On 6/4/2012 7:27 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:
On Jun 4, 10:14 pm, meekerdb<[email protected]> wrote:
On 6/4/2012 6:54 PM, Craig Weinberg wrote:
On Jun 4, 8:57 pm, Stathis Papaioannou<[email protected]> wrote:
If you want to think that, fine. If it upsets you, I'm sorry. If it
upsets you and therefore you conclude that it's not true, then your
thinking is fallacious.
There's nothing upsetting about it, I just don't understand how we can
talk about deciding that we are powerless to make decisions. I'm
trying to figure out how that makes sense to anyone.
Brains are made of the same stuff as everything else (up and down quarks,
electrons,
photons). We have no reason to believe that this stuff obeys different laws
when it's in a
brain, from which we conclude that whatever brains do it's determined by these
same laws.
I'm happy to call that 'free will' so long as your not coerced (however you
want to draw
the coerced/not-coerced line). In which case, since we're not coerced, we are
not
powerless, we're just deterministic (mostly).
If top level properties were determined by low level properties, then
there would only be one level of description. It would be like saying
that since the Taj Mahal is made of bricks, the shape of it must be
determined by the laws of masonry alone. The bottom line is that we
know for a fact that we are conscious, so that consciousness'
association with the brain and it's molecules can only mean that
molecules, or large enough groups of molecules are able to feel and
think.
Sure. Doesn't mean they have to obey different laws to do so.
It is our understanding of quarks and electrons that is
primitive, not matter.
???
Brent
"What is mind? No matter.
What is matter? Never mind."
--- Lady Russell (Bertrand's grandmother)
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