philechat

Unfounded assertion. If you are deprived of any sensation (including touch), and you are not experiencing your sensation at all, would you even be aware of your own existence? This is what I am asking. And how so?
How so? Because we can be awake without knowing that I am? The logic does not follow again. This "evidence" is showing the exact opposite: That we have sensual awareness before "self-awareness", which is an integration of sensual awareness.
When chimpanzees are placed in front of the mirror with a dot on its face, it knows that the dot is on it's own face and try to remove it from the location of its own face, not from the face of its mirror image. On the other hand, gorillas and monkeys treated the mirror-image as another individual.
Again, what is that "something higher"? Is it outside their mind or inside their mind? If it be inside (which I think it is, given that most people lack the ability to be spontaneously aware of the theory of relativity), it only affirms a higher intelligence about these scientists. An average joe could never come up with this "divine" awareness, no matter how much he prayed to God.
Because they haven't "think" about it? Sometimes extensive thinking and accumulation of thoughts are needed to reach a breaking point that a logical flaw was detected. Hardly special--like the way I solve math problems, it requires time and extensive attention devoted to the thinking process.
Not necessary. Heard of self-delusion? People being forced to confess what they have not done, and they began to believe in it?
There are extensive psychological research papers about it.
Then how can you convince others if it be illogical? The whole thing is a non sequitur. You can't say "it's true" and get away with it without having a logical delineation between the two ideas.
Because if you don't your species will become extinct. It is an instinct that is built in our own thinking process because it was what made us existing now in the first place.
Not true again. Not only do psychopaths do not feel this "conscience-thingy", they showed an impaired ability to learn an experimental task involving pain. Normal people learned much faster than psychopaths when punishments were involved in getting the wrong answers.
I was just stating the facts.

yguy

It would be difficult to verify that there is always self-awareness during physical unconsciousness because such episodes are not always remembered - but many people report seeing things, real or imagined, in such instances, which suggests some level of consciuosness.

I think it does. It means that sensory input is not sufficient for awareness.

How does the evidence show that?

I'm not sure this qualifies as comparable to human self-awareness, which enables realization. I see no evidence that chimps can realize anything.

Both.

If you mean a plumber wouldn't have discovered calculus, you are correct, of course; but that is only because he is not interested in math. Within his own field of interest, he is capaple of innovation.

People have spent years in psychoanalysis and gotten worse. Why?

How much thinking does it take for a drunkard to see that he's using alchohol as an escape? None. All it takes is seeing.

That's because they lost contact with their consciences - allowed the will of another person or persons to be substituted for it.

The way you stated it, it is illogical, but you have miscontrued my meaning. Because B does not follow from A doesn't mean that B is not true, it only means that it cannot be deduced from A. If you are looking for some fact from which it CAN be deduced, it may not exist, because logic inevitably takes us to the unprovable.

Then why are there people who don't give a damn whether their own children live or die, much less the species?

What I'm missing is how this contradicts what I said.

philechat

Yes, and we called it hallucinations--not self-awareness.
No. Only that sensory input comes before awareness. Awareness is the integration of different sensory inputs.
That sensory input preceeds awareness, not the other way around. Otherwise we will have awareness before sensory input, which is backwards given the evidence you used.
But doesn't it mean that the difference is only quantitative? That is, there is at least some level of self-awareness in Chimpanzees such that it can recognize itself in a mirror.
Occam's Razor violated. Unless you have evidence to show that internal processes and superior intelligence are insufficient for explaining the realization process of the scientists, Occam's Razor dictates that the more parsimonious idea of it being an internal process alone can explain the evidence.
You think an average plumber can discover calculus if he was sufficiently interested in it? Hardly true. Similar to say a person who is interested in basketball--only a few people can become masters of it when they have interest in a given subject. In the same note, the number of wanna-be poets will always outnumber the great poets, not by interest but by ability.
Individual differences, maybe? Some might get it quicker than others...because of their different mind-set or emotional condition in the beginning.
No. They went through the process and finally discovered that what they do logically violates what they wanted to do. Some thoughts are still involved, as well as a right emotional state.
You speak as if human consciousness is a stable entity. No, people believe weird things because either their thinking hardware was fucked up, or that they have been brainwashed, no matter how out of touch with reality they are...ever heard of schizophrenia?
Yes. So now give me an assumption that is logical, and deduce logically from A to B, instead of asserting it be true with that speculative leap you are famous for. A piece of work is not going to be accepted to any scientific or philosophical journal if you could not even explain how you proceed from point A to B.
Because of recessive genes that were not completely wiped out? Or that they had another reproductive strategy (such as hyper-sexuality in psychopaths)?
I.e. Could psychopaths have some mis-wiring in their brains? Could the idea of "conscience" be included in the nervous system of a human being? Because you have said psychopaths chose to be psychopaths, I am showing you evidence about them being born that way, by nature without the concept of "conscience".

yguy

You're missing the point. If something is there to be perceived, someone is there to perceive it.

How does it follow from the fact that a person can be awake and yet not aware that sensory input comes before awareness?

If you really think there is no qualitative difference between realizing something and knowing yourself from your reflection in a mirror, I don't know what to tell you.

Try to imagine how little I care.

But on what basis do you claim that the idea of God is less simple than the idea that intelligence could come essentially from nothing? Sure, there's one more entity involved, but that is a decidedly superficial "complication" considering the intellectual convolutions you have to go through to explain it without God.

I said he could be innovative in his own field, not mathematics.

Your missing the point. The invention of the cotton gin was not of the stature of the discovery Einstein made, but it was innovation none the less, made of the same stuff.

But some not only never get it, they get worse.

They suffered until the pain woke them up.

But people can realize that intellectually and not change a whit.

People only become brainwashed through their wrong reactions to whoever the tyrants are in their lives.

Sure. That has not been shown to be, at its root, a neurological phenomenon.

But don't you understand that if I gave you that, it would be equally vulnerable to deconstruction, as every assertion is?

Is it not clear to you that logic always runs into a dead end if you drive it far enough?

Whoops.

You are grasping at straws - violating the principle behind Occam's razor, in fact - trying to avoid the obvious conclusion that some people are evil.

I admitted that possibility. I doubt that it's a hardware problem.

philechat

I never disagree with it. I am saying that to be "aware" of ourselves perceiving something, the sensory input from something into our mind must exist first.
He assumes he is awake because there is sensory input coming into his sensory organs, that is to speak.
Argument from incredulity? Try again.
Then go on with your fuzzy thinking and speculations and conspiracy theories.
From not multiplying entities needlessly. Where does God come from? Is God (a being that is intellectually superior to the universe) just "is"? What about the universe just existing?

Intellectual convolutions? You still need to explain the entire "why does the animals suffer if it were humans that sinned" deal. Or "How does our brain works, as conceived by God"? To say "God just knows how it works" is not an explanation.
But you also said that a janitor who was sufficiently interested in Mathematics could become like Einstein. Not to mention the number of graduate students who majored in physics but came out with no unique contributions at all.
It is innovation. But I am saying that one has an inborn ability in a certain subject which cannot be succumbed by interest. As you said, "If you mean a plumber wouldn't have discovered calculus, you are correct, of course; but that is only because he is not interested in math." I am giving you that even if an average plumber is sufficiently interested in math, he cannot become Newton or Einstein.
Yes, individual differences. How does it violate my ideas?
Yes, it requires a certain emotional state to "wake up" from pain. Sometimes depression medications are needed.
Yes, because their emotional state did not permit them to. Often extensive psychological treatments are needed for this kind of addiction.
Not wrong reations. It is hard-wired fear of death. The way we handed money to the robber who held a gun at our heads.
It is a neurological phenomenon. Read up the extremely extensive psychological research papers on schizophrenia, can't you? Not only is there genetic predisposition on schizophrenia, there is a drastic change in the dophamin/seretonin levels in the patients' brain when it occurred.
As I say, let's try your "leap" to any scienctific or philosophical journals, won't you? They will enjoy it, I am certain.
Have I not said that psychopaths will be considered "evil" by most people because they are harmful to our own instinct of self-preservation? "Evil" by intersubjective standard, that is.
Then doubt. It's none of my business how much of recent psychological research you want to ignore.

yguy

I never said anything about awareness of perception. It is possible to be aware of your own existence without sensory input.

Then how is it that he is able to receive that same sensory input and remain unaware that he is awake?

A meaningless question since, as the Creator of time, He is outside it.

Patently absurd. Human ingenuity has yet to construct anything so complex as an amoeba, yet the complexity of it could not be duplicated by 100 Einsteins could design in 100 years. I'm guessing the universe would be a substantially longer project.

No I don't, because I haven't taken it upon myself to change your belief.

Of course it isn't. I'll explain it when you explain how the universe either came about through random occurrences or "just is", and yet tiniest piece of it under a microscope reveals unimaginable complexity of design.

Sure. Not with that stature, perhaps, but with the same quality, if not magnitude, of insight.

You said they got better through a thought process. If that's the case, why doesn't analysis make them get better? Could it be that the analysis ITSELF is part of the problem?

Then why do some people not succumb to that fear?

And how has it been determined that the increased incidence of it within an extended family is mainly due to DNA changes rather than, for instance, living with a parent who is schizophrenic?

And that change was caused by...?

philechat

How do you know? Since we are babies we are constantly exposed to sensory inputs. We interpret "a certain sensory state" as being awake, while the other sensory states imply we are not awake. The knowledge of us being "aware of ourselves" come much later than our sensory awareness.
Because a certain brain state is required for us to be aware of our wakefulness, that is. A given brain state is required to be awake, to be interpreted as awake.
But when he act, he must participate in time. This God outside of time not only forbids human free will, but also forbids his own action. The EoG forum has much more detailed discussion on the idea of God outside of time and its effect on our free will. Note every "action" must imply displacement in time.
Yes, but my question is, why assume God just is if he is even more complex than the universe? Wouldn't it be more incredible to have a being more complex than the universe to exist?
Then we are just debating for fun, aren't we? I have never assumed I can change your belief. Conversion or deconversion is something that is dependent on your state of mind.
How do you know the Universe only act randomly? Why can't the universe be by itself subject to its own nature, its nature being orderly, according to a given principle such as the conservation of energy?
Here I disagree. Just to give you the example of wanna-be poets and the great poets. Why, given the same amount of interest, were certain poets great, while others could only publish them on the internet by themselves, hundreds or thousands of them even, without the possibility of creating anything comparable to say Yeats? And not once be recognized by the American Poetry Review or other prestigious literary magazines?
Some people are either not intelligent enough to figure them out, or had a wrong emotonal state to get better through thinking. Analysis will only work with certain people.
Some are braver, physically stronger, or even...depressed? Individual differences again.
Because among adopted children, their instances of schizophrenia are closer to their biological parents than their adoptive parents, showing the negligible influences from the environment on the instances of schizophrenia.
Because of this change in brain chemicals, their behaviors and thought processes change. Not the other way around that is to speak. Their genes predispose them to have this change of chemical levels in their brain.

yguy

I've been unconscious. In one particular instance, I didn't know where I was, couldn't see or hear or feel anything - but I knew I was there.

Where do you get that idea? Ultrasound has revealed twins playing with each other in the womb. If the twins are aware of each other, why can't they be aware of themselves?

And how do you know this state is a cause rather than an effect?

How so?

Where do you get that idea?

How?

Hardly. Who is more complex, the computer or its builder?

I don't think it does.

That makes no sense.

The rules of chess were obviously fabricated by someone. Physical laws are rather more complex.

Perhaps their interest was not really theirs, inculcated instead by peer pressure or some such.

But why do some people become braver under duress while some become more cowardly?

Are you saying there is a direct correlation between a certain gene(s) and schizophrenia, i.e., every schizophrenic has that gene?

And how do you know the gene is the cause of the chemical imbalance, rather than merely a coexisting but not causative factor?

philechat

Even the sense of touch? Or muscles relaxing or tightening?

Monkeys are aware of each other when they lived in a pack, and so did most veterbrates. Self-awareness is not present in those animals, so why do you assume the twins playing to each other to be self-aware?
As I said before, what occurs first must be the cause when there is a causal relation involved, not the effect.
If God is outside of time, he is aware of the past, present, and future at once. If he is aware of our future we can act only according to what God is aware of as our future.

All action must occur "in time" in the physical universe because action implies displacement with time. That is, if God is outside of time, he must become "inside time" when he performs an action in the physical universe.
You are assuming a builder here, while I am implying this "computer" requires no builder. You presumes the universe to be purely machanistic, which I disagree. In my opinion, the universe is organic and changes by its own nature.
Then we agree.
Yes, but wouldn't the laws that constitute God's laws to be even more complex? Why can't we assume the universe as subjecting to its own nature while we can assume God to be subject to His own nature? Note also that the universe is not inside time as you will assume (since time is not a property independent of the universe) , the changes of the universe itself constitutes time by its spatial arrangement and activities, as supposed by the theory of relativity.
This is ridiculous. Does interest alone makes one great? No. Genius is hard-wired. When Mozart composed he breezed through his composition, knowing exactly where each note should be. On the other hand, an average composition student, no matter how diligent and enthusiastic he is in his endeavor, scratched his head for years trying to squeeze some passable tunes. It is similar for wanna-be poets--some committed suicide for not able to be great, others continue to write and submit their works, just to be rejected again and again (someone I know). As fruitless as Sisyphus himself, if you wanted to know. Some talents are inborn, unfortunately, and enthusiasm by itself is hardly enough...and the way you said they do not try hard enough and are only doing it for peer pressure--why don't you ask those failed artists themselves? Check yourself on how much they will be insulted by your comments.
Different wirings of the brain and different muscle mass, apparently?
Most likely, yes.
It comes from the process of elimination. We may suggest a number of factors, and then eliminate the less explanatory ones by producing control experiments. The scientific method suggests that if the control experiment (say from those not having the gene) shows negative results (they don't have schizophrenia), and the actual experiment (say those having the gene) shows positive results (they have schizophrenia), the hypothesis of causation can be established.

yguy

Nothing. Darkness and me.

Why would I assume otherwise, since I know that awareness is independent of sensory input? Even at that, fetuses are known to react to external stimuli. They can't form thoughts, but those aren't necessary for self-awareness. Actually, the more you are involved in thought, the less self-aware you are.

But the unacknowledged assumption is that the brainwave activity is the ultimate cause for awareness. You have no basis for this belief beyond ignorance of a more fundamental cause.

You presume the events of universal history are predetermined. I don't buy that. God can let events run their course according to the freewill of His creatures. Being outside the time stream, He can intervene without being IN time.

He would have been happy, for instance, to have been surprised by Adam doing the right thing.

What do you mean, displacement in time?

Why?

I presume no such thing. God is in every electron, every photon, every neutrino... That, in my opinion, is why the motions of these particles are so unpredictable.

You are assuming everything has to have a creator. And you're right. What you are missing is that God is not a thing.

What does it mean for anything to be subject to it's own nature? I am limited by my nature, but I didn't give myself my nature. If I had, I wouldn't have given it any limits. So, to say I am subject to my nature is really to say I am subject to whatever gave me that nature. And to say God is subject to His own nature is to say He is subject to something higher than Himself.

You completely missed the point.

Nope. They're just not dumb enough to subject themselves to evil.

That means you don't know.

Same thing. An elaborate, mechanistic guessing game which completely misses the possibility that schizophrenia is, at least in some cases, the result of overreaction to some sociological or psychological stress. In such cases, of course, drugs which mask the symptoms are nothing but band-aids.