I agree.
In most cases experimental science doesn’t have to go that deep. In cases that do go that deep like quantum physics, metaphysical indeterminacy prevails. Awareness of that situation seems to me to be existentially significant.
This is, as far as I am concerned, the point in question. Are we really able to take ourselves out of the equation and look at existence from a purely scientific, or technical angle? Or is it quite normal for human beings to look at existence from an existential angle? I get the feeling sometimes that the position that is often taken by materialists is one of played indifference, which avoids the complexities of existence, trying to appear aloof, unconcerned and unapproachable.
But as soon as you are concerned, involved and emotionally engaged, there is another aspect of existence that will not be ignored. It can be triggered by any number of stimuli, and many of those trying to maintain their deportment have been tripped by something unassuming, something of great beauty, of grace or innocence. It is then that the mask slips, perhaps just for a moment.
That isn’t what McGilchrist is actually saying, but “when the rhetoric fades, and we have stopped trying to cheer ourselves up by believing in sentimental ideas such as virtue, love and courage, the possibility of truly unselfish behaviour, or a realm of spiritual value”, it is then that the materialist view of evolution kicks in and we are told, “we are nothing but blind mechanisms, the dupes of our equally blind genes, with no choice but to play out the sorry farce that the force of evolution, so much bigger and greater than we are, dictates.”
It may be a fine difference, but the implication is in the whole quote.
I guess I’m not seeing your point. Virtue, love, courage, and unselfish behavior are all facts of life, as are, unfortunately, vice, hate, cowardice and selfishness. This is so no matter what metaphysics one subscribes to. Where did these behaviors come from? One can say that God did it (including, it would seem, the vice, hate, cowardice and selfishness bits) or one can say that such behavior arose naturally. Evolutionary theory does not say that we are “blind mechanisms” or “dupes” of our blind genes, playing out some sort of farce. It says that social creatures such as ourselves evolved benevolent (as well as competitive) traits that gave us a survival advantage. But more, our genes do not rule us. We are combinations of nature and nurture.
No, you are not … read what I wrote again, and you might.
But you are just repeating a quote I tried to rebut. Explain in your own words, if you will.
OK, well, first, to get clear, by “materialist view” do you mean what I would call the metaphysical naturalist view? Because the word “materialism” has different connotations. The strict philosophical connotation is metaphysical naturalism. But other, more colloquial views, involve culture — the idea that money, possessions, status, etc., are the most important things in the world. And old slogan from the Reagan “greed is good” era was, “He who dies with the most toys, wins.”
But regardless, I am contesting the idea that evolution means we are “dupes” of blind forces that constitute a “farce.” There may indeed be people who contend for this, but I simply suggest that they are wrong. Or rather, they have an interpretation of evolution and its implications that I disagree with.
The metaphysical naturalist view of evolution (though evolution, like all science, does not entail or depend upon metaphysical naturalism) is that proclivities toward virtue, love, courage, and unselfish behavior are, well, evolved. They are exhibited by evolved social species. If such species failed to exhibit such behavior, they would have been naturally selected against and gone extinct.
To be more precise, perhaps, if by “the materialist view of evolution” we mean, “the metaphysical naturalist view of evolution,” the latter view does not entail “blind mechanisms,” “dupes,” etc. Again, there may be individual naturalists who say this — anyone can say anything — but that does not speak for everyone and it does not mean we should take them seriously.
Not having done the research that McGilchrist has done, but listening to his lectures and reading his books, I have become convinced of his argument. He observes that the initial discovery of particular aspects to right and left hemispheres was soon debunked, and these had contributed to a largely mechanistic view of life. Obviously, I am not painting everyone in science with the same brush, but the public was presented with a picture that was wholly false. He noted that the Volvo advertisement about it being a car for the right hemisphere did the trick and nobody wanted to be seen touching the subject.
This led to a kind of denial, with nobody willing to correct the false impression that had been given and which existed into the time when I was attending and holding lectures, promoting the then current mechanistic view. The effect on medicine and care was problematic. I had nurses explaining the motives of their dealings with patients in this mechanistic way, and at the time there was only the book “The Master and His Emissary” with 615 pages full of great detail, with which to contradict and develop a different perspective. I confess, I retired before attempting the task. “The Divided Brain and the Search for Meaning” is far better for that task.
If science isn’t transported into real life, with real consequences, and the outdated view is continued to be allowed to be transmitted, it has negative consequences. This is why my perspective in this discussion is the practical consequence of ideologies or dogmas that are sold as science in areas of life where we are reliant upon real facts. I think McGilchrist displays this in the following statement:
Well, I have not read this book, about the left and right hemispheres, so at the moment I can only respond to what you initially quoted, and have done so.
To me arguing about metaphysical materialism versus idealism from evolution is inexpedient because evolution is in either case secondary. You can have a material evolution or an ideal evolution and both have been argued back and forth over the history of philosophy.
From the fact that we don’t like an evolution that is a “sorry farce” because it is amoral and blind, it does not follow that it is not the case. On the other hand, materialists must explain away the human propensity of striving for the good. But, this they are able to do to their own satisfaction via various theories of evolutionary psychology. So that pathway of argument for idealism seems to always end in stalemate.
If the process of evolution is amoral and blind, it does not follow that the products of evolution are amoral and blind. They are not. And that includes non-human animals.
Human propensity for striving for the good is inbuilt by evolution but also mediated by culture.
I think that the implied lack of correction of public awareness about materialist theories that are bandied about in the media, influencing the opinions of a majority of people, is the point of what many people who I have read and whom I quote. McGilchrist makes a point that it is observable that we have allowed the left hemisphere to subtly take the driver seat in many portrayals of reality that we see today, for which it is unfit to do.
The complexity of life is such that science gives us theories (that may be quite reliable) but that the humanities show us life. It is the assumption that one can “follow the science” to adequately cope with the complexity of existence that is causing big problems today. This is like the attempt to use one spotlight, however bright, to light up a huge stadium. No wonder that people are reacting the way they do. It is why the West is losing its grip and has made so many catastrophic decisions in the past, out of which the troubles of the present arise.
Materialism is, for me, an important part of the problem and, whether it can be proved or not, idealism presents us with another perspective. As you say, we can’t rely on one or the other, but that is precisely the problem: Materialism is dominant and I see many public figures, who want to keep it that way. Idealism opens up possibilities, no more but no less. It is the left hemisphere that is suggesting that you must choose one or the other, but the right hemisphere is open to what life presents us, the larger picture.
I honestly don’t think that most scientists are telling us that science shows us how to live our lives.
Again, that isn’t what I said …
You wrote:
So maybe you didn’t mean that scientists are trying to tell us how to live our lives, but maybe that we are somehow being conditioned by others into believing that scientism is trying to tell us how to live our lives? Or?
Growing recognition of the irreducibility of consciousness, and quantum indeterminacy have uncovered the apparent incompleteness of metaphysical materialism. That makes the possibility of metaphysical idealism more plausible.
In addition, down the line logically from a point of view not centered in consciousness there are alienating and dehumanizing effects. That suggests that the science which left consciousness out is not only inadequate but wrong but wrong. Recognizing that other animals are conscious results in more compassionate treatment of them. So, how we think about consciousness can have downstream ethical effects.
So I ask: What developments can be anticipated that would further validate universal consciousness? And would a widespread shift to metaphysical idealism have positive ethical effects?
There are people that are in a special way right hemisphere activated, perhaps as children, and they go on through life struggling with the spotlight vision of the left hemisphere – although they may find a way to cope with it. For these people, life is always the fulness of life, when they draw a living object, they may include details that others would not. When drawing a tree, they also include the ground and perhaps the sky. When drawing a human being, they may include what they do. But there are others who don’t see these aspects as being a part of the drawing. In extreme cases, where the right hemisphere is de-activated, their drawing consists of a symbolic tree, or a symbolic human-being, not fully representative. In worst cases, they draw objects that only occupy one half of the page or are one half of a tree. I know of many people who have restricted their perspectives in a similar way, although they are quite unaware of what they have done.
In a society in which the humanities are being pushed out of importance, we see that there are many decisions being made about particulars, but they are often foreign to the whole picture. The fact that we have a commercial system running society is an example of that. For this system, consumerism is the driving factor, and we are all driven to some degree to take part. There are rational reasons for it, jobs, wealth, etc. give us incentive. The problem with the system is paid lip service, but it is possibly the problem that will one day destroy us: The exploitation of resources, the spread of refuse and those items we no longer use, but which just won’t go away. The mental health of people fixated on one aspect of existence suffers. The spread of fundamentalism is also a sign that people notice that there is something wrong, but they just focus on another set of particulars and still lose the whole picture out of sight.
Our inability to read mythology, the need to explain metaphors and symbols that came natural to ancient man, our depreciation of intricate poetry, our tendency to watch a film rather than read the original book, there are many indicators that suggest that we have gone through a development without realising it, that is dedicated to particulars and not to the whole picture. An indication, says McGilchrist, that the left hemisphere has been given the driving seat, and the prominence of materialism is a symptom of this. The problem can only be solved when we are aware of it, and at present, it is people like him, who, it seems to me, profited from formerly being an Oxford literary scholar before entering Psychiatry, that see the larger picture better than most.
This has caused me to wake in the night, so I hope you appreciate that I see myself as one of these people whose grasp of particulars is second to his view of the whole picture. Obviously, people like me (and McGilchrist) manage to cope with society in varying degrees, but I believe I understand the people who are providing opposition to the materialist view that is so dominant in institutions, because they have had an opportunity to see the whole picture in a different way to many of their peers. Look into the lives of Rupert Sheldrake, Kastrup etc. and you will find aspects of “right hemisphere activation” (my terminology) that has helped them look up, if you like. They have seen the stars, the sky, the trees, the rivers, and the creatures great and small, and understood the interdependency in nature, and witnessed what they conceive to be indications that consciousness is primal, the ground of being, and permeates all living creatures.
Agreed, it gives us a different perspective from what institutions have been telling people, including educational institutions. It also opens up an area that had been proposed by people throughout the last fifty years, suggesting that an area of research should be taken seriously with regard to psychoactive substances, which temporarily restrict the brains’ ability to filter and shows up what we are normally missing. The apparent value here seems to be an effective method of solving depression and addiction, both signs of a society in which a meaning crisis has emerged.
This is, in my mind, a very important point. The way we treat animals is a very clear sign of how we regard nature, and at the end of a cycle of consequences, also how we treat each other. The respect for nature as it was expressed by groups that were close to nature, aboriginal or indigenous people, was ridiculed on contact, and the modern mindset was pushed upon them. Compassion has been a central aspect of religious teaching, even if it was reserved for the tribe in many cases, but it is a central thesis of modern traditions, which was why Karen Armstrong put it forward as the basis for a new movement “Charter for Compassion”.
How much more would it be central to human relationships, if we could entertain the idea that we are all expressions of a cosmic consciousness, appearing on the surface to be separate, but in the end one? Imagine a return to that dimension of being, having disregarded all life forms, exercising cruelty in all ways possible, only to realise that I share the pain of those life forms in reunion with them. I know it is speculative, but it is a thought exercise that would do people good, if they could take it seriously.
I’m not sure what developments we can anticipate. What I am witnessing is the amassing of indications that help us understand better, how we became what we are. These also show us, what we have left behind, and why. I think that there must be a change in public perception in order to overcome the mistakes we are making. Otherwise, I am afraid to say, humanity is destined to sink into a period of antagonism and enmity, the lowest station of a civilized society, and only rise out of it again, when a new outlook gives us the courage, the intelligence and the humility to restart a civilization.