Post by The Lost One on May 31, 2017 13:57:29 GMT
Seems kinda close to question-begging to me: "Every fact we think of must be physical because only physical facts can be thought of"
But marriage does exist. I'm married after all. So marriage is a physical fact, or a set of physical facts rather, as is everything.
What physical facts? Well, things such as ways of thinking about other people (which are brain states)
What physical facts? Well, things such as ways of thinking about other people (which are brain states)
Isn't there a confusion there? I have a physical brain state when I think of you as being married but it is the thinking itself that is the brain state not what I am thinking of you as. Like if I say I am walking to the shop, walking is a physical state but the shop itself is not part of the physical state. Of course, in that example a shop is physical in itself, but is marriage?
and ways of treating people (including others treating a married couple in ways that we take to count as a married couple), and particular documents (marriage certificates for example) and so on.
Maybe getting a bit Zen here, but if no-one else knew a married couple were married, would they still be married? If a man gets amnesia and forgets he's married and there is no surviving marriage certificate and he is not around others who think him married, is he no longer married?