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ORIGINAL: vincentML\

Empiricism assumes reality is made of matter. It is materialism successfully applied.

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

Problematic for your take on empiricism is that it calls into question the reliability of that "data."

If we then act on that unreliable data as if it were knowledge, we've left science and entered belief.

Oh, I agree. But I think that the empirical data of experience, especially when experiences of a type are shared by many people, can be evidence of something going on that merits study. To argue otherwise on the basis of physicalist assumptions burdens science with doctrine.

K.

Granted. To pretend there's no data, just because it isn't readily quantifiable, isn't very scientific.

Neither is the data scientific if it is not quantifiable.

Nor is it valid to suggest that reported crowd experiences or even repeated individual experiences such as extraterrestrial kidnappings have been ignored. I believe you are unintentionally setting up a straw man with that assumption.

The question arises when do you crossover from the hard sciences into social psychology or the investigations of hallucinations or fraud? It is problematic and burdensome to wrap self-reported and/or contradictory human experiences in the mantle of science and then complain that science is not fair to such data.

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

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ORIGINAL: vincentML\

Empiricism assumes reality is made of matter. It is materialism successfully applied.

I really don't think that's the case necessarily.

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

Well, presumably your assertion is that all experience is material.

Did I get that wrong? If so, what's the correct basis for your stance?

If that's correct -- certainly we have a wide range of experiences. I suppose you could, for example, relegate all mental sensation as chemical/electrical manifestation, but that's an assumption, and while a possibility, certainly not something established at this point.

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There is no way to observe and verify someone else's subjective experience.

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

Animism, which predates organized religion, is the belief that there is no separation between the physical and the spiritual, between matter and spirit. But it is important to realize that such a statement would be incomprehensible to an animist.

We are frequently told that man invented gods to explain the processes of nature. But consider, for example, that you have a dog you've named Buster. You will say things like, "Buster didn't like that," or "Buster is full of energy today." When you speak in this way, you aren't talking about the "god" of the dog. Buster is the dog. That's his name. Similarly, giving a name to the sky is not inventing a "god" of the sky. Animism is not a form of theism.

The arc of history has been one of increasing abstraction and with it a growing split between the physical and the spiritual, between matter and spirit, culminating in the present Monotheistic view that the world exists in relation to God purely as an object; separate, created, material. Beliefs may vary in the degree to which they postulate spirit's presence in and ability to act upon the material world, but the fundamental split between matter and spirit remains absolute and inviolate.

Critics of Monotheism commonly attack its spiritual claims, but nobody attacks its conjoined material claim, that matter is nothing but insentient "stuff." Yet the fact remains that Monotheism stands or falls on that claim too, and it seems just as much a long shot.

We cannot explain how or why an assemblage of insentient material could or would have any subjective internal experience at all, let alone a rich emotional life and a sense of self. The idea that consciousness is an emergent quality of sufficiently complex systems begs the question. We have no idea how insentient chemicals could possibly develop a conscious awareness of their existence in the first place.

So starting fresh, without rancor or Bible quotes, what conclusion might a reasonable person suspect upon witnessing these assemblages of insentient materials building great cities and penning sonnets and symphonies? What are your private thoughts?

Ode to Joy

K.

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

So then, on my first question, that's a yes, and for the follow-up, that's a nun-uh.

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ORIGINAL: Musicmystery

That's not an example of what he's talking about, and you know it.

But what about when he only imagines it?

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

you cannot supply any evidence of unique subjective experience that is not linked to the neurological infrastructure. The evidence seems pretty strong that human thinking requires a brain. Your assumption that this is speculation is quite in error. Surely, you are not suggesting that neuroscience has been lacking in testing of the relationship between the brain and human functions.

You appear to be suffering from a faith-based belief that brains produce consciousness. But the fact that the claim is speculative and based on an assumption cannot be dismissed with a wave of a priestly hand. No direct evidence exists for such a claim. All you have is an interpretation of the evidence that has been crafted to suit a preconceived bias.

K.

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

You appear to be suffering from a faith-based belief that brains produce consciousness. But the fact that the claim is speculative and based on an assumption cannot be dismissed with a wave of a priestly hand. No direct evidence exists for such a claim. All you have is an interpretation of the evidence that has been crafted to suit a preconceived bias.

Of course it is an interpretation. That's what science is about: constructing the best model that fits the evidence. . . . interpretation of the evidence, duh. Good Gawd, I thought you were an intelligent man. That is the dumbest thing I have read from you.

No direct evidence, hey? Remove your brain, put your body on life support, and let's talk. Ha! Do the same with any other organ and I predict you will be aware or have some brain scan activity showing a level of consciousness.

Your repeated attempts at making science into a religion are ludicrous.

Let's try leaving religion out of it . . . . hmmmm?

Many studies have correlated parts of the brain with particular functions. Some of these have involved stimulating specific areas of the brain and noting the subjective experience reported by subjects. Others such as ablation experiments performed on animals and human cases where a part of the brain has been damaged or lost due to traumatic injury have associated damage to or loss of parts of the brain with specific impairments in functioning. But these are all just basic circuit testing procedures.

We determine the function of components in a circuit by injecting a signal and observing the resulting output with an oscilloscope, and if we already know what the output should be then this is a method of testing the integrity of the components. Another method is to remove a suspected component and swap in a fresh one to determine whether the component has suffered some internal damage. But nobody would conclude on the basis of these procedures that the television shows we watch are being created by the television set, or that entertaining programming is an emergent property of certain types of sufficiently complex electronic circuits.

Well, nobody except perhaps primitives who believe in magic. But lets try keeping your religion out of it.

K.

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

You appear to be suffering from a faith-based belief that brains produce consciousness. But the fact that the claim is speculative and based on an assumption cannot be dismissed with a wave of a priestly hand. No direct evidence exists for such a claim. All you have is an interpretation of the evidence that has been crafted to suit a preconceived bias.

Of course it is an interpretation. That's what science is about: constructing the best model that fits the evidence. . . . interpretation of the evidence, duh. Good Gawd, I thought you were an intelligent man. That is the dumbest thing I have read from you.

No direct evidence, hey? Remove your brain, put your body on life support, and let's talk. Ha! Do the same with any other organ and I predict you will be aware or have some brain scan activity showing a level of consciousness.

Your repeated attempts at making science into a religion are ludicrous.

Let's try leaving religion out of it . . . . hmmmm?

Many studies have correlated parts of the brain with particular functions. Some of these have involved stimulating specific areas of the brain and noting the subjective experience reported by subjects. Others such as ablation experiments performed on animals and human cases where a part of the brain has been damaged or lost due to traumatic injury have associated damage to or loss of parts of the brain with specific impairments in functioning. But these are all just basic circuit testing procedures.

We determine the function of components in a circuit by injecting a signal and observing the resulting output with an oscilloscope, and if we already know what the output should be then this is a method of testing the integrity of the components. Another method is to remove a suspected component and swap in a fresh one to determine whether the component has suffered some internal damage. But nobody would conclude on the basis of these procedures that the television shows we watch are being created by the television set, or that entertaining programming is an emergent property of certain types of sufficiently complex electronic circuits.

Well, nobody except perhaps primitives who believe in magic. But lets try keeping your religion out of it.

You omitted and ignored the reference and link to deep coma brain scans in order to make your delusional point. How can you live with your dishonesty and with the black hole that swallowed your integrity?

Don't you think that clown suit is a bit undignified?

K.