Steve001 Wrote:Things that are real are physical and physical things are real. Meaning this, real things have properties, can be quantified and can interact with other real things such as you. You should hope those things you think are real. Of course science does not probe the immaterial world, well most science that is.
No steve, that's your own definition of what is real. Congratulations, you've created your own definition and stated it as if it was truth. As others have pointed out, that means nothing. It's your opinion and nothing more.
Defining things that are "real" as things that "have properties, can be quantified and can interact with other real things" is a terrible start, unless your aim is to claim that something like emotion is not real/is imaginary. Certainly emotions cannot be said to have "properties", other than those terms that describe the emotions themselves. We can't quantify how happy or sad someone is. So, if you're going to attempt to argue that emotions and the like are not real and are illusory, then by all means, go for it. That's a different argument altogether. But if that's not your argument, then what you're saying isn't what you believe.
Science and the scientific method do not "do" anything. They are tools which are used by people. As with most people who don't actually understand science but worship it like a deity, you seem to lack the understanding that the people are the ones doing the work. The scientific method provides the tools by which to do that work. Science is entirely neutral as far as whether consciousness is reductive, immaterial, or whatever else. Science does not choose to study certain things and not others; people choose what to study using the scientific method.
Sure, studying what you are describing as "physical" is simpler or more directly easy to study using the scientific method. That does not mean that the method or the principles behind it cannot be used to investigate claims pertaining to phenomena that may not have traditionally physical underpinnings as we currently understand those terms to mean. Are electrons physical? Is an electromagnetic field physical? You certainly would say that they're real, and by your definition they then must be physical. But that doesn't seem apparent from anyone who is actually familiar with those things. Once we get down to it, there are lots of things that science studies and deals with in theory that are really, really stretching a more traditional definition of "physical". So saying that "real is physical and physical is real" is really a vacuous statement that doesn't provide the amount of nuance that is due when discussing such a complex topic. You can think that all you want, but it's of course nowhere near that simple. Given your stated resentment of philosophy (and your implied resentment of any form of critical thought), I'm not surprised that you're not more nuanced about it.
Quote:You scoff at scientism, yet you allude to but offer no alternative for another ism which works half as well, as well or better describing how nature works?
And yet again, you are equating two things that are not the same, at all. Scientism, steve, is not science. They are not the same thing. They are not related. Science is the method by which people study things. Scientism is promissory materialism, and unending faith that science can and will answer every important question there is. The two are not equivalent. Science may or may not answer some of these questions in the future. But constantly falling back on the great, capital s "Science" as a way to answer literally any question is just a way to avoid discussion of an issue in greater depth or detail, a way to avoid engaging the problem.
I'm not sure what alternative you'd expect me to offer to scientism, because it does not work at all. The scientific process works. Scientism does no work. It does not describe nature; it has not and never will. Scientists and researchers will undoubtedly continue to use the scientific method to probe the nature of reality as far as they can. No one, including those researchers, knows for sure whether there is a boundary at which science will not be able to dig any deeper, but it's a fair guess that such a boundary exists. And of course, we already know of many examples of questions which science just does not speak on. I'm sure you're unwilling to acknowledge that such things exist, and that's fine. But the one thing that is absolutely certain, is that scientism has not ever described anything about the nature of reality, discovered anything meaningful, or produced any new understandings of things.
This is a good article about this discussion:
https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publicati...-scientism
Quote:From my reading, materialism in the old definition (there's only matter) may not be related to science. Physicalism certainly can. It includes matter and forces such as quarks, gravity, dark energy... . Physicalism was coined in the early 20th century in response to how the pursuit of science was revealing nature's secrets.
The issue, as has been addressed by me and others dozens of times that I've seen on this forum, is that calling something "physical" is a really slippery slope. It's a nebulous term in this sort of discussion, and could become more so in the future. What we now consider to be bizarre and nonphysical or immaterial could some day be considered "physical," but to "immaterialists" today it could be similar to what they were expecting. Simply broadening the term "physical" to include all future things discovered or discoverable by science really renders the word meaningless, at least in terms of the reductive sort of physical that is generally talked about in consciousness discussions.
Linda stated "immaterialists are constrained to finding something that can still be regarded as 'not material' in some way, which I’m guessing may depend upon an outdated concept of physical or material." And unless I misunderstand her (which, apparently, is very likely), this at least relates to what I just said above. I don't think immaterialists are constrained to finding something "not material" unless you first assume that they literally never adjust as science adjusts, and as the concept of what is physical is broadened. Again, microscopic particles and fields likely would not have been described as "physical" a couple hundred years ago if one was to travel back in time and describe it to scientists and philosophers of that era. It's possible that in the future science could make some profound discovery regarding the nature of consciousness that goes far, far beyond what a reductive and materialistic view today would suggest. If that were to occur, it's also possible that people might describe whatever the discovery is, as "physical" because it was discovered by science. Surely, that "physical" would not be remotely similar to what we would call physical today. And that's the whole point. Immaterialists, if we're going to call them that, would not at all be constrained to finding something "non material" just for the sake of it. Their premonitions and reasoning would have turned out to be correct, even if people described such a new discovery as being "physical". The definition of physical has expanded before, and it's very possible that it will continue to do so as more discoveries are made.
So, simply stating that something will turn out to be discovered by science does not actually tell us anything about the nature of its reality or who would be "more right" as of now. With such a broad definition of physical, "physical" in the future could be a lot closer to what modern day non-materialists are positing than what modern day materialists are.
Quote:As both isms are apparently interchangable today I would say science and those isms have much in common with the pursuit of scientific knowledge. They are if not sisters to science at least first cousins. With that said I'm not going to contend the point further even if you do.
I already addressed this to an extent, but no, physicalism and materialism having nothing to do with science. They're philosophical, a priori positions about what exists. Adhering to one of them defines the extent to which some person believes the scientific method can discover things, and nothing else. They have nothing in common with the "pursuit of scientific knowledge" unless you are someone who assumes that the only things that exist are reductive, material things as we currently understand those terms, and thus that science can only discover such things (because they are the only things there are to be discovered).
They are absolutely, positively not related to science, And for all your claimed disdain of philosophy, it is fun to see you try to smuggle philosophical positions underneath the science umbrella.