Materialism

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

It can't be the case that eliminative materialists claim there is no such thing as emotions or sensations. Maybe what they are saying is that there are brain processes that give rise to the physical correlates of emotions, but that all the descriptive and mental baggage that we associate with emotions is just learned culturally. So a person raised without any cultural influence would have a simple mechanical/physical reaction to an emotional event.

Whereas reductive materialists say that the descriptive and mental baggage is real, but a side product of the brain processes.

Is this a reasonable distinction? (Gee, I wonder if both might be true?)

~~ Paul

 

[Win]

Bill:

Completely specious reasoning! Water is H2O. You raised this issue before, I addressed it. I went on to address the question of emergent properties as well as the difference between object and process.

I don't read this:

But no explanation is possible to scientifically explain the existence of the mind in the same way we can explain and show that water is nothing but H2O.

as suggesting that water isn't H20. Why do you?

Perhaps, though, you'd like to explain the nature of the identity relationship between water and H20. For example, is the identity necessary or contingent?

 

[The One called Neo]

But no explanation is possible to scientifically explain the existence of the mind in the same way we can explain and show that water is nothing but H2O.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Completely specious reasoning! Water is H2O. You raised this issue before, I addressed it. I went on to address the question of emergent properties as well as the difference between object and process.

Bill,

I was giving what I believe is the property dualists belief. It was not necessarily an expression of my own belief, although I do happen to agree that mind cannot be scientifically explained in the same way we can explain and show that water is nothing but H2O. Maybe a property dualist would claim that mind can be scientifically explained if he supposes that systematic correlations between brain events and mind events constitute a scientific explanation. I'm not sure precisely what they would claim.

Now we agree that water is H2O. But it would be wrong to say that water emerges from H2O wouldn't it?

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

I propose that we drop the term emergent property. Look at the dictionary definition of emergent:[i/]

1 a : arising unexpectedly b : calling for prompt action : URGENT
2 : rising out of or as if out of a fluid
3 : arising as a natural or logical consequence
4 : newly formed or prominent

Gee, you think definitions 1a and 3 are confusing?

~~ Paul

 

[BillHoyt]

I was giving what I believe is the property dualists belief. It was not necessarily an expression of my own belief, although I do happen to agree that mind cannot be scientifically explained in the same way we can explain and show that water is nothing but H2O. Maybe a property dualist would claim that mind can be scientifically explained if he supposes that systematic correlations between brain events and mind events constitute a scientific explanation. I'm not sure precisely what they would claim.

Now we agree that water is H2O. But it would be wrong to say that water emerges from H2O wouldn't it?

Yes, it would be wrong to say water emerges from H₂O. It is a necessary identity: H₂O is water. There is no emergent property here. The contrast you drew between this example and the brain/mind example was specious.

Cheers,

 

[Win]

Bill:

In your comments to Neo you say:

The contrast you drew between this example and the brain/mind example was specious.

How so?

Oh, and what's heat?

 

[Jethro]

Oh, and what's heat?

A transfer of energy between bodies which are not in thermal equilibrium.

 

[hammegk]

A transfer of energy between bodies which are not in thermal equilibrium.

What is energy?

 

[Q-Source]

Now then. To clarify my property dualist position a little, with regard to the interaction of physical and phenomenal properties: Phenomenal properties have no effect on physical properties. A complete description of the physical world is possible which makes no reference whatsoever to phenomenal properties. Along with the behaviour of the more conventially considered physical world, every action, thought, belief, emotion or memory of a person can be explained, in principle, without reference to the phenomenal.

How so?

Can you explain how (under property dualism) is possible to explain phenomenal properties without reference to the phenomenal?

Do physical properties have an effect on phenomenal properties?

 

[Win]

Q:

Can you explain how (under property dualism) is possible to explain phenomenal properties without reference to the phenomenal?

Perhaps my use of the phrase, "without reference to," was inartful. It might be better to say, "without recourse to."

That being said, my point is that it is possible to explain our beliefs about phenomenal consciousness, our utterances regarding phenomenal consciousness and so on, without recourse to phenomenal properties as part of the explanation.

The eliminative materialist says, well, then, that explains everything. But it doesn't. The existence of phenomenal consciousness, itself, is unexplained.

If you insist that phenomenal consciousness is a feature of the world, you are, I think, compelled to accept a dualistic position.

Do physical properties have an effect on phenomenal properties?

This is a difficult question, in that causation isn't a completely understood concept. But if you mean, does a particular physical state logically necessitate a particular phenomenal state, then no. If you mean, does a particular physical state naturally correlate with a phenomenal state, then yes.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Win, I still don't understand how a phenomenal experience can feel familiar, if phenomenal consciousness has no memory.

~~ Paul

 

[BillHoyt]

I propose that we drop the term emergent property. Look at the dictionary definition of emergent:[i/]

Gee, you think definitions 1a and 3 are confusing?

~~ Paul

Think of it in terms of a reductionist approach. If we identify the subcomponents and their properties completely, the properties of an assemblage can still be unexpected (1a) and yet, a posteriori make sense (3).

Examine three line segments. Put them together to form a triangle. ASA, SAS, all interior angles summing to 180 all suddenly emerge. They are not properties of the lines. They are properties of three lines arranged into a triangle.

Cheers,

 

[Imaginist]

My thesis is that materialism is a faith-based worldview.

Now 'scuse me while I ramble!

The whole problem of materialism boils down to the assumption that if it can't be sensed with the five senses, then it doesn't exist. That is simply a statement of faith, and it too easily bleeds over into the assumption that if we haven't sensed it *yet*, then it doesn't exist. Certainly this faith is based in part upon experience, but it is nonetheless a faith.

There was a time when people were closed to the idea of subatomic particles, like quarks and neutrinos, only because we didn't yet recognize any physical evidence that showed they might actually exist. There were yet others who acknowledged the mathematical possibility or probablity, and adjusted their theories accordingly. In either case, that means that there were people walking around consciously choosing to form worldviews based upon incomplete evidence. Almost sounds like religion, doesn't it?

Taking a different tangent, saying that if you alter or destroy the gray meat in a person's head you also alter or destroy the person seems to be a good point on the surface. It certainly appears that way, but we also know that appearances can be deceiving. How many great scientific "truths," accepted for centuries, turned out to be false constructions based upon appearances combined with insufficient knowledge? This argument is just as weak as someone who knows nothing about how a TV really works concluding that the person they see on the screen has died when the TV is unplugged. I can manipulate the image and sound in many ways, but that doesn't have any effect at all on the actual transmission.

Of course, nearly all of these materialists offhandedly dismiss any paranormal phenomena like telepathy, precognition, remote viewing, past-life memories, and so on. Rather than admit there are unsettled questions in this regard, they'll say that there hasn't been sufficient scientifically valid documentation, and that all the anecdotal accounts are misperceptions, delusions, or lies of one form or another. This also reveals that materialism is a
position based on faith.

Ultimately, materialists are convinced that the senses and logic are the ultimate tools for discerning truth. In one way this seems to have some validity. If all you are concerned about is analyzing, qualifying, and quatifying sensory perceptions, then what other tools do you need? Unfortunately, even here the phenomenology of perception plays a role.

We are not merely sensors and analyzers with complete conscious control of all our faculties. Plenty of research has shown that we unconsciously respond to our sensations in countless ways - prioritizing, filtering, forming associations with latent memories from other experiences, and so on. There is also plenty of research that shows that we aren't perfectly consistent in qualifying or quantifying what should be the same sensations from the same stimulus. This is not only true from one individual to the next, but within the same individual over repeated trials.

So, I continue to think of materialism as a faith, but that in itself isn't a bad thing in my book. Life pretty much forces us to respond to it with something other than a simple "I don't really know." We have to form assumptions and working theories just to get us through an ordinary day, much less deal with the big questions about reality and existence! My only gripe with some materialists is their attitude that they really have a lock on the actual, undeniable, and ultimate truth. Sorry, I'm just not a convert.

Well, that's my rambling for today!

The Imaginist

 

[Win]

Paul:

Win, I still don't understand how a phenomenal experience can feel familiar, if phenomenal consciousness has no memory.

Well, phenomenal consciousness is the experience of the underlying neural correlate, what pain feels like, what it's like to be thinking about these questions, what red looks like, being the phenomenal realization of the same information physically realized in the neural correlate.

But, I guess you're asking, why doesn't phenomenal experience feel novel, that is to say, why aren't we surprized to have phenomenal experiences, moment to moment? And the answer is, because phenomenal experiences are experiences of the information processing going on in the underlying correlate, if there's no novelty there, there's no feeling of novelty in the phenomenal experience.

All the same, you only have access to your phenomenal consciousness in the moment. And that raises some interesting questions concerning the flow of time and the relationship between phenomenal time and physical time. In what sense is the you of ten minutes ago "still" phenomenally conscious?

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Think of it in terms of a reductionist approach. If we identify the subcomponents and their properties completely, the properties of an assemblage can still be unexpected (1a) and yet, a posteriori make sense (3).

Examine three line segments. Put them together to form a triangle. ASA, SAS, all interior angles summing to 180 all suddenly emerge. They are not properties of the lines. They are properties of three lines arranged into a triangle.

But the triangle isn't an "unexpected" result of the lines, is it?

Edited to clarify: I think there are some things we would certainly agree are emergent properties in the sense of surprising yet logically resulting. I just think we can overuse this term for all sorts of unsurprising things.

Then again, maybe I should be more easily surprised.

~~ Paul

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Win said:

But, I guess you're asking, why doesn't phenomenal experience feel novel, that is to say, why aren't we surprized to have phenomenal experiences, moment to moment? And the answer is, because phenomenal experiences are experiences of the information processing going on in the underlying correlate, if there's no novelty there, there's no feeling of novelty in the phenomenal experience.

Aha! I hadn't realized that you were saying that phenomenal experience is so tightly correlated with brain processing. I had gotten the impression they were almost two separate streams of experience.

However, that still doesn't explain it. Sure, the physical experience can feel familiar this way. But the phenomenal experience itself often feels familiar. I feel as if I've had these feelings/qualia/emotions before. That requires the phenomenal process to have memory, too, because my brain has no memory of the previous phenomenal experiences.

~~ Paul

 

[Win]

Paul:

Aha! I hadn't realized that you were saying that phenomenal experience is so tightly correlated with brain processing. I had gotten the impression they were almost two separate streams of experience.

Well, they are two separate "streams." But, as they are simultaneous realizations of the same information by different means, they are correlated.

However, that still doesn't explain it. Sure, the physical experience can feel familiar this way. But the phenomenal experience itself often feels familiar. I feel as if I've had these feelings/qualia/emotions before. That requires the phenomenal process to have memory, too, because my brain has no memory of the previous phenomenal experiences.

There is no such thing as the "physical experience."

And there is no information in the qualia that isn't also physically realized. If you feel as if you've had an experience of red before, it's because you've had the physical correlate of the experience of red before.

 

[BillHoyt]

But the triangle isn't an "unexpected" result of the lines, is it?

Edited to clarify: I think there are some things we would certainly agree are emergent properties in the sense of surprising yet logically resulting. I just think we can overuse this term for all sorts of unsurprising things.

Then again, maybe I should be more easily surprised.

~~ Paul

Yes, I see the term over-used, and, yes, mis-used, and, yes, a-bused. The point is: science views mind as a set of processes in the brain, it doesn't view the mind as the brain.

Cheers,

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Win said:

There is no such thing as the "physical experience."

Of course there is. All the brain processes that occur when I see red are the physical experience of red. I guess you don't like using the word experience here, but what else is it? I suppose we could call it the physical processing of red.

And there is no information in the qualia that isn't also physically realized. If you feel as if you've had an experience of red before, it's because you've had the physical correlate of the experience of red before.

I'm focusing specifically on having had the phenomenal experience of red before. When I see red again, or think about red, I get the sense that I've had the feeling of red, the redness of red, the emotion of red, before.

If you don't think that the phenomenal experience of red can be explained by the brain alone, then I do not see how you can claim that the memory of having had these phenomenal experiences can be explained by the brain alone. Phenomenal consciousness must have memory.

~~ Paul

 

[Q-Source]

The existence of phenomenal consciousness, itself, is unexplained.

Who says so?
Is it a fact?
Is it an assumption?
Is it a conclusion?

If you insist that phenomenal consciousness is a feature of the world, you are, I think, compelled to accept a dualistic position.

IMO (unless I am misunderstanding), the problem has nothing to do to with accepting that phenomenal consciousness exists but with the explanation or description of its cause and origin.

This is a difficult question, in that causation isn't a completely understood concept. But if you mean, does a particular physical state logically necessitate a particular phenomenal state, then no. If you mean, does a particular physical state naturally correlate with a phenomenal state, then yes.

What answer does dualism give to explain by which means physical and phenomenal states correlate?

Q-S