Naturalism recognizes no seperate principle, law or entities. It is all one encompassing thing-nature. Chiropractic and vitalism, on the other hand, recognizes that intelligence, while united with matter, is seperate and distinct from the matter (and the force which unites them). Intelligence can exist apart from the matter because it has been recognized and defined as a seperate entity. True, it may not be manifested without matter but that does not mean that it does not exist. By analogy, a teacher gives a test to his/her students to see the manifestation of their educated intelligence (knowledge). A blank answer sheet means the intelligence was not manifested but it does not necessarily mean that it was not there. Haven’t you ever gone “blank” on a test?
It seems all three ( I, F, and M ) can exist independent of each other but only in principle. If not for the matter, how could we prove the others exist? Maybe that blank page was turned in by a student who never attended a single lecture.
The teacher taught but no one listened, intelligence and force but no matter. A similar result if students show up and the teacher does not, no intelligence. How about a teacher that sleeps the whole period, intelligence and matter but no force? All result in the same way, no test scores.
A British neurologist named Lorber published a paper back in the1980s which demonstrated how individuals born with hydrocephalus who survived into late childhood and adulthood could have normal intelligence and physical development with, in many cases, the majority of the brain missing!!! This of course is rather a large blow to those who would suggest that intelligence is somehow entirely explained by matter alone. That was until the concepts of neuroplasticity opened up the notion that the substance of the brain and its relationship to thought and function were far more flexible than was initially believed. But hold the show! While the near absence of a brain is not a deal-breaker for thought and function in a mechanistic model, when this fact is combined with data being compiled from the emerging “science of the near death experience” the pendulum of evidence begins to swing back in metaphysical direction.
In “Evidence for the Afterlife: Science of the Near Death Experience”, Jeffrey Long MD provided what he calls ‘scientific proof” that consciousness is non-localized. That we do not need eyes to see, ears to hear or a brain to process such things – including a memory of what we see and hear after we code-out! In a state of clinical death when the brain is fully non-functional, we can often see, hear and record memories of what happens immediately following our death as though we were standing and observing the scene of our death from outside and way from the body. Fully inexplicable if intelligence (both innate and educated) are merely materialistic byproducts of brain function.