I Believe God Exists

[stromboli]

When your computer prints a "1" as an output, or display a "1" on your screen, it does that through the workings of switches. If you open your computer, you're not going to see "1" anywhere. It is stored in the configuration of a bunch of open and closed switches. Similarly, when you think of "1", that is stored in the configuration made up of neurons and synapsis of your brain. With MRI, we can locate exactly where "1" is stored in your brain. We can probe that area so that it will automatically popped into your mind, we can even erase that "1" so that even if you try to recall it, you won't be able to. Sorry to rain on your parade, but information IS matter/energy. Nice try.

Yeah, but Casparov can see dead people, so- you lose! 

[Solitary]

I see dead people when I dream, or when I used to do drugs, you mean they weren't real? One time I even saw a horse fly, and a peanut stand. One time I got hit on the head I even saw stars, and it was day time.  Solitary

[stromboli]

Hey, we have to stop with these nonsense posts or Casparov will think we don't take him seriously. Oh wait- we don't.

[Solitary]

I wanted to insult him, but I knew he wouldn't know I did.  Solitary

[the_antithesis]

Nice try.

I disagree. It's not a nice try at all. It's the same tired crap we always get.

I'm reminded of that other guy who used to be on the forum (whose name I forget) who was a substance dualist who just kept spouting the same fucking bullshit and refuse to be smart about anything. Fuck these guys.

[Mister Agenda]

My contention is that information is constitutive of reality rather than objective material objects. I am a Monistic Idealist because I understand that information and consciousness are two sides of the same immaterial coin.

Because I am skeptical of Materialism does not then mean that I believe the reality we are currently perceiving will not continue to operate in the way we have observed in the past. I operate within this reality just as you do, I simply disagree on what constitutes this reality.

I think I get that, but do you realize that evidence we're in a simulation at most indicates that we're programs running on a vast computer? It is not at all the same thing as evidence that all of reality is a mental construct: such evidence is impossible in the context of immaterialism. If everything is mental, everything is an illusion, including evidence that reality is illusory.

Thank you for your many responses, this thread was originally just an introduction, I did not intend it to turn into a debate against the entire forum. I am very interested in the debate, however I would prefer a more structured environment.

You're very welcome. I know I can come off as snippy at times when I'm frustrated, but I don't mean it personally, I react to posts and you're always as good as your last post with me. Your intro HAS gotten out of hand and it was probably smart to open a new thread concerning a debate. Maybe this thread can die naturally now. I know it can be daunting handlling multiple posts countering yours, but I think you've done a good job of it: do you really have that much more to say on the subject?

Mister Agenda, are you willing to engage in a Formal Debate with me in the Debates Section of this forum? If not, I extend this invitation to any and all who read this and are game. I am even open to having multiple debates after the first is complete.

I think you've already heard my major objections to your position, I doubt that I have much new to contribute beyond more arguing. There's only so far I can go with physics, and that physics supports you seems to be one of your major points. I would certainly like to see you debate someone who can expound more on the papers you've cited.

Would you consider breaking down your arguments into two or more debates that focus on specific contentions? Although my intuition is that idealism versus physicalism can't be decided by debate, which one makes more sense is highly subjective. I think people are physicalists, dualists, or idealists primarily for psychological reasons.

[aitm]

26 pages...I am so excited I almost wet myself. JoPa said 30 pages, he must be a god...Something tells me it will stop right at 30 so Joe can't be wrong eh?

[stromboli]

Well, I'm no philosopher. before i came here i thought dualists were two people that shot at each other.

[stromboli]

26 pages...I am so excited I almost wet myself. JoPa said 30 pages, he must be a god...Something tells me it will stop right at 30 so Joe can't be wrong eh?

We'll see. You're the dude with the ban hammer, but at this point it appears Casparov is beyond reach intellectually, so it will probably just trickle and die from boredom.

[Mister Agenda]

What you are doing is called an Appeal To Authority, which is a logical fallacy:

A is an expert on a particular topic
A says says something about that topic
A is probably correct

If you want to debate the evidence that's one thing, but if you want to just Appeal to Authority instead then you're debating the wrong person. Go find a Fundy Xtian to debate so you can feel smart. Go make fun of Creationists or whatever it is you do, just take that trash elsewhere.

The fallacy is really misnamed, it should be called 'appeal to INAPPROPRIATE authority', but I suppose that is too long for most people. It is not a fallacy to cite an expert in the field under discussion, provided it's a field someone CAN be an expert on (there's no one correct politics for every situation that one can arrive at by scientific means, for example: which political ideals resonate with you depend on your particular experiences and values).

This:

A is an expert on a particular topic
A says says something about that topic
A is probably correct

Is actually true, and trivially easy to demonstrate as such. It's a fallacy when you refer to Einstein on theological matters, but not when you cite him concerning Special Relativity, he knows a bit more about that topic than the average bear.

[aitm]

We'll see. You're the dude with the ban hammer, but at this point it appears Casparov is beyond reach intellectually, so it will probably just trickle and die from boredom.

judging from the response, it will not trickle and die.

[stromboli]

judging from the response, it will not trickle and die.

Yeah, you are right, Big Dog. I'm having too much fun posting on here. 

[Mister Agenda]

Upon further investigation we find that matter is 99.999999% empty space. Upon even further investigation we find that the 0.00000001% of matter that is not empty space isn't material either, it is an Ivan Value in a Wave Equation. An Ivan Value in a Wave Equation is a figment of our imagination, not a material object.

If you think this contradicts materialism, your understanding of it is naive. Not to mention the problem of evaluating evidence you think supports your point when you maintain that reality is only a shared illusion.

If you think you are your body you are wrong. You perceive your body, therefore you are not your body, you are that which perceives your body.

You perceive you are conscious, therefore you are not your consciousness. You plan to stick with that?

You cannot look outside of your self and claim that what you perceive is you, because you are always going to be that which is doing the perceiving, not the thing being perceived.

Wave goodbye to your proof of self, then. Awareness of self is pretty much what consciousness IS. If that which does the perceiving can't perceive itself, self can't be perceived, period. Do you have more to back up this contention than intuition?

You are awareness itself. (which is immaterial)

That awareness is immaterial is an assertion.

Reality is fundamentally information which we interpret as perceptions and sensations. (information is immaterial)

That reality is fundamentally information AND that information is immaterial are BOTH assertions.

The only thing that is real is the resulting culmination of information and awareness, ergo: Experience. (experience also is an immaterial concept)

When you do your debate, are you just going to keep piling assertions on top of each other?

There is no need and no basis for material objects in this picture of reality, therefore Monistic Idealism entails.

If monistic idealism is true, monistic idealism is true. Brilliant.

[Mister Agenda]

So we agree that reality is fundamentally information.

I really hate when you're dishonest like this. The rest of us can get through a conversation without claiming the other person has admitted we're right about something. If they really have, let THEM declare it.

But we disagree that information is immaterial. Okay cool. The hard part is done. The rest is easy:

2+2=4

You have received information from the set of symbols I have provided above. This is an example of information. Now we must ask a few questions about this information:

Is the information conveyed by the symbols, equal to the symbols? No. The exact same information can be conveyed using various different symbols. I could point to two apples, add two apples, and point to the four apples and convey the same information. Instead of "2+2=4" I could write 'two plus two equals four" and convey the exact same information using entirely different symbols. Therefore, the information is not equal to the symbols.

Now, do a message without any medium, which you contend is the state of affairs that actually holds true.

You are receiving the information provided by me via light being projected from your computer screen in a certain pattern. Is the information equal to the pixels in your monitor? Is the information equal to the photons hitting your cornea? Is the information equal to the electrical signals passing over neural passageways in your visual cortex? Is the information equal to the matter in your brain which is representing it?

Is the information imprinted on a medium I perceive with my senses and process with my brain? Yes.

if I write 2+2=4 in the sand, is the information equal to the grains of sand? If you see 2+2=4 written in a book, is the information the piece of paper and the blots of ink? No. grains of sand, ink on paper, light from a computer monitor, all of these things are just more symbols. Symbols which are meaningless to someone who cannot interpret their meaning. The information is not equal to the symbols used to convey it.

Yes, symbols are abstract. Do you think that materialism can't account for abstraction? If so, what do you base that on, other than the etymology of the word 'materialism'?

It seems you have confused the "medium" with the "message". The medium is "e=mc²" but the "message" is the information that is conveyed. The information is immaterial because it has no mass, no weight, no volume, etc. It is not measurable, nor quantifiable.

It seems you're claiming that the message doesn't need a medium, which is what would make it actually immaterial. Perhaps you should have conveyed your message telepathically rather than through electrons. It would be much more convincing that way.

If I have a material object and I give it to you, I no longer have that material object. If I have a piece of information (such as 2+2=4) and I give it to you, I have not lost that piece of information. We both have it. Information is not quantifiable.

If information were nonquantifiable, we could not measure it. We can. Q.E.D. Information can be reproduced by sufficiently advanced processing systems, duplicating information in your brain into my brain via a medium and series of mutually understood symbols is not unquantifiable. It is just abstract.

Information has none of the properties of a material object, and all of the properties of being immaterial. Therefore, information is immaterial.

A short quote from Wikipedia, since you appear not to have consulted even that: "In philosophy, the theory of materialism holds that all things are composed of material, and that all emergent phenomena (including consciousness) are the result of material properties and interactions. In other words, the theory claims that our reality consists entirely of physical matter that is the sole cause of every possible occurrence, including human thought, feeling, and action."

In materialism, all THINGS are composed of material (matter, energy, and space/time) and all emergent phenomena have a material cause. Nowhere does materialism imply that information, conscousness, etc. don't exist, only that they don't exist independent of material causes. Show information without a material cause and you win. 

Information is not fundamentally energy, energy is fundamentally information.

Assertion.

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.

Four assertions. I would be wary of any conclusion that requires so many assertions (assumptions) be true to entail it.

[Hakurei Reimu]

This is not a proven fact in the same way that, to you, it is not a proven fact that I exist. You can observe that when brains stop functioning, the person who's brain it was ceases to be able to tell you that they are aware, but this is not proof that they are not aware.

It was never a proven fact that they were aware in the first place. Even when their brain is working, the only way you can know that they are truly aware is if they tell you they are, but they cannot prove it to you, you have to just believe what they say is true without definite proof. It is possible that they are what is called a "philosophical zombie" in philosophy of mind. They could be a body and fully functioning brain with absolutely no conscious awareness. This "zombie" would still be able to tell you it was aware, and would be entirely indistinguishable from someone who truly was aware, but there is no way you can definitively PROVE one way or the other. It should be obvious then that if it cannot be proven to you that a functioning brain is in fact "aware", then it also cannot be proven that a person ceases to be aware when the brain stops functioning.

Or, indeed, that there was ever this thing you call "consciousness" to begin with.

The P-zombie argument shoots itself in the foot because people who advance it cannot prove they are not P-zombies themselves, or that anyone around them are not P-zombies. To us materialists, p-zombie/person is a distinction without a difference. To us, the behavior that you observe, that the people you see in your day to day life behave as if they were conscious down to the last detail is what consciousness is. I know that someone else is conscious because they behave as if they were conscious; I know that I am conscious because I myself behave as if I were conscious.

Evidence is increasingly mounting that that form of consciousness â€" the one that is provable and observable â€" is the result of specific processes within the brain. Your kind of consciousness â€" the kind that makes a p-zombie into a person â€" is unnecessary to explain what we see, so William goes Ochkam on it.

It seems you have confused the "medium" with the "message". The medium is "e=mc²" but the "message" is the information that is conveyed. The information is immaterial because it has no mass, no weight, no volume, etc. It is not measurable, nor quantifiable.

Ah, but we do have a measurement for information: the bit! So information is quantifiable, your argument notwithstanding. The bit even has a heat equivalent to the tune of kT ln 2 joules per bit â€" one bit of information will allow you to do kT ln 2 joules of work. As such, a bit does have energy associated with it, and hence mass and weight.

If I have a material object and I give it to you, I no longer have that material object. If I have a piece of information (such as 2+2=4) and I give it to you, I have not lost that piece of information. We both have it. Information is not quantifiable.

When people say "I gave him the file", they actually mean, "I transmitted an encoded copy of the file to them through some physical medium." The process of "giving" of information is incomparable to the process of giving of a physical thing, and as such you have once again confused a processes for an object. If I gave a copy of my CD to my friend, I would still have my CD myself.