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From: Martin Harran <martinharran@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Making your mind up
Date: Wed, 17 Apr 2024 11:14:14 +0100
Organization: University of Ediacara
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On Fri, 12 Apr 2024 13:27:10 -0500, DB Cates <cates_db@hotmail.com>
wrote:

>On 2024-04-12 6:56 AM, Martin Harran wrote:
>> On Thu, 11 Apr 2024 21:32:18 -0500, DB Cates <cates_db@hotmail.com>
>> wrote:
>> 
>>> On 2024-04-11 2:42 AM, Martin Harran wrote:
>>>> On Wed, 10 Apr 2024 10:19:45 -0500, DB Cates <cates_db@hotmail.com>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On 2024-04-10 4:09 AM, Martin Harran wrote:
>>>>>> On Tue, 9 Apr 2024 11:28:11 -0500, DB Cates <cates_db@hotmail.com>
>>>>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> [snip for focus]
>>>>
>>>>>>>>> Yep. It's just the spectre (ha) of the supernatural that seems to
>>>>>>>>> inevitably arise when 'free will' is invoked that bothers me.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> What bothers me is when people dismiss things out of hand just because
>>>>>>>> they might have even a hint of the supernatural.
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Hint? Is is supernatural
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Funny how in the whole discussion about free will and determinism, you
>>>>>> are the only one to raise the supernatural.
>>>>>>
>>>>> see just below
>>>>>
>>>>>>> and that bothers me because it invalidates much
>>>>>>> of what we believe we know about the universe.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I think at this stage, you have a broad idea of my beliefs but just to
>>>>>> summarise them - I'm a religious believer (Catholic), I'm a dualist
>>>>>> inclined towards panpsychism and I believe there is such a thing as
>>>>>> free will. I don't reject any scientific knowledge or *evidence-based*
>>>>>> conclusions, finding my beliefs readily compatible with them. What in
>>>>>> my beliefs invalidates much of what we know about the universe?
>>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> It's the 'dualism' bit. Perhaps I misunderstand, but It seems to me that
>>>>> dualism requires the existence of some non-material entity that can
>>>>> cause material changes in defiance of physical laws.
>>>>
>>>> What physical laws are being defied?
>>>
>>> Non-random physical activity without the required energy supply.
>> 
>> I see two problems with that statement. First of all, I'm not at all
>> sure what you mean by it; if my dualist consciousness makes me decide
>> to go for a walk, the physical effort involved in that comes from my
>> body, not from my consciousness - perhaps you can give a specific of
>> what you mean.
>
>If you had said, in that statement just above, 'if my consciousness 
>makes me decide to go for a walk, the physical effort involved in that 
>comes from my body, not from my consciousness' then we would be in 
>complete agreement. The "makes me" bit is consistent with determinism 
>and the electrochemical conditions and energy flows are consistent with 
>and sufficient for the changes associated with the decision being made. 

"Consistent with" on its own is not scientific evidence, you need to
show a direct relationship between the two. We have a pretty good
understanding of the brain activities that take place during
decision-making and other conscious activities but nobody has been
able to identify how those activities originate.

>IIUC, dualism posits the existence of an entity separate from but 
>intimately associated with the brain than can non-randomly channel the 
>brain's activity. This should require the application of some sort of 
>energy to the brain. Since there is neither evidence or necessity for 
>this in the observed brain activity I think it counts as supernatural.

You seem hung up on this need for an external energy source. Apart
from the fact that there may be a force that we have not yet
identified, there is no reason why dualist consciousness could not be
using the energy generated within the brain. I have a thermostat in my
living room controlling an electric heating system. The thermostat is
not an inherent part of the heating system but it draws its energy
from the same source in order to control it.

>
>> 
>> Secondly, even if some unidentified energy supply is necessary, I
>> can't understand why you see that as a problem; 50 years ago we knew
>> nothing about the existence of dark energy, but now we know a lot
>> about it. Why do you rule out other forces or supplies of energy that
>> we don't know anything about?
>
>My argument is not that it *is* necessary but that it is not observably 
>necessary but would have to exist under dualism. Dark energy is presumed 
>to exist because something like it is required to account for observed 
>conditions.

It wasn't presumed to exist 50 years ago. When first put forward by
Guth and Starobinsky in 1980, it was pure conjecture, it wasn't until
nearly twenty years later that the first direct supporting evidence
was found.
..
>> 
>>>>
>>>>> That meets my
>>>>> definition of supernatural.
>>>>
>>>> The general definition of 'the supernatural' is "caused by forces that
>>>> cannot be explained by science" (adj) or "things that cannot be
>>>> explained by science" (noun)
>>>> https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/supernatural
>>>>
>>> I'm happy with that definition as long as it is taken quite strictly, ie
>>> "cannot be explained by science" and not 'is not presently completely
>>> explicable by science'.
>> 
>> I have no problem with that provided the qualifier is not just an
>> attempt to create unjustified wriggle room. (See my comments below
>> about the lack of progress in neurological explanations).
>> 
>>>
>>>> As discussed just a couple of months ago, science, at least at this
>>>> point in time, cannot explain consciousness of which decision-making
>>>> is a subset.
>>>
>>> Except that there are scientists working on the problem and believe they
>>> have some promising ideas (there is a short discussion in last months
>>> Scientific American on AI)
>> 
>> They have been promising for rather a long time. As I pointed out to
>> you two months ago, in Matthew Cobb's book "The Idea of the Brain", he
>> refers back to a meeting of 20 scientists in Quebec in1953 for a 5-day
>> symposium on 'Brain Mechanisms and Consciousness'. Opening the
>> symposium, Horace "Tid" Winchell Magoun, regarded as one of the
>> fathers of neuroscience, warned his colleagues of 'the head-shaking
>> sympathy with which future investigators will probably look back upon
>> the groping efforts of the mid-twentieth century, for there is every
>> indication that the neural basis of consciousness is a problem that
>> will not be solved quickly'. Cobb observes that "Tid would probably
>> have been amused to learn that nearly seventy years later the neural
>> basis of consciousness is still not understood, nor, the optimism of
>> Science magazine notwithstanding, is there any sign of an answer on
>> the horizon."
>> 
>> Has there been some major development since that book was published of
>> which I am not aware?
>
>Not that I am aware of, but there is no indication of any movement to 
>abandon the search as fruitless.

I'm not suggesting that the search should be abandoned as fruitless.
What I do think is that there should be a recognition (which does seem
to be happening, albeit very slowly) that the current emphasis on a
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