Physicalism is true.

Ave Con is misconceived about my argument for physicalism. His description of what my argument is turns out to be wholly inaccurate. Instead, my argument states that when we are investigating the true nature of reality, we are pursuing facts. By pursuing facts, we are actually pursuing true propositions, and are therefore pursuing propositions free from lexical, structural, and other forms of ambiguity. For this reason, fields of studies and methods which are analytical and quantitative are closer to discovering the facts of reality because they inherently avoid lexical and structural ambiguity. The hard sciences, being as analytical and quantitative as they are, inherently avoid lexical and structural ambiguity. Thus, the hard sciences represent a set of propositions about reality which are free from such ambiguity. Since facts about reality are true propositions free from lexical and structural ambiguity, and the hard sciences represent a set of true propositions free from lexical and structural ambiguity, then any other proposition which contradicts the hard sciences also contradicts reality itself. As should have been obvious from my opening round, I am in no way committing myself to the notion that an entity does not exist if it is not studied by the hard sciences. Rather, I am committing myself to the notion that an entity can only exist if it’s consistent with the hard sciences. For example, I accept the existence of microeconomic interactions, which are not studied by the hard sciences. However, microeconomic interactions are not inconsistent with the hard sciences, so there is no problem with stating that they exist nonetheless. However, if I held the position that an entity doesn’t exist if the hard sciences do not study it, then I would conclude that microeconomic interactions must not exist. I hope that this example serves to clarify to Con what exactly the argument is. Scientists want to investigate the world as it really is, based on the evidence right in front of us. Scientists don't investigate the world based on a set of preconceived definitions. As such, my examples of contemporary scientific theories that speak of non-physical entities trumps Con quoting from dictionaries. I am providing actual examples from contemporary science to make my case, whereas Con is merely attempting to define his interpretation of science as true. In any case, I’d wager that English PhD’s who write dictionaries have probably never heard of Vilenkin or Tegmark’s theories. I’d also wager that none of them are philosophers of science. Con attempts to prove that I’m contradicting myself, but his “proof” amounts to a non-sequitur. I mentioned Vilenkin and Tegmark’s theories in order to demonstrate that a scientist may invoke non-physical entities into their ontology if they find it to be conceptually necessary. The mere mention of such ideas does not mean that I believe they are correct. These examples serve to show that Con’s interpretation of science ignores what theoretical physics is capable of. Con seems to believe that asserting “Science is not restricted to the physical world” must also entail that “Non-physical entities exist”. However, asserting “Science is not restricted to the physical world” only entails that “In principle, science can study physical and non-physical entities”. I then make the further assertion that Vilenkin and Tegmark are incorrect, and therefore, the practice of science lends itself only to physical entities in practice. It is important to make a distinction between what entities science is capable of studying, and what entities have their existence by backed by science. Science can study a luminiferous aether, for example, but this doesn't mean that science supports the existence of a luminiferous aether. Similarly, my assertion that science can study the non-physical in principle does not entail that I believe science supports the existence of non-physical entities. There is no contradiction. Con fails to understand how important S5 modal logic is to his argument. He asks me to attack a specific premise of his argument rather than attack S5 modal logic, but fails to realize that by attacking S5 modal logic, I am attacking his only defense for P2. His defense for P2 relies on the notion that there is some possible world where "I" am not identical to "my body". Notice the use of the term "possible world". By attacking S5 modal logic, I am attacking the modal operator "possible world", and therefore attacking Cons defense of P2. Con, at this point in the debate, hasn't provided any reasons to think that S5 modal logic is true. Therefore, we can dismiss his argument on the grounds that it makes assumptions about modal logic which are unjustified. However, I also provided an argument in favor of TRIV modal logic, where the modal operator "possible world" does not exist, over S5 modal logic. Con completely ignores this argument. Therefore, we have good arguments against S5 modal logic and none for it. Since S5 modal logic has been demolished, Con can not use the modal operator "possible world", and therefore, he has no sound defense for P2 of his argument. Con then makes the bizarre assertion that sentences are not physical. While some people usually don’t think of sentences as physical, this is irrelevant to what sentences actually are. A sentence is a set of words, and words are utterances with semantic or pragmatic meaning. An utterance is clearly a physical process involving the parts of a biological organism. From this, there is decidedly nothing non-physical about sentences. Perhaps Con thinks that semantic and pragmatic meanings are non-physical, but he would also be incorrect in asserting this, as these are social constructs made by human beings which have no reality outside of neuropsychological processes. Con asks if I have any justification for the assertion that evolution tends to select for truth acquisition more. My answer to this is “yes”, considering that I explicitly justified this view in the previous round by linking the need to survive with the acquisition of true propositions. To reiterate, the need to survive entails overcoming such cognitive fallacies as functional fixedness and the mental set. By surviving, we overcome these cognitive fallacies, and thus survival lends itself to acquiring the truth. Con also fails to respond to most of my arguments against his own. For example, I argued that even if evolution has hard-wired certain erroneous thoughts into our cognition, it is nonetheless the very same cognition that allows us to discover these mistakes. Any argument depending on the inaccuracy of cognition is also an argument depending on the accuracy of meta-cognition (thinking about thinking). Furthermore, he completely glosses over my refutation of the notion that any given belief has a fifty percent probability of being true. I refuted this notion by arguing that if our beliefs about the environment around us were not mostly accurate and mostly true, then we would not even exist as a species. The evolutionary explanations for altruism are concepts like kin-selection, vested interest, and reciprocation. I’m not sure why Con insists that there is no evolutionary explanation for altruism when he mentions all of these things in the very same paragraph. In order to show that evolution cannot explain altruism, Con has to provide us with an example of altruism that cannot be explained by such concepts. So far, Con’s only example clearly never happened in the real world. I don’t know much about the military, so I consulted my friends who have military experience, and even they told me that the notion that somebody would “jump on a roadside bomb” is totally ridiculous. Not to mention that Con’s only support for such an event is that he’s “heard stories”. I can’t imagine how an audience of biologists and philosophers would respond to a speaker trying to tear down the evolutionary paradigm based on vague recollections of stories that he’s heard. Simply put, if Con can not provide a single coherent example of altruistic behavior that cannot be explained by evolution, his argument has nothing to stand on. It’s one thing to assert that there are altruistic behaviors that evolution cannot explain, and it’s another thing to provide actual examples. Our investigations into reality are often difficult. Indeed, at many points, we find ourselves incapable of explaining observed phenomena. However, the history of science shows us that phenomena which were once thought to be unexplainable end up being explained. The fact that projecticles follow the shape of a parabola was cutting-edge physics when Gallileo was around. Now, it's covered in the early chapters of introductory physics textbooks. At no point, however, should we allow a temporary dilemma to lead us to the easy answers. As Christopher Hitchens remarked, we tend to prefer a conspiracy theory over no theory at all. We must overcome the bias that the late Hitchens spoke about. If we ever find ourselves in a situation where we cannot explain a phenomenon, it is not a reason for us to start looking towards souls, ghosts, and other phantasms. Suppose that we couldn't explain an altruistic behavior using previous evolutionary concepts. Does this lend any support to the existence of souls? Clearly not. It only lends support to the idea that our previous concepts were not sufficient to explain everything, so we need to investigate more to devise a coherent, rational, evidence-based explanation of the behavior. Con's method is one which injects spectors and phantoms into gaps of our understanding. It is a method that we must reject, as the history of science shows, if we are to make any progress in obtaining the real answers. Thank you all for reading. Vale