What's wrong with Materialism?

[bobhikes]

No, but science is the only discipline actively conducting a principled enquiry into such questions. The only reasoned answers you'll get will come from materialism.

This statement summarizes my dislike of materialism, which your OP asked for and you confirm. What I have been saying, even though science has proved very little, there are exceptions or limitations to every law and theory they have proved. The materialist insists that science and materialism are the only answers.

As to magic or religion not a fan for solutions but, I do believe the Human is more than the parts. There is a collective association that creates something more than just the parts. Gravity would be an example. Without large masses gravity would not exist. A single atom creates no gravity but Huge masses of atoms create gravity. Robots with many electrons cpu's and other things that mimic the brain are not conscious yet we are.

 

[George-ananda]

There's no mention of that paper ever appearing in a reputable journal of science (where it would first have to pass peer review). Was it in fact so published?

I am not as a layman knowledgeable in what you consider 'reputable'. She was selected by the U.S. government because of her eminent status in the field to statistically analyze the results of the government sponsored psi experiments. Here is a bit of her resume:

2016 President, American Statistical Association

• Chair, Department of Statistics, University of California, Irvine, 2011-2016

• Chief Reader, Advanced Placement Statistics Exam, 2014-2018

• Vice President, International Association for Statistical Education, 2011-2013

• Member, Board of Directors, American Statistical Association, 2010-2012

• Chair, Committee of Presidents of Statistical Societies (COPSS), Jan 2007 - Dec 2009

• Chair of the Board, Consortium for the Advancement of Undergraduate Statistics Education (CAUSE)

• Vice-Chair of the Board, National Institute of Statistical Sciences (NISS), 2008-2011

Now after decades of interest in the paranormal and spirituality, I am convinced that there is a certain segment of the scientific community that will never accept positive results in parapsychology. As Utts' said in the paper, there is no purpose in conducting more experiments to determine the existence of psi for those not satisfied by the current level of evidence. In her words:

I believe that it would be wasteful of valuable resources to continue to look for proof. No one who has examined all of the data across laboratories, taken as a collective whole, has been able to suggest methodological or statistical problems to explain the ever-increasing and consistent results to date.

Basically she is saying if the current data from 20 years of experiments have not satisfied some, then further testing for proof to convince them would be a waste of resources.

Before we go further on this tangent, let me get back to the OP subject of materialism and say this one paper is only one strand of hay in the haystack of why I reject materialism.

 

[George-ananda]

Yes, I am directly referring to the problems with ancient belief systems in today's world, such as the conflicts, violence, and rejection of science. There are real reasons for the Baha'i Faith, and not just because it is nice religion that believes in unity.

Even though I do not believe in Ontological Naturalism (Physicalism or Materialism?) it does get science right and deals with the reality of the physical world better and more consistently than ancient religions.

OK, I think then what you are saying is rejection of things like Biblical literalism. Your post came across to me as an attack on religion period with their God concept and et al. Your words:

Actually considering the fallible nature of humans clinging to the delusion of a sense of belonging to ancient paradigms, believers in whatever God or God(s) may become . . . 'Just dead people walking.

 

[atanu]

By 'materialism' I mean (as Smart and Armstrong put it) the idea that the only entities and processes that exist are those recognized by physics from time to time.
..
If you reject materialism, why?

When you deny the existence of any object (or the subject itself) on the ground of it not being perceived, you admit an inference which itself is based on non-perception.

In other words, materialism is self refuting.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

. Decency is one of the currencies of society

.

Before Christianity, ancient Rome was arguably the most advanced civilization on Earth, where watching innocent people suffer and die horribly was considered the height of civilized public entertainment, and sex slaves didn't raise an eyebrow, just as in many primitive societies, but on a grander scale

Without a specific source of morality, the most advanced civilizations are simply more efficient at practicing, marketing, disseminating immorality

In terms of the OP, that's one downside of materialism, the tendency to downplay more ephemeral factors like personal morality & culture, and place more reliance on the all powerful God of 'natural cause and effect' to sort it all out

 

[ADigitalArtist]

I do not think you understand this correctly. To do statistical odds against chance there must be an objective way of judging.

Let me give the simplest example.

In a Ganzfeld experiment a sender tries to psychically send a random image to a receiver person. The receiver is then asked to select which of four random images the sender was seeing. If materialism is correct, the receiver should be correct 25% of the time. But if the score is higher than 25% over a large sample size then the odds of a materialist explanation can be precisely calculated. Utts' involvement is in being a recognized expert in statistical analysis.

My point is that parapsychologist understand the subjective stuff you are talking about so they devise ingenious ways to remove subjective judging.

Here is more detailed description:

Experimental procedure
In a typical ganzfeld experiment, a 'receiver' is left in a room relaxing in a comfortable chair with halved ping-pong balls over the eyes, having a red light shone on them. The receiver also wears a set of headphones through which white or pink noise (static) is played. The receiver is in this state of mild sensory deprivation for half an hour. During this time a 'sender' observes a randomly chosen target and tries to mentally send this information to the receiver. The receiver speaks out loud during the thirty minutes, describing what he or she can see. This is recorded by the experimenter (who is blind to the target) either by recording onto tape or by taking notes, and is used to help the receiver during the judging procedure.

In the judging procedure, the receiver is taken out of the ganzfeld state and given a set of possible targets, from which they must decide which one most resembled the images they witnessed. Most commonly there are three decoys along with a copy of the target itself, giving an expected overall hit rate of 25% over several dozens of trials.

However before we get off on this tangent, this is only one reason for my rejection of materialism. We are splitting just one strand of hay with this discussion in a haystack of reasons I have given for rejection of materialism.

A claim of objectivity doesn't mean the standards for objectivity were met. Specifically regarding the Ganzfield meta-analysis, over half were rejected due to problems like improper sealage of sender and receiver causing sensory leakage, and the parameters for statistical gathering of 'hits' depended on who was doing the analysis and judging. Since there was huge variance depending on the statistician, we know there's something amiss im the protocol. As Susan Blackmore said:

These experiments, which looked so beautifully designed in print, were in fact open to fraud or error in several ways, and indeed I detected several errors and failures to follow the protocol while I was there. I concluded that the published papers gave an unfair impression of the experiments and that the results could not be relied upon as evidence for psi. Eventually the experimenters and I all published our different views of the affair. The main experimenter left the field altogether.

There's reason enough to be skeptical of the data for psi, no matter how many convinced parties say unequivocally that it's proven.

 

[Jumi]

The purpose of this thread is to invite those who oppose materialism to set out the reasons for their opposition.

If you reject materialism, why?

I'm rather neutral about the type of materialism you follow. People will come to conclusions based on what they know or can know at their present.

 

[Nous]

What are the “entities and processes . . . recognized by physics from time to time”?

That's an open-ended question, since it will change from time to time.

Yes, if it were true that "physics" actually "recognized" the existence of particular "entities and processes" while not "recognizing" the existence of other particular entities and processes, then the materialist who claims that nothing else exists but those those entities and processes that "physics" has "recognized" on any given day would always be wrong.

But, of course, it isn't true that "physics" "recognizes" the existence of particular "entities and processes" on any given day. Here is how we know that the belief that "physics" engages in nonsense is delusional:

Name all of the entities and processes that "physics" recognizes as existing today, and cite your sources.

Where does one get the delusional idea that "physics" “recognizes” certain “entities and processes from time to time”?

You think that the electron, or the Higgs boson, is a delusion? You think that radioactive decay is a delusion? You think that those are not entities and processes recognized by physics as at this date?

Perhaps a problem with reading comprehension is what gives rise to the thesis of materialism these days. Read this sentnce again and see if you can discern what is referred to as delusional: Where does one get the delusional idea that "physics" “recognizes” certain “entities and processes from time to time”?

If someone had told this sort of materialist in 1900 that wave functions exist, the materialist would deny it, presumably claiming that wave functions are “supernatural”.

Which 'wave functions'?

This one: Ψ Wavefunction

The materialism that you espouse generates wrong answers, wrong ideas, wrong beliefs at any given time.

For instance?

Perhaps my sentences are too long for you. Examples of "materialism," as you have defined it, giving wrong answers would be the person in 1900 who disavowed the existence of wave functions, and the person in 1960 who claimed that strange attractors do not exist.

Truth is the best opinion available to us at any particular time and place.

So, if someone were to say in 1960, "I reject the existence of all entities and processes that 'physics' does not recognize today," we know that what that person accepted and rejected as existing was wrong. Right?

 

[oldbadger]

I do not believe the social definition is the proper definition for what Materialism is proposed in this thread.

Bully for you!
But the thread title simply read:-
What's wrong with Materialism?

I do not consider the scientific? one (Philosophical Naturalism) as strange.

Bully for you!
I don't pretend to know subjects that are strange to me.

This is a non sequitur, or the problem that it does not follow that Physicalism determines one's spiritual values? or morals and ethics.

Spiritual values....! eh? And linked to morals and ethics!
Now what would they be, since you, as a bahai, are most unlikely to believe in spiritualism, mediums, healers or things spiritual?
Now that really is a non sequitur.

 

[George-ananda]

A claim of objectivity doesn't mean the standards for objectivity were met. Specifically regarding the Ganzfield meta-analysis, over half were rejected due to problems like improper sealage of sender and receiver causing sensory leakage, and the parameters for statistical gathering of 'hits' depended on who was doing the analysis and judging. Since there was huge variance depending on the statistician, we know there's something amiss im the protocol. As Susan Blackmore said:

There's reason enough to be skeptical of the data for psi, no matter how many convinced parties say unequivocally that it's proven.

I am aware that Utts' analysis is challenged by some skeptics. One can argue anything into infinity if that is what one wants. At some point an interested party has to look deeper and form an opinion on which side is being more honest and objective with the overall situation. After that, both sides have to go their own way as further debate is a waste of time.

But back to the main topic, this is one strand of hay we are splitting in a haystack of evidence against materialism.

 

[shunyadragon]

Bully for you!
But the thread title simply read:-
What's wrong with Materialism?


Bully for you!
I don't pretend to know subjects that are strange to me.

You need to read the introductory post, and not just the title:

The question presented by @blü 2 concerned scientific materialism and not social materialism . . .

I'm a materialist, principally because I think the primary question is, What's true in reality? and I'm not aware of any meaningful alternative to materialism.

By 'materialism' I mean (as Smart and Armstrong put it) the idea that the only entities and processes that exist are those recognized by physics from time to time.

And accordingly, by 'reality' I mean the realm of the physical sciences, the sum of things that have objective existence.

The purpose of this thread is to invite those who oppose materialism to set out the reasons for their opposition.

Spiritual values....! eh? And linked to morals and ethics!
Now what would they be, since you, as a bahai, are most unlikely to believe in spiritualism, mediums, healers or things spiritual?
Now that really is a non sequitur.

Spiritual values do not translate to spiritualism, mediums nor healers.

I believe spiritual values, morals and ethics are universally innate in all of humanity regardless of what we profess we believe. I believe that the evolution of human spiritual, moral, and ethical values is in herent in all humanity since the first human.

 

[blü 2]

Very surreal! Is this your personal materialism, or is there a philosophical tradition you are using here?

My own conclusion after looking at the subjective / objective question, originally in considering Platonism in mathematics, which holds that numbers (1, 2, 3, ... π ... i ...) have an objective existence but can't say how. Numbers are instead concepts, more particularly abstractions, which is why you never encounter an uninstantiated 2 out there.

And consider how humans use eg twoness: before you can count, you must make a selection of the particular things to be counted, and the field in which the counting is to be done: "there are two peas (selection and definition of what is to be counted, exclusion of other things) on my plate (definition of field)". That process is innate in every counting. In the absence of a brain, no concepts of two, pea, plate are available, and nature is continuous, not self-dividing into defined categories or fields in this way.

We've evolved to interpret our sensory input in ways useful to our survival and breeding. It's an error to overlook the interpreting we automatically, unconsciously, constantly do. Not just beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

 

[blü 2]

Even in materialism there are things like thoughts which don't really have apparent physical attributes. Can memories simply be certain chemical configurations or data with certain electrical frequencies coming from neurons?

Not 'electrical frequencies' as such, but bioelectrical intensities (stronger / weaker) in the interconnections. But sure, why should they not be adequate? The argument from incredulity doesn't get us far, so back to the lab to see how it really works, no?

 

[blü 2]

This statement summarizes my dislike of materialism, which your OP asked for and you confirm. What I have been saying, even though science has proved very little, there are exceptions or limitations to every law and theory they have proved. The materialist insists that science and materialism are the only answers.

And that will remain true until someone gives a satisfactory demonstration of an alternative.

I do believe the Human is more than the parts. There is a collective association that creates something more than just the parts.

In a sense, that's right. The cooperation of the neurons of the brain, the muscles, bones, tendons, organs, membranes of the body, the regulatory systems of the body controlling temperature, breathing, heart action, water content of the blood, on and on, show the fine tuning which evolution has produced that makes H sap sap possible.

 

[blü 2]

I am not as a layman knowledgeable in what you consider 'reputable'. She was selected by the U.S. government because of her eminent status in the field to statistically analyze the results of the government sponsored psi experiments.

'Reputable' means the journals of science that are well regarded in the fields of science they serve; they're where serious scientists like to be published. There are many such and they all involve peer review before publication. That's why publication is important, and why not being published detracts from the Utts paper you link.

I find the paper is not simply uncritical of the methods by why the studies under reference were conducted, but not even curious about them. I regard the paper's acceptance of all the evidence being equally and innately credible as a major weakness right at the threshold. And there's more, but it needn't detain us.

If you have some more persuasive example of the mountain of evidence you mentioned, I'm happy to look at it.

Before we go further on this tangent, let me get back to the OP subject of materialism and say this one paper is only one strand of hay in the haystack of why I reject materialism.

Yes, I understand you have another philosophy, as you mentioned.

 

[blü 2]

I'm rather neutral about the type of materialism you follow. People will come to conclusions based on what they know or can know at their present.

Yes, you're right.

I don't assume otherwise.

 

[blü 2]

Yes, if it were true that "physics" actually "recognized" the existence of particular "entities and processes" while not "recognizing" the existence of other particular entities and processes, then the materialist who claims that nothing else exists but those those entities and processes that "physics" has "recognized" on any given day would always be wrong.

Not so. It's simply the way to answer such questions as they arise. How many times a day does your conversation depend on the existence of tachyons or new kinds of neutrino?

Name all of the entities and processes that "physics" recognizes as existing today, and cite your sources.

I answered that in my previous post to you.

Examples of "materialism," as you have defined it, giving wrong answers would be the person in 1900 who disavowed the existence of wave functions, and the person in 1960 who claimed that strange attractors do not exist.

But as I pointed out in my previous post to you, those answers were correct, were 'true' at the time. Truth changes with what we know. That's why the definition of materialism says 'from time to time' ─ but you know that because it too was in my previous post.

I'm afraid that if you crave absolutes, you're going to go hungry.

 

[George-ananda]

'Reputable' means the journals of science that are well regarded in the fields of science they serve; they're where serious scientists like to be published. There are many such and they all involve peer review before publication. That's why publication is important, and why not being published detracts from the Utts paper you link.

It was published in a peer reviewed journal
Jan 1st 1996

• Journal of Parapsychology
• volume 59
• issue 4
• pp 289

The Journal of Parapsychology is a biannual peer-reviewed academic journal covering research on paranormal phenomena, including extrasensory perception, specifically telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, and psychokinesis, as well as human consciousness.

 

[Sapiens]

It was published in a peer reviewed journal
Jan 1st 1996

• Journal of Parapsychology
• volume 59
• issue 4
• pp 289

The Journal of Parapsychology is a biannual peer-reviewed academic journal covering research on paranormal phenomena, including extrasensory perception, specifically telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, and psychokinesis, as well as human consciousness.

That's what they claim ... but the real test of a journal is how often it is cited in other journals, any idea what the Journal of Parapsychology's Citation Index is?

 

[blü 2]

It was published in a peer reviewed journal
Jan 1st 1996

• Journal of Parapsychology
• volume 59
• issue 4
• pp 289

The Journal of Parapsychology is a biannual peer-reviewed academic journal covering research on paranormal phenomena, including extrasensory perception, specifically telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, and psychokinesis, as well as human consciousness.[/QUOTE]
Thanks for that.

According to the net, it is indeed a peer-reviewed journal, but I can't find any detailed description of who are regarded as 'peers' here.

Trouble is, the existence of a Journal of Parapsychology assumes the existence of parapsychology, a point conceded by the physical sciences even more reluctantly these days than in the past. Had the article ─ well, not that article, since I think it's not written nearly well enough to be persuasive to the ordinarily skeptical onlooker, but a well-evidenced article of that kind ─ been accepted in some hard-nosed journal like Nature, it may be I'd have serious food for thought.

(In my view, for the article to have any value, the authors were bound to satisfy themselves in advance about the credentials of the experimenters, the sufficiency of the experimental protocols, and the precise application of the protocols to the experiments ─ but instead they took the papers at face value, thus uncritically adopting the assumptions of the experimenters. Those points are where parapsychology claims repeatedly fall down,)