The PSR is a concept of the mind, which has intuition and reason. Intuition is the source of our knowledge of the Will. Reason is the consequence of separartion and time. The mind and forms are all illusions. The only way we can talk about the world and noumena is through the categories however. Complete personal individuality is denied by German idealists, as it is in philosophies of India and the Islamic world, and yet freedom rather servile piety is teleogical end. But ye speaking of any teleology or forms is strange and can only be strange from the position that Will is fundamental. — Gregory
That's the way it is presented in neophyte philosophy classes, sure. We know better. — Banno
Fucksake. As if materialism and dualism were juxtaposed, and paralleled idealism and materialism.
That's just poor . The sort of thing you might get by granting authority to a bullshit-generator instead of thinking for yourself. — Banno
The two main schools of philosophy of mind are dualism and materialism.
Dualism: Dualism posits that the mind and the physical body are two distinct substances or entities. This view suggests that the mind is not reducible to or identical with the physical brain and its processes. One common form of dualism is Cartesian dualism, named after René Descartes, which asserts a fundamental distinction between the immaterial mind (or soul) and the material body. Dualism can take various forms, including substance dualism, property dualism, and interactionist dualism.
Materialism: Materialism, also known as physicalism or monism, asserts that everything, including the mind and mental processes, can be explained in terms of physical matter and its interactions. In this view, the mind is seen as a product of the physical brain and its activities. Materialism denies the existence of any separate, immaterial substance like a soul. Instead, it holds that mental states and consciousness are the result of complex neural processes and interactions in the brain.
These two schools of thought represent opposing perspectives on the nature of the mind and its relationship to the body and the physical world. There are various nuances and subcategories within each school, and the philosophy of mind continues to be a rich and ongoing area of philosophical inquiry and debate. — ChatGPT
I think Schopenhauer works best as a man who saw the godless [ Darwinian ] deathfuck wheel. I open Dawkins and find Schopenhauer naturalized. In case it's obscure, I mean the loop of breeding and dying, and the generations that come and go like leaves on the tree. Lust leadeth to the horrors of aging, but the young and lusty have not seen this part of the wheel yet, not from the inside, not in the mirror.
Sages of old saw it too, the deathfuck wheel which was just there, shining and dripping. At his best, Schopenhauer was this old school kind of sage, seeing through the illusion of time to the form of the circle, the ancient indestructible Wheel. He believed in The Loop, thought reading Herodotus was enough. He took the world as spectacle, grasped its essence.
He did not need to descend from his balcony for the glory of the revolution. There would be no revolution, not a real one. Just the bloodflower sinwheel forever. He left graffiti for others who might be able to get there sometimes, maybe to help others get there. — plaque flag
What's doing the objectivication? Well i think it's Will, the primordial faculty. Reason-thinking come from Will. This is interesting because we usually think of a conceptualization and only then an act of will. But will produces thinking and it's object is the Forms. — Gregory
But why should we assume that what is meant by idealism is its most unpopular variant? This is like attacking physicalism on the grounds that physicalism must mean reductive corpuscular materialism, and then pointing out that that ontology has major problems and has thus been dumped. — Count Timothy von Icarus
The will as a thing in itself is quite different from its phenomenal appearance, and entirely free from all the forms of the phenomenal, into which it first passes when it manifests itself, and which therefore only concern its objectivity, and are foreign to the will itself. Even the most universal form of all idea, that of being object for a subject, does not concern it; still less the forms which are subordinate to this and which collectively have their common expression in the principle of sufficient reason, to which we know that time and space belong, and consequently multiplicity also, which exists and is possible only through these. In this last regard I shall call time and space the principium individuationis, borrowing an expression from the old schoolmen, and I beg to draw attention to this, once for all. For it is only through the medium of time and space that what is one and the same, both according to its nature and to its concept, yet appears as different, as a multiplicity of co-existent and successive phenomena. Thus time and space are the principium individuationis, the subject of so many subtle ties and disputes among the schoolmen, which may be found collected in Suarez (Disp. 5, Sect. 3). According to what has been said, the will as a thing-in-itself lies outside the province of the principle of sufficient reason in all its forms, and is consequently completely groundless, although all its manifestations are entirely subordinated to the principle of sufficient reason. Further, it is free from all multiplicity, although its manifestations in time and space are innumerable. It is itself one, though not in the sense in which an object is one, for the unity of an object can only be known in opposition to a possible multiplicity; nor yet in the sense in which a concept is one, for the unity of a concept originates only in abstraction from a multiplicity; but it is one as that which lies outside time and space, the principium individuationis, i.e., the possibility of multiplicity. Only when all this has became quite clear to us through the subsequent examination of the phenomena and different manifestations of the will, shall we fully understand the meaning of the Kantian doctrine that time, space and causality do not belong to the thing-in-itself, but are only forms of knowing.
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Only those changes which have no other ground than a motive, i.e., an idea, have hitherto been regarded as manifestations of will. Therefore in nature a will has only been attributed to man, or at the most to animals; for knowledge, the idea, is of course, as I have said elsewhere, the true and exclusive characteristic of animal life. But that the will is also active whore no knowledge guides it, we see at once in the instinct and the mechanical skill of animals.[5] That they have ideas and knowledge is here not to the point, for the end towards which they strive as definitely as if it were a known motive, is yet entirely unknown to them. Therefore in such cases their action takes place without motive, is not guided by the idea, and shows us first and most distinctly how the will may be active entirely without knowledge. The bird of a year old has no idea of the eirgs for which it builds a nest; the young spider has no idea of the prey for which it spins a web; nor has the ant-lion any idea of the ants for which he digs a trench for the first time. The larva of the stag-beetle makes the hole in the wood, in which it is to await its metamorphosis, twice as big if it is going to be a male beetle as if it is going to be a female, so that if it is a male there may be room for the horns, of which, however, it has no idea. In such actions of these creatures the will is clearly operative as in their other actions, but it is in blind activity, which is indeed accompanied by knowledge but not guided by it. If now we have once gained insight into the fact, that idea as motive is not a necessary and essential condition of the activity of the will, we shall more easily recognise the activity of will where it is less apparent. For example, we shall see that the house of the snail is no more made by a will which is foreign to the snail itself, than the house which we build is produced through another will than our own; but we shall recognise in both houses the work of a will which objectifies itself in both the phenomena—a will which works in us according to motives, but in the snail still blindly as formative impulse directed outwards. In us also the same will is in many ways only blindly active: in all the functions of our body which are not guided by knowledge, in all its vital and vegetative processes, digestion, circulation, secretion, growth, reproduction. Not only the actions of the body, but the whole body itself is, as we have shown above, phenomenon of the will, objectified will, concrete will. All that goes on in it must therefore proceed through will, although here this will is not guided by knowledge, but acts blindly according to causes, which in this case are called stimuli.
I call a cause, in the narrowest sense of the word, that state of matter, which, while it introduces another state with necessity, yet suffers just as great a change itself as that which it causes; which is expressed in the rule, "action and reaction are equal". Further, in the case of what is properly speaking a cause, the effect increases directly in proportion to the cause, and therefore also the reaction. So that, if once the mode of operation be known, the degree of the effect may be measured arid calculated from the degree of the intensity of the cause; and conversely the degree of the intensity of the cause may be calculated from the degree of the effect. Such causes, properly so called, operate in all the phenomena of mechanics, chemistry, and so forth; in short, in all the changes of unorganised bodies. — WWR
In fact, the meaning for which we seek of that world which is present to us only as our idea, or the transition from the world as mere idea of the knowing subject to whatever it may be besides this, would never be found if the investigator himself were nothing more than the pure knowing subject (a winged cherub without a body). But he is himself rooted in that world; he finds himself in it as an individual, that is to say, his knowledge, which is the necessary supporter of the whole world as idea, is yet always given through the medium of a body, whose affections are, as we have shown, the starting-point for the understanding in the perception of that world....
....
But all this is not the case; indeed, the answer to the riddle is given to the subject of knowledge who appears as an individual, and the answer is will. This and this alone gives him the key to his own existence, reveals to him the significance, shows him the inner mechanism of his being, of his action, of his movements. The body is given in two entirely different ways to the subject of knowledge, who becomes an individual only through his identity with it. It is given as an idea in intelligent perception, as an object among objects and subject to the laws of objects. And it is also given in quite a different way as that which is immediately known to every one, and is signified by the word will. Every true act of his will is also at once and without exception a movement of his body. The act of will and the movement of the body are not two different things objectively known, which the bond of causality unites; they do not stand in the relation of cause and effect; they are one and the same, but they are given in entirely different ways,—immediately, and again in perception for the understanding. The action of the body is nothing but the act of the will objectified, i.e., passed into perception. It will appear later that this is true of every movement of the body, not merely those which follow upon motives, but also involuntary movements which follow upon mere stimuli, and, indeed, that the whole body is nothing but objectified will, i.e., will become idea. All this will be proved and made quite clear in the course of this work. In one respect, therefore, I shall call the body the objectivity of will; as in the previous book, and in the essay on the principle of sufficient reason, in accordance with the one-sided point of view intentionally adopted there (that of the idea), I called it the immediate object. Thus in a certain sense we may also say that will is the knowledge a priori of the body, and the body is the knowledge a posteriori of the will. Resolutions of the will which relate to the future are merely deliberations of the reason about what we shall will at a particular time, not real acts of will. Only the carrying out of the resolve stamps it as will, for till then it is never more than an intention that may be changed, and that exists only in the reason in abstracto. It is only in reflection that to will and to act are different; in reality they are one. Every true, genuine, immediate act of will is also, at once and immediately, a visible act of the body. And, corresponding to this, every impression upon the body is also, on the other hand, at once and immediately an impression upon the will. — WWR
Thus we see already that we can never arrive at the real nature of things from without. However much we investigate, we can never reach anything but images and names. We are like a man who goes round a castle seeking in vain for an entrance, and sometimes sketching the façades. And yet this is the method that has been followed by all philosophers before me. — WWR
Consciousness already is and always has been studied scientifically. Psychology can be characterized as the study of mind, including consciousness. Second-hand reports can be perfectly valid empirical data. Our own consciousness is the only one we have access to direct evidence for, at least so far. Also - what we call "consciousness", especially in others, is really behavior which we can study more or less objectively. Consciousness can also be studied by more nuts and bolts science as in cognitive science. — T Clark
Other minds have always been a problem for idealists. — Banno
For, with the exception of the Sceptics and the Idealists, the others, for the most part, speak very much in the same way of an object which constitutes the basis of the idea, and which is indeed different in its whole being and nature from the idea, but yet is in all points as like it as one egg is to another. But this does not help us, for we are quite unable to distinguish such an object from the idea; we find that they are one and the same; for every object always and for ever presupposes a subject, and therefore remains idea, so that we recognised objectivity as belonging to the most universal form of the idea, which is the division into subject and object. Further, the principle of sufficient reason, which is referred to in support of this doctrine, is for us merely the form of the idea, the orderly combination of one idea with another, but not the combination of the whole finite or infinite series of ideas with something which is not idea at all, and which cannot therefore be presented in perception. Of the Sceptics and Idealists we spoke above, in examining the controversy about the reality of the outer world.
If we turn to mathematics to look for the fuller knowledge we desire of the idea of perception, which we have, as yet, only understood generally, merely in its form, we find that mathematics only treats of these ideas so far as they fill time and space, that is, so far as they are quantities. It will tell us with the greatest accuracy the how-many and the how-much; but as this is always merely relative, that is to say, merely a comparison of one idea with others, and a comparison only in the one respect of quantity, this also is not the information we are principally in search of.
Lastly, if we turn to the wide province of natural science, which is divided into many fields, we may, in the first place, make a general division of it into two parts. It is either the description of forms, which I call Morphology, or the explanation of changes, which I call Etiology. The first treats of the permanent forms, the second of the changing matter, according to the laws of its transition from one form to another. The first is the whole extent of what is generally called natural history. It teaches us, especially in the sciences of botany and zoology, the various permanent, organised, and therefore definitely determined forms in the constant change of individuals; and these forms constitute a great part of the content of the idea of perception. In natural history they are classified, separated, united, arranged according to natural and artificial systems, and brought under concepts which make a general view and knowledge of the whole of them possible. Further, an infinitely fine analogy both in the whole and in the parts of these forms, and running through them all (unité de plan), is established, and thus they may be com pared to innumerable variations on a theme which is not given. The passage of matter into these forms, that is to say, the origin of individuals, is not a special part of natural science, for every individual springs from its like by generation, which is everywhere equally mysterious, and has as yet evaded definite knowledge. The little that is known on the subject finds its place in physiology, which belongs to that part of natural science I have called etiology. Mineralogy also, especially where it becomes geology, inclines towards etiology, though it principally belongs to morphology. Etiology proper comprehends all those branches of natural science in which the chief concern is the knowledge of cause and effect. The sciences teach how, according to an invariable rule, one condition of matter is necessarily followed by a certain other condition; how one change necessarily conditions and brings about a certain other change; this sort of teaching is called explanation. The principal sciences in this department are mechanics, physics, chemistry, and physiology.
If, however, we surrender ourselves to its teaching, we soon become convinced that etiology cannot afford us the information we chiefly desire, any more than morphology. The latter presents to us innumerable and in finitely varied forms, which are yet related by an unmistakable family likeness. These are for us ideas, and when only treated in this way, they remain always strange to us, and stand before us like hieroglyphics which we do not understand. Etiology, on the other hand, teaches us that, according to the law of cause and effect, this particular condition of matter brings about that other particular condition, and thus it has explained it and performed its part. However, it really does nothing more than indicate the orderly arrangement according to which the states of matter appear in space and time, and teach in all cases what phenomenon must necessarily appear at a particular time in a particular place. It thus determines the position of phenomena in time and space, according to a law whose special content is derived from experience, but whose universal form and necessity is yet known to us independently of experience. But it affords us absolutely no information about the inner nature of any one of these phenomena: this is called a force of nature, and it lies outside the province of causal explanation, which calls the constant uniformity with which manifestations of such a force appear whenever their known conditions are present, a law of nature. But this law of nature, these conditions, and this appearance in a particular place at a particular time, are all that it knows or ever can know. The force itself which manifests itself, the inner nature of the phenomena which appear in accordance with these laws, remains always a secret to it, something entirely strange and unknown in the case of the simplest as well as of the most complex phenomena. For although as yet etiology has most completely achieved its aim in mechanics, and least completely in physiology, still the force on account of which a stone falls to the ground or one body repels another is, in its inner nature, not less strange and mysterious than that which produces the movements and the growth of an animal. The science of mechanics presupposes matter, weight, impenetrability, the possibility of communicating motion by impact, inertia and so forth as ultimate facts, calls them forces of nature, and their necessary and orderly appearance under certain conditions a law of nature. Only after this does its explanation begin, and it consists in indicating truly and with mathematical exactness, how, where and when each force manifests itself, and in referring every phenomenon which presents itself to the operation of one of these forces. Physics, chemistry, and physiology proceed in the same way in their province, only they presuppose more and accomplish less. Consequently the most complete etiological explanation of the whole of nature can never be more than an enumeration of forces which cannot be explained, and a reliable statement of the rule according to which phenomena appear in time and space, succeed, and make way for each other. But the inner nature of the forces which thus appear remains unexplained by such an explanation, which must confine itself to phenomena and their arrangement, because the law which it follows does not extend further. In this respect it may be compared to a section of a piece of marble which shows many veins beside each other, but does not allow us to trace the course of the veins from the interior of the marble to its surface. Or, if I may use an absurd but more striking comparison, the philosophical investigator must always have the same feeling towards the complete etiology of the whole of nature, as a man who, without knowing how, has been brought into a company quite unknown to him, each member of which in turn presents another to him as his friend and cousin, and therefore as quite well known, and yet the man himself, while at each introduction he expresses himself gratified, has always the question on his lips: "But how the deuce do I stand to the whole company?"
Thus we see that, with regard to those phenomena which we know only as our ideas, etiology can never give us the desired information that shall carry us beyond this point. For, after all its explanations, they still remain quite strange to us, as mere ideas whose significance we do not understand. The causal connection merely gives us the rule and the relative order of their appearance in space and time, but affords us no further knowledge of that which so appears. Moreover, the law of causality itself has only validity for ideas, for objects of a definite class, and it has meaning only in so far as it presupposes them. Thus, like these objects themselves, it always exists only in relation to a subject, that is, conditionally; and so it is known just as well if we start from the subject, i.e., a priori, as if we start from the object, i.e., a posteriori. Kant indeed has taught us this.
But what now impels us to inquiry is just that we are not satisfied with knowing that we have ideas, that they are such and such, and that they are connected according to certain laws, the general expression of which is the principle of sufficient reason. We wish to know the significance of these ideas; we ask whether this world is merely idea; in which case it would pass by us like an empty dream or a baseless vision, not worth our notice; or whether it is also something else, something more than idea, and if so, what. Thus much is certain, that this something we seek for must be completely and in its whole nature different from the idea; that the forms and laws of the idea must therefore be completely foreign to it; further, that we cannot arrive at it from the idea under the guidance of the laws which merely combine objects, ideas, among themselves, and which are the forms of the principle of sufficient reason.
Thus we see already that we can never arrive at the real nature of things from without. However much we investigate, we can never reach anything but images and names. We are like a man who goes round a castle seeking in vain for an entrance, and sometimes sketching the façades. And yet this is the method that has been followed by all philosophers before me. — The World as Will and Representation by Arthur Schopenhauer, translated by R B Haldane and J. Kemp Second Book
Only if you can make a coherent case; — Janus
All this sounds very vague and hand-wavy, which would be OK if we were doing mysticism or poetry. — Janus
Recently have been reading a lot of Schopenhauer. — KantDane21
But similar to the other recent post....if thing-in-itself is beyond space, time, causality, subject and object (beyond the phenomenal world), like it is for Schop, how can it have a REFERENT?? what could this REFERENT be?? if the referent of the thing-in-itself is an object or a concept, then it is in the phenomenal world.
so what could it be? — KantDane21
just the invitation to a self-pity party ? It's because I know -- especially from firstperson experience --- how bad life can be, that I can see that my torturers assigned by Dog must be on vacation. — plaque flag
That's true. But there's lots of time and plenty of food to allow for the anticipation and remembering of suffering...not quite the same thing as the real stuff. — plaque flag
Adaptation: we adapt to our circumstances, and if they worsen, our sense of well-being is lowered in anticipation of those harmful circumstances, according to our expectations, which are usually divorced from the reality of our circumstances.
Comparison: we judge our lives by comparing them to those of others, ignoring the negatives which affect everyone to focus on specific differences. And due to our optimism bias, we mostly compare ourselves to those worse off, to overestimate the value of our own well-being. — Benatar
The salient question for me seems to be a different one - what kind of world would we expect to see if there were gods? — Tom Storm
1) Schopenharian utopia. God could have created a world whereby there was no "need" for anything. All of creation was perfectly fulfilled in everyway so that it was like a nothingness Nirvana state of non-being. No lack of anything. No need for anything. This can only be imagined from afar, as we don't know what that really is as people living in a universe that is certainly not this state.
2) Common utopia. God could have created a world whereby we still had needs, but they could be met whenever we wanted. We could turn the dials to make it harder if we get bored, turn it back if we want to go back to easy mode. There is no suffering in the "want" sense of the word. We still "lack" but those desires can be fulfilled easily, without tension. Everyone is harmonious in their actions. There is no struggle.
But then here we come again to the "all too human" aspect that struggle is somehow "what makes us human and what makes life worth it". I contest this fully and wholeheartedly as being a gaslight-y kind of answer. That is to say, if you can't beat them, join them. That is to say, obviously, if we don't kill ourselves, we have to accept that this world with it's struggles has to be good enough. The struggles instead of being "an evil" are incorporated as "necessary" to make us "grow" or to make us "appreciate the good", etc. But what if these are just post-facto excuses for a less-optimal world that we cannot control? What if these are simply psychological justifications that we broadcast over and over the generations to make sure people don't get resentful? — schopenhauer1
. Worldly trials were like tests of character - 'God sends these things to try us', my highly religious paternal grandmother would say. The world was not expected to be perfect, although a Christian ought always try to do good and to help assuage the pain of others.
But the expectation of modern culture is that the world ought to be safe. As there is no other world, nor anything to look forward to beyond this life, then a pain-free existence is the best that can be hoped for. Looked at from that perspective, the world we see is obviously defective, inequitable, arbitrary and cruel. That fosters what I call the 'hotel-manager theodicy'. 'Hey, who's in charge here! Can't you see people are suffering!? What kind of manager would allow this? He must be a total jerk!' — Quixodian
The outcomes are merely not to our taste. I don't see a basis for saying that they're wrong, bad, or evil.
There could also be a God who commands what is good and what is bad, which we are not privy to. Who are we to demand for God to give us answers. It's not like we can say it is wrong for God not to give us answers.
Our perspective is irrelevant either way. — Down The Rabbit Hole
It does feel like the world is conspiring against me every now and again. But over the course of a lifetime extremely rare events are going to happen. — Down The Rabbit Hole
If the creator is all-knowing, their actions are hard to forgive. However, if the creators were just reckless, or even just naive, there is room for forgiveness. — Down The Rabbit Hole
I can imagine a much worse life than I have. So a pure sadist isn't plausible to me.
What I do find plausible is the 'demiurge' sketched by Darwin. Where that motherfucker came from I cannot say. No one can, in my view, cuz they's always another why. But so much makes sense in that Darwinian framework. Demystified Schopenhauer, basically.
Graveleaping sex (in squirts of lost time) and graveleaping knowledge. — plaque flag
But why would God make the hopeful future Heaven contingent on winning a piety competition in the here & now Earth? Apparently, the current occupants of Heaven are the Angels, who function more like immaterial email clients for God than as freewill agents, who must constantly battle their material bodies for moral control. Which "world" is "inauthentic" (tantalizing illusion) : the tangible material terran abode, or the invisible immaterial angelic realm? Do your "two utopias" play each other in football? :nerd: — Gnomon
And maybe Humanity collectively can contribute to the improvement of the Game of Life. Therefore, lacking any direct revelation from the Prime Actor, I must admit that I have no idea what that end-game goal might be. Some have guessed that G*D is gestating little limited gods in He/r image. But why? Does G*D have a motherly instinct? All I can say right now, is that it's an open question --- ripe for philosophical exploration. :smile:
PS___My BothAnd philosophy advises us puzzling humans to just suck it up, and accept the good with the bad. But at the same time, still work toward a more moral Utopian culture on Earth. Ain't that what Morality is all about? — Gnomon
Current models of Evolution have constructed a plausible sequence of advancements from extreme simplicity to the amazing organic complexity we see today in our scopes and neighborhoods.
https://bothandblog3.enformationism.info/page26.html — Gnomon
We can only judge from our own perspective, according to our own standards. So can the aliens. In the sense that we can't judge the god's decisions as right or wrong, nor can the god reward or condemn us by any rules we understand. The god idea is based on a morality given to us by the god. Without that, there is no point in gods: you're right back to saying nature or fate or something equally impersonal. — Vera Mont
If the Universe (Nature) is mostly malevolent, then the Culpable Cause of this ongoing disaster could be construed as morally Evil. But, if Nature is mostly benign, and conducive to sentient human flourishing, then "Mother Nature" could be construed as sufficiently Good for a general moral gold-star. If Gaia is the "god" referred to in the OP, should we view Her as Good, or Evil, or Neutral?
If Nature is morally neutral though, then who do we have to blame for all the adverse aspects of life in this merciless world, "red in tooth & claw"? Who makes all the free-will moral choices in this vale of tears anyway? Do the smiles of a satiated baby offset any of the bloody stuff? How do all such tiny little local Goods add-up in the total scheme of things in an unfinished work of creation : goodish or badish?
The bottom line of the Moral Accounting seems to rest on the question of Agency & Moral Choice. If individual moral agents are free to act selfishly or altruistically, then where should the blame be placed : on the creator of Free Choice or on the Choosers? Is "God" the author of confusion, or of order? Is FreeWill*3 a defect in a world system? Would a cosmos of automatons, be sufficiently Good Enough to warrant a gold star for the designer of a perfectly balanced system of insentient mechanisms? — Gnomon
Physical representations of things which don't actually exist in physical reality doesn't seem problematic from my perspective. — wonderer1
If there are no right and wrong answers to moral questions, how can we say god is wrong, bad, or evil? — Down The Rabbit Hole
I can see the point hiding underneath the question though. Even if there is no cruel god bringing us into this world of suffering, humans brought us here. If you feel it cruel for a god to bring us into this world, to be consistent you would have to say it was cruel for humans to bring us into this world. — Down The Rabbit Hole
and protecting us from a much wider range of horror and misery than we can comprehend — DingoJones
A lot of Christians I've talked to would respond with something like, "Why would you think there are objective moral goods or evils if there is no God?" — wonderer1
If there is a god, his morality is an alien one whereby his good is our evil. That is a very weird thing that would put god as some demiurge that is a force for chaos, and we become more moral than the petulant god who wants to see the chaos manifest. — schopenhauer1
I feel that calling it hidden dualism is a bit misleading because this is a wider problem afflicting the whole of Western philosophy. 'Hidden mind-matter dualism' would be sharper. I wouldn't call it hidden but just rather obvious sloppy or devious thinking. I share the view of you and Chalmers as to the amount of sleight of hand that goes on in consciousness studies. It's an epidemic. . . — FrancisRay
As far as I understand, the person who first adopted neutral monism, though I don't believe his used this term, was William James. Russell was influenced by it and then developed a version of it. I unsure if Whitehead would accept this very label, probably sticking to "the philosophy of organism". — Manuel
In any case, I think that the actual problem is matter - not consciousness, we know very little about matter, much more about consciousness. But people tend to go the opposite route and say that experience is the problem. — Manuel
Except I do think biological processes are different in kind from physical or chemical processes in the same sense that mental processes are different from biological/neurological processes. — T Clark
One of the problems of correlationism is making sense of the ancestral world. Emergence looks tempting, despite its problems and complexities. But I really don't know. — plaque flag
"To return to the physiologist observing another man’s brain: what the physiologist sees is by no means identical with what happens in the brain he is observing, but is a somewhat remote effect. From what he sees, therefore, he cannot judge whether what is happening in the brain he is observing is, or is not, the sort of event that he would call "mental". When he says that certain physical events in the brain are accompanied by mental events, he is thinking of physical events as if they were what he sees. He does not see a mental event in the brain he is observing, and therefore supposes there is in that brain a physical process which he can observe and a mental process which he cannot.
This is a complete mistake. In the strict sense, he cannot observe anything in the other brain, but only the percepts which he himself has when he is suitably related to that brain (eye to microscope, etc.). We first identify physical processes with our percepts, and then, since our percepts are not other people’s thoughts, we argue that the physical processes in their brains are something quite different from their thoughts. In fact, everything that we can directly observe of the physical world happens inside our heads, and consists of "mental" events in at least one sense of the word "mental".
It also consists of events which form part of the physical world. The development of this point of view will lead us to the conclusion that the distinction between mind and matter is illusory. The study of the world may be called physical or mental or both or neither, as we please; in fact, the words serve no purpose. There is only one definition of the words that is unobjectionable: "physical" is what is dealt with by physics, and "mental" is what is dealt with by psychology. When, accordingly, I speak of "physical" space, I mean the space that occurs in physics."
- Bertrand Russell "An Outline of Philosophy" — Manuel
I am not sure your way of seeing about this, but what I am saying is that it may be the case that "emergence" needs "something" for which to "emerge within" (i.e. a point of view). That is to say, assuming there are these "jumps" (which we call "emergent properties"), whence are these properties taking place? We, as the already-observing observer, have the vantage point of "seeing the emergence" but "where" do these "jumps" take place without a point of view? I guess, as another poster used to say, Where is the epistemic cut?. And also, how would that cut take place without an already-existing observer? What does that new enclosure (of the new emergent property) even look like without a vantage point, or point of view already in the equation?. — schopenhauer1