Keith Devens .com

Whoa. This article proves only the strength of The-Will-To-Believe among otherwise rational folks, but nothing else. You’ve set up a ridiculous simplification of the materialist viewpoint. No materialist denies that the relationships between material objects exist in the material world!

That material things exist implies that there must be relationships between those things. The necessity of there being one or two trees in the forest and the fact that we can talk about One and Two as if the concepts have some kind of material form does not prove non-material existence of the number one or the number two or some other world where they do exist. That’s what you are implying (but not stating); you are trying to find things of this world (the only one we know) that do not ‘fit’ in this world.

But of course this world will do fine. Examples from the pedestrian nouns we use in language to denote number relationships to the most complex logic syllogisms prove only that the components of the material world relate to each other in rational ways. The existence the non-material concepts speaks only to human language and our understanding of nature. They not do imply the existence of the supernatural and certainly not to the existence of a personal god.

It’s the personal god part that ‘non-materialists’ are constantly wanting to prove with no proof whatsoever.

I like the way you think. It is indeed spirituality or the belief in a higher power that allows humans to transcend the obvious limitations of our innate nature. As three part beings (spirit, soul, and body) we must seek to nurture every aspect of our being. It is through our spirit that we connect to things that have no pure scientific manifestation (the evidence of things unseen).

No materialist denies that the relationships between material objects exist in the material world!

(emphasis mine) How can things like numbers and abstract rules of thought exist in the material world when they're not material things? Of course, I'm not saying they exist in "some other world" -- they exist in this world. What I'm arguing is that this world is not exclusively material. Note that the "relationships between material objects" are themselves not material.

Practicing philosophers tend to use the word "exist" in a number of ways, as appropriate to context. When pressed, most of them can adequately qualify a particular usage to be more or less defensible. Thus I think even self-identified materialists would be baffled by your assertion that they somehow lack a metaphysic to account for simple abstractions. It doesn't seem to follow.

Could your materialists be made of straw? Do you have a particular contemporary (and I stress contemporary for a reason) material philosopher in mind? I don't mean self-appointed pundits from other fields, like Carl Sagan.

I guess a "real" materialist, as you define it, might argue that concepts exist in specific patterns of neural activity in the brain, and only that, and that's enough. But then, as a non-materialist, I'd be a poor choice to argue that case.

I'd also advise not to push the necessary aspect of logical reasoning too far. As someone who wrote automatic theorem provers for a living, my instinctive response to hearing about "Logic" is "which logic?". Since logic is not one but many, how is it necessary? Furthermore, the intersection of all logics is too weak to be interesting and the union is intractable.

I think even self-identified materialists would be baffled by your assertion that they somehow lack a metaphysic to account for simple abstractions.

Are numbers, ethics, laws of logic, etc. merely abstractions? If they are, I question how anyone can claim their universality. Also, notions like similarity, from which one can create abstractions, are themselves non-physical. One might claim that the ability to notice similar things is merely an ability of the mind, but oops, the mind is not physical either.

Ethics is a very easy example to understand. Clearly ethical rules are non-physical. Yet, to be usable and meaningful they have to be universal, and they can't merely be abstractions from our behavior, for instance.

I don't mean self-appointed pundits from other fields, like Carl Sagan.

My comment was mostly aimed at typical non-philosopher atheists who think they can deny everything that's non-physical. That's why I mentioned that I think "most [real] philosophers" realize that. I just get frustrated when I have to listen to atheists who haven't studied philosophy blithely claim to be materialists without ever stopping to think of anything I've pointed out.

I guess a "real" materialist, as you define it, might argue that concepts exist in specific patterns of neural activity in the brain, and only that, and that's enough. But then, as a non-materialist, I'd be a poor choice to argue that case.

And that's a poor position to argue, because then your concept of, well, pretty much anything, is specific to you, and there's no reason to believe that any of the concepts you have are general, shared by other people, refer to things in the real world, etc.

my instinctive response to hearing about "Logic" is "which logic?". Since logic is not one but many, how is it necessary?

Yes, I know, but I'm arguing a point about the very possibility of logic under a materialist system. I don't have to be referring to a particular system of logic. My comments are just as strong if I'm referring just to modus ponens.

Though, as an aside, different systems of logic apply to different subjects. For instance, some modal logics apply well to ethics, but aren't strong enough to cover things like physical laws. Just because there's no one thing we call "logic" that doesn't impact on my criticism.