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To: Alamo-Girl
See #4295.

"Appropriate physical action of the brain evokes awareness," -- Roger Penrose

4,296 posted on 01/09/2003 8:55:01 PM PST by Physicist
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To: Physicist
Thank you so much for your post!

To help explain my position: Dictionary of Philosophy of Mind

materialism - The view that everything that actually exists is material, or physical. Many philosophers and scientists now use the terms `material' and `physical' interchangeably (for a version of physicalism distinct from materialism, see physicalism). 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.

physicalism - The view that everything that is real is, in some sense, really physical. See also materialism, knowledge argument, non-reductive physicalism.

I'm with Phaedrus on this. Penrose is not a materialist, though he might be a physicalist. He never even addresses unconsciousness, which he says exists. And he asserts that consciousness cannot be simulated. He is not a computationalist.

I do take issue with Penrose in that he ties awareness to the body. I'm not convinced that is the case.

4,299 posted on 01/09/2003 9:33:28 PM PST by Alamo-Girl
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