Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Gallup's Mirror on February 2, 2013 at 12:18pm

If it were the case that we simply perceived our own material world, from inside it, how could they arrive at that conclusion?

This is a classic example of selection bias. You're counting one concept the ancients got (barely) right about nature but ignoring (perhaps millions) of other ancient concepts about nature that they got wrong.

You're essentially proposing that arriving at a correct conclusion without the backing of empirical science is a test for the concept of dualism as you propose it. By the same test, this time counting both the misses and the hits, dualism fails miserably.

If our brains and consciousnesses were simply the accumulation of sense perception, how did they arrive at that conclusion? Where did that idea come from?

They used the natural philosophy of classical antiquity: a process of reason that produces abstract concepts. One such concept was that matter can be split into two until it reaches a point where it can no longer be divided. They were right in that the chemical element oxygen is divisible down to a single oxygen molecule (O2) but wrong in that it can still be divided further into atomic oxygen (O1) and further still into electrons, protons, and neutrons, and further still into quarks.

If there's a cosmic encyclopedia of knowledge-- which our human brains tap into by mental telepathy-- then it's shockingly wrong, misleading, and incomplete.

That, or the cosmic encyclopedia concept is ridiculous drivel; consciousness is how we experience the brain's neurological process of stimuli, memory, association, and response, and reason is simply the product of that process.

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Permalink Reply by Anon on February 2, 2013 at 8:43pm

I'm not suggesting that there is some kind of "cosmic encyclopedia".

I'm suggesting that there is a fourth dimension (at least) of thought. Perhaps more. Music? Pathos? Time? I don't think the world can sufficiently be explained by just the three dimensions of space, and string theory suggests there may possibly be ten such dimensions...

 

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Permalink Reply by Gallup's Mirror on February 2, 2013 at 10:04pm

I'm not suggesting that there is some kind of "cosmic encyclopedia".

Of course you are. You're just calling it "a fourth dimension of thought" rather than a "cosmic encyclopedia". Your basic concept is that thought or knowledge exists independently and the brain only accesses it. (How? Telepathy? Radio waves? Morse Code?)

I'm suggesting that there is a fourth dimension (at least) of thought.

Without a single shred of empirical evidence, you might as well be suggesting we play a game of choo-choo train.

Permalink Reply by archaeopteryx on January 30, 2013 at 11:00am

Well, you certainly can't prove any of what you speak of to be true, you can only deduce the probabilities of it's likelihood, and even then, I fail to see how you could ever prove your deductions were correct. But if you enjoy pissing into the wind, far be it from me to stop you.

Of course a tree makes a sound when it falls in the forest - the same sonic mechanics that act to create the sound a human hears, don't suddenly cease to operate in his/her absence. As far as this planet is concerned, Man is entirely superfluous.

RE: "Heather Spoonheim suggested that some concepts are too large for a single brain to comprehend" - yes, well that was Heather's fault for offering you something you could sink a hook into, and I suspect she's regretting volunteering same.

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Permalink Reply by Anon on January 30, 2013 at 11:05am

I am not actually speaking of anything and have never even stated a position since I have none. Every post I have made has been framed as an honest question. You guys seem to be on some kind of blind theist-hunt. I came here because it said "Fellow Atheists, what is your take on Dualism?" I didn't expect to walk into some kind of monist Inquisition.

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Permalink Reply by Anon on January 30, 2013 at 11:08am

So thinking = pissing into the wind? If everyone thought that we'd still be living in caves.

We know sonic mechanics exist. We know abstract ideas exist. Does that make consciousness superfluous to both? Sonic mechanics exist in the physical world. Where do abstract ideas exist?

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Permalink Reply by archaeopteryx on January 30, 2013 at 11:53am

I said: "I fail to see how you could ever prove your deductions were correct. But if you enjoy pissing into the wind, far be it from me to stop you."

Could you enlighten me as to how your ability to prove your deductions would in any way facilitate or prevent our living in caves? I'd just like to understand how your mind is capable of making such a connection.

You've spent a lot of time throwing around E=MC2 - what would you call that, an abstract idea?

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Permalink Reply by Anon on January 30, 2013 at 11:58am

I'm not talking about my deductions per se, I'm talking about thinking in general. It has merit, thinking that is, and is not just 'pissing into the wind'.

Yes I would call E=mc2 an abstract idea. Wouldn't you?

 

Permalink Reply by archaeopteryx on January 30, 2013 at 1:37pm

E+MC2, combined, as they one day will be, with yet-to-be discovered principles of quantum mechanics, operated the Universe long before Man permanently leaped down from the trees, and will continue to do so long after the trees themselves are gone. Our "abstract idea," regarding E+MC2, was nothing more than our perception of its effects, much as we derive our concept of what causes wind by watching its effect on the objects around us.

Have you another explanation?

Permalink Reply by Anon on January 30, 2013 at 10:55pm

Yes, they operate the universe, but my question is where do they exist? Everything else we perceive exists somewhere. I can see the table. It is there. Where is E=mc2? If E=mc2, what does E+mc2=?

Where does the number 1 or 2 exist? As Sagacious Hawk suggested, and against my better judgment, am reposting this in the philosophy forum under the title "Dualism and Monism - An Atheist Viewpoint". I've tried to order some of the questions I think are appropriate, and hopefully bring some structure to this tangled thread. I just want to state again, AGAIN, that I am not offering answers, since I don't even have a position to argue from. I'm just posing questions I think are interesting. Thanks

Permalink Reply by archaeopteryx on January 30, 2013 at 11:34pm

Anon, you're confusing the forces with the concepts defining them - the forces exist everywhere, the concepts exist in the minds of Man and possibly other sentient beings throughout the universe.

Permalink Reply by Anon on January 30, 2013 at 11:36pm

Yes that is true, but still doesn't resolve the problem of where the pure concepts exist, if no-one is there to see them? The effects of these concepts exist, we can perceive the effects, but everything that we can perceive having an effect, has a place. Where do the pure concepts exist?

Do you think we could possibly move this discussion here? Will add the response you posted since it answers some of the questions I posed. Thanks.

The tree falls, and we both agreed that the sonic particles exist. Where do the pure concepts exist?

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