Consciousness Continued: A fresh start

It is hard for some people to grasp the concept of souls because their rigid belief in science without God limits their minds. But, there is an important thing that everyone should realize: science is very limited itslef and we dont even know all the unexplained secrets in Earth, let alone the entire universe.Materialist science that has no belief in souls or in God is like a man who spent his entire life inside a closed room with no windows to see the outside world. Then this man claims that the world is only the room where he lives and that there is no outside world. Similarly, our science is limited to what we see in the universe and there is no scientific evidence to DISprove the existance of souls or supernatural powers.

Hi there Mr_matrix. Just a quick note to point out when replying to a particular post you are supposed to use the 'reply' button, not the 'gen reply' button.Using the 'Reply' Button reocrds the history of the thread ( who replired to whom, ect) It makes tracking sub threads so much easier.

So ”God of the Gaps’? Nice. JBut no. Any piece of matter at the subatomic level would seem like a disparate, swirling cloud of sub atomic particles. This holds true for a rock as much as the human synapse. It’s the same problem of not being able to see the wood for the trees.And even if you could make the claim that the lager structure was emergent then all it could be emergent from is the bonds and positions of the subatomic particles. But it isn’t truly ”emergent’ as you can infer the macro structure by the bonds and positions of those subatomic particles.I.e., we know this cloud of sub atomic particles are an atom of this , we know that cloud over there is an atom of that. As we look round we identify more atoms. We start to notice their arrangement to one another and we start to recognise those shapes as molecules. We notice these molecules clump together in things we recognise as proteins. Those proteins clump together and form many things including human cells. These cells lump together to form structure. And as we continue to pull out two vast walls of cells loom on either side as chemical messengers hustle from one side to the other. This gap is a human synapse and is the root of the emergent behaviour we call consciousness.The synapse it self isn’t emergent because it is structure, and can be directly inferred from it’s component parts. Consciousness on the other hand cannot be directly inferred from looking at the mass of synaptic connections. Though we know how neurons interact with each other it is not self-evident (yet) how these cascade firings of neurons add up to conscious thought, to feeling to sentience. Thus the human mind is emergent.It was said earlier that if you dissected a human brain you would not be able to see anything you could point to and say “that is consciousness” because it isn’t a thing. It isn’t a substance. It is a property, behaviour. Just because an emergent behaviour can’t be inferred by examining what is doing the behaving, that is no reason to then assume that what is doing the behaving can’t actually be responsible for that behaviour. Langton's Ant is a good example of this If it is impossible to infer such precise behaviours such as the ant’s road building from examining the simple rules it is programmed to follow, why are we so surprised to witness such incredibly complex behaviour, such as the human consciousness, emerge from the comparatively simple mechanics of neuron interaction?It is an argument from incredulity to dismiss the emergent nature of the human mind in favour of the less parsimonious concept of ”soul’ simply because you cant see how that lump of matter could possibly give rise to your concept of you. What would a Neolithic man have made of the Twin Towers? Could he have made the cognitive leap to see that the skyscrapers are an emergent property of his ability to pile rocks up into structures? Or would he more likely think that something other than man had to have had a hand in their existence? To him it would probably be unthinkable that man could have possibly built such structures.

You don't seem to understand. Consciousness is not a physical behavior. You can't even observe consciousness. So there is no way to prove that consciousness is real. The only one who knows for sure if a person has consciousness is themselves.So belief in consciousness is based on faith. It cannot be observed by Science, thus it is supernatural. You cannot observe a behavior in the brain and say that your observing consciousness because your not. Are you observing the person's consciousness itself? No you are not.Other emergences such as matter being solid is observable. You not only observe the structure, but you observe the solid mass itself. With consciousness, you can only observe the brain's structure in relation to what you think is consciosuness. But there is no proof that the person your talking to is really conscious. He could be a robot for all you know.

The existance of millions of electrical connections is not an evidence against the existance of souls. Life is not just based on chemical reactions and brain connection. The soul is a cencept that cannot be grasped by science.

I beg to differ. While you are right in saying consciousness is not a physical entity in it own right, that you can’t hold consciousness in your hand or observe it as a separate thing. However, that does not mean it isn’t a direct manifestation of the physical. The spoken word may seem to be as ephemeral but it is undeniably physical in origin and nature. Our lungs, larynx and mouth conspire to modulate the air. The words we hear are no more or less real than conscious thought. You cant point to a word as it floats through the air and say look a word.The same with music. The tune is emergent from the act of playing a sequence of notes on one or more instruments. The individual notes don’t hold the tune, nether do the instruments but play the right sequence and the tune happens. In Classical there is a technique where you have the violins on the left play a different tune than those on the right. Each side has it’s own distinct melody. But played together a third melody is heard somewhere in the middle. Although this third melody is plainly heard and distinctive it’s not written down, it’s never actually played in and of itself, it is an emergent property of the other melodies when played together. If you change either of the two melodies that are actually being played then the emergent melody evaporates and disappears. The emergent melody is clearly caused by the act of playing the other melodies.There is enough evidence to be pretty sure that the consciousness is rooted in the brain. Brain damage has been seen to cause changes in the level and quality of consciousness in individuals, including and up to Persistent Vegative State (PVS). On top of physical damage there are a multitude of chemicals and drugs out there that change and alter our level of consciousness. If you can change the state of something by altering the state of something else then you have to assume a connection of some kind. If you flick a light switch and a light comes on you don’t assume that the light chose to come on at the very instant you flicked the switch, no, you assume the switch and light are directly connected.As I pointed out in my last post, extremely complicated behaviour can arise from comparatively simple systems in such a way that it is hard to believe that the ”simple’ system is actually capable of the complex behaviour. Emergent behaviour has been shown to exhibit it self in simple networks so why assume that it would be impossible for the vastly more complicated network that is the human brain to develop the extremely complicated emergent behaviour that we call consciousness?Edited by ohnhai, : edited for readability

All the things you talking about are directly observable as physical things. Consciousness is the exception. I addressed this issue already. Just because there is a relationship between chemical and electrical activity in the brain and consciousness does not mean the consciousness is a direct cause of the chemical and electrical activity in the brain.Your kind of thinking will cause scientist to assume many fallacies.For example, if we took your light switch anology. It would be pretty dum to say that the light switch is the direct cause of the light and then just close the case. There is much more going on and much more is involved. When the switch is in one state, electrical energy is restricted from getting to the light bulb. When it is in the other states, the electrical energy flows to the light bulb. So it is the electric that is the direct cause of the light, not the switch. And even that is not the absolute direct cause. There is even more involved. There is simply a relationship between the light switch and the light. So this does not proof that the switch causes the light. And guess what, switches don't cause light bulbs to light up. Switches only indirectly cause them to light up.Now, consciousness is the result of interactions between the soul and the brain. The potential for the same consistent consciousness is in the soul. But the active consciousness is the result between the brain and the soul. So of course if you damage the brain you will damage the consciousness because the brain is involved. But it is the soul, not the brain, that performs the act of being conscious.Edited by Guido Arbia, : No reason given.

This topic is in the science forum, so I will ask (and I have no knowledge at all on this topic) what I think is a pretty straight forward question:

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Now, consciousness is the result of interactions between the soul and the brain.

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If you know there is interaction - there must be some way to measure it or some process of establishing that this interaction occurs? So what's the method?

Guido Arbia That is good to hear. What is the relationship between the electromagnetic force and the consciousness of which you speak?

There should be alterations in the activity in the brain that are not direct results of the previous states of the brain. These alterations would be very suttle and nearly undetectable.Edited by Guido Arbia, : No reason given.

Your asking me this as if I know all the answers. I know nothing but logic and speculation. I can argue my point usng logic but the point itself is speculation.Now, all I know is that the soul corresponds to and affects the electrical and chemical activity in the brain.The result is consciousness and free will. The core character (which include the choosing tendencies) and the potential for a consistent consciousness lie with the soul. The interactions between the soul and the brain result in actual consciousness and coherent decision making. Not all people have coherent decision making of course. If the brain is damanged, then they will not reach the full potential of their free will because their thoughts that aid them in making choices are not fully coherent.Edited by Guido Arbia, : No reason given.

Guido Ariba
This is a capsule summary of our discussion thus far. We are trying to establish here the arguement you have for the existence of a soul as you outlined in your OP You have explained already that the consciousness is due to the electrical activity of the brain. This establishes a physical origin to the consciousness. The difficulty here is in explaining why the addition postulate of a soul, whose defining characteristics you have not established, becomes necessary to explain any aspect of our conscious existence.

Indeed, the very point I was coming to.What with your conversation about electrical activity in the brain, my conversation about synapses (part of the same system causing the electrical activity) the fact that the brain is a massive interconnected neural-network, the fact that in large systems unplanned complex behaviours can and do emerge, the fact that damage and drugs affect consciousness, it all adds up to what should be a convincing argument that the consciousness is a property of the brain.What is left to explain? Why feel the need to add an un-provable mystery layer invoking the soul? How is you concept of soul damaged by moving consciousness fully over to the physical? Having a purely physical consciousness shouldn’t invalidate the concept of ”soul’.(and sorry for chipping in, please address your reply to Sidelined.)

I realize you were specifically asking Guido but I felt like throwing some answers in. Is that a rhetorical question? It doesn't damage my concept of the soul but it does damage my concept of consciousness because I find something 'magical' it. Our consciousness loses its special-ness when its moved fully over to the physical, IMO. I agree. But I like that, because the consciousness isn't purely physical, it gives a way for the soul to affect our bodies.

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You have explained already that the consciousness is due to the electrical activity of the brain. This establishes a physical origin to the consciousness. The difficulty here is in explaining why the addition postulate of a soul, whose defining characteristics you have not established, becomes necessary to explain any aspect of our conscious existence.

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Are you retarded? No where in any of my posts have I explained that consciousness is the result of activity in the brain. I have all this time been saying that the interactions between the soul and the electrical and chemical activity in the brain is the cause of active consciousness and coherent free will.