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Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God
#51
RE: Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God
(October 16, 2014 at 10:52 pm)HopOnPop Wrote: BTW, I believe this specific notion you now described above, in my experience, has been a fairly common staple explanation made by panentheists regarding consciousness/mind origins in their worldview. Are you perhaps an agnostic who is more apt to entertain notions blowing in from that realm?
Yes, I'm more friendly to panentheism/panpsychism etc. than others here, probably.


Quote:I realize you haven't said or even suggested this notion of "psychogony" as you coined it, is something that you take all that seriously, but this conversation does make one wonder how seriously you might weight this kind of thing when weighing out the possibilities in your own head.
By psychogony, I mean the fact of the existence of mind (rather than a lack of it), rather than material structures on which it supervenes, or the flow of impressions or perceptions of which it is subjectively composed. So it's a fact by definition, not even an assertion.

Quote:Isn't it far more compelling to you to listen to what neuro-science today is largely seeing in their work -- that the mind very likely merely originates with/in/from the brain itself, simply as an emergent property that arrises out of the brain functions themselves (not unlike, say the way the programs we "experience" on our computer which are an emergent property of the selective flow of electricity across various computer hardware components)?

Just curious how you tip that scale.
There's no doubt, unless we really go to a strong idealism (the brain is an illusion) or solipsism or something, that the perceptions and ideas we experience depend massively (and perhaps solely) on the function of the brain. However, I don't think there's anything about our understanding of objective matter from which we can derive the need, or even capacity, for subjective experience to exist in this universe. In other words, I'm saying that the "how" of mind is not sufficient to answer the "why" of it.
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#52
RE: Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God
It's possible, useful, and there is a mechanism for propagating and then refining what is possible and useful on this planet. How's that for a how and why?
(I'd hesitate to suggest that there is/was a "need" for subjective experience in the same way that I would hesitate to suggest that there is/was a "need" for ants to exist in this universe, so I'm not sure that this even applies. As far as capacity goes, you know my thoughts, but to lay them out again, very simply. The ability to interact, the ability to quantify those interactions, and a limitation on both to a specific frame of reference handles the capacity of matter for subjective experience in toto. Matter can do this, and can be/quite often is limited thusly. I've never understood or seen the mystery you see in that.)
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#53
RE: Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God
What we have here from Feser is an analogy. As Feser's Earth is rhe necessary first cause of support, the Prime mover must likewise be the first necessary being of a chain of contingent effects, Aristotle's 'movement'. But movement is inherent in energy expressed as matter. A photon must move. A cloud of hydrogen will collapse into stars because of inherent gravity that collapses that cloud of interstellar gas. I will leave it to the reader as an exercise to extend this common place phenomenon of change in physics.

The only way to 'save' the argument is to shift from a first mover argument to a design argument, that the prime mover created hydrogen atoms to have gravity etc. But failing that, inherent qualities of matter can account for change, that is "movement" in Aristotle's extended sense of that word with no reference to a prime mover, that is, God.

This is not a new argument, nor a new reply. I have laid out a very bare boned, bumper sticker version of this here, I leave it to each of you to dress it and gussy it up as you wish. One reason this argument 'worked' in the past was that Aristotle knew very little about real physics and neither did his readers of old. We can do better.

In another context, David Hume warned us to be careful to distinguish between analogies and hard evidence. Always sound advice.
Cheerful Charlie

If I saw a man beating a tied up dog, I couldn't prove it was wrong, but I'd know it was wrong.
- Attributed to Mark Twain
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#54
RE: Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God
(October 17, 2014 at 9:25 pm)Rhythm Wrote: It's possible, useful, and there is a mechanism for propagating and then refining what is possible and useful on this planet. How's that for a how and why?
Not very good, in my opinion, since it explains niether how nor why there is mind.

And what's this "useful" stuff? Useful to whom? To a thinking organism?

If you want to go with evolution, I'd start at the atomic level-- some atoms happen to stick well to others and form molecules in certain environments. Some molecules happen to stick together to form simple proteins, etc. up to Mozart. But at no step in this chain is anything useful-- it's better to say that "it just so happens that _____." It's mind which establishes usefulness, not usefulness which establishes mind.
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#55
RE: Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God
I find it peculiar and a little amusing that people focus so much on the why question without considering if it's important. They give this why question a lot of significances, yet they generally fail to explain why the importance of their why question. I'm not saying that there aren't important why questions, but some why questions are meaningless.

For example, some creationist will put a lot of emphasis on how far away the earth is from the sun. They first will argue that it this distance is necessary for us to live on this planet (and it is). They follow up by asking why this is the case. They fail to realize we can't asked the question if it wasn't the case. They fail to apply the antropic principle to life on earth. Worse, their desire to have an answer to this question leads to faulty conclusion.

So in the case on "why there is a mind," it is because it has to be so for us to be able ask the question. I know the antropic principle does not provide a "satisfing" answer, but the answer it gives is better than a faulty conclusion. Plus, if you can't answer how, asking why is a foolish endeavour.
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#56
RE: Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God
I'd argue that the fact of the existence of the universe is an important "why" question, what with us being part of it and all. It's the "Why? I don't know therefore Sky Daddy" that I don't like much.
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#57
RE: Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God
Ok, lets hear the argument.
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#58
RE: Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God
(October 28, 2014 at 12:39 am)Surgenator Wrote: Ok, lets hear the argument.
lol

Okay.

First, what's an important question in general? Since only people are known to ask questions, then let's establish the human experience as the context in which questions may be said to be important.

The purpose of asking questions is to gather information, and the question should be considered important if the answer is of utility to human being's most important functions: namely, those connected to genetic fitness.

So the question is-- is it likely that knowing exactly how the universe was created would aid us in making decisions that would help us to survive, to breed, etc.? If you could know for sure that a deity created the universe (or for sure that it didn't), would this affect our survival?

Hmmmm, I think I'm talking myself out of this one. I think I might have to argue that knowing the answer to those questions would affect people's psychology, but I cannot see how the knowledge would provide any utility to maintaining genetic fitness.
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#59
RE: Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God
To me the question is not whether it, philosophy, makes living easier; but rather whether it makes it better. Like art and music, even games and jokes, I think the a rich contemplative life makes living more interesting and engaging.
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#60
RE: Ed Feser's Aristotelian Proof of the Existence of God
(October 28, 2014 at 8:29 am)ChadWooters Wrote: To me the question is not whether it, philosophy, makes living easier; but rather whether it makes it better. Like art and music, even games and jokes, I think the a rich contemplative life makes living more interesting and engaging.
Yes, I think so, too.

I might go back on my previous going back, and redefine the importance of questions: that the enjoyment of the faculty of thinking is, at least for people in good circumstances, more important than questions about genetic fitness. There are very few things I could think about which will seriously affect my ability to reproduce (already done), make money (self-employed), survive (live in a safe area), or raise my children (they are already smarter than I am, and one's only 4).
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