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Quantum Experiments Disprove Materialism

Discuss any topics related to metaphysics (the philosophical study of the principles of reality) or epistemology (the philosophical study of knowledge) in this forum.
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Meleagar

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Post Number:#61  PostApril 7th, 2010, 7:39 am

Jester Gren wrote:You replied to someone else's post of the name "It doesn't matter". I'm somewhat confused as to what you're suggesting though. If the scientific method depends solely on observation, how can one apply it to unobserved objects, and therefore prove inexistence beyond its domain?


They don't prove "inexistence", they prove the immaterial nature of phenomena.

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Jester Gren

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Post Number:#62  PostApril 7th, 2010, 8:49 am

What necessarily is so immaterial about it? Up to this point our observations have led us to think of what material is, and now a contradictory observation leads us to question whether it is material? Maybe the definition of material has simply undergone a working.
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Meleagar

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Post Number:#63  PostApril 7th, 2010, 9:54 am

Jester Gren wrote:What necessarily is so immaterial about it? Up to this point our observations have led us to think of what material is, and now a contradictory observation leads us to question whether it is material? Maybe the definition of material has simply undergone a working.


Perhaps you should re-read the O.P. and the quotes and check out some of the references.
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Keith Russell

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Post Number:#64  PostApril 7th, 2010, 10:33 am

Meleagar wrote:
Jester Gren wrote:What necessarily is so immaterial about it? Up to this point our observations have led us to think of what material is, and now a contradictory observation leads us to question whether it is material? Maybe the definition of material has simply undergone a working.


Perhaps you should re-read the O.P. and the quotes and check out some of the references.


The only thing in the OP that gives a clue to what "immaterialism" means, in this context, is this:
"...the notion that ‘the physical environment’ is sufficient to create reality, independent of the human mind."

I still think all the psuedo-scientific nonsense is just a way to try to rationalize the irrational, to try to justify "faith": the desire to believe, without evidence.

This seems to suggest that "materialism" is the idea that there is a reality independent of human consciousness.

If reality, external to human consciousness, is not "material", could human consciousness then be the "material"? (Or, do you reject that notion as well?)
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Meleagar

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Post Number:#65  PostApril 7th, 2010, 10:46 am

Keith Russell wrote:If reality, external to human consciousness, is not "material", could human consciousness then be the "material"? (Or, do you reject that notion as well?)


What I object to are equivocated, apologetic notions of "materialism" patched together to semantically salvage the idea.

What is the point of insisting on "materialism" when, as an idea, it was juxtaposed against mind-primary idealism, and then when science clearly proves our experience of the physical world to be mind-primary, try to claim the mind as "material"? At what point does one give up the long-dead ghost of materialism, if to salvage it one must coopt the very idea it was diametrically opposed to?

Materialism as a philosophy meant more than "experience is constructed of something"; it meant that experience is constructed of material. Not "energy" (which was later coopted into materialistic definition), not "potential", not "information", not "mind". IOW materialism meant that mind was not generating any fundamental aspect of what we experienced as physical reality, and we know precisely the opposite is true; mind generates everything we recognize as physical reality, because without mind not only does physical reality not exist, it never would have existed, and cannot ever have existed unless the observation of a mind collapsed quantum potential into physical experience.
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James S Saint

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Post Number:#66  PostApril 7th, 2010, 11:39 am

Meleagar wrote:
Keith Russell wrote:If reality, external to human consciousness, is not "material", could human consciousness then be the "material"? (Or, do you reject that notion as well?)


What I object to are equivocated, apologetic notions of "materialism" patched together to semantically salvage the idea.
I'm not a materialist, but I can clearly see when just the opposite of what you accuse is being done as well.

Meleagar wrote:... and cannot ever have existed unless the observation of a mind collapsed quantum potential into physical experience.
You should really leave QM out of your arguments until you understand it. QM has nothing to do with materialism.
Clarify, Verify, and Instill the Hopes and Threats that lead to the Maximum Momentum of Self-Harmony for the Living - Measure your Progress.
Else
From THIS age of sleep, Homosapian shall never awake.
What remains in harmony cannot perish.
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Meleagar

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Post Number:#67  PostApril 7th, 2010, 12:18 pm

James S Saint wrote: You should really leave QM out of your arguments until you understand it. QM has nothing to do with materialism.


Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg, two Nobel Laureates in physics, disagree with you:

The Universe is entirely mental. - Niels Bohr


The ontology of materialism rested upon the illusion that the kind of existence, the direct "actuality" of the world around us, can be extrapolated into the atomic range. This extrapolation is impossible, however. - Werner Heisenberg
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James S Saint

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Post Number:#68  PostApril 7th, 2010, 12:28 pm

Meleagar wrote:
James S Saint wrote: You should really leave QM out of your arguments until you understand it. QM has nothing to do with materialism.


Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg, two Nobel Laureates in physics, disagree with you:

The Universe is entirely mental. - Niels Bohr


The ontology of materialism rested upon the illusion that the kind of existence, the direct "actuality" of the world around us, can be extrapolated into the atomic range. This extrapolation is impossible, however. - Werner Heisenberg
And the infallible Pope declared the Earth is the center of the universe.

Titles and public awards are the evidence for sheep, dogs, and weasels, not thinking people. Quoting them out of context and without understanding reveals which kind of non-thinker a person is.
Clarify, Verify, and Instill the Hopes and Threats that lead to the Maximum Momentum of Self-Harmony for the Living - Measure your Progress.
Else
From THIS age of sleep, Homosapian shall never awake.
What remains in harmony cannot perish.
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Meleagar

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Post Number:#69  PostApril 7th, 2010, 12:55 pm

James S Saint wrote: Quoting them out of context and without understanding reveals which kind of non-thinker a person is.


Please support your contention that I quoted them out-of-context.
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Felix

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Post Number:#70  PostApril 7th, 2010, 1:43 pm

I would like to know the context of the Niels Bohr quote... I know he did say that science cannot say what Nature is, only attempt to accurately describe how it operates.
Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by language. - Wittgenstein
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Meleagar

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Post Number:#71  PostApril 7th, 2010, 1:48 pm

Felix wrote:I would like to know the context of the Niels Bohr quote... I know he did say that science cannot say what Nature is, only attempt to accurately describe how it operates.


You mean, more context that is provided in the larger quote in the opening post?
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James S Saint

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Post Number:#72  PostApril 7th, 2010, 1:59 pm

You guys might want to note that Niels Bohr and Heisenberg knew no more about the mind nor metaphysics than the Pope knew about Science.
Clarify, Verify, and Instill the Hopes and Threats that lead to the Maximum Momentum of Self-Harmony for the Living - Measure your Progress.
Else
From THIS age of sleep, Homosapian shall never awake.
What remains in harmony cannot perish.
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Meleagar

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Post Number:#73  PostApril 7th, 2010, 2:12 pm

James S Saint wrote:You guys might want to note that Niels Bohr and Heisenberg knew no more about the mind nor metaphysics than the Pope knew about Science.


Would you care to support any of that?
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James S Saint

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Post Number:#74  PostApril 7th, 2010, 2:53 pm

Meleagar wrote:
James S Saint wrote:You guys might want to note that Niels Bohr and Heisenberg knew no more about the mind nor metaphysics than the Pope knew about Science.


Would you care to support any of that?
What were their Nobel Prizes for?
Clarify, Verify, and Instill the Hopes and Threats that lead to the Maximum Momentum of Self-Harmony for the Living - Measure your Progress.
Else
From THIS age of sleep, Homosapian shall never awake.
What remains in harmony cannot perish.
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Meleagar

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Post Number:#75  PostApril 7th, 2010, 3:21 pm

James S Saint wrote:What were their Nobel Prizes for?


I'll take that as a "no" on both cliams I've asked you to support.
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