i) If materialism is true all of reality reduces to material...
𝘢𝘳𝘳𝘶𝘴@_bonaventurian
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Jan 24, 2024
~1 min read
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i) If materialism is true all of reality reduces to material objects (sensible bodies).
ii) Material objects reduce to the mathematical notes that fundamentally describe their operation and nature qua physics.
∴ If materialism is true reality reduces to mathematicals.
ii) Material objects reduce to the mathematical notes that fundamentally describe their operation and nature qua physics.
∴ If materialism is true reality reduces to mathematicals.
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Proof of the minor: a material object is an body with a) extension through time and space that is acted upon by b) fundamental forces. Both a) and b) reduce to mathematicals so matter reduces to mathematicals.
Moreover:
Moreover:
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i) Mathematicals are abstracted from sense data, not proper to sense data.
ii) If X is abstracted from Y, X is not identical to Y.
∴ Mathematicals are not identical to sense data.
ii) If X is abstracted from Y, X is not identical to Y.
∴ Mathematicals are not identical to sense data.
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i) Materialism holds that reality is exhausted by sensible bodies.
ii) But mathematicals are not sensible bodies as they are abstracted:
ii) But mathematicals are not sensible bodies as they are abstracted:
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∴ Materialism entails the contradictory conclusions that all reality a) exhaustively reduces to mathematicals and b) exhaustively reduces to sensible bodies. But these are mutually exclusive conclusions.
Ergo, materialism is false on pain of contradiction.
Ergo, materialism is false on pain of contradiction.
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To hold that reality reduces to mathematicals which cannot be the objects of the senses is to hold to a kind of idealism. Materialism and idealism being opposites, for materialism to reduce to idealism on its own terms spells an unceremoniously accidental suicide for materialism.
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The Scholastic position would hold that: mathematicals describe the manner of the existence of essences/real natures in physical laws. Quantity is a kind of accident for substances that inhere in them. Abstraction provides an immaterial species that is made one with the knower.
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Mathematicals would then have a manifold existence: i) an accidental existence in a substance ii) an existence as a common nature [the monad for you Nicomachus nerds] iii) existence as abstraction iv) existence as Exemplar in the Eternal Art.
