Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Mon Sep 12, 2022 11:47 am
1 'My problem with this argument or assertion is that the category 'physical' has been expanding through time.'
Agreed. And that's meant the gaps/spaces for the supposed non-physical have been closing.
Only because what can be called physical now is a lot like what most people would not have called physical before. The potential qualities and lack of them. The word physical sounds like a stand on substance, but it just means...real things, whatever their qualities.
2 'For your position to be meaningful there would need to be a process whereby evidence would come in for something and it could possibly be considered non-physical. I believe science should not be considered a physicalist methodology. It's really a verificationist methodology, but I think due to the history of conflict with the church, say, and other sets of beliefs, it has seemed necessary to take an ontological stand, whereas, in fact scientists in practice just try to find real phenomena and understand them.'
My condition is 'pending evidence'. And natural scientists do as you say - they try to find 'real phenomena' - which is physical evidence.
It's just evidence. That adjective is hollow.
So I think 'methodological naturalism' is the correct name for the scientific method - assuming at least a near-synonymy between naturalism, materialism and physicalism - which I know can be disputed. I don't understand what you think 'evidence...that could possibly be considered non-physical' could be.
That's approaching it backwards. I am saying that they don't care what something is made of, if they consider it real, they feel paradigmatically bound to call it physical - if they even do.
That we believe, or have believed, a phenomenon to be non-physical isn't evidence that it is non-physical - obviously.
Personally I think the whole thing is a storm in a tea cup based on an old battle. And that the real is on a spectrum and neither physical nor non-physical mean anything. But the real has a spectrum of qualities. 600 years ago pretty much anyone, and certainly theologians, would have thought some of our descriptions of what passes as matter would be descriptions of non-material things. It's like the old battle is being run, so old terms with their baggage must be clung to, even though the playing field has shifted utterly on the scientific side.
3 'So, to rule out a phenomenon because it seems or is asserted to be non-physical, it seems to me, is jumping the gun. To ask for evidence, especially if the other person expects you to believe them, is only logical and rational. As it would be if someone asserted X, that is physical, exists, if one is not aware of any evidence backing this up.'
Again, there's no ruling out here. My point isn't that the non-physical can't exist. It's precisely the asking for evidence that makes the enquiry logical and rational.
4 'If we look at the history of science, up into the early 70s it was professionally dangerous to assert that animals were conscious experiencers with intentions, and other cognitive subjective qualities. The problem of other minds coupled with old prejudices made this taboo. And it is very hard to demonstrate the internal life of anyone including animals. Yet, animal trainers, pet owners, animists, indigenous people, pagans and many others worked with the rather rational assumption that animals did have internal lives, etc. Then there was a shift in the model.'
My point is that there's no evidence - so far, and to my knowledge - that the 'internal life' of anything is non-physical - that it has a non-physical cause or explanation.
But then there is no reason to use the adjective non-physical. Any phenomenon that does not have evidence for it cannot move into communal knowledge. It doesn't matter what it might or might not be made of. Someone sees a ghost and believes they exist. They may well think it is non-physical. The skeptic may think it must be or would be non-physical. But that's all beside the point. Is it real? Do we have evidence? Perhaps there is some field we cannot now sense with our devices. Perhaps it is or will be considered physical once it is determine via peer review to be real. The fact that it seems like it must be in a certain ontological category is irrelevant. So, it seems to me implicit in your wording that some things can be ruled out due to the substance category. I think that is problematic.
5 'I am NOT arguing that consciousness is non-physical. What I am saying here is that it is not irrational per se to believe in things one is not, at a certain point in time (which is always where we are) able to demonstrate to others or the scientific community.'
Absolutely. Loads of scientific advance comes from pushing the boat out, hypothesising and exploring possibilities.
Or even living your entire lifetime believing in something that only after your death is confirmed. There can be good reasons to believe things that cannot be demonstrated to others, let alone confirmed by a consensus of the scientific community. Like, for example, the existence of animal experiencing, which was considered an irrational belief in science up to my teens.
6 'One can have rational reasons for believing something that cannot be demonstrated with scientific rigor to others.'
Maybe here's the rub - and the condition 'cannot' seems critical to me. Can you give an example?
That's an ambivalent verb, yes.
Cannot now be demonstrated, would have been better wording. Or 'has not yet been'. Or might not be demonstrated by science.
And I have given some past examples: animal consciousness, rogue waves, elephant long distance communication. These were, yes, later confirmed. But before that one could not know if they would someday be confirmed or when and yet it was not irrational to believe in these things.