On Thu, Apr 11, 2013 at 10:55 PM, Craig Weinberg <whatsons...@gmail.com<javascript:;>> wrote:
>> >> Muscles and cells follow your intention if they receive input from >> >> conscious centres in your brain, but the cells in those centres follow >> >> the mechanistic rules that neuroscientists know and love. >> > >> > >> > If that were so, then neuroscientists would not need to ask me to move >> > my >> > arm, they would simply predict when I think I am moving my arm. >> >> And after that they would predict the lottery numbers. > > > So you are saying that my arm moves at random times like the lottery pays > off randomly? How come I can predict when I am about to move my arm and be > right every time? The lottery pays off unpredictably to an outsider, but not necessarily randomly. The lottery may itself know what its own outcome is going to be and feels that it has chosen it freely. This can be said about any process, since there is no way to know whether it is associated with consciousness or not. >> A top-down effect would result in things happening at the low level >> seemingly magically. > > > You only think that because your world view is panmechanistic instead of > panpsychic. Since we observe the ordinary top-down control of our own > voluntary muscles and some mental capacities, the challenge is not to > explain away this fact to preserve an arbitrary attachment to a particular > cosmology, but to see that in fact, all that we see as being low and high > level are defined by relativistic perception. Low and high are aesthetic > perspectives, not objective realities. In reality, low and high can be > discerned as separate in some sense and they are united in another sense. Of > the two, Top-down is more important, since all bottom up processes are > meaningless if a person is in a coma. Whether or not the scientific world view is wrong, the fact remains that a top-down effect would result in things happening at the low level SEEMINGLY MAGICALLY. >> If it is all consistent with physics then it >> isn't a top-down effect. > > > It is the job of physics to be consistent with reality, not the other way > around. In the above sentence I am not claiming that physics is right, I am not claiming there is no top-down effect, I am just pointing out that IF IT IS ALL CONSISTENT WITH PHYSICS THEN IT ISN'T A TOP-DOWN EFFECT. If you disagree with this then explain how you think the brain could consistently follow the mechanistic rules of physics while at the same time breaking these mechanistic rules due to the top-down action of free will, because that is what you are saying, over and over and over. >> Again and again I bring this up and you say >> that I misrepresent you, that I haven't understood your theory, while >> it is you who have not understood the meaning of your own words. > > > Seriously, that is your best argument? That I must not know what my own > words mean since they don't make sense to you? It may not be your fault. I > have yet to see someone with the strong panmechanistic view successfully > question their own own belief, so it is entirely possible that you won't be > able to do that, barring a life-changing neurological or psychological > event. Rest assured that I understand precisely my own words and your words, > and it is you who have not seen more than one side of the argument. You repeatedly contradict yourself, and when this is pointed out your response is a non sequitur, as above. >> I am trying to explain to you that you are contradicting yourself. If >> you agree that the brain functions consistently with physical laws >> then you have to to agree that consciousness does not directly affect >> brain behaviour, since there is no place for consciousness in chemical >> equations. > > > There doesn't need to be any place for consciousness in chemical equations, > just as there doesn't need to be any place for images in the pixels or > flicker rate on a video screen. When we watch TV, we watch TV programs, not > pixels turning off and on. This is what the universe is made of - perceptual > relativity. Existence is a false concept - relevance of sense is the > universal truth. See, non sequitur. I point out that if you are right chemistry is wrong, you respond with this. >> This is not to say that consciousness does not exist or is >> not important, just that it is not directly or separately or top-down >> causally efficacious. > > > Then in what sense do you claim consciousness "exists"? As a metaphysical > ephiphenomenon which appears magically in never-never land for no > conceivable purpose? Most interesting and important things in the world are epiphenomenal. There is no shame in this. -- Stathis Papaioannou -- Stathis Papaioannou -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
