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Cogito ergo sum

Here in the Philosophy forum we will talk about all the "why" questions. We'll have conversations about the way in which philosophy and theology and religion interact with each other. Metaphysics, ontology, origins, truth? They're all fair game so jump right in and have some fun! But remember...play nice!

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Can Atheism Account For Rationality

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  • Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
    Are you arguing that this evidence supports the proposition that they are separate things and the mind can have its own existence separate from the brain?
    Only that they are separate things. I'm not alleging that it's evidence that the mind can exist independently of the brain.

    Comment


    • Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
      Not a single characteristic in common?

      1) They both exist.
      Well obviously, though I don't count existence as a property per se. Though that by itself shows that they are separate things, because if the mind exists as an entity in itself then it couldn't possibly be the same thing as the brain.

      Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
      2) They both are associated with humans (brains to other animals and mind possibly as well)
      I mean, if you use "associated with X" as a characteristics you can basically subsume different characteristics of the same general type under the same umbrella and sort of assert that they are the same characteristic, but I'm not really convinced by that.

      Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
      3) They are both associated with thought (and the brain with other things as well)
      But in different ways. Thoughts themselves only exist in minds, so brains are only associated with thoughts in virtue of being related (in whatever fashion) to minds. Thoughts are primarily associated with the mind, and only secondarily with the brain. (Unless you're an eliminativist of course)


      Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
      4) They are both impacted (to one degree or another) when harm is done to the brain
      5) They are both associated with memory
      6) They are both associated with the five senses
      Well, except they're impacted by and associated with these things in fundamentally different ways. Memory and the five senses are associated with the mind and brain in different ways, and so is the way the mind and brain gets impacted when harm is done to the brain.

      If we take the five senses for example, it's quite obvious for different parts of the brain are related to different senses, but it's not like the qualia, or sensations themselves, reside anywhere in the brain.

      Bottom line, it seems to me that you've tried to come up with as general (and abstracted) type of characteristics as possible in order to find commonalities, but when you start delving down into the specifics you see that although the mind and brain have characteristics that can be grouped together into the same sort of category they're not really the same characteristics at all, but different characteristics of the same general type (So they're both in the general type of characteristics of being "associated with the five senses" for example, but the specific type of association is different for the mind and the brain).

      Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
      7) They are both fallible
      I don't even know what it means for the brain to be fallible.

      Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
      8) They both exist in time and space
      I mean, I'm not saying that you're necessarily wrong here, I'm inclined to believe that the mind does exist in time, or we experience the passage of time, but if the mind exists in both time and space how is it that we've never been able to directly observe the mind of anyone other than ourselves? It doesn't seem to me like the mind is extended in space at all.

      Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
      That's my quick list...there may be other things.

      Don't get me wrong - I don't think they are "the same thing." But they do appear to be inextricably linked.
      Well, I think they're linked as well, not just as inextricably as you believe them to be.

      Comment


      • Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
        Only that they are separate things. I'm not alleging that it's evidence that the mind can exist independently of the brain.
        OK - but I would not agree with "separate." "Distinct," perhaps - but not separate.
        The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy...returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Martin Luther King

        I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong. Frederick Douglas

        Comment


        • Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
          OK - but I would not agree with "separate." "Distinct," perhaps - but not separate.
          In the context of this discussion I'm using separate and distinct pretty much interchangeably. I'm pretty sure there's an overlap of meaning between the two, atleast for some definitions of the words.

          Comment


          • Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
            Well obviously, though I don't count existence as a property per se. Though that by itself shows that they are separate things, because if the mind exists as an entity in itself then it couldn't possibly be the same thing as the brain.
            So the attributes of a thing have a separate existence from the thing? You'd have to show that the mind can exist without the brain to make this claim stick.

            Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
            I mean, if you use "associated with X" as a characteristics you can basically subsume different characteristics of the same general type under the same umbrella and sort of assert that they are the same characteristic, but I'm not really convinced by that.
            No. I am saying that something a leg and arm have in common is they are associated with humanity. So too are "brain" and "mind" (though not ONLY with humans).

            Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
            But in different ways. Thoughts themselves only exist in minds, so brains are only associated with thoughts in virtue of being related (in whatever fashion) to minds. Thoughts are primarily associated with the mind, and only secondarily with the brain. (Unless you're an eliminativist of course)
            No two attributes will be related to a thing in the same way, Chrawnus - or they would be the same attribute. You said "no characteristic in common." I'm simply citing a few. And I think you are making a leap to claim thoughts are "only associated with mind." We can see the electrical activity associated with "thought" in an FMRI. We can use thoughts to control prosthetics and are even beginning to crack the door on using them as a human/computer interface. There is a relationship between "thought" and "brain." That we don't know how it works or exactly what that relationship is does not eliminate it.

            Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
            Well, except they're impacted by and associated with these things in fundamentally different ways. Memory and the five senses are associated with the mind and brain in different ways, and so is the way the mind and brain gets impacted when harm is done to the brain.

            If we take the five senses for example, it's quite obvious for different parts of the brain are related to different senses, but it's not like the qualia, or sensations themselves, reside anywhere in the brain.

            Bottom line, it seems to me that you've tried to come up with as general (and abstracted) type of characteristics as possible in order to find commonalities, but when you start delving down into the specifics you see that although the mind and brain have characteristics that can be grouped together into the same sort of category they're not really the same characteristics at all, but different characteristics of the same general type (So they're both in the general type of characteristics of being "associated with the five senses" for example, but the specific type of association is different for the mind and the brain).
            Again - no two characteristics will be related in exactly the same way, or the two things in question would be the same thing. I think you're hair-splitting a bit.

            Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
            I don't even know what it means for the brain to be fallible.
            It means they can make errors - they can fail to operate "normally" in a variety of ways.

            Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
            I mean, I'm not saying that you're necessarily wrong here, I'm inclined to believe that the mind does exist in time, or we experience the passage of time, but if the mind exists in both time and space how is it that we've never been able to directly observe the mind of anyone other than ourselves? It doesn't seem to me like the mind is extended in space at all.
            And yet, that is our experience, isn't it? Your mind "feels" like it's situated in your head. Indeed, given that eyes and ears are so pivotal to us as communication information gathering, our sense of "me" has a sense of being physically located in that part of our head that is most near these organs, and will even shift slightly as we focus on sight versus hearing. But we never experience our "mind" as being in our foot, or in our index finger.

            Well - almost never. A great deal of study has been done on how the mind creates a map of the body and can even extend that map to objects we hold or use. So the baseball bat becomes an extension of the body. Even a car becomes an extension. And then there are those "out of body experiences," which we now know can be induced in a repeatable fashion by the correct electrical stimulation to the correct part of the brain. It seems that stimulation "translates" the map the brain has built to a different set of coordinates, leaving the person feeling as if they are "outside of their body looking down on it."

            Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
            Well, I think they're linked as well, not just as inextricably as you believe them to be.
            I was once, a long time ago, a Christian and a person who believed in the human soul and eternal life. Despite the claims of many, I don't come at this from the perspective of a "died in the wool materialist" looking to justify my pre-conceptions. If I had a "pre-conception," it was to think as you (apparently) do. But over time I grew convinced that this idea of an eternal mind/soul was simply not viable - and was a form of human wishful thinking. I think one of the consequences of sentience is that we not only reflect on ourselves, but we come face-to-face with our own mortality. Life yearns to continued. A conscious mind will struggle with the idea of its own ending. Winking out of existence is a fate it naturally resists. Sentience brings with it the concept of "meaning" and "purpose," so it has long been humanity's quest to find "ultimate meaning" and "ultimate purpose."

            Coming to grips with the fact (I believe) that such things are illusions is not an easy process.
            The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy...returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Martin Luther King

            I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong. Frederick Douglas

            Comment


            • Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
              In the context of this discussion I'm using separate and distinct pretty much interchangeably. I'm pretty sure there's an overlap of meaning between the two, at least for some definitions of the words.
              Fair enough.

              I am not sure if I have said this to you before, but I thoroughly enjoy your discussion style. You focus on the arguments and the concepts, and don't appear to take disagreement as a personal attack. There is not a hint of sarcasm about you (except playfully), and your tone is consistently civil. I wish there were more posters like you. You set an example that I strive (not always successfully) to emulate.

              And coming from a 61-year-old curmudgeon - that's high praise!
              The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy...returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Martin Luther King

              I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong. Frederick Douglas

              Comment


              • Originally posted by carpedm9587 View Post
                And coming from a 61-year-old curmudgeon - that's high praise!
                nick cage 2.jpg

                Comment


                • Originally posted by Darfius View Post
                  [ATTACH=CONFIG]38018[/ATTACH]
                  Kudos to you as well, Darf. After a bit of a rough start...the discussion has become downright upright!
                  The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy...returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Martin Luther King

                  I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong. Frederick Douglas

                  Comment


                  • Originally posted by MaxVel View Post
                    Welcome to 'dialogue' with Shunya. Watch out for when he cites a source which clearly refutes whatever position he's arguing for. That's always entertaining.
                    Only in your apparent lack of understanding of the English language. Nothing I have cited refutes my position.
                    Glendower: I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
                    Hotspur: Why, so can I, or so can any man;
                    But will they come when you do call for them? Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1, Act III:

                    go with the flow the river knows . . .

                    Frank

                    I do not know, therefore everything is in pencil.

                    Comment


                    • Originally posted by shunyadragon View Post
                      Only in your apparent lack of understanding of the English language. Nothing I have cited refutes my position.
                      Originally posted by shunyadragon View Post
                      You are not even up to date on the scientific advances in the development of 'organic computers,' and computers that simulate the neurological nature of the brain, which represent the future generation beyond our mechanical digital computers.
                      What you cited was irrelevant to the issue, which is what I accused you of. Why is it irrelevant? Because making a piece of DNA or whatever function as a logic gate is not sufficient for making a mind. If you want to make an actual brain, whose causal powers are sufficient - then have sex. You could conceivably build one in a lab, but given the complexity of an actual brain - good luck with that. Simulating one is insufficient.

                      Here is why:

                      Searle has produced a more formal version of the argument of which the Chinese Room forms a part. He presented the first version in 1984. The version given below is from 1990.[51][n] The only part of the argument which should be controversial is A3 and it is this point which the Chinese room thought experiment is intended to prove.[o]

                      He begins with three axioms:

                      (A1) "Programs are formal (syntactic)."

                      A program uses syntax to manipulate symbols and pays no attention to the semantics of the symbols. It knows where to put the symbols and how to move them around, but it doesn't know what they stand for or what they mean. For the program, the symbols are just physical objects like any others.

                      (A2) "Minds have mental contents (semantics)."

                      Unlike the symbols used by a program, our thoughts have meaning: they represent things and we know what it is they represent.

                      (A3) "Syntax by itself is neither constitutive of nor sufficient for semantics."

                      This is what the Chinese room thought experiment is intended to prove: the Chinese room has syntax (because there is a man in there moving symbols around). The Chinese room has no semantics (because, according to Searle, there is no one or nothing in the room that understands what the symbols mean). Therefore, having syntax is not enough to generate semantics.

                      Searle posits that these lead directly to this conclusion:

                      (C1) Programs are neither constitutive of nor sufficient for minds.

                      This should follow without controversy from the first three: Programs don't have semantics. Programs have only syntax, and syntax is insufficient for semantics. Every mind has semantics. Therefore no programs are minds.

                      This much of the argument is intended to show that artificial intelligence can never produce a machine with a mind by writing programs that manipulate symbols. The remainder of the argument addresses a different issue. Is the human brain running a program? In other words, is the computational theory of mind correct?[g] He begins with an axiom that is intended to express the basic modern scientific consensus about brains and minds:

                      (A4) Brains cause minds.

                      Searle claims that we can derive "immediately" and "trivially"[36] that:

                      (C2) Any other system capable of causing minds would have to have causal powers (at least) equivalent to those of brains.

                      Brains must have something that causes a mind to exist. Science has yet to determine exactly what it is, but it must exist, because minds exist. Searle calls it "causal powers". "Causal powers" is whatever the brain uses to create a mind. If anything else can cause a mind to exist, it must have "equivalent causal powers". "Equivalent causal powers" is whatever else that could be used to make a mind.

                      And from this he derives the further conclusions:

                      (C3) Any artifact that produced mental phenomena, any artificial brain, would have to be able to duplicate the specific causal powers of brains, and it could not do that just by running a formal program.

                      This follows from C1 and C2: Since no program can produce a mind, and "equivalent causal powers" produce minds, it follows that programs do not have "equivalent causal powers."

                      (C4) The way that human brains actually produce mental phenomena cannot be solely by virtue of running a computer program.

                      Since programs do not have "equivalent causal powers", "equivalent causal powers" produce minds, and brains produce minds, it follows that brains do not use programs to produce minds.
                      You could say that Dennett is right - however, that is not an agreed on position outside of people that subscribe to his particular and radical form of materialism. A small group of people, I might add that might themselves be affected by a lack of functionality on their part - autism and similar conditions might skew people's perspectives.

                      Comment


                      • Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
                        How on earth does it make sense to recognize a notion that's so patently absurd and false? The issue of how an immaterial entity can interact with a material entity isn't even half as insurmountable as the problem the eliminativist faces when he has to explain how the brain and the mind, two entities that do not share one single characteristic in common, could actually be one and the same thing, despite every indication to the opposite.
                        You're simply making assertions, Chrawnus. You are simply assuming that the brain and the mind are two distinct entities and therefore that they do not share one single characteristic. If thinking, if mental states, are of the brain, if consciousness is of the brain, then the mind is simply how we define those functions of the physical brain, not something distict from it;.

                        Comment


                        • Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
                          Perhaps, but if the question of how the mind can interact with the brain if they're two distinct entities has yet to be adequately explained then it looks even bleaker for the person who wants to maintain that they're one and the same thing.
                          The question of how the mind can interact with the brain if they're two distinct entities does not need explanation at all, because they are not separate entities. This is merely an assumption generated in an attempt to explain the existence of ‘souls’.

                          Well for one (and this is perhaps the most fundamental difference), your brain is physical and can be touched, while your mind is intangible and cannot be accessed by anyone other than yourself.
                          The same applies to all sentient creatures, not just the human animal. Humans are not unique in possessing the neurological substrates that generate intangible characteristics such as consciousness, self-awareness and reasoning power. Do you suggest that chimpanzees have a mind separate from their brains?
                          “He felt that his whole life was a kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.” - Douglas Adams.

                          Comment


                          • Originally posted by Tassman View Post
                            The question of how the mind can interact with the brain if they're two distinct entities does not need explanation at all, because they are not separate entities. This is merely an assumption generated in an attempt to explain the existence of ‘souls’.
                            Mind =/= to computer. Thought =/= to a program. The analogy that we are just computers running software - is not substantiated. Searle, a biological naturalist, made a strong argument why that is so. People building AI and claiming that it will be able to be sentient in just the same way as we are, have their work cut out for them to explain why they believe this is so.

                            This is why it is an undergraduate position that tends to be expunged by the time people get to postgraduate study - in philosophy. Outside of philosophy it is an uncritical position held by computer scientists and the like that they accept blindly.

                            Regarding the hard problem of consciousness - this again, has not been solved. So claiming that it has been, is done so uncritically because - herp derp, "attempt to explain the existence of not ‘souls’."
                            Last edited by Zara; 06-29-2019, 10:32 PM.

                            Comment


                            • Originally posted by Tassman View Post
                              The question of how the mind can interact with the brain if they're two distinct entities does not need explanation at all, because they are not separate entities. This is merely an assumption generated in an attempt to explain the existence of ‘souls’.
                              No, you've got it pretty much backwards. The fact that we clearly experience the mind and the brain as being distinct entities is what underlies the belief in the existence of the soul, not the other way around. It's not that I assume that the mind and the brain are distinct from each other because I need them to be in order to rescue my belief in the existence of souls, but rather it's my experience of my mind and brain being distinct that compels me to believe in the existence of souls.

                              Originally posted by Tassman View Post
                              The same applies to all sentient creatures, not just the human animal. Humans are not unique in possessing the neurological substrates that generate intangible characteristics such as consciousness, self-awareness and reasoning power. Do you suggest that chimpanzees have a mind separate from their brains?
                              It would certainly not be any problem what so ever for my position if they did.

                              Comment


                              • Not that I expect analogies to be understood these days, but

                                That gravity arises from matter doesn't mean that gravity is matter. (and gravitational waves seemingly can continue in existence long after the matter that produces them is destroyed.)
                                That mind (perhaps) arises from brain doesn't mean that mind is brain.

                                The concepts advanced by Chrawnus seem reasonable to me.

                                As for animals having minds - observation indicates a high probability that they do.
                                1Cor 15:34 Come to your senses as you ought and stop sinning; for I say to your shame, there are some who know not God.
                                .
                                ⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛
                                Scripture before Tradition:
                                but that won't prevent others from
                                taking it upon themselves to deprive you
                                of the right to call yourself Christian.

                                ⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛⊛

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