| | Daniel:
I appreciate your direct responses to my questions. In the interests of brevity (Hey, it COULD happen!), I'll respond only to those issues which I feel are principal weaknesses of Popper's view as you present it. (I say this to make it clear that I'm only responding to what you say, and not to any wider knowledge of Popper.)
>1. How does Popper's model ACTUALLY do anything but say "they're different" and deny physicality?
... I call it "non-physical" just because it is more clear cut - what is not subject to physical laws is surely not "physical" in any usual sense!!!
OK
In brief, by postulating a nonphysical (or whatever you'd like to call it) W2 Popper preserves human freedom in his system.
This assumes that the physical necessitates rigid causality and that volition could not arise in this framework. Given that and given volition, it would seem necessary to posit some other realm.
Of course, I do not accept the first premise.
[Restatements of the belief snipped.]
Interestingly W3, being abstract, is nonetheless also *deterministic*, like W1. For example, mathematical systems are deterministic - in fact, far more precisely so than the physical world, as was first noticed by the great American philosopher Pierce. I don't believe one can make the claim that "mathematical systems are deterministic." But this seems an aside and I'll not argue that can of worms here.
>Why is Popper's physical world subject to determinism but NOT his hypothetical worlds--how do they escape determinism in a way which would not apply to the physical world? See above. Hope this clarifies.
I'm afraid not. Unless I'm overlooking something, Daniel, you have just restated the WHAT (Popper's belief) and the WHY (that we must have another world to avoid determinism) but you did not explain the HOW.
Again: How does [the other Popperian world] escape determinism in a way which would not apply to the physical world?
If no answer is forthcoming, I'm forced to conclude that this concept is devoid of cognitive content, and that we could apply the same assertion to the physical world, namely, that 'somehow the physical world escapes hard determinism.'
[Subjective/objective snipped. That's another discussion.]
>Why is Popper's physical world subject to determinism but NOT his hypothetical worlds--how do they escape determinism which would not apply to the physical world?
In W2 because it must as a basic assumption
Not to split hairs, it appears more of a necessary CONCLUSION, given his actual premises: a) that the physical necessitates rigid causality and that b) volition exists but could not arise in this framework.
I reject his premises, of course. But also I point to the flawed logic which would posit some unknown escape mechanism in a hypothetical world when an unknown escape mechanism would apply just as nicely to the physical realm.
BTW, even the most determined physicalist has to admit your unicorn exists *in the physical patterns of your brain*, much like in Popper's W2.
Exactly, so why do we need W2?
I'm not sure I can help you see it, Daniel, but as you've presented this picture, it is circuitous.
If you apply EXACTLY THE SAME PREMISES AND LOGIC to W2, W2 would need a W2.2 world, and that a W2.2.2 world, etc., and the scheme succumbs to the fallacy of infinite regress.
If you DO NOT apply the same premises and logic to W2 (and that appears to be the case), then we're forced to ask why those changed premises could not also apply to W1.
>Computers can model circles as our mind does--are we to hold that there must be some nonphysical realm which corresponds to the model of a circle in a computer's memory?
Yes. Computers are mostly W3 objects! That is, they rely on *man-made* rules.
Not so. Computers can invent their own rules of inference.
'Yes,' you might note, 'but ULTIMATELY they depend upon human programming.'
True. Just as we depend upon the programming of nature to get our intellectual start in the world.
But the question is: Can ANY machine, natural or artificial, become volitional without recourse to a posited nonphysical realm. I answer in the affirmative, for both computers and humans.
>How is awareness of something OUTSIDE our physical brains a better explanation than that we are simply aware of our internal states?
That which is outside our physical brains is *objective*, whether it is physical or not.
Internal states are called *subjective* states.
I see. You say, "We want to avoid a comprehensive subjectivism first and foremost."
I'm afraid that doesn't apply to me, though. What I want first and foremost is to understand HOW THINGS ACTUALLY WORK.
If all there truly is to consciousness and volition are the physical and organizational states of our brain, that's what I want to know. I could not care less whether someone labels that circumstance "subjective." Reality is what it is.
Without evidence, I cannot accept the notion that "something more is required." Avoiding hard determinism would be a good reason to posit another realm like W2, but just to say "it does" is insufficient. One would also be required to say HOW it does so in a way that the physical/organizational cannot. Otherwise it is an empty notion.
I appreciate your discussion of these views, but suspect we are at the end point unless you can produce a rationale which avoids the problems I've mentioned. Just restating the beliefs, of course, would get us nowhere.
Thanks, Daniel.
Nathan Hawking
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