On Wed, Mar 11, 2015 at 1:18 AM, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote:
> On 3/10/2015 4:35 PM, LizR wrote: > > On 11 March 2015 at 08:30, meekerdb <[email protected]> wrote: > >> If I develop a theory of consciousness that consists of statements >> about neurons and chemicals and ion flux and it predicts when we will see a >> person behaving in the way we call conscious and when not; even predicting >> when they will appear sad or happy or angry. Is that not a falsifiable, >> material theory of consciousness? Couldn't its predictions be empirically >> wrong? >> > > Yes of course they could. That isn't at issue, as far as I know. > > >> And if they were wrong, wouldn't they be equally wrong whether or not >> primary materialism (whatever that means) were true. >> >> Yes, that was my point. > > Primary materialism is the theory that there is no deeper explanation > for existence (or consciousness, specifically, in this discussion) than the > fact that matter exists. In discussions on this list "primary materialism" > is often abbreviated to just "materialism", presumably to save time and > wear and tear on the fingers / keyboards of those involved. > > > I seems to me there's confusion between falsifying the theory that matter > is primary and falsifying a materialistic theory of consciousness. Here's > the relevant excerpts of the thread I was addressing: > > ====================== > Menezes: This is, however, not true of the hypothesis that consciousness > is an epiphenomena of matter. That is a materialist theory, and it's also > peepee (no falsifiability, no explanatory power, no ability to predict > anything). > > Clark: >> it's irrelevant if matter is fundamental or not, either way it > wouldn't change the fact that a non-materialistic theory [of consciousness] > is not falsifiable. > > Menezes:> Nor is a materialistic theory falsifiable. > > Clark: if no materialistic theory is falsifiable and no non-materialistic > theory is falsifiable then no theory is falsifiable and science does not > exist. > > LizR: Strictly speaking that isn't correct. All one can deduce is that > science is agnostic on whether materialism is correct or not, which leaves > it plenty of scope to find other stuff out. > > (Bear in mind that materialism in this context is shorthand for primary > materialism.) > ========================== > > I agree with your point that science is agnostic about (fundamental) > materialism; in fact "matter" has been redefined and abstracted so much in > theoretical physics that its definition is almost reduced to circularity: > Matter is whatever satisfies the equations about matter. > Ok. > > But the original discussion between Telmo and John was about whether a > materialist theory of consciousness was possible. Telmo seemed to think no > materialist theory was falsifiable and John thought no theory of > consciousness was falsifiable. And so they agreed that no materialist > theory of consciousness was falsifiable. > I agree with this with reservations. There might be some fundamental insight that we are missing. > I disagreed on both counts and provided an example. > But you ask for strong assumptions that cannot be verified. Telmo. > > Brent > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
