Is Materialistic Reductionism Self Refuting?

Blog post:
http://www.godless.biz/2010/12/08/is-materialistic-reductionism-self-refuting/

Background music: "Clang" by the Propellerheads.

Title music: "Leaving Planet Earth (Eelke Kleijn Remix)" by Talisman & Hudson. Great track!

Movie clip: "Brainstorm". An interesting look at the intersection of neuroscience and spirituality. Check it out -Christopher Walken is in it!

Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/askegg
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Podcast & Blog: http://www.godless.biz/

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Materialistic
• Matter
• Science
• Soul
• Thought
• Idea
• Brain
• Consciousness
• Reductionism
• Dualism
• Philosophy
• Religion
• spirituality
• philosophy
• christianity
• science

[otonanoC]

The fact that this video makes a dichotomy between materialist reductionism and soul-based spirituality, only shows that askegg does not understand this problem. I will elucidate. : If you propose that consciousness is operated by a secondary substance called "the soul" your basic paradigm is still reductionist, you have merely added more parts to the human parts. Abandoning reductionism completely, requires a mental gymnastic trick that is very difficult to grasp.

[askegg]

@otonanoC Not sure you followed what I was saying. I do not think materialist reductionism is self refuting - at least according to my current understanding of them. Yes, adding a soul does not help the situation, but I had planned to address this in a video on determinism.

[German1184]

Good video, askegg.You should watch:

"MONISM VS DUALISM & PSYCHIATRY 1/4 DENNET & SEARLE"

watch?v=m9XzGz6N25Q

watch?v=RElSIYPfHus&feature=re­lated

watch?v=7A_3F-Q-5WU&feature=re­lated

watch?v=5F_J7RdBp4g&feature=re­lated

[askegg]

@veerleke How many grams of knowledge, tradition, and culture go into a cake?

You are taking abstract concepts and treating them as real things. This is a category error.

[Magnetohydrodynamics]

If you have a belief, in that you are convinced of something being true, it is a simple fact that you can not confirm the truth of your belief until you go and interact with the world.

If I say "Snow is white" I cannot confirm it without going out on a winters day and actually looking at the snow.

I have no idea what Consicousness or Souls are, can you explain it to me without using the words: Though, Self, Feeling, Spirit, Awareness, God, Life and any other related terms?

[askegg]

@BlackMetalPoser There is certainly no direct material evidence of an immaterial soul (by definition), and we cannot rule out the possibility an immaterial soul is somehow affecting our material brains - although the models work just as well without this addition.

[calmreason]

This is quite hard to follow. As a software tester, Ive come to view (the many) personalities of a mind in the same way. We might one day have a deterministic measure of 'beauty' in the same way a GUI can be either good or bad. But it's a way off. Human personality is the Peacock's Tail - a grandiose adornment to an otherwise simple animal.

[otonanoC]

Abandoning reductionism DOES NOT mean you tack on another part of the human called "the soul" to the existing parts. That is not addressing the issue. To abandon reductionism, you must look yourself in the mirror and declare that objects we experience do not reduce to their parts. This will, at first,  come to you as a form of insanity. But keep the insanity going. Sustain it. Soon you will realize what the world is like without reductionism, but it will be uncomfortable at first.

[qtzlctl2012]

I've been discussing this a long time and I love your software/hardware analogy. As a programmer, i'm quite ashamed I didn't think of it myself :-p

[0Fear]

The problem with your assessment is that the "hardware" also arises from the "software" in the instance of our world. What we call "material" is a subjective quality of the mind, and depends on that quality. A computer never "experiences" its software. We do. And no current material theory can account for that. "Emergence" is like saying that a computer not only has hardware, but created software simply by being turned on. . . which is not how a computer works.

[askegg]

@circusOFprecision "When and how does the internal dimension of awareness arise?"

Great question. I do not know the answer, or have a clue how to go about finding out.

"Does a turing test merely mimic or experience?"

Both, I think - and that's part of the problem.

[askegg]

@circusOFprecision "Couldn't bacteria be conscious?"

Now we are getting into some nuances. I would say bacteria are not sufficiently complex to sustain consciousness, but I could not say for sure. I must be careful here or people will misconstrue what I am saying and covert it into some spiritual woo woo.

"Or maybe the internet?"

Maybe. The question is "how do we really know if another entity truly has consciousness?"