Are you discounting the posibility that by a closer examination of brain state you could find states of mind within?
Something like brain state expanded to a physical brain that has the capability to fully support an observed state of mind.

Does thinking take place in the human brain?

Firstly, Human thought requires the approximately 86 billion neurons that the brain contains. However, we have to ask what created this brilliant arrangement such that we can have such complex thought?
As we dig down to the source of thinking we get to the source of life, and from the point of view of biology, chemistry, geophysics astrobiology, biochemistry, biophysics, geochemistry, molecular biology, oceanography and paleontology, self organization created life. The only exception to this point of view would be God, but when we ask who created God, then it seems God too would have had to self organize into existence. So, self organization does the thinking.

Life is the evolution of self organization, and it is a process that from it's very begging integrates information to some form. The simplest of conceptions exists as information in some form. And the form of our understanding interacts with the form of the simplest conception, to create information about what does the thinking.

Yes. How would that work? You think that by inspecting the brain more closely you'll literally 'see' a thought? Or smell one, perhaps?

I agree that 'thoughts' are 'non-physical'. But this type of non-physical can only exist if supported by a sufficiently capable brain state. Like this:

BRAIN(a specific thought) = a specific brain state
and,
A specific thought unsupported would not exist.

So the existence of specific thought is proof that brain state is supporting this specific thought.

Where's your argument for this? If you provide one, I bet it'll commit the fallacy I identified earlier - that is, you're going to argue like this: this brain state causes this mental state......therefore this brain state 'is' this mental state.

A specific thought unsupported would not exist. — Mark Nyquist

A second storey can't exist without a first storey. That does not imply that the second storey 'is' the first storey. So, even if your unsupported claim that a mental state can't exist absent a brain state is true - and I stress, it isn't true and you have not supported it in anyway - that would not be evidence that the mental state 'is' the brain state.

Thanks for your response and sharing your views, but I won't comment on them because this is just a poll.

↪Mark Nyquist Where's your argument for this? If you provide one, I bet it'll commit the fallacy I identified earlier - that is, you're going to argue like this: this brain state causes this mental state......therefore this brain state 'is' this mental state. — Bartricks

You might be right about brain state causing mental state being fallacy. I was giving an overview, not cause and effect. My second attempt was that thought can only exist if supported by brains state. That's how I approach it
Mental state(as non-physical thought) is subsidiary to brain state, not equal to. But mental state cannot exist unsupported so (in the state it exists) it is brain state.

I stress, it isn't true and you have not supported it in anyway — Bartricks

I'm not trying to do a full proof here but trying to outline a posible relation.

If you're going to argue that brain states are primary, you should have a coherent causal explanation for how brain states produce mental states.

That seems like the fallacy Bartricks was accusing me of. I might try to review on my own what the science is. Science doesn't have a full explanation.

I know it doesn't. At this point in time, it should. The lack of explanation should give one pause about being certain about the primacy of brain states.

So given some uncertainty, isn't the brain state model still the front runner. What are the alternate models or should we just work harder on the brain state model?

I am a poor representative of whatever the Philosophy Forum might be.

The question is a problem for me. If I am asked to locate a process in one place or another, does that mean it is not happening in other places?

How would one go about checking if such was the case? — Valentinus

Your line of reasoning has merit, however, I don't know how we could validate that thinking happens anywhere besides in our brains. We can validate that thinking happens in our brains by measuring brain waves and MRI imaging, and being to prove with the imaging that the process of thinking causes the area of the brain that is activated to grow. How could we validate thinking outside of the brain?

One approach has been to view exchanges of information as a network of the mind which includes all the different component of the experienced world. That is the premise of Gregory Bateson's Evolution of the Mind. The idea has a lot of problems but the "brain" versus "not brain" issue is not one of them.

Another system approach to consider is that of Lev Vygostky. He (and his study group) said that focus on individual outcomes of any organism is looking through the wrong end of the telescope. Here is a paragraph from a brutally concise summary:

The application of a systemic approach lead Vygotsky to another very important conclusion: since psychological functions are organized in hierarchical systems, developmental processes become central for understanding the human mind. The crucial role of developmental processes in the system as a way to understand the system itself is a direct consequence of a principle of systemic organization: when a component becomes part of a system, both the properties of the new whole and the properties of the component change (Vygotsky, 1932/1960; Koffka, 1935; Kohler, 1947). Vygotsky argued that once new components enter the system, they affect the system in general and all other components of this system accordingly. For example, once a child masters language, its psychological functions become semiotically mediated and thus change their qualities, becoming higher psychological functions. This principle was essential for Vygotsky, who maintained that the structure of the mind cannot be understood by researching the mind of an adult. To know what a mind system is, we need to observe mind development in a child. It is not enough to observe only the final product of these processes. — Olga Basileva and Natalia Balyasnikova

There are groups of people talking about "brains-in-vats" and ranges of inputs and outputs but I fall into a coma when I try to read any of it.

Suppose a hundred years from now, science still hasn't explained how brains produce consciousness. Would you still be convinced that brain states cause mental states? What about a thousand years and still no explanation?

The OP asks 'Does thinking take place in the human brain?', not how.

I think this is an excellent preliminary question to ask before asking how. It identifies where to start looking if you answer it correctly. And we don't know the solution before we get there. I do U-turns if I need to.

Fair enough.

My left little toe, or so I think, because I am quite sure it is smarter than some people.

:100:

I agree that 'thoughts' are "non-physical'. — Mark Nyquist

Great! What, then, are they?

In the physical form that they exist, they are brain state. That's not a limitation. You just don't need a non-physical realm to explain them.

In the physical form that they exist, they are brain state. That's not a limitation. You just don't need a non-physical realm to explain them. — Mark Nyquist

Ty! I agree, adding perhaps that while non-physical realms even counterproductive in explaining them, maybe reasonable for understanding (some of) them - a different question.

I sometimes get into how the brain contained 'non-physical' can control physical matter. Your point in treating thought as a concept(disembodied) is useful and maybe a commom perception of thought.

Bob: Hey that was a great idea, where did you come up with that?
Mary: When I was studying Philosophy at the University of Sunset.

Therefore, in this situation, thinking took place at a university.

You might be right about brain state causing mental state being fallacy. I was giving an overview, not cause and effect. My second attempt was that thought can only exist if supported by brains state. That's how I approach it — Mark Nyquist

I don't understand your point. There's no evidence your mind is your brain. There's lots of evidence your mind is not your brain. That's the actual situation. So, if we're interested in what's true, that's what's most likely true: your mind is not your brain.

Again: if you try and argue that your mind is your brain, you are almost certainly going to argue badly. For instance, you are now implying that if mental states 'depend' on brain states - a thesis for which you have provided no evidence - this somehow shows that they 'are' brain states. How? That same reasoning would lead you to conclude that the second storey of my house 'is' the first storey of my house.

Since you don't understand, there's no evidence, but you have lots of evidence and there is an actual situation and we should be interested in what's true and what's most likely true and the fact that your mind is not your brain, then my position is indefensible...nuts.

Well, that was just gibberish.

Do you have any evidence that your mind is your brain? If you do, present it.

Your task, should you choose to accept it, is to present a valid argument that has this conclusion: 'therefore, my mind is my brain'.

This is a valid argument form:

1. If P, then Q
2. P
3. Therefore Q

Q is the proposition "my mind is my brain".

The argument will be a good one to the extent that 1 and 2 are self-evident to reason or else are themselves teh conclusions of arguments that have premises that are self-evident to reason.

So, here is the argument that most of those who believe the mind is the brain provide, if they have wit enough to be able to provide any at all:

1. If brain states cause mental states, then brain states are mental states (and my brain is my mind).
2. Brain states cause mental states
3. Therefore, brain states are mental states (and my brain is my mind).

That argument is shit. Why? Because premise 1 is obviously false: if A causes B, that does not mean A 'is' B.

So that's a rubbish argument. And that's the beauty of arguments: when you're forced to make one, you can discover that your view is based on assumptions that are self-evidently false. Perhaps there's a good argument out there that has "therefore, my mind is my brain" as its conclusion - but if there is, I haven't heard it yet.

Or you can just wrap yourself in a big cloak of your own ignorance. You decide.

Well, that was just gibberish. — Bartricks

I agree. Just so you know, I'm not classically trained.

But you possess a faculty of reason, yes? And your reason tells you, does it not, that this argument is valid:

1. If P, then Q
2. P
3. Therefore Q

And that this one is not:

1. P
2. Therefore Q

When asked to provide evidence that the mind is the brain, most will provide the second argument. That is, they will say "mental states are caused by brain states" (or something equivalent - doing something to the brain affects what goes in in the mind, etc).

That's not a valid argument. It's this:

1. Brain states cause mental states
2. Therefore brain states are mental states

That's

1. P
2. Therefore Q

So to make it valid, we need to add a premise saying "if P, then Q".

But what does that mean in this context? It means adding "if brain states cause mental states, then brain states are mental states"

Yet that premise is obviously false. Our reason tells us this as clearly as it tells us that the argument is valid. For instance, I am affecting you right now - so things I am doing are affecting you. That doesn't mean I am you.

Anyway, that's 'reasoning' and it is the only way to figure out what's true. For otherwise one is just making shit up or listening to yourself.

Personally, I like the method of working the problems of monism/dualism, information, brain states and a few other problems as one problem. Can your method do that?

I do like the P and Q stuff, Might be useful. Hope it's not a distraction.