I've been forthright in my criticism of physicalist philosophy of mind. — Wayfarer

Indeed you have, and I have previously acknowledged that your criticisms provide a good basis to believe there is some non-physical aspect to mind. So I haven't rejected anything you've said on the sole basis that it's contrary to physicalism, as you alleged.

What I HAVE done is point out that this merely established a negative fact (the mind is not entirely physical). This may suggest that it is impossible to develop a complete understanding of the mind through scientific investigation. However, it doesn't point to any particular boundary- so it seems irrelevant to science.

Relevant to the issue that instigated our current exchange: the negative fact doesn't constitute a reason to doubt that there are laws of nature, and that these fully account for the evolution of the universe (with the possible exception of mental activity). You thought it more relevant that Law Realism is embraced by physicalists (this seemed like a genetic fallacy - rejecting it based on the source, not the merits). You reasoning SEEMS to be: the negative fact falsifies physicalism, therefore all aspects of physicalist metaphysics should be rejected. Isn't that so?

If we treat a metaphysical theory as a conjunction of axioms, then that makes sense: the conjunction is false if any one axiom is false. However, that's not the way I treat it, as I've described.

Turning to your specific comments:

information is not reducible to matter or energy — Wayfarer

My first impression is that this quote refers to some abstract view of information, ignoring the real world fact that information is encoded (it takes energy to encode it, and it is encoded in something physical).

Or perhaps it's just noting that information relates to understanding, which requires mind. This is true irrespective of the metaphysical basis of mind, so it seems to add nothing that isn't already captured by the negative fact.

How, for example, do you explain syllogistic logic? — Wayfarer

Computers operate with logic, so our ability to think logically is consistent with a mechanistic aspect of mind.

general semantics, in terms of neural processing?

A word triggers a sequence of firing neurons, which include connections to areas of the brain such as factual and emotional memories.

Syllogistic logic and general semantics operate in a normative, rule-governed space ('the space of reasons'). To reduce that to neural processing is a category mistake.

Logic and semantics can be described with rules, but that doesn't imply that they are grounded in the rules we describe. That's conflating the model with the functional basis.

Neural firings may underlie thought, but they don’t explain validity, reference, or meaning.

These are problematic only to the extent they relate to the "hard problem". You haven't added additional problems to the ones I've already acknowledged. It's still the "negative fact".

Do you acknowledge the fact that there are essential physical aspects to a functioning mind? There's clearly a dependency on a functioning brain: memory and personality can be impacted by disease and trauma. Birth defects that affect brain development have bearing on cognitive ability. Hormones affect our moods and our thinking. Each of our senses (our interface to the external world)are dependent on physical organs and on specialized area of the brain to interpret the input. I don't see any reason to think that mind can exist without a functioning brain, or something with analogous functionality.

I haven't seen any indication that you will consider any alternatives. — Wayfarer

So...you make the unwarranted assumption that I won't. What I would need would be reasoning to support an alternative. A couple months ago, you said:

As for the 'unknown immaterial ground' - what if that 'unknown immaterial ground' is simply thought itself? — Wayfarer

This was no more than raising a possibility, with no reasoning to show why one might think this to be the case. I replied:

Why should I believe that? Why do you believe this to be more than a bare possibility? Thinking is a process - a process that humans engage in. Referring to a "thought" as an object seems like treating a "run" (the process of running) as an object. There's no run unless there's a runner, and there's no thought unless there's a thinker. This is what seems to be the case, so explain how your alternative makes sense. — Relativist

So you had tossed out a bare possibility, and I explained why I reject it. Because I stated my reason, you had the opportunity to identify a flaw in my reasoning, or simply answered my question, "Why should I believe that?" Or at least explained why one might take this possibility seriously.

I don't even know if you believe it, but bringing it up suggests you considered it worthy of mention. Why DO you?

I've been forthcoming with what I believe and why I believe it. This affords you the opportunity to identify a flaw in my reasoning, or undercut something I believe. By contrast, you have only made vague statements about what you believe.

You're right about that. He's executing Project 2025 to create a MAGA "deep state". People like Stephen Miller are the real strategists, and they know how to play Trump.

I don't assume a master plan - he's not that smart. I think the goal is to stoke his ego. He's playing to his supporters, who perceive him as a tough guy who gets things done ("only I can fix it").

My prediction: he will not send troops to a city, like Chicago, because that would be a blatant violation of the Posse Comitatus Act. He can, and will, send the National Guard to places like New Orleans - where the Governor invites him, since the law allows it. He will then blame Democratic governors for not inviting him and letting their crime rates continue. The whole thing is political theater. This cannot solve a city's crime problem because it can only be temporary. At best, crime will be down temporarily.

Remember that “metaphysics” as a term originates with Aristotle... — Wayfarer

The meaning of "Metaphysics" has broadened:

"One might almost say that in the seventeenth century metaphysics began to be a catch-all category, a repository of philosophical problems that could not be otherwise classified as epistemology, logic, ethics or other branches of philosophy. ...
...Whatever the reason for the change may have been, it would be flying in the face of current usage (and indeed of the usage of the last three or four hundred years) to stipulate that the subject-matter of metaphysics was to be the subject-matter of Aristotle’s Metaphysics."

--Stanford Article on Metaphysics

When you lump everything else under “enormous speculative guesses,” you’re effectively classifying any framework that doesn’t begin from physicalist premises as irrational — Wayfarer

My statements were not a judgement of anyone else's rationality. But it would be irrational for me to drop physicalist metaphysics in total just because of the negative fact you repeatedly discuss: the mind is not entirely physical. I do not insist the mind is necessarily 100% physical (I'm not dogmatic), but whatever else it might be seems unknowable - and therefore the possibilities I've seen discussed simply seem like speculative guesses. You certainly don't have to agree with me, but if you believe my judgement (rooted in my backrgound beliefs) is misguided (irrational), then please identify my errors. If you don't wish to, then just agree to disagree and stop reacting negatively when I describe my point of view.

What is of practical siginficance (IMO) is the importance of making an effort to seek truth through good epistemological practices. What I've been arguing is that inference to best explanation (IBE) is usually the best we can do. I doubt that any IBEs can constitute knowledge,
— Relativist

Right, and that's what I've been driving at: it seems that you think IBE's are the only option, and IBE's do not constitute knowledge. — Leontiskos

No. I said IBEs are usually the best we can do. Whether or not they constitute knowledge is irrelevant to my point.

but that doesn't mean we should treat all inferences as equally credible.
— Relativist

If there is no pole of knowledge then I don't see how one IBE can be better than another (because no IBE can better approach that pole). — Leontiskos

Here are some questions about which rational answers can be given (IBEs), but the answers do not constitute knowledge:

Have aliens visited Earth?

Is Christianity true?

Was the 2020 Presidential election stolen from Trump?

Did Epstein commit suicide, or was he killed?

Is autism caused by vaccines? By Tylenol?

Is my name actually "Fred"?

I understand that you’re looking for a comprehensive alternative metaphysics. That’s a high bar — one that most philosophers don’t clear. — Wayfarer

And yet, physicalism does comprise a comprehensive metaphysics. My eyes are wide open: I recognize that it's imperfect; I want to understand it's weaknesses, because that comprises an area where it can't be applied. But it can be applied to most everything I'm interested in.

It dovetails my epistemology. My epistemology justifies utilizing physicalism as a pragmatic framework for evaluating new information. Conversely, physicalism grounds that epistemology, in terms of a theory of truth. As I've recently discussed in another thread, I think that most of our rational beliefs are the product of inference to best explanation: draw conclusions (form beliefs) based on evidence (interpeted through my world-view, of course) and strive for that conclusion to be the best interpretation of that evidence.

This outlook comes full circle when reconsidering physicalism: I'm not going to drop it unless there is a better explanation. I haven't encountered one. The "explanatory gap" simply comprises an area where no rational position exists - and judgement should be withheld. I observe a variety of (unnatural) guesses about the mind , all of which seem purely speculative and depend on enormous assumptions. There seems to be no "best" one because they aren't epistemologically grounded in objective evidence. This "enormity" has two forms: 1) treating mind as ontologically primitive; 2) negating much else of what we know about the world.

"Possible" is about all we can say about the various enormous speculative hypotheses. There are more modest speculations that address the explanatory gap, that build upon what we know about the world - rather than supplant it. Still, they aren't grounded in evidence, so none are worthy of accepting them. But they support the view that naturalism is also possible - and therefore, I see no rational reason to drop it.

I've written this solely to outline my point of view, not to convince anyone else to change their mind. I'm happy to answer questions and to address any weakness one may perceive.

Law realism works well with physicalism, but it doesn't seem dependent on physicalism being true. The notion that there exist laws of nature seems (to me, at least) a better explanation of regularities than Hume's constant conjunctions.

I want to comment on this:

Many of the contributors I will talk to here - Apustimologist, Relativist, Philosophim, to name a few - assume that, as the brain is physical, and the brain is the source of throught, then thought too has a physical basis. In fact they can't even conceive of there being an alternative to that, it is so firmly a tenet of modern culture. — Wayfarer

I am open to alternatives to a physicalist metaphysics, but I haven't seen any viable proposals from you or anyone else. You've merely pointed to the hard problem of consciousness as a reason to be skeptical of a physicalist theory of mind. The alternatives are as speculative as they are numerous, so they do no more than raise possibilities. You seem interested in exploring these possibilities, but I am not. I'd be interested if you (or someone) felt he had a persuasive argument to support one of them, but my impression is that each theory gets embraced purely on subjective grounds.

Of course, physicalist metaphysics deals with much more than theory of mind. So if you think one should abandon physicalism because of the explanatory gap with mind, I'd need to see a metaphysics that is equally comprehensive and parsimonious. You've never proposed one, and my impression is that this is not something you're particularly interested in. I can respect your point of view on that, but I have a different one.

The damage to the DOJ is also concerning. For that matter, Trump is endeavoring to hire only MAGAs for all government jobs:

"...questions, outlined under the administration’s Merit Hiring Plan, ask candidates how they would “advance the president’s executive orders and policy priorities,” and to name “one or two executive orders or policy initiatives that are significant to you,” and how candidates will help implement them if hired."
--
https://marylandmatters.org/2025/08/25/opm-trumps-hiring-questions-mandatory-to-ask-but-optional-to-answer/

the only way we ever know about universals or laws is through the activity of reason, the mind’s ability to discern likeness within diversity and to infer necessity where the senses show only succession — Wayfarer

What's wrong with that? It's a metaphysical hypothesis with broad explanatory scope, and consistent with the success of science.

The difficulty is that law realists won’t acknowledge it, because it thinks mind itself is simply the product of those same physical processes which it situates ‘in things’. — Wayfarer

You're conflating law realism with physicalism. One could accept the reality of laws, while choosing to believe "the mind" is not the product of natural law - whether by faith (as religious scientists do), or by hypothesis - including whatever hypothesis of mind you are drawn to.

David Hume broke this supposed relationship. He argued that causation is not something we can deduce from reason alone — it's only ever inferred from constant conjunctions: "We see A followed by B, and infer causation." Hence, causation is not logically necessary but contingent and habitual. — Wayfarer

IMO, the Law Realists improved upon this by proposing that laws of nature entail a necessitation. They define a law of nature as a causal relation between types of things (AKA "universals"). Hume would notice the empirical evidence that every observed pair of electrons repelled each other, and label this a "constant conjunction", while law realists would say that electrons (a type of thing) repel each other - and this is constitutes a law. If A and B are electrons, then they it is physically necessary that they will repel, given that that this law exists.

So I'm curious if you agree that law realism is a better explanation of empirical evidence than constant conjunction?

Relativist, how far does the immunity go?
All the way until impeachment + conviction by Congress? — jorndoe

Immunity applies to any acts that are part of his official duties. For example, he can't be prosecuted for illegally firing people, illegally withholding funds from universities, or violating the Posse Comitatus Act (ordering the National Guard to enforce the law). He's done all these things.

He could have been convicted for his 2020 election fraud, when he wasn't in office. He was indicted for this, but it was dropped when he became President because (it has been decided years ago) any prosecution would interfere with his official duties.

He could certainly be impeached for any of the crimes he's committed, and it Dems control the House after the 2026 elections, they may do that. GOP won't, because Trump controls them. Regardless, even if impeached, he won't be convicted because it requires 2/3 of Senate.

It's going to be a long 4 years.

I'm having a surprisingly hard time locating any discussions in the literature of mental-to-mental causation -- that is, the idea that one thought or image could cause another thought or image. I've looked through the usual suspects on causation but haven't nailed it yet. Can anyone on TPF help? — J

That is exactly the topic of Peter Tse's book (from a physiicalist perspective), The Neural Basis of Free Will: Criterial Causation

If a presidential order and actions on those orders are illegal, then US Marshalls should arrest Trump. Simple as that really. — Christoffer

No, it's not. Trump is immune. Even before SCOTUS established this (and before they became corrupted), the DOJ Office of Legal Counsel had determined that a sitting President cannot be indicted. So the only way Trump can be held accountable is if he were impeached and removed from office.
The House of Representatives is controlled by Trumpists. They publicly rationalize everything he does. So although a judge determined Trump's action was illegal, Trumpist Congressmen say the judge got it wrong. It will be appealed, and they will continue to say the courts got it wrong unless and until SCOTUS affirms it.

Here's a classic syllogism in philosophy:
1. All men are moral
2. Socrates is a man
3. Therefore Socrates is mortal

The conclusion does not establish an equivalence between Socrates and being mortal. Neither does the statement "knowledge is belief" entail an equivalence between knowledge and belief. Regardless, it appears we've gotten through this misunderstanding.

So your argument here is, "I believe X is true and I have strong justification to believe it, therefore it is true [or, therefore I know it]." But why do you think those two conditions are sufficient?

Those conditions obviously fail to generate knowledge in certain circumstances. And this idea of "strong" or "adequate" justification is not even in keeping with that broad sort of Gettier epistemology. It looks like a subset, something like probabilistic internalism. — Leontiskos

I agree that "Strong" justification, per se, is not sufficient for knowledge. But if one believes that knowledge is possible, one would then have to agree that there are SOME justifications are sufficient for knowledge. Does "my name is Fred" qualify for knowledge? It doesn't really matter, because I was simply trying to illustrate the relation between knowledge and belief.

But again, rather than falling into the rabbit hole of contemporary epistemology, my claim is that the traditional epistemic opinion is that knowledge is possible - that I can know and know that I know certain things. I don't see how you would be able to accept such a view.

I do believe knowledge is possible (analytic truths, for example), but I also believe it is rare - because Gettier conditions are nearly always present. If one chooses to define knowledge more loosely, with somewhat less deference to Gettier conditions, then he would consider knowledge to be more common. But whether or not the term (knowledge) can be applied to some specific belief seems to me to be of no practical significance.

What is of practical siginficance (IMO) is the importance of making an effort to seek truth through good epistemological practices. What I've been arguing is that inference to best explanation (IBE) is usually the best we can do. I doubt that any IBEs can constitute knowledge, but that doesn't mean we should treat all inferences as equally credible. Conspiracy theorists draw inferences from data, but they tend to cherry pick data to fit a prior prejudice, while ignoring or rationalizing data that is inconsistent with the theory. They are not applying good epistemological practices.

No, your source did not say that knowledge is belief. Go back and have another look. — Leontiskos

Yes, it did. Let me be clear: the sources did not say (nor did I claim) that all beliefs are knowledge. Rather, both sources are saying that knowledge constitutes a a subset of ones beliefs. I'll also clarify that we're discussing propositional beliefs/knowledge.

I gather that you use the terms differently, but I've consistently been discussing what the standard philosophical terms are. If you are unable or unwilling to understand this, then there's no point continuing the discussion.

When we are talking about knowledge we are not really dealing with beliefs. — Leontiskos

I don't think so, because it is a statement of knowledge, and knowledge is not belief. — Leontiskos

You're wrong - in terms of standard philosophical discourse. I provided the definition from the Blackwell Dictionary of Western Philosophy that categorically states that knowledge is belief (belief that is adequately justified and true). Here's another source:

Ever since Plato’s Theaetetus, epistemologists have tried to identify the essential, defining components of propositional knowledge. These components will yield an analysis of propositional knowledge. An influential traditional view, inspired by Plato and Kant among others, is that propositional knowledge hasthree individually necessary and jointly sufficient components: justification, truth, and belief. On this view, propositional knowledge is, by definition, justified true belief. This tripartite definition has come to be called “the standard analysis.”

-- Moser, Paul K.. The Oxford Handbook of Epistemology (Oxford Handbooks) (pp. 15-16). Oxford University Press. Kindle Edition.

If you think there are truths then can you give an example of a truth? — Leontiskos

I'll give two examples:
I. :My name is Fred.

I believe this to be true, and I have strong justification to believe it (it's the name on my birth certificate, the name my friends and family have always called me, and the first name on a variety of legal documents). My justification is sufficient to categorize this belief as knowledge - so I can also say I know this to be true. A TRUTH is nothing more than a true statement (or proposition), so I can confidently say "My name is Fred" is a truth.

Now let's suppose you believe me - that my name really is Fred. Your justification is weak, compared to mine (you're just taking the word of a strange guy on a public internet forum), so you cannot claim this to be knowledge on your part. In spite of the fact that you can't know this to be true, you do believe this to be the case and this also means you regard "My name is Fred" to be a truth.

II. Consider Goldbach's conjecture:
Every even number greater than 2 is the sum of two prime numbers

This statement has not been proven, and it hasn't been disproven. This implies that one of the following is a true statement:
G1. Every even number greater than 2 is the sum of two prime numbers
G2. There is at least one even number greater that 2 that is NOT the sum of two prime numbers

No one can claim to KNOW G1 or G2, because there's no proof of either. But one of them has to be true in spite of this - and therefore one of them is a TRUTH. My point is that something can be true, even if no one can actually know it.

For me, telepathy means there is an energy that is different from our other forms of communication, which are all physical. — Athena

If telepathy is real, why wouldn't it be physical, given that both sender and receiver are physical? To assume there's something nonphysical means the brain can have a causal relation to the nonphysical. More assumptions = weaker justification.

Perhaps there was a telepathic event as the man was dying, that planted the words in your mind. Or perhaps you received it telepathically from his wife's subsconscious, stimulated by her mental state. These seems more plausible to me than your receiving this cryptic message from him, after his brain ceased functioning.

You seem to be suggesting that our memories could be copied to another form and re-attached to our souls after death.

Sure, this is logically possible, but it's an ad hoc hypothesis that lacks supporting evidence. If this is something that occurs, I wonder why the deity bothers at all with brain-storage of memories, and why she fails to help out dementia patients with access to this resource.

The medical evidence demonstrates that memories are "stored" (in some sense) in the brain. Disease and physical trauma can result in memory loss. So even if a "soul" lives on, if the individual's memories are absent, it seems irrelevant to me. I regard myself as the person who was shaped by my experiences, including the memories that were formed along the way.

Meat is murder, but it's also rather tasty. Ultimately, I think that's why it's going to continue to be consumed.

I agree that the question of an afterlife is more relevant than the existence of a God.

The thought of an afterlife is certainly appealing, but wishful thinking seems to me a poor guide to truth. And AFAIK, there's no evidence of it (unless you buy into claims about houses being haunted). Still, believing in an afterlife is not usually harmful (unless it leads one to risk or forgeit his life, or that of others), and it could be emotionally beneficial.

whether or not one believes in God does affect one's approach and interpretation of all that happens in life. — Jack Cummins

Consider 2 scenarios:
1) deism is true: a "God" created the universe, but is indifferent to everything that occurs in it. There is no afterlife.
2) naturalism is true: there is no being that intentionally created the universe.

Would you approach life differently in scenario 1 vs scenario 2?

That couldn't be more wrong. Surely you know of the many controversies over the interpretation of quantum physics. The question of whether the objects of analysis really exist, or in what sense they exist, is central to that. — Wayfarer

There are a variety of interpretations of QM, and it seems unlikely that it will ever be possible to verify which one is correct. That seems a background curiosity, and gives a good reason to be agnostic as to which interpretation is correct. However, it does not provide a reason to deny that the "objects of analysis" exist. These objects are (obviously) analyzable- which seems sufficient reason to regard them as real. If some interpretation of QM entails these things as being nonexistent, that seems more of a reason to deny the interpretation, than a reason to deny the existence of these analyzable objects.

At worst, this interpretation establishes that it is possible the object doesn't exist. But that possibility still seems no more than an idiosyncratic curiosity - not a fact that further scientific investigation should feel obligated to take into account.

Perhaps such idiosyncratic interpretations of QM might lead some brilliant scientist to develop a new paradigm on this basis. If that paradigm is more successful at making predictions, then it could become relevant. But unless/until that occurs, it seems a dead-end.

the set of all things that have this property. — litewave

a set is a single thing too and its elements can be said to participate in or share the character of this thing. — litewave

the set of not only its presently existing instances but also of its past and future instances and of all its possible instances (existing in possible worlds) — litewave

Can we agree that only one possible world actually exists (the actual world)?

In that case, your set includes "things" that do not exist, never have existed, and never will exist (they are non-actual possibilities). Let's focus on this subset of your big set. Does it have any members? Are the members things? If so, what is a thing?

The shift in language from “prostitute” to “sex worker” reflects a deeper societal change in how we view autonomy, dignity, and labor. Referring to it as “sex work” acknowledges that it is, indeed, work -often under complex and challenging circumstances. — PatriciaCollins

The term also normalizes/de-stygamtizes it. Somewhat. That is both good and bad. It's good we're finally accepting that the sex trade will always be with us, that the sex workers are people too, and deserving of the respect every human deserves.

That said, I am firmly in the camp that going to OnlyFans instead of getting a skilled job is absolutely a cop-out and not something we can sufficiently compare as "work". — AmadeusD

Yes. This is the problem, and it does not seem like a long-term career. It would be good for sex-workers to recognize the relatively short term nature of the career and plan accordingly. I suspect that's rarely done, although I did read about a nursing student who was using sex-work to fund her education. Good for her!

Why does it matter if a "God" exists?

A religious person would point to the promise of eternal life. That requires a God of religion: one requiring worship and perhaps a moral life, and providing a life after death. The problem is that this package is rather implausible.

By contrast, the traditional arguments for God's existence only (provisionally) establish a creator and ontological ground of reality (i.e. deism). So what if such a being exists? The only reason I can imagine is that it statisfies a curiosity about the nature of existence. But does it? Should it?

At best, these arguments only define a coherent metaphysical framework. Being coherent means its possibly true. But the frameworks that entail a God necessarily depend on questionable metaphysical assumptions. Why should this satisfy anyone's curiosity?

There are metaphysical frameworks that don't include a God. Similarly, they depend on metaphysical assumptions - so they can't be established as true either. But...

No metaphysical theory can be tested, verified, or falsified. Still, we can compare different theories in terms of explanatory power and parsimony. A deistic theory can answer all questions (magic can explain ANYthing), but it loses parsimony by assuming something as complex as a deity just happens to exist without cause or explanation. To me, this seems sufficient reason to assume a deity does not exist. One can still explore metaphyical systems to satisfy curiosity, but the theistic ones seem rather far-fetched.

That said, in my experience debating these issues with theists- they tend to embrace the deistic arguments because it helps to rationalize what they already believe, or want to believe.

if you are saying that everything is believed and nothing is known, then I don't find that to be epistemologically precise. — Leontiskos

My semantics is standard in epistemology Here's what the Blackwell Dictionary of Western Philosophy says:

Starting from Plato’s dialogue Theaetetus, knowledge has been thought to consist in three necessary conditions: belief, truth, and justification. Traditionally, the focus is on the nature of justification...In 1963 Gettier showed that these three conditions do not really explain what knowledge is. For I may hold a justified belief which is true but which I believe to be true only as a matter of luck. Such a belief cannot count as knowledge. Epistemology since then has been debating whether the original conditions need to be modified, or whether further conditions must be introduced.

So if you KNOW X, this means you BELIEVE X, X is true, you are justified in believing X, and your justification is not a product of luck.

You said, "I know X is not a statement of belief". Well, it IS a statement of belief in standard philosophical discourse. I realize that in colloquial speech, some people consider belief and knowing to be something distinct, but that actually muddies the water.

You're also drawing a distinction with "certainty" and "certitude" but this also seems colloquial. We're still dealing with beliefs, even if there is no logical possibility that the belief is false.

the way we linguistically distinguish facts from opinions highlights the way that facts are not subjective in the way that opinions are subjective, and that they exist all the same. That is: there really are facts (truths), and they really are something different than opinions. If everything returns to attitude, then it seems that there is nothing other than opinion. — Leontiskos

Our colloquial way of speaking is vague, and implies distinctions that are not real. An opinion is a belief. Colloquially, if we say "that's my opinion" - we may be qualifying the nature of the belief, but it's a vague qualification. A person might say this when he knows the basis for his opinion is weak, but another person might formulate an opinion only after a good deal of analysis. In either case, they're stating a belief.

A TRUTH is a statement that corresponds to some aspect of reality. Of course there are truths. Truth is what we all want to have in our possession. The issue is: how do we assess whether of not some statement is true? A justification is a reason to believe the statement is true. Some justifications are better than others. If it's derived from deductive reasoning, you're on very solid ground (although you're still dependent on the premises being true). The point I've been making is that we rarely use deduction; more often we use abduction - it's an imperfect guide to truth, but it's usually the best we can do. But it's better than choosing beliefs randomly, or jumping to conclusions without considering all the facts.

In the context of this discussion on continuity of the self? Nothing. What I mean is: the most defensible position on the self is that consciousness is just a momentary phenomenon that comes packaged with the illusion of continuity. — Mijin

I agree.

What do you regard as the necessary and sufficient conditions (or properties) for being you? I suggest that this is a central issue in the transporter scenario.

Are you a physicalist, with respect to the mind?
If not strictly a physicalist, do you agree that at least some physical components are necessary to being you?

My position: I'm a physicalist, so I believe I consist of my component, physical parts. These parts change over time, but there is a causal chain that accounts for these changes. As such, at any point of time - I consist of exactly the physical parts that comprise my body at that time (100% are necessary and sufficient for being me at that time). This accounts for the perdurance of my identity over time. AFAIK, no other theory if identity makes as much sense under physicalism. So, if you are a physicalist then I think you should embrace perdurantism (although I'm open to hearing alternative points of view and reconcidering).

I think you are still running roughshod over the difference. There is a difference between believing a proposition to be true vs the proposition actually being true, and this is tracked by the fact that people are saying different things when they say, "I believe it is true," and, "It is true." Similarly, when you say, "That's what it means to be certain," what you are saying is, "That's what it means [for someone] to be certain." But again, "certain" is not always predicated of persons. It is very often predicated of propositions. — Leontiskos

I think you're discussing the semantics of everyday language - many people say "I believe X" to convey a degree of uncertainty. There could be an implied "but I could be wrong". Some people also say they "know" something to be true, conveying absolute certainty, not the philosophical sense of knowledge. Everyday language is imprecise. In a conversation, one might need to clarify.

I'm using the terms more precisely- using definitions that dovetail epistemology (dealing with beliefs and their justification) and psychology (what a belief IS to a person).

For example, from the Grammarist entry, "It’s a near certainty that the 17-member nation eurozone won’t survive in its current form." This is not a predication about an attitude or a subjective state.

It's a statement of belief* by whoever formulated it and becomes a belief* of any person who reads it and accepts it. If no one had ever formulated it, then it wouldn't be a belief* held by anyone.

* a subjective state of an individual.

Perhaps you're thinking, "it would be true even if no one had formulated it". But what exactly would you be referring to as the "it" that is true? The statement? Does the statement exist independently of human minds? Do all possible statements have some sort of independent existence? In my opinion, statements only exist in minds.

Do you stand by your decision to label beliefs that are not provably true IBEs? — Leontiskos

No, not all unproveable truths. I was being careless in my wording. More precisely: most of our rational, acquired beliefs are IBEs. (My objective had only been to contrast this with the notion that our beliefs are somehow proven deductively; in most cases - IBEs are the best we can do, and that's perfectly fine).

The more central question can be restated with your claim, "Under this extreme definition, nearly every belief we have is underdetermined." The "nearly" makes me think that some beliefs are not underdetermined, but I'm not sure if you really hold that. — Leontiskos

I do hold that we have some beliefs that are not underdetermined. The belief that the object before me is a tree or not a tree is not underdetermined. Properly basic beliefs (e.g. there is a world external to ourselves) aren't underdetermined, because they aren't determined through reasoning at all- so the term seems inapplicable (however, arguably- they are determined by the environment that produced us. This aspect is what makes them properly basic - a variation of Alvan Plantinga's reformed epistemology).

In English "certitude" connotes subjectivity, whereas "certain" and "certainty" need not. When I said, "premises which are foundational and certain," I was using 'certain' in this objective sense, which is quite common. For example, you ↪claimed that some beliefs follow necessarily from other beliefs/facts. I might ask, "But do they really follow necessarily?" You might answer, "They certainly do." Your answer would not mean, "I have a high degree of certainty or a high degree of certitude that they do follow necessarily." It would mean, "They objectively follow necessarily." — Leontiskos

I understand the semantic distinction, but are the attitudes actually distinct? (Remember that I suggested certainty is an attitude). Some may insist there is a parallel distinction of attitude, but I'm not convinced.

This is associated with my view toward "Bayesian epistemology": which depends on assigning an epistemic probability to every belief. It is a practical impossibility to do this consistently. We can only apply some subjective coarse grained level of certainty (which may vary from one day to the next). So it seems to me that our epistemic judgements aren't sufficiently fine-grained to truly have an attitude distinction that matches the semantic one. Example: I'm certain the sun will come up tomorrow, despite there being a nonzero probability the sun will go nova.

Well the same problem crops up here. What is certain and a feeling of certainty are not the same thing, just as justification and a feeling of justification are not the same thing. One's being justified and one's deeming themselves justified are two different things. — Leontiskos

This seems similar to someone believing a proposition to be true vs the proposition actually being true. All we can ever do is to make a judgement: there is no oracle to inform us that our judgement is correct. One or more people may examine the reasoning and concur, but this only elevates a subjective judgement to an intersubjective one. Similar with the feeling of certainty: it's subjective, and so is the analysis that leads to the feeling. When we're certain of something, we believe we've arrived at objective truth - that's what it means to be certain.

"..I guessed that this meant that some of our beliefs are provably true, and are not IBEs. If that guess is correct, then apparently you must hold that some foundations are certain. If that guess is wrong, then it would seem that you hold that all beliefs are (unprovable) IBEs. Do you disagree with any of that?"
I don't think ALL beliefs are IBEs:
-We have some basic, intrinsic beliefs, that aren't inferred. Example: the instinctual belief in a world external to ourselves.
We also accept some things uncritically (no one's perf ect).

Re: certainty- that's an attitude, and it may or may not be justified. Justification doesn't require deductive proof. Consider your example "this entity before me is either a tree or it is not a tree." Solipsism is logically possible, so that there actually isn't something before you. We can justifiably feel certain despite the logical possibility we're wrong.

Arguments for a more widespread skepticism or relativism I am familiar with tend to instead rely on a more global underdetermination of things like all rules/rule-following, all causal/inductive reasoning, or the underdetermination of any sort of solid concept/meaning that would constitute the possession of knowledge, which is a step up (or down) from simple scientific underdetermination. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I think we should keep the underlying logical limitations in the background of our minds, but we shouldn't let this undermine practical critical thinking for making judgements and arguments. As one example: a lot of people embrace some conspiracy theory because it explains some facts, and defend their judgement on the basis that it's not provably false. It's a distortion of inference to best explanation. This is a tangent from the theme of your thread, but it's an issue I consider extremely important.

So would you say that some of our beliefs are provably true? — Leontiskos

Good question. We have beliefs that follow necessarily from other beliefs/facts, so they're provable in that sense. It seems inescapable that we depend on some foundational beliefs. So nothing can be proven without some sort of epistemological foundation. What are your thoughts?

God can be known through the application of reason to empirically demonstrable aspects of the ordinary and natural world, — Bob Ross

Is this a premise?

Your OP seems focused on morality. Are you defining God as nothing more than the foundation of objective moral values? That may be all you need, and it lightens your burden of proof.

I would basically argue that some theory which is believed to be underdetermined is not believed. So if I think there are only two theories to account for a body of evidence and that both are exactly 50% likely to be true, then I psychologically cannot believe one over the other.

So I think we would need to get more precise on what we mean by "underdetermined. — Leontiskos

Agreed that we need to establish what "undetermined" means, when were talking about beliefs. I've been treating "underdetermined" as any belief that is not provably true (i.e. determined=necessarily true). Under this extreme definition, nearly every belief we have is underdetermined. I also agree that we ought not to believe something that has a 50% chance of being false.

Most of our beliefs are not provably true, so I have labelled them IBEs. I don't see how else one could claim to have a warrant to believe it. So if you say your belief in X is "more than an IBE" - is it really, if it's not provably true? Or is it still an IBE, but with strong support?

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This is a really interesting objection. Is an IBE underdetermined? Remember that the conclusion is not, "X is the explanation," but rather, "X is the best explanation." I actually don't see why underdetermination would need to attend IBEs. — Leontiskos

I see your point, that by labelling X and IBE, underdetermination may not apply. Labeling it the explanation would be underdetermined.

But I suggest that in the real world, we operate on beliefs, which are often formed by inferring to the best explanation from the facts at hand (background beliefs will unavoidably affect the analysis). We make errors, of course, but a proper objective is to minimize these errors (more on this, below).

I think it depends on how far underdetermination is allowed to roll. If you pair these arguments, their reach is far greater than scientific theories. The term is most associated with the underdetermination of scientific theories, but as noted in the OP is has been used for substantially broader effect.

If some of these arguments go through, then the "best" explanation is not "the most likely to be true (as in, corresponding to reality)," but rather "the explanation I most prefer," or "the explanation society most prefers, given its customs." — Count Timothy von Icarus

Forgive me if I misunderstand, but this sounds a bit fatalistic, to me - in that it seems to imply the quest for truth is irrelevant or hopeless. I suggest that we have a deontological duty to minimize false beliefs and maximize true beliefs. To do otherwise is irrational, and this includes embracing an explanation simply because he prefers it (there are exceptional cases where this might be appropriate, but I'll leave that aside).

Even if we were perfect at this, the resulting beliefs would still be "underdetermined", but ideally they will be our best explanation for the set of information we have. There will necessarily be subjectivity to it (we each make a judgement, and it will be based on our background beliefs - many formed the same way, others the product of learning). This is a proper objective for critical thinking.