Are there any materialists these days? Isn't methodological naturalism the most commonly held theory these days amongst the 'non-woo' approaches.

It seems to me that your reply has nothing to do with what I'm asking for.

Just that I am wondering if anyone has any attachments to materialism these days, enough to speculate on these questions.

I think there are plenty of them.

I'm a philosophical naturalist (paradigm) which includes both m-physicalism (models) and m-materialism (data), and I have no bleepin' idea what the OP is about.

Almost 4am here. Zzzzzz :yawn:

Cool. I wasn't sure what it was about either.

1. Strong emergence - I would accept that it is logically impossible and that it is not pure materialism anyway.
2. Therefore, I would adopt weak emergence. That would force me to adopt the identity theory.
3. Type-Type Identity can be refuted by multiple realization.
4. So, the next step is to adopt Token-Type. Here the problem arises: depending on what we categorize an emotion?
4.1. The only way here is represented by functionalism, which can in turn be refuted by inverted qualia or multiple realization. — Eugen

1. I don't know what emergence is, and also don't know what strong emergence is.
2. I don't know what weak emergence is. I don't know what identity theory is.
3. I don't know what type-type identity is.
4. I don't know what Token-Type is.

Since all these are false, or assumed to be false theories,

let's assume that we all agree that everything up to 4 is proven to be false. — Eugen

, I can just ignore them altogether.

Eliminating the notion of Type altogether helps as well, since I have no clue what the notion of Type does.

So far your theory has a lot of things mentioned which you ask us to ignore. Why list them in the first place then?

You then eliminate the need for physical structure. Then you eliminat th e need to justify the experience to fit in a category.

1. We don't need the same physical structure - multiple realization solved.
Having no categories, but simply experiences, I don't need a justification for fitting an experience into a category, so:
2. I don't need to equate an experience with a function. There is no law of nature that prevents the existence of an experience without it fulfilling a specific purpose.
I realize that this position is very weak in terms of explanatory power, but I don't see any logical argument that invalidates this exact position. So feel free to hit me with counterarguments. Thank you! — Eugen

What remains?

I am unable to see a statement or a proposition.

You kept eliminating stuff I don't understand. It does not matter that I don't understand what you mean, since they are eliminated.

But you fail to state what remains after the process of elimination. There is no counter-argument to form, since you made no argument.

Did you just bother writing that?

Ohh hey man, you changed your photo hehe

What does "strong emergence" and "weak emergence" means? Sorry but if I don't understand the concepts, I can't follow your premises.

Guys, I'm not your philosophy teacher. You either learn those concepts and debate or ignore this OP.

But, if I were a materialist, I would go further and eliminate the notion of Type altogether. — Eugen

If I started as a Materialist, this would lead me into becoming a Physicalist, and eventually a Panprotopsychist.

I would have thought that to be a Materialist means rejecting the notion of a type. A Conceptualist would accept the existence of types in the mind, but I don't think that a Materialist would be a Conceptualist.

There are no types of experiences, only experiences. — Eugen

As an aside, an "experience" as a concept is a type.

Guys, I'm not your philosophy teacher. — Eugen

As an aside, an "experience" as a concept is a type. — RussellA

Ok... elaborate a bit please, it looks like you're saying something there

There are no types of experiences, only experiences. Toothache and leg pain are classified as pains only because they are similar, so it is for language purpose, but in reality they are two different things. Similar does not mean identical, so:
1. We don't need the same physical structure - multiple realization solved.
Having no categories, but simply experiences, I don't need a justification for fitting an experience into a category, so:
2. I don't need to equate an experience with a function. There is no law of nature that prevents the existence of an experience without it fulfilling a specific purpose. — Eugen

So there's a weak emergence, but none of the experiences are the same. Even within the same person, because the physical structure is always changing.

Seems a weird space to think through -- I certainly feel a lot more coherency than that. At least a before, a now, and a later: all three tenses sit within an experience.

Now, if language were to fulfill the functional aspect then totally possible. It just feels somewhat like Hume's conclusion on the skepticism of causation -- I see how we got here, but aren't we confused now?

Ok... elaborate a bit please, it looks like you're saying something there — Eugen

Intellectually, my belief is that of Neutral Monism, where reality consists of elementary particles and elementary forces in space-time. Consciousness may be explained by Panprotopsychism. However, the unity of consciousness, the neural binding problem, Kant's unity of apperception remains beyond comprehension, and must remain what McGinn called Mysterianism.

On the one hand I cannot believe in Conceptualism but on the other hand I know Conceptualism is true.

As an "experience" is a concept, and therefore a type, perhaps the wording should be "there are no experiences, only tokens of experiences", though I know what you meant, which is the main thing.

Would it be fair to classify what you've put forth as a sort of austere nominalism? I.e., pain is just "a name for certain types of experience."

I think the problem with that sort of nominalism is that it bleeds into ontological nominalism. So, the experience of seeing a triangle is just a name for similar experiences, etc.

But this seems to run into the problem of explaining the similarities and differences that create these different names in the first place.

This reduces the very scientific theories and findings that are supposed to make us believe that physicalism is the case to either mere language games, statements about other statements/fictions, or outright incoherence.

My guess is this is why most nominalists who are into this thing enough to write about it tend to embrace trope theory, concept nominalism, etc.

I think the problem is that the considerations that motivate people to embrace physicalism are often the same sorts of considerations that cause them to embrace nominalism, but the two don't play particularly well together.

I'm not your philosophy teacher. You either learn those concepts and debate or ignore this OP. — Eugen

Yeah, @javi2541997 and @god must be atheist, why should Eugen have to put together a coherent, understandable post? Why should he have to define his terms?

Those are not ''my terms".

Those are not ''my terms". — Eugen

You're just lazy. And you're also.... Well, let's just leave it at that.

Sissy

Those are not ''my terms". — Eugen

This is not a philosophy forum dedicated to a narrow subset of thinking within analytic philosophy , it is a general forum. Concepts like emergence, qualia, functionalism and materialism can take on entirely different meanings depending on which branch of philosophy , and which particular philosopher, is using them. How about giving us names of philosophers who you are aligning yourself with so we have a context Whose thinking do you feel overlaps most closely with the claims of the OP?

I thought to answer that Clarky is my philosophy teacher in this site. But I didn't want to get scolded by Eugene again...

T Clark I thought to answer that Clarky is my philosophy teacher in this site. But I didn't want to get scolded by Eugene again — javi2541997

Eugen may get scolded by the mods.

Eugen may get scolded by the mods. — Joshs

Mods don't usually get involved just because someone is being a dick.

I'll try and work through this. :)

I know that everything I will present from 1 to 4 is debatable, but, for the sake of the argument, let's assume that we all agree that everything up to 4 is proven to be false. — Eugen

Understood.

Therefore, if I were a materialist.

1. Strong emergence - I would accept that it is logically impossible and that it is not pure materialism anyway.

If I were a (materialist) naturalist/physicalist I might try and make something of strong emergentism in order to keep my concept of phenomenal consciousness. But we're assuming it's false, so that's OK. No strong emergentism.

2. Therefore, I would adopt weak emergence. That would force me to adopt the identity theory.

I would adopt weak emergence. And I'd jump straight to functionalism. I didn't think functionalism was a subset of identity theory. I thought Identity theory was that the mind is the brain, or something like that. But I could be wrong. Anyway, weak emergence is rejected too, fair enough.

3. Type-Type Identity can be refuted by multiple realization.

So a type of mind is identical to a type of physical system? I guess that can be refuted by multiple realisation. But multiple realisation hasn't been proven. However it is intuitively plausible and is arguably entailed by functionalism. So we ditch that as well, fair enough.

4. So, the next step is to adopt Token-Type. Here the problem arises: depending on what we categorize an emotion?

Token-type identity? Which side is the physical, which the mental? I don't think I've understood this one. I did a quick search and nothing immediately came up.

4.1. The only way here is represented by functionalism, which can in turn be refuted by inverted qualia or multiple realization.

If I were a physicalist functionalism is an attractive option. It has a number of virtues. Inverted qualia may be a problem for functionalism (but it hasn't been shown as far as I am aware), but I thought multiple realisability was one of its features, not a bug.

Unfortunately, I have noticed that most materialists stop here. But, if I were a materialist, I would go further and eliminate the notion of Type altogether.
There are no types of experiences, only experiences. Toothache and leg pain are classified as pains only because they are similar, so it is for language purpose, but in reality they are two different things. Similar does not mean identical,...

I disagree with you here. In principle one could have two identical brains realising the same function. In that way we would have two experience of the same type, assuming functionalism. They would be qualitatively identical, but quantitatively distinct. Have I misunderstood you?

so:
1. We don't need the same physical structure - multiple realization solved.
Having no categories, but simply experiences, I don't need a justification for fitting an experience into a category, so:

I don't follow you here, sorry

2. I don't need to equate an experience with a function. There is no law of nature that prevents the existence of an experience without it fulfilling a specific purpose.

I agree with you. So we're ditching functionalism here?

I realize that this position is very weak in terms of explanatory power, but I don't see any logical argument that invalidates this exact position. So feel free to hit me with counterarguments. Thank you!

I'm unclear what your physicalist position is that you have arrived at. So what is an experience in this view?

EDIT: I sense logical thought in the OP, but there is too little concession to the reader to clearly discern it.

EDIT: the psychology of the materialist is odd here. He's decided to be a materialist, and then set about finding a coherent line. I guess that's what someone who isn't starting out as a materialist would do to charitably try to find a coherent materialist position.

:up:

I would adopt weak emergence. And I'd jump straight to functionalism. I didn't think functionalism was a subset of identity theory. I thought Identity theory was that the mind is the brain, or something like that. — bert1

I didn't say functionalism was a subset of anything. And why would you jump straight to functionalism?

Token-type identity? Which side is the physical, which the mental? I don't think I've understood this one. I did a quick search and nothing immediately came up. — bert1

There are no sides, there's one and the same thing. Type - category, while token - an individual subset of that category. In Type-Type, we had to admit that pain must be C-fibers firing, while in Token-Type, different pains can have different physical forms. But the following issue arises: in virtue of what we can call a pain, pain? Answer: By its function. Therefore, functionalism.

but I thought multiple realisability was one of its features, not a bug. — bert1

Actually, there's a ''multiple realization" problem for functionalism too, similar but not the same as that of identity's problem. I won't get into details here though.

I disagree with you here. In principle one could have two identical brains realising the same function. In that way we would have two experience of the same type, assuming functionalism. They would be qualitatively identical, but quantitatively distinct. Have I misunderstood you? — bert1

If two brains are identical to the last atom, then they would be both qualitatively and quantitatively identical (assuming they experience the same environment as well).

My position here is the following: every experience is, in fact, identical to a physical state. Simple as that. But there are no categories of experiences (eg pains). We call them pains just because they're similar, but there is no such category in reality. There are just physical/mental variations. That's ALL. We don't have categories - we don't need to appeal to functions.

This position doesn't explain anything, but it does get rid of problems. I haven't found strong refutations so far.

Thank you for your answers! Please give me more time to reflect. Thanks!

What's the difference between protoconsciousness and matter?