Souls?

[c7ityi_]

i think its so illogical to separate matter from the mind. observer from the observed. modern science only observes visible things (effects) but not the invisible things (causes). the presence. they observe the past, the created world, but not the continuous creation.

that's why they think the quantum world is weird. they can't observe the causes. they can't observe what has no duration or substance.

But think how useful they would have been if they had access to modern knowledge.

they would have probably hated it because its so materialistic. the thing about atom came from the greeks, but very few believed in material reality.... i think the entire modern science has taken the wrong path.

the science of reality shouldn't be physics but metaphysics, the science of consciousness and causes.

 

[ProCop]

No matter how wise someone might be, without knowledge their speculations will always be suspect. But think how useful they would have been if they had access to modern knowledge.

More and more research is done in computerised speculations ahm: simulations (thus Plato's position: one does not need experiment if his logic is right) will return shortly to reclaim it's validity...

 

[ellion]

OK so what is your soul and what does it do

my soul is me, it gains experience.

and why would it have any value?

why would a soul have value???
or do you mean why would what the soul does have value???
what do you mean why would it have value??? that seems strange, a strange question!

Remember that memory, identity, ability to think and feel emotions are all functions made possible by the brain.

the brain and its functions are an expression of the soul.

When the brain dies then all these properties cease to exist.

when the brain dies the brain is no longer being prtojected by the soul.

 

[(Q)]

the brain and its functions are an expression of the soul.

Finally, someone has stepped forward. Unfortunately, you'll find that boris makes his case refuting that very statement.

when the brain dies the brain is no longer being prtojected by the soul.

The brain is dead, but the body may remain alive, hence has no soul?

 

[ellion]

thats immaterial

 

[ellion]

The brain is dead, but the body may remain alive, hence has no soul?

what are you saying? if the brain is dead the body may remain alive, and this you think is a reason for there not to be a soul?
but the soul does not depend on the brain. the soul does not depend on the body. both the body and the brain are a projection of the soul. on death the soul ceases its projection as physical incarnation

 

[(Q)]

if the brain is dead the body may remain alive, and this you think is a reason for there not to be a soul?

Isn't that what you said? Please clarify.

both the body and the brain are a projection of the soul.

Define 'projection' and then explain how the soul 'projects' the body and the brain? Why can't we detect this 'projection?'

 

[Raithere]

Here's the core of all your arguments: Ideas are more important than people.

Wow water. Why is it that you have such a low opinion of me?

In fact, no, I don't think ideas are more important than people. I don't subscribe to ideologies and doctrines.

~Raithere

 

[Cris]

Ellion,

my soul is me, it gains experience.

How and how does it store that information? Experience comes from sensory data but if the soul is immaterial how does that material information pass to the soul? Why would soul be any different than your brain?

why would a soul have value???

It serves a purpose. The brain appears to fulfill the functions of memory, thinking, intellect, emotions, consciousness – what then does the soul do? It doesn’t appear to do anything, i.e. has no value or purpose.

the brain and its functions are an expression of the soul.

And right back to Boris’s argument – how does this communication take place? How does the immaterial communicate with the material?

when the brain dies the brain is no longer being prtojected by the soul.

As Q asks – how does this projection take place?

 

[Raithere]

I'm not concluding the abstract has anything to do with the "thing itself" except in an impression from it. The important question here is: What differentiates?

The mind.

Until programmed to recognize patterns by a being that recognizes patterns, a computer cannot for instance, differentiate between any two real things.

I disagree, chips have been designed that are capable of learning how to recognize patterns.

What besides "mind" can employ the concept (abstract) of differentiation? Not the object of the idea, but the idea itself? Certainly it's subjective as you confirm below, but it is also, the idea itself.. the cognition of it, the holding of it in the focus of mind... purely non-phsyical, even though there is a physical thing coaxing it into (abstract/non-physical) existence.

You're asserting here that the mind is non-physical. Can you give me an example of a mind that is not embodied in the physical realm? If not, from what do you assert that the mind is non-physical?

Of course, but the cognition of that pattern in and of itself, the experience of it (in the everpresent now)... is non-physical.

You've not yet established this.

~Raithere

 

[ellion]

How and how does it store that information?

it gains expereince by experiencing.

Experience comes from sensory data but if the soul is immaterial how does that material information pass to the soul?

only sensory expereince comes from sensory information. the information does not need to pass to the soul, it is already in the soul. the body and the brain are the expression of the soul. they exist in the soul but they are not the soul.


i dont know how to put this into a language that you will understand. if you had experienced it your self you would just get it, and you would not have a need to question it and there would be no confusion. if it has not been expereinced then how do i describe it, the existing language of these expereinces is much confused and misleading already.

Why would soul be any different than your brain?

the soul is more than the brain. your question is similar to saying why is the universe different from the earth. one has created the other and the lesser exists in, and because of, the greater.

as the universe is to the earth and as the brain is to the body, so the soul is to the both brain and body.

It serves a purpose. The brain appears to fulfill the functions of memory, thinking, intellect, emotions, consciousness – what then does the soul do?

it eminates the brain (and the other material conditions of the soul)

And right back to Boris’s argument – how does this communication take place? How does the immaterial communicate with the material?

i am not sure there is a communication as you imagine. as i said above the brain is the expression of the soul .

As Q asks – how does this projection take place?

i dont know how to answer that. the closest approximation i can think of is; it is willed.

how do i whistle? i just put my lips together and blow!

 

[ellion]

Isn't that what you said? Please clarify.

you have lost me, i have not said the soul requires a brain or a body, i have said the soul can exist without both.

Define 'projection' and then explain how the soul 'projects' the body and the brain?

i use the word projection to create a sense of what is happening, as i do with the words expression, mainfestation, emanation and so on. they dont need to be defined as it is not literally what is happening. i dont think there is a word for what is happening when the soul si incarnating a physical presence.

Why can't we detect this 'projection?'

i am not sure whay we cannot "detect" this projection. we can expereince this projection for what it is. it may have something to do with the fact that we are the projection, as though we are looking at our selves but not seeing who really are. when we look in a mirror we see the face the body but we dont see the mind the personna. something like that.

 

[ellion]

And right back to Boris’s argument – how does this communication take place? How does the immaterial communicate with the material?

i think this is a better way to put it; the brain IS the communication, we detect the communication, but we call it the brain (or other material conditins)

 

[wesmorris]

Raith, a computer "recognizes" nothing, EVER.

It just operates.

The "recognizer" something to which the results have meaning, as to a computer, they have none. You give it value, the computer cannot.

I'm asserting that a component, or aspect of the mind is non-physical.

A mind is at this point, the resultant of a brain. Maybe at some other time there will be some other thing that can be a mind. I've not intended to imply otherwise.

Add an abstract component to a brain and you have a mind as I see it, and it's really more like a brain generates an abstract component. The main dispute here, is that you assert that abstracts are physical, where I assert that are physically based, but non-physical in and of themselves. I don't see how to get past this point of difference. To me, that there is a chemical signature (or whatever) that initiates it, doesn't mean that the chemical signature IS it. Hrmph.

for the moment humor me and assume that a line has an x and y component. can you describe the line from only the x component?

the problem with describing meaning in the way you do, as merely chemical descriptors, is that you can't do it unless you're inside them. try to map the concepts of a cadaver with a perfectly preserved brain for instance. without him being alive to express a concept when you zap it with a voltage, you will never know what any particular juncture of synapses specifically represents. what do you think about that?

 

[superluminal]

wes,

At what point will we conceed that a computer that acts just like a human brain and claims that it is self aware really is self aware and has "mind"?

As for your dead brains, I would bet that if those patterns were transposed to a functioning "interpreter" (a living brain) they would be completely clear in what they represent. I think "mind" is an emergent phenomenon of complex organization. Purely physical.

 

[water]

Raithere,

Wow water. Why is it that you have such a low opinion of me?

What makes you think I have "such a low opinion" of you?!
I have a very good opinion of you.

In fact, no, I don't think ideas are more important than people. I don't subscribe to ideologies and doctrines.

Yes, I've heard you state this before.
But you don't behave in accordance with that belief, when you value discussion so highly.

 

[wesmorris]

wes,

At what point will we conceed that a computer that acts just like a human brain and claims that it is self aware really is self aware and has "mind"?

When we can look at the computer, and see it's looking into itself. *shrug*

As for your dead brains, I would bet that if those patterns were transposed to a functioning "interpreter" (a living brain) they would be completely clear in what they represent. I think "mind" is an emergent phenomenon of complex organization. Purely physical.

And you're simply incorrect.

I invite you, Cris, Raithere and anyone else who is interested to watch "what the F do we know?".

It's on right now at my house. I've never seen it before, and it's making my point better than I have - for the most part.

Oh, and you're wrong for the dead brains for the most part too. You might be able to transfer an image, but the concepts attached to that image wouldn't make any sense to the brain you implanted it into. The network is subject to itself, and parts of another network couldn't make sense when transplanted from one to another. It has to be "transformed" first, into language, sound, something.. and then it is integrated into that system. A direct replacement can retain no meaning.

 

[superluminal]

Wes,

No, you are wrong. And a poopie head too. That sums up my argument nicely I think.

P.S. The movie/documentary you are watching is a piece of wishy-washy pseudoscientific claptrap. A whosale slaughter of the actual physics of the quantum world. Bah.

 

[wesmorris]

I AM a poopyhead, that is for certain.

It IS kind of cheesy, but the point of abstraction is firmly made. Of course, I saw it before I saw it, so how could it not have been?

 

[superluminal]

Right. Anyway, I don't think we know enough about the way brains really work to say that neural patterns transplanted from a dead brain would have no meaning to the host brain. I simply don't subscribe to the idea that there is some ethereal essence (mind) as seperate from brain function. A computer with the same level of complexity and similar organization would be self aware and conscious. IMO.