How this thread is starting to feel:

Quote:dying would be when your body/brain can't function, but as you say this would not kill your mind. though this would also be akin to the concept of an afterlife and an immortal soul.

Also, do you have any evidence to back up this ridiculous assertion?

(September 18, 2015 at 3:20 am)Captain Scarlet Wrote: This seems straightforward to me.

1) minds are eternal if Idealism is true
2) eternity implies and infinite past and future
3) it is impossible to transcend an infinite series of events (by definition you cannot get to today if the causal precursor is in the infinite past)
4) minds operate through a series of mental events
5) we exist today experiencing mental events
6) Idealism is false from 1), 2), 3), 4) and 5)

I disagree with premise 1. I don't think there is an eternal past. I think time itself had a beginning. so I can only grant half of that premise. the future part.
this argument, however, has different implications depending on what minds you're talking about. if you're talking about human minds, then they certainly had a beginning. I don't think human minds are without beginning or cause. and given they have a potentially infinite future, all that means is their knowledge of events will increase over time. though there's nothing contradictory about that, nor does it imply a transcendence of infinity.

now if you're talking about God's mind, that's a different story. I believe God is without beginning, but not that he has an infinite past. I think time itself doesn't have an infinite past. God in this case would transcend time rather than transcend infinity. as for the infinite future part, I gave that infinite series expressed as finite functions in defense of that particularly. I see no problem in God having all future knowledge in finite functional terms that can be expressed in an infinite series of events. we express an infinite series of numbers in finite functional equations all the time. I can write many functional equations that all express a different set of infinite sequence of numbers.

(September 18, 2015 at 3:25 am)Rational AKD Wrote:

(September 18, 2015 at 2:37 am)Losty Wrote: If your mind exists, but matter doesn't....how to physical things actually kill you? I get how in a simulation you could feel real pain from being repeatedly beaten in the head with a baseball bat, but if it's just a simulation....neither your head, nor the bat is real...then it cannot kill you. Right?

because the matter we experience is really a mental construct. the sensations you receive, such as pain, are all part of the simulation. and your physical body functions the same as all matter, thus can be broken like all matter. dying would be when your body/brain can't function, but as you say this would not kill your mind. though this would also be akin to the concept of an afterlife and an immortal soul.

I thought you said matter doesn't exist?

So...is this something you're arguing because you're bored or something you actually believe?

(September 18, 2015 at 3:40 am)Lucanus Wrote: Also, do you have any evidence to back up this ridiculous assertion?

the answer I gave you was to answer a question... not provide evidence. the evidence for idealism is the argument I presented in the OP. the 'ridiculous assertion' is an answer to a criticism of consistency of idealism. you don't have to believe it, but it disproves the objection nonetheless.

(September 18, 2015 at 3:42 am)Losty Wrote: I thought you said matter doesn't exist?

So...is this something you're arguing because you're bored or something you actually believe?

matter doesn't exist. the only thing that exists that resembles matter are mental constructs of matter. typically people don't consider dreams or hallucinations of matter, matter.

monistic idealism is my actual belief. I argue for something either because i consider it true (IE believe it) or i'm playing devil's advocate. but i only do the latter for specific situations which mostly involve criticizing someone.

(September 18, 2015 at 3:58 am)Rational AKD Wrote:

(September 18, 2015 at 3:42 am)Losty Wrote: I thought you said matter doesn't exist?

So...is this something you're arguing because you're bored or something you actually believe?

matter doesn't exist. the only thing that exists that resembles matter are mental constructs of matter. typically people don't consider dreams or hallucinations of matter, matter.

And you can't die from being bludgeoned by a baseball bat in a hallucination or a dream either...

Quote:monistic idealism is my actual belief. I argue for something either because i consider it true (IE believe it) or i'm playing devil's advocate. but i only do the latter for specific situations which mostly involve criticizing someone.

I've never even heard of anyone who believes this before. Do you have a church?

Quote:but they aren't the same statements.

They are all contained -within- premise 1.  In a solipsistic world, all implications and constraints by definition would be true.  As I've already said, if you need, as your premise, to have a metaphysical solipsism granted - then you have no need of an argument, your premise -is- your conclusion.

Quote:as I said, premise 3 is key to establishing this premise. given it is possible for mind to exist in a solipsist (immaterial) world but impossible for matter (by definition), then there is something that is true of mind but not matter. 

No need to argue, and you certainly aren't establishing anything.  In a metaphysical solipsist world there -is- no matter.  No argument required, nothing to establish.  

Quote:so I guess your only problems then are with 4 and 5 since your only complaint about 6 is that there are problems with 4 and 5. at least now I have a good idea on what your objections are.

My objection is that you didn't use any logic in your argument - as I said from the very beginning.  You strung claims together, many repetitive, none useful or informative, while failing to leverage any valid means of inference or deduction.  Not really -my- problem......now is it?

Quote:you may be using an alternate definition of matter, which you will have to define if that's the case. however, I wouldn't consider the apparent material constructs in our experience equivalent to mind. they are mental constructs. just because they aren't produced by your mind doesn't mean they aren't produced by any mind. my personal position is that they are produced by God's mind, though that is not the aim of the argument i'm presenting here.

Nope, just the usual matter we're all used to.  You may not, but reductivism does.

Quote:you are not your imagination? you can come up with concepts in your mind, and those concepts are distinguishable from your own identity and mind. I mean, this is tautological stuff here...

You think my imagination, and the concepts I can come up with are distinguishable from my identity, distinguishable from my mind?  I'd say that my mind -is- one of those concepts.  But, regardless, again, how might you determine that?  What means do you have..or is this another one of those things you'll simply claim ad naus?

Quote:then prove you're right and explain how my power plant analogy fails.

LOL?  There's no need to explain how your analogy fails after having repeatedly explained to you how the thing we are -actually- discussing works.  

Quote:you can assess information without simulating a mountain... and those aren't the kinds of simulations i'm talking about. i'm talking about a simulation for an observer to experience. not an assessment program.

Oh, so now we're past manifestations and your're on to your next dodge?  "Oh...well..that's not the kind of simulation I was talking about, I was talking about another kind".  Guess what.......they -all- work the same way.  That simulation -is- the same kind....the difference you think is salient is the addition of a screen (which, frankly, has nothing to do with simulation- that's interface)...and whether or not I plug the screen in when I play Ark, my comp is still running that sim and those mountains are still there, on the board.......machines.....in........state.

Quote:if it doesn't exhibit any qualities of a mountain, it isn't a mountain. I don't care if the code in the memory database means mountain, it's just an arbitrary code that is no more a mountain than the word itself I'm typing here.

-and again...a simulated mountain doesn't actually have to be a mountain, or have the qualities of a mountain.  If it had the qualities of a mountain..it would be a mountain..plain and simple...not a simulated mountain.  

Quote:no... that would be the 'simulator...' not the simulation... the circuit board would be the simulator while the game is the simulation.

Just where do you think the game is? Wait for it..............on the board....machines...in..state.

Quote:all languages and codes are arbitrary... whether you're using binary, hex, or C++ it's all arbitrary.

Go punch some arbitrary code into your machine and see if it does anything.  It won't..because it isn't arbitrary.  Again, programming, "code", is a high level interface tool (for us) to machine language....you know.......machines....in...state.  

Quote:at least the problem is isolated now... answer me this, do substances need to be tangible to tangibly interact? or do they not need to share that property?

Not sure you understood the phrase, I wasn't disagreeing with you here...but yeah, sure for a tangible interaction at least -one- of the two substances must be tangible.  Do they both need to be tangible...no, there doesn't seem to be any requirement there.  

Rhythm Wrote: Wrote:Separate substances with a single shared property would seem to overcome your objection handily.

Quote:if they have a shared property, then there is a common substance between them. 

no...there is a common -property-, as plainly stated.  

Quote:if they are fundamental, they cannot be broken down. if they are different, they have unique properties that make them different. if 2 substances share a property, that property is distinguished and taken from at least one of the substances. if they are both fundamental with fundamental properties, you wouldn't be able to take part of the substance's fundamental properties and distinguish it from that substance... or it wouldn't be its fundamental property now wouldn't it? it's like trying to distinguish materiality from matter. or mentality from mind. you simply can't because they're fundamental to it.

You can't seem to stay consistent with fundamental [substances] which share [properties].  Flipping back and forth interchanging the bracketed terms.  Perhaps this explains your misapprehension? Maybe, what you really take issue with is property dualism..and not substance dualism? Perhaps it's property dualism that you believe has been disproven......and you were just confused? In any event, if you can;t manage to produce a consistent and coherent response to my actual statements..what is there for us to discuss? Rules of inference you don't seem to be interested in using.....claims which you can't back up? Haven't we done that enough already?

Why don't you just rephrase your argument.......it shouldn't be that difficult. I'll be responding in larger blocks going forward.

(September 18, 2015 at 3:50 am)Rational AKD Wrote:

(September 18, 2015 at 3:40 am)Lucanus Wrote: Also, do you have any evidence to back up this ridiculous assertion?

the answer I gave you was to answer a question... not provide evidence. the evidence for idealism is the argument I presented in the OP. the 'ridiculous assertion' is an answer to a criticism of consistency of idealism. you don't have to believe it, but it disproves the objection nonetheless.

Yeah, but that answer is bullshit, and disproves nothing.

pretty much like the rest of your arguments

(September 18, 2015 at 3:42 am)Rational AKD Wrote:

(September 18, 2015 at 3:20 am)Captain Scarlet Wrote: This seems straightforward to me.

1) minds are eternal if Idealism is true
2) eternity implies and infinite past and future
3) it is impossible to transcend an infinite series of events (by definition you cannot get to today if the causal precursor is in the infinite past)
4) minds operate through a series of mental events
5) we exist today experiencing mental events
6) Idealism is false from 1), 2), 3), 4) and 5)

I disagree with premise 1. I don't think there is an eternal past. I think time itself had a beginning. so I can only grant half of that premise. the future part.
this argument, however, has different implications depending on what minds you're talking about. if you're talking about human minds, then they certainly had a beginning. I don't think human minds are without beginning or cause. and given they have a potentially infinite future, all that means is their knowledge of events will increase over time. though there's nothing contradictory about that, nor does it imply a transcendence of infinity.

now if you're talking about God's mind, that's a different story. I believe God is without beginning, but not that he has an infinite past. I think time itself doesn't have an infinite past. God in this case would transcend time rather than transcend infinity. as for the infinite future part, I gave that infinite series expressed as finite functions in defense of that particularly. I see no problem in God having all future knowledge in finite functional terms that can be expressed in an infinite series of events. we express an infinite series of numbers in finite functional equations all the time. I can write many functional equations that all express a different set of infinite sequence of numbers.

You are making a claim that something which (in your words) is immaterial (your mind) began to exist.  We have immediately descended into non-cognitivism.  Not only do we have no idea of what the immaterial is, we are now to believe that it comes into existence just as physical phenomena. But without any evidence or argument at all for that idea.  It just seems ad-hoc to me.

How does a god transcending time make a coherent concept?  One can imagine a thing in a different dimension from the ones we see, but that still makes it natural and finite.  But how does one imagine a thing existing outside of the universe (or metaverse or multiverse if you prefer), that is to say existing outside of existence itself.  If god transcends time don't bother praying to it, listening for it, expecting it to do things in time or space.  I am not sure what a god transcending time conjurs up in your imagination and I understand theists accept it.  But what on earth does it mean? It has as much meaning as the sound is brown.  

A god outside of time is frozen, unable to act, has no internal processes which lead to any form of mental causation, no causlity at all.  Without time nothing is possible because there is no potentiality.  If you think it is possible, you owe us at least a sketch of how this works. If nothing else if this is true, this presents us with a whole new form of causality which is even more exotic than speculation on magic (even that requires time).

(September 17, 2015 at 9:54 pm)Rational AKD Wrote: ok, perhaps I made interpretations of the fallacy that were not exactly accurate. nonetheless, calling my definition 'shitty' isn't any sort of disproof or invalidation thus not by any means a meaningful criticism as it's only an assertion on your part.

Except where I went on to state what I meant by "shitty."


Behold, the power of reading.

Quote:first, this 'Occam's Razor' claim has nothing to do with the claim you made that the argument is more likely to be invalid than provide insight... second, Occam's razor doesn't cut out more complicated explanations... it cuts out unnecessary assumptions made in an explanation. for example, if I were to postulate we are in a world created by God, created by God's god, created by God's God's god... none of those intermediate gods add any further explanation and thus are unnecessary assertions to be cut out by Occam's Razor. it has nothing to do with the content being 'testable' which I still think you abuse. if 'testable' means can be shown by reason thus also invalidated or proven false by reason, then it is testable. if you mean 'can be shown by empirical demonstration' then you're presuming empiricism in a discussion about reason... you can't say Occam's Razor cuts out what can't be empirically demonstrated as that's certainly not what it means.

I see...unnecessary explanation...ok, so let me use an example to see if I understand correctly. Let's say I lived in a world that appeared to be filled with evidence that the Universe is natural and material and that it exists because of phenomenon that have physical explanations, and in which there is no evidence of anything supernatural or metaphysical, ok? Let's say I live in such a world, and all the evidence points to things in that world existing because of natural phenomenon that have been ongoing for billions of years, and I then assert that all of that is happening because a metaphysical super-mind is dreaming it all up, and that this metaphysical super-mind is the only thing that actually exists at all because the rest of reality is a pile of dream objects that have no true, physical substance. The "metaphysical super-mind" and the dream world it generates would be classified as "unnecessary explanations," right? Right?


Occam's razor is designed to lend us toward testing and considering explanations which can easily be proven or disproven before moving on to more difficult explanations that would require more sophisticated evidence. Because the premise "The Universe exists because of natural processes involving physical objects and energy" has been overwhelmingly borne out by evidence, that seems to be the position most rational people take. It's defensible, it's demonstrable, and it contains nothing unnecessary. If you want to add something else to that, you need evidence, starting with some evidence that metaphysics is something other than abstract, theoretical talk with no basis in reality.

Quote:just as I thought... you are advocating empiricism in a discussion about reason. if that's your definition of reason, can you provide me with evidence that only things repeatable and observable count as evidence? can you show me how you know only things that can be shown can be known? there are more ways to show something is true than from what's repeatable and observable. to say otherwise is contradicting yourself.

More like you're trying to use reason to demonstrate things that have to be addressed with empiricism. You cannot use reason to prove things about physical reality unless you're using premises that are based on physically observable facts. Reason alone is not evidence, and it especially isn't proof.

Quote:as I said, you can't use experience to explain why you experience. you can establish functional realism from experience, but not objective realism... so your evidence doesn't show brains produce minds...

Yeah, it pretty well does. Even if there's a metaphysical super-mind generating a dream and that's what we live in, the evidence in that dream world indicates that our dream brains generate our dream minds by using our dream senses to interact with our dream world. Even if your assertions were correct, they'd have no impact really on the facts of our reality. It explains nothing and only raises questions about the nature of this mind-thing, why it exists, where it came from, etc.

Quote:at best, you can conclude all those studies conclude brain affects the mind and thus there is a correlation... it's a leap so say ""mind" is a process, not a substance, and that this process is carried out by brains."

"Correlation does not indicate Causation" does not bend that far, my friend. Reactivity does indicate causation, and with nervous response you don't just have correlation, but also reactivity. We can observe the stimuli contacting the senses. We can watch the neurons fire from the nerves into the brain. We can watch the neurons bounce around inside the brain. We can watch them travel back out to the body to activate a response, and we can see the body's other systems act according to those impulses. That is a direct chain of causation. Brain activity isn't just "correlated with" mental activity, it is mental activity. All the thinking happens while the brain is lighting up. All the believing and understanding happens while the brain is lighting up. Stimuli causes sensory input, input causes mental response, mental response causes physical response. In that order. Every time. Science, bitch.

Quote:I thought 30 times was enough for you to know why... because that would be question begging. you can't use experience to explain why we experience. the only part of what you said I agreed with was when you said we can learn things about how our bodies and minds behave by studying the world. we can certainly observe how our mind behaves, but that's not the same as observing the nature of what mind is. how mind behaves is observable, that which is behind our mental processes is not.

Ok, you're going to have to define what you mean when you use the word "why." All this crap about "using experience to explain why we experience" is starting to sound like part of your word salad. We can answer so many different versions of that question that I don't even know where to start. Observable evidence from the physical Universe suggests that we "experience" because we are alive and we possess bodies that can gain environmental input and respond to it. Even though we have to "experience" that evidence to know anything about it, we can still draw conclusions from the evidence. You seem to be using some deeper, metaphysical sense of the word "why" here, and in that sense there doesn't appear to be any deeper meaning to the Universe. It just is what it is, and your time in it is what you make of it.

Quote:the problem with this, however, is you're starting from the premise that the material world behaves in consistent ways.

Because it does.

Quote:from this you can draw accurate conclusions only about the behavior of matter, not the nature of its existence. remember your premise is only concerning the behavior matter, thus you can only make conclusions from that premise concerning the behavior of matter. you need a different premise to draw a conclusion concerning the nature of matter's existence.

Ok, according to you, how much would we need to know about a subject before we get to the "nature of its existence?" This is what I'm talking about when I say "word salad." We don't just understand how matter behaves, we also understand what it's made of, what that stuff is made of, what that stuff is made of, and we're getting damn close to observing the fundamental particle that everything is made of. What question are you trying to answer? Do you want to know what the meaning of life is? It's 42. I thought we knew this already.

Quote:they can understand how matter behaves... the philosophical model they take, be it realism or idealism, is apart from the evidence they find. you can acknowledge the behavior matter regardless of your metaphysical position on matter and mind. so i'm not saying their studies are useless, i'm saying their studies can't prove what's behind our conscious experience.

More word salad. Evidence indicates that objective stimuli and our perceptions of and reactions to those stimuli are "what's behind our conscious experience." What do you mean by that phrase, exactly? You seem to be working from the presupposition that reality is just a curtain behind which is "what's really going on." From everything we can tell, the physical world is what's really going on. If you want to claim anything else, you need evidence. You cannot use mere reason to prove a positive claim about the existence of a real thing.