Proof Mind is Fundamental and Matter Doesn't Exist

[Rational AKD]

I haven't read through the 6 other pages so I apologise in advance if I'm jumping on anyone else's refutation, repeating subject matter or interrupting discussion.


This is wrong. You immediately start off on the wrong foot. An argument is not proof, only facts are proof. Arguments can be used as part of a body of support for a hypothesis (which must include verifiable & falsifiable evidence if it's to be taken seriously) but by themselves they are nothing more than mental exercise. So my first question is what is the hypothesis which your argument is trying to support?

lets see.. definitions of proof by Mariam Webster

a :  the cogency of evidence that compels acceptance by the mind of a truth or a fact
b :  the process or an instance of establishing the validity of a statement especially by derivation from other statements in accordance with principles of reasoning

I think that's the relevant definition. I went a little further and said when I say proof I mean it cannot be reasonably refuted or bypassed. so my definition is actually more strict than the dictionary's, because it says I only need valid reasoning. I'm saying the validity and the premises cannot be reasonably denied. and there is no reasonable way around the argument.
I must remind you this is a philosophical argument, not a scientific argument. the conclusion it comes to need not be falsifiable by means of experimentation. it needs only to be falsifiable by means of invalidating the logic or falsifying the premises. in this case, the only premise you can falsify is premise 1 because premise 2 follows from premise 1 and the definition of reasonable, premise 3 follows from premise 1 and 2, premise 4 is Leibniz Law, premise 5 is from the interaction problem which shows substance dualism is inconsistent, and the conclusion is from 4 and 5. so really if 1 is true, then all of it is true.

The 'hypothesis' (which it isn't, it's barely even a coherent sentence) which Raatz is trying to support with this argument is (and I quote) "If God exists, His existence should be so fundamental to reality that it should be obvious and understandable on basic principles alone.". Instead of providing robust definitions of what he means by 'god', 'existence', 'reality', 'obvious', 'understandable' and 'basic principles' or looking for actual evidence for his hypothesis, he created his 'argument'.

by obvious, he doesn't mean God's existence cannot be denied, he means it cannot be reasonably denied. he's granting that his argument is sound, and therefore the conclusion is inescapably true. given that, the concept of atheism as he sees it is incoherent, which makes his existence 'obvious and understandable on basic principles alone.' personally, I wouldn't go so for as to say the concept of atheism is incoherent. it is coherent to think of simply a world with no God (i'm pretending the modal ontological argument doesn't exist for this discussion because I don't want to go off topic). but I would say the concept is not compatible with how we think and experience, since an argument such as this can be constructed from epistemic principles alone. the reason people don't think God is so obvious is because people in general don't like thinking in epistemic principles. thinking about how you think can be very exhausting, so you have to have a special interest in epistemology to be able to think hard about concepts such as these.

I'll deal with your version rather than his but I note that yours does deviate a little from the original

really the only difference are the first two premises and he puts 'the mind exists' as a premise which I left out because that's obvious. the original Raatz uses just states there are different properties between mind and matter making mind irreducible to matter, and gives reasons external to the argument to substantiate this premise. I put substantiation into the premises using an evident modal difference between mind and matter (and Raatz has stated that reason to support his premise).

No. I won't let you redefine 'mind' in this way.

redefine? it doesn't differ from the general dictionary definitions of the term.

Mind is an emergent property of brain function and an alternative term for 'consciousness'. 'Mind' doesn't produce consciousness, the brain produces consciousness, the quale of which is sometimes referred to as 'mind'. There is zero evidence to suggest otherwise.

but you see... that would be question begging. you see, the argument has a conclusion with implications about whether materialism, dualism, or idealism is true. so to avoid question begging, I need to use a definition that doesn't imply any of those are true or I would be question begging. your definition already assumes materialism is true, so it begs the question on this topic. as for your 'zero evidence to suggest otherwise' claim, you're shifting the burden of proof. 'i'm right because you can't prove me wrong.' you need to give a reason other than 'you can't prove me wrong.'

Your first premise is that you can't disprove that something isn't real?

I said false... but semantics I guess. and keep in mind I made a strong claim that not only are you not able to prove it false with current evidence... but that everyone is not able to prove it false with any knowledge we could possibly possess. which is to say to our epistemic knowledge (for all we know and could possibly know) it is possible.

This is a shifting of the burden of proof. You must first demonstrate that you can show that a metaphysically solipsitic world is existent.

but that's not what i'm trying to prove... my conclusion is an idealistic world, not a solipsist one. all i'm trying to prove is there is a difference between mind and matter that makes mind irreducible to matter... and I chose to prove this by using a modal difference between what's possible with mind but not matter. anticipating that people might deny solipsism is possible, I showed that to our epistemic knowledge it is possible and thus it is most reasonable to accept it is really possible.

 It doesn't automatically follow that because people can't disprove that something doesn't exist that it must be possible.

I didn't say it 'must' be possible, I said it's most reasonably possible. for all we know and could possibly know, solipsism could be true. if for all we could know it could be true, then that's good reason to accept it could actually be true... unless you want to believe our knowledge cannot correspond to facts of reality. but that would be a claim of knowledge concerning facts of reality in itself...

There are other criteria for 'possibility', not least that the concept is coherent and non-contradictory.

oh? and what would that criteria be then?

Since you claim that mind is the producer of the thing that it is, your base claim is contradictory and consequently impossible.

i'm not saying 'mind is the producer of the thing that is.' i'm saying mind exists, and reality is merely a mental construct. if you define 'the thing that is' as something that objectively exists, then you should refer to the title of this thread for your answer on my position.

The rest is word salad.

you mean premises and conclusions that follow from the prior...