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... and science starts to come round to a metaphysics that was at the root of taoism and hinduism thousands of years ago. Materialism was, and continues to be,
by beaconstudios 6y ago
... and science starts to come round to a metaphysics that was at the root of taoism and hinduism thousands of years ago.
Materialism was, and continues to be, a mistake.
- zackees 6y agoor physics is broken.
- beaconstudios 6y agoso we should be more willing to hold onto materialism than science? Or are you suggesting that quantum mechanics is a bad model?
- Nbox9 6y agoQuantum mechanics might be a bad model, but over the last century it’s become less controversial and more accepted in the scientific community. The last century has produced more scientists and mathematicians than any other century. I can see a few possible situations. 1. Quantum Mechanics is a fairly accurate representation of the world, or at least about as good as we can come up with given our current state of technology. 2. Quantum Mechanics is a fairly inaccurate representation of the world. 2a. Incorrect theories dominating for centuries is a natural consequence of the scientific method and trying to determine the nature of the universe. 2b. Incorrect theories dominating for centuries is a result of an imperfect implementation of the scientific method in our modern society. 2c. The scientific method is incapable of providing humans with a true and accurate understanding of the world.
- andagainagain 6y agoOr physics is perfectly fine, and so is materialism. Quantum weirdness, remember, is defined by physics. It's tested by physics. And it's perfectly compatible with materialism. The problem is in people's understanding. Full disclosure - I'm no subscribing to finish reading the article. But what it sounds like is "if we change our philosophy to match physics, physics is easy". Quantum physics has always made sense. The only issue was that it wasn't intuitive.
- eigenket 6y agoI kinda agree with this, one thing I'd add is that what is "intuitive" is what matches our intuition, honed over millions of years to...survive wild animal attacks, throw spears accurately and not fall out of trees. There isn't really any reason to expect physics to match our intuition, when our intuition isn't built for dealing with the sorts of things modern physics deals with.
- rafaelvasco 6y agoIt will always be. Science is by definition always incomplete. Once you know how Everything in the Universe works, you already transcended Science and became a God.
- mortehu 6y agoAre you saying taoism's longevity comes from the application of superior models of physics?
- beaconstudios 6y agoI'm saying that it's funny how we're coming back round to something that used to be accepted. That makes materialism the abberation, not idealism. This is metaphysics, not physics. Physics is a set of models about what should happen in response to specific events (modelling cause and effect); metaphysics is about trying to understand the nature of reality.
- ClumsyPilot 6y agoEven people coming up with stories about greek gods were "about trying to understand the nature of reality.". That phrase is far too vague to be usefull
- beaconstudios 6y agosure, but I'm afraid I'm not skilled enough to explain metaphysics in a short form. Perhaps I should just link to wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphysics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphysics
- meowface 6y agoIs the "everything is quantum entanglement" theory proposed here really incompatible with materialism? Additionally, is "materialism" perhaps just an overloaded term with no strict definition? It alters how we think about the fundamental makeup of matter, but it's still a way of describing a material universe that obeys some laws of physics, with no implication of things sometimes associated with non-materialism (dualism, panpsychism, afterlife). Quantum mechanics already significantly shook up how we thought about matter. Our conception of matter fundamentally being some kind of relation coefficient of information is weird, but still wouldn't be as surprising and paradigm-breaking as, say, some sort of reality where everything is consciousness, a la Donald Hoffman. It could still be a natural world full of emergent phenomena such as consciousness. Maybe "naturalism" is a term I'd be more philosophically comfortable with for these sorts of discussions.
- beaconstudios 6y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materialism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materialism Materialism in this case just means that we have access to objective reality. Idealism is not necessarily supernatural, but it does claim that we do not have access to objective reality beyond our perception and interpretation. The definition of "matter" keeps shrinking the closer we look. It seems that we can never truly know what reality is made of at its lowest levels, and all we have is essentially our own subjective interpretations of what we perceive. > It could still be a natural world full of emergent phenomena such as consciousness. Maybe "naturalism" is a term I'd be more philosophically comfortable with for these sorts of discussions. Naturalism is just the idea that there is no supernatural process at work. I'm not talking about naturalism.
- meowface 6y ago>The definition of "matter" keeps shrinking the closer we look. True. >It seems that we can never truly know what reality is made of at its lowest levels, and all we have is essentially our own subjective interpretations of what we perceive. How can we say that with confidence, though? What if we're just still scratching at the surface of fundamental physics? What if in 3,000 years we have much more than our subjective interpretations and do pretty much understand what's going on? This feels like a little bit like a "God of the gaps" type argument. It's fair to say we likely don't truly understand the fabric of reality, the universe, and matter, but it doesn't necessarily mean we can't or never will. >Naturalism is just the idea that there is no supernatural process at work. I'm not talking about naturalism. I think many people interchange "materialism" and "naturalism", even if it may not be correct.
- rafaelvasco 6y agoNot a mistake. But merely something incomplete. Consciousness is the Way.