Materialism and Logic, mtually exclusive?

[Z]

I see, ST. I was mistaken.

H, Hypothesis. What we're testing for.

H. everything that exists is material (def: materialism)
P1. material things do not combine premises by logical inference to reach conclusions
P2. something exists which combines premises by logical inference to reach conclusions
S1. by P1 and H, NOT P2
S2. P2 and NOT P2
C. reductio ad absurdum: there is no logic (principle of non-contradiction)

Now I understand the logic statement above, but while it may be a logic analysis, it is not a factual one. First, there is no significant evidence of anything immaterial existing; indeed, no evidence is possible for the immaterial to exist (as separate from the material. Under idealism, everything is immaterial; but that's another goat altogether). Second, the process of combining premises by logical inference to reach a conclusion is, in fact, something that CAN be done by sufficiently complex machines. Hence, P1 is false. As for P2, the only way to invalidate H with P2 is to state:

P2: something immaterial exists which combines premises by logical inference to reach conclusions

Otherwise, P2 could just as easily be proving P1 to be wrong as H.

In fact, the way your statement reads, it seems you have two Hs: H and P1. Using the argument in this format is circular reasoning, and therefore invalid.

...Yeah, I could use a course in formal logic. But apparently, you could use a refresher yourself.

H. every vehicle that exists is white
P1. white vehicles do not have six wheels
P2. some vehicle that exists has six wheels.
S1. by P1 and H, NOT P2
S2. P2 and NOT P2
C. reductio ad absurdum: there are no white vehicles. (principle of non-contradiction)

Same thing.

 

[chriswl]

Only part of me has to be material in order to type.

Solely by viewing the results of your physical typing I'm able to infer that you can do logic. Am I justified in making this inferrence? If so, how does the non-material part of you that is capable of logic communicate with the material part of you that does the typing and thus make its "capacity to do logic" known to the world?

I agree it is quite disconcerting that there needs to be some non-material explanation.

I don't think there needs to be a non-material explanation for logic, I'm just guessing that this is your assumption. But in any case, its rather more than "disconcerting" if you are proposing some kind of interactionist dualist setup. Is that your position?

 

[stillthinkin]

The pathetic fallacy is a literary criticism, not a logical fallacy.

It does not prove that what ever you're applying the trait to does not, in fact, have that trait.

ETA - Besides, until you prove that you are more than just material, you provide your own counter-example to P1. Yourself.

Someone's doing research!
I don't know if i ever said it was? Anthropomorphism and pathetic fallacy are pretty much synonyms. I took the following from the wiki article on anthropomorphism:

In logical reasoning
"Using anthropomorphized caricatures or projecting human qualities on conceptual entities or inanimate objects in reasoning is also known as committing a pathetic fallacy (not a pejorative term)."

Maybe it is really a semantic fallacy? Egads there's that word again!

If one relies on anthropomorphic ideas to commit an equivocation... then you have a logical fallacy.

No time to research more... hey, don't you guys have jobs? I won't have one much longer if I don't get some work done...

 

[Fifty Thousand Bucks]

Predicating Existence

...Yeah, I could use a course in formal logic. But apparently, you could use a refresher yourself.

H. every vehicle that exists is white
P1. white vehicles do not have six wheels
P2. some vehicle that exists has six wheels.
S1. by P1 and H, NOT P2
S2. P2 and NOT P2
C. reductio ad absurdum: there are no white vehicles. (principle of non-contradiction)

Same thing.

Sigh! If this were the best of all possible worlds, would we not all be taking refresher courses in logic? Certaintly, I don't exempt myself.

Sir Z-Dragon, I see one SMALL problem with your syllogism. If it is to parallel ST's sufficiently (i.e. to count as "the same thing"), you have to treat existence as a predicate. Hence, what you should be asking us (your readers) to accept in your P1 is something akin to this:

P1': Everything that is exists and is white.

​

I've never been comfortable with compounding existence. But if you'd like try me, I'm open to persuasion. I suppose, then, that I too am still thinkin.

Wouldn't you have started better simply by saying something like the following?

All things are white.

​

I don't see how saying that all things are both vehicles and white preserves the parallelism you are striving for in your efforts to match still thinkin.

Cheers,

FTB

 

[Z]

...Yeah, I could use a course in formal logic. But apparently, you could use a refresher yourself.

H. every vehicle that exists is white
P1. white vehicles do not have six wheels
P2. some vehicle that exists has six wheels.
S1. by P1 and H, NOT P2
S2. P2 and NOT P2
C. reductio ad absurdum: there are no white vehicles. (principle of non-contradiction)

Same thing.

Sigh! If this were the best of all possible worlds, would we not all be taking refresher courses in logic? Certaintly, I don't exempt myself.

Sir Z-Dragon, I see one SMALL problem with your syllogism. If it is to parallel ST's sufficiently (i.e. to count as "the same thing"), you have to treat existence as a predicate. Hence, what you should be asking us (your readers) to accept in your P1 is something akin to this:

P1': Everything that is exists and is white.

​

I've never been comfortable with compounding existence. But if you'd like try me, I'm open to persuasion. I suppose, then, that I too am still thinkin.

Wouldn't you have started better simply by saying something like the following?

All things are white.

​

I don't see how saying that all things are both vehicles and white preserves the parallelism you are striving for in your efforts to match still thinkin.

Cheers,

FTB

I dunno. I just pasted one term over another. Every instance of one word in his structure got pasted with a particular word in mine. Then I tidied up the grammatically unsavory bits.

Or I think I did. Fact is, I was drinking....

Anyway, the point here is that he's not even keeping to his hypothesis. He's already assuming a hidden variable that means the hypothesis is already false.

If his hypothesis is 'All things are material', and he's saying something (which is not material) can do logic, then he's already contradicting his hypothesis with an unstated premise.

In fact, the statement ought to have read like this:

H. everything that exists is material except for minds (def: dualism)
P1. material things do not combine premises by logical inference to reach conclusions
P2. minds exist which combines premises by logical inference to reach conclusions

But, of course, that would neither address materialism nor show an exclusion of logic.

Ergo, he has to keep the hypothesis of the non-material mind out of the equation. In which case, the equation would have to look like this:

H. everything that exists is material (def: materialism)
P1. material things combine premises by logical inference to reach conclusions

...since, after all, under materialism, everything (including us) is material.

Stillthinkin', you either have to apply the argument equally under the hypothesis that everything is material (and that includes you), or you have to throw out this unsteady attack on materialsm. Either way, though, logic is done by you. The problem you have, then, is to prove or disprove that you are a material being. Until you can do that, your OP is illogical; and since thousands of years of philosophers have failed to do just that, I'm not holding my breath for an answer.

 

[I less than three logic]

Someone's doing research!
I don't know if i ever said it was? Anthropomorphism and pathetic fallacy are pretty much synonyms. I took the following from the wiki article on anthropomorphism:

In logical reasoning
"Using anthropomorphized caricatures or projecting human qualities on conceptual entities or inanimate objects in reasoning is also known as committing a pathetic fallacy (not a pejorative term)."

Maybe it is really a semantic fallacy? Egads there's that word again!

If one relies on anthropomorphic ideas to commit an equivocation... then you have a logical fallacy.

No time to research more... hey, don't you guys have jobs? I won't have one much longer if I don't get some work done...

This is really beside the point. I’m willing to concede this point because doing so does not strengthen your case any. What you are left with is: P1 is true because there are no counter-examples. This is an argument from ignorance. The lack of examples to the contrary does not prove P1 true.

Also, you must prove that you (your example used in P2) are more than just material. We know you are material, but we have no reason to believe you are anything more. Until you’ve done so, you are your own counter example to P1.

 

[RandFan]

...Yeah, I could use a course in formal logic. But apparently, you could use a refresher yourself.

H. every vehicle that exists is white
P1. white vehicles do not have six wheels
P2. some vehicle that exists has six wheels.
S1. by P1 and H, NOT P2
S2. P2 and NOT P2
C. reductio ad absurdum: there are no white vehicles. (principle of non-contradiction)

Same thing.

Sigh! If this were the best of all possible worlds, would we not all be taking refresher courses in logic? Certaintly, I don't exempt myself.

Welcome to the forum FTB.

 

[stillthinkin]

Stillthinkin', you either have to apply the argument equally under the hypothesis that everything is material (and that includes you), or you have to throw out this unsteady attack on materialism.

What you are requiring of me here is that I must "beg the question" in order to be logical. This is not correct.

The argument I have presented is logically correct... if H, P1, and P2 are true then we have a contradiction. The premise every materialist will question is P1, of course. I have not proven this premise, anymore than anyone has proven H. Disproving my argument could be accomplished very easily by providing only one valid counter-example to the premise. RandFan and Marquis suggested rivers and transistors within a few minutes of this thread starting. I argued that these counter-examples show how anthropomorphically we think. Another counter-example offered was p-zombies, but that thread of thought seemed to die out. We can pursue that one if anyone wants to.

It is true that the lack of a counter-example does not prove the premise. But the lack of a counterexample should at least make people suspicious that it might be true. If I wanted to prove the premise "A greek god exists" then I only need to provide an example. The fact that I can't do that should make both of us a little suspicious that it might not be true?

If human beings are the only thing we know of that do logic -- then how is it that we are different from everything else we know of? What is the difference that makes the difference?

Note that some people do deny P2, at least implicitly - they hold that logic is reducible to causality in the brain. Of course there are a few problems with that line of reasoning...

 

[Marquis de Carabas]

If I wanted to prove the premise "A greek god exists" then I only need to provide an example. The fact that I can't do that should make both of us a little suspicious that it might not be true?

But that is precisely what you are doing. You are positing the existence of an immaterial something that makes humans--and nothing else--capable of logic without providing an example. The fact that you can't do that should make both of us a little suspicious that it might not be true.

 

[stillthinkin]

Yes welcome aboard FTB, i see that was your first post!

I think you intended to quote z-dragon in the first half of your post... you will find a "quote" button at the bottom right corner of each post, which will provide you with the main text of the post within the "quote" syntax.

 

[I less than three logic]

It is true that the lack of a counter-example does not prove the premise. But the lack of a counterexample should at least make people suspicious that it might be true. If I wanted to prove the premise "A greek god exists" then I only need to provide an example. The fact that I can't do that should make both of us a little suspicious that it might not be true?

Your suspicions do not make a proof. You can not say, “If materialism is true, then logic doesn’t exist” on suspicions alone. At best you could say, “If material things do not combine premises by logical inference to reach conclusions, then should materialism be true, logic does not exist.”

ETA- Seems I missed this bit.

Disproving my argument could be accomplished very easily by providing only one valid counter-example to the premise.

We do not have to disprove the premises. This is a fallacious attempt to shift the onus on us. You have to show your premises to be true for your proof to be sound. We simply have to show it has not been proven true, not prove it false.

 

[stillthinkin]

But that is precisely what you are doing. You are positing the existence of an immaterial something that makes humans--and nothing else--capable of logic without providing an example. The fact that you can't do that should make both of us a little suspicious that it might not be true.

Wow, no one has called me a greek god in a while

Hey, arent you going to take me up on my offer to prove that if materialism is true, then God exists?

 

[stillthinkin]

Your suspicions do not make a proof. You can not say, “If materialism is true, then logic doesn’t exist” on suspicions alone. At best you could say, “If material things do not combine premises by logical inference to reach conclusions, then should materialism be true, logic does not exist.”

Excellent! I agree with your argument.

 

[Marquis de Carabas]

Hey, arent you going to take me up on my offer to prove that if materialism is true, then God exists?

Let's stick to the topic at hand, thanks. Feel free to start a new thread, though.

I still don't understand why you deny that computers make inferences.

 

[Z]

What you are requiring of me here is that I must "beg the question" in order to be logical. This is not correct.

No, I'm not. You're positing 'something' that is apparently not material doing logic. However, you're not demonstrating that 'something' exists which is not material; all you're doing is contradicting the hypothesis without reason.

You might as well have stated P2 as 'something immaterial exists' and gotten much the same result, as materialism is concerned.

The argument I have presented is logically correct... if H, P1, and P2 are true then we have a contradiction.[/quote]

Yes - and the error lies in either P1 or P2. The hypothesis is not in error in your argument until you can reconcile P1 and P2 - or prove the existence of some thing, which is not material, which does logic.

The premise every materialist will question is P1, of course. I have not proven this premise, anymore than anyone has proven H. Disproving my argument could be accomplished very easily by providing only one valid counter-example to the premise.

Or simply noting that, given that humans perform logic, P1 is wrong, until such time as it can be proven that humans possess an immaterial component.

RandFan and Marquis suggested rivers and transistors within a few minutes of this thread starting. I argued that these counter-examples show how anthropomorphically we think.

Yes, and your noted misdirection failed, since we know that computers can and do perform logic. But when this was pointed out, you fled into semantics, choosing a definition that, to your mind, disproved that point (which, however, is not true). We know that some computers do combine premises by logical inference to reach conclusions. In fact, that's much of what an advanced computer program does.

Another counter-example offered was p-zombies, but that thread of thought seemed to die out. We can pursue that one if anyone wants to.

P-zombies are an incoherent idea.

It is true that the lack of a counter-example does not prove the premise.

What lack?

Counter-examples: Human. Animal. Computer.

But the lack of a counterexample should at least make people suspicious that it might be true. If I wanted to prove the premise "A greek god exists" then I only need to provide an example. The fact that I can't do that should make both of us a little suspicious that it might not be true?

If that's what you are saying... but what you're saying here, specifically, is that only humans do logic, and humans are immaterial (in some way). Since you have failed to provide evidence for either side of this statement, your argument is invalid.

It's like saying no Greek gods exist, and Zeus throws lightning. What is Zeus, if not a Greek god? It's up to you, at that point, to demonstrate WHY Zeus is not a Greek god.

It's up to you, at this point, to demonstrate WHY the 'something' you refer to is not a material thing.

If human beings are the only thing we know of that do logic -- then how is it that we are different from everything else we know of? What is the difference that makes the difference?

IF humans were that might be one thing; but we're not.

Now who's anthropomorphicizing?

Note that some people do deny P2, at least implicitly - they hold that logic is reducible to causality in the brain. Of course there are a few problems with that line of reasoning...

No, it's just an issue of semantics.

 

[I less than three logic]

Excellent! I agree with your argument.

Great, but I don't agree with that first if. I have no reason to believe that material things are not capable of combining premises by logical inference to reach conclusions. In fact, I believe that is exactly what I do.

 

[Z]

The first thing anyone, anywhere, has to do to disprove materialism is to show that something immaterial exists.

Until then, all we can say is that humans are material things, humans do logic, and the answer to the thread title is, "No."

 

[chriswl]

The argument I have presented is logically correct... if H, P1, and P2 are true then we have a contradiction. The premise every materialist will question is P1, of course. I have not proven this premise, anymore than anyone has proven H. Disproving my argument could be accomplished very easily by providing only one valid counter-example to the premise.

We've already answered you. Computers (and lots of other machines, besides) do logic. I'm 100% certain of this for what I mean by "logic".

You have your own definition of "logic" which as far as I can see simply conflates logic with consciousness. So your argument reduces to: consciousness contradicts materialism.

 

[stillthinkin]

Let's stick to the topic at hand, thanks. Feel free to start a new thread, though.

I still don't understand why you deny that computers make inferences.

I have designed and built a number of machines, including DDL and TTL circuits. I am familiar with what they do and how they work. Like any other machine, they do what stuff does... if a marble rolls down a track, and there is an opening in the track, the marble falls down the opening. It does not infer its way into the hole. If a set of transistors form an AND gate, and both the inputs go to +5 V, then and only then does the output go to +5 V. The transistors are not making an inference any more than the marble is.

 

[stillthinkin]

We've already answered you. Computers (and lots of other machines, besides) do logic. I'm 100% certain of this for what I mean by "logic".

You have your own definition of "logic" which as far as I can see simply conflates logic with consciousness. So your argument reduces to: consciousness contradicts materialism.

We have at least two definitions for "logic":
1. "to combine premises by inference to reach conclusions"
2. "what transistor-transitor functionality provides in a computer"

To equate these two in an argument is an equivocation, which is a fallacy.

Note that in my argument H,P1,P2 etc. I use defn 1 without equivocation.