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Replying to fredonly in post #36]
Assuming undirected evolution "accounts" for nothing.
You're wrong.
You used the word "assumed" re the phrase "Undirected Evolution". If your subsequent argument above is to be taken seriously, then the claim has to change to simply "Undirected Evolution" because anything simply assumed accounts for nothing, due to the assumption.
The physical evolution of the universe is a fact that is largely explained by known physics, whose job it is to derive laws of nature.
This is not under dispute (by me) but the explanation is not an assumption because it is based on what is known not what is assumed. (Any assumption about what is known is related to what is still unknown re what is known)
So far, no processes have been identified that point to any alternative explanation - such as a mind.
I myself am not arguing for an
alternative explanation re a mindful thing involved with the processes being uncovered re materialism. The possibility of an overlooked undercurrent of the processes of material formation (densification) isn't alternative but a possible aspect of the whole process which would naturally be overlooked through material studies alone.
There is enough evidence imo to support the idea that the process isn't purely materialistic (in nature) but is also mindful/conscious (in the way nature unfolds re formations).
In that, I am not arguing The Kalam Cosmological Argument re William Lane Craig is correct about a supposed supernatural alternative which caused a natural universe, but that mindfulness is as natural as the nature it creates through the process and niether as unnatural/supernatural to each other because they are aspects of the one thing.
One must look at what can be at least construed as evidential of possible mindfulness, something we all have access to but is by no means simply (yet neither overly difficult).
So...make an ad hoc assumption of "mindfulness", and fit empirical facts to it. Do you see the problem?
We do not need to assume "mindfulness" in an improvised fashion. Not sure how you reached that conclusion re what I wrote, other than you quoted me out of context.
Mindfulness (consciousness et al) exists not only as an aspect of the material processes we can far more easily account for but to get anywhere productive re the material, mindfulness is essential.
Based upon that knowledge, to assume mindfulness is something along the lines of 'unnecessary" flies in the face of the evidence we have access to - just on this planet alone.
It is important too, not to impose a double standard just because one way of thinking is simpler to do than the other.
You misrepresented what I'm saying.
Unlikely. I simply cautioned against any use of double standard. If anything I may have misunderstood your statements of opinion.
The question I'm dealing with is metaphysical: what is the most parsimonious metaphysical explanation, that is still coherent? Coherence, explanatory scope, and parsimony are the only objective measures we have for choosing a metaphysical explanation. Wishful thinking doesn't tend to get toward truth, and neither does an ad hoc assumption that becomes a basis for defining an alternative metaphysics.
As I explained above, I am not arguing for an alternative explanation but for a wholesome explanation. In that, I am not suggesting that there is any requirement for us (as mindful critters in a material situation) to separate mind from matter simply because the condensed state of particles makes it easier for mind to understand the stuff of matter than it does for mind to understand the stuff of itself in relation to to said matter.
If one allows for the assumption of mindlessness being able to create formation and order, one has the burden of providing explanation rationally as to how this contradiction is possible to achieve.
The assumption of "mindfulness" is ad hoc, and requires accounting for the existence of this quality/function.
I don't think you claiming that mindfulness doesn't exist at all, so what accounts for the mindfulness we do know exists? Also, why do you argue that mindfulness would not account as a quality/function in the broader reality, when there is ample evidence to support that it certainly counts as a quality/function in the local environment (life on earth)?
We've discussed this before, and you've shown that you are forced to make more ad hoc assumptions to account for it. The more ad hoc assumptions you depend on, the less credible it is.
The existence of mindfulness (specifically but not altogether displayed through human beings) is not ad hoc and taking from that fact of mindful existence within material existence, one can indeed rational extrapolate the idea that the material (of the universe) is mindful (too) rather than simply declare such a thought to being in the realm of improvisation, and (therefore) not worthy of examination.
