New Argument for God

This video explores the meta problem of consciousness proposed by David Chalmers and argues that naturalistic processes couldn’t have given us knowledge of consciousness.

This is my video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WJVvZNi0Fi8

Can naturalistic processes explain how humans came to know that subjective experience exists?

[Laird]

First of all, welcome to the forums, @PonderPoints.

I've watched all four of your videos, and I like the thoughtful, considered approach that you take in them, using thought experiments, analogies, and concrete examples to illustrate philosophical points and arguments. I also share some of your insights, and two in particular are crucial to conclusions I draw in philosophy of mind, but they are different conclusions to the ones you've drawn, although there are also significant similarities.

In any case, I'll focus on the video you've shared in this thread. Rather than deconstructing it at the start, I have some clarifying questions:

1. You say that "subjective experience is in the same position [as ghost dragons] because both of them have no causal effects". Are you saying that subjective experience has no causal effects whatsoever, or just that it has no causal effects on anything natural aka physical?
   
   
2. Is the knowledge that concerns you - that of our own subjective experiences - natural aka physical, or supernatural aka non-physical? I of course don't mean knowledge in the abstract; I mean it in the embedded sense, in the sense of its substrate.
   
   
3. Along similar lines, when you refer to "us" knowing, is the aspect of us that "knows" natural aka physical or supernatural aka non-physical? (I know from one of your other videos that you believe that we are souls that are more than our bodies, so I know that you understand us to have both physical and non-physical aspects.)
   
   
4. More generally, in the context of your assertion that "If something has no causal effects, then there's no naturalistic way to learn about it existing", what are the necessary and sufficient conditions for the sort of knowledge that concerns you in this argument (that of one's own subjective experiences)? For example, does it require anything non-physical? If so, what? Does it have a physical component, e.g., some configuration of neurons in the brain?
   
   
5. You conclude that for us to have knowledge of our subjective experiences, we must have been "supernaturally designed with that knowledge". "Designed with" in this context is ambiguous. It might mean designed to have the general capacity for that knowledge, or it might mean designed to have the specific, applicable knowledge in all specific, applicable circumstances. Maybe there are other possible meanings. Can you clarify as to what you actually mean?
   
   
6. Does God have causal effects?
   
   
7. Is God, ultimately, natural aka physical, or supernatural aka non-physical, or some combination?
   

Incidentally, I think you're right to prefer "subjective experience" to "consciousness", for the very reason you give: "consciousness" means different things in different contexts. I came to a similar conclusion recently.

[Laird]

Given the lack of response to my clarifying questions over a week later, I'll supply a deconstruction anyway:

Your argument seems to be something like this:

1. There are no causes of natural phenomena other than natural causes.
2. Subjective experience is not a natural phenomenon (implicit).
3. Subjective experience is causally inert.
4. Subjectively experiencing beings (such as us) have knowledge of our subjective experiences.
5. Our knowledge of our subjective experiences cannot be explained by natural phenomena nor by subjective experience itself (given #1, #2, and #3).
6. Therefore, our knowledge of our subjective experience is supernatural ("designed").

A lesser (semantic/terminological) problem with this argument is that it conflates "natural" with "physical", and "supernatural" with "non-physical" (in my first post, I alluded to this conflation without calling it out as problematic). This is problematic in particular because most people would agree that subjective experience is non-physical, but not that it is supernatural. I'll otherwise simply run with that conflation in what follows.

The main problem with this argument though is that it simply assumes the truth of premises #1 and #3, without justification. In my view, both are false.

To see why, let's assume that they are true and that the conclusion is sound. We can then show by a sort of reductio ad absurdum that the scenario in which at least one of them is false is rationally more appealing than the scenario in which the conclusion is true, given how rationally unappealing that conclusion is:

When subjective experience is entirely epiphenomenal (caused by natural processes of the brain) except for our knowledge of those subjective experiences, which is supplied to us supernaturally, then we have a sort of special pleading, which is thus rationally unappealing, but, additionally, this scenario suggests another rationally unappealing conclusion, especially given the theistic (protestant Christian) motivations underlying the argument: a denial of free will. If experience is entirely caused by (1) natural phenomena, and (2) divine intervention, then there is no room for personal agency.

If, instead, we allow that premise #3 is false in at least the limited sense according to which subjective experience is causally efficacious with respect to itself, then we have no need for special pleading to explain premise #4: in this case, we have knowledge of our subjective experiences simply because those experiences themselves cause that knowledge in us (i.e., in our own, self-reflexive, experience). Moreover, we don't have to deny free will if we additionally posit that our experiences occur in the context of a non-physical mind (aka soul) which in a holistic sense has personal agency, i.e., it is not wholly determined by natural phenomena like the brain plus special-case divine intervention.

If we then extend that falsity to allow that subjective experience (in the context of each of our non-physical minds) is causally-efficacious with respect to physical phenomena too (including the brain and its processes), and thereby falsify premise #1 too, then we can explain how the intuitive reality that our experiences, such as pain, have real physical effects is correct. We don't, then, have to deny this intuitive reality as you do in the video.

I think it's pretty clear, then, that denying premises #1 and #3 is more rationally appealing than accepting your argument's conclusion.

Related arguments in other Psience Quest threads:

Analytical argument against physicalism. This argument works with similar intuitions and premises as yours to falsify physicalism (which you seem to equate with naturalism).

The Mystery of Psycho-Physical Harmony. This is an argument for theism that might excite you. It works in similar territory: the (strangely harmonious) relationship between physical phenomena like the brain and body, and subjective experience.

Generally, the alternative scenario I suggest (in which premises #1 and #3 are false) is almost certainly more compatible with theism than with atheism, so you need not reject it on the basis that it flies in the face of your religious beliefs.