In this article, we are going to examine the philosophy of materialism.There are two types of materialism that people usually think of.One is the obsessive love of material object and greed of money.The other is the philosophical school of thinking in which the creed is
stated below:
MATERIALISM:
"Everything that is, is material."
In other words, materialists believe that the
only thing that have existence are materials in which we can physically see or
touch.Things such as God, soul and
mind does not exist according to materialism since they are not physical in
nature.The philosophy of
Materialism, sadly, has been commonly taught in the scientific community.It is an erroneous philosophy that should be rejected.We shall evaluate this second form of Materialism.
Reasoning:
Materialists believe that whatever we can sense with our five senses
must indeed exist.They
then take a leap and say, whatever we can't sense physically does not
exist.
Examined:
Could love, the mind, language, thought and
reasoning, in which all of themarenon-material in nature, really not exist?
Objection:Using the exact criteria of materialism to examine
itself, we see that by thisself test, the philosophical thought of Materialism self destructs
since it'sreasoning and thought
cannot be allowed to exist in the first place!
Objection:If the mind and thought is not materialistic, and by
Materialism's philosophy it does not exist, then how did the philosophy
of Materialism come about in the first place?
Problem#1:This creed of Materialism can not explain why man has
emotions.
Problem#2:It does not also explain why people think, recall
memories and have reasoning.
Problem#3:Materialism would make man similar to rocks, toilet
paper and bubble gum since man does not have a soul
Problem#4:If man does not have a soul, is missing one thumb, is short of two
legs, has lost an arm, or is absent an elbow, the question is, "is
he lesser or no longer a human being?"
Statement: "Thinking is just only a fluid function
of the brain." or "Thought is only an electronic process in the
brain."
Reasoning:Since thinking and thought can not be denied,
Materialists try to explain why these things exist.They do so by giving an alternative story of how thinking and
thought is actuallysome form of a
chemical process or other material function.
Examined:Is there proof of man's "fluid secretion" and the such?The burden of proof would be on the materialists to prove such a
thing exists.
Problem#1:If the thinking process is just only a mind secretion
of fluid, then why would theMaterialists
even try to mock or belittle the Christian position that there is a soul
and a God in the first place?After
all, by this Materialist's statement, both viewpoint are valid since
both views were sparked by some physical elements that we have no
control over.
Problem#2:
From problem#1, we have another problem.In reality, both viewpoints are not really valid because they
contradict.But since by
Materialist forced position, the view points have to be valid, even
though they contradict, this gives Materialism a problem of being an
illogical belief system.
Added
info: The book, "Man on his nature" by the father of
modern brain research, Sir CharlesSherrington
(originally a materialist) shows some reason why he finally had to
reject the idea that man has no soul, etc., that materialism embraces.Canada's best neurosurgeon, W. Penfield's book, "The mystery
of the Mind" documents more reasons why he embraces the concept of
the soul too.
Added
info:One
account of a mind outside the physical realm was when a patient had
brainsurgery as recorded in the
book mentioned above.The
surgeon sent a pulse through a part of the patient's brain and his right
hand moved.The surgeon
then tells the conscious patient, "Youmoved your arm".In
which the patient replied, that it wasn't him but the doctor.This shocked the surgeon.Obviously,
the brain and the mind are distinct.If the brain was the mind, then it would have been the patient
consciously moving his hand and not the doctor!The doctor repeated the experiment again, this time asking
the patient to stop his hand movement.The patient then grabbed his hand with the other arm!
Statement:"Since we cannot know anything about
non-material objects, therefore they do notexist."
Reasoning:Due to the fact that that certain things such as soul
and mind can not be empirically or materialistically tested (the
scientific method), materialists assume that they can't know aboutthe non-material world and objects to it's existence because of
it.
Examined:To make a statement like that and deny the existence of non-material
objects isactually to know too
much, an error of the materialists.
Added
info: The only way to know more about the non-material, is
from the creator of the non-material himself.He gave us his Word of truth, namely the Bible.From the Bible, we see that there is indeed a non-material world
that exist.
It is no wonder that scripture says, "For the invisible things of
him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the
things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are
without excuse" Romans 1:20 (KJV)
If you are a philosophical materialist reading
this, you have two choices: Come to the truth of Jesus Christ, or perish trying
to grasp unto an inexcusable lie.
