34517Y136 Another Way To Dismiss Mind&Consciousnes

Q&@
ANOTHER WAY TO DISMISS MIND AND CONSCIOUSNESS
IS TO DENY THEIR RELEVANCE RATHER THAN THEIR EXISTENCE.
SOME SCIENTISTS - such as Daniel Dennett & Stanislas Dehaene - argue that all
relevant questions can be answered by studying brain activities, without any recourse to subjective experiences.
So scientists can safely delete 'mind', 'consciousness' & 'subjective experiences' from their vocabulary & articles.
However, as we can see now in the following pages, the whole edifice of modern politics and ethics is built upon
subjective experiences, and few ethical dilemmas can be solved by referring strictly to brain activities...............
For example, what's wrong with torture or rape? From a purely neurological perspective when a human is raped
or tortured certain biochemical reactions happen in the brain, & various electrical signals move from one bunch
of neurons to another. What could possible be wrong with that? Most modern people have ethical qualms about
torture and rape because of the subjective experiences involved! If any scientist wants to argue that subjective
experiences are irrelevant, their challenge is to explain why torture or rape are wrong without reference to any
objective experience? And finally, some scientists concede that consciousness is real and may actually have
great moral & political value, but that it fulfils no biological function whatsoever! Consciousness is the biological
Useless By-product of Certain Brain Processes! Jet engines roar loudly, but the noise doesn't propel the plane
forward through the air. Humans don't need carbon dioxide, but each & every breath fills the air with more of
the stuff. Similarly, consciousness may be a kind of mental pollution produced by the firing of complex neural
networks. It doesn't do anything? It is just there! If this is true, it implies that all the pain & pleasure experienced
by billions of creatures for millions of years is just mental pollution?! This is certainly a thought worth thinking,
even if it isn't true! But it is quite amazing to realise that as of 2016/'19, this is the best theory of consciousness
that contemporary science has to offer us? Maybe the life sciences view the problem from the wrong angle........
They believe that life is all about data processing, and that organisms are machines for making calculations, taking
decisions. However, this analogy between organisms & algorithms might mislead us?! In the 19th century, scientists
described brains & minds as if they were steam engines!? Why steam engines? Because that was THÉ LEADING technology of the day,
which powered trains, ships, factories, so when humans tried to explain life, théy assumed it must work according to analogous princi-ples! Mind & body are made of pipes, cylinders, valves & pistons that build & release pressure, thereby producing movements & actions! Such thinking had a deep influence even on Freudian psychology, which is why much of our psychological jargon us still replete with all kinds of concepts borrowed from mechanical engineering......... In short, we've been 'copying' each other from the very tiniest beings to the greatest bodies on earth: viruses, atoms, molecules, 'organisms', plants, weeds, trees, bushes, fish, birds, reptiles, mammals and what not? Genesis' stories about creations by Arabs, Assyrians, Babyloneans, Brahmans, Chaldeans, Chinese, drugs, economics, fire, silver, gold, hip hop, Indians, Jews, diamonds, Kelts, Longobards, Mongols, Negroes, old priests, queers, rebelrousers, strangers, terrorists, universals & vast winning xenophobes, yuppies & immeasurable types of zombies through all millennia in strange ànd common places
'4AllOfUs'?
06 mei 2019 - bewerkt op 11 mei 2019 - meld ongepast verhaal
Weet je zeker dat je dit verhaal wilt rapporteren? Ja | Nee
Profielfoto van Asih
Asih, man, 79 jaar
   
Log in om een reactie te plaatsen.   vorige volgende