Schopenhauer has persuasively shown that free will is an illusion in his essay, On the Freedom of the Will. — darthbarracuda

How? (Not denying that he did this, just wondering how). For something to be illusory, it must appear to be the case. So, in order for free will to be illusory, we must appear to have it.

If we appear to have it, then that's good prima facie evidence that we do have it.

So, we would need good evidence that the appearances are innacurate.

What's that evidence? It would need to be very good, surely, to defeat such widespread appearances to the contrary?

How are the views up there on your high horse? (You're competing in the condescension finals again this year, I take it?). Do you have anything philosophical to contribute?

For example, what do you think of the viability of robust modest incompatibilism about free will versus agent-causal incompatbilism? Do you think the agent-causalists are correct to hold that without agent-causation the robust modest incompatibilist (and, of course, the modest incompatibilist) have done nothing to supplement the agent's originative control over their decisions beyond what it would be if determinism were true? I certainly think so, but that's just me and I'm sure 180Proof will put me right.

Er, no. First, to be a member of that club you need to 'lack' expertise yet think you have it. I have expertise. Gobs of it. You don't. See? (the answer will be 'no', obviously).

Second: what I said about compatibilism and incompatibilism was true, yes?

Here's your homework, my little Dunning-Krugerite: find out what a 'robust modest incompatibilist' is. And then find out what distinguishes one of those from a mere 'modest' (a.k.a. Valerian) incompatibilist. And then find out what distinguishes both from an 'agent causal' incompatibilist. Then come back and try and say something of philosophical relevance.

An interesting debate of compatibalism (limited free will) vs incompatibilism (no free will): — 180 Proof

Ignorant as ever. Compatibilism is not the view that we have 'limited free will' (it is the view that free will is 'compatible' with causal determinism - hence the name). And incompatibilism is not the view that we have no free will (it is the view that free will is 'incompatible' with determinism...hence the name).

Neither are views about whether we have free will. They're views about what free will is or is not compatible with. Sheesh!

Well done for trying. But, you know, maybe stop.

"The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing." Socrates — Nikolas

What's the reference for this? I keep hearing this 'quote' from Socrates - where is it? (Don't say 'The Apology' - I want to know exactly where)

I believe we do have free will. Indeed, I think there is nothing we or anyone else among us (with the exception of God, of course) can do to rob us of it. My reason tells me that I am morally responsible for every single decision I make, no matter what the circumstances. And as my reason tells me as well that I could not be morally responsible unless my decisions were truly my own and not the product of antecedent causes, I conclude that my decisions - all of them - are truly my own and not the product of antecedent causes (and thus that I have free will in respect of them).

Those who argue otherwise - that is, those who argue that we lack free will, or have less than our full share of it - are, I contend, demonstrably confused as they consistently allow weaker evidence to overrule stronger.

Free will is not something seen, touched, smelt, heard, or tasted. Our awareness of it comes via our reason. It is our reason that tells us we have it, not our senses. This is why it is not an object of empirical inquiry.

The reason of literally billions of people tells them that their wills are free and that they are responsible for the decisions they make. That is staggeringly good evidence.

It is also worth noting that the majority of philosophers who have thought carefully about this issue have also come to the conclusion that we have free will, despite disagreeing over what possessing it involves.

Clearly then, this premise - 1. We have free will - is extraordinarily well supported by rational evidence.

Yet those who conclude that we lack free will must first defend a controversial thesis about what having free will involves, such as that it involves having alternative possibilities of a kind only indeterminism can provide, or whatever. And then they must go on to argue that we do not have what it takes.

But that thesis - the thesis about what free will involves possessing - will be less self-evident to reason than the thesis that we have free will.

Take the thesis that free will is incompatible with causal determinism ('incompatibilism'). It provides the most common route to the 'no free will conclusion'. The reasoning going as follows:

1. Free will is incompatible with determinism
2. Determinism is true
3. Therefore we lack free will

Well, that's a terrible argument. It's valid, but even if premise 2 is true (and of course, its truth is currently in question), premise 1 is less rationally self-evident than "we have free will".

So even if premise 2 is true (and I'm not saying it is), this would be the rationally more compelling argument to make in light of it:

1. We have free will
2. Determinism is true
3. therefore free will is compatible with determinism.

Needless to say, my views here are, as ever, heavily influenced by Descartes.

You are right. I misunderstood I will try to answer your actual argument. — Fides Quaerens Intellectum

It seems to me that you still are. Here is my argument:

1. If disinterested moral observers from time t1 get the impression Xing in circumstances S is wrong, and distinterested moral observers from time t2 get the impression that Xing in circumstances S is right (P), then other things being equal this is prima facie evidence that Xing in circumstances S was wrong at time t1 and right at time t2 (Q).
2. P
3. therefore Q — Bartricks

You need to deny a premise. You haven't done that. Rather you say this:

You are arguing that we have no reason to believe that morality exists separate of humanity. — Fides Quaerens Intellectum

Clearly that is not what I am arguing at all. No premise of my argument asserts such a thing. So you're just attacking a straw man.

I believe the truth of a moral proposition is not constitutively determined by any human attitudes.

You are confusing moral relativism with human subjectivism about morality. These are completely different views.

The physical landscape is not made of human attitudes, is it? It exists objectively. Or at least, it exists outside of human minds. Yet it changes over time. And our evidence that it changes is that it appears to. I am making the same claim about morality. Just as the claim that the physical landscape changes over time is obviously not equivalent to the claim that the physical landscape exists in human minds alone or is a human construct, likewise for the parallel claim about morality.

Circular definitions are correct. So, here's my definition of bread. Bread is bread. That's correct. Bread really is bread. But it's totally unhelpful and stupid. That's what's true of your definition of determinism, a thesis you clearly do not grasp. You've said 'Determinism is what you have when things are determined". Er, yes. Correct, but lacking in substance. Anyway, I've reached the conclusion you can't reason you're way out of a paper bag.
"You mean a plastic bag? And that I can't reason my way into one?"
No, you can't reason your way out of a paper bag.
"But if a bag is paper, then it is plastic. Here is my definition of a paper bag: a plastic bag. Please tell me if you disagree with my definition".
Yes, I disagree with it. It's not a definition of a paper bag.
"But if you want me to get out of a bag, then I must already be in it".
What?
"Your own argument is that if I am in a paper bag, then I am in a plastic bag, and you want me to get out of it. Please tell me if I am reasoning badly".
Er, yeah, you're not so much reasoning badly as reasoning insanely.
"But here's SEP's definition of a paper bag - a bag that is made of paper".
Yes, so?
"But isn't this your argument 1: bags are necessarily paper, 2, if something is necessarily paper, then it is necessarily plastic. 3. Therefore I am in paper bag.?"
No. That's just mental. What are you on?

If my reasoning here is faulty just say so. — ToothyMaw

Er, yes. It's all over the place. I mean, 'faulty' would be kind.

Essentially I'm saying this: you claim all of the factors that affect our character, and thus actions, are external to the will. One of those elements, our initial character, if it is to be out of our control, must be the result of factors outside of our character that can be identified with a state of the world. Furthermore, if this state of the world is fixed as a function of previous states of the world that originate with a specific state of the world at some time t, and it would have to be if it were determined, then determinism must be true. — ToothyMaw

I just can't follow that at all. My view is really not hard to understand. I am arguing that if we have come into existence, then we will not be morally responsible for anything we are or do, for eveything we are and do will be the causal product of factors we were in no way morally responsible for.
That will not be the case if we exist with aseity. Therefore, if we are morally responsible we exist with aseity. And we are morally responsible. Therefore, we do exist with aseity.

It's not hard. I haven't mentioned determinism. I haven't mentioned necessity. i don't know why you're mentioning them.

Determinism: the doctrine that all events, including human action, are ultimately determined by causes external to the will. — ToothyMaw

That's a circular definition as you've included the word 'determined'.

Anyway, no premise in my argument asserted the truth of determinism. And no premise in my argument said anything about necessity (determinism essentially involves a claim about necessity, for if determinism is true then every event that occurs was necessitated by past circumstaces and the laws of nature).

your assertion that if we come into existence then we are not responsible for our initial character implies you believe that all other events not related to human action are also determined — ToothyMaw

First, if was no an assertion, but a conclusion. Second, it does not imply that at all.

I assume you will dispute my definition of determinism — ToothyMaw

Yes, because it wasn't one. You can't mention the term you're defining in the definiens.

Determinism: The world is governed by (or is under the sway of) determinism if and only if, given a specified way things are at a time t, the way things go thereafter is fixed as a matter of natural law. — ToothyMaw

That's not a good definition either, as 'fixed' means 'determined' yes? An event is determined to occur if it is necessitated by the past and the laws of nature.

Again, no premise in any argument I made asserted the truth of determinism. And no premise in any other way asserted a supposed necessary truth. I made no appeal to necessity in anything I argued.

The aseity argument establishes that we exist with aseity. If you think it doesn't, you need to take issue with a premise and to provide independent evidence of its falsity.

I do not understand your objection to my objection.

I understand moral absolutism to be the view that moral truths are fixed across time and space. So, if Xing in circumstances S is wrong, then it is always and everywhere wrong to X in circumstances S.

I understand moral relativism to be the denial of moral absolutism, and thus to be the view that though Xing in circumstances S may be wrong here and now, this does not entail that it was always and everywhere wrong.

Here is my argument for moral relativism:

1. If disinterested moral observers from time t1 get the impression Xing in circumstances S is wrong, and distinterested moral observers from time t2 get the impression that Xing in circumstances S is right (P), then other things being equal this is prima facie evidence that Xing in circumstances S was wrong at time t1 and right at time t2 (Q).
2. P
3. therefore Q

What you have done in your reply is simply note that while Xing in circumstances S may be wrong, Xing in circumstances T may be right. True, but irrelevant.

My argument does not assume determinism. Which premise asserts determinism?

An object exists with aseity when it exists but has not been brought into being. Thus, objects that exist with aseity have always existed. They do not have prior causes.

We know a couple of things about this kind of object. We know that some - at least one - must exist. For if everything that exists has been brought into being, then we will find ourselves off on an infinite regress. As there are no actual infinities in reality, we can know that there must exist some things that have not been brought into being. Thus we know that there are objects that exist with aseity.

We also know that at least some of these objects can originate causal chains. For as before, if every cause has an event as a prior cause, then we will be off on another infinite regress of events. Thus some objects must be capable of causing events, directly as it were. That is, they must be able to cause events without being caused to do so. It's known as the power of 'substance causation'.

If we exist with aseity and if we are substance-causes, then we will be the originators of our decisions. That is, the causal chain that explains why we decided as we do will terminate with us. And thus we will be capable of being morally responsible for that decision. (Note, then, the power of substance causation is also needed to have free will and be morally responsible, which just underlines that existing with aseity is not sufficient).

So you are saying that if we have free will we are morally responsible, right? — ToothyMaw

No, if we are morally responsible, then we have free will.

It is possible to have free will and not be morally responsible (that would be the case if, for example, we had free will but moral nihilism is true).

But if we are morally responsible - and we are - then we have free will.

I keep saying "If P, then Q" and you keep responding "so, if Q then P". No. 'If P then Q' does not entail 'if Q then P'. If we are morally responsible, then we have free will. It doesn't follow that if we have free will we are morally responsible. And if we are morally responsible, we exist with aseity. It does not follow that if we exist with aseity we are morally responsible.

Furthermore, how does that argument mean that if we exist with aseity then we are morally responsible? — ToothyMaw

I haven't made that argument! That's the argument 'you' keep making, as if it is mine. My argument estalibhses that if we are morally responsible, we exist with aseity (and as we are morally responsible ,then we do exist with aseity). But it does not show that if you exist with aseity you are morally responsible.

Once more, 'if P then Q', does not entail that 'if Q then P'. If you are a basketball player, then you are tall. It doesn't follow that if you are tall you're a basketball player.

I am having trouble following you. First, I haven't the faintest idea what all those symbols and letters mean. Not sure you do either! Anyway, they're not necessary and I do know that whatever they mean, they do not capture my argument for my argument certainly committed no modal fallacy.

According to the aseity argument you outlined in you latest post, it is logically necessary that if we have free will, we exist with aseity, and, thus, are morally responsible. — ToothyMaw

The argument assumes we are morally responsible and have free will and concludes that we exist with aseity.

I did not say 'necessary' once. So you're introducing the notion of necessity, not me. It is not present in my argument. I do not believe in necessary truths. The argument I made was deductively valid and all of its premises are true, or at least are far more reasonably believed than disbelieved. So its premises are 'true' (not 'necessarily' true, just true) and its conclusion is too. Not necessarily: it just is.

You also seem to be confusing the claim that aseity is required for moral responsibility with the different claim that if we exist with aseity we 'are' morally responsible.

I have not made that claim. Something could exist with aseity yet not be morally responsible. It is the reverse that I deny.

You're the one committing fallacies. This:

1. If P, then Q
2. Q
3. therefore P

is fallacious. Yet that's how you're reasoning. For my argument establishes the truth of this premise:

1. If we are morally responsible, we exist with aseity

But you've reasoned like this:

2. We exist with aseity.

3. Therefore we are morally responsible

That's a fallacious argument and it is no argument I made. Note, my claim is that aseity is needed for moral responsibility, but that does not entail that it is sufficient.

Again, this is how I have reasoned:

1. If we are morally responsible, we exist with aseity
2. We are morally responsible
3. Therefore, we exist with aseity


Presumably what you are doing is arguing that despite existing with aseity, we lack moral responsibility because we did not choose to exist with aseity - is that correct? That's what this suggests.

I mean, we have no control over whether or not we have free will, and thus exist with aseity, and thus have moral responsibility. How could we control those things? — ToothyMaw

You're assuming, falsely - indeed, absurdly - that to be morally responsible we need to have 'control' over everything that contributes to our decisions. That's ridiculous and has no support from our reason.

Take an everyday example: John says "P" and that annoys me and I punch him. Am I morally responsible for punching him? Intuitively, yes. What about the fact - the obvious fact - that I had no control over John saying "P"? Can I appeal to that as an excuse? No, nobody in their right mind would accept that as an excuse, even though it is obviously true that I lacked control over John saying "P".

What's needed for moral responsibility - as my argument shows - is not control over everything, but the power truly to originate one's decisions.

The main point is that your argument for aseity is fallacious, I think. — ToothyMaw

But you earlier agreed that it was deductively valid. I did not invoke necessity.

Here is the argument:

1. If I have come into existence, then I have been caused to come into existence by external events that I had nothing to do with.
2. If I have been caused to come into existence by external events that I had nothing to do with, then I am not morally responsible for my initial character.
3. Therefore, if I have come into existence, I am not morally responsible for my initial character.
4. I am not morally responsible for my environment or the laws of nature that prevail in it.
5. If I am not morally responsible for my initial character and not morally responsible for my environment. and the laws of nature that prevail in it, then I am not morally responsible for anything.
6. Therefore, if I have come into existence, I am not morally responsible for anything.
7. I am morally responsible for some things.
8. Therefore I have not come into existence.

There's no fallacy there. No premise says 'if this, necessarily that'. They just say 'if this, then that'.

You need to deny a premise.

Libet demonstrated that he could predict a behavior before a subject decided consciously to perform that behavior. — Ree Zen

Actually no. But even if that is what his experiment did, I did that too: red tomato. Now you're thinking of a red tomato. I knew you would. See?

We - that is, reflective human beings - have always known that decisions have antecedent causes and known that if one knows enough about what those antecedent causes are, one can make reliable predictions about what someone will decide to do. It's not something his experiments showed, and by itself it implies nothing about whether we have free will or not. So the experiment has zero importance to the free will debate. Zero.

You're misusing terms. What you're calling 'moral relativism' seems actually to be 'moral nihilism' a.k.a. 'moral error theory'.

I am a moral relativist. Moral relativism is the view that the truth of a moral proposition can vary according to place and time, other things being equal. So, 'Xing in circumstances S is wrong' might be true today, but false tomorrow.

Moral relativism is not, then, equivalent to moral nihilism. The two are consistent - one can be a moral relativist 'and' a moral nihilist. But one can be a moral realist - such as myself - and a moral relativist.

Moral relativism is also often confused/conflated with moral subjectivism. Moral subjectivism is the view that moral norms and values are reducible to the norms and values of a person or persons. It would seem to entail moral relativism, but moral relativism doesn't entail it.

Anyway, I'm a moral relativist and a moral realist and a moral subjectivist. So I agree that moral nihilism is false. However, your case against it seems to be just that no one actually believes it. That, to my mind, doesn't constitute any kind of evidence that it is false. I think it is false, I stress. But I think it is false because it appears to be and becuase any attempt to defend it will be self-refuting.

As for moral relativism: well that appears to be true as well. People at some times seem to have gotten the impression that Xing in circumstances S was wrong, whereas people at other times seem to have gotten the impression Xing in circumstances S was right. That's default good evidence that Xing in those circumstances was wrong at one time, and right at another.

I think you have missed the point, which is that Libet's experiments tell us precisely nothing about free will. They do not imply we lack it, or that we have it. They show at best that our decisions or intention-formings have antecedent causes. Which is something that's obvious and that one doesn't need to run those tests in order to demonstrate.

No, you're assuming we do not have aseity, not showing it.

If the aseity argument cannot be refuted - and as yet I see no grounds for thinking any of its premises are false - then aseity has been shown to be required for moral responsibility. And you accept this.

Well, moral responsibility is something we have excellent evidence we possess. The reason of virtually all of us represents us to be morally responsible. What better evidence can we have that we are morally responsible?

So, it follows that we exist with aseity. That is, the evidence that we are morally responsible is, by extension, evidence that we exist with aseity.

What you're doing is arguing that we are not morally responsible on the basis of an argument that has a premise - premise 1 - that is false if we exist with aseity. So you're not providing evidence that we lack aseity, you're just assuming we lack it.

Cakes, soups - it's all the same.

and like the rest of us doesn't give a damn what barprick thinks. — Baden

That's somewhat ironic. Bumden.

I suppose it is implausible to assert that one's current character is a blend of all of the factors external to their wills and their interactions with these external factors (environment, laws of nature, initial character)? It does seem odd, as one's previous character affects one's previous actions and thus current character, and is not really external to their will according to the compatibilist. If the will is externalized then one's current character results directly from one's previous character and one's current character is pretty much predetermined and there is no agency at all. No one would have any power over anything they do. — ToothyMaw

How is it implausible? It clearly 'is' the case if you have come into being. There's no way around it.

Imagine we're making a soup. We start with a saucepan of water. Is that the soup? No. We add some ingredients - some stock, some herbs, some onion etc. Adding each one affects the flavour. And how that affect the flavour, let us imagine, depends on what flavour it had when they were added. Okay.

Now, perhaps it is not clear when, exactly, we have a soup on our hands. But that's irrelevant. The fact remains that the soup did not create itself, yes? Even though it acquired a flavour and the flavour it had affected how other ingredients affected it, at no point does this mean that the soup was not a product of external causes.

That's obvious. And it is no less obvious when it isn't a soup, but a body. So, if you accept that if you're not responsible for A and A is causally responsible for B, then you have to accept that you're not responsible for your body if you came into being. And if your mind is part of your body, then you're not responsible for your mind - not responsible for it being the kind of mind that produces this or that decision under this or that circumstance.

Does it make a dot of difference if indeterminism is involved? Nope. Just imagine it was indeterministic what flavour the soup would have. Is it now true that the soup creates itself? If the soup had a mind could it now be morally responsible for its flavour? No, the idea is absurd.

So, while it may - perhaps - be a requirement of responsible agency that one have an ability to do otherwise of a kind only indeterminism can facilitate, the fact remains that this will do nothing in terms of making one morally responsible if one does not already satisfy the aseity requirement.

Eating a healthy diet is good for long life. But if you're dead already there's no point in forcing vegetables into your corpse, is there? Likewise, unless you exist with aseity you can have all the abilities to do otherwise you like, you're dead responsibility wise.

Again, so far I have not heard a single good objection to any of the premises of the aseity argument. Rather, it is just being ignored and focus is transferring to abilities to do otherwise. They're beside the point. Like I say, it's like discussing what the best diet may be for the corpse in front of you.

yes, but that is not equivalent to this:

Your argument of catchy maxims getting generated only by populist mass philosophers — god must be atheist

I did not say that proper philosophers never generate catchy maxims. I said that populist 'philosophers' will boil everything down to them. And indeed, 'philosophy' in their hands will really amount to nothing more than this because they can't afford to pursue an argument beyond a reflective member of the public's attention span. They need to make a living. Whereas academic philosophers have to produce good philosophy to earn a living.

Anyway, this guy does not appear to be an academic philosopher, or even to have a PhD in the subject, so far as I can tell. So he's not an expert, just a self publicist. But then I think most people here wouldn't know a real philosopher from their elbow. They probably think Sam Harris is one!

If "professional" means earning money, then "professional philosopher" means philosopher who earns money, be he or she good or bad. "Academic philosopher" is most likely also professional, but not all professional philosophers are academic philosophers. — god must be atheist

Yes, but the only value of inviting a 'professional' philosopher is surely that they are good at philosophy, as opposed to good at making money out of philosophy.

Your argument of catchy maxims getting generated only by populist mass philosophers — god must be atheist

Er, that isn't what I said. Read what I actually said.

And I have seen my share of bad academic philosophers. (Bad as judged by me.) — god must be atheist

If they're academic philosophers they're highly unlikely to be bad at philosophy. They're almost certainly exceptionally good at it. I mean, that's the point (and if you judge them bad....well, you're not a professional philosopher are you?). By contrast, to make money at philosophy you don't have to be exceptionally good at it, rather you have to be a good salesperson. These are quite different skills.

He doesn't express the view I attributed to him in that piece. But it is attributed to him by John Martin Fischer in his article "Recent Work on Moral Responsibility" (Ethics 1999, fn. 67).

Yes, that sounds correct about Strawson.

When it comes to Van Inwagen, I am not so sure. You're focussing on Van Inwagen's incompatibilism. However, I am agnostic on whether incompatibilism or compatibilism is true (for I am arguing that aseity is necessary for moral responsibility, not that it is sufficient - so I leave open that it may still be the case that alternative possibilities of the indeterministic kind are also needed if one is to be morally responsible for one's actions.....though I am a long way from being convinced about that).

What I do share with Van Inwagen is a belief that it is more plausible that we have free will and are morally responsible than that free will requires indeterminism. As I understand him, he has argued that if determinism could somehow be established to be true, then he would simply conclude that compatibilism is true, rather than abandon belief in free will. That is, he would give up his incompatibilism over the reality of moral responsibility. He believes the reality of moral responsiblity is more clear and distinct than any theory about what moral responsibility requires.

And that seems quite right: it is, after all, demonstrably more manifest to our reason that we have free will and are morally responsible than it is that free will requires this or that metaphysical thesis to be true. It seems absurd to think that incompatibilism is more obviously true than that we have free will; the reverse is clearly the case. And so anyone who, after concluding that free will requires x, then concludes that as we lack x we lack free will, is someone who is allowing the weaker overrule the stronger.

I apply that to my own view as well, of course. It is much more powerfully self-evident that I am morally responsible than that moral responsibility requires aseity. I think it demonstrably does require aseity - I have yet to hear any reason to think it doesn't - but I accept that its requiring aseity is less powerfully self-evident than the reality of our moral responsibility itself. And thus if it was established that we do not exist with aseity, I would take this to constitute evidence that free will does not require it.

That, however, is not our situation. The situation is that we have an argument - the aseity argument - that appears to establish that moral responsibility requires aseity. Every premise in that argument is well supported. And aseity is something we possibly are, as we know on independent grounds that at least some things must exist in that way.

This, combined with the fact we so obviously are morally responsible gets me to my conclusion.

You have said that Strawson assumes a 'thin' conception of agency (and so by extension, so do I). I do not really know what you mean by that. But I stress, aseity is a necessary condition, not sufficient. By making aseity necessary I am adding, not subtracting from an account of what moral responsibilty conferring agency involves. For I am saying that in addition to whatever reason-responsiveness conditions the compatibilist or incompatibilist says are necessary, aseity is needed as well.

Yes, but you need to be good - really good - at philosophy to be a professional academic. So being an academic is a sign of quality. By contrast, to earn money at 'philosophy' some other way doesn't require being good at it (arguably, you'd need to be quite bad at it - you need to prioritize boiling everything down to catchy maxims). Indeed, it is really only in the academy that being really good at it provides one with a viable way of earning a living. So, 'professional' should surely be understood to mean 'professional academic' not just anyone who has managed to earn money from philosophizing.

Beep.

Like I say, this argument -

1. Brain events cause mental events
2. Therefore brain events are mental events

shares a property with you. I don't click on links, but good luck with your continuing youtube education programme. Everyone knows that professional philosophers spend most of their days making youtube videos.

Toot toot!

Grrrr.

I was wondering if you ever got around to addressing the mind-body issue 180 raised - back on page 1? About how an "immaterial mind" interacts with (its) material body.

But leave it. I can see you have your hands full fulminating. — Banno

Purrrrr.

Dunning and Kruger. Stop playing "I'm teacher". You're not. You don't know what you're talking about, okay. You didn't know that you can turn any inductive argument into a deductively valid one until approx. 5 minutes ago, after you hurriedly looked it up on the internet, yes?

You didn't know that inductive arguments are 'cogent' not 'valid'.

Dunning. And. Kruger.

Now, once more: what's your argument? Lay it out for all to see, and then I'll take you to the cleaners.

Mmmm. — Banno

Try and make some kind of an argument rather than a noise.

Again, you're just nay-saying. — InPitzotl

Stop misusing ugly phrases.

The Dunning Kruger effect is a cognitive bias where a person's meta-cognitive awareness of an area is low, and as a result they overestimate their knowledge in the subject. — InPitzotl

Yeah, thanks, I know what it is.

That does not apply here. — InPitzotl

It really does.

But Bartricks... the mind-is-a-function-of-the-brain argument is inductive. — InPitzotl

You could turn it into a deductively valid argument if you knew how. (Oh, and well done for making a category error too, just for good measure).

And don't thank me for giving you the word 'cogent'.

I don't need you to think for me. — InPitzotl

You really do. But as I say at points like this, Dunning and Kruger. Dunning. And. Kruger.

You phrase a perfectly valid inductive argument as a deductive argument, and argue that it's stupid on the basis that it doesn't follow. — InPitzotl

Ah, someone who's done all their learning on the internet. Inductive arguments are not 'valid'. 'Cogent' is the word you're looking for.

The argument was stupid. Someone who thinks it isn't shares that quality with the argument.

Now, do you have a deductively valid argument that has 'Therefore my mind is my brain' as a conclusion? You don't do you? So why are you still here?

Like I say, you're beyond my help.

Here's what you need to do. Present an argument -a deductively valid argument - that has 'therefore my mind is my brain' as a conclusion. Do that. I won't hold my breath.

No, it's not stupid. Yes, it doesn't follow. — InPitzotl

No, it is stupid. And yes, it doesn't follow.

Why the hell are you talking about knives and bananas? That's not the same argument at all. Not even remotely. Are you on something or do you actually think you're making sense? Sorry matey, but you're beyond my help. You need medication, not education.

So educate me. — InPitzotl

Not sure I am up to the job.

This argument:

1. Brain event causes mental event
2. Therefore brain event is mental event

is stupid, yes? The conclusion doesn't follow.

Given me an argument in support of the thesis that mental events are brain events (and thus that the mind is the brain) and I'll tell you if it is stupid or not.