RE: Your position on naturalism
November 22, 2016 at 7:59 am
(This post was last modified: November 22, 2016 at 8:13 am by Excited Penguin.)
(November 22, 2016 at 7:25 am)Whateverist Wrote:(November 22, 2016 at 6:45 am)Excited Penguin Wrote: What do you mean, there?
Emphasis added.
I had to go back to look at the paragraph from which that snippet was taken to remember what I did mean there. Thanks for bringing it up because I think it is important. In that paragraph from which you quoted I meant to contrast what I think is the correct analysis of the mind/matter conflict with the one which seems to impress theists which I was referring to in the second paragraph of my post from which you took that quote. This one:
The flawed mind/matter dilemma worries about how we from our point of view are supposed to differentiate between perception imparted by the world and that which is a product of the mind. This view attributes to minds the capacity to create objects in a manner parallel to those encountered in the world. Theists seem to find fuel for believing that a supernatural realm is a source for at least some of those mind created pseudo objects, especially that most revered of objects, God. Believers attribute all objects to God's creations. Those that we apprehend as being physical objects in the world are but a part of God's grand creation, an idea in God's mind. In this resolution of the mind/matter dilemma primacy is given to mind.
But our modern way of looking at the relationship between minds and the world (matter) is very different. We note that every creature has a perceptual array with which it finds its way in the world, toward food and mates but away from threats. Those perceptual array's vary. The dogs world is 'seen' through its nose, a bat's through its ears and much of ours world is colored by what our eyes see. But any discrepancy between mind and matter is understood as arising from idiosyncrasies of the sensual medium. In some cases perhaps we make mistaken assumptions about the world because of glitches in our perceptual/cognitive processing of the data we receive about the world. But the only thing our minds are producing in these instances are mistakes. Our mind's job is to create a mental analogue of the real world to help us to navigate our real physical bodies through the natural world. No mind, not ours' and not God's, creates the physical world. That is what I mean when I say matter is primary and mind is secondary.
That's great, Whateverist. Now, if you could put all that mental energy you seem to have of late towards answering any actual questions I put to you that'd be even greater. As it is, you ignored the specificity of my inquiry and instead took it as an excuse to further expound on your session of fapping to your own thoughts.