When Rebutting Arguments For the Existence of God

[sneez]

"A Ukrainian, Albert Ignatenko, demonstrated on the TV show, The Paranormal World of Paul McKenna, that he could rapidly raise or lower the pulse rate of people who were at a remote location. This was a dramatic demonstration of remote-influencing (RI), which is the basis of hypnosis.

My research would seem to indicate that the psi-able operator is capable of affecting the neuronal calcium efflux of another person through remote-viewing, rather like the US National Security Agency's electronic microwave mind-control machines.
"
A psychic energy ?

Im sorry for my vagueness which could not help anybody but i don't feel that my story belongs to this forum...

Anyway guys, let's leave it like you want it. I am not here to persuade you into some belief. So do reasearch if you want or belief what you want. I was rather interested in the free will counter argument if some one knows a thread open to that topic...

 

[quantumdude]

Yea, I know what you mean, "found it in their hearts".

I've heard that one, too. The question I always ask, and not surprisingly I never get an adequate response to, is:

Which ventricle did you find Him in?

 

[quantumdude]

And you must have tried very hard to convince yourself of that. Either that or you didn't look deep enough into your discovery to ascertain its full meaning.

LOL

Royce, you're a mature, experienced man. So how is it that you could come up with such a blatant false dilemma? Is it really that inconceivable to you that someone could just come to the realization that the existence of some god is pure bunk?

Let me ask you something: Do you believe in the Tooth Fairy? Well, if you don't then you must either have tried very hard to convince yourself of Her non-existence or you didn't look deep enough into your discovery to ascertain its full meaning.

Hallelujah.

 

[hypnagogue]

Let me ask you something: Do you believe in the Tooth Fairy? Well, if you don't then you must either have tried very hard to convince yourself of Her non-existence or you didn't look deep enough into your discovery to ascertain its full meaning.

Well, to be fair, Royce's argument is based on what is called spiritual or religious experience. Spiritual experience is a naturally occurring part of human psychology / consciousness, albeit not ubiquitous. It has received serious treatment from dedicated and well-respected scientists, for instance in William James' The Varities of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature and in Andrew Newberg's and Eugene D'Aquili's Why God Won't Go Away: Brain Science and the Biology of Belief. This analogy's use of the Tooth Fairy is something of an unfair caricature, as it seems to deny the very existence or validity of spiritual experience itself (certainly there is no analogous 'Tooth Fairy experience' built into human psychology).

Having recognized and respected spiritual experience per se, I cannot share the conclusions Royce draws from it. Spiritual experience is a wonderful and potentially life changing thing to expericne, but we have to reason carefully about what can be confidently concluded from it. Certainly, we cannot deduce from the experience itself the actual existence of a God, anymore than we could conclude from an Escher drawing that it is possible to have an idefinitely ascending staircase, or from a movie projection that the motion picture is a continuous progression rather than a series of still images. The spiritual experience should be treated as just that-- an experience. It should not be denigrated, but nor should it be taken to be a reliable source for insight about some of the grander mysteries of the universe.

 

[Icebreaker]

Spiritual enlightenment should be taken as an inspiration, a challenge to seek out the true nature of the universe; one should not sit on it for too long.

 

[Billy T]

Well, to be fair, Royce's argument is based on what is called spiritual or religious experience ...Spiritual experience is a naturally occurring part of human psychology / consciousness, albeit not ubiquitous...This analogy's use of the Tooth Fairy is something of an unfair caricature, as it seems to deny the very existence or validity of spiritual experience itself (certainly there is no analogous 'Tooth Fairy experience' built into human psychology).

I agree, but would like to know where on the "God - Tooth Fairy" axis you would place "free will"?
Please respond here or in the thread "what price free will." I have my own views, stated there, but want to know yours. You part company with Royce, I think, because you are inclinded towards physical explanations. Does your understanding of physics conflict with (I am presuming here) your feeling that you do chose / have free will? That "feeling" is an almost universal human "experience."

 

[hypnagogue]

I agree, but would like to know where on the "God - Tooth Fairy" axis you would place "free will"?

Well, this is off-topic for this thread, and I already gave some input to the 'What price free will?' thread... so I'll just make a brief tangential statement here, while noting that we shouldn't carry on this point here and hijack this thread.

I regard free will in much the same way I regard the 'God' experience, as I explained above. I recognize that believing in free will, and acting/feeling as if we have it, is a natural, inbuilt part of human psychology and consciousness (and unlike spiritual experience, the natural predisposition to the free will belief/feeling is ubiquitous). However, as with spiritual experience, I do not believe that this experience as of having free will gives us license to conclude that we do, in fact, have free will.

 

[loseyourname]

I recognize that believing in free will, and acting/feeling as if we have it, is a natural, inbuilt part of human psychology and consciousness (and unlike spiritual experience, the natural predisposition to the free will belief/feeling is ubiquitous).

Are you certain of that? It seems to be ubiquitous in contemporary western society, but given the nature of ancient Greek drama and epic poetry, they didn't seem to have much concept of free will before the pre-Socratics at least. They seemed to believe that all of their actions were fated.

 

[hypnagogue]

Are you certain of that? It seems to be ubiquitous in contemporary western society, but given the nature of ancient Greek drama and epic poetry, they didn't seem to have much concept of free will before the pre-Socratics at least. They seemed to believe that all of their actions were fated.

True, that is something to consider. An interesting point in response to that observation is that the characters in Greek tragedies do tend to typically act as if they have free will-- if they are forewarned of their inevitable fate, they nonetheless take action to try to avert it.

In any case, I'm not staking anything important on this 'ubiquitous' claim. I do recognize that it might not be as inherent to human nature as it might seem. Still, I would say the experience of free will is far more widespread and common than spiritual experience. The latter tends to be relatively rare in occurrence and short in duration, across most cultures AFAIK.

 

[IntellectIsStrength]

I'm going to repost what I posted in the other thread about the existence of God.


Can You Prove the Existence of God?
(Why philosophers and atheists love this question)
By Gregory E. Ganssle, Ph.D.
Ever since Immanuel Kant wrote his Critique of Pure Reason, it has been common for thinking people to insist that it is impossible to prove the existence of God. In fact this claim has been elevated to the level of dogma in American intellectual culture. The reason I know this is considered unquestionable dogma is the reaction I get when I call it into question. When someone says "You cannot prove the existence of God," I want to ask, "How do you know? You just met me! How do you know what I can do?"
What do most people mean when they recite this claim? Most people mean that I cannot provide a philosophical argument for the existence of God which will convince all thinking people. It is impossible, so the story goes, to provide an argument which will compel assent. If my argument will not convince the most ardent atheist, they say, I have not proven God's existence. Since I cannot convince such an atheist to believe, my arguments do not count as proof in their eyes. If they do not count as proof, what good are they?
I agree that I cannot provide an argument that will convince all thinking people. But what does this tell me? Does this tell me anything about God? No. This tells me more about the nature of proof than it does about whether God exists. I cannot provide an argument which will convince everyone, without a possibility of doubt, that God exists. That is no problem. You see, I cannot provide an argument for any interesting philosophical conclusion which will be accepted by everyone without possibility of doubt.
I cannot prove beyond the possibility of doubt -- in a way that will convince all philosophers -- that the Rocky Mountains are really here as a mind-independent object. I cannot prove that the entire universe did not pop into existence five minutes ago and that all of our apparent memories are not illusions. I cannot prove that the other people you see on campus have minds. Perhaps they are very clever robots.
There is no interesting philosophical conclusion that can be proven beyond the possibility of doubt. So the fact that arguments for the existence of God do not produce mathematical certainty does not by itself weaken the case for God's existence. It simply places the question of God's existence in the same category as other questions such as that of the existence of the external, mind-independent world and the question of how we know other people have minds.
Does this mean that arguments for the existence of God are useless? Not at all. Sure, I cannot provide an argument which will convince all thinking people but this does not mean I don't have good reason to believe in God. In fact some of my reasons for believing in God may be persuasive to you. Even if you aren't persuaded to believe that God exists, my arguments may not be useless. It is reasonable to believe that the mountains are real and our memories are generally reliable and that other minds exist. It is reasonable to believe these things even though they cannot be proven. Maybe some argument for God's existence will persuade you that belief in God is reasonable.
So how can we know that God exists? Instead of looking for undoubtable conclusions, we weigh evidence and consider alternatives. Which alternative best fits the evidence?

 

[Billy T]

{concluded with}...So how can we know that God exists? Instead of looking for undoubtable conclusions, we weigh evidence and consider alternatives. ..

Pascal, a very firm believer in a very minor sect, had an interesting POV on how one should act on the alternatives: If God does not exist it won't matter if I believe in him. If he does, then I had better. The "best alternative" is clear.

 

[reilly]

I would like to suggest that many issues once philosophical in nature are increasingly becoming scientific ones. To wit: read Why God Won't Go Away, Newberg, D'Aquili and Rause -- Ballentine 2001. The first two are MDs, and their hypothesis is, "The religious impulse is rooted in the biology of the brain", and they deal with the issue with scientific data, and, of course, verbal arguments. While you may not agree fully, the book will undoubtedly have a subsantial impact upon your thinking.

For much of the last 100 years, physics has had an enormous impact upon our thinking about very fundamental issues. It is my opinion that over the next 100 years, neuroscience will have an even more profound impact, and will totally transform much of philosophy -- think of what we already know about perception and learning -- all that stuff about a "tabla rosa", Kantian eyglasses, as one of my profs used to say, and so forth, are simply brilliant attempts to deduce by reason what we can now understand through observation and experiment.

Regards,
Reilly Atkinson

 

[Billy T]

...An interesting point in response to that observation is that the characters in Greek tragedies do tend to typically act as if they have free will-- if they are forewarned of their inevitable fate, they nonetheless take action to try to avert it.

Two observations:
(1)It has been seriously suggested, by very competent linguist if memory serves me, that humans only became conscious in the later part of the Greek era. I think the book is called "The birth of consciousness in the bicameral mind" or something like that - I read it years ago and no longer have copy. Thus they may indeed have thought quite differently about free will, gods, fate. etc. Even when warned of their fate (killing the father sleeping with their mother etc.) their struggles to avoid it only made it happen.

(2)One of my favorite greek stories on this point, in condensed form, is that of the Rich man's servant who was startled by the angel of death coming close to him, and even asking his name, while he shopped in the market of Athens. Very scared, he returned to his master who agreed to to help his most favored servant. He gave him three of his best horses, one to ride and one to trail on each side of it. "Ride as fast as you can on the first till it drops, then switch to another" the servant was told. "You can reach Sparta before night fall and hide there." Quite angry that the angel of death would single out his faithful servant, who was young, strong and healthy, the merchant went to the market and sought out that angel - "How dare you frighten my servant?" to which the angel of death replied: "I did not mean to startle him. - I was just so surprized to see him here in Athens when I knew that this very eve, just outside of Sparta, I must claim him when his neck breaks as he falls from a galloping horse!"

 

[Barbie]

Pascal, a very firm believer in a very minor sect, had an interesting POV on how one should act on the alternatives: If God does not exist it won't matter if I believe in him. If he does, then I had better. The "best alternative" is clear.

Pascal's Wager! I wrote a paper on it. He did take an interesting and original approach.

I have only one problem with his logic...I can't force myself to believe something even for a possible reward/avoidance of punishment. Thats not how one forms a belief. Maybe there are those out there who can do this, I cannot.

 

[loseyourname]

Pascal's Wager! I wrote a paper on it. He did take an interesting and original approach.

I have only one problem with his logic...I can't force myself to believe something even for a possible reward/avoidance of punishment. Thats not how one forms a belief. Maybe there are those out there who can do this, I cannot.

The other problem with Pascal's wager is that it only holds if you believe in a God that cares whether or not you believe in him and will reward you for such belief. Even in that case, there are no guarantees. Both the God of Islam and the God of Christianity supposedly care and will reward believers, but you will not receive the reward unless you accept the specific doctrines of one faith. Even Pascal, as a good Christian, can be in hell right now if Islam is correct.

 

[Dayle Record]

This business of defining consciousness as arising with the Greeks, is so ethno-centric, so west-centered, as to be mind boggling. Supposedly the first western poet was a woman who lived ~8000BC in Sumeria. There were tribes all over Northern Europe, labeled barbarians by the Romans, who were literate, used symbols, worked metal, lived in peace for approximately 10,000 years. The East Indians claim civilized history in excess of 150,000 years. This idea that consciousness evolved in what we call "The Cradle Of Civilization", is not well founded in reality. I think of it more in terms of, "The Cradle Of Chaos", it is not a lot different, than it always has been there, at least ethically, only now they have more efficient weapons. The complaints and power mongering are just the same.

I read something today, that put me in mind of Genesis, and some "spiritual" prohibitions, and offerings. In trying to come up with clean stem cell lines, that have no animal contact "no sodomy", they are using some special medium to carry the fetal cells "infant sacrifice", and they are using cells from the foreskins of babies, "The tradition of sacrifice of the foreskin". Those three things, just rang a bell with me today. In the last few years, it has seemed to me that Genesis is the rehashed description of a genetics experiment, if it is anything at all.

I guess if we were sentient bugs in a jar, the kid that caught us for his science experiment, would seem like a God.

 

[Billy T]

This business of defining consciousness as arising with the Greeks, is so ethno-centric, so west-centered, as to be mind boggling. ...

I am not trying to defend the view, that consciousness recently arose, but clearly it did at some point in evolutionary history. Your comments made me goole, both to get the name of book correct and since the first hit was a resume of some interest, I paste it below:
Going back to the the earliest writings and studying particularly the many early civilizations of the Near East, Jaynes came to the conclusion that most of the people in these archaic cultures were *not* subjectively conscious as we understand it today.

Jaynes provides extensive illustrations--ranging from Sumer, Ur, Babylon, Egyptian, Early Mycenean, Hebrew, and even Mayan and Asian cultures--that support his theory of the bicameral mind. But he mainly focuses on Mycenean (Greek) material--and it is this material which we will examine mostly in this post.

Jaynes bluntly declares "There is in general no consciousness in the ILIAD." Analyzing Homer's great epic, Jaynes came to the conclusion that the characters of the Trojan siege did not have conscious minds, no introspection, as we know it in the modern human. [Julian Jaynes, THE ORIGIN OF CONSCIOUSNESS IN THE BREAKDOWN OF THE BICAMERAL MIND, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1976, p. 69]

Whether Achilles or Agamemnon, there was no sense of subjectivity. Rather they were men whom the gods pushed about like robots. The gods sang epics through their lips. Jayne declares that these Iliadic heroes heard "voices," real speech and directions from the gods--as clearly as those diagnosed epileptic or schizophrenic today.

Jaynes stresses that the Iliadic man did not possesses subjectivity as we do--rather "he had no awareness of his awareness of the world, no internal mind-space to introspect upon." This mentality of the Myceneans, Jaynes calls the bicameral mind. [Ibid, p. 75]

Now what was this bicameral mind? Jaynes briefly discusses brain biology--in that there are three speech areas, for most located in the left hemisphere. They are: (1) the supplemental motor cortex; (2) Broca's area; and (3) Wernicke's area. Jaynes focuses on Wernicke's area, which is chiefly the posterior part of the left temporal lobe. It is Wernicke's area that is crucial for human speech.

Pursuing the bicameral mind, Jaynes focuses on the corpus callosum, the major inter-connector between the brain's hemispheres. In human brains the corpus callosum can be likened to a small bridge, a band of transverse fibers, only slightly more than one-eighth of an inch in diameter. This bridge "collects from most of the temporal lobe cortex but particularly the middle gyrus of the temporal lobe in Wernicke's area." And it was this bridge that served as the means by which the "gods" who dwelled in one hemisphere of the human brain were able to give "directions" to the other hemisphere. It is like thinking of the "two hemispheres of the brain almost as two individuals." Hence the bicameral mind! [Ibid, p. 117]

Archaic humans were ordered and moved by the gods through both auditory hallucinations and visual hallucinations. The gods mainly "talked" to them--but sometimes "appeared," such as Athene appeared to Achilles. And "when visual hallucinations occur with voices, they are merely shining light or cloudy fog, as Thetis came to Achilles or Yahwey to Moses." [Ibid, p. 93]

Jaynes believes in the mentality of the early Mycenean that volition, planning and initiative were literally organized with no consciousness whatsoever. Rather such volition was "told" to the individual--"sometimes with the visual aura of a familiar friend or authority figure or 'god,' or sometimes as a voice alone." [Ibid, p. 75]

Now Jaynes thinks the great agricultural civilizations that spread over much of the Near East by 5000 b.c.e. reflected the bicameral mind. These civilizations were rigid theocracies! They were reminiscent of the Queen Bee and the bee-hive. These bicameral societies reflected "hierarchies of officials, soldiers, or works, inventory of goods, statements of goods owed to the ruler, and particular to gods." [Ibid, p. 80]

Jaynes contests that such theocracies were the only means for a bicameral civilization to survive. Circumventing chaos, these rigid hierarchies allowed for "lesser men hallucinating the voices of authorities over them, and those authorities hallucinating yet higher ones, and so" to kings and gods. [Ibid, p. 79]

According to Julian Jaynes, "the idols of a bicameral world are the carefully tended centers of social control, with auditory hallucinations instead of pheromones." [Ibid, p. 144]

In these ancient bicameral societies the idol or the statue was literally the god, so says Jaynes. The god/goddess had its own house. It was usually the center of a temple complex. The size varied according to the importance of the god and, of course, the wealth of the city.

In these theocracies the owner of the land was the divine idol--and the people were the tenants. The steward-king served the god by administrating the god's estates. According to cuneiform texts, the gods also enjoyed eating, drinking, music and dancing. They required beds for sleeping and connubial visits from other gods. They (the statues) were washed and dressed, driven around on special occasions. Ceremony and ritual evolved around these idols.

The collapse of the bicameral mind came slowly, it was a slow erosive breakdown. But Jaynes spotted the first serious indications of collapse by the time of Egypt's Middle Kingdom, around 1700 b.c.e. Authority had started to crumble--and due to this Egypt had to re-unify itself, hence the Middle Kingdom.

Jaynes considers that this slow collapse was caused by natural disasters, such as the Santorini volcanic explosion that devastated many Greek islands. Migration of different peoples into new areas disrupted the bicameral societies already in place. Conquest over peoples by others resulted in further collapse. And writing gradually eroded the "auditory authority of the bicameral mind." [Ibid, pp. 208, 212-213, 220]

Jaynes felt a real tipoff of this bicameral breakdown could be discerned in the Babylonian lines: "My god has forsaken me and disappeared, My goddess has failed me and keeps at a distance... [To Marduk]

It was with this, according to Jaynes, that one could detect for the first time the mighty themes of the world religions: "Why have the gods left us? Like friends who depart from us, they must be offended. Our misfortunes are our punishments for our offenses. We go down on our knees, begging to be forgiven. And then find redemption in some return of the word of a god." [Ibid, p. 226]

For Jaynes this ruin, this bitter bicameral breakdown led to the growth of subjective consciousness in Greece. Moving from the ILIAD, Jaynes declares that Homer's ODYSSEY is unlike its predecessor. Here we have wily Odysseus, the hero of many devices, a man of a "new mentality." The ODYSSEY was about a man who was learning how to get along in a "ruined and god-weakened world." [Ibid, 272-273]

With the Golden Age of Greece, in the starstruck sixth century b.c.e., with Solon, with Thales, Anaximander, and Pythagoras, Jaynes claims we are now with human minds with whom we can feel mentally at home!

 

[Dayle Record]

I am not sure why the Jayne theory is so compelling for you, that you would deny bicameral mind, or consciousness to anyone who lived before the Odyssey was written. I don't think that the religion of the Greeks was mass Schizophrenia, brought on by miniscule connections between the right and left hemispheres of the brain.

The Greek plays, were far too insightful to be a product of non conscious beings, beings who write at all, display a high degree of sophistication, distilling passion, humor, history, math, poetry from real time to two dimensional metaphor on a page.

 

[Barbie]

Of course, Pascal's Wager works only for people who are considering the Judo-Christian-Islaamic "God" and are open to the possibility. Not to mention people who can make themselves believe something for a reward...

I agree with Dayle on the Greeks. Although they were sadly religious, they were very intelligent for their time, and deserve a lot of credit. There were definitely great conscious minds at work.

 

[loseyourname]

I am not sure why the Jayne theory is so compelling for you, that you would deny bicameral mind, or consciousness to anyone who lived before the Odyssey was written. I don't think that the religion of the Greeks was mass Schizophrenia, brought on by miniscule connections between the right and left hemispheres of the brain.

The Greek plays, were far too insightful to be a product of non conscious beings, beings who write at all, display a high degree of sophistication, distilling passion, humor, history, math, poetry from real time to two dimensional metaphor on a page.

The Greek playwrights all came well after the time of Homer. In fact, the Iliad and Odyssey actually predate Homer and are rooted in oral tradition. Homer was simply the first man to write them down. I wouldn't rely on literature to tell us whether or not a particular group of people experienced subjective consciousness in the same way we do, but it is clear from studying Greek epic poetry that they had to concept of a self. Socrates seems to be the first person to ever put forth this idea that humans are self-determined and have an aspect to their being beyond the mechanical, physical workings of their bodies. Even Aristophanes, in Clouds, mocks the Socratic idea of a spiritual self. There is evidence from earlier eastern writings that humans had previously considered themselves to be spiritual beings of some sort, but as far as being self-determined, Socrates really seems to be the first.

 

[Billy T]

I am not sure why the Jayne theory is so compelling for you, that you would deny bicameral mind, or consciousness to anyone who lived before the Odyssey was written. I don't think that the religion of the Greeks was mass Schizophrenia, brought on by miniscule connections between the right and left hemispheres of the brain. The Greek plays, were far too insightful to be a product of non conscious beings, beings who write at all, display a high degree of sophistication, distilling passion, humor, history, math, poetry from real time to two dimensional metaphor on a page.

Several points:
1) James is inventing the concept of a "bicameral mind" thus one who follows him would not "deny" it to the preconscious peoples.
2) I only found JJ very well informed both in his knowledge of ancient societies and in neurophysiology. (I don't recall for sure, but think he was head of Princeton's linguistic dept - anyway he was a "pre-Chompski" linguist - one who was more concerned with words and different languages that some innate "grammar of all mankind."

3) I am almost sure he read the old works of many societies in the original and few challenge his understanding of them. If he came to the conclusion, that the early peoples thought differently than modern man, were directed by inner voices that they assumed were Gods, etc.; I suspect he has better reason for this view than I have to disagree. Most tradition of the Bible's origin is that it is the "word of God" spoken to the writers. Apparently it is true of almost all old texts that the writer is only doing as told.

4) I tend not to know what to think about when mankind first became conscious. As far as it being required to write a good story, I doubt that. I think I once read a pretty good one, written solely by a computer. I know computers make good musics. The concept of "zombies" (not the drugged bodies of Haiti ) of philosophers discussing the "other minds" problem is a good example also of fact that a well told story is no proof of a conscious author. I also am not an expert on Greek plays, but it is my impression that the audience was not disturbed when the "deus ex machina" stepped into set thing right - perhaps that was they way it was for them in their lives, at least for their grand parents - I.e. until recently for them.

5) Dan Dennet (Consciousness Explained, et al) believes that at some unconscious level you create stories, constantly revising them, and that your consiousness is the current version you are telling yourself. If he is correct, it is obvious that you do not require consciousness to make up the story - It is the other way round - the story is making up the consciousness.

6) Again please do not take this as a defense of JJ - he is so far advanced in this area compared to me that any such effort on my part would be silly. - Read his book and decide for your self if he has a good case or not. don't prejudge him without doing so. I bet he is much better informed on the subject than you also.

 

[Les Sleeth]

I tend not to know what to think about when mankind first became conscious. As far as it being required to write a good story, I doubt that. I think I once read a pretty good one, written solely by a computer. I know computers make good musics. The concept of "zombies" (not the drugged bodies of Haiti ) of philosophers discussing the "other minds" problem is a good example also of fact that a well told story is no proof of a conscious author. I also am not an expert on Greek plays, but it is my impression that the audience was not disturbed when the "deus ex machina" stepped into set thing right - perhaps that was they way it was for them in their lives, at least for their grand parents - I.e. until recently for them.

Just a couple of small points before addressing your main idea. The computer doesn't write a story or music in the absense of consciousness since it requires programming and sophiticated machinery to do so, both of which were organized into existence by human consciousness.

Dan Dennet (Consciousness Explained, et al) believes that at some unconscious level you create stories, constantly revising them, and that your consiousness is the current version you are telling yourself. If he is correct, it is obvious that you do not require consciousness to make up the story - It is the other way round - the story is making up the consciousness.

Dennett's theory is one designed to fit his a priori beliefs about consciousness. His unconscious story building is explained by my point below.

James is inventing the concept of a "bicameral mind" . . . If he came to the conclusion, that the early peoples thought differently than modern man, were directed by inner voices that they assumed were Gods, . . . I tend not to know what to think about when mankind first became conscious.

I read James' book when it first came out, so it has been awhile. But I remember thinking then, as I still do, that humanity is still bicameral. I don't see why anyone would believe we are much different.

Do we have voices in our heads? Yep. Can we stop the voices? Nope. You can prove this by closing your eyes and attempting to make your mind stop talking. It won't shut up, and that is how it is for the vast majority of humans.

Then think about what determines much of what that internal dialogue goes on about. As we grow up, our interaction with reality (which includes parents, society, other people, pain, our own predilections, etc.) conditions us. We are encouraged to like and dislike, to fear and long for, to believe and disbelieve . . . So although we might call the voice in our head "my idea" or "my view," often it hasn't been consciously decided by the individual at all (or at least entirely).

Do we listen to our non-stop chattering mind? Yes we do, and we accept its conclusions and act on them. But if we haven't fully decided ourselves the make up of that mind, then aren't we in a sense really unconsciously listening to a "god" who tells us what to do?

It might be that ancients, lacking any understanding of how consciousness works, misunderstood their runaway minds more than we do. They might have interpreted all that chatter as a voice from God, or whatever. But I don't see it as any different than what goes on today, except we understand better that it is our own brain talking, and also some of us train and organize our minds so the educated, thoughtful person does better at reason and interpretation.

I say, until we get enough control over the mind to make it stop, we will continue to be bicameral, with one aspect of the mind enslaved to cogitating, while the receptive side sits there enthralled listening to its machinations.

Once one stills the mind, an interesting thing happens . . . unity. That is, the conscious part of us leaps to the forefront to be more fully in the experience of the moment; and that thinking aspect takes a back seat like a good servant, and waits until called on before opening its mouth.

 

[Billy T]

I don't think we have much difference in our POVs. but...

Just a couple of small points before addressing your main idea. The computer doesn't write a story or music in the absense of consciousness since it requires programming and sophiticated machinery to do so, both of which were organized into existence by human consciousness.

Certainly both the computer and the software are the product of human consciousness, but the point was that the author of the story need not be conscious. The existence of greek produced stories, music and plays was being advance as proof that the greeks were conscious. I was just refuting this argument. The guy/gals who designed to computer and those that wrote the story/ music/ play writing software could all be dead and yet the computer, with no consciousness at all, could still be cranking out story/ music/ plays - that was my point - No consciousness required for this type of activity - hence claiming it is, is a bad argument.

Dennett's theory is one designed to fit his a priori beliefs about consciousness. His unconscious story building is explained by my point below.

I don't really care why he wrote it. It was just more convenient, well know evidence, if he is anywhere near right, that production of stories is not good evidence for the existence of consciousness. Again, I am not arguing that JJ is correct - only that the arguments based on story production agains JJ are very weak, if they have any force at all.

I read James' book when it first came out, so it has been awhile. But I remember thinking then, as I still do, that humanity is still bicameral. I don't see why anyone would believe we are much different.

Me too. Me too. I doubt JJ would claim that there has been any significant change in the physiology of the brain. I think he is claiming, as you basically do, that we understand the "voice" we hear differently; however, I think he was saying that the ancients were more like modern schizophrenics, in that they thought their voices came from real external sources.

Then think about what determines much of what that internal dialogue goes on about. As we grow up, our interaction with reality (which includes parents, society, other people, pain, our own predilections, etc.) conditions us. We are encouraged to like and dislike, to fear and long for, to believe and disbelieve . . . So although we might call the voice in our head "my idea" or "my view," often it hasn't been consciously decided by the individual at all (or at least entirely).

Perhaps you should make some comments like this in my thread ("What Price Free Will") Your reasons and my understanding of Physics and Biology are what lead me to believe for many years that genuine free will was impossible - that we only have the illusion of making real choices. See attachment to post 1 of that thread to learn why I have recently changed my view (and learn the price I am willing to pay for genuine free will).

...

 

[Les Sleeth]

. . . the point was that the author of the story need not be conscious. The existence of greek produced stories, music and plays was being advance as proof that the greeks were conscious. I was just refuting this argument. The guy/gals who designed to computer and those that wrote the story/ music/ play writing software could all be dead and yet the computer, with no consciousness at all, could still be cranking out story/ music/ plays - that was my point - No consciousness required for this type of activity - hence claiming it is, is a bad argument.

I suppose we'll have to disagree. As far as I am concerned, the argument that a creative story (such as the Greeks wrote) can come about unconsciously is not demostrated with a computer program that can write creatively after being designed by a conscious human to do so. IMO, for the point to be valid, I think you have to keep consciousness out of the loop entirely.

See attachment to post 1 of that thread to learn why I have recently changed my view (and learn the price I am willing to pay for genuine free will).

Okay, I'll check it out.

 

[Billy T]

I suppose we'll have to disagree. As far as I am concerned, the argument that a creative story (such as the Greeks wrote) can come about unconsciously is not demostrated with a computer program that can write creatively after being designed by a conscious human to do so. IMO, for the point to be valid, I think you have to keep consciousness out of the loop entirely.

Perhaps we should, just agree to disagree, but in post 56 there are 6 numbered points. (No. 1 &2 do not really refute your view - 2 is just "appeal to authority" and far be it from me to ever think that "authorities" are always right.)

However you are only responding to one of the three separate arguments in point No. 4. The unconscious computers write stories, music, and plays argument. What about some of the other points I made there in point 4?

Let me also note (expand point 4) that the type of "thought" Big Blue used to defeat the world champion chess player is not at all like his, but judged by their performence, both were playing very good chess. That is based on performance alone, you really can not infer much about the nature of the thought/ consciousness that is producing the performance. You could claim it does not matter - thought as a mental process does not exist, but that behaviorist view not only is out of style, it has been destroyed, especially by linguists, even linguists like JJ, instead of like Chompski. Until you address this and the two independent other arguments in point 4 and some of the other points, I will continue to think you have a very weak case for rejecting JJ's claim - Again I a not trying to say he is correct - only that he knows a lot more about it than I do and makes a pretty good case as far as I can judge. I am quite convinced it is an honest case in that his facts about what is to be found in the ancient writings, and how their societies were organized around their god kings is correct. Something relatively unique did happen to the way man thought with the later Greeks. JJ's idea may be right, even though it is hard to believe.

 

[moving finger]

Pascal, a very firm believer in a very minor sect, had an interesting POV on how one should act on the alternatives: If God does not exist it won't matter if I believe in him. If he does, then I had better. The "best alternative" is clear.

aka Pascal's wager.
Fine if you are just worried about divine retribution and are happy to be a hypocrite. I would like to think that humankind can rise above that kind of thing - have the courage of your convictions.

MF