About a deity full of love and compassion

[Penumbra]

And yet, the "self-programmed" computer has a "master programmer". The concept works fine, it's using self-programming in analogy to biology that's problematic.

Behavior results from natural selection.

Which has nothing to do with self-programming; right.

Yes it does. This whole programming tangent started because of the computer example. You were questioning the difference between a living body and a dead body, and I pointed out that, just like the difference between a working computer and a broken computer, the difference is the valuable emergent properties.

Then the idea of a programmer was brought into the discussion. Really, when the mind/brain/software/hardware discussion occurs, there are two different discussions going on.

One is that, we have a brain and a mind. So the discussion revolves around what it is, and how it works. Do you have evidence that the mind is not emergent from the physical brain?

The other is that, we wonder how the brain and mind came to be. This is where self-programming comes into play. The mechanisms for developing organisms from simpler systems is already reasonable understood with evolution.

Gaia. Who else?

Who programmed Gaia?

Hellooooooo

Agreed. And that is why the analogy of 'zombie programmed computers' do not work.

You seem to believe that the programming analogy is not an analogy but a reality, sans the requirement of a programmer and intelligence? In real life, the Computer and its intelligent User are two distinct entitities with Master and Servant relationship.

That's because you're thinking about computers too narrowly. Computers are not all like your desktop computer, either in reality or in potential. Computers have experienced exponential growth in complexity and ability, and beginning to catch up with the human mind in terms of complexity.

The human mind, much like a computer, has to continually perform calculations and processes to remain functional and conscious. It has memory storage, inputs and outputs, etc. Who knows where computer technology will be in 10, 20 years.

Then create a brain with that kind of arrangement please. Speculation cannot be said to be the proof.

I'm not the one doing the speculating. You're positing the concept that consciousness can exist independently, which is not even remotely verified by science. On the other hand, the brain's functioning, while not completely understood, is still quite studied by science, and a lot of knowledge has been attained regarding it.

We've had this discussion before, in my Continuity of Consciousness thread, where I put forth an abundance of evidence regarding the mind being an emergent property of the brain, including links.

In summary
-Brain chemicals can influence personality.
-Something like a stroke can permanently alter personality.
-Damage to certain areas of the brain results in a loss of consciousness, either temporarily or permanently.
-White matter / Grey Matter, and diseases that can affect those things, can alter personality (another poster brought that example up)
-Memories can be temporarily or permanently erased by physical damage.
-The brain/mind develops as we age from conception and birth, making more and more connections, and if this process is interrupted, mental disability can occur.
-Examining a brain says a lot about that creature's level of intelligence. Vertebrate brains are actually pretty similar, but certain parts are greatly developed in certain creatures.

And these momentary arrangements that become momentarily available create momentary intelligence and yet store the understanding and knowledge permanently? :slap:

Not permanently, no. Memories are lost over time. Typically one cannot remember what they did on this same day 1 year ago as well as they can remember what they did yesterday. Only particularly powerful and vivid experiences last that long, or a vague collection of smaller memories (like I remember approximately what I was doing last year, but not on a day-to-day basis). And some people have brain injury that results in having bad short-term or long-term memories. Plus the memories can only last as long as the brain is alive.

Storing information really isn't all that complex. It can be done with a few logic gates. Storing more information is a matter of scale and speed.

There is no hard-disk in your analogy? And there is no Input-Output mecahnism that reads the information in the permanent disk/s? And there is no intelligence that comprehends these input-output bits?

Our brain has all of those things.

(In real life the key function of understanding the input-output is the human intelligence itself. And in real life, a very subtle ungraspable thing called will overcomes the natural tendency of matter towards entropy increase.)

Can kinetic energy (the emergent and visible one) be explained if the Potential one is rejected? The emergent property itself means that it is emergent of something. If it is emergent of matter and/or of its particular design then the emergent property should not vanish, since matter and its arrangements have not vanished.

-----------------------------------------------------

Science has at least shown that energy and matter are two aspects of same one thing. Is that same one thing zombie?

Emergent properties are lost when the arrangements vanish.

 

[Willamena]

Yes it does. This whole programming tangent started because of the computer example. You were questioning the difference between a living body and a dead body, and I pointed out that, just like the difference between a working computer and a broken computer, the difference is the valuable emergent properties.

Then the idea of a programmer was brought into the discussion. Really, when the mind/brain/software/hardware discussion occurs, there are two different discussions going on.

One is that, we have a brain and a mind. So the discussion revolves around what it is, and how it works. Do you have evidence that the mind is not emergent from the physical brain?

The other is that, we wonder how the brain and mind came to be. This is where self-programming comes into play. The mechanisms for developing organisms from simpler systems is already reasonable understood with evolution.

I never questioned a difference between a living and dead body, you must be thinking of someone else. My reply was to Koldo, to what he'd said about the body self-programming. Perhaps you've mistaken my responses for relevance to another part of the discussion.

With Atanu, my understanding of "emergence" is that it would not be applicable to something like "mind." Emergent properties are actually properties. "Mind" is simply a word we assign to the subjective perspective of thought.

 

[Willamena]

Emergent properties are lost when the arrangements vanish.

Do you believe things come into existence from nowhere, and vanish from existence into nothingness?

 

[Penumbra]

Do you believe things come into existence from nowhere, and vanish from existence into nothingness?

Well, there are virtual particles. Weird things happen at small levels.

It depends on what you mean by "things". With conservation of mass/energy, on a macro scale, mass and energy don't seem to come into and out of existence. Arrangements, however, can come in and out of existence.

If I put together a jigsaw puzzle, the image exists now. Then if I take the puzzle apart, and burn all of the pieces, then the universe still has the same amount of energy, but the image no longer exists, anywhere.

Arrangements and information can indeed come into and out of existence.

 

[Willamena]

Well, there are virtual particles. Weird things happen at small levels.

It depends on what you mean by "things". With conservation of mass/energy, on a macro scale, mass and energy don't seem to come into and out of existence. Arrangements, however, can come in and out of existence.

If I put together a jigsaw puzzle, the image exists now. Then if I take the puzzle apart, and burn all of the pieces, then the universe still has the same amount of energy, but the image no longer exists, anywhere.

Arrangements and information can indeed come into and out of existence.

And what does that say about what "existence" is?

 

[Penumbra]

I never questioned a difference between a living and dead body, you must be thinking of someone else. My reply was to Koldo, to what he'd said about the body self-programming. Perhaps you've mistaken my responses for relevance to another part of the discussion.

I'm referring to what you've said, and to what I previously responded to:

If I may...

What is it that we mourn the loss of when someone dies? Their body is still there, it hasn't gone anywhere. Their memories are still with us, they haven't gone. So what has "died"? We generally think that someone, a "self", a "being", has died, perhaps regarded in total as the sum of their thoughts. A sum-of-thoughts has "died"? Is that it? Where (what "place") does a sum-of-thoughts exist? And if we can't even answer that question, how can we tackle where a sum-of-thoughts should "go"?

And I brought up the computer example in response to this specific point. When a computer breaks, nothing "goes" anywhere. It just stops working. The emergent properties of the computer that were useful to us are no longer around.

When a person dies the self doesn't need to go anywhere for it to no longer be around. It can simply fall apart, as the arrangements and information have been lost.

With Atanu, my understanding of "emergence" is that it would not be applicable to something like "mind." Emergent properties are actually properties. "Mind" is simply a word we assign to the subject perspective of thought.

The subject perspective of thought is the emergent thing, then. It doesn't matter what word is used to describe it.

Can you show me a mind that exists without a brain?

 

[Penumbra]

And what does that say about what "existence" is?

Which part?

If you're referring to arrangements and information being created and destroyed, then it says existence is a complex arrangement of particles and fields.

 

[PolyHedral]

And what does that say about what "existence" is?

It says that existence isn't very well defined.

 

[atanu]

I'm not the one doing the speculating. You're positing the concept that consciousness can exist independently, which is not even remotely verified by science.

Consciousness does not require a third party validation. All validation is done using consciousness -- which never goes out of existence, though arrangements come and go.

Our brain has all of those things.

Our cars also have many such things. That does not make the car me.

I build the computer. I build the car. In the design of a computer, I imprint a part of my intelligence on the computer.

Consciousness can be conscious of itself only so long as it has manifested itself in a phenomenal form, a body (a gross body as in waking time or a subtle light body as in dream time), whether it is that of an insect, or a worm, or an animal, or a human being. Without the body, in unmanifested state, consciousness is not conscious of itself. Without consciousness the body is merely dead material.

In deep sleep, without a phenomenal body (without a subject-object division), consciousness is homogeneous and being devoid of any contrast will not know anything. In dream, the dreamer himself becomes the subject and object and begins to know -- as if. In waking, the source of the waking state human body is the male sperm fertilized in the ovum of a female womb, and when conception takes place, consciousness is latent therein. Consciousness is the 'nature', or 'suchness', the physical body like sweetness is of sugar. This requires no scientific proof -- being self evident. Consciousness (prajna) is constant in all three states of existence. But body-mind consciousness (the emergent consciousness or vignana) does not know it.

If you are keen you may go through the following:

http://www.religiousforums.com/forum/mysticism-dir/110779-concepts-based-consciousness.html

There are views of scientists therein.

 

[PolyHedral]

sweetness is of sugar.

Ah, here's your problem. Sweetness isn't in sugar, only in the tongue's reaction to sugar. A differently constructed tongue will give you a different taste of sugar.

 

[atanu]

Ah, here's your problem. Sweetness isn't in sugar, only in the tongue's reaction to sugar. A differently constructed tongue will give you a different taste of sugar.

In the tongue's reaction or in the perception of that reaction as of pleasant, understood as sweetness, as opposed to the undersanding of reaction with salt? I hope that the reactions did not name these different perceptions.

You prove that consciousness is not the reaction.

 

[Penumbra]

Consciousness does not require a third party validation. All validation is done using consciousness -- which never goes out of existence, though arrangements come and go.

That's a statement you haven't supported yet.

Our cars also have many such things. That does not make the car me.

I build the computer. I build the car. In the design of a computer, I imprint a part of my intelligence on the computer.

Consciousness can be conscious of itself only so long as it has manifested itself in a phenomenal form, a body (a gross body as in waking time or a subtle light body as in dream time), whether it is that of an insect, or a worm, or an animal, or a human being. Without the body, in unmanifested state, consciousness is not conscious of itself. Without consciousness the body is merely dead material.

I advise reading about Anencephaly. It's a condition where the neural tube doesn't close, and the result is that the baby never develops most of his/her brain. It's often due to not eating enough folic acid during pregnancy.
Here's the link, but I should point out that although it is wikipedia, it does include what could be considered fairly graphic images.
Anencephaly - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

From the article:
A baby born with anencephaly is usually blind, deaf, unconscious, and unable to feel pain. Although some individuals with anencephaly may be born with a main brain stem, the lack of a functioning cerebrum permanently rules out the possibility of ever gaining consciousness. Reflex actions such as breathing and responses to sound or touch occur.[2]

In deep sleep, without a phenomenal body (without a subject-object division), consciousness is homogeneous and being devoid of any contrast will not know anything. In dream, the dreamer himself becomes the subject and object and begins to know -- as if. In waking, the source of the waking state human body is the male sperm fertilized in the ovum of a female womb, and when conception takes place, consciousness is latent therein. Consciousness is the 'nature', or 'suchness', the physical body like sweetness is of sugar. This requires no scientific proof -- being self evident. Consciousness (prajna) is constant in all three states of existence. But body-mind consciousness (the emergent consciousness or vignana) does not know it.

Hindus regularly discuss deep sleep and consciousness, but I don't see why. When I'm in deep sleep, I'm not conscious.

Saying that the consciousness is the nature of the physical body and does not require proof is incorrect. Sweetness is not a property of sugar either. Sweetness is something the brain has come up with. Cats, for instance, generally cannot taste sweet things due to a genetic issue.
Strange but True: Cats Cannot Taste Sweets: Scientific American

If you are keen you may go through the following:

http://www.religiousforums.com/forum/mysticism-dir/110779-concepts-based-consciousness.html

There are views of scientists therein.

Maybe I'll give it a longer look.

I glanced through it and saw
"Moreover, if consciousness was only contingent upon a material brain, then a dead body (with a physical brain) should be able to say "I wish to live". That is not known to happen ever."

Based on the seeming lack of knowledge based on that quote, it doesn't give me a lot of confidence towards the rest of the content of the thread.

 

[atanu]

That's a statement you haven't supported yet.

That is surprising. One sees/ knows/validates using awareness. Awareness cannot be validated by a third object. It is the subject. THE BRAIN YOU TALK ABOUT IS KNOWN BY AWARENESS AND NOT OTHERWISE.

Hindus regularly discuss deep sleep and consciousness, but I don't see why. When I'm in deep sleep, I'm not conscious.

That is exactly the point. At present our awareness is situated in differentiated awareness called vignana, which is equivalent of 'emergent awareness' -- just as sight is modified by a coloured spectacle.

But one exists in deep sleep. It is not accessible through the emergent awareness.

Saying that the consciousness is the nature of the physical body and does not require proof is incorrect. Sweetness is not a property of sugar either. Sweetness is something the brain has come up with. Cats, for instance, generally cannot taste sweet things due to a genetic issue.
Strange but True: Cats Cannot Taste Sweets: Scientific American

That proves my point. Whether a cat tastes it differently does not mean that sweet has no sweetness -- a property categorised as sweet by intelligence. Intelligence exists independent of all experiences.

When I say "i experience red colour", it does not mean that I am red colour, which is the emergent property that has been experienced due to interaction. The mind is experienced by consciousness.

Maybe I'll give it a longer look.

I glanced through it and saw
"Moreover, if consciousness was only contingent upon a material brain, then a dead body (with a physical brain) should be able to say "I wish to live". That is not known to happen ever."

Based on the seeming lack of knowledge based on that quote, it doesn't give me a lot of confidence towards the rest of the content of the thread.

Please go through it fully.

Why do you think that inability of a dead brain to assert "Let me live" and inabilty of your knowledge to bring back a dead brain to say "I live" is not sufficient proof that you and science do not know the 'Living organism'? You are just theorising that some day computers will be intelligent of their own and will create progeny?

The self evident intelligence in life form is more valid or your theory is?

 

[Willamena]

I'm referring to what you've said, and to what I previously responded to:



And I brought up the computer example in response to this specific point. When a computer breaks, nothing "goes" anywhere. It just stops working. The emergent properties of the computer that were useful to us are no longer around.

When a person dies the self doesn't need to go anywhere for it to no longer be around. It can simply fall apart, as the arrangements and information have been lost.

Okay, whatever. It's Koldo's analogy I was addressing.

The subject perspective of thought is the emergent thing, then. It doesn't matter what word is used to describe it.

Can you show me a mind that exists without a brain?

How is it emergent? It's reducable.

Relevance?

Can you show me a brain that exists without a mind? (without you having one, that is)

 

[Willamena]

It says that existence isn't very well defined.

I'd say so, too.

 

[ellenjanuary]

I see a crescent wave of time moving forward, with a fractal edge, allowing simultaneity; a brain, possibly quantum, nearing ascension... oh, what shall the Philosophers do, when duality goes octal?

And YHWH, perhaps deist, all along; only locally exuberant, a terrier with his favorite chew toy? I do not see it, not at all. If you do not align with god, how may your worries have merit? This is life; the corners, sharp; the rocks, hard. And rather than god, all of us; could be more respectful of each other, perhaps make humanity, a light worth seeing.

And what if it is emergence, along scale; fractal progression, across the cosmos. Humanity the terrible animal, cannot love enough , in reaching up; as YHWH reaches down.

 

[atanu]

Behavior results from natural selection.

In summary
-Brain chemicals can influence personality.
-Something like a stroke can permanently alter personality.
-Damage to certain areas of the brain results in a loss of consciousness, either temporarily or permanently.
-White matter / Grey Matter, and diseases that can affect those things, can alter personality (another poster brought that example up)
-Memories can be temporarily or permanently erased by physical damage.
-The brain/mind develops as we age from conception and birth, making more and more connections, and if this process is interrupted, mental disability can occur.
-Examining a brain says a lot about that creature's level of intelligence. Vertebrate brains are actually pretty similar, but certain parts are greatly developed in certain creatures.

Your sight will be affected by scratches in your spectacle but you can replace the spectacle. This is an example and should not be extrapolated beyond what it illustrates. I feel that you are mixing up an organ/instrument and its functions with the 'person' who knows these both.

 

[Penumbra]

That is surprising. One sees/ knows/validates using awareness. Awareness cannot be validated by a third object. It is the subject. THE BRAIN YOU TALK ABOUT IS KNOWN BY AWARENESS AND NOT OTHERWISE.

That is exactly the point. At present our awareness is situated in differentiated awareness called vignana, which is equivalent of 'emergent awareness' -- just as sight is modified by a coloured spectacle.

But one exists in deep sleep. It is not accessible through the emergent awareness.

Awareness can be measured with response to stimuli, and measurement of brain activity. Doctors need to utilize rather objective approaches regarding levels of consciousness so that they can best deal with brain injury.

People can be mistaken regarding what their own awareness consists of. Science has helped us to better understand the brain and how it operates.

That proves my point. Whether a cat tastes it differently does not mean that sweet has no sweetness -- a property categorised as sweet by intelligence. Intelligence exists independent of all experiences.

When I say "i experience red colour", it does not mean that I am red colour, which is the emergent property that has been experienced due to interaction. The mind is experienced by consciousness.

It does not prove your point. It contests your point. You said that sweetness is the nature of sugar, and compared it to consciousness being the nature of the physical body. Both are inaccurate.

It shows that sweetness is not something inherent to the sugar, but rather, the biological system assigns flavors to things. In fact, there's a berry, which I've personally tried, that makes all sour things taste sweet. It makes biting into a lemon taste like biting into sugar.
Synsepalum dulcificum - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Please go through it fully.

Why do you think that inability of a dead brain to assert "Let me live" and inabilty of your knowledge to bring back a dead brain to say "I live" is not sufficient proof that you and science do not know the 'Living organism'? You are just theorising that some day computers will be intelligent of their own and will create progeny?

The self evident intelligence in life form is more valid or your theory is?

I'll consider going through it some more.

A dead brain is not the same as a living brain. When cells don't receive blood flow, they begin dying. Dead cells cannot perform the functions the brain uses to operate.

Proposing independent consciousness is basically akin to proposing magic, as far as science is concerned. This would qualify as an extraordinary claim requiring extraordinary evidence.

Medicine and science, on the other hand, can show that various types of issues regarding the brain affect consciousness and mental states. Lack of a brain means lack of consciousness. Brain damage means altered or lack of consciousness. Changes in the brain can change personality.

Your sight will be affected by scratches in your spectacle but you can replace the spectacle. This is an example and should not be extrapolated beyond what it illustrates. I feel that you are mixing up an organ/instrument and its functions with the 'person' who knows these both.

But even internal awareness of personality and thought can be affected by brain issues. It can't get any more intimately intertwined than that. If changes to the brain change one's own subjective experience as well as the objective experience of being conscious or unconscious, being able to remember or not able to remember, and having one personality or another personality, then how can it get any more clear than that?

 

[Penumbra]

Okay, whatever. It's Koldo's analogy I was addressing.

Ok, whatever?

Yes, you addressed his post, which was in response to another's post, but you said what you said, and I addressed it with the example of a computer.

How is it emergent? It's reducable.

What, exactly is reducible, and in what way?

Relevance?

Can you show me a brain that exists without a mind? (without you having one, that is)

The relevance is that the last 10 or so pages of this thread have concerned the relationship of the brain to the body, and being compared to software and hardware.

Any dead brain is a brain that exists without a mind. Same thing with comatose brains. They can be measured, and there is no activity. Brains can exist without minds, but minds haven't been shown to exist without brains (or similar hardware, potentially), because minds are emergent properties of brains.

What do you mean without me having one? Are you suggesting I show you a non-functioning brain without using my functional brain? How would that be relevant?

 

[Willamena]

What, exactly is reducible, and in what way?

Mind is reducable to all the things that make up the world.

Ok, whatever?

Yes, you addressed his post, which was in response to another's post, but you said what you said, and I addressed it with the example of a computer.


The relevance is that the last 10 or so pages of this thread have concerned the relationship of the brain to the body, and being compared to software and hardware.

Any dead brain is a brain that exists without a mind. Same thing with comatose brains. They can be measured, and there is no activity. Brains can exist without minds, but minds haven't been shown to exist without brains (or similar hardware, potentially), because minds are emergent properties of brains.

So, no relevance -- what I'd said had been drawn into another part of the discussion. Thought as much.

What do you mean without me having one? Are you suggesting I show you a non-functioning brain without using my functional brain? How would that be relevant?

No, I'm suggesting that neither brains nor minds exist one without the other.