Well, you guys are the adults here. You be knowing. — TheMadFool

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

Best excuse I have heard in quite a while.

Is there anyone alive that does not?

I see. I guess if people are just going to make stuff up off the top if their heads then they could just make up a thing which exists but doesn't have a location. — Isaac

Yep, there is no such thing as a soul.

What possible reason would we have for believing there's anything more to it than that? — Isaac

None at all.

But some people keep on insisting that the mind "person" can and does exist without the brain. To do so it would need to have a location.

That is what I want someone to explain. What is this space it is in?

As no one seems to be able to do so, then it is obvious that the mind does not occupy a space, but is nothing more than a function of the body.

There's no one way. If you're interested in that, you've certainly found a way to help. — David Mo

I am a teacher, I try to do my part.

What are the terrorists doing here? To end the terrorism of the multinationals? Terrorism against terrorism, I don't think it's a good idea. — David Mo

I just mentioned them as a side thought.
If I was terrorist and I wanted to bring down a multi-national empire I would not even have to kill people to do it.
If I put bombs in 20 Pizza Hut places around the world and blow them up when they are empty, only property damage would occur. Then I make an announcement that the next 20 bombs will blow up while the place are full and that they might be any where around the world.

Would you go buy pizza?

Blow up a few more over the next few months and no one wants a Pizza Hut concession any more. Down they go.

Am I wrong? — Outlander

I think so.

Ironic how backwards and detrimental doing so would be toward preventing corruption, The utopia you imagine is actually a dystopia of the worst kind. I have a feeling people confuse eliminating corruption with eliminating people talking or knowing about it. — Outlander

First of all, I do not imagine utopia. Humans today are completely incapable of creating it.

How could eliminating ignorance of any kind cause problems. Education of all kinds is necessary for the advancement of people. If the people advance intellectually it will eventually lead to the end of corruption.

Eliminating superstition can do no harm at all. Don't you think that it would be wonderful if everyone got the vaccine shots they needed to stop things like measles spreading. Myths like the vaccine causes autism are stopping lots of kids from getting their shots.
Would it not also be wonderful if certain peoples' belief in myths allowed them to continue mutilating the genital of their young. Oh, sorry. No it would not be so bloody wonderful would it. That would be barbaric.
And also the myths about certain races being better than others would have to go, but unfortunately that would mean that the idea that certain religions are better than others would also have to be eliminated.

Defend that things can exist as properties of physical objects or defend that properties of physical objects do not occupy space? — Francis

Why do you think that everyone should be closed minded like you. If you ever plan on winning an argument, you have to be prepared to argue both sides of it.

Photons? How do we decide whether two objects A and B occupy space? Well, they can't be placed in the same location at the same time - one must be removed in order to put the other in the same spot.

Light, since it casts shadows which implies that light and a material object can't occupy the same space at the same time, could be massless particles that occupy space.

On the other hand, take glass. Light passes through glass which implies either that light doesn't occupy space or that glass doesn't occupy space. Since we know both of the above two possibilities are false, a paradox presents itself: Glass occupies space and light occupies space but light passes freely through glass as if both don't occupy space. :chin: — TheMadFool

Is they universe wonderful.

How are we every going to know whether the mind is a part of the body or the body is a tool of the mind? I have no idea. :groan:

The last requirement limits the mind to a space, I think; but then the mind does not only depend on the spatial distribution of the molecules which form it; it would also depend on their ratios, absolute quantities*, and their chemical properties**. — Daniel

While it is true that the brain is limited by the brain's properties and that the mind is affected by chemical imbalances I think that all of this means that the mind is one of the properties/functions of the brain and as such cannot occupy space.
A closed bottle containing perfume limits the smell to the bottle, but makes neither part nor property of the other. A perfumed candle is a complex mixture of carefully balanced chemicals, the smell is part of the candle in the sense that it is a property. It does not in it self occupy space because it is part of the chemical mix of the candle.

I think Lisa Feldman Barrett’s book How Emotions Are Made presents an intriguing body of neurological and psychological research with regards to the nature of this relationship of the mind to the brain. FWIW, I happen to believe that the ‘person’ IS “more than a group of cells interacting with each other on a molecular level” - but that may be a much bigger discussion. It depends on how we understand the various terms in this statement. — Possibility

I read a couple of her books years ago, one was called Emotion and Consciousness. Interesting.

Obviously this topic might be sensitive to some because it touches on the body/souls theme and therefore goes strait to religious beliefs.
I have still not made up my mind on the topic but I am extremely skeptical about the presence of a soul in the body. It is less complicated to imagine the brains functions being the ME.

Doesn't it? If, by deleting all humans physically, you delete all minds, then without special pleading, that does, on the face of it, suggest very strongly that minds are physically located. Why would it not? — Isaac

No, it only implies that the bio-chemical vessel of the mind has a physical location.
If we accept that the mind is nothing more than electro-chemical processes then yes, that would the space the mind occupies. If not then we are still stuck without a space.

How is knowledge of success constructed by schools, — iloveparis

School try to give students the tool they will need to be successful. The key word there is try. Not all schools try the same way or as hard to do their job.

Put an end to ignorance and superstition (especially religious). — David Mo

I saved this one for last. Find a way and sign me up to help.

What is an effective way to curb corruption in 3rd world countries mainly in Africa and south America? — Gitonga

I live in one, so I have a bit of experience with the topic.

Some of the proposed ideas might work, others no.

- ban private funding of election campaigns or cap it to a certain low maximum — Olivier5

Ban all funding, make the candidates or their followers pay for what they want or need. Personal checks only.

- get the state to reimburse election campaign costs within a certain treshold, for all candidates getting at least 5% of expressed votes. — Olivier5

Why should the tax payer have to foot the bill at all? In any country around the world the money is needed in health care.

- set up dedicated anti-corruption units in the judiciary to fast-track high-level corruption, and isolate such units from political pressure. — Olivier5

In most places they cannot afford to pay enough for these people not to be corrupted. Why would anyone work for a small wage and stick his neck out to catch crooks?

- for petty corruption (mainly) set up a dedicated phone line to report corrupt officials, cops, etc. — Olivier5

These guys sell or give the info to the bad guys to make a bit extra or keep their families safe.

- force all elected officials to declare and itemize their wealth, prior and after their turn, in a verifiable manner. — Olivier5

It would probable cost more to verify their declarations than what they are going to steal. These people are clever at hiding the money.

...for first world countries to get the fuck out. — Banno

Probably the best solution, but they should take their cash with them. If they want to help the starving people of the world they should take the food directly to them, not give it to governments.

Put an end to the global corporations. — David Mo

Great idea but not going to happen. I am surprised that terrorist have not worked this angle yet.

Well, it's an interesting line of inquiry because it uncouples the two essential qualities of matter - mass & volume. Is it possible for something to have mass and no volume or volume and no mass? — TheMadFool

Science says that it is possible, who am I to disagree.

Personally I think that like the old song said "you can't have one without the other". Maybe something has mass and they still don't have a method of measuring the volume. Or the other way around.

the five-dimensional structure of capacity or the six-dimensional structure of freedom. — Possibility

Just curious, where can I find more information about this?

But there is a tendency to assume that by actual ‘space’ we mean the three-dimensional structure of the objects in conceptualised reality. — Possibility

Which is why I asked at the beginning for someone to set a proper definition of "a space". I could not think of any definition that would allow the mind to have its own space.

The relationship of the mind to the brain is, I think, an established fact. But exactly what that relationship is, is not so well defined.
Many still refuse in this day and age to believe that the "person" is nothing more than a group of cells interacting with each other on a molecular level.

If the mind is the brain then, yes. If not then, no. Also it mind depend on what you mean by mind. If the mind is seen as brain function then, it becomes difficult to attribute a material quality like volume to function. Think of it - the lips and tongue take up space but in what sense could we say that speaking/talking has a spatial attribute. — TheMadFool

Exactly. From what I have read, most people think that it is just the bio-chemical functions of the body. I tend to agree with that.

I think that it would be difficult to assert that the mind occupies a space because there is no way to define a space that it could occupy.

An idea would depend on the spatial organization and composition of the molecules at the moment when such idea comes to mind.

To ask what makes the idea come to mind would be the same as to ask what makes the spatial organization and the composition of the molecules be the one which allows the existence of, or represents, such idea.

Each idea has associated to it a particular molecular spatial organization and composition, which changes in time, just like the idea. — Daniel

If this is true then the mind, the YOU, is nothing more than a bunch of biological/chemical reactions.

How do we control the chemical reactions?

:rofl: :cool:

Energy occupies space. Something does not have to have mass to occupy space. Just because a photon is massless doesnt mean it doesnt have a velocity, a location, a distance to travel- all of which denote location or "space". — Benj96

Everything you say is true.
Golf balls are always in a place, commonly know as a physical/spacial location.
If I say I have an idea, it would only make sense to deduce that it is located in my mind. What sort of location would it be then?

If the mind is in a space, how would we define that space?

If you burned all the papers, deleted all the hard drives, and killed (or lobotomized) all the people with knowledge of the mortgage, how would there still be a mortgage? Yet if the mortgage doesn't take up any physical space, then how have I destroyed it entirely just by destroying physical things? — Isaac

By the same method I can delete all humans from the earth, and there will be no minds. But that does not answer the question that was posed in the OP. Does the mind occupy a space. If it does, then the kind of space needs to be defined.

You don't have physical/digital documents that describe the conditions of your mortgage? When you forget the conditions of the mortgage, where do you look to find it? — Harry Hindu

The piece of paper is not the mortgage, only the physical representation of it. Think of a mortgage as a promise, is that physical?

Space is the medium that separate minds and the more complex some pattern is within some amount of space, the more information within that space. — Harry Hindu

Paper might fit the definition here.

Yes. We IT experts use the term, "space" to talk about how much is taken up by data and how much is free on your computer's hard drive. You have a finite amount of space on your drive to store data.

Well, I tried to get on with that by asking you this, but you seemed to want to ignore the question. — Harry Hindu

And this is why I said that before the question can be answered we need a definition of what "a space" actually is.

Space for IT people is not the same as it is for a NASA person, and neither use the word in the same way that a writer would.

We are using space in different ways and therefore we will never resolve anything.

If we take space to mean something that can be occupied by material objects the arguments would be different to those where space is used to mean the re-arrangement of existing material to accommodate non material OBJECTS.

Does anyone want to provide a fixed definition of space?

The mind doesnt have to be more than data because data can react to data. Analysis, computation and processing of data requires "software" ie. Data. All information reacts with information to transform it into new or derivative information.

Just as a mathematical function is information with input (data) and an output (data). — Benj96

So if emotions are similar to mathematical operacions, math like data would also have space that it occupies? That does not make much sense.

No, in my viewpoint things like Qualia do not have locations but they exist as properties of things that have locations. — Francis

But if they do not have a location, their mere existence does not mean that they occupy space. as Banno pointed out his mortgage is real, but it does not occupy any space at all.

It'll be great content for Netflix's next season of Unsolved Mysteries. — Nils Loc

There is a simple solution, buy a flexible hose like those used for washing machines and install it so that the U-bend is about the same shape as the gas trap tube. It works just as well and you only have to worry about the 2 ends.

Fine. Data is one of the properties of the brain.

But the mind is more than data, it is reaction to data, analyses of data, emotions. Do they have a location?

Yeah but that's only true for objects which have meaning projected onto them. An objects mass doesn't take up any extra space but mass still exists, but it exists as a property of an object that takes up space and not as an object itself. — Francis

OK, so the answer to the OP

Does the mind occupy a space? — Daniel

Is yes.

The mind then is a property of the brain.

Do all properties of an object take up mass of the object?

Why isn't this middle junction designed with a gasket? — Nils Loc

It should not need a gasket if installed properly. The seal is caused by the difference in the angles of the 2 sections, male and female. The principle is the same as the combustion engine's intake and exhaust valves.
There is a small difference in the angles so that when the two part meet with in a limited amount of degrees the tightening of the locking nut pushes them together and forms a contact point around the whole circumference.

Problems usually occur when the angle of contact is incorrect due to faulty alignment. That is why the are made in several sections, to give enough flexibility. Most people think that a leak means that the locking nut is not tight enough and proceed to over tighten it and warp the union.

Plumbing 101.

The electrons which correlate with the concepts that humans have mentally assigned to them certainly do occupy a space within computers and microchips. — Francis

But they would still be there even if there was no data on the chips. So the data is none existent in the sense that it occupies no extra space.

The complexity of our neural network indicates how much information we have stored in our brain, but brains are more or less the same size. — Harry Hindu

So does the mind take up space or not?

A blank drive occupies the same amount of physical space as a drive filled to capacity. What makes them different is the complexity of the patterns within that physical space. — Harry Hindu

So does the data take up space or not?


If your answer is yes to either of the questions above, please tell me how you define space.

So now we have a problem.

Let's stay with the computer hard disk for now instead of the brain.

A hard disk can be explained in the most simplistic way as a metallic disk that has its atoms rearranged to form specific magnetic patterns.
The atoms are part of the disk, no matter what the data or lack of data does to them. Filling the disk completely full will make no difference to the space occupied by the disk nor the space of the whole computer.
If the data occupies space then it would have to be added to the total of the disk, as we know that this does not happen we are obliged to accept that data is immaterial and does not occupy space.
The only other possibility is that they both occupy the same space but one of the two would still have to be immaterial for that to happen. The data occurs through the rearrangement of the atoms, not by adding to them

When you learn that the milk you put on your cornflakes is sour or that 2+2=4, does it add atoms or anything else to your body? No extra space is added to the space occupied by you body, it stays exactly the same. What happens is that neurons get rearranged, new synapse connections can appear. But the brain is not getting bigger, it is just a different arrangement.

So, either we need a proper definition of "a space" or we accept that the mind has no physical qualities except for the sensory organs that it uses as tools.

do you think there is a definition which would encompass every space there is? — Daniel

I have no idea, but for the sake of this discussion it would seem necessary to have a clear idea of exactly what is meant by "a space".

like, is there a feature which is common to all spaces so that they all can be classified as such in terms of such feature? — Daniel

Is there a difference between spaces? Could it be possible that the different spaces have nothing in common?

does my question make sense? — Daniel

Do my answers make sense?

Also, if they are separate, what does this mean? I mean, to be separate, wouldn't they have to occupy a different point in some kind of space? — Daniel

Would that not depend on it being a fact that they do actually occupy space? If they don't, then it is irrelevant.

Data on my computers hard drive does actually have a very specific location, but it does not exist as separate from the disk. The data in my mind might be the same.

No. The body cannot contain the mind, because the spatial aspect of the mind need not be confined to the body. — Possibility

So the mind of a person can be outside of the body?

The spatial location of the mind is a ‘fuzzy’ concept. The highest probability of ‘measuring’ it at any one time would locate the mind in the brain, but neither the brain nor the body appears to necessarily contain it. — Possibility

First of all, no one has yet provided any proof of spatial location of the mind, if it were so then this discussion would have ended already.
What is measured in the brain is electrical and chemical activity, is that what the mind is?

If there are other minds then it seems to be necessarily so that each mind occupies its own space. — Harry Hindu

If there are other minds only implies that they are separate, you cannot conclude that they occupy a space from that.

My mind does not overlap your mind or else how could we say that our mind are separate? — Harry Hindu

My computer memory does not overlap with yours, but I cannot prove that they occupy a space either.

Data surely occupies space in the computer. This space may be no larger or less than it was previously but rather a specific pattern or configuration of "on" switches and "off" switches but no less the information occupies the space of the computer in a certain encrypted order. — Benj96

This reminds me of the guy that wanted his laptop cleaning out completely because it was to heavy to carry.
Data in a computer does not occupy any space at all.

This is why I said that someone needs to define what exactly space is supposed to be in this context.

In that sense, it ‘occupies’ all of the spacetime that I do - although all of this spacetime that I consist of need not occupy all of this mind. — Possibility

So basically you think your whole body contains your mind?

Some scientists think that different dimensions occupy the same space at the same time.
But that does not answer the question.
For the mind to occupy a space it would need to be something and there would need to be something to occupy. We have no idea exactly what the mind is so we would need an explanation of what a space is to be able to even start a discussion about it.

To answer this question we should surely try to figure out what the mind IS, right? — oni

I think it would be a good idea to actually define "a space" first. Exactly what would need to be occupied if the mind was to do so?

consequence of hot wings, — Hanover

Wow, you are reckless! :lol: