Materialism

“Seems to be” is right. We’re heading down the path to manipulating genetic codes, controlling states of mind through molecular neuropsychopharmacology, altering brain functions with microchip implants that will affect cognition, consciousness and the sense of identity itself. Quantum physics is creating (has created) a paradigmatic shift in our understanding of reality.

There is no ‘I’, it is an artifact.

Xunzian, I think the reason that ‘emergent properties’ is a necessary description is that, as Uccisore has pointed out repeatedly, we seem to experience ‘consciousness’. It may be a coordination of smaller functions, but it is unsatisfactory to many to simply say “we don’t need to explain consciousness, because it doesn’t exist. We only need to explain the lower level functions.” When we talk about consciousness as an emergent property, we don’t need to deny that it is a thing all its own, but we can still explain it in terms of the coordination of other funtions.

Willamena, the I is the emergent property of a complete brain (or body).

Of course consciousness is real.

But it is just a manifestation of the degrees of freedom established by the network of our mind. If there is a robot that can only go right, then it has no degrees of freedom, it lifts. As soon as you add the notion of left and right, you have a single degree of freedom. You can actually observe moderately complex behaviours in constructs with that single degree of freedom, as I mentioned earlier in the thread.

Now, when we have the human example where we can do many, many things, the degrees of freedom for our mind approaches infinity (well, it is very large, at the very least). Our consciousness is just shifting from a state of freedom to a state of action (where freedom is gradually restricted until the act is completed and the degrees of freedom are reduced to zero).

The ‘I’ as a placeholder for this process is what is the artifact. It represents a reduction in the degrees of freedom based upon specialization and experience.

Um… don’t you mean there is an I, it is an artifact?

So an emergent property of the complete brain can act on the brain to excite and alter it? But isn’t this the same as positing “more than the brain” to explain the operations of the brain (which you claimed earlier wasn’t necessary)? See, I think it is.

That depends entirely on whether you consider artifacts genuine or not. Does the run really rotate around the Earth, or is that an artifact of our reference frame?

A lighter is a machine that makes fire out of butane fuel. With a rubber band, I could hold the button on a plastic lighter, making a sort of mechanical candle. The candle would, eventually, warp itself due to the heat from the flame it produced.
Or how about this. We have a computer program that has a loop. It starts with some parameter set to zero, and with each cycle through the loop, it adds one to that parameter. As this program runs, part of its function is to alter itself by adding one to this certain parameter.
You could claim that in either of these scenarios, something ‘more than the thing’ is acting to alter the thing. But really, the thing is acting to alter itself, and there’s nothing all that strange about it. We don’t need to call the thing ‘more than itself’, and there’s no benefit to doing so. We just need to understand that what at first seems ‘more than the thing’ is really a part of the thing, so our original picture, our original referrent of the whole thing, was actually ‘less than the thing’.

As the conversation drifts towards science, I’m going to have less and less I can say without making a fool of myself, I’m sure (whether or not that will stop me remains to me seen). But, staying with philosophy, let me say a couple of things:
There are many new discoveries that can be made through science or observation. I can go walking down the street, look through a telescope or microscope, interview experts, and come to learn a great deal. But there are limits. For example, I cannot, through reading books, come to learn that I am illiterate. It doesn’t matter how much I read, or how well put together the arguments are, I cannot come to learn of my illiteracy through reading books. If I were illiterate, the information would have to come in some other way- a verbal explanation, perhaps.
If you accept the nature of that limitation, then I would submit that there is nothing, nothing I can do to come to learn that I, ‘the self’, or consciousness doesn’t exist. I can’t even take it on faith reasonably. The best I can do is use compartmentalized thinking to become convinced by an argument or evidence, while separating that from the automatic defeater that we all have.

[b]Carleas[/b]  The difference between consciousness and operating systems isn't one of location so much as multiplicity.  You were right to point out that a clump of cells is insufficient to be a memory- but then you stand with me, a memory, properly understood, is pure [i]qualia[/i], the thing is the experience itself.  If that's the case, then consciousness is a requirement for a particular memory. So all those difficult questions come flooding back- if you recreate a memory somehow, have you created a new person? Have you somehow created another of the same person?  And we come back to the index cards- if the cards are doing what a brain does, then you have a consciousness.  If the cards are doing what [i]your [/i]brain does, then we have [i]your[/i] consciousness. And that kind of thing is absurd.  Consciousness only makes sense as an irrevocably unique, and that can't happen under materialism.

I consider “I” and the apparent rotation of the earth to be genuine artifacts.

To the idealist, the “emergent property” is the bit that transcends its programming (has existence only in spirit), that has the perceived ability to alter its programming (will) and is still an integral part (result) of the program (“I”).

The lighter’s flame falls short as an example of “emergent property” of the lighter, but the flame’s apparanent capacity to “feed itself” would be an example of an emergent property of flame. In the computer’s looping, it is the apparent evolution of the program that is emergent of the program.

I think that it is utterly necessary to utilize an “I” as a “self” more than the sum of mind and body to define ourselves --not only because without it we would have to restructure most of our spoken and written languages, but because it has all the apparance of being quite real --it is what real being is to consciousness. Without consciousness there is no emergent property “I”, and without the emergent property, we cannot describe consciousness.

But you’re right, there’s nothing strange about it. :slight_smile:

You are gonna have to clarify that position.

Uccisore, I think the point is valid that you can’t believe that you don’t exist, and I’m avoiding saying that. It’s not that you don’t exist, it’s just then you look very different from one angle than from another. This is why I don’t think that materialism has to be reductionism. I clearly exist, my consciousness is obvious to me. To say that it doesn’t exist is not only unproductive, it’s not justified: why prioritize the level on which my consciousness doesn’t exist? It’s not right to say the pattern isn’t a pattern, it’s just shapes.
But the pattern is shapes too, and if you have the same shapes in the same sequence, you have the same patter. The thing is, if I make a perfect replica of my brain, it’s not me, I’m me. I don’t have it’s consciousness. It’s consciousness would react identically to mine in identical situations, but it won’t experience identical situations. In any reproduction, the thoughts aren’t the same thoughts, just functionally the same thoughts, until it is altered by its experiences enough that it is only functionally similar, and eventually I and my replicate may even disagree. And the global index card me won’t act like me, because it will process too slowly (even slower than flesh-and-blood me). So, yes, there are scenarios that are a little bit weird, but only because they are novel. They don’t self-contradict or break any more-sacred rules, they just do things we haven’t yet been able to do. I suspect our childrens children will find them downright commonplace.

An artifact, as an object “made by man.” In the case of these examples both objects (“I” and the apparent motion of the earth) are products of his perspective. Genuine, as in not pretending to be something it is not.

I consider them to be genuine products of a conscious perspective.

Edit: guess I should have said apparent rotation of the sun about the earth, sorry, but I kept the same wording to keep it in context.

Ah, that explains it. I was using ‘artifact’ in the investigative sense, meaning a result due to an error in the way the thing was observed.

I was talking about definition #4/#6, whereas you were talking about #2.

Though Ucci’s (and your) points are well taken, especially the bit about the illiterate not learning he is illiterate through reading – that said, I am not denying our perception of the ‘I’, nor even its importance. Instead I am suggesting that the ego is something not naturally present in us. Whether or not it ought be overcome is a different discussion entirely. So, in that vein, the ego can be viewed as either something akin to reading or language, where it is acquired as a normal part of our development but isn’t present initially or it can be viewed as a ‘bad habit’, if you will, from things like socialization or “turbid psycho-physical stuff”, or what-have-you.

The best evidence for the ego’s non-presence, at least initially, is the participation mystique. Especially that between a mother and child, where (at least from the child’s perspective) the difference between the mother and the child is non-existent. Now, it could be argued that this is just a different view of the ego, whereby the child perceives the mother as an extension of itself. I think this position is incorrect for a variety of reasons.

  1. It presupposes the notion of self. While not an argument in-and-of-itself, I do think that this point is important if we are to accept that, psychologically, people are born without prior experience.

  2. It renders a fluid concept concrete. The self that I was ten years ago is barely recognizable from the self that I am now. So, at least in this respect, the self is a concept that requires a context for it to have any meaning. Incidentally, I think this is also where Hume’s skepticism falls apart, because he tries to separate concept from context and in doing so, he can only see a house of cards floating on air . . . so in a poof of logic, he demands that that which he perceives cease to exist. And when it fails to, he accuses it of a logical fallacy. Given that an infant has no prior experience (or extremely limited experience), the concept of self would lack any meaningful context rendering it susceptible to just what Hume talks about!

  3. So, then what gives the context for the self? Other selves, of course, which arose due to forced distinctions being made between people. In Chinese thought (especially Daoism and, by extension, Zen), you’ll hear people say that the self is ‘empty’. This isn’t ‘empty’ as in ‘non-existent’ but rather ‘empty’ like the space in a cup. So, the self is a useful space wherein various concepts can be placed within a context (the self is a concept that can provide a context, after all) that is created by the boundaries between people. The space in the cup is the same as the space in the air (the pre-cup space), however, the space in the cup has a function that the pre-cup air does not. When people talk about a ‘relational’ self, that is what they mean.

So, in the interactions with the mother (who possesses her own ego), the child is forced to recognize the distinction between itself and its mother (context is establish), and from there the concept of its own ego takes root. The reverse is also possible. When a person is left completely alone (such as in solitary confinement), they will begin to hallucinate other people. This is the concept of ego desperately trying to provide a context for it to exist in, so the ego itself breaks down into separate entities, which each give each other context. The process is the same for the madman as it is for the child, the impetus is the only thing that differs.

Given reality, which materialism is subject to, does good and evil exist regardless of who came up with the terms?

Are you saying that atheist don’t hold to the existence of good and evil aand therefore are not moral beings?

morality simply means to act according to cultural customs and/or within socialy accepted peramiters… neither theists nor atheists have claim to good behavior… it’s an individual thing whether you act “moraly” or not…

Atheism does NOT exclude moral behavior, however, so the implication is wrong.

As for the existence of good and evil… they are, as i said, man made terms that DESCRIBE behavior… they do not dictate… they DESCRIBE… they have the same function as words such as “cold” or “hot” or “pretty”… meaning that they decribe based on (usually) unspoken agreements of a “norm” between people… but i suppose in the case of religion the basis is whatever is written in “the holy texts” given one can actually make sense of them.

though stricktly speaking… good and evil do not exist given atheism… Moral behavior does… but the words good and evil do not have the same meaning to an atheist as they do to a theist.

just as i might say “oh my god!” when i am surprised… using the words good and evil likewise have no basis in religion in my mind… they are words i’ve picked up through exposure to them and now use them as i see fit… it goes no further…

however… if you are attempting to link the notion of good and evil to morality you are sorely mistaken… no such link exists.

Xunzian, it seems the idea of me as distinct from the rest of the universe belays the claim that the ‘self’ is empty, or at least that in that sense the cup is as empty as the space within. I understand a cup relationally as well. I understand it as an object distinct from the table it rests on, and the liquid within. I understand its shape as a relation of one part of the cup to the other. The matter that composed the cup was there before the cup was, just as the space inside it was. But arranged like this and used like that, it has become a cup. As much as anything exists, so does my self, so the distinction seems arbitrary.
Can you also expand on your comment about Hume?

Ace, good and evil can also be understood as they relate animal or instinctual feelings. Murder, for example, could well be an instinctively repulsive act, because it would impact the survival of the tribe or social group pretty strongly. Theft might have a similar innate repulsion. There’s good reason to believe that good and evil are part of our social instincts.

The self as something separate from society is an artifice, is all I am trying to say. Remember, the self isn’t the cup, the cup is our social relationships. The self is the space within the cup, which is distinct from the space outside the cup only because we have placed an artificial barrier around it. But cording a space off doesn’t make that space phenomenologically distinct from the space outside. It is like when siblings draw a line down the centre of a room to separate ‘their’ spaces. While the line exists, the room is not actually split in any way beyond an agreement that exists between two people. But again, that distinction can’t exist if only one person wills it – both need to recognize it, so the true matter isn’t about one person and another person, but the space between them, the thing that arises because of their interaction.

As for Hume, his radical skepticism creates a world where it is constantly re-made every second. With every new second, there isn’t just a new Hume, but an entirely new world, distinct from the world that existed before it. This is hardcore B-series time (or is it A-series? I forget), whereby everything exists in a moment of time forever. The iron that was hot on Monday at 8 AM will always be hot on that Monday at 8 AM. This creates a disjointed slide-show of reality. The problem for Hume is that if we put this slide-show together, we observe fluid motion without fail. There are no ‘glitches’ in reality, if you will. My knife will not suddenly become a rubber chicken for an instant, and then turn back into a knife. So, that is what I mean by context. If you view each instant as self-contained (as Hume does), then all that can result is radical skepticism since nothing outside of this very instant exists. However, my knife has the context of having been a knife as well as being a knife, and so for a transformation to occur, that context would have to be changed in some way. Essentially it is applying the notion of inertia to existence, and seeing that the relationship between things (though those things are in the process of change) will remain constant unless acted upon by some outside force.

My issue is that the cup (or out social relationships) is not distinct from the space around it (the social context is as dependent on the selves as the selves are dependent on the social context). To me, it seems arbitrary to grant one more existence than the other. Perhaps the social context has more ‘net existence’ than any one self, but the ‘existence density’ of the context can only ever be as great as that of the selves that comprise it.

I have argued before that part of what our referrents mean is that they will continue, so for instance a knife means not just the thing, but its continuity through time. Something that jumps around between a knife-looking thing and a rubber-chicken-looking thing wouldn’t really be a knife at all. I think it’s a similar idea to what you’re saying, that the knife isn’t the thing that exists in such-and-such a moment, but the thing that exists in many moments preceeding and folloiwng it.