There’s more to life than meets the eye

Mary knows everything about the color, red, except to experience the experience of seeing it for the first time. Would she sigh when sees red? Would she hug the person standing next to her out of joy, because she is seeing the color red, a beautiful color, for the first time? Would Mary be reminded of a happy or sad memory when she sees the color, red, for the first time? In other words, would she experience a flashback in black and white? If the answers to all these questions are in the affirmative; it is true that Mary also experiences thoughts and feelings that cannot easily be explained through the physical senses.

What is the nature of the mind, after all? Churchland does not even explain how the nature of imagination could be described in terms of things that can be sensed with the five senses alone. Of course, Mary has read about the color, red. Then again, how would she describe the joy she feels in terms of the physical world? If physicalism is the only way to describe and understand the nature as well as experiences of human beings, then Mary should know everything about the color red, just because she has studied everything under the bright blue sky (Vinueza, 2004).

This is the belief of people that believe there are only facts to describe about the physical world. There are no bases for feelings, such as joy, in this belief system. So, Mary must essentially feel like a robot. Because Mary is not a robot – she is a human being – it is essential for her to experience the color red for the first time as something breathtaking, even if books had taught her to expect that. In that case, books must also have taught her how she would see the color red for the first time, that is, what she would experience within herself to boot – her thoughts and feelings.

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If this is true, then physicalism cannot truly be false, according to those that believe in it. After all, it is now possible to reduce everything to physical notes and tones – neurons and electric signals within the brain – in order to understand thoughts, feelings and imagination. Given that it is possible to argue for both physicalism and metaphysical philosophies – it can be stated with confidence that both the knowledge argument and physicalism were developed by reasonable people.

It was only their belief systems, and the way they explained their experiences in life and facts about the world – with both metaphysical examples and arguments based on materialism – that made them either for or against physicalism or another philosophy. The example of creative writing or fiction shows that it is possible to explain almost everything with words, regardless of how human reason is applied to create an argument or philosophy. The active human mind makes it possible to believe anything whatsoever.

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