I recently had some impromptu exchanges about the mind erupt from a discussion of all things, the latest champion of religious bigotry, Miss CA. What I encountered was a big dose of woo, but what I find disconcerting about this is it comes from what otherwise appears to be a critical, rational source.
Now it's typical for the religious to push dualism (the notion that the mind is an independent thing from the body) since they all have some kind of belief of a soul and/or the survival of the mind after death. Certainly if the mind is going to survive, it has to be independent, right? I mean, if the mind is simply the collective functions of the brain, and the brain dies, that's it for the mind so if you want to believe in surviving death, then you have to buy into the soul idea.
But what if you think of yourself as a rational person, one who won't fall for silly, irrational notions like souls but yet, you want to believe you will live on somehow after death? Hmmm, that's tough. Well if you're sort of clever, you do the only thing you can, you rationalize. How? Well how about energy?
"I disagree with atheism only on the point that many believe that there is no afterlife. On the contrary, I have a problem with that from a scientific stand point, in that we are energy, the impulses in our brain are electric, and since energy can neither be created nor destroyed, it has to do something or go somewhere and has to have been something and somewhere before we came into this physical existence."
Hopefully you're asking yourself, "wait, how do you go from energy to minds?" Excellent question. The answer? Well that's just wishful thinking. Now such irrationality should be distasteful for the rational thinker, but yet there's that desire to want to believe in an afterlife, so in comes rationalization. I especially loved the "from a scientific stand point". Indeed, that religious crap about souls is just silly, but energy is scientific. Behold the power of rationalization!
Now in fairness, I don't think any of us consciously sit down with the intent to work out a loophole like this, so I'm not trying to vilify this blogger or anyone else guilty of such things. Rationalizing just sort of happens as a result of our desires overcoming our rationality. So then how can we tell when we're rationalizing? Well one good way is to examine if when defending an idea or course of action, are you arguing it's merits or simply fending off challenges? If you find yourself doing only the latter, then first ask yourself if it's possible to do the former. If you can't, that can be a red flag. Next, take a closer look at how you're defending. Are you simply making excuses for your beliefs or actions? In other words, are you simply trying to undercut challenges so that you're free to indulge in your beliefs or actions?
Most who buy into dualism will quickly cite the current inadequacies of science to explain ALL the workings of the brain. 'If you can't prove the mind isn't independent, then you're only assuming that isn't'. That's an excuse to believe, and shifting of the burden of proof. What's amazing is this person may very well object to the religious demanding proof that their god doesn't exist, yet here they are demanding proof that their unwarranted belief isn't true. Our blogger friend does this with more subtlety...
"There's also no reason to think that the mind isn't independent"
See? Discredit the challenge to excuse belief. Actually, there is reason to think it's not independent. There are some wonderful case studies found in The Accidental Mind, a book written for us non-medical folk, where we see how physical effects on the brain affect the mind. How could this be if the mind were independent? But of course, that's not the point. The point is rather than give any reason for believing the mind is independent, this person is simply attempting to discredit reasons to believe it's not, and again, such a person might very well cry foul when a religious person makes the same excuse about believing in their god.
Ah, but there is that energy thing, right? Well far from being a reason for belief, I find the entire exercise a waste of energy, and therefore, a very good reason to avoid it and rationalizations altogether.
*Side Note* - Visit the Rodin museum in Philadelphia to see The Thinker and many other works by the master Rodin.
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31 comments:
If there is ever credible evidence of something else that contradicts my long held private *belief*... -
This is another red flag: switching from an epistemic analysis to the normative defense that one has the "right" to one's "private" beliefs.
Yes, well there was that attempt at one point to admit it was just an irrational belief but then it was followed by that. You can't have it both ways. Either you acknowledge your belief is irrational and therefore unwarranted, or you try to give warrant for the belief.
I don't have too much of a problem with people who acknowledge their irrationality is irrational. There's plenty of things I do which are irrational (do I REALLY need to see a game live instead of recorded later?), but I admit they are. Claiming they aren't is a lie, and if it's not initially self deceptive, the longer you tell the lie, the more likely you will believe it and end up deceiving yourself.
Excellent points about getting to the root of the discussion rather than getting caught up in the wash.
I agree, if "faith" is an irrational belief, fine, just call it faith, but then stop saying it is something I have to believe too. That's what really makes religion crazy.
I started recording football games (generic tivo thingy) out of necessity, always try not to know the final outcome of the game before watching. I ended up *addicted* to skipping the commercials, etc.
And a gem of a museum, one of my favorites.
I'm a yell at the screen kind of fan. What's the point if it's taped? LOL!
Philly has a lot of gems. The Philly Art Museum has some real favorites of mine, like perhaps my favorite Dali, Soft Construction With Boiled Beans and of course The Moorish Chief. The Brandywine Museum has a great collection of early 20th century American illustrators like NC Wyeth and Maxfield Parrish, and the Delaware Art Museum has a fantastic collection of Pre-Raphealites, the precursors to those American Illustrators and influencers of everything from Art Nouveau of Disney. There's also where I studied, the PA Academy of Fine Art which has a musem as well as castings of Renaissance sculptures in it's artist studios (my anatomy drawing class was in the studio with a life sized Michelangelo's David among other wonders).
The Philly area may be short on the galleries with paintings done by guys dipping their asses in paint and scooting across canvases, but it's great for the good stuff. ;)
Art Nouveau to Disney.
Blogger needs a comment editor
Actually, because I live in the United States I do have a RIGHT to my private belief.
What skin is it off your nose if I believe in "fairies at the bottom of the garden" to quote Dawkins, so long as I'm not telling you that you have to believe the same thing. Because I don't dare think for a second that anyone has to believe what I do, because I do realize that it is a *belief* and is not supported by any scientific evidence. Indeed, what started this whole conversation was a simple musing, which if I'd had any sense, I would have kept to myself. Why? Because there are very few people in this world who want a philosophical conversation. I either have the atheists telling me that I'm "irrational" and the Bible thumpers telling me "I'm going to hell" LOL
So, what do you guys do when confronted by the unexplained? Do you theorize about what could be possible, or do you just ignore it?
And what do you think of parapsychologists like TAPS who have evidence of ghosts? They're not just a bunch of wackos going around "feeling" for ghosts. They have scientific equipment and cameras and audio. Which BTW, would imply a life after death.
" ...the impulses in our brain are electric, and since energy can neither be created nor destroyed..."
Valid premises. The conclusion that there must therefore be an afterlife is hopelessly invalid, however. Whilst energy cannot, to the best of our knowledge, be created or destroyed, it can be converted from one form into another. Those electrical signals in your brain-meats will one day be no more than faint heat emanations from your rapidly cooling corpse. To assume that because we require energy to perform our biological processes we must therefore be in some way "made of energy" is the worst sort of woo, and I feel sorry for anyone who has misunderstood basic physics that badly.
AWQM,
Indeed you have a right to your beliefs. Did I say you didn't? Was this ever an issue of rights? What's the point of bringing that up? Could it be another example of attacking the challenge to make an excuse for your belief?
What skin is it off my nose that you indulge in woo? Again, irrelevant and yet another attempt to remove a challenge to your belief.
I would have to ask for what your definition of "philosophical" is, for it sounds to me as if what you're saying is challenging a belief isn't being philosophical.
As for dealing with the unexplained, I try to find explanations. I may theorize one, but then I'll seek validation or a warrant for that theory. If that's not possible, I'll probably settle with an "I don't know" and leave it at that. What I will never do is make up something fantastic as an explanation.
TAPS is full of crap, and until one can define what a ghost is, how can you have evidence for one? This is no different than people pointing to trees or existence as evidence for their god. Unexplainable evidence is unexplainable evidence. Claiming it's then evidence for a ghost is what I just mentioned above, making up something fantastic as an explanation.
Try watching this video again, especially the bit about the ghost.
Philly,
I disagree with only on the point that I don't believe AWQM's shifting of the burden of proof was subtle at all. The reference to energy being incapable of creation or destruction is a total red herring because, as yunshui noted, it distracts attention from the fact that it leaves the body in the form of heat after death.
There's a yawning gap between "theorizing what is possible" and concluding something improbable.
The first comment sounded when I read it like I didn't have a right to my beliefs, which is why I brought that up, but I realized that I misinterpreted it. They're saying that a right to a belief doesn't constitute a sound argument, and indeed it doesn't.
And that's when it hit me, you see, why I misinterpreted it, is because I missed the fact that I was supposedly arguing for something. You think this is an argument for or against something. You must be too used to arguing with fundies.
And that leads me to my next, and final point in this conversation. You have mistaken my comments for an argument, in which it is not. I am not trying to persuade you or anyone else that I am right in my thinking, or to believe a word that I say. You can take my ramblings with a grain of salt.
Oh I just love those 'this is my final post' comments. It's so Cartman "screw you guys, I'm goin' home". LOL!
Here's the thing, Cupcake - if you assert a belief and then try to justify it, you're engaging in argumentation. Hell, just posting something online is opening yourself up for argumentation.
From what I can gather from your comments, you don't care for criticism. That's fine, but then you should avoid putting yourself in situations where you potentially will face criticism (ie - posting comments on the internet). Also, it would probably be a good idea to avoid criticizing others, since eventually criticism has a way of blowing back. In other words, having a blog where you criticize people's words and actions is PROBABLY not the best thing for you.
However, I encourage you to learn to accept and deal with criticism, much like learning to accept and deal with reality. There's only so much you can avoid or ignore you know, and what's the point of that? Life's far too short, and like it or not, you probably only get one.
I hate trying to watch a recorded game. Someone always ruins it for me!
Wow! I can't believe I didn't get in on this one yet Philly. Mind arises as a product of evolutionary function. The dualists not only have to prove that the mind is somehow independent from nature for humans, but they must prove that mind is independent for insects and fish too. Perhaps Buddhists, although atheists, tend to believe in dualism to support their views on reincarnation and nirvanna.
For practical purposes, I believe in a kind of functional tri-alism. I believe that mind, logic, and nature are separate entities but that reality can only be understood when there is convergence of the three. In that sense, a fly's brain can't comprehend reality on the same level as a human brain since the fly can't understand logic. However, the fly can understand the nature of flight dynamics with much better ease than humans do, simply because the fly has evolved to perform acrobatic maneuvers with grace, and has a much better intuitive understanding of small scale forces.
Nate, I was at the beach once, game taping at home, and some older guy i was randomly walking past pulls off his headphones and says, "The Birds are up by 10," or something to that effect. Doh!
Philly, you should do yourself a favor and listen to Adam Carolla interviews Joe Rogan
If Joe didn't push the 9/11 conspiracies and some of that other crazy shit, his argument of drugs are cool and don't adversely affect him would be a good one.
One thing's for sure, I wouldn't want to trip with him.
Dualism is also a theological term, denoting opposing personalities.
Anyway, I'm ever picking up after you, Chief. Your concept of a soul isn't the one described in scripture, so your graph claiming you know 75% of the Bible is bullshit, or that part was part of the 25% you missed.
A "soul" according to Genesis 2:7, is the complete individual, not some vaporous mist of energy hovering in space. That is a pagan concept.
Now, if you're going to say that there are no souls, then you're even dumber than even I think you are, because that would mean that none of us exist!
"So then how can we tell when we're rationalizing? Well one good way is to examine if when defending an idea or course of action, are you arguing it's merits or simply fending off challenges?"You do this all the time. That, and scoff at challenges in an attempt at diverting from the questions.
One wonders if you know anything at all, and are just occupying a soapbox scanning for smoke signals!
"Now, if you're going to say that there are no souls, then you're even dumber than even I think you are, because that would mean that none of us exist!"I had no idea either that the existence of souls was a substantiated fact or that their existence was a necessity for our existence. Where did you get that from? Journal of American Medicine perhaps?
I has assumed you were basing your concept of souls on the Bible definition.
Personally, I don't give a rat's ass what the JAM thinks about it.
Well, the Jewish people like to make this equation, no doubt:
Mind = Soul
Except that they believe the mind goes on after death, but have no more proof of this assertion than King Tut did 3,350 years ago....I think that 3,350+ years is plenty of time to have proved their assertion of an afterlife. Absense of proof, therefore, shows laziness and incompetence on the part of the Judeo-Christian history, but I feel it is merely a scam to say that mind goes on after death.
The reason that no one has come back from the grave, boys, is that the Bible doesn't teach that anyone comes back from death. If you'd been listening, all these years, instead of taking on hopeless causes like Darwinism, you'd have realized that TRUE Christianity doesn't allow for disembodied forays into the netherworld.
In fact, Ecclesiastes 9:10 pretty much sums it up. Also, ever wonder why Christ would have to return to Earth at His second advent - you know, that future day that the whole of scripture talks about, from Genesis to Revelation - to collect His people and destroy the wicked, if His people were already in Heaven, and the wicked in hell???
The short answer is there is no early entrance to Heaven, nor is there any eternally-burning hell. Fairy stories churned up by infidels determined to discredit God, and glorify themselves!
The Bible is the ONE book in existence that virtually NO ONE has read, yet everyone seems to have an opinion on!
Philly, you don't trip with conspiracey theorists....because you somehow know truth from fantasy when you're tripping?
Actually, let me rephrase that...
If you've been listening to mainline christianity ( small 'c' ) all these years, you WOULD get the wrong idea, because most evangelicals have their heads up their asses where doctrine is concerned, anyway! They primarily follow Rome's ideal, which is pure-dee pagan!
I should have said if you'd been reading the Bible FOR YOURSELVES, you wouldn't have been horn-swoggled into this Darwin bullshit.
Anyway, you can forget what you ever learned from evangelicals, they're crazier than Dawkins is!
Yo, Quiff...
The biggest conspiracy ever is Darwinism, and that's for sure and for certain!
Gideon, I think you are a religious conspiracey theorist which is one of the worst kinds imagineable. At least aliens and government coverups are possible, but not magic lions in the sky though.
I'll take a magic lion over a magic ape, any day!
This EDGE article discusses how dualism may be a genetic cognitive illusion with adaptive features -- thus, limiting its input into the sea of our thoughts may be like fight upstream.
Thank you for the link. I think he's off his rocker, though. This one leaps out at me:
"In fact, babies, before they hit their first birthday, have a rich and intricate understanding of bodies and of souls.".
REEEEEEEEEEEEEally? In fact? Should I bother to read on past that nonsense? Wow. Professor at Yale? Amazing. I thought that was a good school.
Anyway, let me address your point, Sabio. We're genetically predisposed to killing and also mating with as many females as possible, even if that means via rape, yet we consciously curb such predispositions. If we're predisposed to dualism and/or god belief as well, I see fighting against that as wrong as I see fighting against killing and rape.
I see genetic predispositions as "crosses to bear", so to speak, not things to just throw up your hands and surrender to.
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It will not succeed as a matter of fact, that is what I consider.
It will not truly have success, I feel like this.
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