Searching for GOD...

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

So the onus is on you to clarify how we can process any logical argument to reach a consciously verified conclusion without any conscious guidance of the thought processes involved.

No it isn’t. Yet again: THE ABSENCE OR INCOMPLETENESS OF ONE EXPLANATON IS NOT A JUSTIFICATION FOR A DIFFERENT EXPLANATION (LET ALONE A DIFFERENT EXPLANATION THAT'S A LOGICAL IMPOSSIBILITY).

I really don’t know how to make this clearer for you but perhaps if you write it down 100 (or1,000?) times it might finally sink in?

Again: if you had even a basic understanding of logical argument you might at least have a chance of avoiding rhetorical howlers like this in future.

Why do you still refuse to do that?

[Sebastian Toe]

NDEs (Near Death Experiences) have recorded numerous examples of people experiencing vivid reality while there was no measurable brain activity.

How did they make the memories of the event which is what they  would be referencing when describing it, if there was no brain activity at the time of the event?

[torridon]

Science cannot define what comprises our thoughts or what determines them.
The fact that we can contemplate our existence and guide our thoughts to reach consciously verified conclusions suggests that our conscious awareness must play a substantial role in this process.  To suggest that it can all drop out from the consequences of uncontrollable physical reactions truly beggars belief.

Can you suggest how it could not 'drop out from the consequences of uncontrollable physical reactions' given that classical physics is 100% deterministic, which means that chemistry is 100% deterministic, which means that biology is 100% deterministic.  You're either going to have to reach for some sort of quantum weirdness or magic, one or the other.

[Alan Burns]

AB,

No it isn’t. Yet again: THE ABSENCE OR INCOMPLETENESS OF ONE EXPLANATON IS NOT A JUSTIFICATION FOR A DIFFERENT EXPLANATION (LET ALONE A DIFFERENT EXPLANATION THAT'S A LOGICAL IMPOSSIBILITY).

I really don’t know how to make this clearer for you but perhaps if you write it down 100 (or1,000?) times it might finally sink in?

Again: if you had even a basic understanding of logical argument you might at least have a chance of avoiding rhetorical howlers like this in future.

Why do you still refuse to do that?

It is not just absence of an explanation.
I am highlighting the profound impossibility of sound reasoned arguments leading to consciously verified conclusions to just drop out from uncontrollable physical reactions with no means of conscious guidance.

[Alan Burns]

How did they make the memories of the event which is what they  would be referencing when describing it, if there was no brain activity at the time of the event?

You are making a presumption that all memories within our conscious awareness are derived from material brain cells.
My contention would be that the spiritual nature of our human soul would also have spiritual memory

[Gordon]

You are making a presumption that all memories within our conscious awareness are derived from material brain cells.
My contention would be that the spiritual nature of our human soul would also have spiritual memory

Then you need evidence to support your contention, and that should include the methods used to confirm this 'soul' and it's 'spiritual memory' exists and describe how it operates and interacts with our biology.

So far as is known ALL mental activities are biological processes and to contend otherwise without stating a clear basis for doing so (such as peer-reviewed research into 'spiritual memory') reads like laughable nonsense, Alan.

[Sebastian Toe]

You are making a presumption that all memories within our conscious awareness are derived from material brain cells.
My contention would be that the spiritual nature of our human soul would also have spiritual memory

Fascinating.
What form does this spiritual memory take?
Do you have to "consciously decide" what is stored there?
Or do you also have a "Spiritual subconscious mind" which processes that for you?
Does that memory fade ever?
I'm thinking that if you consciously decided to move all if your physical memories over to there then Alzheimer's would be cured would it not?
I'll await your Nobel Prize winning paper on that.
It beholds you for mankind's sake to make that happen does it not?

[Alan Burns]

Then you need evidence to support your contention, and that should include the methods used to confirm this 'soul' and it's 'spiritual memory' exists and describe how it operates and interacts with our biology.

So far as is known ALL mental activities are biological processes and to contend otherwise without stating a clear basis for doing so (such as peer-reviewed research into 'spiritual memory') reads like laughable nonsense, Alan.

I am quite certain that our spiritual memories will be intact when we come before God.  NDEs suggest that our spiritual memories are far more vivid and accurate that anything we can get from the biological working of our material brain.  A common NDE experience involves vivid memories of our entire lives flashing before us in a moment of time.

[Maeght]

I am quite certain that our spiritual memories will be intact when we come before God.  NDEs suggest that our spiritual memories are far more vivid and accurate that anything we can get from the biological working of our material brain.  A common NDE experience involves vivid memories of our entire lives flashing before us in a moment of time.

The belief is strong with you Alan. Belief is all it is though and your claims aren't convincing to me.

[ekim]

The belief is strong with you Alan. Belief is all it is though and your claims aren't convincing to me.

It's beginning to sound like the Akashic Records of the Theosophical Society ...... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akashic_records

[Alan Burns]

Can you suggest how it could not 'drop out from the consequences of uncontrollable physical reactions' given that classical physics is 100% deterministic, which means that chemistry is 100% deterministic, which means that biology is 100% deterministic.  You're either going to have to reach for some sort of quantum weirdness or magic, one or the other.

You have employed conscious guidance to consciously compose this reply.
You need to realise that there must be more than the uncontrollable laws of physics and chemistry involved in determining the conscious thought processes involved in making reasoned arguments and reaching consciously verified conclusions.

[Gordon]

I am quite certain that our spiritual memories will be intact when we come before God. 

No doubt you are certain, but that isn't the problem: the problem is the absence of evidence for either 'spiritual memories' or 'God'. Maybe I haven't been paying attention, but it seems to me that in 'spiritual memories' you've found a new drum to bang.

NDEs suggest that our spiritual memories are far more vivid and accurate that anything we can get from the biological working of our material brain.  A common NDE experience involves vivid memories of our entire lives flashing before us in a moment of time.

NDE's, since the 'E' is for 'experiences', implies a functional brain, albeit in perhaps acute or disordered circumstances, and since there are mental experiences involved we can conclude 'biological working' (since there is evidence that mental events involve biological processes). However, there is no evidence for 'spiritual memories' since, as far as I can see, there is no basis to investigate your claim, which seems to me like unfalsifiable nonsense.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

It is not just absence of an explanation.

Yes it is. You told me, “So the onus is on you to clarify how we can process any logical argument to reach a consciously verified conclusion without any conscious guidance of the thought processes involved”. That was a basic mistake in reasoning (called shifting the burden of proof) for the reasons I explained and you (again) have just ignored.

Why are you so dishonest that you cannot acknowledge your mistake and then try at least to avoid it in future?

I am highlighting the profound impossibility of sound reasoned arguments leading to consciously verified conclusions to just drop out from uncontrollable physical reactions with no means of conscious guidance.

You’re not “highlighting" that, you’re just asserting it to be the case but you never manage to tell us WHY you think that with any reasoning for support that isn’t entirely false.

By contrast the logical impossibility of your magic soul conjecture is being highlighted because such a thing would presumably have to do so some thinking of its own and so, by your thinking, that would just create an infinite regress. As you keep ignoring that falsifying problem too though presumably you’ll just keep making the same mistake over and over again.   

[Outrider]

You have employed conscious guidance to consciously compose this reply.

Nobody's arguing that is at least one of the elements in use - the problem is that your interpretation of that is that it is somehow independent of what came before via the medium of some noncorporeal directing 'spirit' that you've manifestly failed in any meaningful way to establish.

You need to realise that there must be more than the uncontrollable laws of physics and chemistry involved in determining the conscious thought processes involved in making reasoned arguments and reaching consciously verified conclusions.

You appear to have stopped typing here before you got to the bit where you say '...because...' and then explain your reasoning. Maybe your homonculus got bored and wandered away to polish its spiritual bits?

O.

[Sebastian Toe]

I am quite certain that our spiritual memories will be intact when we come before God.  NDEs suggest that our spiritual memories are far more vivid and accurate that anything we can get from the biological working of our material brain.  A common NDE experience involves vivid memories of our entire lives flashing before us in a moment of time.

Can your soul which is independent of your body, tap into your spiritual memory at will?

[Sebastian Toe]

You are making a presumption that all memories within our conscious awareness are derived from material brain cells.
My contention would be that the spiritual nature of our human soul would also have spiritual memory

Is this the first time that you have mentioned spiritual memories?
I believe that it is.
It's almost as if you are making stuff up as you go along in order for your narrative to "work"!

[bluehillside Retd.]

Seb,

It's almost as if you are making stuff up as you go along in order for your narrative to "work"!

“Almost”???!   

Yes, one of the problems with clinging to a self-negating idiocy like “soul” is that when someone asks him questions about it AB has to invent ever more convoluted additional properties and characteristics to make the tottering edifice hang together. Coming next: what souls have for breakfast!   

[Nearly Sane]

...Coming next: what souls have for breakfast!

Anima crackers

[bluehillside Retd.]

NS,

Anima crackers

Cerealously?

[Enki]

No doubt you are certain, but that isn't the problem: the problem is the absence of evidence for either 'spiritual memories' or 'God'. Maybe I haven't been paying attention, but it seems to me that in 'spiritual memories' you've found a new drum to bang.

NDE's, since the 'E' is for 'experiences', implies a functional brain, albeit in perhaps acute or disordered circumstances, and since there are mental experiences involved we can conclude 'biological working' (since there is evidence that mental events involve biological processes). However, there is no evidence for 'spiritual memories' since, as far as I can see, there is no basis to investigate your claim, which seems to me like unfalsifiable nonsense.

And, again, Alan shows his ignorance of NDEs when he suggests these so called spiritual experiences to be ' far more vivid and accurate that anything we can get from the biological working of our material brain.' No doubt he is completely unaware of the evidence that circa 20% of NDE experiences are distressing and nightmarish, ranging from being confronted by strange monsters to feeling utterly alone in empty space. No doubt Alan will undergo some mental contortions to make such distressing NDEs fit his desperate and disparate picture of a soul guiding a material brain.

[torridon]

You have employed conscious guidance to consciously compose this reply.
You need to realise that there must be more than the uncontrollable laws of physics and chemistry involved in determining the conscious thought processes involved in making reasoned arguments and reaching consciously verified conclusions.

I'm not going to 'realise' that in the absence of any supporting evidence, and this is not forthcoming from you.  What evidence we do have strongly supports that thinking and reasoning are the remit of a healthy functioning biological human brain.  Appeals to magic have no place in a serious analysis of mind function

[Alan Burns]

I'm not going to 'realise' that in the absence of any supporting evidence, and this is not forthcoming from you.  What evidence we do have strongly supports that thinking and reasoning are the remit of a healthy functioning biological human brain.  Appeals to magic have no place in a serious analysis of mind function

The evidence you and many on this forum try to ignore is your own capability to guide the contents of your conscious mind to formulate reasoned arguments and draw validated conclusions.

The problem you fail to acknowledge is the limitations of what can be achieved by physical reactions alone without any means of conscious guidance.

In the materialistic scenario you have to presume that our conscious awareness is an emergent property of material reactions.  So the material reactions responsible for our conscious awareness will have already occurred before our awareness kicks in.  Awareness will be the end result of the physical brain activity with no feasible means to interact with the reactions from which our conscious awareness emerges.  So how I am currently able to contemplate this scenario and draw these conclusions without any conscious interaction with the thought processes involved?  I am constantly being accused of personal incredulity - but how can it be labelled "personal" if my apparent incredulity is generated by unavoidable material reactions beyond my conscious control?

I am not appealing to magic.  I am just witnessing to our God given gift of free will which allows us to think, to contemplate, to draw valid conclusions, to analyse, to choose between good and evil, to believe, to cast judgement, to pray, to worship, to love ....

Remove this gift and we would be driven entirely by automated reactions generated from biological instincts and learnt experience with no will of our own.

[Gordon]

I am not appealing to magic. 

That is exactly what you are doing.

[torridon]

The evidence you and many on this forum try to ignore is your own capability to guide the contents of your conscious mind to formulate reasoned arguments and draw validated conclusions...

That is just your misunderstanding of the nature of mind.  If I could 'guide the contents of my conscious mind', then I could look at a tree and decide to see a penguin.  I could put a lemon in my mouth and decide to experience it as chocolate.  We cannot do these things because the contents of consciousness are the product on non-conscious process over which we have no control, and of which 'we' too are ourselves a product.  Our conscious awareness is like a personal narrative that our minds construct of the things we have experienced, including the thoughts we have just had. 

This doesn't mean that we cannot think or reason, but the way this happens has subtleties that need not concern us in terms of everyday functioning.  Our minds have evolved beautifully to take care of business and for all intents and purposes we don't need to worry about how it happens.

[Outrider]

The evidence you and many on this forum try to ignore is your own capability to guide the contents of your conscious mind to formulate reasoned arguments and draw validated conclusions.

Nobody is denying that happens; the disagreement is on where that 'conscious mind' comes from, what it constitutes, how it functions. You posit some extra-dimensional 'driver' on the basis, so far as we can tell, that you really, really don't like the implications of the deterministic explanation, but you've neither offered anything to support your own contention nor to undermine the counterpoint.

The problem you fail to acknowledge is the limitations of what can be achieved by physical reactions alone without any means of conscious guidance.

We can't acknowledge anything until you explain what it is that you think they are. So far the 'limitations' appear to be in your capacity to accept the possibility, and nothing more. You've not made an actual argument that needs to be acknowledged or countered, you've just repeated asserted 'free will because souls'.

In the materialistic scenario you have to presume that our conscious awareness is an emergent property of material reactions.

Yes.

So the material reactions responsible for our conscious awareness will have already occurred before our awareness kicks in.

Yes. There is, albeit limited, evidentiary support for this supposition, as well.

Awareness will be the end result of the physical brain activity with no feasible means to interact with the reactions from which our conscious awareness emerges.

Not exactly. The awareness provides a feedback mechanism which could conceivably feed into the subconscious 'processing' and update conclusions, but that process is not 'guided' by us, that process is us being us.

So how I am currently able to contemplate this scenario and draw these conclusions without any conscious interaction with the thought processes involved?

Because the formative notions to which you've been previously exposed have shaped the architecture of your brain in such a way that your subconscious can't parse those links, the 'training' it has undergone in your life of exposure to ideas does not equip it to put those ideas into a framework that holds together with the precepts that are already foundational to you.

I am constantly being accused of personal incredulity - but how can it be labelled "personal" if my apparent incredulity is generated by unavoidable material reactions beyond my conscious control?

Because it is YOUR subconscious and conscious mind failing to accept that notion - that's what personal is, specific to you and your mental activity.

I am not appealing to magic.  I am just witnessing to our God given gift of free will which allows us to think, to contemplate, to draw valid conclusions, to analyse, to choose between good and evil, to believe, to cast judgement, to pray, to worship, to love ....

If it's not something that has a naturalistic explanation, and so far what you've suggested doesn't, then whilst calling it magic might be a tad comically pejorative, what's a better phrase? Does supernatural have a better vibe? Divine? Why should it get special treatment when, say, pagan rituals to influence human behaviour would presumably be called 'magic' without any pushback?

Remove this gift and we would be driven entirely by automated reactions generated from biological instincts and learnt experience with no will of our own.

There is no gift. There is nothing to remove. There are just scales over your eyes that need to be shed.

O.