The simplest and cleanest way to understand physicalism is as the idea that only the stuff described in physics texts is true.

Physicalism can't explain how traffic lights work. There simply is no physical description of why it is that the traffic stops at a red light, and proceeds on the green. Any suggestion otherwise amounts to wishful thinking.

The statement that "only physical statements are true" is not a statement in physical terms. It is neither falsifiable nor demonstrable.

On the other hand, when one does physics, one must look only for physical explanations. Methodologically, physicists must restrict themselves to only physical explanations.

Notions such as idealism and panpsychism bring with them their own conceptual issues, at least as dubious as physicalism.

The solution is to accept that there are different ways of talking about different subjects, that we do a range of different things in the world.

To borrow an example from Ryle, a watercolour of a mountain is not poor geology, and a stratigraphic map is not a poor piece of art. They are doing very different things, and are associated with very different ways of talking.

"Supervenience" is not an explanation so much as a description of patterns between physical descriptions and the many other descriptions we use to find our way around.

For a bit more from Ryle, take a look at Chapter Five from Dilemmas

The simplest and cleanest way to understand physicalism is as the idea that only the stuff described in physics texts is true. — Banno

I don't disagree but can I ponder this with you for a bit?

My understanding of physicalism is that it tends to deny the existence of non-physical substances or entities and proposes that all phenomena, including mental states and consciousness, can be reduced to or explained by physical processes.

Physicalism can't explain how traffic lights work. — Banno

Perhaps not when seen from one perspective, but is it not the case that traffic lights and the convention that we stop can be explained by physical processes? Behaviors are physical. A code of conduct (which is what traffic lights amount to) is surely reducible to physical processes?

Maybe. I just don't see how physicalism differentiates itself from the wider umbrella of naturalism in that case though. I can't think of any reason why objective idealists, dualists, or physicalists couldn't overlap completely on methodology. "Methodological physicalism," seems like a misnomer to me. It seems like it would just be naturalism + a certain set of theory laden ideas. The difference isn't in the methodology, but in contents of the theory ladenness. — Count Timothy von Icarus

The physicalist sees a "dead" universe, so to speak. Scientists don't consider the possibility that the universe is alive or developing according to psychological rules. If an idealist looks at the world that way, then yes, that idealist is basically a naturalist.

As a philosophy of mind, I think physicalism has some killer arguments that suggest it gets at least some crucial details right. Physicalist philosophy of mind also doesn't have the same need for reductionism to be coherent, minds don't need to reduce to brains, embodied cognition still works, — Count Timothy von Icarus

Embodied cognition just aims to explain some features of functionality. But I admit that the term kind of irritates me. It's not like we overlooked the relationship between mind and body as we went about discovering how the body works.

A code of conduct (which is what traffic lights amount to) is surely reducible to physical processes? — Tom Storm

How? Show your working. In terms only found in physics.

Well, I guess behavior is physical. We choose to follow a convention or choose not to be fined. Brain activity/chemicals, etc. Then we physically apply the brakes. We physically wait for the light to change. We accelerate when the lights are green.

Your suggestion takes the convention of stopping for red as a non-physical behavioral convention, right?

But how is this different to a dog being trained to bark for food? Isn't the causal chain which lead to the behavior determined by physical processes which can be explained by physics?

Perhaps you are saying that intentionality can't be explained by physics?

How? Show your working. In terms only found in physics. — Banno

Isn't that like asking someone who wrote a program in python to write it instead in machine code? Possible but a pain in the ass. Not that I know anything about programming.

The simplest and cleanest way to understand physicalism is as the idea that only the stuff described in physics texts is true. — Banno

Can you quote anyone calling herself a physicalist saying anything remotely like that?

Don't some philosophers suggest that this comes down to the distinction between philosophical naturalism or methodological naturalism?

That said, I wouldn't underestimate the degree to which reductive physicalism is the default view of the public, and seen broadly as what "science says the world is like. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yes, I can see that, though I also think maybe the general public might not really know what reductive physicalism means their views might be still quite vague even if they lean toward reductive physicalism. And I think its possible to lean or are drawn toward reductive physicalism even if they don't actually hold the view. I think I am probably in that category. I don't think I am actually a reductive physicalist at all but there is this kind of gravitational pull tugging at my intuitions. I don't know if it just has something to do with how compelling a person finds science, or something like that.

this is also why compatibilism doesn't seem appealing to them. The problem isn't just that the mind is determined by what comes before any volitional act, it's that mental life has no causal efficacy because real causal power rests with the atoms and molecules. Often I also see a conflation where "if determinism is true then reductionism/smallism is also true," so that evidence for determinism (strong in some contexts IMO) becomes evidence for smallism (weak IMO). — Count Timothy von Icarus

I don't think I know what smallism is but tbh I don't find compatibilism that compelling for reasons like these.

Philosophy doesn't need to be the sort of anti-intellectual activity you would have it be. — wonderer1

That is hilariously mistaken but neo-darwinist materialism is a different topic so I won’t pursue it here.

That seems to me to be a uniting theme on materialism -- something, be it qualia, intentionality, mind, or spiritual things, is somehow reduced to or explained away as a physical, material, or natural process of things. (I'd include supervenience as a kind of reduction, so I mean that term broadly) — Moliere

Yes, it's a matter of perspective—I see it more as a case of those being better understood as physical, material or natural processes than as being "reduced to explained away" by that understanding. It doesn't seem to me that anything important is being lost or diminished by thinking that way.

Nice. Can I borrow this? — Tom Storm

Cheers—but, I cannot loan what I never owned.

Ah - ok. Yes, this is reasonable. I believe that the mental is another aspect of the physical though, so it's not an opposition, but your point is well taken. — Manuel

I agree—I tend to see 'mind' as a verb not a noun, and I see mental functions as one kind of physical function. The tricky part is that the physical aspects of mental functions are well-hidden from us; we don't so easily feel the physical aspects of mental functions as we might, for example, with digestion. We don't feel our brains, I mean that's why they can be operated on without anaesthetic.

Energy yes - as far as I know, I think this applies. Entropy is tricky though, is the universe an open or closed system? What is order and what is disorder? Ben-Naim has written about this, it's quite interesting. — Manuel

Right, entropy is a complex and hard concept to pin down, but I was referring just to the way everything seems to "run down" over time. the way heat disperses and things in general are dissipative structures. Thanks for the text reference; I''ll check it out,

If one does. I'm saying that 'substance' is a poor choice of words, for the reasons I gave. I'm not denying the reality of the mind.
— Wayfarer

Yes, substance is problematic and dated. But if qualified, it can be used, though it can lead to confusions. — Manuel

I think some of the confusions comes with thinking that only objects or entities exist. This may be a spin-off of substance thinking. I see minding, like digesting or running as real functions and "the mind" as a reified container metaphor.

We choose... — Tom Storm

Well, there is that bit...

I'm guessing that the way the brain works when someone stops at a traffic light is not the same as the way a dog salivates at the sound of a bell. Stopping at the red light is understood from childhood, I'm thinking that few driving instructors have to explain it to their students, but instead move on to the "how" of when to press the brake and when to drive through.

But there's more here than an individual brain. The lights will fail if other folk do not also follow the procedure. SO you and I also follow the procedure on the understanding that others will do likewise - there's a group intentionality involved.

And then there is the planning that goes in to implementing this system, from the light factory to the urban planner to the magistrate and parliament.

Yet stoping at the red light is a relatively simple social institution.

The supposition is that this is

like asking someone who wrote a program in python to write it instead in machine code? — bert1

but that is an algorithmic process, and it is far from clear that brains, let alone minds and social institutions, function in such an algorithmic fashion. Some supose that the "supervenience" is still algorithmic, that

"There cannot be an A-difference without a B-difference." — frank

is a shorthand for a physically causal link, such that B is emergent from A. But human behaviour is more complex than that. You could right now lift your arm, but will you or won't you? Which will you choose, and once you have made your choice, will you enact it or change your mind? And now that I have said that, will you change your mind again? The recursion and iteration involved in your deciding whether to raise your arm or not place it well outside any calculable algorithm.

So physics is not capable of giving an account of the simplest social interactions.

Yet even if it were, if some algorithm could set out such a situation, what we would have is what we already have in our folk descriptions of how traffic lights work. Nothing would be gained.

Can you quote anyone calling herself a physicalist saying anything remotely like that? — wonderer1

The suggestion cuts out the interminable fluff of substance versus materialism versus naturalism and so on seen here.The stuff found in physics texts serves to tie down the term"physicalism".

So physics is not capable of giving an account of the simplest social interactions. — Banno

I probably agree with you, I was just putting a counter-argument. But if I adopt a reductive bottom-up causality position, I'm not convinced you have shown me I am wrong. They may not be more than the individual brain and its model of the social world. And the model is itself, the argument will go, is nothing more than a stupendously complex brain process. But yeah, I don't find that plausible either.

Don't some philosophers suggest that this comes down to the distinction between philosophical naturalism or methodological naturalism? — Tom Storm

I've mostly seen the distinction come up in the context of scientists saying they practice methodological naturalism as scientists but are not metaphysical naturalists. I'm not in a position to speak very exhaustively about what some philosophers may say. :wink:

Why do you ask?

Cool. I don't think this is at odds with your characterisation, here:

1) Some things are physical
2) Monism is true
Therefore: 3) Everything is physical — bert1

Idealism denies the first premise, which is what several folk here are doing. I'm working on the second, pointing out that physical explanations are inadequate for many, many of the things we do, and that we use other explanations that work in these situations.

But if I adopt a reductive bottom-up causality position — bert1

I've also taken issue elsewhere with the overly simplistic notion that physical explanations are "causal", the image of A causing B causing C and the folk hereabouts who think this an adequate description of the world. "Cause" isn't a term used in physics, having been replaced by maths since Galileo. But it lingers in meta-physics and in pop philosophy of science.

Why do you ask? — wonderer1

Just that for physicalists (and secular humanists) I know, they would argue that they hold to methodological naturalism and not philosophical (or metaphysical) naturalism. The latter being a truth claim about reality they believe is unwarranted, the former being a more (shall we say) pragmatic approach to philosophical enquires. I'm pretty sure AC Grayling puts it similarly although he calls himself a naturalist rather than a physicalist.

I've also taken issue elsewhere with the overly simplistic notion that physical explanations are "causal", the image of A causing B causing C and the folk hereabouts who think this an adequate description of the world. "Cause" isn't a term used in physics, having been replaced by maths since Galileo. But it lingers in meta-physics and in pop philosophy of science. — Banno

Yes, that's really interesting, I noted your post about that with interest. Worth a thread perhaps. The place of causality in nature, if anywhere,

Cause" isn't a term used in physics, having been replaced by maths since Galileo. — Banno

Is that so? In making predictions, doesn’t physics implicitly appeal to causation? Isn’t causation implicit with every use of ‘because’?

What Galileo dispatched was telos, not causation as such.

The suggestion cuts out the interminable fluff of substance versus materialism versus naturalism and so on seen here.The stuff found in physics texts serves to tie down the term"physicalism". — Banno

So are you saying it's a rhetorical ploy? Attempting to manipulate people into seeing things as you wish?

Feel free to explain, but I'll take that as a, "No.", to my question "Can you quote anyone calling herself a physicalist saying anything remotely like that?"

So physics is not capable of giving an account of the simplest social interactions. — Banno

Do you believe there is a meaningful distinction between a physicalist and a naturalist?

The naturalist, presumably has a broader scope than a physicalist and will point to the notion that everything can be explained by natural laws and phenomena (as opposed to the supernatural), not necessarily limited to the physical - other disciplines beyond physics which would incorporate social interactions and codified behaviors, rituals, anthropology, biology, etc.

I guess the upshot of this might be that if we can confirm that there is an afterlife or a Platonic realm, then these become known as natural.

Maybe. It's not that there are no causes, but that the way folk talk about them oversimplifies what they are and what they do.

Oh, there's . It may be too late to move causation to a new thread.

In making predictions, doesn’t physics implicitly appeal to causation? — Wayfarer

ok, so we have something to work with, what would be an example? Here's a nice description of the physics of billiards, using formulae for conservation of momentum and so on. Nary a mention of cause - doesn't that seem odd, if physics is about A causing B causing C....? Does making the "implicit" explicit give us any advantage?

You're familiar with Russell's take on this.

Smallism is a neat term for the idea that "facts about large things are reducible to facts about smaller parts." Wholes are defined by their parts, rather than vice versa. Whatever is fundamental
in the universe must exist on the smallest scales. It preferences "bottom-up" explanations over "top-down" ones.

For example, consider explaining why balloons take on a spherical shape. We could explain this in terms of the fact that the roughly spherical shape will best equalize pressure, a top-down explanation. Alternatively, we could describe it solely through a description of molecules bouncing off one another. Smallism would tend to preference the latter, and that might very well be the right approach in that example, but bottom-up explanations don't always seem possible (e.g. the heat carrying capacities of metals).

On the face of it, parts being defined by the whole of which they are a part seems like it could be equally valid. However, I can certainly see why smallism is popular. One of the best ways to figure out how something works is to break it down, and narrowing your focus can also make a problem more soluble. So, I think the popularity of the idea stems from how successful decomposition has been as a research method.

I think problems crop up when this tendency graduates from being a general approach to figuring things out to a metaphysical position about the nature of reality. For one, there are some phenomena that we have good reasons to think might not be reducible to their parts (e.g. molecular structure). The whole idea of fundamentality adds another wrinkle (e.g. fields that fill the entire universe in some ways appear more fundamental than particles.) There are good arguments that computation isn't decomposable this way either, and there is a lot of support for pancomputationalism in the physics community, which would entail that smallism is simply a flawed position.

I don't know if it just has something to do with how compelling a person finds science, or something like that.

I think that might be right in a way. A lot of scientific knowledge comes from breaking things down, which lends credence to the smallist account. That said, a great many scientists don't buy into smallism and a lot of our best explanations come in top-down forms, so I could see how it might depend on exactly which science you delve into the most. Neuroscience tends to be very bottom up, particularly because we lack good top-down theories for major phenomena like consciousness. Physics tends to have a lot of top-down explanations.

My $0.02 is that smallism itself is a speculative proposition, and if chemists, working in a field as mature as any, are still debating if molecular structure is reducible, then it isn't on particularly solid ground.

The physicalist sees a "dead" universe, so to speak. Scientists don't consider the possibility that the universe is alive or developing according to psychological rules.

True. Although I've considered before that if you accept computational theory of mind, still the most popular theory in cognitive science, then nothing necessarily precludes the entire universe from being conscious or becoming conscious. Not panpsychism, but a "cosmic mind" having very slow thoughts, the stuff of click bait articles to be sure, but possible!

Embodied cognition just aims to explain some features of functionality. But I admit that the term kind of irritates me. It's not like we overlooked the relationship between mind and body as we went about discovering how the body works.

Yeah, I don't love it either. And it seems like common sense, but when it comes to debates about compatibilism, etc. it is nice to have a set of ideas summed up in one term, expressing how people aren't just brains, and how our actions are constantly changing the environment, so that identifying the "will" in time and space gets rather tricky.

So are you saying it's a rhetorical ploy? — wonderer1

More like

...being able to talk about the same thing at two different levels of abstraction, — wonderer1

...removing the unnecessary emergent stuff. Physics does not make substantive use of the notion of substance... (see what I did there?)

These are methodological rather than ontic issues, to my eye. So if you are doing physics, you don't do seances.

Physicists look only for physical explanations.

More like
...being able to talk about the same thing at two different levels of abstraction,
— wonderer1
...removing the unnecessary emergent stuff. Physics does not make substantive use of the notion of substance... (see what I did there?) — Banno

:lol:
Yeah, I see what you did there on multiple levels. However, the person you quoted looks at things at various level including physics, chemistry, biology neuroscience, psychology, etc. So unfortunately you still haven't come up with a quote to support your claim. Care to try again?

The simplest and cleanest way to understand physicalism is as the idea that only the stuff described in physics texts is true.

That’s a weird and messy way to understand it, in my opinion. Much of physics is theoretical and abstract. Not even physicists believe they’re true.

The root word gives it away. It’s not physics or physicism or any sort of positivism. It’s physicalism. It’s much simpler and cleaner to understand it as the thesis that everything is physical.

I've also taken issue elsewhere with the overly simplistic notion that physical explanations are "causal", the image of A causing B causing C and the folk hereabouts who think this an adequate description of the world. "Cause" isn't a term used in physics, having been replaced by maths since Galileo. But it lingers in meta-physics and in pop philosophy of science. — Banno

I think your dismissal of the idea of causation as being relevant in physics is overly simplistic. One of the issues with thinking in terms of local efficient causes is that it ignores global conditions, which produces a false impression of strict linearity or "causal chains" instead of networks of energetic influences.

Causation can broadly be understood as energy exchange, without the elimination of complexity, an elimination introduced by simplistic "efficient" notions of causation, and this understanding in terms of energy would seem to be compatible with physics, with the rest of science and with the understanding of everyday events in general.

Hmm. What is it you are disagreeing with?

What I did was to suggest that we could simplify the issue of what "physicalism" is by sticking to physics.

It's not obligatory. But if physicalism is not about the sort of stuff that goes on in physics books, then what?

At the least, physicalism has something to do with physics.

It's a simple enough point. Explicit physics uses equations in terms of mass, time, energy and so on, not in terms of causes. I don't see a point of disagreement between us.

It involves the evidence of offered by physics, surely, but also some other sciences as well. Given its relation to philosophy of mind, it’s also about biology and chemistry, for example.