Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[Lagayascienza]

Sorry about the typos in the above. I did proof read it several times in the full editor but my old eyes don't see so well anymore. And typing in difficult, too.

[Count Lucanor]

Was philosophy really a "monumental failure" before science? Science started as part philosophy.

Nature is what we have in front of us, that’s the whole show. To get the insight on what’s behind it, the ancients only had raw observation and reflection, which could not get them too far, especially when being heavily influenced by theological speculations. Not even natural philosophy managed to liberate itself from the chains of religious thinking. So, in some way indeed philosophy took on the tasks that we trust now to science, but it was at best its infancy. It should be acknowledged that philosophy advanced in other matters, in fact the philosophy of materialism was in place even before the scientific revolution. Nevertheless, it is as clear as a sunny day that with regards to nature, to the kind of things that exist, naturalistic science left behind philosophical speculation. It is odd to think that we can leave science “behind” by going back to philosophical speculation.

Philosophy as we know it did not exist before science. As you mentioned, it was natural philosophy, a combination of science and philosophy. Many of the old philosophers were also scientists. Then science split off from the rest of philosophy.

So, philosophy was not a failure, unless we consider all work done before modernity to be a failed attempt at modernity.

While I am not a fan of schools replacing hard grades with motherhood statements, I think that "developing" is a more accurate description for our ancestors' endeavours than giving them a F.

Yes, you are right. The overall assessment should not be an F if we use the criterion of pre-scientific thought being a necessary stage, although still immature, in the gradual development of science.

Still, there are areas of interest to individuals, which are not of the same interest to society, which science cannot address. For instance, science is famously no help in making decision as to how to use scientific findings, the concept brought to life in Frankenstein. It doesn't help with aesthetic assessments. It won't help you develop morality. Science can tell you how things might exist but provides no reason for any of it. Stuff just happens.

If one takes the practical side of scientific findings, they indeed help us make better decisions. Maybe science will not answer what is the best architecture style, but its applications in engineering might help us create more options in materials, disqualify the harmful ones and give us better insights for a sustainable architecture. DNA studies can help us understand some aspects of human populations, such as genetic predisposition to diseases. Social studies could help us understand demographics and allow us to make the most appropriate urban interventions. Science will not tell me what to have for dinner tonight, but its applications in health and medicine will be helpful to know that anything high in sodium or sugar might not be the best option, or that I better choose the restaurant that passes sanitary inspections, because microbes (and not witchcraft) are the causes of illnesses. Science, anyway, is not reduced to physics, or chemistry, not even biology. We can include its sub-branches in social studies, such as verbal and non-verbal communications. All aspects of culture can be studied scientifically, by that we should mean a systematic, rigorous approach that uses empirical evidence, naturalistic explanations and testable predictions. I cannot think of the human condition (which you might call a purely philosophical endeavor) while ignoring the scientific findings of anthropology and sociology, nor try to understand its history without the help of scientific archaeology. Science then is indispensable for a holistic understanding of the world, requiring an interdisciplinary approach that takes into account the lessons from each discipline, even though each field has its own methodological and epistemological principles and focuses on a specific object of study.

Our moral and aesthetic decisions may ultimately depend on subjective factors, but a good part of our subjectivity relies on our rationalizations of how the world works, on our justified beliefs and expectations of what is in front of us. That, putting in simple terms what Sellars used to call the manifest image, which is neither scientific nor unscientific. I can make value judgements solely on that, but when I incorporate the scientific framework to my understanding of the world, my set of values does not stay the same. I know that a comic or a superhero movie that relies on magical superpowers or ineffable forces involves less insight on the intricacies of human life than any other work of fiction that relies on our real flaws and virtues. I can also make moral judgements based on the knowledge that there is no afterlife, nor divine forces or celestial bodies guiding our actions and determining our destiny, saying who I can have sex with or what I can eat on Good Friday. It’s not that a particular field of science tells me that, there’s no normative application there, but a scientific, naturalistic image of the world is key for mastering the synoptic view that unifies both images holistically.

[Lagayascienza]

Science is what we need in order to understand all aspects of the physical universe. And if there are questions that are not susceptible to investigation by the scientific method, then, IMO, it is unlikely that there are any factual or satisfying answers to those questions.

[Sy Borg]

If one takes the practical side of scientific findings, they indeed help us make better decisions. Maybe science will not answer what is the best architecture style, but its applications in engineering might help us create more options in materials, disqualify the harmful ones and give us better insights for a sustainable architecture.

I will just address this one because your thoughts on each issue, in essence, are based on same predication that science at least helps to inform decisions, which of course is true. I agree that the scientific method is indispensable, but it is also limited.

The complexity of interdependencies tends to be too great for science to apprehend. Even if we could apply supercomputers to every aspect of life, the resources are not there or it. Saying that some of these complexities are beyond science as we know it is akin to saying that interstellar travel is impossible. It's easy to point out that one only needs to wait a very long time, but it is technically possible. Further, no one is motivated to spend the resources on such obscurities.

Or, put more simply, metaphysics precedes physics. Metaphysics is what you have when the above-mentioned interdependencies are beyond the current scientific and mathematical methods. You might have some intuition as to the dynamics, but they are yet to be proved.

Think of all the New Age / hippie talk about vibrations and suchlike. Yet we know it's true in some ways, that everything vibrates, and that some things resonate with us, and some don't. Certain sounds will make one person's skin crawl while another is relatively unaffected.

In that context, please listen to this clip about our cells emitting certain frequencies and possibly responding to healing vibrations :) ... from targeted ultrasound, that is. And this is all recent science, no nonsense, albeit still early days with some theoretical aspects that are yet to be experimentally verified.

Or consider Einstein's metaphysical ideas that preceded his mathematical proofs. Einstein's metaphysics coupled with deep knowledge of the field and mathematical mastery proved to be a potent combination.

[Lagayascienza]

I've watched all seven of Kastrup's videos on Analytic Idealism. I made notes on five of them but I did not make notes of the last two because the sixth is basically a recap of the previous five and, whilst the seventh deals with common objections to Analytic Idealism, it answers those objections by reference to material already dealt with in the first five videos.

I've found the course very interesting. But I am not convinced. As I see it, the weakest part of the theory is Kastrup's notion of a "Universal Mind" and his notion of "dissociation" whereby postulated individual "alters" form by dissociating from the postulated "universal mind". I do not find the analogy with dissociative disorder convincing. However, that analogy is pretty much all he offers in support of the notion of the dissociation of individual consciousnesses from a universal consciousness. There is little explanation of how, or why, the posited dissociation from the posited universal mind occurs. I did not find his evidence from consciousness studies convincing. I consider this a "just-so" story.

I am also not satisfied with his explanation of why the Standard Interpretation of Quantum Mechanics is untenable. Further, it is not true that the only alternative to the the Standard Interpretation of QM is the Many Worlds Interpretation. There are many other interpretations on offer. And nor am I satisfied that, if we reject these two interpretations of QM, the only option left is Analytic Idealism. He simply hasn't made a convincing case for this.

Still, I'm not closing the door to all possible forms of Idealism. If a form of Idealism entails only that:

1.) phenomena given in consciousness must be the staring point of any investigation into reality (and who could argue with that?), and
2.) if it does not deny what we perceive as the material universe and other minds,

then I'd have no problem with it and I cannot see why science should either.

One can choose to believe in Transcendental Idealism as some sort of support for mysticism or as a stop-gap measure for making sense of things we do not yet understand about consciousness and the material world. But one is not compelled by reason to do so. Science may yet fill the explanatory gap.

I have learned a lot about Idealism and phenomenology through my discussions with Hereandnow and Count Lucanor. I thank you both.

[Count Lucanor]

If one takes the practical side of scientific findings, they indeed help us make better decisions. Maybe science will not answer what is the best architecture style, but its applications in engineering might help us create more options in materials, disqualify the harmful ones and give us better insights for a sustainable architecture.

I will just address this one because your thoughts on each issue, in essence, are based on same predication that science at least helps to inform decisions, which of course is true. I agree that the scientific method is indispensable, but it is also limited.

The complexity of interdependencies tends to be too great for science to apprehend.

Sure, I don’t object to that, in the same sense that we can say that within mathematics, arithmetics is limited for solving all complex problems. It’s true, yet you cannot get rid of arithmetic, it is already included in every other complex mathematical operation.

Even if we could apply supercomputers to every aspect of life, the resources are not there or it. Saying that some of these complexities are beyond science as we know it is akin to saying that interstellar travel is impossible. It's easy to point out that one only needs to wait a very long time, but it is technically possible. Further, no one is motivated to spend the resources on such obscurities.

I didn’t get the relation between the complexity we are talking about and supercomputers, but anyway…I think that the talk about the limits of our technological abilities is different from the philosophical stance that claims there is a realm within the universe to which we don’t have direct access, a transcendent realm, which is the case proposed by Idealism and Phenomenology, in other words, it states a case, either implicitly or explicitly, against realism and materialism, and by extension, against scientific realism. But that’s the metaphysical side of the coin. The other side is epistemological, stating that the scope of scientific inquiry that can produce valuable knowledge, given its methods and objects of study, is limited to the natural sciences, setting apart the sphere of values and human interaction as a domain exclusive for a type of philosophical reflection, that is, Idealist philosophical reflection, based on a blend of introspection and different forms of mysticism, which often takes pride in denouncing materialism as a cold, heartless, reductionist worldview. While indeed there is, from a perspective of emergentism, a separate domain or culture, it is not outside the purview of science, if science is understood as “a rigorous, systematic body of knowledge, in which one can ground truths that are both universal and necessary”.

Or, put more simply, metaphysics precedes physics. Metaphysics is what you have when the above-mentioned interdependencies are beyond the current scientific and mathematical methods. You might have some intuition as to the dynamics, but they are yet to be proved.

Think of all the New Age / hippie talk about vibrations and suchlike. Yet we know it's true in some ways, that everything vibrates, and that some things resonate with us, and some don't. Certain sounds will make one person's skin crawl while another is relatively unaffected.

In that context, please listen to this clip about our cells emitting certain frequencies and possibly responding to healing vibrations ... from targeted ultrasound, that is. And this is all recent science, no nonsense, albeit still early days with some theoretical aspects that are yet to be experimentally verified.

Or consider Einstein's metaphysical ideas that preceded his mathematical proofs. Einstein's metaphysics coupled with deep knowledge of the field and mathematical mastery proved to be a potent combination.

Materialist ontology precedes physics, that’s the only ontology compatible with scientific realism. We can safely assume that vibrations are a natural occurrence of the physical, material world, the only one there is. We might be yet far from understanding every aspect of reality we encounter, but that does not open the door to transcendent realms and methods of inquiry based on pure introspection and mysticism.

[Sy Borg]

If one takes the practical side of scientific findings, they indeed help us make better decisions. Maybe science will not answer what is the best architecture style, but its applications in engineering might help us create more options in materials, disqualify the harmful ones and give us better insights for a sustainable architecture.

I will just address this one because your thoughts on each issue, in essence, are based on same predication that science at least helps to inform decisions, which of course is true. I agree that the scientific method is indispensable, but it is also limited.

The complexity of interdependencies tends to be too great for science to apprehend.

Sure, I don’t object to that, in the same sense that we can say that within mathematics, arithmetics is limited for solving all complex problems. It’s true, yet you cannot get rid of arithmetic, it is already included in every other complex mathematical operation.

Regardless, there needs to be a place for instinct and intuition. It is a human capacity that ideally won't be wasted, but probably is. Relative laypeople sometimes intuit things that are only proved a long time afterwards, eg. Bruno, Democritus. Today, a relative layperson can be completely correct about an issue but, because they are not part of the network, they will be completely disregarded. There seems to be more emphasis today on who makes claims, of for what reasons, than the nature of the claims.

Even if we could apply supercomputers to every aspect of life, the resources are not there or it. Saying that some of these complexities are beyond science as we know it is akin to saying that interstellar travel is impossible. It's easy to point out that one only needs to wait a very long time, but it is technically possible. Further, no one is motivated to spend the resources on such obscurities.

I didn’t get the relation between the complexity we are talking about and supercomputers, but anyway…I think that the talk about the limits of our technological abilities is different from the philosophical stance that claims there is a realm within the universe to which we don’t have direct access, a transcendent realm, which is the case proposed by Idealism and Phenomenology, in other words, it states a case, either implicitly or explicitly, against realism and materialism, and by extension, against scientific realism. But that’s the metaphysical side of the coin. The other side is epistemological, stating that the scope of scientific inquiry that can produce valuable knowledge, given its methods and objects of study, is limited to the natural sciences, setting apart the sphere of values and human interaction as a domain exclusive for a type of philosophical reflection, that is, Idealist philosophical reflection, based on a blend of introspection and different forms of mysticism, which often takes pride in denouncing materialism as a cold, heartless, reductionist worldview. While indeed there is, from a perspective of emergentism, a separate domain or culture, it is not outside the purview of science, if science is understood as “a rigorous, systematic body of knowledge, in which one can ground truths that are both universal and necessary”.

Sorry about the oblique analogy. I'm trying to parse what is theoretically possible and what is practically possible. There are many aspects of reality that will never be formally explored by science due to lack of interest and/or an inability to justify funding.

Or, put more simply, metaphysics precedes physics. Metaphysics is what you have when the above-mentioned interdependencies are beyond the current scientific and mathematical methods. You might have some intuition as to the dynamics, but they are yet to be proved.

Think of all the New Age / hippie talk about vibrations and suchlike. Yet we know it's true in some ways, that everything vibrates, and that some things resonate with us, and some don't. Certain sounds will make one person's skin crawl while another is relatively unaffected.

In that context, please listen to this clip about our cells emitting certain frequencies and possibly responding to healing vibrations :) ... from targeted ultrasound, that is. And this is all recent science, no nonsense, albeit still early days with some theoretical aspects that are yet to be experimentally verified.

Or consider Einstein's metaphysical ideas that preceded his mathematical proofs. Einstein's metaphysics coupled with deep knowledge of the field and mathematical mastery proved to be a potent combination.

Materialist ontology precedes physics, that’s the only ontology compatible with scientific realism. We can safely assume that vibrations are a natural occurrence of the physical, material world, the only one there is. We might be yet far from understanding every aspect of reality we encounter, but that does not open the door to transcendent realms and methods of inquiry based on pure introspection and mysticism.

Logical positivism / materialist ontology are certainly highly credible and practical. However, the story of materialism is so replete with plot holes, that I cannot consider it a certainty. That does not mean that I endorse ancient myths (it's quite possible that we have all been wrong in our assumptions about reality and it's actually something we simply can't yet comprehend). A few of materialism's plot holes are:

- inability to reconcile QM and GR in the centre of black holes
- inability to understand / replicate consciousness
- materialism says precious little about ethics and morality
- materialism says precious little about how to best order a society (although scientific support is critical)
- related to the above, materialism has no solution to the problem of how to best use scientific knowledge.

That is, there's a heck of a lot of informational processing going on in the material world that we either cannot access, cannot understand, are uninterested in accessing, or cannot afford to explore. I will be most interested to see what progress, if any, that AI can make in this.

[Lagayascienza]

This thread started with Hereandnow’s questioning of the nature of religion. He offered a phenomenological/existentialist/deconstructivist interpretation that located religion and value in the same indeterminate Ideal realm. But maybe Idealism fulfils the same role as "god-of-the-gaps" arguments whereby god(s) are invoked to plug holes left by science's inability thus far to explain certain aspects of the world in physicalist/materialist/reductionistic terms. Gap-filling arguments such as "god did it" are “just-so” stories that have not yet been proved wrong. Perhaps Idealism is similar to religion in this respect. We are not bound by reason to accept Idealism. We can choose to believe it if we wish but it is susceptible to inroads by science just as stories of religion have been whittled away by science. For example, we now know that humans were not magically created 6000 years ago but evolved over millions of yeas like all other organisms on earth. Consciousness is still a big gap that Idealism and mysticism are wont to fill. But science is working on it and maybe that gap, too, will be filled so that Idealism is shunted off the metaphysical stage as religion has increasingly been in places where its strangle-hold on the human mind has loosened by scientific education. In the meantime, Idealists and mystics can “hang in there”.

[Count Lucanor]

Regardless, there needs to be a place for instinct and intuition. It is a human capacity that ideally won't be wasted, but probably is. Relative laypeople sometimes intuit things that are only proved a long time afterwards, eg. Bruno, Democritus. Today, a relative layperson can be completely correct about an issue but, because they are not part of the network, they will be completely disregarded. There seems to be more emphasis today on who makes claims, of for what reasons, than the nature of the claims.

We can call science the body of testable and predictive knowledge generated by scientific practice, and we can see it is conformed by a solid, systematic, rigorous framework, but as far as I can remember, instinct and intuition from the individual scientists involved in these endeavors have never been ruled out, in fact it is what is mostly celebrated in popular media.

Sorry about the oblique analogy. I'm trying to parse what is theoretically possible and what is practically possible. There are many aspects of reality that will never be formally explored by science due to lack of interest and/or an inability to justify funding.

Lack of interest points to relevance and motivation, but it doesn’t say much about practical (technical) possibilities. I’m not interested, nor I have the resources to go to Siberia. It is most likely that I will never go, but still it is theoretically possible, as well as practically (technically) possible that I go to Siberia. Just the same, if there are areas of research not covered by science, it doesn’t mean it is a reality out of our reach.

Logical positivism / materialist ontology are certainly highly credible and practical. However, the story of materialism is so replete with plot holes, that I cannot consider it a certainty. That does not mean that I endorse ancient myths (it's quite possible that we have all been wrong in our assumptions about reality and it's actually something we simply can't yet comprehend). A few of materialism's plot holes are:

- inability to reconcile QM and GR in the centre of black holes

Well, that will not be a plot hole of materialism. At most, it would be a plot hole of the science of physics, but if we consider all the gaps in scientific knowledge plot holes that are immediately filled with explanations of ineffable, supernatural, immaterial forces, we can then dismiss science altogether and embrace ancient myths again. Notice, though, that our knowledge about QM and GR, the fact that they are now part of our discussions about the real world, is the result of scientific discovery.

- inability to understand / replicate consciousness

Being unable to replicate consciousness is not a plot hole of materialism, either. Neither being unable to replicate life or replicate cumulonimbus clouds, or fossil oils. Again, at most, a plot hole of science. In any case, the argument becomes completely irrelevant after the fact that no known practice, which could be associated with Idealism, replicates these things either. Now, about understanding them, it seems that all materialist explanations that we handle so far are reasonable and coherent, such as the fact that all consciousness we know, is embodied, is a property of a material entity, an organism with a nervous system. What is the Idealist alternative, if not ancient myths?

- materialism says precious little about ethics and morality

And that’s perfectly fine, because no ontology does, not even Idealism. Ontology is a branch of metaphysics concerned with the things that exist. Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy, but there are other branches, such as ethics. Surely, you can build morality and ethics having an Idealist metaphysical view in mind, often consistent with theology, but you can also do it with a materialist mindset, concerned with the immanent value of life as it is in its natural and social settings. In practice, both systems exist.

- materialism says precious little about how to best order a society (although scientific support is critical)

Same as above.

- related to the above, materialism has no solution to the problem of how to best use scientific knowledge.

Same as above.

That is, there's a heck of a lot of informational processing going on in the material world that we either cannot access, cannot understand, are uninterested in accessing, or cannot afford to explore.

Let’s assume that’s the case. Still will not give any advantage to Idealists over materialists endorsing naturalism and scientific realism.

I will be most interested to see what progress, if any, that AI can make in this.

I’ll bet that as much as a pocket calculator can make progress in solving any of the problems in the current list of unsolved math problems.

[Sy Borg]

Regardless, there needs to be a place for instinct and intuition. It is a human capacity that ideally won't be wasted, but probably is. Relative laypeople sometimes intuit things that are only proved a long time afterwards, eg. Bruno, Democritus. Today, a relative layperson can be completely correct about an issue but, because they are not part of the network, they will be completely disregarded. There seems to be more emphasis today on who makes claims, of for what reasons, than the nature of the claims.

We can call science the body of testable and predictive knowledge generated by scientific practice, and we can see it is conformed by a solid, systematic, rigorous framework, but as far as I can remember, instinct and intuition from the individual scientists involved in these endeavors have never been ruled out, in fact it is what is mostly celebrated in popular media.

I am pointing out that progress comes at a cost. The cost of improved rationalism is the dampening of intuition. Intuition works. It is effective, which is why pre-scientific humans survived to later develop the scientific method. However, at large scales, rationalism is more reliable than intuition, hence its success.

Sorry about the oblique analogy. I'm trying to parse what is theoretically possible and what is practically possible. There are many aspects of reality that will never be formally explored by science due to lack of interest and/or an inability to justify funding.

Lack of interest points to relevance and motivation, but it doesn’t say much about practical (technical) possibilities. I’m not interested, nor I have the resources to go to Siberia. It is most likely that I will never go, but still it is theoretically possible, as well as practically (technically) possible that I go to Siberia. Just the same, if there are areas of research not covered by science, it doesn’t mean it is a reality out of our reach.

And Siberia remains a mystery. Just because something can be learned doesn't mean that it will. Many knowledge gaps will remain. It might not be important, but it is a fact, and is cause for rationalist humility.

Logical positivism / materialist ontology are certainly highly credible and practical. However, the story of materialism is so replete with plot holes, that I cannot consider it a certainty. That does not mean that I endorse ancient myths (it's quite possible that we have all been wrong in our assumptions about reality and it's actually something we simply can't yet comprehend). A few of materialism's plot holes are:

- inability to reconcile QM and GR in the centre of black holes

Well, that will not be a plot hole of materialism. At most, it would be a plot hole of the science of physics, but if we consider all the gaps in scientific knowledge plot holes that are immediately filled with explanations of ineffable, supernatural, immaterial forces, we can then dismiss science altogether and embrace ancient myths again. Notice, though, that our knowledge about QM and GR, the fact that they are now part of our discussions about the real world, is the result of scientific discovery.

Oh come now, what's this about supernatural beings? I don't mind if you run down the field with the ball, or even make a touchdown, but here you have just run past the goal line, out into the crowd and out of the stadium. You were apparently last seen in Honduras, still running :)

Seriously, let's put aside the goblins, grumpkins and wizards and consider actual reality, not the confused notions of theological literalists, who have mistaken human mental potential for a physical supernatural extra-universal spirit man.

To help clarify where I stand is this, I'll happily walk into any darkened room or place anywhere and not fear ghosts or supernatural entities. I'll certainly worry about obstacles, uneven ground, hostile humans or animals but I do not believe in the supernatural at all. Hopefully that helps.

Speaking of superstitions, how many times have scientists and educators referred to the "singularity" at the heart of black holes. Singularities are almost as ridiculous as God - infinitely dense and infinitely small - which is obvious ********.

Fact is, when a star of 2.5 times or more stellar masses goes supernova, gravity apparently crushes matter down to quantum scales. However, gravity is not thought to make a difference at quantum scales. This is a major plot hole in materialism, suggesting that some of our assumptions about reality are wrong. At least researchers are moving away from hypothetical Schwarzchild non-spinning black holes, so that's a plus.

- inability to understand / replicate consciousness

Being unable to replicate consciousness is not a plot hole of materialism, either. Neither being unable to replicate life or replicate cumulonimbus clouds, or fossil oils. Again, at most, a plot hole of science. In any case, the argument becomes completely irrelevant after the fact that no known practice, which could be associated with Idealism, replicates these things either. Now, about understanding them, it seems that all materialist explanations that we handle so far are reasonable and coherent, such as the fact that all consciousness we know, is embodied, is a property of a material entity, an organism with a nervous system. What is the Idealist alternative, if not ancient myths?

Nope, not understanding the nature of consciousness is a massive plot hole of materialism and science. Until this question is resolved, the metaphysical door remains open, eg. panpsychism - at least.

The current materialist explanations for consciousness are, alas, inadequate. In terms of evolution, there is no need for any entity to be conscious if a "philosophical zombie" could do the same job more efficiently (as we are increasingly demonstrating with AI).

Further, why should the alternative to materialism be idealism? All parties may be wrong. Perhaps it's not even possible for human brains to comprehend actual reality, leaving us forever treating the "icons" we use to interface with reality as the real thing? Until we delve deeper, these questions remain.

I do not see this as a battle between warring ideologies - idealism and materialism. That war does exist, but it's about as misguided as any other war. There is an inability for humans to admit that they might not know something, and perhaps never will. Yet this lack of knowing has been the typical state for humans from the start. The overblown assumptions of both idealism and materialism seem to provide the comfort of certainty. One's personality determines which schema's overly-optimistic confidence provides most comfort.

- materialism says precious little about ethics and morality

And that’s perfectly fine, because no ontology does, not even Idealism. Ontology is a branch of metaphysics concerned with the things that exist. Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy, but there are other branches, such as ethics. Surely, you can build morality and ethics having an Idealist metaphysical view in mind, often consistent with theology, but you can also do it with a materialist mindset, concerned with the immanent value of life as it is in its natural and social settings. In practice, both systems exist.

Still, it's a limitation of what is supposed to be an all-encompassing model.

- materialism says precious little about how to best order a society (although scientific support is critical)

- related to the above, materialism has no solution to the problem of how to best use scientific knowledge.
Same as above.

In this case, the limitation has great costs. Realistically, these will remain wicked problems that will hasten the extreme changes that it seems the planet has in store for us. There's probably not much anyone can do about it.

That is, there's a heck of a lot of informational processing going on in the material world that we either cannot access, cannot understand, are uninterested in accessing, or cannot afford to explore.

Let’s assume that’s the case. Still will not give any advantage to Idealists over materialists endorsing naturalism and scientific realism.

Again, I don't accept the idealism vs materialism divide as anything but a social construct. It's like deciding whether the best system of government is fascism or communism, and not considering alternatives - or that alternatives may exist that we could never understand.

It seems to me that to entirely reject either materialism or idealism is as much of a mistake as rejecting modernism or postmodernism. These models of reality and society are essentially tools. Materialism can be augmented by intuition, and intuition can be bounded by logic. Likewise, postmodernism points to the limits of modernism, while postmodern ideas are rendered reasonable when moderated by some modernist standards.

I will be most interested to see what progress, if any, that AI can make in this.

I’ll bet that as much as a pocket calculator can make progress in solving any of the problems in the current list of unsolved math problems.

Methinks you underestimate what is coming for us. Today's AI will indeed seem like pocket calculators compared with what's coming. AI will be pivotal, heralding at least as profound a change as tool use, the wheel, agriculture or the internet, perhaps as much as cyanobacteria 2.5bya.

[Count Lucanor]

I am pointing out that progress comes at a cost. The cost of improved rationalism is the dampening of intuition. Intuition works. It is effective, which is why pre-scientific humans survived to later develop the scientific method. However, at large scales, rationalism is more reliable than intuition, hence its success.

I don’t think it’s a zero sum game. Intuition has its place in scientific discovery. When Archimedes had his eureka moment, this didn’t make his inquiry less rational, but more importantly, regardless of the nature of his epiphany, the result and valuable achievement was a physical principle that still stands today as solid, predictive, testable knowledge, recognizable as truly scientific.

And Siberia remains a mystery. Just because something can be learned doesn't mean that it will. Many knowledge gaps will remain. It might not be important, but it is a fact, and is cause for rationalist humility.

Your argument implies that I will never explore Siberia and that there will always be that gap in my knowledge, only because I’m not currently interested, nor have the resources to go there. Your claim is not justified because it is not based on unsurmountable technical (practical) possibilities. If I really tried, in as many ways as possible, to reach Siberia, and still couldn’t make it, or if I was required to be there in one hour from my current location, then there would be reasonable expectations that I will never get to explore Siberia.

But if you read again, my argument has always been in response to the claim from Idealism and Phenomenology that there is a realm within reality that is inaccessible to our knowledge and that therefore the intrinsic materialism of science cannot be grounded realistically on facts independent of minds.

Oh come now, what's this about supernatural beings? I don't mind if you run down the field with the ball, or even make a touchdown, but here you have just run past the goal line, out into the crowd and out of the stadium. You were apparently last seen in Honduras, still running

Seriously, let's put aside the goblins, grumpkins and wizards and consider actual reality, not the confused notions of theological literalists, who have mistaken human mental potential for a physical supernatural extra-universal spirit man.

To help clarify where I stand is this, I'll happily walk into any darkened room or place anywhere and not fear ghosts or supernatural entities. I'll certainly worry about obstacles, uneven ground, hostile humans or animals but I do not believe in the supernatural at all. Hopefully that helps.

Well, it was you who sent the ball out of the stadium with that straw man. I never said “supernatural beings”, I was happily settling for the term “supernatural forces”, which seems a broader category that includes all the mystics, even our New Age friends and quantum woo woo peddlers. Supernatural means a realm beyond the physical world where natural causes don’t apply, or, if you want, events in this physical world that are not caused by the natural processes of the material objects and the natural forces, but by “mind stuff”, whatever it is. Magic is a good example of the latter. This is evidently not compatible with materialism and naturalism. So, it’s either materialism or non-materialism, naturalism or supernaturalism, no middle ground here. The moment you decide not to embrace materialism, you’re in supernatural territory.

Speaking of superstitions, how many times have scientists and educators referred to the "singularity" at the heart of black holes. Singularities are almost as ridiculous as God - infinitely dense and infinitely small - which is obvious ********.

Fact is, when a star of 2.5 times or more stellar masses goes supernova, gravity apparently crushes matter down to quantum scales. However, gravity is not thought to make a difference at quantum scales. This is a major plot hole in materialism, suggesting that some of our assumptions about reality are wrong. At least researchers are moving away from hypothetical Schwarzchild non-spinning black holes, so that's a plus.

Again, no such plot hole in materialism. Gaps in our scientific knowledge do not immediately translate to “some spooky force must be involved and materialism is false”. As science progresses, new questions and new problems to solve arise. We know about black holes and all the facts that surround their existence because of science and its materialistic foundations. The theoretical physics that is trying to figure out the mathematical solution to what is happening inside of them is far from displaying the “god-is-the-answer” dogmatic attitude that we find in religious proselytizers. The fact that the physicists themselves are debating the issue and questioning each other is a sign of physical science’s good health, not the opposite.

Nope, not understanding the nature of consciousness is a massive plot hole of materialism and science. Until this question is resolved, the metaphysical door remains open, eg. panpsychism - at least.

The current materialist explanations for consciousness are, alas, inadequate. In terms of evolution, there is no need for any entity to be conscious if a "philosophical zombie" could do the same job more efficiently (as we are increasingly demonstrating with AI).

I notice that you changed from “explaining consciousness” to “explaining the nature of consciousness”, which begs the question. The argument is completely irrelevant anyway, because no metaphysical system, such as Idealism, has the answer to what is the nature of consciousness. If you know about any adequate non-materialistic explanation of consciousness, please deliver it right away, after so many years waiting I’m getting anxious.

OTOH, all that a materialistic explanation of consciousness requires is to make it the result of natural processes which occur in the living bodies of physical organisms, comprised of physical systems with physical organs, one of which is responsible for most of our conscious experience. That is quite an adequate explanation that is supported with concrete evidence. Unlike the philosophical speculations about zombies and the wishful thinking of AI enthusiasts.

Further, why should the alternative to materialism be idealism? All parties may be wrong. Perhaps it's not even possible for human brains to comprehend actual reality, leaving us forever treating the "icons" we use to interface with reality as the real thing? Until we delve deeper, these questions remain.

If there’s an alternative to Materialism that isn’t Idealism, I want to hear about it. What is it? Do you know it? Vague speculations don’t cast any shadow of doubt over the physicality of the universe as we know it, they don’t postpone that certainty for the future and leave questions remaining. Your “perhaps” is just a repetition of the phenomenalist argument. The fact is we live in a material world. We don’t know anything else, so you can keep speculating about the possibility of some other immaterial realm, but you cannot say you actually know something about it.

I do not see this as a battle between warring ideologies - idealism and materialism. That war does exist, but it's about as misguided as any other war. There is an inability for humans to admit that they might not know something, and perhaps never will. Yet this lack of knowing has been the typical state for humans from the start. The overblown assumptions of both idealism and materialism seem to provide the comfort of certainty. One's personality determines which schema's overly-optimistic confidence provides most comfort.

What we don’t know, we just don’t know, but we do know that we live in a physical universe comprised of matter and energy, which works naturally, without the intervention of “mental forces”, and that we are physical beings constituted by star dust. Why should we dismiss what we do know as if we ignored it? That surely would be an overblown aspiration of the epistemological nihilists in their quest for the ideal state of knowledge, the absolute. It’s the equivalent of positing that while any gap in our knowledge remains, anything goes. When you think you have figured out 99.99%, it could be untrue because the remaining 0.01% holds the ultimate secret to the universe.

Still, it's a limitation of what is supposed to be an all-encompassing model.

Nope. If all car models are designed to travel over a surface, it is not a limitation of my car model that it doesn’t travel suspended in the air. No metaphysical system, as an all-encompassing model, deals with what ought to be, but with what is, so that’s not a limitation of materialism.

Again, I don't accept the idealism vs materialism divide as anything but a social construct. It's like deciding whether the best system of government is fascism or communism, and not considering alternatives - or that alternatives may exist that we could never understand.

It seems to me that to entirely reject either materialism or idealism is as much of a mistake as rejecting modernism or postmodernism. These models of reality and society are essentially tools. Materialism can be augmented by intuition, and intuition can be bounded by logic. Likewise, postmodernism points to the limits of modernism, while postmodern ideas are rendered reasonable when moderated by some modernist standards.

It seems you have not understood the problem. Again, your examples point to other branches of philosophy that carry very little weight, if any, over the problems of metaphysics. By definition, those are failed analogies. What concerns us when talking about Materialism and Idealism is ontology, and these are simply not compatible ontologies, they are mutually exclusive. It is useless to insist that “we can’t reject either one”. Either everything is fundamentally mental or it is fundamentally physical. If you go through the dualist route, you will stumble with even more problems, as raised by Gassendi to Descartes, and which he could not solve.

Methinks you underestimate what is coming for us. Today's AI will indeed seem like pocket calculators compared with what's coming. AI will be pivotal, heralding at least as profound a change as tool use, the wheel, agriculture or the internet, perhaps as much as cyanobacteria 2.5bya.

As you well know, I can share your enthusiasm for the future practical achievements of technology. I don’t share the same enthusiasm for its future ability to replicate consciousness, which as of today is lacking.

[Sy Borg]

I am pointing out that progress comes at a cost. The cost of improved rationalism is the dampening of intuition. Intuition works. It is effective, which is why pre-scientific humans survived to later develop the scientific method. However, at large scales, rationalism is more reliable than intuition, hence its success.

I don’t think it’s a zero sum game. Intuition has its place in scientific discovery. When Archimedes had his eureka moment, this didn’t make his inquiry less rational, but more importantly, regardless of the nature of his epiphany, the result and valuable achievement was a physical principle that still stands today as solid, predictive, testable knowledge, recognizable as truly scientific.

That's why I neither said not implied that it was a zero sum game. I said that the changed emphasis "dampens" intuition, not eliminates it.

And Siberia remains a mystery. Just because something can be learned doesn't mean that it will. Many knowledge gaps will remain. It might not be important, but it is a fact, and is cause for rationalist humility.

Your argument implies that I will never explore Siberia and that there will always be that gap in my knowledge, only because I’m not currently interested, nor have the resources to go there. Your claim is not justified because it is not based on unsurmountable technical (practical) possibilities. If I really tried, in as many ways as possible, to reach Siberia, and still couldn’t make it, or if I was required to be there in one hour from my current location, then there would be reasonable expectations that I will never get to explore Siberia.

But if you read again, my argument has always been in response to the claim from Idealism and Phenomenology that there is a realm within reality that is inaccessible to our knowledge and that therefore the intrinsic materialism of science cannot be grounded realistically on facts independent of minds.

Ok, but I GUARANTEE that you will never explore Siberia, Timbuktu, Tierra del Fuego, the Antarctic and Bouvet Island.

Theoretically, you could, but we know you won't. The knowledge gaps remains. Again, the gaps are unimportant, but real.

Oh come now, what's this about supernatural beings? I don't mind if you run down the field with the ball, or even make a touchdown, but here you have just run past the goal line, out into the crowd and out of the stadium. You were apparently last seen in Honduras, still running :)

Seriously, let's put aside the goblins, grumpkins and wizards and consider actual reality, not the confused notions of theological literalists, who have mistaken human mental potential for a physical supernatural extra-universal spirit man.

To help clarify where I stand is this, I'll happily walk into any darkened room or place anywhere and not fear ghosts or supernatural entities. I'll certainly worry about obstacles, uneven ground, hostile humans or animals but I do not believe in the supernatural at all. Hopefully that helps.

Well, it was you who sent the ball out of the stadium with that straw man. I never said “supernatural beings”, I was happily settling for the term “supernatural forces”, which seems a broader category that includes all the mystics, even our New Age friends and quantum woo woo peddlers. Supernatural means a realm beyond the physical world where natural causes don’t apply, or, if you want, events in this physical world that are not caused by the natural processes of the material objects and the natural forces, but by “mind stuff”, whatever it is. Magic is a good example of the latter. This is evidently not compatible with materialism and naturalism. So, it’s either materialism or non-materialism, naturalism or supernaturalism, no middle ground here. The moment you decide not to embrace materialism, you’re in supernatural territory.

To say I disagree with the comment I have bolded would be an understatement. That is a poor truism, as wrong as GWB's 'If yer ain't with us, yer against us'.

Of course, I embrace naturalism and reject superstition - which would ideally be clear to you, given the pains I went to to make that point.

Contrary to your truism, there is a huge amount of middle ground between materialism and the supernatural. To start, the qualities of things that cannot be calculated. Everything that exists that we cannot perceive. Every web of interactions and relationships between entities that we do not notice ...

Speaking of superstitions, how many times have scientists and educators referred to the "singularity" at the heart of black holes. Singularities are almost as ridiculous as God - infinitely dense and infinitely small - which is obvious ********.

Fact is, when a star of 2.5 times or more stellar masses goes supernova, gravity apparently crushes matter down to quantum scales. However, gravity is not thought to make a difference at quantum scales. This is a major plot hole in materialism, suggesting that some of our assumptions about reality are wrong. At least researchers are moving away from hypothetical Schwarzchild non-spinning black holes, so that's a plus.

Again, no such plot hole in materialism. Gaps in our scientific knowledge do not immediately translate to “some spooky force must be involved and materialism is false”. As science progresses, new questions and new problems to solve arise. We know about black holes and all the facts that surround their existence because of science and its materialistic foundations. The theoretical physics that is trying to figure out the mathematical solution to what is happening inside of them is far from displaying the “god-is-the-answer” dogmatic attitude that we find in religious proselytizers. The fact that the physicists themselves are debating the issue and questioning each other is a sign of physical science’s good health, not the opposite.

If the QM and GR are ever reconciles, it may prove current science wrong. It might kill of the Standard Model, which still is full of holes and contestable concepts.

I am much less confident than you that humans have reality mostly worked out, barring a few details. I think about people 1,000 years ago, and how they probably thought they had most of reality sewn up too. Meanwhile, humans/AI in 10,000 years' time will surely see today's paradigms as quaint and creative, perhaps even superstitious.

Many times in the past scientists have been unconsciously influenced by the religious concepts prevalent in their societies. I suspect that future scientists will pick up all these assumptions. Really, Christianity is a pretty strongly materialistic religion, especially fundamentalism. Fundamentalists treat the poetic, allegorical and metaphorical content of their religious texts as physically real. Everything is rendered physically, seemingly because their mindset is inherently materialist.

Nope, not understanding the nature of consciousness is a massive plot hole of materialism and science. Until this question is resolved, the metaphysical door remains open, eg. panpsychism - at least.

The current materialist explanations for consciousness are, alas, inadequate. In terms of evolution, there is no need for any entity to be conscious if a "philosophical zombie" could do the same job more efficiently (as we are increasingly demonstrating with AI).

I notice that you changed from “explaining consciousness” to “explaining the nature of consciousness”, which begs the question. The argument is completely irrelevant anyway, because no metaphysical system, such as Idealism, has the answer to what is the nature of consciousness. If you know about any adequate non-materialistic explanation of consciousness, please deliver it right away, after so many years waiting I’m getting anxious.

OTOH, all that a materialistic explanation of consciousness requires is to make it the result of natural processes which occur in the living bodies of physical organisms, comprised of physical systems with physical organs, one of which is responsible for most of our conscious experience. That is quite an adequate explanation that is supported with concrete evidence. Unlike the philosophical speculations about zombies and the wishful thinking of AI enthusiasts.

I notice that you veered from the actual subject to my use of language. We can notice all kinds of things about each other, but that's boring. I'd rather just talk turkey and see what happens.

I don't claim to have alternative models that explain consciousness; I am just saying that the models that you cling to so hard, well, IMO they suck ;) They have been decisively proved not to work (yet) for decades. I can reject what I see as over-certainty in today's knowledge without having to pretend that I have a better answer.

I doubt that science is even two percent into its mission to understand reality. I am reminded of the 1970s, when humans were thought to soon be commuting in flying cars and travelling to distant galaxies at superluminal speeds. As Rummy said, you don't know what you don't know.

Humans today are like teenagers - we think we know a lot more than we actually do.

I do not see this as a battle between warring ideologies - idealism and materialism. That war does exist, but it's about as misguided as any other war. There is an inability for humans to admit that they might not know something, and perhaps never will. Yet this lack of knowing has been the typical state for humans from the start. The overblown assumptions of both idealism and materialism seem to provide the comfort of certainty. One's personality determines which schema's overly-optimistic confidence provides most comfort.

What we don’t know, we just don’t know, but we do know that we live in a physical universe comprised of matter and energy, which works naturally, without the intervention of “mental forces”, and that we are physical beings constituted by star dust. Why should we dismiss what we do know as if we ignored it? That surely would be an overblown aspiration of the epistemological nihilists in their quest for the ideal state of knowledge, the absolute. It’s the equivalent of positing that while any gap in our knowledge remains, anything goes. When you think you have figured out 99.99%, it could be untrue because the remaining 0.01% holds the ultimate secret to the universe.

You appear to have misunderstood my post. I am referring to the ideas as mental tools, not absolutes. Why would I dismiss knowledge? Or rather, why would you?

A decision to use some mental tools or not is a personal choice, but it's not philosophically important.

Again, I don't accept the idealism vs materialism divide as anything but a social construct. It's like deciding whether the best system of government is fascism or communism, and not considering alternatives - or that alternatives may exist that we could never understand.

It seems to me that to entirely reject either materialism or idealism is as much of a mistake as rejecting modernism or postmodernism. These models of reality and society are essentially tools. Materialism can be augmented by intuition, and intuition can be bounded by logic. Likewise, postmodernism points to the limits of modernism, while postmodern ideas are rendered reasonable when moderated by some modernist standards.

It seems you have not understood the problem. Again, your examples point to other branches of philosophy that carry very little weight, if any, over the problems of metaphysics. By definition, those are failed analogies. What concerns us when talking about Materialism and Idealism is ontology, and these are simply not compatible ontologies, they are mutually exclusive. It is useless to insist that “we can’t reject either one”. Either everything is fundamentally mental or it is fundamentally physical. If you go through the dualist route, you will stumble with even more problems, as raised by Gassendi to Descartes, and which he could not solve.

Your interpretation is not useful. Again, I think you are the one missing the point. We are probably too keen to make our own points and running at cross-purposes. SNAFU haha

Seriously, why treat intellectual tools as absolutes arther than just as tools? There's no reason to repeat others' mistakes, even if they are oh-so-vehement about their "babies". We can leverage intellect, emotions and creative imagination. Many materialists would never consider using creative imagination in any pursuit that mattered to them, which is basically a decision to reject intuition and eschew the placebo effect. Which is fine.

Methinks you underestimate what is coming for us. Today's AI will indeed seem like pocket calculators compared with what's coming. AI will be pivotal, heralding at least as profound a change as tool use, the wheel, agriculture or the internet, perhaps as much as cyanobacteria 2.5bya.

As you well know, I can share your enthusiasm for the future practical achievements of technology. I don’t share the same enthusiasm for its future ability to replicate consciousness, which as of today is lacking.

Sure it's lacking. The first planes were lacking too. Many of them face-planted. However, half a century later, a Saturn V rocket flew to the Moon and back.

One issue with developing consciousness is that researchers greatly underestimate the importance of the gut-brain link. It may be that entities must be alive first before being conscious. There is potential in the blending of biology and technology. One would presume that, in time, fragile biological tissues will be increasingly replaced by more robust parts.

The above seems a more promising path towards digitising consciousness than creating an AI with qualia. The issue here is time. It has taken the Earth 500m years to evolve abstract intelligence. Humans do many things that accelerate processes far beyond the tempo of natural selection, (eg. culture, climate change, extinction rates) but condensing 500 million years of evolution appears to be beyond current capabilities.

[Count Lucanor]

That's why I neither said not implied that it was a zero sum game. I said that the changed emphasis "dampens" intuition, not eliminates it.

You said it twice: that progress and improved rationalism came at a cost: the dampening of something that worked. When something comes at a cost, at the expense of another, you lose in one side what you gained at the other. That’s a zero sum game.

Ok, but I GUARANTEE that you will never explore Siberia, Timbuktu, Tierra del Fuego, the Antarctic and Bouvet Island.

Theoretically, you could, but we know you won't. The knowledge gaps remains. Again, the gaps are unimportant, but real.

That sounds like what you would say over a few drinks at a bar. But seriously, the joke has no weight: you cannot predict contingent events that depend on many factors that cannot be predetermined, nor you can’t control. This doesn’t help your point, there’s no such unsurpassable gap.

The moment you decide not to embrace materialism, you’re in supernatural territory.

To say I disagree with the comment I have bolded would be an understatement. That is a poor truism, as wrong as GWB's 'If yer ain't with us, yer against us'.

Of course, I embrace naturalism and reject superstition - which would ideally be clear to you, given the pains I went to to make that point.

Contrary to your truism, there is a huge amount of middle ground between materialism and the supernatural. To start, the qualities of things that cannot be calculated. Everything that exists that we cannot perceive. Every web of interactions and relationships between entities that we do not notice ...

There’s something wrong with your defense here. By definition a truism is a self-evident truth. The Cambridge dictionary defines it as: “a statement that is so obvious or said so often that its truth is not questioned”. So it’s really weird that you say that you disagree with an unquestionable truth at the same time that you acknowledge it is an unquestionable truth. It cannot be wrong and be a truism, get it?

There cannot be ground between materialism and the supernatural. First, for the obvious reason that the supernatural does not exist. Now, if you want to posit the existence of a supernatural realm, go on, no one is stopping you. How you’re going to explain afterwards that you still reject superstition and embrace naturalism, will surely be interesting, given all the pains you say you go to to make the point. Secondly, because of what I already said: gaps in our knowledge do not automatically translate into “spooky things are real and materialism is false”.

If the QM and GR are ever reconciles, it may prove current science wrong. It might kill of the Standard Model, which still is full of holes and contestable concepts.

I am much less confident than you that humans have reality mostly worked out, barring a few details. I think about people 1,000 years ago, and how they probably thought they had most of reality sewn up too. Meanwhile, humans/AI in 10,000 years' time will surely see today's paradigms as quaint and creative, perhaps even superstitious.

You keep speculating. Meanwhile, the progress of materialistic science remains incontestable (perhaps another truism). Unlike you, my calculations are not projections based on speculations about the future, but in the concrete exponential advances of science in the last two centuries in comparison with was known or believed for thousands of years before. It’s not proportional, not even close, not even by any stretch of our imagination. That’s why it is called the Scientific Revolution, I guess. As it often happens, the more you learn, the more you know how much there is yet to know, but there’s no reason to believe one must go backwards to the tools and frameworks, the paradigms of the pre-scientific era. That is reactionary thinking, the one behind the denials of evolution, climate change, the real existence of the moon, and so on, a way of thinking that no matter its form, taste or color, has one thing in common: finds in science and its materialistic foundations an obstacle for peddling nonsense.

Many times in the past scientists have been unconsciously influenced by the religious concepts prevalent in their societies. I suspect that future scientists will pick up all these assumptions. Really, Christianity is a pretty strongly materialistic religion, especially fundamentalism. Fundamentalists treat the poetic, allegorical and metaphorical content of their religious texts as physically real. Everything is rendered physically, seemingly because their mindset is inherently materialist.

You’re confusing milk with Magnesia. There’s nothing inherently materialistic in the ancient myths of religion, barring perhaps the concept of the soul in Judaism. If there’s no clear distinction in oral traditions between the divine and earthly realms it is only because of the anarchy and incoherence of mythical thinking, lacking systematization. As soon as theological rationalization appears, such distinctions surface more clearly, as we can see in the writings of the founder of Christianity (Paul), influenced by Greek thought. All the history of philosophy and its sibling (religion) ever since, has been permeated by the fundamental tenets of Idealism.

I don't claim to have alternative models that explain consciousness; I am just saying that the models that you cling to so hard, well, IMO they suck They have been decisively proved not to work (yet) for decades. I can reject what I see as over-certainty in today's knowledge without having to pretend that I have a better answer.

Of course you don’t have alternative models that explain consciousness, that shows. Evolution deniers from the ID camp don’t have a systematic, rational alternative to evolution by natural selection either, their only aim is to eliminate science as an obstacle. Evolution sucks, they say, it’s not 100% proven, it doesn’t work, there are gaps, etc. It’s no different. The same arguments. I’ll take your word that you’re in that bandwagon.

You appear to have misunderstood my post. I am referring to the ideas as mental tools, not absolutes. Why would I dismiss knowledge? Or rather, why would you?

A decision to use some mental tools or not is a personal choice, but it's not philosophically important.
[…]

Seriously, why treat intellectual tools as absolutes arther than just as tools? There's no reason to repeat others' mistakes, even if they are oh-so-vehement about their "babies". We can leverage intellect, emotions and creative imagination. Many materialists would never consider using creative imagination in any pursuit that mattered to them, which is basically a decision to reject intuition and eschew the placebo effect. Which is fine.

I did get your post. It is all about reducing the Materialism/Idealism distinction to a subtle and irrelevant scholastic intellectual discussion. And it’s all about peddling epistemological nihilism, so that anything goes. You got it all wrong either way. Most, if not all of the history of thought and social practices has been dominated by Idealism and its non-material realms. Science and materialism represent a major paradigm shift, a real game changer, which is still resisted by the whole legion of mystics and reactionaries in the bandwagon. Whatever can be done to prevent a secular, rational, science-minded society from flourishing, they will push it hard. Lack of creativity, imagination? That’s just gratuitous bashing of straw men. It has nothing to do with metaphysical endorsements.

Sure it's lacking. The first planes were lacking too. Many of them face-planted. However, half a century later, a Saturn V rocket flew to the Moon and back.

Obviously false analogy. Just because past failed attempts resulted in success, does not mean that current failures will end up in success.

[Sy Borg]

That's why I neither said not implied that it was a zero sum game. I said that the changed emphasis "dampens" intuition, not eliminates it.

You said it twice: that progress and improved rationalism came at a cost: the dampening of something that worked. When something comes at a cost, at the expense of another, you lose in one side what you gained at the other. That’s a zero sum game.

Incorrect, Mr Count.

My usual analogy (did I already use it here?) is that, in order to become an adult, we must forever lose some qualities. We will lose some of our innocence, our cuteness, our charm, reflexes and a child's ability to learn quickly. As adults, we have have greater knowledge, experience, networks and understanding instead.

It's not a zero sum game; the losses and gains are far from equal. Would you choose to keep your youthful innocence, cuteness and quickness and forego your hard-won knowledge, experience, networks and understanding? Of course not, because that would make you dysfunctional in an adult word.

It's clear that human progress is more influential and potent than that which we lost along the way (some natural knowledge, instinct and intuition etc). However, some things have been lost via simple opportunity cost and entropy. I'm not sure why this is hard to admit. Must modernity be thought of as perfect in every way? Must all mention of its limits be quashed, lest the masses revert to base theism?

How about just accepting reality as it comes without thinking about how one's ideological enemies may use it?

Ok, but I GUARANTEE that you will never explore Siberia, Timbuktu, Tierra del Fuego, the Antarctic and Bouvet Island.

Theoretically, you could, but we know you won't. The knowledge gaps remains. Again, the gaps are unimportant, but real.

That sounds like what you would say over a few drinks at a bar. But seriously, the joke has no weight: you cannot predict contingent events that depend on many factors that cannot be predetermined, nor you can’t control. This doesn’t help your point, there’s no such unsurpassable gap.

I am pointing out that the difference between theory and practice is not always a matter of physics and chemistry; it's also circumstantial. Do you deny this? If so, on what basis?

The moment you decide not to embrace materialism, you’re in supernatural territory.

To say I disagree with the comment I have bolded would be an understatement. That is a poor truism, as wrong as GWB's 'If yer ain't with us, yer against us'.

Of course, I embrace naturalism and reject superstition - which would ideally be clear to you, given the pains I went to to make that point.

Contrary to your truism, there is a huge amount of middle ground between materialism and the supernatural. To start, the qualities of things that cannot be calculated. Everything that exists that we cannot perceive. Every web of interactions and relationships between entities that we do not notice ...

There’s something wrong with your defense here. By definition a truism is a self-evident truth. The Cambridge dictionary defines it as: “a statement that is so obvious or said so often that its truth is not questioned”. So it’s really weird that you say that you disagree with an unquestionable truth at the same time that you acknowledge it is an unquestionable truth. It cannot be wrong and be a truism, get it?

There cannot be ground between materialism and the supernatural. First, for the obvious reason that the supernatural does not exist. Now, if you want to posit the existence of a supernatural realm, go on, no one is stopping you. How you’re going to explain afterwards that you still reject superstition and embrace naturalism, will surely be interesting, given all the pains you say you go to to make the point. Secondly, because of what I already said: gaps in our knowledge do not automatically translate into “spooky things are real and materialism is false”.

Arrgh, I'm getting old and used the wrong word. I mean "factoid" rather than "truism" - something that sounds "true-ish" but is not true. Whatever, my intent would have been clear to most readers, anyway.

Your claim that there can be no middle ground between materialism and what we refer to as "the supernatural" is false for the reasons I made above, which you did not address, because you were having so much fun with "truism".

Again, some areas that lie between materialism and the so-called supernatural are, as stated, "... the qualities of things that cannot be calculated. Everything that exists that we cannot perceive. Every web of interactions and relationships between entities that we do not notice ..."

Materialism cannot account for any of those things. The scientific method cannot solve them. They cannot readily and accurately be quantified. Many things in reality will never be known by anyone. Countless events simply happening, unobserved, unknown.

The complex informational webs of reality are not "spooky" as you seem to claim. It's just aspects of reality that science can't do much about.

If the QM and GR are ever reconciled, it may prove current science wrong. It might kill of the Standard Model, which still is full of holes and contestable concepts.

I am much less confident than you that humans have reality mostly worked out, barring a few details. I think about people 1,000 years ago, and how they probably thought they had most of reality sewn up too. Meanwhile, humans/AI in 10,000 years' time will surely see today's paradigms as quaint and creative, perhaps even superstitious.

You keep speculating. Meanwhile, the progress of materialistic science remains incontestable (perhaps another truism). Unlike you, my calculations are not projections based on speculations about the future, but in the concrete exponential advances of science in the last two centuries in comparison with was known or believed for thousands of years before. It’s not proportional, not even close, not even by any stretch of our imagination. That’s why it is called the Scientific Revolution, I guess. As it often happens, the more you learn, the more you know how much there is yet to know, but there’s no reason to believe one must go backwards to the tools and frameworks, the paradigms of the pre-scientific era. That is reactionary thinking, the one behind the denials of evolution, climate change, the real existence of the moon, and so on, a way of thinking that no matter its form, taste or color, has one thing in common: finds in science and its materialistic foundations an obstacle for peddling nonsense.

You have not made any calculations. We are both speculating:

• You speculate that humans have already worked out most of reality, with only some arcane details to fix. Thus, in 10,000 years' time, you believe that scientists will still use all the same models we use today, because they are already correct.

• I speculate that in 10,000 years' time, most of the models we believe are true today will be superseded and today's science will be seen as riddled with superstition. It's highly likely that some findings in the future will break some our current paradigms.

I also speculate that most scientists would concur with my view than yours. Of course, if civilisation fails, none of the above will apply.

Many times in the past scientists have been unconsciously influenced by the religious concepts prevalent in their societies. I suspect that future scientists will pick up all these assumptions. Really, Christianity is a pretty strongly materialistic religion, especially fundamentalism. Fundamentalists treat the poetic, allegorical and metaphorical content of their religious texts as physically real. Everything is rendered physically, seemingly because their mindset is inherently materialist.

You’re confusing milk with Magnesia. There’s nothing inherently materialistic in the ancient myths of religion, barring perhaps the concept of the soul in Judaism. If there’s no clear distinction in oral traditions between the divine and earthly realms it is only because of the anarchy and incoherence of mythical thinking, lacking systematization. As soon as theological rationalization appears, such distinctions surface more clearly, as we can see in the writings of the founder of Christianity (Paul), influenced by Greek thought. All the history of philosophy and its sibling (religion) ever since, has been permeated by the fundamental tenets of Idealism.

I probably did not make myself clear, but you made no effort to work it out.

Christianity is indeed inherently materialistic. The myths are metaphors for perceived unseen dynamics, to make them more understandable for the people. They became stories about people that could be related to, and remembered. They rendered natural dynamic "material" with anthropomorphic myths.

Since then, Christian fundamentalists treated the poetry and metaphor of the texts as literally true. That is, materially true.

Today there is a "prosperity gospel", which treats material wealth as evidence of righteousness, and poverty as evidence of sin. There are believers with a more Spinoza-like non-material notion of God, but they are either a tiny minority or they keep their vies to themselves to avoid ostracism, probably some of each.

I don't claim to have alternative models that explain consciousness; I am just saying that the models that you cling to so hard, well, IMO they suck They have been decisively proved not to work (yet) for decades. I can reject what I see as over-certainty in today's knowledge without having to pretend that I have a better answer.

Of course you don’t have alternative models that explain consciousness, that shows. Evolution deniers from the ID camp don’t have a systematic, rational alternative to evolution by natural selection either, their only aim is to eliminate science as an obstacle. Evolution sucks, they say, it’s not 100% proven, it doesn’t work, there are gaps, etc. It’s no different. The same arguments. I’ll take your word that you’re in that bandwagon.

Funny thing. I think your model of consciousness sucks exactly because because it is quasi-creationist. In your anthropocentrism, you and others ignore critical aspects of evolutionary history - the fact that life started as genetic material supported by a metabolism, and that life was feeling its environment long before the evolution of brains.

Humans are famously brain-oriented. So, in your semi-theocratic anthropocentrism, you assume that the brain is the be-all-and-end-all - the sole filter and generator of one's sense of being. This viewpoint assumes that most life forms are "philosophical zombies" - which your incoherent schema claim do not exist.

If you thought more about the seminal work of Dawkins and Wilson and less about how bad religion is, you would make more progress.

You appear to have misunderstood my post. I am referring to the ideas as mental tools, not absolutes. Why would I dismiss knowledge? Or rather, why would you?

A decision to use some mental tools or not is a personal choice, but it's not philosophically important.
[…]

Seriously, why treat intellectual tools as absolutes arther than just as tools? There's no reason to repeat others' mistakes, even if they are oh-so-vehement about their "babies". We can leverage intellect, emotions and creative imagination. Many materialists would never consider using creative imagination in any pursuit that mattered to them, which is basically a decision to reject intuition and eschew the placebo effect. Which is fine.

I did get your post. It is all about reducing the Materialism/Idealism distinction to a subtle and irrelevant scholastic intellectual discussion. And it’s all about peddling epistemological nihilism, so that anything goes. You got it all wrong either way. Most, if not all of the history of thought and social practices has been dominated by Idealism and its non-material realms. Science and materialism represent a major paradigm shift, a real game changer, which is still resisted by the whole legion of mystics and reactionaries in the bandwagon. Whatever can be done to prevent a secular, rational, science-minded society from flourishing, they will push it hard. Lack of creativity, imagination? That’s just gratuitous bashing of straw men. It has nothing to do with metaphysical endorsements.

No, you did not get my post at all, alas. A metaphor for your approach would be trying to remove an ingrown hair with a power drill. In each case, things become messy quickly without intervention.

You falsely paint this scenario as you embracing modernism while I embrace postmodernism. Materialism and idealism have now been conflated to modernism and postmodernism. Ok.

Your first logical error is in taking the "If you ain't with us, yer against us" approach, which is anti-philosophical.

Secondly, even if you had sufficient objectivity to question my post on the basis of the middle ground fallacy ("the truth must be in the middle"), you'd still be wrong. There's no reason why answers need to be exactly in the middle, and that is not my claim.

Here is where you reveal your link between idealism and post-modernism: "peddling epistemological nihilism, so that anything goes".

Again, you are completely wrong I am very much a modernist, which anyone who's read my posts here for decades would know, but I also accept that post-modernism has its place. The concept has a bad reputation because it has been misunderstood and misused as a replacement for modernism, rather than a critique that reveals some of modernism's limitations.

Epistemology operates as postmodern tempering of your certainty regarding ontology. Postmodernism questions claims regarding objective truth and morality. It questions anyone's claim to be completely objective. It questions the notion that reason and logic can solve all problems.

[Count Lucanor]

Incorrect, Mr Count.

My usual analogy (did I already use it here?) is that, in order to become an adult, we must forever lose some qualities. We will lose some of our innocence, our cuteness, our charm, reflexes and a child's ability to learn quickly. As adults, we have have greater knowledge, experience, networks and understanding instead.

It's not a zero sum game; the losses and gains are far from equal. Would you choose to keep your youthful innocence, cuteness and quickness and forego your hard-won knowledge, experience, networks and understanding? Of course not, because that would make you dysfunctional in an adult word.

It's clear that human progress is more influential and potent than that which we lost along the way (some natural knowledge, instinct and intuition etc).

You keep saying that we lost something in exchange for our gains, whether that’s a zero sum game or not matters less than the fact that the argument fails. While it may work in the case of our personal development, it does not work in the context of our research practices, which don’t follow a fixed script. In any case, the whole process will go through several stages, with different inputs and outputs from each one. There are opportunities for intuitive approaches at some points, even resorting to creativity and imagination, especially at the moment of figuring out a workable hypothesis and designing the appropriate testing conditions. At some other points in the process, a more rigorous methodical approach is required, usually when applying measurements, controls and verifications. Archimedes had his Eureka moment, but at the end he had to validate his findings.

I am pointing out that the difference between theory and practice is not always a matter of physics and chemistry; it's also circumstantial. Do you deny this? If so, on what basis?

Circumstances may vary. By circumstantial you should mean contingent. What is contingent may or may not happen, it’s not predetermined, it’s not predictable. I may have limitations to go to Siberia, as well as any particular scientific research might find practical limitations, as any human endeavor, but being those limitations circumstantial, contingent, accessory, that can change. Whether I or the scientist overcomes those limitations, we don’t know, we’ll have to see. That’s different from facing essential, intrinsic, unavoidable restrictions, which indeed there are. The point that Idealists and Phenomenologists make is that reason and science face an unavoidable restriction in its access to a realm of things in themselves, which they call noumena. That’s the point in contention, my focus in this thread. If you want to address it, I’m all ears, if you want to talk about turkey, it’s a free forum. I like it with gravy.

Your claim that there can be no middle ground between materialism and what we refer to as "the supernatural" is false the reasons I made above, which you did not address:

Again, some areas that lie between materialism and the so-called supernatural are "... the qualities of things that cannot be calculated. Everything that exists that we cannot perceive. Every web of interactions and relationships between entities that we do not notice ..."

Materialism cannot account for any of those things. The scientific method cannot solve them. Many things in reality will never be known by anyone. Countless events simply happening, unobserved, unknown.

The complex informational webs of reality are not "spooky" as you seem to claim. It's just aspects of reality that science can't do much about.

If the “supernatural” is only just “so-called supernatural” and it isn’t spooky, why would you then call it “supernatural”? If it’s just natural, it doesn’t really exist as the supernatural, spooky realm, which was exactly what I said. I’m not calling the natural world spooky, you are. What would be the point then when saying that there’s a middle ground between materialism (which implies naturalism) and the supernatural? So, let me go back to my statement, which still stands in its original meaning : once you decide not to embrace materialism, you are in spooky territory.

“Things that cannot be calculated” do not fall into the category of spooky, supernatural. We cannot calculate the exact number of stars in a patch of sky viewed with the James Webb telescope, that doesn’t make them spooky, supernatural. Also, if you cannot perceive something to exist, there’s no reason to assume that it exists, nor you can claim that not being able to perceive this hypothetical (at best) thing, automatically makes science or anything else not competent for solving our questions about the universe.

You have not made any calculations. We are both speculating:

Not true. I’m not working with exact numbers, which are not needed, but I’m dealing with concrete historical facts: the volume of things we know since the last 200 years, including what we get right now that we used to get wrong, vs the volume of things we knew before that, is simply appalling. That’s not speculation. Throwing guesses at the future, like you do, that’s speculation.

-You speculate that humans have already worked out most of reality, with only some arcane details to fix. Thus, in 10,000 years' time, you believe that scientists will still use all the same models we use today, because they are already correct.

None of that corresponds to anything I said. Paradoxically, your mindset is that you have already figured out the actual extension of reality and put yourself in a position to judge how much the rest of humans have not worked out. I think the other way: I look to what we have worked out vs what we had before. I look at what frameworks we have used to achieve it and what frameworks we used to have. Makes more sense than your speculations.

- I speculate that in 10,000 years' time, most of the models we believe are true today will be superseded and today's science will be seen as riddled with superstition. It's highly likely that some findings in the future will break some our current paradigms.

I also speculate that most scientists would concur with my view than yours. Of course, if civilisation fails, none of the above will apply.

Well, OK, you can keep speculating. I pass.

I probably did not make myself clear and you made no effort to understand the point I was making.

Christianity indeed inherently materialistic. The myths themselves are metaphors for perceived unseen dynamics, to make them more understandable. To render them more "material".

Meanwhile, Christian fundamentalists treat the poetry and metaphor with which the ancients expressed themselves as literally true. That is, materially true. Today there is a "prosperity gospel", which treats material wealth as evidence of righteousness, and poverty as evidence of sin. There are believers with a more Spinoza-like non-material notion of God, but they are either a tiny minority or they keep their vies to themselves to avoid ostracism, probably some of each.

Saying that Christianity is inherently materialistic has to be one of the most preposterous, wildest things I have ever heard. I mean, not even one chance. It is widely accepted that Christianity, ever since the beginning, endorsed notions of spirituality and immaterial realms. Paul thought he had seen Jesus as a ghost (not on flesh). Already in the First Council of Nicaea the discussions were about the divinity of the son of God and the Aryan controversy, which concerned the salvation of the immaterial souls. That you can think a doctrine body deeply committed with these notions is inherently materialistic, is baffling. Your argument that myths are materialized is laughable. It seems you cannot make the very important philosophical distinction between what is deemed “real” and what is deemed “material”. The ghost believers think such entities are real, but not material. Plato held that universal ideas were real, yet still ideas, not material substances (supposedly mere shadows of those universals).

Funny thing. I think your model of consciousness sucks exactly because because it is quasi-creationist. In your anthropocentrism, you and others ignore critical aspects of evolutionary history - the fact that life started as genetic material supported by a metabolism, and that life was feeling its environment long before the evolution of brains.

What is really funny is than none of your assertions point to a non-materialist model of consciousness. You might think that mine sucks, I happen to believe that about yours too, but the important thing is that we can both agree that there’s no respectable alternative among the ones compatible with metaphysical Idealism, that is, the ones that deviate from naturalism and physicalism.

Humans are famously brain-oriented. So, in your semi-theocratic anthropocentrism, you assume that the brain is the be-all-and-end-all - the sole filter and generator of one's sense of being. This viewpoint assumes that most life forms are "philosophical zombies" - which your incoherent schema claims does not exist.

If you thought more about the seminal work of Dawkins and Wilson and less about how bad religion is, you would make more progress.

Ha! Dawkins is a naturalist and a materialist. Not only that, but an advocate of science as a major influence in society, but apparently he’s among the good ones, just because he has been critical of anthropocentrism. Anyway, nothing in what you said casts even a tiny shadow of doubt on naturalism and materialism. You may want to believe that you have a better materialistic and naturalistic explanation of consciousness, but nevertheless materialistic. Don’t you think it’s compatible or will be compatible with science?

You falsely paint this scenario as you embracing modernism while I embrace postmodernism. Materialism and idealism have now been conflated to modernism and postmodernism. Ok.

Your first logical error is in taking the "If you ain't with us, yer against us" approach, which is anti-philosophical.

Secondly, even if you had sufficient objectivity to question my post on the basis of the middle ground fallacy ("the truth must be in the middle", you'd still be wrong. There's no reason why answers need to be exactly in the middle, and that is not my claim.

Here is where you reveal your link between idealism and post-modernism: "peddling epistemological nihilism, so that anything goes".

Again, you are completely wrong

I am very much a modernist, which anyone who's read my posts here for decades would know, but I also accept that post-modernism has its place. The concept has a bad reputation because it has been misunderstood and misused as a replacement for modernism, rather than a critique that reveals some of modernism's limitations.

Epistemology operates as postmodern tempering of your certainty regarding ontology. Postmodernism questions claims regarding objective truth and morality. It questions anyone's claim to be completely objective. It questions the notion that reason and logic can solve all problems.

You really have gone off the rails here. I mean, what are you talking about? Postmodernism and modernism? Oh, please, come on! Such deviations from the topic are mere distractions and perhaps your best and only chance to produce more straw men, in industrial quantities. It’s funny how you get a step forward, plant arguments that I’m supposed to say (even though I never said such things), and then answer them. How clever!!