Idealism

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I realised that later on in the thread, twas my bad.

I am not trying to inductivly reason my way to into an epistemology. I am a coherentist, I accept that the starting axioms cannot be proven; it is simply a flaw we have to live with, otherwise we cannot solve the infinite regress problem. So you either accept a starting premise at one point or another. Stating that I beg the question in favor of subjective experience is moot, because eliminative meterialism begs the question in favor of an objective world. Neither eliminativism nor coherentism can prove their starting axioms, they can only show that they are logically coherent (see the Münchhausen Trilemma). So far I have given you reasons for thinking that eliminativism is not coherent, I even showed you evidence of it's own major supporters (Devitt and Rey) accepting that it is incoherent, yet you still dismiss my point in the most juvenile fashion. Eliminativism does not solve the trilemma, it does not even attempt to solve it, so citing an opposing view for failing to establish through induction what your own position cannot is the very definition of special pleading.



Perhaps you need to study more on eliminative meterialism. It accepts the objectivity of the outside world but gives us no reason to accept the objectivity of it's findings. In fact it denies that there is an 'us' to begin with. It may create a view that is logically consistant to an outside observer, but it denies that there is such a thing, so the point is, that you would never know if it worked or not, there is no trust in the outcome established. Eliminative meterialism can deny until the cows come home that we have subjective experience from which to experience the universe, it can even claim that the brain is all there is. It is however moot, if it cannot establish 'who' is asking the question or if the answer can even be known. One may not need subjective experience to establish this, but eliminative meterialism gives us no reason to think that we don't, it really does not even try to establish this. As such, it even fails to establish that the result can be understand, by us, or any other process, it therefor provides us with a significant defeater for believing it's own results. Since it denies that there is any 'us' to accept them, that there is any reliable process for accepting them or that there is a replacement concept as powerful as 'subjective experience' that would provide the same outcome. The reason it fails at this is because of its main motivation. I can respect it's author's primary motivation, to establish a set of non-subjective language for approaching epistemology, but claiming that it is useful beyond this is ridiculous, since it's own authors do not really push it past that point. Eliminative meterialism is certainly no real challenge to coherentism.

Not a problem. Simply the fact of finitude.

ruveyn

I would agree that it is a fact that we have to deal with within epistemology, but I would not go so far as to call it 'not a problem': obviously I would prefer if it could be resolved.

You ought not wish for what is logically impossible.

The difficult takes time and the impossible will never happen.

ruveyn

Nonsense. Eliminative materialism is an ONTOLOGICAL theory of mind. Criticizing it because it cannot compareed to any EPISTEMOLOGICAL theory of mind is just strawman.


Fail. Eliminative materialism does NOT take the non-existence of subjective experience as starting axiom. Rather it is a consequence of what is established in science.


In other words you just assert idealism as 'axiom', and evidentally your axioms aren't that coherent.

1) Actually you assert there are TWO realities, an objective reality to be understood and a subjective reality. However you don't know what is the boundary of the two. You can separate subjective experience from memory. You don't know how the two realities interact. You find no traces of actions of your subjective experience in the objective reality.

2) Moreover, it is a scientific fact that your subjective experience is not that coherent. e.g.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_Phi_phenomenon
http://www.philosophy.uncc.edu/faculty/ ... olor2.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Change_blindness


It is you who is criticizing my position in the most juvenile fashion. What Devitt and Rey accept is that some some theory of meaning is not likely to be coherent under eliminative materialism, and mental fictionalism avoids the problem.


What do you mean by 'who' 'question' 'answer' 'known'? You are just presupposing epistemology in your idealist term.


Just your ignorance. There are many theories concerning how 'consciousness' might work without involving magic
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_architecture

The whole subjective experience is a whole different debate. See the easy problem of consciousness
http://www.imprint.co.uk/chalmers.html


Beyond what?

Firstly, Eliminative materialism is not a theory of mind. Descartes was the original cognitive reductionist who took the existence of certain mental states for granted; eliminativism is a specific and direct challenge to the assumptions made by Descartes. Eliminativism fundamentally recoils against the use of the word mind, since one of it's primary goals is to create a new vocabulary separate from the standard folk psychology definitions. The fact that you could not even describe it, without directly moving against one of it's main objectives should give you pause both to doubt your understanding of the subject and its effectiveness as a concept. Secondly, all theories of mind, aside from fictionalism (which includes eliminativism) are ontological theories. Ontology relates to the reality of a thing, epistemology relates to a theory of knowledge, these are separate concepts within philosophy and all theories of mind attempt reconcile themselves with both. Further, the only ontological distinction between eliminativism and coherentism is that eliminativism entails ontological monism (all materialist positions do). What I think you are attempting to bring up is that eliminativism is a naturalistic theory of mind but there is no good reason to think that because it is, it is therefor incomparable to coherentism.



I never said that it did, I stated that eliminativism entails an objective world not that it denies the subjective. Please read what I am saying.



Once again, I am not someone who subscribes to idealism. How many times do I have to tell you that when it comes to the mind I hold to epistemological coherentism; basically because I think it is the most we can achieve at this point.



The last sentence is a massive reach, if you want to claim that, then you have to prove that my position rules out overlap and I see no good reason to think that it does. Further in response to 1) I do not assert that there are two realities, just that there is one experience in more than one ways; other people might experience reality also, but it does not mean that they experience a different objective reality, just a different subjective experience. For myself, I tend to think that we experience an objective reality through subjective experience.



Certainly, mental states can be altered, the brain works in interesting ways but none of that disproves subjective reality: It would lend us towards the view that the objective world can effect our subjective experience but a predatory lion can do that just as well, so your discovery is hardly earthshaking.



Ahh no, Devitt and Rey accept that eliminativism is implausible when considered next to our own experience of reality see the quotes that I gave you.



Once again, I am not an idealist, when it comes to theory of mind I am a epistemological coherentist What I am using is the standard folk-psychology terms, they are generally accepted. If you accept eliminativism, then you ought to translate them into the work of that field, since it is so highly specialized and highly lacking in descriptive power, I personally chose not to use it. I see no reason to abandon the accepted terminology unless I have a good reason. I am simply using the terminology, if eliminativism is as powerful as you say it is, you ought to be able to reason through.



Ignorance? I must have missed the part where you studied epistemology, your post does not lend itself towards a conclusion that you ought to be considered an authority on the knowledge of others. I would suggest to you that on eliminativism a cognitive process, however formed, has no way of knowing if it's results are correct; we have been over proper function before and yet you still keep on ignoring it.

Eliminativism does not go much beyond an attempt to replace the folk-psychology vocabulary of terms and it does not do a particularly good job of that either. It has yet to even demonstrate that it can achieve this limited goal and it's authors accept this.

Hi 91,

Why stop at a Trilemma???

Tetralemmas sound more fun, and heck, as Feynman Physic's Frequencies dictate an illogic that even violates itself with any attempted "rationality", try for an infinite amount of whatever rules.

I would like to find the most recent version of Hylephobia that is faithful to the 125 year old version, but it fits very well with the non-materialisms so often cited here.

"""Reification" versus the cure of "hylephobia" is sorta summarized as:

A major branch of mistaken citations seem to be sourced to: http://books.google.com/books?id=xoS3AA ... ia&f=false

"...Its analogue we may call hylephobia, or morbid fear of materialism, also a very modern distemper, which afflicts, now and then, a philosopher with a horror of contact with the fresh facts of science so necessary to his survival in the world of modern thought, and impels him to try to purge every element of matter from facts he cannot escape. Hylephobia, however, is now often regarded as a sacred madness, as epilepsy used to be. It befalls only the good; and the richer and fairer the world of sense, and the more violent the phobia against it, the more surpassingly rich and fair and real must the purely subjective, rational, ideal world appear. All the wisdom of scientific psychology melted in this author's [Dr. Borden Parker Bowne's] crucible is but slag and dross,...."

So what happens when an overly stressed neurologist encounters the neurological equivalent to Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle? They simply display their intense hylephobia when rational certainity eludes them, and hide every challenge in a subjective fog masking the thin air of pseudo-science, with the fog presently labeled neuropsychiatry or psychiatry. ""

The album for "Rip It To Shreds" might be clued from "Buddhist illogic: a critical analysis of Nagarjuna's arguments" by Avi Sion, to inspire and guide what to do with old LOGIC, with no stop at the tetralemmas.

Bizarre & misbehaving frequency counts of whims is all that's remaining.

Re: reifying energy:
"I think nature's imagination is so much greater than man's that she's never going to be defeated!" Feynman.

Tadzio

I still have not seen a proof of this claim, even assuming the need of proper function.

Within the epistemology of science, that has come to be a perfectly acceptable starting point. However in a general epistemology that does not cut the mustard because one has a great deal more to explain. Idealism, Materialism, Direct and Indirect Realism, Coherentism etc all have to deal with the problem and nature of perception and other problems. Philosophy of science limits ambitions to science and therefor essentially ropes itself off from the discussion. What you want us to accept is that general epistemology can take place within the same limits and put simply, it cannot.



Of course not, basic coherentism is a position linked to reinforcing axioms. It is how the author applies to to the problem of perception and other issues that makes the position distinct. I use Coherentism because I believe the Munchhausen Trilemma disproves the ability to have non-inferential justification. Coherentism has flaws but I think that it is the best one can do in the face of regress and the reality that foundationalism cannot be proven. In essence I agree with Eliminative Meterialism in that I think it's challenge to givenness works. What I have a problem with is that they replace it with another set of assumed premises and ones are nowhere near as powerful. As such, it simply does not recommend itself as a position when selecting it from a range of options.



I accept that one cannot prove that subjective experience exists without relying on some other standard. I however think that it is reasonable to accept that subjective experience exists on the grounds that one can build on it (like foundationalism) and that it is coherent with other beliefs. I agree that subjective experience is our primary source of knowledge, up until the point where there is a significant defeater for it. Eliminative Meterialism is not that defeater, since it simply assumes its position. As such I find Eliminative Meterialism potentially useful not not particularly powerful.



Do you read what I post. Because I seriously doubt you do. There is no basic point that can be proven without reference to another. Invoking infinite regress gets you precisely nowhere.



So you prove that mental states are not necessarily reliable. Big deal, it does not disprove them.



Both I gave you two references.



You need to explain this more, you are not making sense.



Because you don't understand it. Proper function is a method of establishing the reliability of one's faculties. If they are made to be generally reliable then one has a reason to trust in their outputs. You cannot reject proper function out of hand unless you have some other method of establishing reliability. For myself, I think Plantinga did a very good job in criticizing the naturalistic accounts of proper function and reliability.

Not true. Science is supposed to the study of reality and the mind is part of reality. So how the mind works is not outside science.


But it is more consistent with science.


Indeed it is not clear what 'subjective experience IS in your theory of mind.


What do you mean by 'mental state'? How is it different from subjective experience?


I doubt you are not actual reading the paper and is quoting them out of context.


OK. If I ask you where does Sherlock Holmes live'? How are you going to respond?


[/quote]
Again you are conflating your objection to naturalism.