That which is us

Faith defines us. It allows us to accept our existance and accept the existance of others. Without it we are nothing more than malatonin and nrw. Two series of causal events.You 2 seem to be working very hard at proving you dont exist. I have to admire that.
Without my belief or faith that you do exist. I would in fact be talking to nothing more.Biological computers and artificial inteligence will take us places I really do not want to go!....whewThis message has been edited by 2ice_baked_taters, 02-21-2006 12:34 PM

I disagree. Faith might be part of the conciousness.. but that is not what we are. It is part of the results of brain activity. It might affect our actions.. but the basis of 'faith' is how our brains work.

yes I am the result of a causal event, hopefully I won't have to go into the details You and nwr are too...Faith may define you, but not me. I accept your existence and that of others and myself. I do not require faith to know my son exists, it is a fact.You OP stated in essence that when science sees behaviour as biology/chemistry it is abusive, when in fact it is reality. Can you control certain aspects of this? Yes, but again you need the biology/chemistry to mediate control.I could remove your amygdala, you would never fear again. I could destroy the lateral region of your hypothalamus you would starve to death, the VMH region and you will eat yourself to death. Biology and chemical processes can not be disregarded.Can you show how and why it is an abuse of science?This message has been edited by melatonin, 02-21-2006 04:06 PM

Perhaps it takes some sort of belief for me to accept your existence. But it does not take faith to accept my own existence. Not in any way.

So you believe that you and your son exist?

No, I know my son exists, I know I exist. You exist, although you could be a chatbot.Row, row, row your boat...but in my dream I know I exist and so does my son I can see you are heading into philosophical mumbo-jumbo. Fine, have fun.I'll stick to science with the aim of solving real-world problems whilst you can ruminate over whether I believe I exist, do exist, or require faith to do so...

You do beieve I exist then?
That would be kinda nice. you seem like a personable and inteligent series of causal events to me. You do accept or your own existence then? Are ya sure?
So a series of causal events has the capacity to accept it's own existance? I am not sure about that myself. but I'm listening.
What separates a series of causal events member nwr from any other natural series of causal events?This message has been edited by 2ice_baked_taters, 02-21-2006 07:04 PM

This is not a simple topic to discuss. I would go so far as to say it is the most difficult one that exists that we are aware of.
I appreciate your participation in my topic. I was happily surprized to see it put forth so soon. I would very much like you to continue.
But please...do not go the above route. I have not thus far. I will try my best this forum and all others not to go there. Respect is all I ask. However I understand if you get frustrated...who needs it.
If you are still willing... To promote the idea that emotions and behavior are nothing more than chemical reactions and learned responses is an abuse of science. It is denying the existence of will or self and in turn denies the very source of the idea.I stand by what I said. not in essence but word for word.
I took care to choose them very carefully... tried my best to say exactly what I mean. Please see "are nothing more"
Something must set one set of physical causal events apart from another. Yes, In the physical world we live in I could not agree more.Understanding how the physical world works is a valuable tool.

I have edited my forum topic. I had my misgivings about the higher power assertion. I have revised this. and now feel I have achieved something that will hold water without muddying it? lolI have picked a topic that is frying a few of my brain curcuits!
Dag gummit that smarts!

Yes, I agree with you. Where have I disagreed? Yes. The scientifically unanswered question is. Are our brains the vehicle to experience this...are we more than physical or is all that we are simply learned responses and chemical reaction. Yes it most deffinitely does I need more clarification of this portion of the point to have a response.

I don't feel it's an abuse of science but merely a method of science. Reductionism has its uses, but it by no means explains all. As I said before, as organisms we are greater than the sum of parts, but we need to understand how the parts interact to understand the whole.I could describe a tree as C, H, O, N, etc - it would have uses to do this.I could go to a higher level and see a tree as a collection of interacting cells all with their own functions - again it's usefulEven higher up the scale I could describe a tree as an organism with leaves, trunk, and bark - it has uses.All are correct and useful for a certain level of analysis. Do any of them detreeise a tree?If I see a patient with frontal damage and am interested in how damage to the ventro-medial PFC affects decision-making, I will focus on the behavioural deficits associated with such damage. I may go to an even lower level and assess how the PFC represents value of environmental stimuli, and at an even lower level, how this affects dopamine release in the nucleus accumbens. All are correct but assessing all this may help me find a way to explain why they have difficulty in social cognition and maybe finding a therapy to improve their everyday life.What is wrong with that, have I dehumanised them?It is a reality that behaviour requires biology/chemistry. It is not the whole story, but without one you don't have the other. Maybe the soul exists and is eternal, but while in this reality, a biological organism is its home.

Before I jump in I'd need to know how you define "will" and "self" and "science". However I will sketch my position based on my understanding of these words just to give you some idea of where I would be coming from.At this point in time we don't have a way to quantify consciousness nor any way to measure it and perform experiments so the subjects of science thus far has been matter/energy and space/time. I think it is quite proper for scientists to push this as far as they can. In order for there to be breakthroughs something has to break. For example regarding the speed of light the notion of the ether had to break. And so it goes.I will say I find your approach to be a bit too coy. It's like you are wanting people to quess the answer to the question you are really thinking of. Why not be upfront and spit out your postition and discuss it with us instead of doing this intellectual strip tease?As to will and self I am most interested in the non dual teachings which deny both of those things but not in the name of science but from the actual experiences of sages first historically referenced in the awakening of the Buddha. Now Buddhism doesn't get a lot or respect around here, but then except for some very parochial fundamentalist it doesn't get a lot of disrespect either. I'm tossing this in simply to point out that a very long lineage of serious thinkers have denied "will" and "self" for centuries. I personally would be pleased if science validated and furthered the non dual understanding in this area.So you want to drop the veil, get naked, get real and tell us what you think?lfen

Probably. But it is easy to create fake identities on the internet, so who can be sure. I see no problems with my own existence. I have not agreed that I am a series of events. I indicated that I am a system of interacting processes.

Paul Churchland and Antonio Damasio may be worth investigating. Damasio's book 'descartes error' is a scientific criticism of Dualism. His other books are a good read also but IMHO his somatic-marker hypothesis is vacuous.Simply, if the mind and body are separate, why is it so easy to alter the mind by affecting the body (brain)This message has been edited by melatonin, 02-22-2006 12:05 AM

Yes, you have the idea.