| | I understand that you don't think my support [for thinking that the mind just is the operation of the brain considered under the aspect of subjectivity] is sufficient, but I have offered support for it. This "support" does not stand up to scrutiny-- a fact which I hope to indicate conclusively within this post.
Do you offer support for your assertions about God and his miraculous powers?
When I make assertions about God, I do not presuppose that such assertions are as apparent to others as they are to me. Often I write from the perspective of Christian orthodoxy, such that one could preface my assertions with the parenthetical attachment "[Christians believe as true that] God is x, y, or z."
Thus, when you encounter passages within my posts which refer to God's actions or powers casually or matter-of-factly, you ought to understand them as propositions to which theists or Christians rationally give their assent, not as propositions which are expected to receive universal affirmation.
The difference, then, between (many of) my assertions about God and William's assertions about the nature of the mind and brain, is that, whereas I write as one who admits that the assent to such propositions requires a degree of faith and the acceptance of disputed religious premises, William writes as one who believes that his assertions are of such rational force that they ought to be accepted by all those who understand them.
William's claim, therefore, that I have little justification for accusing him of making groundless assertions with respect to the mind and brain, in light of the fact that I stand guilty of making similarly groundless claims with respect to God, has little merit. For I admit the possibility of rational disagreement over God and his actions and powers, whereas William makes the very brash supposition that anyone who understands his assertions with respect to the mind and brain ought to agree with them under pain of irrationality.
I agree; they [i.e. propositions] are non-physical in the sense that they are properties of consciousness, but consciousness itself is simply the subjective aspect of the physical brain and nervous system. The assertion made after the conjunction 'but' is unfounded. Indeed, this is precisely what William is supposedly trying to prove, yet he states it as though it were a universally accepted and demonstrable fact.
Vision is also non-physical inasmuch as it is a perceptual experience, but that experience is simply the subjective aspect of the operation of a physical sense organ, not something that exists independently of it. This is false, as I've said before, inasmuch as the objective aspect of vision can be replicated merely by running a camera into a computer screen on live. William would have it that the computer 'sees' the content of the footage captured by the camera in the same sense that I see the desk sitting before me. But this is absurd, and proves the fact that vision involves some kind of mental recognition of visual content, which further shows that any attempt to draw an analogy between vision and mental activity is flawed on account of it being the case that vision without mental content does not have a subjective aspect of its operation that is non-physical.
It would behoove William, then, to cease making analogies between vision and mental activity as if they both had a non-physical aspect, since it is clear that vision does not have such an aspect. (When William claims that vision does have a non-physical aspect, he conflates the terms of his analogy, for it is only in virtue of the fact that human vision involves the operation of a brain or mind having non-physical properties that vision itself can possibly be called non-physical.)
Consciousness does not "influence" the brain any more than the brain influences consciousness; conscious activity (or thinking) is brain activity initiated and controlled subjectively. Interested to see how this assertion is supported...
To think is the process of activating the cerebral cortex. One doesn't think independently of brain function and then influence the brain as a result of such thinking. More assertion here.
If that were what occurs, then consciousness could exist independently of the brain, when in fact the brain is required for mental activity. False. How many times must I repeat myself? Just because a certain activity X [mental activity] requires the presence or activity of a certain apparatus Y [the brain], it does not follow that X [mental activity] cannot influence Y [the brain]. If you disagree with my response, address it as opposed to re-asserting that to which I responded in the first place.
Although one form of mind-brain activity can certainly influence another (as when a process of reasoning leads to a conclusion), there is no independent influence of the mind on the brain or of the brain on the mind... OK. Hopefully the support for this conclusion will be forthcoming...
[T]here is only one cognitive organ -- the brain whose subjective aspect or appearance is the mind. Surprise, surprise! He supports the above conclusion with...another unsupported assertion!
Perhaps the following analogy will help. Before the planet Venus was recognized to appear in the Eastern sky before sunrise and in the Western sky after sunset, it was thought to be two different celestial bodies two different stars. The Greeks called it Hesperus as an evening star and Phosphorus as a morning star. The Romans called it Vesper as an evening star and Lucifer as a morning star. But neither the Greeks nor the Romans recognized it as the same celestial body; neither identified it as the planet Venus. Now we know that it is indeed the same planet viewed from two different perspectives. OK.
The organ of thought can be seen in a similar light: as the same thing viewed from two different perspectives. Of course it can be seen in a similar light, but that doesn't amount to, nor does it mean, that you've in fact shown that the mind just is the subjective operation of the brain--which is precisely what you must do and what you have not yet done.
Citing analogies--however clever--which merely assume what you are trying to demonstrate does not help you.
Viewed introspectively, it is called "the mind" or "consciousness"; viewed extrospectively, it is called "the cerebral cortex."
That's one way of looking at it. But I don't agree that this way of looking at it is in fact the way it is. So what you've said here means nothing to me. It would only mean something to me if you actually supported your assertions.
I wrote: "One can always attribute what appears to issue as an effect from a substance to that substance's nature, even though it is perfectly possible that the effect has a cause outside of that substance, and only appears to issue from it."
William replied:
Even if one mistakenly attributes an effect to something other than its real cause, its still the case that how a thing behaves depends on the kind of thing it is.
Not necessarily. That every effect has a cause does not entail that everything behaves according to the kind of thing it is. If you think it does, show me how.
I supported the law of causality by the fact all things must act according to their nature. The law of causality is true by definition, insofar as an effect must have a cause by definition. But this has nothing to do with the purported fact that "all things must act according to their nature," a 'fact' which you have not yet demonstrated.
No, perceiving what are ostensibly causes and effects depends on a recognition of the law of causality, which is established by reference to the law of identity -- i.e., by recognizing that a thing must act according to its nature, because if it didnt, it wouldnt be the same thing.
It is certainly the case that the logical law of identity is incontrovertible, for it is certainly the case that for X to be Y, X must have all of the same properties as Y.
But the metaphysical law of identity, which you seem to accept as self-evident, is hardly incontrovertible.
Example: Let us say that it looks as though X, who is a cat, acts by raising its left paw, over the interval [T1, T2]. Could it not equally be the case that the difference between the state of affairs at T1 and T2 is explicable not only in terms of X's action, but also in terms of T1 and T2 being different cats?
This consideration alone ought to be enough to cast doubt on the metaphysical law of identity.
The law of identity implies the law of causality, but the law of identity is the more fundamental of the two laws. The law of causality is a special case of the law of identity: it is the law of identity applied to action.
In other words, if I can deny the metaphysical law of identity, I can deny the law of causality. Fair enough. I'll just deny them both (for the sake of argument, of course).
William wrote:
Since there is no Lockean "substratum" underlying and uniting its characteristics, a thing just is all of its characteristics. If it exists under the same conditions, it will possess the same characteristics, including the same action. I replied:
"False. How could you ever prove this? You've just never experienced an instance to the contrary. But that hardly amounts to establishing it as a necessary truth that the same thing in the same conditions will undertake the same action, since necessary truths are only those truths whose contraries entail contradictions."
William replied:
Well, it follows from the law of identity, such that to deny it is a contradiction. Joseph explains the relationship as follows: "Uniformity of action is not indeed the fundamental element in the causal relation, for it depends on repetition of the action; the causal relation has nothing to do with the number of instances, so far as its existence -- though much so far as its detection -- is concerned; it is bound up altogether with the nature or character of things, and the nature of anything is not a question of the number of such things that may be or have been fashioned. Yet if a thing is to have any determinate nature and character at all, there must be uniformity of action in different things of that character, or of the same thing on different like occasions. If a thing a under conditions c produces a change x in a subject s -- if, for example, light of certain wave-lengths, passing through the lens of a camera, produces a certain chemical change (which we call the taking of a photograph of Mount Everest) upon a photographic film the way in which it acts must be regarded as a partial expression of what it is. It could only act differently, if it were different. As long therefore as it is a, and stands related under conditions c to a subject that is s, no other effect than x can be produced; and to say that the same thing acting on the same thing under the same conditions may yet produce a different effect, is to say that a thing need not be what it is. But this is in flat conflict with the Law of Identity. A thing, to be at all, must be something, and can only be what it is. To assert a causal connexion between a and x implies that a acts as it does because it is what it is; because, in fact, it is a. So long therefore as it is a, it must act thus; and to assert that it may act otherwise on a subsequent occasion is to assert that what is a is something else than the a which it is declared to be. (H.W.B. Joseph, An Introduction to Logic, pp. 407-409)" This is metaphysics, not logic. Logic is strictly analytic, while Joseph appears to take liberty to make unfounded metaphysical suppositions. In logic proper, conditionals are always hypothetical [e.g. "Let us suppose that Y necessarily follows from X"] and causation is completely bracketed.
In any case, any hope of establishing the necessary truth of the metaphysical law of identity was exploded by Hume, who revealed that any alleged demonstration thereof relied on questionable premises.
In short, to deny the law of causality is to deny the law of identity, and to deny the law of identity is to affirm a contradiction.
Oh, really? Please show me, logically, what contradiction I am affirming by denying the law of causality and the metaphysical law of identity.
I wrote: "I would take issue with the idea that it is necessarily true that death amounts to a cessation of consciousness. Perhaps God immediately provides the soul with a new hylomorphic compound after its bodily host dies out, but this hylomorph exists in a parallel universe, such that we assume that consciousness ceases since in our universe, empirically speaking, it does."
William replied:
First of all, you have no evidence of a hylomorphic transformation, which is just sheer, arbitrary speculation on your part. Whether or not I have evidence of hylomorphic transformation is beside the point. The point is that such transformation is possible. And the possibility of hylomorphic transformation is enough to prove it is not necessarily true that death amounts to a cessation of consciousness.
Second, and more important, such an hypothesis misconceives the nature of consciousness. OK, I'm looking forward to seeing the support for this assertion...
Consciousness is not an independent entity; it is simply an aspect or a manifestation of physiological processes (specifically of the brain and sensory nervous system), not an entity that co-exists alongside those processes. So once those processes cease, no consciousness remains to be provided with a hylomophic compound.
Why am I not surprised? Have you not realized that the continued assertion of theses such as "consciousness is not an independent entity"--to which I have satisfactorily responded many times--does nothing? That it just wastes my time?
If you assert something which I contest, back it up.
I wrote:
"You've not shown that there is no such thing as an immaterial substance, though you admittedly have become quite adept at tirelessly repeating this assertion, as if its cogency might accrue from mere repetition."
By substance I meant an independent entity. There is no evidence that consciousness exists as a separate, independent entity.
Fine. Let "substance," for the purposes of our discussion, henceforth include those entities which are separate from other entities, although they nevertheless cannot exist independently of these or other entities.
I wrote:
"You've not shown that conscious is merely a property or faculty of a physical organism, though you admittedly have become quite adept at tirelessly repeating this assertion, as if its cogency might accrue from mere repetition."
William replied:
Once again, if I said that there is a consciousness in the next room, youd want to know who or what it is thats conscious wouldnt you? And if I said that its not anything that is conscious; its just pure consciousness, you most assuredly would balk at that reply. Why? Because youd recognize that consciousness is an attribute of an entity, not an entity in its own right. Well, of course. Angels (from the Christian perspective) are conscious, immaterial beings. That doesn't mean they just are consciousnesses.
According to Mortimer Adler's book, The Angels and Us, angels are intellectual entities that are non-spatial-temporal. They differ according to the universality and number of their innate ideas and their other intellectual capacities.
Thus, you are right in thinking that a purely intellectual being could not exist in a room. This is why angels are only said to be in certain locations insofar as they act in these locations. (Angels act on physical objects through a species of telekenesis.)
I wrote:
"Adducing vision as a subjective manifestation of the function of the eye does not work as an analogy to understanding mental activity as a subjective manifestation of the function of the brain. Why? For the simple reason that vision itself is a form of mental activity, which is precisely what you were attempting to provide an analogy for."
William replied:
You mean you honestly think that vision can exist apart from and independently of an organ of vision. I assumed that, at the very least, you wouldnt question that.
Of course. For instance, computer video cameras can transfer images through the "optic nerve" of the world wide web to users across the globe.
But my point was that the important and distinctive trait of human vision, viz. the fact that it involves content-recognition, has to do with mental activity. This is why vision won't work as an analogy to mental activity.
Certain visual sensations may be created by stimulating the brain, but not vision itself. I can have visual sensations in a dream, but there is no actual vision occurring in a dream. A true visual experience means that I actually see an object in the external world, not simply experience an hallucination. OK, how about the case of a blind man whose brain is electrically stimulated such that he sees a certain lamp in front of him, and his vision correctly corresponds with the nature of a lamp that is actually in front of him, which, were he not blind, he would have seen in the same way in which he saw it through the electrical stimulation?
But the point was simply that consciousness emerges at the end of a process of evolutionary development; it does not exist at the beginning, which it would have to if God were the origin of the universe.
God could very well be an eternal being to whom it belongs naturally to be conscious.
There is no reason, in any case, why consciousness is something that has to emerge over time. Indeed, there are possible worlds in which conscious beings have existed for an eternity.
Well, according to the evolutionary record, animals evolved from lower, non-sentient forms of life, so before their emergence, there was no consciousness. What? First establish that life exists only on earth. There could very well be conscious beings that existed from the beginning of the universe in other galaxies. (Remember that profound and incredibly obvious truth: existence exists.) ;)
The latter emerged as a biological mutation that conferred a survival advantage to the organisms that acquired it. Since it did not exist prior to the evolution of animal life, its appearance had to be due to a biological mutation resulting from a unique configuration of material constituents. Not necessarily. See above.
Besides, to say that there were immaterial substances (conscious monads, to use Liebnizs [sic] term) that pre-existed the evolution of animal life would again imply that consciousness does not require physical organs of perception and cognition as a form and means of awareness. Of course it would imply that.
But as I have shown, without these organs of awareness, consciousness is impossible. Where have you shown this? You've shown no such thing.
I wrote:
"If conscious organisms are wholly material substances then they must follow the laws of physics."
Not as conscious organisms. Youre ignoring the emergence of goal-directed action and purposive behavior.
On the contrary, you're ignoring a very obvious fact, viz. that if anything is wholly physical, it is, by definition, fully explicable in terms of the laws of physics.
I wrote:
"In a wholly materialistic universe, all laws--including biological or psychological laws--reduce to physics. Cf. grand unification and string theories."
William replied:
I dont know what you mean when you say reduce to physics. The parts i.e., the constituent elements can themselves be subject to the laws of physics, but the integration of the parts are subject to altogether different laws. They wouldn't be "altogether different laws," for they would be wholly derivable from the fundamental laws of physics. How could they not be?
Newtons First Law of Motion does not apply to the action of conscious organisms. That's because Newton's First Law of Motion is not a universal law. Quantum mechanics, on the other hand, which has replaced/refined Newtonian mechanics, does, nay must, apply to the action of conscious organisms if these organisms are in fact wholly physical beings.
Lets be very clear what the argument is:
All animals are physical organisms.
All conscious beings are animals (because consciousness requires a brain and sense organs).
Therefore, all conscious beings are physical organisms.
This exactly parallels the rock example:
All inanimate objects are non-sentient.
All rocks are inanimate.
Therefore, all rocks are non-sentient.
I dispute premise 2 of the first argument. For there is no reason to think it necessary that all conscious beings are animals.
But I don't dispute premise 2 of the second argument, for it seems clear to me that all rocks are inanimate definitionally. But I don't believe it is similarly true that all conscious beings are animals definitionally.
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