approach to science, or Systems Science, would in theory include most reductive evidence, but not be limited to it. Yet, some on the holistic side could go the the extreme of "disregard for known science fallacy", as GT put it. However, the pro-thought posters on this thread seem to be merely more interested in "Soft Science" with theoretical evidence (concepts), than in "Hard Science" with empirical evidence (things).
Another way to frame the debate is between Inductive & Deductive reasoning. Empirical science is supposed to be strictly Deductive from direct experience (experiment). But a lot of modern science, especially the Soft Sciences, have little hard evidence to work with, so most of their reasoning is Inductive, from a general hypothesis to a more developed theory (what if?). Yet again, trying to prove a prior belief, without skeptical pruning can result in a self-fulfilling prophecy. So, I can't blame the Realists for their hard interrogation. In fact, that why I invite such challenges for my somewhat fringey notions. :nerd:
Holism in science, [i]and holistic science, is an approach to research that emphasizes the study of complex systems. Systems are approached as coherent wholes whose component parts are best understood in context and in relation to one another and to the whole.
This practice is in contrast to a purely analytic tradition (sometimes called reductionism) which aims to gain understanding of systems by dividing them into smaller composing elements and gaining understanding of the system through understanding their elemental properties.[1] The holism-reductionism dichotomy is often evident in conflicting interpretations of experimental findings and in setting priorities for future research.[/i]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holism_in_science
Empirical vs Theoretical evidence :
Empirical: Based on data gathered by original experiments or observations. Theoretical: Analyzes and makes connections between empirical studies to define or advance a theoretical position.
https://coloradocollege.libguides.com/c.php?g=286871&p=1911416
Inductive vs Deductive reasoning :
The main difference between inductive and deductive reasoning is that inductive reasoning aims at developing a [new] theory while deductive reasoning aims at testing an existing theory.
https://www.scribbr.com/methodology/inductive-deductive-reasoning/
Agree with your analysis, on the whole.
Quoting Gnomon
C S Pierce also included abductive reasoning - reasoning from effect to probable cause. But the issue is that underlying 'scientism' is 'positivism' - that being, in a loose sense, the view that science and mathematical extrapolations of empirical observations are the sole forms of valid knowledge.
Great point. In phenomenology, thought is a negative, meaning it has has no actuality. In other words, thought belongs to possibility and is that which determines what is possible. The only connection that thought has to the actual is in approximating its possibilities (with more or less certainty).
There is nothing computed in the brain. This is a common misconception. The brain (be it that of an ant or that of people) resonates selectively with structures in the world. These structures leave traces, memories. And because of these structured traces, all structures in nature can resonate in the brain. But nothing is computed, as nothing is computed in nature. Only computers compute.
No. Just that non-physical Mind & physical Body are philosophically distinct concepts. The latter is subject to empirical investigation, but the former is subject only to theoretical exploration. Philosophers only do thought experiments, which are always debatable. That may be why Mind is more interesting to them than Brains. You don't have to get your hands mucky.
The notion of a disembodied soul is a legitimate topic for philosophical discussion, but would be absurd for empirical dissection. Personally, I'm skeptical of ghosts & afterlife & reincarnation, but I'm willing to discuss such topics on an intellectual level, without eye-rolling. My interest would be why so many people with normal brains find the notion of disembodied Souls intuitively believable. :smile:
"Whole" . . . "holistic" . . . I get it. :joke:
Quoting Wayfarer
Sure. But Positivism was mainly concerned with weeding-out Metaphysics. And most of modern Philosophy falls in that non-physical category, by default. If it ain't physical, it's metaphysical (i.e. religious faith). Which is why many philosophers try to dissociate themselves from Scholastic Metaphysics. :cool:
Positivism : a philosophical system that holds that every rationally justifiable assertion can be scientifically verified or is capable of logical or mathematical proof, and that therefore rejects metaphysics and theism.
Metaphysics :
It is not easy to say what metaphysics is. Ancient and Medieval philosophers might have said that metaphysics was, like chemistry or astrology, to be defined by its subject-matter: metaphysics was the “science” that studied “being as such” or “the first causes of things” or “things that do not change”. It is no longer possible to define metaphysics that way, for two reasons. First, a philosopher who denied the existence of those things that had once been seen as constituting the subject-matter of metaphysics—first causes or unchanging things—would now be considered to be making thereby a metaphysical assertion. Second, there are many philosophical problems that are now considered to be metaphysical problems (or at least partly metaphysical problems) that are in no way related to first causes or unchanging things—the problem of free will, for example, or the problem of the mental and the physical.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/metaphysics/
PS___That's why I'm still searching for another simple term, besides "metaphysics" to distinguish the scope of Philosophy from that of Physical Sciences. So far, "non-physical" is a candidate. But even that discrimination seems to elicit negative reviews from those for whom "physical" means Real, and non-physical means un-real, hence non-existent. In what sense does Mind exist, if not as an illusory figment of imagination? It seems to be a no-win contest of perspectives. :sad:
It's broader than that, although though that is part of it. 'A philosophical system recognizing only that which can be scientifically verified or which is capable of logical or mathematical proof, and therefore rejecting [anything that is not]'. Few will admit to being positivist, although many implicitly are, although spelling it out sounds like an accusation, when really it's just a description. In fact for a lot of people it's simply common sense. (Which is fair enough, but then it shouldn't be mistaken for philosophy proper.)
Quoting Gnomon
It's been discussed a lot but I always say, never loose sight of its connection to Aristotle, for whom the term was coined. Otherwise metaphysics becomes a catch-all term for any kind of woo. That is why I try and understand topics within the context of history of ideas and comparative religion - it provides some context. I've grown to understand the Western metaphysical tradition through understanding something about Platonism and Aristotelianism. (Feser has helped in that.)
Quoting Gnomon
There's a key insight from non-dualism here, which is very hard to spell out because it's not a concept, but a shift in perspective. Kind of like a gestalt shift. The way I try and explain it is that mind is never an object of cognition (which seems obvious to me, but which seems to cause all manner of confusion). But it is real as the subject of experience. It is something which is central to Asian philosophy, but you have to feel your way into it - realise it, I suppose you could say.
The problem with "Western" thinking generally is that it is utterly confined to the symbolic-conceptual mode of thought. Of course it has power within its scope but there are entire domains that it is blind to. But seeing through that takes philosophical therapy. That's what it is for.
Nonsense. This preferred "interest" may be only true – symptomatic – of idealists, platonists or cartesians. You need to study (more) modern philosophy such as works by Spinoza, Hume, Peirce/Dewey, Jaspers, Merleau-Ponty, Dennett, Flanagan, Maturana/Varela, Hofstadter, Lakoff/Johnson, Damasio, Metzinger ... also some synopses (e.g.) neurophilosophy and neurophenomenology. Get your mind's "hands mucky", Gnomon. :eyes:
Easy to say; make a conceptually coherent, logically sound case for this "notion's" "legitimacy" (i.e. that "disembodied soul" (or disembodied mind) is not vacuous, just-so, woo-woo). Show me, intellect to intellect, G, don't just tell me (bloviate). :sweat:
Yes. For the purposes of my Enformationism thesis, I typically define "metaphysics" in terms of the topics Aristotle discussed in the second volume of his treatise in Nature. There, he was not describing physical things, but ideas about things, or about Nature in general, including the human Mind and its Thoughts. Volume 1 was the primitive forerunner of modern Science, while volume 2 was the prescient ancestor of modern Philosophy. :smile:
Meta-physics :
[i]The branch of philosophy that examines the nature of reality, including the relationship between mind and matter, substance and attribute, fact and value.
1. Often dismissed by materialists as idle speculation on topics not amenable to empirical proof.
2. Aristotle divided his treatise on science into two parts. The world as-known-via-the-senses was labeled “physics” - what we call "Science" today. And the world as-known-by-the-mind, by reason, was labeled “metaphysics” - what we now call "Philosophy" .[/i]
BothAnd Blog Glossary
As usual, you missed the point of my description of what distinguishes Philosophy from Science. Some professional scientists with mucky hands, also do some philosophical speculation on the side. Apparently, you think that Philosophers should be required to present empirical evidence for their conjectures.
Do you consider yourself a Philosopher, perhaps an amateur like me? If so, what "mucky" physical experiments have you done? Do you tinker with real stuff in your basement? Or do you simply express personal opinions as Facts on forums? Do you simply quote the Scriptures of Science as evidence for your claims of what's Real, and what's not? :joke:
Science vs Philosophy :
The main difference between science and philosophy is that science deals with hypothesis testing based on factual data whereas philosophy deals with logical analysis based on reason.
https://askanydifference.com/difference-between-science-and-philosophy/
I consider myself a freethinker (and naturalist) who studies philosophy.
Three years of graduate lab work (Cognitive Science / Psychology). Engineering projects and physics + chemistry lab work as an undergrad. Paralegal and mortgage underwriting work for decades (pre-pandemic). Left-Green political activism for decades (pre-9/11). I'd say I've been quite "mucky" in various ways ...
I don't have a basement.
I cite publicly available, corroborable evidence and fact-based interpretations which support my "personal opinions" in the spirit of inviting dialectical challenges (against which "personal opinions" like the usual woo-of-the-gaps, such as yours, sir, that usually does not hold up under the slightest scrutiny).
I only cite findings of science to corroborate my challenges to the pseudo-science woo-of-the-gaps silliness graffitied on these fora by you hordes of "amateur philosopher" poseurs. My own speculations – what I call "the Real" – are open to being challenged. I welcome the dialectic, but like you, Gnomon, most retreat back into their own self-consoling, "scripture" quoting, "personal opinions" (i.e. dogmas) instead.
As an untrained dilettante philosopher, I bow before your self-proclaimed Omniscience. But, I still don't appreciate your "dogmatic" (your word) True-Believer-in-Scientism shtick on this non-ideological forum. Most of us amateurs are well-informed about modern science in general, but we are not narrowly-focused specialists in any particular sub-field. So, our worldviews may be broader and more inclusive than yours. If that open-mindedness is what you call "woo", then woo-hoo give me a tattoo! :joke:
TPF Site Guidelines :
[i]Types of posters who are welcome here:
Those with a genuine interest in/curiosity about philosophy and the ability to express this in an intelligent way, and those who are willing to give their interlocutors a fair reading and not make unwarranted assumptions about their intentions
Types of posters who are not welcome here:
Evangelists: Those who must convince everyone that their religion, ideology, political persuasion, or philosophical theory is the only one worth having.[/i]
Well, your "untrained dilettante" ad hominems, sir, miss their mark by a wide country mile with projections of your own philosophical defects. :sweat:
The path with flowers on it is that of the rejection of the existence of thoughts. This is not the rejection of language, which would be even more offensively absurd. Nor is it strictly a denial. It is rather a trial, in which the stuff of the final ghost sorry (go story) is found guilty.