Physicalism is False Or Circular
Physicalism is the philosophy that everything is physical and by physical, physicalists (those who subscribe to physicalism) refer to matter, energy, and the laws that govern their interaction.
That out of the way, I want to make a mention of perceptibility defined as "capable of being perceived by the senses and their extensions, scientific instruments".
There seems to be deep connection between perceptibility and physicalism. For instance, all that we know to be physical are perceptible in one way or another. In fact, the two seem to be synonymous with each other for the perceivable are classified as physical. In short, to be perceivable is to be physical and vice versa i.e. physical = perceivable or to be physical implies and is implied by to be perceivable or physical <-> perceivable.
To be physical -> To be perceivable is almost too obvious to require stating; after all matter, energy, the laws that govern them, all, are perceivable.
However, saying To be perceivable -> To be physical is also true means is to define the physical as perceivable i.e. To be perceivable <-> To be physical implies To be perceivable = To be physical.
Now consider how one would go about proving statement 4. below,
4. To be perceivable -> To be physical
from what we know.
2. To be perceivable -> To exist [true] [we know]
2a. To exist -> To be physical [Physicalism] [necessary for 4]
Ergo,
4. To be perceivable -> To be physical
Statement 4. To be perceivable -> To be physical presupposes physicalism [statement 2a. To exist -> To be physical]. In other words the argument for physicalism that people might be tempted to present (see below)
1. To exist -> To be perceivable
4. To be perceivable -> To be physical
Ergo
5. To exist -> To be physical
is actually the one below:
1. To exist -> To be perceivable [True]
2. To be perceivable -> To exist [True]
2a. To exist -> To be physical [??? Physicalism. Necessary for 4]
4. To be perceivable -> To be physical [2, 2a Hypothetical,syllogism]
5. To exist -> To be physical [Physicalism. 1, 4 Hypothetical syllogism]
Basically, considering statement 4. To be perceivable -> To be physical to be true presupposes physicalism [2a. To exist -> To be physical] and this makes the argument for physicalism circular - begging the question.
[quote=Wayfarer]Numbers and logical laws are intelligible, not physical.[/quote]
This amounts to rejecting statement 4. To be perceivable -> To be physical. Please go through my argument which I've summarized below for khaled.
[quote=khaled]That would mean that by your definition their mental image is a physical thing[/quote]
Well, that's correct but not by my definition. It has to be correct for physicalism to be true.
I'll state the physicalist argument for your consideration.
1. To exist -> To be perceivable [Has to be true for physicalism]
2. To be perceivable -> To exist [True]
3. To exist -> To be physical [??? necessary for 4]
4. To be perceivable -> To be physical [from 2, 3 and necessary for 5]
Ergo,
5. To exist -> To be physical [Physicalism]
In other words, Physicalism is a circular argument [3 (a premise) is necessary for physicalism to be true but 5 (the conclusion, Physicalism) is just a restatement of 3.
A note on the critical statements 1 and 2.
For statement 1 to be false, there must be something that exists that's unperceivable. If so, consider the statement that's undeniably true:
6. To be physical -> To be perceivable [matter, energy and the laws of nature are perceivable]
From statement 6, we get the following,
7. To be unperceivable -> To be non-physical
For statement 1 to be false, let's suppose that y is the thing that exists but is unperceivable. Then,
7. To be unperceivable -> To be non-physical
8. y exists & y is unperceivable [statement 1 is false]
9. y is unperceivable [from statement 8]
10. y is non-physical [from statements 7 and 9]
11. y exists [from statement 8]
Ergo,
12. y exists & y is non-physial [from statements 10, 11]
Notice, statement 12 is precisely what non-physicalism is.
For statement 2 to be falsified, we need to have "something" perceivable that doesn't exist but this is impossible because there's nothing there (doesn't exist) and so how can it be perceivable? Ergo, statement 2 can't be falsified. The rest of the argument proceeds as shown.
Now, some have pointed out that hallucinations count for things that don't exist but are perceivable.
However, by perceivable I'm not referring to the perception of one or a handful of individuals or even measurements by instruments in a piecemeal sense. There are standard procedures for ruling out hallucinations and these are invariably scaled-up versions of the normal act of perceiving; people, more people, instruments, more instruments, you know the deal but the bottom line is the entire exercise is nothing but the act of perceiving just ramped up. In short, by perceivable I'm talking about something being perceived in this fashion - hallucinations having been ruled out. Ergo statement 2 stands as it is, in its full glory - true.
It seems that physicalism is either false or circular.
That out of the way, I want to make a mention of perceptibility defined as "capable of being perceived by the senses and their extensions, scientific instruments".
There seems to be deep connection between perceptibility and physicalism. For instance, all that we know to be physical are perceptible in one way or another. In fact, the two seem to be synonymous with each other for the perceivable are classified as physical. In short, to be perceivable is to be physical and vice versa i.e. physical = perceivable or to be physical implies and is implied by to be perceivable or physical <-> perceivable.
To be physical -> To be perceivable is almost too obvious to require stating; after all matter, energy, the laws that govern them, all, are perceivable.
However, saying To be perceivable -> To be physical is also true means is to define the physical as perceivable i.e. To be perceivable <-> To be physical implies To be perceivable = To be physical.
Now consider how one would go about proving statement 4. below,
4. To be perceivable -> To be physical
from what we know.
2. To be perceivable -> To exist [true] [we know]
2a. To exist -> To be physical [Physicalism] [necessary for 4]
Ergo,
4. To be perceivable -> To be physical
Statement 4. To be perceivable -> To be physical presupposes physicalism [statement 2a. To exist -> To be physical]. In other words the argument for physicalism that people might be tempted to present (see below)
1. To exist -> To be perceivable
4. To be perceivable -> To be physical
Ergo
5. To exist -> To be physical
is actually the one below:
1. To exist -> To be perceivable [True]
2. To be perceivable -> To exist [True]
2a. To exist -> To be physical [??? Physicalism. Necessary for 4]
4. To be perceivable -> To be physical [2, 2a Hypothetical,syllogism]
5. To exist -> To be physical [Physicalism. 1, 4 Hypothetical syllogism]
Basically, considering statement 4. To be perceivable -> To be physical to be true presupposes physicalism [2a. To exist -> To be physical] and this makes the argument for physicalism circular - begging the question.
[quote=Wayfarer]Numbers and logical laws are intelligible, not physical.[/quote]
This amounts to rejecting statement 4. To be perceivable -> To be physical. Please go through my argument which I've summarized below for khaled.
[quote=khaled]That would mean that by your definition their mental image is a physical thing[/quote]
Well, that's correct but not by my definition. It has to be correct for physicalism to be true.
I'll state the physicalist argument for your consideration.
1. To exist -> To be perceivable [Has to be true for physicalism]
2. To be perceivable -> To exist [True]
3. To exist -> To be physical [??? necessary for 4]
4. To be perceivable -> To be physical [from 2, 3 and necessary for 5]
Ergo,
5. To exist -> To be physical [Physicalism]
In other words, Physicalism is a circular argument [3 (a premise) is necessary for physicalism to be true but 5 (the conclusion, Physicalism) is just a restatement of 3.
A note on the critical statements 1 and 2.
For statement 1 to be false, there must be something that exists that's unperceivable. If so, consider the statement that's undeniably true:
6. To be physical -> To be perceivable [matter, energy and the laws of nature are perceivable]
From statement 6, we get the following,
7. To be unperceivable -> To be non-physical
For statement 1 to be false, let's suppose that y is the thing that exists but is unperceivable. Then,
7. To be unperceivable -> To be non-physical
8. y exists & y is unperceivable [statement 1 is false]
9. y is unperceivable [from statement 8]
10. y is non-physical [from statements 7 and 9]
11. y exists [from statement 8]
Ergo,
12. y exists & y is non-physial [from statements 10, 11]
Notice, statement 12 is precisely what non-physicalism is.
For statement 2 to be falsified, we need to have "something" perceivable that doesn't exist but this is impossible because there's nothing there (doesn't exist) and so how can it be perceivable? Ergo, statement 2 can't be falsified. The rest of the argument proceeds as shown.
Now, some have pointed out that hallucinations count for things that don't exist but are perceivable.
However, by perceivable I'm not referring to the perception of one or a handful of individuals or even measurements by instruments in a piecemeal sense. There are standard procedures for ruling out hallucinations and these are invariably scaled-up versions of the normal act of perceiving; people, more people, instruments, more instruments, you know the deal but the bottom line is the entire exercise is nothing but the act of perceiving just ramped up. In short, by perceivable I'm talking about something being perceived in this fashion - hallucinations having been ruled out. Ergo statement 2 stands as it is, in its full glory - true.
It seems that physicalism is either false or circular.
Comments (171)
And for that matter, none of your elaborate logical (or pseudo-logical) reasoning is physical, either. It’s simply the relationship of ideas - one of which is what constitutes ‘the physical’.
What you’re talking about is scientific empiricism. That is, propositions must be validated by observable data. As I’ve hinted above, pure maths is already outside that domain, as mathematical proofs don’t need to be validated with respect to observable data. Consider platonic realists, such as Kurt Gödel:
[quote=Rebecca Goldstein] Gödel was a mathematical realist, a Platonist. He believed that what makes mathematics true is that it's descriptive—not of empirical reality, of course, but of an abstract reality. Mathematical intuition is something analogous to a kind of sense perception. In his essay "What Is Cantor's Continuum Hypothesis?", Gödel wrote that we're not seeing things that just happen to be true, we're seeing things that must be true. The world of abstract entities is a necessary world—that's why we can deduce our descriptions of it through pure reason.[/quote]
Of course, this is an embarrassment to empiricists, as a consequence of which they have come up with ridiculous ideas like ‘fictionalism’. But the fact remains, rational beings perceive intelligible truths through the ‘eye of reason’. Without that ability, science would not exist, but //discussion of// that ability is not at all on the curriculum of what is currently regarded as scientific education.
What about the perceiver themselves? If everything is physical and If to be physical is to be perceived by something, how is there something to perceive and create all the physical by this perception?
In the same sense that they "exist", yes. In the sense of patterns in observable phenomena, then yes, obviously: patterns in observable phenomena are themselves observable. In the sense of human theories about what exactly those patterns are, also yes: we can observe that humans do really have those theories.
Quoting Echarmion
This one is easy: the observer is also a physical thing. Physical things observe other physical things, and the web of all that observation (which is also interaction, physical things acting upon other physical things) is what constitutes reality.
There’s your issue, Forrest. Everything real, for you, is situated somewhere.
But whence the web? That is, we'd have to suppose that mutually observing observers just are, without any temporal process.
But this isn't true for anything else we observe, so isn't this special pleading, where the observer is some special kind of physical entity that's somehow not temporal?
What I think Platonism gets at, is that laws (etc) transcend the physical (which is also ‘the existent’ or ‘the domain of phenomena’). Put another way, the physical (or the existent) is what ‘the transcendent’ is transcendent in relation to. So it does not exist - it transcends existence. It is beyond existence, but that which exists is dependent on it. If ‘the existent’ is real, then the source is ‘super-real’. Science itself doesn’t account for scientific laws, because (Platonists would say), the source of those laws is beyond what science can discover. But of course that goes against the fundamental tenet of modern naturalism, which is that nature ‘contains its own cause’.
Let me rephrase. Is causation observable? Are those observed patterns the result of necessary relations?
We don't "perceive" energy, or probability waves, or the gravitational curvature of space-time. We hypothesize them and perceive their effects. This is highlighted by the fact that there are different theories of mechanics and different quantum theories. There are Newtonian mechanics, Hamiltonian mechanics, Lagrangian mechanics, etc. These don't use the same concepts. Where is the space-time curvature in string theory? All of these theories explain the same phenomena by proposing differnt (unperceivable) concepts and variables.
Quoting Pfhorrest
Well you know it's not what is intended meaning you probably know what IS intended. What is intended is that physical laws are not physical things.
Yes. They can be seen, i.e. perceived, in action in the way matter and energy behave. I suppose one needs to think of "perception" in the broadest sense of what it means to be perceivable.
Quoting Wayfarer
That's the heart of the issue. The physical is defined in terms of us being able to "perceive" or not. Ergo, the moment you say "...rational beings perceive intelligible truths through the eyes of reason." you'll have to concede that whatever it is that's being perceived is physical.
It boils down to the relationship between perceptibility and physicalism outlined in the OP.
1. To be physical -> To be perceivable.
Statement 1 isn't difficult to accept. All that's physical - matter, energy, the laws of nature - are perceivable. No room for doubt there for someone who's a non-physicalist.
2. To be perceivable -> To be physical.
This statement provides the only opportunity for non-physicalists to validate their position for it were false, then there would be something perceivable but not physical. Your claim that "...rational beings perceive intelligible truths through the eye of reason." would then be an instance of something being perceivable but not physical. This (a perceivable thing which isn't physical) would then pave the way for a proof of non-physicalism because it no longer contradicts the essence of proving existence which is: to exist means to be perceivable to the senses/instruments.
Let's study the situation we have more carefully:
We have to agree, for good reason, that the statement,
1. To be physical -> To be perceivable. [matter, energy, and the laws of nature are perceivable] is true.
Now, if we also agree that statement,
2. To be perceivable -> To be physical is true then it means the following is true,
3. To be perceivable <-> To be physical
Statement 3 is just another way of saying,
4. The physical = The perceivable [The physical is defined as the perceivable]
Now, let's see how existence relates to perceptibility. We need to do this because non-physicalists claim that some things are not physical which is another way of saying non-physical things exist.
As far as I can tell, the relationship between existence and perceptibility can be expressed as,
5. To Exist -> To be perceivable
And statement 5 is equivalent to,
6. To be unperceivable -> To not exist
Now, if physicalism insists that the following is true,
2. To be perceivable -> To be physical
then it would mean,
7. To be non-physical -> To be unperceivable
But, if 7 is true then, taking 7 along wih statement 6, the statement about existence, we get the statement,
8. To be non-physical -> To not exist
In other words, non-physicalism is about nonexistent things!! Nonexistent things are Nothing! Non-physicalism is about Nothing! Absurd!
If you disagree then, you must falsify the following two statements:
2. To be perceivable -> To be physical
and/or
5. To exist -> To be perceivable
That's to say non-physicalists have to prove
9. There are perceivable things that are non-physical
and/or
10. Unperceivable things exist
We can't prove statement 10. Unperceivable things exist i.e. we can't reject/falsify statement 5. To exist -> To be perceivable because Nothing is unperceivable and that's why it's nonexistent. If I say, for instance, that here's x, x is unperceivable and exists, I wouldn't be able to distinguish x from nothing, both being unperceivable.
Nothing doesn't exist because it's unperceivable i.e. we're using the following statement in deciding the nonexistence of Nothing,
11. To be unperceivable -> To not exist
and statement 11 is equivalent to statement 5. To exist -> To be perceivable
So, rejecting/falsifying statement 5 would mean, at the very least, Nothing could exist. Another Absurdity!
Going by how some philosophers talk of the mind being non-physical, I'd have to say that non-physicalists are rejecting statement 2. To be perceivable -> To be physical because the mind is perceivable but the claim is, it's not physical i.e. statement 9. There are perceivable things that are non-physical is true. So, from a non-physicalist point of view, mind can't be matter, can't be energy, and, at this point, we can forget about it being some kind of law of nature.
Now a summary of all that's been said.
5. To exist -> To be perceivable [can't be falsified]
2. To be perceivable -> To be physical [necessary premise]
Ergo,
12. To exist -> To be physical [Physicalism] (from 2, 5 Hypothetical Syllogism)
If now physicalists claim premise 2 to be true then that would imply the following statements are true,
13. To be perceivable -> To exist [this is true even considering hallucinations because for existent things, perception is a sufficent condition in order to infer existence]
14. To exist -> To be physical [necessary but ???]
The whole argument now looks like this:
5. To exist -> To be perceivable [can't be falsified]
13. To be perceivable -> To exist [true for reasons above]
14. To exist -> To be physical [necesary but ???]
2. To be perceivable -> To be physical [from 13, 14 Hypothetical syllogism]
Ergo,
12. To exist -> To be physical [2, 5 Hypothetical Syllogism]
In other words, physicalism begs the question. There's a circularity [premise 14 and conclusion 12] in the physicalist's position.
Wayfarer, what say you?
:chin: :chin:
Quoting khaled
That's all that counts.
Numbers and logical laws are intelligible, not physical. The 'eye of reason' is an allegorical expression - when you see that 2 and 2 is 4, you're seeing something that cannot be perceived by the physical senses but only by reason, only by an intelligence capable of counting. So you're seeing an intelligible truth, not a physical fact. We do this all the time, without noticing that we're are doing it - it's taken for granted. So we see through the 'eye of reason', without noticing that they're doing it, and then we're so inattentive that we don't even notice that this is what we're doing. :-(
[quote=Jacques Maritain]what the Empiricist speaks of and describes as sense-knowledge is not exactly sense-knowledge, but sense-knowledge plus unconsciously introduced intellective ingredients, - sense-knowledge in which he has made room for reason without recognizing it. A confusion which comes about all the more easily as, on the one hand, the senses are, in actual fact, more or less permeated with reason in man, and, on the other, the merely sensory psychology of animals, especially of the higher vertebrates, goes very far in its own realm and imitates intellectual knowledge to a considerable extent.[/quote]
So when an artist imagines something and draws it that counts as "perception of effects" right? (since they couldn't draw it without imagining it). That would mean that by your definition their mental image is a physical thing.
Similarly according to your definition hallucinations would be physical things (since they can be perceived, by definition)
Also numbers now become physical things, since the effects of using them are observable.
Once you start including things like imagination among the set of things that are "physical things" the word physical becomes redundant. We're just talking about things in general now. The way you define it, there is no such thing as a non-physical thing in the first place. Which means you're not a physicalist, it's more accurate to call you a "thingist".
I don't think that when non-physicalists propose a non-physical concept they would do so despite the concept not having any effect. Since any concept with any effect will always be "physical" to you, it must follow that even these "non physical concepts" (numbers, imagination, etc) are physical. At this point you've blurred the line between physical and non-physical and are now just talking about things.
Hence physicalism is nonsense.
This amounts to rejecting statement 4. To be perceivable -> To be physical. Please go through my argument which I've summarized below for khaled.
Quoting khaled
Well, that's correct but not by my definition. It has to be correct for physicalism to be true.
I'll state the physicalist argument for your consideration.
1. To exist -> To be perceivable [Can't be falsified]
2. To be perceivable -> To exist []
3. To exist -> To be physical [??? necessary for 4]
4. To be perceivable -> To be physical [Necessary for 5]
Ergo,
5. To exist -> To be physical [Physicalism]
In other words, Physicalism is a circular argument [3 (a premise) is necessary for physicalism to be true but 5 (the conclusion, Physicalism) is just a restatement of 3.
A note on the critical statements 1 and 2.
For statement 1 to be false, there must be something that exists that's unperceivable. If so, consider the statement that's undeniably true:
6. To be physical -> To be perceivable [matter, energy and the laws of nature are perceivable]
From statement 6, we get the following,
7. To be unperceivable -> To be non-physical
For statement 1 to be false, let's suppose that y is the thing that exists but is unperceivable. Then,
7. To be unperceivable -> To be non-physical
8. y exists & y is unperceivable [statement 1 is false]
9. y is unperceivable [from statement 8]
10. y is non-physical [from statements 7 and 9]
11. y exists [from statement 8]
Ergo,
12. y exists & y is non-physial [from statements 10, 11]
Notice, statement 12 is precisely what non-physicalism is.
For statement 2 to be falsified, we need to have "something" perceivable that doesn't exist but this is impossible because there's nothing there (doesn't exist) and so how can it be perceivable? Ergo, statement 2 can't be falsified. The rest of the argument proceeds as shown.
Now, some have pointed out that hallucinations count for things that don't exist but are perceivable.
However, by perceivable I'm not referring to the perception of one or a handful of individuals or even measurements by instruments in a piecemeal sense. There are standard procedures for ruling out hallucinations and these are invariably scaled-up versions of the normal act of perceiving; people, more people, instruments, more instruments, you know the deal but the bottom line is the entire exercise is nothing but the act of perceiving just ramped up. In short, by perceivable I'm talking about something being perceived in this fashion - hallucinations having been ruled out. Ergo statement 2 stands as it is, in its full glory - true.
It seems that physicalism is either false or circular. :chin:
A hallucination.
Quoting TheMadFool
Again, I think this definition of perceivable is confusing. Being able to see the effects of something doesn't mean you saw the thing. If I hear knocking at my door I can postulate that there is a thief there. That does not make it the case that I perceived a thief there. I could also postulate that it's Amazon. Again, that does not make it the case that I saw an Amazon employee there.
Quoting TheMadFool
Not much of an argument then.
:ok:
Perceived by who?
This is an entirely new line of inquiry and you seem to ask this question as if a perceiver is necesssary for perceiving but you draw this conclusion from a world that could be a hallucination which isn't a good idea as far as I can tell.
That means all you have to go on to make your case is your own perceiving and to infer a perceiver from that is to beg the question because that's exactly what needs to be proven.
This might not always be the case but I think that it will take a while before the universe and all the forces acting within are fully known.
But that also doesn't mean that all those fantastical supernatural things exist either.
The problems begin when one wishes to claim that there is only one way of looking at things - this is a way of looking at things that is quite obviously faulty.
Definitions:
To be physical = To be matter or energy or the laws that govern them or some combination of the aforementioned
To be perceivable = Possible to become aware of through the senses or instruments following such procedures as necessary to rule out hallucinations
1. To exist implies To be physical [All things that exist are physical = Physicalism]
2. To be physical implies To be perceivable [all things physical (matter, energy and the laws that govern them) are, for certain, perceivable]
3. To be perceivable implies To be exist [See definition of perceivable]
4. To exist implies To be perceivable.
Suppose 4 is false. If 4 is false then, it's possible for, say, x exists & x is unperceivable
5. x exists & x is unperceivable [statement 4 is false]
6. x is unperceivable [from 5]
7. To be unperceivable implies To be non-physical [from 2]
8. x is unperceivable implies x is non-physical [6 and 7]
9. x is non-physical [6 and 8]
10. x exists [from 5]
Ergo,
11. x exists & x is non-physical [9 and 10]
Statement 11. x exists & x is non-physical is precisely what non-physicalism (some things exist that aren't physical) is. Ergo, the physicalist can't reject statement 4 i.e. for the physicalist who insists that 1. To exist implies To be physical [physicalism], statement 4 can't be false.
Now, the physicalist argument must have the conclusion,
1. To exist implies To be physical [Physicalism]
We know,
4. To exist implies To be perceivable [If the physicalist says this is false then it leads to non-physicalism (see above). So, the physicalist has to say 4 is true]
The physicalist wants to conclude 1. To exist implies To be physical.
The premise required to accomplish the physicalist's goal is,
12. To be perceivable implies To be physical
Then, the following argument takes form,
4. To exist implies To be perceivable
12. To be perceivable implies To be physical [necessary premise to conclude physicalism, 13 below]
Ergo,
13. To exist implies To be physical [from 4 and 12 and is physicalism]
Statements 4, 12, and 13 is the argument for physicalism. It's sound but only if statement 12 is true. Is statement 12 true?
Let's check...
We know,
3. To be perceivable implies To exist
So, now for the physicalist to prove statement 12. To be perceivable implies To be physical, a premise is required. That premise is,
14. To exist implies To be physical
The physicalist's argument that statement 12. To be perceivable implies To be physical is true should look like this,
3. To be perceivable implies To exist
14. To exist implies To be physical [???]
Ergo,
12. To be perceivable implies To be physical [3 and 14]
Take note of the fact that statement 14. To exist implies To be physical is physicalism i.e. physicalism is being presupposed by statement 12. To be perceivable implies To be physical.
Let's rewrite the physicalist argument as it actually is below,
3. To be perceivable implies To exist
4. To exist implies To be perceivable
14. To exist implies To be physical [Necessary premise]
12. To be perceivable implies To be physical [from 3
and 14. Necessary premise to conclude physicalism, 13 below]
Ergo,
13. To exist implies To be physical [from 4 and 12 and is physicalism]
Look at premise 14 and the conclusion 13. They're identical i.e. argument for physicalism is circular - the conclusion is assumed among the premises.
Oops! Too long again. Sorry, it's the best I can do without compromising my argument.
Quoting unenlightened
Because
Quoting unenlightened
:ok: :up:
If you want to do science, construct experiments; if you want to do mathematics construct proofs.
By some sort of physicalism, I'd start out with a cup of coffee (important), the Moon, a soccer match (Manchester United), ... Of course there's more to it (perhaps mass energy distance/volume duration forces relativistic quantum fields whatever), in a way, but we might start there.
So, where does that (physicalism plus abstracts) then take us?
To the stars?
That's odd. Chess is an invention; naturally, everything about it is arbitrary - for instance, the rules are the way they are because the inventor said so.
Physicalism is not like chess. It's a claim about the universe i.e. it has to correspond to reality. Nothing arbitrary about that. It's not that the universe has to conform to our theory (here physicalism), our theory has to conform to the universe. Again, nothing arbitray about that.
You speak as if I can, at will, on my whim and fancy, make the universe anything. Incorrect! Try making gravity disappear by changing the rules, something you must be able to do as per your own admission that the rules can be anything you want them to be (like chess), and see how that works out for you. If you want my advice, don't jump out of windows higher than those on the ground floor.
Physicalism is just a basic common sense notion taken to an extreme... maybe somewhat to it's detriment.
We invented words like real and to exist for the purpose of discerning between ideas/dreams and the world we experience. That's one of the first things moms teach their children, that dreams and ideas aren't real... they can't hurt you.
Circular or not, it still seems like a pretty useful principle to live your life by.
That, sir, is the thesis of atheism, that reality is not the way it is because the inventor said so. But it is not clear to me why it would make a difference even if it is true. Chess is real, whether it was invented or evolved, and the rules are the rules, whatever you may think.
You're missing the point. The rules and board setup of chess are indeed arbitrary and the universe could be too whether a creator exists or not. However a theory of the universe is like a particular strategy a player adopts in a game. Just like how chess strategy must be in accordance to the rules, a theory of the universe (physicalism is one such theory) has to be aligned to the rules of the universe. A chess strategy can't be arbitrary and a theory of the universe can't be arbitrary. If you do that i.e. use arbitrary strategies in chess and whimsical theories for the universe, in chess you'll be disqualified and in the universe, it'll be worse as you'll face vigorous, even deadly, opposition at every turn.
Dude first you deny my analogy on spurious grounds, and then you try and play it back at me in garbled form. No thanks.
Physicalism is a theory about our universe. It's an attempt to describe the universe as accurately as possible. In other words there's pressure for physicalism to correspond to the facts/truths of our universe and that's just another way of saying, physicalism can't be arbitrary - it's not a case of anything goes as you seem to be implying.
Besides, I would argue that really we don't have a definition of what is 'physical', on the grounds of the many unanswered questions of physics. I think Noam Chomsky says somewhere that we don't have a satisfactory definition of 'a body', and I think that's true. Essentially what most physicalists believe is that what you can see, touch, and objectify, is the criterion of what is real. But I think that quantum physics has undermined that.
Read up on what physicalism actually says, and the counter arguments to it. https://www.princeton.edu/~fraassen/abstract/SciencMat.htm
If you take "physical" to mean "empirical", and "real" to mean "empirical", then of course all and only physical stuff is real.
Quoting Wayfarer
We can perceive the effects of dark matter, which counts as perceiving dark matter.
Otherwise the only things we ever perceive are photons, since all the interactions of the world with our senses are mediated by photons, and we infer everything else about the world through the patterns in those photons.
Almost everything we perceive, we perceive indirectly, through its effects on other things (which we also perceive through their effects on other things, and so on until you get to the final photons that impart energy to the molecules of our sense-organs), and dark matter is no different in that regard.
Quoting Pfhorrest
Again, don't agree with that. It's a placeholder for a gap in the accounts, but that should be discussed in the thread on that topic.
Quoting Pfhorrest
Photons themselves are an element in a causal chain of perception and judgement. We don't perceive photons, in fact it takes an elaborate experimental setup to make them visible, and even then they can manifest as either particles or waves, so their real nature remains moot.
Therein lies the rub.
Matter, energy, and the laws that govern them are treated as physical. They are known to exist because they're percievable.
How can we define physical.
Since perception through our sense and instruments is the only channel open to the outside world, the definition of physical must be based thereof.
So, it must be that perceivable implies and is implied by physical and this definition of the physical can be decomposed into two statements,
1. Perceivable implies physical
2. Physical implies perceivable
Of these two statements, 2 can't be rejected by the physicalist because it's true that all that's physical (matter, energy, and the laws that govern them) is perceivable
Coming to statement 1, rejecting it means,
3. To be perceivable and To be non-physical
We know that the following statement has to be true,
4. To be perceivable implies To exist [perception here includes all procedures to rule out hallucinations]
Combining 3 and 4, we get,
3. To be perceivable and To be non-physical
4. To be perceivable implies To exist
5. To be perceivable [From 3 Simplifcation]
6. To exist [4, 5 Modus ponens]
7. To be non-physical [3 Simplification]
8. To exist & To be non-physical [6, 7 Conjunction]
Statement 8 is non-physicalism which essentially states that something non-physical exists. This follows from rejecting statement 1 and so the physicalist can't reject statement 1.
What does the physicalist now have to make the case for physicalism viz. concluding that To exist implies To be physical?
1. To be perceivable implies To be physical [can't be rejected by the physicalist]
9. To exist implies To be perceivable
Rejecting statement 9 would mean the following statement is true,
10. To exist and To be unperceivable
Combining 10 with statement 2 we get
2. To be physical implies To be perceivable [remember this can't be false]
10. To exist and To be unperceivable
11. To be unperceivable implies To be non-physical [2 Contraposition]
12. To be unperceivable [10 Simplification]
13. To be non-physical [11, 12 Modus ponens]
14. To exist [10 Simplification]
15. To exist and To be non-physical [13, 14 Conjunction]
Statement 15 is precisely what non-physicalism is viz. something exists and that something is non-physical. Ergo, a physicalist can't reject statement 9. To exist implies To be perceivable.
Now what statements can't be rejected/denied by physicalists?
1. To be perceivable implies To be physical [can't be rejected by the physicalist]
9. To exist implies To be perceivable [can't be rejected by the physicalist]
An argument for physicalism now begins to emerge,
1. To be perceivable implies To be physical
9. To exist implies To be perceivable
Ergo
16. To exist implies To be physical [1, 9 Hypothetical syllogism] [This is physicalism]
However, we know one other statement is true,
4. To be perceivable implies To exist [perception here includes all procedures to rule out hallucinations]
For the moment assume statement 9 is true and doesn't require proof and that statement 1 needs proof
The physicalist argument then made explicit is the following,
1. To be perceivable implies to be physical [4, 17 Hypothetical syllogism]
4. To be perceivable implies To exist
9. To exist implies To be perceivable
17. To exist implies To be physical [necessary to prove statement 1] [This is physicalism]
Ergo,
16. To exist implies To be physical [1, 9 Hypothetical syllogism] [This is physicalism]
As you can see, the conclusion [physicalism 16] is contained in the premises [physicalism 17]
Begging the question OR Circular argument.
Sorry but I can't make it any shorter than this.
The observations were then theorised in the kinetic theory of gases. Certain assumptions about an 'ideal gas' allow the gas laws to be derived mathematically, but with limitations ...
'The ideal gas' is a made up entity to which reality approximates some of the time. This is called "physics". It is of course out of date, and better approximations and more complicated equations have replaced these ideas.
Nevertheless, such is still the nature of physics. Dark matter is a made up entity to explain why galaxies do not fly apart, which they otherwise would if everything else we think we know was right, and yet they don't seem to.
Theoretical models are not reality, they are useful simplifications.
What, then, is physicalism?
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/physicalism/
My take on it is that physicalism is a form of philosophical monism, that is, there is only one kind of substance (in the philosophical, not everyday, sense) and that substance is matter (or now, matter~energy, as they were discovered to be essentially [s]the same[/s] interchangeable through Einstein's famous equation e=mc[sup]2[/sup]).
Perhaps we should clarify what being perceivable means. All perception starts with contact between two physical objects. We see because light bounces off other objects. We hear words through the physical contact of sound.
So what is physical is perceivable, because perception is a process of contact between two physical objects. That's not circular, that's just a description of a physical process.
But you cannot start there in this thread, because in this thread we are problematising "physical objects". That kind of circularity is the vicious kind.
"Perception starts with physical objects; something is physical if it can be perceived." Nothing has been said, and nothing has been elucidated. Rather, reality has been made dependent on observation, which actually smacks of idealism.
No, I'm trying to point out that perception cannot occur without there being a collision of two mediums. Its not an ideal, its simply a fact. You cannot use perception to contradict physicalism, as perception is a physical process. It is a result of physicalism, and not the cause of physicalism. Reality is not dependent upon observation, observation is dependent on reality. And reality, is what is physical.
If you are to counter physicalism, it will have to be something which does not allow the collision of two mediums. And if something can exist that cannot collide with another medium, then it is also beyond perception. An example would be, "nothing". "Nothing" cannot be perceived, only inferred.
Thus we can say reality is composed of the physical, and the nothing. Perhaps there is something else. But you can't use perception, which is a result of a tenant of physicalism called "collision", to contradict physicalism.
It's a fact under physicalism. Unsurprisingly, physicalists do not have a problem with physicalism any more than Christians have a problem with Jesus.
Or at least phenomenalism, which I see as a feature, not a bug. Proper physicalism is phenomenalist; proper phenomenalism is physicalist.
The real questions underlying the question of whether physicalism or not are:
is there anything that’s real but completely unobservable?
and
is there anything that’s real to one person but not to another?
Physicalism is the position that says “no” to both of those, or conversely says that there is a universal, non-relative reality, but that it’s entirely phenomenal, non-transcendent.
Trouble is, this is not the argument for physicalism. I've seen something like this before, again in a proof of circularity in physicalism. Did you perchance write a paper on this?
The physical (as in physicalism, as in the physical sciences) is that which is empirically verifiable in principle by definition. There is no difference between (1) and (5) without making the definition of 'physical' up for grabs, so the circularity is being introduced by hand.
The usual argument I'm aware of is reductio ad absurdum. Physical objects are those with purely physical properties, such as mass, charge, position, momentum, etc. Physical properties are couplings between objects. A change in the momentum of one body is brought about by the change in the momentum of another. The charge of one body that _causes_ the properties of another body to change is precisely the same property that allows the first body to change due to the second. Such correlated changes in the (directly or indirectly) observable properties of bodies are what physics is about.
We can consider additional, non-physical properties and bodies comprised purely or partly of them, but we have to understand what that means. A non-physical cause might have a physical effect, such as a non-materialist idea of free will leading to physical movement. A physical cause might have some non-physical effect, such as perhaps a creationist might think of emotional responses to physical stimuli as being an effect on the soul. Finally a non-physical cause might have a non-physical effect.
The first two are empirically eliminated, since either would breach conservation laws. E.g. if a non-physical cause could have a physical effect such as movement, physics wouldn't work at all: momentum and energy would not appear to be conserved. Likewise if a physical cause had non-physical effects. In addition, it's a contradiction. Supposing that a non-physical property could couple to a physical property such that the non-physical thing having the former could cause the physical thing to change, e.g. the proposed non-physical mind has the property of being able to induce the physical brain to send a signal to the left leg to make it move. What then makes that property non-physical? It is not unobservable any more than the curvature of spacetime or the colour charge of quarks: we can infer its presence from its effects. Such a non-physical property would be physical by virtue of what it does.
Which leaves non-physical causes of non-physical effects, neither of which can be observed directly or indirectly, subjectively or objectively since they are, by definition, purely unobservable things. We cannot speak of their properties since we have no insight into them. We cannot verify their existence. These are dismissed as redundancies.
The same goes for non-physical properties of otherwise physical things. If it is their physical properties that couple to the properties of purely physical things, then either the non-physical properties couple to those, making them physical, or else the non-physical properties do nothing at all, in which case why postulate them?
So to believe in the soul is to be creationist?
That is not a logical inference.
Are there Hindu creationists?
It appeared to be what you had written.
Quoting Kenosha Kid
Physicalism and empiricism are different principles. Besides there are vast areas of conjecture in current physics which are beyond empircal verification in principle, such as the multiverse conjecture and string theory.
Quoting Kenosha Kid
Leave aside telekenesis. What about plain old psycho-somatic effects? Patients get sick, and are also sometimes cured, by what they believe. Placebos have a measurable affect on patients, even though they're physically inert. In those cases a psychological (mental) cause has a bodily (physical) effect.
Quoting Marchesk
Probably. There are sufficient numbers of Hindus to include representatives of almost everything although it's hard to see how that's relevant to the OP.
If what you call "psychological causes" are themselves physical, neuronal processes then your argument fails, and the mystery (or at least the one you're promoting) dissolves. In other words, your argument assumes what it purports to demonstrate.
What does "more than physical" mean, though? Does it mean "spiritual" or "ghostly" or "transcendent"? I put those in scare quotes because it's not clear what they mean, what they are pointing to; they seem to be terms without a referent.
No, it means the natural world is more than the abstract stuff we model it with. Object Oriented Ontology would be another example. So would Aristotle's view of Platonism.
I don't think physicalism claims that the physical is abstract. Of course it is modeled in abstract terms, obviously it must be, since all our concepts are abstract. As I read it, OOO is an attempt to eliminate idealism and restore the idea of the real physical world, so I'm confused by that reference.
You could fit that on top of physicalism, but it sounds like it's adding something more to things. Might be read as a form of essentialism.
It doesn't. But our saying the world is physical is reifying the abstract models (largely mathematical) we have and saying the world is that structure in some sense. For example, Sean Caroll says the wavefunction is a true description of reality, therefore the Many Worlds Interpretation is true. As opposed to it being a useful model.
No, it doesn’t. The demarcation between physical and mental is obviously a very slippery question, but the placebo effect is well documented. If a patient is given an actual medicine, then that has a physical effect - such as an antibiotic that kills bacterial infection. But if they’re given a placebo, then there is no effectively physical substance. The effect then is purely due to the patient’s belief or expectation of a cure.
Sure, there’s controversy over the efficacy of placebos, but their efficacy is nevertheless established, and it’s an anomaly from a strictly physicalist viewpoint. In other words, if physicalism were true then they ought not to work.
If the believe world is intelligible and our models are modeling anything real, then why should we not think they reflect the structure of the world "in some sense"?
If the patient's belief is a neuronal process or pattern, which causes physical effects in the body, then where is the mystery, beyond the fact that we haven't fully understood those unimaginably complex physical processes?
Now who's begging the question?
One thing I will point out is that whilst the cellular and metabolic processes are amazingly complex, the patient - the subject - is simple. Placebos work, apparently, because patients believe they do. If they stop believing it, then they don’t. Even though the mechanics are complex, the psychology is simple.
I gave a familiar example. I did not generalise from it in the way you claim.
Quoting Wayfarer
Yes. There's no contradiction there. Empiricism doesn't necessitate physicalism.
Quoting Wayfarer
Yes, and these are frequently cited as unscientific for that reason. String theory might yet yield predictions, although it's not looking good. Multiverses could perhaps be inferred, but I doubt it.
Quoting Wayfarer
In the second case, the belief has an obvious physical cause. One could postulate, as in my description, that a non-physical mind might have such properties that they couple with physical properties such that it might be tricked by physical events into that belief. And further that it has additional non-physical properties such that that belief can be the non-physical cause of physical effects leading to healing. One again arrives at the problem: we have a supposedly non-physical thing indirectly observed through its physical effects and its physical causes, just like a physical thing. What distinguishes it as non-physical, other than sheer insistence?
I can pack and ship penicillin, whereas beliefs can only be imparted by persuasion or impression or something of that kind. And the placebo is only considered an anomaly in medicine because of its apparently non-physical nature.
The insistence by physicalists, that the supposed non-physical thing is imaginary, is what distinguishes it as non-physical. The supposed thing is incompatible with physicalism, therefore it is non-physical. Take God for example, indirectly observed through His effects (physical existence), yet claimed to be imaginary by physicalists, and so He is necessarily non-physical. By refusing to accept the reality of the supposed non-physical thing, the physicalists force it into the category of non-physical, as incompatible with physicalism.
It doesn't have an apparently non-physical nature. It has an apparently physical one according to the definition of 'physical' in this context. What we have instead is a rigid and irrational *belief* that it is non-physical.
It might be a different story if those who believe in non-physical things could describe them better, explain how we can know they exist, how they can enter into causal chains, etc. But I imagine this would yield the same absurdity: they would find themselves talking about physical things but arbitrarily and incorrectly calling them non-physical.
Which is why psycho-somatic effects ought not to exist. Yet, they do.
It is physical in the same way everything else is: it can be observed directly or indirectly, and its properties couple to the physical properties of other things. A red ball rolls into my field of vision, and I am conscious of it. I hear someone call my name behind me, and I choose to turn around. What I can't do is put it under a microscope and study it, but that's also true of quarks, Higgs bosons, energy, entropy, spacetime curvature, etc. That's why the claim of non-physical consciousness is both absurd and unjustifiable. It's really a statement about _taste_.
Quoting Wayfarer
This is not logically sound. This statement is based on the contradictory premises that there are no non-physical things and that psycho-somatic effects are non-physical. If you take the former seriously, the latter is ruled out and there is no contradiction. And vice versa, of course, although that has its own problems as I described above.
All that is evidence for the mind being a physical phenomenon, not to the contrary.
Either that, or it's evidence for the fact that humans are not purely physical beings, but that ideas and impressions, which are mental in nature, can have, in the case of humans, physical effects, which they wouldn't have in the case of inanimate objects or dumb animals.
Quoting Kenosha Kid
All we're dealing with is your refusal to believe that there are non-physical effects or things. Because you refuse to believe it, then you must interpret any evidence accordingly. When humans are affected by ideas or beliefs, or they fall ill due to something they believe or think, then the causes aren't physical. If a person ingests a substance or gets hit with something, or is poisoned, there is a physical cause. But there are psycho-somatic illnesses, just as there are psycho-somatic cures, such as the placebo affect. In those cases, the causes are psychological, not physical. All we're discussing here, is that your physicalist framework can't accomodate that, so you must insist it can't be real.
The reason I mentioned psycho-somatic effects, is because there is evidence for them, whereas there's not for more exotic claims, like psycho-kinesis.
I didn't read past this first sentence. I have explained my reasoning as to why non-physical things are either contradictory or meaningless (the basis of my belief that non-physical things do not exist) multiple times, rather than just described my beliefs as you do (e.g. that psycho-somatic effects are non-physical, for which you provide no explanation). I anticipated pushback with more argument behind it, but that's not what's happening here. If you're sticking to the approach of repeatedly misrepresenting my position, which you've done four times in as many posts now, then I'm satisfied that said pushback is going to come from elsewhere if at all. I see no worth in repeatedly denying positions or approaches that I haven't taken.
I did.
Quoting Kenosha Kid
If you are right, what does it mean to talk of 'physical things', as distinct from just 'things'? It seems to me that for 'physical' to have meaning, it must distinguish itself from something -'mental' or 'theoretical', or 'abstract'. I like to get my ducks in a row. Ordinary physical ducks, three of them, as is traditional. So here they are in a row:
duck duck duck.
Now granting that the ducks are physical, is the row physical? Do I have 4 physical things - 3 ducks and a row? Or 3 physical things - the ducks in a non-physical row?
That's a nice easy one. If the row of ducks was a row plus three ducks, then if I remove each duck one by one I should be left with just the row, right? ;)
A row of ducks is a physical thing comprised of other physical things, in the same way you are comprised of cells, cells are comprised of atoms, and atoms are comprised of electrons, protons and neutrons. A hydrogen atom is not an atom plus a proton plus a neutron. That would be double counting a system and its constituents.
What happens if I add a duck? Is it a row of ducks plus a duck, or just a larger row of ducks? Well, what happens if I add a proton to a lithium atom? Is it still an atom? Yes: it is a system of electrons protons and neutrons, which we call atoms. Is it still a lithium atom? No. Why? Because we call atoms with three protons lithium and those with four protons beryllium. So a row of three ducks plus a duck is a different row of ducks.
Ultimately it doesn’t mean anything different, because the supposed difference in kinds of things is a false assumption.
But this applies equally to any kind of monism, or any case of claiming that for all x, x is F. What does “F” mean if it applies equally to everything? Are we completely unable to make any universal claims without thereby rendering them meaningless?
To my mind real and physical are as natural synonyms as moral and ethical. One is for description and the other for prescription. (And fun fact: “nature” and “nurture” share the same etymological relationship as “physical” and “ethical” too).
Cool. I think we agree thus far. Stuff and structure. Rows are always rows of somethings, and thus physical, but they are nothing other than the somethings in a particular arrangement.
duck duck
duck
A non-row of ducks.
So a physical architect's brain and hand produces plans for a house, and the plans are physical, but there is no house. A natural way of talking would be to say that the builders will realise the architect's plans when they build the house that is imagined. And thus we arrive at, as it were, map and territory. real and imagined, physical and mental. Now if you want to deny the sense of all these virtual existences, then it seems to me that you are trying to police a strained and convoluted language to no good purpose. 'Everything is physical' becomes as vacuous as the mystic's 'all is one'.
I'd be fine with that. The whole idea of reducing all of reality to a single substance has been somewhat of a misguided quest in philosophy no doubt. In fact, I totally agree with what you wrote in response to another post:
Quoting Coben
The last thing I would want to do is make blanket metaphysical statements about the whole of reality. It's more about a method indeed, about the value of testing your ideas against the world.
Part of the problem might be that we don't have the language to name a single substance that incorporates everything without issues. Or that language is inherently limited when it comes to that sort of thing.
Aye, although I think that is what properties are. The charge of a particle is its coupling to everything, likewise for mass, spin, etc. The position is its position wrt everything else, likewise momentum, energy, etc. The properties of something are given by what it does, and nothing does things to itself. In turn those properties define what that something is. Consciousness is a something that definitely does things -- we are all familiar with that and those things include physical effects.
Quoting Coben
Sure. And it's perfectly understandable why back then we categorised things as physical and non-physical. But it's also not surprising that these older ideas have become refined. Some people still make that distinction, for instance between physical (matter, energy, information, etc.) and material (when taken to mean only massive bodies). It's probably not a huge surprise that new age hippy dippy people talk of energy in much the same way that others talk of supposed non-physical things, like energy is the mystical side of the physical coin.
Quoting Coben
Physicalism assumes physical things exist, which is a reasonable, uncontroversial assumption. For instance, if no physical thing existed, why would we not use the word 'physical' with a different meaning? A non-physical electron still distinguishes itself as a physical electron does (otherwise we're not talking about this human-yielding universe at all) so why would we call it something else. If we assume even only a single physical thing exists, then the argument I gave suggests that all things are either physical or meaningless.
Quoting Coben
The physicalism argument essentially makes them synonyms. Everything real is physical and vice versa.
What about the distinction between mind/matter or mental/physical? Is there such a distinction, or do minds/mental states not exist?
But the number of ducks in the row is not 'a physical thing'. It's an intelligible unit, a number, and numbers are intrinsic to the success of physics.
Are numbers real?
With respect to your argument, or rather, assertion.
Quoting Kenosha Kid
What we have is the insistence that, if something is real, then it must be physical. That is just as 'rigid and irrational' as the contrary. And it ends up saying that 'whatever exists, must be physical' on the basis that 'only physical things exist'. So it is a circular argument, and I haven't misrepresented it in the least.
I could then go and find papers on 'the placebo effect' but the very fact that it is something that is documented is already a counter against physicalism.
But I think I understand why you, or anyone for that matter, must insist that 'everything is physical'. It's because the alternatives open a can of worms - you have to consider dualism, metaphysics, philosophy of mind - all these subjects other than science! It's much easier to declare it over and done with.
[quote=Richard Lewontin, Review of Carl Sagan, 'Demon Haunted World']Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door![/quote]
What is the difference from "being physical" and "existing"? Aren't those two ways of saying the same thing?
Only if everything is entirely physical. Why assume the conclusion? Are we to the point of just defining physicalism as true?
Isn't that what the theists tried to do with God?
Also there are many things that are real that are not physically existent - the Gross National Product, the probability of the Red Sox winning the next World Series, the current interest rate, the value of the US dollar. And so on. So ‘what is real’ is of greater scope than what exists.
(Back in the day of the old ‘philosophy forum’, the proprietor Paul had an excellent essay on this topic posted in the resource section. Alas, no more. )
That's a good explanation. The category of "physical" has been expanding with the intent of occluding dualism. The result is all sorts of category mistakes all over the place because the most fundamental division, the distinction between a thing and its properties, has been lost to the occlusion.
It’s more that, after Descartes, idealists tended to congregate around res cogitans, and the engineers and scientists around stuff you can actually work with - which was of course perfectly sensible. The error with this approach is that Descartes model was that - a philosophical model, like an economic model, not a theory, as such, but it has lead to all kinds of unexpected consequences which we’re still living through.
Wayf you'll note that on my version of physicalism that includes along with it mathematicism, abstract objects like numbers are still ultimately the same kind of stuff as the physical universe, because on that account the physical universe is itself an abstract object, and all other abstract objects are empirically observable (and so physical) to any observers (if any) that are part of them (which we are not), just like our universe (of which we are a part) is to us.
One kind of structure is that which encodes information. In this instance, we know that the information -- the design of the house -- is encoded physically by an immediately physical (motor) process, so the information is also encoded in the deliberate sweeps of the arm. We know that those arm movements are caused by a great many physical (electrical) signals from the brain which cause muscles in the arm to contract and relax, and those signals also encode that information. And finally we know that one thing the brain definitely does in addition to sending signals is physically encode information (such as long term memory in the cerebral cortex).
It's also worth pointing out that, artistic license and self-aggrandisement aside, it's unlikely that the original information ever came fully formed in the brain. The architect likely took an iterative approach, and refined what she saw on the paper. I would be sceptical of anyone telling me that they imagined the whole building exactly then drew it out. Same goes for any other creative act. Even the greatest geniuses, like Mozart and Beethoven who did not need more than pen and paper to write entire symphonies and requiems, will have used that pen and paper as a means of not having to imagine the whole work.
I think it’s too easy an explanation. Every physical thing is compound - composed of parts - and temporally delimited - beginning and ending in time. Neither of those attributes apply to e.g. prime numbers. So that’s an ontological distinction which you can’t escape by equivocating the meaning of ‘exists’.
I'm not sure what you're asking. One can distinguish between a house and a mouse in physicalism, also between a living human and a corpse. Physicalism is a monism insofar as it holds that there is only one *kind* of thing: physical things. That doesn't entail there being only one fundamental thing. If you're asking about dualism, again physicalism is a monism: you can't derive a contradictory pluralism from it. That would be like asking how I explain God in my atheism... I don't need to do that.
I’m asking how do you verify a mind or mental states?
This does not account for the causation of existence of the physical house. It is clear that the house exists in a non-physical form, "the design of the house", prior to its physical existence. Of course you dismiss this as technically untrue, the house does not exist in a non-physical form, what we call the non-physical form (ideas), you describe as brain signals, which cause arm movements.
So you transform what we call the non-physical, into a specific type of activity, an activity which "encodes information". The problem with this is that you do not account for the cause of existence of this type of activity, and all you do is posit a new non-physical object, "information", as being involved in that activity. You cannot account for this type of activity because it is the intentional activity responsible for free willing movements, and it acts to create a physical object, which is contrary to Newton's law of inertia. Newton's first law describes an assumed temporal continuity of a massive object, and cannot account for its creation.
In modern physics, all we have as principles to account for the existence of massive objects, is a described relationship between non-massive energy, and massive objects, which cannot account for the designed creation of massive objects. You know Kenosha Kid, that the physicist's understanding of the relation between the wave field and the particle does not allow that the wave field intentional designs the particle. Unless the creation of a particle is determined by existing mass (law of inertia), the furthest that physicist can go in speculating about the cause of massive existence, is spontaneous, or random creation. But this excludes the possibility of this activity being used to encode information. To propose that this random activity encodes information is a violation of the laws of physics.
Quoting Wayfarer
But that does not answer my question. What is the semantic difference between "physical" and "existence"?
Ah. If you read a bit further down, I point out that there are many things we cannot observe directly (such as quarks, Higgs bosons, spacetime curvature) but rather through their effects. The empirical criterion is not hurt by this. Really, all observed things are detected by their effects.
So there are two possibilities here: 1) the mind is not detectable directly or indirectly, in which case we have no justification for claiming it exists; 2) it falls under the purview of physicalism.
A simple (to write down) verification would be to choose something that the mind does, take a sample of people, and test whether that property is present. What that is will greatly depend on how you define 'mind'. I would go for a series of tests where people have the opportunity to 'change their mind', i.e. something where they can override a more automatic response. That would obviously be no good for a panpsychist who believes everything has mind, because they define the word differently.
Doesn't empirical verification require direct observation? Otherwise, it's indirect observation and inference.
I had assumed that when you said "The physical...is that which is empirically verifiable in principle by definition," that the "in principle" meant something like "with sufficient technology", whereby we could directly observe the physical. Otherwise, what did you mean by "in principle"?
Quoting Kenosha Kid
Perhaps, but there's a difference between directly seeing/perceiving something and seeing/perceiving only its effects. Empirical verification has to do with direct observation via the senses.
Quoting Kenosha Kid
Or 3) minds do exist, but because they cannot be empirically verified - even with sufficient technology - then they are not physical (according to your definition).
Quoting Kenosha Kid
It doesn't require any special definition. Wikipedia offers the following, which seems suitable enough:
Quoting Wikipedia
As Descartes made abundantly clear, the reality of one's own mind, at least, is what is described as an apodictic truth, 'apodictic' meaning 'cannot reasonably be doubted', for the simple reason that doubt requires a mind capable of doubting.
No, as I've pointed out with orthodox examples several times.
Quoting Luke
You've been on this site for a while now. Is your impression that we're unanimous?
Quoting Wayfarer
I agree, but knowing that I have doubted is a detection.
OK, this is a good start. By what means does one "detect" the mind. Surely it's not a sense observation, so the indubitableness of this proposition is not empirically based. What produces this certainty then? We can see that the conclusion expressed by Wayfarer (from Descartes) is a logical conclusion, and ask the same question about logic in general. Logic provides us a type of certainty which is not empirically based. What supports, or substantiates this certainty?
What are you on about? If you disagree with the Wikipedia definition of "mind" that I quoted, feel free to spell out where you disagree.
If you don't want to explain what you meant by "in principle" or to discuss it further, that's fine.
What can it really mean to detect, when knowledge of having doubted is given immediately from it. It is impossible to doubt without doubt being known as that which has occurrence. There is no need for the one to test for the other.
No different than saying a spinning wheel detects its own roundness. It spins because it is round, it couldn’t spin if it wasn’t. Being round is a necessary condition for wheel spinning, hence, if there is spinning, roundness is necessarily given. There is no requirement or admission of detection.
In the same way, I know I doubted because I doubted; I couldn’t know I doubted without having doubted. That which is known about is a necessary condition for knowing; upon doubting, knowledge of doubt follows necessarily, without requirement or admission of detection.
Besides, if there is that which knows, and there is that which doubts....what is it that detects? Knowledge doesn’t need to detect that which it already knows, and doubt doesn’t need to detect itself. If, on the other hand, it is I that knows and it is I that doubts, but it is only possibly I that detects, then there is no real knowledge of detection because it may not have been I that detects. And if it is I that detects, all that has happened is I’ve detected what I already know I did, which is the same as admitting I haven’t done anything by detecting.
Waiting for my bread to rise, saw this, so........rhetorically speaking......
If I see a broken window I haven't seen the person who broke it.
You're offering a variant of Hempel's dilemma.
FFS, forget it. Your bizarre responses are, as the past has taught me, beyond my skill to negotiate.
Quoting Metaphysician Undercover
The 'I think' of the cogito is an observation. It is an empirical fact that I think, albeit limited to one observer and one object which is why it would not make a good test for presence of mind. A better one would be to take something like an optical illusion, discount those that identify the sought image straight away (which would deal with AIs too), and look for evidence that subjects can, upon immediately seeing the unsought image, figure out how to see the sought image. That's as good an indicator of mind as any, encapsulating as it does self-awareness, motivation, memory, doubt, and algorithmic thinking.
Of course, you could game this with AI too, but height is still a good test for adulthood notwithstanding the occasional kid on another kid's shoulder wearing a trenchcoat and fake beard.
Quoting Mww
Does a spinning wheel know it is round? If not, where is the detection? Granted, yes, the act of doubting necessitates the mind that does the doubting. That this is not true of being round means the analogy cannot hold.
However, I can detect the roundness of the spinning wheel with the same mind that is aware that it thinks.
Quoting Mww
I think you meant "I couldn't doubt without knowing I have doubted"? I don't know how difficult it would be to design a doubting AI, but it doesn't seem beyond the realm of possibility. For us, yes, we cannot doubt and not be aware if it, unlike, say, breathing. This doesn't seem problematic. The route between fact and knowledge of it can be short or long.
That's a dubious proposition. I would say it is more of an assertion than an observation. So in the logical argument of Descartes, it serves more as a definition than an observation. It defines "I" as something thinking, and concludes that the something which is thinking is necessarily existing. It cannot be considered as a valid observation because the supposed "I" cannot be observed to be thinking. The existence of the "I" is rather inferred from the act of thinking, not observed to be thinking. That is the point of the argument the existence of the "I" which is claimed to "be", is inferred from the thinking, it is not observed to be thinking. Many in philosophy will dispute the existence of the "I", by insisting that an "I" is unnecessary for a thinking.
But I see from your discussion with Luke, that you are free and easy as to what qualifies as an "observation". I think that this is one of the places where modern science (especially quantum physics) fails us. Modern science does not employ rigorous restrictions as to what qualifies as a valid observation, and many theories are verified by bogus "observations".
Quoting Kenosha Kid
When we reduce the human act of sense observation to being passively effected by something, we ignore the active aspect of observation and neglect the role of intention. Then we might create "detection machines", and claim that these machine are observing. But of course they are only detecting what they are designed to detect, and everything else goes right past them. So they cannot be claimed to be making valid "observations".
A computer can be programmed to assert that it thinks. Doesn't make it so. Descartes was starting from what he knew for sure, which is that he thinks.
Quoting Metaphysician Undercover
Precisely as much as the empirical sciences. We cannot put spacetime curvature under a microscope: we infer it from indirect evidence, i.e. observations of its effects. This is actually true of all observations. You have no direct observation of your chair: it is all interpretations of effects.
Quoting Metaphysician Undercover
We use such machines all the time, and class an observation to be a reading of their outputs.
I take that to be an argument that Descartes did not know for sure that he thinks. I can agree with that. Thinking does not necessitate knowing. So in thinking, Descartes thought that he was thinking, but that doesn't mean that he knew for sure that he was thinking, because thinking doesn't necessitate knowing.
Quoting Kenosha Kid
This is why we need a rigorous definition as to what constitutes an "observation". Observation is in general, theory laden. If I see a flash of light at night, I might say that I saw lightning. If you knew that there was no clouds in the area at that time, you might ask me for a better description of what I really did see. Stated observations can be easily tainted by the descriptive terms employed.
Where I differ from you on this subject is that I look at the observation as a creation of the observer, I do not look at it as an effect of what is observed, like you seem to. So I see no necessary causal relation between what is observed, and the noted observation. The existence of hallucinations is evidence toward the truth of my position. And the observer, being a free willing human being is not constrained to describe the observation in any particular way, but does so freely according to one's intent. This is why science needs rigorous principles regarding what constitutes a valid observation.
Quoting Kenosha Kid
Right, that's one of the places where I think modern science fails us. Machines are used as tools to make measurements, and measurements may make up part of an observation. But notice that the observation proper is the reading of the output, what you called interpretation. And this is a matter of contextualizing the output, because understanding the context is a vital part of interpretation. However, the output from the machine is often taken as an interpretation already, in itself, when the machine cannot even distinguish context.
What does "physical" mean in that sentence? What is the metaphysical claim that (I presume you mean) empiricism isn't caring about there?
I can't think of what "physical" might even mean besides "empirically real", other than absurd guesses that don't even track natural usage of the word like "solid". (E.g. is air non-physical unless it turns out to be made of tiny solid billiard ball atoms bouncing around? If all atoms turn out to be fuzzy local excitations of omnipresent fields does that mean even rocks aren't physical?)
Quoting Pfhorrest
The first chapter of Eddington’s Nature of the Physical World goes into this idea (although of course things have developed since his day.). But it was around the time he wrote that book that physicists worked out the most of atoms are, in fact, empty space, which naturally lends itself to this kind of speculation.
Isn't this really about attitude?
[quoteQuoting Pfhorrestexactly my point, but it sure sounds like it is saying more. Because it did mean more, openly for a long time, whether used by dualists or monists disagreeing with them. It included claims about substance. And since there is no reason not to just use real or empirically real (though the latter sounds like it is leaving the door open for other types of real) I think it should be dropped.
As far as air, as far as I know that was always included in the physical.
As far as the rocks, notice how you are giving me a kind of have you stopped beating your wife version of the question.
It puts me in the position to deny something about substance. I am focused on the word.. I think physical is a poor word choice since the set of the physical now includes things like you describe there. It is as if a particular metaphysical stand is being taken, when it is not. The word has unnecessary baggage and that baggage has been ignored (quite rightly) when new real things were not at all like stuff in the set earlier, and it sure looks like this will continue. Whatever is determined to be real, even particles in superposition, and even if less 'physical' stuff is found, it will be considered real. We lose nothing by calling it simple real or verified or something similar.
Yes, philosophers have been through this mess already, most notably in ancient Greece. The resolution to this dilemma, developed by Plato and Aristotle, is dualism. Hence the great rise in Christian dualism.
It seems like the modern trend back toward monism is simply a failure of our institutions to teach solid metaphysical principles. So we now have many people approaching metaphysics from other fields of study, without appropriate training in sound principles. Instead of performing a thorough study, the tendency is to think that simplifying an extremely complex field of study, is the right approach. Therefore, what we really need today is people who will take metaphysics seriously.
An observation is a recording of data about a system. That system cannot be a quark, or spacetime curvature, or someone's conscious experience in isolation, since none of these things exist in isolation. But I can observe the outputs of a technology that captures decay rates of pions, or the position of Mercury wrt the Earth and Sun, or the testimony of students as to whether they saw the man in the gorilla suit. Each of these are, according to respective theories, affected by the non-isolatable part: the colour charge of the quark, the curvature of space, the content of the humans' consciousness. If the theories are sound, those effects are discernible in the observations. Otherwise the theories are not sound.
I apologize in advance for this disparaging comment - but this has to be one of the most unintentionally funny comments I have seen on the forum in a long time. "Solid metaphysical principles"? Talk about a contradiction in terms. :lol:
That out of the way, I then said to myself that I needed to be fair - perhaps there is some core set of metaphysical principals that I was previously not aware of. So I did a google search of "metaphysical principals" and, not unexpectedly, came up with a disparate set of contradictory information. Here are some of the top sites that came up:
Christian Philosophy / by Louis de Poissy
Live By These 11 Metaphysical Principles and Create the Life You Truly Desire
The First United Metaphysical Chapel
For completeness I also reviewed the Stanford Encyclopedia as well as Philosphy Basics
All of this confirms my initial reaction - when it comes to metaphysicas there is no agreement on even the most basic concepts.
But I try to keep an open mind - I am out on the forum to learn new things - so perhaps I am wrong. If there are any solid metaphysical principles that should be taught, then clearly all (or most) meta-physicians should agree upon them, yes? So what are these principals?
I think the problem is, there is no adjudicator - no definitive authority to whom one can appeal for the ‘correct’ version - and there seems to be an enormous range of ideas covered by it.
However, there is something that should be considered. This is that the term ‘metaphysics’ was originally coined in relation to Aristotle’s writing. As is well known, it was coined by a scholar/librarian tasked with categorising Aristotle’s extant writings, and he used the term ‘meta-physica’ to denote those books that came after the books on physics. However, the Greek prefix ‘meta-‘ also has the connotation of being over or above, rather than simply after, and it’s that connotation of ‘beyond physics’ that characterises the use of the word.
But, as you note, once you go ‘beyond physics’ then you’re in an unknown land, terra incognito, about which there are many conflicting claims. Hence, nowadays ‘metaphysical’ is a term that is bandied about to mean all kinds of things by many different kinds of people but generally taken to mean ‘spiritual’ or associated with ‘higher consciousness’ in a lot of different senses.
But, to support Metaphysician Undiscovered’s point, if one were to teach the subject at school or University level, I think it should retain a focus around Aristotelian philosophy, and the way this became discussed and developed by subsequent generations. That means, looking at it through the perspective of history of ideas. That limits the scope of the subject to some extent, although it’s still a formidable subject to study, requiring a lot of reading and deep thought.
I think there’s a core of intelligible concepts that can be found in metaphysics proper and I think the SEP article does a reasonable job of laying it out. The Philosophy Basics page has a lot of outlinks to other topic pages, so is more like an index but it’s still useful.
One of the major, underlying problems is, however, that modern culture is in some sense profoundly hostile to the idea that there can be a valid metaphysic (hence the last heading in the SEP article). One reason is because metaphysics is often associated with theology and/or religious doctrines, which most modern philosophy determinedly rejects (and also why metaphysics proper is often associated with Thomistic philosophy, and hence, Catholicism.) I think it’s necessary to recognise that association if the subject is to be studied, and regardless of one’s own religious or anti-religious ideas. It’s just that for many scientific-secular people, when it comes to metaphysics, there’s an irresistible urge to ‘commit it to the flames’, as David Hume urged at the end of his Treatise. So I think there’s a need to have some sympathy with the subject, and also to find something about it that you can relate to.
I have found a way into it, through the contemplation of Platonic realism, which is the contention that number and other intellectual objects, are real, but immaterial (which obviously entails the falsity of physicalism!) I’m profoundly convinced of the truth of that and it’s given me a perspective from which to read the subject.
I think this is a bit off, on a number of different levels.
First, there is no need to assume "a system". There might be an apparatus, designed for the purpose of an experiment, but we cannot simply assume that the apparatus comprises a system unless it is specifically designed with boundaries of isolation to ensure that it actually is a system. To assume "a system" when proper boundaries are not imposed is a mistake.
Next, when a person records an observation, there is a choice made as to the descriptive terms used, as in my example, "flash of light" or "lightning". The wording is itself an interpretation of what was noticed by the observer, and there are often logical inferences inherent within the wording, like in the case of "lightning". When you observe "the outputs of a technology", such inferences are already inherent within the design and programming of the machine, such that the outputs are a mechanized interpretation. So for example, every time that a flash of light inputs the machine, it might output "lightning". So in your example, who, other than the manufacturers of the machine, knows what input is interpreted as the decay of a pion in your example?
The problem being that the interpretive theory is not necessarily sound. The machine may serve the purpose even with faulty interpretive theory. For example, it reports every flash of light as "lightning". You might insist that it doesn't matter what we call it so long as we are consistent. And that is fine, until the machine records a flash of light as lightning, which isn't lightning, then there's a problem. See, "flash of light" is the more general description, and "lightning" more specific. So long as the vast majority of flashes are actually lightning, the machine will remain within an acceptable margin of error. But that machine is operating in a very specific system, and a different environment could render the interpretive theory which is correct under those circumstances, as unsound.
Then so long as the machine is always employed in a similar environment (the same type of system), the faulty interpretive theory will appear to be acceptable. This is a problem with the use of extremely constrained artificial systems, in experimentation. It is the inverse problem of the first problem, which was to assume a system when "system" is not justified by proper boundaries. Here, we have the problem of assuming that theories which are valid within a tight system are also valid in a wider application.
Quoting EricH
I think I can conclude with a high degree of confidence, that you have never studied metaphysics.
Quoting EricH
This is exactly why a very thorough study of metaphysics is required before one can obtain a satisfactory level of understanding in the field. A very significant amount of effort and hard work is required to make sense of what appears to be incoherent nonsense at first glance. It is also probably why most modern metaphysics has gone soft, it requires an awful lot of work to be a good metaphysician.
Quoting EricH
Every human being can judge whether a principle is solid or not, and we all judge them in our own way. So it appears to me, that what you are lacking is confidence in your own capacity to judge metaphysical principles. I do not think I can give you what you need. Judgement is an activity, requiring technique, which is developed through practice.
Hi. I think that some people do have rare experiences that they can't communicate. If they try, they don't enjoy a sense of being believed and/or understood. So we have esoteric things. But it's tricky when such things are advertised or argued for. This is why lots of religion looks so bad. Instead of excluding it recruiters recruiters, and of course there's a fee.
Really I don't like physicalism. I do think it's more or less false or circular, or a vague expression of attitude. Another poster commented on the Lebenswelt being fundamental. That's more like it. An irreducible pluralism of grandmothers and pencil sharpeners and square roots. Our soggy category systems are always just useful lies perhaps.
Well, I like dualism more the monism in this case. Perhaps we can even talk of a spectrum and not a sharp distinction. Basically we have both words in our vocab to begin with because it's a vital distinction for us. Monism seems to be of the form: "actually, black is white." (Or white is black.)
I have many more important things to do with my life than to make sense of incoherent nonsense.
Quoting Metaphysician Undercover
I cannot assert this with 100% certainty, but I have a high level of confidence that - at best - metaphysics is a form of poetry in which people attempt to express vague feelings of, umm, well - and here I get stuck - I'm not quite sure what it is they're trying to express. I get that you are dissatisfied with the notion that everything (whatever "everything" means) is explicable in terms of a physical reality (AKA physicalism). But once you get beyond the physical, language falls apart - there are no clear definitions and you end up with a word salad - and no two people can agree on anything.
Quoting Wayfarer
Don't let my carping stop you folks. If believing this stuff helps you with your life then who am I to stop you? It seems harmless enough in the scheme of things.
And if you can come up with a set of metaphysical principals that you metaphysicians can agree on - and if they are not coherent nonsense? I will keep an open mind.
No, you've misunderstood what @Metaphysician Undercover is saying. He's saying that you lack the confidence to arrive at the the same judgements he's arrived at. If only we could all be so confident as to agree with MU - we can but dream...
Now we're getting too silly. Of course an apparatus is a system.
Not necessarily, that's the point. When the apparatus is faulty, or in some way deficient in its capacity to be what it is supposed to be, it cannot be said to be a system. This is because a "system" is an artificial thing designed for a purpose. If the apparatus fails in the attempt to fulfill the conditions of the described "system" it cannot truthfully be said to be that system. And since the operation of that apparatus falls outside the boundaries of the described system, or any other described system, it's true function is unknown, so it cannot be a system at all.
This is the problem with your idea that an apparatus is necessarily a system. It produces a false sense of certainty through the assumption that the apparatus necessarily fulfills the parameters of the system. And with this false sense of certainty, systems theory deceives us. The unknown is brought into the system, and accounted for through probabilities, as evident in nonlinear systems, and the illusion that what is actually outside the system, the unknown, is within the system, as known. So systems theory allows that the boundaries of a system are breached, while creating the illusion that they are not, by treating it as a "system" which implies such boundaries. Allowing this contradiction, to persist, unchecked is a deception which creates a false sense of certainty.
Yes, it is. It is a system in an undesirable state, but it is still a system.
Quoting Metaphysician Undercover
That is extremely wide of the mark. A carbon atom is a system of fermions. It is neither artificial nor does it have a purpose, although it is certainly useful.
This is a failure to adhere to a rigorous definition of "system", which very clearly would lead to faulty observations. The apparatus is not doing what it's supposed to do, but it still serves the function which it is supposed to serve, only in an "undesirable" way. Come on Kenosha Kid, you know better than to say something like that.
Quoting Kenosha Kid
This is a good example of the faulty use of "system" which I described in my last post. A "system" requires defined boundaries. When the boundaries cannot be well defined, as is the case with an atom, one might attempt to incorporate the unknown boundaries into the description of the object, as variables, to create the illusion of a "non-linear system". But in reality a non-linear system is not a system at all, because the boundaries are unknown and this contradicts any rigorous definition of "system".
Then why do you assert a "high level of confidence"? Are you highly confident that you are unsure? I'll call you Socrates then, you're sure that you're unsure.
Quoting EricH
Why would you say this? Do you think that every word used must always refer to a physical object in order for language to be useful? That would be very strange if it were the case. In reality, agreement between individuals is much easier when the terms and conditions are more vague and general than precise and specific, because the commitment required for that agreement is less restrictive.
That's some of it, but don't forget all the attempts to prove things that people really want to believe. Proofs of God, proofs of free will, proofs that the world is good, that 'our' way of life is superior. A cynic might speak of methodical rationalization, and then a second cynic might tease the first for thinking that either of them are getting by without their own rationalizations. For instance, 'rationalization' is part of a story about the human mind.
I think I know what you mean and agree with you, but perhaps 'physical' is not the ideal word here. There are lots of noncontroversial aspects of reality. People can play chess without getting lost in semantics, but it doesn't matter how the queen is shaped, only that there's no sincere argument about which piece is the queen.
'Word salad' is also a bit harsh. Maybe it's more like subcultures. If a small group of people read and write all the papers about exotic thinker X, they slowly develop a lingo. It's quite understandable that outsiders would ask if this lingo has any power or relevance in what you might call a 'physical' sense. I'd call it a lifeworld sense.
Can the works of X cure cancer, get me to Mars, etc.? Or do the words only make the insiders happy? I suspect that really believing any orienting grand narrative makes people happy. It may be investment in the narrative rather than the narrative that does the work.
You mean your typically esoteric definition? I wouldn't class that as a failure. It's important to have consensus in language. Adhere to that and you will make fewer communication errors. Since I introduced the word into the convo, you can take it as read that I mean it in the normal sense of interacting parts comprising a whole, not whatever arbitrary definition you insist upon after the fact.
John A. Wheeler said ‘no phenomenon is a real phenomenon until it is an observed phenomenon’. Wheeler also coined the term ‘the participatory universe’, saying ‘ The universe does not exist “out there,” independent of us. We are inescapably involved in bringing about that which appears to be happening. We are not only observers. We are participators. In some strange sense, this is a participatory universe.’ The ‘participatory universe’ is a term that Wheeler in particular is associated with.
I think this is where today’s understanding of physics tends to undermine traditional physicalism, insofar as that form of physicalism assumes the ‘mind-independence’ of the physical domain. So long as participation is acknowledged as fundamental, then physicalism in the traditional sense of the universe being ‘out there’, separate from, and indifferent to, the observer, is no longer tenable. Mind, then, becomes an integral or inextricable aspect of the whole.
So on the one end of a spectrum of sorts, you have that reality in the abstract is just a formal structure. On the other end, you have that reality in the concrete is entirely experiential. These are both things you might call "mental". The physical world, the ordinary stuff with which we are most familiar, like rocks and trees and tables and chairs, is stuff in the middle of that spectrum: those are abstract structures that we suppose are a part of the abstract structure that is our world, on account of (and held to account by) our concrete experiences.
The mental-as-in-experiential and the mental-as-in-abstract are just the extreme aspects of physical things that are left once you've completely removed the other aspect: the mental-as-in-abstract is just what's left when you remove all experientiality from the (ordinarily physical) object of your consideration, and the mental-as-in-experiential is just what's left when you remove all abstraction from the (ordinarily physical) object of your consideration.
But it's still all continuous and unified with the physical, the same kind of stuff as rocks and trees and tables and chairs. The things that you might want to consider nonphysical are just the extreme ends of that continuum.
The problem here is that we're talking about the reliability of scientific observations, not the capacity for common vernacular. In science, "system" has a very specific definition involving boundaries, such that any "whole" which you are talking about is defined by its boundaries. If the boundaries of the proposed "whole" are really unknown, or nonexistent, and the observer applies systems theory in interpretation, which pretends that the nonexistent boundaries are there and known, in order to treat what is observed as a "system", then obviously the observations will be unreliable.
This is a good example of what Wayfarer refers to as the "participatory universe". The proposed "whole", being the observed object, is a fabrication of the observer, created for the sake of applying systems theory. And systems theory works, because it is formulated to allow that something which is not really a system (has no definite boundaries), can be treated as a system. So the result is fabricated objects (systems), and therefore fabricated observations.
You've heard of an "open system"?
An "open system" is one with empirically verifiable boundaries, which allow specific materials to cross the boundaries, like a living cell. It is not a system with boundaries which are unverifiable, and unknown, therefore arbitrary.
I tried to draft a response to this, but really couldn't, without going into too much detail. I'll try and pick some of these points up in ongoing discussions.
This is Nietzsche 101 basically. It's not language that fails, it's that you have nothing 'out there', nothing concrete to test your ideas to. And if that's the case, the source of those ideas can only be human (all to human) psychology. He showed that metaphysics is in fact a subset of psychology... not everybody has gotten the memo though.
I have thought of something to say. It is that Wheeler’s ‘participatory universe’ challenges materialism, because it places ‘the observer’ in the picture (‘the observer’ being the participant in question.) So this introduces ‘mind’ as fundamental, but not as an objective factor. It is fundamental because of its participation. But you can’t get behind that, or outside of that, so as to see what it is; it is not a ‘that’, an object of analysis, because it is always ‘what is analysing’.
Whereas, in your post, I feel as though you are trying to treat everything - mind included - as object. That’s how come you can say that the Universe is ‘an abstract object’.
Right, that's what made me think of the thought that I then posted. Like Wheeler's participation of the observer, on my view it is precisely our participation as part of the abstract object that is our concrete universe that makes it concrete, to us. There are other abstract objects very similar to our universe that contain within them structures much like the structures that we are, that participate as part of those objects/universes, and so experience them as concrete, whereas to us they are abstract -- and to them, our universe is an abstract object. It's being an interacting, participating part of this universe that makes it concrete from our perspective, and other structures that we are not part of abstract from our perspective.
Quoting Wayfarer
On my account, 'object' and 'subject' are roles in or perspectives on an interaction, and everything is both. It's true that we can't get out of our own perspective, except perhaps inasmuch as we can become something else so as to have the perspective of that kind of thing instead, but then we're still in our own perspective, it's just a different kind of perspective.
But we can still acknowledge that there are perspectives other than ours. We see objects moving around that look like what we ourselves look like -- other humans -- and suppose that they are also subjects with their own first-person perspectives. Those objects are also subjects, and that's a natural intuition almost all humans have.
It's not that far a leap to just continue with the principle that all subjects are also objects (minds are things), or even that all objects are also subjects (every thing "has a mind", at least in a sense), and so that object and subject are just different perspectives on the same (if you prefer) beings, or entities, or whatever you'd like to call them.
The important differences between different things/beings/entities/whatever is their structure and function, which are abstract features independent of any substance. From there it's a short step to treating everything as equally abstract, with concreteness merely being participation in the same structure as oneself -- to wrap back around to Wheeler.
I think there really is a basic difference between objects and subjects. It’s an ontological distinction, and that not everything has or is a mind. I think your perspective arises from internalising the abstract view of physics - as treating everything as a point within a mathematical matrix. But what that doesn’t allow for, is the reality of suffering, which can’t be represented abstractly or converted into mathematical co-ordinates. Ballpoint pens and lumps of granite don’t have minds, animals and humans do, and the latter are also capable of reason.
The point I take from Wheeler’s observation is that it’s an acknowledgement of the role of the observer. Science has been forced to make that acknowledgement, for reasons I’m sure you know. But you can’t ‘get behind’ that - the role of the observer is acknowledged but there’s nothing in the mathematics that models it. That’s why it’s a turning point in science - it’s because hitherto, it was believed science was seeing the world ‘as it truly is’ as if in the absence of any observer. That is what has been called into question.
It seems to me that what you are really getting at is a socially established notion of the real. Thinkers have made a strong case that perception is never pure (always involves interpretation.) So it's more like shared habits of interpretation-perception sort out hallucinations/noise from 'genuine' experience of the real. The word 'physical' gets some excited because of its association with hard science. But the prestige of hard science depends on its effectiveness in the ordinary lifeworld of medium sized dry goods.
Quoting TheMadFool
To me it seems like a bold and counterintuitive claim. It's like a leap of faith that directs research. Or as an outsider that's my impression. If I hope to reduce everything mental to the brain, then I want to assume that such a thing is possible in the first place. The circle had better be squarable if I'm going to dedicate my career to it. It's also aggressive and edgy like atheism, so it's a nice balcony from which to look down on the sentimental proles who think they exist as more than mere skullmeat.
If you read my post, I go further than describing the observer as an active participant, to the point of arguing that "the observation", any observation, is a creation of this act of the observer. This produces the need for sound principles whereby we might distinguish a scientifically valid observation from a fabrication.
Quoting Wayfarer
This describes the need to respect the tinted glass analogy. The reason why the mind must be immaterial, posited by ancient philosophers like Aquinas, is that only by being completely separate from the material, can the mind know all material existence. If any aspect of the mind is material, it will taint our understanding of the material, as looking through a tinted glass taints our ability to see the true colour of things.
Now there is a problem, and that is that following Aristotle's biology, "On the Soul", Aquinas describes the intellect as being dependent on the body, as all the various and distinct powers of the soul reside in the material aspect, the physical body. The human intellect itself is nothing other than an extension of the other described powers, self-nutrition, self-movement, and sensation. This is why the human intellect is deficient when compared to a completely free intellect like God. The human intellect is deficient because of that power's dependence on the body.
This implies that the tinted glass problem is inherent, or intrinsic to the human mind. The intellect is not completely immaterial (hence the divide between active and passive intellect), and this fact cannot be avoided. The human mind has material aspects which will necessarily taint its understanding of the material world, as the tint of the glass does to vision. However, we can learn from the tinted glass analogy, that the tinting does not necessarily incapacitate the understanding. What is required is that we determine the nature of the tint, through comparative methods, and then we may account for the tinting in the observations. The tinting itself can be found represented in Kant's critique as the a priori intuitions of space and time. These are the fundamental intuitions which form or structure "sensibility". The way that the world appears to us through sensation is fundamentally structured by these a priori intuitions, so they constitute the lens through which we naturally observe the world. The task for the metaphysician is to determine how the lens is constituted such that its contributions to the observations might be accounted for.
Yeah, brains are objects, minds and ideas are not.
I think the basic difference is between information/ideas and physical stuff. The physical is that what exists in time and space, whereas information does not. You can convey the same information via a number of different physical media. The exact configuration in space or time doesn't really matter, as long as it contains certain signs that can be interpreted by some (physical) being that can grasp the meaning that is conveyed by those signs... otherwise it's just a bunch of random symbols that doesn't effect anything physical.
So the link between the physical and information is some entity that is capable of generating, communicating and interpreting agreed upon meanings of signs. Until relatively recently that was biological life exclusively (as far as we knew), but computers also do this now, albeit auto-matically via code that we programmed into it.
The point I want to get to, it that the notion of physicalism is still important for how we make sense of the world. The physical came first, and life grew out of that. In fact life developed this ability precisely to be able to affect the physical for its goals... to extend its physical life and reproduce physical life. So ideas and information can affect the physical only in this very specific way. The mistake that is being made, I think at least, is turning this specific way in which life uses information into some kind of metaphysical or ontological distinction.
As to the wheeler comment. There's an obvious way in which it's true that science, as something we beings with certain goals and cognitive abilities do, will reflect some of that. But I don't think scientist are wholly unaware of that, it's more that they don't particularly care about the possible metaphysical reality outside of human perspective. If it works and can predicts things we experience then it's fine. In fact, if you look at the history of quantum mechanics, the consensus for a long time was exactly that... we shouldn't look at what the shrödinger-equation really means, as long at it predicts things accurately.
And as another aside, much more has been made of the observer-problem in quantum mechanics than it probably warrants, because it doesn't really apply to the scale we typically operate in. Again, it seems to be a mistake to generalize a very specific problem into something of metaphysical proportions.
I thought it was more because intellect, nous, is what grasps the forms and the final cause, the senses receive the material impression as per sensible and intelligible form.
Quoting ChatteringMonkey
Actually, Wheeler says not. He said that 'it' - a physical object - comes from 'bit' - binary choices, yes/no questions:
[quote=J A Wheeler, Information, Physics, Quantum: The Search for Links] I, like other searchers, attempt formulation after formulation of the central issues and here present a wider overview, taking for working hypothesis the most effective one that has survived this winnowing: It from Bit. Otherwise put, every it — every particle, every field of force, even the spacetime continuum itself — derives its function, its meaning, its very existence entirely — even if in some contexts indirectly — from the apparatus-elicited answers to yes or no questions, binary choices, bits.
It from Bit symbolizes the idea that every item of the physical world has at bottom — at a very deep bottom, in most instances — an immaterial source and explanation; that what we call reality arises in the last analysis from the posing of yes-no questions and the registering of equipment-evoked responses; in short, that all things physical are information-theoretic in origin and this is a participatory universe.[/quote]
Wheeler's 'delayed choice' thought experiment also poses huge challenges for realism. See this article for an account.
Besides, where did 'the physical' originate? Complex matter, such as carbon and the other heavy elements, were the product of stellar explosions. But the formation of stars are in turn dependent on the existence of the fundamental constraints which governed the formation of the Universe, and it's impossible to say what the source of those constraints are, or if they're simply 'brute fact'.
Yeah ok maybe at the very bottom. But I think what reality ultimately is at bottom is a separate question from how reality at our scale operates.
So for instance it might very well be that we life in a simulated universe, but within that simulated universe what we call the physical still seems to comes first... and information doesn't seem to directly effect it.
Even if ultimately something like ideas, information or mind is at bottom of all the physical stuff in in the universe, it certainly doesn't seem to be 'our' mind or ideas that are that basis... we still need a physical biological organism to sustain our mind, and we still can't create or directly effect physical stuff with our thoughts.
If information is ultimately the source, then it certainly took a very long detour, by first creating all the physical stuff, that is able to give rise to biological life only in some corner case... which then finally is able to generate and process information again.
I want to stress that i'm not necessarily endorsing a metaphysical version of physicalism that makes definite claims about the basic substance of the universe, and I don't think science is doing that either for the most part. I think a more common version of physicalism just brackets that question altogether, and is only committed to the notion that we need to test our ideas to empirical data about the world.
That is what is called 'methodological naturalism' which is perfectly fine. It doesn't make any claims about the world in general - but then, it probably also has no need to post to philosophy forums.
But physicalism is not that - physicalism is the 'thesis that everything is, or supervenes on, the physical'. It is the presumption of many people - maybe the majority! - in that having taken God out of the picture, then what you have left is a universe 'governed by' the laws of physics. If it can't be accounted for in those terms, then it isn't real, or it doesn't exist. It is the philosophy of modern scientific secular culture.
What I'm pointing out, is that, if not God, at least mind has now been re-introduced to the picture by physics itself. I know that's still a controversial point of view, but there's a lot of support for it. There's a strong idealist streak in physics since the 1920's. Arthur Eddington's Nature of the Physical World was an early example. Heisenberg's Physics and Philosophy is another. The Copenhagen interpretation of physics is philosophically very interesting in its own right. (I know I can't follow the maths, but then, many of those who can often seem philosophically tone-deaf in their own right. I got a lot out of Paul Davies' books in the 1980's and 90's, particularly God and the New Physics and The Matter Myth.)
The European pioneers of quantum physics - Bohr, Heisenberg, Schrodinger, and others - were philosophically very deep thinkers, with a very wide range of interests. Schrodinger wrote later in life on philosophy and was interested in both European idealism and Vedanta. Heisenberg tended towards Platonism (as a lot of mathematicians do). But since WWII the focus shifted to the USA which is generally more pragmatist and (pardon me for saying) less philosophically literate.
So my view is that modern, or should we say post-modern, science, really undermines physicalism altogether. Of course a lot of people are going to disagree with that, but note this: those physicist 'public intellectuals' like David Deutsch and Sean Carroll who are most vocally wed to physicalism, are also advocates for 'many-worlds' and multiverse interpretations of physics. And I say that's because physicalism can't accomodate the paradoxes of quantum physics without introducing such ideas.
I'm of the opinion that making claims about the world in general isn't very philosophical, but then I usually tend to side with what one might call anti-philosophers, so maybe that makes sense.
Quoting Wayfarer
As I alluded to earlier, I think physicalism is an extreme version of the common sense notion that ideas and dreams aren't real, as opposed to the world we experience via our senses. Rather than deep thoughts about the nature of reality, i'd say most people just start from this basic intuition. And that's not so much a philosophy, as it is something that is hard-wired in us to some extend. Even those who believe in God assume this much when they go about their day.
Quoting Wayfarer
I do wonder how you would come to that conclusion? Granting that physics reveals basic stuff to be information-theoretical or mathematical values, that still doesn't necessitate something like mind or God. Minds, or rather thoughts, to me are something brains produce, I don't even know how to make sense of mind being part of the basic stuff of the universe. So yeah it's hard to respond to such claims if it isn't even clear what it is supposed to mean.
Quoting Wayfarer
Classical physics, Newtonian and Einsteinian physics, can't accomodate it, I don't know if that has much to do with the philosophical position of physicalism... maybe to some extend, sure.
And I think Sean Carroll would say that he's not so much introducing an idea to accomodate the paradox, rather that it's the interpretation that is the most simple and straightforward because it doesn't have to introduce new ideas to explain the disappearance or collapse of part of the wave-function. There is no paradox in many-worlds.
Which is pretty much what I was saying.
NB that that doesn’t imply that there are any non-physical things.
The problem with this is that idealism, and theology in general, dispute this claim that "the physical came first". They believe that the immaterial came first. If you take the time to follow the logical process outlined by Aristotle in his Metaphysics, the argument that the immaterial was first is actually quite strong.
Quoting Wayfarer
The tinted glass analogy is that if the intellect is not completely immaterial it could not properly know all material things, just like if we were looking through a tinted glass, we could not properly see the colours of things.
The problem with the idea that the intellect grasps the forms of things, as in Aristotle's description, is that then the intellect must have a passive aspect, in order to be a receptacle for forms. But this is the characteristic of matter, it is the receptacle which receives forms in the creation of material objects. This produces the difficult problem of what exactly is the passive intellect. If on the other hand, the intellect is understood as completely active, then it does not receive the forms of things, it creates forms. But now we have a separation between the senses, which must be passive receptacles of forms, and the intellect which is a creator of forms. So unless we allow passivity (the characteristic of matter) into the intellect, so that the intellect can receive forms from the senses, we have no way to reconcile the forms of the intellect with the forms of the senses.
I can’t see it, but never mind.
That is interesting, I hadn't encountered these nuances. I'm very interested in the medieval notion of the 'rational soul' and am doing some readings on it.
Good luck with the reading. I'm sure you'll find it very interesting.
Yet, science can't explain consciousness. Surely, it ain't the best then, no?