I Believe God Exists

[Berati]

"All of reality and everything that you have ever perceived and experienced and interpreted as energy/matter is fundamentally information. Information is immaterial, awareness is immaterial, experience is immaterial, therefore Idealism entails."

This is wrong. Information does not have it's own independent existence. It is always... ALWAYS dependant upon the material. No material = No information
Show us a way to hold or transmit information without any material. I dare you.

[josephpalazzo]

Dead people talk to him. You lose.

[Contemporary Protestant]

has this post finally fizzled out?

[stromboli]

has this post finally fizzled out?

No, Caspasrov is merely sharpening his considerable array of weapons to once again leap into the fray. Or not.

[Shol'va]

After having read this thread in its entirety twice, what I can safely conclude, amongst other things, is that Casparov has a serious aversion to axioms. Our existence in a material universe can be said to be axiomatic. That is to say, it is self-evident.
Every time I saw him to say materialism is an unsupported assertion, at first it was a little aggravating. Now, it is humorous.

[Casparov]

"All of reality and everything that you have ever perceived and experienced and interpreted as energy/matter is fundamentally information. Information is immaterial, awareness is immaterial, experience is immaterial, therefore Idealism entails."

This is wrong. Information does not have it's own independent existence. It is always... ALWAYS dependant upon the material. No material = No information
Show us a way to hold or transmit information without any material. I dare you.

What you have labeled "material" is fundamentally nothing more than information interpreted into a representation that appears within your awareness. The only way you know "material" exists, and the only reason why you have ever experienced anything "material" is because of information that you have interpreted as such.

Information and patterns of information, are what produce the reality you experience. Show me how you know a material object exists without first receiving and interpreting information.

[Sargon The Grape]

Show me how you know a material object exists without first receiving and interpreting information.

Demonstrate that it is possible for information to exist without something to produce it. Be sure and demonstrate it without using anything that is inherently material in nature, seeing as that is the entire point of your argument.

And before you say anything about "I think, therefore I am," the whole point of that statement is to say that because the information that I call "me" exists, there must be something producing it. It is absolute silliness to think it means anything else. You want to talk about appeals to authority, maybe we could start with you not making any further irrelevant appeals.

[stromboli]

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/2011/03/07/why-information-cant-be-the-basis-of-reality/

So what’s the problem with saying that everything comes down to information, bits, answers to our queries? First of all, as the physicist Rolf Landauer liked to say, all information is physicalâ€"that is, all information is embodied in physical things or processesâ€"but that doesn’t mean that all things physical are reducible to information. The concept of information makes no sense in the absence of something to be informedâ€"that is, a conscious observer capable of choice, or free will (sorry, I can’t help it, free will is an obsession). If all the humans in the world vanished tomorrow, all the information would vanish, too. Lacking minds to surprise and change, books and televisions and computers would be as dumb as stumps and stones. This fact may seem crushingly obvious, but it seems to be overlooked by many information enthusiasts.

The idea that mind is as fundamental as matterâ€"which Wheeler’s "participatory universe" notion impliesâ€"also flies in the face of everyday experience. Matter can clearly exist without mind, but where do we see mind existing without matter? Shoot a man through the heart, and his mind vanishes while his matter persists. As far as we know, informationâ€"embodied in things like poetry, hiphop music and cell-phone images from Libyaâ€"only exists here on Earth and nowhere else in the universe. Did the big bang bang if there was no one there to hear it? Well, here we are, so I guess it did (and saying that God was listening is cheating).

It isn't that hard.

[Casparov]

Demonstrate that it is possible for information to exist without something to produce it.

I thought we were arguing that information is immaterial?  I must have missed when we started arguing that information exists without something to produce it... but whatever. Mathematical information such as Platonic Objects like "the cube" are not "invented" or "produced" by anything other than our minds, but of course, nothing can exist in the absence of consciousness so that shouldn't be a surprise.

[Casparov]

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/2011/03/07/why-information-cant-be-the-basis-of-reality/
The concept of information makes no sense in the absence of something to be informedâ€"that is, a conscious observer capable of choice, or free will (sorry, I can’t help it, free will is an obsession). If all the humans in the world vanished tomorrow, all the information would vanish, too. Lacking minds to surprise and change, books and televisions and computers would be as dumb as stumps and stones. This fact may seem crushingly obvious, but it seems to be overlooked by many information enthusiasts.

I agree that the concept of information makes no sense in the absence of something to be informed, which is why consciousness is fundamental, rather than information. I agree with every single point made above, it is not something overlooked but necessary to my conception of reality. Consciousness and information go hand in hand. We are consciousness and reality is information, together they produce experience. Information cannot exist in the absence of consciousness. I'm glad we agree on something so trivial.

Now to my greater point, all of reality and existence is easily explained immaterially. Materialism is an unjustified assumption clung to with the same conviction as a fundamentalist christian clings to his bible. If you let go of materialism, your entire world view crumbles, therefore you cling to it even in the face of concrete evidence that directly disproves it and even with full knowledge that it is nothing more than a glorified belief.

You can provide no argument to justify Materialism, you can merely assert that it is "self evident". To ask for evidence or proof is blasphemy. Clinging to it creates more problems than it solves. In truth, the only real problem it solves is your necessity to preserve your preconceived view of the world.

[stromboli]

The idea that mind is as fundamental as matterâ€"which Wheeler’s "participatory universe" notion impliesâ€"also flies in the face of everyday experience. Matter can clearly exist without mind, but where do we see mind existing without matter? Shoot a man through the heart, and his mind vanishes while his matter persists. As far as we know, informationâ€"embodied in things like poetry, hiphop music and cell-phone images from Libyaâ€"only exists here on Earth and nowhere else in the universe. Did the big bang bang if there was no one there to hear it? Well, here we are, so I guess it did (and saying that God was listening is cheating).

Now read the rest of it.

[Sargon The Grape]

I thought we were arguing that information is immaterial?  I must have missed when we started arguing that information exists without something to produce it... but whatever. Mathematical information such as Platonic Objects like "the cube" are not "invented" or "produced" by anything other than our minds, but of course, nothing can exist in the absence of consciousness so that shouldn't be a surprise.

You have not proven that consciousness is required for existence. It is, however, long since confirmed that consciousness arises from material. You can watch it happen in the womb.

[stromboli]

Quote:
"Now to my greater point, all of reality and existence is easily explained immaterially. Materialism is an unjustified assumption clung to with the same conviction as a fundamentalist christian clings to his bible. If you let go of materialism, your entire world view crumbles, therefore you cling to it even in the face of concrete evidence that directly disproves it and even with full knowledge that it is nothing more than a glorified belief."


Evidence please, of the immaterial universe. And don't try the quantum theory route, because we've already pointed out the definition of the word theory.

You have set aside materialism as unjustified by ignoring every piece of evidence that proves it. Mind cannot exist without matter- period, end of story. Matter is material. You cannot assume the mind as separate from the brain.

[Casparov]

Matter can clearly exist without mind, but where do we see mind existing without matter?

Please explain to me how and when matter has ever been observed existence in the absence of a mind? If it is being observed, it is because there is a mind observing it. It has been conclusively shown that matter ceases to exist in the absence of observation, in it's place we have only a wave equation which describes the probabilities of it existing in certain states when it is actually observed.

"Matter can clearly exist without a mind." this is a bald assertion in direct conflict with scientific evidence. "clearly" implies that it has been observed, but to observe postulates a mind to do the observing. NO matter has ever been observed existing, unless it was observed by a conscious mind.

Shoot a man through the heart, and his mind vanishes while his matter persists. As far as we know, informationâ€"embodied in things like poetry, hiphop music and cell-phone images from Libyaâ€"only exists here on Earth and nowhere else in the universe. Did the big bang bang if there was no one there to hear it? Well, here we are, so I guess it did (and saying that God was listening is cheating).

Now read the rest of it.

The only mind you have ever "observed" as existing is your own. You have never "seen" or "observed" anyone else's mind, therefore all you know of mind is your own direct experience of it. Now ask the question: Have you ever experienced matter existing in the absence of a mind?

[stromboli]

Evidence, dude. Evidence.