On Fri, Sep 2, 2011 at 2:33 AM, Craig Weinberg <whatsons...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> >> A mechanistic world model can still accomodate human (and animal) feeling,
>> >> imagination, creativity and compatibilist free will.
>>
>> > How, specifically?
>>
>> There is no onus on us to answer that question in order to show that
>> it can happen, since it is in fact what happens.
>
> You assert a completely fallacious claim that "A mechanistic world
> model can still accomodate human (and animal) feeling, imagination,
> creativity and compatibilist free will." and then decline to answer on
> behalf of 'us' on the grounds that you say 'it is what happens'?
>
> So I can say that a universe made of strawberry jam can still
> accommodate heavy industry and supercolliders, and you will ask me
> how, and then I can respond that "There is no onus on 'us' to answer
> that question in order to show that it can happen, since it is in fact
> what happens'.
You claim that consciousness is a separate, non-physical thing that
can act on matter but there is absolutely no evidence for that. What
we are left with, then, is a mechanistic world. Since consciousness
occurs in this world, consciousness is consistent with a mechanistic
world.
> What you are saying, in no uncertain terms, is "There is no reason for
> me ('us') to justify my ('our') reasoning, since I am right."
>
> You could have instead just said "oh, I guess you might be right. A
> mechanistic worldview probably does fail to account for feeling,
> creativity, or imagination'.
It's a fact that feeling occurs in a mechanistic world. The
explanation for it may be elusive, the "Hard Problem" of
consciousness, but that does not change the brute fact that it
happens.
>> It's like asking how
>> heavier than air flight is possible: birds are heavier than air, birds
>> fly, therefore heavier than air flight is possible.
>
> Yeah, no, it isn't. You are stating clearly that the entire cosmos is
> either mechanistically determined by particle physics or random. I'm
> saying that view does not account for things that obviously do not
> fall into either category, like enthusiasm, beauty, meaning, logic,
> imagination, novelty, science, design, technology, life, pain,
> struggle, choices, etc.
My point is that we can observe that something occurs and conclude
that therefore it is possible, even without being able to explain how
it occurs or how to replicate it.
--
Stathis Papaioannou
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