Searching for GOD...

[Enki]

There is every indication that nature exists. There is no indication that God exists. Therefore the addition of a God to explain how nature exists is superfluous unless it can be explained in detail who this God is and how this God created nature along with supporting evidence. Personal experiences and subjective beliefs are of no use as evidence because they only have significance to the person(s) concerned.

If you suggest that God caused nature, then it is only reasonable that one can ask what caused God. If you dismiss the idea that God must have a cause, then the same train of thought can just as easily be applied to nature. That is why I suggest that the idea of a God is an addition which is not needed. It seems to me that this state of affairs will remain until we have reason and evidence to claim that nature has always been, or alternatively how nature was created.

[SusanDoris]

The truth is Susan you were born in a blessed position in life, a life that has not really experienced an occasion where your beliefs have been put to the test

I see that bluehillside has responded comprehensively to your post, and as usual he has it exactly right. I did not respond before because I choose not to re-tell the years in my twenties when I was married. Fortunately, these made no difference to my detached kind of belief since I had already worked out, as I said before, that God did not do anything anyway. Getting through and out of the situation was all done by me.

Edited sp

[SusanDoris]

bluehillside #18,420

Thank you.

[bluehillside Retd.]

Vlad,

God has no explanatory power is a positive assertion and has a proof burden now go and prove it. Just slipping in the words ''It's white noise'' doesn't do it. God is that which creates the universe. There is a universe so the first statement is not incoherent.

You actually seem to revel in your ignorance of what “burden of proof” means don’t you. “God created the universe” is the positive statement – the burden of proof there is all yours.

The statement in response “this God claim you make has no explanatory power for anyone other than you” is merely the factual observation that you’ve never managed to provide that proof.

QED

But hey that'll teach me to waste my time with your good self the arch question Begger 'isself..

If you think being corrected is “wasting your time” that says more about you I suspect than you’d like.

[Alan Burns]

By the way - how's the answer to bluey's (repeated) question coming along?

BH accused me of deliberately using logical fallacies because I like the conclusions.

But in other posts, he says that my apparent freedom to consciously choose is just the way it seems, and I am just an emergent property defined entirely by cause and effect chains over which I have no conscious control.

So is BH accusing these uncontrollable chains of cause and effect of deliberate use of fallacies?
Can inevitable reactions driven by natural forces be deemed to be wrong?

Or is BH coming to terms with the truth that we do have conscious control of our thoughts and actions, and if so, can he define what drives this conscious control in our deterministically driven universe?

[wigginhall]

There is every indication that nature exists. There is no indication that God exists. Therefore the addition of a God to explain how nature exists is superfluous unless it can be explained in detail who this God is and how this God created nature along with supporting evidence. Personal experiences and subjective beliefs are of no use as evidence because they only have significance to the person(s) concerned.

If you suggest that God caused nature, then it is only reasonable that one can ask what caused God. If you dismiss the idea that God must have a cause, then the same train of thought can just as easily be applied to nature. That is why I suggest that the idea of a God is an addition which is not needed. It seems to me that this state of affairs will remain until we have reason and evidence to claim that nature has always been, or alternatively how nature was created.

Pretty good summary, enki.   Or we could bring in Occam's razor - do not multiply entities unnecessarily, or if you like, it is futile to do with more things that which can be done with fewer.   

[floo]

Or is BH coming to terms with the truth that we do have conscious control of our thoughts and actions, and if so, can he define what drives this conscious control?

Why is it necessary for anything external to the human psyche to supposedly drive conscious control?

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

BH accused me of deliberately using logical fallacies because I like the conclusions.

No, what BH actually did was to ask – repeatedly in fact – whether you even know what the term “logical fallacies” means and, if you do, whether your reliance on them implies that you think a bad argument becomes a good one when you happen to approve of its outcome.

That is, I asked you questions rather than made accusations. As a secondary issue however, it’s also the case that the argumentum ad consequentiam is one of your favourite fallacies.

But in other posts, he says that my apparent freedom to consciously choose is just the way it seems, and I am just an emergent property defined entirely by cause and effect chains over which I have no conscious control.

Depends what you mean by “conscious control”, but essentially yes – if you want to step outside of cause and effect then you have all your work ahead of you to explain how randomness instead would be a cogent position.   

So is BH accusing these uncontrollable chains of cause and effect of deliberate use of fallacies?

Whether deliberate or not is moot – the fact the you rely heavily on them though is not.

Can inevitable reactions driven by natural forces be deemed to be wrong?

Yes.

Or is BH coming to terms with the truth that we do have conscious control of our thoughts and actions, and if so, can he define what drives this conscious control in our deterministically driven universe?

You still don’t get it. We do have “conscious control” in the sense that the complex ecosystem of interacting parts we call “us” can respond to stimuli, but thinking that to be “free” in the sense you imply is just incoherent. 

So, do you intend ever to answer the questions I asked you then?

[Alan Burns]

Depends what you mean by “conscious control”, but essentially yes – if you want to step outside of cause and effect then you have all your work ahead of you to explain how randomness instead would be a cogent position.   

But the conscious will of the human soul is not random.  And if you insist our will is pre determined by physical events, there can be no control - just inevitable reactions.  Can you not see that your conscious control is driven by you, not the uncontrollable forces of nature over which there is no control?  Are we all just biological robots ?  Are our thoughts and actions driven from something outside the endless chains of physical cause and effect to enable the conscious control we all perceive?

[torridon]

But the conscious will of the human soul is not random.  ...

If you want something for a reason, then that reason derives from the chains of prior cause and effect that result in the want.  If you want something for no reason, then it is random.  How could there be any other possibility ?

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

But the conscious will of the human soul is not random.

That’s the reification fallacy again, and a failure in reasoning. If this “soul” of yours does not function randomly, then it too correlates with the cause and effect model. There is no third option because "magic", "mystery" etc are not a cogent answers.

And if you insist our will is pre determined by physical events, there can be no control - just inevitable reactions.

Your first problem here would be to demonstrate a non-physical. Even if you could do that though (and a Templeton prize would await if you did), you’d still have a non sequitur. I just “controlled” my action by drinking some coffee. That though says nothing about my decision somehow floating free from the substrate of neural activity that underpinned it. 

Can you not see that your conscious control is driven by you, not the uncontrollable forces of nature over which there is no control?

Can you not see that this is a false binary? The “you” of which you speak is itself a “force” of nature, and the bit of it that “feels” in control (the pre-frontal cortex since you ask) is useless without the sub-conscious that’s in fact processing and making sense of the data it receives and responds to.

Are we all just biological robots ?

That “just” is the judgmental language approach (and informal logical fallacy), and whether or not you like the notion of being a “robot” is just the argumentum ad consequentiam again.

Are our thoughts and actions driven from something outside the endless chains of physical cause and effect to enable the conscious control we all perceive?

Seems unlikely as to be “outside the endless chain of physical causes” is incoherent. What would that even mean, and how would it work if not randomly – ie, chaotically?

Any news by the way on whether you ever intend to answer the questions I asked you but you keep avoiding? Would it help you if I asked them separately perhaps?

Here we go then:

DO YOU KNOW WHAT THE TERM “LOGICAL FALLACY” MEANS?

[Alan Burns]

If you want something for a reason, then that reason derives from the chains of prior cause and effect that result in the want.  If you want something for no reason, then it is random.  How could there be any other possibility ?

But what is it that consciously decides how, when and where to satisfy that want?  Or indeed perhaps overriding what your body wants in favour of choosing to do something you do not want to do?

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

But what is it that consciously decides how, when and where to satisfy that want?  Or indeed perhaps overriding what your body wants in favour of choosing to do something you do not want to do?

Your weasel word there is “consciously”. If you mean by it something like, “the property that floats free of cause and effect” that’s called begging the question; if instead though you mean, “the emergent property of my body that provides the impression of an independent “me”” (which is what the available evidence tells us) then the answer is simple: you.

[torridon]

... Or indeed perhaps overriding what your body wants in favour of choosing to do something you do not want to do?

This post betrays the fact that you are still thinking in terms of dualist mind/body.  It assume a separation of mind and body in which twin streams of hopes and fears run in parallel to then be negotiated.  How do you think the wants of a body are derived and how are they substantiated; if a body is a material thing, what material are its wants made of ? If the soul is a separate thing from the body, where do its wants come from and how are they held ?  This thinking would imply there are two me's in contention with each other.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

“the emergent property of my body that provides the impression of an independent “me”

LOL.

[Alan Burns]

This post betrays the fact that you are still thinking in terms of dualist mind/body.  It assume a separation of mind and body in which twin streams of hopes and fears run in parallel to then be negotiated.  How do you think the wants of a body are derived and how are they substantiated; if a body is a material thing, what material are its wants made of ? If the soul is a separate thing from the body, where do its wants come from and how are they held ?  This thinking would imply there are two me's in contention with each other.

Yes there are two drivers to the "me" within us.  There is basic animal instinct based on programmed and learnt behaviours, which are entirely definable with the physical model of the human body and brain and are quite capable of ensuring our survival.  And we have the consciously driven override which may or may not enhance our chances of survival, but which greatly enriches our lives and provides the many unique features which separate us from other animals.

[floo]

Yes there are two drivers to the "me" within us.  There is basic animal instinct based on programmed and learnt behaviours, which are entirely definable with the physical model of the human body and brain and are quite capable of ensuring our survival.  And we have the consciously driven override which may or may not enhance our chances of survival, but which greatly enriches our lives and provides the many unique features which separate us from other animals.

But that is something which has evolved, I bet our species didn't start out like that.

[torridon]

Yes there are two drivers to the "me" within us.  There is basic animal instinct based on programmed and learnt behaviours, which are entirely definable with the physical model of the human body and brain and are quite capable of ensuring our survival.  And we have the consciously driven override which may or may not enhance our chances of survival, but which greatly enriches our lives and provides the many unique features which separate us from other animals.

That didn't address the points in the previous post.

If there are twin streams of desires running in parallel, from where do the desires of the soul originate from ? In what medium are they held ?

For desires in a body, their derivation can be modelled in terms of chains of cause and effect in a brain.  How are desires manifested in a body ? A body is made of matter, so are there particles of pure desire in a brain ?

[wigginhall]

Yes there are two drivers to the "me" within us.  There is basic animal instinct based on programmed and learnt behaviours, which are entirely definable with the physical model of the human body and brain and are quite capable of ensuring our survival.  And we have the consciously driven override which may or may not enhance our chances of survival, but which greatly enriches our lives and provides the many unique features which separate us from other animals.

So you are saying that the override feature is in the soul?   I can't really follow that.   The human psyche obviously has different functions, which interact.   For example, part of me might feel like getting drunk, but another part is more cautious, as I have to take the car out.   Why is this particularly magical?

In fact, Freud had dismembered the psyche a hundred years ago, and suggested different functions, such as ego, superego and unconscious (id), and later psychologists suggested other functions.   For example, inhibition seems important, and some people have too much, and some people not enough.   It's not outside the body though.

[Walt Zingmatilder]

That didn't address the points in the previous post.

If there are twin streams of desires running in parallel, from where do the desires of the soul originate from ? In what medium are they held ?

For desires in a body, their derivation can be modelled in terms of chains of cause and effect in a brain.  How are desires manifested in a body ? A body is made of matter, so are there particles of desire in a brain ?

Particles of desire?.......The emergent property of my body?
What's got into you reductionist materialist chaps?

Mills and Boon Presents

Particles of Desire

By Donna Torride

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The Emergent Consciousness

By Dame Amelia Hillside.

Ha Ha Ha.

[torridon]

Yes there are two drivers to the "me" within us.  There is basic animal instinct based on programmed and learnt behaviours, which are entirely definable with the physical model of the human body and brain and are quite capable of ensuring our survival.  And we have the consciously driven override which may or may not enhance our chances of survival, but which greatly enriches our lives and provides the many unique features which separate us from other animals.

Learned behaviours are themselves a form of override. Simple behaviours can be encoded in DNA but the information carrying capacity of DNA is insufficient to encode the wide variety of complex behaviours of higher animals so these have to be learned and this certainly requires consciousness - a lion cub will not learn to catch prey when it is sleeping. What is the difference between a human toddler learning to push blocks through holes and a lion cub learning to catch small mammals ?

[wigginhall]

There are probably multiple override features in cognition.  An obvious example is during sleep, when the body is still prepared to deal with an emergency, by waking up and either fleeing or whatever. 

Well known examples (dealt with by Freud) involve inappropriate thoughts and feelings and actions.   I am able to ignore them, that is, if my inhibition is functioning, but some people can't. 

Another example involves food and drink - some people are able to resist tempting foods. 

What has this got to do with the soul? 

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

Yes there are two drivers to the "me" within us.  There is basic animal instinct based on programmed and learnt behaviours, which are entirely definable with the physical model of the human body and brain and are quite capable of ensuring our survival.  And we have the consciously driven override which may or may not enhance our chances of survival, but which greatly enriches our lives and provides the many unique features which separate us from other animals.

Are the clocks striking thirteen? Remarkably, you’ve got something more or less right here. What you're sort of describing on the one hand is the limbic system (that we share with for example reptiles) and that deals with emotion, long term memory etc, and on the other the pre-frontal cortex (that we share with the other great apes) that deals with planning, cognitive behaviour etc.

Neither though imply anything non-physical, supernatural or soul-like.

Anyways, you were about to tell us I think whether or not you were familiar with the the concept of logical fallacies?

[bluehillside Retd.]

Vlad,

LOL.

Dull incomprehension noted.

[Alan Burns]

That didn't address the points in the previous post.

If there are twin streams of desires running in parallel, from where do the desires of the soul originate from ? In what medium are they held ?

For desires in a body, their derivation can be modelled in terms of chains of cause and effect in a brain.  How are desires manifested in a body ? A body is made of matter, so are there particles of pure desire in a brain ?

Of course there can be no physical description or definition of origin for the desires of the soul, otherwise they would just become part of the naturalist robotic functionality driven by physical chains of cause and effect.  The workings of the human soul are evident, but remain a mystery to our limited knowledge of reality.