Mind vs Matter: the Result of an Error of Thought

_{William Murray

June 10, 2019

Intelligent Design}

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(I think we’ve corrupted KF’s thread long enough.)

The entire problem of mind/matter dualism is rooted in a single error of thought: the reification of an abstract descriptive model of experience into an causal agency independent of the mind that conceives it and the mental experience it is extrapolated from. It is similar to the same error of thought that mistakes “forces” and “physical laws” and “energy” as independently existing causal agencies, when in fact they are abstract models of various mental experiences.

All experience and all thought about experience takes place in mind, regardless of whether or not it is caused by something external to mind. Therefore, “an external, physical world” is a mental abstraction about mental experiences. Insisting that the content of the abstraction is “real” is entirely irrelevant.

Since all we have to work from and with is mental experience and mental thoughts about mental experiences, mind is not only primary ontologically and epistemologically; it is ontologically and epistemologically exhaustive. Even if some non-mental, independent “secondary” aspect of our existential framework exists, we have no access to it nor any ability to use it. If some sort of independent physicality exists, it is therefore 100% ontologically and epistemologically irrelevent. The “external physical world” abstraction still lies within the ontological and epistemological framework of mind and it is all we can ever have access to or use.

In fact, once one understand this error of thought, the self-evidently true irrelevant nature of any supposed external world comes clearly into focus.

This error of thought has entrenched the idea of an external world as “real” so deeply into general psychology that it has contaminated thousands of years of thought. It has generated “the hard problem of consciousness” out of nothing but error. It has led to adoption of 3rd-layer abstractions about mental experience as having primacy over mental experience itself from which they are generated (much like insisting that one’s grandchild is one’s own father). It has generated an entirely false dependency on the “reality” of that abstract world in many philosophical lines of thought.

One such bizarre perspective it has generated is this: that if the external physical world doesn’t in fact exist (even though it is 100% irrelevant because it is 100% outside of our access), then mental experience – the ONLY kind of experience we actually have – is deemed “delusional,” when in fact “delusion” can factually only ever be a comparison between kinds of mental experiences and can never include any comparison to any supposed “external physical reality.” The idea that unless an actual external world exists we are doomed to delusion is entirely due to an error of thought. The delusion or reality value of anything can only ever be a comparison of kinds of mental experiences.

It gets worse. Non-materialists (people that are not materialists) insist that epistemological validity requires that some sort of external world exists independent of mind that can cause universal or near universal mental states in observers . It seems no one has figured out that if one insists that non-mental, independent external commodities can cause mental states, thoughts and experiences, they have just given up free will and have become an “in principle” materialist, consigning themselves to existence as caused automatons.

How would we determine what is an externally-caused mental state, thought or experience concerning free will and what is an independent free choice? Answer: as long as something external can cause mental states, there’s no way to know. As with materialism, even rationality is lost.

Comments

I don’t believe he thinks in such a literal sense from what I’m reading Pretty much means that every single experience you have from writing that comment, to reading what I’m about to write, has to be experienced in your mind. That subjective self. Your entire world around you is translated (abstracted) by your mind. Yes you have sensory organs that interact with the external, but ALL of the information they gather is translated (determined) by the mind and it’s parts. Now how far that goes I’m not certain, even if the sensation of water felt more like dried cement, it wouldn’t follow that you couldn’t move freely through the water still. But someone could never know colors or defined details if all the saw was shapes in various shades of brown. Maybe I got it wrong, I did just kind of skimmed through everything so pay no attention to meAaronS1978_{June 11, 2019
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Deleted. - WJMBrother Brian_{June 11, 2019
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Deleted - WJMEricMH_{June 11, 2019
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Hazel
Good post by Fasteddious, I think.
I agree. If what WJM says is actually true, then all of the arguments for objective moral truth are wrong (which I think they are, but for different reasons).Brother Brian_{June 11, 2019
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Good post by Fasteddious, I think.hazel_{June 11, 2019
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I find myself disagreeing with, "The “external physical world” abstraction still lies within the ontological and epistemological framework of mind and it is all we can ever have access to or use." for two reasons: 1. I and any number of others can compare thoughts about "the real world" outside our minds without prior collusion, and agree on most (if not all) aspects of it. Thus, as far as we are able to discern, we all share the same physical reality and the mental models we each have of it are coherent and very compatible. Moreover, one person's sleeping (i.e. mind turned off) does not seem to affect the rest of the "real world" as experienced in the minds of everyone else, whether we know about that person's sleep or not. Thus, his/her loss of mind does not appear to affect our models of reality. 2. Our senses are transducers to convert something (presumed external) to impulses experienced by our minds. The simplest approach is to assume that these transducers are relatively accurate, within their limitations, and reasonably reflect the objects or reality they are sensing. To claim that there is no such reality, or that it may be totally different from how we experience it, is to assume that something is sending us false or severely contrived and extremely non-linear sensory signals, which nonetheless appear to be consistent, allowing us to create coherent mental models of "reality". That is, of course, a logical possibility - the brain in a vat idea - but Ockham' razor suggests that it is less likely. It would take considerably more simulation effort, cleverness and energy to create such a false reality for us. The simpler explanation of more-or less accurate transducers therefore seems the better approach, at least as a starting point.Fasteddious_{June 11, 2019
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WJM “ If you turn your mind off – all of it, conscious, subconscious, unconscious – is there any experience?” Thought experiment. If everyone in the world were sleeping (unconscious) at the same time does this mean that London, NY, etc dont exist? “If we see a table, touch a table, think about a table …” What table? Vividvividbleau_{June 11, 2019
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Most of our experiences are the product of direct contact with the material world. We don’t come to know the existence of a cat, for example, by using a mental “model.”. We simply experience this or that cat through our senses, courtesy of matter, and then we abstract the idea of cat from the matter we just experienced. That is how we come to know things for what they are. We don’t define things by their atomic or subatomic structure; we define them by their nature and purpose. If we had experienced a dog, then we would have abstracted the idea of dog from its material existence. Our senses tell us about the individual dog or cat (the one) and our mind recognizes it as a member of a class (the many). We don’t project the idea of cat onto the cat, because the cat was already there waiting to be experienced. Yes, our thoughts take place in the mind because the faculty of mind was designed for that purpose. Still, those thoughts are often about things that exist outside the mind. The key point, though, is this: Not *all* of our experiences take place in the mind. Sometimes our experiences take place in the senses –at least at first. I experience hot and cold weather in the senses and then, I think about it and react to it. I may try to project the idea of hot and cold all day long, but it will not change the weather. To say that we have no “access” to the outside world is to ignore the role of the senses or to deny their existence altogether. In the world of cause and effect, the senses are often the recipient of causes coming from the outside: The sound waves reach my ear from the outside and then I hear the music. In this case, I don’t project the idea of sound waves from my mind to the outside world. I know that this is the case because I also know the chronological order of events. The experience is not the cause of the sound wave, it is the effect. None of this violates the principle of free will nor does it lead to a deterministic view of life. Law-like regularities in the universe do not affect our capacity to act as free moral agents. Indeed, as causal agents, we can use those laws any way we choose. Yes, law like-regularities influence us in many ways, and sometimes they are an intrusion. But that doesn’t change our role as intelligent and moral agents. For some reason, there is this idea floating around that to acknowledge the material world as real, which it is, is to also subscribe to the philosophical error of materialism (matter is all there is). Nonsense. That is bad enough, but there is more. Not a few quantum scientists have even tried to deny the laws of non-contradiction and causality based on the precision of their experiments.. More nonsense. Thoughts are real, and matter is real; minds exist, and bodies exist. And yes, the laws of causality and non-contradiction persist no matter what some philosophically challenged quantum scientists may say about it. As Clint Eastwood once put it, “a man’s got to know his limitations.”StephenB_{June 11, 2019
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BB,
KF@4 has pulled out all the stops and used numbered sentences. WJM is doomed.
At least he stopped before ω. :P Referring to the OP:
Since all we have to work from and with is mental experience and mental thoughts about mental experiences, mind is not only primary ontologically and epistemologically; it is ontologically and epistemologically exhaustive. Even if some non-mental, independent “secondary” aspect of our existential framework exists, we have no access to it nor any ability to use it. If some sort of independent physicality exists, it is therefore 100% ontologically and epistemologically irrelevent.
We have sense organs, which allow us to obtain "information" about our physical surroundings, do we not? Otherwise, what are eyes and ears for?daveS_{June 11, 2019
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And >>hazel_{June 11, 2019
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KF@4 has pulled out all the stops and used numbered sentences. WJM is doomed. :)Brother Brian_{June 11, 2019
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Apparently to WJM, God… is a Principle known as the Divine Mind. It has no personhood and no personality… God is "All in All." In other words, God is all that exists, and what we perceive as matter is an interpretation of divine mind.john_a_designer_{June 11, 2019
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WJM, I cross-comment from the previous, responding to 249: _____ F/N: WJM in 249 seems to summarise his argument. So, on points: >>249 William J Murray June 10, 2019 at 5:40 am Once we’ve established the exhaustive ontologically and epistemologically mental nature of our experiential reality,>> 1: Referring to the extended Smith model in the OP, we can see that consciousness would be part of the self-aware self moved behaviour of an oracle, but by an interface to brain and thence to wider body, there is no incoherence in an onward interaction with a real, physical world. 2: On theism, that world is a creation, and is the natural domain of our common experience. Such a domain is antecedent to our particular existence. 3: On naturalism, we in effect have -- modulo, emergentism -- the inverse monism, of the physical world. However the inability of computational, composite substrates to sustain rationality radically undermines such monism. >> we can see the sheer folly of making models that include extra-mental commodities and investing in those abstract commodities as independently existing causal agencies.>> 4: This gives mostly perspective and implies appeal to idealistic monism on parsimony. We therefore face the challenges of the ancient but still very live problem of the ONE and the MANY, with its ramifications. 5: The assertion on INDEPENDENTLY existing causal agencies is not quite right. Independent of us and our particular error-prone and often causally ineffective notions, yes . . . if wishes were hoses, beggars would own stables . . . but that is very different from what sounds like a clock-winder characterisation of an utterly independent natural, physical world. We are by no means locked up to idealism or monism. 6: It seems apt to draw upon Plato in The Laws Bk X as he discusses first, self-moved cause, chains of consequent effects, life and soul -- and yes, we here delve into philosophy, not of my choice but to respond to serious questions taken seriously:
Cle. You are right; but I should like to know how this happens. Ath. I fear that the argument may seem singular. Cle. Do not hesitate, Stranger; I see that you are afraid of such a discussion carrying you beyond the limits of legislation. But if there be no other way of showing our agreement in the belief that there are Gods, of whom the law is said now to approve, let us take this way, my good sir. Ath. Then I suppose that I must repeat the singular argument of those who manufacture the soul according to their own impious notions; they affirm that which is the first cause of the generation and destruction of all things, to be not first, but last, and that which is last to be first, and hence they have fallen into error about the true nature of the Gods. Cle. Still I do not understand you. Ath. Nearly all of them, my friends, seem to be ignorant of the nature and power of the soul [[ = psuche], especially in what relates to her origin: they do not know that she is among the first of things, and before all bodies, and is the chief author of their changes and transpositions. And if this is true, and if the soul is older than the body, must not the things which are of the soul's kindred be of necessity prior to those which appertain to the body? Cle. Certainly. Ath. Then thought and attention and mind and art and law will be prior to that which is hard and soft and heavy and light; and the great and primitive works and actions will be works of art; they will be the first, and after them will come nature and works of nature, which however is a wrong term for men to apply to them; these will follow, and will be under the government of art and mind. Cle. But why is the word "nature" wrong? Ath. Because those who use the term mean to say that nature is the first creative power; but if the soul turn out to be the primeval element, and not fire or air, then in the truest sense and beyond other things the soul may be said to exist by nature; and this would be true if you proved that the soul is older than the body, but not otherwise. [[ . . . .] Ath. . . . when one thing changes another, and that another, of such will there be any primary changing element? How can a thing which is moved by another ever be the beginning of change? Impossible. But when the self-moved changes other, and that again other, and thus thousands upon tens of thousands of bodies are set in motion, must not the beginning of all this motion be the change of the self-moving principle? . . . . self-motion being the origin of all motions, and the first which arises among things at rest as well as among things in motion, is the eldest and mightiest principle of change, and that which is changed by another and yet moves other is second. [[ . . . .] Ath. If we were to see this power existing in any earthy, watery, or fiery substance, simple or compound-how should we describe it? Cle. You mean to ask whether we should call such a self-moving power life? Ath. I do. Cle. Certainly we should. Ath. And when we see soul in anything, must we not do the same-must we not admit that this is life? [[ . . . . ] Cle. You mean to say that the essence which is defined as the self-moved is the same with that which has the name soul? Ath. Yes; and if this is true, do we still maintain that there is anything wanting in the proof that the soul is the first origin and moving power of all that is, or has become, or will be, and their contraries, when she has been clearly shown to be the source of change and motion in all things? Cle. Certainly not; the soul as being the source of motion, has been most satisfactorily shown to be the oldest of all things. Ath. And is not that motion which is produced in another, by reason of another, but never has any self-moving power at all, being in truth the change of an inanimate body, to be reckoned second, or by any lower number which you may prefer? Cle. Exactly. Ath. Then we are right, and speak the most perfect and absolute truth, when we say that the soul is prior to the body, and that the body is second and comes afterwards, and is born to obey the soul, which is the ruler? [[ . . . . ] Ath. If, my friend, we say that the whole path and movement of heaven, and of all that is therein, is by nature akin to the movement and revolution and calculation of mind, and proceeds by kindred laws, then, as is plain, we must say that the best soul takes care of the world and guides it along the good path. [[Plato here explicitly sets up an inference to design (by a good soul) from the intelligible order of the cosmos.]
>>It is folly for several reasons. First, it reifies an abstract model as the cause of what the model describes. >> 7: Reminder, to reify is:
reify Also found in: Thesaurus, Legal, Encyclopedia, Wikipedia. re·i·fy (r???-f??, r??-) tr.v. re·i·fied, re·i·fy·ing, re·i·fies To regard or treat (an abstraction) as if it had concrete or material existence. [Latin r?s, r?-, thing; see r?- in Indo-European roots + -fy.] re?i·fi·ca?tion (-f?-k??sh?n) n. re?i·fi?er n. American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved. reify (?ri???fa?) vb, -fies, -fying or -fied (tr) to consider or make (an abstract idea or concept) real or concrete [C19: from Latin r?s thing; compare deify] ?reifi?cation n ?reifi?catory adj ?rei?fier n Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014 re•i•fy (?ri ??fa?, ?re?-) v.t. -fied, -fy•ing. to convert into or regard as a concrete thing: to reify a concept. [1850–55; < Latin r?(s) thing + -ify] re`i•fi•ca?tion, n. Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary, © 2010 K Dictionaries Ltd. Copyright 2005, 1997, 1991 by Random House, Inc. All rights reserved.
8: This seems to beg the question by positing that we in effect live in a Plato's cave where our in-common world is a shadow show on the wall, a sort of simulation, similar to the notion that on a grand multiverse, the most plausible explanation for the perceived world shared with others is that a Boltzmann brain by fluctuation of the underlying quantum foam has popped into composite being, programmed with a simulation of a world perceived but which has no reality in concrete sense beyond the somehow simulation. 9: In short, we already see the critical foundational crack: grand delusion at level 1. But then once loosed, level 2 delusion beckons, that this level 1 perception is itself delusion, thence levels 3, 4 ad infinitum. 10: We can take as a first principle of responsible rationality comparable to the law of distinct identity and its corollaries (LNC, LEM, number, etc) that a scheme of thought reducing to a grand delusion is absurdly self defeating by utterly undermining rationality. 11: We could stop here, but it is important to continue. 12: Now, one of the tainted fruit of modernity is the dismissal of abstracta, even though without resort to such, we can neither think nor communicate. Instead we can take it that per logic of being in any possible world, certain abstracta must obtain, starting with the panoply of numbers. These constrain what is possible of being. In a simple case, there is no world where we will but obtain: || + ||| -> |||||. 13: Many intangible and abstract things are real, not just internalised mouth noises running on wetware. Absent that, including things like meaning and understanding, implication and import, rationality collapses. Reppert, again, is helpful:
. . . let us suppose that brain state A [--> notice, state of a wetware, electrochemically operated computational substrate], which is token identical to the thought that all men are mortal, and brain state B, which is token identical to the thought that Socrates is a man, together cause the belief [--> concious, perceptual state or disposition] that Socrates is mortal. It isn’t enough for rational inference that these events be those beliefs, it is also necessary that the causal transaction be in virtue of the content of those thoughts . . . [But] if naturalism is true, then the propositional content is irrelevant to the causal transaction that produces the conclusion, and [so] we do not have a case of rational inference. In rational inference, as Lewis puts it, one thought causes another thought not by being, but by being seen to be, the ground for it. But causal transactions in the brain occur in virtue of the brain’s being in a particular type of state that is relevant to physical causal transactions.
14: This is of course an answer to evolutionary materialistic scientism, but its force is general. Abstracta can be as real as concrete particulars like the labelled keys I am using, just they are real in a different, characteristically mental way. Contemplation and recognition by mind, tied to being integral to the logic of being. 15: For instance, consider a possible world W distinct from a near neighbour W' because of some aspect A, so W = {A|~A}, thus we see simple and complex unity [A vs ~A], duality [A with the distinct ~A] and nullity [partition is empty]. From this numbers come, {] --> 0, {0} --> 1, {0,1} --> 2 and so on by unlimited succession, thence N, Z, Q, R, C, and transfinites thence hyperreals and surreals. 16: None of these is concrete, none can be found in some ghostly repository but we can see they are necessary entities and that they are discovered not invented in the sense of not existing until we come along and first think of them as figments of our imagination. (I of course do not exclude their being eternally contemplated by world root, necessary being mind.) 17: So, no, we can and credibly do have abstract and concrete entities that are antecedent to our thinking about them, and we have no good reason to dismiss the physical world as not being just that, objectively real regardless ow what we think. >>Second, it generates intractable problems like the hard problem of consciousness (personal experience being ** caused** by physical commodities that have no inherent capacity to cause any such thing, or – the hard problem of personal experience).>> 18: Consider again the extended Smith Model. There is no intractable problem of consciousness arising from interactions of a computational substrate. All that problem does is it exposes the bankruptcy of materialism. But materialism and mentalism as opposed monisms do not exhaust our options. >>Hazel’s speculation (and other have speculated this) that the “material world” and “mind” are phenomena generated by an “unknowable,” mysterious deeper substrate is a form of this cognitive error – reifying a model as an independently existing cause (and, it further suffers from sheer lack of predictive or explanatory capacity – basically, it’s a cognitive dodge).>> 19: Again, not relevant. See extended Smith model i/l/o Reppert etc. >>KF (and others capable of following a logical argument): Let’s follow the logic of “external reality” further. What is one of the reasons (perhaps the most important one) that we theorize an external, consistent world in the first place?>> 20: We experience an objective in common reality, in-common mass delusions are implausible, we have no reason to reduce the world to a computational simulation or dream. Such would all reduce to grand delusion, axiomatically an absurdity. >> It is the apparent consensuality of experiences between observers.>> 21: No, it is not agreement that is primary, but evidence that the world is, despite what we imagine or desire, fear or wish. Surprises like quantum theory are a good case in point. 22: And BTW, we are seeing what has happened to our civilisation as it abandoned its Judaeo-Christian heritage, we are wandering, helplessly into questions we don't have a clue how to resolve and rebuild a sound consensus on. >> IOW, whatever one theorizes is the ultimate nature of a tree, different observers experience “the tree” in a very similar fashion – where it is, the colors of the leaves and bark, its basic structure, etc. The theory claims that the independent nature of the tree (independent from mind) is causing fairly universal mental states in all observers.>> 23: The best explanation for the breadfruit tree experiences on going out the front door, is, the real breadfruit tree. Similarly, the banana tree, the Christmas Palm tree, the mango tree, the Avocado, the cashew, etc. >> We’ll skip the model reification issue here>> 24: Already answered. >> and go another route: think about what you’ve just proposed: an independent, non-mental commodity has caused a particular mental state/experience in all observers.>> 25: The best explanation for the breadfruit tree experiences on going out the front door, is, the real breadfruit tree. Similarly, the banana tree, the Christmas Palm tree, the mango tree, the Avocado, the cashew, etc. Observers come and go, or may err, the trees are there. 26: Also, the independence is independence from our error-prone opinions and perceptions. >>However you slice it, you are promoting a materialist principle: that mental states can be caused by independently existing non-mental commodities. >> 27: Nope, this is not materialism. That we have organs and senses capable of working to provide a body of information recognised and understood as a world does not imply that the world has been reduced to a simulation or model. 28: Agaim refer to the extended Smith Model. >>You’ve reduced us to being externally-caused entities>> 29: causal influence is not causal determinism. Yes, our senses respond to the external world and generate signals in differing ways that are integrated to form an understanding of ourselves in the world, that on sound common sense we take very seriously. That is not the same as that those determine our actions, we are self-moved. >> and you’ve effectively given up free will. >> 30: Not at all, again see the extended Smith Model. Plato long ago got this right. >>There is no escaping the self-annihilating logical consequences of the premise that mental states can be caused by external commodities.>> 31: Are causally influenced by is not deterministic. We perceive, we act, we respond. 32: It further seems we need to clarify cause. That an external entity is sensed and is interacted with does not entail that it controls us. Our eyes or ears for example are designed to sense and feed processing that assembles a gestalt, thence a world-picture. This is a mostly reliable though sometimes defective cybernetic subsystem. That does not determine what the supervisory oracle will do. KF ______ KFkairosfocus_{June 11, 2019
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WJM,
Care to provide a source for that definition?
Here's the definition I posted. From the Collins Dictionary: "believing in something that is false." According to this dictionary, "deluded" means "believing things that are not real or true".daveS_{June 11, 2019
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Vivid @1: All experiences we have occur in the mind. Every experience is a mental experience. If we see a table, touch a table, think about a table ... all those experiences occur in the mind. If you turn your mind off - all of it, conscious, subconscious, unconscious - is there any experience? Two different observers having the same, or similar enough, mental experience. We are all part of universal mind, which lies entirely within all of us, making each of us part of each other's mental world. Of course we can have shared experiences and shared thoughts about experiences - if we have similar enough identity structures.William J Murray_{June 11, 2019
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WJM Obviously, at least to me, that you have thought long and hard about these things and certainly have touched upon a very interesting and controversial subject, thank you. “All experience and all thought about experience takes place in mind” When you say “All experience ..“ what experience are you referring to? “regardless of whether or not it is caused by something external to mind” How do you explain common shared thoughts about experiences? Thanks Vividvividbleau_{June 10, 2019
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