Do materialist lay-people have anything interesting to offer?

Can I? Yes. Will I? No. This go-round seems increasingly silly and strange to me. What is your point with this?

Well, you're asking a question addressed to a group of people who you won't define.

When you say "not doing research", I'm guessing you're meaning "non-scientists", as though the "materialists" you refer to are usually part of a group that draws from non-supernatural assumptions in scientific methodology. But then there's "materialism as a total belief system" (it seems) as well as non-scientist philosophers who operate within a framework they call materialism.

Is this guy a "materialist"?

I am utterly convinced that the universe is made of mathematics and that the concept of physical reality is incoherent.

Now you say you can define "materialists, the people" but will not. It seems that's partially true, if what you mean by "materialists" is just your personal stereotype of "closed-minded skeptics", and you'd prefer to just call them "materialists", regardless of the accuracy of the term.
 
Rarely have I seen a thread that is almost 100% meta-conversation. This one is a winner!

~~ Paul

I don't think it's futile, though. Language matters.

Now, it is clear that the decline of a language must ultimately have political and economic causes: it is not due simply to the bad influence of this or that individual writer. But an effect can become a cause, reinforcing the original cause and producing the same effect in an intensified form, and so on indefinitely. A man may take to drink because he feels himself to be a failure, and then fail all the more completely because he drinks. It is rather the same thing that is happening to the English language. It becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts. The point is that the process is reversible. Modern English, especially written English, is full of bad habits which spread by imitation and which can be avoided if one is willing to take the necessary trouble. If one gets rid of these habits one can think more clearly, and to think clearly is a necessary first step toward political regeneration:

He was writing about politics primarily, but I think the principle applies to science, philosophy, and the intersection of the two, as well.
 
Well, you're asking a question addressed to a group of people who you won't define.
.
Seriously? I won't define? I pointed you to the standard definition and told you plainly that it's the one I use. It's as if you read my accepted definition of Catholicism and then claim I haven't said how I define a Catholic. In fact. Arouet aside, all the posts in this thread so far reinforce my initial query. The device you use is a common-one Don't deal with the question, deviate by focusing to an inane degree on a term that has a standard definition. Then you can go on ad nauseum rather than deal with the issue at hand.

I could take the same approach by asking what do you mean by language. Then however you answer I'll pick another term from that answer - ask that question about it and keep going.It's a great way to derail any thread.

Here's the thing - you well know what I mean by materialist. You insult yourself by acting as if you don't.
 
Seriously? I won't define?

Yes. You actually, flat-out said:

you said:
Can I? Yes. Will I? No.

That's not very ambiguous.


Here's the thing - you well know what I mean by materialist. You insult yourself by acting as if you don't.

Again...(let me see if I can be even more clear)

1) You said: "By lay-people I mean those who aren't doing the research themselves."
So you're addressing part of the group of people YOU define as "materialists", but just the ones who are not scientists? And the "materialists" who ARE doing research are the ones forming and testing ideas in ways that don't blow off the mysterious/unknown as simply "supernatural"? So, here, "materialists" are those who use a certain scientific methodology?

2) What about philosophers? Were you, in your OP, including even cautious "proponents" of speculative ideas like the MUH as part of the group you refer to as "materialists"?

3) Or were you just using the term "materialist" as a vague, fuzzy catch-all for "closed-minded skeptics/people on the internet who get on my nerves"?
 
Again...(let me see if I can be even more clear)
[/quote]

Okay. . . at this point I'm going to ask you to just stop. It's been explained clearly and if you don't get it my apologies but that's on you. But as I see it your aim is to derail the thread - which you've had success with.
 
Maybe you should just ask to have the thread deleted if you're unwilling to define or describe the people who you want responses from. :)
 
What is "a materialist", in your opinion, Saiko? How do you personally define one, in your own words?
I'll state it in mine!

For all practical purposes, being a materialist means that you subscribe to the hypothesis (never proven) that the mind resides entirely in the brain, and so is constrained by various physical laws that would apply to the brain. Furthermore, you subscribe so completely, that you will search for any hypothesis - however unlikely - to explain evidence that seems to point elsewhere.

David
 
I can reread your opening post another half dozen times and I still won't understand why you think that "materialist" laypeople have nothing to offer while other laypeople do. Perhaps the thread title is misleading and you're simply asking why a "materialist" would be interested in this forum.
I can understand Saiko's question. By analogy, I can't see myself spending time on a Christian forum - because I don't believe the doctrine!

Answer: Because some of the subject matter is interesting to me.

~~ Paul
Well if you could elaborate that interest into an essay of 1000 words, we would have something worth discussing :D

David
 
I
For all practical purposes, being a materialist means that you subscribe to the hypothesis (never proven) that the mind resides entirely in the brain, and so is constrained by various physical laws that would apply to the brain. Furthermore, you subscribe so completely, that you will search for any hypothesis - however unlikely - to explain evidence that seems to point elsewhere.
That's certainly not the philosophical definition.

~~ Paul
 
I can understand Saiko's question. By analogy, I can't see myself spending time on a Christian forum - because I don't believe the doctrine!
So you agree that the thread title is misleading? What does your wondering about my reasons for being here have to do with whether I can make a contribution?

Well if you could elaborate that interest into an essay of 1000 words, we would have something worth discussing.
Does everyone have this homework assignment? :eek:

~~ Paul
 
Well I would find it interesting to read - so might many others.
There's nothing much to say. I find some of these topics interesting. I find other things interesting. Perhaps you think I might self-analyze to discover why I find the topics interesting, but I don't find that task interesting. ;)

~~ Paul
 
I can understand Saiko's question. By analogy, I can't see myself spending time on a Christian forum - because I don't believe the doctrine!

David you need to remember that until recently Alex billed Skeptiko as a place for skeptics and proponents to come together to talk about these topics. Now there's been a bait and switch but only after the mixed community was already formed. Unfortunately there's no other forum out there that provides the role Skeptiko used to and at least in the CD forum the last vestiges of the old dream survive for at least the time being.

There's little other choice for us at the present. It's skeptiko which still has a balance between skeptics and proponents or going to one of the skeptic dominated forums where that balance isn't there. I still prefer to have the broader spectrum of views. I think many proponents do as well. The proponents who aren't interested have no obligation to participate.
 
David you need to remember that until recently Alex billed Skeptiko as a place for skeptics and proponents to come together to talk about these topics. Now there's been a bait and switch but only after the mixed community was already formed.
Not so. It is still a place for proponents and sceptics.

The only people who feel shut out are those who adhere rigidly to some belief system. All that is required to be made welcome here is to be flexible rather than rigid about the final outcome of any given debate.
 
Not so. It is still a place for proponents and sceptics.

The only people who feel shut out are those who adhere rigidly to some belief system. All that is required to be made welcome here is to be flexible rather than rigid about the final outcome of any given debate.

I agree that if certain people were more flexible the current shutting out of a group of skeptic regs here would have been avoided.
 
The only people who feel shut out are those who adhere rigidly to some belief system. All that is required to be made welcome here is to be flexible rather than rigid about the final outcome of any given debate.
Surely you're joking. Do you honestly believe that when someone tells me I'm an idiot for suggesting that an NDE might be confabulated, it is because that person is flexible but I'm too rigid? They are literally telling me that the confabulation option is off the table and the only thing left is the afterlife option.

Saying that I'm inflexible is a euphemism for saying that I am not going with the preferred paradigm.

~~ Paul
 
I agree that if certain people were more flexible the current shutting out of a group of skeptic regs here would have been avoided.
You're playing games here. Starting a sentence with "I agree" and then devoting the rest of the sentence to stating that you disagree is just a way to derive entertainment from the discussion. Why not engage with the topic rather than just seeking amusement?
 
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