I Believe God Exists

[Mister Agenda]

I wouldn't call that Materialism, I'd call that science. And it works just as well whether we work in an Objective Material Universe or we live in a simulated Universe or anything else.

Why should we care what YOU'D call materialism? You don't seem to have any idea of what it actually is and seem to base your understanding of it solely on its etymology.

[Mister Agenda]

I am not saying that if you can't prove your world view then mine is automatically right. I am just saying.... that you can't prove your world view. 

What's hijiri's world view? Are you wiling to put money on your ability to describe it accurately?

[Mister Agenda]

If it is not an unsupported assumption, then that means there is surely proof or evidence to support it. If it is an unsupported assumption, then that means that there is not any proof or evidence to support it.

So if you do not agree that there is no proof or evidence for Materialism, then simply provide the proof or evidence that supports it. Very easy and simple.

Done and done. Only problem is, you don't accept perceivable reality as evidence...except when you think it supports your position. That's a level of denial that can only be penetrated from within.

[Hakurei Reimu]

To begin with, in order to claim that the brain produces mind, you will need to first demonstrate that the brain can exist as an objective external material object independent of mind. We are back to proving Materialism.

How do you know brains exist? They have to appear as images and sensations in your mind just like everything else. Even if you remove your own brain and place in front of you so you can perceive it, it is still just qualia, just a perception in your mind. Until you can prove that materialism is true, you cannot prove that my mind is the result of something that appears in my mind. (a brain)

But now just for kicks and giggles, for a moment I will grant your assumption of materialism and see what happens. The claim is that "because when you alter the brain, the abilities of the consciousness are altered, this proves that consciousness is a product of the brain."

Consciousness is not a thing. It is a process, something that the brain does. That's why you mistakenly think that it is an immaterial object, because you mistakenly think it is an object proper instead of a process that is merely given the semantics of an object proper. Consciousness isn't material because it's not a thing at all, not because it is an immaterial thing.

So I will give you an analogy:

You really like your analogies, don't ya? It's because you can't argue on the subject on its own terms, so you have to resort to reasoning by analogy.

The material object that is the brain, will be represented by a material object DVD. The immaterial consciousness, will be represented by the immaterial meaning and message conveyed by the movie that plays on the DVD.

Now then, if we scratch the DVD, we see that the meaning and message are no longer conveyed properly. THIS THEN PROVES THAT THE MEANING AND THE MESSAGE OF THE MOVIE IS A PRODUCT OF THE DVD. Right? Just like altering a brain alters the consciousness?

No. The immaterial meaning and message of the movie remain undamaged, but the ability to be conveyed through this material object that has been damaged, has also been damaged. Load the same movie onto a different DVD and behold the meaning and message are there. This is because the meaning and message of the movie are immaterial, they are INFORMATION which cannot be destroyed just because you destroy the material object that is conveying the information.

So you argue that, because another material copy of the message exists eleswhere, that the message itself is immaterial?

Bullshit. First off, the information encoded on the DVD is not a process, like consciousness is. The information on the DVD is a static pattern of pips in its data layer. Consciousness is dynamic, changing from moment to moment as thoughts run through it. (This is the true meaning of "I think, therefore I am," by the way. It's the recognition that something is happening to you, which makes no sense if you do not exist.) Already your analogy is defective.

Secondly, the only reason you know that the true meaning and message of the DVD is X is because there exists an intact copy of it for you to compare against it. If that scratched, unplayable DVD is the only copy that exists, then the information on that disk is lost to you, forever.

Now lets not forget the fact that before you can claim that "external material objects and their interactions" can produce mind, you must first be able to prove that they exist independent of mind.

Dead brains.

[stromboli]

You keep separating mind from brain. "Mind" is nothing but a name for a collection of neurological activities. If you shoot somebody in the head and kill them, their brain is dead- their mind does not exist separately and will die with the brain.

apparently you are not aware that there have been numerous experiments done to chart the activity of the brain in its function. The "mind" function, whether it be expressed as happiness, hatred, or any emotion  imaginable, or any thought process imaginable, shows physiological activity that can be charted- neurons discharging, receptors gathering and so on. The advent of antidepressants and other chemicals stem from the discovery of neurotransmitters like Serotonin and hormones like Endorphin that cause changes in brain function, measurable changes in mood, cognition and so forth.

Regardless of new discoveries that may change our view of the universe, there is no evidence of a spiritual, non physical universe that has yet replaced what we can know and test for in our sadly material one.

You have not provided it, and you can't, because your world view is not based on evidence but on philosophical ideas. Personally, I'll take a reality I can measure in real terms.

[Mister Agenda]

Now, because I am being very cautious and trying to maintain rational skepticism in order to build a sound world view, I am interested in entertaining Materialism as a solution to Solipsism, but first would like to hear the case.

I'm not sure you really understand what the qualifier 'rational' means when applied to 'skepticism'.

When another presents Materialism as a solution to me, they are making a positive claim about reality which is subject to the burden of proof. This assertion then requires evidence, or else it is just a bare assertion with nothing to support it.

'Reality is real' is an axiom which comports with our experience and makes all other human endeavor possible. But that won't satisfy someone determined to find a way conclude 'therefore, God'. That's pretty much the only person unsatisfied by that axiom, and even then, only a special subset of those.

I know that my own mind exists. But I quickly learn that there is no proof for Materialism. It is a bald assumption, unsupported and unjustified. This is because we do not observe the exterior world directly. We do not perceive matter itself. What we perceive is a representation of the outside world produced by filtered information and  interpreted by our own conscious experience.

Good. Now explain how this is no evidence at all when it's the only evidence of anything that we actually have.

In Philosophy this is known as the Veil of Perception Problem. Naive Realism is the belief that what we perceive is exactly as it really it, and this seems to be the position of the Materialists I encounter.

It's the position of NONE of the people participating in this thread, and you seem to think most of us are materialists.

There is no evidence to support this position, and certainly no proof.

You can't even describe what evidence would convince you, while I've repeatedly given examples of what would convince me, such as demonstrating information without physical substrate. Proof is for math and whiskey.

Materialism is presented to me as a possible solution to Solipsism but it is an unjustified assumption because of the Veil of Perception Problem, the equal possibility of other explanations such as the Simulation Argument, and the complete and utter lack of evidence to support it. I also know that Materialism states that the only things that exist are material objects and their interactions, which seems to negate the existence of my Mind, the only thing I really know with certainty actually exists.

There is no evidence to support the thing I've concluded is false. There is no evidence to support the thing I've concluded is false. If I repeat this enough, that's all that's necessary to convince the people who don't agree with me.

In order to accept Materialism I would have to sacrifice the only thing I know with absolute certainty in favor of an unprovable unjustified assumption.

Only if your understanding of materialism is so profoundly misinformed that you think it asserts that consciousness does not exist, rather than that it does exist as an emergent property of physics. And the only people who seem to be trying to get you to accept materialism are in your own head.

Those that do this seem to do so out of fear more than anything else because Materialism provides a simple and comfortable explanation that eases the uncomfortable feelings of uncertainty.

Those? You've found more than one materialist here? Name two.

The universe and everything it get wrapped up with a pretty little Material bow.

That a claim about everything account for everything is the very least one should expect from a claim about everything.

But the Game Ender for me when it comes to Materialism is the growing amount of scientific evidence that seems to directly refute Materialism, therefore, after all is said and done, I am forced to remain skeptical.

Since you don't understand what materialism is, you are incapable of understanding what would count as evidence for or against it. Since you reject the proposition that reality is real, you have no basis with which to evaluate scientific evidence, or any evidence at all.

1) Mind exists.
2) Mind is immaterial.

What is the evidence for this, bearing in mind that 'it seems immaterial to me' is something we're far beyond, evidence-wise, and evidence can only be perceived by the senses, the reality of which you reject.

3) Materialism states that only matter exists, anything immaterial does not.

As long as you don't use a laughably naive defintion of 'matter'.

4) Materialism is an unprovable assumption.

Being unprovable does not make it an assumption. We perceive reality, however imperfectly (especially microscopically and 'megascopically'), and as in your example of perceiving your own mind, we are utterly unable to successfully act as if it isn't real. Much the same justification for accepting reality as real is used as was for accepting that I am real. I can't prove it to anyone else, but I can experience it directly and am unable to disengage from it.

5) Scientific evidence exists that directly refutes Materialism.

Did you use your senses to find that out?

C1) I know that Mind exists but Materialism requires that it does not, therefore Mind is not compatible with Materialism and I cannot doubt the existence of my Mind so Materialism must be a false assumption about the nature of reality.
C2) Two key characteristics of a Material Universe are the Principle of Causality and Local Realism and yet recent scientific experimentation has conclusively demonstrated that both of these characteristics of a Material Universe can be violated, therefore Materialism is a false assumption about the nature of reality.

Have you considered reading a book on the topic of materialism? There is literally nothing in this segment of your post that is actually correct.

Plus it is impossible to provide even a shred of evidence, proof, or justification for asserting Materialism beyond bare assumption.

You just can't repeat that too much, eh? 

So with Materialists unable to provide a convincing argument for their world view, I am still left with Solipsism but searching for a way out.

Stay there, with the materialists in your head. The location seems suited to your 'revolvolutionary' level of thinking.

So I talk to more people, and they assert that the solution to Solipsism is obviously Substance Dualism. They say that mind exists, which I agree with, and they also say that matter exists. They say that both existence simultaneously, mind existing in the Material Objective World. I like this idea because at first it seems like the best of both worlds, but I want to remain skeptical of all claims, and so, knowing that this too is a positive assertion about the nature of reality, I know that it too is subject to the burden of proof, and so I seek evidence to justify this positive claim.

That doesn't sound like a very accurate description of substance dualism, either.

What I discover is even worse than what I got for Materialism. All of the same problems of Materialism are still there, the Veil of Perception Problem, the Simulation Argument, the complete lack of any evidence, but the Game Ender for Substance Dualism is the Causal Interaction Problem. It is impossible to explain how immaterial mind can interact with material objects. Material Objects by definition cannot be effected by anything immaterial. This for me, makes Substance Dualism an impossibility, and another failed attempt to resolve Solipsism, and thus I am forced to remain skeptical.

This part seems sound.

I wont go into it here, but Substance Dualism is probably the most thoroughly refuted assertion about reality out there.

So what options do I have left? Well... There is one more, and here it goes:

P1.) Minds can exist in a solipsist universes.

P2.) Nothing material can exist in a solipsist universe.

C1.) Minds are not material.

P3.) Substance dualism is impossible.
C2.) Matter can not possibly exist, all that can exist is mind, and thus Monistic Idealism is true.

Except that there's no evidence for it--and can never be, since monistic idealism declares reality an illusion and that means all evidence is illusory too--, it's unprovable, and materialism actually can account for consciousness.

Monistic Idealism is a solution to Solipsism that does not suffer from any of the problems the other explanations do. It is even consistent with modern Quantum Experimentation that is slowly doing away with Materialism and Realism in general. Idealism states that reality is a mental construct, and does not exist dependent of mind.

Anything at all is consistent with monistic idealism since it is the position that reality is essentially imaginary, so evidence of any kind is completely irrelevant since it's all imaginary. Even a simulation is infinitely more real than the actual case if monist idealism is true.

If all is mind, and mind is immaterial, then it follows that the apparent objective material reality we experience is in fact a mental construct, as well as the apparent individuality and separateness we seem to possess because what is immaterial does not have definite boundaries by definition. Objectivity and separateness are illusions. All consciousness and all experience and all existence together as one grand thing in the Tenth Dimension, is worthy of the Title "God."

And how does being a figment of an overarching consciousness fit in with your perception that you are a conscious individual?

I then conclude that Idealism is more reasonable and more justified than both Substance Dualism and Materialism as a solution to Solipsism, and also more consistent with current scientific experimentation.

In a mental construct, there's no result that scientific experimentation can't produce. Scientists farting purple bunnies is just as valid (and likely) a finding as quantum entanglement.

1) Materialism if true would negate the existence of God, afterlife, soul, mind, and all other things immaterial.

Here we get to the meat of why you prefer a reality where scientists could just as easily fart purple bunnies as investigate quantum entanglement. You like those things, and you think materialism negates them.

2) Substance Dualism would save the intuition to cling to Realism with regards to perceptions but also allows for the existence of immaterial such as mind, soul, gods, afterlife etc into the mix.

So you turned to something even more useless and stupid.

3) Idealism rejects the intuition of Naive Realism but expands the undoubtable knowledge of the existence of mind to include our perceptions, (even those perceptions that seems extremely physical and objectively material) and as the only rational alternative to solipsism, also just so happens to allow for and even necessitate the existence of mind, god, afterlife, and all other things immaterial, because it states that all is immaterial, and all is mind.

And all is imaginary, including you. Good going!

"God" in this world view would then be analogous to Rob Bryanton's description of the tenth dimension: A mind with ultimate degrees of freedom encompassing, creating, and experiencing all possibilities all at once.

FIN

P.S. Turned into another book.... I tried.

Thanks for explaining your position and actually engaging us. It's a refreshing change of pace from all the people who never get around to presenting their reasoning. Although I think your reasoning is profoundly flawed, you're participating honestly, and that counts for a lot.

[Mr.Obvious]

To begin with, in order to claim that the brain produces mind, you will need to first demonstrate that the brain can exist as an objective external material object independent of mind. We are back to proving Materialism.

No. We are not.
You are just missing the point. You always do this.
You asked why we thought minds are a subject of matter. It is clear from any observation ever that a brain is required in order to get a 'mind'. And that the status of the brain affects the 'mind'. The mind thus is dependend on the status of the brain. Even if this is all a simulation, you still need a brain to have a functioning mind.
And yes, it can exist without. Brain-dead people, commonly known as 'plants', do exist. They are not conscious. They have no mind. They have no brain-activity. Yet their body lives. From all observations it becomes clear: you can have brain without mind, but not mind without brain.
You can say, if materialism isn't true than there is perhaps a 'Mind' at work without a brain. If that were the case, than it could exist without. If it exists, it exists. But it would go contrary to all previous observations. And without any proof, your claim for this is dismissible without effort.

How do you know brains exist? They have to appear as images and sensations in your mind just like everything else. Even if you remove your own brain and place in front of you so you can perceive it, it is still just qualia, just a perception in your mind. Until you can prove that materialism is true, you cannot prove that my mind is the result of something that appears in my mind. (a brain)

Again; within your standards for proof, it can't be proven to exist. But, AGAIN, within your standards of proof nothing can. Not even your claims. Say you could make predictions and measurements to measure this 'immaterial reality' of yours. By your standards it would not suffice. Because you dismiss the 'limited proof' within the framework of 'methodological materialism'. One could always dismiss any 'limited proof' within your 'methodological immaterialism'. Even if we were to have such 'limited proof', workable theories within the framework of the 'immaterial', one could still ask; but isn't there a yet undiscovered material law of nature that explains everything or perhaps something else entirely that is not disproven (though also not proven) to exist? Let's entertain the hypothesis that you could have working models in an immaterialist view that explained how the relationship between brain and mind as you put it is proven. I could then still, with as much reason and validity as you do now, claim that there is a material explanation that is not yet fully understood but that is greater than our immaterial hive-mind and that makes it look like we are just a hive-mind creating a world that looks material to us. You can always put it one step further because 'limited proof' can not ultimately prove a framework by your standards.
The only problem is, no such 'limited proof' within the framework of 'immaterialism' exists. The immaterial perspective provides no chance to build theories, make predictions or measurements. So there is no reason the accept it as true. So we have no reason to take it the step further.

If you make the claim that an immaterial reality exists, the burden of proof is on you. I do not claim it doesn't exist. I don't claim it cannot exist. If it did, perhaps it could even be measured. But untill then, the material (even if it were a simulation,  which is a claim that has no empirical evidence backing it up) is all we've observed so far.

But now just for kicks and giggles, for a moment I will grant your assumption of materialism and see what happens. The claim is that "because when you alter the brain, the abilities of the consciousness are altered, this proves that consciousness is a product of the brain."

Pretty much the idea, yeah.

So I will give you an analogy: The material object that is the brain, will be represented by a material object DVD. The immaterial consciousness, will be represented by the immaterial meaning and message conveyed by the movie that plays on the DVD.

Now then, if we scratch the DVD, we see that the meaning and message are no longer conveyed properly. THIS THEN PROVES THAT THE MEANING AND THE MESSAGE OF THE MOVIE IS A PRODUCT OF THE DVD. Right? Just like altering a brain alters the consciousness?

Pretty much the idea, yeah.
Except that a DVD is imprinted with the information from an outside source. While the brain has it's mind be an emergent property from it's (bio)material parts.

No. The immaterial meaning and message of the movie remain undamaged, but the ability to be conveyed through this material object that has been damaged, has also been damaged. Load the same movie onto a different DVD and behold the meaning and message are there. This is because the meaning and message of the movie are immaterial, they are INFORMATION which cannot be destroyed just because you destroy the material object that is conveying the information.

No, you are wrong. Just like a damaged brain, the DVD ceizes to be able to process the information on it. But also the information on it, is lost. The information stored in it, is useless, it can not be produced. It's gone. If you have a piece of information on a disk, whitch gets shattered you can not load the information from that disk onto another disk. You would need an earlier file on your computer and store it on another disk. And it is this 'immaterial mastercomputer' with all the files to go onto the discs that you would have to prove.

If you have a program that runs on a computer, if you cut the computer in half the program will not longer run properly, but this is not proof that the computer and the program are the same thing!!! (unless of course you are a materialist  )

Again, the computer does not have the program be an emergent property from it. So though it can be a usefull analogy, you need to keep this in mind when you say program and computer aren't the same thing. True they aren't the same, but the brain isn't a computer, nor is the mind a program. A program, even coded and in a package and not on a computer is still a tangeable, material and measurable thing. The mind, however, can not be observed outside of the brain. At least it has never been. The most likely reason for this is that it's an emergent property of that brain, shown by how it's altered if the brain is damaged and how it can't exist without it, unlike the program.

And if you want to claim there is a mind without a brain that creates brains so that it can run it's sub-minds on them as programs that seem, in every way measurable and observable, to be emergent properties of said brains, you have made an outrageously complex claim. You've  added complexity to a working model without any evidence for said complexity. You have, as I've said before, put a God on top of a working model. And there is no need for that.

Now lets not forget the fact that before you can claim that "external material objects and their interactions" can produce mind, you must first be able to prove that they exist independent of mind. Materialism must first be proven to be true. And that cannot be done.

Again, brain-dead people exist. It's possible to have your brain technically stay 'alive' without any neurological activity that indicates consciousness or 'Mind'. As for the materialism part, I've made myself clear on that.

Brains always appear in a mind. No brain has ever been discovered existing outside of a mind.

Minds can appear in brains, as emergent properties. No mind has ever been discovered existing outside of a brain. You got that mixed up there, I fixed it for you.

Your own mind cannot be doubted and you know exists with absolute certainty.

Not with absolute certainty, but that's semantics and philosophical bullshit. But even if it were, and I don't mind it being so for the sake of argument, that does not mean the other observations aren't true. It doesn't logically lead you to the conclusion that minds exist without brains. It doesn't validate the existance of an immaterial reality. It doesn't logically lead to a 'hive-mind-god' reality within said immaterial universe. Your non-sequiturs are just that, non-sequiturs

[Mister Agenda]

@sasuke

lol You're right, I should have said, "No need to hear the case for Materialism, I choose to accept it on blind faith grounded in a firm belief in Naive Realism. Case closed!" and just ended it right there huh?

No you should have learned what the case for materialism actually IS, if for no other reason than being able to attempt to refute it without sounding like you have a grade-schooler's understanding of it.

[Mister Agenda]

I shall consider the alternative:

Mind is material. It therefore exists independent of mind. It has a weight and a mass that is measurable.

I suppose that's AN alternative, though an unintelligible one. Have you ever considered asking other people what other alternatives could be instead of making up your own? You're so terrible at it that's it's no wonder you're a monist idealist.

[Mister Agenda]

Demonstrably false means it has been demonstrated. Demonstrate away. Or point to the demonstration.

I honestly was not aware that you guys thought minds were material objects. This is interesting to me, but consistent with Materialism, so at least you are staying consistent.

You shouldn't even consider yourself qualified to say anything about materialism if you haven't investigated how materialism addresses minds, and it shouldn't even have occurred to you that materialism doesn't have a take on that.

[Mister Agenda]

Materialism being false does not mean that suddenly the laws of physics no longer apply. "Either materialism or true, or we can fly." Is a False Dichotomy.

Correct. Monist idealism means that there is no more reason to expect that we can't fly than that we can't walk, because the rules underlying reality are held within a mind that can change any of them at will, and we can't know what that mind is going to do next, or that we weren't imagined five seconds ago complete with imagined history. Anything goes, including the status quo, but considering the infinite range of other possibilites, the odds are it won't stay the same much longer, wouldn't you think?

[Mister Agenda]

It cannot be weighed or measured or even detected in any way. It has all of the qualities of being immaterial and none of the qualities of being a material object.

Wouldn't one of the qualities of being immaterial be 'being independent of a physical substrate'?

If you are claiming that "energy" is immaterial and coexists with "matter", then you are a dualist not a Materialist.

No one is claiming energy is immaterial. It's part of 'matter' as 'matter' is defined in the position of materialism. As you should already know if you're going to make so many statements about materialism.

If you are saying that "energy" is not material, then you are not a Materialist, because you are admitting the existence of something immaterial. So what does it matter if e= mc^2 if there are just two different states of Material? This changes nothing.

It certainly challenges your notion that your interlocutor thinks energy is immaterial. And did your interlocutor state that they are a materialist?

I do not doubt that we have perceptions.

But you claim outright that our perceptions don't pertain to anything that is actually real.

I doubt that we perceive the world directly and can conclusively prove that we are perceiving an objective material reality.

It's a fact that we don't perceive the world directly, but facts aren't real in monist idealism.

I doubt this based on The Veil of Perception Problem, the fact that what we perceive is only a representation of an external reality. Our perceptions are produced by interpreting information which could easily be produced by Nick Bostrom's Simulated Universe.

And you resolve that pesky Veil of Perception problem by getting rid of that pesky reality. Under your scheme there IS no external reality, only mind. Not even a computer to be simulated on. 

I have no reason to assume Materialism is true.

Besides your inability to behave as though it isn't.

You have provided no valid reason beyond "Naive Realism" which I reject based on current scientific experimentation.

The naive realists on this thread are actually only in your head, monist idealism or no.

I have absolutely no reason to accept your world view.

Reality being real would be SO inconvenient to your afterlife!

The only logical conclusion I can come to that is consistent with what I can justify as existing philosophically and that is consistent with current scientific experimentation is that Materialism is False, Substance Dualism is False, and Idealism entails.

Are you incapable of grasping the contradiction between your world view and appealing to scientific experimentation? The results of experiments are whatever the MIND wants them to be and could as easily be ANYTHING else. A simulation is still ultimately bound by the laws of physics, it can have flaws as you've described, but in a world of pure imagination, clues only lead where the dreamer wants its dreams to go. Flaws in a monist idealist 'reality' are deliberate, and cannot be trusted at all. Simulations are material, they run on brains and computers. In monist idealism there can't be any real clues that you're in a simulation: those clues are considered significant because they reveal limits to what can be simulated; and monist idealism has no such limits.

[Mister Agenda]

When a character jumps off a cliff in Skyrim, it dies. Is this proof that skyrim is an objective material universe?

Skyrim IS a material universe. It is made of material.

[Mister Agenda]

THANK YOU BABY JESUS!!! ding ding ding ding ding!! :new_birthday:

You are the first to finally admit that it is an assumption! Thank you very much for your intellectual honesty, it is truly commendable considering the circumstances!

It's YOUR intellectual honesty that's in doubt. Note the 'if' in the sentence you're declaring an admission. How desparate are you for someone here to validate you?

[Mister Agenda]

You are absolutely right. Just because you perceive a character that says he exists, that does not prove to you that you he exists. But because you are perceiving, you know that you exist. The fact that you are aware of anything at all, is proof that you exist.

Incorrect. You are aware, therefore you exist. The fact that you are having experiences, whether the experiences are illusions or not, is proof that you exist. You cannot doubt your own existence. As soon as you say "I doubt that I exist." the fact that you have that capability itself is proof that you exist.

Yet, under monist idealism. you are fictional. We all are. There is only one mind, really.