Materialism

r4n8e · Jun 19, 2012

Zorba The Grape said:

I think I can weigh in on this question to some degree. I will tell you what I think are the benefits of "materialism," and what I consider to be its drawbacks.

To begin with the positive, materialism attempts to be honest with itself, to abide by the scientific method, and not posit metaphysical causes and effects. It is an attempt to explain things based on the smallest number of principles necessary (the principle of parsimony or "Occam's Razor"), which must be the essence of any honest method. One does not assume metaphysical causes where physical causes provide the same explanatory power. As an example: what would you say about a person who reads Mein Kampf and, having discovered a statement that seems to contradict Hitler's major positions, attempts to explain it by assuming that there is an "anti-Nazi" thread running through his work? If we are dealing with just one statement, or even several, you would probably say that he's jumping to an extreme conclusion: there is probably a way of explaining these statements while still assuming that Hitler is a Nazi. The essence of the matter is that one avoids multiplying contradictions: one puts in the extra work to explain things on the basis of principles which are already necessary and in use. It is only if these principles fail utterly -- have no explanatory power in this situation -- that one must consider adopting more. In this sense materialism is methodical, which is to say (relatively) honest, and this can only be a good thing. In our times one does not merely err in assuming extraneous causes, one lies: one reinterprets experience and thinks selectively in order to bring it off.

The drawback, to make a controversial argument, (and what a drawback it is!), is that materialism is another form of idealism. I don't expect most of you to understand this or agree with me, but it most certainly is. The essence of the matter is that "materialists" mistake the origin and nature of physical models of the universe. It has not been realized that physics is simply an interpretation and exegesis of reality, and certainly not reality itself. A "particle," for instance, is a theoretical construct, a model for understanding, for making things thinkable to human beings. It is the greatest of errors -- perhaps a modern form of comfort as well -- to suppose that the images in physics textbooks are images of "reality." On the contrary, they are simply theoretical models. I am furthest from denying the value and explanatory power of these models, as I explained above: if one wishes to get to the moon, one does best to think in terms of physical models. Philosophically, however, it must be remembered that they are models. Reality is not "summed up" by modelling the quark, just as it was not summed up by Aristotle's physics. There is always an instinct to go "deeper," "smaller," to break reality down to its constituent elements and call this real. In the end, we are doing nothing but asserting the reality of a theoretical model, a system of ideas. Why should this not be called idealism?
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Your awesome! Thanks

autophobe2e · Jun 20, 2012

erm, lets see if i can remember this, seems relevant (maybe)...

Claude levi-strauss' theory on language structures would seem to prove that materialism as a concept is flawed because nothing has any inherent value, it is only given value through an interdependent structure of words. for example, if the only sorts of house that existed were: shed, bungalow, house, mansion, palace. and you removed the word "mansion", the values of all of the other objects would be altered significantly, even though no physical change has occurred either to the structure of the building or to the words which denote them. The values of objects are defined only by their context in language, that is, in relation to other words. This structural theory can be applied to most things... we understand light in relation to dark, hot to cold etc. we even deliberately create binary oppositions where none are necessarily apparentne might say:" i am male because i am not female", for instance, and react violently when the structure is threatened, hence the controversies over sex-changes, homosexuality, transvestisism which always seem to resurface- they threaten the (fragile) binary opposition which is socially constructed in order to help us make sense of the world. yet terms like "male" and "female" have no inherent value or meaning, because really, nothing does.

a materialist is, surely, someone who places faith in the idea that objects DO have an inherent value which isn't entirely socially constructed. so, according to a structuralist, they'd be dead wrong. as to the morality of it? can't really say, except that it helps to shore up capitalism, which is inherently exploitative.

thats the best i can do, i study literature, not philosophy, although there is some crossover.

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Materialism

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Materialism

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