The whole idea of reducing all of reality to a single substance has been somewhat of a misguided quest in philosophy no doubt. — ChatteringMonkey

Part of the problem might be that we don't have the language to name a single substance that incorporates everything without issues. Or that language is inherently limited when it comes to that sort of thing.

The best case, it seems to me, is the one you are making where if it affects something physical than it is physical. Which ends up, it seems to me replacing properties with relations. — Coben

Aye, although I think that is what properties are. The charge of a particle is its coupling to everything, likewise for mass, spin, etc. The position is its position wrt everything else, likewise momentum, energy, etc. The properties of something are given by what it does, and nothing does things to itself. In turn those properties define what that something is. Consciousness is a something that definitely does things -- we are all familiar with that and those things include physical effects.

And it's not just the exotic things like quarks that are exotic since everything is made up of exotic stuff that is not physical in the way we used the word about things like rocks and chairs and as opposed to spiritual or ideal. — Coben

Sure. And it's perfectly understandable why back then we categorised things as physical and non-physical. But it's also not surprising that these older ideas have become refined. Some people still make that distinction, for instance between physical (matter, energy, information, etc.) and material (when taken to mean only massive bodies). It's probably not a huge surprise that new age hippy dippy people talk of energy in much the same way that others talk of supposed non-physical things, like energy is the mystical side of the physical coin.

Further we must assume that all that matters is the impingement on things that we already consider physical (despite whatever we my have found out about their make-up). — Coben

Physicalism assumes physical things exist, which is a reasonable, uncontroversial assumption. For instance, if no physical thing existed, why would we not use the word 'physical' with a different meaning? A non-physical electron still distinguishes itself as a physical electron does (otherwise we're not talking about this human-yielding universe at all) so why would we call it something else. If we assume even only a single physical thing exists, then the argument I gave suggests that all things are either physical or meaningless.

But real seems more appropriate. — Coben

The physicalism argument essentially makes them synonyms. Everything real is physical and vice versa.

The physical (as in physicalism, as in the physical sciences) is that which is empirically verifiable in principle by definition. — Kenosha Kid

What about the distinction between mind/matter or mental/physical? Is there such a distinction, or do minds/mental states not exist?

A row of ducks is a physical thing comprised of other physical things, in the same way you are comprised of cells, cells are comprised of atoms, and atoms are comprised of electrons, protons and neutrons. — Kenosha Kid

But the number of ducks in the row is not 'a physical thing'. It's an intelligible unit, a number, and numbers are intrinsic to the success of physics.

Are numbers real?

I anticipated pushback with more argument behind it, but that's not what's happening here — Kenosha Kid

With respect to your argument, or rather, assertion.

It [the placebo effect] doesn't have an apparently non-physical nature. It has an apparently physical one according to the definition of 'physical' in this context. What we have instead is a rigid and irrational *belief* that it is non-physical. — Kenosha Kid

What we have is the insistence that, if something is real, then it must be physical. That is just as 'rigid and irrational' as the contrary. And it ends up saying that 'whatever exists, must be physical' on the basis that 'only physical things exist'. So it is a circular argument, and I haven't misrepresented it in the least.

I could then go and find papers on 'the placebo effect' but the very fact that it is something that is documented is already a counter against physicalism.

But I think I understand why you, or anyone for that matter, must insist that 'everything is physical'. It's because the alternatives open a can of worms - you have to consider dualism, metaphysics, philosophy of mind - all these subjects other than science! It's much easier to declare it over and done with.

Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door! — Richard Lewontin, Review of Carl Sagan, Demon Haunted World

What is the difference from "being physical" and "existing"? Aren't those two ways of saying the same thing?

What is the difference from "being physical" and "existing"? Aren't those two ways of saying the same thing? — EricH

Only if everything is entirely physical. Why assume the conclusion? Are we to the point of just defining physicalism as true?

Isn't that what the theists tried to do with God?

well, the question I broached above, is ‘do numbers exist’? You might say, of course they do, there’s ‘7’. But you’re pointing to a symbol. The same value can be represented in other notation, like ‘seven’ or ‘VII’. So, the reality of number is (believe it or not) a fiercely contested question in current philosophy. On one side, platonic realists, who insists numbers are real, and on the other side, attitudes like ‘fictionalism’.

Also there are many things that are real that are not physically existent - the Gross National Product, the probability of the Red Sox winning the next World Series, the current interest rate, the value of the US dollar. And so on. So ‘what is real’ is of greater scope than what exists.

(Back in the day of the old ‘philosophy forum’, the proprietor Paul had an excellent essay on this topic posted in the resource section. Alas, no more. )

Physical has been an expanding category for a long time. The things that are considered physical are really just the members of what is considered real, regardless of properties. The best case, it seems to me, is the one you are making where if it affects something physical than it is physical. Which ends up, it seems to me replacing properties with relations. That's fine, but then we are using a word with metaphysical property baggage when we are really referring to relations. — Coben

That's a good explanation. The category of "physical" has been expanding with the intent of occluding dualism. The result is all sorts of category mistakes all over the place because the most fundamental division, the distinction between a thing and its properties, has been lost to the occlusion.

The category of "physical" has been expanding with the intent of occluding dualism — Metaphysician Undercover

It’s more that, after Descartes, idealists tended to congregate around res cogitans, and the engineers and scientists around stuff you can actually work with - which was of course perfectly sensible. The error with this approach is that Descartes model was that - a philosophical model, like an economic model, not a theory, as such, but it has lead to all kinds of unexpected consequences which we’re still living through.

Physicalism is basically just monism, the view that there is only one fundamental kind of stuff, and all the apparently different kinds of stuff are just different manifestations of this one kind of stuff -- and the commitment that that one kind of stuff is the kind of stuff we are most familiar with, the kind of stuff that the world around us that we ordinarily experience, rocks and trees and tables and chairs and so on, is made of.

Wayf you'll note that on my version of physicalism that includes along with it mathematicism, abstract objects like numbers are still ultimately the same kind of stuff as the physical universe, because on that account the physical universe is itself an abstract object, and all other abstract objects are empirically observable (and so physical) to any observers (if any) that are part of them (which we are not), just like our universe (of which we are a part) is to us.

So a physical architect's brain and hand produces plans for a house, and the plans are physical, but there is no house. A natural way of talking would be to say that the builders will realise the architect's plans when they build the house that is imagined. — unenlightened

One kind of structure is that which encodes information. In this instance, we know that the information -- the design of the house -- is encoded physically by an immediately physical (motor) process, so the information is also encoded in the deliberate sweeps of the arm. We know that those arm movements are caused by a great many physical (electrical) signals from the brain which cause muscles in the arm to contract and relax, and those signals also encode that information. And finally we know that one thing the brain definitely does in addition to sending signals is physically encode information (such as long term memory in the cerebral cortex).

It's also worth pointing out that, artistic license and self-aggrandisement aside, it's unlikely that the original information ever came fully formed in the brain. The architect likely took an iterative approach, and refined what she saw on the paper. I would be sceptical of anyone telling me that they imagined the whole building exactly then drew it out. Same goes for any other creative act. Even the greatest geniuses, like Mozart and Beethoven who did not need more than pen and paper to write entire symphonies and requiems, will have used that pen and paper as a means of not having to imagine the whole work.

Wayf you'll note that on my version of physicalism that includes along with it mathematicism, abstract objects like numbers are still ultimately the same kind of stuff as the physical universe, because on that account the physical universe is itself an abstract object, — Pfhorrest

I think it’s too easy an explanation. Every physical thing is compound - composed of parts - and temporally delimited - beginning and ending in time. Neither of those attributes apply to e.g. prime numbers. So that’s an ontological distinction which you can’t escape by equivocating the meaning of ‘exists’.

What about the distinction between mind/matter or mental/physical? Is there such a distinction, or do minds/mental states not exist? — Luke

I'm not sure what you're asking. One can distinguish between a house and a mouse in physicalism, also between a living human and a corpse. Physicalism is a monism insofar as it holds that there is only one *kind* of thing: physical things. That doesn't entail there being only one fundamental thing. If you're asking about dualism, again physicalism is a monism: you can't derive a contradictory pluralism from it. That would be like asking how I explain God in my atheism... I don't need to do that.

I was responding to your statement that “The physical...is that which is empirically verifiable in principle by definition.”
I’m asking how do you verify a mind or mental states?

One kind of structure is that which encodes information. In this instance, we know that the information -- the design of the house -- is encoded physically by an immediately physical (motor) process, so the information is also encoded in the deliberate sweeps of the arm. We know that those arm movements are caused by a great many physical (electrical) signals from the brain which cause muscles in the arm to contract and relax, and those signals also encode that information. And finally we know that one thing the brain definitely does in addition to sending signals is physically encode information (such as long term memory in the cerebral cortex). — Kenosha Kid

This does not account for the causation of existence of the physical house. It is clear that the house exists in a non-physical form, "the design of the house", prior to its physical existence. Of course you dismiss this as technically untrue, the house does not exist in a non-physical form, what we call the non-physical form (ideas), you describe as brain signals, which cause arm movements.

So you transform what we call the non-physical, into a specific type of activity, an activity which "encodes information". The problem with this is that you do not account for the cause of existence of this type of activity, and all you do is posit a new non-physical object, "information", as being involved in that activity. You cannot account for this type of activity because it is the intentional activity responsible for free willing movements, and it acts to create a physical object, which is contrary to Newton's law of inertia. Newton's first law describes an assumed temporal continuity of a massive object, and cannot account for its creation.

In modern physics, all we have as principles to account for the existence of massive objects, is a described relationship between non-massive energy, and massive objects, which cannot account for the designed creation of massive objects. You know Kenosha Kid, that the physicist's understanding of the relation between the wave field and the particle does not allow that the wave field intentional designs the particle. Unless the creation of a particle is determined by existing mass (law of inertia), the furthest that physicist can go in speculating about the cause of massive existence, is spontaneous, or random creation. But this excludes the possibility of this activity being used to encode information. To propose that this random activity encodes information is a violation of the laws of physics.

So ‘what is real’ is of greater scope than what exists. — Wayfarer

But that does not answer my question. What is the semantic difference between "physical" and "existence"?

I’m asking how do you verify a mind or mental states? — Luke

Ah. If you read a bit further down, I point out that there are many things we cannot observe directly (such as quarks, Higgs bosons, spacetime curvature) but rather through their effects. The empirical criterion is not hurt by this. Really, all observed things are detected by their effects.

So there are two possibilities here: 1) the mind is not detectable directly or indirectly, in which case we have no justification for claiming it exists; 2) it falls under the purview of physicalism.

A simple (to write down) verification would be to choose something that the mind does, take a sample of people, and test whether that property is present. What that is will greatly depend on how you define 'mind'. I would go for a series of tests where people have the opportunity to 'change their mind', i.e. something where they can override a more automatic response. That would obviously be no good for a panpsychist who believes everything has mind, because they define the word differently.

Ah. If you read a bit further down, I point out that there are many things we cannot observe directly (such as quarks, Higgs bosons, spacetime curvature) but rather through their effects. — Kenosha Kid

Doesn't empirical verification require direct observation? Otherwise, it's indirect observation and inference.

I had assumed that when you said "The physical...is that which is empirically verifiable in principle by definition," that the "in principle" meant something like "with sufficient technology", whereby we could directly observe the physical. Otherwise, what did you mean by "in principle"?

Really, all observed things are detected by their effects. — Kenosha Kid

Perhaps, but there's a difference between directly seeing/perceiving something and seeing/perceiving only its effects. Empirical verification has to do with direct observation via the senses.

So there are two possibilities here: 1) the mind is not detectable directly or indirectly, in which case we have no justification for claiming it exists; 2) it falls under the purview of physicalism. — Kenosha Kid

Or 3) minds do exist, but because they cannot be empirically verified - even with sufficient technology - then they are not physical (according to your definition).

A simple (to write down) verification would be to choose something that the mind does, take a sample of people, and test whether that property is present. What that is will greatly depend on how you define 'mind'. — Kenosha Kid

It doesn't require any special definition. Wikipedia offers the following, which seems suitable enough:

The mind is the set of faculties including cognitive aspects such as consciousness, imagination, perception, thinking, intelligence, judgement, language and memory, as well as noncognitive aspects such as emotion and instinct. — Wikipedia

...the mind is not detectable directly or indirectly, in which case we have no justification for claiming it exists; — Kenosha Kid

As Descartes made abundantly clear, the reality of one's own mind, at least, is what is described as an apodictic truth, 'apodictic' meaning 'cannot reasonably be doubted', for the simple reason that doubt requires a mind capable of doubting.

Doesn't empirical verification require direct observation? — Luke

No, as I've pointed out with orthodox examples several times.

It doesn't require any special definition. — Luke

You've been on this site for a while now. Is your impression that we're unanimous?

As Descartes made abundantly clear, the reality of one's own mind, at least, is what is described as an apodictic truth, 'apodictic' meaning 'cannot reasonably be doubted', for the simple reason that doubt requires a mind capable of doubting. — Wayfarer

I agree, but knowing that I have doubted is a detection.

I agree, but knowing that I have doubted is a detection. — Kenosha Kid

OK, this is a good start. By what means does one "detect" the mind. Surely it's not a sense observation, so the indubitableness of this proposition is not empirically based. What produces this certainty then? We can see that the conclusion expressed by Wayfarer (from Descartes) is a logical conclusion, and ask the same question about logic in general. Logic provides us a type of certainty which is not empirically based. What supports, or substantiates this certainty?

It doesn't require any special definition.
— Luke

You've been on this site for a while now. Is your impression that we're unanimous? — Kenosha Kid

What are you on about? If you disagree with the Wikipedia definition of "mind" that I quoted, feel free to spell out where you disagree.

If you don't want to explain what you meant by "in principle" or to discuss it further, that's fine.

knowing that I have doubted is a detection. — Kenosha Kid

What can it really mean to detect, when knowledge of having doubted is given immediately from it. It is impossible to doubt without doubt being known as that which has occurrence. There is no need for the one to test for the other.

No different than saying a spinning wheel detects its own roundness. It spins because it is round, it couldn’t spin if it wasn’t. Being round is a necessary condition for wheel spinning, hence, if there is spinning, roundness is necessarily given. There is no requirement or admission of detection.

In the same way, I know I doubted because I doubted; I couldn’t know I doubted without having doubted. That which is known about is a necessary condition for knowing; upon doubting, knowledge of doubt follows necessarily, without requirement or admission of detection.

Besides, if there is that which knows, and there is that which doubts....what is it that detects? Knowledge doesn’t need to detect that which it already knows, and doubt doesn’t need to detect itself. If, on the other hand, it is I that knows and it is I that doubts, but it is only possibly I that detects, then there is no real knowledge of detection because it may not have been I that detects. And if it is I that detects, all that has happened is I’ve detected what I already know I did, which is the same as admitting I haven’t done anything by detecting.

Waiting for my bread to rise, saw this, so........rhetorically speaking......

We can perceive the effects of dark matter, which counts as perceiving dark matter. — Pfhorrest

If I see a broken window I haven't seen the person who broke it.

You're offering a variant of Hempel's dilemma.

On the one hand, we may define the physical as whatever is currently explained by our best physical theories, e.g., quantum mechanics, general relativity. Though many would find this definition unsatisfactory, some would accept that we have at least a general understanding of the physical based on these theories, and can use them to assess what is physical and what is not. And therein lies the rub, as a worked-out explanation of mentality currently lies outside the scope of such theories.

On the other hand, if we say that some future, "ideal" physics is what is meant, then the claim is rather empty, for we have no idea of what this means. The "ideal" physics may even come to define what we think of as mental as part of the physical world. In effect, physicalism by this second account becomes the circular claim that all phenomena are explicable in terms of physics because physics properly defined is whatever explains all phenomena.

What are you on about? If you disagree with the Wikipedia definition of "mind" that I quoted, feel free to spell out where you disagree.

If you don't want to explain what you meant by "in principle" or to discuss it further, that's fine. — Luke

FFS, forget it. Your bizarre responses are, as the past has taught me, beyond my skill to negotiate.

OK, this is a good start. By what means does one "detect" the mind. — Metaphysician Undercover

The 'I think' of the cogito is an observation. It is an empirical fact that I think, albeit limited to one observer and one object which is why it would not make a good test for presence of mind. A better one would be to take something like an optical illusion, discount those that identify the sought image straight away (which would deal with AIs too), and look for evidence that subjects can, upon immediately seeing the unsought image, figure out how to see the sought image. That's as good an indicator of mind as any, encapsulating as it does self-awareness, motivation, memory, doubt, and algorithmic thinking.

Of course, you could game this with AI too, but height is still a good test for adulthood notwithstanding the occasional kid on another kid's shoulder wearing a trenchcoat and fake beard.

What can it really mean to detect, when knowledge of having doubted is given immediately from it. It is impossible to doubt without doubt being known as that which has occurrence. There is no need for the one to test for the other.

No different than saying a spinning wheel detects its own roundness. It spins because it is round, it couldn’t spin if it wasn’t. Being round is a necessary condition for wheel spinning, hence, if there is spinning, roundness is necessarily given. There is no requirement or admission of detection. — Mww

Does a spinning wheel know it is round? If not, where is the detection? Granted, yes, the act of doubting necessitates the mind that does the doubting. That this is not true of being round means the analogy cannot hold.

However, I can detect the roundness of the spinning wheel with the same mind that is aware that it thinks.

In the same way, I know I doubted because I doubted; I couldn’t know I doubted without having doubted. That which is known about is a necessary condition for knowing; upon doubting, knowledge of doubt follows necessarily, without requirement or admission of detection. — Mww

I think you meant "I couldn't doubt without knowing I have doubted"? I don't know how difficult it would be to design a doubting AI, but it doesn't seem beyond the realm of possibility. For us, yes, we cannot doubt and not be aware if it, unlike, say, breathing. This doesn't seem problematic. The route between fact and knowledge of it can be short or long.

The 'I think' of the cogito is an observation. — Kenosha Kid

That's a dubious proposition. I would say it is more of an assertion than an observation. So in the logical argument of Descartes, it serves more as a definition than an observation. It defines "I" as something thinking, and concludes that the something which is thinking is necessarily existing. It cannot be considered as a valid observation because the supposed "I" cannot be observed to be thinking. The existence of the "I" is rather inferred from the act of thinking, not observed to be thinking. That is the point of the argument the existence of the "I" which is claimed to "be", is inferred from the thinking, it is not observed to be thinking. Many in philosophy will dispute the existence of the "I", by insisting that an "I" is unnecessary for a thinking.

But I see from your discussion with Luke, that you are free and easy as to what qualifies as an "observation". I think that this is one of the places where modern science (especially quantum physics) fails us. Modern science does not employ rigorous restrictions as to what qualifies as a valid observation, and many theories are verified by bogus "observations".

Really, all observed things are detected by their effects. — Kenosha Kid

When we reduce the human act of sense observation to being passively effected by something, we ignore the active aspect of observation and neglect the role of intention. Then we might create "detection machines", and claim that these machine are observing. But of course they are only detecting what they are designed to detect, and everything else goes right past them. So they cannot be claimed to be making valid "observations".

That's a dubious proposition. I would say it is more of an assertion than an observation. — Metaphysician Undercover

A computer can be programmed to assert that it thinks. Doesn't make it so. Descartes was starting from what he knew for sure, which is that he thinks.

But I see from your discussion with Luke, that you are free and easy as to what qualifies as an "observation". — Metaphysician Undercover

Precisely as much as the empirical sciences. We cannot put spacetime curvature under a microscope: we infer it from indirect evidence, i.e. observations of its effects. This is actually true of all observations. You have no direct observation of your chair: it is all interpretations of effects.

But of course they are only detecting what they are designed to detect, and everything else goes right past them. So they cannot be claimed to be making valid "observations". — Metaphysician Undercover

We use such machines all the time, and class an observation to be a reading of their outputs.