Enlightenment & Materialism

[Isaac]

I've been lurking on this forum for quite sometime now, and I've deemed that it's finally time to introduce myself properly and perhaps initiate a discussion.

Allow me to introduce what I believe is the truth:

I am a materialist. I hold that mental phenomena do not exist, the only thing that exists are physical phenomena. I am an epiphenomalist, in the sense that I believe the mind cannot have an affect on the physical world. I deny altogether that there is a "mind" separate from the physical substrate of the brain. It is still useful to use the word "mind" though, in the sense of the total electrical and chemical activity of the brain.

So really, from my perspective, the mind can't cause anything. The mind simply does not exist, neither does consciousness. Both are simply ways of talking about certain physical brain states.

It's my impression that there are members of this forum who are enlightened. Do you share my materialist views? Or do you see things differently?

(fixed spelling error)

[Dan Rowden]

One of the problems with the notion of consciousness as an emergent property of some sort of physical state is where does this physical state begin and end? The brain, whilst being a necessary cause of consciousness is not a sufficient cause. So, what are we saying causes consciousness, exactly?

[Jehu]

When you say that “mental phenomena do not exist”, do you mean that they are ‘non-existent’, or merely that they exist in a manner that is different from those things that we call ‘material’?

[Dan Rowden]

That's an important question, too. One of the things the physicalist approach to consciousness has difficulty dealing with is qualia. Saying such things don't exist seems pretty nonsensical to me. It's like saying everything I'm thinking right now doesn't exist, which is patently absurd. The direct subjective experience of the content of mind is not identical to brain states that are empirically associated with them. Indeed, as in the case of any empirical causation, it cannot be definitively shown that there's a causal relationship at all.

[Greg Shantz]

Spiritism and materialism are one, and are different stages through which the same person goes one after the other. The spiritual would lose its entire dignity if it materialized. - Otto Weininger

[Kevin Solway]

I hold that mental phenomena do not exist, the only thing that exists are physical phenomena.

Yes, I would agree with that. But I would also agree with the idea that physical phenomena do not exist, and the only thing that exists are spiritual (unbounded) phenomena.

[Jamesh]

One of the problems with the notion of consciousness as an emergent property of some sort of physical state is where does this physical state begin and end?

To me this sort of question is simply about whether one is choosing the perspective of the observable whole or the observable parts of the whole.

The emergent state of anything is what it appears to be to any observer at the time of observation or in mentally complex species, recollection. Even the simplest form of life observes by reacting against what is not within its structural pattern of existence at the time. I guess that is A=A.

Only by recollection are beginning and endings observed or "real". In reality itself though it is not things that have beginnings or endings, but causal symmetries and non-symmetries - and the problem is that even such definitions require a thing related referential framework (ie symmetries and non-symmetries are not real without being set within the conceptual framework of finite thingness, time, space, change and observational qualities). Taking this for granted, as we must however, then Physical Realness, just becomes observed patterns of existence.

A pattern of existence is just observable differentiation, and observation is possible because of differing causal symmetries and non-symmetries acting dualistically to form the non-duality of thingness, and this thingness interacting with our senses. What is behind this is entirely causal, and it is non-physical causality (physical causality is closer to billiard ball causality).

If everything is causal then there can be no emergent inherent physical property, but there can be an infinity of emergent observable properties that appear to be physical. That the universe provides for observable differentiation, logically implies that that which is most fundamental, namely causes, themselves are different, intrinsically different. In being inherently different this means they can be relative to one another. In being relative to one another while at the same time having opposite natures, this then means they can be in the same "place" at the same time, in fact that is the first emergent property of causality - they create "space", which is observable (we can’t see it but we know it is there).

Causality has no beginning or end, and in thus being outside of "flowing time", the time we observe that includes beginnings and endings, then this would logically infer that causality is really just Time - but not Time in its flowing sense but rather in its intrinsic dualistic sense, which is not observable in any fashion that would allow full conceptualisation, one can only point to it's nature.

As Causality has no beginning or end, this means that causality does not stop at forming the duality of existence that is Space. Space is the just the fundamental emergent property that in turn is relative to what preceded it, and in being so, it becomes a new form of causality, it has a different nature to that which proceeded it. In having this different nature, a nature of absolute symmetry, it gains the capability of causing an infinity of additional forms to arise by forming a duality between perfect symmetry and the twofold perfect non-symmetry that caused it to exist.

The emergent evolution of layers of relativity is really just like the Fibonnacci series applied to fundamental causality. 1 + another 1 that is not the same as the first one, cause 2, then 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233 etc. The big difference however is that while in the number series as the numbers get larger, the inferred quantity of existence gets larger, it accumulates, whereas in a causal sense, each relativity layer in being caused by that which preceded it must be existent within the domain of all the preceding causal relativities - ie as relative existence evolves it gets increasingly smaller.

This is why within the observed universe the percentage of observed Matter covers such a small percentage of spatial territory compared to less evolved forms of existence like light. The universe is infinite because that is its starting point, that is where things within it evolve from. It is instinctual nature to think it is the other way around, that the universe somehow has grown to be infinite. No. The universe starts from the infinity of non-spatial existence, which causes an lesser infinity of spatial existence, one completely empty of physical thingness (though I am only saying this as a pointer - emptiness requires beginnings and endings, which are not possible when looking at reality holistically). Then a graduating spectrum of lesser physical infinities are caused, continuously, in each instant of reality.

[Jason]

James did you come up with that as you wrote it? That's not meant to be an insult, I'm just trying to grasp what I am reading exactly. It's extremely dense if nothing else.

[Jason]

I hold that mental phenomena do not exist, the only thing that exists are physical phenomena.

Yes, I would agree with that. But I would also agree with the idea that physical phenomena do not exist, and the only thing that exists are spiritual (unbounded) phenomena.

Kevin this post is pretty cryptic and oblique, which is not unusual for you. Maybe you're trying too hard to crank out aphorisms? Or perhaps you're just a little bit flaky.

[Jamesh]

James did you come up with that as you wrote it?

Don't we all?

That's not meant to be an insult, I'm just trying to grasp what I am reading exactly.

Not a bad question really. I do admit to a feeling a sense of directionlessness in the post, when I posted it.

I didn't bother going down the "emergence of consciousness" path at all, which was what the quote I posted was about. In my mind, consciousness manifests no differently to any other thing, so I just talked about things more generally.

It's extremely dense if nothing else.

It's extremely "Slow to learn or understand; lacking intellectual acuity" if nothing else.
It's extremely "permitting little if any light to pass through because of denseness of matter" if nothing else.
It's extremely "of high relative density or specific gravity" if nothing else.

[Jason]

James did you come up with that as you wrote it?

Don't we all?

You know what I mean. Maybe you're just coming up with semi-random shit on the fly(interesting reversal there), ranting gibberish like a homeless guy. But you can't tell it's nonsensical for certain until you listen to him for a while, cos it appears to have some sort of internal consistency. It's probably just that you laid out so much(and it's very unconventional) and I have so little background information about what you're talking about, that I cannot make much sense of it.

It's extremely dense if nothing else.

It's extremely "Slow to learn or understand; lacking intellectual acuity" if nothing else.
It's extremely "permitting little if any light to pass through because of denseness of matter" if nothing else.
It's extremely "of high relative density or specific gravity" if nothing else.

Try this definition:

"difficult to understand or follow because of being closely packed with ideas or complexities of style" or "impenetrable."

[Nick]

I hold that mental phenomena do not exist, the only thing that exists are physical phenomena.

Yes, I would agree with that. But I would also agree with the idea that physical phenomena do not exist, and the only thing that exists are spiritual (unbounded) phenomena.

I think it would be most accurate to say that any and all phenomena exist, just not inherently. With the Totality being only thing that does exist inherently.

[Isaac]

Dan,

One of the problems with the notion of consciousness as an emergent property of some sort of physical state is where does this physical state begin and end?

I don't hold consciousness to be an emergent state. I hold it to be some subset of physical brain activity that we have yet to define, probably in the frontal lobes. Where the physical state begins and ends probably fluctuates, but over time is relatively stable and localized. It doesn't need to be completely static to be defined.

The brain, whilst being a necessary cause of consciousness is not a sufficient cause.

What are the other cause(s) of consciousness then besides the brain? When I say the brain, I include all aspect of the nervous system such as the spinal cord and sensory nerves.

So, what are we saying causes consciousness, exactly?

What I'm saying is that consciousness is not caused by something other than what it already is. Consciousness, in my view, is equivalent to a subset of physical brain activity, that exists by itself. It's not caused by anything other than physical forces that shape molecules and chemical reactions, etc.

[Isaac]

Jehu,

When you say that “mental phenomena do not exist”, do you mean that they are ‘non-existent’, or merely that they exist in a manner that is different from those things that we call ‘material’?

Great question. My answer is the latter. I hold that mental phenomena do not exist as separate entities from physical phenomena, i.e: mental phenomena are physical phenomena.

[brokenhead]

Jehu,

When you say that “mental phenomena do not exist”, do you mean that they are ‘non-existent’, or merely that they exist in a manner that is different from those things that we call ‘material’?

Great question. My answer is the latter. I hold that mental phenomena do not exist as separate entities from physical phenomena, i.e: mental phenomena are physical phenomena.

I agree, but not the physical phenomena that the neuroscientist speaks of. You do not need to be reductionist in the slightest for this to be true. I think that we have to rethink what we mean by "physical" and "material." In other words, it is a helpful strating place to think that thoughts themselves have actual - not imagined or purely conceptual - substance. This is not to say mass. A helpful analogy would be a photon, which can be shown to be a discrete thing, and although massless, carries and can impart physical momentum.

[David Quinn]

In the end, trying to reduce everything to materialism, or to consciousness, or even to spirit, is fundamentally flawed and reveals a misunderstanding of the nature of reality.

On the other hand, such activity can help a person break down certain barriers and enable him to see the oneness of everything, so it can serve as a useful stepping stone.

-

[Jehu]

Jehu,

When you say that “mental phenomena do not exist”, do you mean that they are ‘non-existent’, or merely that they exist in a manner that is different from those things that we call ‘material’?

Great question. My answer is the latter. I hold that mental phenomena do not exist as separate entities from physical phenomena, i.e: mental phenomena are physical phenomena.

I agree with you that there are two modes of existence, however, I should like to understand on what logical grounds you claim that the material is the primary mode, and not the mental. Clearly the two modes are related, but what is the nature of this relationship?

[Trevor Salyzyn]

Isaac,

What I'm saying is that consciousness is not caused by something other than what it already is. Consciousness, in my view, is equivalent to a subset of physical brain activity, that exists by itself. It's not caused by anything other than physical forces that shape molecules and chemical reactions, etc.

That's a pretty big "etc." you have there. Consciousness is not simplified when it is reduced to the physical forces that make it up, since there are a lot of physical forces that can be looked at, some known, many still unknown. What practical difference is there between this and what you see as the alternative?

As far as I can tell, this amounts to: "you can look at mind from the perspective of biology, chemistry, physics, neuroscience, psychiatry, or any of the established sciences... but you cannot look at the mind from the perspective of philosophy of mind."

[Dan Rowden]

The brain, whilst being a necessary cause of consciousness is not a sufficient cause.

What are the other cause(s) of consciousness then besides the brain? When I say the brain, I include all aspect of the nervous system such as the spinal cord and sensory nerves.

If you slap a brain and its associated central nervous system on a table, you still won't get much consciousness. That system requires various aspects of its environment to function. Deprive a brain of oxygen and see what happens. And I'm not sure the view you're taking, as I intimated regarding the physicalist position, accounts properly for qualia.

[Elizabeth Isabelle]

I believe the mind cannot have an affect on the physical world. I deny altogether that there is a "mind" separate from the physical substrate of the brain. It is still useful to use the word "mind" though, in the sense of the total electrical and chemical activity of the brain.

From this, it sounds like you essentially define "mind" as "the total electrical and chemical activity of the brain." Fair enough, and I will continue this post based on the assumption that this is what you meant. Along the same line of reasoning, I would say that a mind is a collection of thoughts. A person can change their mind by changing their thoughts, and thoughts are in part a product of the brain - but thoughts, brain, and mind all point to slightly different things, or different aspect of the same thing, depending on how you choose to view it/them.

I would say that a lightning bolt has similar characteristics to a thought. They both are transmissions of an electrical impulse from one place to another. When lightning strikes an object, the effect on the physical world is obvious. When lightning merely crackles through the air, there is still a physical affect to this, although it is far more subtle.

When a thought strikes a particular brain cell, it physically changes that brain cell. This is how both specific and abstract memories are formed. Repeating certain types of thoughts builds up those pathways, changing the physical structure of the brain, making those sorts of thoughts more automatic for the person, which results in the thought-habits commonly considered "personality."

I hold that mental phenomena do not exist, the only thing that exists are physical phenomena.

Yes, I would agree with that. But I would also agree with the idea that physical phenomena do not exist, and the only thing that exists are spiritual (unbounded) phenomena.

True enough - it all depends on how you look at it. Does everything exist or does nothing exist? No, yes, both and neither - such is the nature of the Totality. Another way to look at it is to ask if you have a tree or a trunk, some branches, roots, and a bunch of leaves, or do you have a mind-boggling number of differentiated cells, or and exponentially larger number of protons, neutrons, and electrons with masses of space in between, or...or... well, you get the idea.

[Isaac]

Jehu,

Jehu,

When you say that “mental phenomena do not exist”, do you mean that they are ‘non-existent’, or merely that they exist in a manner that is different from those things that we call ‘material’?

Great question. My answer is the latter. I hold that mental phenomena do not exist as separate entities from physical phenomena, i.e: mental phenomena are physical phenomena.

I agree with you that there are two modes of existence, however, I should like to understand on what logical grounds you claim that the material is the primary mode, and not the mental. Clearly the two modes are related, but what is the nature of this relationship?

I don't assert that there are two modes of existence, quite the contrary. There is only one mode of existence, physical existence. The mental mode is just a label applied to one aspect of physical existence, namely, the electro-chemical functioning of the human brain. There is no relationship between two separate modes, but only an interrelationship between different parts of the same physical existence.

[Isaac]

Dan Rowden,

The brain, whilst being a necessary cause of consciousness is not a sufficient cause.

What are the other cause(s) of consciousness then besides the brain? When I say the brain, I include all aspect of the nervous system such as the spinal cord and sensory nerves.

If you slap a brain and its associated central nervous system on a table, you still won't get much consciousness. That system requires various aspects of its environment to function. Deprive a brain of oxygen and see what happens. And I'm not sure the view you're taking, as I intimated regarding the physicalist position, accounts properly for qualia.

Well obviously if you deprive the nervous system of the body's nutrients (including oxygen) it cannot function properly. But consider the thought experiment: what if you placed the entire living nervous system (assume you removed it from a living person) into a tank of cerebrospinal fluid and somewhat found a way to attach electrodes to all the sensory nerves imitating how they are stimulated in the human body at rest, and pump blood through the arteries of brain, would that brain have consciousness? I think yes, you probably don't agree, if so, why?

I don't really understand your objection based on qualia, can you elaborate on why I haven't probably resolved that problem?

[Steven Coyle]

Physics, objects in motion
Smoke rising
Static relax.

Bathtub...

[Dan Rowden]

Isaac,

If you artificially replace the environment of a central nervous system there's no necessary reason that it won't function like the standard organic system. My point was that environment is necessary and that I can see no boundary to that environment other than that which we arbitrarily construct.

As to qualia: where is "red" in your perspective? A bunch of neural pathways and synapses that light up when a person says they see "red" isn't that "red", is it? It's a bunch of brain activity that we associate with the subjective experience of "red". The physicalist perspective of consciousness doesn't deal with epiphenomena very effectively. It basically just says the physical state is that experience, which is unsatisfactory.

[Steven Coyle]

Subatomic fusion
Subconscious Conscious
Low jet flow

(Enough Haiku, ku though.)