On Monday, August 26, 2019 at 11:21:28 AM UTC-5, Bruno Marchal wrote: > > > On 26 Aug 2019, at 10:28, Philip Thrift <[email protected] <javascript:>> > wrote: > > > *The Mary-Go-Round* > Galen Strawson > https://www.academia.edu/31517753/Strawson_The_Mary_Go_Round > > "The mistake [in the debate about Mary in the Black and White Room] to > think that *physics can give an exhaustive characterization of the nature > of the physical**." > > that is, *material*, but Stawson I guess wants to be one of the cool kids > > > > I am quite amazed he cites Al Ghazali! I think Al Gazhali is partially > responsible for the current widespread obscurantism in Islam. He “won” his > debate against Averroès, in 1248 (or 1148). > > Al Ghazli defended the idea that Reason must be submitted to the Text, > where Averroès defended the idea that the Text must be submitted to Reason. > That has transformed the Golden Age of Islam into fight in between > different radical versions of some literal reading of the Quran and some > haddiths. The christian did the same error around 529. That transforms > theology into “the opium of people”. It makes religion into authoritative > arguments, and violence. > > Strawson argument is not valid, it identifies []p with []p & p, or []p & > <>t with []p & <>t & p. Like Lucas and Penrose, in a different context. But > I will not develop this right now. This asks to understand well how > incompleteness imposes those nuances to the subject. Mary needs the “p” > which is not a formalisable notion. Neither in arithmetic, nor in any > complete 3p account of the physical reality. > > Bruno > > > > I don't know much about al-Ghazālī or much of anything about Islamic philosophers (I did read something of Mulla Sadra once, who is noted as an existentialist in the Islamic context), but al-Ghazālī apparently was a Sufi, which supposedly is a liberal (in the modern sense) type of Islam, relatively speaking.
But to the core of the paper ... Below, wherever Strawson writes "physical" I would write "material". He is attempting to be faithful to "current" physicists definition of "matter", but current physicists - philosophically confused - are wrong on that matter in the first place. He refers to "materialism/physicalism" (he says consistently one word is a substitute for the other), so why not "material/physical". Aside from that inconsequential word substitution argument - which is a bit too pedantic, here is the significant core argument: *Philosophers constantly question things that aren’t seriously in question. * The claim that something is controversial has zero dialectical force in philosophy, although it’s often made by referees rejecting papers submitted to learned journals. This is because there is as Louise Antony says ‘no banality so banal that no philosopher will deny it’. [1] everything that concretely exists is wholly physical. The Mary-carousel rotates round a mistake shared on both sides. The mistake consists in the endorsement of a highly substantive thesis about physics, the thesis that [2] physics can (in principle) give a full or exhaustive characterization of the nature of the physical. [1] and [2] entail the view I call physics-alism: ‘the view—the faith—that [3] the nature or essence of all concrete reality can in principle be fully captured in the terms of physics. One can re-express [3] in a way that matches the wording of [2]: [3] physics can in principle give a full or exhaustive characterization of the nature of everything that concretely exists. The mistake, on both sides of the Mary-go-round, is to turn materialism/physicalism into physics-alism by adding [2] to [1] to produce [3]. Endorsement of [2] leads to the false identification of [1] physicalism with [3] physics-alism. On one side of the roundabout we confront the adamantine truth, already recorded, that on leaving the black and white room [4] Mary learns something new about the nature of concrete reality in having a red-experience (an indubitably real concrete phenomenon) that has the experiential-qualitative character (an indubitably real concrete phenomenon) it does have. (If you doubt this, ask her.) This couples with the widely agreed fact that [5] physics cannot characterize the nature of red-experience (colour experience in general) to produce the mistaken conclusion that [6] Mary raises a difficult and seemingly insoluble problem for physicalism by showing that there is an undeniably real part of concrete reality that physics can’t characterize. On the other side of the roundabout, [2] couples with the endorsement of the truth of [1],physicalism, to produce the mistaken conclusion that (in some sense or another) [4] is false—that Mary does not learn something new about concrete reality when she leaves theblack and white room. Two mistakes. The solution is simple. Give up [2]. Nothing in [1], physicalism, requires any attachment to [2], a thesis about the descriptive reach of physics. It’s vital for physicalists to give up [2] because it is certainly false if physicalism is true. It’s equally vital for those who reject physicalism to give up [2], because their rejection of physicalism can have no real force if it relies on [2]. If it relies on [2] it begs the question: it defines physicalism/materialism in such a way that it can’t be true. What if we replace ‘physics’ by ‘the physical sciences’ in [2], to get [2] the physical sciences can (in principle) give a full or exhaustive characterization of the nature of the physical? ... We have, as remarked, ten propositions (they overlap in various ways, and [7] is a version of [2]): [1] materialism or physicalism: everything that concretely exists is wholly physical [2] physics can give an exhaustive characterization of the nature of the physical [3] physics can give an exhaustive characterization of the nature of everything that concretely exists [4] Mary learns something new about concrete reality when she leaves the black and white room [5] physics cannot characterize the nature of colour experience [6] Mary raises a difficult and perhaps insoluble problem for physicalism [7] ‘x is physical’ entails ‘x’s nature is in principle fully characterizable in the terms of physics’ [8] colour experience is real, a concretely existing phenomenon [9] colour experience is wholly physical [10] physicalism doesn’t entail physics-alism. I accept [1], [4], [5], and [8]–[10]. I know that accepting [1]—being a physicalist—doesn’t require me to be in any way irrealist about conscious experience because I know that being a physicalist doesn’t require to me accept [3] that physics can give an exhaustive characterization of the nature of concrete reality. I accept [8] unconditionally, because its truth is certain, as Descartes observed in his Second Meditation. [1] and [8] entail [9], I take [5] to be beyond serious question, and [1] and [5] entail [10]. One way to put the problem, plainly, is as a disagreement about the meaning of the word ‘physical’. I’ve always taken ‘physical’ to be a natural-kind term. It’s a term that denotes a fundamental kind of stuff whose nature we may not fully know, and plainly do not fully know (ask the physicists). This puts me in conflict with Jackson when he says that Mary in the black and white room can acquire ‘all the physical information there is to obtain about what goes on when we see ripe tomatoes’ (1982: 130, my emphasis). The trouble is that Jackson equates ‘all the physical information’ with ‘all the information expressible in the terms of physics, or more generally the physical sciences’, and this equation makes it impossible for someone who is a real realist about conscious experience to count as a physicalist. This is a startling result for a great host of physicalists like myself who are real realists about conscious experience, whether or not they follow Russell when he says (correctly if physicalism is true—see §9) that ‘we know nothing about the intrinsic quality of physical events’—nothing about the intrinsic non-structural nature of physical events—‘except when these are mental events that we directly experience’ (1956: 153, my emphasis). In other terms: it directly begs the question. The flagship materialist or physicalist thesis, in sum, is precisely that consciousness— real consciousness—is wholly physical. ---------- *The flagship materialist (or physicalist) thesis, in sum, is precisely that consciousness—real consciousness—is wholly material. * I realize there is a trend towards immaterialism (by physicists today as well). @philipthrift -- 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 view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/2e1ab9fa-3b84-43f7-80be-03459958b9ac%40googlegroups.com.
