THE SPIRITUAL ODYSSEY

Preface
Materialism

1-INTRODUCTION
2-STRANGER THINGS
3-MIND BODY RELATION
4-CHANGE AND EVOLUTION
5-ETHICS
6-CONCLUSION

Thinking universe
Subjects
Ethics
Human destiny Conclusion

Mind power

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MATERIALISM

1-INTRODUCTION

Materialism regards Matter as the only reality in the world. Everything that actually exists is material. Every event in the universe results from the activity of matter. Life emerges from and returns to inorganic matter. Mind emerges of matter: All the mental terms such as sensation, will, reasoning and so on have reference to physical events or physiological changes in our material brains. (1)(2)

Moreover, the materialists tell us a magnificent story. It begins with the Big Bang and the appearance of simple elements such as photons, quarks, electrons, nucleus and finally atoms. All these elements enter in combinations and some of them although appearing by chance, do not disappear because they are compatible with earlier combinations. It is then explained that a logical necessity seems to replace mere chance as this series advance: Atoms create molecules and then organic molecules.

Life emerges from them. Living organisms evolve by the accumulation of micro mutations that only happen by chance. Through natural selection, some mutations are conserved and finally the process leads to the human brain, the consciousness and the thought. All the diversity of the universe, all the mysteries of our consciousness only come up from some particles of matter combined by chance and necessity.

Materialists claim that this story is the scientific truth . In fact, Materialism brings many hopeless paradoxes through its interpretation of mind body relations. It is facing many implausible hypotheses with change and evolution. It contains some miraculous explanations. Moreover, the theory results in poor ethics: Finally, Materialism is Nihilism.

1-INTRODUCTION 2-STRANGER THINGS 3-MIND BODY RELATION 4-CHANGE AND EVOLUTION 5-ETHICS 6-CONCLUSION

2-STRANGER THINGS

Many beginners in philosophy think that Materialism is the most obvious theory. In fact, it is not obvious at all.

21-From objects to waves and particles

People think that the existence of matter is as evident as the objects that they see or touch. Of course, educated people know that a table that appears compact is made up of empty space and a group of points called atoms with a nucleus and electrons orbiting around. These atoms finally reduced themselves to a dust of particles or waves. It means that every object is just a collection of particles or waves. Each layer (atom, molecules, cell, compact object, your own body) just corresponds to a specific arrangement of these particles.

More precisely, any object is a number of elementary particles and a pattern of relations between the particles of the collection.

The primary properties of any object such as its mass do not depend of the stuff of its particles. Consider for example two different elements such as oxygen and carbon, a gas and a solid. The oxygen atom is formed of a nucleus of eight protons with eight electrons circling around it. The carbon atom, on the other hand, has six protons and six electrons. All the atoms are made up of the same stuff: Electrons are the same whatever the atom. On the other hand, protons too are the same. Consequently, the difference between the properties of an atom of carbon and an atom of oxygen do not come from the intimate stuff of the electrons or protons since it is the same. The properties and their difference only result of the number and the position of the electrons on the orbits around their nucleus, that is to say their arrangement or configuration. A configuration is a network of relations. It means that number and relations, and not the stuff, create the properties that distinguish the different objects.

22-From particles to sensations.

Since the external reality is made up of waves, particles, and relations, we only experience the objects through their secondary qualities such as color, odor, and sound and so on. Considering that, the materialists describe the process as follow: The particles and waves of the external objects enter in relations with some particles that compose the cells of our organs such as the eye. Then, through chemical and nerve pattern, the brain is activated andthese secondary qualities are reconstituted by the brain from the translation of the neuronal signals.

There are two hurdles in this description: Firstly, the qualities such as colors, sound, perfumes, bitter or sweet do not exist in the external objects and into our organs such as the brain. When it is said that the frequency of a vibration corresponds to the red, it does not mean that either the frequency or the vibration are the red by themselves. These qualities just exist as sensations in our mind and we only know the external world through them. For example, looking and touching are sensations. When we reach out toward this table, the effort undertaken is a sensation and the sight of our outstretched arm is yet another one. When an object falls on our head, the sound of the impact is also a sensation. Secondly, any sensation, even at an infinite low level, implies some pain or pleasure that don't exist neither in external objects nor in our brain: Let us suppose with Leibniz that you can travel in the brain like in a windmill. You will observe chemical phenomenon or electrical waves but you will never find a pain or a joy.

You may object that the sensations are only the effects of neural states. For example, thanks to drugs, pain can be anaesthetized. However, in admitting that the neural state is the cause of the pain, we must consider that the pain is by itself a material fact. For example when you light a candle, you can say that the smoke is an effect because it is made up of some molecules of gas. Clearly, the cause is material and the effect too. Now, can you argue that your feeling of pain is made up of molecules? Indeed, the materialist explanation of sensation brings many mysteries!

23-Space-Time-Motion: Hopeless paradoxes

Materialism becomes more complicated when the basic particles are introduced into the space-time framework. Materialists profess that space and time exist really by themselves: Things are in space and move according to time. As space and time are not material things, it is always difficult to connect their supposed reality with the material objects. Since the antiquity, these expected connections have been a fountain of hopeless paradoxes (See additional comments- 4)

We must recall that the Relativity theory shows that neither the time interval between events nor the spatial interval is independent from the observer. As the observer is not an object but mainly a mind, Relativity implies that space and time are mind dependant (Remember that Einstein was Deist). It means that Relativity weakens the Materialism based on absolute space and time existing independently of any mind.

1-INTRODUCTION 2-STRANGER THINGS 3-MIND BODY RELATION 4-CHANGE AND EVOLUTION 5-ETHICS 6-CONCLUSION

Materialists have always had the difficult task of explaining the psychological phenomena such as thoughts, beliefs, desires, and intentions.

31-Will and action

The materialists consider that some material facts explain the brain activities. For example, it can be a lack of calcium. This material situation will start some anatomic and biologic phenomenon. As a result, you get up and go towards the door. Of course, there is not any freewill in such a process. Materialists argue that instead of talking about the will, you have to seek the motives of the action: lack of calcium in our example. As a result, the "will" is just a word, a linguistic habit that means nothing and the freewill is an illusion.

Of course, certain impulses seem strictly determined by a motives and do not imply a will. For example, my pain is the cause of my will to go away from the fire. However, even such a basic action can involve a will. For example, the pain can be a joy for a kamikaze and incited him to stay close of the fire. In fact, the pain can cause several events and the determination of one out of them depends on my freewill. Relations between the neural states and our wills certainly play a role but it is wrong to say that the will does not exist by itself.

This example introduces a distinction between the will and the goal. Any freewill has a goal. Of course, as a goal does not yet exist, it cannot be represented by an existing material state. That is why the materialists who proscribe any finalism in nature cannot allow a goal to exist. This position leads to absurdities: For example, I am hungry and I refuse to eat because I expect to be a top model. Do you mean that my goal to be a top model is a material state? Consider now a more serious topic such as the manufacturing process of a combustion engine: The engineer must represent this goal in his mind through the complex sketch of a combustion engine. Now how could you accept that such a complex model is only a material state built up of particles and waves?

Therefore, some materialists are obliged to admit the existence of the freewill but it leads to another hurdle: If the will exists by itself, how could you explain its connection with a material brain?

32-Reason and knowledge

According to materialism, thought and knowledge emerge along the evolution from the complexity of matter. Men think in different ways due to the complexity of their brain. Neurons of course do not think. However, when they interact, materialists contend that human consciousness emerges and they use to compare the process with the computer. Indeed, thanks to the advances in artificial intelligence, many people believe that their computer is a thinking substance! In fact, the hardware is just an electrical cabling that opens and close doors: For example, a door is the number one and another zero. According to the program, the cabling gives the same result as our mental addition or subtraction do. It does not mean that the computer calculates or thinks. It just follow a program written by a human mind and materialized through an ingenious cabling like inside other automates. Moreover, this comparison may turn against the materialists. Of course, we may compare our brain with hardware but, in this case, we may ask where the software is? Without software, the comparison shows that the brain cannot produce any intelligent result. It is just a tool like a violin but the melody is not in the violin!

What is more, I must repeat my previous argument . Materialists point out that the brain is the cause of the thought. Since the brain is material, the effect must be material too. Now, do you seriously believe that your most secret thoughts are made up of waves or particles? Could you accept that? More largely, how could you resign yourself to a materialist theory that is so much in contrast with our daily experience? (5)

Moreover, because of its genuine principle, Materialism destroys itself! Let us suppose that non-intelligent atoms in my brain determine my ideas. Consequently, I have no reason to suppose that my ideas are true and hence I have no reason to suppose that my ideas result of atoms! It is impossible to state any truth including any "materialist truths".

Finally, the knowledge process remains a mystery. The materialist explanations do not resist to a close examination: We should have better to say that this stone enjoys a soul just as the primitives believe it. These materialist explanations do not bear more value than those of magic! Clearly, Materialism tends to animism.

1-INTRODUCTION 2-STRANGER THINGS 3-MIND BODY RELATION 4-CHANGE AND EVOLUTION 5-ETHICS 6-CONCLUSION

The materialist description is not obvious but the story it tells seems magnificent. In fact, it is quite a fairy tale with many miraculous events.

41-Beginning of Universe

Universe is supposed to have a beginning with the big bang. If the world had a beginning, what was the cause of it? Nothingness being at rest, one thing had to have started moving. This means that an irrational cause, such as Epicure ‘clinamen’ or God snap of the fingers imagined by Descartes had to start the first movement.

Today, some believe that it could be a simple fluke but such an interpretation seems incompatible with what we know of the birth of the universe based on dozens of calculated cosmological constants so precisely tuned that they could not have occurred by chance. For example, mathematician Roger Penrose has calculated that the probability to get by chance the fine tuning of our Universe is one part of an infinite number. It means that the probability is quite zero. (6)

In order to preserve their argument based on chance and statistic, the materialists have imagined that there could be an infinite number of universes so that our fine tuning should be just a chance among million existing worlds deprived of such constants. Obviously, this cosmic lottery complicates the problem but does not solve it.

42-Beginning of life

According to Materialism, life arose by an accident and then a great number of small genetics mutations, through natural selection, could explain all the evolution since a bacterium to a man. In short, Materialism states that life emerges from organic molecules.

Of course, organic molecules can appear easily by chance under primitive earth conditions. For example, the Miller-Urey experiment shows that a mixture of methane, ammonia, hydrogen, and hot vapor exposed to electrical lightnings brings new components such as amino acids. Unfortunately, the real hurdle is to go from these organic components to a simple living cell. Thanks to the computers, many scientists realize today that it is quite impossible for a random mix of organic molecules to produce a living cell. Odds to assemble by chance these elements in a single cell bacterium were one in 10 followed by seven zeros. A computer would need a span of time superior to the duration assigned to our universe to assemble by chance such a bacteria!

More precisely, the DNA Double Helix that establishes each organism's physical characteristics appears to be incredibly complex. What is more, its components act as instructions and guide the formation of the cell. It means that the random of bits of matter should be able to produce not only a complex organism but also the informations that guide the formation of the cell!

43-Complex organisms

The idea that complex organisms are created through random events and natural selection has always been very difficult to admit. It implies that evolution has no goal. In other words, an eye has not been made up for seeing. The complex network of the eye is just the result of a blind random move of bits of matter: Firstly, a primitive eye once occurred by chance. As it is useful to see, natural selection conserved this primitive eye. Then, new random mutations improved the primitive eye and finally they drove to our present eye. Of course, not all this process is logically impossible but it becomes quite miraculous when we are facing the most complex structure of the universe, that is to say our own brain.

Let us examine the human brain. Neuroscience has concluded that every brain has billions of neurons, joined together in billions of networks by tiny filaments called dendrites and axons. According to Darwin explanation (7), evolution is a step-by-step process, It means that a very complex system like the brain has been built up gradually. Moreover, a complex system may only function when it is complete just like any machine. Therefore, these two facts suppose natural selection has conserved billions of useless intermediary steps!

Just like for the DNA, the fact to imagine that such a complexity could appear through random mutations and natural selection is more miraculous than the biblical withdraw of the red sea!

Indeed, evolution exists. Of course, we constantly observe mutations in nature and laboratories. Of course, the natural selection certainly plays a role in the conservation of the useful variations. Nevertheless, there is a gap between these observations and the results such as the DNA and the brain. For crossing the gap, we have just to admit that evolution tends to a goal. The explanation of evolution should be comprehensive: Organisms have evolved over a long period through gradual changes, mutations, natural selection and in addition a goal.

Materialists claim that they do not need such a hypothesis. Sure, they need it because their own hypothesis is incredible! In other words, materialists do not hesitate to sacrifice the scientific method just to conserve their materialist beliefs. Clearly, they want to adapt the Science to the Materialism. It looks like a religious behavior!

1-INTRODUCTION 2-STRANGER THINGS 3-MIND BODY RELATION 4-CHANGE AND EVOLUTION 5-ETHICS 6-CONCLUSION

In a materialist vision, the matter causes your feeling, thoughts and actions. Consequently, there is no room for ethics.

Materialists argue that morality is too a product of the natural selection. Firstly, they equate moral discrimination with sense discrimination. The ability to decide whether this thing is better or worse than that thing is the same as the ability to feel a difference between heat and cold, light and dark. Consequently, moral discrimination results of a mutation conserved through natural selection. Finally, Human beings are moral not because they have chosen to be but because natural selection has conserved some useful characters in the life competition.

Anyway, your life is meaningless. You are the result of random chemicals that came together by chance. You are individually worthless. Of course, these bitter prospects result in an increase in despair, depression and teen suicides. Instead of favoring the survival, it is clear that the materialism could lead individuals and society to degenerate and disappear.

The most negative outcomes appear in the political sphere (8). Since you are just a number with no more value than a sand grain in the Sahara, it cannot be sad to torment or eliminate your insignificant physical body. That is why the most awful crimes humanity has ever known have been committed by materialist ideologies such as Nazism and communism. Of course, most of the materialist individuals are honest and peaceful persons (9) but history proves that when transplanted in a trouble period , the materialist theory becomes easily a free license to kill.

1-INTRODUCTION 2-STRANGER THINGS 3-MIND BODY RELATION 4-CHANGE AND EVOLUTION 5-ETHICS 6-CONCLUSION

6-CONCLUSION

We must underline that the Materialism is not a scientific theory: Our quick investigation shows that these hypotheses are incredible and call for miraculous facts. They deserve science instead of helping its progress. What is more, the Materialism tends to nihilism in ethics.

In the next lesson, we shall demonstrate that Materialism relies on a logical impossibility because the matter does not exist!

1-INTRODUCTION 2-STRANGER THINGS 3-MIND BODY RELATION 4-CHANGE AND EVOLUTION 5-ETHICS 6-CONCLUSION

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS

1 -You may have a good overview of Materialism and its last trends with the two next sites:

http://skepdic.com/materialism.html

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/materialism-eliminative

2 -You will find with the two next sites all the "great thinkers" of the Marxist Materialism: Marx, Engel, Lenin, Stalin, Mao and so on. www.marxist.com

Go to: www.infidels.org : Indicate materialism in the research bar and you will find an interesting survey with many links to the Greek materialists. It is worth to recall that Materialism is the oldest philosophical doctrine and certainly not a new one. Visit also www.twow.net/index.htm : An extensive survey regarding all the philosophical schools since the early beginning until right now.

3 -In "problem of philosophy", (click on: www.popular-science.net . Click on "Russell" and then on "Appearance and reality"), Lord Russell establishes a difference between sensations and that he calls "sense-data»:" Let us us give the name of 'sense-data' to the things that are immediately known in sensation: such things as colors, sounds, smells, hardness, roughness, and so on. We shall give the name 'sensation' to the experience of being immediately aware of these things. Thus, whenever we see a color, we have a sensation of the color, but the color itself is a sense datum, not a sensation. The color is that of which we are immediately aware, and the awareness itself is the sensation".

Russell establishes a linguistic description. We can easily contend that: if the "sense-data" are different of sensations, they must exist outside our mind as physical objects. Nevertheless, Russell claims that the "sense-data" are not the real table that is an atomic turmoil. He says that they result of a convergence between the atomic turmoil of the table and our organs. As our organs are also an atomic turmoil, and as it is impossible to find the color in a physical brain, we can finally ask: Where are located the sense data? If the sensation of the red is not the red by itself, where may we find the red by itself outside the sensation?

With the "sense -data", Russell just restores the old idea of Epicure about the "simulacra» in order to save the Materialism. About Epicure go to: www.epicurus.net. In fact, "sense -data" and sensations are only one thing.

4 -Materialist profess that space and time exist really by themselves. As space and time are not material, it has been always difficult to connect their supposed reality with the material things. Since the antiquity, this connection has been a fountain of hopeless paradoxes. We describe here some of these paradoxes. Due to progress in mathematic, some of them are worthless but they illustrate the philosophical way of thinking. It is a good drill before dealing with more complex topics along this survey!

-Space

If space is a real thing, it must occupy a spot and thus another space. This assertion leads to a hopeless regression to the infinite. Clearly, we cannot confuse any space with a real thing. If it is not a thing, do we conclude that it is nothing and that objects float in nothingness? To mitigate this obvious difficulty, some assert that space is an attribute of matter. It means that the objects themselves create distance and space by their diversity. Therefore, the appearance of objects would be a prelude of space. In fact, once an object changes place, the space it occupied does not disappear. It means that which still exists once its content is gone, is what existed before the content appears. Therefore, objects do not create space and space is prior to objects.

Space being neither a thing nor an attribute of matter, the materialism comes up against a great difficulty, which is compounded when we examine extension as the content of an object. Space is infinitely divisible. Indeed, the extension of an object, being a portion of space, would also be infinitely divisible. In this case, a billiard ball would never have a center because the division of its diameter would never end. On the contrary, the real presence of any object demonstrates that its extension is not infinitely divisible, because if it were, its composition from its primary constituents would have necessitated an infinite period. It means that the composition would never end and that this object could not be present here and now.

Therefore, we have to suppose that divisibility stops at indivisible points. These points are they extended, or non-extended? If these points were extended, all the while being indivisible, it would mean that space is not to a certain degree divisible. There would then be specific indivisible spaces in the middle of divisible space: A contradiction with all geometry! If our indivisible point is non extended, it is just a geometric point. It means that it is an idea or a concept. It cannot be a point of matter and it becomes impossible to reconstruct the extension of any material body with idea or concepts.

-Time

The belief that objective time exists outside of our mind leads to hopeless paradoxes. The sensation cannot give us objective time because the feeling of duration only exists in the present: We breathe and act in the present. We are unable to imagine time existing without a spirit. For example, when we speak of the universe before man, we cannot do anything but imagine it as if we were a fictive observer.

The concept of objective and physical time puts reason to a rough trial. The past no longer exists, the future does not exist yet and the present is nothing. Indeed, if time, and each instant, is infinitely divisible, what is now tends to be nothing. We cannot imagine materialist’s real time, as the very idea self-destroys as soon as it is stated. For example, how can an object change instants when the preceding one no longer is and the future one does not exist yet? Besides, because the future does not exist yet, we are now faced with nothingness. Since, the entire world is with us in this instant, it must be concluded that it is also faced with nothingness. This idea seems extravagant but it is the logical conclusion from the materialist’s real time.

What is more, according to Hume, if a cause precedes the effects, the causing event would be over before its effects begin! When you say that such event has a cause, this cause being in the past no longer exists and you must assume that something that does not exist is the cause of a thing that exists!

On the other hand, without any particular effort of our imagination, we can notice duration. We are able to conceive it even in the absence of any conscious observer but it is more because we have the habit of confusing duration with the measure of a reference movement such as the earth around its axis. In fact, we must suppose that this reference movement is always of the same duration! This supposition calls upon a homogenous time that would be anterior to all the particular durations. It is impossible to exclude time and we find ourselves up against the same wall once again.

-Motion

The most fascinating argument against the movement is due to Zeno of Elée. It can be formulated as follow:

"If all that occupies an extension equal to its own extension is at rest and if an arrow always, at each moment, occupies an extension equal to its own, then an arrow that flies is immobile"

The argument is based here on the notion of indivisible instant: Look at the Drawing . An object always being in a spot AB to its own and in an instant I, the arrow does not leave the spot during that instant. If it does not change spot, it is therefore immobile. To refute this argument, Aristotle tries to demonstrate that indivisibility does not exist and that therefore movement cannot be fixed in an indivisible instant.

Let us suppose that the arrow, does not exist in one indivisible instant I, but, for example in two instants I1 and I2. In this case, one instant is in the present and the second either in the future or in the past. If our arrow exists in these two instants, that means that one of its segments does not yet exist, or no longer exists! Therefore, it is no use dividing the instant, because in its most minute, the arrow will remain with its extension. Look at the next drawing.

Zeno’ argument both amuses and irritates because we constantly observe multiple movements, but the words «we observe" are important here because it means that the content of this observation exists only for a mind. Today, a bit of calculus is supposed to solve the paradox.

5 -A prominent version of materialism, eliminative materialism, recommends that we eliminate most, if not all, everyday psychological discourse, on the ground that it rests on assumptions about human psychology that will disappear with the advance of science. It means that we must accept the materialist description just like it is. We are not allowed to object. That is another proof of the old religious character of Materialism that finally condemns free examination!

Along human history, men have shared many falsehoods. For example, they believed that the earth was plate or that the sun was moving around our planet. However, these falsehoods were quite understandable because the sun seems moving around the earth and on the other hand, people were unable to explain how they could avoid falling in the vacuum if the earth was spherical. By contrast, our contemporaries have no excuse to accept the materialist theory that is so in contradiction to the common sense.

How could you really imagine that the consciousness that you right now experience in reading this essay is located in the disgusting spongy and bloody mass of tissue that we use to call the brain. How could you be comfortable with the idea that your thoughts are located inside a matter that does not think. The only coherent explanation should be to say that this matter is thinking by itself and has a soul. It is clearly the opinion of the natives of Australia and New Guinea. They believe that this river or this stone think and that you have to respect them in order to avoid some painful consequences. Clearly, the materialism is in fact a new animism and a dramatic back step of the human thought.

6 -Some arguments come up from the "Intelligent design movement" notably represented by the Discovery Institute, which explores the fields of technology, science and culture. For more information, browse Discovery's Web site at: http://www.discovery.org.

7 -About the famous Darwin book"Origins of species" go to www.popular-science.net and click on " Darwin".

8 -It is currently said that Materialism inverses the values. It was probably true with the communism . Nevertheless, any inversion of values does not deny the values by themselves and just replaces some values by other. For example, the Marxists stated that the matter was the cause of everything but they considered that some behaviors were morally grounded such as the proletarian heroism.

On the other hand, the new materialism does not inverse the values. It states that values do not exist . It means that it is a true nihilism based on the idea of nothingness. As a result, Materialism is an absolute alienation. This materialization of the man has no precedent in the history of ideas. It explains why darkness is spreading over the mind of so many persons notably over those of young people directly exposed to a wrong education. I think that we cannot forecast all the future consequences: Terrorism, genocide and so on.

9 -We must mention that these "honest and peaceful" persons were strong supporters of Stalin or Pol Pot. Just take a look at the early writings of our modern materialists. Forty years ago, they said that Stalin was the masterpiece of the universal philosophy. Compared to Stalin, Plato and Aristotle were peanuts. For example in France, it was used to ask «Is it possible to think after Marx?" Marx having concentrated all the thinking power, it was not politically correct to think any more about philosophy or Economy.

This grotesque respect to Marx, Lenin, Stalin and so on remains today prevalent and explains why the metaphysic studies do not exist any more: It's not fruitful to only open an essay of metaphysics since the materialism has already stated all that merited to be stated in such a matter. It means that today metaphysics is not "politically correct".

Go to: www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/2001/07/15/stories/13150611.htm

1-INTRODUCTION 2-STRANGER THINGS 3-MIND BODY RELATION 4-CHANGE AND EVOLUTION 5-ETHICS 6-CONCLUSION