Materialism and Consciousness.

[Souron]

First we need to actually establish a definition of what makes up a conscious system - if we don't, this argument will be silly. In your post you use two different definitions: providing sensory input, and helping you live. I think the latter is a bad definition - because many things in the world fit that category. The first one seems better, but I don't like it either. Do we count the these "organs" of consciousness as part of the conscious system? I don't necessarily see why. Regardless of your opinion on whether or not a conscious being can develop in a vacuum (which is really what the other part of our discussion is about, I think), a conscious being can be placed into a vacuum - and can still exist without sensory input.

EDIT: But, of course, that a conscious being can exist without something doesn't mean it isn't part of the "conscious system"; but that just leaves us back where we were, in need of a definition...

I define consiousness as the ability to think the thought: "I exist." This definition is not very tangable becouse there is not necessarily a way of reading and interpreting a system's thoughts. But I do feel it is a definition that can be generally agread upon.

I have made the arguement that sensory perseption is necessary for consiousness, and under that logic I have defined the foot as part of the constious system.

I have claimed things that help you live as part of a consious system becouse in order to think "I exist" you need to be alive. More precicely, the vital parts of the consious system must all remain functional.

In retrospect, I suppose I have error in saying that a functionless object can still be part of a system. When colloquially reffering to a system that has extrenious parts, it does make sence to refer to those externious parts as part of the system even if the have no function.

As I said above, I think the real problem is developing in a vacuum. I am skeptical of this as well - but existing, I am not. Imagine if Helen Keller's life had gotten worse just as it got better: after learning how to speak and think, she lost all senses. Would she still be conscious? Of course.

Hmm. Perhalps your right. She would be passing in and out of sleep, not being able to tell the diffenence between sleep and daydreams, but on some level she would be consious. She would be able to on some level think "I exist". Or would she?

I mean consious life is very different from recycing the thoughts and experiances she had when she was alive, as she would be doing in her vegitating state. I guess it comes down to how real the perseption of self is in a dream.

 

[Souron]

Why not?

XCL

Becouse he's not a good scientist. You might still value his opinion as a person, but as a scientist you'd want somebody else. Someone who does not "believe" in evolution, but exepts it as a valid, most likely correct, scientific theory.

 

[punkbass2000]

Then it would seem you've answered your own question.

 

[cgannon64]

So I read Sidhe's link. Is it just me, or does that seem very much like adding the supernatural to science? The word 'soul' is just glowing in-between each line...

 

[Souron]

Then it would seem you've answered your own question.

I'm sorry I thought you were trying to make a point when you said "The devout Scientists will probably tell you you're delusional." As I see it now, there wasn't one?

 

[Gothmog]

cg wrote:

I cannot reconcile free will with materialism.

Yes, it is tough.

I cannot reconcile a lack of free will with my current existence.

Indeed, illusion can be powerful, and we have touched on this topic before.

Simply put, the only way I can conceive existing for the rest of my life is pretending that I have free will.

Couldn't you just take it on faith? believe it rather than pretend.

But, what is wrong with a pleasing illusion?
If I cannot prove that tomorrow exists, must I discount what I learn today?

As I wrote above, the experience of a thing is not the thing its self.

You have the experience of free will, isn't that enough? Why must you actually have free will? What difference does that make?

As with love, just because it may be nothing more than a specific biochemical state of the brain - does that make it less real? less powerful? less conducive to a good life?

Is pain not real enough for you either?

If I could truly and fully understand that I do not have a will, my will would vanish. It would be a mental breakdown...

Well then, you need to hold on to your belief in free will however you can.

I still don't see the connection between life sucking and materialism.

The answer is still the same; find happiness in human interaction, in love and compassion, in living life as a human on earth with other humans.

But then I've never understood what's so great about a god that works in mysterious ways.

 

[punkbass2000]

I'm sorry I thought you were trying to make a point when you said "The devout Scientists will probably tell you you're delusional." As I see it now, there wasn't one?

It was just a warning. Quit reading what I don't write

 

[El_Machinae]

Simply put, the only way I can conceive existing for the rest of my life is pretending that I have free will.

You'll choose to get depressed if you learn you don't have free will? Or will you be forced to become depressed when you learn you don't have free will?

 

[Sidhe]

All this at least from the materialist perspective is covered in the thread I posted, I suggest you read it and then make some statements, because your simply reiterating what people already know? If you want to come to the same conclusions as the paper through a thousand topic thread by all means. But please read the paper. Your points are made and discussed in it in all but a small minority of cases. up to you

http://consc.net/papers/facing.html

And free will arguments boil down to Qauntum Mechanics, this has been established in this paper, read the links if you want to know why.

 

[cgannon64]

I have made the arguement that sensory perseption is necessary for consiousness, and under that logic I have defined the foot as part of the constious system.

I have claimed things that help you live as part of a consious system becouse in order to think "I exist" you need to be alive. More precicely, the vital parts of the consious system must all remain functional.

So, may I generalize and say that you define a conscious system as something that is conscious, and everything that is necessary to support that consciousness?

Hmm. Perhalps your right. She would be passing in and out of sleep, not being able to tell the diffenence between sleep and daydreams, but on some level she would be consious. She would be able to on some level think "I exist". Or would she?

I mean consious life is very different from recycing the thoughts and experiances she had when she was alive, as she would be doing in her vegitating state. I guess it comes down to how real the perseption of self is in a dream.

I don't think you give her enough credit. If she lived to full adulthood, and was suddenly stripped of all her senses, I don't see why she couldn't function as a full adult, in her own world. Blind people can retain intense visual imaginations, even after losing their sight. It would be a bizarre, probably hellish existence, but she could probably get alot of philosophisizing done.

(I'm reminded of a story, I forget by whom - I wanna say Borges - in which an author condemned to die wishes for another year to write his novel. He is put against the wall, and he is convinced that his wish wasn't granted. But then, just before the soldiers fire, time stops, and he has a full year within his own mind to write his novel. He does, and dies satisfied.)

Couldn't you just take it on faith? believe it rather than pretend.

I can take things on faith, but I cannot take things on faith that I know to be untrue.

But, what is wrong with a pleasing illusion?

Because it is opposed to a search for truth. If my search for truth ends with accepting a pleasing illusion, why did I even start it?

You have the experience of free will, isn't that enough? Why must you actually have free will? What difference does that make?

It makes a world of difference. With free will, I exist; without it, I have nothing but a window onto existence.

As with love, just because it may be nothing more than a specific biochemical state of the brain - does that make it less real? less powerful? less conducive to a good life?

Yes, yes, yes. In fact, love is rather one of the smaller things that would be overthrown by the nonexistence of free will and the self.

Is pain not real enough for you either?

No. Now, don't get me wrong, I've decided that, if free will doesn't exist, I'd have to accept some sort of literary striving for the purest experience, the highest of emotions... but that would still be nothing.

Well then, you need to hold on to your belief in free will however you can.

I do, if you beleive a person's goal in life is happiness, at any cost; I beleive it is truth, at any cost.

I still don't see the connection between life sucking and materialism.

Well, how do you derive purpose from your life at the moment? Losing free will would probably suck the purpose out of what you do...

The answer is still the same; find happiness in human interaction, in love and compassion, in living life as a human on earth with other humans.

That's not quite right. The word "find" implies a subject. But there is no subject, there is no 'I', there is nothing. If you are happy, you did not find it; if you are in love, you did nothing to bring it about; anything you do is irrelevent, because 'you' don't exist in that sense.

But then I've never understood what's so great about a god that works in mysterious ways.

God, with all the problems he causes, all the mystery, and all the uncertainty, is incomparably better than the non-existence of free will.

You'll choose to get depressed if you learn you don't have free will? Or will you be forced to become depressed when you learn you don't have free wil

See how even our language would have to be re-ordered! The existence of free will is implied in nearly every verb, in the very existence of subjects, etc.

Sidhe: If that post is directed at me, I did read it, and I made a post about it.

 

[punkbass2000]

cgannon, could you define "free will"? What would it mean to have it? How would you know if you did, or if you did not?

 

[El_Machinae]

If it makes you feel any better, QM theory seems to think that conscious observation is a huge problem too ...

 

[cgannon64]

To have free will is to have a self that is capable of controlling or affecting other things, including itself, according to whim; a chain of effects which has a cause in the action of a free will cannot be extended further with complete accuracy (although it can, with inaccuracy, be traced to influences, motivations, etc.). Exactly how much control it has, and how free it is, is another aspect of the debate - but it must have some, in some way, to be considered free. I understand this idea sounds very antiquated and opposed to any discussion in a materialistic (read: deterministic) discussion, which is why I was wary to bring it up earlier.

Now, the second part of your question is trickier. How could I tell that I have free will from not having it? That's tough to say. If free will is possible, and we don't have it, then I don't know how we could tell our particular strain of illusion from actual free will. If it is possible, and we do have it, then I'm not sure that any being could think that it has it and not have it.

(A definition I've heard of free will that I consider to be a completely vacuous bit of sophistry is, "the ability to act differently in differenct circumstances." What isn't free, according to that bit of tripe?)

 

[El_Machinae]

Do you feel like you have free will?
Do you act like you have free will?
Do you treat others like they have free will?

I do. Therefore, I believe we have free will.

 

[cgannon64]

And how do you reconcile that belief with not only recent scientific discoviers, but with the very basis of science, which is determinism?

 

[punkbass2000]

To have free will is to have a self that is capable of controlling or affecting other things, including itself, according to whim; a chain of effects which has a cause in the action of a free will cannot be extended further with complete accuracy (although it can, with inaccuracy, be traced to influences, motivations, etc.). Exactly how much control it has, and how free it is, is another aspect of the debate - but it must have some, in some way, to be considered free. I understand this idea sounds very antiquated and opposed to any discussion in a materialistic (read: deterministic) discussion, which is why I was wary to bring it up earlier.

Now, the second part of your question is trickier. How could I tell that I have free will from not having it? That's tough to say. If free will is possible, and we don't have it, then I don't know how we could tell our particular strain of illusion from actual free will. If it is possible, and we do have it, then I'm not sure that any being could think that it has it and not have it.

(A definition I've heard of free will that I consider to be a completely vacuous bit of sophistry is, "the ability to act differently in differenct circumstances." What isn't free, according to that bit of tripe?)

Does God have free will?

 

[cgannon64]

Now this is quite a digression. But, that's not excuse not to answer, so...

I don't beleive you can really apply the term to God. Can you say a being has free will when none of his choices are ever succeeded by other ones? When all of his existence is one eternal moment?

 

[El_Machinae]

the very basis of science, which is determinism?

I don't agree. The basis of science is that something predictable will happen. And people with free will are still rather predictable (the more you know, the more predictable they are). However, the final event is composed of bajillions of tiny, unpredictable, events. And it seems that imposing will on those events determines when they become predictable.

In other words, life can interpose on nature to make nature less variable. Consciousness is a feedback-loop of independence (free will) that allows future actions to be free.

Hmmmn, I don't know if that makes sense ...

 

[Perfection]

materialistic (read: deterministic) discussion

Materialism should not be equated with determinism. The universe appears to be probabilistic not deterministic.

I am a materialist but not a determinist.

 

[cgannon64]

In other words, life can interpose on nature to make nature less variable. Consciousness is a feedback-loop of independence (free will) that allows future actions to be free.

Hmmmn, I don't know if that makes sense ...

No, to be honest, I still don't understand how this can result in free will.

Materialism should not be equated with determinism. The universe appears to be probabilistic not deterministic.

Which is just as fatal to any belief in free will.