An Argument Against Materialism
A lot of materialists will admit that there are some kinds of entities that are a little more difficult to make sense of within a materialist ontology. For example - propositions. Here’s an argument for immaterialism that I encountered that seems to be aimed at materialists who would accept the existence of propositions.
I’ve encountered this argument before, but I recently came across it in a dialogue written by Keith Yandel. I think it’s an interesting argument, so I decided to try and reconstruct it as carefully as I could. Here it is.
An Argument Against Materialism
- Some propositions are necessarily true.
- It is possible for there to be a world with no material entities.
- If (1) and (2), then it is possible for a proposition to be true in a world without material entities.
- Therefore, it is possible for a proposition to be true in a world without material entities.
- If it is possible for a proposition to be true in a world without material entities, then propositions are not material entities.
- Therefore, propositions are not material entities.
- If propositions are not material entities, then materialism is false.
——————————————————————- - Therefore, materialism is false.
I’ve got some thoughts on this argument, but I’m going to mull it over for a bit. If anyone cares to comment - the thread is open.
Filed under: metaphysics, philosophy by Andrew Cullison
I’ll start comments on my own post. Here are what I see as the materialist options.
First Option: Deny that some propositions are necessarily true and reject premise one.
Second Option: Deny that it is possible to have a world without material entities and reject premise two.
Third Option: Insist that some propositions are necessarily true and that it’s possible to have a world without material entities, but (somehow) this doesn’t entail that is possible for a proposition to be true in a world without material entities.
(I’ve got some vague idea as to how this might be worked out, but I’m not sure. I’ll wait on this.)
Option Four: This is another interesting option. If a materialist could work out a theory of truth for propositions such that it was possible for a proposition to be true in a world without existing in that world, they could reject 5. Bleg: Doesn’t Williamson have some stuff on this?
I can’t see rejecting premise 7. So I think I’ve outlined the four major options for the materialist.
This type of argument is ontological and also is a false dilemma.