Materialism as a religion

I'm always a bit bemused by these discussions. Admittedly there's no satisfying explanation of how consciousness can arise in a materialistic world. But is there a satisfying non-materialistic explanation of how consciousness arises? Or is it just essentially a matter of saying that there's a non-material entity which is somehow intrinsically conscious?

[Laird]

I never saw any explanation or evidence to substantiate such claims.

I've heard at least one explanation, I just don't think it makes sense.

Perhaps this echoes the title of this thread?

Yes, perhaps.

[Laird]

{I}s it just essentially a matter of saying that there's a non-material entity which is somehow intrinsically conscious?

For me the answer, provisionally, is "Yes", just as materialists take matter to be intrinsic - axiomatic in a sense. But without an answer to the fundamental metaphysical question, everything is provisional.

I've heard such claims. But I never saw any explanation or evidence to substantiate such claims.

Perhaps this echoes the title of this thread?

I think part of the evidence is that, despite looking really hard, we’ve never found anything in biology that is outside the known physical building blocks of the universe. I’m not saying we should stop looking though.

I also wouldn’t want to underestimate the wonder and mystery of those building blocks.

I'm just encouraged that people - including academics - are at last willing to stand up and say that scientism exists and that the general public should be aware of it. The video posted above is one of a series with scientists and philosophers addressing the same issue. 

To recognise that scientism is a fact is not to reject science. It is to acknowledge that science and the scientific method is limited to materialism, usually referred to as naturalism. Clearly then, science is going to show progress when dealing with the material world - with things that fall within its scope. It would be silly to argue that it hasn't. It would also be short-sighted to claim that science has been successful in explaining many of the subjects we discuss here. At best it can claim to be the tool by which we can sometimes sort the wheat from the chaff. 

There were times when science was used with an open mind to investigate the paranormal. People like William James, Richard Hodgson and Oliver Lodge were unafraid to risk their reputations. Yet if one were to rely on Wikipedia, for example, then one would be unable to separate science from scientism. The entry for Oliver Lodge, for example, contains the following:

Edward Clodd criticized Lodge as being an incompetent researcher to detect fraud and claimed his Spiritualist beliefs were based on magical thinking and primitive superstition. Charles Arthur Mercier (a leading British psychiatrist) wrote in his book Spiritualism and Sir Oliver Lodge (1917) that Lodge had been duped into believing mediumship by trickery and his Spiritualist views were based on assumptions and not scientific evidence. Francis Jones in the American Journal of Psychology in a review for Lodge's The Survival of Man wrote that his psychical claims are not scientific and the book is one-sided as it does not contain research from experimental psychology. 

So a man can be lauded for his scientific achievements (he was knighted in recognition of such) yet dismissed as "an incompetent researcher" when he strayed from the confines of materialism. Terms like "magical thinking" and "primitive superstition" have become part of the vocabulary of scientism. Should anyone doubt that scientism has become the religion it is accused of being, here's one of its high priests, Michael Shermer, proclaiming its status as such.

Scientism is courageously proffering naturalistic answers that supplant supernaturalistic ones and in the process is providing spiritual sustenance for those whose needs are not being met by these ancient cultural traditions. Second, we are, at base, a socially hierarchical primate species. We show deference to our leaders, pay respect to our elders and follow the dictates of our shamans; this being the Age of Science, it is scientism’s shamans who command our veneration. Third, because of language we are also storytelling, mythmaking primates, with scientism as the foundational stratum of our story and scientists as the premier mythmakers of our time.

I think part of the evidence is that, despite looking really hard, we’ve never found anything in biology that is outside the known physical building blocks of the universe. I’m not saying we should stop looking though.

I also wouldn’t want to underestimate the wonder and mystery of those building blocks.

Malf, when you limit the scope of your investigation to naturalistic causes then you can only expect to discover naturalistic evidence. It is a self-confirming argument. Science confines itself to the objective and the naturalistic. It is taboo to suggest that biology, to use your example, might show evidence of mind at work. That is dismissed at the outset (as we can see in the long-running Darwin thread here on this forum).

If you really don't want to underestimate the wonder, then don't restrict your thinking. Open your mind (if you can first accept that your mind exists).

Malf, when you limit the scope of your investigation to naturalistic causes then you can only expect to discover naturalistic evidence. It is a self-confirming argument. Science confines itself to the objective and the naturalistic. It is taboo to suggest that biology, to use your example, might show evidence of mind at work. That is dismissed at the outset (as we can see in the long-running Darwin thread here on this forum).

If you really don't want to underestimate the wonder, then don't restrict your thinking. Open your mind (if you can first accept that your mind exists).

And yet parapsychologists and their kin use science to find proof. Should they find it does it constitute immaterial knowledge or does it extend the definition of what is material?

I think part of the evidence is that, despite looking really hard, we’ve never found anything in biology that is outside the known physical building blocks of the universe. I’m not saying we should stop looking though.

I also wouldn’t want to underestimate the wonder and mystery of those building blocks.

Not even an inkling.

I've heard such claims. But I never saw any explanation or evidence to substantiate such claims.

Perhaps this echoes the title of this thread?

How many years centuries millennia have people felt the same as you? How much does faith account for persistence of an immaterial world? Your position like so many other expressed suggests a self imposed ignorance or outright disdain maybe both for all science has discovered.  Someone wise once said, nature does not reveal it's secrets easily. For example, it's been nearly 100 years since the formalization of quantum mechanics and scientists still do not know what it is telling us about the fundamental nature of reality. Should we point our collective fingers and accuse quantum mechanics can't? I say no. So why do you seem so willing to through the baby out with the bathwater?

Malf, when you limit the scope of your investigation to naturalistic causes then you can only expect to discover naturalistic evidence. It is a self-confirming argument. Science confines itself to the objective and the naturalistic. It is taboo to suggest that biology, to use your example, might show evidence of mind at work. That is dismissed at the outset (as we can see in the long-running Darwin thread here on this forum).

If you really don't want to underestimate the wonder, then don't restrict your thinking. Open your mind (if you can first accept that your mind exists).

I’m not limiting anything which is why we should keep on looking, and ponder the mystery of chemistry. 

In the meantime we know the chemical breakdown of a human:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Composit...human_bodygd

I’m not strongly averse to these elements being little ‘bits (projections?) of mind’ rather than ‘little bits of matter’ in line with your idealistic view. I’m not sure whether that really explains those ‘big questions’ more satisfactorily though... I guess individuals can decide on their preferred pragmatic worldview to get things done/get them through the day etc.