Searching for GOD...

[Stranger]

I have never disputed that our choices do not have causes.
It is the origin of the cause which is in question.
Is it the end result of a physical chain of reactions?
Or is it formed within our conscious awareness, possibly after perusal of the options, but sometimes just because it is what our conscious awareness wants to do at that moment.

Here we go again....     

How many more times do you need this explaining? How many more times will you pretend that playing with the words will make a difference?

*** PHYSICAL HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH WITH THE LOGIC. ***

So, if we have a "cause" that is "formed within our conscious awareness" then it either formed entirely due to previous causes or not. Likewise if a "conscious awareness" wants to do something, it either does so entirely due to previous causes, or not.

You can wrap any amount of words around it you like, and you still hit the basic logic. Everything that happens (consciously or unconsciously, physical or "spiritual") either happens entirely due to previous causes or not - and if not, it happened, to some extent, with no cause, which means random.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

I have explained numerous times why it is flawed.

No you haven’t. Being asked for an explanation and actually providing one are not the same thing.

It is because there is no definitive cause for a conscious choice in your scenario.

Which is not an explanation at all – it’s just an assertion, and even if it was true (arguably nothing can be said with certainty to have a “definitive cause”), that would tell you nothing at all about the quality of the argument you think it falsifies. We don’t have a definitive cause for gravity either, but that doesn’t mean we don’t know a great deal about its characteristics and properties, which is why with confidence we can dismiss the “pixies with very thin strings” conjecture.

In epistemological terms you soul conjecture is identical to the pixies with very thin strings conjecture. It attempts to fill a gap in an explanation that already tells us a great deal with a guess that has no logic or evidence of any kind to support it, and thus with no explanatory value at all.

Classifying our apparent choice be an illusion effectively redefines the choice to be an unavoidable reaction dictated by previous chains of events with no single causal event.

Again, it doesn’t “re-define” anything – apart that is from your logically impossible concept of the term “choice”. What it actually does is to describe the model of reality that all the reasoning and evidence we have so far points towards.

Do you honestly believe that all our posts are just a result of chain reactions dating back to the beginning of time?

As ever your terminology is all wrong but essentially yes, at least until we’re down to the quantum field level. Do you honestly believe that they’re not despite the logical impossibility of your alternative assertions?

Oh, and as you seem determined never, ever to tell us why you think your perception of an experience must also provide the explanation for it, would you at least tell us why you never answer that? I’m guessing it’s because the tide of reason can't be allowed anywhere near your sandcastle of beliefs, but there could of course be a different explanation for your relentless evasiveness.

Do tell.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

All the examples of emergent properties you give are merely an externally observed functionality or pattern.  There is no concept of a single entity of any sort within the objects being observed.

You seem to be struggling to make a point here, but there's no guessing what it might be. If what you're trying to say is that most emergent properties don't have a "concept of a single entity", therefore our "concept of a single entity" cannot be an emergent property though even you must be able to see the deep stupidity here. Assuming though you actually meant something else, by all means try to explain in plain English what it is.

[Alan Burns]

We don’t have a definitive cause for gravity either,

But we are talking about choices which we make - not about the universe in general.

In epistemological terms you soul conjecture is identical to the pixies with very thin strings conjecture. It attempts to fill a gap in an explanation that already tells us a great deal with a guess that has no logic or evidence of any kind to support it, and thus with no explanatory value at all.

But all human civilisations have shown evidence of awareness of their spirituality.  Not so with pixies.

Again, it doesn’t “re-define” anything – apart that is from your logically impossible concept of the term “choice”. What it actually does is to describe the model of reality that all the reasoning and evidence we have so far points towards.

Why should the concept of conscious choice be logically impossible?  A choice directed by the spiritual awareness of the human soul is not a logical impossibility.

As ever your terminology is all wrong but essentially yes, at least until we’re down to the quantum field level. Do you honestly believe that they’re not despite the logical impossibility of your alternative assertions?

I believe every post on this forum to be evidence of our conscious freedom to drive our own thoughts and to make conscious choices.  The alternative which you appear to support would make this entire discussion (and any other discussions) an inevitable waste of time.

Oh, and as you seem determined never, ever to tell us why you think your perception of an experience must also provide the explanation for it, would you at least tell us why you never answer that? I’m guessing it’s because the tide of reason can't be allowed anywhere near your sandcastle of beliefs, but there could of course be a different explanation for your relentless evasiveness.

Everything we have ever known is derived from human perception. 

[Stranger]

Why should the concept of conscious choice be logically impossible?

Why are you so dishonest?

A choice directed by the spiritual awareness of the human soul is not a logical impossibility.

It is the way you describe it, for reasons that have been explained many, many, many times, and which you continue to totally ignore. A soul isn't logically impossible (although there is no evidence for it) but your ideas of freedom and choice, most definitely are.

I believe every post on this forum to be evidence of our conscious freedom to drive our own thoughts and to make conscious choices.

But not of your self-contradictory ideas of freedom and choice.

The alternative which you appear to support would make this entire discussion (and any other discussions) an inevitable waste of time.

Why?

[Alan Burns]

It is the way you describe it, for reasons that have been explained many, many, many times, and which you continue to totally ignore. A soul isn't logically impossible (although there is no evidence for it) but your ideas of freedom and choice, most definitely are.

So can you explain in precise terms why a consciously aware soul can't be free to invoke a choice which is determined by its own conscious will, rather than predetermined by an entire history of past events?

[Dicky Underpants]

Everything we have ever known is derived from human perception.

That is quite different from assuming that our immediate impression of deep felt emotions, gut feelings or what immediately appears to walk in through our eyes when we look at something actually gives us a totally accurate appraisal of what the realities of human experience actually are.

Furthermore, you shoot yourself in the foot, since when do we ever perceive a "soul", the little man supposedly in control of your human machine?

[Alan Burns]

*** PHYSICAL HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH WITH THE LOGIC. ***

But it has everything to do with predetermination

[Enki]

I have never denied that there are reasons for our choices.
But we have the power to consciously consider those reasons before making the choice.
It is all driven by our conscious awareness - not by inevitable reactions.

So, we consider the reasons. Presumably we then make our choice. If the choice we have made is result of the of the consideration of the reasons then this is called a deterministic process. However you seem to imply that our choices are made by bringing something else into the process of choosing. If you are, then please tell me what it is. Simply saying that it is our conscious awareness explains nothing, simply saying that it is our 'soul' explains nothing. You need to say how it works, on what basis does it make its decisions. You have excluded the idea that randomness plays a part, so it can't be that. You seem to exclude the idea that a choice is purely deterministic(i.e. given the same reasons we would always make the same choices). So, on what basis does our conscious awareness or 'soul' make its decisions?

I suppose I should resign myself to the probability that you won't actually bother to answer this question,  just as you didn't bother to answer my last question. Well, you never know!

[Dicky Underpants]

So can you explain in precise terms why a consciously aware soul can't be free to invoke a choice which is determined by its own conscious will, rather than predetermined by an entire history of past events?

Are you now using the word "soul" in the Old Testament sense (nephesh), which simply means a living entity? Or are you using the word in the developed (and totally uninvestigable) later Christian sense of "a spiritual component of the human being which survives death, and may be subjected to eternal reward or punishment"?

[Alan Burns]

Furthermore, you shoot yourself in the foot, since when do we ever perceive a "soul", the little man supposedly in control of your human machine?

We can perceive it from our thought processes of deduction, and from a divine gift of spiritual awareness which many on this thread appear to ignore.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

But we are talking about choices which we make - not about the universe in general.

Irrelevant. If you think an explanation fails because we don't know the ultimate cause of something you can't then arbitrarily pick and choose which phenomena this assertion does and does not apply to.
 

But all human civilisations have shown evidence of awareness of their spirituality.  Not so with pixies.

Also irrelevant. You're trying a sort of superstition top trumps here - the point though is that in epistemological terms the two claims are identical regardless oh how many subscribe to each of them. 

Why should the concept of conscious choice be logically impossible?

For the reason that's been explained to you countless times already - your concept of it is internally self-contradictory.

A choice directed by the spiritual awareness of the human soul is not a logical impossibility.

Wrong again for the reason I explained to you a few posts ago but that you just ignored. You're not even at the logically possible/impossible stage yet because your claim isn't truth apt, and nor can it be until you finally come up with a cogent definition, some means of identification and of investigation etc. Your problem at this level isn't that you're wrong, it's that you're not even wrong. 

I believe every post on this forum to be evidence of our conscious freedom to drive our own thoughts and to make conscious choices.  The alternative which you appear to support would make this entire discussion (and any other discussions) an inevitable waste of time.

No, that's a non sequitur and an argumentun ad consequentiam to boot - two of your favourite fallacies. You should know by now though that fallacious arguments are always wrong arguments. You do know that now don't you? Don't you?.

Everything we have ever known is derived from human perception.

Sort of, but sometimes our immediate perceptions of things turn out to give us superficial and wrong explanations for them, and we know that when we think harder about things and when we conduct tests and experiments that falsify the explanations our perceptions initially give us. You've also just avoided the question again - why do you think your perception of choice etc must give you a reliable explanation for it?

Why though?

[Stranger]

So can you explain in precise terms why a consciously aware soul can't be free to invoke a choice which is determined by its own conscious will, rather than predetermined by an entire history of past events?

Again? Seriously!? Have you been paying no attention whatsoever?

If a choice is determined by "its own conscious will", then said concious will, will have to have reached its choice either entirely because of previous causes or not (which means some randomness).

YET AGAIN: saying what (the conscious will) determines something is a totally different question to saying whether it was entirely due to causes or not.

But it has everything to do with predetermination

Drivel. The concepts are independent of each other.

[Gordon]

We can perceive it from our thought processes of deduction, and from a divine gift of spiritual awareness which many on this thread appear to ignore.

Not sure, Alan, that you can ignore what isn't there in the first place. How could anyone even do that?

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

We can perceive it from our thought processes of deduction, and from a divine gift of spiritual awareness which many on this thread appear to ignore.

Not that you care at all, but that's yet another fallacy - this time called affirming the consequent (or assuming the antecedent if you prefer).

No doubt you'll reply (if you bother to at all) with more poisoning of the well along the lines of "no amount of wordy..." etc but actually when you try logical fallacies you should care. You really should.

Oh, and while I'm here another quick tip: when you begin an attempted rebuttal with "but", almost invariably you then rebut nothing at all. Try to remember that - it'll help you (a lot) if you do.

[torridon]

I did not claim that self awareness was impossible.
I said it was physically impossible for self awareness to emerge from material reactions alone.
The impossibility arises from having to define a single entity of awareness from many magnitudes of discrete reactions.  There is nothing in the physical model which can pull all these reactions into a single entity of awareness.  Physical reactions can initiate further reactions, but no matter how complex the chain of reactions, they do not define conscious awareness.  It is a logical impossibility.

My, what a short memory you have, I've lost count of the number of times I've covered this. What you are describing is what consciousness does, it synthesises multimodal information streams into a singular stream of experience.  There is nothing impossible about it.  Consciousness evolved in the ocean, long ago, when marine vertebrates started developing sense organs; what we call consciousness is the brain synthesising and homogenising information from senses and integrating it with information about internal body state.  It is remarkable, but there's nothing magic about it.

[torridon]

So can you explain in precise terms why a consciously aware soul can't be free to invoke a choice which is determined by its own conscious will, rather than predetermined by an entire history of past events?

It's 'conscious will' must derive from something; if it does not, then it must be random.

[Alan Burns]

So, we consider the reasons. Presumably we then make our choice. If the choice we have made is result of the of the consideration of the reasons then this is called a deterministic process. However you seem to imply that our choices are made by bringing something else into the process of choosing. If you are, then please tell me what it is. Simply saying that it is our conscious awareness explains nothing, simply saying that it is our 'soul' explains nothing. You need to say how it works, on what basis does it make its decisions. You have excluded the idea that randomness plays a part, so it can't be that. You seem to exclude the idea that a choice is purely deterministic(i.e. given the same reasons we would always make the same choices). So, on what basis does our conscious awareness or 'soul' make its decisions?

If our choices were entirely driven by predetermined events then we have no control of the final choice.  Our choice making is ultimately consciously driven rather than being entirely predeterministically driven, which is what distinguishes it from a reaction.

[Alan Burns]

It's 'conscious will' must derive from something; if it does not, then it must be random.

It derives from the conscious awareness of our human soul

[Alan Burns]

My, what a short memory you have, I've lost count of the number of times I've covered this. What you are describing is what consciousness does, it synthesises multimodal information streams into a singular stream of experience.  There is nothing impossible about it.  Consciousness evolved in the ocean, long ago, when marine vertebrates started developing sense organs; what we call consciousness is the brain synthesising and homogenising information from senses and integrating it with information about internal body state.  It is remarkable, but there's nothing magic about it.

All I can say is that you have a very simplistic view of what constitutes conscious awareness.
It is not just information flow, it is perception of the information.

[Alan Burns]

Again? Seriously!? Have you been paying no attention whatsoever?

If a choice is determined by "its own conscious will", then said concious will, will have to have reached its choice either entirely because of previous causes or not (which means some randomness).

YET AGAIN: saying what (the conscious will) determines something is a totally different question to saying whether it was entirely due to causes or not.

Drivel. The concepts are independent of each other.

You seem incapable of understanding what can be achieved by our conscious awareness.  It does a lot more than show what we see (as on a TV screen).

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

If our choices were entirely driven by predetermined events then we have no control of the final choice.  Our choice making is ultimately consciously driven rather than being entirely predeterministically driven, which is what distinguishes it from a reaction.

Perhaps you missed my recent post when I explained to you that relying on logical fallacies for support is a bad idea. A very bad idea.

First, it doesn't mean that at all for reasons that have been explained to you countless times but that for some reason you just pretend haven't been given to you.

Second, even if it did mean that though that would be (yet again) just an argumentum ad consequentiam - perhaps your all-time favourite fallacy (though there's plenty of competition for top spot).

PS Any news yet by the way on when you plan to tell us what logical path you think there to be from your perception of an experience to the explanation for it?

Something?

Anything?

Just a tiny ickle teaser maybe?

Look, I'll even help you by getting your started: I Alan Burns think my perception of an experience must also provide the explanation for that experience because...

OK, over to you then: honest time or dishonest time - you choose.

[Stranger]

You seem incapable of understanding what can be achieved by our conscious awareness.  It does a lot more than show what we see (as on a TV screen).

You seem incapable of facing up to the logic of the situation, let alone pointing out a flaw...

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

All I can say is that you have a very simplistic view...

Time to add "irony" to the ever-lengthening list of word you clearly don't understand then.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

It derives from the conscious awareness of our human soul

Which undefined, un-argued, non-investigable gibberish you also know to be impossible because of its self-contradictory premise.

Why do you assert this idiocy time and again? Seriously - why though?