The World View That Has No Name

People often hate to think that they're part of a movement or subscribe to a world view, and so it is on this forum. People love to think of themselves as just critical thinkers or free thinkers, following the evidence wherever it leads.
I hope you include yourself in this!
However, I think there is a movement or world view here, but I don't know what to call it. If I use terms like New Age or paranormal, it seems wrong. But I don't have a better term.

I think for me, the problem isn't one of picking sides, it is that one side in the debate seems to want to dodge the real questions. It is worth listening to Alex's abortive attempt to interview Patricia Churchland for an extreme example of what I mean, but none of the 'thinkers' on the other side of this debate seem to debate seriously. Above all, I'd like a sceptic to give me some inkling of an idea how a thing made of matter - the brain - can actually have experiences - qualia - yet these great thinkers mostly try to avoid this issue.

I actually thought when I joined Skeptiko, that the sceptics would put up a stronger case for their viewpoint - it staggers me that they do so badly - I mean I think I could probably make a better case than the sceptics typically make, and I don't even believe in materialism any more!

David
 
Above all, I'd like a sceptic to give me some inkling of an idea how a thing made of matter - the brain - can actually have experiences - qualia - yet these great thinkers mostly try to avoid this issue.

You're right, David. The truth is, they don't know, and may never know, how the brain produces conscious experience. It's a mystery, and I wish they'd be more honest about that.
 
Hancock has this idea that materialism is the dominant ideology of the powers that be, and that the wonderful and mysterious wisdom of the ancients is being suppressed because it threatens consumerism and the military-industrial complex.

Though his best-selling books managed to slip through the net. :)
 
I hope you include yourself in this!


I think for me, the problem isn't one of picking sides, it is that one side in the debate seems to want to dodge the real questions. It is worth listening to Alex's abortive attempt to interview Patricia Churchland for an extreme example of what I mean, but none of the 'thinkers' on the other side of this debate seem to debate seriously. Above all, I'd like a sceptic to give me some inkling of an idea how a thing made of matter - the brain - can actually have experiences - qualia - yet these great thinkers mostly try to avoid this issue.

I actually thought when I joined Skeptiko, that the sceptics would put up a stronger case for their viewpoint - it staggers me that they do so badly - I mean I think I could probably make a better case than the sceptics typically make, and I don't even believe in materialism any more!

David

Wait - so you expect the skeptics to give you the answer to a currently unsolved problem? And you consider them deficient for not being able to do so?

Skepticms is a method of evaluating claims. It is not an answer repository for otherwise unanswered questions!
 
But you know people in the materialist/atheist/skeptic world also like to think of themselves as individuals just doing their own thing, but it's obvious to outsiders that there is a movement and a world view there. When you are IN that world you can't see it. You need sociologists and historians of ideas to look at it from the outside. Only then can you see it for what it is.

They are individuals. That many individuals choose to "run with the pack" doesn't change that. One of the summations of perception that I like is R.A. Wilson's reality tunnels. So I'll use it here. Each individual has their own tunnel that they are constantly building. And yes of course Harry might create a tunnel more obviously similar to Hermione's than to Draco's. One could stop at that but if one looks beneath the surface one will also find that in other ways Harry's tunnel is like Draco's, go deeper and at some point you realize that ultimately Harry's tunnel is uniquely his own.

Sure groupings - on whatever parameters - can often be a convenient thing. IMO though, many people - even against their intentions - forget that it is just an arbitrary convenience and begin to view it as an actual definitive reality.
 
Wait - so you expect the skeptics to give you the answer to a currently unsolved problem? And you consider them deficient for not being able to do so?

Skepticms is a method of evaluating claims. It is not an answer repository for otherwise unanswered questions!

There are unsolved questions and unsolved questions. If people admitted straightforwardly that they don't have a clue how consciousness is created, then that would be fine, but then they couldn't claim that the modern 'understanding' of consciousness excludes phenomena such as ψ. Nor could they exclude the idea that the brain is more of a transreceiver.

Conversely, if they do 'understand' consciousness, surely that understanding should at least extend to providing some sort of outline explanation of how we experience anything!

I mean, if you wanted to understand roughly how a computer works, you could read a general book that would give you an overview of how one works - a mere sketch. It wouldn't be detailed enough for you to actually build one from scratch (chips and all), but you would feel sure that you could fill in more details if you needed to do so. With consciousness, there isn't even a sketch of a theory! This is hardly surprising, because nobody ever makes a link between physical matter and mental phenomena except by hand waiving. How could they - three isn't any way to attribute an inner life to structure or mechanism (or computer). If someone told you your computer was feeling sad, you wouldn't take them seriously, would you? Why - because such an idea simply can't be taken literally. On the other hand, if someone told you something physical about your computer - perhaps they measured how much electrical interference it was generating - you would have no problem with that.

Formally, this is known as an explanatory gap - there simply is no way to relate physical matter to mental states.

David
 
There are unsolved questions and unsolved questions. If people admitted straightforwardly that they don't have a clue how consciousness is created, then that would be fine, but then they couldn't claim that the modern 'understanding' of consciousness excludes phenomena such as ψ. Nor could they exclude the idea that the brain is more of a transreceiver.

Conversely, if they do 'understand' consciousness, surely that understanding should at least extend to providing some sort of outline explanation of how we experience anything!

I mean, if you wanted to understand roughly how a computer works, you could read a general book that would give you an overview of how one works - a mere sketch. It wouldn't be detailed enough for you to actually build one from scratch (chips and all), but you would feel sure that you could fill in more details if you needed to do so. With consciousness, there isn't even a sketch of a theory! This is hardly surprising, because nobody ever makes a link between physical matter and mental phenomena except by hand waiving. How could they - three isn't any way to attribute an inner life to structure or mechanism (or computer). If someone told you your computer was feeling sad, you wouldn't take them seriously, would you? Why - because such an idea simply can't be taken literally. On the other hand, if someone told you something physical about your computer - perhaps they measured how much electrical interference it was generating - you would have no problem with that.

Formally, this is known as an explanatory gap - there simply is no way to relate physical matter to mental states. I haven't seen too many of the skeptics

David

I dunno. You referred to the skeptics on this forum doing a bad job of defending our viewpoint. I don't recall many skeptic posts on this forum making firm declarations about the current scientific understanding of consciousness or that psi is impossible. Most of the focus, frankly, has been on the proponent proposition that the brain can't produce consciousness. Maybe if you pointed out specific posts we've made it would give a better idea of what you are referring to.

Otherwise, I suspect you may be attributing claims to the skeptics on this forum that they never made (and thus you should not be surprised that they haven't provided an explanation for them!).
 
I think it's time for materialists to admit that materialism (though not atheism) is a faith position, in the sense that they simply have no idea how the brain can produce conscious experience, but believe it on faith.

But this need not be a bad thing. Panpsychism, dualism, idealism and the rest also require faith. The materialist could argue that, despite being a faith position in certain respects, materialism is still the best theory out there.
 
I think it's time for materialists to admit that materialism (though not atheism) is a faith position, in the sense that they simply have no idea how the brain can produce conscious experience, but believe it on faith.

But this need not be a bad thing. Panpsychism, dualism, idealism and the rest also require faith. The materialist could argue that, despite being a faith position in certain respects, materialism is still the best theory out there.

By materialism do you mean simply that the brain produces consciousness? By faith do you mean belief without evidence?

Does the materialist rely on faith if they don't have evidence of how the brain produces consciousness, but rather relies on evidence of the close correlation between the brain and consciousness?

Does the possibility that further evidence might show the hypothesis to be false mean that the hypothesis is believed based on faith?

Do you think there is no evidence that the brain produces consciousness?

Similar questions could be asked of the other ones you listed.

Frankly, I think the accusation that someone is relying on faith (when they think they are relying on evidence) is conterproductive. Forget about whether the reasons for the belief should be labelled faith or not. Just focus on the reaons, and evaluate how confident we should be about our conclusions based on them.
 
By materialism do you mean simply that the brain produces consciousness? By faith do you mean belief without evidence?

Does the materialist rely on faith if they don't have evidence of how the brain produces consciousness, but rather relies on evidence of the close correlation between the brain and consciousness?

Does the possibility that further evidence might show the hypothesis to be false mean that the hypothesis is believed based on faith?

Do you think there is no evidence that the brain produces consciousness?

Similar questions could be asked of the other ones you listed.

Frankly, I think the accusation that someone is relying on faith (when they think they are relying on evidence) is conterproductive. Forget about whether the reasons for the belief should be labelled faith or not. Just focus on the reaons, and evaluate how confident we should be about our conclusions based on them.

All knowledge apart from personal experience is faith based. Even science requires faith that experiments tell us something about reality. We believe that they do. We also believe the theories that science comes up with to explain things. They could be all wrong and we have no way of knowing for sure. We just have our trust and belief that they have done a good job.
 
All knowledge apart from personal experience is faith based. Even science requires faith that experiments tell us something about reality. We believe that they do. We also believe the theories that science comes up with to explain things. They could be all wrong and we have no way of knowing for sure.

What definition of faith are you using?

My definition is usually "belief without evidence". Evidence based belief does not require certainty, and allows for chance of error.

We just have our trust and belief that they have done a good job.

To some extent you are correct in that for practical reasons, no one person can possibly research the evidence for every claim. We have to diversify. Ideally, the system should be set up so that there are checks and balances. That while not everyone can research personally every claim, or double check every claim, each claim has some people who do and the results trickle down into the community.

So in a sense we can say that we have to have some "faith" that the system is working. That's using faith in a slightly different sense: that of trust.

But if we're relying on decisions that are evidence based, even if completely wrong, I wouldn't characterise it as "faith based".

For example: I don't haven't in the slightest double checked the evidence in favour of quantum mechanics. But should I therefore say that my belief is "faith based"? I don't think so. Rather, I think we have evidence of a century or so of research, studied in institutions, covered in the press, debated amongst experts, oversight by panels, technological applications. etc. It may turn out that the whole thing is wrong is some fundamental way - but that doesn't mean, I would say, that the belief that the scientists have uncovered some pretty useful information is faith based.

Regardless,though, the point I think you are making - and which with I agree - is that we should always be skeptical, and allow for the chance we are wrong about any belief we have.[/quote]
 
By materialism do you mean simply that the brain produces consciousness? By faith do you mean belief without evidence?

Does the materialist rely on faith if they don't have evidence of how the brain produces consciousness, but rather relies on evidence of the close correlation between the brain and consciousness?

Does the possibility that further evidence might show the hypothesis to be false mean that the hypothesis is believed based on faith?

Do you think there is no evidence that the brain produces consciousness?

Similar questions could be asked of the other ones you listed.

Frankly, I think the accusation that someone is relying on faith (when they think they are relying on evidence) is conterproductive. Forget about whether the reasons for the belief should be labelled faith or not. Just focus on the reaons, and evaluate how confident we should be about our conclusions based on them.

Yes, that's my definition of 'materialism' here.

When I say 'faith' I mean it in the 'leap of faith' sense. It's impossible and absurd that first-person subjective experience emerges from the brain, and yet materialists accept this absurdity. They have to leap there.

In this context 'faith' doesn't mean 'belief without evidence', since evidence is irrelevant here. Evidence may show that my brain is more important and more involved in my conscious experience than say my kidney or whatever, but no amount of evidence will make it less absurd to say that the experiential emerges from the non-experiential.

You may respond that things like quantum physics and relativity also seem absurd and impossible, and yet we accept them because of the evidence. But right here we see the difference between materialists and everybody else. Consciousness is a special case, and if you can't see that there's nothing I can do to change your mind. We just have different intuitions, and that's the end of it.
 
No, you're right. I probably shouldn't have said that.

I was really thinking more of Hancock than Marrs, though. Hancock has this idea that materialism is the dominant ideology of the powers that be, and that the wonderful and mysterious wisdom of the ancients is being suppressed because it threatens consumerism and the military-industrial complex. That fits in quite nicely with Skeptiko.

I wonder, is Alex a Hancock fan?

Is it the "dominant ideology of the powers that be" or just the dominant ideology? On this forum I suspect people believe it is the dominant metaphysics of mainstream academic science, which it is.
 
Though his best-selling books managed to slip through the net. :)

I don't understand this kind of thinking. I know it's a joke, but people really don't like alternative viewpoints. That's a very dangerous outlook and it has everything to do with conformity, which is the reason societies (such as ours) still live under authoritarianistic rule. I personally love all viewpoints and the more outlandish, outrageous and crazy I think they are, the more I appreciate them.

Nature loves diversity.
 
Is it the "dominant ideology of the powers that be" or just the dominant ideology? On this forum I suspect people believe it is the dominant metaphysics of mainstream academic science, which it is.

Yes it is, but some people don't have the sense to stop there. A true statement about neuroscience starts to get a bit out of control when it gets applied to political elites, corporate capitalism, the military-industrial complex, and anything else we happen to dislike.
 
Yes, that's my definition of 'materialism' here.

When I say 'faith' I mean it in the 'leap of faith' sense. It's impossible and absurd that first-person subjective experience emerges from the brain, and yet materialists accept this absurdity. They have to leap there.

In this context 'faith' doesn't mean 'belief without evidence', since evidence is irrelevant here. Evidence may show that my brain is more important and more involved in my conscious experience than say my kidney or whatever, but no amount of evidence will make it less absurd to say that the experiential emerges from the non-experiential.

You may respond that things like quantum physics and relativity also seem absurd and impossible, and yet we accept them because of the evidence. But right here we see the difference between materialists and everybody else. Consciousness is a special case, and if you can't see that there's nothing I can do to change your mind. We just have different intuitions, and that's the end of it.

I'm not sure how we can be confident that "consciousness" is a "special case". It feels like it is, but that's part of the difficulty.
 
Well, I appreciate that you consider this exchange to be at an end and no longer wish to discuss it but since I had some thoughts about your post on my drive home I hope you don't mind if I post them. If others wish to continue the discussion you are welcome, otherwise we can certainly drop it.

Yes, that's my definition of 'materialism' here.

When I say 'faith' I mean it in the 'leap of faith' sense. It's impossible and absurd that first-person subjective experience emerges from the brain, and yet materialists accept this absurdity. They have to leap there.

In this context 'faith' doesn't mean 'belief without evidence', since evidence is irrelevant here. Evidence may show that my brain is more important and more involved in my conscious experience than say my kidney or whatever, but no amount of evidence will make it less absurd to say that the experiential emerges from the non-experiential.

Well, I think you are approaching this question from the opposite end that I do.

I don't want to put words in your mouth, if you are interested in continuing the discussion, please correct me if I'm wrong. Your approach appears to be:



1) Pose a hypothesis 1: does B (brain) cause C (conscious experience)
2) Before looking for evidence, make the following argument: For B to cause C, the materials that make up B must already possess the properties of C.
3) Before looking for evidence, conclude that the materials that make up B, do not possess the properties of C, therefore B cannot cause C
3) If B cannot cause C, then the hypothesis is false.
4) if the hypothesis is false, no evidence could lead us to conclude it is likely true
5) therefore the belief that B causes C is not based on evidence and is therefore faith based.

I'm not trying to mock your argument here. This seems to be what you are laying out. If I've misinterpreted you in any way please let me know (or anyone else if Dominic is not interested)

My approach would be as follows:

1) Pose a hypothesis: B causes C
2) Evaluate the evidence in favour of the hypothesis. This involves:
  • examining the correlation between B and C
  • testing how close the correlation between B and C is
  • testing to see if the correlation could be due to some other cause, let's call it M
  • examine whether the evidence could support multiple hypotheses
  • evaluate the quality of the evidence of the various hypotheses
3)If the correlations between B and C survived the above, then conclude that there was evidence in favour of the hypothesis,
4) if the evidence was consistent with other hypotheses continue to explore those as well
5) consider the evidence in favour of the hypothesis to be justification for investing resources in exploring how B causes C, at the same time continuing to evaluate evidence coming out of that process to see if it still suported the hypothesis.
6) consider what this research suggests about possible properties of the materials that make up B that might not have been previously identified. Ask ourselves whether this research points at the directly research on those materials should go.

Getting tired now, but hopefully the drift is there - I'm sure there are some holes in the above- it's a first draft so contructive criticism is welcome.

The point is that logical arguments depend on the premises being accurate. I get the hard problem as it is posed. The danger is in assuming that the fact that we seem to know a lot about the structure and dynamics of matter should lead us to believe there are no other properties of matter. Or assuming that we understand enough about structure and dynamics to state with confidence that particular arrangements of it can't produce what we've labelled conscious processes.

The other point is that if the research I described above has been done, even if not proof, it still may be accurate to say that there is evidence in favour of the hypothesis, while at the same time acknowledging that the hypothesis could still be wrong or incomplete, and continuing to explore other avenues until such a time as the evidence gets strong enough to consider the expenditure of those resources to be wasteful.

You may respond that things like quantum physics and relativity also seem absurd and impossible, and yet we accept them because of the evidence.

I only consider logical impossibilities absurd. Anything else is on the table. My problem with the hard problem, in terms of logic, is that it depends on the premises being true - and I'm not sure we understand the premises enough to consider it a valid logical impossibility.
 
The more I read this forum the more I realise how much of a black sheep I actually am.
It is actually science that has given shape to my views as much as my experiences have. So much so that at 40+ I am studying again. I always apply science to my reasons except in regards to topics were it has no value. I would go as far to say that science itself refutes materialism. Actually it did over a hundred years ago and evolved into physicalism, by definition an ever changing tautology. And it is science that has local realism dangling by a thread Btw.

There seems to be so much angst toward science. That is misdirected I think, like anything it can be abused, and at times is treated as a religion. We can make a list of those guys too. Usually PR guys who are spokesman more than scientists such as Tyson and figure heads like Hawking who have never made a successful prediction or produced anything of use, and use there position to promote views that have nothing to do with science.

Or how about a new name for a world view of a person that says one thing in the name of science but lives contrary to what the implications are?

Oh right, we got that. Materialists.
 
Well, I appreciate that you consider this exchange to be at an end and no longer wish to discuss it but since I had some thoughts about your post on my drive home I hope you don't mind if I post them. If others wish to continue the discussion you are welcome, otherwise we can certainly drop it.



Well, I think you are approaching this question from the opposite end that I do.

I don't want to put words in your mouth, if you are interested in continuing the discussion, please correct me if I'm wrong. Your approach appears to be:



1) Pose a hypothesis 1: does B (brain) cause C (conscious experience)
2) Before looking for evidence, make the following argument: For B to cause C, the materials that make up B must already possess the properties of C.
3) Before looking for evidence, conclude that the materials that make up B, do not possess the properties of C, therefore B cannot cause C
3) If B cannot cause C, then the hypothesis is false.
4) if the hypothesis is false, no evidence could lead us to conclude it is likely true
5) therefore the belief that B causes C is not based on evidence and is therefore faith based.

I'm not trying to mock your argument here. This seems to be what you are laying out. If I've misinterpreted you in any way please let me know (or anyone else if Dominic is not interested)

My approach would be as follows:

1) Pose a hypothesis: B causes C
2) Evaluate the evidence in favour of the hypothesis. This involves:
  • examining the correlation between B and C
  • testing how close the correlation between B and C is
  • testing to see if the correlation could be due to some other cause, let's call it M
  • examine whether the evidence could support multiple hypotheses
  • evaluate the quality of the evidence of the various hypotheses
3)If the correlations between B and C survived the above, then conclude that there was evidence in favour of the hypothesis,
4) if the evidence was consistent with other hypotheses continue to explore those as well
5) consider the evidence in favour of the hypothesis to be justification for investing resources in exploring how B causes C, at the same time continuing to evaluate evidence coming out of that process to see if it still suported the hypothesis.
6) consider what this research suggests about possible properties of the materials that make up B that might not have been previously identified. Ask ourselves whether this research points at the directly research on those materials should go.

Getting tired now, but hopefully the drift is there - I'm sure there are some holes in the above- it's a first draft so contructive criticism is welcome.

The point is that logical arguments depend on the premises being accurate. I get the hard problem as it is posed. The danger is in assuming that the fact that we seem to know a lot about the structure and dynamics of matter should lead us to believe there are no other properties of matter. Or assuming that we understand enough about structure and dynamics to state with confidence that particular arrangements of it can't produce what we've labelled conscious processes.

The other point is that if the research I described above has been done, even if not proof, it still may be accurate to say that there is evidence in favour of the hypothesis, while at the same time acknowledging that the hypothesis could still be wrong or incomplete, and continuing to explore other avenues until such a time as the evidence gets strong enough to consider the expenditure of those resources to be wasteful.



I only consider logical impossibilities absurd. Anything else is on the table. My problem with the hard problem, in terms of logic, is that it depends on the premises being true - and I'm not sure we understand the premises enough to consider it a valid logical impossibility.

It's strange. So many people in the skeptic world can only think in terms of 'faith' as meaning 'belief without evidence'. In fact, 'faith' has many different meanings. See the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Faith entry for more on that.

I told you that I'm not using 'faith' here to mean 'belief without evidence'. Of course materialists have lots of evidence, i.e. correlations, to support their view that the brain produces conscious experience. I'm using faith to mean 'leaping to accept an absurd conclusion'. It's absurd not because no evidence has been given to support it, but because no amount of evidence could even conceivably ever support it. Consciousness is a special case in that it doesn't matter how many correlations the scientist comes up with. The materialist conclusion will always be absurd. And I would add that the panpsychist, dualist and idealist conclusions are also absurd in their own ways too.

But we don't even need to use the word 'faith' here. Maybe it's too confusing. I would just like to hear materialists say, "Yes, I know materialism seems crazy, absurd, impossible, etc., but what the hell, we've got so much evidence that human beings are part of the natural world and so I'm just going to go ahead and believe that somehow consciousness is too."

I do get annoyed with those materialists who pretend that there's really no big deal here and no great mystery. "Yeah, so this thing, the brain, produces first-person subjective experience. It's no big deal. Shit happens." I always want to get hold of these people and shake them. But hey, as I said, different intuitions.

But to play devil's advocate a bit, here's a thought experiment. Imagine that in say 300 years time scientists are building artificial brains and robots etc, and that we all become convinced that these are conscious beings with an inner life and feelings and creativity every bit as real as ours. We fall in love with them, marry them, get inspired by them, and so on. I will concede that in such a situation materialism may come to seem less crazy and absurd than it seems now.

So I have mixed feelings about all of this.
 
Back
Top