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To: Alamo-Girl
Conversely, if a poster specifies that he is a physicalist, no ill will can follow. The physicalist has not presumed that the material world is all that there is, but he has not ruled it out either.

I don't feel very sophisticated in this particular discussion, but I would say that when anything reaches the threshold of "isness" it is material. to me this is just semantics. Physicist speaks of being a Deist. I suppose I am a monist, if that term is not obsolete. Of course, quantum theory allows matter to embody what used to be called dualism. The difference between philosophical dualism and quantum theory is that quantum duality can be observed and studied.

Now I'm going to take a nap before I drown in my own BS.

4,514 posted on 01/10/2003 9:53:53 PM PST by js1138
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To: js1138
Thank you so much for your post! And I don't think you need worry about drowning - I don't see any BS.

The definition of materialism cautioned that it is not taken to be semantic (emphasis mine):

Characterized in this way, as a doctrine about what exists, materialism is an ontological, or a metaphysical, view; it is not just an epistemological view about how we know or just a semantic view about the meaning of terms.

That's the rub. The word materialism, like the word evolution, is not one of those terms we can use casually. It has a specific meaning with consequences in the debate.

4,516 posted on 01/10/2003 10:37:08 PM PST by Alamo-Girl
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