I thought Albert Hoffman was mentioned. Interesting chap.

I hear you. — Tom Storm

Well, if you need any inside info on a pond vacuum cleaner, don't hesitate......

Albert Hoffman — Shawn

No, Donald Hoffman, but as you've dropped the name.....

Albert Hofmann (11 January 1906 – 29 April 2008) was a Swiss chemist known for being the first to synthesize, ingest, and learn of the psychedelic effects of lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD). Hofmann's team also isolated, named and synthesized the principal psychedelic mushroom compounds psilocybin and psilocin.[1] He authored more than 100 scientific articles and numerous books, including LSD: Mein Sorgenkind (LSD: My Problem Child).[2] In 2007, he shared first place with Tim Berners-Lee on a list of the 100 greatest living geniuses published by The Daily Telegraph newspaper.[3] ...

While researching lysergic acid derivatives, Hofmann first synthesized LSD on 16 November 1938.[9] ... on 19 April 1943, Hofmann intentionally ingested 250 micrograms of LSD, which he thought would represent a prudently safe, small amount, but was in fact a strong dose. At first, his trip was not pleasant, as people appeared to morph into fantastic creatures, office furniture moved and shifted like living entities, and he felt possessed by otherworldly forces.

April 19 is now widely known as "Bicycle Day", because as Hofmann began to feel LSD's effects, he tried to ride to the safety of his home on his bike. This was the first intentional LSD trip in history. — Wikipedia

How is it exactly that experience is caused by/realised by/is identical with the functions of complex systems? — bert1

It's not. Is a living organism caused by/realized by/identical with the functions of complex chemical systems? No.

Why can't all these things happen without experience? — bert1

Who says they can't? Just because they don't doesn't mean it's not possible.

A robust theory on consciousness will be able to reliably predict which systems have experience of some kind or another. — bert1

I'm not sure I know what that means, but I'll try this - can a robust theory of chemistry reliably predict which chemical systems are alive? Again, no.

Why is it that such-and-such function causes/realises/is the taste of chocolate instead of the smell of coffee? — bert1

I don't see how that differs significantly from the previous question.

As soon as you’re talking about ‘the sense in which the spoon “exists”’ then you’re already in the territory of philosophy — Wayfarer

I think all of this is philosophy - metaphysics - and people use these metaphysical positions to draw positive factual conclusions about the world, e.g. science will never be able to understand how experience arises out of biological and neurological systems.

I'm going to back off now. I don't really want to get any deeper into a discussion of the hard problem. You and I tend to bark at each other when we do that and we never get any closer to agreement.

As far as I know science never purported to be able to directly study anyone's experiences. It generally acknowledges that its ambit of investigation, its whole data source, is restricted to what reliably appears to the human senses.

It’s not a problem in search of a solution. It’s pointing out that a third-party (objective) description cannot be equated with the first-person (subjective) experience, as the latter possesses a qualitative dimension which cannot be reduced to, or represented in, symbolic terminology. It’s not a failure on the part of scientific psychology, but a limitation inherent in the objective method. — Wayfarer

I'd say it is more a matter of limited perceptual and cognitive faculties on our parts. We don't have minds capable of comprehensively understanding the complexity of what goes on in our brains. So what you are concerned with is only a pseudo-problem from a physicalist perspective. It's no more a problem for physicalism, than is the fact that you can't demonstrate that your mind is not emergent from physical processes, is a problem for physicalism.

So what you are concerned with is only a pseudo-problem from a physicalist perspective. — wonderer1

I think it's more that the physical sciences offer pseudo-solutions to a problem that their modus operandi can't accomodate.

I think it's more that the physical sciences offer pseudo-solutions to a problem that their modus operandi can't accomodate. — Wayfarer

Ok, but you aren't coming from a well informed perspective. (Or do you no longer deny that there is evidence for physicalism?)

Ok, but you aren't coming from a well informed perspective. (Or do you no longer deny that there is evidence for physicalism?) — wonderer1

I made that remark a long time ago, but I really didn't think at the time you understood what I meant. When I say there is no evidence for physicalism, I am referring to the metaphysical view that "what is real is reducible to physics." This claim is not something that can be subject to scientific demonstration. It's not a claim within physics itself - there are physicists who do maintain that claim, and others who question it.

The point is that physicalism is a methodological assumption regarding what can be objectively measured and predicted. While it may be sound methodologically, it is still an assumption that operates within a framework composed of other assumptions and constraints. When this assumption is extrapolated to make claims about the nature of reality or being as such, those assumptions may no longer be applicable. That is the distinction between a metaphysical (or philosophical) claim, and physics as such, which has a more restricted scope.

Do you see the distinction I'm trying to make?

those assumptions may no longer be applicable. — Wayfarer

And we couldn't know if they were :up:

Have you made it to the last chapter? He sort of turns everything he has said on his head. His point is that a common way of looking at the relationship between mind and nature is self-refuting. Plantinga has previously made a similar argument. I don't think this is a bad argument, although the way it is framed it does seem like he is refuting himself as well. But I take it that this is exactly the point, his position is self-refuting because it's situated in popular assumptions that are self-refuting. — Count Timothy von Icarus

What is that common view that he thinks is self-refuting?

Alvin Plantinga's rather fun argument called the evolutionary argument against naturalism (EAAN). If it comes up with apologists a lot these days. Here's a basic overview:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_argument_against_naturalism#:~:text=Religion%2C%20and%20Naturalism.-,Plantinga%27s%201993%20formulation%20of%20the%20argument,faculties%20is%20low%20or%20inscrutable.

The OP raised this in relation to Hoffman's theory too.

Hoffman makes the same mistake as Kant, supposing that there is a really, truly world out there that is different to and inaccessible from the world we live in.
But the world is the world we live in. — Banno

That sounds like a statement of metaphysical Materialistic belief*1 . But Kant was a philosopher. He was not talking about the world we "live in" (objective reality), but about the world we "think in" (subjective ideality). Do you think the world we live & breathe in is the same as the world we imagine? If the only "world" was the physical environment, why do we amateur philosophers so often argue about what is real and what is illusion? If we all saw the same world-model, why do we disagree on its properties and qualities? Was Einstein also mistaken in his frame-of-reference theory of Relativity?

Physical Science studies its macro-scale properties, and over centuries has gradually come to a stable understanding of its material structure. But Quantum Science has found that, on the fundamental scale, those classical properties are not so stable and certain. For example, the table you see before you as a solid object, is now defined by quantum science as mostly empty space with a few bits of condensed energy. So which "reality" does Philosophy argue about? Kant's hypothetical ding an sich was not postulated as a "real" physical object, but as an ideal metaphysical concept. Hoffman's theory is not about sensable objective reality, but about our subjective conception of that reality.

Which world do you live in? The scientific world of sight & touch, or the philosophical world of imaginary worldviews? This forum, as indicated by its name, is for the latter. :smile:


*1. Metaphysical Materialism :
The metaphysics of materialism is a belief system held in large swathes of academia in the same manner, and often for the same reasons, that religious beliefs are held in fundamentalist organizations, argues Dr. Quinn, with 30 years of academic experience to substantiate her views.
“We do not see things as they are, we see them as we are.” Anais Nin (1961)
https://www.essentiafoundation.org/materialism-in-academia-is-a-fundamentalist-belief-system/reading/
Note : Werner Heisenberg said, "We have to remember that what we observe is not nature in itself but nature exposed to our method of questioning."

(Or do you no longer deny that there is evidence for physicalism?) — wonderer1

I think I might deny that there is no evidence for physicalism. I'm interested in what people think is evidence for physicalism.

EDIT: Confusing typo inverted my meaning. Apologies @T Clark Fixed.

I'm interested in what people think is evidence for physicalism. — bert1

See here.

Alvin Plantinga's rather fun argument called the evolutionary argument against naturalism (EAAN). If it comes up with apologists a lot these days. — Tom Storm

I read the Wikipedia article you linked. Interesting. After extensive research, reexamination of my understanding of evolution and cognitive science, and hours of contemplation I've come to the conclusion that it's the dumbest fucking philosophical argument I've ever heard. If someone will start a separate thread, I'll explain my thinking.

I think I might deny that there is no evidence for physicalism. I'm interested in what people think is evidence for physicalism. — bert1

Physicalism is a metaphysical position. It's a presupposition, an assumption you make to allow you to make sense of what you know about the world. It's not that there is or isn't evidence for it, it's that there can't be. I think that's what Wayfarer meant when he wrote

When I say there is no evidence for physicalism, I am referring to the metaphysical view that "what is real is reducible to physics." This claim is not something that can be subject to scientific demonstration. — Wayfarer

After extensive research, reexamination of my understanding of evolution and cognitive science, and hours of contemplation I've come to the conclusion that it's the dumbest fucking philosophical argument I've ever heard. If someone will start a separate thread, I'll explain my thinking. — T Clark

:rofl:

I'd be interested in such a thread as well, but there are so many gaping holes in the EAAN, that it would be hard to pick a best objection to it. However, I do think it brings up matters well worth thinking about.

I'd be interested in such a thread as well, but there are so many gaping holes in the EAAN, that it would be hard to pick a best objection to it. However, I do think it brings up matters well worth thinking about. — wonderer1

Yes, well, @Tom Storm did say it's a fun argument.

Physicalism is a metaphysical position. — T Clark

Yes I agree, sorry I made a typo. Corrected above.

Thanks, that's helpful.

But Kant was a philosopher. He was not talking about the world we "live in" — Gnomon

Quite right. :rofl:

Alvin Plantinga's rather fun argument called the evolutionary argument against naturalism (EAAN). If it comes up with apologists a lot these days. Here's a basic overview:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_argument_against_naturalism#:~:text=Religion%2C%20and%20Naturalism.-,Plantinga%27s%201993%20formulation%20of%20the%20argument,faculties%20is%20low%20or%20inscrutable.

The OP raised this in relation to Hoffman's theory too. — Tom Storm

Yes, I know about Plantinga's argument, but it would work against Hoffman's position, not for it, since it aims to undercut its very foundations.

What is that common view that he thinks is self-refuting? — SophistiCat

The common view that Donald Hoffman seeks to challenge is our belief that objects continue to exist independently of our perception of them when they’re not perceived. He doesn’t claim they cease to exist when not perceived - something continues to exist - but they don’t possess the identity which we impute to them, which is what the mind has been conditioned by evolutionary biology to recognise in terms of what he calls ‘fitness payoffs’. It’s in this respect that his findings are similar to Berkeley’s and Kant’s (whom he mentions).

I had also thought Hoffman’s arguments could be used against him, on the grounds that they would also undercut scientific reasoning, but he does address these kinds of objections towards the end of Chapter 3 (with references to journal articles articulating those objections in detail.)

I think what Hoffman is really challenging is ‘cognitive realism’, the instinctive belief that our sensory perception reveals the world as it really is. I think his book would have been better titled The Case against Cognitive Realism, but of course that title would loose a great deal of zing.

I’ve considered writing a comparative analysis of Hoffman, Plantinga, and Thomas Nagel’s ‘Evolutionary Naturalism and the Fear of Religion’. They are all concerned with the implications of evolutionary biology on the nature of knowledge, but from different perspectives, Hoffman from cognitive science, Plantinga from natural theology, and Nagel on the sovereignty of reason. I often cite Nagel’s essay, particularly in regard to his analysis of why claims that reason can understood solely in terms of evolutionary biology is self-refuting.

The only form that genuine reasoning can take consists in seeing the validity of the arguments, in virtue of what they say. As soon as one tries to step outside of such thoughts, one loses contact with their true content. And one cannot be outside and inside them at the same time: If one thinks in logic, one cannot simultaneously regard those thoughts as mere psychological dispositions, however caused or however biologically grounded. If one decides that some of one's psychological dispositions are, as a contingent matter of fact, reliable methods of reaching the truth (as one may with perception, for example), then in doing so one must rely on other thoughts that one actually thinks, without regarding them as mere dispositions. One cannot embed all one's reasoning in a psychological theory, including the reasonings that have led to that psychological theory. The epistemological buck must stop somewhere. By this I mean not that there must be some premises that are forever unrevisable but, rather, that in any process of reasoning or argument there must be some thoughts that one simply thinks from the inside--rather than thinking of them as biologically programmed dispositions. — Thomas Nagel

Yes, I know about Plantinga's argument, but it would work against Hoffman's position, not for it, — SophistiCat

I thought that was the point. Maybe I missed something. The idea in the OP that Hoffman’s work is self-refuting.

think what Hoffman is really challenging is ‘cognitive realism’, the instinctive belief that our sensory perception reveals the world as it really is. — Wayfarer

Yes, I think that’s fair.

By this I mean not that there must be some premises that are forever unrevisable but, rather, that in any process of reasoning or argument there must be some thoughts that one simply thinks from the inside--rather than thinking of them as biologically programmed dispositions. — Thomas Nagel

Thinking ones thoughts were purely a matter of biological dispositions would indeed be naive, but who actually thinks that way?

I'd think it more reasonable to say biological dispositions enable "thoughts that one simply thinks from the inside", but of course that isn't a full account of the causality of those thoughts.

Thinking ones thoughts were purely a matter of biological dispositions would indeed be naive, but who actually thinks that way? — wonderer1

I think biological determinism remains a potent force in contemporary thought. The whole of naturalised epistemology would seek to ground reason in terms of evolutionary psychology, would it not? A physicalist theory of mind has to maintain that mental operations can be reduced to physical causes.

This is where Plantinga's argument is relevant. He says that in naturalized epistemology reason and cognitive processes are seen to be grounded in evolutionary psychology and neurobiology. This means that our ability to reason is understood as a product of evolutionary processes that favor adaptive behavior.

Plantinga's argument contends that if our cognitive faculties are the result of evolutionary processes driven purely by survival, then there is no reason to accept that that they produce true beliefs, only that they produce beliefs that are advantageous for survival. (This is where his argument dovetails with Hoffman's.) Therefore, if one accepts both naturalism and evolution, one has a defeater for trusting the reliability of their cognitive faculties, including the belief in naturalism and evolution themselves. This is a self-defeating position.

Reasoning itself is based on 'ground and consequent' relations. Such arguments assert that reasoning involves understanding logical relationships and following principles of validity and soundness, which are not simply reducible to physical processes or evolutionary adaptations. So again if reason were purely the product of physical neurobiological processes, it would lack the normative force of logical inference, where conclusions are drawn based on grounds (premises) and consequents (conclusions). Physical processes operate through causal relations, but logical inference operates through rational justification, which is of a different nature.

The argument here is that reason must in some sense transcend purely naturalistic explanations if we are to trust its conclusions. This implies that reason possesses a normative dimension that cannot be fully accounted for by naturalistic evolutionary processes alone. Reason involves not just causal relationships but also logical relationships, which include principles of validity, soundness, and truth that seem to operate on a different level from mere physical causation.

Plantinga (and others) make this an argument for natural theology, i.e. that the Divine Intellect is the source of reason, however I believe the argument stands on its own two legs, so to speak, without reference to God. That is the thrust of Nagel's paper mentioned above.

I think biological determinism remains a potent force in contemporary thought. The whole of naturalised epistemology would seek to ground reason in terms of evolutionary psychology, would it not? — Wayfarer

I only got as far as "evo" before my search tool told me that I wasn't going to find "evolutionary psychology" in that link. I was unsurprised, in view of evolutionary psychology being a fairly small part of a much bigger scientific picture.

In any case my interest is in a cooperative naturalism perspective:

Cooperative naturalism is a version of naturalized epistemology which states that while there are evaluative questions to pursue, the empirical results from psychology concerning how individuals actually think and reason are essential and useful for making progress in these evaluative questions. This form of naturalism says that our psychological and biological limitations and abilities are relevant to the study of human knowledge. Empirical work is relevant to epistemology but only if epistemology is itself as broad as the study of human knowledge.

A lot of what is considered under naturalized epistemology isn't that interesting to me.

Plantinga's argument contends that if our cognitive faculties are the result of evolutionary processes driven purely by survival, then there is no reason to accept that that they produce true beliefs, only that they produce beliefs that are advantageous for survival. — Wayfarer

Accurate enough synopsis, but Plantinga doesn't consider factors which are of great relevance. For example, consider the case of a social species, and whether an ability to convey truths to conspecifics provides a fitness advantage to members of the social group. An ability to recognize and disseminate truths within a social species seems like it could be pretty damn adaptive to me.

Therefore, if one accepts both naturalism and evolution, one has a defeater for trusting the reliability of their cognitive faculties, including the belief in naturalism and evolution themselves.

Well I suppose, if one accepts Plantinga's naive understanding of the theory of evolution, but surely no one here would do that.

Also "defeater" is a bit much. Perhaps it is not such a binary matter. Perhaps it would be of benefit for members of the aforementioned social species to question the reliability of their cognitive faculties. After all, some of their conspecifics might be smarter or better informed than themselves. Do you think it is a bad thing that people question the reliability of their cognitive faculties. Peer review anyone?

This is a self-defeating position.

Are you familiar with Plantinga's "Paul"?

Supposing Plantinga's straw man account of evolution results in a self defeating position. It's still merely an argument based on a straw man.

Supposing Plantinga's straw man account of evolution results in a self defeating position. It's still merely an argument based on a straw man. — wonderer1

When he published his paper on the evolutionary argument against naturalism, a number of scholars responded critically to it, but, so far as I know, not along the lines that it was a straw man argument. (There's an expensive compendium of critical essays and Plantinga's responses available at Amazon, not that I'm going to go to the trouble or expense.)

The ability to 'disseminate information amongst social species' - for example species that make sounds on the approach of predators, like meerkats, or that of bee dances - is obviously advantageous to survival, but what does that have to do with the issue at hand?

At issue is whether rational inference can be accounted for in purely naturalistic terms - but there's no need for meerkats or bees to demonstrate rational inference. Their behaviours can be described in terms of stimulus and response. (Speaking of straw men....)

There are actually several overlapping issues at stake. Donald Hoffman is concerned with the veracity of perceptual cognition - that we don't see reality as it is. In the context of his book, he doesn't pay much attention to the validity of rational inference, but presumably he must have some confidence in it, else he would, as several have suggested, saw off the branch he's sitting on.

Alvin Plantinga is more concerned with epistemology of reason - that reducing reason to natural causation undermines it. There are plainly many complex and deep issues at hand. I don't defend Plantinga's theistic conclusion, but I maintain there's an element of truth in his criticism.

(There's an intriguing pre-cursor to this style of argumentation in the Phaedo. This is 'the argument from equality'. Here Socrates argues that our ability to perceive that two things as equal, relies on our innate grasp of what equality means, which is a rational insight, not something acquired through empirical means, as we must already have the knowledge of 'equality itself' to judge things as equal or not. ref)