Top 10 Materialist Fallacies

The top 10 most fallacious arguments used by materialists. For more, check out the book "Why Materialism Is Baloney":

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Copyright 2014 by Bernardo Kastrup. All rights reserved.

[jeffwunder]

One argument I haven't seen here (or at least didn't recognize it) is the objective/subjective divide. This one is tough for materialists. The subjective experience of another human or animal is unobservable. But materialism (i.e. most 'science') is all about objective observation. In other words, there is a supremely important part of reality that science can never directly observe. Therefore science and materialism must always be an incomplete description of reality. Either that, or you become an eliminativist materialist, believing that all subjective experience is an illusion. But to most, it is the most real thing there is. One can imagine a universe with nothing but unconscious biological automatons in it. A universe like that might as well not exist, since nothing would ever be aware of it. One could also reason that, if subjective experience is real and not observable, then it exists outside the universe, which leads to dualism. The final option is to assume that the subjective is supreme - idealism.

[zakmatew]

Materialism has lost its grounds in physics as well. It is time to be replaced with a different model. It is too outdated and inadequate.

[anduinxbym]

I love this view of consciousness.  I think idealism is the superior model. Materialism is on the way out.

[soumyabanerjee]

What is lovely to see is how you are presenting the ancient Hindu ideas of Advaita (nondualism) to a Western audience in your own way.

[DiscipleToki]

Spacetime is not material, this is scientifically true. We know it has very real effects on the physical like gravity and experiential effects like time. We also know it is not material but what material rests in with the mass causing curves that we experience as gravitational waves. This is in my view damning to the idea of materialism. All things that exist are clearly NOT material.

It is the elephant in the room that materialists miss.

Ironically it shares traits with consciousness, we see similar things, we have the experience of consciousness and also it can change the physical in that you can think to move something and it is moved by your own hand.

We also have the experience of time in consciousness which can be altered through manipulation in a lab.

Therefore while we do not know exactly what the answer is, we can know by inference that materialism is not accurate.

[rodrigomachado]

Bernardo, I adopt idealism as my preferred philosophy of mind just like you and I agree with nearly everything you said except one thing: in one of the 10 items, you say that idealism is "not too metaphysical", and I can't see how this is true. Because both materialism and idealism (and also panpsychism or any other view) are metaphysical models. And there's nothing wrong with that. Metaphysics is just an area of philosophical study.

[christopherjohnson]

Wow, I'm glad I found this channel!

[williamp.chiles]

In a sea of decaying chaos, this guy has a clue. I can't tell you how refreshing that is for this old man!

[pentosmelmac]

Bernardo, For sure you are on the right track. The primary layer of reality or consciousness stores or contains the structure of the universe in the form of potentialities. The individual conscious agents that have emerged from the primary layer independently project their current realities on the screen of their individual minds. These manifold projections are similar but each is unique and based on the pallet contained in the primary layer. Each agent communicates in real time with concurrent agents to share experience. This gives us the impression that we all exist in a common material world. Interestingly the concept of multiple universes put forward by scientists may ultimately be satisfied by separate conscious agents. I suggest you also look into pure consciousness as the source of the more machine like mind. Mind is still just a computing interface. It is not the final experiencer. All of this considered it still begs the question "how can the primary consciousness become the many agents?" Perhaps the primary layer is incapable of experience without fragmenting into many agents.

[CaptainPhilosophical]

0:38 because we cannot change reality by merely wishing it to be different, it's clear that reality is outside consciousness.

1:33. Reality is clearly not inside our heads, therefore you are wrong.

2:24 that cannot be, because there are strong correlations between brain activity and subjective experience. Clearly, therefore, the brain generates consciousness.

3:33 because psychoactive drugs change subjective experience, it's clear that the brain generates consciousness.

4:50 because we are separate beings partaking in the same reality, reality has to be outside consciousness.

6:03 this separation between Consciousness and unconsciousness is duelist nonsense.

7:40 because reality behaves according to immutable laws, it cannot be generated by consciousness.

8:25 then, to say that a collective unconscious generates reality is equivalent to saying that reality is outside consciousness.

9:30 this idea of Consciousness generating reality is to metaphysical...

11:13 why would conciousness deceive us by simulating a materialist world?

[freepiratequeen]

Lovely to have what i've always believed explained by such an intelligent, humble man. Thank you.

[jasonparker]

This reminds me of when I was into apologetics. Everything was simple. Anyone who wasn't the same type of Protestant as me was guilty of some basic logical fallacy.

[alchemy]

Brilliant. Thank you Bernard. Loved your book too. 

[IFYOUWANTITGOGETIT]

Materialist don’t say that reality is created inside the brain. They claim that organisms perception of reality is created inside the brain.

[ahmednasser]

Found you from Rupert spira. Love ur content

[chaosinorder]

I think anyone on here who is a materialist should read Thomas Nagel's book "Mind and Cosmos" he addresses the materialist project and shows that it almost certainly false, and he's an atheist on your side. I think it's interesting that an atheist wrote a book about how a form of atheism is almost certainly false.

[ElanSunStarPhotographyHawaii]

This is Excellent... So obvious.  Thank you for creating this one.

[JoedeLange]

Ah rabbit holes... Not 10 minutes ago this guy was showing me how to adapt a modern 6502 in my Vic 20 computer. :)

[Stream]

Digesting Kastrup videos from the Philippines. Fascinating conflations.

[asdfgmnbvczxcv]

But.. but Neil tyson told me that couscousness was illusory... something we made up to make ourselves hunt and attract mates better, just like advanced mathematics and near death experiences!