Sorry this took so long, guys, but I have been quite occupied as of late. I shall only address the comments directly pointed at me...
1. Where is the line between what we know and what we don't know?
Good question --- unfortunately, it isn't one particularly relevant to the discussion at hand.
Y'see, the main contention here is
not that humans will never know this-or-that. Rather, it is that humans will never know this-or-that using this particular methodology --- and that seems to be the contention that you have the biggest problem with here.
The main problem you seem to be having, upnorthkyosa, is that the sciences you have pledged allegiance to are not actually the Omniscient Source of All Wisdom. You seem to have a huge problem with the very notion that the human psyche is understood through dialogical, introspective, and phenomonological means --- as opposed to monological, external, empirical-analytic means. Namely, you seem to have this desire to make your favored approach to knowledge as the
only valid approach to knowledge.
Which really brings us back to the original issue at hand here: the reductionist claims that if his science(s) or field(s) can't see it, then it doesn't exist. And I'm not just talking about "atomistic" reductionism here either (extreme cultural constructivism and the "subtle" reductionism of some systems scientists suddenly come to mind). All of this strikes me as a whole lot of academic and professional hubris.
Now, don't get me wrong --- I think studying things like linguistics, biology, or the systems sciences can greatly
aid and
complement our understanding of the human psyche. But those are indirect means --- they mostly tell us correlative data about the subject and not causative data. The actual contents of an individual's mind or intentions or whatnot are discovered through introspective phenomenology (among other things), not through prodding at his/her neurons with a microscope. The psyche is, and has been, directly studied by fields like psychology. That is their forte, their turf, their backyard.
What happens when we cross that line?
Then we cross it. Its happened before, and it will happen again undoubtedly.
The fact remains, however, that we humans will
never know everything in the universe --- namely because the universe is constantly changing and evolving. New data and information emerges too quickly for us to categorize and classify, making any real "Theory of Everything" ultimately futile. But, hey, we can always give it our best shot.
2. If evolution is correct, then everything that makes us who we are evolved. Assuming this is correct, then how can anything we do be separate from our biology?
Because "evolution" and "biology" are not synonyms.
Evolutionary principles have their origins in certain "Neoplatonic" philosophies, most clearly elucidated by the German Idealists (Hegel, Schophenhaur, Schelling, etc). These priniciples were not applied to the natural sciences until quite a few decades later. And, even today, many sciences and fields employ evolutonary and developmental principles --- including psychology, sociology, anthropology, and especially philosophy.
Perhaps a tad bit wishy washy, but you are still drawing lines.
That's an interesting accusation, coming from someone that claims that all subjective phenomena aren't "really real".
What can we know and what can't we know? What is special and what isn't? When we cross a line that you have drawn, what happens then?
I haven't drawn any lines on what we can or cannot "know", and I'm not entirely certain what you mean by "special" either. I think you may be projecting some common contentions against materalism onto my arguments, contentions which I never made.
The only contention of import here that I have made is that there are different means of acquiring knowledge, and not all of these means can study the same phenomena (I can't "know" a molecule's chemical makeup using introspection, nor can I "know" a subject's motivations using empirical-analysis). What I'm essentially making is a call for a more multi-disciplinary, holistic, cross-cultural, and integral approach to knowledge --- not an exclusivistic, monopolar, reductionistic model. I don't think that's that unreasonable.
I think that a great many drug companies would disagree with you.
Drug companies can't think. Individuals can.
The whole concept of "biology is psychology" is what they make their money off of. Unless we're talking about the placebo effect...but that could just be the mind having more of a control over the body then we thought.
Gee... talk about being wishy-washy.
No, the drug companies do
not make money off of the presumption that "biology is psychology". They
do make money off of the presumption that biology
influences psychology --- that there is
some kind of relationship between your exterior and interior states and well-being. But collapsing that correlative relationship (which has been "proven") into a causative relationship (which has not) is nothing short of bad science.
As for the famed placebo effect, that seems to help my case a lot more than it does yours.
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Originally Posted by heretic888
And, also, not differentiating between philosophical reductionism and reductionistic methodology is definately not being multi-disciplinary. Its being projectionistic, putting your philosophical beliefs onto a science that does not have them.
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You haven't shown me how there is a difference. I don't think that philosophic reductionism exists...
I suggest you research the subject, then. This philosophy had been known in a long time in the West as "materialism". The modern hijacking of science to support materialism is now generally referred to as "scientism", a position you seem to be supporting.
Its really not that difficult a concept to understand. Not all "hard scientists" are materialists, period. They don't make assumptions, in the laboratory or elsewhere, that only material phenomena are "really real". They don't make assumptions that material, externally-observable qualities are the only "real" components a particular object (or subject) is made up of. Many natural scientists (including physicists), for example, believe in souls. And God, for that matter.
In short, they don't make the reductionistic assumption that just because their science or field cannot percieve a particular phenomena or quality, that that phenomena or quality does not exist.
There is an obvious difference between the scientific method and "scientific materialism" (i.e., "scientism") --- hell, psychologists use the scientific method all the time and they most certainly don't think the mind is just a hallucinatory side-effect of neurotransmitters. The same goes for anthropologists and worldviews, as well as sociologists and social systems. Collapsing concepts does not change any of this.
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Originally Posted by heretic888
And, as for not differentiating causation and correlation?? Pssh... that's the worst of them all. An elementary mistake in science, one of the first things you learn not to do in psychology.
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You talk about the burden of proof with this point and that is fine. If the burden is on me, I think that I can safely say that the cause of psychology is biology. From a developmental point of view, there was a new study done where children were measured through their formative years and their developments could be seen as both the growth in the complexity of connection and the density of brain tissue.
Well, first off, I could question your claim here and request a citation of some sort. However, your account basically coincides with what I know of neurophysiology, so we can for argument's sake just agree that what you stated above is probably true.
In any event, kyosa, all you've "proven" in the above account is your continued inability to differentiate causation and correlation. There is absolutely nothing above that "proves" that the changes in brain tissue actually
caused those developmental changes in the psyche. All it "proves" is that changes in brain tissue accompanied these changes in developmental cognition.
In other words, correlation.
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Originally Posted by heretic888
Because its inherently contradictory. Biology is not a subjective field, its an objective field. There are, of course, fields where the two interlap (such as anthropology or psychology), but biology is not one of them.
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Please forgive me, but I have not been able to follow this part of your argument.
Its quite simple: biology does not study subjective qualia. It studies external quantities that can be observed from the "outside". They are completely different ways of acquiring data here, due to the completely different natures of the data in question.
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Originally Posted by heretic888
Chemicals are not subjective phenomena. Nor are neurons nor synapses nor neurotransmitters nor brainwaves. We experience all these objectively, "from the outside". Subjective phenomena are qualia --- they are emotions, ideas, thoughts, feelings, memories, experience, awareness, and consciousness. I cannot objectively "see" any of those "from the outside".
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I disagree. You can see an emotion flashing across your brain. You can locate the section in the brain that shows where you are attracted to a member of the opposite sex. Sexual thoughts, feelings, mathematics, we can see all of that happening and all we have to do is measure the minute flow of electromagnetic radiation through through your gray matter. To say that these concepts are completely "subjective" is incorrect. We can see the parts that make them.
I'm sorry, kyosa, but I suggest you look up the meaning of "emotion" in the dictionary. It will not say "a blip of color that registers on the electromagnetic field".
Yes, there are objective correlates that ground subjective qualia. No one is contending against this. But your claim that these correlates are somehow what "makes" the qualia is one devoid of any grounding or evidence whatsoever.
Your rather dubious claim above would be like me saying that the theory of evolution is "a feeling of incredible intellect and analysis, and nothing more". I would, in essence, be using a rather dubious and extremist version of psychology to reduce all objective phenomena to the subjective qualia we feel whenever we experience them. That is exactly what you are doing with biology --- you are attempting to deny the validity of subjective qualia
in their own terms to make your favored approach to knowledge the One Great Truth of the universe.
In either event, it is very, very bad science.
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Originally Posted by heretic888
You also still have to explain how a subjective view that denies the validity of all subjective views could actually be "true". According to physicalism, the idea of physicalism itself is nothing but biological processes having fun and thus has no substantive reality itself. Thus, according to its very own premises, physicalism cannot possibly be a true idea because it is an idea.
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Look, when it comes right down to it, this is gibberish. You are arguing in circles and avoiding reality.
Nope, sorry. I can understand your desire to
want that to be true, because then you don't have to contend with the rather obscene contradictions of your own position. But, let's look at it logically...
Your materialism claims that no subjective phenomena is "really real", that they are essentially hallucinatory side-effects of neuronal activity in the material brain. The contradictory part is that this philosophy, this claim, this point of view, this position
itself is a subjective phenomena. Thus, by its very own criterion, it is not "really real" and has absolutely no substantive validity.
Thus, according to the philosophy of materialism, the philosophy of materialism cannot be true.
What all this really boils down to is the "myth of the given". You are making the rather naive assumption that the objective world is just sitting out there,
given to us in a pure sense, without filtration from the subject itself. The actual truth, however, is that we
only percieve this objective world, including neurons,
through our subjective contours.
The myth that Western scientists and philosophers clung to for centuries is that the observer, the subject, can somehow observe objective reality in some pure, unfiltered sense --- which ended up with philosophies like materialism, which naively claim that therefore subjective phenomena don't matter, or don't exist. Increasingly in the late 19th century and on into the 20th century, with individuals such as Nieztsche, Wittgenstein, Heiddeger, and so on, we learn that the subjective (and intersubjective) spheres profoundly influence our perceptions of the world. This included everything from linguistics to cultural worldview to the subject's very own individual intentionality.
Sorry, man, but your "object only" view of the world died out about 100 years ago. Nobody buys into that stuff anymore, especially not with the Theory of Relavitiy looming in the background.
The simple truth is that
both objective
and subjective phenomena are equally valid and important.
Where the circle breaks is with the assumption that all ideas are created equal.
Sorry, again, but no. That position is a plainly hypocritical and contradictory stance (because, once again, it is a type of reductionism and all reductionisms are inherently self-contradictory). Namely, because although it
says that "all ideas are created equal", this is based on the assumption that that idea itself is, in fact,
superior to all ideas that say otherwise.
Put succinctly: "all ideas are created equal, except for the idea that all ideas are created equal".
Ummmm. Gotchah.
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Originally Posted by heretic888
You also have to explain how objective phenomena can actually exist without subjective phenomena. That's like saying all ups are true, but all downs are false. All hots are correct, all colds flawed. Its a completely incomprehensible position. Subjectivity and objectivity define one another, you cannot have the one without the other.
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This is one of the areas that I'm going to have to punt. I'm not sure what bearing this has on the conversation.
Quite a lot of bearing, actually.
You cannot have "external observation" or "objectivity" unless there is a subject, an interior reality, to contrast and compare it to. Darkness means nothing without any light to give it substance and definition.
These kind of arguments seem to be the ones you have the most problems with, kyosa. Namely, because they directly point to the contradictions of your position in a straightforward way --- as opposed to ironing out little details (like what dopamine does to our minds).
The very plain and direct truth is that you cannot actually adequately formulate
how materalism could feasibly be true in the first place --- you cannot explain how objects can exist without subjects. And this is why you are often forced to resort to tactics like "that's gibberish" or "that's not relevant" without even giving an explanation as to why.
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Originally Posted by heretic888
Then again, you have to further explain why you are basing your philosophy on such plainly inaccurate models of reality. Your arguments just scream "the myth of the given", "truth as correspondence", and "the representational model". Reality is not a perception, its an interpretation. And you can't do any interpreting without a subject.
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Basic epistomology. I don't see how I'm violoating any of this.
Because you are claiming the subjective isn't real or valid. That's a pretty damn big violation, and absolutely screams myth of the given.
Do you think that you can sense a neurotrasmitter firing in your brain as you type your reply? With the right instruments, we can watch the electromagentism flow over your brain as you type your reply. We can also measure and record how your brain functions when you remember something, have a feeling, or even contemplate infinite. We can even take a look at the difference between people who are disabled in some way in these areas and then compare it to how our brain works. Guess what, the two pictures are different.
Yes, which I agree with completely. But all you've talked about is the material brain. I was talking about the subjective mind. A little less on the collapsing concepts, pelase.
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Originally Posted by heretic888
I suggest you actually look into what the influential philosophers and scientists supporting physicalism have to say on the matter --- they will gladly admit that we don't have a damn clue how "mind" can possibly issue forth from a physical organism.
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They are not going to say anything on the subject because they don't have the data.
Its quite funny how someone can even vaguely claim his position is "scientific" when he admits we "don't have the data". Unless you think you know something that neuroscientists do not??
Take a look at some of the stuff that neurosurgeons are doing as well as psychiatrist. Also, you might want to dissect a brain and learn the parts...It is enlightening to say the least.
Been there, done that.
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Originally Posted by heretic888
And, throughout it all, I still don't see any justification for how all these biophysical processes are anything other than correlates. Correlation is not causation.
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I seriously don't think that it is for any lack of data. Corellation upon correllation upon correllation upon correllation eventually becomes causation and that is what we are dealing with here.
Nope, sorry again. Correlation upon correlation upon correlation does not eventually become causation. I suggest you open up a basic pyschology book (a subject you seem to have very little knowledge of) and read up on the actual differentation between the two.
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Originally Posted by heretic888
Besides, I notice you still can't explain how genuine novelty occurs in the universe, which is a rather damning hole in your philosophy.
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Yes, it is, but I made a darn good attempt at an assumption above. Still, I admit that we may never have a clue to the source of randomness.
Which is a fundamental inadequacy in your philosophy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by heretic888
Depends on which "parts" you are referring to. I have yet to see any hard scientist show me a microscopic slide of a memory or emotion, so you are on a slippery slide here to say the least.
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Like I said, you have to look at brain scans of people thinking. You have to dissect the brain and learn its parts. You have to study how humans affect the brain through drug interactions. You have to know about brain chemistry. There is plenty of hard science on this stuff if you look for it. Don't take my word for it though. Go and ask someone in the biology department.
Okay, then I'll ask someone in my college's cultural studies department to tell me about how gravity works!! *laughs hysterically*
You see the problem here?? You're attempting to make your field the Center of the Universe, the One Great Truth, the Theory of Everything, the Only Way to Know. Pure academic hubris.
Nothing you mentioned above references the "mind". It was all squishy brain data which, as important as it is, is not going to tell me a person's motivations for murder or their level of moral development or anything else of qualitative importance.
Sorry, man, but no dice.
Laterz.
