The Medium writer Gerald R. Baron is on a (to use his own word) “crusade” against what he describes as “physicalism” (i.e., philosophical materialism). From Baron’s own words, it’s very clear that his religious views are a prime motive behind his anti-materialism. Yet when critics mention the prior religious beliefs and motivations of such religious (or “spiritual”) anti-materialists, Baron doesn’t deem that to be a good thing. Indeed, he suggests that critics should stick to the arguments.
“My crusade then, if there is one, is to expose the false teaching that physicalism represents [].”
— Gerald R. Baron [See source here.]
Gerald R. Baron has said that critical commentators shouldn’t talk about the motivations and prior religious convictions of those who criticise materialism (or physicalism), as well as the religious motivations of those people who go against what he deems to be “mainstream science”. In Baron’s own words:
“Murphy is critical of Goff’s views on panpsychism, and more recently, cosmopsychism. Again, he doesn’t argue against these ideas directly, but attributes them to his prior political and religious ideas or commitments.”
Later, Baron adds:
“What I miss in this process is the substantive analysis of the ideas.”
Those two statements are outrageously and obviously false.
Now Baron may not like what I’ve written on these subjects, but does he also need to make claims which are obviously false? Is this kind of thing allowed in his “crusade”?
Sure, I can give Baron the benefit of the doubt here and say that in the single essay which he tackled, I may not “argue against these ideas directly”. But I have done so, in great detail, elsewhere. (Baron has stated that he’s read at least some of my other stuff.) More particularly, I’ve done so in many essays that never mention “prior political and religious ideas or commitments” — not a single time. [See note 1 for a list of such essays.]
What’s more, I did actually argue against the ideas directly even in the essays Baron focused upon. [See note 2.]
The same is true when when I’ve written on Paul Davies, and even when I’ve written on Bernardo Kastrup. Yet it’s hard not to bring up religion, etc. when discussing Davies’s and Kastrup’s ideas because they often do so themselves.
All that said, I don’t deny for one moment that I have indeed mentioned the motivations and prior religious views of Bernardo Kastrup and Philip Goff. So I do both: I tackle their technical arguments, and then I place that within the (what I deem to be) important context of their prior religious and political views.
If that’s still a problem, then I need to know why.
Indeed, chronologically, I came to discuss these writers’ prior political and religious views precisely because I noted the (obvious) weaknesses of their arguments (or lack thereof). More relevantly, the weaknesses of their arguments are best explained (to me at least) by their religious and political views and motivations. [See note 3.] In other words, it can be strongly and easily argued that the philosophical arguments such writers put forward are purely and simply designed to advance their prior religious and political positions.
All this can be brought right up to date.
Baron has just published an article called ‘Decoding David Bohm’s Metaphysics’. (David Bohn is a favourite with New-Agers and “spiritual” people. See Graham Pemberton’s ‘Quantum Physics and Spirituality — part 7, David Bohm’ and here.) When you read this “first in a short series of posts”, you can clearly see exactly where it’s all heading — to religious/spiritual and (to use Baron’s own word) “transcendent” conclusions. Thus, David Bohm’s quoted words are simply a vehicle for these conclusions. Bohn’s physics isn’t t embraced (as it were) in itself. It’s embraced simply as a means to an end. Hence, Baron quotes Bohn extensively, but he never adds much (or even any!) critical — or otherwise — commentary.
So religion and politics wag the dog.
Of course, all this is up for debate.
However, if a writer did only one of these things (e.g., concentrate entirely on the motivations and prior religious views of Kastrup, Goff, Baron, Davies, etc.), then that may well be a problem. However, I’ve never personally done such a thing — not even in the essays in which I do, admittedly, mention such people’s motivations and prior religious views.
So was the following really the case?
It was Baron himself who focussed on my mentions of “motivations” and “prior religious views”, and he simply ignored all my arguments (i.e., those arguments which didn’t mention such things). Indeed, from what I’ve read, Baron never tackles the technical arguments of flesh-and-blood physicalists or materialists, or even paraphrases what they’ve written. [See note 4.]
To slightly change tack.
It’s odd that Baron doesn’t like critics bringing up his own and other people’s motivations and prior religious views — and that’s because Baron does so himself.
For example, in an interview with a self-described “humanist, a seeker and [] globalist” called Anders Bolling, Baron was very open and honest about all his religious and political motivations.
In detail.
All the following information (i.e., the bits of autobiography, the talk of motivations, etc.) come from an interview on YouTube called ‘Gerald Baron: To unite science and faith’. In that interview (or at least in the written introduction), Baron tells us that he’s a Christian. He also says that his Christian faith “validates much of what the Bible tells us”. Indeed, Baron believes that “[o]ne such example is the studies at the University of Virginia that show compelling evidence of reincarnation”.
Baron also almost perfectly expresses the position of Intelligent Design in the following passage:
“There is evolution, but it is not random. The digital code in our DNA is remarkably complex and carries meaning. In science we know of no process of creating meaningful code other than through an intelligent mind.”
Baron then ties neo-Darwinism to, yes, physicalism. [See Baron here.]
So perhaps critics can mention religious, etc. motivations because anti-materialists like Baron, Bernardo Kastrup, etc. do so themselves — frequently.
Finally, if it’s a bad thing to mention such motivations in a critical manner, then shouldn’t it be a bad thing to mention them (as Baron and Bolling did in their interview) in a positive manner too?
Gerald Baron’s Religious and Political Views
Gerald Baron’s case against physicalism is hardly motivated by metaphysical and logical argumentation. Indeed, Baron hardly ever (perhaps never) quotes physicalists (certainly not contemporary philosophers) arguing (in detail) for physicalism. (To be clear. I’ve never read Baron doing so in all the stuff I’ve read. It is of course possible that he’s done so elsewhere.)
Thus, this is Baron himself on the subject of physicalism:
“The above argument may suggest my primary concern is how that belief system [physicalism] determines our values, priorities and actions. But that is not my primary reason.”
He then continues by more or less saying that this is indeed his “primary reason”:
“If physicalism is true, then the destructive results of living without any possible meaning or purpose and choosing our own versions of right and wrong without accountability should and will play out as the laws of nature demand.”
In the following passage, Baron then sets out what can only be described as his political agenda:
“[P]hysicalism is not true, of that I am fully convinced. Yet, because that is the belief system that is widely promoted by scientists, philosophers, scientists speaking as philosophers, educators and journalists, choices made individually and corporate in our culture are based on false premises. If the physicalist belief system is harmful to individual people and societies as I believe it is, the harm is multiplied by the false basis.”
Baron then gets even more prophetic in the following:
"Major paradigm shifts will be represented in some significant changes in worldview. The foundation of science is crumbling, and most scientists understand that.”
Just like Kastrup, Baron also uses terms from psychological literature, as in the following:
“My crusade then, if there is one, is to expose the false teaching that physicalism represents and in doing so help resolve the dissonance. Resolving this may well mean not a return to traditional Christian beliefs, but perhaps something related but new, a syncretistic and more universal spirituality that is thoroughly transcendent. Perhaps Richard Rohr’s The Universal Christ points the way to the future of belief.”
So Baron is indeed on a crusade against physicalism which, it can be argued, has very little to do with metaphysics, logic and/or argumentation. Instead, Baron’s (to use his own words again) “primary reason” for his crusade in that he believes that physicalism corrupts “our culture” as a whole.
Gerald Baron on Being Called a “Science-Denier”
Gerald Baron blames “the media” for what he takes to be the embrace of physicalism.
He believes that the media “stands for Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt and Outrage”. More relevantly, Baron believes that the media is to blame for people not upholding his own (i.e., non-physicalist and religious) views. (This is much like the position which many political activists take toward the media when they too come across people with very different views to their own.)
Thus, if you don’t like an individual’s or some group’s views, then blame the media. (Or “media brainwashing”, as teens often put it.)
Or if someone holds a view you find distasteful, then blame the media.
Of course, all the above are variations on the false consciousness theme.
In any case, politics isn’t going to be discussed here. However, Baron does tie the (Platonic) Media to, yes, “our culture’s embrace of physicalism”. [See also Kastrup’s ‘Materialism as a political weapon’.]
More specifically, Baron writes:
“[W]hat is most important to me is the fact we are continually told that if you do not accept the belief system of physicalism, [then] you are a science-denier.”
That passage is bizarre because I can honestly say that I’ve never once come across anyone stating that “if you do not accept the belief system of physicalism, [then] you are a science-denier”.
Never once.
Of course, Baron may believe that those precise words needn’t be used, just variations thereon.
So which actual words does Baron believe have been used, and has he ever quoted them?
Whichever way this supposed categorical statement about physicalism and science-denial is expressed, can Baron cite any examples of scientists (or others) mentioning physicalism in this way, and then saying that if you don’t accept it, then you simply must be a “science-denier”?…
Unless this is physicalism by default.
In other words, if a scientist doesn’t accept religious, paranormal, spiritual, etc. explanations of any given x, then he simply must be a physicalist.
So now take an admittedly extreme example.
If a scientist or layperson doesn’t accept astrology (or the existence of ley lines), then does this also mean that he simply must also be committed to physicalism?
Alternatively, say that someone — anyone — doesn’t accept Baron’s championship (see here) of Carl Jung’s “objective reality” (i.e., the unconscious), is such a person automatically a physicalist?
Does all this mean that the word “physicalist” (or “materialist”) is simply a stand-in for the following position? —
All those people who don’t accept my own religious and non-physicalist views.
Bernardo Kastrup, for one, seems to go in for this kind of thing.
Kastrup regards almost everyone under the sun outside his own idealist “school” (from Guardian journalists, biologists, physicists, to people he gets into arguments with on YouTube) as “materialists”.
Thus, we end up with the following Manichean war: (supposed) materialists vs Kastrupian idealists and Jungians, Christian dual-aspect monists, etc.
Are Baron’s Scientific Big Names Really Physicalists?
Gerald Baron’s main point is that “the mainstream position of science today is physicalism”.
Is it?
Baron targets various scientific (as it were) big names. In his own words:
“Leading scientists such as the late Stephen Hawking, Brian Greene, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Sean Carroll, Brian Cox, Richard Dawkins and a great many others are assuming the mantle of philosophy and from that esteemed podium are the prophets, priests and evangelists of the quasi-religion of physicalism. Our education system tolerates no alternative view other than physicalism and the exclusive claims of evolution despite widespread and increasing scientific discomfort with the claims. [] Our science journalists and major media channels rarely allow any exposure to data, reports, discoveries or discussion that question the tenets of physicalist belief. If they do, ardent defenders of physicalism rally to call for the dismissal of the offending editors.”
That passage is very similar to the following one from Kastrup:
“But science-as-you-know-it implicitly adopts the materialist ontology. Perhaps not all scientists do this; perhaps even only a minority does. But this minority is vocal and influential. They clearly control where the research funding goes, for projects that do not assume the materialist metaphysics collectively get much less funding than projects that do. [] Moreover, this vocal minority also controls how science-as-you-know-it is presented in the media, in school curricula, and to the culture at large. Just think of people like Lawrence Krauss, Richard Dawkins, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Stephen Hawking, and others such specialized prodigies of rhetoric and intellectual puzzles, who cavalierly ignore rigorous logic, epistemology, and ontology.”
So Kastrup mentions Lawrence Krauss, Richard Dawkins, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Stephen Hawking. And, guess what, Baron also mentions Stephen Hawking, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and Richard Dawkins. Indeed, not only are the names the same, so are the general positions.
The scientists Kastrup and Baron mention are very different to each other. So readers can suppose they’re all connected together (i.e., by Kastrup and Baron) because of their supposed commitment to physicalism (or materialism). Yet this is a philosophical position which they rarely (if ever) actually discuss.
So Baron and Kastrup may believe that these scientific big names must have caught physicalism via some kind of “virus of the mind”.
In any case, Baron refers almost exclusively to the writers of popular-science books and those scientists in the public eye. Perhaps Baron has a good reason to do this because he believes that these scientific big names are corrupting what he calls “our culture”.
Again, I can only say that most — even all — the famous scientists Baron targets never even refer to “physicalism”. They certainly never class themselves as “physicalists”…
After all, these people are scientists.
“Physicalism” is a term of art, mainly used in analytic philosophy.
In detail.
The term “physicalism” dates back to the 1930s, and was first used by two logical positivists: Otto Neurath and Rudolf Carnap. [See here.] However, this term didn’t have a widespread use until the 1960s — or even later. Interesting enough, the long Wikipedia entry on ‘Physicalism’ only mentions “physics” (i.e., not “physicalism”) twice, and doesn’t refer to a single scientist. The same is broadly true of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy’s own entry on ‘Physicalism’. (The bibliography doesn’t include a single work by a scientist.)
As for scientists. I’ve read most of the the scientists that Baron mentions, and I don’t recall a single time they’ve used the term “physicalism”, let alone discussed it in any (philosophical) detail. Sure, I’m willing to be corrected on this. Perhaps some of these big names have indeed used the term “physicalism”. However, even if they have, then it must have been extremely rarely.
In addition, it can be guessed that some of the popular scientists Baron targets would argue — if only when pressed - that they have no need to use the term “physicalism”, or to commit themselves to this philosophical doctrine. Instead, their views on science generally, as well as on particular scientific theories, are simply a product of tests, experiments, observations, theorising, mathematics, logical reasoning, etc., not the product of an arcane and academic doctrine which is mainly found in analytic philosophy.
This may be “philosophically naive” when it comes to scientists ignoring philosophy. However, it’s not being argued here that scientists deny all philosophical elements to their scientific theories and positions. No, this is specifically about their supposed commitment to physicalism.
So as hinted at earlier, the best Baron can do is opt for Kastrup’s position of physicalism-as-false-consciousness (or physicalism-by-osmosis).
In other words, scientists — and just about everyone else who isn’t “spiritual”, religious, an idealist, etc. — must catch physicalism in the air without ever using that term, and certainly without thinking deeply (or philosophically) about it.
Again, physicalism is a technical philosophical position which actually requires much (philosophical) thought. And I’d suggest that most scientists — and other offenders — don’t give physicalism that much thought…
Indeed, perhaps that acknowledgement can be made to actually work in favour of Baron’s own position!
In other words, the (false) idea that scientists “blindly accept materialism” actually works in Baron’s favour. (Even though most scientists don’t blindly accept materialism, and for all the reasons just given… and more.)
Yet Baron did say that “the mainstream position of science today is physicalism”, and I’m saying that most scientists don’t philosophise about physicalism.
So can Baron and Kastrup have it both ways?
The best that can be argued is that physicalism (Kastrup both implies and states this in his writings) is caught in the air, or it influences scientists through osmosis (i.e., in today’s “materialist culture”)…
Yet Baron and Kastrup can’t argue that scientists are “committed to physicalism”, and, at the very same time, also admit that scientists don’t think (or philosophise) about physicalism.
Consequently, imbibing physicalism unconsciously, and being intellectually committed to physicalism, are two very different things.
Notes:
(1) The following are examples of essays I’ve written on Philip Goff which never mention his religious and political views: ‘Intrinsic Nature: Philosopher Philip Goff on What Physics Leaves Out’, ‘Against Philip Goff’s (Panpsychist) Phenomenal Bonding’, ‘Philip Goff’s Panpsychism vs. Sam Coleman’s Russellian Monism?’, ‘Panpsychist Philip Goff’s Combination Problem: Little Conscious Subjects and Emergence’, ‘John Horgan and Philip Goff on Panpsychism & Geocentrism’, ‘Philip Goff on the Brute Identity Theory: Flogging a Dead Horse?’, ‘Philip Goff’s Panpsychist Conceivability-to-Possibility Argument’, etc.
(2) Where are the references to prior religious beliefs and motivations in the following passage?
“[N]ow take Carl Jung’s idea (as expressed by Gerald R. Baron) that ‘the unconscious is in the realm of objective reality while the conscious [mind] is not — it is subjective’. (It’s worth noting here that Pauli offered criticisms of Jung’s work, particularly of the notion of synchronicity.)
“In the light of Jung’s reference to ‘objective reality’, it can be said that Pauli rejected the opposition between *objective reality* itself (or ‘ultimate reality’), and what we can can know about reality (as did Niels Bohr). In other words, knowing ‘how Nature is’ amounts to no more than a metaphysician’s dream. All we actually have is ‘what we can say about Nature’. And, at the quantum-mechanical level at least, what we can say is what we can say with the mathematics — in conjunction with experiments, tests, observations, etc. Consequently, just about everything else is interpretational, analogical and/or imagistic in nature. Indeed, the analogical, imagistic and interpretational stuff can — and often does — mislead us. It also causes endless insoluble controversies.”
Needless to say, Baron didn’t respond to this passage, or any passages like it. Instead, he focussed (almost) entirely on my mentions of people’s prior religious beliefs and motivations.
Baron also (indirectly) refers to an essay I wrote on Philip Goff, in which the following passage can be found:
“When Goff first discussed panpsychism in his early papers (they date back to 2006), there was very little (if any) science to be found within them. There certainly wasn’t much — or even anything — about physical cosmology and scientific cosmology. This was the case up until around 2017, when Goff started to refer to ‘cosmopsychism’. Sure, Goff had previously referred to atoms, electrons, etc. in his early papers. However, he did so simply to argue that such things might (or do?) instantiate experience or consciousness.
“Then Goff moved on to include spacetime itself within his panpsychism. (Goff wrote: ‘Spacetime on its own is a simple and ubiquitous experience[].’) And now, in 2023, Goff states that the ‘quantum vacuum’ may be conscious.”
Again, there’s not much about religion or motivations here either.
(3) Some of the positions and arguments in Philip Goff’s book Galileo’s Error are strikingly poor. However, this is only the case when Goff broadens out his discussion to refer to such things as the politics of trees. (See my ‘Professor Philip Goff’s (Panpsychist) Philosophy of Trees’.)
(4) Even in an article called ‘Panpsychism trapped by physicalism’, all Baron does is quote the critics of physicalism.
Baron’s argument is that Galen Strawson, who is a panpsychist, is also a physicalist. (Strawson does class himself as a “real physicalist”.) Yet Strawson actually argues against physicalism in the video ‘Galen Strawson: Panpsychism vs. Physicalism?’. However, because Strawson doesn’t also embrace religion, Jung, synchronicity, etc., then his critical words about physicalists simply aren’t enough for Baron. Instead, Baron believes that Strawson should also be thoroughly committed to what he calls “the transcendent”.
As ever, Baron doesn’t quote or even paraphrase any of Strawson’s actual arguments. (He repeatedly quotes the often-used “mystical” and/or “spiritual” passages from Arthur Eddington, David Bohm, Erwin Schrödinger, etc.) However, he does quote Strawson saying the following:
“[Galen Strawson] states at the outset his firm commitment to physicalism. He even admits that this is a personal preference, something he ‘wants’.”
Isn’t this Baron talking about people’s motivations and prior beliefs?
No comments:
Post a Comment