logoalt Hacker News

energy123today at 9:53 AM3 repliesview on HN

I don't know anyone who supports both ideas at the same time. Are you saying that philosophers do?

Most philosophers are materialists or computational functionalists, while being monists. This means they aren't dualists, and it means they do not adopt the supernatural explanation. But they are careful not to rule out dualism.

There's this pattern I've observed in discussions about philosophy. First there's a rejection of philosophy as silly and misguided, followed by a rediscovery of the same concepts that philosophers have developed, but under a new ad-hoc and less precise language.

Congratulations, you're a philosopher.


Replies

mikk14today at 10:10 AM

I don't know if this is discussed by actual serious philosophers, but consider the issue of "mind uploading." I have seen very staunch monists seriously discussing that, if you were to produce a complete digital copy of your brain -- copying any possible information to the most minute synapse -- then you effectively "uploaded" yourself into a computer and can live a digital life.

These people believe this while at the same time considering dualism so ridiculous as to laugh dualists out of the room. The evident problem being that "mind uploading" is the most dualistic possible position to take. A real monist would easily see that by doing mind uploading you have just created a clone that is a whole separate entity from yourself and it is not yourself.

show 5 replies
naragtoday at 10:50 AM

I don't know anyone who supports both ideas at the same time. Are you saying that philosophers do?

Every guy saying that free will doesn't exist is arguing exactly this. Physical causality considered an obstacle to freedom implies that the conscious entity is somehow outside the physical world.

show 2 replies