I am loath to admit 2 minds in one brain. Admitting two separate minds in one body gets out of hand very quickly. — Bitter Crank
Interestingly, people can live without the right hemisphere of their brain. On a few occasions, the hemisphere has been removed because of disease. I'm pretty sure nobody who had this done counted it as an improvement, but they didn't drop dead from it, either. I suppose they could live without a right hemisphere (not in addition to losing the right hemisphere, but as an alternative -- though I have met people who appear to be without any brains whatsoever). If the left hemisphere was removed, they wouldn't be able to tell us much about what it was like.
The two hemispheres are not duplicates of each other, but are rather complimentary. Different specialties are allocated to opposite hemispheres -- such as language being in the left hemisphere, while rhythm is a specialty of the right brain. The left brain thinks more in a sequential, linear fashion, while the right brain is given to more of a gestalt, a-linear style. On the other hand, each hemisphere processes left/right body sensory information (sight, hearing, touch, proprioception, smell, taste, etc.). — Bitter Crank
There is an interesting book by a brain anatomist, Stroke of Genius by Jill Bolte Taylor. She suffered a severe stroke; the book is about her recovery and about brain function and anatomy. Easy read, very interesting. Search YouTube for Jill Bolte Taylor and you can watch her TED talk -- summarizes everything in the book. — Bitter Crank
If the halves of the brain were never connected by the cerebral commissure, then two "persons" might develop (from birth forward). I don't know whether this has ever happened and been observed. — Bitter Crank
Severing the cerebral commissure in someone who has already developed an intellect and personality (using both hemispheres of the brain) results not in two persons, but two now uncoordinated hemispheres. I (quite literally) can not imagine what that would be like. — Bitter Crank
If consciousness isn't the product of the brain then why can we get knocked unconscious? — Panzerfaust
You can see how this can be scaled up by adding more atoms and particles to the system: they each have some finite number of states, and so do their combinations, even allowing for interactions. The number of degrees of freedom rises dramatically as you expand outwards, but the principle remains the same. — SophistiCat
I'm thinking it just means that our language can be confusing. We're not accustomed to tense-less chat. — jorndoe
So, the block universe = what was, what is, and what may yet come to be. — jorndoe
What I'm saying is that the meaning of the concept of the predicate is included in the concept of the subject. For example, "All bachelors are unmarried," or "All bodies are extended in space," which are instances of the meaning of the predicate being a function of the meaning of the subject. You can't have one without the other. — Sam26
Ya, it seems that time, at least to me, is logically impossible without change. — Sam26
On eternalism, or the block universe, there “is” still time (— by the way, notice the present tense “is” here — it’s misleading due to our language). — jorndoe
Claiming that the past exists now is incoherent. — jorndoe
But there must also be a kind of connectedness between these mini 4D entities that enables accumulation and integration of memories that enable our experience of personal identity that evolves in time. — litewave
These chunks of experiences may actually overlap, but since we cannot experience time intervals under the scale of tens of milliseconds the transitions between experiences may feel fuzzy and continuous. — litewave
Our experiences are obviously associated with spatiotemporally extended objects like brains but the experiences themselves seem to be indivisible and unanalyzable. They seem to have an intrinsic, unstructured, monadic identity as well as a relational identity that is constituted by the relations of the intrinsic identity to other intrinsic identities. This metaphysical view is also known as Russellian monism. — litewave
If it states that there is an ontological present, then it is not any form of eternalism that I'll agree with. — noAxioms
They are existing in an ontological sense, but not a temporal sense. — noAxioms
I don't like to reference the present when speaking of ontological sense since it has no ontological existence. But the temporal present can still be referenced and that is what the Stanford post is doing. Such mixing of senses only serves to confuse. — noAxioms
Good example of mixing senses, leading to confusion. Everything exists (ontological, italics) right now (temporal, bold). Eternalism does not give temporal existence to Socrates, nor give any ontological status to 'right now'. — noAxioms
I cannot agree to a statement with mixed senses like that. Be explicit. Every event (there is no 'every time' since something like '1945' is ambiguous outside the context of Earth) currently (temporal sense) exists (ontological sense). — noAxioms
Right. It appears that one's identity is a series of experiences along the time dimension that are connected in an intimate way by laws of nature but each experience excludes the others. Earlier experiences may affect later experiences as memories built in the structure of your brain but at each moment there is an experience that excludes both earlier and later experiences. This exclusion seems to be due to the fact that consciousness exists only on certain time scales, which is about tens of milliseconds. There is no experience on shorter or longer time intervals. And so you cannot have an experience that spans an hour or your whole life. At this moment you have an experience that spans say 50 milliseconds. Over the next 50 milliseconds you have a different experience and not the one that you have over the previous 50 milliseconds. And you have no experience that spans 100 milliseconds. — litewave
It does indeed say that, with the note that Socrates is not currently present. So there's a difference, and they are apparently allowing the use of an implied reference to a present. — noAxioms
So in my posts, I consider references to the present ('right now', 'currently', etc.) to be temporal references, not ontological ones. There is no ontological now, nor a time that is ontologically the current one. — noAxioms
Are you saying that relativity does not order my parents' birth before my own? The ordering is ambiguous or nonexistent? — noAxioms
Eternalism is not an assertion that all times 'currently exist'. — noAxioms
One version of Non-presentism is Eternalism, which says that objects from both the past and the future exist just as much as present objects. According to Eternalism, non-present objects like Socrates and future Martian outposts exist right now, even though they are not currently present. We may not be able to see them at the moment, on this view, and they may not be in the same space-time vicinity that we find ourselves in right now, but they should nevertheless be on the list of all existing things. — Stanford Encyclopedia entry on Time (My emphasis)
No, events are still ordered if within each others' light cones. My parents were born before me, in any relativistic reference frame. — noAxioms
Eternalism is not an assertion about simultaneity or preferred frames or the lack of them. — noAxioms
No, I say he exists. There is no current time. — noAxioms
Eliminativism most likely (denial of subjective experience/ appearance vs the reality), I think that's what can be interpreted the "stubbornly persistent illusion" quote. — JupiterJess
Anyway, the B-theory of time is the modern Parimendes and so the classicial criticisms apply. Such as how it is possible to be persuaded by the result of argument if change is not possible. In order to accept B-theory, you have to accept minds can change in some way and the change must be in some way the result of the argument.
There is no present, no present objects, since no reference has been specified. So you can say that Napoleon presently exists at Earth, 1815, which is a redundant way of saying Napoleon exists at Earth, 1815. But there is no 'the present', and 'currently' is meaningless without a temporal reference point. Whose present? Currently with what? Begging references to these things is going to make you declare the position irrational. — noAxioms
Napoleon exists, and he also exists in 1815, but does not exist in 1915 since the two times are not simultaneous. Paris exists, and Paris exists in France, but Paris does not exist in Japan since the two locations are not the same place. But that doesn't mean Paris doesn't exist just because the speaker is in Japan. It simply doesn't exist at that speaker's 'here' any more than Napoleon exists at your 'present'. — noAxioms
No, not simultaneously. — noAxioms
If "possible" means logically possible (or non-contradictory) alone, then no, not everything logically possible is bound to be the case. An analogy:
1. in an infinitude of numbers, there are every kinds of numbers
2. there are infinite whole positive numbers {1, 2, 3, ...}
3. therefore there are negative numbers among them (from 1)
4. contradiction, 1 is wrong (however intuitive it may seem)
Same argument for the negative whole numbers {..., -3, -2, -1} and 1, the even numbers {0, 2, 4, 6, ...} and π, etc. — jorndoe
I think the unintuitiveness of the quantitative behaviour of infinity is something isolated to the folk-mathematics idea of it. Infinity isn't just well understood in mathematics, it's essential. — fdrake
There are possible events which have probability 0 too. Stuff that could happen but will not. Like throwing a dart onto the number line and hitting a fraction (or a real world equivalent if reality is continuous). — fdrake
Don't know how to explain it better. The simulation is of a real thing. The simulation is not the thing, and thus at no point are we in a simulation, be we simulated or not. So my stance is that we cannot be a simulation. If a simulation is run and it is not perfect (does not simulate what was intended), then the simulation is just of something else with different physics, but the simulated thing is still not a simulation. — noAxioms
It indeed cannot be exact, and yes, it works fine that way. I suppose our universe could be simulated down to the quantum level, but not on any simulating equipment that I can envision. It seems unnecessary unless there is a quantum amplifier (like the one that kills Schrodinger's cat) that needs to be simulated. Biology seems not to have them, nor does electronics for the most part. History cannot be reproduced, but a functional world of sorts can be simulated. It would work. A transistor for instance has very simulatable macroscopic behavior, and I've actually worked with transistor simulations which are cheaper to test than real chips. But transistors rely on quantum effects to function. They wouldn't work without that. Doesn't matter: The simulation does not simulate at the quantum level. It simply simulates it as a macroscopic switch with this and that delay, threshold, and EM noise. The neuro-chemical nature of brain cells seem to have similar macroscopic function. The simulation need not be more detailed than that. — noAxioms
My assumption is no dualism, not necessarily true, but hardly a wild assumption. I consider BIV to be dualism, essentially a mind being fed lies about its true nature. — noAxioms
I'm not undermining the argument. I'm listing additional possibilities than the three listed. — noAxioms
This statement presumes that the simulation is the simulated. — noAxioms
The simulation runs on macroscopic rules, and suddenly the simulated guy starts doing non-macroscopic experiments in his simulated lab and the simulation cannot handle that. He'd be able to tell. So the simulation has to be good enough to mimic even that, and at that point I have a hard time agreeing that it is possible even in principle. — noAxioms
Likewise, the simulation needs to be confined somehow, limiting resources. An infinite universe cannot be fully simulated even macroscopically. The simulated guy would possibly notice that he is in the center of a finite place, just like we were centuries ago. So I have a hard time with the assertion that the simulation could be so good that we can't know we're in one. — noAxioms
Your argument was that since there's always an underlying fulfillment of personal desire by carrying out a seemingly selfless act, all acts must be inherently selfish. I disagreed, arguing that fulfillment of desire (i.e. doing what you want) does not make an act selfish. In order to determine whether something is selfless, you simply look to the specific act and see if it primarily is directed at helping others. — Hanover
(My Emphasis)On the other hand, it seems like in all of these cases, there was something to gain from performing such actions. If somebody didn't donate to a charity then they would be guilt-ridden by not doing anything. — Alec
My understanding of the word "intent" is that it refers to an action with a goal, while your jumping on one foot apparently doesn't have one. Isn't there a difference between "voluntary" and "intentional?" — T Clark
You distinguished between two sentences:
#1: I simply want to save someone from a burning house vs.
#2: I want to save someone from a burning house in order to protect myself from the guilt of not doing so.
The problem is that #1 is an incomplete sentence. There is some reason you want to save someone because, tautologically, every intentional act has a corresponding intent. In order to find an act without an underlying intent, you must look for accidental or random events, not the sort we're at all interested in here.
So, to your question, when does #1 occur, asking very specifically as you have when do you intentionally save someone from a burning house for no reason, I'd say never, but that's based upon a logical problem in trying to explain how one can act intentionally for no reason. That just doesn't make sense. If you acted intentionally, you had a reason, and that reason formed the basis of your intent. — Hanover
You're creating a tautology here. If I do what I want to, then I'm selfishly doing what I want, even if what I want is to save your life from a burning house. If I didn't want to save you, I wouldn't have. — Hanover
There are all kinds of reasons people may provide assistance to other people. Sometimes it is just because they empathize and wish to help. For those who have empathy for others, they understand what I just said, but I am not saying categorically everyone had empathy nor am I saying that people assist only or even primarily for empathy. But I know that sometimes people help others simply because they care. — Rich
Doing something for the benefit of others is the definition of selflessness, regardless of whether you happen to benefit yourself. Otherwise, you must define selflessness as those accidentally helpful acts. — Hanover