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If the brain is necessary to have a vision

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Hans Blaster

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Do you understand the difference between a physical system and the human model of it? (Who am I kidding, the answer is no, you clearly don't.)

QED is a human model of how the electromagnetic force works quantum mechanically. It is not actual reality, rather our description of it.
 
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Hans Blaster

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The DI article did not provide what I wanted which are statistics that show the claimed trend toward "prominence" that you have been claiming. (And you need better sources because DI is tainted by their abject dishonesty as are all of the creationist orgs.)
You've posted the same experts (like Chambers) so many times that I recognize them individually. This does not bode well for the notion that this is anything more than a niche idea studied and supported by a few people.
Don't confuse the study of consciousness for consciousness as fundamental.
Do you actually want stats or credible sources stating this fact.
I want stats as I have stated at least 6 times in this thread.
 
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Ophiolite

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Where is the quantification of "popularity? Is this anything but anecdotes about a few scientists with "thoughts"?
You are talking past him Hans, or rather so far over his head your words must require bottled oxygen. He just does not understand the difference between many anecdotes and a serious, well designed, properly conducted, independently verified study. He sees several aticles (popular articles, it seems, with click bait headlines) and in his mind that demonstrates that there is growing acceptance of the ideas that attract him. He fails to see that he subconsciously cherry pick such articles, fails to recognise that they are often sensationalised, or simply wrong, but in either case proceeds to misunderstand them.

I applaud your persistence in trying to get through to him and trust you are well supplied with blood pressure medication.
 
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Hans Blaster

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Insisting on only the one thing that does not require settling (or shouting about) "physicalism" narrows the argument (for the moment) to just one claim and helps keep my blood pressure lower.
 
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Fervent

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Yes, I know, I just find positing a duality unnecessary.
At present, it doesn't appear as if monism can even begin to explain fundamental mental operations like abduction and the reality of subjective experience. From my vantage point, the only reason to resist dualism is a prior commitment to naturlist reduction. Citing parsimony as if it is a viable manner of sifting the options isn't appropriate since there's not really any genuine connection between parsimony and truth, so it's just a way of making an arbitrary decision seem as if there is real reason behind the decision.
 
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Larniavc

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At present, it doesn't appear as if monism can even begin to explain fundamental mental operations like abduction and the reality of subjective experience.
That’s simply and argument from ignorance.
 
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Fervent

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That’s simply and argument from ignorance.
Not at all, it's a recognition that despite all attempts to the contrary naturalizing consciousness continues to be nothing but spinning wheels. It's an inductive argument based on the continued failure of programs attempting to naturalize consciousness.
 
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partinobodycular

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It's an inductive argument based on the continued failure of programs attempting to naturalize consciousness.

I'm all for inductive arguments. Could you perhaps summarize yours for me.
 
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Fervent

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I'm all for inductive arguments. Could you perhaps summarize yours for me.
The argument is that given the volume of attempts to naturalize consciousness and the persistent fork of either epiphenomenalism or some form of dualism, it is likely that so long as naturalism only has monism as a recourse it will continue to fail because the issue is that consciousness must either reduce to the physical processes and therefore be causally inert, or consciousness is causally robust and requires some form of dualism to explain its causal powers. The general fact that naturalist theories for at least the last 50 years keep running aground on the same binary options leads to the inference that monist naturalism is insufficient to the task of explaining consciousness and one of the binary options is likely true.
 
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Larniavc

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It's an inductive argument based on the continued failure of programs attempting to naturalize consciousness.
Yet you would agree that any conclusion must be tentative in the light of any new information?
 
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Fervent

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Yet you would agree that any conclusion must be tentative in the light of any new information?
Sure, though given the ontological/metaphysical nature of the question I'm not sure such posturing is genuinely possible.
 
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partinobodycular

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The argument is that given the volume of attempts to naturalize consciousness and the persistent fork of either epiphenomenalism or some form of dualism,

Pardon my ignorance, but could you explain what you mean by 'persistent fork of either epiphenomenalism or some form of dualism'.
 
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Stopped_lurking

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I have never thought that there is a mind-body distinction. It simply doesn't match my experience.

What mechanistic explanations does dualism give for abductive reasoning and the reality of subjective experience?
 
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Fervent

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Pardon my ignorance, but could you explain what you mean by 'persistent fork of either epiphenomenalism or some form of dualism'.
In philosophy of mind, theories keep ending up either embracing an eliminativest materialism and denying mental phenomena as efficacious, or adopting a dualist model. Type theory found itself there, as did token/functionalism and more recent notions like grounding are showing signs of ending up in the same untenable position. No one seems to be able to solve the problem of mental phenomena being asymetrically dependent on material processes while still having unique properties/causal influence.
 
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Fervent

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I have never thought that there is a mind-body distinction. It simply doesn't match my experience.
So your thoughts are spatially located, and have mass?
What mechanistic explanations does dualism give for abductive reasoning and the reality of subjective experience?
You seem to miss the point entirely, because mechanistic explanations are necessarily "physical" so you're simply begging the question with this.
 
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BCP1928

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So your thoughts are spatially located, and have mass?

You seem to miss the point entirely, because mechanistic explanations are necessarily "physical" so you're simply begging the question with this.
Oh, how charminingly Newtonian you are.
 
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