Reply #15: No, I gave a precise definition of religion

[HamdenRice]

and materialism is more than the idea that the universe is made of stuff.

Here are two good articles:

Materialism is a set of related theories which hold that all entities and processes are composed of — or are reducible to — matter, material forces or physical processes. All events and facts are explainable, actually or in principle, in terms of body, material objects or dynamic material changes or movements. In general, the metaphysical theory of materialism entails the denial of the reality of spiritual beings, consciousness and mental or psychic states or processes, as ontologically distinct from, or independent of material changes or processes. Since it denies the existence of spiritual beings or forces, materialism typically is allied with atheism or agnosticism.

http://members.aol.com/NeoNoetics/Materialism.html

Materialism — which, for almost all purposes, is the same as physicalism — is the theory that everything that exists is material. Natural science shows that most things are intelligible in material terms, but mind presents problems in at least two ways. The first is consciousness, as found in the 'raw feel' of subjective experience. The second is the intentionality of thought, which is the property of being about something beyond itself; 'aboutness' seems not to be a physical relation in the ordinary sense.

...

Materialism at the fin de siècle

The materialist mood in the twentieth century has been poised between an almost triumphalist self-confidence and a more modest perplexity. The triumphalism is produced by the success of science, which makes materialism seem obviously true. In this mood, materialists are prepared to deny what seem to be the most obvious facts of mental life if their theory requires it. In a more sombre moment, however, some will confess that all attempts to tackle the problems have so far missed the mark. This more sober tendency became stronger in the 1980s and 1990s. Nagel (1974) had already declared that the mind-body problem could only be solved by a conceptual breakthrough we could not, as yet, imagine. McGinn (1991) pronounced the problem insoluble in principle because the mind cannot understand itself Galen Strawson (1994) has denied that there is any conceptual connection between mind and behaviour. All these philosophers deem themselves to be materialists, of some not-yet-quite-articulable kind. The Journal of Consciousness Studies has been set up to 'take consciousness seriously' in a way it is said science has not so far done; but perhaps this underestimates the main reason why consciousness has been sidelined and treated harshly: namely because it seems so clearly impossible to say anything constructive about it within the materialist presuppositions of natural science.



http://members.aol.com/NeoNoetics/MATERIALISM_MIND.html