Materialism
I've had a lot of occasion to be reconsidering my stance on materialism lately.
By "materialism" I mean the philosophical stance that all that exists is physical matter and its movement through space and time.
A notion of "energy" is permitted in via the back door to accommodate the source of the movement and (through increasingly detailed study and grudging allowances) acting as the substrate of materiality (E=mc2).
By this accounting, our human perceptions of mental events, such as "consciousness" and "free will", are mere illusions and "epiphenomena" created wholly from electrochemical processes in brain tissue.
Materialism in this sense is a foundational principle of classic modern science (along with empiricism, reductionism, on a core of logical positivism).
While the classic formulation of science as a discipline has much going for it as a method to investigate the Cosmos, including many self-correcting mechanisms; it did not well address the question of how to go about questioning any of its principles.
Some of these principles (arguably materialism falls into this category) are postulates (things assumed to be true for the sake of argument or investigation). There was no allowance made for backing up and starting from first principles with another postulate in the face of conflicting evidence or possible alternative explanation.
Materialists will argue that there's no "proof" of anything beyond materiality. This may well be true in terms of the rules materialism has defined.
I liken it to the mathematical concept of a "closed set". Take for instance the set of positive integers (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5...).
This set of numbers is closed over the operations of addition and multiplication. You can add and multiply positive integers until you are blue in the face, and all you'll ever get is another positive integer.
But if subtraction comes along, the game changes. Suddenly there's these negative numbers that can come up if you subtract a larger absolute value number from a smaller. This opens the positive integers onto the larger set of all integers.
Now integers, positive or negative, look pretty similar, the only difference is that negative sign. But what if we now consider the operation of division. Now we can get all these fractional values, decimals, the "rational numbers". And it's like we've cracked open a whole new universe just between zero and one (and similar infinities between each and every other integer).
And we also know, even with all that, there are still other numbers in the mix that we don't even get at: The transcendental numbers (e, π, √2).
So, materialism, defined on its own terms perhaps cannot be transcended; is self-referentially "complete" and cannot be refuted using its own self-defined operations. It requires a new operation.
Bridges cannot be build from inside, there's nothing to build them with. They must be built from the other side inward.
Bravo, sweet man, that's a marvelous analogy.
I feel your sadness, I'm here sweet man, what you're feeling is projection, I haven't gone anywhere, trust me darling, keep working, I'll be here when you get back. I love you. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo
By "materialism" I mean the philosophical stance that all that exists is physical matter and its movement through space and time.
A notion of "energy" is permitted in via the back door to accommodate the source of the movement and (through increasingly detailed study and grudging allowances) acting as the substrate of materiality (E=mc2).
By this accounting, our human perceptions of mental events, such as "consciousness" and "free will", are mere illusions and "epiphenomena" created wholly from electrochemical processes in brain tissue.
Materialism in this sense is a foundational principle of classic modern science (along with empiricism, reductionism, on a core of logical positivism).
While the classic formulation of science as a discipline has much going for it as a method to investigate the Cosmos, including many self-correcting mechanisms; it did not well address the question of how to go about questioning any of its principles.
Some of these principles (arguably materialism falls into this category) are postulates (things assumed to be true for the sake of argument or investigation). There was no allowance made for backing up and starting from first principles with another postulate in the face of conflicting evidence or possible alternative explanation.
Materialists will argue that there's no "proof" of anything beyond materiality. This may well be true in terms of the rules materialism has defined.
I liken it to the mathematical concept of a "closed set". Take for instance the set of positive integers (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5...).
This set of numbers is closed over the operations of addition and multiplication. You can add and multiply positive integers until you are blue in the face, and all you'll ever get is another positive integer.
But if subtraction comes along, the game changes. Suddenly there's these negative numbers that can come up if you subtract a larger absolute value number from a smaller. This opens the positive integers onto the larger set of all integers.
Now integers, positive or negative, look pretty similar, the only difference is that negative sign. But what if we now consider the operation of division. Now we can get all these fractional values, decimals, the "rational numbers". And it's like we've cracked open a whole new universe just between zero and one (and similar infinities between each and every other integer).
And we also know, even with all that, there are still other numbers in the mix that we don't even get at: The transcendental numbers (e, π, √2).
So, materialism, defined on its own terms perhaps cannot be transcended; is self-referentially "complete" and cannot be refuted using its own self-defined operations. It requires a new operation.
Bridges cannot be build from inside, there's nothing to build them with. They must be built from the other side inward.
Bravo, sweet man, that's a marvelous analogy.
I feel your sadness, I'm here sweet man, what you're feeling is projection, I haven't gone anywhere, trust me darling, keep working, I'll be here when you get back. I love you. xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo
Comments
Post a Comment