Materialism, ordinarily understood, means that all causation is mechanistic. Consider materialistic determinism. The basic elements are in some position at the beginning if there was one, and everything that happens to every basic element of the universe that is necessitated by the laws of physics. All other states that exist are states that follow necessarily from those basic physical states. On chance-and-necessity physicalism, there is a brute chance factor involved, but nothing at the base level is teleological, normative, perspectival, or intentional. You may get, as Churchland indicates, effects that one might think require intelligence, but they are in fact produced by stupid elements properly hooked up. This is teleonomy, not teleology, the quality of apparent purposefulness of structure in living organisms due to evolutionary adaptation.
When a Darwinian materialist says “The purpose of your eye is to see” it is not literally true. There are no true purposes in a materialist universe. However, the power to see did result in the eye being selected for. In the same way, if a materialist says that he accepts materialism because the evidence supports it, this is also not literally true.
80 comments:
Victor,
"In the same way, if a materialist says that he accepts materialism because the evidence supports it, this is also not literally true."
Another attempt at a gotchya that depends on equivocation. Is this what immaterialism must reduce to? It seems so, since immaterialists seem, in general, quite taken with various shallow quips that seemingly purport to be clever expositions of some sort of self contradiction in materialism.
That's a significant reason why immaterialism is a non-starter.
What exactly is the "it" in your sentence? I mean in detail, what does "it" refer to?
And what "literally"? What is it that is supposedly not literal, that a materialist somehow thinks actually is literal?
Is a wall not "literally" a wall because it is actually composed of bricks? If so, then nothing in our ordinary experience is literally whatever we say it is, because everything is composed of quarks and electrons.
Is that supposed to be some sort of argument against materialism?
StarDustyPsyche,
>Is this what immaterialism must reduce to?
Criticisms of materialism does not entail that one is automatically an "immaterialist," which refers to George Berkeley's flavor of idealism. One can criticize materialism without offering any alternative at all, but there are many other alternatives to "immaterialism," such as dualism, Aristotilianism, and even Bertrand Russell's neutral monism.
>What exactly is the "it" in your sentence? I mean in detail, what does "it" refer to?
The "it" in Victor's sentence clearly refers to "materialism."
>And what "literally"?
That means that for a materialist, since there is no teleology but only as-if teleology (teleonomy), there cannot be any situation that involves reasoning to some conclusion from premises, since that entails directedness towards a goal.
>nothing in our ordinary experience is literally whatever we say it is, because everything is composed of quarks and electrons.
Correct, for a materialist such as yourself, there are only fermions and bosons, and four forces, and that's it. There is no goal directedness (so no reasoning from premise to conclusion).
Being a materialist is kind of like thinking you are a brain in a vat. Even the esistence of the brain itself, as an actual entity with it own causzl powers, is a problen for materialism. It is a set of particles, but what mind thought that set of particles together?
The trouble with materialists is that they are just not skeptical enough.
Correct, for a materialist such as yourself, there are only fermions and bosons, and four forces, and that's it.
If you want to get right down to it, the 4 forces are a fudge for materialists.
Originally materialists insisted that there was only matter in motion and motion was only caused by the atoms bouncing off each other. The 4 forces are not only not matter and not motion but they cause action at a distance which was a criticism of Aristotelianism that atomism/materialism was supposed to correct. Very "occult" as they used to say.
Current day materialists routinely smuggle in Aristotelian concepts without even knowing it and still think they are materialists. Some can't even see it when you point it out to them.
Victor,
This is teleonomy, not teleology, the quality of apparent purposefulness of structure in living organisms due to evolutionary adaptation.
How can one without a purpose determine the difference between things with a purpose and those without a purpose although appearing to have a purpose? They are intending to refute teleology, but that can only be apparent as must their effort to put together an argument. I, on the other hand, can tell it's only apparent because it is obviously so lame. Because I have a purpose.
Martin ,
Question ? Wouldn’t dualism and hylemorphic dualism ultimately amount to forms of immaterialism? The Christian Thomist admits of ensoulment and what is the other substance in substance dualism if not immaterial ? Neutral monism seems to me like idealism but not wanting to admit it .
Martin,
"Correct, for a materialist such as yourself, there are only fermions and bosons, and four forces, and that's it. There is no goal directedness (so no reasoning from premise to conclusion)."
Wrong.
Collections of fermions and bosons arranged brainwise do just that, reason from premise to conclusion.
Reasoning is a process of fermions and bosons, a premise is a process of fermions and bosons, and a conclusion is a process of fermions and bosons.
There is no argument against materialism that rises above superficial sophistry.
Victor,
"Being a materialist is kind of like thinking you are a brain in a vat."
Every analysis of all sorts can be accounted for on the speculation of being a brain in a vat.
You can speculate that you are a brain in a vat praying to nothing every time you pray to your imaginary god.
If you want to live your life on that basis, up to you. My life seems very real to me. If you think your life is just a dream that is a speculation you can make, but do you believe it enough to hold your breath for the next hour?
"Even the esistence of the brain itself, as an actual entity with it own causzl powers, is a problen for materialism."
Nonsense.
"It is a set of particles, but what mind thought that set of particles together?"
Your brain. Pretty simple. Is this supposed to be some sort of example of supposed circularity in materialism that somehow negates materialism? What simplistic sophistry.
Look in a mirror. You see a reflection of yourself. So, does that mean there can be no you because you are thinking about you? How absurd.
"The trouble with materialists is that they are just not skeptical enough."
More sophistry. As though materialists are not well aware of the fact of their own composition.
People who live their own lives with faith often tend to project that mindset on others. I have had many theists project that XYZ is my god, since they seem to be unable to conceive of living without a notion of god.
Victor, your sort of skepticism is of a very shallow sort that seems easily befuddled by superficial gotchya quips that get a good laugh of agreement when delivered to a credulous audience.
I am very obviously light years ahead of you. Every so-called "argument" you present is immediately obvious as a superficial non-starter.
I keep waiting for some kind of mature argument from you but so far it has been crickets.
bmiller,
"The 4 forces are not only not matter and not motion but they cause action at a distance which was a criticism of Aristotelianism that atomism/materialism was supposed to correct. Very "occult" as they used to say."
More theistic projection. You believe in ghosts so the rest of us must also believe in some sort of ghosts even if we are not astute enough to be aware of our own superstitious beliefs.
The 4 forces are material. "Materialist" does not mean one thinks everything is made of ordinary matter and thus if something is discovered that does not seem to be how we perceive ordinary matter then that somehow means not everything is material.
There is nothing "occult" about forces as material. It is very obvious that our mathematical expressions for forces are abstractions of real processes that are not fully understood ontologically.
Lack of full understanding defaults to a ghost or a god or the occult for the superstitious, like you, for example.
For a materialist the answer is simple, real ontological processes of real material are described abstractly by the equations that describe the 4 forces.
There is no good reason to speculate ghosts or spirits or gods or the occult, just material processes that are not yet fully understood, but are very well understood in many respects.
StarDustyPsyche,
>Reasoning is a process of fermions and bosons, a premise is a process of fermions and bosons, and a conclusion is a process of fermions and bosons
But that means that a collection/process of fermions and bosons symbolizes something else. If a lump of fermions and bosons is a symbol for the premise "All men are mortal," but no collection of particles counts as a symbol unless some intelligence deems them so, then you have the exact same problem I've been pointing out to you.
Stardusty,
More theistic projection.
No, I'm just reporting the history of what the atomists said about Newton's idea of occultic force. So today is a good day for you. You learned a new thing.
The 4 forces are material.
They are if you include things that have no extension in space, no mass, and yet effect things that have extension in space and mass. But that's my point. So many non-material things have had to be included in "materialism" world-view because pure materialism is obvious nonsense. "Materialists" today have swallowed so many Aristotelian pills without having been told, they think Aristotelian concepts are part of materialism, yet loudly denounce Aristotelianism. I guess that makes them closet Aristotelians. Come out of the closet guys!
Chris,
Question ? Wouldn’t dualism and hylemorphic dualism ultimately amount to forms of immaterialism? The Christian Thomist admits of ensoulment and what is the other substance in substance dualism if not immaterial ? Neutral monism seems to me like idealism but not wanting to admit it .
I see that Martin didn't answer, so let me give my 2 cents worth.
An A-T hylemorphism substance is what a thing essentially is. So material substances are a substance that consists of form and matter. For an animate being/substance, the form of that being can be called a soul. When the form and matter of an animate substance separate at death, the substance no longer exists as that substance. In the case of a human, there is an immaterial part of the soul that cannot cease to exist, so that part of the substance remains in existence after death. So the substance ceases to exist as a complete substance although an incomplete immaterial part remains.
Chris,
Sorry, missed your comment. Bmiller gives a good rundown of A-T philosophy, but I guess my point was more semantic and a judgement call of Stardusty: knowing New Atheist behavior, often they have a simplistic false dichotomy, something like: either materialism is true, or there are ghosts and psychics and Christian theism. So I assumed Stardusty was following something like that, and a critic of materialism does not necessarily intend to say that the opposite is true (Berkeleyan idealism/immaterialism). If he means it more generally, then yes, I guess you could say that A-T is kind of an immaterialism, since the form half of the form/matter composite is not composed of matter, obviously, but it's not an existing separate thing, either, like it would be on Berkeleyan idealism.
the form/matter composite is not composed of matter
I would argue that the materialist also uses the concept of "form" without admitting it.
Martin,
"But that means that a collection/process of fermions and bosons symbolizes something else. If a lump of fermions and bosons is a symbol for the premise "All men are mortal," but no collection of particles counts as a symbol unless some intelligence deems them so, then you have the exact same problem I've been pointing out to you."
Yes, I am in the position of the total coherence of materialism and you are in the position of making inane quips that purport to show some sort of self defeating circularity in materialism.
There are about 160 billion cells in the brain, and about 100 trillion atoms per cell, and about 42 particles in a carbon atom.
You have some simplistic notion of some lump of particles being self referential.
Learn something about how the brain is structured and you will be able to free yourself from your simplistic pointless quips.
Martin,
>And what "literally"?
"That means that for a materialist, since there is no teleology but only as-if teleology (teleonomy), there cannot be any situation that involves reasoning to some conclusion from premises, since that entails directedness towards a goal."
You are conflating ultimate goal that somehow resides outside of material with particular arrangements of and processes of material that exhibit teleonomy.
>nothing in our ordinary experience is literally whatever we say it is, because everything is composed of quarks and electrons.
"Correct, for a materialist such as yourself, there are only fermions and bosons, and four forces, and that's it. There is no goal directedness (so no reasoning from premise to conclusion)."
All AFRs on offer rely on equivocation, false premises, gross oversimplifications, and other defects of logical argument.
Reasoning from premise to conclusion is teleonomy.
You are probably familiar with the aspect of DNA replication that occurs after the original DNA molecule has been unzipped. In a somewhat anthropomorphized description an assembler fits pieces matching molecules onto the site (say, A onto T, or G onto C). Thus, the assembler reads the T, goes and gets an A for the goal, for the purpose, of attaching it to the T. Once the assembler accomplishes that goal he goes to the next site down the line, reads it, goes and gets the match, and attaches it, thus accomplishing his goal.
Hopefully you realize there is no "he", there is no "goal", and "he" is not "reading" to "accomplish" "his" "goal". There are just quarks and electrons and 4 forces and they are arranged as atoms and molecules which go through process we call chemical reactions.
"reasoning from premise to conclusion" is like that. There is no need for a god or a spirit or some other worldly dimension to account for "reasoning from premise to conclusion".
Avogadro's number is about 6.022 × 10²³. So 602,200,000,000,000,000,000,000.
That's about how many carbon atoms are in 12 grams of carbon.
That is about how many hydrogen atoms there are in 1 gram of hydrogen.
That is about how many water molecules there are in 18 grams of water.
Your brain mass is about 1300 grams.
Yet, somehow, it seems lost on the folks here that the brain is not a single point entity of "you" or "me".
Different parts of the brain do different things, pretty simple.
The AFR treats the brain as a simple entity requiring something external to the brain to account for the complexities we observe.
The realist, the scientist, the materialist understands the simple fact the the brain is highly complex with a multitude of processes such that whatever the anti-materialist speculates is outside the brain is really just another process elsewhere within the brain.
There is no such thing as a sound AFR on offer.
There is no self defeating circularity in modern well expressed materialism.
All attempts on offer to show a sound AFR or self defeating circularity in materialism are on the level of creationist arguments against index fossils.
You are conflating ultimate goal that somehow resides outside of material with particular arrangements of and processes of material that exhibit teleonomy.
This is a good example of a materialist smuggling in the concept of "form" from Aristotle which they (at least genuine materialists) claim to have got rid of. Single units of material behave in one way but many units of the same material start behaving in different ways according to the magic of "complexity" or "emergence" when certain conditions arise. There is no essential difference between this explanation and the Aristotelean concept of a new substance coming into being from the form and matter of prior substances due to an efficient cause (or causes).
bmiller,
"according to the magic"
Projection.
You believe in magic, spirits, gods, ghosts, souls...so you project your superstitious beliefs on others, continually attempting to frame atheistic concepts in theistic terms.
You are manifestly incapable of thinking absent ghosts of some sort, and thus project your conceptual limitations upon those who have no need of that hypothesis.
Stardusty,
You're a "materialist" that believes in "forces" that have no physical extension in space and no mass yet cause material things to move at distances far away. You also believe that things have forms that behave differently according to their origin and arrangement.
The former belief is nothing other than the concept of Aristotle's natural movement of material objects which true atomists/materialists opposed. To them, only physical collisions of material objects could move things. The latter is just Aristotle's formal cause, another concept opposed by true atomists/materialists.
If those are superstitious beliefs then you are superstitious.
The fact of the matter is that true materialism was tested scientifically and philosophically and found lacking. So "materialists" had to grudgingly incorporate non-materialist concepts into "materialism" until it looks like what you swallow today and still call "materialism". What does one call a philosophy that admits non-material causal entities, things composed of form/matter composites due to efficient causes that tend always or for the most part toward a predictable end. I don't call that "materialism".
StarDustyPsyche,
> There are about 160 billion cells in the brain, and about 100 trillion atoms per cell, and about 42 particles in a carbon atom.
Yep, there are a lot of particles in the brain. That still isn’t an answer to how particles can symbolize something without an intelligent agent assigning meaning to them.
StarDustyPsyche,
>You are conflating ultimate goal that somehow resides outside of material with particular arrangements of and processes of material that exhibit teleonomy.
No, I’m not doing anything like that. Any form of reasoning involves goal directedness, not “ultimate” goal directedness, whatever that’s supposed to mean.
>Reasoning from premise to conclusion is teleonomy.
Then we don’t really reason.
>"reasoning from premise to conclusion" is like that.
Correct, so we don’t really reason. Therefore, non of your beliefs are rationally inferred. Argument from reason.
> There is no need for a god or a spirit or some other worldly dimension to account for "reasoning from premise to conclusion".
Sure, but I never suggested anything like that.
>The AFR treats the brain as a simple entity requiring something external to the brain to account for the complexities we observe.
The AFR doesn’t do anything like that.
bmiller,
"true" materialism is just a strawman for you to knock down.
The 4 forces of nature are measurable and in some cases directly observable to the human senses. There is nothing occult, magical, or immaterial about them.
""forces" that have no physical extension in space"
You obviously know nothing about field equations.
"I don't call that "materialism"."
Because you don't know what you are talking about.
Martin,
"Yep, there are a lot of particles in the brain. That still isn’t an answer to how particles can symbolize something without an intelligent agent assigning meaning to them."
Yes it does, and I have explained it to you multiple times, so I cannot help but wonder if perhaps you have a cognitive block or if you are maybe even being intentionally trollish. On the other hand, even a PhD with long experience on this subject does not seem to get it, so perhaps I am missing something as to how these concepts, so simple and easy for me, are so very difficult to understand for others.
"No, I’m not doing anything like that. Any form of reasoning involves goal directedness, not “ultimate” goal directedness, whatever that’s supposed to mean."
A local or relative teleonomy sort of aboutness or goal or directedness is due to the vastly complex and multiprocessing structure of the brain.
Symbols are stored in locations, signals stream into the brain in other locations, and various processing networks act upon all these symbols and signal streams in various other network locations.
There is no circularity because there is no single locus of you, or me.
All of this activity includes limited goals or time sequence models of an imagined future state stored in yet another networked location. More brain processes in more different locations cause motor movements that are sensed in a feedback system that references the time sequence localized goal internal model.
That is, in very rough terms, how particles can, in a teleonomy sense, exhibit reasoning to conclusions and actions based on localized goal setting.
" “ultimate” goal directedness, whatever that’s supposed to mean."
That means the notion of some ultimate cosmological attractive force, or some external beacon of some sort or external teleological source or force such as expressed in the Fifth Way of Aquinas.
There Aquinas was concerned primarily with the ends that non-intelligent things seem to act toward. On materialism apparent teleology of unintelligent processes are accounted for on teleonomy.
The AFR attempts to argue that if particles cannot have goals then on materialism we cannot have goals because we are just particles in that case.
The answer is simple, our goals are also of the teleonomy sort. Any supposed problems of circularity as applied to the human brain are immediately and fully addressed by the vast number of particles, cells, and processing processes to accomplish all these vastly complex processes, not in precisely the same place, rather, simply within the volume of the human skull.
Stardusty,
True materialism was atomism. I say was, because what you believe hasn't been materialism since occult action at a distance became accepted in "materialism".
The 4 forces of nature are measurable and in some cases directly observable to the human senses. There is nothing occult, magical, or immaterial about them.
The 4 forces of nature are what Aristotle referred to as "natural motion" as compared to "violent motion" which is things colliding with each other. Materialists claimed there was no such thing as "natural motion" and that it was occult. I agree with you that natural motion is not magical. You just don't realize that makes you an Aristotelean.
You obviously know nothing about field equations.
Well, equations exist and have no extension in space so that's another anti-materialist concept you hold to be true. But if a force has extension in space then it has a size. What size is it? If you say it extends to the ends of the universe, then what if there are 2 forces (or an uncountable number as science says)? Do they all occupy the same space? What type of material objects can occupy the same space? The material of modern materialism seems pretty promiscuous. Why even call it that?
>Reasoning from premise to conclusion is teleonomy.
Then we don’t really reason.
>"reasoning from premise to conclusion" is like that.
Correct, so we don’t really reason. Therefore, non of your beliefs are rationally inferred. Argument from reason.
This is a good example of something going right over someone else's head. Stardusty admits that "reasoning" is not really rationally inferred which is the Argument from Reason's reductio against materialism. Yet still seems to want to argue "rationally". You can't make this stuff up.
bmiller,
"Correct, so we don’t really reason."
Yes we "really" reason. That's what reasoning really is, particles in motion.
" Therefore, non of your beliefs are rationally inferred."
That's what "rationally inferred" is, particles in motion, so yes, my beliefs are rationally inferred.
" Argument from reason."
There is no argument from reason that rises above simplistic equivocation and/or patently false claims.
bmiller,
"True materialism was atomism"
I am not stuck 2300 years ago as you are
"since occult action at a distance became accepted in "materialism""
There is nothing "occult" about the 4 forces. Your use of the word "occult" is just more projection nonsense.
"Well, equations exist "
No, equations do not exist.
Equations are processes of material, the human brain, that are descriptive, in this case, of material, such as fields.
"equations exist and have no extension in space"
Equations describe material that has extension in space, which is very obvious to anybody who knows anything about field equations, which you manifestly do not.
"The material of modern materialism seems pretty promiscuous. Why even call it that?"
What's wrong with promiscuity?
Victor:
You may get, as Churchland indicates, effects that one might think require intelligence, but they are in fact produced by stupid elements properly hooked up. This is teleonomy,
Stardusty:
Reasoning from premise to conclusion is teleonomy.
Also: Stardusty:
Yes we "really" reason.
It seems in this case that no intelligence is in evidence whether it be real or only teleonomy.
Stardusty,
No, equations do not exist.
OK.
Equations are processes of material, the human brain, that are descriptive, in this case, of material, such as fields.
Wait. You just said they don't exist, now you say they do exist as "processes". So do they exist or not?
If so, I assume you mean this (according to Merriam Webster):
process:
a natural phenomenon marked by gradual changes that lead toward a particular result
Sounds like these "processes" proceed toward particular ends. In other words they demonstrate teleology. Fellow Aristotelian.
bmiller,
" now you say they do exist as "processes"."
Strawman, as usual. I never said that.
" Materialism, ordinarily understood, means that all causation is mechanistic."
Right, Victor, that is a reasonable statement.
All causation is mechanistic on materialism, fair enough.
Fields are mechanistic. We have equations that do a very good job of describing those mechanistic causal processes associated with fields.
Thus, fields are material.
Stardustypsyche,
>Yes it does, and I have explained it to you multiple time
No, you have never explained it. It's not that you did and I didn't understand it. It's that you have never once explained how a collection of particles can be a symbol for something else without some intelligence assigning meaning to that collection. You tried a little when you spoke of "causal connections" but as was pointed out to you, that won't work since some symbols symbolize things that don't exist, and that theory also can't distinguish between symbols of things and symbols of symbols of things (e.g. a painting of your mother vs a painting of a painting of your mother).
This also relates to the Ross paper "Immaterial Aspects of Thought" which Victor posted on another thread, and to which you didn't answer ANY of the objections to materialism. Nor can you, since they are unanswerable.
Maybe you have reading comprehension problems...? Here, let's see if Ed Feser, a much better write than I am, can explain it better:
Consider the symbol: Δ It has a number of physical features, such as being black, having three straight sides, having a certain size, etc. Now, what exactly is it that Δ is a symbol of? Does it symbolize triangles in general? Black triangles in particular? A slice of pizza? A triangular UFO? A pyramid? A dunce cap? Your favorite Kate Bush video?
There’s nothing in the physical properties of Δ that entails any of these interpretations, or any other for that matter. The physical properties are “indeterminate” in the sense that they don’t fix one particular meaning rather than another. The same is true of any further symbol we might add to this one. For example, suppose the sequence T-R-I-A-N-G-L-E appeared under Δ. There is nothing in the physical properties of this sequence, any more than in Δ, that entails or fixes one particular meaning rather than another. Its physical properties are perfectly compatible with its signifying triangles themselves, or the word “triangle,” or some weird guy who calls himself “Triangle,” or your favorite trip hop acid jazz, or any number of other things.
Stardusty,
You:
Equations are processes of material, the human brain, that are descriptive, in this case, of material, such as fields.
Me:
Wait. You just said they don't exist, now you say they do exist as "processes". So do they exist or not?
You:
" now you say they do exist as "processes"."
Strawman, as usual. I never said that.
Help me understand what I got wrong from what you wrote. You first said that equations don't exist and then you said "Equations are processes". I understand the word "are" to imply something plural that is in existence at the present time so that indicates that equations do exist to English speakers. Now you may think I got that wrong or that you actually meant something else but I'm not intentionally misunderstanding. Please clarify. As I presently understand it, from what you wrote, you hold that equations both do not exist and do exist.
Feser et al are quite right in what they say. But their examples are always of material structures external to mind-brains, never internal. See here for a bit more.
David,
I reject this. I say that if a material structure---a suitable data structure in the digital machine, a neural structure in the human brain---is connected to sensors and actuators that interact with the external world, then it acquires genuine intentionality.
What if I connect my AND gate to some sensors for input and the output to an actuator? Does the AND gate that had no intentionality before now have intentionality?
Yes, why not? Go back to the bacterium example. Let the output of the and-gate select the direction of swimming. The and-gate now contributes in a tiny way to the life-success of the organism. Isn't this what intentionality is at bottom about? Responding to the environment in a life-enhancing way.
David Brightly,
>their examples are always of material structures external to mind-brains, never internal.
The premise, that the physical is indeterminate, concerns anything physical. It doesn't matter if its something inside or outside some special bit of particles you've defined.
You still run into the same problems using this "causal" view of aboutness. That a thought can be about something that doesn't even exist, or about abstract concepts. How can the fact that a thought can be about perpetual motion machines connect to such non-existent things? So you're telling me that Δ represents UFOs and not pizza because...there is a chain of particles or a gravitational influence connecting the symbol to UFOs? Really?
David,
I thought intentionality was this according to SEP:
In philosophy, intentionality is the power of minds and mental states to be about, to represent, or to stand for, things, properties and states of affairs.
Something that contributes to the life success of an organism does not necessarily involve the power of a mind to represent something. But also, why couldn't we think of the AND gate as deciding the direction of a swimming bacteria even without an actuator?
M, just to be clear, my view is that the premise, 'the physical lacks intentionality/determinacy', is a false intuition inflated by consideration of numerous external examples. I make no claims about connecting chains of particles or mysterious forces. Merely that the representational structure causally contributes to any search for the target. It 'points' as it were, but there may be nothing there.
BM, agreed, but the telos of the mind-brain is surely life-enhancement, no? It's risky using an anthropomorphism like 'decide' in the context of such a tiny mind, but it makes sense to say the and-gate sets or selects or chooses the life enhancing direction of motion, even if it's disconnected from any actuator, ie, the organism is 'broken'.
David,
I suppose from our perspective our telos is to enhance our lives but wouldn't applying our telos to any other object be anthropomorphism? I sort of thought that was the materialist objection to telology in the first place. Material objects (other than us, and maybe even us) do not have a final cause.
Regarding the AND gate. Wouldn't it act exactly the same if it were part of a suicide machine dispensing poison? If both inputs are "high", the "high" output would release the poison. The same gate doing the same thing in one case doing something life enhancing and in the other case bringing a life to and end. Is there anything about the AND gate itself that distinguishes whether it is life enhancing, life ending or neutral regarding life?
BTW. Are you actually in China? You mentioned being behind a Chinese "firewall".
bmiller,
"I understand the word "are" to imply something plural that is in existence"
That depends on what your definition of the word "is" is:-)
Slick Willie
Jack and Jill are running.
That does not mean running is an ontologically existent thing. Running is a process of ontologically existent material. Running does not exist as a process, rather, running does not exist period.
To say that running exists as a process would open the door to arguments by equivocation, which is the basis for the ontological argument for the existence of god.
It is said that god exists as a thought in the mind. From there equivocation is used to reify that existence of god.
In point of fact god does not exist at all in the mind, therefore the attempt at equivocation is nipped in the bud.
Well, I'm not using 'telos' in any technical sense but just to mean function, purpose, role, of an organ within an organism. I don't see this as problematic. Regarding the and-gate: do I detect essentialist thinking here? Surely it is what the gate does that counts, not what it is. It switches on 'swim up' just when both photo receptors are above threshold, and this is life-enhancing for the bacterium or whatever.
We have been in China visiting our son and his family for the first time in four years consequent to the wretched virus. The authorities there block access to everything Google from within China. Search, maps, gmail, blogspot, etc. Another sino-pain.
David Brightly,
>the representational structure causally contributes to any search for the target.
It seems you are conflating two things:
* Intentionality or aboutness
* A system that reacts to some other object
You can have intentionality without actually reacting or doing anything about it. You can sit and think about "the meaning of life" but never move, or do anything about that topic. Yet, your thoughts are still about the meaning of life. Conversely, you can have some critter, like an amoeba, that reacts to a chemical in the environment and moves towards it to consume it, and yet there is nothing in the amoeba that is "about" anything.
Stardusty,
I'm only asking you to be clear. What you write is not clear.
You say Jack is running, but running doesn't exist. If Jack is doing something that doesn't exist, then is he doing anything at all?
If running doesn't exist for Jack then does breathing, living, or getting pushed about not exist either?
David,
Surely it is what the gate does that counts, not what it is. It switches on 'swim up' just when both photo receptors are above threshold, and this is life-enhancing for the bacterium or whatever.
The gate's output switches to a "one" when both inputs switch to "one". That function can be life enhancing or not. There is nothing about the gate's function by itself that tells us either way as far as I can tell. It depends on the design that's using it.
Welcome back.
Martin, I partly agree. 1. Intentionality is a power. It may or may not be exercised. 2. Bodies can be inert or active. An inert body is simply moved around by external forces. An active body has internal energy flows that allow it to counter external forces. It may do this in a fixed way like a clockwork toy car or in random way or in a way that depends on information from its environment. In the latter case it exhibits a degree of intentionality, I think.
BM, I agree. We cannot locate the telos of an organ to place within it. Like asking of the heart where the blood pumping occurs. Intentionality likewise.
Thank you.
David,
I wasn't considering "where" the telos of an AND gate resides. I was considering "what" the telos is. I doubt it considers itself as providing a life-enhancing act nor a life-ending act when 2 ones at it's inputs cause a one at it's output. I wonder how it, being part of a life-enhancing mechanism or a life ending mechanism, can impart a different intentionality to it.
I'd say that surely the telos of an isolated and-gate is to drive its output to the logical AND of its inputs, relative to some decision as to what counts as 1 and what counts as 0, no? And that the larger system of photo sensors and swimming actuator connected up to the and-gate in a certain way has a telos of enhancing the life of the embedding organism which it does by way of causing it to swim towards the light and away from the dark. Just as a heart with its various interconnected chambers, valves, and other parts enhances the life of an animal by pumping its blood around. Does that sound reasonable?
So the heart exhibits intentionality? It seems every bodily part does the same then.
That intentionality is life-enhancing doesn't imply that everything life-enhancing is intentional.
Then no particular part of a body is intentional? Not even the heart?
Yes, I think that's right. Of course, some parts of a body have a larger role in supporting a body's intentionality than others, just as the heart has a larger role in circulating the blood than the fingernails. But I don't think it makes sense to say that the central nervous system for example, in itself, is intentional. Even less does it make sense to say that an inert piece of paper with writing on it is intentional. But this is not the conventional view, I'm afraid!
A comment on the language of the original post. Victor writes,
When a Darwinian materialist says “The purpose of your eye is to see” it is not literally true.
So the materialist cannot write about purposes, norms, perspectives, intentions, etc, without falling into falsehood? Isn't that question-begging? As well as implicitly imposing an extra burden on the materialist. We all understand and use these terms pre-theoretically. The debate is about their nature. The materialist will say they are emergent perhaps, others will say they are fundamental constituents of the world, built in at the 'base level'. It doesn't help to write as if the concept of purpose, etc, contained within itself a theory as to its nature.
David Brightly said ...
"A comment on the language of the original post. Victor writes,
When a Darwinian materialist says 'The purpose of your eye is to see' it is not literally true.
So the materialist cannot write about purposes ... without falling into falsehood?"
If the materialist is, let us say, an epiphenomenalist, and if the word purpose is commonly understood as including a sense of there being a mental intent that can be made (or make itself) manifest physically, a sense which could not easily - if at all - cohere with the epiphenomenalist position, then there would be at least semantic incoherence in speaking of the purpose of an eye. Falsehood is easily avoided by instead speaking of the function of the eye. Of course, in the alternative, it could be asserted that purpose is being used metaphorically, but this is a case where it would be clearer to (also) speak non-metaphorically.
The same matter pertains to your earlier remark when you stated: "Let the output of the and-gate select the direction of swimming." Clearly, the key word there is select, a word which has built into it a sense of indeterminateness such that there are supposedly multiple alternatives from which to select when, in fact, the and-gate is such that there is no indeterminateness with regards to what the output can be given a particular input. You appear to be aware of something similar to this when you later said, "It's risky using an anthropomorphism like 'decide' in the context of such a tiny mind, but it makes sense to say the and-gate sets or selects or chooses ..."; however, given the lack of indeterminateness with regards to the functioning of the and-gate, then sets or even determines, effects, or produces would be semantically more consistent or precise than would be selects or chooses.
The same sort of semantic point can be made about natural selection and evolution; the facts of evolution would not be affected at all by replacing the expression, natural selection. The eye functions as it functions whether there is or is not a purpose for the eye.
This does not seem to be an extra burden on the materialist; the non-necessity of virtually every word choice or expression is both burden and gift for everyone.
I take your point, Michael. There is a common electronic circuit called a multiplexer or 'selector'. n control lines choose (sorry) which of 2**n input data lines is routed to a single output. The ordinary language terms are familiar and readily understood but they are being used without any sense of 'mental intent'. No confusion arises, I hope.
David,
I understood how you were using the terms, and, as far as I could tell, the terms of art were not being used to sneak in any reliance on indeterminateness. After all, you all were discussing intentionality rather than intent, iirc.
David,
Even less does it make sense to say that an inert piece of paper with writing on it is intentional. But this is not the conventional view, I'm afraid!
This starts the SEP article on intentionality:
In philosophy, intentionality is the power of minds and mental states to be about, to represent, or to stand for, things, properties and states of affairs. To say of an individual’s mental states that they have intentionality is to say that they are mental representations or that they have contents. Furthermore, to the extent that a speaker utters words from some natural language or draws pictures or symbols from a formal language for the purpose of conveying to others the contents of her mental states, these artifacts used by a speaker too have contents or intentionality.
So do you just hold a different concept of intentionality? A different definition?
I do. People talk about the 'original' intentionality of minds/mental states and the 'derived' intentionality of sentences, pictures, etc. My view is that these are utterly different phenomena, so to subsume them both under the term 'intentionality' is confusing and misleading. I reserve the word 'intentionality' for the former.
David Brightly,
Since most professional philosophers seem to think they are the same, and you, as a layman, do not, then I'd say the burden is on you to explain exactly what the difference is.
The professionals admit there is a difference between 'original' and 'derived' intentionality and I agree there are two phenomena here. I don't regard the latter as a kind of intentionality. But I'll call it 'derived intentionality' if you insist. What's in a name?
So maybe you would say that a word is a means of conveying the intentionality of one mind to others but doesn't count as intentionality because it is not done in a mind? Words do have something that a mind can grasp as having content and produces the same content in the mind hearing the language. So something must reside in the word to produce that content in the other mind. If it's not content itself, then what is it?
...but doesn't count as intentionality because it is not done in a mind? Exactly. Except I would say that words in themselves have no content---nothing resides in the word apart from its shape on the page or sound in the ear. Rather a word acts to 'trigger' existing content already in the mind. If you have not learned the meaning of 'gonfalon', say, my using it will trigger no content in your mind. Nor will the word in itself convey its sense to you.
I suppose we all have to learn what things are before we can have thoughts about them. Not just words. I can see a wombat and not know what it is, but I would probably try to relate it to something I already knew or observe what it does in context. I would probably do the same way with a new word. But after that, I could see a picture of a wombat or hear the word and know what it represented.
If you told me to 'gonfalon' I just might take offense ;-) But it does have some content and in this context I know what you mean by it. A made-up word used to get a point across.
Yes, I'm tempted to say that pictures do have more content than words. They at least resemble actual things where words don't. Hieroglyphs came before alphabets. 'gonfalon' doesn't break up into bits that resemble or even relate to anything else. But it's a genuine word.
Pictures may resemble objects but they don't necessarily tell a story and hieroglyphs were not easily readable either (without a Rosetta stone). But both do have content if they can convey an idea from one mind to another, no?
I'm still inclined to downplay the contentfulness of written or spoken sentences. It's not as if the content were being in some sense transported from writer to reader. Rather the reader 'assembles' existing content (the meanings he possesses for the words) into a novel structure according to the grammar of the sentence. If all goes well the new structure in the reader is a copy, in some sense, of a structure in the writer. And we call this conveying a thought or idea from one mind to another. There are multiple ways this process can go awry.
I don't follow.
A writer writes something and the reader reads something. Yes, they are ink squiggles on paper, but both writer and reader understand more than just that. They both understand that there is some idea or intention present also. It seems that you think the mechanism that you imagine is happening somehow falsifies the contention that an idea is being conveyed. You mention that it could go awry and so maybe a wrong/different idea becomes present in the reader's mind. Does the process have to be perfect in order for it to count as conveying an idea?
But it does seem that you have pointed out the indeterminacy of the physical since the written message could possibly be interpreted differently (or perhaps was just an accident of nature).
They both understand that there is some idea or intention present also. Hmmm. My view is that we don't really understand what is going on so we resort to metaphor. In this case the metaphor of physically passing some object from one to another. We say a thought is being conveyed, or as you say, 'some idea or intention is present'. I don't deny that we say this, just that it's not literally true. I think the ways in which the 'conveyance' can go wrong is revealing of what really is happening.
Note that what is indeterminate is the meaning (if any) that the reader constructs from the text. This will depend to some extent on the initial state of the mind-brain as well as the text itself. I say that this meaning is some physical structure with fully determinate causal properties. It is what it is.
I think the ways in which the 'conveyance' can go wrong is revealing of what really is happening.
Then what is really happening? I doubt most people think that something is physically leaving one mind and that same thing becomes physically present in another, like a letter in the mail. Rather, that only information is being passed, like the contents of the letter and not the paper.
Note that what is indeterminate is the meaning (if any) that the reader constructs from the text. This will depend to some extent on the initial state of the mind-brain as well as the text itself. I say that this meaning is some physical structure with fully determinate causal properties. It is what it is.
I don't get this. The first sentence says the meaning is indeterminate. The next to last seems to asset that it is fully determinate.
We can readily home in on what is being conveyed: a finite sequence of symbols taken from a finite alphabet. 26 letters and one space, say.
I don't get this. Apologies, was too brief. What I mean is that what I am calling the 'meaning', though a definite thing inside the mind-brain of the reader, depends both on the text and the state of the reading mind-brain. So it's not uniquely determined by the text. There is a degree of indeterminacy relative to the text, as it were. But once this 'meaning' thing has been constructed it has a perfectly determinate causal effect on the reading mind-brain. One of the problems in this topic is that we don't have a firm grasp of the meaning of 'meaning'! I start with the idea that the meaning of a text is in some sense its causal effect on the reader, better, what change it induces in the mind-brain of the reader. So I can identify meaning with some structure within the mind-brain that the text creates that wasn't there before. Of course that structure takes bits that were there before---the meaning structures of individual words---and puts them together in a new way.
Note how the external text has a somewhat fuzzy relationship to the internal meaning. But the internal meaning has a perfectly determinate relationship with itself. Identity. So we get a model of the derived versus intrinsic intentionality distinction.
We can readily home in on what is being conveyed: a finite sequence of symbols taken from a finite alphabet. 26 letters and one space, say.
An author usually means to convey more than just this no? Our dialog has been about me gaining an understanding of the idea in your mind about intentionality. I agree that writing something to someone or something that can't read for whatever reason would be a waste of time. But this is just how we, as the kind of things we are, pass information back and forth.
I think it's valid to point out the distinction between having intentionality within one's mind and attempting to convey that intentionality to another through a means of communication however that mechanism plays out.
Let me try it a different way. Would a prospective reader find out what a prospective author had in mind if the prospective author did not communicate his idea in some fashion like talking, writing, painting etc? If not, then the mechanism seems to necessary and not something the mind of a prospective reader could do on his own short of telepathy.
I agree entirely. Here is an analogy for what I'm claiming. Q. What is an effective, quick, cheap, and legal way for me in the UK to send you in the US a cake? A. I email you or post here a recipe for the cake. You buy the ingredients, mix them up, and bake the cake.
So how does your objection regarding how the recipe doesn't have content relate to your agreement that I will know how to bake a cake once I have the recipe? I don't know how to bake it before I have the recipe and I do know how to bake it after. It must have more to it than just alphabet letters and spaces. I propose that the way those letters and spaces are arranged conveys the message. In other words, the message is the form those letters are arranged in and so it has been "informed" and that "information" is what is being conveyed.
OK. The cake is analogous with the thought and the recipe with the text. I don't send the actual cake just as the text doesn't bear the actual thought (*). Instead I send a recipe just as I send a text. At your end you use the recipe to make a cake (which hopefully turns out pretty much like the cake I wanted to send you) just as the text, on your reading it, re-creates in your mind the thought (or something pretty close to it). For another analogy, think Star Trek matter transporter!
* thoughts can only exist in minds.
I got your analogy. What I'm not getting is why you think/thought that the recipe is without content. For instance here:
I'm still inclined to downplay the contentfulness of written or spoken sentences.
I take your point that a thought in one's mind is different than that thought expressed in writing. The writing on one account is no more than ink on paper. This seems to be the position of attributed to materialists/physicalists. I can't make out if this is your position or not. On another account, the writing is more than just ink on paper. Writing conveys a meaning to a reader (let's leave aside for the moment the mechanism). I also can't make out if this is your position or not.
Regarding Star Trek. Does the transporter transport content?
Excellent.
Maybe it's a matter of convention whether we say a text bears content. We usually do, of course. But I still want to say that the text is no more than ink on paper. The text just has an interesting effect on the prepared mind of the reader. I hope the account I have offered goes some way to dissolve the mystery.
With the Star Trek transporter a body goes in one end, is destroyed, and a facsimile emerges at the other end. I wouldn't go near one!
I wouldn't go near one!
Maybe you already have. Or was that the previous you?
Indeed!
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