Talk:Physicalism

Physical monism vs David Deutsch and Sean M. Carroll's Absolute rationalism (old rationalists irrationally believed in soul as a simple (philosophy) without any elaboration of its Brodmann-like modalities and correct wiring = connectome [or how it works without them])

David Deutsch and Sean M. Carroll use physicalism to simply mean absolute rationalism. Many (not all) Croatian atheists overfocus on aspects of monism when they use the term physicalism.

No Mention of Quantum Mechanics?

It seems very odd this article makes no mention of quantum mechanics, considering that it's the best description of the fundamental nature of reality that science currently provides, as well as the profound implications the theory has to the question of what it means for something to be "physical" in the first place. Is that purposeful? Surely at least a brief mention of wave function collapse and entanglement would be an important addition. Betamaleparticle (talk) 00:25, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

a) Do you have any reliable sources that discuss "wave function collapse and entanglement" in connection with physicalism?

b) This article is about physicalism, not physics.

c) It's not clear that any of the views and arguments discussed in the article would change if we lived in a strictly Newtonian world with no quantum mechanics. Jibal (talk) 07:38, 9 January 2023 (UTC)

There should be an objections/criticism section

I think the article should feature a section which mentions some common objections, criticism or attempts to refute physicalism. I am not an expert on the topic, just saying that the article feels incomplete without this. 213.175.38.130 (talk) 14:08, 27 March 2024 (UTC)

A critique of this thesis, as it is presented (that «everything is physical»), if anyone is interested, is the pointing of the fact that, in fact, «the physical» is not a concept with a semantically clear or well defined meaning, unless, as Hempel's dilemma points, the case we were talking about the concept "the physical" as handled by a future ideal physics (in which case today we do not yet know even close what such a meaning of "the physical" would be and, therefore, in that case, such a meaning would not be the one we currently handle for the expression «the physical» when emitting this pseudo-thesis). Apart, etymologically, "physical" would mean nothing but "natural", term that is typically defined negatively, by mere contrast to "the supernatural"; this way, the thesis «everything is physical», where «physical» is defined as a synonymous with «natural», would be too a semantically circular thesis and, therefore, a semantically empty thesis. Regards. 84.121.82.221 (talk) 11:40, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

Separate physicalism to: physical monism and physical logicism (unitary logic is wrong for many neologicists)

Typically many people argue for hours and their main argument is different definitions of a noun. This is very common because people have emotions for terms. 2A02:2149:8A2D:F400:301D:6D07:4B97:3B35 (talk) 17:36, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

A critique

A critique of this thesis, as it is presented (that «everything is physical»), if anyone is interested, is the pointing of the fact that, in fact, «the physical» is not a concept with a semantically clear or well defined meaning, unless, as Hempel's dilemma points, the case we were talking about the concept "the physical" as handled by a future ideal physics (in which case today we do not yet know even close what such a meaning of "the physical" would be and, therefore, in that case, such a meaning would not be the one we currently handle for the expression «the physical» when emitting this pseudo-thesis). Apart, etymologically, "physical" would mean nothing but "natural", term that is typically defined negatively, by mere contrast to "the supernatural"; this way, the thesis «everything is physical», where «physical» is defined as a synonymous with «natural», would be too a semantically circular thesis and, therefore, a semantically empty thesis. 84.121.82.221 (talk) 11:39, 16 October 2024 (UTC)

This article is imprecise, unclear, badly structured and of unusually low quality to the point of being unsound.

This article is unclear, badly structured, argumentative in a way that appears to clash with Wikipedia's guidelines of neutral writing (rule 9, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Ten_simple_rules_for_editing_Wikipedia), and under-cited.

The most glaring example is the section "Supervenience-based definitions of physicalism". The expression "supervenience-based definitions of physicalism" is not common in the philosophical literature and is clumsy and potentially misleading. The section reads badly, is unclear, and argumentative. Most of what is said here should be at under a "critique" section at the bottom of the article, not included in the main text as an explanation of physicalism.

Secondly, the notion of supervenience is badly introduced. Supervenience is not a particular kind of physicalism. it is a particular relation often discussed and invoked in the context of physicalism. Specifically, supervenience is (commonly) the idea "that there cannot be two events alike in all physical respects but differing in some mental respect, or that an object cannot alter in some mental respect without altering in some physical respect" (Davidson 1980).

Similarly, the section "Realisation physicalism" adds nothing or very little to the article. Like the expression "supervenience phsyicalism", the expression "realisation physicalism" is not common in contemporary philosophy. The fact that this section is only 1 sentence long with no reference to further in-depth article is itself a sign that this section is a low-quality addition to the article.

The section "Token physicalism" is clumsily worded at times and plain wrong at other times. (1) "Token physicalism is the proposition that "for every actual particular (object, event or process) x, there is some physical particular y such that x = y". It is intended to capture the idea of "physical mechanisms"." - what is meant by "It is intended to capture the idea of physical mechanisms"? And where does this claim come from? This sentence seems either non-sensical or just plain wrong in the context. (2) "Token physicalism is compatible with property dualism, in which all substances are "physical", but physical objects may have mental properties as well as physical properties." This is true, but clumsily put. All (or most) physicalists would also say that physical objects have mental properties - only that they mean something very different when they say this, than the property-dualists do. For non-philosophy readers entering Wikipedia the current formulation seems clearly misleading. (3) "Token physicalism is not however equivalent to supervenience physicalism. First, token physicalism does not imply supervenience physicalism because the former does not rule out the possibility of non-supervenient properties (provided that they are associated only with physical particulars)." is wrong or at best imprecise. Token physicalism does entail philosophical supervenience - as it is normally understood. If every particular mental event/process/object x has some physical particular y such that x = y, this describes a supervenient relation. Any change to y entails a change to x ergo it is a case of supervenience (Davidson 1980).

Type physicalism is introduced under the section reductive physicalism (which is appropriate), but the explanation of type physicalism - especially regarding how it differs to token physicalism - is unclearly put. Consider the essential assertion of type-physicalism "for every actually instantiated property F, there is some physical property G such that F=G" compared to the essential assertion of token-physicalism "for every actual particular (object, event or process) x, there is some physical particular y such that x = y". What is the difference between these two sentences? (There is one, but it is subtle and not well-explained).

The sentence "First, token physicalism does not imply supervenience physicalism because the former does not rule out the possibility of non-supervenient properties (provided that they are associated only with physical particulars)." is non-sensical, or, at best extremely clumsy. Token physicalism does entail philosophical supervenience - as it is normally understood. If every particular mental event/process/object x has some physical particular y such that x = y, this describes a supervenient relation. Any change to y entails a change to x ergo it is a case of supervenience.

The latter parts of the article (from "Reductionism and Emergentism") is in general of much higher quality than the sections preceding them, but the article as a whole is in dire need of a large revamp and would be severely improved with the inclusion of a "criticism" section at the bottom. 2A01:CB00:389:3E00:E589:82AC:240D:6777 (talk) 02:03, 25 November 2024 (UTC)