John Page

Because I am your worst nightmare (as they say in the movies )

To selectively summarize your post, the mind is the part of us that knows itself and the body is the part that provides the mind representations. Care to offer criteria to be satisfied for something to "know itself"?

Cheers, John

John Page

I would venture that our "will" is a phenomenon of mind that obtains an advantage over weaker willed or passive beings. Its origins - evolutionary, I would suppose.

Cheers, John

WJ

John!

The only issue is that there is no scientific evidence ethics and/or sentience [not to mentioned consciousness from inert matter] has evolved. Perhaps it is best to leave it at phenomenology or some other explaination...

BTW, I'm still not worthy...glad to see you back!

cookoocachoo,
walrus

John Page

I think that "will" is inherent. An internal combustion engine works by converting the energy of burning gases into rotational motion - no will is required. Why do we need to be? No reason, all that is required is that we continue to want to be.

That the experience of personal tragedy can destroy this desire to continue to "want to be" seems good evidence pointing towards the mental/emotional mind state as the custodian of will.

Is there any evidence that inert matter has consciousness? Or is your issue how such inert matter can be the only constituent of animate, conscious, beings?

Cheers, John

DRFseven

Hi, John Page. There has to be a way for thinking behavior to have evolved from the responsiveness of flat worms to people making decisions about what action to take. Why would we assume that there's "something else" in there interacting with the neural firing? From what would that something else have evolved? Doesn't the flat worm have a "will", even if it doesn't have a way to know it?

John Page

Hi DRF!

Yes, thanks, very succinctly put. The "will" is inherent.

Cheers, John

WJ

"No reason, all that is required is that we continue to want to be."

"That the experience of personal tragedy can destroy this desire to continue to "want to be" seems good evidence pointing towards the mental/emotional mind state as the custodian of will."

Guys, what makes the will "inherent"? Could the essence of the will exist outside the body, then? And are there 'inherent' forces (contained in the stream) that precludes higher levels of consciousness from complete extinction?

In other words, what prevents suicide as part of the will, *not* to be? And who/what is the custodian?

I'm trying to attack the border issue from an ethical perspective and/or the will (to live and be).

Walrus

Mr. Sammi

John, an appropriate question. I have to adjust my knowledge base to form a coherent reply, of course that starts out as my brand of coherent reply. I hope you also smoke menthols.

To know itself must first commence without being blind to itself. Then the ability to initiate independent verification processes AND to incorporate the results of independent stimulus in order to compound the "inkling of itself". Finally the ability through simultaneity to combine all available parts (internal simultaneity).

This knowing could be (as you stated) a persistence of representations implying what is available through use of itself. An evolution from a preliminary knowing which may have been thrust upon us and evolves as we interact with the flow of experience.

A state of being self-conscious IS NOT BEING BLIND TO THE SELF.

I thought you were going to ask HOW COME I CAN THINK I KNOW YOU electronically? Could it be representation identicals...

Sammi Na Boodie ()

Ierrellus

John,

Yes, what I was looking for when I came up with the stupid phrase "organic dynamics" was the simple word "process".

I wish I had a memory. I do not have a good one on account of low serotonin; and my computer does not have one from the mechanical equivalent. Otherwise, I would refer to the really good posts on this thread.

There is an old story from the 1930's. Grandpa listens to the radio and says, "How the hell did they get this orchestra in that box?" I think the same way, wondering how sound and image can travel over a wave. The answer to granpa and me is that sight and sound can be broken down into electronic impulses, which can be restored to the original sounds and sights. So far this technique works only on the human senses that can operate on data at a distance. these are sight, sound and hearing. And these are the ones neuroscientists have explored to great advantage.

IMO, the internal voices and pictures must be explored as translations of data. Science knew a quantum leap only after discoveries of how to extend the spectra of the senses mechanically. We now have PET scans that can show what your brain is doing while you are thinking. The picture you get is explosions of light in the areas of the brain where glucose (brain food) is utilized. The translation come from decoding brain activity into standard emotions, etc.

In college I had a German professor who taught French and spoke in English. We asked him in what language did he think. He said he thought in German, his native tongue. So, perhaps chimpanzees think in chimpanzee (their local dialect) and must learn translation in order to figure out what humans want them to say in human terms.

In short, the translation from impulse to image has already been established.

Ierrellus

John Page

Hi Walrus!

The need to survive.

I would turn this round - what stimulates suicide against the need to survive. I think we have learned altruistic behavior that causes individuals to dispense with themselves when they perceive a low self-worth, that they are a burden on society, not contributing etc. These traits are useful for group survival.

Interesting, I never thought of a purely behavioral approach. Hmmmm. How about a mind being minimally defined as that that process within a body that causes the body to survive either individually, through group action with its genus or through replication. This would cause me to consider, for example, what is the mind of a single-cell organism. Does its DNA activity constitute a form of mental capacity?

Take a peek at <a href="http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/protista/slimemolds.html" target="_blank">Slime Molds</a>, especially the cellular slime molds that aggregate into a multi-celled organism under certain conditions.

Cheers, John