Searching for GOD...

[Nearly Sane]

Moderator A number of posts have been moved here from the thread on the fallacy of composition on the Philosophy Board as they were off topic for that, and a continuation of the discussion on here. 1 post noting that that was the case from Jeremyp, to whom thanks for alerting us, has been removed as it no longer makes sense.

[Alan Burns]

AB,

Your really need to make up your mind about this. According to your beliefs, is there an invisible and undetectable wee homunculus called a "soul" doing the decision-making or not?

I am sorry if you have ever misunderstood what I have posted.
I have not changed my position, but in an effort to make my beliefs more clear I do endeavour to clarify in different ways.
My posts refer to your spiritual self  - your God given identity which has the power to exert conscious control over your thoughts words and actions rather than being shackled to uncontrollable, physically defined material reactions over which you have no conscious control.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

I am sorry if you have ever misunderstood what I have posted.

Your problem isn’t that – it’s that I’ve understood your posts better than you have, which is why I'm so readily able to find the flaws and contradictions in the arguments you attempt to justify your beliefs.

I have not changed my position, but in an effort to make my beliefs more clear I do endeavour to clarify in different ways.

Expressing wrong arguments in different ways doesn’t make them less wrong.

My posts refer to your spiritual self  - your God given identity which has the power to exert conscious control over your thoughts words and actions rather than being shackled to uncontrollable, physically defined material reactions over which you have no conscious control.

But that’s just list of blind faith assertions. Why then should I take any of them seriously?

So let me clarify my position in different ways by asking you some simple questions, starting with:

Do you understand that there are some ways of framing an argument that make the argument itself necessarily unsound?   

[torridon]

I am sorry if you have ever misunderstood what I have posted.
I have not changed my position, but in an effort to make my beliefs more clear I do endeavour to clarify in different ways.
My posts refer to your spiritual self  - your God given identity which has the power to exert conscious control over your thoughts words and actions rather than being shackled to uncontrollable, physically defined material reactions over which you have no conscious control.

So what would your thoughts be like if they were free and weren't being controlled by this soul thing ?

[Alan Burns]

So what would your thoughts be like if they were free and weren't being controlled by this soul thing ?

I am free to control and direct my own thoughts - I do not understand your question.
Without the power of my human soul I would have no conscious freedom - I would be a biological robot with no will of my own.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

I am free to control and direct my own thoughts - I do not understand your question.

Who or what is this "I" of which you speak - the material you, or the invisible man at the controls that you call a "soul"?

Without the power of my human soul I would have no conscious freedom - I would be a biological robot with no will of my own.

Nonsense.

[Alan Burns]

AB,

Who or what is this "I" of which you speak - the material you, or the invisible man at the controls that you call a "soul"?

As I said previously, there is only one "you".
You are your God given soul - the source of conscious awareness and conscious control.
The material body is just the machine which you have been assigned to control.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

As I said previously, there is only one "you".

But isn't your conjecture that there's a sort of automaton "me", and then additionally there's an invisible decision maker at the controls called a "soul", and that somehow these two distinct entities operate in tandem?

You are your God given soul - the source of conscious awareness and conscious control.
The material body is just the machine which you have been assigned to control.

Yes, I know the blind faith claims but you seem to use "you" as the automaton me, the soul me, and the two together hand-in-hand more or less interchangeably. I guess that's what happens when you indulge in magical thinking - anything goes whenever it suits.

Anyway, the question I actually asked you was this: do you understand that the construction of some arguments makes them false in themselves no matter what they're used to justify?       

[Alan Burns]

AB,

But isn't your conjecture that there's a sort of automaton "me", and then additionally there's an invisible decision maker at the controls called a "soul", and that somehow these two distinct entities operate in tandem?

Yes, I know the blind faith claims but you seem to use "you" as the automaton me, the soul me, and the two together hand-in-hand more or less interchangeably. I guess that's what happens when you indulge in magical thinking - anything goes whenever it suits.

Anyway, the question I actually asked you was this: do you understand that the construction of some arguments makes them false in themselves no matter what they're used to justify?     

Some of our human body is fully automated - such as your heartbeat.
Some is semi automated - such as breathing, where we can use manual override to enable speech.
In essence, we have conscious control over many of our bodily functions - in particular our conscious thought processes.
I claim our human soul is the source of conscious control.
You appear to claim that my concept of conscious control is a logical impossibility, presumably because in the material model we have no control over physically defined material reactions.

I fully understand your observation regarding the construction of arguments, but I fail to see how it applies to my posts.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

Some of our human body is fully automated - such as your heartbeat.
Some is semi automated - such as breathing, where we can use manual override to enable speech.
In essence, we have conscious control over many of our bodily functions - in particular our conscious thought processes.

Except the last bit is plainly drivel. As has been explained to you about a billion times now without rebuttal, something with “conscious control of our thought processes” would have to do some thinking of its own, so the problem you (wrongly) perceive with thinking for ourselves would be just transferred to that something – and so on forever. 
 

I claim our human soul is the source of conscious control.

And I claim that leprechauns leave pots of gold at the ends of rainbows. As both claims are entirely evidence free though, they’re epistemically equivalent. So what?

You appear to claim that my concept of conscious control is a logical impossibility, presumably because in the material model we have no control over physically defined material reactions.

No, for the reason I just explained to you again – it’s because it would cause an infinite regress, and your only way out of that is hopeless - ie, “but it's magic innit”.   

I fully understand your observation regarding the construction of arguments, but I fail to see how it applies to my posts.

We’ll come to that. For now though, is it fair to say that you do understand that the construction of some arguments makes them false in themselves no matter what they're used to justify?     

[Alan Burns]

AB,

Except the last bit is plainly drivel. As has been explained to you about a billion times now without rebuttal, something with “conscious control of our thought processes” would have to do some thinking of its own, so the problem you (wrongly) perceive with thinking for ourselves would be just transferred to that something – and so on forever. 

I have rebutted this argument and I will continue to rebut it with the simple fact that YOU are the source which exerts conscious control of your thought processes.  No need for infinite regress.
 

And I claim that leprechauns leave pots of gold at the ends of rainbows. As both claims are entirely evidence free though, they’re epistemically equivalent. So what?

The evidence for your conscious freedom to think lies in this post you just composed - how else could you come up with the absurd example of leprechauns and pots of gold?
 

No, for the reason I just explained to you again – it’s because it would cause an infinite regress, and your only way out of that is hopeless - ie, “but it's magic innit”.   

It is your God given gift of freedom, enabled through the demonstrable power of your human soul.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

I have rebutted this argument and I will continue to rebut it with the simple fact that YOU are the source which exerts conscious control of your thought processes.  No need for infinite regress.

That’s not a rebuttal, it’s just a repeated assertion. And again, you’re dicking around with your terminology. If you think the “YOU” that does the “controlling” is a separate “soul”, that’s your infinite regress problem.

The evidence for your conscious freedom to think lies in this post you just composed - how else could you come up with the absurd example of leprechauns and pots of gold?

Easily if consciousness is a self-evaluating emergent property of minds. You assert that to be “totally impossible”, but you never justify that claim with an argument.   
 

It is your God given gift of freedom, enabled through the demonstrable power of your human soul.

Leprechauns leave pots of gold at the ends of rainbows. See, we can both assert blind faith claims but they’re still just white noise for epistemological purposes.

Anyway the question I asked you and you ignored was: is it fair to say that you do understand that the construction of some arguments makes them false in themselves no matter what they're used to justify?    

[Nearly Sane]

I have rebutted this argument and I will continue to rebut it with the simple fact that YOU are the source which exerts conscious control of your thought processes.  No need for infinite regress.
 The evidence for your conscious freedom to think lies in this post you just composed - how else could you come up with the absurd example of leprechauns and pots of gold?
 It is your God given gift of freedom, enabled through the demonstrable power of your human soul.

Alan, why have you now twice in a row replied to bhs and edited out his final paragraph?

"We’ll come to that. For now though, is it fair to say that you do understand that the construction of some arguments makes them false in themselves no matter what they're used to justify?" 

[torridon]

I am free to control and direct my own thoughts - I do not understand your question.
Without the power of my human soul I would have no conscious freedom - I would be a biological robot with no will of my own.

All of which is mere assertion. of course.

But my question was intended as a thought experiment, sorry for the pun, for you to reflect on what mind would be like without this controlling, directing 'soul' organising our thoughts.   Without a soul, we would still have thoughts, ideas would still spring to mind, but what would your inner mental landscape be like, having thoughts, but having no way to organise or direct them ?

[Alan Burns]

Alan, why have you now twice in a row replied to bhs and edited out his final paragraph?

"We’ll come to that. For now though, is it fair to say that you do understand that the construction of some arguments makes them false in themselves no matter what they're used to justify?"

I did answer it in a previous post: "I fully understand your observation regarding the construction of arguments", , so I do not know why I was asked again.

[Alan Burns]

Easily if consciousness is a self-evaluating emergent property of minds. You assert that to be “totally impossible”, but you never justify that claim with an argument.   
 

Please enlighten me on what precisely is meant by a "self-evaluating emergent property of mind" and how it works in a material sense.

[Alan Burns]

All of which is mere assertion. of course.

But my question was intended as a thought experiment, sorry for the pun, for you to reflect on what mind would be like without this controlling, directing 'soul' organising our thoughts.   Without a soul, we would still have thoughts, ideas would still spring to mind, but what would your inner mental landscape be like, having thoughts, but having no way to organise or direct them ?

If I am entirely controlled by material reactions - as in a man made robot, I would have no need for conscious thought and I am quite certain that there would be no mechanism for conscious thought.

[torridon]

If I am entirely controlled by material reactions - as in a man made robot, I would have no need for conscious thought and I am quite certain that there would be no mechanism for conscious thought.

So suppose you are a Homo Erectus adult, possessed of fairly advanced cognitive functioning, could control fire and could converse with some limited language skills with others.  You've got thoughts coming and going in your head, but no soul to direct or control them.  How would that work ?  Wouldn't they just be having random disorganised mental states with no soul imposing order and finding routes to solving their problems ?

[Nearly Sane]

I did answer it in a previous post: "I fully understand your observation regarding the construction of arguments", , so I do not know why I was asked again.

I would suggest that your statement: 'I fully understand your observation regarding the construction of arguments, but I fail to see how it applies to my posts' was both caveats, and couched with a possible equivocation that bhs then reformulated the question to remove any confusion to 'For now though, is it fair to say that you do understand that the construction of some arguments makes them false in themselves no matter what they're used to justify? ' to avoid any possible confusion.


The possible equivocation is in you saying that you understand the statement which does not necessarily mean that you agree with it. I think it might have been easier if bhs had changed the word understand in his reformulation to agree but it also seems obvious to me that he was trying to avoid misunderstanding.

[Nearly Sane]

So suppose you are a Homo Erectus adult, possessed of fairly advanced cognitive functioning, could control fire and could converse with some limited language skills with others.  You've got thoughts coming and going in your head, but no soul to direct or control them.  How would that work ?  Wouldn't they just be having random disorganised mental states with no soul imposing order and finding routes to solving their problems ?

My reading of Alan's position is that that those would be classified as 'conscious thought' rather than just thought. It would seem necessary for Alan to define 'conscious thought' clearly.

[bluehillside Retd.]

AB,

I did answer it in a previous post: "I fully understand your observation regarding the construction of arguments", , so I do not know why I was asked again.

NS has got there before me but I’m trying to clarify the question to avoid you using weasel terms like “I fully understand your observation”. Again then: do you understand/agree/know that it’s objectively the case that the framing of some arguments makes them invalid in themselves no matter the purpose to which they are put?

[Alan Burns]

My reading of Alan's position is that that those would be classified as 'conscious thought' rather than just thought. It would seem necessary for Alan to define 'conscious thought' clearly.

The difference between conscious thought and non conscious thought could be illustrated by the difference between a computer and a human playing the game of chess.  One is truly conscious of the processes going on, the other is just processing data to achieve a specific goal (which has been consciously designated by the human programmer).

[SteveH]

Yawn.

[Alan Burns]

AB,

NS has got there before me but I’m trying to clarify the question to avoid you using weasel terms like “I fully understand your observation”. Again then: do you understand/agree/know that it’s objectively the case that the framing of some arguments makes them invalid in themselves no matter the purpose to which they are put?

Of course I would agree that badly framed arguments would make the arguments invalid.
However, I suspect that our abilities to judge what may comprise a badly framed argument may well differ - it might be useful to quote a specific example for me to consciously analyse and use my God given freedom to think about the parameters involved to come up with a consciously verified conclusion.

[Nearly Sane]

The difference between conscious thought and non conscious thought could be illustrated by the difference between a computer and a human playing the game of chess.  One is truly conscious of the processes going on, the other is just processing data to achieve a specific goal (which has been consciously designated by the human programmer).

And where does the subconscious fit into this analogy?