Are we rational or irrational?

[tonyrey]

Yes.

One word reveals your blindness to everything that really matters! In other words you believe truth, goodness, freedom, equality, justice, beauty and love are merely human abstractions that do not correspond to reality.

No, this is just pejorative palaver. As is the rest of your post.

Two words are supposed to settle the** matter**! That facile evasion was predictable in view of your increasing inability to answer my questions or disprove my statements. Your dissection of reality has made it valueless and meaningless - even for yourself. It is overwhelmingly clear that the sole solution for diehard materialists is to follow logical positivists into oblivion.

Ironically your adulation of science has resulted in a loss of intellectual respectability, given that you ignore the most valuable aspects of life and restrict your attention entirely to what you can see, hear, touch, smell and taste… unaware that **if only matter exists nothing **matters!

 

[tonyrey]

If we consist **solely **of atomic particles we cannot be rational.

Why not?

1. Self-control is an illusion because the self doesn’t exist!
2. All our thoughts are caused by molecular activity.
3. Truth is merely an abstraction, i.e. a term which refers to nothing!

 

[larkin31]

One word reveals your blindness to everything that really matters! In other words you believe truth, goodness, freedom, equality, justice, beauty and love are merely human abstractions that do not correspond to reality.

Nope.

Two words are supposed to settle the** matter**! That facile evasion was predictable in view of your increasing inability to answer my questions or disprove my statements. Your dissection of reality has made it valueless and meaningless - even for yourself. It is overwhelmingly clear that the sole solution for diehard materialists is to follow logical positivists into oblivion.

Nope.

Ironically your adulation of science has resulted in a loss of intellectual respectability, given that you ignore the most valuable aspects of life and restrict your attention entirely to what you can see, hear, touch, smell and taste… unaware that **if only matter exists nothing **matters!

Nope.

Answering your misrepresentations can be done in one word!

 

[inocente]

I would like to respectfully disagree. He has never been comprehensible.

 

[inocente]

Come to think of it, there’s not much substance in your post… but then we have to contend with an atomistic view of reality, I suppose.

So did you watch the videos yet? There’s a chocolate chip cookie and glass of milk when you’re done.

1. Self-control is an illusion because the self doesn’t exist!

Of course it does. Take your cookie and sit beneath a tree a while. Zillions of atoms formed into long chain molecules formed into cells, some making up roots, some the trunk and branches, some leaves. At one level it’s a whole bunch of complex electromagnetic activity, another a colony of cells, another a tree. A tree is incredibly complicated to explain when you really think about it, but it’s still a tree, it doesn’t pop out of existence because you don’t fully comprehend.

2. All our thoughts are caused by molecular activity.

You’re making the claim that something else is needed, beyond I imagine what you would claim to explain a tree. Ball’s in your court to explicate.

3. Truth is merely an abstraction, i.e. a term which refers to nothing!

Very post-modernist dude but possibly off-topic.

 

[inocente]

I want to argue this - because I’m right…

Then you’re going to have to cite a reputable source for your post #40 . Incidentally empty space has energy - the space between quarks makes most of the mass of a proton and there’s that little thing some like to call dark energy.

 

[inocente]

Actually, materialism is incomplete because it cannot address all reality.
It is the reality which materialism is unable to address which proves that it is limited.

Being thus limited, materialism becomes false when one tries to apply it to all reality.

Ah but emergence theory is more than materialism – it says the sum of the parts is more than the whole.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41clTbP1ztL.SL500_AA300.jpg
(from amazon.com)

 

[tonyrey]

One word reveals your blindness to everything that really matters

Two words are supposed to settle the** matter**

! That facile evasion was predictable in view of your increasing inability to answer my questions or disprove my statements. Your dissection of reality has made it valueless and meaningless - even for yourself. It is overwhelmingly clear that the sole solution for diehard materialists is to follow logical positivists into oblivion. Nope.

Ironically your adulation of science has resulted in a loss of intellectual respectability, given that you ignore the most valuable aspects of life and restrict your attention entirely to what you can see, hear, touch, smell and taste… unaware that **if only matter exists nothing **

matters! Nope.

Answering your misrepresentations can be done in one word!

Your inability to explain why they are misrepresentations speaks for itself…

It is abundantly evident to any unbiased person your attempt to defend outdated materialism is an abject failure. Unlike you the logical positivists had the courage to admit they were mistaken…

 

[tonyrey]

grannymh

             *Actually, materialism is incomplete because it cannot address all reality.

It is the reality which materialism is unable to address which proves that it is limited.
*
Being thus limited, materialism becomes false when one tries to apply it to all reality.Ah but emergence theory is more than materialism – it says the sum of the parts is more than the whole. Gratuitously! Precisely what makes the sum of the parts more than the whole?

Apart from ignorance…

 

[tonyrey]

			http://forums.catholic-questions.org/images/icons/icon1.gif 				**Re: Are we rational or irrational?**

Backbiting is always a sign of impotent cowardice…

	  		  		 		  		  		  		  		 			 			 			 			 				[

](http://forums.catholic-questions.org/newreply.php?do=newreply&p=7511144)

 

[You]

Then you’re going to have to cite a reputable source for your post #40 . Incidentally empty space has energy - the space between quarks makes most of the mass of a proton and there’s that little thing some like to call dark energy.

I am a reputable source. When you add some energy to a molecule it jiggles, that is heat; add more energy, the electrons jump to higher energy levels than fall back and emit energy, light; conversely remove energy from the molecule the electrons stop jumping, it stops emitting energy; remove more energy the molecule stops jiggling, it freezes; remove more energy, the molecule breaks down into atoms and so on down until there is nothing left, no more energy. Temperature is just the name of the scale used to measure the addition or subtraction of energy within a particular very narrow band of the spectrum of all possible energy levels. Unravelling the energy housed in an atom, its quarks and any ‘dark stuff’ is analogous to continuing to lower its ‘temperature’; as all lowering temperature really is is a human name ‘jiggly molecules’] for lowering energy within one small arbitrary range of all possible values. “Temperature”, energy, can lower until there is nothing, not even space, left.

 

[tonyrey]

So did you watch the videos yet? There’s a chocolate chip cookie and glass of milk when you’re done.

I bet they don’t explain consciousness. If they did it would be in the headlines!

Twas behavioral psychology, neuroscience and information technology, not programmers or AI.

Are you trying to divorce them?

No response!

Foresight is an occupational hazard of being rational.

I wonder how a bunch of atomic particles succeeded in escaping from the presnt moment… Magic must be at work!

No response! (Understandably…)

1. Self-control is an illusion because the self doesn’t exist!

•                            Of course it does. Take your cookie and sit beneath a tree a while. Zillions of atoms formed into long chain molecules formed into cells, some making up roots, some the trunk and branches, some leaves. At one level it’s a whole bunch of complex electromagnetic activity, another a colony of cells, another a tree. A tree is incredibly complicated to explain when you ***really think*** :) about it, but it’s still a tree, it doesn’t pop out of existence because you don’t fully comprehend.

Your faith in science is touching but not by any stretch of the imagination does this have anything to do with a person’s power of self-control!

1. All our thoughts are caused by molecular activity.

You’re making the claim that something else is needed, beyond I imagine what you would claim to explain a tree. Ball’s in your court to explicate.

If all our thoughts are caused by molecular activity they are beyond our control and there is no guarantee they are reliable - and we cannot even choose the most reasonable conclusion. There are countless ways of being mistaken but only one way of being right.

1. Truth is merely an abstraction, i.e. a term which refers to nothing!

Very post-modernist dude but possibly off-topic.

Plato and Aristotle considered this question two millenia ago(!) and it is the greatest stumbling block for materialism.

 

[grannymh]

inocente;7511151:

Gratuitously! Precisely what makes the sum of the parts more than the whole?

Apart from ignorance…

synergy

 

[jonfawkes]

1. Atomic particles are not rational.

How do we know that particles are not rational? Perhaps that is what is rational about us. What we consider “rational” is perhaps no more than a critical mass of smaller units, which allows us to discount anything that hasn’t achieved that critical mass - e.x. “lower” life forms.

 

[tonyrey]

How do we know that particles are not rational? Perhaps that is what is rational about us. What we consider “rational” is perhaps no more than a critical mass of smaller units, which allows us to discount anything that hasn’t achieved that critical mass - e.x. “lower” life forms.

A fascinating possibility! Yet in this context being rational is usually associated with the power of reason. How would that be related to critical mass?

 

[tonyrey]

synergy

What type of synergy?

 

[grannymh]

My apology for the error in format in post 93. I was responding to Tonyrey post 89.

Gratuitously! Precisely what makes the sum of the parts more than the whole?

Apart from ignorance…

synergy

 

[jonfawkes]

A fascinating possibility! Yet in this context being rational is usually associated with the power of reason. How would that be related to critical mass?

Perhaps that each particle or atom has a limited amount of “consciousness quotient” we need a certain amount or certain combination to appear rational by our standards. It’s always there just not recognizable.

 

[tonyrey]

Perhaps that each particle or atom has a limited amount of “consciousness quotient” we need a certain amount or certain combination to appear rational by our standards. It’s always there just not recognizable.

The great mathematician and philosopher Leibniz had a similar idea in his theory of monads but it lacks the support of evidence.

 

[grannymh]

What type of synergy?

In general, synergy refers to the interaction of two or more agents or forces so that their combined effect is greater than the sum of their individual effects. However, since I do not have an UK dictionary on hand, my suggestion is to try this link or similar ones. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synergy

Naturally, you are welcome to disagree with my use of the word synergy. I enjoy a variety of ideas.

Blessings,
granny

“The shepherds sing; and shall I silent be?”
from the poem “Christmas” by George Herbert