# Naturalism Steelman

This module prevents The Signal from defeating a weak version of atheism or naturalism.

Do not test village-atheist materialism. Test the strongest naturalist coalition available.

## The Strong Naturalist Coalition

A serious naturalist response may combine:

- nonreductive physicalism,
- emergentism,
- Russellian monism,
- panpsychist-friendly naturalism,
- structural realism,
- moral realism without God,
- evolutionary debunking replies,
- mathematical Platonism plus naturalism,
- social and cognitive accounts of religion,
- methodological naturalism as a disciplined research posture.

The question is not whether any one of these explains something. Many do.

The question is whether the coalition becomes a unified worldview or a patched set of local repairs.

## Variant Matrix

### Nonreductive Physicalism

Explains well:

- mental properties as dependent on the physical without crude reduction,
- serious continuity with neuroscience,
- resistance to simplistic soul/body dualism.

Burden:

- must explain how irreducible mental properties fit inside causal closure,
- must preserve rational normativity and truth-directedness,
- must avoid epiphenomenal mind.

Possible cost:

- defers or tensions agency, intentionality, and normativity.

### Emergentism

Explains well:

- higher-level properties,
- complex systems,
- non-simple reduction.

Burden:

- must explain why emergence produces truth-directed reason, first-person subjectivity, binding obligation, and intrinsic dignity rather than functional complexity only.

Possible cost:

- emergence can become a label for the gap rather than an explanation of the gap.

### Russellian Monism

Explains well:

- why physics may describe structure without exhausting intrinsic nature,
- a possible route for consciousness inside nature.

Burden:

- must explain personhood, rational normativity, moral obligation, love, and historical meaning beyond proto-experiential intrinsic properties.

Possible cost:

- helps consciousness but does not by itself ground Logos-level coherence.

### Panpsychist-Friendly Naturalism

Explains well:

- avoids brute emergence of experience from non-experience,
- takes consciousness seriously.

Burden:

- combination problem,
- personhood problem,
- rational normativity problem,
- moral obligation problem.

Possible cost:

- spreads proto-mind everywhere without explaining persons, truth, or moral oughtness.

### Structural Realism

Explains well:

- mathematical structure in science,
- continuity through theory change,
- why physics latches onto relational structure.

Burden:

- must explain why structure is intelligible to minds,
- must explain why truth-directed reason can know structure,
- must explain whether structure has ontological depth or is only descriptive.

Possible cost:

- preserves structure while leaving subject, norm, and person underexplained.

### Moral Realism Without God

Explains well:

- objective moral claims without collapsing into preference,
- moral criticism of religion and society,
- binding moral language.

Burden:

- must explain why moral facts exist in an impersonal order,
- must explain why they bind evolved agents,
- must explain why persons have intrinsic dignity.

Possible cost:

- borrows obligation without a personal moral ground.

### Evolutionary Debunking Replies

Explains well:

- how cognition can be shaped by evolution while retaining some truth-tracking capacities,
- why survival and truth often overlap in ordinary environments.

Burden:

- must explain abstract reason, moral knowledge, metaphysics, mathematics, and universal normativity beyond adaptive success.

Possible cost:

- truth becomes reliable only locally while the worldview makes global metaphysical claims.

### Mathematical Platonism Plus Naturalism

Explains well:

- objective abstracta,
- mathematical necessity,
- the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics.

Burden:

- must reconcile abstract nonphysical objects with naturalism,
- must explain mind's access to abstract objects,
- must explain why mathematical reality and physical reality are deeply fitted.

Possible cost:

- imports nonphysical structure while denying a broader Logos-ground.

### Social/Cognitive Religion Accounts

Explains well:

- natural mechanisms behind religious belief,
- group identity,
- ritual formation,
- meaning-making,
- error and projection in religious systems.

Burden:

- explaining belief formation is not the same as explaining belief falsity,
- must still address historical and metaphysical claims directly.

Possible cost:

- genetic explanation becomes a substitute for truth evaluation.

## Required Naturalism Audit

Use this template:

```text
Strong naturalism explains:
- ...

Strong naturalism must disclose:
- Its ontology of reason.
- Its ontology of persons.
- Its ontology of moral obligation.
- Its ontology of consciousness.
- Its ontology of mathematics.
- Its ontology of historical meaning.
- Its treatment of Jesus, Christ identity, and resurrection.

Burden ledger:
- Truth-directed reason: [explains / partially explains / borrows / reduces / defers / evades / collapses]
- Consciousness: [...]
- Personhood: [...]
- Moral obligation: [...]
- Love: [...]
- Mathematics: [...]
- History: [...]
- Revelation: [...]
- Christ identity and resurrection: [...]

Coalition judgment:
Is strong naturalism a unified worldview, or a patched coalition of local solutions?
```

## Final Test

Strong naturalism does not fail because it explains nothing. It fails only if, after steelmanning, it still explains mechanism while reducing or borrowing reason, personhood, moral obligation, consciousness, mathematics, historical meaning, and the Christ/resurrection data.

If it preserves those without reduction, contradiction, evasion, or borrowed capital, then The Signal must say so.
