(Since the original thread is way down the list and there has been no response in that thread, I’m making a new post for him to respond in. KF, if you don’t have time to properly engage this discussion, please just say so instead of cutting and pasting the same things as if they are responsive to actual MRT theory but are only responsive to your straw man version of it.)
KF, you’re using straw man, category error, irrational appeal to consequences and circular reasoning in your argument against MRT. I’ll show you where and how.
STRAW MAN:
KF said:
WJM, nope. On the contrary, any frame of thought that leads to the conclusion that the broad common sense view on the reality of our common world is delusional, is an appeal to grand, pervasive delusion.
No, it isn’t, as I’ve already pointed out. It’s not delusional to think that there is an external world; it’s an error of categorization based on a faulty assumption. Nothing more.
MORE STRAW MAN:
You cannot have your cake and eat it, if you imply grand delusion like that,
Only I’m not implying any such thing, so I’m not trying to have my cake and eat it too.
APPEAL TO CONSEQUENCES:
you imply the equally pervasive discredit of rationality, knowledge claims etc leading to collapse in self-referential absurdity.
You can repeat this all you want, but again, I’ve implied no such thing. I’ve stated directly that it’s a categorization misidentification based on an an erroneous assumption. Nothing more. It doesn’t lead to self-referential absurdity or solipsism, as I’ve repeatedly and exhaustively explained, so that is an irrational appeal to consequences.
CIRCULAR REASONING:
We may safely set such aside.
Sure, if you assume external physical world speculation is true and ignore the self-evidently true nature of our experiential existence.
When you have a an argument against MRT that isn’t circular (a priori assumption of your external-world conclusion that insists MRT implies “grand delusion,” which it does not) to make the case against MRT, let me know. I haven’t called anything a delusion nor have I implied anything is a “grand delusion” (other than identifying “delusion” as a “deviation from the norm that renders social participation problematic,” or something to that effect in a discussion on how MRT would classify and treat mental illness.)
YET MORE STRAW MAN ARGUMENT:
Yes, we are prone to error and are limited, but we are not victims of grand delusion about our common world.
Please stop insisting I’m implying things, or saying things that I am clearly not and which I have repeatedly said and shown I am not.
As to evidence, once we accept that our senses, acting in an environment they were made for and were made to give us a generally sound access to that world, will on the whole give us a reasonably accurate view; including our rational common sense that allows us to think straight.
This can be equally said by recategorizing that “world” as “shared consistent, measurable and mutually verifiable experiences” without invoking the pure speculation that it is caused by an external physical world.
CATEGORY ERROR:
The consistent testimony is that we live in a physical, spatially extended world [of perhaps 90+ B LY across], with matter based on quantised micro particles interacting in accordance with significantly intelligible laws and giving rise to phenomena at various stages.
This is a blatant and obvious categorization error. There is simply no possible way anyone can give testimony about an external physical world; the only thing they can possibly be giving testimony about is their mental experiences. We can speculate that those mental experiences are caused by an external physical world, but that can only ever be speculation.
There is no reason to deny such,
Other than it’s blatantly impossible to ever experience “an external physical world.” All we can possibly experience are mental states and phenomena.
and say the Smith Cybernetic model allows us to see how a two-tier controller can be part of a cybernetic entity, with room for quantum influences so that there is ground to see how mind-body interaction can bridge gaps suggested.
That model is 100% unnecessary under MRT.
Yes, arguably, in Him we live and move and have our being, but that does not make physical reality evaporate;
I didn’t say physical reality “evaporated” under MRT, it only recategorizes what “physical reality” is, and where and how it occurs.
it simply means, source and sustainer actively present every-where, every-when. Such points to precisely the framework of Divine attributes already highlighted. KF
MRT just makes most of that Rube Goldberg, domain-transfer gulch, pure speculation and denial of our self-evidently true existential state unnecessary.