Hi Stathis Papaioannou The brain is dead meat unless something like vitalism or intelligence or consciousness is there to not only to provide life but to explain how the brain works. How is the brain able to focus its cacophony of electromagnetic signals into a perception ?
For the brain is a complex bundle of nerves and electromagnetic signals that, without something to organize and focus its experiences, would only provide us with chaotic noise. The self does that. It provides us with a singular unifed point of experience, that is to say, the self provides us with perception. Do you have an alternate explanation ? Roger Clough, rclo...@verizon.net 9/20/2012 "Forever is a long time, especially near the end." -Woody Allen ----- Receiving the following content ----- From: Stathis Papaioannou Receiver: everything-list Time: 2012-09-19, 13:42:05 Subject: Re: Re: Zombieopolis Thought Experiment On Thu, Sep 20, 2012 at 12:38 AM, Roger Clough wrote: > Hi Stathis Papaioannou > > OK, I'll bite. > > How does modern biology define life ? It's rarely defined unless someone asks for a definition. Problems arise with the definition when it comes to viruses and prions, which have some characteristics of other entities commonly considered alive but not others. We can imagine other cases of entities that grow, replicate and maintain homeostasis but may or may not be said to be alive based on some other arbitrary criterion, such as whether it uses organic chemistry. Thus a machine (electronic and mechanical) that maintains itself, seeks energy and spare parts from its environment and makes copies of itself may or may not be called "alive" depending on the whim of the definer. But the important point I wanted to make is that biologists reject vitalism. -- Stathis Papaioannou -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
