Can Everything be Reduced to Pure Physics?

[Les Sleeth]

A great deal is becoming clearer about 'our nature'; the other day I even saw a review of a book called "The God Gene" (or something similar), in which the author (so the review said) describes and discusses some recent research which shows that the feeling of spirituality are inheritable, and that there is a gene for this!

The God gene is about as provable as God is right now. And spirituality . . . what makes scientists think they can evaluate that with science?

What I have been utterly unsuccessful in getting any devoted empiricist to admit is the illogic found in the approach of science toward spirituality. First, just like one must separate the pseudoscience some uneducated people spout from real science practitioners, one must separate the spiritual nonsense the masses indulge in from serious practitioners. Can you do that? Do you know anyone here at PF (or anywhere in the science world) qualified to select the right person and practice for study? If one cannot even recognize what a genuine spiritual practice is, then how can one evaluate?

One of the trademarks of a serious spiritual practice is that to practice one disassociates from the senses to experience what consciousness becomes aware of. I myself have practiced daily for decades and can report the experience is not leisurely learned or understood. It takes years of hard work to get anywhere and years more to become good at it. Who do you know that practices like that? How many studies have been conducted on such practitioners?

Next add to that the fact that science requires full participation in sense experience to practice. So tell me, how is a discipline requiring sense experience to practice going to evaluate something that requires disassociating from sense experience to practice? It is a very specific inner experience which is the heart of genuine spirituality, not just any old weirdness scientists want to put in the laboratory and ridicule as nonsense.

Science studying spirituality reminds me of a joke:

Mike and Maureen landed on Mars after accumulating enough frequent flier miles. They met a Martian couple and were talking about all sorts of things. Mike asked if Mars had a stock market or if they had laptop computers and how they made money. Finally Maureen brought up the subject of sex. "Just how do you guys do it?" asked Maureen. The male Martian responded "Pretty much the way you do." A discussion ensued and finally the couples decided to swap partners for the night (for the sake of scientific research, of course).
Maureen and the male Martian went off to a bedroom where the Martian stripped. Maureen was disappointed to find that he had a teeny weeny member about half an inch long and just a quarter inch thick. "I don't think this is going to work," said Maureen. "Why?" he asked. "What's the matter?"
"Well, " she replied "it's just not long enough to reach me!" "No problem," he said and proceeded to slap his forehead with his palm. With each slap his member grew until it was impressively long.
"Well," she said "that's quite impressive, but it's still pretty narrow." "No problem," he said and started pulling his ears. With each pull his member grew wider and wider. "Wow!" she exclaimed. They fell into bed and made mad passionate love.
The next day the couples joined their normal partners and went their separate ways. As they walked along Mike asked, "Well was it any good?" "I hate to say it," said Maureen "but it was pretty wonderful. How about you?" "It was horrible," he replied. "All I got was a headache. She kept slapping my forehead and pulling my ears.

Similarly, I say science will never “get it” using the head-slapping, ear-pulling methods of empiricism because the techniques of science are not appropriate for the job.

So far as the subjective is concerned, it seems to me that if romantic love becomes understandable as drug addiction (as it seems it might be), then there isn't much else for philosophy (etc) to play with than inter-relationships among subjective experiences (and the 'hard' problem of consciousness). . . . Googling on 'romantic love brain chemistry' and many links refer to a recent book by Helen Fisher "Why We Love: The Nature and Chemistry of Romantic Love"; here is the abstract of a study into "the neural correlates of maternal and romantic love"; sure it's early days - give it another 20 years or so for solid results to crystalise - but it does seem that chemistry can account for much observable phenomena ("drug addiction" comes into play in that the bond between two people in love is, crudely, an addiction to each other, mediated by chemicals, utilising the same or similar brain processes that 'cause' cocaine or alcohol addiction).

If you take a painting by Vermeer and analyze the chemistry of the paint until you can explain every single reason why it appears as it does, have you thoroughly accounted for the presence of that painting? That’s what science is doing with romantic love and other consciousness traits. True, hormones are causing the physical attraction, but what is love? The painting’s physical look is explained by chemistry and physics, but what variety of chemistry and physics explains the creativity which produced it?

The reasoning in that case is more illogic, this time how certain scientific conclusions are reached about life and consciousness. If you have a discipline (science) which by its nature can ONLY see the physical relationship between things, then is it logical to assume that when all you find is physical stuff in life/consciousness it’s because that is all there is to it? If I only look through a kaleidoscope, should I conclude the world is nothing but pretty patterns? The proper conclusion is that there is a physical aspect to life and consciousness, and that is all science can say. The extension of logic to say life and consciousness are entirely physicalistic exposes the loss of objectivity due to 1) exclusive participation in a particular mental discipline, and 2) the inherent physicalistic “filter” such a perspective naturally maintains.

So I can surely find a dozen people who will truthfully say (and I can objectively test their truthfullness) that they feel these questions are *not* the most profound, that the questions which 'science can answer' are much more profound, that to them their health and physical comfort - the result of 'science' - are far more 'vital' than whether or not there is a god (or 20 million gods). . . . can we please have an example of 'the most important questions' which science cannot answer?

Well, it depends on one’s priorities in life doesn’t it? I want to understand how the universe works; I want to understand my psychology and how my physiology affects it; I am grateful for anything science discovers useful to improving the quality of my life. It is wonderful, it is great, I love it.

However, science hasn’t given me my most valued insights about how to be happy or conscious. What I’ve learned about these things have come far more from looking inside myself. If I were forced to choose between the benefits of science or introspection, I would choose introspection in a heartbeat. Maybe others wouldn’t, and that’s fine with me. Fortunately, we aren’t forced to choose one or the other, and so we are free to enjoy and learn from it all!

 

[Nereid]

Good to be having a discussion with you again Les!

The God gene is about as provable as God is right now. And spirituality . . . what makes scientists think they can evaluate that with science?

What I have been utterly unsuccessful in getting any devoted empiricist to admit is the illogic found in the approach of science toward spirituality. First, just like one must separate the pseudoscience some uneducated people spout from real science practitioners, one must separate the spiritual nonsense the masses indulge in from serious practitioners. Can you do that? Do you know anyone here at PF (or anywhere in the science world) qualified to select the right person and practice for study? If one cannot even recognize what a genuine spiritual practice is, then how can one evaluate?

Hey, I didn't write that book As I think I said, it would seem that there are interesting new domains which may be coming into the reach of serious study, using the scientific method, which our great-grandparents would've considered to be well beyond its scope.

If you take a painting by Vermeer and analyze the chemistry of the paint until you can explain every single reason why it appears as it does, have you thoroughly accounted for the presence of that painting? That’s what science is doing with romantic love and other consciousness traits. True, hormones are causing the physical attraction, but what is love? The painting’s physical look is explained by chemistry and physics, but what variety of chemistry and physics explains the creativity which produced it?

Of course it doesn't, but isn't this somewhat of a strawman (or strawpainting)?

I thought I was careful to say that 'the hard problem of consciousness' is clearly beyond the realm of science (at least, as we currently understand and practice it), so whatever the subjective experience *is* it's not chemistry. However, what one *can* study (and maybe get some answers; again, I think it's at least 20 years too soon to say with much confidence) is how brain chemistry, physiology, etc and concepts which Homo sap. individuals reliably report as 'romantic love', 'the feeling of spirituality', 'anger', 'the colour puce', 'the feeling of betrayal', and so on are related. Surely you agree that we're well on the way to this (non-subjective) kind of understanding? For example, look at the work on how the visual system works in mammals, or how the brain 'does' language, or the origin and control of (some) pain! To repeat, knowing 'all about' pain in a physiological sense doesn't address the subjective experience in any way; however knowing 'all about' pain *can* lead to means by which an individual Homo sap. may report that 'the pain has gone away'.

The reasoning in that case is more illogic, this time how certain scientific conclusions are reached about life and consciousness. If you have a discipline (science) which by its nature can ONLY see the physical relationship between things, then is it logical to assume that when all you find is physical stuff in life/consciousness it’s because that is all there is to it? If I only look through a kaleidoscope, should I conclude the world is nothing but pretty patterns? The proper conclusion is that there is a physical aspect to life and consciousness, and that is all science can say. The extension of logic to say life and consciousness are entirely physicalistic exposes the loss of objectivity due to 1) exclusive participation in a particular mental discipline, and 2) the inherent physicalistic “filter” such a perspective naturally maintains.

wrt (the hard part of) consciousness, I think we agree; IIRC several pages earlier in this thread were devoted to the 'life' part, and we probably ended up disagreeing.

Well, it depends on one’s priorities in life doesn’t it? I want to understand how the universe works; I want to understand my psychology and how my physiology affects it; I am grateful for anything science discovers useful to improving the quality of my life. It is wonderful, it is great, I love it.

However, science hasn’t given me my most valued insights about how to be happy or conscious. What I’ve learned about these things have come far more from looking inside myself. If I were forced to choose between the benefits of science or introspection, I would choose introspection in a heartbeat. Maybe others wouldn’t, and that’s fine with me. Fortunately, we aren’t forced to choose one or the other, and so we are free to enjoy and learn from it all!

Yes, and that's the point ... thank you for agreeing with me

Whether a question is 'profound' or 'totally banal' is (entirely?) subjective; if dekoi had said "I think that science can address only unimportant questions" or "I think the most important questions can only be answered by philosophy and religion" (note, I'm NOT saying she said these things!), then that's OK (I can reply, "well, I think differently!"). However, if it's to be anything but a personal, subjective opinion, let's have the basis for deciding, and let's have it on the table so we can discuss it!

 

[omin]

How true is the claim that everything in the whole universe can be explained by Physics and Physics alone? How realistic is this claim? Does our ability to mathematically describe physical things in spacetime give us sufficient grounds to admit or hold this claim? Or is there more to physical reality than a mere ability to matheamtically describe things?

All humans have five senses, and only thoughts represent those senses.

Our brain has the capacity to qualify things we sense, which is comparison, the principle in physics.

With more precision, we use the quantifying aspect, which gives our comparisons numbers.

Every thought really is a number. Numbers may represent any of the fives senses (qualification) and the amount (quantification), so numbers may comprise all we ever think. All English words are qualifications, in essense estimated numbers of some physical things we have sensed. Want me to prove it? Just try to think of something you can't count or compare as different from something else. You can't. It all adds up. Everything is qualifiable and quantifiable.

All things in the world that can be sensed are physical. We are bound to qualify by our five senses and the organization of how those senses arrive. Our ability to quantify is bound the precision of our senses. (Instruments do help magnify what can be sensed).

Physics is the heart of honesty about explaining the world, unless you still are captivated by imprecision and disorder. Physics is the only way to tell it like it REALLY is, and in the order it is, because numbers tell it all, to the maximum extent of human sense. When you understand this, you have arrived. When you don't, you just aren't expressing it in the right amount and in the right order. If you actually believe the wrong amount or the wrong order represents the physical world, we call this is mental disorder. Mental disorder is a theory of the world that does not acurately represent the world. Physics has the highest capacity of any mental discipline to be honest and represent the truth about anything! That would be telling like it is.

 

[russ_watters]

... It[science] promises validity and preciseness. Some even state that science is an omnipotent method, which lives in the foreground of knowledge. It is beyond philosophy, as philosophy only lives in its unnoticed shadow, theorizing what science promises to eventually prove. The arisen conflict is not the dispute of science as a means of knowledge, but its claim to be an omnipotent source of this knowledge. Perhaps, it is the origin of scientific knowledge, but certainly not knowledge altogether. Since scientific knowledge only proves the most naïve and minor questions – which might at that certain moment, seem like enormously important ones --- while philosophy is a completely distinct method; a method which explains what science cannot.

As I alluded to in the other thread, the conflict (to me) appears to be a one-sided one. Scientists don't object to philosophy per se, its just that its not relevant to the pursuit of science. They tend to ignore it and follow their science were-ever it leads them. But that can be threatening to people who already have territory (the subject of love, for exmple) staked-out for philosophy. Those who prefer the subjectivity of philosophy object to the gradual erosion of the domain of philosophy as scientific knowledge has expanded to encompass much of what used to be studied only in philosophy.

Aristotle thought that philosophy could provide all the answers (not just the ones you consider important). He reasoned things like the idea of inertia: objects in motion will stop unless acted upon by an outside force. Of course, his idea of inertia was proven to be wrong once Galileo started approaching the issue scientifically. (edit: another aside - would Aristotle have felt threatened by Galileo's, and later Newton's research? If so, is that intellectually honest...?)

When the scientific method coalesced and asserted itself about 500 years ago, the domain of what could be investigated philosophically quickly went from 'everything' to 'what exists only in your mind.' But it hasn't stopped there: 'what is love?' and 'why are people spiritual' are questionsthat are now, quite reasonably, being tackled by biologists and psychologists.

Could, one day, all questions be answered by science? Probably not. But there are only one or two that I can think of that we may never be able to difinitively answer with science. 'Is there a god?' for example (of course, if He reveals himself to us, He will become a subject of science).

IMO, the one-way conflict is based on a perceived threat/fear: people want freewill (though ironically, religion would tend to preclude it) and science seems too deterministic. Would it scare you to have a psychologist talk to you for a few minutes and then lay-out a complete personality profile for you?

I'm a member of Eharmony.com (yes, I am utterly incapable of picking up a girl at a bar). For those not familiar with it, its a dating site that matches potential partners through a complex personality profile created by a psychologist. After answering an hour's worth of questions, it generated a 1 page personality profile that was, actually, a little scary in how well it pegged my personality.

Of my friends, there is one who objects to Eharmony.com rather strongly - she says its unnatural and gets in the way of fate. Well...maybe that contradicts what I said above. Do philosophical people really want freewill or do they want fate? Or do they want a self-contradictory combination of the two? Maybe I need to start a new thread about that. [/digression]

The point is, it seems to me that philosophical objections to science are based on a (somewhat self-contradictory) fear that philosophically-minded people will lose control of, not just fields of study, but their minds themselves.

I heard a great speech from a Vietnam POW and one of the things he said was that after years of captivity/torture, most POW's came out psychologically healthy (they were, of course, studied by psychologists). Why? Each of them eventually came to the realization that the only thing in life you have complete control over is what is going on inside your head and psychologically they retreated into their own minds for protection. Trouble is, that severely limits the domain of applicability of philosophy: As soon as another person gets involved, ie you tell someone or write down what you are thinking, your thoughts and feelings can be studied scientifically.

 

[russ_watters]

Whether a question is 'profound' or 'totally banal' is (entirely?) subjective; if dekoi had said "I think that science can address only unimportant questions" or "I think the most important questions can only be answered by philosophy and religion" (note, I'm NOT saying she said these things!), then that's OK (I can reply, "well, I think differently!"). However, if it's to be anything but a personal, subjective opinion, let's have the basis for deciding, and let's have it on the table so we can discuss it!

I agree that subjective claim such as this is totally useless. May I suggest an objective critereon for the domain of applicability of one of the two? Science can study only that which has/can have a physical manifestation.

Careful though, dekoi and Les Sleeth - I think you will find that you can attach a physical manifestation to a great many things that you may consider, at first glance, to be completely ethereal. For example, does love have any physical consequences?

 

[Les Sleeth]

Good to be having a discussion with you again Les!

Why thank you. I meant to drop out, but apparently I couldn't stay away.

Hey, I didn't write that book As I think I said, it would seem that there are interesting new domains which may be coming into the reach of serious study, using the scientific method, which our great-grandparents would've considered to be well beyond its scope. . . .Of course it doesn't, but isn't this somewhat of a strawman (or strawpainting)?

If it was a strawman argument, I apologize, it wasn't intentional (I hate it when someone does that). I was responding mostly to what I interpreted as your infatuation with the idea of a God gene, and this statement: "So far as the subjective is concerned, it seems to me that if romantic love becomes understandable as drug addiction (as it seems it might be), then there isn't much else for philosophy (etc) to play with than inter-relationships among subjective experiences (and the 'hard' problem of consciousness)."

It seems to me that if we boil philosophy down to that, it's almost the same as saying we should elevate science to the status of what dekoi was suggesting and then find a little corner in the science perspective where philosophy can "play."

Surely you agree that we're well on the way to this (non-subjective) kind of understanding?

Yes, I do agree. But you may not realize how much discussions about the physical side end up implying that's all there is, and that even the subjective aspect and life will one day be shown to be a consequence of physical processes. That idea of a god gene, for instance, is exactly that route to eliminating the subject altogether, and already a great many scientists "dismiss" the notion of some distinct vital principle. They say they don't need it to explain life. This is where my painting analogy applies quite well in my opinion because guess how they've gotten rid of the vital concept? Well, they claim because they can describe all the crucial physical interactions in life, they've explained "living."

Whether a question is 'profound' or 'totally banal' is (entirely?) subjective; if dekoi had said "I think that science can address only unimportant questions" or "I think the most important questions can only be answered by philosophy and religion" (note, I'm NOT saying she said these things!), then that's OK (I can reply, "well, I think differently!"). However, if it's to be anything but a personal, subjective opinion, let's have the basis for deciding, and let's have it on the table so we can discuss it!

Yes, I think I understand your response to dekoi better now, and it seems more balanced than I originally thought. (Hey, did you like that joke?)

 

[Les Sleeth]

I agree that subjective claim such as this is totally useless. May I suggest an objective critereon for the domain of applicability of one of the two? Science can study only that which has/can have a physical manifestation.

Careful though, dekoi and Les Sleeth - I think you will find that you can attach a physical manifestation to a great many things that you may consider, at first glance, to be completely ethereal. For example, does love have any physical consequences?

I agree totally. But in this thread the question has been whether or not the physical is causing all manifestations, or if some manifestations have sn inherent nature. I will try an analogy. If I cause a room to suddenly be at a sub-freezing temperature, and small bits of ice form on walls, do I say that low temperature alone creates ice? To be sure temperature has manifested ice, but water (moisture) was there in the first place, and it was the inherent nature of water which allowed low temperature to manifest it as ice.

My point is, I think part of the objection to the physicalist perspective is that it implies or outright claims the physical conditions causing certain manifestations are not only the cause, but also the whole ball of wax. Others of us think there may be "something more" which the physical is acting upon. And of course, there is also the question of if "something more" has the ability to affect the physical.

 

[Nereid]

Why thank you. I meant to drop out, but apparently I couldn't stay away.

PF is the richer for your second, involuntary, decision

If it was a strawman argument, I apologize, it wasn't intentional (I hate it when someone does that). I was responding mostly to what I interpreted as your infatuation with the idea of a God gene, and this statement: "So far as the subjective is concerned, it seems to me that if romantic love becomes understandable as drug addiction (as it seems it might be), then there isn't much else for philosophy (etc) to play with than inter-relationships among subjective experiences (and the 'hard' problem of consciousness)."

Provocative, can I be.

Re "The God Gene" (Dean Hamer, Doubleday): it wouldn't surprise me in the least if the 'The' was added by the marketing department. Certainly the review I read made the point quite strongly (as does Hamer, though less strongly) that it's very early days. To quote one part of the review "It is reasonable to ask, as Hamer does, whether certain genes [note the plural] play a significant role in faith. But he is a long way from providing an answer."

However, since we are exploring the limits of science in this thread, I'm sure you'd agree that a certain flexibility (shall we say) wrt extrapolating today's well-established neuroscience and genetics isn't inappropriate.

Yes, I do agree. But you may not realize how much discussions about the physical side end up implying that's all there is, and that even the subjective aspect and life will one day be shown to be a consequence of physical processes.

Oh dear. Surely there are no such silly people here? I mean, an excruciatingly boring, detailed exposition on what the subjective experience of eating a good Belgium chocolate, or drinking a glass of 2003 Spy Valley Sauvignon Blanc is, in terms of bigLatinnamedpartsofthebrain and dryasdustverylongchemicalnames and morestuffthatsurelyonlyasadistwouldinflictonus, as a substitute for the real things? *shudder* That someone might be able to make such an exposition, and even show that it is a very good account of the subjective experience, maybe; that that's all there is?? In any case, as I said before, it'll be long after I'm gone that the 'hard problem of consciousness' joins 'origin of Homo sap.' on the science shelves of your local library.

That idea of a god gene, for instance, is exactly that route to eliminating the subject altogether, and already a great many scientists "dismiss" the notion of some distinct vital principle. They say they don't need it to explain life. This is where my painting analogy applies quite well in my opinion because guess how they've gotten rid of the vital concept? Well, they claim because they can describe all the crucial physical interactions in life, they've explained "living."

We may well differ here Les; not in the 'subjective' parts, but in the 'vital' part.

(Hey, did you like that joke?)

I laughed and laughed and laughed!

 

[hypnagogue]

Gregg Rosenberg's newly released "A Place for Consciousness" should be mandatory reading for anyone interested in this issue of the relationship between physics and consciousness. In short, Rosenberg motivates the case against physicalism being able to account for phenomenal consciousness, then constructs a new theoretical framework of causation that accommodates consciousness quite well while simultaneously leaving physics intact. Rosenberg's framework provides a new way of seeing many of the classical problems of consciousness, in such a manner that what once seemed intractable melts away into a natural and pleasing picture of how it all works.

Even if one rejects Rosenberg's framework, it can still come to bear upon this discussion in an important way. The conventional way of thinking holds that if phenomenal consciousness is to be considered causally efficacious (which it seems to be from the 1st person case), then it must somehow 'interact' with the physical substrate of the brain; otherwise, it must be epiphenomenal, a mere causally insignificant 'byproduct' or 'side effect' of physical brain processes. Indeed, this conceptual dichotomy has popped up on both sides of this discussion recently, and for good reason: on the face of it, it appears as if we ultimately are forced to choose one of the two rather counterintuitive proposals, since there seems to be no coherent alternative. Even if Rosenberg is wrong, what he has done is provide an existence proof of exactly such a coherent alternative, where phenomenal consciousness neither interacts with brain processes nor falls prey to epiphenomenalism.

The key intuition is to reconceptualize how consciousness might fit into the causal chain. Both interactionism and epiphenomenalism suppose that consciousness fits into the causal chain of physics very much like any other physical phenomenon. To use a metaphor, if we picture the causal chain literally as a chain, each of whose links is a physical event, then both interactionsim and epiphenomenalism depict consciousness as just another link on the chain, alongside brain activity, the environment, etc. (They only differ insofar as how they place the consciousness 'link' on the chain with respect to the other links.)

In Rosenberg's framework, loosely speaking, phenomenal consciousness is not a link in the chain, but rather the material from which the chain is made. Thus it does not 'interact' with the physical, anymore than we would say that the metal from which a chain is made 'interacts' with the links. Nor is it causally insignificant with respect to physical phenomena, anymore than we would say that the metal from which a chain is fashioned is causally insignificant to the structure and relations of its links.

It's well worth noting that this move fells two philosophical albatrosses with one stone. Physics is entirely an extrinsic theory, describing structures, functions, and relationships only, with no mention of anything that is fundamentally intrinsic to play the role of things-being-structured-and-doing-the-relating. This problem has been recognized both by philosophers (eg Bertrand Russell) and physicists (eg Hawking: "Even if there is only one possible unified theory, it is just a set of rules and equations. What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe?"). In Rosenberg's framework, something like a very primitive form of phenomenal consciousness is precisely the thing that breathes fire into the equations and plays the role of things-being-related, and this move also winds up making the causal role of consciousness more intelligible.

 

[Les Sleeth]

PF is the richer for your second, involuntary, decision

My genes made me do it.

We may well differ here Les; not in the 'subjective' parts, but in the 'vital' part.

Well, regarding vitalism, you are dead wrong.

 

[Les Sleeth]

In Rosenberg's framework, loosely speaking, phenomenal consciousness is not a link in the chain, but rather the material from which the chain is made. Thus it does not 'interact' with the physical, anymore than we would say that the metal from which a chain is made 'interacts' with the links. Nor is it causally insignificant with respect to physical phenomena, anymore than we would say that the metal from which a chain is fashioned is causally insignificant to the structure and relations of its links.

If you will allow me to represent the point of view shaped by introspection, then I can unabashedly report that consciousness does appear to be the "material from which the chain is made." My experience makes me believe that something precedes the physical effects the brain is causing; something is "there" already which the brain is shaping, organizing, and almost teaching what's "there" a wonderful variety of mental skills.

 

[hypnagogue]

If you will allow me to represent the point of view shaped by introspection, then I can unabashedly report that consciousness does appear to be the "material from which the chain is made." My experience makes me believe that something precedes the physical effects the brain is causing; something is "there" already which the brain is shaping, organizing, and almost teaching what's "there" a wonderful variety of mental skills.

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding you, but the way you phrased that-- consciousness being shaped, i.e. being on the direct receiving end of physical causes-- makes it sound (to extend the metaphor for ease of discussion) like you're thinking of consciousness as a link and not as the metal.

For the sake of comparison, Rosenberg wouldn't conceive of some kind of phenomenal essence preceding and being shaped by the brain-- rather, his hypothesis would say that physical phenomena themselves, including the brain, are realized by / carried by / made possible by / have fire breathed into them by protophenomenal properties themselves. The physical phenomena quite literally are the (proto)phenomenal phenomena-- or more accurately, they are a particular aspect of those protophenomenal phenomena: physical phenomena are the extrinsic relationships that these protophenomenal properties engage in. Thus, on this hypothesis, studying the structure and function of the brain would quite literally be seeing consciousness "from the outside."

 

[hypnagogue]

Thus far I've only given a rather narrow and shallow account of Rosenberg's ideas, of necessity, since in total they are rather broad and deep. To get a much better understanding of what makes his ideas so compelling and elegant, I advise reading what apparently was a poster at the 3rd Tucson consciousness convention: http://cognet.mit.edu/posters/TUCSON3/Rosenberg.html . This poster serves as a pretty good nut-shell account of his book A Place for Consciousness, although at some points it might get a bit dense or confusing without prior introduction to his material. I still recommend that anyone interested read the book, but at least this poster gives the opportunity to get an overview of his ideas in one sitting.

 

[Les Sleeth]

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding you, but the way you phrased that-- consciousness being shaped, i.e. being on the direct receiving end of physical causes-- makes it sound (to extend the metaphor for ease of discussion) like you're thinking of consciousness as a link and not as the metal.

For the sake of comparison, Rosenberg wouldn't conceive of some kind of phenomenal essence preceding and being shaped by the brain-- rather, his hypothesis would say that physical phenomena themselves, including the brain, are realized by / carried by / made possible by / have fire breathed into them by protophenomenal properties themselves. The physical phenomena quite literally are the (proto)phenomenal phenomena-- or more accurately, they are a particular aspect of those protophenomenal phenomena: physical phenomena are the extrinsic relationships that these protophenomenal properties engage in. Thus, on this hypothesis, studying the structure and function of the brain would quite literally be seeing consciousness "from the outside."

Right, I didn’t understand your original post very well, but I’ve read the link you recommended and can now disagree.

I have three problems with Rosenberg’s approach. First, he has the basis of consciousness as physical; second, he assumes consciousness is “study-able”; and third, his model is contrary to my experience.

Regarding my first objection, it seems to me that before we can hypothesize that the physical has “two faces,” we have to understand what the essence of the physical is. Consider this absurdity of physics. Currently we say matter is energy, but then go on to say in another context that energy is a mere abstraction, and really has no reality beyond how it helps explain the behavior of matter. This is an inconsistency which has confused many a layperson about the physical universe. Here’s how science writer Paul Davies explains it, “When an abstract concept becomes so successful that it permeates through to the general public, the distinction between real and imaginary becomes blurred. . . . This is what happened in the case of energy. . . . Energy is . . . an imaginary, abstract concept which nevertheless has become so much a part of our everyday vocabulary that we imbue it with concrete existence.”

But how can that which is absolutely essential to matter be only a concept? If nothing definitive can be said about that which supposedly constitutes matter other than it’s just an explanatory convenience, then in a sense physics is pure functionalism. We describe how things happen, but we don’t know what it is that is driving it, or that which the physical is made up of. It behaves but it has no “is-ness”? To me, this is a crucial aspect of the problem Hawking addresses when he asks, “What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe?"

So the first problem is that if we are going to use the physical as the starting place for consciousness, then I say we are right back to functionalism; true, we’ve managed to move it quite a few steps more fundamental, but we still don’t reach the nature of what’s causing it all. I think Rosenberg gives us clues he is opting for functionalism with his “life world” analogy, and when he distinguishes between human and animal consciousness. The on-off basis of life world sounds like the functionalist consciousness-as-computer model, and distinguishing the human from animal seems to be elevating the human intellect to what consciousness is, rather than something it can do. To me Rosenberg’s model is like getting around the “hard problem” of abiogenesis by saying life arrived here on an asteroid.

The second problem I have with Rosenberg’s model is that he assumes that consciousness can be studied; and you can see from how he is talking about it that by “study” he means the ability to objectify it for scrutiny. Built into his assumption is another assumption, reductionist in nature, which is that consciousness has “parts” which cause it. But what if consciousness has no parts, is instead homogeneous, and so can’t be studied in a reductionist way?

And this brings me to my third objection, which is that Rosenberg’s model contradicts my experience. Since I’ve asked to represent the introspective view, let me cite an experience I’ve repeatedly had during the meditation I do. When beginning, I can see my consciousness is there a certain way; after practicing, I experience my consciousness as more expanded than when I began. Diagram 1 represents this shift:

See Diagram 1 below

The impression I have is that consciousness is “compressed” by the physical processes of the brain. By disassociating from the brain, expansion happens and consciousness “brightens” somewhat. In some of the more powerful expansion experiences, not only does one become aware of being expanded from a formerly compressed state, one also becomes aware that one has expanded into a much more expanded (and brighter) environment, as Diagram 2 represents:

See Diagram 2 below

In terms of duality, my sense is that the physicalness of the brain is not in essence different from my consciousness, but rather the brain is a structured form of what my consciousness is also. In other words, neither consciousness nor the physical is most basic; both are “forms” of something even more basic. That’s the reason my consciousness can be part of the physicality of the brain . . . because they share a common essence, with the brain being in a far more compressed and structured condition than consciousness.

And why doesn’t Rosenberg offer this as a possibility? I’d say this last is the problem I have in general with “consciousness studies,” which is that none of the theorists seem to think it necessary to look within and directly experience what the nature of their own consciousness is like. They know there is physics, they know there is consciousness, they know some of the things consciousness can do, but like the energy-matter irony, they don’t know what consciousness IS. Where’s the experience that is going to convert this currently rationalistic field into something empirical?

I suspect you and I are approaching this subject in different ways. I am relying very much on my personal experience with my own consciousness first, and objective data second. If I were to choose someone from that Arizona conference who seemed to feel angst similar to mine over the lack of is-ness and personal experience in models, I might choose:

http://www.ca-sps.org/Jon-Klimo_PROBLEMS_AND_CHALLENGES_IN_CONSCIOUSNESS_RESEARCH_3-18-2002.html

 

[hypnagogue]

Les, I think you misread the poster. I would recommend rereading it after you read my reply to your post. Perhaps the material is a little obtuse if you haven't read the book yet-- I can't tell for certain, having already read the book. Also, I think you may have been thrown off a bit when I spoke so strongly of studying the brain as (in some partial sense) literally studying consciousness, but trust me that this theory comes to that sort of statement in a way much more interesting and motivated (and modest!) than your average physicalism or functionalism.

But how can that which is absolutely essential to matter be only a concept? If nothing definitive can be said about that which supposedly constitutes matter other than it’s just an explanatory convenience, then in a sense physics is pure functionalism. We describe how things happen, but we don’t know what it is that is driving it, or that which the physical is made up of. It behaves but it has no “is-ness”? To me, this is a crucial aspect of the problem Hawking addresses when he asks, “What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe?"

This is more or less exactly what Rosenberg says. He argues that

* schematic systems built on contrastive circularity posit a kind of barren ontology consisting of 'bare differences' (an 'is-related-to' without an 'is');

* modern physics is just such a system consisting ultimately of bare differences;

* such bare differences necessarily require 'carriers,' phenomena which can coherently instantiate bare differences in virtue of their own, internal contrasts that outrun the categories defined by the system (such as how the bare difference 'on' and 'off' of Life can be carried by red and black checkers-- redness and blackness outrun the categories specified by Life, and in virtue of their own internal contrasts (red is distinct from black) they can carry or instantiate the bare difference relations stipulated by Life);

* physical theory is in conceptual need of carriers, of an 'is' to be doing the 'relating,' or a 'fire' to be doing the 'breathing';

* carriers for physics would need to have a kind of bottom line intrinsic nature; they would need to be such that, if a difference obtains between carrier A and B, then it is not a bare or stipulative difference, but rather a difference that must directly follow from their intrinsic natures;

* something like phenomenal consciousness appears to be just the sort of thing that could play the role of intrinsic carrier for physics.

So the first problem is that if we are going to use the physical as the starting place for consciousness, then I say we are right back to functionalism; true, we’ve managed to move it quite a few steps more fundamental, but we still don’t reach the nature of what’s causing it all.

The physical is not the starting place here; it is not fundamental in Rosenberg's analysis. The carriers are what is fundamental. Insofar as physics is a schematic system of bare differences, at most it describes the functional relationships that its carriers engage in. Physics is a kind of functionalism, in the way you're using the word, but physics cum carriers is not.

I think Rosenberg gives us clues he is opting for functionalism with his “life world” analogy, and when he distinguishes between human and animal consciousness. The on-off basis of life world sounds like the functionalist consciousness-as-computer model, and distinguishing the human from animal seems to be elevating the human intellect to what consciousness is, rather than something it can do. To me Rosenberg’s model is like getting around the “hard problem” of abiogenesis by saying life arrived here on an asteroid.

Rosenberg never differentiates between animal consciousness and human consciousness. When he says animal consciousness, he is referring to the kind of rich, higher-order consciousness that exists in humans and, presumably, other animals. He uses this term to distinguish this kind of 'macroscopic' consciousness from the kind of protophenomenal carriers that his hypothesis posits-- he wants to emphasize that such things would be like human consciousness only insofar as they would be phenomenal/experiential, and that their exact qualities would probably be really alien to us.

As for the Life world, Rosenberg uses it to illustrate problems that exist with physical theory: the lack of carriers, and the seeming impossibility to account for consciousness. He doesn't use it as a model of how his framework actually explains consciousness, as you seem to imply; quite the contrary, he uses as a model of how traditional physicalist / functionalist explanations are counterintuitive, conceptually problematic, and ultimately wrong.

The second problem I have with Rosenberg’s model is that he assumes that consciousness can be studied; and you can see from how he is talking about it that by “study” he means the ability to objectify it for scrutiny. Built into his assumption is another assumption, reductionist in nature, which is that consciousness has “parts” which cause it. But what if consciousness has no parts, is instead homogeneous, and so can’t be studied in a reductionist way?

Rosenberg identifies experience with the 'receptive face' of causation, and claims that both are strongly emergent phenomena, i.e. completely novel and irreducible aspects of nature. He also argues (in his book, at least) that this receptive side is, of necessity, beyond objective, empirical investigation. Only the structure and function of the 'effective face' of causation is amenable to empirical study, and this is precisely the domain of physics: studying the structure and function of effective properties. There is a pretty simple reasoning behind this: you can only empirically study something that will make its effects felt on your measuring instruments, and only effective properties will fit the bill here, by definition of what it means to be effective vs. receptive.

Also in his book, he gives an argument that different phenomenal properties may also be strongly emergent, in the sense that the higher order phenomenal properties of human consciousness may not be reducible to / explicable in terms of some literal compositional combination of protophenomenal properties.

The impression I have is that consciousness is “compressed” by the physical processes of the brain. By disassociating from the brain, expansion happens and consciousness “brightens” somewhat. In some of the more powerful expansion experiences, not only does one become aware of being expanded from a formerly compressed state, one also becomes aware that one has expanded into a much more expanded (and brighter) environment, as Diagram 2 represents:

I don't think this is all that much incompatible with Rosenberg's framework. The metaphysical explanation is a little different, insofar as Rosenberg might picture a tighter relationship between brain and mind. He wouldn't speak of dissociation from the brain, but rather, different effective and receptive relationships between the phenomenal/experiential carriers. This different relationship would manifest itself as a different physical brain process, since ex hypothesi physical phenomena are just the structural and functional relationships obtaining among effective properties.

In terms of duality, my sense is that the physicalness of the brain is not in essence different from my consciousness, but rather the brain is a structured form of what my consciousness is also. In other words, neither consciousness nor the physical is most basic; both are “forms” of something even more basic. That’s the reason my consciousness can be part of the physicality of the brain . . . because they share a common essence, with the brain being in a far more compressed and structured condition than consciousness.

This, too, might not be all that far off from what Rosenberg proposes. For him, physical phenomena are certainly not the most basic kinds of phenomena, but neither is human consciousness. The most basic phenomena would be protophenomenal/protoexperiential properties, which is proposed to be analagous to human phenemonal experience in only the a very general and basic sense; if we could experience such things ourselves, we might not even recognize them as forms of consciousness.

"The brain is a structured form of what my consciousness is also": this is also similar to what Rosenberg is proposing, except he would say that the brain, qua physical object, literally is the raw, 'bare difference' structure of consciousness as it is seen from the outside.

In a rough analogy, suppose we think of Jane's consciousness as a house. Jane is free to move around inside her house and observe both its intrinsic properties, which we'll represent with its various colors, and its structural properties, which we'll say is the framework of the house (walls, floors, ceilings, the angles at which they meet, etc). Now when Bob looks at Jane's house, he has no access to its intrinsic properties, nor can he see it from the inside; all he can see is a line-drawing of the structure of its facade. Bob calls this line-drawing of the structure of its facade Jane's brain.

 

[Les Sleeth]

Les, I think you misread the poster. I would recommend rereading it after you read my reply to your post. Perhaps the material is a little obtuse if you haven't read the book yet-- I can't tell for certain, having already read the book. Also, I think you may have been thrown off a bit when I spoke so strongly of studying the brain as (in some partial sense) literally studying consciousness, but trust me that this theory comes to that sort of statement in a way much more interesting and motivated (and modest!) than your average physicalism or functionalism.

I am impressed with how well your explanation helped make more sense of Rosenberg’s ideas for me. I have to work pretty hard intellectually if I want to understand such an approach to consciousness quickly. My natural style as a generalist is to analogize my experience intuitively and fit physical facts broadly, rather than describing things in detail as you and Rosenberg do so well.

I am not trying to nitpick, but my generalist intuition still tells me there’s something crucial missing from Rosenberg’s model, and I suspect it is what I think is missing from the field of consciousness studies as a whole. Before I respond again without a solid understanding, possibly you could claify some of your statements for me.

You said, "Rosenberg identifies experience with the 'receptive face' of causation, and claims that both are strongly emergent phenomena, i.e. completely novel and irreducible aspects of nature. . . . Also in his book, he gives an argument that different phenomenal properties may also be strongly emergent." My understanding of how most thinkers use the terms "emergent" and "nature" is physicalistic. It is to say consciousness has emerged from the physics of the brain, and nature is what the universe's physical processes produced here on planet Earth which established the biosphere. Is that what do you mean by emergent and nature?

I got confused when you labeled two things as fundamental. You said, "The most basic phenomena would be protophenomenal/protoexperiential properties," and "The physical is not the starting place here . . . the carriers are what is fundamental." Are the "protophenomenal/protoexperiential properties," what carriers are carrying, or is this another way of describing a carrier? If it is another way of describing a carrier, what is the origin of the carriers? What created and composes them?

When you say, "Insofar as physics is a schematic system of bare differences, at most it describes the functional relationships that its carriers engage in. Physics is a kind of functionalism, in the way you're using the word, but physics cum carriers is not," it seems you are suggesting consciousness is not possible without physics, that the materials of consciousness, "carriers," are pulled together and synthesized by brain physics and chemistry. My impression is that you are almost saying carriers are the quanta of consciousness which would be wandering around in space unless a nervous system pulls them into biology and organizes them into consciousness. Is that what you mean?

 

[hypnagogue]

You said, "Rosenberg identifies experience with the 'receptive face' of causation, and claims that both are strongly emergent phenomena, i.e. completely novel and irreducible aspects of nature. . . . Also in his book, he gives an argument that different phenomenal properties may also be strongly emergent." My understanding of how most thinkers use the terms "emergent" and "nature" is physicalistic. It is to say consciousness has emerged from the physics of the brain, and nature is what the universe's physical processes produced here on planet Earth which established the biosphere. Is that what do you mean by emergent and nature?

In philosophy, nature is just a general term for what exists, the totality of existence. A physicalist would strongly identify nature with physics, but Rosenberg isn't a physicalist. His ontology has metaphysics that goes well beyond physical phenomena.

Emergence, too, need not refer to physical phenomena. It is just a general term for how different levels of nature are related to each other, how we can think of one level in terms of another. Emergence can be divided into two types, weak and strong. Here is how Rosenberg explains them in his book:

There are two notions of emergence. The first notion, which I will call weak emergence, is non-controversial. It refers to non-fundamental properties like liquidity, shape, solidity, and flammability that emerge in a constitutive way from the organizations and interactions of lower-level entities. In the terminology of chapters two and three, the lower-level facts entail the facts about these properties. They “emerge” in the sense that they are numerically different from any lower-level properties, but they are not radically novel properties because their instances are explicable as the inevitable consequences of the activity at the lower levels.

The second notion of emergence, which I will call strong emergence, refers to the appearance of new fundamental properties that only exist at the higher-levels of nature. It is controversial whether any strongly emergent properties exist, and orthodox belief is that they do not. Strongly emergent properties are properties whose instances, if they exist, are not wholly constituted by the organizations and interactions of lower-level entities, although their existence may be a consequence of the lower-level activity in conjunction with suitable fundamental laws applying specifically to the situations in which they emerge. One might say that the strongly emergent properties are not constituted from lower-level activity, but they are generated by that activity.

Weak emergence is readily amenable to reductionist analysis, and indeed physicalism would hold that only weak emergence exists, but a strongly emergent phenomenon is not completely amenable to reduction.

Rosenberg defines the 'receptive face' of causation as that aspect of causation that allows things to be effected, i.e. that which feels the effect of, or receives the work done by, effective properties (such as charge or mass). Physics speaks only of effective properties, so receptivity is necessarily outside of the scope of physics. Thus the strong emergence of receptivity is an example of emergence occurring outside of the scope of physics.

I got confused when you labeled two things as fundamental. You said, "The most basic phenomena would be protophenomenal/protoexperiential properties," and "The physical is not the starting place here . . . the carriers are what is fundamental." Are the "protophenomenal/protoexperiential properties," what carriers are carrying, or is this another way of describing a carrier? If it is another way of describing a carrier, what is the origin of the carriers? What created and composes them?

The protophenomenal/protoexperiential properties are the carriers themselves. They carry instances of effective properties and receptivity, respectively, which are the two components of causation. Since physical phenomena (as modeled in physical theory) are just the effective properties, protophenomenal properties carry physical properties.

It's kind of difficult to convey concisely what a carrier is, what it's supposed to do, and why it is conceptually important. Rather than try to explain it imperfectly myself, I think it would be better if you got a thorough treatment from the source. So for now I would advise that you read chapter 12 of A Place for Consciousness: http://www.ai.uga.edu/~ghrosenb/chptr12.htm . You will run into a bit of terminology that is unfamiliar without having read previous chapters (for instance, the concept of a 'natural individual' or just 'individual'), and much of the second half of section 12.4 in particular will probably be largely unintelligible, but for the most part you should be able to make sense of it. I think after reading this you will have a much clearer idea of carriers and of the overall flavor of Rosenberg's framework in general.

When you say, "Insofar as physics is a schematic system of bare differences, at most it describes the functional relationships that its carriers engage in. Physics is a kind of functionalism, in the way you're using the word, but physics cum carriers is not," it seems you are suggesting consciousness is not possible without physics, that the materials of consciousness, "carriers," are pulled together and synthesized by brain physics and chemistry. My impression is that you are almost saying carriers are the quanta of consciousness which would be wandering around in space unless a nervous system pulls them into biology and organizes them into consciousness. Is that what you mean?

Not quite. From what you're saying, it sounds like you conceive of the carriers existing outside of and being operated on by physics-- floating in space and being subject to physical laws. But in Rosenberg's picture, physical phenomena (even spacetime) are viewed as being constituted (in a sense) by the carriers. Thus it's not so much that the physical structure and functional organization of the brain is organizing the carriers, but rather that the brain (in its purely physical sense) literally is the structural and functional organization of the carriers.

Maybe another rough analogy will help here. Suppose we conceive of the carriers as being the material of a tapestry, and that their interactions and relationships are represented by patterns on the tapestry. It sounds like you would conceive of the physical structures and functions of the brain as the weaver who creates the patterns. In Rosenberg's picture, the physical structure and functions of the brain are the patterns. We seem to agree that physics describes an abstract set of relationships without mentioning an 'essence' or an 'is-ness'; here, the 'physics' of the tapestry would do essentially the same thing, describing the patterns on the tapestry in an abstract way, without mentioning the cloth (carriers) that instantiate the patterns and make them possible. (Rosenberg would explain the creation of this pattern itself in terms of causal laws of interaction among the carriers, which are of a different and more fundamental type than physical laws.)

 

[Les Sleeth]

So for now I would advise that you read chapter 12 of A Place for Consciousness:

Thank you for the reference. After reading it I can see I don't have time right now to give it the attention needed for an intelligent critique. It should be interesting to see how Rosenberg's ideas are accepted by other thinkers.

 

[Philocrat]

Thanks guys for beginning to dive a little deeper into the Reductionism issue. If you come across more materials and concrete data on the subject, please don't hesitating drawing our attention to them. Why reductionism is such an important issue is frankly because that is what this thread demands to know. All the related disciplines must start making some concrete commitments as to the nature of the reductionist theories or theses raised there. Meanwhile, I will keep an eye on some myself.

 

[Rader]

Gregg Rosenberg's newly released "A Place for Consciousness" should be mandatory reading for anyone interested in this issue of the relationship between physics and consciousness.

Can you post the ISBN number of the book? Not sure if this is the correct book, does he go by Jacob also?



Thanks

 

[hypnagogue]

Can you post the ISBN number of the book? Not sure if this is the correct book, does he go by Jacob also?



Thanks

I have no idea why he's listed as Jacob Rosenberg on that link, but the ISBN listed there matches the one I found at two other sites (0195168143). I'm not sure what's going on with the actual publishing; I thought it was supposed to have been published this past September, but I keep seeing varying release dates.

 

[Rader]

I have no idea why he's listed as Jacob Rosenberg on that link, but the ISBN listed there matches the one I found at two other sites (0195168143). I'm not sure what's going on with the actual publishing; I thought it was supposed to have been published this past September, but I keep seeing varying release dates.

Thanks just wanted to be sure.

 

[balkan]

oh my god... is this thread powered by DuraCell?

 

[jaguar99]

No

My answer is no. Because you would be explaining forever without actually stopping.

 

[zhaggy]

agree

although i try my best to prove to myself that the universe can be explained by pure physics alone, i doubt there can ever be a pure mathematical equation to substantiate it. the closest we come to actually getting a near enough equation is "1+1=2".
all we can do is believe.
and have faith in our belief... but that then deviates towards spirituality/religion which is no good.
so is the answer then in the unanswerable(read as God), i hope not!

 

[hypnagogue]

I have no idea why he's listed as Jacob Rosenberg on that link, but the ISBN listed there matches the one I found at two other sites (0195168143). I'm not sure what's going on with the actual publishing; I thought it was supposed to have been published this past September, but I keep seeing varying release dates.

I've just received confirmation from Gregg himself that his book A Place for Consciousness has just recently been released officially. It's available directly from the publisher http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/Philosophy/Mind/?ci=0195168143&view=usa. (It's also available on Amazon, although they seem to have listed an incorrect release date.) In any case, the ISBN number is indeed 0195168143.

 

[docbill]

> In which other ways can the Physical world be explained?
> By Physics alone?

Physics explains nothing. It is not the job of science to explain, but only to describe.

> By Religion alone?

Religion is believed, not explained.

> By any other discipline?

Purhaps some things could be explained by philosophy, but I doubt you could even reach a consensious there is a physical world.

> By Multi-disciplinary efforts?

I would have to take that as an axium.


Man A jumps from a cliff at exactly 12:00 noon and falls seven hundred feet to his death.
1. How long did he fall before hitting the ground?
2. At what velocity did he hit?
3. Why did he jump?
4. Did the man really exist?
5. Do you, the reader of this question really exist?

 

[toasty]

Our nature determines how we interact with the Universe, because we are part of it.

Then there's the fact that if every motion stopped, it - and us with it - would simply evaporate into nothing.

For all practical purposes there is no real benefit in such things.

 

[geraldmcgarvey]

I don't think so.

How can qualitative experiences (qualia), such as the experience of colors, emotions, tones, etc. be described quantitatively? Maybe they can be correlated to triggers that can be described quantitatively, but that is different than actually describing them.

We can quantify aspects of the physical world, e.g. energy, matter, etc. but does that say what the stuff really is?

I love mathematics, but it has its limits.

 

[evagriselda]

Wonder about the answers of the Chemists... Ontologists... that's nice too.

 

[Andrew Stengel]

How true is the claim that everything in the whole universe can be explained by Physics and Physics alone? How realistic is this claim? Does our ability to mathematically describe physical things in spacetime give us sufficient grounds to admit or hold this claim? Or is there more to physical reality than a mere ability to matheamtically describe things?

Hi there,
I noticed among the replies the propensity of modern thought to consider physics
the sole competent explanation of physical reality. This is actually a philosophical
standpoint, an axiom adhered to by faith. Therefore those who hold the view that
physics can explain anything outside of philosophy are, though many, sorely deluded.
Andrew

 

[Canute]

A few other opinions on physics and reality.

"Up to now, most people have implicitly assumed that there is an ultimate theory, that we will eventually discover. Indeed, I myself have suggested we might find it quite soon. However, M-theory has made me wonder if this is true. Maybe it is not possible to formulate the theory of the universe in a finite number of statements. This is very reminiscent of Goedel's theorem. This says that any finite system of axioms is not sufficient to prove every result in mathematics.

Stephen Hawking
Goedel and The End of Physics

"Might it not be the case that the reason for existence has no explanation in the usual sense? This does not mean that the universe is absurd or meaningless, only that an understanding of its existence and properties lies outside the usual categories of human thought."

Paul Davies
The Mind of God


"…as I explained in the first lecture, the way we have to describe Nature is generally incomprehensible to us."

Richard Feynman
QED - The Strange Theory of Light and Matter


"We should suspect an intention to reduce God to a system of differential equations. That fiasco at any rate [must be] avoided. However much the ramifications of [physics] may be extended by further scientific discovery, they cannot from their very nature trench on the background on which they have their being. . . We have learned that the exploration of the external world by the methods of physical science leads not to a concrete reality but to a shadowy world of symbols beneath which those methods are unadapted for penetrating."

Sir Arthur Eddington
The Nature of the Physical World (p 282)


"Many would hold that, from the broad philosophical standpoint, the outstanding achievement of twentieth-century physics is not the theory of relativity with its welding together of space and time, or the theory of quanta with its present apparent negation of the laws of causation, or the dissection of the atom with the resultant discovery that things are not what they seem; it is the general recognition that we are not yet in contact with ultimate reality. We are still imprisoned in our cave, with our backs to the light, and can only watch the shadows on the wall."

Sir James Jeans
The Mysterious Universe (1931)

 

[Canute]

Hypnagogue

Thanks for all the stuff on Rosenberg. I think you ought to write a book explaining his. I attempted his (its downloadable as a pdf for anyone who wants to check it out) but after about a third of the way I lost track of what he was talking about and skimmed the rest. I instinctively liked his approach to causation, a topic that IMO physicists have not yet addressed properly, but in the end I didn't understand it. Is he proposing microphenominalism? It seems like it, but I'm very confused as to what he is really saying. I don't think my brain is quite up to understanding his arguments, which to me seem gratuitously complex. (I felt he had modeled it on Hofstedters GEB, which I felt also buried the key issues under the details). I wouldn't criticize it though, not without reading it again a few times. What are the metaphysical consequences of his ideas? That is, what do they suggest for cosmogeny and the ontology of matter and consciousness?

 

[James W. Pugh]

Good information can come from a vast number of relevant sources. Why would we want to dismiss any point of view that might have some factual basis. The whole is the sum of many parts is also true in science.

 

[Philocrat]

Good information can come from a vast number of relevant sources. Why would we want to dismiss any point of view that might have some factual basis. The whole is the sum of many parts is also true in science.

But science is guilty of one fundamental charge: IT WHOLLY NEGLECTS A PURPOSIVE APPROACH TO THE INTERPRETATION OF PART-WHOLE RELATIONS! How could science coherently explain reality when it is neglecting the purposes of things in a given relation? My investigation of the scientific account of the Part-Whole Relations suggests that this inevitably leads to explanatory deficits, which is what I having been trying to point out throughtout my postings on PF and elsewhere. Sooner or later science must take a concrete stand on this!