Brain in a vat

Discussion in 'General Philosophy' started by James R, Nov 22, 2016.

  1. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    This is why I've stopped participating. MR has a similar tendency to degrade from rational argument to emotional argument, including the ubiquitous use of "LOL!"
     
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  3. Syne Sine qua non Valued Senior Member

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    Yet you seem too scared to even find out if that argument holds any water. Since it would be intellectually dishonest, even while playing devil's advocate, I don't pose arguments that can trivially fail. I can even provide citations to support that counter-argument. But alas, you'd rather heap ad hominems while I truly seek to forward the discussion.

    And this is twice I've set aside my strong arguments in favor of forwarding discussion, only to have you claim I'm unwilling to engage the discussion or dishonest.

    Sadly, all you seem left with is personal attacks, in lieu of argument.

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  5. Syne Sine qua non Valued Senior Member

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    Yep, "people", as in you "bid[ding] adieu" and Sarkus, who has not only completely avoided the type-token argument, but has been reduced to wholly personal attacks to avoid it...as you are now. You're both just screaming "liar, liar!" in lieu of anything even remotely resembling an argument.

    http://www.sciforums.com/threads/sciforums-site-rules.142880/
    • Do not engage in ad hominem attacks (i.e. attack the argument, not the person).

    Bidding adieu to that argument. Was I supposed to wait indefinitely, in the hope you might decide to engage that argument after all? No, I believed what you wrote. Unlike you, I don't presume someone is lying until I can definitively demonstrate they are, with their own words.

    A proclamation is not an argument. Argument to the contrary of no argument at all? That's called shifting the burden. I've already supported my argument. So far, you've yet to engage it. You've just been effectively reduced to saying, "huh-uh!' and stamping your feet.

    Shifting the burden without supporting your argument at all. Sad....but expected.

    http://www.sciforums.com/threads/sciforums-site-rules.142880/
    E13. Appropriate supporting evidence or explanations should be posted together with any opinion, especially on contentious issues. Sciforums is not your personal blog, and should not be used to promote your unsupported opinions.​

    LOL! Tone trolling.

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    Not only did you try to weasel out of you own avoidance of the type-token argument, with this nonsense about not giving you enough time to respond, but after calling you on it, forcing you to get erroneously pedantic about the use of "people", you've returned to that lame excuse again. What, couldn't come up with a new one?

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  7. Syne Sine qua non Valued Senior Member

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    Really? It didn't have anything to do with you being forced to apologize?

    Apparently you can't see where I continue to make arguments, while your friends devolve to nothing but personal attacks. Confirmation bias at its best.

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  8. DaveC426913 Valued Senior Member

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    I wondered if you would try to use this against me.
    It was a honest error. I owned it and fixed it and apologized. Not sure what you mean by forced. Did it sound forced? You called me out. I acknowledged and conceded my error. That's the responsible thing to do. If we were respectful opponents, it would have been understood and we'd have moved on.

    But you've just confirmed that no tactic is too low for you to exploit.

    So this has stopped being a debate a while ago and has become bickering. Had kids already. No need to revisit that.
     
  9. Baldeee Valued Senior Member

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    Are you even sure he has seen it?
    No, rather than act civilly and ask, or even simply remind, you just jump to assumptions of the worst.
    Where have I ever simply presumed you or anyone else are lying?
    Please provide evidence or retract the baseless accusation.
    As for subsequent discussion, you can wait for as long as you want or not, but since you have claimed "people" is actually just more than me, perhaps you could have waited for them before insulting them.
    Furthermore, if you were truly after a civil discussion you would wait for as long as necessary.
    People are under no obligation to post replies here, whether quickly, after a long time, or indeed ever.
    And only the truly obnoxious would subsequently post that the other's absence is due to embarassment, or some other insulting language.
    It was not intended as an argument.
    I have twice told you: your assumption is incorrect and your subsequent argument thus was, and remains, a strawman.
    I have no intention of simply repeating my posts just because you think I was talking about something that I wasn't.
    What do you expect me to do when you make the wrong interpretation and argue a strawman?
    There is no additional argument to make on the matter until you correct your interpretation of what I was saying.
    When you have - feel free to post something that is not a strawman.
    It's a strawman, Syne.
    Do you expect me to argue away all such strawmen you argue?
    No.
    You have been told your interpretation is incorrect, so please argue the correct interpretation, not merely what you want it to be.
    You are the only one who knows why you arrived at the interpretation you did, so the onus is on you to revisit it.
    If you need clarification on any points because you can't seem to interpret it differently, feel free to ask.
    You know, as one does in civil discussion.
    And I will continue to do so while you remain arrogant and obnoxious.
    So you should probably get used to it, I guess.
    It is neither erroneous nor pedantic but speaks to your attitude.
    You gave people (whether 1 or more) 5 hours to respond to one of your posts before insulting them for not responding to it... 5 hours during which most people in the UK are sound asleep.
    I have said it before, Syne, and I will say it again: get over yourself.

    The room is now empty, Syne, and you are indeed its master.
     
  10. Baldeee Valued Senior Member

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    I refer to post #717 of this thread: "I was wrong about the sufficient relationship to modus ponens/tollens. No excuse." - Syne
    He made an error, was called out on it, acknowledged it, fixed it, and we moved on.

    You made an error in another thread, was called out on it, acknowledged it, fixed it, and that thread also moved on...

    And then he exploits it here.

    Aye.
    Consider me sent to my room.

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  11. Sarkus Hippomonstrosesquippedalo phobe Valued Senior Member

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    Baldeee's just informed me that I may not have responded directly to your post #723, Syne. Personally I thought Baldeee's statement that you had drawn the wrong interpretation of what at least he had been discussing would have sufficed. It appears not.

    Okay, just to be clear:
    Syne, your interpretation of what I (and it seems he) was discussing is wrong. I was certainly not discussing type-effects but token-effects, as I thought was he. As Baldeee has subsequently posted, the rest of your post - i.e. your wrong interpretation - is therefore nothing but a strawman, given that it is not what I was arguing, and does not seem to be what he was arguing. I'm sure you would agree that noone need argue against someone else's strawman.
    I am not sure what you are expecting by way of further clarification/argument that is not already included within the various posts previous to your incorrect interpretation. As Baldeee has stated, it is your incorrect interpretation so the onus is on you to correct it, not on us to correct it for you. If you use the correct interpretation as you go through those preceding posts and arguments, and still feel that there are arguments made that you disagree with, come back with those, not the nonsense you're currently serving up.

    And just so you know... I'm off for my dinner now, and unlikely to be back until tomorrow at the earliest (that's 13 hours minimum, I'd say, Syne) and even possibly not then. It really depends on whether I can be bothered to put up with you, Syne, whether your on-topic arguments are correct or not. Post or don't, I personally don't care. I may respond, I may not. That's just something you're going to have to deal with, and preferably deal with without insults. If you want to assume the worst of people then feel free, but if you do then please keep it to yourself.
     
  12. Syne Sine qua non Valued Senior Member

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    Hey, I liked Kitt's post about deleting those posts. Too bad he didn't follow through...and you had to make wholly personal comments.

    I called you out, you implied I was a liar, and then only after I showed you where the quote came from did you believe me. That's the kind of confirmation bias I'm alluding to. You were so willing to assume I was lying that you doubled-down on your own mistake before correcting it. If you're going to claim you quit the conversation...while slinging unsupported personal arguments...of course I'm going to use your own mistakes against you. At least I can fully support my criticism of your mistake. Can you quote the supposed "emotional argument" you accuse?

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    Please do.

    I presume most people are honest, so when I say "forced", I mean by your own conscience.

    He says while returning to make no on-topic comment, but only personal attacks in lieu or argument.

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  13. Syne Sine qua non Valued Senior Member

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    Since I expressly said it was only my assumption, he was more than capable of refuting that. Instead, he chose to call me a liar. Ah well.

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    I guess you call that civility.

    "No, Syne, you are again being dishonest."

    Sarkus had replied before that post. He had his chance, and only you are claiming he may not have seen that post. So how many of his posts should I wait for before assuming he's avoiding it? Am I Sarkus' keeper, that I should make sure he's read all my posts? Or would me asking him if he's even read that post just be more fodder for you to claim I'm an egotist...demanding that my posts don't go unnoticed?

    I don't think anyone is obligated to reply...which is exactly why I don't necessarily wait for a reply.

    Only the truly insecure would lend so much credence to an assumption by attacking it as a legitimate argument.

    Just more proclamation as justification for the previous proclamation. Would you ever accept me telling you you were wrong without any argument whatsoever?

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    So far, you haven't even given us any idea whether you know the difference between type and token, much less whether your "same cause" actually is one or the other. Do you plan to continue just proclaiming it a token-effect, or do you ever plan to justify that claim?

    There's no way to tell if it's a straw man if you resolutely refuse to support your position. If it's a toke-effect, how...why?

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    First, I didn't say you claimed it to be a token-effect (although you seem to be now)...so not a straw man (argument attributed to another). I fully assumed you didn't realize there was any difference in the sorts of effects you and I were discussing. How you could argue for a token-effect without knowing it, I have no idea.

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    Well...do you think you've been arguing the same token-effect? If so, can you support that assertion?
    I'm not sure what other alternative to type-effect you think there may be. If you claim you are not arguing a type-effect, then you are making the contrary claim, and the burden is yours to support you arguing a token-effect.

    Instead of all this arm waving.

    Thanks for admitting to trolling.

    No need since you had already said you were done, e.g. "bid adieu". Oh, you're just mad I didn't leave you with the last word.

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  14. Syne Sine qua non Valued Senior Member

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    The difference is that I didn't imply you were a liar before making the correction, and didn't just reenter the discussion to make off-topic personal attacks. No doubt your confirmation bias will preclude you from recognizing that.

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  15. Syne Sine qua non Valued Senior Member

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    Since when is an assumption, not claimed to be an assertion of another, a straw man? To the contrary, I ended that post with a question (neither of you has yet to answer), e.g. "If minds are specific things, how can one sufficient cause fail to obtain?" That expressly assumes you think you were arguing token-effects.

    If a mind if not a type-effect, how do two sufficient causes produce one token-effect? If your "same effect" is a token-effect, the onus is yours to support that claim. Since you've explained you are asserting two sufficient causes can produce the same token-effect, I don't know what you expect me to refute, because that would be equivalent to saying "prove me wrong". You haven't even made the case that it is.

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    It is a straw man that I ever insulted you for not posting. Oh, the hypocrisy of you accusing me of assuming the worst, while you've been calling me a liar every other post.


    What, didn't even want to see the citation to support your argument?
     
  16. Syne Sine qua non Valued Senior Member

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    Contributory causes
    For some specific effect, in a singular case, a factor that is a contributory cause is one amongst several co-occurrent causes. It is implicit that all of them are contributory. For the specific effect, in general, there is no implication that a contributory cause is necessary, though it may be so. In general, a factor that is a contributory cause is not sufficient, because it is by definition accompanied by other causes, which would not count as causes if it were sufficient. For the specific effect, a factor that is on some occasions a contributory cause might on some other occasions be sufficient, but on those other occasions it would not be merely contributory.
    - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causality#Necessary_and_sufficient_causes
    Contributory cause is a clinically useful concept of causation. It requires demonstration that (1) the presumed cause precedes the effect and (2) altering the cause alters the effect. - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/450828

    Only one cause can be sufficient for one effect, otherwise all causes producing the exact same effect are merely contributory (or jointly sufficient). And the test of causality is if changing the cause changes the effect. Since changing the pattern of a simulated brain could not effect the mind of a real brain, we can clearly see that the two causal chains are independent, each having their own sufficient cause.

    QED

     
  17. paddoboy Valued Senior Member

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    How obfuscating can you get.........
    Let's have a summary......We certainly have good evidence and experience over the years to logically conclude, that the brain and the mind are one and the same, being as a part of a body, governing all aspects of that body......
    Your continued stretching of philosophical banter, to claim otherwise, is simply another fabricated effort to suggest a "god of the gaps"or soul.
    Sorry friend, it doesnt work that way.

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  18. Syne Sine qua non Valued Senior Member

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    Thank you. At least your claim that "the brain and mind are one and the same", directly contradicts Sarkus' claim that a computer simulation could somehow create the exact same mind as a brain. If they're one and the same, that would make Sarkus' claim out to be the computer simulation creating the real brain. Maybe you two should hash that out between yourselves...or at least get on the same page.
     
  19. paddoboy Valued Senior Member

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    Stop playing games my friend.....My opinion based on the links I have given you over the last couple of weeks and scientific logic, is that the mind and brain are the same. Experience and research shows that to be the case.

    In essence I believe most others would agree with the fact that we certainly have good evidence and experience over the years to logically conclude, that the brain and the mind are one and the same, being as a part of a body, governing all aspects of that body..
     
  20. Syne Sine qua non Valued Senior Member

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    Evidence. You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

    Are you telling me you can predict a decision a person will make based solely upon observations of their brain activity? Wow! When do you accept your Nobel prize?
     
  21. paddoboy Valued Senior Member

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    Yes, plenty of evidence and research that show and indicate the mind and brain are one.

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    As usual, another dishonest attempt to obfuscate......
    What I'm saying is clear.....What you are saying, is philosophical unsupported agenda laden hogwash.
    Hence your emotional replies to all that have taken you to task.

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  22. Syne Sine qua non Valued Senior Member

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    Then by all means explain to me why we can only predict when a random choice will be made (akin to a mentalist predicting your random choice due to environmental priming), but we cannot determine if it will be a choice to act or not, and cannot predict any purposeful choices at all? Ever hear of the Libet experiment? It's the only significant evidence your claim that the mind is wholly reducible to the brain could be based on, and it only proves that we consult the subconscious when making random choices. You haven't even shown why identity theory should be preferred over all the other physicalist philosophy of mind theories, much less why physicalism should be preferred over dualism.

    But feel free to keep playing science, without understanding its basic principles and standards of evidence.
     
  23. paddoboy Valued Senior Member

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    Far better then playing some evangelistic crusade to shoe in your "god of the gaps"
    I suggest you read a few of the links I have given...far better then your musings and nonsense.
     

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