Fear: Can it take away your choices...?

[Walkntune]

While something being peer reviewed in no way guarantees that it is correct, it counts for a hell of a lot more than your "hunch".

And if you do not believe in the process of science, why do you use a computer, take a flight on a plane, use modern medicine, drive a car, eat any food that you haven't grown yourself, buy clothes, own a cellphone and so on and so forth?

I am not against all of science. I just tend to favour the scientists that are intuitive and imaginative over the skeptics who come strolling behind trying to claim the glory.

 

[EverChanging]

I believe the chemical reactions are from the process of emotions turning into thoughts.

If emotions turning to thought creates chemical processes, what is an emotion? Some ghost detached from the brain? Some immaterial existence? Because that's what you have if the emotion doesn't have a chemical or physical basis. Then you have the problem of explaining how the non-material realm can interact with a physical one.

]Chemical reactions being part of the process does not make it the cause.

When the brain is sleep deprived, lacking in nutrition, etc., this will affect emotions. Do you not think there is a causal link between the physical organism as a whole, including its brain and nervous system, and emotions? Physical processes affect our emotions. That's why people with bi polar disorder are given medications -- the drugs affect the brain chemistry, thus producing different emotions and different behavior.

To assume chemical imbalances is the cause of depression is only theory which is in ongoing debate.

Everyone knows chemical imbalances aren't the sole factor contributing to depression. It is one among many.

If chemical reactions are the cause then what part of the thinking and feeling process caused the chemicals to be out of balance. Think about cause and effect.

I don't assume that any part of the thinking and feeling process causes chemicals to be out of balance. Chemicals act according to the laws of chemistry alone. The root of any chemical imbalance is grounded in the laws of chemistry.

Personally I believe the cause of the chemical imbalance is a conflict between the emotions and thoughts.

The cause of a particular combination of chemicals in the brain must be physical. Chemicals behave according to natural laws.

 

[EverChanging]

I can pull up studies on this that have shown medications to only be effective in short terms and people actually are able to deal better without the medicines and the side effects over long term.

Okay. What are your sources?

 

[EverChanging]

I am not against all of science. I just tend to favour the scientists that are intuitive and imaginative over the skeptics who come strolling behind trying to claim the glory.

Scientific endeavor takes creativity. It takes creativity to create hypotheses, test them, weed out the false ones, to carry on looking for knowledge and having all of your prejudices challenged by other scientists and peer review. Even the most skeptical scientists must be creative themselves if they are to have any success with the scientific method. Often times, scientists do have an intuitive hunch or flash of inspiration, although every hypothesis must be tested.

There is no picking and choosing what you wish to be true in science. Science is not a statement of beliefs, but a method. Either the evidence is there, or it isn't. It makes no sense to affirm the theory of gravity on scientific principles and then totally blow off the theory of evolution because it does not fit with your bias. It makes no sense to say "I am not against all of science." It is a method. You affirm its usefulness, or you don't.

 

[jarofthoughts]

For one we are not controlled by emotions or thoughts and actually have the ability to control them.

I'm sorry but the available evidence points to us being controlled by our emotions to a very large degree. Of course, it is possible to condition oneself through gradual exposure (psychologists treating phobias often use this method) and repetition tends to dull the experience, but at the end of the day we are emotional beings and emotions are electrochemical reactions in our brains.

At least i hope you do because they both tend to be deceptive and not accurate to reality.

They certainly can be, and they can skew one's view of reality. This is why anecdotal evidence is considered almost worthless in science. Also, the longer the brain has to process an event, the more modified it will be. Your memory is not a video recording of past events. Rather it is more of a narrative. Which is why the police usually wants to interview witnesses to a crime as soon as possible after it took place.

It doesn't mean we don't have thoughts but we do not grip on to them.They come in and go.We control them.

That is certainly up for debate. Various experiments using fMRI machines have indicated that your brain makes your decisions for you long before you are consciously aware of them.

Spiritually speaking we cast all thoughts a side and we cast our cares on him for he cares for us.

Sounds somewhat irresponsible to me... :sarcastic

 

[EverChanging]

They certainly can be, and they can skew one's view of reality. This is why anecdotal evidence is considered almost worthless in science. Also, the longer the brain has to process an event, the more modified it will be. Your memory is not a video recording of past events. Rather it is more of a narrative. Which is why the police usually wants to interview witnesses to a crime as soon as possible after it took place.

I agree. Many of our memories are fictional, embellished, and otherwise inaccurate. Brain stimulation to certain areas of the brain can create very vivid memories, and it is suspected that they are more like a story than history.

This is why old family stories evolve with time, with each new telling....The memory is only present when it is...I don't know, there. They often pop up unsummoned. And each time it pops up, it is different, new in some way, unique.

So who remembers it one way and then another? The same person? Or is a new person called up with each new version of a memory?

I suspect that we are constantly dying and being re-born.

 

[EverChanging]

Spiritually speaking we cast all thoughts a side and we cast our cares on him for he cares for us.

As I understand casting our cares onto God, so to speak, I understand this as accepting the universe for what it is. There are consequences, yet no doer. Everything is changing. Nothing is permanent. There is no autonomous self, just an interconnected web, all that is. When grasping this while mindfully attending to the present, sufferings vanish. All thoughts are gone. And if there is no autonomous self, no central head quarters, no central place of consciousness, just a mass of neurons processing information in parallel all the time, there is no free will. The mass of neurons does what it is determined to do by physical, chemical, and electrical laws.

All that is, is God.

 

[jarofthoughts]

I am not against all of science. I just tend to favour the scientists that are intuitive and imaginative over the skeptics who come strolling behind trying to claim the glory.

To me that reads as "I am against the science that contradicts my personal idea of how the world should work, but I sure like to make use of the perks science gives me". Which to me sounds rather hypocritical. Being a sceptic is an essential part of the Scientific Method and faulting those scientists who display scepticism means that one has not in the slightest understood how science works. Science is not a democracy in which opinion matters. In science, evidence is king, dictator and emperor all rolled into one and no matter how uncomfortable or how much it contradicts how we would wish the world to be, we must still follow the evidence.

And the evidence says emotions are the result of electrochemical reactions in our brains.

 

[Walkntune]

=EverChanging;2218049]If emotions turning to thought creates chemical processes, what is an emotion? Some ghost detached from the brain? Some immaterial existence? Because that's what you have if the emotion doesn't have a chemical or physical basis. Then you have the problem of explaining how the non-material realm can interact with a physical one.

It is the same as gravity but acting on much smaller bodies in the universe.

When the brain is sleep deprived, lacking in nutrition, etc., this will affect emotions. Do you not think there is a causal link between the physical organism as a whole, including its brain and nervous system, and emotions? Physical processes affect our emotions. That's why people with bi polar disorder are given medications -- the drugs affect the brain chemistry, thus producing different emotions and different behavior.

I think mind and emotions are connected through chemical processes but not caused by the chemical reactions.This is why altering the chemicals still effect thoughts and feelings.

Everyone knows chemical imbalances aren't the sole factor contributing to depression. It is one among many.

I don't assume that any part of the thinking and feeling process causes chemicals to be out of balance. Chemicals act according to the laws of chemistry alone. The root of any chemical imbalance is grounded in the laws of chemistry.

So you are saying that bad childhoods. repressed emotions etc. is not the cause of altering the chemicals in the brain.People going to wars and seeing things to consciously hard to deal with plays no part in post traumatic stress disorder which is also treated as a chemical imbalance. It is all just grounded in the laws of chemistry and coincidence.

The cause of a particular combination of chemicals in the brain must be physical. Chemicals behave according to natural laws.

They behave according to what we allow consciousness to deal with or not deal with. Look at post traumatic stress disorder again.

 

[Walkntune]

=jarofthoughts;2218151]I'm sorry but the available evidence points to us being controlled by our emotions to a very large degree. Of course, it is possible to condition oneself through gradual exposure (psychologists treating phobias often use this method) and repetition tends to dull the experience, but at the end of the day we are emotional beings and emotions are electrochemical reactions in our brains.

Sorry but feeling emotions is not the same as being controlled by them.
Some are controlled and they are the ones who have to kick or hit something to release the emotion. Others are able to just release it as they have conditioned themselves to do sthers repress the emotions which over time starts altering brain chemistry and altering conscious awareness.
Once again I ask what is it being released as one has an emotional fit?

That is certainly up for debate. Various experiments using fMRI machines have indicated that your brain makes your decisions for you long before you are consciously aware of them.

Yes we mostly operate subconsciously.

Sounds somewhat irresponsible to me... :sarcastic

So would you consider releasing anger before trying to discipline your kid irresponsible or is better to take the aggression out on the child?
And please explain how there is a difference in your opinion since its all just a chemical reaction? How is anger released?

 

[Walkntune]

As I understand casting our cares onto God, so to speak, I understand this as accepting the universe for what it is. There are consequences, yet no doer. Everything is changing. Nothing is permanent. There is no autonomous self, just an interconnected web, all that is. When grasping this while mindfully attending to the present, sufferings vanish. All thoughts are gone. And if there is no autonomous self, no central head quarters, no central place of consciousness, just a mass of neurons processing information in parallel all the time, there is no free will. The mass of neurons does what it is determined to do by physical, chemical, and electrical laws.

All that is, is God.

We all have a subconscious desire in us to control,want approval, and survive.
Once these become a conscious desire then how the subconscious interprets this becomes different.
If you consciously want to control, then the subconscious responds as I must not have control. If you consciously want to survive, then the subconscious feels threatened.
To cast your cares asisde is to let go of wanting to control consciously and then the subconscious feels in control and confidence is released.
Same as when people who want to be good at a specific skill. When they first start the conscious wants to do it right and so the confidence is not there subconsciously. As one starts seeing themselves get better at the skill, they let go consciously and the skill starts becoming more subconscious and confidence grows..
Do you think worrying when someone is coming home late is not a choice?You can choose to worry and assume they were in a wreck or you can assume they had to work a little late. Its your choice what you hold into consciousness? We are not controlled by chemicals.

 

[Walkntune]

Okay. What are your sources?

I took this from a science forum I am in. You can look at the tests.

MMS: Error
Stefan Leucht, Caroline Corves, Dieter Arbter, Rolf R Engel, Chunbo Li, John M Davis, Second-generation versus first-generation antipsychotic drugs for schizophrenia: a meta-analysis, The Lancet, Volume 373, Issue 9657, 3 January 2009-9 January 2009, Pages 31-41, ISSN 0140-6736, DOI: 10.1016/S0140-6736(08)61764-X.

So what about those first-generation drugs? Well, in 1977, it was found that schizophrenic "relapse is greater in severity during drug administration than when no drugs are given", and that symptoms got worse with relapse, with other new symptoms coming in. (G Gardos and J. Cole, "Maintenance antipsychotic therapy: is the cure worse than the disease?" American Journal of Psychiatry 133 (1977) 32-36, and G Gardos and J. Cole, "Withdrawal syndromes associated with antipsychotic drugs," AJM 135 (1978) 1321-24)

In 1977, the National Institute of Mental Health funded studies to see if schizophrenia could be treated without medications. In the first, those not medicated were discharged sooner, and only 35% relapsed within a year, compared with 45% of the medicated group. Nonmedicated patients stated they found it "gratifying and informative" to go through the psychotic episodes unmedicated, and the researchers concluded that medication stopped the patients from learning to cope with their illness, and prevented them from doing better over the long run. (W. Carpenter, "The treatment of acute schizophrenia without drugs," American Journal of Psychiatry 134 (1977): 14-20)

So first-generation antipsychotics didn't do so well, and newer ones don't do much better.

This is not to say they don't work at all; in the short term, they do quite well in studies. (Say, over a month or so.) But in long-term treatment, there's all sorts of wonderful side effects and more medication ends up being required, not less.

Hmm.

 

[Walkntune]

Scientific endeavor takes creativity. It takes creativity to create hypotheses, test them, weed out the false ones, to carry on looking for knowledge and having all of your prejudices challenged by other scientists and peer review. Even the most skeptical scientists must be creative themselves if they are to have any success with the scientific method. Often times, scientists do have an intuitive hunch or flash of inspiration, although every hypothesis must be tested.

There is no picking and choosing what you wish to be true in science. Science is not a statement of beliefs, but a method. Either the evidence is there, or it isn't. It makes no sense to affirm the theory of gravity on scientific principles and then totally blow off the theory of evolution because it does not fit with your bias. It makes no sense to say "I am not against all of science." It is a method. You affirm its usefulness, or you don't.

There is a huge difference in how introverts and extroverts approach science.
Unfortunately we live in a extroverted world and very few introverts find there way into science like Newton, Einstein and Tesla, were all three introverted.
There approach is different and more intriguing to me but this is jumping into a different subject right now so..

 

[thedope]

You are not your thoughts any more than you are your emotions and feelings.
You have thoughts and you have feelings.
Thoughts don't come out of nowhere. Thoughts come from emotions and feelings.
True you can't control thoughts directly but you can release emotions which change and alter thoughts.

The ray of creation proceeds thought, word, and deed. It is the thought that comes first, and you can control your thoughts directly. Animus animates animal. Behavior and emotion arises directly and naturally from conceptual decisions.

Here is a simple example. Lady riding on bus gets grabbed in the crotch by someone she does not know or same lady gets grabbed in the crotch by someone she does and is comfortable with. In the first instance reaction is fear and a sense of violation, in second instance there is joy and familiarity. The same act, crotch grabbing, is interpreted differently depending on the minds model of appropriateness. Emotions are conceptual tensions.

 

[Walkntune]

The ray of creation proceeds thought, word, and deed. It is the thought that comes first, and you can control your thoughts directly. Animus animates animal. Behavior and emotion arises directly and naturally from conceptual decisions.

Here is a simple example. Lady riding on bus gets grabbed in the crotch by someone she does not know or same lady gets grabbed in the crotch by someone she does and is comfortable with. In the first instance reaction is fear and a sense of violation, in second instance there is joy and familiarity. The same act, crotch grabbing, is interpreted differently depending on the minds model of appropriateness. Emotions are conceptual tensions.

I believe awareness was key in determining the emotion which determined thought.
We can not directly control thoughts from entering the mind but if she feels safe and familiar the thoughts would be a lot different than if it was an act of violation.
Everything enters the fight and flight instinct before it is rationalised. Fight and flight gives an emotional reponse and warns us of danger and is our survival instinct.

 

[thedope]

I believe awareness was key in determining the emotion which determined thought.

Exactly as I said. The thought comes first. That, "awareness" is a sponsoring thought not consciously articulated at the moment, non the less allowing for how we interpret stimuli. Emotion does not determine thought. Emotion may influence decision making, and if it is not correctly regarded, may do so to ones own detriment

 

[Walkntune]

Exactly as I said. The thought comes first. That, "awareness" is a sponsoring thought not consciously articulated at the moment, non the less allowing for how we interpret stimuli. Emotion does not determine thought. Emotion may influence decision making, and if it is not correctly regarded, may do so to ones own detriment

Awareness is opened and closed through the fight and flight instinct and has nothing to do with thought.In fact thought blinds awareness to a degree.

 

[thedope]

Awareness is opened and closed through the fight and flight instinct and has nothing to do with thought.In fact thought blinds awareness to a degree.

Fight and flight response has it's prime directive in identification of threat. There is a sponsoring thought motivating it.
The following is a list of human reflex;

• Accommodation reflex — coordinated changes in vergence, lens shape and pupil size when looking at a distant object after a near object.

• Acoustic reflex or stapedius reflex or attenuation reflex — contraction of the stapedius and tensor tympani muscles in the middle ear in response to high sound intensities.

• Ankle jerk reflex — jerking of the ankle when the Achilles tendon is hit with a tendon hammer while the foot is relaxed, stimulating the S1 reflex arc.

• Arthrokinetic reflex — muscular activation or inhibition in response to joint mobilization

• Asymmetric tonic neck reflex (ATNR) or tonic neck reflex — in infants up to four months of age, when the head is turned to the side, the arm on that side will straighten and the contralateral arm will bend.

• Babinski reflex — in infants up to one year of age, and also in older individuals with neurological damage, a spreading of the toes and extension of the big toe in response to stroking the side of the foot.

• Baroreflex or baroreceptor reflex — homeostatic countereffect to a sudden elevation or reduction in blood pressure detected by the baroreceptors in the aortic arch, carotid sinuses, etc.

• Bezold-Jarisch reflex

• Biceps reflex — a jerking of the forearm when the biceps brachii tendon is struck with a tendon hammer, stimulating the C5 and C6 reflex arcs.

• Blushing — a reddening of the face caused by embarrassment, shame, or modesty.

• Brachioradialis reflex — a jerking of the forearm when the brachioradialis tendon is hit with a tendon hammer while the arm is resting, stimulating the C5 and C6 reflex arcs.

• Churchill cope reflex

• Corneal reflex — blinking of both eyes when the cornea of either eye is touched.

• Cough reflex — a rapid expulsion of air from the lungs after sudden opening of the glottis, and usually following irritation of the trachea.

• Cremasteric reflex — elevation of the scrotum and testis elicited by stroking of the superior and medial part of the thigh.

• Crossed extensor reflex — a contraction of a limb in response to sensation of pain in the contralateral limb.

• Galant reflex — in infants up to four months of age, a rotation of the upper body towards one or other side of the back when that side is stroked.

• Glabellar reflex

• Golgi tendon reflex

• Knee jerk or patellar reflex — a kick caused by striking the patellar tendon with a tendon hammer just below the patella, stimulating the L4 and L3 reflex arcs.

• Mammalian diving reflex

• Moro reflex — only in all infants/newborns up to 4 or 5 months of age: a sudden symmetric spreading of the arms, then unspreading and crying, caused by an unexpected loud noise or the sensation of being dropped. It is the only unlearned fear in humans.

• Palmar grasp reflex — in infants up to six months of age, a closing of the hand in response to an object being placed in it.

• Photic sneeze reflex — a sneeze caused by sudden exposure to bright light.

• Plantar reflex — in infants up to 1 year of age, a curling of the toes when something rubs the ball of the foot.

• Pupillary accommodation reflex — a reduction of pupil size in response to an object coming close to the eye.

• Pupillary light reflex — a reduction of pupil size in response to light.

• Rooting reflex — turning of an infant's head toward anything that strokes the cheek or mouth.

• Shivering — shaking of the body in response to early hypothermia in warm-blooded animals.

• Sneeze or sternutation — a convulsive expulsion of air from the lungs normally triggered by irritation of the nasal mucosa in the nose.

• Startle reflex — see Moro reflex above.

• Sternutation — see Sneeze above.

• Suckling reflex — sucking at anything that touches the roof of an infant's mouth.

• Stretch reflex

• Triceps reflex — jerking of the forearm when the triceps tendon is hit with a tendon hammer, stimulating the C7 and C6 reflex arcs.

• Vagovagal reflex — contraction of muscles in the gastrointestinal tract in response to distension of the tract following consumption of food and drink.

• Vestibulo-ocular reflex — movement of the eyes to the right when the head is rotated to the left, and vice versa.

Note the moro reflex.

 

[Walkntune]

Fight and flight response has it's prime directive in identification of threat. There is a sponsoring thought motivating it.
The following is a list of human reflex;

There is such a thing as the thought behind the thought. This thought behind the thought is often hidden from us. It is the sponsoring thought from which the conscious thoughts arise. The sponsoring thought has a large effect on your life. It is responsible for much of the mysterious events that you end up calling unexpected good fortune, luck, and of course problems and disasters. Especially the recurring misfortunes that you just can't seem to explain. Just because you are not aware of your sponsoring thought does not mean it does not work in your life to create conditions and events around you.
I see no difference in what you are calling a sponsoring thought and what is called the subconscious.Just sounds like a more spititual term for that which we store a belief system.
Interesting that it is also based on fear and love or actually that which are awareness is based on.

 

[EverChanging]

It is the same as gravity but acting on much smaller bodies in the universe.

That answer is completely irrelevant to what I asked and makes no sense at all. What is the same as gravity? What does this have to do with emotions?

I think mind and emotions are connected through chemical processes but not caused by the chemical reactions.This is why altering the chemicals still effect thoughts and feelings.

What do you mean by mind and emotions are connected through physical processes? If thoughts and feelings don't have a chemical basis, why does altering chemicals alter our emotions?

So you are saying that bad childhoods. repressed emotions etc. is not the cause of altering the chemicals in the brain.People going to wars and seeing things to consciously hard to deal with plays no part in post traumatic stress disorder which is also treated as a chemical imbalance. It is all just grounded in the laws of chemistry and coincidence.

No, I am not. For the brain to process information like wars and traumatic experiences, this takes chemical and electrical activity, and those processes are grounded in the laws of chemistry and electricity. And no, I didn't say anything about coincidence.

They behave according to what we allow consciousness to deal with or not deal with. Look at post traumatic stress disorder again.

No, chemicals do not behave according to what we allow them to do. They behave according to the laws of chemistry. When you can show that you can make the chemicals in your brain behave according to anything other than the laws of chemistry, I'll believe you.