Searching for GOD...

[torridon]

You are thinking in a materialistic way which inevitably leads to your conclusion that everything must be pre determined by past events.

You do not seem to appreciate just what conscious awareness comprises and what it can do.  Granted it can only initiate one thing at a a time, and at that point in time it will be what it wants to do.  But our conscious awareness allows us to consider several options before making a final choice.  The act of being able to consciously consider the options allows us the freedom to choose.  There is a two way communication between conscious awareness and our physical brain cells.  Our conscious awareness perceives the information contained in our brain cells and it then initiates a conscious action by stimulating the required brain cells.

You are trading on a completely made up notion of what consciousness is here.  I'm not interested in fantasy beliefs, I'm interested in how things work and that means pretty much ignoring such as the above for which there is no justification.

Back in the real world, things happen for a reason, and it is good that it is so, otherwise we would not be here to argue about it. That cause leads to effect allows for meaning, and humans, like all else, are subject to that base principle of reality.  Sure we have greater capacities for cognitive reasoning and abstraction than most other species, so we can consider a greater range of responses to satisfy our needs; that comes courtesy of the layer of neocortex surrounding your otherwise mammalian brain. It is not some magic gift from an invisible pan dimensional hyperbeing in secret communication with you; it's neural cortex, doing what neural cortex does.  I can't believe I'm having to write this.

[Stranger]

I am not sure that you can identify the instinctive reactions of animals to be driven by decision making algorithms...

Wow, you really haven't thought about this at all, have you? How on earth do you think animals decide what to do, if not algorithmically? How do you think instinct works?

You're the one who's forever going on about the physical universe being deterministic (even though it's an open question) and telling us that non-human animals don't have this logically impossible, non-material, magic soul thingy.

And you still haven't addressed the logic that leads to the conclusion that determinism and (possibly) randomness is all that can lead to any decision, whether the system is physical or not.

Neither did you acknowledge, accept, or challenge the point that no amount of conscious decision making on your part can possibly demonstrate or provide evidence that your actions are not fundamentally predetermined.

[Alan Burns]

Fascinating stuff Alan.
Does this mean that you can predict where Heaven is?

To progress your logic further;

Currently if your body is not in Heaven and your soul is not yet in Heaven either. Then logically it follows that Heaven cannot be in this Universe.
So is it maybe part of the 'Eternal state' in which your soul resides, just not actually near your soul
(Additional query - can there even be a 'near' in that place anyway?)
 - or is it somwhere else, away from and not part of the 'Eternal state'?

Do you have any clues as to what you are proposing?

Any at all?

Our current human knowledge opens up more questions that it solves.  We know the universe exists, and it probably had a beginning from which time and space emerges.  But what is there outside the universe?  I speculate that there must be some form of eternal state from which the universe emerged.  The concept of nothing existing at all existing outside the universe is beyond my comprehension, as is the concept of a timeless state.  But the concept of eternity is also beyond human comprehension - neither can I come to grips with a time which has no beginning.  Everything we know in this universe seems to have a beginning and an end, including the universe itself.  But I can't contemplate what lies beyond or outside these beginnings and ends - my brain is not up to understanding this, I just feel that there must be something which exists outside the time and space of our universe.  Our conscious awareness enables us to make these speculations, and I believe there is a reason for this - to realise that there is more to reality than this material universe, an eternal state to which we have an insight.

[wigginhall]

Well, Alan will never concede any of these points.   He has to cling to his mantras, presumably they form a kind of rampart to keep nasty ideas at bay.   There's that old saying that you can't reason someone out of views that they weren't reasoned into.

[Sebastian Toe]

Our current human knowledge opens up more questions that it solves.  We know the universe exists, and it probably had a beginning from which time and space emerges.  But what is there outside the universe?  I speculate that there must be some form of eternal state from which the universe emerged.  The concept of nothing existing at all existing outside the universe is beyond my comprehension, as is the concept of a timeless state.  But the concept of eternity is also beyond human comprehension - neither can I come to grips with a time which has no beginning.  Everything we know in this universe seems to have a beginning and an end, including the universe itself.  But I can't contemplate what lies beyond or outside these beginnings and ends - my brain is not up to understanding this, I just feel that there must be something which exists outside the time and space of our universe.  Our conscious awareness enables us to make these speculations, and I believe there is a reason for this - to realise that there is more to reality than this material universe, an eternal state to which we have an insight.

You are harder to pin down than an eel soaked in vegetable oil.
Let's try baby steps.
To be clear, you do state that your soul is definitely not part of this Universe don't you?

[Alan Burns]

Wow, you really haven't thought about this at all, have you? How on earth do you think animals decide what to do, if not algorithmically? How do you think instinct works?

You're the one who's forever going on about the physical universe being deterministic (even though it's an open question) and telling us that non-human animals don't have this logically impossible, non-material, magic soul thingy.

And you still haven't addressed the logic that leads to the conclusion that determinism and (possibly) randomness is all that can lead to any decision, whether the system is physical or not.

Neither did you acknowledge, accept, or challenge the point that no amount of conscious decision making on your part can possibly demonstrate or provide evidence that your actions are not fundamentally predetermined.

I consciously drive my thoughts to do what I want to do.  Which in this case is to deny that my thoughts can be entirely pre determined.  If this is not acceptable evidence for my conscious ability to choose, I do not know what is.

[Alan Burns]

You are harder to pin down than an eel soaked in vegetable oil.
Let's try baby steps.
To be clear, you do state that your soul is definitely not part of this Universe don't you?

All I can deduce for definite is that my soul perceives and interacts with this universe through interaction with my physical body.  Anything beyond this is speculation.

[Gordon]

All I can deduce for definite is that my soul perceives and interacts with this universe through interaction with my physical body. Anything beyond this is speculation.

FIFY

[Alan Burns]

You are trading on a completely made up notion of what consciousness is here.  I'm not interested in fantasy beliefs, I'm interested in how things work and that means pretty much ignoring such as the above for which there is no justification.

Back in the real world, things happen for a reason, and it is good that it is so, otherwise we would not be here to argue about it. That cause leads to effect allows for meaning, and humans, like all else, are subject to that base principle of reality.  Sure we have greater capacities for cognitive reasoning and abstraction than most other species, so we can consider a greater range of responses to satisfy our needs; that comes courtesy of the layer of neocortex surrounding your otherwise mammalian brain. It is not some magic gift from an invisible pan dimensional hyperbeing in secret communication with you; it's neural cortex, doing what neural cortex does.  I can't believe I'm having to write this.

The neural cortex is still just a collection of atomic particles behaving in accordance with natural laws.  To try to speculate that this is all there is to conscious thought processing involves a very big assumption about what comprises thought, but you just assume that this is it without any understanding of the nature of our thoughts.

[Sebastian Toe]

All I can deduce for definite is that my soul perceives and interacts with this universe through interaction with my physical body.  Anything beyond this is speculation.

So....

I would have thought it was obvious that I was referring to the spiritual state which is not part of this material universe

Speculation.

not part of this material universe, but where our spiritual soul resides. 

Speculation.

And it is not definable in the space time coordinates of our universe,

Speculation.

, but exists in what I believe to be the eternal state from which our universe was created.

Speculation.

..is that about the summation of your 'theory of the soul'?

[floo]

All I can deduce for definite is that my soul perceives and interacts with this universe through interaction with my physical body.  Anything beyond this is speculation.

Your whole post is speculation.

[Stranger]

Alan, just for once, why not try to concentrate on what is being said to you, before just repeating the same old mantras?

I consciously drive my thoughts to do what I want to do.

That really doesn't make sense in the way you've stated it but I assume you mean that you think about and do what you want, which would be the case whether what you want is predetermined or not.

Which in this case is to deny that my thoughts can be entirely pre determined.

And you wanting to deny this could easily have been predetermined.

If this is not acceptable evidence for my conscious ability to choose, I do not know what is.

For (what seems like)  the ten thousandth time: nobody is denying your conscious ability to choose - which is fully compatible with your consciousness being deterministic (predetermined).

And you still haven't addressed the logic that leads to the conclusion that determinism and (possibly) randomness is all that can lead to any decision, whether the system is physical or not.

[Stranger]

To try to speculate that this is all there is to conscious thought processing involves a very big assumption about what comprises thought, but you just assume that this is it without any understanding of the nature of our thoughts.

Says the guy who has indulged in extensive speculation and made sweeping assumptions without any understanding of the nature of our thoughts and without any regard to the inherent logical contradiction at the heart of said speculation.

[Gordon]

The neural cortex is still just a collection of atomic particles behaving in accordance with natural laws.

Then again everything is 'just a collection of atomic particles behaving in accordance with natural laws', including the biology in which your thoughts occur.

To try to speculate that this is all there is to conscious thought processing involves a very big assumption about what comprises thought, but you just assume that this is it without any understanding of the nature of our thoughts.

The nature of our thoughts is, er, natural - you can't think at all without having the appropriate functioning biology: this is a clue, Alan.

Unless you ditch your particular approach to 'God' you're going to remain stuck in the various fallacies you seem unable to avoid.

[Maeght]

I consciously drive my thoughts to do what I want to do.  Which in this case is to deny that my thoughts can be entirely pre determined.  If this is not acceptable evidence for my conscious ability to choose, I do not know what is.

Why do you want to do that?

[Alan Burns]

Alan, just for once, why not try to concentrate on what is being said to you, before just repeating the same old mantras?

Of course I fully understand every comment on this thread.
But I have to say that I will never believe that every thought word and action I make is unavoidably pre determined by past events, because it does not comply with the reality I perceive.  I can only state what I sincerely believe to be true, and nothing I have read on this thread has made me doubt the truth of my own perceptions.

[Alan Burns]

You are trading on a completely made up notion of what consciousness is here.  .....

I did not say that I know what consciousness is.

I was just stating what I believe our consciousness does, which is to perceive information in our brain cells, and consciously interact with our brain to initiate acts of will.

[Alan Burns]

Why do you want to do that?

Was it the uncontrollable reaction to past events?
Or was it my wilfully driven response to show what I believe to be true?

[Gordon]

Of course I fully understand every comment on this thread.
But I have to say that I will never believe that every thought word and action I make is unavoidably pre determined by past events, because it does not comply with the reality I perceive.  I can only state what I sincerely believe to be true, and nothing I have read on this thread has made me doubt the truth of my own perceptions.

Do you think, Alan, that you might possibly be mistaken?

[Gordon]

Was it the uncontrollable reaction to past events?
Or was it my wilfully driven response to show what I believe to be true?

Or is this a false dichotomy.

[Maeght]

Was it the uncontrollable reaction to past events?
Or was it my wilfully driven response to show what I believe to be true?

Or both since they are not opposites.

[Sebastian Toe]

But I do not just feel that I am making a conscious choice.  I am demonstrably making conscious choices.  It is what God intended, so we can freely choose to accept Him as our saviour.

Do you find it ironic that you cannot choose to accept him if you have not deterministicaly known about him first and set up a deterministic chain of events upon which you make your choice?

[Gordon]

Do you find it ironic that you cannot choose to accept him if you have not deterministicaly known about him first and set up a deterministic chain of events upon which you make your choice?

Now that is an interesting point, Seb - in order to choose to adopt a personal stance (such as 'accept') in relation to a something you would need some awareness of the proposed characteristics of this something that are sufficient for you think about in order to come to a view, which implies you are reacting to some preceding details (such as what other people claim).

[Alan Burns]

Do you find it ironic that you cannot choose to accept him if you have not deterministicaly known about him first and set up a deterministic chain of events upon which you make your choice?

God has made Himself known to me through Jesus Christ.  That is all I know.

[Sebastian Toe]

God has made Himself known to me through Jesus Christ.  That is all I know.

Like I said. Ironic!