Dualism does not mean that there is more than one way of thinking about reality. — Dfpolis
... they [physical beings] have no intrinsic necessity and so need to be sustained in being by something that has such necessity. — Dfpolis
... the laws of nature are contingent and need to be discovered empirically.
... an agent intellect to understand intelligible contents
You misunderstand the definition. I mean the "ability to be aware" in operation. I add "of intelligibility," because we are never aware without being aware of something intelligible. This is important because the carrier of intelligibility is a neural state. I thank you for showing me how my definition can be misunderstood.You define consciousness as "awareness of intelligibility", to be aware of our ability to understand. What about our ability to be aware on the first place....known in Science as Consciousness!(the ability to be aware of internal or environmental stimuli , to reflect upon them with different mind properties through the connections achieved by the Central Lateral thalamus i.e.intlligibility" and thus creating conscious content during a mental state.) — Nickolasgaspar
What you call "cherry picking," I call "focusing." My work is no more cherry-picking than any study that focuses one aspect of a whole to the exclusion of others.Its looks like we have the practice of cherry picking a specific secondary mind property known as intelligibility or Symbolic thinking or Meaning — Nickolasgaspar
Intelligibility is typically a property of objects in nature that may be neurally encoded, not a property of the mind. In the mind, it is actually known, rather than merely intelligible, for consciousness makes merely intelligible contents actually known.a specific secondary mind property known as intelligibility — Nickolasgaspar
No, it is not the Hard Problem. You need only refer to my article.s this the Hard problem for you? because if that is the case a simple search will provide tones of known mechanisms on how the brain uses symbolic language and learning (previous experience) to introduce meaning to stimuli (internal or external). — Nickolasgaspar
No, those are explanations for the problems. The problems I was referring to are:Are the facts you raised the following.
(1) The Fundamental Abstraction of natural science (attending to the object to the exclusion of the subject);
(2) The limits of a Cartesian conceptual space. — Nickolasgaspar
I am also a methodological naturalist, with no need to capitalize because it is a method, not an ideology. Nothing in my article transgresses the bounds of methodological naturalism. The actual problem is you seem to be a closet physicalist -- unwilling to admit that the intentional theater of operations is just as natural as the physical theater. If you were not a closet physicalist, you would have no difficulty in being open to intentional realities. So, you might as well come out of the closet.I am a Methodological Naturalist and like science my frameworks and gaps of knowledge are shaped by our Scientific Observations and Logic solely based on Pragmatic Necessity , not because of an ideology. — Nickolasgaspar
On the other hand, when we do know, say by analyzing first-person experience, we should admit it.When we don't know, we admit we don't. We shouldn't go on and invent extra entities which are in direct conflict with the current successful Paradigm of Science. — Nickolasgaspar
This is not the claim of a methodological naturalist, but of a dogmatic physicalist.Yes a healthy functioning brain is a necessary and sufficient explanation for any property of mind known to us. — Nickolasgaspar
For me, it is not. For you, it seems to be reason to ignore all previous progress.that's not a reason to overlook the huge body of knowledge that we've gained the last 35 years. — Nickolasgaspar
All humans are liable to err, and no one can know everything. I opened this thread to allow people the opportunity to point out actual problems. My not knowing everything is not an actual problem with my work. If you find an actual mistake, please point it out.How can you be sure about the epistemic foundations of your ideas and positions when you are not familiar with the latest epistemology on the topic? How can you be sure that we haven't answered those questions when your philosophy is based on ideas and knowledge of the past? — Nickolasgaspar
See above. The list is not intended to be exhaustive. It is just the problems I have identified.IS it ok if I ask you to put all the problems in a list (bullets) so I can check them? — Nickolasgaspar
Please explain how neuroscience has come closer to understanding our awareness of (as opposed to the processing of) neurally encoded contents.yes they have been huge progress to the emerging physical nature of consciousness. — Nickolasgaspar
Congratulations on coming out of the closet!By default we know,can verify and are able to investigate only one realm, the Physical. — Nickolasgaspar
Again, the issue is not contents, but our awareness of contents.In my academic links you can find tones of papers analyzing which(and how) mechanisms enable the brain to introduce content in our conscious states. — Nickolasgaspar
I am not asking you to solve "every single problem," but to respond to my actual arguments. If you do not wish to do so, you are wasting my time.Can you give me an example for every single problem? — Nickolasgaspar
All science is based on abstract concepts, because it seeks to be universal, and universal ideas are abstract.Abstract concepts do not help complex topics like this one. — Nickolasgaspar
Not at all. I said that we are dealing with first person data, and you responded I was dealing with the supernatural.Plus you strawmanned me again with that supernatural first person data. — Nickolasgaspar
Science cannot possibly tell us any theory is sufficient to all phenomena, but only that it is sufficient for the phenomena for which it has been confirmed.Science tells us that the brain is necessary and sufficient to explain the phenomenon even if we have loads of question to answer — Nickolasgaspar
Evolution’s necessity derives from the laws of nature, which are intentional realities, the vehicle of divine providence.
Biological species, as secondary substances, are beings of reason founded in the natures of their instances. They are traceable to God’s creative intent ...
Logical principles essential to science require these laws to be maintained by a self-conserving reality identifiable as God.
No, I am not. I am not saying they are separate, only that they are real because if they were not real, we could neither discover nor describe them, and we do both.You are claiming a dualist ontology. The laws of nature as Platonic entities — Fooloso4
The laws of nature have physical, not metaphysical necessity. They could be different, and there might even be actual universes in which they are different.Do the laws of nature have such necessity? — Fooloso4
Yes. Logically (wrt human knowledge) and metaphysically (wrt the nature of existence) contingent.I assume you mean that the laws of nature are physically necessary but logically contingent. — Fooloso4
Yes, I see the laws of nature as God's general will for matter. That is my conclusion, not my definition.Upon further examination ontological commitments are with God — Fooloso4
Yes, I see the laws of nature as God's general will for matter — Dfpolis
Dfpolis says he concludes God, not assumes God. — bert1
In any case it's not particularly relevant for this thread. — bert1
I am not quite sure what you are asking, but I will comment.What happens to God’s will if we determine the origin and nature of will, following in the footsteps of Nietzsche, Freud and embodied approaches in cognitive science, in terms of a differential ecology of drives? In a twist on Aristotle, Nietzsche suggested we could understand the “mechanistic world as a kind of life of the drives”. — Joshs
Of course! God is the ultimate cause of reality. Darwin recognized that when he wrote of his belief in "designed laws." Still, being the Ultimate Cause does not mean that God is the proximate cause of phenomena. As scientist and philosophers, we want to understand proximate, not ultimate causes. That is why Darwin developed his theory. The same with Newton and many others.Call it what you will, assumption, premise, conclusion, beginning or end, your ultimate answer to how and why is the same, God. — Fooloso4
So the high accuracy of our experiences raises our chances for survival and procreation.
My argument is based on the premises laid down -- none of which are theological. So, to reject my argument you need to show either that my premises are false, or that my reasoning is invalid. Rejecting them because I also think that there is an ultimate cause of reality is an act of prejudice, and so irrational.Perhaps he is concerned that if he make clear his theological grounds it would lead to rejection of his argument. — Fooloso4
First, the idea of differential drives is simply wrongheaded. We desire food, water and air. If I asked, "How much food (or money) would you be willing to take for all your air?" you would think I was crazy. This is because our desires are incommensurate. We need a satisfactory, not a maximal, amount of food, water and air, and, indeed, of all the things we naturally desire. So, they cannot be traded off against one another. Accordingly, the idea of a maximal good or utility or anything of that sort is nonsense — Dfpolis
Nietzsche suggested we could understand the “mechanistic world as a kind of life of the drives”. — Joshs
When Aristotle says that nature acts for ends, he explains this by saying that the end is the form. Things have natures because they are formed into wholes. The claim is not that these natural wholes have purposes but that they are purposes. Every being is an end in itself, and the word telos, that we translate as end, means completion. When we try to judge Aristotle's claim that nature acts for ends, we tend to confuse ourselves in two ways. First, we imagine that it must mean something deliberates and has
purposes. Second and worse, we begin with our mathematically conceived universe, and can't find anything in it that looks like a directedness toward ends. But Aristotle indicates that it is just because ends are present in nature that a physicist cannot be a mathematician. We have seen that even change of place becomes impossible in mathematical space. But there are three other kinds of motion, from which the mathematician is even more hopelessly cut off, without which activity for the sake of ends would be impossible. Things in the world are born, develop, and grow. Genuine wholes, which are not random heaps, must be able to come into being, take on the qualities appropriate to their natures, and
achieve a size at which they are complete. But mathematical objects can at most be combined, separated, and rearranged. If we have first committed ourselves to a view of the world as being extended lumps in a void, there is no way to get wholes or ends back into the world. That means in turn that the question of ends has to come first, before one permits any choice to be made that empties the world of possibilities. — Joe Sachs
Of course.My point about differential drives is that psychologists and biologists today view organisms as self-organizing systems whose functioning is defined by reciprocal interactions with an environment. — Joshs
Not quite. It is a structure able to interact in what was an adaptive way in its native environment. Whether its species will survive depends on the rate at which its progeny can adapt to environmental change.The organism is nothing but its adaptive interactions. — Joshs
Scare quotes always concern me. Clearly, you recognize that this is not "will" by the usual definition. It is an adaptive response without conscious commitment. Will, in the proper sense, is a commitment in light of knowledge. This is analogous to what you are describing, but hardly identical. The common note in the analogy is desire, or goal orientation. The difference is that biological desire need not involve awareness, while will proper does. This is a move from the physical to the intentional theater of operation.‘Will’ derives from the overarching tendency of living systems to maintain consistent goal-oriented adaptivity in the face of changing environmental conditions. — Joshs
This would be true if I let you equivocate on "will." I won't. Will in the proper sense is a conscious commitment, and as such transcends the merely biological. So, I am happy to agree that an adaptive biological inclination makes no sense outside the biological context, but that is not what will in the proper sense is.‘Will’ makes no sense outside of this reciprocal feedforward-feedback adaptive relationship between a living thing and its world. — Joshs
Thank you for your faith claim. Now, how about an argument that shows that one conscious being cannot commit to the good of another, even if it is unadaptive for the one committing? You might just show that the concept of conscious commitment is incoherent.The idea of a divine will , a first or final cause existing outside of a continually changing system of interactions, is an empty, incoherent concept. — Joshs
Really? So an artist creating a work is acted upon by the work that does not yet exist? My learning a song causes the song? Perhaps you can explain what you mean.All causation is reciprocal — Joshs
No. Will is the capacity to knowingly commit, even if it is non- or un-adaptive.What gives Will its meaning , even for a hypothesized god, is its relevance to the aims of adapting to a changing world. — Joshs
Again, this does not work. I can commit to the good of my children even before they are conceived.Will prior to world is like the smile before the Cheshire Cat. — Joshs
We need to remember that mechanism does not contradict teleology. It merely rearranges its constituents. Mechanically, initial states and the laws of motion determine final states. "Final state" is just another term for "end." So, mechanism says systems act toward ends. Every physical end requires means, or mechanisms, and every set of determinate means leads to a determinate final state or end.it is another way to ask what laws of nature refer to in our picture of a caused world. — Paine
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