Atheist Realism?

[synthesizer-patel]

Ronan, this is becoming laughable.

State your definition of consciousness please.

I thought so a few days ago - that's why I gave up caring or bothering.

"Reality = God, and consciousness = God" says Ronan

"Says who?" says everyone, theists included.

"Because I say so" says Ronan

"but there could be any number of definitions of reality, or consciousness, or God" says everyone else - theists included

"Yeah, but I say Reality = God, and consciousness = God" says Ronan

"Says who?" says everyone, theists included.

"Because I say so" says Ronan

"but there could be any number of definitions of reality, or consciousness, or God" says everyone else - theists included

ad infinitum ad nauseam

 

[Enmos]

I thought so a few days ago - that's why I gave up caring or bothering.

"Reality = God, and consciousness = God" says Ronan

"Says who?" says everyone, theists included.

"Because I say so" says Ronan

"but there could be any number of definitions of reality, or consciousness, or God" says everyone else - theists included

"Yeah, but I say Reality = God, and consciousness = God" says Ronan

"Says who?" says everyone, theists included.

"Because I say so" says Ronan

"but there could be any number of definitions of reality, or consciousness, or God" says everyone else - theists included

ad infinitum ad nauseam

I don't know what else to say about this without horribly insulting him and getting banned. Really..
I'm afraid he is beyond salvation lol (actually, this is not funny).

 

[synthesizer-patel]

I don't know what else to say about this without horribly insulting him and getting banned. Really..
I'm afraid he is beyond salvation lol (actually, this is not funny).

Don't let it get to you old son - Ronan has his views and simply can understand how anyone could possibly disagree with them - so he keeps re0itterating the same point over and over and over and over and over and over in the hope that someone might change their mind and agree with him.

:deadhorse:

His problem not yours

This discussion was dead within 24 hours - time to walk away now

**edit** darn it - the "Flogging a Dead Horse" smiley doesn't work on here

 

[Enmos]

Don't let it get to you old son - Ronan has his views and simply can understand how anyone could possibly disagree with them - so he keeps re0itterating the same point over and over and over and over and over and over in the hope that someone might change their mind and agree with him.

:deadhorse:

His problem not yours

This discussion was dead within 24 hours - time to walk away now

**edit** darn it - the "Flogging a Dead Horse" smiley doesn't work on here

True.. I just.. my mind short-circuits when trying to imagine how people like that actually exist..
Anyway, enough said. You are right.

 

[ronan]

Ronan, this is becoming laughable.

State your definition of consciousness please.

You should read the thread
consciousness is what permits you to feel something (to have perceptions)

and tell me why you find it laughable, I want to laugh also if possible

 

[ronan]

I thought so a few days ago - that's why I gave up caring or bothering.

"Reality = God, and consciousness = God" says Ronan

"Says who?" says everyone, theists included.

"Because I say so" says Ronan

"but there could be any number of definitions of reality, or consciousness, or God" says everyone else - theists included

"Yeah, but I say Reality = God, and consciousness = God" says Ronan

"Says who?" says everyone, theists included.

"Because I say so" says Ronan

"but there could be any number of definitions of reality, or consciousness, or God" says everyone else - theists included

ad infinitum ad nauseam

If you read the post, you will see that I said SOME theist and SOME atheist !!
at the end I probably forgot to mention it always but that was repeated so many time that it is obvious.
Remember my claim is only that there is some theist that believe in a god that is the conscious reality and they have a proof of its existence, namely consciousness

 

[ronan]

The funny thing about you guys is that when you cannot disprove my claim, you cannot even recognize that you are wrong.

1) We cannot know that we are dreaming or not
2) consciousness exist
3) Historically and at least for SOME theist god is consciousness
4) Reality defined as Kantian's noumena (shared by many atheist here apparently) has to be conscious because as Nagel show, even perfect knowledge about unconscious matter cannot gibe us the feeling of being the being studied (we have to feel to know)

So what did you say about that?

For dreaming, you try to put down my arguments but you could not (indeed it is impossible)

For the fact that reality is conscious, you just said that Nagel is wriong and that there are other authors who criticizes
if you know why, please share with us. then we can discuss!

But until now, you did not do anything!!

 

[synthesizer-patel]

I've pointed out all along Ronan, that what you are sharing with us is simply your subjective opinion - no more no less - you've done nothing to prove it other than re-state your opinion, and a few other references of other people who share your opinion - but its still just opinion - not proof. :yawn:

Reality, consciousness, and god can be described and interpreted in a multitude of ways - as you have seen from the other posters here - by your own logic, this disproves your opinion.

Give it up mate - its over

 

[ronan]

I've pointed out all along Ronan, that what you are sharing with us is simply your subjective opinion - no more no less - you've done nothing to prove it other than re-state your opinion, and a few other references of other people who share your opinion - but its still just opinion - not proof. :yawn:

Reality, consciousness, and god can be described and interpreted in a multitude of ways - as you have seen from the other posters here - by your own logic, this disproves your opinion.

Give it up mate - its over

If you guys do not want to attack my arguments, I agree it is over.

Consciousness has a specific meaning for us, you cannot deny. We don't even need definition because every body knows what it is.

You have consciousness at least!
and you know that even when you think about you it is still there: so it is more than you.

You know my statement is not something that I invented from scratch, it come from a long debate in ancient time where people where not believing in an unconscious matter which before everything is AN ASSUMPTION

Some of them took this assumption and try to defend it (samkya, charvaka),
You should learn about:
Budhism, Advaita, Jainism, Charvaka, Samkya and many others

don't forget that god/consciousness is probably ineffable: we know it but we cannot describe it.

 

[Enmos]

Oh boy..

 

[ronan]

Enmos I reread our conversation and you never said any good argument against my point while you never gave argument for your view that reality is unconscious.

Our talk about yellow show you did not understand my point:
I said that we cannot experience unconsciousness (I am not talkign about the feeling (which is conscious) of having waked up)

So the existence of unconsciousness is an assumption , you have to prove it , your task !


my point on the contrary relies on the existence of consciousness which you agree, we have, isn't it?
=> consciousness exist

secondly if you said that it come from somewhere, I argue that it has to come from something conscious because of Nagel argument.
No one in this thread gave argument against that


In fact most of your argument against anything is saying that I don't have argument and that I just say thing as true without proof ("because he say so" is one of your favorite sentence), but that is not true, it is just that I don't need much because consciousness is already there!

 

[Crunchy Cat]

Crunchy cat, I told you if you say that my logic is invalid because logic relies on experiences then it is fine because then logic is not powerful enough for proving anything
so you cannot prove that you are not dreaming neither that you are dreaming (My point)

In this scenario, the phrase "you cannot prove that you are not dreaming" is based on words and concepts... both of which come from experience and are therefore invalid. ANYTHING you think or say is invalid.

But if assume that logic is powerful enough then also you cannot prove that you are dreaming or not because your evidence have to be based on your experiences (which are at issue here)

Simple,
Read again, you will understand.

You're contradicting yourself here. In this scenario you are proposing that logic (coming from experiences) is valid while evidence (coming from experiences) is not. Either experience is valid OR its not.

 

[Cris]

Ronan,

secondly if you said that it come from somewhere, I argue that it has to come from something conscious because of Nagel argument.
No one in this thread gave argument against that

Apart from my post of course.

Nagel has an opinion based on a deliberate attempt to limit what science will be able to do, i.e. the claim that science can never show that consciousness has a physical cause because it can’t explain consciousness now. This is a logical fallacy and an invalid conclusion and must be appropriately dismissed.

This leaves us at the point where we do not yet understand consciousness sufficiently to explain its cause. There is absolutely nothing that points to its cause being supernatural. However, there is this massively complex organ known as a brain that shows enormous promise as a potential cause of consciousness.

Your claim is that consciousness is caused by a god. You have not shown anything of substance to substantiate that claim.

 

[ronan]

In this scenario, the phrase "you cannot prove that you are not dreaming" is based on words and concepts... both of which come from experience and are therefore invalid. ANYTHING you think or say is invalid.

Crunchy Cat, I feel you are not getting serious here.
If logic is invalid I told you you cannot prove anything!
because proving itself loose its meaning

so you cannot prove you are dreaming or not!
How many times I should repeat that to you?

Is there nobody for helping him?

You're contradicting yourself here. In this scenario you are proposing that logic (coming from experiences) is valid while evidence (coming from experiences) is not. Either experience is valid OR its not.

I am not contradicting myself because I took the two possibilities (as you said: "in this scenario"): logic is working or logic is not working

but if it works, then also you cannot prove that you are dreaming or not!


Ok?

Why don't you want to accept the fact ?
Is it because now you feel ridiculous of having fighting so much time without success?

 

[Enmos]

Ronan, ..ah forget it..

 

[Crunchy Cat]

Crunchy Cat, I feel you are not getting serious here.
If logic is invalid I told you you cannot prove anything!
because proving itself loose its meaning

so you cannot prove you are dreaming or not!
How many times I should repeat that to you?

Is there nobody for helping him?

For whatever reason you cannot or will not understand / acknowledge that the statement "so you cannot prove you are dreaming or not!" is based on expereinces and is therefore invalid. That's now your problem.

I am not contradicting myself because I took the two possibilities (as you said: "in this scenario"): logic is working or logic is not working

but if it works, then also you cannot prove that you are dreaming or not!


Ok?

Why don't you want to accept the fact ?
Is it because now you feel ridiculous of having fighting so much time without success?

Simply because it's not a fact. If "logic" is working then experiences (which logic is comprised of) are valid. Once that realization is made, your claim becomes falsifiable. I really do think that this is another case where you cannot or will not understand... and I can't perform the understanding for you; hence, this is also now your problem.

 

[ronan]

Ronan,

Apart from my post of course.

The only I found is this one but I would not call it an argument, at least not against Nagel's argument itself:

Note that Nagle, Jackson, and Chalmers, deliberately attempt to limit the scope of science and make the erroneous conclusion that consciousness can never be explained by science. History is littered with authority figures asserting an event can never occur, only to see that very event occur later.

First it is not simply that we can never explain, it is that we cannot explain because we will have to feel what is like to be a bat in order to know and we will never know because first of all unconsciousness is a assumption and secondly causation is also an assumption (only thing we have is correlation)

Nagel has an opinion based on a deliberate attempt to limit what science will be able to do, i.e. the claim that science can never show that consciousness has a physical cause because it can’t explain consciousness now. This is a logical fallacy and an invalid conclusion and must be appropriately dismissed.

Nagel does not talk about now and in fact in his paper he ask us to imagine if we could know everything about physical reality and what a bat is, we would still not know what is the feeling of the bat because in order to know we have to feel it
Please read his article first!

This leaves us at the point where we do not yet understand consciousness sufficiently to explain its cause. There is absolutely nothing that points to its cause being supernatural. However, there is this massively complex organ known as a brain that shows enormous promise as a potential cause of consciousness.

How can you explain consciousness by something that is inside consciousness ?

Moreover (apart from the last question) remember that the content of your consciousness can be a dream
so it is simply not possible to explain because you will always have the doubt!

Your claim is that consciousness is caused by a god. You have not shown anything of substance to substantiate that claim.

no, I said consciousness is god,
individual consciousness (as one part of the content of consciousness) is caused by consciousness

 

[ronan]

For whatever reason you cannot or will not understand / acknowledge that the statement "so you cannot prove you are dreaming or not!" is based on expereinces and is therefore invalid. That's now your problem.

Are you joking?
how can you say for sure that something is invalid if you say that logic is not working?
If logic is not working, proof have no meaning so you cannot say that I am wrong
and you cannot say that you are not dreaming
That was my only point, remember

Simply because it's not a fact. If "logic" is working then experiences (which logic is comprised of) are valid. Once that realization is made, your claim becomes falsifiable. I really do think that this is another case where you cannot or will not understand... and I can't perform the understanding for you; hence, this is also now your problem.

But I don't need logic because I am not claiming anything, it is you the one who claim that you are not dreaming

 

[ronan]

Just a little paper to read if you have time:
http://users.ecs.soton.ac.uk/harnad/Papers/Harnad/harnad00.mind.humphrey.html

 

[Cris]

Ronan,

First it is not simply that we can never explain, it is that we cannot explain because we will have to feel what is like to be a bat in order to know

And why assume that is impossible? The argument is fundamentally flawed because of an assumption of a “never” condition placed on an unknown future.

If science is able to reverse engineer the mechanism of consciousness then that allows the potential possibility of creating the condition that would permit experiencing and knowing what it would be like to be a bat.

and we will never know because first of all unconsciousness is a assumption and secondly causation is also an assumption (only thing we have is correlation)

There is the flaw again of attempting to predict the future.

I don’t see any relevance to the issue of unconsciousness here. This appears to an error in confusing different terminology. Being unconscious is akin to being asleep, while being conscious is akin to being awake and aware. The issue here is consciousness, i.e. what it means to be “I”, and how is it possible for me to be self-aware.

We make assumptions all the time, some are fundamental to any meaningful progress and we generally call these axioms. E.g. existence exists, reality exists, there is cause and effect. These are universally accepted starting points that provide a frame of reference for future discussion.

Assumptions are fine if they are appropriately substantiated.

Nagel does not talk about now and in fact in his paper he ask us to imagine if we could know everything about physical reality and what a bat is, we would still not know what is the feeling of the bat because in order to know we have to feel it
Please read his article first!

It is a flawed argument since he is indeed attempting to limit what science can do in the future. He is making unsubstantiated assumptions based on his opinion on what consciousness is and then drawing flawed conclusions.

How can you explain consciousness by something that is inside consciousness ?

You have yet to make a meaningful case that consciousness is inside another consciousness.

There is no reason yet to conclude that consciousness is not a physical phenomenon and hence not able to be explained by science.

Moreover (apart from the last question) remember that the content of your consciousness can be a dream
so it is simply not possible to explain because you will always have the doubt!

This is irrelevant to a scientific study of the mechanism of consciousness.

no, I said consciousness is god,
individual consciousness (as one part of the content of consciousness) is caused by consciousness

Whatever variation you choose is fine, the issue is you have introduced a conclusion, that a god is involved that has no basis.