Searching for GOD...

[Nearly Sane]

The logic is simple.
Our conscious freedom cannot exist within physically predefined reactions.
If you insist that consciousness is entirely defined by physical reactions, then the concept of conscious freedom must be an illusion.
But then - where does the conscious ability to insist come from?

Repetition of assertion. Bot is broken.

[torridon]

The logic is simple.
Our conscious freedom cannot exist within physically predefined reactions.
If you insist that consciousness is entirely defined by physical reactions, then the concept of conscious freedom must be an illusion.
But then - where does the conscious ability to insist come from?

It is not so much that the concept of conscious freedom is an illusion, more that your conceptualisation of it is irrational.  Go back to basics, think what 'freedom' actually means.  Consciousness as we experience it could not happen in a non deterministic universe, and the set of thoughts and sensations that we have is bounded by and formed by our encounters with the wider world; we cannot be 'free' of that, it just makes no sense. Are you 'free' to find sour foods sweet ?

[Alan Burns]

It is not so much that the concept of conscious freedom is an illusion, more that your conceptualisation of it is irrational.  Go back to basics, think what 'freedom' actually means.  Consciousness as we experience it could not happen in a non deterministic universe, and the set of thoughts and sensations that we have is bounded by and formed by our encounters with the wider world; we cannot be 'free' of that, it just makes no sense. Are you 'free' to find sour foods sweet ?

I have no control over my taste buds.
But I am free to imagine things far beyond what can be predicted by past events.
Do you not have conscious freedom to imagine the impossible?

[Nearly Sane]

I have no control over my taste buds.
But I am free to imagine things far beyond what can be predicted by past events.
Do you not have conscious freedom to imagine the impossible?

Bot repeats bot assertions.

[Sebastian Toe]

There are powers of evil which blind people to the truth.

What are these powers?
How exactly do they blind people to the truth?

Are you assisting these evil powers but not warning people about the detail in order that they might resist them?

Why are you so reticent?
It's all very suspicious.

[torridon]

I have no control over my taste buds.
But I am free to imagine things far beyond what can be predicted by past events.
Do you not have conscious freedom to imagine the impossible?

It is not just your taste buds, rather the perception of taste is something done by your mind, it is a facet of conscious perception and we have no control over it.  At the most fundamental level we have no control over how we react with the wider world.

What we can imagine is bounded by past experience.  Could you have imagined what salt tasted like before you first tasted it ? Could you describe what green is like to someone who is colour blind ? The range of our imagination is limited by past experience, and the things that we do imagine will be a consequence of our desires, and, as with taste perception, we do not have control over which desires to have at a fundamental level. To be fundamentally 'free' in these contexts would be incomprehensible chaos.  That we can make sense of the world means that we are bounded by causality just as is every bacterium, every house sparrow. What differentiates us from other life forms, is the degree of complexity achieved within the principle of causality.

[Gordon]

I have no control over my taste buds.
But I am free to imagine things far beyond what can be predicted by past events.
Do you not have conscious freedom to imagine the impossible?

Your imagination (a mental process occurring within your active biology) is just as subject to antecedents as anything else: try imagining something and tell us all about it without utilising your preexisting language skills.   

[Stranger]

The logic is simple something I don't understand.

FIFY.

Our conscious freedom cannot exist within physically predefined reactions.
If you insist that consciousness is entirely defined by physical reactions, then the concept of conscious freedom must be an illusion.
But then - where does the conscious ability to insist come from?

You're basically using a motte and bailey tactic. The way you have defined "freedom" (the ability to have done differently without randomness) makes "conscious freedom" self-contradictory nonsense. It cannot possibly exist because it's logically impossible (nothing to do with "physically predefined reactions"), neither can it be an illusion because it's as unimaginable as a square circle.

But here you're pretending that it's the same thing that we all experience as "conscious freedom" - the ability to use our conscious minds and make choices. Every time you're challenged to defend the impossible nonsense of being able to have done differently, you start wittering about "conscious freedom" and make this switch to the other meaning.

Either you're doing this deliberately, in order to deceive people, or you're genuinely too lacking in any ability to look at this rationally to see the difference.

And yet again, you've totally ignored this - you must be really scared of thinking about it...

If you could make your version of free will logically self-consistent, then you could NOT rule out a physical explanation without claiming to know everything about the physical world.

What passes for an 'argument' in your mind seems to be based entirely on being unable to see the difference between logical impossibility and the limitations of the physical world.

[ippy]

I've yet to see any of your numerous assertions backed up by anything that could be classed as verifiable evidence Alan, any chance of putting that to rights?

The indoctrination's so strong you're unable to break the bands?

Commiserations Alan, ippy

[Alan Burns]

It is not just your taste buds, rather the perception of taste is something done by your mind, it is a facet of conscious perception and we have no control over it.  At the most fundamental level we have no control over how we react with the wider world.

What we can imagine is bounded by past experience.  Could you have imagined what salt tasted like before you first tasted it ? Could you describe what green is like to someone who is colour blind ? The range of our imagination is limited by past experience, and the things that we do imagine will be a consequence of our desires, and, as with taste perception, we do not have control over which desires to have at a fundamental level. To be fundamentally 'free' in these contexts would be incomprehensible chaos.  That we can make sense of the world means that we are bounded by causality just as is every bacterium, every house sparrow. What differentiates us from other life forms, is the degree of complexity achieved within the principle of causality.

We do not have the power to change the data and information perceived by our sense organs.

But close your eyes, relax and open up your mind to whatever you can possibly imagine.
You are free to imagine images, sounds and limitless thought up scenarios.
Can all this be just the end result of physical chain reactions in a material brain?
Or is it a glimpse of the spiritual nature of the person within us?
Consider the artist imagining an image and painting it.
Consider the composer imagining a sound and composing it.
Consider the author imagining a story and writing it.
I believe our freedom to imagine is not just a creative source for such artistic achievement - it gives us a taste of the joys to come when we reach our true spiritual home.

[Alan Burns]

If you could make your version of free will logically self-consistent, then you could NOT rule out a physical explanation without claiming to know everything about the physical world.

I know enough about the predictability of physical reactions to come to the realisation that physical reactions alone could not be entirely responsible for the unpredictable nature of many aspects of human behaviour.

[ekim]

We do not have the power to change the data and information perceived by our sense organs.

But close your eyes, relax and open up your mind to whatever you can possibly imagine.
You are free to imagine images, sounds and limitless thought up scenarios.
Can all this be just the end result of physical chain reactions in a material brain?
Or is it a glimpse of the spiritual nature of the person within us?
Consider the artist imagining an image and painting it.
Consider the composer imagining a sound and composing it.
Consider the author imagining a story and writing it.
I believe our freedom to imagine is not just a creative source for such artistic achievement - it gives us a taste of the joys to come when we reach our true spiritual home.

Surely all those activities are dependent upon a functioning brain rather than free from it, aren't they?  Apply a general anaesthetic and those activities would most likely cease, as would the imagined control over them that you suggest.

[Gordon]

We do not have the power to change the data and information perceived by our sense organs.

But close your eyes, relax and open up your mind to whatever you can possibly imagine.
You are free to imagine images, sounds and limitless thought up scenarios.
Can all this be just the end result of physical chain reactions in a material brain?
Or is it a glimpse of the spiritual nature of the person within us?
Consider the artist imagining an image and painting it.
Consider the composer imagining a sound and composing it.
Consider the author imagining a story and writing it.
I believe our freedom to imagine is not just a creative source for such artistic achievement - it gives us a taste of the joys to come when we reach our true spiritual home.

It's just biology doing what it does, Alan. While we all have varying abilities regarding specific areas and attributes, I'd have to say that your ability to cram multiple logical fallacies into but a few sentences is especially notable - but not at all admirable. 

[torridon]

We do not have the power to change the data and information perceived by our sense organs.

But close your eyes, relax and open up your mind to whatever you can possibly imagine.
You are free to imagine images, sounds and limitless thought up scenarios.
Can all this be just the end result of physical chain reactions in a material brain?
Or is it a glimpse of the spiritual nature of the person within us?
Consider the artist imagining an image and painting it.
Consider the composer imagining a sound and composing it.
Consider the author imagining a story and writing it.
I believe our freedom to imagine is not just a creative source for such artistic achievement - it gives us a taste of the joys to come when we reach our true spiritual home.

All very nice, but as previously noted, our imagination is limited, it is wholly derived from past experience.  I've seen polar bears, and I've seen red things, so I can imagine red polar bears, but I can only do that because I've already experienced redness and polar bears.  I am merely recombining things I already know about, and I am limited to things I already know about.  There is nothing spooky about this, imagination is fundamental to the operation of a Bayesian brain, which we all have, ie it seeks to preserve homeostasis for the organism by continually predicting the future starting from past experience and updating the internal model as novel sense data comes in such that prediction errors are minimised and homeostasis preserved. So, the ability to imagine futures is a fundamental aspect of all brain function, and not just human brains, the Bayesian prediction model is how perception works across all species.  Humans have developed this facility more than any other species, no doubt, clearly there is a reward mechanism for creativity, I think any creative person will testify to that.

This kind of rationale may not be appealing to everyone, granted, but I think it maps more truly to observation than the wacky and baseless insinuation that imagination is somehow inexplicable-therefore-supernatural.

[Outrider]

We do not have the power to change the data and information perceived by our sense organs.

Just to be technical for a slight moment, our senses do not pick up information - our senses pick up data, and it's only once it's processed into something meaningful by our brain that it becomes information.

But close your eyes, relax and open up your mind to whatever you can possibly imagine.

OK.

You are free to imagine images, sounds and limitless thought up scenarios.

Actually, I'm not.  I don't imagine sounds or images, I'm amongst the approximately 2% of people who are aphantastic.

Can all this be just the end result of physical chain reactions in a material brain?

I see no reason why it can't.

Or is it a glimpse of the spiritual nature of the person within us?

What is this 'spirit' thing - it's just a hanger for 'I don't know' which would be justified if there was evidence of something out there not to know, but you have a word for something you don't know that's invented to explain no gap in our current understanding.  You have no phenomenon that needs and explanation, and yet you're spending all this time coming up with words for the explanation you don't have for it.

Consider the artist imagining an image and painting it.  Consider the composer imagining a sound and composing it.  Consider the author imagining a story and writing it.  I believe our freedom to imagine is not just a creative source for such artistic achievement - it gives us a taste of the joys to come when we reach our true spiritual home.

That's absolutely meaningless.  I write novels - none of them have sold, yet, but nevertheless; imagination is a complex and multifaceted activity, but I don't see where any 'spiritual' input comes into it - which neurons are agitated by 'spirit', which bit of 'spirit' is independent of what's gone before?  You're introducing this like it's an explanation but it's just a code-word for 'I don't have an answer', which is fine because it doesn't appear like there's actually a question that needs that non-answer.

O.

[Stranger]

I know enough about the predictability of physical reactions to come to the realisation that physical reactions alone could not be entirely responsible for the unpredictable nature of many aspects of human behaviour.

It's very obvious from your posts that you don't, but ignoring that for the moment, how do you know that the physical world can only do "reactions"?

The fact is that what you know is only about current science, and that is obviously incomplete. If you could make your notion of free will make logical sense, you couldn't possibly know that it might not be some, as yet unknown, aspect of the physical world. If you could make your meaningless mantra about "the ever present state of conscious awareness" into a logically self-consistent proposition, you would have to claim to known everything about the physical world to rule out a physical basis for it, not just what we have discovered to date.

As I said, you're confusing logical impossibility with the (unknown) limitations of the physical universe. If you really know that your version of freedom is impossible in the physical world, you must know that it's simply impossible, full stop.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Stranger,

It's very obvious from your posts that you don't, but ignoring that for the moment, how do you know that the physical world can only do "reactions"?

The fact is that what you know is only about current science, and that is obviously incomplete. If you could make your notion of free will make logical sense, you couldn't possibly know that it might not be some, as yet unknown, aspect of the physical world. If you could make your meaningless mantra about "the ever present state of conscious awareness" into a logically self-consistent proposition, you would have to claim to known everything about the physical world to rule out a physical basis for it, not just what we have discovered to date.

As I said, you're confusing logical impossibility with the (unknown) limitations of the physical universe. If you really know that your version of freedom is impossible in the physical world, you must know that it's simply impossible, full stop.

A point I’ve made to him several times. His position goes like this:

1. I know about computers

2. No computers I know about are self-aware

3. Therefore, no matter how complex no computer could ever be self-aware

When asked how he gets from 2 to 3 he just ignores the question, presumably because he thinks he has the god-like ability of his own to know what every possibly future technology could ever achieve. Either that or he’s just dishonestly evading questions.

[Alan Burns]

What is this 'spirit' thing - it's just a hanger for 'I don't know' which would be justified if there was evidence of something out there not to know, but you have a word for something you don't know that's invented to explain no gap in our current understanding.  You have no phenomenon that needs and explanation, and yet you're spending all this time coming up with words for the explanation you don't have for it.

The "spirit thing" is what distinguishes you.  It is not an "I don't know" - It is the definitive "I".  You know that you exist.  But what comprises the "you" within the continuum of this material universe?  You are more than physical reactions can ever produce on their own.  The fact is that I do know that I exist, and I know that I have a conscious will of my own which can't be explained by the predictable nature of physically driven reactions.

[Alan Burns]

It's very obvious from your posts that you don't, but ignoring that for the moment, how do you know that the physical world can only do "reactions"?

The fact is that what you know is only about current science, and that is obviously incomplete. If you could make your notion of free will make logical sense, you couldn't possibly know that it might not be some, as yet unknown, aspect of the physical world. If you could make your meaningless mantra about "the ever present state of conscious awareness" into a logically self-consistent proposition, you would have to claim to known everything about the physical world to rule out a physical basis for it, not just what we have discovered to date.

As I said, you're confusing logical impossibility with the (unknown) limitations of the physical universe. If you really know that your version of freedom is impossible in the physical world, you must know that it's simply impossible, full stop.

Without the spiritual awareness of my human soul I would know nothing.

[Outrider]

The "spirit thing" is what distinguishes you.  It is not an "I don't know" - It is the definitive "I". You know that you exist.  But what comprises the "you" within the continuum of this material universe?

'I' am probably a distinctive and continuously updating pattern of neural activity in a brain driving a skeleton and shrouded in meat armour.  I have no evidence for any other 'spirit' element.

You are more than physical reactions can ever produce on their own.

You keep saying this, but you keep failing to demonstrate it.  It would appear that you are a series of physical reactions which are constrained to be unable to accept that you might just be a complex series of physical reactions.

The fact is that I do know that I exist, and I know that I have a conscious will of my own which can't be explained by the predictable nature of physically driven reactions.

That's not a fact, that's a belief until and unless you can show WHY you could not be the accumulation of purely physical events.

o.

[SusanDoris]

The "spirit thing" is what distinguishes you.  It is not an "I don't know" - It is the definitive "I".  You know that you exist.  But what comprises the "you" within the continuum of this material universe?  You are more than physical reactions can ever produce on their own.  The fact is that I do know that I exist, and I know that I have a conscious will of my own which can't be explained by the predictable nature of physically driven reactions.

And on and on the drivel goes... ...

[torridon]

Without the spiritual awareness of my human soul I would know nothing.

and yet the gazelle knows that a lion is dangerous, a squirrel knows where to find a good source of nuts, a polar bear knows how to catch seals; could go on, you know, this is why we have brains .....

[ippy]

Without the spiritual awareness of my human soul I would know nothing.

It's a shame that you really believe such a load of old twaddle Alan, but there you go, catholic indoctrination must occasionally catch some of the more susceptible subjects from time to time, it happens in this case to be just your bad luck.

Commiserations Alan, ippy.

[Stranger]

Without the spiritual awareness of my human soul I would know nothing.

And this silly assertion answers my point how, exactly?

[Alan Burns]

and yet the gazelle knows that a lion is dangerous, a squirrel knows where to find a good source of nuts, a polar bear knows how to catch seals; could go on, you know, this is why we have brains .....

Yes, animal brains are seen to react in programmed, instinctive ways.