Any Defenses of Materialism?

[sayak83]

I have been unconscious and I have been in deep sleep. That is the point. I exist in different forms but what is my true form? Water exists as solid, liquid or vapour. What is its true form? Swarupa?

You are using lingustic usage as a guide to ontological truths. By that criteria, love and emotion reside in the heart. Common language uses folk psychology which is dualistic and considers the self as a homunculus residing somewhere insider the body. Using common language as a guide to truth works only if folk psychology is found to be true, not otherwise.

Brain is an object of waking state phenomenon. It is not an object in other two forms of consciousness. When I observe a dreaming or sleeping man, it is my waking state observation. It does not correspond to the nature of consciousness from the first person perspectives.

Take time to contemplate on this. Consider the forms of awarenesses and forms of corresponding universes in waking, dreaming, and sleeping states from first party perspective.

If you do so, you may intuit how there is nothing solid and graspable actually. It is mind/awareness taking on different forms. There is nothing worthy of clinging to. And you will realise that forms that we consider to be solid and graspable are forms of awareness only.

And even as taste of mango cannot be explained, the aforesaid also cannot be explained. The point is not to score points but to gain a first person perspective of what our Swarupa, true form is.

You are arguing from idealism. I can construct a theory that is identical to materialism based on first person idealistic framework alone. In such a situation all "objects" are entities in the phenomenological space and my theory of how to categorize them is based on pragmatic considerations of self-interest. So external objects are seperated from internal object by virtue of emotional and interest valence (it hurts if my toe is crushed but does not when your toe is crushed etc.) Similarly the identity inference between the bones I feel directly and the pictures in the X-ray is based on similar pragmatic considerations. In such a situation I make no ontological commitments at all, rather every theory is a model whose "truthfulness" is based on its impact in the quality of my first person experience upon adopting it.

In such a stance, the self is also just another object in this phenomenological space. Its a persistent object, but so are many other things, like time.

 

[1137]

Phenomenological difference does not imply ontological difference. Color may be seen both as color and as spatio-temporal electromagnetic waves in an appropriate detector. Different ways of perceiving the same thing can lead to difference in the phenomenology of what is being seen. Hence the idea that neural patterns and mental states are categorically different is not established.

So the phenomenons are different, the properties are different... how many things can be different between A and B before they're not identical? That's right... one.

 

[sayak83]

So the phenomenons are different, the properties are different... how many things can be different between A and B before they're not identical? That's right... one.

You just ignored all my examples that show otherwise.

 

[Satans_Serrated_Edge]

So the phenomenons are different, the properties are different... how many things can be different between A and B before they're not identical? That's right... one.

You do realize that even were you such a talented rhetorician(which you patently ain't, but moving on) that you could cogently and coherently build a case against 'materialism' of such strength that the intellectually honest would be forced to realize it was somehow false, you'd still be no closer to proving your point. You were unable to do it in the thread you made specifically to do so, so why make your own version of an 'attack evolution to try to prop up creationism'(not identical in subject matter but completely identical in method and approach) and try to do it again here? It just doesn't make any sense.

Anyway, you've been asking and asking for a method that consciousness might happen that's better than 'beamed into our heads by alien/magical organisms' which is the card you have been trying to lay.

Imagine this, if you can.

First, everything we know of is causal. Causes causing causes in a giant incomprehensbly complex web of motion setting motion in motion. Even creationists accept this as fact, and indeed it is the basis of the cosmological argument. With me so far?
Now, follow that ever growing complexity of happenings until it arrives at us. Many would say causation causation inexplicably ends here, with us, because we have this magical ability to defy everything called freewill, or the black flame if you like. But do we? I would say not.

Imagine the mind not as an actor, but an observer. The amount of sense data coming at us when we are awake is of the magnitude of hundreds of terabytes a second. We process it all, but are only 'aware' of a tiny fragment of it. Awareness it would seem, could be a byproduct of this overload of data.

So why does it seem like we choose things? A convincing illusion brought on by the linear way we experience time. At any given time in our experience, there is now, and there is what we remember, but never what is next. When confronted with a choice, we are really just watching a predetermined conclusion play out, our illusion of control brought on by a glitch that creates a primitive awareness of the universe unfolding(of which we are part), that is yet constrained by the same linear rules of time space as all other matter in such a way it seems like you are a choosing agent.

All well within the confines of 'materialism'

Now, this is theory of course, but entirely more robust and less problematic than being a walking FM radio with no antenna.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

But all of that is irrelevant. Do you have any evidence of mental states (A) and brain states (B) do not satisfy the relations (1)-(4) among all the observations made till present?

Yes. In fact, no mental state has yet been observed that satisfies the relations given. At best, we have statistical evidence for similar signals from proxies (e.g., proton spin alignment in hydrogen atoms) in similar regions of the brain corresponding to particular mental states. Also, 1-4 don't really mean much. I can just as well correlate heartbeats with mental states (as the primary method for identifying brain states relies on hemodynamic activity), and I can cite clear instances of correlations that satisfy 1-4 more generally (i.e., the "correlation implies causation" AND "identity" as you have presented it) which not only do not entail your "identity" but don't even entail causation. Photons that were prepared in a superposition state and emitted along divergent trajectories must necessarily both be described probabilistically and cannot influence one another causally after emission. Yet, if a measurement of the spin of one such photon is made in a laboratory light-years away from the other photon, then if the other photon were to be measured, it would locally appear to yield a "random" outcome (because the measurement of the photon's spin in this laboratory would be subject to the statistical laws of photonic spin), but the outcome would actually be determined "globally" once the spin of the other photon was measured. We can thus device experiments whereby A is 100% correlated with B, ~B 100% correlated with ~A, B 100% correlated with A, and ~A 100% correlated with ~B, but all without any "cause".

If you do not, that constitutes excellent evidence for the identity hypothesis. Nothing in science is irrefutable of course. If contrary evidence comes, we will discuss it then.

Every fMRI or other neuroimaging study I've run or helped to run has failed to satisfy 1-4. I have never encountered any research or studies, published or undertaken by colleagues, which satisfies your "identify" rules.

 

[LegionOnomaMoi]

The neural signals associated with a conscious and a REM brain is distinctly different than the neural signals associated with deep sleep or unconscious states.

What "neural signals"? Functional neuroimaging of mental or cognitive states doesn't allow for sufficient voxel resolution to identify neural signals except in terms of the averages of a signal generated from massive ensemble of neural populations. These readings are subject to all manner of issues from fundamentally problematic assumptions regarding their interpretations, the curse of dimensionality, and the moronic application of the failed NHST intro stats methodological welding of Fischer and Neyman-Pearson approaches to inadequate applications of statistical techniques to misunderstood data. Hence the study showing that common methods showing "distinctly different" brain states could be (and were) used to identify mental states in a dead fish.

Do you accept that if the relations (1)-(4) do accrue, identity relation is established?

No. These relations run afoul at a far more basic level in physics to hold for a more general approach to causality, let alone identify. I do accept that there must exist a causal relationship between A and B if 1-4 hold, but not identity.

 

[sayak83]

What "neural signals"? Functional neuroimaging of mental or cognitive states doesn't allow for sufficient voxel resolution to identify neural signals except in terms of the averages of a signal generated from massive ensemble of neural populations. These readings are subject to all manner of issues from fundamentally problematic assumptions regarding their interpretations, the curse of dimensionality, and the moronic application of the failed NHST intro stats methodological welding of Fischer and Neyman-Pearson approaches to inadequate applications of statistical techniques to misunderstood data. Hence the study showing that common methods showing "distinctly different" brain states could be (and were) used to identify mental states in a dead fish.


No. These relations run afoul at a far more basic level in physics to hold for a more general approach to causality, let alone identify. I do accept that there must exist a causal relationship between A and B if 1-4 hold, but not identity.

Your wholesale skepticism of neural imaging technology based on a paper that simply cautions researchers to use the techniques with care is completely irrational. The scientific books that deal with the neuroscience of consciousness show great awareness of the limitations of these techniques and base their conclusions only on extremely well validated results.

 

[sayak83]

Yes. In fact, no mental state has yet been observed that satisfies the relations given. At best, we have statistical evidence for similar signals from proxies (e.g., proton spin alignment in hydrogen atoms) in similar regions of the brain corresponding to particular mental states. Also, 1-4 don't really mean much. I can just as well correlate heartbeats with mental states (as the primary method for identifying brain states relies on hemodynamic activity), and I can cite clear instances of correlations that satisfy 1-4 more generally (i.e., the "correlation implies causation" AND "identity" as you have presented it) which not only do not entail your "identity" but don't even entail causation. Photons that were prepared in a superposition state and emitted along divergent trajectories must necessarily both be described probabilistically and cannot influence one another causally after emission. Yet, if a measurement of the spin of one such photon is made in a laboratory light-years away from the other photon, then if the other photon were to be measured, it would locally appear to yield a "random" outcome (because the measurement of the photon's spin in this laboratory would be subject to the statistical laws of photonic spin), but the outcome would actually be determined "globally" once the spin of the other photon was measured. We can thus device experiments whereby A is 100% correlated with B, ~B 100% correlated with ~A, B 100% correlated with A, and ~A 100% correlated with ~B, but all without any "cause".


Every fMRI or other neuroimaging study I've run or helped to run has failed to satisfy 1-4. I have never encountered any research or studies, published or undertaken by colleagues, which satisfies your "identify" rules.

Its obvious in the case of entanglement that the "two" photons are not in fact two photons but part of a single wavefunction. The photons do not exist as individuated entities before the decoherence event. They are ONE thing that splits in two after disentanglement.

Regarding neural correlates of consciousness, I would point you toward the works cited by Dr. Stanislas Dahaene in his new book "Consciousness and the Brain".

 

[atanu]

You are using lingustic usage as a guide to ontological truths. By that criteria, love and emotion reside in the heart. Common language uses folk psychology which is dualistic and considers the self as a homunculus residing somewhere insider the body. Using common language as a guide to truth works only if folk psychology is found to be true, not otherwise.

You are arguing from idealism. I can construct a theory that is identical to materialism based on first person idealistic framework alone. In such a situation all "objects" are entities in the phenomenological space and my theory of how to categorize them is based on pragmatic considerations of self-interest. So external objects are seperated from internal object by virtue of emotional and interest valence (it hurts if my toe is crushed but does not when your toe is crushed etc.) Similarly the identity inference between the bones I feel directly and the pictures in the X-ray is based on similar pragmatic considerations. In such a situation I make no ontological commitments at all, rather every theory is a model whose "truthfulness" is based on its impact in the quality of my first person experience upon adopting it.

In such a stance, the self is also just another object in this phenomenological space. Its a persistent object, but so are many other things, like time.

Linguistic use? You mean that colors in brain have feelings of love and pain?

And who is claiming origin of consciousness in brain? You or the brain?

 

[jonathan180iq]

I personally think so, though I certainly don't know for sure. How is this a defense of materialism?

I'm getting there.

Like you, I also think that the world existed before I was born.

Now, here's the good part: Can you explain why you think that without referencing a materialist worldview?
....

Take all the time you need to think about that for a second.


My defense for materialism comes from the fact that nothing else is rationally defensible. (And from the fact that you rely on it in every single aspect of your life.)

Unless you think that the world was created the instant that you came into existence, then you're already losing the argument, you materialist!

You believe, most likely, that the Sun rises in the East and sets in the West, correct?
You believe that based on observation...
You believed when you awoke this morning that your internet was going to work so you could log on to ReligiousForums.com and partake in some hearty spiritual debate.
You believe that the keyboard or device in front of you will let you electronically transcribe your thoughts and transfer them through a medium that makes them available to other people, all over the world.
You believe in other people.
You believe in their ability to think and read.
You believe in their sovereignty and individuality.
You believe that they exist apart from you.
You believe in the chair that you're sitting in.
You believe in the shoes on your feet, and the ground that keeps you from falling through the Earth.

You believe these things materialistically. Unless you want to find some way to argue that the shoes/chair/people/keyboard/internet/sun don't(doesn't) actually exist, then I don't have to defend materialism. You've done it for me.

 

[1137]

You just ignored all my examples that show otherwise.

You're trying to say that the differing nature between brain and mind is irrelevant, but pretending it's not ontological. You're not even making arguments anymore, youre drowning.

 

[1137]

I'm getting there.

Like you, I also think that the world existed before I was born.

Now, here's the good part: Can you explain why you think that without referencing a materialist worldview?
....

Take all the time you need to think about that for a second.


My defense for materialism comes from the fact that nothing else is rationally defensible. (And from the fact that you rely on it in every single aspect of your life.)

Unless you think that the world was created the instant that you came into existence, then you're already losing the argument, you materialist!

You believe, most likely, that the Sun rises in the East and sets in the West, correct?
You believe that based on observation...
You believed when you awoke this morning that your internet was going to work so you could log on to ReligiousForums.com and partake in some hearty spiritual debate.
You believe that the keyboard or device in front of you will let you electronically transcribe your thoughts and transfer them through a medium that makes them available to other people, all over the world.
You believe in other people.
You believe in their ability to think and read.
You believe in their sovereignty and individuality.
You believe that they exist apart from you.
You believe in the chair that you're sitting in.
You believe in the shoes on your feet, and the ground that keeps you from falling through the Earth.

You believe these things materialistically. Unless you want to find some way to argue that the shoes/chair/people/keyboard/internet/sun don't(doesn't) actually exist, then I don't have to defend materialism. You've done it for me.

So simply because I seem to perceive matter I know it's the only thing that exists? That is nonsense. In fact, we can only know master through the mind in the first place! Can you give me reasoning for thinking the universe is older than you that doesn't require information to be processed by the self?

 

[1137]

You do realize that even were you such a talented rhetorician(which you patently ain't, but moving on) that you could cogently and coherently build a case against 'materialism' of such strength that the intellectually honest would be forced to realize it was somehow false, you'd still be no closer to proving your point. You were unable to do it in the thread you made specifically to do so, so why make your own version of an 'attack evolution to try to prop up creationism'(not identical in subject matter but completely identical in method and approach) and try to do it again here? It just doesn't make any sense.

Anyway, you've been asking and asking for a method that consciousness might happen that's better than 'beamed into our heads by alien/magical organisms' which is the card you have been trying to lay.

Imagine this, if you can.

First, everything we know of is causal. Causes causing causes in a giant incomprehensbly complex web of motion setting motion in motion. Even creationists accept this as fact, and indeed it is the basis of the cosmological argument. With me so far?
Now, follow that ever growing complexity of happenings until it arrives at us. Many would say causation causation inexplicably ends here, with us, because we have this magical ability to defy everything called freewill, or the black flame if you like. But do we? I would say not.

Imagine the mind not as an actor, but an observer. The amount of sense data coming at us when we are awake is of the magnitude of hundreds of terabytes a second. We process it all, but are only 'aware' of a tiny fragment of it. Awareness it would seem, could be a byproduct of this overload of data.

So why does it seem like we choose things? A convincing illusion brought on by the linear way we experience time. At any given time in our experience, there is now, and there is what we remember, but never what is next. When confronted with a choice, we are really just watching a predetermined conclusion play out, our illusion of control brought on by a glitch that creates a primitive awareness of the universe unfolding(of which we are part), that is yet constrained by the same linear rules of time space as all other matter in such a way it seems like you are a choosing agent.

All well within the confines of 'materialism'

Now, this is theory of course, but entirely more robust and less problematic than being a walking FM radio with no antenna.

So you see no need to address how, say, your mind plays an integral role in everything here? How many times do you refer to yourself in the above explanation? And how are you gaining this knowledge about the world around you without it going through the mind? You've changed to free will, a red herring.

 

[Satans_Serrated_Edge]

You seem to have missed the point entirely. The concept of freewill is essential to your argument. Don't you even realize that?

Seriously, I almost want to just take this argument you are trying to make and do it for you. I think your position is pure hubris but watching you flounder like this is piteous.

 

[atanu]

I'm getting there.

You believe these things materialistically. Unless you want to find some way to argue that the shoes/chair/people/keyboard/internet/sun don't(doesn't) actually exist, then I don't have to defend materialism. You've done it for me.

What does your "You believe" indicate to you?

As per you, it is some material process that believes. No? In that case what is the value of your knowledge? The material process that blindly generates your intelligence also blindly controls it. Where is any objectivity?

The proponent of this theory of blind origination of consciousness is actually akin to a Disney character saying "I know Walt Disney".

Believing in existence of tables and chairs and bodies in a phenomenal realm does not mean that these objects have equal ontological significance as the consciousness that is aware of these objects.

Accepting Newton's laws for a given scope does not mean that Quantum Mechanics becomes inapplicable for that scope.

 

[1137]

You seem to have missed the point entirely. The concept of freewill is essential to your argument. Don't you even realize that?

Seriously, I almost want to just take this argument you are trying to make and do it for you. I think your position is pure hubris but watching you flounder like this is piteous.

Can you explain why non-materialism relies on free will? Possibly without pathetic fallacies if possible?

 

[Quintessence]

Can you explain why non-materialism relies on free will?

Rather curious about this as well, as a non-materialist who rejects the notion of free will...

 

[jonathan180iq]

So simply because I seem to perceive matter I know it's the only thing that exists? That is nonsense. In fact, we can only know master through the mind in the first place! Can you give me reasoning for thinking the universe is older than you that doesn't require information to be processed by the self?

Yes. That's the only thing that you know to exist.

And to answer your second question, of course not. I'm filtering everything I experience through this fleshy sack of tools, same as you.

The thing is, when you cease to be, so do those experiences. If you disagree with me, then answer these questions:

Do you believe that your existence carries on after your synapses stop firing?
Did you exist before you were born?
Do you exist after you die?
If you believe that, why? Can you relate to me an example of a person who isn't you that existed before they were born or who exists after their death?

I can justify my belief in the world existing before me because I have parents who tell me it's so. They have memories and pictures of times that predate me. I have memories and experiences of times that predate my children. They will have memories and experiences that predate theirs and so on...This pattern follows for not just me, but for everyone who ever was. It's also true of all animals and all reproducing organisms. I can not only contemplate it, but observe it factually. Now, I could attempt to make arguments all day long that existence started with my birth because there is nothing outside of my experience - like Last Thursdayism... but that's incredibly shortsighted and arrogant, if I'm being honest. If you want to follow your stance to it's extreme conclusion, I'm only writing these words because you are subconsciously making me do so. We are all just a figment of your imagination, while you sleep sweetly in the Matrix and dream...

If the world existed before you were born, then there is no Mind-Body problem, as you are just a result of whole heaping pile of information that's taken a very long time to accumulate. That means that you, and all of the amazing thoughts and feelings that you've ever experienced are just a part of this boring physical world, rooted solely in materialism. If you thought the world into existence and unknowingly created the whole Universe in doing so, then there is a Mind-Body problem and you're the only one who can solve it. If you came into being last Thursday, full of memories of events that never actually happened, then there's a mind-body problem. If you're sleeping in a bio-tube, suspended high above the primordial ooze of creation, feeding into the shared nature of existence by dreaming all of this conversation, then there's a Mind-Body problem. If you are a ghost who can freely pass between realms once you figure out that danged Enlightenment thing a little better, then there's a Mind-Body problem...

But more likely than not, you're not any of those outlandish things. You're just a curious sack of flesh with thoughts and feelings that you don't quite know the origin of, same as me. You're full of ideas and convictions and emotions and you are certain that the source of your being comes from something greater than a mental illusion. There's nothing wrong with that. I just think you're mistaken.

 

[jonathan180iq]

As per you, it is some material process that believes.

Yes. None of my beliefs are possible without the health of my brain.

What is reality to someone who is insane?
Is it the same reality that you and I experience?

why or why not?

No?

I said yes.

In that case what is the value of your knowledge?

Not much.

The material process that blindly generates your intelligence also blindly controls it. Where is any objectivity?

There is none, if you really want to go there.

The proponent of this theory of blind origination of consciousness is actually akin to a Disney character saying "I know Walt Disney".

And it's what we are doing, isn't it? Pretending to know things that we don't know? Making **** up because we feel like there has to be something out there?

What is reality from the perspective of Snow White's Dwarves?

Believing in existence of tables and chairs and bodies in a phenomenal realm does not mean that these objects have equal ontological significance as the consciousness that is aware of these objects.

Do those objects exist apart from you - or do they exist because you perceive them?

Again, how much of the world did you know about before you were born?

Accepting Newton's laws for a given scope does not mean that Quantum Mechanics becomes inapplicable for that scope

I always find it strange that arguments from your side like to reference quantum mechanics, as if that helps in some way... Everything you know about it comes from the materialist world of observation, does it not? Regardless of how kooky or improbable some quantum actions appear, they're still factually part of the material world. You would not know about them otherwise.

 

[George-ananda]

Do you believe that your existence carries on after your synapses stop firing?

Yes

Did you exist before you were born?

Yes

Do you exist after you die?

Yes

If you believe that, why? Can you relate to me an example of a person who isn't you that existed before they were born or who exists after their death?

.

The Near Death Experience points us in the direction of showing that. After death spirit communication is what you are asking about next. The quality of the data on this subject has convinced me. Before birth? Those same spirits consistently tell us how they have been here before. Also childhood reincarnation memories including specific verifiable details is evidence for pre-existence.

Western materialism seems to be a strong influence among many today. I think eastern/Indian wisdom traditions have a more advanced understanding to which this 'beyond the normal' data is part and parcel of a more complete world-view.