Chocolate Hat debunked: A response to Chocolate Hats video series “Debunking Inspiring Philosophy”

Note: This is a response to parts 1-3 on chocolate hats video series I will do a response to part 4 on a separate blog post since Chocolate Hat is taking too long to upload part 4 of his series

(This blog is a response to this video series http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLIvP4w6TgOtE9vcvX2aIK84fa_GUGlkrS )

So recently there is a new youtuber that has decided to respond to IP on quantum mechanics debunking materialism. And as you will find out the objections he uses are weak and are mostly objections that IP has already dealt with in his blog responses (1). Chocolate Hat is not the first youtuber to respond to IPs video there are many others that have used similar objections. I will respond when an objection is made to IP and when Chocolate Hat uses phrases like “woo woo” as an objection those are ad hominem at best and I won’t make a response to them. So to keep this simple I will divide this response into 4 separate parts and each part will be responding to each video since there are 4 videos that respond to IPs video. Also I will label Chocolate Hat as “CH” so that I don’t have to keep on repeating his name. So let’s get started with the response.

(1) https://inspiringphilosophy.wordpress.com/

Part 1

So the video starts off with IP original video (keep in mind much of CH response are clips of different videos). Objections don’t start until (8:05-8:55) in which CH says

“The argument that there is an ultimate cosmic consciousness that observes everything is an argument of infinite regress. The cosmic consciousness is either a characteristic of the universe that is not detectable or measurable or it is detectable and measurable and can be said to exist within the universe. If a supposed consciousness has no detectable interactions with matter and no way to falsify it then it cannot be seen as an entity in its own right. In this case it becomes irrelevant to our investigation not only that but you could argue that as we have not found any definable entity that we could call the source of consciousness we have to assume there is something else outside of it giving the necessary conditions for the existence of the universe thus infinite regress so then it must have properties that we can define and measure”

The objection that CH has presented is a misunderstanding of what our position is. Yes God would be beyond the universe he created he wouldn’t be a part of it. Our viewpoint is that God’s mind simulates the universe just like a computer simulating a universe but that God can also interact with the universe to produce miracles. So there is no infinite regress if the universe is a simulation within the mind of God so the objection that CH presents is a huge misunderstanding of our position. The cosmic consciousness doesn’t have to be part of the universe if it’s what simulates the universe in the first place. We should also remember the need for a source of first cause would infer this source is necessary. This is just basic contingency arguments which avoid an infinite regress. Furthermore, not being measured would be to assume God is a physical being, which he could not be by definition. If he was, he would just be another physical thing that needs observed. The source of consciousness would not be physical and therefore not measured. This should have been pretty obvious in the reasoning itself. So ultimately CH objection fails.

(8:55-9:00) “So far consciousness has been observed to be emergent from brain activity”

No that is false there is zero reason to believe the mind emerges from the brain. Supposedly objective material brains do not have subjective mental properties and not anything that epistemologically relates to subjective mental properties. Therefor minds emerging from brains do not explain minds, and they need to if one is to posit that the mind emerges from the brain. The fact that strong emergence does not posit an explanation puts it right up with magic and the argument from ignorance. This also assumes your conclusion true aka materialism being true so CH is already assuming materialism without providing a good argument for it. And saying brain damage proves the mind is emergent is also wrong because that would only show correlations between mind and brain not the mind emerging from the brain.

(9:00-9:05) “There is no evidence to suggest that consciousness comes from a field or anywhere else outside the central nervous system”

This is actually not true at all. Donald D. Hoffman conscious agent dynamics makes consciousness fundamental to reality and not emergent from brain activity.

“We have proposed that consciousness, not space-time and physics, is fundamental and that consciousness can be formally modeled by dynamical systems of conscious agents” .

You can check out the papers (1) (2) but it shows how the mind is fundamental to reality and not emergent from brain activity. And IP actually did a series on the case for the soul showing that a dual aspect idealism model of the mind can account for all the scientific evidence of what we know from neuroscience, quantum biology and near death experiences (3).

(9:20-10:30) There have been studies of self-awareness in other animals…the further away from humans you go the more you have to expand the definition of consciousness to fit the observation so much until the word becomes meaningless”

Ok so how does that show mind is emergent from brains? It doesn’t and I don’t remember us having to change the definition of consciousness. Animals have consciousness like we do and this is not a problem for idealism at all

At (9:48-10:30 and 11:30-11:40) CH makes the argument of infinite regress which i have already responded too so i don’t need to repeat myself.

So for the rest of the video he just plays IPs original video and says that in part 2 he will explain why quantum physics doesn’t debunk materialism. So then since this is the case then we are going to respond to part 2 of his series in the next part of this response

Sources for part 1:

Part 2

This is part 2 of defending idealism against CH. This will respond to CH part 2 response to IP. Objections don’t start until 7:40-11:30 in which CH says

“Particles are not aware if they are being observed by a conscious being or not. The use of a blinking eye to represent a particle detector adds to this particular deception. There is no credible evidence to suggest consciousness or awareness has anything to do with the way particles behave. To say this is the case as it is claimed in the film is false entirely disingenuous. What the experiment does is…demonstrate the measurement problem…and IP mistake is taking one interpretation of quantum mechanics (The Copenhagen interpretation) and claiming it debunks materialism.”

Note: To the readers I had to paraphrase what he said because he took a clip from another video explaining the measurement problem.

Ok so this is probably the foundation of CH response to IP that there are other interpretations of QM and therefore QM does not debunk materialism. Well this objection is really bad and i will explain later in this document but the first claim that “No credible evidence for consciousness causing collapse” is entirely false. According to the Copenhagen interpretation particles are in a state of superposition in the wave function and don’t reach definite collapse until an observer makes a measurement. Now since this is true then whatever causes final collapse cannot be something governed by the same material laws since all particles are in the form of a superposition including measuring apparatuses. This is known as a von Neumann chain where each particle is connected in a chain and the particles in the chain are all in a state of superposition. So whatever causes the whole physical system to collapse (The chain) is something beyond the physical and material and this is argued to be a conscious observer (the mind). So CH objection does not work.

At (17:20-19:05) CH takes a clip from Sean Carroll in which he says that the many worlds interpretation requires the fewest equations and since the equations predict many worlds than therefore it’s not a violation of Occam’s razor since all you need is the least amount of evidence to show this interpretation is accurate.

There are several problems with CH objection to MWI violating Occam’s razor. First simply by arguing for the parsimony of equations, the universe is then having googleplexes of universes with every milliseconds of time. It’s not a simple fact of having the fewest equations but that in other universes every possibility happens and so the possible equations themselves get multiplied beyond necessity because each universe is described by its own unique equations. That’s why the MWI violates occam’s razor however that is the least of the problems for the MWI. The MWI fails in deriving the born rule of QM and there are other criticisms you can check out in IP video that gives a critique of the MWI (1). So CH defense of the MWI is misunderstanding the point we are making regarding occam’s razor and CH completely ignores the bigger problems for the MWI of QM which rule out that interpretation.

(20:00-20:42) “Bohemian mechanics… debunks IP”

That is basically CH objection is that since we have Bohemian mechanics (BM for short) then therefore QM does not debunk materialism. Throughout the video series he uses BM as his strongest objection against IPs video and he repeats this objection many times throughout the video series. Well here i will provide a criticism of BM to show that it’s just as bad or probably even worse as the many worlds interpretation of QM.

A critique of Bohemian mechanics: The First problem with BM is that one of the central concepts of BM the “quantum potential” was recently falsified by an experiment (2). Most of BM formalisms have the quantum potential but now that it has been falsified the vast majority of BM formalisms are completely wrong. There are some formalisms that don’t include the quantum potential but they are riddled with issues as well such as faster than light hidden variables because of non-locality. Now of course supporters of BM will object that QM itself is incompatible with relativity, which is true, but if we want a successful quantum gravity theory non-local hidden variables will not allow it to be compatible with relativity since it will violate causality and thus no hidden variables theory can work for quantum gravity. That’s why information-theoretic interpretations are far more successful in creating a quantum gravity theory and information-theoretic interpretations are nicknamed “Copenhagen 2.0” since it has the same metaphysical implications of consciousness causing collapse as the original Copenhagen interpretation does. The only difference with “Copenhagen 2.0” is that it can deal with the objections that are raised against the original copenhagen interpretation since it faces much less problems. So then BM is ultimately an ad hoc theory that tries to save realism and any model of BM that can somehow fix the problems associated with it will still not be good candidate theories for an ultimate quantum gravity theory. This is one of the main reasons why BM is rejected by the vast majority of physicist despite the claims made by BM supporters the interpretation is just severely ad voc and no more different from the MWI when it comes to its problems. So just like the MWI the BM interpretation cannot compete with idealistic interpretations like copenhagen and/or information-theoretic interpretations (Copenhagen 2.0). If you would like more information of the problems associated with BM you can check these out (3) (4).

(21:30-22-55) CH takes a clip from another video that shows droplets moving like a wave and that this would be evidence for BM.

However as I will quote this experiment is not good evidence for BM since it can be used in any other interpretation as well.

“Recently, experiments have been made with water droplets surﬁng on the

waves produced by the Faraday instability on the surface of an oscillating tank ﬁlled with a ﬂuid [21]. The motion of these droplets mimics the sug-

gestion of de Broigle and of Bohm that elementary particles are likewise “pi-

loted” by the ψfunction of wave mechanics. In particular, it is claimed that

when the waves propagate through two slits, or are conﬁned in a “corral”, the

droplets satisfy statistics that are similar to those observed for particles in

quantum mechanics [22]. But such experiments only demonstrate the univer-

sality of wave propagation, and the associated pathlines, whether governed

by the equations of ﬂuid mechanics, quantum mechanics, or of other sources

of waves in physics.” (5)

So in other words this experiment could work for idealist interpretations as well such as Copenhagen or information-theoretic interpretations (Copenhagen 2.0). So CH evidence is not good evidence for BM. So for the rest of CH video it is just clips of BM experiments which as pointed out before is not good evidence for BM. Also even if BM was an accurate theory there are versions of it that can work in an idealist paradigm. The de Broglie-Bohm interpretation is very like that of idealism, with the vital difference that the “pilot wave” in the system is mental, not physical. It collapses everywhere at once because it is not in space and time at all but in the mental domain. A mental pilot wave guides a physical body – exactly as a mental pilot guides a human body! As above, so below. The mind-body relationship is ingrained in the fabric of the cosmos. What is our mind? – a superposition of possible futures from which we select one. As soon as we do so, a new superposition develops and again we have to choose … and we keep choosing until the day we die. We are exactly the same as quantum systems. Our body is the “physical particle” and our mind is where the superposition of possible futures is generated. Our mind continually collapses our personal wave function to create a definite physical state in time and space, then instantaneously generates a brand new superposition of possible futures.

What is free will? It’s the ability to freely choose between the different possible futures that we generate. In quantum systems, lacking consciousness, a much more automatic process takes place. Consciousness is the only fundamental difference between human beings and quantum systems. So there are versions of BM that are fully compatible with idealism so if CH wants to defend BM he will inevitably defend idealism unless he can find a model of BM that saves realism and avoids all the problems associated with BM and can be a good candidate for quantum gravity but as I’ve pointed out before that would be completely ad hoc and not going where the evidence leads. You don’t start with a metaphysical conclusion and find evidence for that conclusion you start with the evidence and go where the evidence points too to find the best conclusion. So CH appealing to other interpretations of QM is ad hoc and not going where the evidence leads.

So that would conclude part 2 of this response to CH we will work on part 3 next.

Sources for part 2

Part 3

This is part 3 of a defense of idealism against CH. So at this point in the series CH has already made his strongest objections against IP so then the rest of these responses we will just be responding to new objections that CH uses. Since we already dealt with many worlds and bohemian mechanics i will not respond to CH when he brings it up since I’ve already shown why they are both ad hoc interpretations and cannot compete with idealist interpretations. So since i’ve made that point clear let’s get started with part 3.

(3:00-5:15) “If matter is dependent on conscious observation then two observers taking two separate measurements at the same particle for example a particle before ever meeting each other two observers would due to their own separations would create two different states of reality. When they meet to compare results they would disagree on what they’re measurement was and since this never happens then consciousness causing collapse is either false or hard metaphysical solipsism is true…even if proponents of conscious observation creates matter can satisfactory answer this contradiction the fact is that whenever we do test measurements and compare them there is only one consistent answer thus i propose one consistent reality this means there is a difficulty in asserting reality is dependent on observation and this idealistic approach is rendered irrelevant and thus is not meaningful in science…one huge problem for consciousness causes collapse is we never see detectors measuring two different results symoteniesly”

This objection against consciousness causing collapse is not a good objection against our position of objective idealism. CH objection could work against other versions of idealism such as subjective idealism but in objective idealism reality is still objective thus when separate measurements look at the same particle they get the same result. CH didn’t pay attention to IP original video. We only participate in nature, we do not determine it. Reality is still objective. We ask with the Heisenberg choice and nature returns an answer, known as a Dirac choice. So nature determines where the particle is, we do not. So two observers would not disagree because nature is still objective. So ultimately CH objection against IPs video is a complete straw man. Once a particle is measured another observer cannot change that fact about the universe.

So that is the only new objection that CH uses in his video response to IP. The rest of the video he just talks about Bohiem mechanics and as I’ve said before I’m not going to repeat myself about it since i’ve already addressed BM and MWI. So we will look at part 4 next which concludes CH response to IP in a seperate blog post

Christian Idealism and Philosophy

Chocolate Hat debunked: A response to Chocolate Hats video series “Debunking Inspiring Philosophy”

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