Atheists also believe in souls

[gmilam]

Well, it means that to a physicalist it was not the same person at 10 - not simply that the person has changed, but that the person has been replaced by a rather different copy - and will not be the person who retires, for example. Most atheists I know speak as if it was the same person and will be the same person and are not merely speaking out of convention. And most, but not all, of those I ask do believe in a persistent self through what we call the lifetime of the body.

Also, you could explain the spidergoat about this common knowledge and what it means as far as any delusional persistent self.

You obviously feel as if you've discovered something with deep philosophical implications. But I'm not seeing it... Everything changes. So?

If you choose to call the mind a "soul", I can live with that. So? It is still tied to the physical... I'm not seeing your point.

 

[spidergoat]

No you are confusing our labeling it the same thing as it being the same thing.

You are not going to experience 'your' retirement - assuming there are some years before this happens.

All the matter in you will be replaced, let alone the differences Arioch is pointing out.

It will not be you.
'
The ten year old child was not you. You share no matter with that child. Unless you believe in some kind of soul.

You are assuming that in order to be called a thing it must be a static object. We are more like a highly localized weather disturbance. But it's still physical. The Mississippi is still a river even though the water and the banks change.

 

[Pineal]

Then they wouldn't be a consequent physicalist.

Well, there's that too.

 

[Pineal]

You are assuming that in order to be called a thing it must be a static object.

No, in fact my response made it clear that I think that we label things like tornadoes even though they are not static.

We are more like a highly localized weather disturbance. But it's still physical. The Mississippi is still a river even though the water and the banks change.

Of course. I have nowhere suggested here that we are anything but physical. My point is that if all we are is physical and every portion of that physical entity is changed, then it was not the same person at 7 and will not be you who experiences, for example, retirement. An inexact copy will experience your retirement.

 

[Pineal]

You obviously feel as if you've discovered something with deep philosophical implications. But I'm not seeing it... Everything changes. So?

I did not discover it. Buddhists who believe in anatma thought this was the case long before I was born. Certainly some scientists also believe it. My point is not yippie, look how great I am - I don't even think I said anything about discovering something or referred to me in a positive sense because of this anywhere in the thread.

In fact my point is that a physicalist should believe that they are being slowly copied over time and they will not experience things like retirement.

It will be an inexact copy that will.

Of course one can be consistent. An atheist could disbelieve in the persistent self, but I find in my non-online life that most do believe they will get to experience stuff years in the future and that it was them, rather than something else, composed of entirely different atoms, that experienced 'their' childhood.

If you choose to call the mind a "soul", I can live with that. So? It is still tied to the physical... I'm not seeing your point.

see above.

 

[Arioch]

@Pineal --

All of you is replaced in a fairly short period of time. Much shorter than a lifetime. Yet atheists act and speak as if this is not the case and as far as I can tell they are not merely speaking out of convention.

There are multiple reasons for this. One is that most, if not all, of us were raised in a society(and likely by parents) who buy into the whole mind/body duality thing, of which the continuity of the mind/soul/whatever is a natural bi-product, and old habits are really hard to shake off. It's not that we believe what "we" will be able to experience retirement, it's that it's easier to speak that way because of a lifetime of speaking that way.

Another reason is that we just don't care. It doesn't really matter whether the matter in my body is the same or not, at the time that I retire the "me" that's there will experience retirement. This would be true if I retired tomorrow or thirty years from now, either way the completely current me won't "live" to see it. So such meanderings of the mind, while occasionally interesting, are of no consequence to us.

Well, it means that to a physicalist it was not the same person at 10 - not simply that the person has changed, but that the person has been replaced by a rather different copy - and will not be the person who retires, for example.

Has anyone here denied this fact? Have we all admitted to accepting it? The answer to both of these questions is "yes". Now for an important question, out of the atheists and materialists(they are not, strictly speaking, the same thing) who've posted here, how many have said that it doesn't really matter to them?

 

[Pineal]

There are multiple reasons for this. One is that most, if not all, of us were raised in a society(and likely by parents) who buy into the whole mind/body duality thing, of which the continuity of the mind/soul/whatever is a natural bi-product, and old habits are really hard to shake off. It's not that we believe what "we" will be able to experience retirement, it's that it's easier to speak that way because of a lifetime of speaking that way.

You do realize that you just repeated my argument for why most people believe in an afterlife?

Anyway. I am skeptical that most atheists merely speak in conventional terms without believing the underlying ontology.

It would also help me if you would explain to Spidergoat why he is incorrect about the persistent self.

Another reason is that we just don't care. It doesn't really matter whether the matter in my body is the same or not, at the time that I retire the "me" that's there will experience retirement. This would be true if I retired tomorrow or thirty years from now, either way the completely current me won't "live" to see it. So such meanderings of the mind, while occasionally interesting, are of no consequence to us.

I don't think this is the case for most atheists/humanists. At least it is not in my experience. My family, in fact most of the people I know are atheists, and they are not merely using conventional language. This could be a fluke, but I doubt it. When I have raised the issue in other forums, I generally get Spidergoats response from atheists, or a response similar to his or hers. They tend to use nominalism to defend the idea that they will in fact experience things and they are not being copied. And no other atheists seem to manifest to disagree with them.

The great thing is here in this thread we seem to have a mixed group and I am very curious to see how they will interact on the issue.

Just to be clear: I do acknowledge that atheists can be and certainly some are consistent as physicalists just as you are.

Has anyone here denied this fact?

Yes, Spidergoat, clearly. Potentially Sarkus. He is certainly presenting a case for continuity, not that I think it works, nor does he seem to be convinced himself. I am not sure about gmiliam and a number of others.

What I experienced when I read a number of other responses, for example from Fraggle or Phlogistan, was that they came up with their own wording or seemed to have misread the OP. I fed back what I hoped was a very clear rewording and I am interested in seeing what their responses are. They may have agreed with a consistent physicalist position, but I can't be sure yet.

A couple of people wrotethat their personalities change, and that they admit this, so they are atheists who do not fit my description. That seems to be a very odd misread of the OP. A physicalist can be consistent when they consider identity to last over time when the object in question has some insubstantial changes. A rock that gets painted blue is still the same rock. I do not know what they meant by personality changes, but it is not at all clear that they were acknowledging that the entire physical object is no longer the same, but a kind of gradually made copy - an analogy could be petrified wood, where there is no longer any of the original wood, which has been replaced by clay or sandstone or whatever it is.

I found these responses odd and Fraggles to be almost completely missing the mark, so I am still not sure.

Have we all admitted to accepting it? The answer to both of these questions is "yes".

Well, no.

Now for an important question, out of the atheists and materialists(they are not, strictly speaking, the same thing) who've posted here, how many have said that it doesn't really matter to them?

Not sure. It seems you have tallied.

As far as atheists not being the same thing as materialists or physicalists. Yes, of course. But that's not the issue. A non-physicalist atheist can believe in something like a soul that persists through a life time without contradiction.

IOW if an atheist believe in a persistent self they believe in something like a soul. For physicalists this creates a problem. For non-physicalists this may not cause a problem, but it undercuts criticism of theists as dualists or supernaturalists, for example.

 

[ughaibu]

You will not be you in 7 years, it will be a copy, and not at all an exact one.

So, do you suggest that seven years should be the maximum prison term?

 

[Pineal]

So, do you suggest that seven years should be the maximum prison term?

Sure, if the goal is punishment. A case could be made for rehabilitation terms longer than that. Patterns continue, potentially, in the copies.

 

[ughaibu]

A case could be made for rehabilitation terms longer than that. Patterns continue, potentially, in the copies.

Perhaps children with dodgy genetics should be imprisoned from birth.

 

[phlogistician]

Fine, then you may well be an exception. But to be clear, it is not a matter of personality changing, it is that all the matter that you are changes.

Exactly the point. Our personality is a product our physical being, so changes as we age. There is no eternal soul, just the biochemistry of our bodies.

 

[Sarkus]

Potentially Sarkus. He is certainly presenting a case for continuity, not that I think it works, nor does he seem to be convinced himself.

I am comfortable that "I" am the same "I" from previous moments, previous years, because I consider "I" to have a sense of continuity, and my sense of continuity is reasonably intact. It is not a belief per se but a rational acceptance until I have evidence to the contrary.

But if you change what you consider "I" to be then you will have different views. The views won't be contradictory to your world-view, just different because of the different definition of "I" being used.

Much of the argument is not in disputing world-views but in different definitions/understandings of "I".

IOW if an atheist believe in a persistent self they believe in something like a soul. For physicalists this creates a problem. For non-physicalists this may not cause a problem, but it undercuts criticism of theists as dualists or supernaturalists, for example.

A persistent self is very different from a soul in many regards.
The soul is considered the driving force behind decisions, and it is generally thought to survive after death.
A persistent self is, in my view, merely an emergent property of the activity of the brain and no more drives decisions or survives after death than the rest of the body. It merely gives rise to a sense of "I", and the ability for that sense, by reference to immediate memory, of continuation.

And emergent properties are no more dualistic in nature than tornadoes... where complex wind patterns contrive to give rise to rather beautiful formations that seem to have a life of their own.

Dualism might offer a means of looking at the emergent property separately from that which gives rise to it, but that is not the same as saying there are two distinct things such as "body and soul".

So one needs to distinguish between what many theists would consider a dualistic view (body and soul being distinct entities), and the tool of dualism that philosophers (and scientists) may adopt to help provide explanations at different orders of complexity while still holding to a materialistic (or other such) view.

 

[wynn]

No you are confusing our labeling it the same thing as it being the same thing.

You are not going to experience 'your' retirement - assuming there are some years before this happens.

All the matter in you will be replaced, let alone the differences Arioch is pointing out.

It will not be you.

The ten year old child was not you. You share no matter with that child. Unless you believe in some kind of soul.

This is where the example with the ships of Theseus or the Argo come in:

The replacing of the elements occurs slowly enough for us to still have the perception that we are talking about the same entity.

If all the building elements would be replaced from one moment to the next, then your objection would apply.

However, it appears we tend to conceive of identity as something that flows, changes, embraces, permeates.
An analogy would be a liquid like water that soaks, encircles, embraces, permeates everything it encounters.

So even when an individual element is replaced, since the other elements are holding that which permeates, the new element is also permeated, thus becoming part of entity, the entity retaining its identity.

 

[CptBork]

So, do you suggest that seven years should be the maximum prison term?

Sure, if the goal is punishment. A case could be made for rehabilitation terms longer than that. Patterns continue, potentially, in the copies.

Anyone arguing that western prison systems are geared towards rehabilitation is either deluded or lying outright; male prisoners wouldn't be forced to fight like cornered raccoons to protect their bumholes on a near-daily basis if it was only/mostly about rehab. Revenge is usually part of the motivation, as well as the protection of potential future victims. It also involves sending a deterring message to would-be criminals; that message says you are not to commit what the state defines to be serious crimes, or you will not like the outcome, which will involve a lot more than just regular visits with a therapist and will continue for an excruciating and mentally/physically crippling period of time even if you change your ways and acquire the heart of a saint.