*So you're saying that matter is as much a delusion as the luminiferous
aether and could be a logical extension of Kant's subjective definitions
of space and time? And the splitting of the MWI is just permutations of
equations? Gosh.
m.a.
*
Bruno Marchal wrote:
>
> On 16 Nov 2008, at 11:20, Kory Heath wrote:
>
>> On Nov 15, 2008, at 5:22 PM, m.a. wrote:
>>> *Isn't some sort of substrate necessary for any mathematical event,
>>> whether it be a brain or a screen or a universe? And isn't that
>>> substrate sufficiently different from the math to be called physical
>>> existence?
>>> *
>>
>> That's certainly the prevailing intuition. My position is that that
>> intuition is incorrect, and that it bears a deep similarity to the
>> (once prevailing) vitalist's intuition that some kind of "life
>> force", sufficiently different than inanimate matter, is necessary
>> for life.
>>
>> I'm arguing that mathematical facts-of-the-matter all by themselves
>> fulfill the requirements that the materialist's substrate is supposed
>> to fulfill. The materialists disagree, but then the burden is on them
>> to explain exactly what qualities this substrate needs to have, and
>> why mathematical facts-of-the-matter don't fit the bill. I've never
>> heard a non-question-begging response. What I've heard a lot of is,
>> "Mathematical facts-of-the-matter just aren't the kinds of things
>> that can count as a physical substrate." But that's just a
>> restatement of the position that needs to be defended.
>>
>> When the materialists try to describe what kind of thing *would* fit
>> the bill, I find the descriptions as confusing as the vitalist's
>> descriptions of the life-force.
>
>
> I agree 99% with you, and I have myself in my papers and in this list
> compared very often "materialism" with "vitalism". In generally I do
> that after the seventh step of the UDA. At that step people should
> understand that, in case a concrete UD is executed integrally
> (infinite task) in our material universe, then, to predict what a pen
> will do if we drop it, we have to look at the entire set of possible
> computations going through our current state (when in from of that
> pen) OK?
>
> Now, are you aware that the MGA is just an argument to logically show
> that the material invocation, cannot indeed be used to contradict of
> weaken the consequence of those 7 steps?
>
> No need (for you!) of MGA, if you have already the (correct) intuition
> that using materialism just cannot work. The use of matter is indeed
> akin to the (fraudulous) use of God for explaining the existence of
> the universe. That explain nothing. But we do have a very strong
> intuition that matter does exist, and it is not so simple (and indeed
> quite subtle) to precisely show that primitive or fundamental matter
> is a red herring both for the mind and the body part of the mind-body
> problem. OK?
>
> I will begin by a step 0, for the MGA, where I sum up what should be
> completely clear before beginning the MGA itself. I have also to
> explain what the MGA does not. For example the MGA does not prove the
> inexistence of matter, it proves only to irrelevance of the notion of
> matter concerning again both mind and body, consciousness and physics.
>
> Bruno
>
> http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/~marchal/ <http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/%7Emarchal/>
>
>
>
>
> >
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Received on Tue Nov 18 2008 - 09:31:11 PST