On the Topic of Consciousness

[Divine Insight]

Maybe we should break this out.....

This topic is an offshoot from another thread which was on another topic altogether.

This thread is "On the Topic of Consciousness"

I wouldn't pass judgements. My biggest question is why you have a brain type that is willing to jump into the unknown with some assurance, while I seem to have a brain type that doesn't. If I don't know, I leave it at not knowing.

I don't think it comes down to just the brain alone. I think there are many other factors involved. Clearly even from a secular point of view it is recognize that the brain "evolves" as we grow as individuals based much on how we experience life, etc.

For example the very concept of the "unknown" may mean something entirely different to me than it does to you. I mean, sure we could get out a dictionary and look up the term, but that really wouldn't help much because what you believe you know and what I believe I know are going to clearly be two different things. Especially considering my last sentence of the above paragraph. Our knowledge and beliefs evolve in our own brains based upon our own experiences, which clearly are not going to be the same experiences.

Consciousness: I don't know of any scientist that makes his or her living studying it who declares they know what it is.

This is true, but there may be quite a few scientists who feel like Daniel Dennett. Even though he is just a philosopher.

[youtube][/youtube]

I don't disagree with much of what Dennett says about how the brain functions. I don't disagree at all. But he doesn't touch on the real issues as far as I'm concerned. Near the very end of the above video he state a kind of Deepity of his own, "It's not that the Emperor has no clothes, but rather the clothes have no Emperor". The idea intended to imply that we are attempting to push too much onto consciousness that doesn't need to be there.

But for me none of this is satisfying.

I don't disagree with the fact that the brain is indeed a functional portal for the experiences that we have in this incarnated life. Therefore everything he observes and states about how the brain functions and how it "creates" much of our experience, is not in question for me.

But none of that even begins to address the issue of exactly what it is that is actually having this experience. In other words, if the clothes have no Emperor, then what is it that is having an experience? The brain itself?

This becomes a problem for me, because insofar as we know, the brain itself is made of nothing more than matter and energy. If neither matter, nor energy are capable of having an experience, they why should a brain that is made of nothing more than matter and energy become an "Emperor" in its own right?

This is not an easy question, and I wouldn't hesitate to put this question to Dennett himself. In fact, I would like to hear his thoughts on this. Maybe he does address this sort of issue in one of his many lectures. If you find a lecture where he addressed this heart of the matter please share and I'll be glad to take a gander at it.

I've watched several of his lectures, and thus far I haven't been convinced of his conclusions.

To say it is supernatural vs natural seems a leap.

This is statement here goes back to what I had mentioned above, concerning how you and I may very well think differently due to our different experiences in life.

You speak of the term "supernatural" as though that's a meaningful term.

I have been a scientist my entire life. Isaac Newton, and certain Greek philosophies like Zeno and others were my childhood heroes. Albert Einstein was my next hero as I grew in my scientific knowledge. And today I hold many scientists in high regard and marvel at what they were able to discover and prove.

Just the same, in all of this, I have come to the profound realization that to date we cannot say what the true nature of reality genuinely is. Therefore does it even make any sense to speak of the supernatural, when we can't even say with certain what is natural?

So I'm not prepared to accept the insinuation that I'm "jumping off to assume something supernatural". All I'm doing is recognizing that we can't say where the boundaries of the natural world truly are.

So I don't feel that I'm actually leaping anywhere. I'm just recognizing that we can't know that things need to be restricted to what we believe to be a finite physical existence.

In fact, if you go back to Dennett's very argument perhaps you can see an irony there. He is proclaiming that we can't know nearly what we think we can know, yet he seems to think that he can make very clear conclusions from this evidence that our brains clearly trick us.

That's almost an oxymoron right there. If what Dennett says is true, that our brains can fool us considerably, then perhaps the entirety of physical reality is itself an illusion that we are being tricked into believing. What we believe to be "brains" may not be physical entities at all.

My position is that we know consciousness is affected by natural events, and we know nature exists... seems a very small slide to presume consciousness is a natural phenomenon. But not knowing, sure, I can't say it's not - but I haven't been offered ONE example of the supernatural. So, I simply can't presume it's supernatural. I can't even think of why I'd consider the supernatural when the supernatural has such a horrible track record.

Well, our difference of views here may indeed amount to the extremely different way we view the "supernatural". For you to say that the supernatural has a bad track record implies that you associate the term with just about any guess that anyone might come up with (and especially specific claims that have indeed been shown to be false).

Whilst those do indeed qualify as "supernatural", they may not qualify as the type of "supernatural" that I consider. In fact, the type of "supernatural" that I consider is actually quite natural. It simply amounts to nature that we haven't yet discovered or understood, so it's only in that sense that it seems to be supernatural to us, when in reality it may be perfectly natural.

Given this, there only seems to be the natural. Just because we don't know how consciouness works doesn't means it's because of the gods, or the supernatural or something else, or even "natural vs. I don't know".

Nature exists.
Consciousness exists.

Given these two facts, why presume we can't explain consciousness eventually?

I already gave my answer to this earlier in this post. I'll repeat it here for clarity.

Copy and pasted from earlier in this very same post:

But none of that even begins to address the issue of exactly what it is that is actually having this experience. In other words, if the clothes have no Emperor, then what is it that is having an experience? The brain itself?

This becomes a problem for me, because insofar as we know, the brain itself is made of nothing more than matter and energy. If neither matter, nor energy are capable of having an experience, they why should a brain that is made of nothing more than matter and energy become an "Emperor" in its own right?

This is not an easy question, and I wouldn't hesitate to put this question to Dennett himself. In fact, I would like to hear his thoughts on this. Maybe he does address this sort of issue in one of his many lectures. If you find a lecture where he addressed this heart of the matter please share and I'll be glad to take a gander at it.

End of copy and paste

Yes, consciousness exists. And something is having an experience.

But what is it that is having an experience?

Energy and matter?

Electromagnetic fields?

Something else? Many people have suggested that the thing that is having an experience is some sort of "emergent property of complexity".

I suppose this is a valid philosophical idea, but it seems pretty strange to me that an abstract idea of an emergent property could have an experience.

So I'm still left with a deeper mystery.

To simply say that "consciousness" is a natural result of nature, still leaves me asking, "Who is the Emperor that is having this experience?"

If the clothes have no Emperor, then what is it that is having the experience of conscious awareness? The clothes?

It just seems strange to me that the clothes (i.e. matter and energy) should be able to have an experience.

So this simply leaves the door to the "supernatural" (i.e. nature that we simply don't yet understand) wide open.

I'm not saying that the secular view is necessarily wrong. I'm simply saying that the purely secular view seems every bit as strange to me as the supernatural view.

In other words, that view doesn't "hit the spot" as being an obvious conclusion to accept either.

I'm not going to automatically accept Dennetts "Deepity" that "The clothes have no Emperor" as being the profound answer to this question. That's just as absurd as any other Deepity, IMHO.

So this is where I'm coming from.

I'm not claiming that the supernatural necessarily has to exist. But I am claiming that, insofar as I can see, it's on precisely equal footing with any other conclusions at this point.

Seeing that they are on the same footing, I don't mind using intuition and gut feelings to consider one over the other. So with that in mind, I confess that I lean toward the mystical view. But clearly I could be wrong.

[JohnA]

I ask readers to note that Divine Insight once again fails to give a clear and unambiguous description of what the "mystical/spiritual" answer is to how consciousness arises and what it is. Its just more evidence of the obscurantism he engages in.

And I would ask the readers to note that scourge99 is seeking a precise scientific explanation. That is absurd. I just got done explaining why science itself may not be able to provide such a description.

The scientific method of reductionism fails at the quantum level, revealed to us via scientific observations and experiments themselves.

Scourge and others view this observation as an attack against the scientific method of inquiry. But it's not an attack at all. On the contrary it's simple the acceptance of what science has already shown to be truth.

Scourge apparently can't accept that science itself has lost its grip on reality. With the discovery of Quantum Mechanics, science has quite literally lost its balls. And that's a fitting phrase because this is precisely what has happened. Prior to the discovery of quantum behavior the universe was seen to be machine-like, running with clockwork precision where the constituents of the universe were seen as indivisible particle-like points following perfect Newtonian laws of motion.

That picture was shattered by Quantum Mechanics. Quantum Mechanics demands that this picture must break-down, and that a weird property known as complementarity must take over at the quantum level. This behavior is described by Quantum Mechanics very mathematically by the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principles, which is actually a very precise mathematical statement.

Scourge seems to be upset because mystical pictures of reality do not explain the world in terms of reductionism (which Quantum Mechanics has shown us cannot be carried out to the infinitely small).

Albert Einstein was upset about this too. In fact, most people are upset about it. A few people like Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg have accepted it because they accept the scientific facts.

Mysticism does not need to explain things in precise detail. On the contrary mysticism accepts that such a reductionistic description of reality is indeed impossible (just as the science of Quantum Mechanics demonstrates).

The bottom line is that given sufficient thought we can see that we are the entity that is having an experience, and that there is no place in science for such an entity to even exist. A purely secular accidental reality is not even possible.

The only reality that makes any rational sense at all is indeed a mystical reality.

In fact, as I have often pointed out in many of my posts, even if we lived in the purely secular world of a Newtonian-like mechanical universe where balls were having an experience, that reality would still be every bit as mystical as a spiritual reality.

The mere fact that anything exists at all, is mystical itself.

The additional fact that this stuff that exists can actually have an experience is mystical beyond even that.

So even a purely secular reality would be a mystical reality anyway.

There's no getting around it.

How anyone can believe that our reality could be explained in a way that makes complete rational secular sense is beyond me.

Scourge seems to be upset with the idea that reality may be beyond rational explanation.

But why should that be a significant factor in considering the truth of reality?

Why should reality need to cater to how Scourge believes it should be?

It's far more likely that reality will just be what it is regardless of whether rationalists think its rational or not.

Where is it written that reality must be rational?

It's not even quantitatively rational. We can even see that quantitatively it's irrational. So the universe is screaming with irrationality. We have no justification to start demanding that it should behave rationality.

And what would that even mean anyway?

The fact that anything exists at all is already irrational.

The fact that anything is having an experience is already irrational.

A pure secular existence (if it exists) is already a totally irrational existence anyway.

Pure secularism is totally equal to pure mysticism.

They are equally absurd.

Why anyone would think that one has a leg up on the other is beyond me.

They are both equally mystical.

Also, if a purely secular accident could happen once, then it could happen again. And therefore even a pure secular accident could itself be an eternally reoccurring event.

In fact, how could it be considered to be "rational" not to believe that it could?

After all, if reality could pop into existence from nowhere and have an experience once. Then there is no reason at all why it shouldn't be able to do this infinitely many times.

And bingo, all of a sudden you're talking mysticism.

I'm not sure if there can even be shown to be a difference between the two.

We may be arguing about totally irrelevant things.

Mysticism and scientific knowledge may actually be in total harmony with each other. In fact, I personally don't see any reason to believe that they aren't.

Can you please provide the science journal that states how QM disproved reductionism. I never got that memo or read this journal. So, all particle physics is rubbish, they can not discover more: the standard model is complete and there is only 'DI's mystical stuff' that science admitted can not be reduced?

Please back up your claim. And no, I am not interested in your obscurantism or mental gymnastics on this. State the journal or retract your claim.

What qualifies you not being an obscurantist?

[scourge99]

You REFUSE to clearly explain what the "mystical" answer is. Its just a perpetually moving goalpost or a non-answer like "its a mystery".

The mystical answer is simple. You are the thing that is having an experience.

More obscurantism.

If i asked you what the mystical answer for why things fall and you said "things fall when they are dropped" that wouldn't be an explanation. You would just by identifying what it is we are trying to explain. That is precisely what you've done here.

You claim to have a "mystical"/"spiritual" explanation for consciousness. Yet when I ask you to clearly explain what the explanation is, all you can do is identify consciousness. You don't explain it or present anything knowledgeable about it.

As expected, YOU HAVE NOTHING.

Imagine now that you have a terrible stroke and brain damage. Now you are laying in a hospital bed unable to even understand why 2+2=4. You can no longer even remember the poems you used to recite flawlessly.

Is this the same person? Sure it is. It's still YOU, having brand new experiences.

A "person", a "you" is a brain/body in action. "You" are nothing more than the workings of your physical body and that includes your brain. Your mind, which is a manifestation of your working brain is a part of "you" as well because it is an extension of your physical body.

So if your brain is damaged from stroke and your mind and personality are altered, its still you. "You" are your brain/body, whatever state of perfection or damage they may be in

There is nothing mystical/spiritual about any of this.

When we discover exactly how consciousness arises from the brain, I'm sure you'll move the goalposts and claim that it was "compatible" with mysticism all along. You act just like a prophet and fortune teller who make extremely vague predictions that can apply to anyone/anything.

I don't think I'll need to worry about science discovering exactly how conscious awareness arises from the brain in my lifetime.

Planning on dying within 20 years? ...but thats unfair. I know better than to make predictions about the future of scientific discoveries. Understanding the structures and mechanisms of a piece of machinery with literally billions of individual parts (neurons) is no small task.

Its just intellectually vacuous (perhaps even intentionally deceitful) nonsense that fools the gullible and unwary. but those who actually pause to pay attention see right through it.

See right through what?

You seem to be already convinced of a purely secular picture of reality.

Trying to turn this around on me does nothing to vindicate your intellectually vacuous position. All this grandiose talk you make about the spiritual/mystical answers you have is a bunch of Grade A Baloney thats nothing but word games, woo, and pseudoscience. The further we dig into trying to get you to say something specific and non-obscure, the more desperate you become.

But what you don't seem to be aware of is just how much your views are actually faith-based. You apparently have complete faith in the scientific method to come up with a completely secular explanation of reality.

Once again, trying to turn this around on me does nothing to vindicate your intellectually vacuous spiritual/mystical obscurantism.

It seems you are getting desperate to distract from the point.

Science doesn't even know what energy is, of what breathes fire into the quantitative equations that describe the physical world.

Another argument form ignorance: Science doesn't know what energy even is therefore my mystical/spiritual answer is believable or true!



You know what an interesting definition for insanity is? Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. You keep repeating the same argument from ignorance again, and again, and again.... and you think no one notices?

Science has already discovered that the quantum realm behaves in truly strange and weird ways compared with the macro world. Yet you seem to want to push that scientific discovery under the carpet as though it doesn't hold any merit at all.

Once again, trying to turn this around on me just screams of desperation to avoid addressing my criticisms head on.

[Divine Insight]

[quote="[url=http://debatingchristianity.com/forum
You claim to have a "mystical"/"spiritual" explanation for consciousness. Yet when I ask you to clearly explain what the explanation is, all you can do is identify consciousness. You don't explain it or present anything knowledgeable about it.

As expected, YOU HAVE NOTHING.

You are arguing with yourself. I never claimed to have an "explanation" for anything. That's your own desire being pushed onto me.

Where did I ever claim to have an explanation for anything?

All I'm saying is that if we allow for the postulates of mysticism things make sense AND are compatible with all known scientific knowledge.

If we simply postulate that reality is some sort of dream talking place in the mind of a supreme being that we can't understand then this is indeed an answer to all our questions. It's not an "explanation" because we haven't explained how this higher being can exist. But that's irrelevant. Mysticism isn't claiming to explain how this mystical mind can exist.

What you seem to be missing entirely is that science is the one that has no explanations all the while pretending that it has explanations.

Can science explain how anything came to be in the first place?

No it cannot. Sure, it may have been able to observe that it appears that the universe began as some sort of primordial explosion some 13.7 billion years ago. But it cannot explain what it was that banged, or from whence that material or energy came from.

So science has NOTHING to offer. NOTHING. Just as you accuse me of having NOTHING.

The mere fact that science is able to observe that the universe started as some sort of high energy explosion and then expanded is NOTHING but an observation of what already is. That's not impressive.

Also, when it comes to the question of what it is that is having an experience science has NOTHING to offer. What is the scientific "explanation"? That some sort of an emergent property is having an experience?

What sense does that even make?

Moreover, it's hardly and explanation. There would still be the extreme mystery of how an emergent property could have an experience and then vanish.

If you think that science has an explanation for any of this then you are the one who is being deluded by science.

All I'm saying is that the philosophy of mysticism is on equal footing with the philosophy of science.

You don't seem to understand science at all. Science can't tell you anything more than what can be observed. In fact, this is precisely how it necessarily must be limited because it refuses to even consider things that can't be observed.

Although, in truth, even that is changing in recent times. Scientists are beginning to believe in things like a multi-verse if only because the evidence from other theories appears to point in this direction. Although those previous theories could be all wrong as well.

You faith in science is a religious faith. You're placing all your hopes and dreams on the idea that what humans deem to be logical investigation will somehow pan out and the universe will comply to the thinking of human beings.

I seriously doubt that this will be the case. The universe hasn't conformed to our previous guesses, and most likely won't comply to our modern day guesses either.

The mystical guess is every bit as good as the scientific guesses when it comes to these deeper questions of reality.

So when it comes to these particular questions science has NOTHING either.

[Divine Insight]

Can you please provide the science journal that states how QM disproved reductionism. I never got that memo or read this journal.

Look up Bell's Theorem. Bell's theorem demands that we must forfeit either locality, or causality. Take your choice.

Please back up your claim. And no, I am not interested in your obscurantism or mental gymnastics on this. State the journal or retract your claim.

I just did. Bell's Theorem and the experimental verification of quantum entanglement. It's very well know in physics, I shouldn't need to point it out to you.

What qualifies you not being an obscurantist?

Because I know exactly what I'm talking about and I try to communicate it as clearly as possible.

Also, will please quit with your strawman accusations?

So, all particle physics is rubbish, they can not discover more: the standard model is complete and there is only 'DI's mystical stuff' that science admitted can not be reduced?

I never said that particle physics is rubbish. This is total strawman on your part.

Although any particle physicist will freely tell you that's it's not really about particles at all.

I also never said that the standard model of particle physics is complete. It can't be complete without a working theory of the graviton which they haven't yet been able to describe or detect. We all know that the standard model is incomplete. And there can be improvements made to that model. The discovery of the Higgs field was one such improvement. But that didn't violate QM nor shed anymore light on the mysteries of QM.

Just because they don't have a complete picture of the standard model doesn't mean that they will need to violate QM in order to improve that model.

The problem is that it's actually quite possible for them to find a complete standard model where there is nothing more to add to the picture and STILL remain restricted by QM. The Standard Model would then be as far as we could go but it still wouldn't be a complete picture of reality.

There is nothing in the Standard Model of Particle physics that predicts or promises that it will reveal the complete workings of reality. Steven Weinberg himself has confessed this. And I think he was the one who dubbed the name "Standard Model".

Even Steven Weinberg says, "There is nothing written in the stars that says that nature has to make physicists happy".

Studying the fundamental constituents of nature does not guarantee that this will pan out in some profound understanding of the true nature of reality. On the contrary, after all this hard work we might end up with nothing more than a complete description of how the fundamental constituents of our universe behave with absolutely NO CLUE why those fundamental constituents behave the way they do.

Physicists have already realized that they have no clue why these particles have the masses and forces they they have. They have something like 22 fundamental parameters that they have absolutely no clue why they have the values they have.

And the Standard Model of Particle physics doesn't even try to explain those. It has no need to explain them. It's an observational science. All it does is observe what they are and report that this is what they have to be in order to make things work out to match what we observe.

It may not be possible to discover the true nature of reality by merely observing it. Have you ever thought of that?

That's the presumption of science that has no merit.

Where were we ever given a promise that we should be able to figure out the true nature of reality simply by observing how it behaves? That's an assumption right there.

And this is the underlying assumption of science. Because that's all science can do. Observe, and report what has been observed. Period.

If that fails to pan out, then all of science fails.

It's a gamble placing all eggs in one basket.

[JohnA]

Can you please provide the science journal that states how QM disproved reductionism. I never got that memo or read this journal.

Look up Bell's Theorem. Bell's theorem demands that we must forfeit either locality, or causality. Take your choice.

Please back up your claim. And no, I am not interested in your obscurantism or mental gymnastics on this. State the journal or retract your claim.

I just did. Bell's Theorem and the experimental verification of quantum entanglement. It's very well know in physics, I shouldn't need to point it out to you.

What qualifies you not being an obscurantist?

Because I know exactly what I'm talking about and I try to communicate it as clearly as possible.

Also, will please quit with your strawman accusations?

So, all particle physics is rubbish, they can not discover more: the standard model is complete and there is only 'DI's mystical stuff' that science admitted can not be reduced?

I never said that particle physics is rubbish. This is total strawman on your part.

Although any particle physicist will freely tell you that's it's not really about particles at all.

I also never said that the standard model of particle physics is complete. It can't be complete without a working theory of the graviton which they haven't yet been able to describe or detect. We all know that the standard model is incomplete. And there can be improvements made to that model. The discovery of the Higgs field was one such improvement. But that didn't violate QM nor shed anymore light on the mysteries of QM.

Just because they don't have a complete picture of the standard model doesn't mean that they will need to violate QM in order to improve that model.

The problem is that it's actually quite possible for them to find a complete standard model where there is nothing more to add to the picture and STILL remain restricted by QM. The Standard Model would then be as far as we could go but it still wouldn't be a complete picture of reality.

There is nothing in the Standard Model of Particle physics that predicts or promises that it will reveal the complete workings of reality. Steven Weinberg himself has confessed this. And I think he was the one who dubbed the name "Standard Model".

Even Steven Weinberg says, "There is nothing written in the stars that says that nature has to make physicists happy".

Studying the fundamental constituents of nature does not guarantee that this will pan out in some profound understanding of the true nature of reality. On the contrary, after all this hard work we might end up with nothing more than a complete description of how the fundamental constituents of our universe behave with absolutely NO CLUE why those fundamental constituents behave the way they do.

Physicists have already realized that they have no clue why these particles have the masses and forces they they have. They have something like 22 fundamental parameters that they have absolutely no clue why they have the values they have.

And the Standard Model of Particle physics doesn't even try to explain those. It has no need to explain them. It's an observational science. All it does is observe what they are and report that this is what they have to be in order to make things work out to match what we observe.

It may not be possible to discover the true nature of reality by merely observing it. Have you ever thought of that?

That's the presumption of science that has no merit.

Where were we ever given a promise that we should be able to figure out the true nature of reality simply by observing how it behaves? That's an assumption right there.

And this is the underlying assumption of science. Because that's all science can do. Observe, and report what has been observed. Period.

If that fails to pan out, then all of science fails.

It's a gamble placing all eggs in one basket.

I asked you for a scientific journal. You offered me a math theorem. You said you reject math, so how can you offer this. Besides if Bell's theorem disproves determinism, then it is self refuting since you can not use math in a situation of non-determinism.

When you say determinism is false, then you by default reject that particle physics describe the standard model and that objects exist. And you admit this by offering "DI's mystical stuff" exists. I know you are referring to quantum entanglement, but we have math (probability) to explain that, so your argument that QM PROVED determinism wrong as a blanket statement for all determinism is unfounded, ungrounded, illogical and irrational.

Your argument is self-refuting. You want your own logical system, your own dictionary, and science/math can not determine anything, your mystical rubbish explains it all is unfounded, unscientific rubbish.
This is not a straw man as you wrote this yourself that you reject these fundamental things that we base reality on. You can not have it both ways.
You have not defined your mystical rubbish. All you offer is your Eastern Philosophies that are grounded in no evidence and can not prove anything, let alone disprove anything. Your argument from ignorance grounded in obscurantism is pure drivel. It is silly and you know it.

And you have not disqualified from being an obscurantist. You have not written or explained anything. Before you go off pontificating in your condescending tone to me, define your terms. What is 'mystical'? What is "experience"? I asked you this before and all you do is offer dogma drivel.


Keep posting as it just makes readers realize that you have no base for your dogma. It is worse than religion since only you want to change reality to fit your beliefs. How absurd is your dogma preaching?

I appreciate you continuing to post completely meaningless dogma drivel about the "mystical experience" rubbish which is cemented in your of superstitious simpletons of Eastern Myth. How can you not realize that this is obtuse projection is beyond me.

[Divine Insight]

I asked you for a scientific journal. You offered me a math theorem. You said you reject math, so how can you offer this. Besides if Bell's theorem disproves determinism, then it is self refuting since you can not use math in a situation of non-determinism.

I never said that I reject math. That's your misunderstanding.

I simply said, "If modern mathematics is supposed to correctly describe the quantitative nature of the universe, then modern mathematics is wrong."

And I made it clear in several posts that by modern I'm talking about mathematics invented since the 17th century and in particular with respect to the work of Georg Cantor and modern ideas of set theory.

Besides, if you do not reject that math, then you are stuck with Bell's Theorem. And keep in mind that Bell's Theorem is a theorem not a theory. In other words it has been recognize to be mathematically sound and true.

I have no problem accepting Bell's Theorem because I can accept it using a similar conditional statement as above.

"If modern mathematics correctly describes the quantitative nature of the universe, then Bell's Theorem proves that science has come to a dead end."

And this really highlights my point. Because it basically shows us that as long as modern science depends upon modern mathematics then it will indeed be dead in the water.

When you say determinism is false, then you by default reject that particle physics describe the standard model and that objects exist. And you admit this by offering "DI's mystical stuff" exists. I know you are referring to quantum entanglement, but we have math (probability) to explain that, so your argument that QM PROVED determinism wrong as a blanket statement for all determinism is unfounded, ungrounded, illogical and irrational.

I have no clue what you are talking about when you say, "DI's mystical stuff". You'll need to explain what you mean by that. I don't recall proposing any mystical stuff. The Standard Model already relies on its own mystical stuff.

The Standard Model of Particle physics simply categorizes the behavior of quantum fields of potentiality. In fact, the term "particle" is highly misleading and even particle physicists will be the first to admit to this. That term is just a hang-over from classical thinking.

There are no particles.

What actually exists are quantum waves. And quantum waves are unlike classical waves. They don't behave the same as classical waves. Classical waves are actually large collections of "particles" behaving according to classical mechanics. Quantum waves, on the other hand, are not particle waves. They can only be described as "waves of potentiality" of "waves of probability". We can either of these names as they both apply equally well.

And yes, they do obey the mathematics of probability (not dependent upon modern set theory), so this is ancient mathematics (mathematics that still has merit). The reason they obey the laws of probability are because conservation laws hold. So it should come as no surprise that these waves obey the laws of probability.

Your argument is self-refuting. You want your own logical system, your own dictionary, and science/math can not determine anything, your mystical rubbish explains it all is unfounded, unscientific rubbish.

It's not unscientific. My conclusions and analysis are arrived at based entirely on what can be observed, and what has been reported to have been observed by the scientific community. That's as scientific as it gets.

Yes, I absolute must reject modern mathematics (math ideas invented since the late 17th century) because it's wrong. Besides, that math doesn't reveal any answer anyway. On the contrary it runs into extreme paradoxes that cannot be solved.

So all I'm saying is that science that continues to rely on modern mathematics is indeed dead in the water (proven by Bell's Theorem) and the Heisenberg Uncertain Relationship. Science cannot move forward until it goes back and corrects the errors that were introduced into mathematical formalism in the the 17th century.

This is not a straw man as you wrote this yourself that you reject these fundamental things that we base reality on. You can not have it both ways.

Yes it is strawman on your part because you're not paying attention to the details.

I point out very specific weaknesses and flaws in modern science and mathematics, and you go off the deep end proclaiming that I reject all of logic, math, and science, which is totally strawman on your part.

You have not defined your mystical rubbish.

Forget about anything mystical if that's your hangup. Mystical simply means "Mystery". And Quantum Mechanics is certainly a mystery, so QM is mystical whether you like it or not.

All you offer is your Eastern Philosophies that are grounded in no evidence and can not prove anything, let alone disprove anything. Your argument from ignorance grounded in obscurantism is pure drivel. It is silly and you know it.

The Eastern mystics have a rock solid case. It is very well thought-out and actually quite logical. Any yes they haven't been able to prove any final conclusions but so what? They don't claim to have proof.

Moreover, if you are a secular atheists join the club! You can't prove your conclusions either, so you are in precisely the same boat with the Eastern mystics whether you like it or not.

And you have not disqualified from being an obscurantist. You have not written or explained anything. Before you go off pontificating in your condescending tone to me, define your terms. What is 'mystical'? What is "experience"? I asked you this before and all you do is offer dogma drivel.

Mystical - That which is not yet fully understood (i.e. it's a mystery)

Experience - I'd rather not even try to define this term objectively. Experience is what you are having at this very moment subjectively. And that's the only definition you should need. If you can't understand that definition then perhaps I should conclude that I'm speaking to a non-sentient computer?

Keep posting as it just makes readers realize that you have no base for your dogma. It is worse than religion since only you want to change reality to fit your beliefs. How absurd is your dogma preaching?

I'm not preaching anything. All I'm doing is offering food for thought for intelligent minds.

My impression is that you have become so extremely defensive toward any potential spiritual or mystical idea of reality that you strike out against the very thought of it. I can't say that I blame you considering how absurdly radical many religious fanatics can be, especially those who preach the jealous-God religions.

But I can assure you that there is nothing to fear in the ideas I present. No boogieman jealous God is out to get you. So you needn't worry about that.

I appreciate you continuing to post completely meaningless dogma drivel about the "mystical experience" rubbish which is cemented in your of superstitious simpletons of Eastern Myth. How can you not realize that this is obtuse projection is beyond me.

Why you find the idea of a potential mystical reality to be so threatening is beyond me. Are you not still open-minded to considering the wonders of reality?

I'm simply offering my views for those who may find them interesting. Clearly you have some sort of phobia to this whole topic.

So what is your stance anyway? That a pure secular reality has been proven beyond any reasonable doubt and that to question that result is irrational?

If that's your position then clearly I disagree with you. I see that position as being totally unwarranted, ungrounded, yes, even unscientific rubbish.

There is nothing in science that demands such a conclusion, and that even allows for the modern day screwed up math. Even with the faulty modern day math science still can't make any absolute statements about the true nature of reality. In fact, given the modern mathematics, then Bell's Theorem holds true as does the Heisenberg's Uncertainty principle, and thus science is clearly at a dead-end.

So what exactly is your point?

That we should all become secular atheists? Why? There is no scientific reason to jump to that conclusion.

[JohnA]

I asked you for a scientific journal. You offered me a math theorem. You said you reject math, so how can you offer this. Besides if Bell's theorem disproves determinism, then it is self refuting since you can not use math in a situation of non-determinism.

I never said that I reject math. That's your misunderstanding.

I simply said, "If modern mathematics is supposed to correctly describe the quantitative nature of the universe, then modern mathematics is wrong."

And I made it clear in several posts that by modern I'm talking about mathematics invented since the 17th century and in particular with respect to the work of Georg Cantor and modern ideas of set theory.

Besides, if you do not reject that math, then you are stuck with Bell's Theorem. And keep in mind that Bell's Theorem is a theorem not a theory. In other words it has been recognize to be mathematically sound and true.

I have no problem accepting Bell's Theorem because I can accept it using a similar conditional statement as above.

"If modern mathematics correctly describes the quantitative nature of the universe, then Bell's Theorem proves that science has come to a dead end."

And this really highlights my point. Because it basically shows us that as long as modern science depends upon modern mathematics then it will indeed be dead in the water.

When you say determinism is false, then you by default reject that particle physics describe the standard model and that objects exist. And you admit this by offering "DI's mystical stuff" exists. I know you are referring to quantum entanglement, but we have math (probability) to explain that, so your argument that QM PROVED determinism wrong as a blanket statement for all determinism is unfounded, ungrounded, illogical and irrational.

I have no clue what you are talking about when you say, "DI's mystical stuff". You'll need to explain what you mean by that. I don't recall proposing any mystical stuff. The Standard Model already relies on its own mystical stuff.

The Standard Model of Particle physics simply categorizes the behavior of quantum fields of potentiality. In fact, the term "particle" is highly misleading and even particle physicists will be the first to admit to this. That term is just a hang-over from classical thinking.

There are no particles.

What actually exists are quantum waves. And quantum waves are unlike classical waves. They don't behave the same as classical waves. Classical waves are actually large collections of "particles" behaving according to classical mechanics. Quantum waves, on the other hand, are not particle waves. They can only be described as "waves of potentiality" of "waves of probability". We can either of these names as they both apply equally well.

And yes, they do obey the mathematics of probability (not dependent upon modern set theory), so this is ancient mathematics (mathematics that still has merit). The reason they obey the laws of probability are because conservation laws hold. So it should come as no surprise that these waves obey the laws of probability.

Your argument is self-refuting. You want your own logical system, your own dictionary, and science/math can not determine anything, your mystical rubbish explains it all is unfounded, unscientific rubbish.

It's not unscientific. My conclusions and analysis are arrived at based entirely on what can be observed, and what has been reported to have been observed by the scientific community. That's as scientific as it gets.

Yes, I absolute must reject modern mathematics (math ideas invented since the late 17th century) because it's wrong. Besides, that math doesn't reveal any answer anyway. On the contrary it runs into extreme paradoxes that cannot be solved.

So all I'm saying is that science that continues to rely on modern mathematics is indeed dead in the water (proven by Bell's Theorem) and the Heisenberg Uncertain Relationship. Science cannot move forward until it goes back and corrects the errors that were introduced into mathematical formalism in the the 17th century.

This is not a straw man as you wrote this yourself that you reject these fundamental things that we base reality on. You can not have it both ways.

Yes it is strawman on your part because you're not paying attention to the details.

I point out very specific weaknesses and flaws in modern science and mathematics, and you go off the deep end proclaiming that I reject all of logic, math, and science, which is totally strawman on your part.

You have not defined your mystical rubbish.

Forget about anything mystical if that's your hangup. Mystical simply means "Mystery". And Quantum Mechanics is certainly a mystery, so QM is mystical whether you like it or not.

All you offer is your Eastern Philosophies that are grounded in no evidence and can not prove anything, let alone disprove anything. Your argument from ignorance grounded in obscurantism is pure drivel. It is silly and you know it.

The Eastern mystics have a rock solid case. It is very well thought-out and actually quite logical. Any yes they haven't been able to prove any final conclusions but so what? They don't claim to have proof.

Moreover, if you are a secular atheists join the club! You can't prove your conclusions either, so you are in precisely the same boat with the Eastern mystics whether you like it or not.

And you have not disqualified from being an obscurantist. You have not written or explained anything. Before you go off pontificating in your condescending tone to me, define your terms. What is 'mystical'? What is "experience"? I asked you this before and all you do is offer dogma drivel.

Mystical - That which is not yet fully understood (i.e. it's a mystery)

Experience - I'd rather not even try to define this term objectively. Experience is what you are having at this very moment subjectively. And that's the only definition you should need. If you can't understand that definition then perhaps I should conclude that I'm speaking to a non-sentient computer?

Keep posting as it just makes readers realize that you have no base for your dogma. It is worse than religion since only you want to change reality to fit your beliefs. How absurd is your dogma preaching?

I'm not preaching anything. All I'm doing is offering food for thought for intelligent minds.

My impression is that you have become so extremely defensive toward any potential spiritual or mystical idea of reality that you strike out against the very thought of it. I can't say that I blame you considering how absurdly radical many religious fanatics can be, especially those who preach the jealous-God religions.

But I can assure you that there is nothing to fear in the ideas I present. No boogieman jealous God is out to get you. So you needn't worry about that.

I appreciate you continuing to post completely meaningless dogma drivel about the "mystical experience" rubbish which is cemented in your of superstitious simpletons of Eastern Myth. How can you not realize that this is obtuse projection is beyond me.

Why you find the idea of a potential mystical reality to be so threatening is beyond me. Are you not still open-minded to considering the wonders of reality?

I'm simply offering my views for those who may find them interesting. Clearly you have some sort of phobia to this whole topic.

So what is your stance anyway? That a pure secular reality has been proven beyond any reasonable doubt and that to question that result is irrational?

If that's your position then clearly I disagree with you. I see that position as being totally unwarranted, ungrounded, yes, even unscientific rubbish.

There is nothing in science that demands such a conclusion, and that even allows for the modern day screwed up math. Even with the faulty modern day math science still can't make any absolute statements about the true nature of reality. In fact, given the modern mathematics, then Bell's Theorem holds true as does the Heisenberg's Uncertainty principle, and thus science is clearly at a dead-end.

So what exactly is your point?

That we should all become secular atheists? Why? There is no scientific reason to jump to that conclusion.

I can not deal with your obscurantism and circular arguments anymore.

e.g.
You do not accept modern math, but you offer a modern theorem as proof that you reject science which you do not reject when I ask you why because determinism has been proved wrong completely by science and logic can not represent reality as we know it.

Maybe you are right, you do not rely on obscurantism, maybe you just rely on mumbo jumbo circularity around the pole. I am not sure there is a fallacy name for this mumbo jumbo you are pontificating. I can invent one and call it "DI mystical experience fallacy'.

Regardless, I am not playing.

[Divine Insight]

[Replying to post 286 by JohnA]

And maybe you're just hostile to my ideas.

That makes the most sense to me.

If you don't like them, don't read them. It's that easy.

[JohnA]

[Replying to post 286 by JohnA]

And maybe you're just hostile to my ideas.

That makes the most sense to me.

If you don't like them, don't read them. It's that easy.

You do not have any ideas, mumbo jumbo is not ideas since it is self-refuting circular rubbish.

[Divine Insight]

You do not have any ideas, mumbo jumbo is not ideas since it is self-refuting circular rubbish.

I laid everything out very clearly. You inability to comprehend my ideas does not translate into mumbo jumbo on my part.

It's pretty clear that you are simply hostile to these ideas.

Besides, if you think that science supports a conclusion of a purely secular reality then I question your knowledge of scientific information and methods.

This idea that science supports a religious movement of "Secular Atheism" is itself nothing more than new-age mumbo jumbo being lead by evangelical charlatan atheists like Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and others.

There is no scientific support for their views. They create that mumbo jumbo on their own. They are jumping the gun by a long shot. Our scientific understanding of reality is nowhere near being in a position to jump to such unwarranted conclusions.

If you truly value logic you should know better than to jump to unwarranted conclusions without sufficient evidence. You shouldn't fall for their mumbo jumbo so easily.