This view is "hammered" into people from early age on — EugeneW

Very right. In the beggining, the material world --later represented by science-- was part of philosophy, but I believe that philosophers could distinguish between material and non-material things and they were putting them in their right perspective. Then, in 19th century, "science" (a word coined in that period) gained its "independence". Since then, it has grown up to become more more and important than the other part --the non-physical one-- of philosophy. The Western world has followed (the philosophy of) Aristoteles, who was a "materialist" but only in relation to Plato. That is why even today "materialism" is contrasted to "idealism" --a totally wrong idea-- because Plato is considered an "idealist" --I guess, mainly because he talked about "Ideas"!

We don't know how the West would have been evollved if it has followed Plato's philosophy instead of Aristoteles' ... (But I like to imagine about it, even if I'm certainly not an "idealist"! :smile:)

Science is nice, but it's only knowledge. About the external side of material reality. — EugeneW

It's good that you made the distinction, because knowledge contains non material things too! :wink:

it [technology] will never, if sophisticated enough, be indistinguishable from magic, for the magic lies within — EugeneW

Nice!

I believe the statistics show a general downward trend in violence, and a general improvement in the human condition over recent history — Daemon

You don't have to "believe" ... Statistics talk for themselves! :smile:

About crime, from https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/z2cqrwx/revision/8: "The crime rate increased in the 20th century, particularly after the 1960s. Many new crimes have emerged due to the rapid technological, social and economic changes."
(Notice that one of the reasons is technology, which is quite pertinent to our case.)

About suicides, from https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-59259-910-3_10: "Although reports of suicide have existed since the Greek and Roman times, the trends of suicide specifically in the United States have drastically changed, especially within the past century."

About drug abuse, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3144502/:
"Overall illicit drug use reached a peak in the late 1970s, declined during the 1980s, rose again in the 1990s, and has remained relatively stable during the past several years."

I wonder if you could tell me what it is that your soul or spirit actually does? — Daemon

Come again? :smile:
(I mean, can you be more precise?)

I don't see that in the paper you refer to AP — Daemon

What does "AP" stand for?

They aren't talking about art or music appreciation, they are talking about "wakefulness" — Daemon

I already explained the lack of validity regarding "wakefulenss", and also that this is just an attribute and cannot stand for a definition/description of consciousness.

I've got a body that can do things like pushing the keys on the piano, and I've got a mind that can do things like appreciating the emotional tension and release in the music. So I'm wondering what I would need a soul or spirit for. You seem to think you have a soul or spirit in addition to your body and mind, so I'm wondering what role it plays in your life.

What does "AP" stand for? — Alkis Piskas

Alkis Piskas.

Ethics, unequivocally. — Garrett Travers

Unequivocally? I cant't even think about how ethics get involved here ...
Do you want to give justice to Neuroscience in general?

I've got a body that can do things like pushing the keys on the piano — Daemon

Do you mean that your body plays piano automatically, like a robot? :smile:
What is that directs it, not just to play (i.e. tap on the keys), but also what to play and how to play it, how to express a melody, how to compose a music piece ... ?

I don't see that in the paper you refer to AP — Daemon

Alkis Piskas. — Daemon

Ah, OK. Well, I have mentioned that paper 3 or 4 times already in this thread. Here's one more: "Consciousness: New Concepts and Neural Networks"(https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fncel.2019.00302/full)

Do you mean that your body plays piano automatically, like a robot? :smile:
What is that directs it, not just to play (i.e. tap on the keys), but also what to play and how to play it, how to express a melody, how to compose a music piece ... ? — Alkis Piskas

My mind, as I mentioned.

My mind, as I mentioned. — Daemon

I read that. But your mind is not physical!

I have asked and received no answer to the question as to how the experimental results would be expected to look any different if the brain was a receiver of consciousness rather than a producer of consciousness. — Janus

And how, exactly, does the brain "receive" consciousness? Is there any indication of an antenna?

Why would evolution result in brains that receive the non-physical uber-consciousness? Because the non-physical uber-consciousness needed something to do? Is that what drove evolution? Or did the uber-consciousness see highly complex brains lying around not being used and decided to take advantage?

Are we just buds off the big brother uber-consciousness? Meat-puppets that entertain the otherwise bored uber-consciousness?

I would really love to learn more about your faith, but there don't appear to be any sources.

As to your other question "And why can't any of us remember our thoughts before the brain received them?", why would we remember thoughts which we had not received, and thus had not had yet? — Janus

So there is no actual consciousness (i.e., thinking, remembering, sense of self) until brains are involved. Got it.

Physicalism is equally speculative, even if it might seem more plausible due to our inbuilt modernist biases, and I am sure there are very good neuroscientists out there who are devout Christians, or Buddhists, or Muslims and so on; and I am sure their work is not compromised by their metaphysical beliefs. — Janus

Aha, there we go! From now on let's spell Philosophy with a capital P since it's just another religion.

Well, I think you may be falling into the trap of adopting the Cartesian categorisation of elements of existence.

But how does that account for your soul?

I think you may be falling into the trap of adopting the Cartesian categorisation of elements of existence. — Daemon

I cannot know whether I fall into a trap or not. If I knew, it wouldn't be a trap, would it? :smile:
And certainly, you cannot know myself better than me! :smile:
Then, I do not adopt any theory at all. I can bring up Descartes only as an example or for description purposes. If I share common points with him, this is another story.
What I say is all based on my reality, which in turn is based on my experience, logic and knowledge (facts).

But how does that account for your soul? — Daemon

"That", what?

Well, I have to go out now ...

The “Soul” is the touch point for the presence of God.

We think because God thinks and with the power of God’s perfect omniscient mind.

We love because God loves and with the power of God’s perfect all-loving heart.

We exist because God exists and with the power of God’s perfect omnipresent being.

Our Soul is the center of God’s omnipotent presence in us from where all his perfect attributes spring forth.

We do not think, love, and exist because we have a physical body evolved from matter and energy.

How does that tie in with your assertion that you "have never been religious for a single day"?

@Daemon

You equate God with religion because your eyes cannot see the Kingdom of God within yourself and others.

And you trust only your eyes to be the measure of reality.

And then there’s the possibility that some religious person shoved a Bible up your ass when you were young and you are still trying to shit it out.

The necessity of God is a logical reality, as Aristotle took great pains to think out in his “Metaphysics”.

Have you taken great pains to read it and think out the necessity of God for yourself?

Of course not. No one on this forum has.

You work out the Google Machine.

This forum is a place of untrained intellects going to great pains to appear otherwise.

Right. So you can see all these marvellous things that I can't. And yet, I seem to be managing ok.

And I'm not the one who wasted five years of his one life in a fucking catholic monastery. I reckon I will look elsewhere for wisdom.

@Daemon

You write that you’re going to do this and not do that as if it’s something anyone cares about other than yourself.

Of course you only do and do not do what you tell yourself. That’s the point — you’re merely close-minded and opinionated, and not truly wise.

And “managing ok” is the mantra of mediocre human beings everywhere, not those of us who become much greater from taking the path least traveled and entering the narrow gate.

You are satisfied with yourself because you have not entered into the Kingdom of God within you and gone on the great quest that awaits you there.

We become as great as our hopes are, and our greatness we can “see” by the love that surrounds us.

Do you have an example of integrated information in the brain?
— EugeneW

No. — Garrett Travers

Consciousness is integrated sensory information - where information from the eyes, ears, nose, skin, etc. all come together to produce the model of the world we experience.

Yep, that's exactly my point. And it is the brain doing so, as far the evidence is concerned. You have something that suggest otherwise, present it. I'm not here to discuss opinions. — Garrett Travers

The only evidence anyone has is of consciousness itself. Any evidence you have of brains is by means of consciousness/integrated sensory information/empiricism. So is it brains that produce consciousness or consciousness that produce brains? And that is only part of the question. The other part of the question is how does one "produce" the other? What exactly is meant by "produce" in this context?

So is it brains that produce consciousness or consciousness that produce brains? — Harry Hindu

:up:
Yes, this was exactly what I was saying.

I have asked and received no answer to the question as to how the experimental results would be expected to look any different if the brain was a receiver of consciousness rather than a producer of consciousness.
— Janus

And how, exactly, does the brain "receive" consciousness? Is there any indication of an antenna? — Real Gone Cat

William James had some ideas on this subject:


“When the physiologist who thinks that his science cuts off all hope of immortality pronounces the phrase, "Thought is a function of the brain," he thinks of the matter just as he thinks when he says, "Steam is a function of the tea-kettle," "Light is a function of the electric circuit," "Power is a function of the moving waterfall." In these latter cases the several material objects have the function of inwardly creating or engendering their effects, and their function must be called productive function. Just so, he thinks, it must be with the brain. Engendering consciousness in its interior, much as it engenders cholesterin and creatin and carbonic acid, its relation to our soul's life must also be called productive function. Of course, if such production be the function, then when the organ perishes, since the production can no longer continue, the soul must surely die. Such a conclusion as this is indeed inevitable from that particular conception of the facts.

But in the world of physical nature productive function of this sort is not the only kind of function with which we are familiar. We have also releasing or permissive function; and we have transmissive function. The trigger of a crossbow has a releasing function: it removes the obstacle that holds the string, and lets the bow fly back to its natural shape. So when the hammer falls upon a detonating compound. By knocking out the inner molecular obstructions, it lets the constituent gases resume their normal bulk, and so permits the explosion to take place.

In the case of a colored glass, a prism, or a refracting lens, we have transmissive function. The energy of light, no matter how produced, is by the glass sifted and limited in color, and by the lens or prism determined to a certain path and shape. Similarly, the keys of an organ have only a transmissive function. They open successively the various pipes and let the wind in the air-chest escape in various ways. The voices of the various pipes are constituted by the columns of air trembling as they emerge. But the air is not engendered in the organ. The organ proper, as distinguished from its air-chest, is only an apparatus for letting portions of it loose upon the world in these peculiarly limited shapes.

My thesis now is this: that, when we think of the law that thought is a function of the brain, we are not required to think of productive function only; we are entitled also to consider permissive or transmissive function. And this the ordinary psycho-physiologist leaves out of his account.”

https://web.ics.purdue.edu/~drkelly/JamesHumanImmortalityTwoObjections1898.pdf

I think that all accounts, all kinds of accounts, are reliant for their coherence on their contexts and the grounding presuppositions..... — Janus

Couldn’t be any other way, could it.

I would even go so far as to declare, saying that philosophy, and he who merely poses as a philosopher, rejects empirically grounded cognitive science with respect to brain operation and demonstrable functionality, is a case of pathological stupidity.

No one denies that the absolute necessity of the brain has been established, yet everyone acknowledges an irreducible sufficiency in its manifestations, has not. Questioning the completeness of scientific investigations is very far from rejecting that which is antecedently proven from it. While the cognitive philosopher can say, “if this, then this, from which that is given”, the cognitive scientist can only say, “because of this, then this, but that is not given”.

At the same time, the utter completeness and internal self-consistency of purely logical cognitive metaphysics, mediately denies to empirical cognitive science the possibility of attaining such complete certainty, merely from the sheer quantitative and qualitative complexity of the system being empirically investigated. In fact, the philosophical admissions of the cognitive scientist himself, may propose that his science may even get in its own way, when the irreducible certainty it seeks may reside in a domain impossible for it to investigate, a difficulty not met in cognitive metaphysics, which has the system it investigates immediately presented to it in its entirety.

The pathologically stupid don’t recognize that science is more apt to reject metaphysics simply because its tenets do not lend themselves to observation, yet metaphysics cannot reject the tenets of empirical science, insofar as those tenets provide the necessary causality for the paradigm in which metaphysics operates.

Science builds and maintains the road, metaphysics uses it. Simple as that.

Rhetorically speaking.....

Any attempt to define consciousness as some sort of illusion just pulls the rug out from under all the empirical "evidence" one has for the existence brains.

There are numerous well-known theories that explain that the way we perceive the world is "inaccurate", or not the way the world is. The theory that color only exists in our minds, and not in the world is one of those theories. What does that say about how we perceive brains? How do we get any "accurate" information about the world to survive for any length of time if we can only access our consciousness and consciousness isn't suppose to be an accurate representation of reality?

I think that we do get accurate information about the world via consciousness, but there are many who confuse the map with the territory. The territory is process. The map is static models of processes - hence brains are confused to be the real thing (the map (static models)) and minds (the territory (process)) are relegated to the status of illusions or as subordinate to the static model. It's as if scientists are forgetting about the very nature of observation itself and the role it plays in how we think about things.

@Mww

"philosophy ... rejects empirically grounded cognitive science ..."

You are defining "empirically grounded" as "physically grounded", aren't you?

Logical empiricism is a thing. Look it up.

A truly educated and talented philosopher, who would be only known by another one, does not "reject" the physical existence and functions of a brain, but logically knows that a physical brain is merely the "seat" for consciousness and not the power of consciousness itself.

I've posted this above, and you ignored it, didn't you? And now you are calling philosophy and philosophers pathologically stupid for not paying homage to your limited and false definition of "empirically grounded".

And then you place Metaphysics after Science, when scientists couldn't take a simple step in the scientific method without first having metaphysical logical empirical principles to draw further empirical knowledge from.

The formulation of the scientific method itself is a metaphysical reality, not a physical one.

And a truly stupid person full of only his own thoughts would see all knowledge that he doesn't understand as "pathological stupidity".

Anyway ...

Your post above contains two blatant falsehoods that I "empirically grounded" the corrections to.

What do you think the chances are that you will ignore this, too?

Of course not. No one on this forum has. — Joe Mello

Then you have overlooked me. If all the gaps are closed, the only thing we can logically conclude is gods who clapped in their hands or shouted out, which resulted in an eternal and infinite universe. Which resembled themselves in the sense that the universe is bestowed with the divine elements involved in their clapping, shouting, fighting, dancing, musing, painting, thinking, hunting, or whatever they were and are doing. I don't think they engaged further with their planned or accidental creation after it was created. Maybe they show themselves once in a while, or to those who need them. Could be. But in general the course of history will not be influenced by them, despite some people thinking they are their placeholders on Earth to structure reality in some god-given way, be it morally, politically, scientifically, socially, or in any other aspect.

I think that we do get accurate information about the world via consciousness — Harry Hindu

Well, when you think about it (as I think about it) "consciousness" is information about the world - or universe. I think of it as a naturalistic phenomenology, or maybe a phenomenological naturalism......

This is some 19th century made-up mystical mumbo-jumbo (he mentions souls :roll: ), and I don't see how it answers my questions. Care to elaborate?

Of course it comes from the brain. Ever seen a person get knocked out by hitting their head? How do you think that happens? Barring all the massive evidence at this point in scientific discovery, where does it come from then? I have a claim of where consciousness comes from, and have the entirety of neuroscience to back me up. What's your alternative?

I’ve seen people knocked out, but never a brain knocked out. People are far more than brains.

When speaking of qualities or states of a human being, such as consciousness, happiness, sleepiness, etc. we are discussing qualities and states of the organism in its entirety, such as it exists. Since disembodied brains can neither function nor exist on their own—without blood, oxygen, the skeleton, flesh—it’s silly to say a brain can produce a quality that only an entire organism can display.

“Consciousness” is a silly concept, anyways. Nothing called “consciousness” moves from one area to another, so saying that it “comes from” the brain is nonsensical. Neither is it “produced” by the brain, as if the brain was a qualia factory.

Neuroscience should stick to describing how the brain functions, and that’s it. Brain function is a limited aspect of “consciousness”, because it’s a limited aspect of biology. Only the field of biology in general can describe consciousness.

This is some 19th century made-up mystical mumbo-jumbo (he mentions souls :roll: ) — Real Gone Cat

Have you read James’ Principles of Psychology? Most of the field of experimental psychology ( and I suspect that includes your perspective) still hasnt caught up
to the ideas in that book, so I wouldn't be so dismissive of his speculations, just because his language is sometimes archaic by today’s standards.

When you answer the questions I posed instead of going off on a number of sarcastic tangential rants that do nothing but reveal your own set of prejudices then I'll respond further.