Y'all are a smart lot, and I would wager that some of you have done a bit of reading in the area of philosophical and scientific understandings of the "mind," "soul," "conciousness," "free will," etc. I've had some pesky questions in the back of my mind about these things for some time, and they've recently come to the fore. Most pertinent are the questions I have about those who would articulate a position of materialism or determinism (ie. denial of free will, denial of souls, "brain in a vat" stuff). I've found some useful insight into these issues from parts of Chesterton's "Orthodoxy," and Berry's "Life is a Miracle," but these works seem to only criticize the method of the materialists/determinists they examine. I'd like to read some folks who engage materialists on their own turf, in their own jargon. If any of you have read something that fits that description, could you point me towards the author/work? Thanks.
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J.R. Lucas apparently has a contra-mechanistic theory of mind.
Materialism in its various forms (perhaps excluding historical materialism?) rests on meta-scientific assumptions and arguably, metaphysical assumptions. I think that eventually betrays the self-reflexive problem that belongs to any philosophical system. This is me speaking broadly, though. There's maybe no reason to think there isn't some barrier between physical reality and something else, or that the mind or soul is a mysterious non-material entity or whatever, but reasons these days seem to count only if they can be epistemologically accounted for - but isn't science the captured territory of philosophy? That we came to think of a mathematical description as somehow more fundamental or real is interesting though. Is a mathematical meaning really a whole 'meaning'? Ok, sorry, I've gone off doing injustice to the big ideas by trampling around like this. Excuse me, etc.
Posted by
bnjmn |
5:43 PM
Actually...
The early famous response to materialism is i think the one from (Bishop) Berkeley who said that to be is to be percieved (things exist when percieved (the trite heart of materialism?) - to affirm the existence of the world, etc we end up affirming God - that was clever). The work is the "Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge".
Posted by
bnjmn |
7:43 PM