Which is more economical: theism or atheism?

[Oreoracle]

I wish that were actually true, Touchstone - but having dealt with a plethora of atheists both here and in my own personal realm I know for a fact that your statement may be true to you but is not true to all atheists. I have had many many encounters with absolutely rabid - Richard Dawkins - THERE IS NO GOD atheists. My husband was one of them for the majority of our dating and married life. I regularly correspond with one I met online.

The reality is, Touchstone, that you have graduated from atheism into the realm of agnosticism, and need to give back your atheist card :>)

Ugh…Since Charles Darwin (another user on this site) isn’t around anymore, it looks like I’ll have to clarify:

A common misconception is that “agnostic” is some sort of midpoint between theism and atheism, but this is simply not the case. Theism and atheism strictly pertain to the belief, or lack thereof, in a deity. They are opposites of one another. Likewise, agnosticism in not a mean between two extremes but is the opposite of gnosticism. Gnosticism and agnosticism pertain strictly to knowledge (in most cases, knowledge about gods, but not always). Gnosticism is the belief that the state or even non-existence of a god can be known. Agnosticism is the belief that knowledge pertaining to a god’s existence, nature, or non-existence cannot be gained. So, to recap: a/theism–>belief…a/gnosticism–>knowledge

Now you may wonder, how do we distinguish between the atheists who don’t just lack belief in God, but claim to know he doesn’t exist? Well, that would be called “strong atheism.” Those who only lack belief hold to “weak atheism.” Any atheist who claims to know that a god doesn’t exist would also be a gnostic atheist, one who claims we can’t know would be an agnostic atheist. It’s possible to be an agnostic theist, too.

So please, stop advertising this silly “you’re either an atheist or agnostic” bogus. Agnosticism and atheism are different positions on entirely different matters.

 

[Touchstone]

I wish that were actually true, Touchstone - but having dealt with a plethora of atheists both here and in my own personal realm I know for a fact that your statement may be true to you but is not true to all atheists. I have had many many encounters with absolutely rabid - Richard Dawkins - THERE IS NO GOD atheists. My husband was one of them for the majority of our dating and married life. I regularly correspond with one I met online.

The reality is, Touchstone, that you have graduated from atheism into the realm of agnosticism, and need to give back your atheist card :>)

Well, I am a “THERE IS NO GOD” atheist. Hear me clearly:

THERE IS NO GOD!

All knowledge is tentative beyond what we know by necessity (that we exist), so there’s no conflict there in saying that in all caps, and granting reasonable that I cannot know this with full certainty, and neither can anyone else.

If you read Richard Dawkins, he explicitly states the same thing in The God Delusion. As “rabid” as he is (??), he freely grants as I do that it is impossible to rule out the possibility of God’s existence. Like me, he affirms that there is a non-zero probability that God does exist. He just also holds that to be a very low probability.

Really, any atheist who claims they can know God doesn’t exist with certainly is either a fool or is trying to pull your leg. That goes for Dawkins and Dennett and Harris and Hitchens and all the rest right on down the line (these four all affirm the same possibilities I do). So it takes about 30 seconds to slice and dice an atheist who claims such certainty. No thinking atheist makes that claim. If that was your husband’s position, he was demonstrably a fibber or a weak-minded fool (sorry to be the bearer of bad news, if that’s bad news).

I have to explain this in forums where I post at least once a week, so thank you for filling this week’s quota for me. Now you know the deal – all atheism is a form of agnosticism, and it has always been thus.

-TS

 

[wanstronian]

That’s an unbelievably smug answer, my atheistic friend. Atheism isn’t more honest than theism - just more arrogant. Atheism substitutes NOTHING for God.

Theists question: What made the universe?
Atheists answer: Nothing did.
Theists question: How do you know nothing did it?
Atheists answer: Because we don’t know anything that could do it, therefore nothing must have done it.
Theists question: But how could nothing make something?
Atheists answer: We don’t know…but we know nothing did.

And your post just illustrates your total and utter incomprehension of the atheist stance, of logic, and of common sense. The alternative to God isn’t “nothing.”

Go away and do some reading, then come back when you can contribute to the discussion.

 

[tonyrey]

No. Not a rhetorical question. One I’d appreciate a real answer to!

It is rhetorical because you know perfectly well that everyone knows that it is not an illusion.

Salt is a physical compound. It’s not “wet”. Why is water “wet” and salt not?

Are you trying to reduce all “why?” questions to "how"questions? To eliminate purpose from the scene altogether? If so you are ignoring the fact that you are acting purposefully in asking me these questions? Can you explain scientifically how you are doing this?

Physical compounds have attributes which physical elements lack. They can be made by chemists. It does not follow that a person is in principle feasible from **impersonal **elements…

Why not? Unless you can tell me where the ‘wetness’ comes from in water, I think you are not in a position to assert that. Unless you can tell me on what grounds you know that persons can be reduced to, i.e. explained in terms of, impersonal particles (I don’t think) I know you are not in a position to assert that it is feasible.

 

[tonyrey]

No. Not a rhetorical question. One I’d appreciate a real answer to!

It is rhetorical because you know perfectly well that everyone knows that it is not an illusion.

Salt is a physical compound. It’s not “wet”. Why is water “wet” and salt not?

Are you trying to reduce all “why?” questions to "how"questions? To eliminate purpose from the scene altogether? If so you are ignoring the fact that you are acting purposefully in asking me these questions? Can you explain scientifically how you are doing this?

The reason why water is wet and why you are asking me questions is not that you and water exist by chance for no reason or purpose but that the physical laws of the universe are designed to sustain living organisms and rational beings who have the power to think for themselves, choose what to believe and how to live…

Physical compounds have attributes which physical elements lack. They can be made by chemists. It does not follow that a person is in principle feasible from **impersonal **elements…

Why not? Unless you can tell me where the ‘wetness’ comes from in water, I think you are not in a position to assert that. Unless you can tell me on what grounds you know that persons can be reduced to, i.e. explained in terms of, impersonal particles (I don’t think) I know you are not in a position to assert that it is feasible.

 

[tonyrey]

Correction:

Touchstone

 

[Touchstone]

It is rhetorical because you know perfectly well that everyone knows that it is not an illusion.

I don’t know that. If the human mind cannot be a purely natural phenomenon, then on that principle, I would say, neither can the wetness of water. “Wetness” would have to be some mysterious supernatural quality endowed to water by a creator, because water is just hydrogen and oxygen atoms, as everyone knows, and neither of those are “wet”.

Are you trying to reduce all “why?” questions to "how"questions? To eliminate purpose from the scene altogether? If so you are ignoring the fact that you are acting purposefully in asking me these questions? Can you explain scientifically how you are doing this?

“How” is just fine as a substitute for “why” here. I’d be happy if that would enable you to answer my question, that substition.

How is water “wet”, when the atoms water is made of are not “wet”?

The reason why water is wet and why you are asking me questions is not that you and water exist by chance for no reason or purpose but that the physical laws of the universe are designed to sustain living organisms and rational beings who have the power to think for themselves, choose what to believe and how to live…

That doesn’t tell me anything about how (assuming that’s the word you’d rather use than ‘why’) water is wet when the atoms water is made of do not themselves have “wetness”.

In other words, your naïve reductionism you apply to cognition defeats the wetness of water too. Just as you are confounded by the idea of “particles trying to be rational”, you are now confounded by hydrogen and oxygen atoms trying to be “wet”. This commits the massive mistake of avoiding/ignoring a fundamental property of nature – new and novel features emerge from constituent parts that, reduced, do not have those same properties.

Upthread, you said: " which implies that a collection of irrational particles **understand **their own activity. The ultimate absurdity!"

This is to say that a “collection of non-wet atoms combine to make compounds that are wet. The ultimate absurdity!”

If you can understand the emergence of “wetness” as supervenient on the molecular structure of water, you have the basic understanding for realizing the error of announcing the natural mind as “the ultimate absurdity”. Particles aren’t irrational (or rational), and hydrogen isn’t “wet”. Mind, like wetness is only coherent as a concept in the context of higher levels of description, as properties that obtain from higher level structures.

Why not? Unless you can tell me where the ‘wetness’ comes from in water, I think you are not in a position to assert that. Unless you can tell me on what grounds you know that persons can be reduced to, i.e. explained in terms of, impersonal particles (I don’t think) I know you are not in a position to assert that it is feasible.

We don’t know, and that’s the crucial understanding here. Science doesn’t have an exhaustive model for cognition at this point, and who knows, it may never achieve that? But it hasn’t been my claim, or science’s that such a detailed model current exists? It is your claim, apparently, that such a reality CANNOT BE, that such is not naturally feasible. So I was asking, and am still asking, on what ground that gets ruled out.

On the science side, we can look at big strides in knowledge in neuropshysiology and cognition, but science doesn’t pretend to have all the answers – that’s a theological conceit. Rather, given what we do know, monism looks to be quite sufficient as the explanatory framework for the mind and cognition.The more we know, and learn by scientific investigation, the more it supports a natural model, with immaterial or supernatural explanations looking more superfluous and frivolous with each step.

But that’s not to say there’s a guarantee that a comprehensive natural model will be reached. That can’t be known until we get there, and only if we get there.

So my answer, based on the science and the researchers who study this stuff, is “looks feasible, no known defeaters for the idea”. Your position, as I understand it, is “not feasible”. That’s a categorical claim, unlike mine, so I ask: how do you know this?

-TS

 

[tonyrey]

tonyrey

Because water is composed of highly polar molecules. Now how do you explain scientifically the fact that you are acting purposefully?

In other words, your naïve reductionism you apply to cognition defeats the wetness of water too. Just as you are confounded by the idea of “particles trying to be rational”, you are now confounded by hydrogen and oxygen atoms trying to be “wet”. This commits the massive mistake of avoiding/ignoring a fundamental property of nature – new and novel features emerge from constituent parts that, reduced, do not have those same properties.

Your analysis is vitiated by the assumption that cognition is an **entirely natural **process. In addition it does not explain why new features emerge from constituent parts. It also reveals an atomistic interpretation of reality which does not account for the formation of entities and assumes that what happens must happen necessarily.

If you can understand the emergence of “wetness” as supervenient on the molecular structure of water, you have the basic understanding for realizing the error of announcing the natural mind as “the ultimate absurdity”.

Again you are taking it for granted that the mind is a natural phenomenon and that everything that exists can be explained as supervenient. How do you justify these assumptions?

Particles aren’t irrational (or rational), and hydrogen isn’t “wet”.

Do particles have a special status of their own which excludes them from the dichotomy of being rational or irrational?

Mind, like wetness is only coherent as a concept in the context of higher levels of description, as properties that obtain from higher level structures.

Why do high-level structures exist? Why is evolution progressive?

On the science side, we can look at big strides in knowledge in neurophysiology and cognition, but science doesn’t pretend to have all the answers – that’s a theological conceit.

Your assertion that theology pretends to have all the answers is blatantly false. Nor do big strides in knowledge entail the probability of a scientific explanation of the mind - and of knowledge!

Rather, given what we do know, monism looks to be quite sufficient as the explanatory framework for the mind and cognition.

You are correct in your conclusion that monism is the simplest and most adequate explanation of reality - theistic monism which, unlike materialistic monism, accounts for the existence of creative, rational, purposeful beings with free will and a capacity for love.

The more we know, and learn by scientific investigation, the more it supports a natural model, with immaterial or supernatural explanations looking more superfluous and frivolous with each step.

We have already discovered that science alone is a recipe for disaster - because it does not take into account spiritual, personal and moral values.

But that’s not to say there’s a guarantee that a comprehensive natural model will be reached. That can’t be known until we get there, and only if we get there.

It will never be reached for the simple reason that the comprehension of a comprehensive natural model is not to be found within the natural model!

So my answer, based on the science and the researchers who study this stuff, is “looks feasible, no known defeaters for the idea”. Your position, as I understand it, is “not feasible”. That’s a categorical claim, unlike mine, so I ask: how do you know this?

The incompleteness theorem - the fact that matter cannot explain itself…

 

[Touchstone]

Because water is composed of highly polar molecules. Now how do you explain scientifically the fact that you are acting purposefully?

For the same reason that water is wet, while hydrogen and oxgen atoms aren’t. “Purpose” is a feature of a highly organized, delicate and particular configuration of brain matter (and related (name removed by moderator)uts/outputs like nerve endings and receptors). When you combine components, the attributes of those components can and do give rise to features and functionality that are not detectable or even coherent in reductionist analyses of the components themselves.

Your analysis is vitiated by the assumption that cognition is an **entirely natural **process.

No it is not, for the umpteenth time. The brain is a natural phenomenon, and as such, we are simply unable to say that this is insufficient (practically or in principle) to explain the mind and provide a robust model of cognition. We know the brain is at least partly implicated, and we don’t know that anything more is needed. There is no *a priori *that claims it’s “entirely natural”. The more we learn, the more robust and complete natural explanations appear, and the more fanciful and superfluous “dual aspect monism” or dualist hypotheses appear.

In addition it does not explain why new features emerge from constituent parts. It also reveals an atomistic interpretation of reality which does not account for the formation of entities and assumes that what happens must happen necessarily.
Again you are taking it for granted that the mind is a natural phenomenon and that everything that exists can be explained as supervenient. How do you justify these assumptions?

I think a key word here is “provisionally”. Scientific hypotheses are accepted provisionally. Taken to be true only insofar as that is necessary to test it, subjective to possible falsifications, and draw novel predictions from it. There is no dogma in that, but rather, “putting the idea in the wind tunnel, and seeing what flies off, or stays bolted on”.

As such, the naturalist model of cognition, taken on provisionally as a scientific hypothesis, performs really well. We can’t even say what “testing, subjecting to falsification, and deriving novel predictions from it” would mean for the supernaturalist idea. Because it is supernaturalist in character, it’s completely intractable to systematic, objective testing. If it wasn’t it would be ‘naturalist’, rather than ‘supernaturalist’.

In any case, when the naturalist “mind is a description of brain” idea is accepted provisionally for testing and analysis, it does well. Supernatural intuitions don’t help, and can’t even articulate what “helping” would mean beyond “it’s mysterious!”

Do particles have a special status of their own which excludes them from the dichotomy of being rational or irrational?

Of course. Does ‘purple’ have a special status which makes ‘smells good’ or ‘smells bad’ a problem? Yes, it’s an incoherent statement – smell is not a property of color. “Rational/irrational” is not a property of particles. “rational” is a descriptive term we apply to cognition and thought processes. A particle itself is not conscious, or thinking, making “rational/irrational” as nonsensical as the “smell” of the color purple.

Why do high-level structures exist? Why is evolution progressive?

For the same reason water is wet – these are the emergent features of physical law when energy and matter interact in significant amounts and across vast expanses of time.

Your assertion that theology pretends to have all the answers is blatantly false.

Sorry, should be more precise. Catholicism pretends to have the ultimate answers.

Nor do big strides in knowledge entail the probability of a scientific explanation of the mind - and of knowledge!

It does, empirically, inductively. The evidence we have from the history of scientific investigation provides strong evidence for the expectation of richer, more robust, more detailed and predictive models of the mind as a natural phenomenon. There are no guarantees in science, but this looks like another of a great many frontiers that have been subjected to fruitful and robust discovery by science. Science has a long, illustrious history of ‘naturalizing’ phenomena that were historical the province of superstitions and ‘immaterial answers’.

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

You are correct in your conclusion that monism is the simplest and most adequate explanation of reality - theistic monism which, unlike materialistic monism, accounts for the existence of creative, rational, purposeful beings with free will and a capacity for love.

 

[wanstronian]

It hasn’t escaped my attention that you, Tony, have failed to answer my most recent post. Never mind, I’m quite enjoying seeing your arguments debunked by Touchstone, who is undoubtedly more educated (in these matters at least), more eloquent and more patient when confronted with empty rhetoric, than I.

But, I just thought that I would let you know there has just been an interesting programme on BBC in the UK this evening, as part of the ‘Horizon’ series. The host - a mathematician called Marcus du Sautoy on this occasion - sets out to find out ‘who’ he is. He undergoes a number of experiments, but the most incredible is the final one, at the Bernstein Centre for Computational Neuroscience. He is put into a brain scanner and given two buttons. His remit is to decide which button to press and *immediately *press it. There is no prompting or timescales. He makes a decision off the top of his head, and pushes a button. The scanner monitors his brain activity and a computer registers his button pushes.

The guys monitoring the scanner are able to tell, 6 seconds before the button is pushed, which button it will be. That is, they know his decision before he makes it due to the patterns of activity within his brain.

No doubt there will be a backlash of theistic excuse-making and debunking attempts in response to this research, but on the face of it at least, it seems to support the assumption that thoughts and decisions are a product of physical brain activity.

 

[tonyrey]

For the same reason that water is wet, while hydrogen and oxygen atoms aren’t.

How can it be the same reason when water is not purposeful?

“Purpose” is a feature of a highly organized, delicate and particular configuration of brain matter (and related (name removed by moderator)uts/outputs like nerve endings and receptors).

It is significant that you don’t come into the picture at all! Your atomistic explanation does not do justice to the irreducible unity, continuity and autonomy of the mind. It is based on the assumption that causality is essentially retrospective. In other words the future is always explained by the materialist in terms of the past. Yet any adequate explanation of a process considers the process in its entirety from start to finish.Otherwise it is obviously a one-sided interpretation of reality. Why should the beginning be more important and more significant than the end? You eliminate purpose even though you are engaged in purposeful activity in the attempt to prove everything is purposeless!

Your analysis is vitiated by the assumption that cognition is an entirely natural process.
The brain is a natural phenomenon, and as such, we are simply unable to say that this is insufficient (practically or in principle) to explain the mind and provide a robust model of cognition.

Unable? It **is **insufficient to explain the mind. It cannot even explain consciousness or free will.

We know the brain is at least partly implicated, and we don’t know that anything more is needed.

We know the brain is a physical organ which is restricted to biochemical activity located in a specific place and at a specific time. It functions according to physical laws and cannot transcend its environment. The mind is not subject to these limitations and grasps abstract principles and universal laws as well as controlling the environment to an extent unparalleled by any other being.

The more we learn, the more robust and complete natural explanations appear, and the more fanciful and superfluous “dual aspect monism” or dualist hypotheses appear.

The more we learn the more evident it becomes that holistic explanation is superior to atomistic explanation. In addition naturalism does not explain why new features emerge from constituent parts. It does not account for the formation of **entities **and assumes that what happens must happen necessarily.

*Again you are taking it for granted that the mind is a natural phenomenon. *I think a key word here is “provisionally”. Scientific hypotheses are accepted provisionally.

How do you justify the assumption that everything can in principle be explained as supervenient?

We can’t even say what “testing, subjecting to falsification, and deriving novel predictions from it” would mean for the supernaturalist idea…

We have evidence of supernatural activity within our own mind. We can test persons objectively to find out whether they are conscious, rational, emotionally balanced, morally responsible and spiritually developed. None of the most important aspects of life can be examineD or explained by analytic methods.

In any case, when the naturalist “mind is a description of brain” idea is accepted provisionally for testing and analysis, it does well.

The naturalist’s description reduces (I use this term advisedly) a person to a human concept - which you have recently supported on the ground that it may well be an illusion but it is efficacious. That demonstrates the inadequacy of the materialist’s attempts to do justice to the highest and most valuable form of reality which we know. Expediency is rated higher than the truth.

Do particles have a special status of their own which excludes them from the dichotomy of being rational or irrational?
“Rational/irrational” is not a property of particles.

Are particles conscious and capable of reasoning?

Why do high-level structures exist? Why is evolution progressive?
For the same reason water is wet – these are the emergent features of physical law…

Do you agree that the development from low-level structures to high-level structures constitutes progress? What causes the emergence to happen?

Sorry, should be more precise. Catholicism pretends to have the ultimate answers.

False again. Catholicism does not claim to understand or explain how or why the Ultimate Reality exists.

Nor do big strides in knowledge entail the probability of a scientific explanation of the mind - and of knowledge!
The evidence we have from the history of scientific investigation provides strong evidence for the expectation of richer, more robust, more detailed and predictive models of the mind as a natural phenomenon.

Science is notorious for the ways in which men have regarded it as the sole source of knowledge, progress and success in solving the problems of life - with devastating consequences for both nature and human beings. The materialism on which scientism is based has driven many people to apathy, despair and suicide because they realise their lives can have no ultimate meaning, value or purpose in such a closed system. They can understand that biological machines which have emerged solely to random mutations and natural selection have no intrinsic rights to life or reason to expect any solution to the problems of suffering and injustice. The** logical **outcome of full-blooded materialism if fatalism and nihilism.The only possible long-term view for the materialist is that “life is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing…”

 

[tonyrey]

It hasn’t escaped my attention that you, Tony, have failed to answer my most recent post.

I have been deluged today and shall answer your post as soon as possible. I’m glad you’re looking forward to it. I too find our discussions stimulating and enjoyable - as they should be.

The guys monitoring the scanner are able to tell, 6 seconds before the button is pushed, which button it will be. That is, they know his decision before he makes it due to the patterns of activity within his brain…on the face of it at least, it seems to support the assumption that thoughts and decisions are a product of physical brain activity

Thank you for that interesting information. A similar experiment has already been performed elsewhere and of course quoted in a reply to one of my posts. The temporal lapse does not demonstrate that brain activity caused the thoughts and decisions but simply shows his physical **awareness **of, and physical response to, his decision occur after it is made. Often in daily life our decisions are outstripped by our actions. Sometimes we do things so quickly we are hardly aware we are doing them although it is quite clear they are intentional. Of course it depends on the nature of the problem and situation. I hope to see the programme or read an account of it so that I am in a better position to make a decision!

 

[tonyrey]

We can decide what to think about, that’s not the same as controlling our thoughts.

If we choose a subject we are directing our thoughts.

Similarly, we can’t control our body in its entirety.

We can control our body to a certain extent just by the power of thought…

Other than that I think your comment is reasonable.

So a consensus of many people’s thoughts does constitute objective evidence?

Do you behave as if you can control your thoughts and actions?
From my perspective, I can control my actions. But not my thoughts.

How do you control your actions without controlling your thoughts?

Do you try to resist impulses and desires?
Of course.

That implies a belief in willpower not entirely determined by physical events.

So we are just passive spectators of our thoughts and decisions?
No.

Please explain how a biological machine acquires independent control of its functions.

So if we lose our memory we are not responsible for what we have done?
Actually that is often true in a court of law.

We are responsible for our actions if we lost our memory after we committed them.

However, my point was that it is our memory and/or the chemical makeup of the brain, that retains our sense of self, our morals, our personality.

If that is the case we no longer have the right to life…

So there is no control centre from which our thoughts and actions emerge?
I’ve made it quite clear that imo, the brain handles this.

So the entire brain functions as an entity? Could it be called a collective choice?

If, as you believe, mental events are events in the brain they are physical and there is no need to postulate intangible events.
Yes, it depends on your definition of ‘tangible.’ A thought can be held to be intangible because it cannot be held in the hand, measured or observed. Its origin is most likely physical.

What is your estimate of its degree of likelihood?

Similarity is an objective concept. How can similarity exist without anybody to witness it?
How about the similarity of two stones which are exactly the same size, shape and colour?

Is that not an objective fact?

How do you know that purpose existed before human beings? Particularly if you subscribe to the common theist belief that animals are unintelligent biological automata, how can you justify that statement?

All the theists I have known believe animals have a mind with intelligence and feelings. All living organisms act purposefully by instinct but not by choice.

So our beliefs that we make decisions are not evidence for their existence?
Not in the strictest sense. I am just pointing out that if you take subjectivity to its extreme, there’s no evidence that anything exists except your mind, dear reader.

Neither you nor I nor anyone we know is a solipsist. You have agreed that a consensus of beliefs can be evidence.

Do you think your belief that we are biological machines is a subject to avoid?
Well, it’s not a belief, it’s a proven fact.

It’s only a proven fact that our bodies are similar to machines.

And we don’t have to avoid it, it’s just not generally relevant.

If the subject comes up would you be dogmatic about it?

Can machines understand themselves?
We seem able to, yes.

Can non-human machines do so?

How do you fit purpose into your mechanistic scheme of reality?
Purpose is a product of intelligent consciousness. We are intelligent, therefore we have purpose.

Do you believe consciousness, intelligence and purpose are inseparable?

How do you fit purpose into your “God did it” scheme of reality?

I believe consciousness, intelligence and purpose are inseparable attributes of persons created not by blind forces but by the Supreme Reality.

In that case the right to life is therefore simply a human convention and can be ignored when convenient?
No, not when convenient…

Why not? You believe it is not a categorical imperative but a social rule which an individual is not obliged to follow.

It is a human convention - the fox doesn’t spare the rabbit.

The fox is not a moral being.

Are brain events conscious of what they are and what they are doing?
If you are talking about a thought, then no, because a thought is not independently self-aware.

Then the brain as a whole is conscious?

Logical truths, mathematical and scientific principles, philosophical explanations and personal values have endured for centuries…
Yes, they originated as thoughts and ideas.

So we do not discover facts but construct them?

Are truth, goodness, justice, freedom, equality, innocence, guilt and responsibility simply transient human concepts?
If the entire human race was killed off tomorrow, do you think that those concepts would remain? Who would conceptualise them?

Other rational beings! They are realities for every person, human or non-human…

With sufficient practice we can select a thought, focus our mind on it and let it be the sole object of our attention.
Thoughts pop into your head. You can focus on them or discard them, but you can’t choose which thoughts to have in the first place.

You can induce them by habit and by selection.

What is the mechanism by which some mental processes reject others?
Nobody knows. But that doesn’t mean that there must be a different answer.
What is the mechanism by which you choose to think about a subject?
At one point, nobody knew the mechanism by which the planets orbit the sun. Does that mean the mechanism doesn’t exist?

The absence of a neuroscientific hypothesis for such fundamental and important facts considerably weakens materialism.

 

[Touchstone]

How can it be the same reason when water is not purposeful?

“Saltiness” arises from sodium and chlorine atoms combined in salt. Why is salt “salty” and not “wet” like water? different configurations of matter and energy produce different emergent properties, and “purpose” is not an emergent property of water. Purpose is an emergent property of complex brain functions and the subsystems that enable them.

It is significant that you don’t come into the picture at all! Your atomistic explanation does not do justice to the irreducible unity, continuity and autonomy of the mind.

I think I’m the one proposing the deep unity here – the mind is the brain, they are one and the same. The are of one substance. And I do affirm that this unity produces an ego-centric form of cognition – the sense of self, the “I”. It’s central to the picture I’m proposing.

It is based on the assumption that causality is essentially retrospective. In other words the future is always explained by the materialist in terms of the past.

Again, you’re confusion “assumptions” with “conclusions”. Given the evidence we have available, and the explanatory resources we have to draw on, that’s the reasonable conclusion. But I think you are just recapitulating causality here – it is essential retrospective. When I throw a baseball, if I analyze it at the midway point, observing its past – it trajectory, velocity, spin, etc. – I can predict the future, based on the causal factors at work, right? When the catcher catches the ball, and I want to explain who it got there, I invoke causality in a retrospective sense: it got to your glove by this arc, which is determined by the causal effects of the force of the throw, gravity, aerodynamics, etc.,…

Yet any adequate explanation of a process considers the process in its entirety from start to finish.Otherwise it is obviously a one-sided interpretation of reality. Why should the beginning be more important and more significant than the end? You eliminate purpose even though you are engaged in purposeful activity in the attempt to prove everything is purposeless!

You are laboring under the impression that “purpose” is somehow “acausal”? That it does not obtain from nature, our environment? Look, I skip lunch at work and by late afternoon, I’m hungry. I have a purpose now, which is to find some food and sate my hungry. It’s entirely purposeful, but it’s quite explainable in terms of causal factors I’m reacting to. Do you suppose that is somehow not purposeful, if there are causal factors driving it?

Unable? It **is **insufficient to explain the mind. It cannot even explain consciousness or free will.

I believe you are confusing “insufficient in principle” with “insufficient in practice”. For centuries, man was unable to explain the motion of the planets. Natural explanations were not forthcoming, “insufficient in practice”. But in principle, there was nothing insufficient about natural explanations for the motions of the planets. Saying “you can’t explain consciousness in natural terms” is NOT a basis for establishing the insufficiency in principle of natural explanations. It may not be explainable in natural terms, ultimately, but we do not see any barriers in principle to doing so, and the history of science is replete with cases where natural explanations supplanted superstitions and immaterialist explanations. Progress continues apace in this field, and has picked up considerably in the last ten years. We fill in pieces of that naturalist model of cognition bit by bit as research continues…

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

We know the brain is a physical organ which is restricted to biochemical activity located in a specific place and at a specific time. It functions according to physical laws and cannot transcend its environment. The mind is not subject to these limitations and grasps abstract principles and universal laws as well as controlling the environment to an extent unparalleled by any other being.

Grasping abstract principles and universal laws as concepts is no problem at all on the naturalist view. “A==A” is a concept. “Red” is a concept. That doesn’t militate against the constraints of natural law in any way.

As for controlling the environment, this is an argument for naturalism. The mind cannot transcend nature, so far as we can tell, and everything humans do with their minds is explainable in natural terms. That we can build skyscrapers that chimps can’t begin to conceive of is, indeed impressive, but it’s all just doing things the hard way like all the other animals – pushing around and configuring resources toward goals.
What is conspicuous is how perfectly constrained we are by physical laws and our natural environment. We do not “bend physical laws” with our transcendent immaterial minds, so far as we can see, and are restricted to the mundane mechanics the rest of the natural world is.

Once you can get your head wrapped around the idea of an abstract concept being the “conceptualization of an abstraction” – a concrete, physical brain-state that has an abstraction as its content – the “magicalness” of those ideas will evaporate, and the sense that these concepts are somehow “immaterially extant” will be dispelled.

The more we learn the more evident it becomes that holistic explanation is superior to atomistic explanation. In addition naturalism does not explain why new features emerge from constituent parts. It does not account for the formation of **entities **and assumes that what happens must happen necessarily.

Nature affords necessity and chance as explanatory resources. Laplacian determinism was put to rest long, long ago. There is no necessary future, based on even a perfect knowledge of the present, from end to end. At the lowest, fundamental levels, events obtain probabilistically.

Which is not to say that emergence is function of randomness. Emergence – like the wetness of water – obtains for causal reasons (you hinted at the polar affinities of H20) that are combinatorial – only manifest through combination and configuration – and are typically very subtle and nuanced as features of the contributing components. So, with a very robust model of the physics and chemical properties of hydrogen and oxygen, we could anticipate the “wetness” of water, even if we had no experience of it directly. But this demands a level of detail and comprehensiveness in our models that is generally only developed well after those emergent properties are identified.

We notice that water is “wet”, and that neither hydrogen or oxygen exhibit those properties themselves in isolation. We note that water introduces new properties of its own through the H2O combination. That drives investigation – why is water wet? is a non-trivial physics and chemistry problem.

This is the workflow we have on all sorts of phenomena – *X *has properties that its parts don’t have separately, how does that work? Explaining emergence phenomena demands the most robust models, as these are the “secondary” or “tertiary” features of the components, and not directly observable.

How do you justify the assumption that everything can in principle be explained as supervenient?

I don’t make such an assumption and neither do I understand that everything can be explained as supervenient.

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

tonyrey:

We have evidence of supernatural activity within our own mind. We can test persons objectively to find out whether they are conscious, rational, emotionally balanced, morally responsible and spiritually developed. None of the most important aspects of life can be examineD or explained by analytic methods.

Non-sequitur. “Non-explicablility” is not evidence for the supernatural, anymore than ignorance about the physics of lightning was evidence for the “wrath of the gods”. This is a major error in reasoning, to construe ignorance or difficulty in obtaining natural explanations as “evidence of supernatural activity”. This is the heart of superstition.

The naturalist’s description reduces (I use this term advisedly) a person to a human concept - which you have recently supported on the ground that it may well be an illusion but it is efficacious. That demonstrates the inadequacy of the materialist’s attempts to do justice to the highest and most valuable form of reality which we know. Expediency is rated higher than the truth.

I’m not sure what you mean by “justice”, here. We explain things as best we can with the evidence we have. That’s as just as it gets. Saying it’s magic or “God did it” is not justice, it’s not an explanation at all, but a stand-in for a real explanation, for real knowledge. The “appearance of an explanation” because that is expedient. For some, “don’t know” is just not acceptable, and is inferior to just making something, anything up to stuff in there as an answer.

Are particles conscious and capable of reasoning?

As particles in isolation, of course not! Reasoning is a phenomenon that obtains several layers up the stack, at a much higher level of description, dependent on highly complex and delicate configurations of an enormous number of particles. On their own, they are perfectly non-cognitive.

Do you agree that the development from low-level structures to high-level structures constitutes progress? What causes the emergence to happen?

I don’t recognize it as “progress” because that seems to imply intent, or some kind of intelligent direction. Hydrogen and oxygen combining to form water and thus “wetness” aren’t progressing in the process. It’s just physics and chemistry doing that they do.

False again. Catholicism does not claim to understand or explain how or why the Ultimate Reality exists.

Isn’t God the ultimate reality? As a matter of pedantry, we can always ask “why” to any given answer – there is no end to that regress, by definition. But as for ultimate answers, I understand Catholicism to identify the Christian God as the ultimate reality, the ultimate answer, the very top of the hierarchy of meaning and existence. Am I mistaken?

Science is notorious for the ways in which men have regarded it as the sole source of knowledge, progress and success in solving the problems of life - with devastating consequences for both nature and human beings. The materialism on which scientism is based has driven many people to apathy, despair and suicide because they realise their lives can have no ultimate meaning, value or purpose in such a closed system.

None of which argues for or against a natural explanation of mind. Reality is what it is regardless of any apathy or despair or joy or exultation its apprehension may cause. I think here you are “flashing your cards”, so to speak, as to the source of your resistance to systematic investigation of this question – you anticipate revulsion at what may be revealed, so… it must not be the case.

They can understand that biological machines which have emerged solely to random mutations and natural selection have no intrinsic rights to life or reason to expect any solution to the problems of suffering and injustice. The** logical **outcome of full-blooded materialism if fatalism and nihilism.The only possible long-term view for the materialist is that “life is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing…”

That’s not the logical outcome at all. If we are willing to look at the world as it is, as best our reasoning, evidence, instrumentation and analysis is able to reveal it, we are still confronted with choices as to how to proceed. And in no case is it necessary to adopt or embrace fatalism or nihilism – this is a happy conceit theists like to tell themselves. On naturalism, the world and life is rich with meaning and beauty, and enriched in its appreciation of life’s most precious and gratifying features – love is actual, real and urgent, as opposed to imaginary, immaterial, and cosmic-eternal. In summoning the courage to see the world and ourselves for what they are, we have summoned the courage we need to set goals, develop meaning, build relationships and make full use of the short moments we have as natural beings who are capable of exploiting those opportunities.

-TS

 

[wanstronian]

If we choose a subject we are directing our thoughts.

Indeed. A traffic cop can direct you in your car. He is not controlling you or the car. My statement stands - we cannot control our thoughts, as I have previously demonstrated.

We can control our body to a certain extent just by the power of thought…

Again, you are side-stepping the point. We cannot control our body by thought alone. We can control a very few aspects of it. Not the same thing at all. As I said before, having an effect is not the same as control. Please address my actual comments, not what you wish I’d said!

So a consensus of many people’s thoughts does constitute objective evidence?

I didn’t say that, in fact I’ve said the exact opposite. I’m agreeing with your statement about what we all believe.

How do you control your actions without controlling your thoughts?

Acting on thoughts is not the same as controlling them. If I have a thought about stirring a cup of coffee, I don’t consider whether to have that thought, then have it, then stir my coffee. The thought occurs spontaneously, I then decide whether to act on it. I don’t class a decision the same way as a thought.

That implies a belief in willpower not entirely determined by physical events.

You may have inferred that; I haven’t implied it.

Please explain how a biological machine acquires independent control of its functions.

Oh, for God’s sake. NOBODY KNOWS! Why do you keep asking the same question over and over again? Do you really believe that not knowing how something happens means it can’t possibly happen? I have this conversation with you over and over again and you consistently refuse to own up to your flawed logic.

We are responsible for our actions if we lost our memory after we committed them.

As I stated, that wasn’t my point. I understand why you’re dodging the real issue, but it’s non-productive to do so, it just prolongs the posts for no benefit as I have to point out your errors.

If that is the case we no longer have the right to life…

What a ridiculous conclusion. I have explained where rights come from - this is not generally considered a contentious point amongst rational people - why are you making such a big deal of it?

So the entire brain functions as an entity? Could it be called a collective choice?

Not really, because that implies a quorum of independently conscious entities.

What is your estimate of its degree of likelihood?

More likely than not, purely due to the fact we have evidence of our brains, and zero evidence of any supernatural influence. It’s very telling that you are reduced to such making such pithy comments rather than address my statements!

How about the similarity of two stones which are exactly the same size, shape and colour? Is that not an objective fact?

No. Dictionary definition of similar: “showing resemblance in qualities, characteristics, or appearance; alike but not identical” (emphasis mine). Identicality is an objective fact… that still needs to be witnessed to be verified. Similarity is necessarily subjective.

All the theists I have known believe animals have a mind with intelligence and feelings.

Good. It’s just warpspeedpetey then!

All living organisms act purposefully by instinct but not by choice.

Presumably you don’t mean this, because humans are living organisms. Although I think you’re probably closer to the truth than you intend. There is no evidence that the universe is not entirely deterministic.

Neither you nor I nor anyone we know is a solipsist. You have agreed that a consensus of beliefs can be evidence.

I don’t think I have. I think I said that a consensus of perceptions can be taken as a common datum of reality.

It’s only a proven fact that our bodies are similar to machines.

An incorrect statement. There is no identifiable feature of the human body that does not have an equivalent in animals. Not one.

If the subject comes up would you be dogmatic about it?

I wouldn’t have to be, because dogma only comes to bear when the statement being made is unprovable.

Can non-human machines do so?

I don’t know, I’m not one. But in the first case, you’d have to define ‘understand onesself’ before that question could even be considered.

Do you believe consciousness, intelligence and purpose are inseparable?

Generally yes, they co-exist as product of brain activity.

I believe consciousness, intelligence and purpose are inseparable attributes of persons created not by blind forces but by the Supreme Reality.

Yes, I’m aware that’s what you believe. However, I would like to see (a) a definition of ‘Supreme Reality’; (b) evidence that it exists, and (c) proof that it created these attributes in people. Call me a stickler for the rules, but blindly believing something so outrageous seems a little wacky.

Why not? You believe it is not a categorical imperative but a social rule which an individual is not obliged to follow.

Not for the first time, you are putting words in my mouth. I never said any such thing.

The fox is not a moral being.

Indeed - it is our morals, evolved over many thousands of years (coupled with local conventions that have evolved over shorter amounts of time), that guide us in creating rights.

Then the brain as a whole is conscious?

No, I didn’t say that either. I said the brain activity creates consciousness. I’m getting really tired of you misrepresenting me. You said, a few posts back, that you wanted to take this to a logical conclusion. That cannot happen unless you start being a bit more honest in the discussion.

So we do not discover facts but construct them?

Please see my previous comment.

(continued…)

 

[wanstronian]

Other rational beings! They are realities for every person, human or non-human…

Okay then, let me restate the question. What if all sentient life were killed off tomorrow? But you have proved my point - those things are concepts, not innate truths. Alien life forms, for example, may have very different concepts.

You can induce them by habit and by selection.

How can you develop a habit for having a thought you’ve never had before? How can you induce a thought before you know what it is?

The absence of a neuroscientific hypothesis for such fundamental and important facts considerably weakens materialism.

Compared with accepting it as absolute truth, you’re bang on. Unfortunately for you, the question marks hanging over materialism (by which I mean unknowns, not evidence against - because there is none) do not in any way lend any weight to supernaturalism.

 

[tonyrey]

If we choose a subject we are directing our thoughts.
Indeed. My statement stands - we cannot control our thoughts, as I have previously demonstrated.

How can we even direct our thoughts if they have physical causes?

We cannot control our body by thought alone. We can control a very few aspects of it.

We can put the entire body into a hypnotic trance.

So a consensus of many people’s thoughts does constitute objective evidence?
I didn’t say that, in fact I’ve said the exact opposite. I’m agreeing with your statement about what we all believe.

Then a consensus of many people’s thoughts is valueless as evidence?

How do you control your actions without controlling your thoughts?
Acting on thoughts is not the same as controlling them. The thought occurs spontaneously, I then decide whether to act on it.

How can a thought occur spontaneously if it has a physical cause?

That implies a belief in willpower not entirely determined by physical events.
You may have inferred that; I haven’t implied it.

Trying to resist an urge implies that the outcome is not determined.

Please explain how a biological machine acquires independent control of its functions.
Do you really believe that not knowing how something happens means it can’t possibly happen?

I have not stated that it cannot happen. I have merely confirmed the fact that to date naturalism is an inadequate explanation…

We are responsible for our actions if we lost our memory after we committed them.
As I stated, that wasn’t my point.

Are we responsible if we lose our memory after the event?

I have explained where rights come from - this is not generally considered a contentious point amongst rational people -

Do you agree that a human convention is not a categorical imperative?

So the entire brain functions as an entity? Could it be called a collective choice?
Not really, because that implies a quorum of independently conscious entities.

So choices are made by the entire brain?

What is your estimate of its degree of likelihood?
More likely than not, purely due to the fact we have evidence of our brains, and zero evidence of any supernatural influence.

We have evidence of intangible minds and their power which has not been explained scientifically… The likelihood of an explanation being true diminishes in direct proportion to the insufficiency of the evidence.

How about the similarity of two stones which are exactly the same size, shape and colour? Is that not an objective fact?
No. Identicality is an objective fact… that still needs to be witnessed to be verified.

Even though identicality is not verified and even if human beings do not exist it is still an objective fact. And if we discover facts they must exist independently.

All living organisms act purposefully by instinct but not by choice.
Presumably you don’t mean this, because humans are living organisms.

I regard humans as more than living organisms because we act by choice as well as by instinct…

There is no evidence that the universe is not entirely deterministic.

What about quantum theory?

You have agreed that a consensus of beliefs can be evidence.
I think I said that a consensus of perceptions can be taken as a common datum of reality.

Which you don’t accept as evidence?

It’s only a proven fact that our bodies are similar to machines.
There is no identifiable feature of the human body that does not have an equivalent in animals.

Even animals have an urge to survive which is lacking in machines.

Can non-human machines do so?
…you’d have to define ‘understand oneself’ before that question could even be considered.

Do non-human machines know they are machines and why they were constructed?

Do you believe consciousness, intelligence and purpose are inseparable?
Generally yes, they co-exist as product of brain activity.

So they are all scientifically inexplicable?

I believe consciousness, intelligence and purpose are inseparable attributes of persons created not by blind forces but by the Supreme Reality.
However, I would like to see (a) a definition of ‘Supreme Reality’; (b) evidence that it exists, and (c) proof that it created these attributes in people.

(a) Supreme Reality is the source of everything that exists.
(b) The evidence that it exists stems from the principle of causality.
(c) The evidence that it created everything including human beings stems from the
principle of adequacy. The power of rational, conscious creativity is inadequately explained in terms of processes which lack that power.

You believe it is not a categorical imperative but a social rule which an individual is not obliged to follow.
I never said any such thing.

Why is an individual **obliged **to follow social rules?

The fox is not a moral being.
Indeed - it is our morals, evolved over many thousands of years (coupled with local conventions that have evolved over shorter amounts of time), that guide us in creating rights.

What is the purpose of morals?

Then the brain as a whole is conscious?
I said the brain activity creates consciousness.

So the brain is not aware of itself but uses some unknown mechanism to be aware of itself?