• RedDawn [he/him]
    ·
    4 years ago

    Literally everything is the result of material things, what you’re saying makes no sense at all, it would be equally (not) applicable to literally any quality of any living thing. It’s mumbo jumbo

    • space_comrade [he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      Not sure I understand honestly. You admit the subjective qualities of consciousness are purely the result of matter interacting. That necessarily implies only a one way causal direction, meaning that subjective feels in of themselves don't actually do anything in the material world.

      • RedDawn [he/him]
        ·
        4 years ago

        That necessarily implies only a one way causal direction,

        NO, IT DOESNT

          • RedDawn [he/him]
            ·
            4 years ago

            How does it? You can’t jump from “X is the result of material reality” to “X can have no affect on material reality”. What is the logical process you’re using to claim that the first thing “necessarily implies” the second? It’s a complete non sequitor

            • space_comrade [he/him]
              ·
              4 years ago

              I guess it isn't necessarily implied in of itself but it sure is heavily implied in a physicalist framework. Otherwise you have to admit there's some kind of "consciousness particle" that interacts with matter, which is something no physicalist admits to.

              Not sure why we're arguing this is not even that controversial, most scientists and physicalist philosophers admit that subjective feels have no causal effect on reality and are wholly a product of the material brain doing stuff (except Daniel Dennet and other illusionists I guess but honestly their viewpoint is just a bunch of rhetorical slights of hand and are completely missing the point)

              • RedDawn [he/him]
                ·
                edit-2
                4 years ago

                No, I don’t agree that would need to be “consciousness particle”, I’m not sure where you’re getting all this stuff to be honest, it just keeps coming out of nowhere. Consciousness is a quality that we ascribe to things, whether something has that quality or not affects the way that thing interacts with other things.

                What you’re saying doesn’t make any more sense for consciousness than it would for any other quality. “If pregnancy is the result of material processes, then pregnancy can’t have any affect on the material world unless there’s a pregnancy particle”. This is literal gibberish, it’s not an argument from logic. I feel that you assign some sort of mystical otherworldliness to the quality of consciousness and assuming that I share this idea about it. I don’t.

                Edit: good talking with you, I’m going to bed as it’s quite late here. If I log on tomorrow I’ll try to continue discussing

                • space_comrade [he/him]
                  ·
                  edit-2
                  4 years ago

                  What you’re saying doesn’t make any more sense for consciousness than it would for any other quality

                  Alright, you're getting there. Now you just have to realize that all qualities are in essence mental constructs, nowhere in the material world does "pregnancy" exist, atoms and EM fields don't know nothing about babies. "pregnancy" is an abstract quality of organisms that exists only in our minds that we use to make sense of the material world, and our minds are made up of subjective experiences, which is what the discussion is about. When you're doing logic and math and science you're doing it within the confines of your awareness, which again is "just" a bunch of subjective feels. You can't really hope to separate qualities as you understand them from your own mind, because you are your mind and you understand everything through your mind. The material world can function just fine without knowing about pregnancy and other quality or abstract concept, but your mind cannot. The question is where does the mind fit in the whole picture.

                  I feel that you assign some sort of mystical otherworldliness to the quality of consciousness and assuming that I share this idea about it.

                  I'm not assigning any mysticism, you're ignoring the relevance of mind existing in a seemingly exclusively material universe. That's what the "hard problem of consciousness" is all about, explaining how our minds fit in the material world. It's a question as old as philosophy itself and it has not yet been adequately solved.

                  • RedDawn [he/him]
                    ·
                    4 years ago

                    Now you just have to realize that all qualities are in essence mental constructs, nowhere in the material world does “pregnancy” exist

                    This isn’t true, the words we use to describe things are just language games, sure, but words like “pregnancy” or “consciousness” are referring to actual real world phenomena. You can’t say because a word referring to something is an abstraction that the thing itself is abstract.

                    I don’t believe in a hard problem of consciousness, this isn’t a “problem” in my materialist world view. Consciousness is just one of many aspects of certain living things, it may be more complicated than other aspects but that doesn’t mean it “couldn’t have evolved” or “isn’t material” or whatever.

                    • space_comrade [he/him]
                      ·
                      edit-2
                      4 years ago

                      This isn’t true, the words we use to describe things are just language games, sure, but words like “pregnancy” or “consciousness” are referring to actual real world phenomena.

                      What is the actual real world material phenomenon of "pregnancy"? It's just a clump of matter slowly growing inside another clump of matter, material reality doesn't need your concept of pregnancy to do its work. Why does it need a name? The actual concept of pregnancy lives entirely in your mind, not in the material world. It's a symbol for you to make sense of the world, and it's a part of your mind. Now again, what is the mind?

                      I don’t believe in a hard problem of consciousness, this isn’t a “problem” in my materialist world view. Consciousness is just one of many aspects of certain living things, it may be more complicated than other aspects but that doesn’t mean it “couldn’t have evolved” or “isn’t material” or whatever.

                      What are living things? It's all just clumps of matter, why do clumps of matter develop consciousness? Those are pretty big questions for your worldview, you don't really get to just brush them off like that, you need to account for the existence of your mind somehow.

                      • RedDawn [he/him]
                        ·
                        4 years ago

                        It’s just a clump of matter slowly growing inside another clump of matter,

                        Yes, so it is a real world, material phenomenon, which is what I said.

                        you need to account for the existence of your mind somehow.

                        I did, my mind exists as a result of physical/chemical processes within my body and brain. That’s it. This poses absolutely no problem for me, it’s a problem for you because you insist on treating consciousness as unique, other or above matter. That’s a you problem, I don’t have that problem.

                        • space_comrade [he/him]
                          ·
                          4 years ago

                          I did, my mind exists as a result of physical/chemical processes within my body and brain. That’s it. This poses absolutely no problem for me, it’s a problem for you because you insist on treating consciousness as unique, other or above matter. That’s a you problem, I don’t have that problem.

                          Which brings us back to this comment again: https://hexbear.net/post/91483/comment/1013036

                          I was literally you a year or two ago when I started researching this stuff, I get that you think you've got it figured out but please give it a chance. You're making logical errors in your thinking without realizing it.

                            • space_comrade [he/him]
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                              edit-2
                              4 years ago

                              Yes, you are. The subjective feeling in of itself cannot be equal to configurations of matter, it's literally like saying the cup on your desk is literally the abstract concept of the number "2". It makes no sense at all, it's a complete non sequitur.

                              You literally twisted your mind in a knot to force yourself not to think about this properly.

                              • RedDawn [he/him]
                                ·
                                4 years ago

                                No, you’re honestly just rambling now and projecting. Be a non-materialist if you want, but you’ve presented nothing resembling a coherent argument in favor of it, just circular reasoning and mumbo jumbo.

                                • space_comrade [he/him]
                                  ·
                                  4 years ago

                                  but you’ve presented nothing resembling a coherent argument in favor of it, just circular reasoning and mumbo jumbo.

                                  I could say the same to you too, your viewpoint makes absolutely 0 sense. Like I get saying consciousness is a stuff that's caused by matter interacting but what you're proposing is just patently absurd.

                                  It's fascinating, it's like you're completely unable to metacognize your own awareness, this is beyond me, I give up.

                                  • RedDawn [he/him]
                                    ·
                                    4 years ago

                                    Please don’t message me anymore, I don’t have any interest in arguing against pseudoscientific nonsense anymore.

                                    • space_comrade [he/him]
                                      ·
                                      4 years ago

                                      Little do you know how pseudoscientific you're being, but whatever, it was a good talk I guess, bye.