The Science and Mechanics of Free Will

[untermensche]

You probably dismiss QM just as easily, I suspect.

Superposition? ''Bah, humbug'' you say? Entanglement? ''What rot is that?'' I hear you say? After all, none of this is evident in everyday experience, is it? So just as you dismiss the underlying means of of producing you and your conscious experience of the World, the activity of 'your' brain, you probably feel that you can dismiss anything that you can't experience directly...right?

Or is it a case of cherry picking?

QM represents actual knowledge.

There is NO actual knowledge of how a bunch of cells gives rise to a mind.

Thus in study after study the only knowledge of what is happening in the mind is subjective reporting.

 

[fromderinside]

There is NO actual knowledge of how a bunch of cells gives rise to a mind.

Nailed it. Finally. There is no knowledge about what gives rise to the mind.

Amazing. From the keyboards of babes.

 

[untermensche]

There is NO actual knowledge of how a bunch of cells gives rise to a mind.

Nailed it. Finally. There is no knowledge about what gives rise to the mind.

Amazing. From the keyboards of babes.

Only a fool would use their mind to express the idea there is none.

 

[DBT]

You probably dismiss QM just as easily, I suspect.

Superposition? ''Bah, humbug'' you say? Entanglement? ''What rot is that?'' I hear you say? After all, none of this is evident in everyday experience, is it? So just as you dismiss the underlying means of of producing you and your conscious experience of the World, the activity of 'your' brain, you probably feel that you can dismiss anything that you can't experience directly...right?

Or is it a case of cherry picking?

QM represents actual knowledge.

There is NO actual knowledge of how a bunch of cells gives rise to a mind.

Thus in study after study the only knowledge of what is happening in the mind is subjective reporting.

Not to mention that not knowing how brain activity forms conscious mind, which nobody disputes, does not mean that all of the available evidence supports the proposition that it is the brain and its activity that does indeed form and generate a mind. Not knowing how it is done by the brain is not the same as seeing that it is done by the brain. Which is supported by evidence.

Which you yourself have said as much....but where you fail is by going too far with your speculation that it is mind that controls or guides the brain....like something the brain is doing, which you acknowledge, takes possession of the vehicle that gives it form and function.

Which is not supported by any evidence, which you dismiss as a broken vehicle that the driver can no longer control

There lies the absurdity of your claim.

 

[untermensche]

QM represents actual knowledge.

There is NO actual knowledge of how a bunch of cells gives rise to a mind.

Thus in study after study the only knowledge of what is happening in the mind is subjective reporting.

Not to mention that not knowing how brain activity forms conscious mind, which nobody disputes, does not mean that all of the available evidence supports the proposition that it is the brain and its activity that does indeed form and generate a mind. Not knowing how it is done by the brain is not the same as seeing that it is done by the brain. Which is supported by evidence.

Which you yourself have said as much....but where you fail is by going too far with your speculation that it is mind that controls or guides the brain....like something the brain is doing, which you acknowledge, takes possession of the vehicle that gives it form and function.

Which is not supported by any evidence, which you dismiss as a broken vehicle that the driver can no longer control

There lies the absurdity of your claim.

The absurdity is in your claim.

It is absurd to claim I can't move my arm with my mind, with a thought, with a desire, with my "will".

Because I do it everyday.

It is a bizarre claim from outer space.

 

[fromderinside]

Nailed it. Finally. There is no knowledge about what gives rise to the mind.

Amazing. From the keyboards of babes.

Only a fool would use their mind to express the idea there is none.

- Confucius sez

 

[untermensche]

Only a fool would use their mind to express the idea there is none.

- Confucius sez

So does any honest human.

It is only some strange subset of humans that somehow uses their mind to conclude there is no mind.

It takes a lot of delusion to be so blind.

 

[fromderinside]

So does any honest human.

It is only some strange subset of humans that somehow uses their mind to conclude there is no mind.

It takes a lot of delusion to be so blind.

Rather than quibble about honest men I'd rather get to the nut of the problem.

So here goes. The world in which we live responds to material inputs which can be demonstrated by any number of tests. Presuming, then. it is true we live in a material world it follows that we are material beings The mind being something in that material world must have a location, a material representation, and be manipulable in material ways.

My view is that the 'mind is a collection of activity used by humans as a convenience for representing that activity as a unity for discussion sake and simplicity. DBT and I have gone to some effort to communicate to you the nature of that activity you want to call mind while at the same time you refuse to even enter into the discussion of its nature.

Its as if you believe the mind is something not material in a material world that you otherwise operate freely using that world's principles. If you can't characterize the mind as a material thing then we must conclude you are left with no argument.

QED.

 

[untermensche]

My view is that the 'mind is a collection of activity used by humans as a convenience for representing that activity as a unity for discussion sake and simplicity.

This is babble.

 

[DBT]

Not to mention that not knowing how brain activity forms conscious mind, which nobody disputes, does not mean that all of the available evidence supports the proposition that it is the brain and its activity that does indeed form and generate a mind. Not knowing how it is done by the brain is not the same as seeing that it is done by the brain. Which is supported by evidence.

Which you yourself have said as much....but where you fail is by going too far with your speculation that it is mind that controls or guides the brain....like something the brain is doing, which you acknowledge, takes possession of the vehicle that gives it form and function.

Which is not supported by any evidence, which you dismiss as a broken vehicle that the driver can no longer control

There lies the absurdity of your claim.

The absurdity is in your claim.

It is absurd to claim I can't move my arm with my mind, with a thought, with a desire, with my "will".

Because I do it everyday.

It is a bizarre claim from outer space.

Pure comedy.

What you actually do is persistently ignore the means that produces your day to day experience of conscious agency in response to stimuli, all the while just focusing on your experience....never considering that your conscious experience does not encompass the means by which it is formed and produced and therefore you cannot be aware of what is happening beneath the threshold of awareness...which you dismiss because it does not suit your belief in a mind that is autonomous, supposedly controlling the very thing that shapes and forms it.

Which is funny in a way, but also tragic.

 

[untermensche]

Pure comedy.

What you actually do is persistently ignore the means that produces your day to day experience of conscious agency in response to stimuli, all the while just focusing on your experience....never considering that your conscious experience does not encompass the means by which it is formed and produced and therefore you cannot be aware of what is happening beneath the threshold of awareness...which you dismiss because it does not suit your belief in a mind that is autonomous, supposedly controlling the very thing that shapes and forms it.

Which is funny in a way, but also tragic.

I seriously think you are coming from outer space.

Here's the second paragraph from the Wikipedia article on the mind. Of course it is not the last word on anything but here it is:

Whatever its nature, it is generally agreed that mind is that which enables a being to have subjective awareness and intentionality towards their environment, to perceive and respond to stimuli with some kind of agency, and to have consciousness, including thinking and feeling.

This conception is based on experience, not subjective interpretation of brain activity. We clearly experience the ability to move our arm at "will".

And there is no brain scan ever made that demonstrates otherwise or demonstrates the brain is fooling us somehow into thinking we are moving the arm at "will".

Of course this clear phenomena distresses those who claim they understand the mind. Since it adds another wrinkle to something that is not understood at all, how cells can create a mind that can also have an effect on those cells.

I don't think you are absorbing all I am saying about the external world forming the mind, not merely the brain. The brain is partially that which creates a mind from experience. It does other things as well.

That is the evolutionary strategy of the mammal. An evolved mind which makes sense of the world, makes actual sense, not a phony representation. You can't survive with a phony representation. And the animal is dependent on the decision making capability of that mind to survive. But the decisions are decisions never seen before. So the mind needs memory but it must be able to strategize, which is a learned skill and an artistic skill (innate).

Nobody is doubting all this mental activity has some correlation to brain activity, just as there must be some correlation between the decision making capability of the mind and brain activity. It could be one section or layer of the brain activating another. But the activity is based on conscious capricious decision, not the result of some inevitability because the brain activity preceding it forced the decision in some way. That is mere speculation which refuses to even consider the mind itself could be a mechanism because they can't in an instant understand how.

 

[DBT]

No, you still ignore the means of volition, your Wiki quote is a general reference and does not support your claim.

Volition - the cognitive process by which an organism decides on and commits to a particular course of action.


Abstract
''This review deals with the physiology of the initiation of a voluntary movement and the appreciation of whether it is voluntary or not. I argue that free will is not a driving force for movement, but a conscious awareness concerning the nature of the movement. Movement initiation and the perception of willing the movement can be separately manipulated. Movement is generated subconsciously, and the conscious sense of volition comes later, but the exact time of this event is difficult to assess because of the potentially illusory nature of introspection. Neurological disorders of volition are also reviewed. The evidence suggests that movement is initiated in the frontal lobe, particularly the mesial areas, and the sense of volition arises as the result of a corollary discharge likely involving multiple areas with reciprocal connections including those in the parietal lobe and insular cortex.'' - M . Hallett

Quote;
Subjects in this test performed exactly as if their brains were subconsciously gathering information before reaching a confidence threshold, which was then reported to the conscious mind as a definite, sure answer. The subjects, however, were never aware of the complex computations going on

 

[untermensche]

Subjects in this test performed exactly as if their brains were subconsciously gathering information before reaching a confidence threshold, which was then reported to the conscious mind as a definite, sure answer. The subjects, however, were never aware of the complex computations going on

This is not in any way an explanation of anything.

I don't know how you think you are saying anything here.

It is some obscure nothingness that is not understood in the least.

But of course stories can always be invented about what we know nothing about.

These are fables and myths you are peddling, not any kind of explanation of the mind and what the mind can do.

 

[fromderinside]

My view is that the 'mind is a collection of activity used by humans as a convenience for representing that activity as a unity for discussion sake and simplicity.

This is babble.

Is it? Why? You have offered nothing which is much less than something.

 

[fromderinside]

This is not in any way an explanation of anything.

Yet DBT offers it as a pretty sound summation of what is in the document he posted.

To date the best you've done is offer nothing at all.

What is your claim for mind?

 

[untermensche]

This is not in any way an explanation of anything.

Yet DBT offers it as a pretty sound summation of what is in the document he posted.

To date the best you've done is offer nothing at all.

What is your claim for mind?

You share his religion. That is why it makes sense to you.

But you couldn't if you tried make it make sense to somebody else.

Tell me what was specifically done in the studies he references.

Then tell me what was looked at to count as data.

I see no primary research I can peruse.

 

[Malintent]

This is babble.

Is it? Why? You have offered nothing which is much less than something.

Well, it is not so much "babble" as it is a definition by example... you have not indicated what "mind IS", but what "mind DOES".

You can pretty much define anything as "the collection of actions it does".

 

[untermensche]

This is babble.

Is it? Why? You have offered nothing which is much less than something.

I offer clarity to begin with.

The clear phenomena is the mind that has a conception of the world acting on that conception. Not acting according to the dictates of brain physiology. I drive to work because I know about the need to go and I know the way, in my mind. It is absurd to claim the brain forces me to do it in some completely unexplained way.

In some areas, voluntary movement, voluntary imagining, voluntary expression, the mind leads and the brain follows.

That is what needs to be explained.

If it is possible for humans to do it. Humans are of course animals with limitations.

 

[DBT]

Is it? Why? You have offered nothing which is much less than something.

I offer clarity to begin with

No you haven't. You ignore anything that doesn't suit your belief and rinse and repeat your belief in an inexplicably autonomous mind. All the while asserting that nothing is known about the mind or what it can or cannot do!! You call that clarity?

 

[untermensche]

I offer clarity to begin with

No you haven't. You ignore anything that doesn't suit your belief and rinse and repeat your belief in an inexplicably autonomous mind. All the while asserting that nothing is known about the mind or what it can or cannot do!! You call that clarity?

I have not ignored anything. I have disputed claims about very limited data.

I have disputed invented stories from specks of data.

I have disputed the astrology of this.

Abstract
''This review deals with the physiology of the initiation of a voluntary movement and the appreciation of whether it is voluntary or not. I argue that free will is not a driving force for movement, but a conscious awareness concerning the nature of the movement. Movement initiation and the perception of willing the movement can be separately manipulated. Movement is generated subconsciously, and the conscious sense of volition comes later, but the exact time of this event is difficult to assess because of the potentially illusory nature of introspection. Neurological disorders of volition are also reviewed. The evidence suggests that movement is initiated in the frontal lobe, particularly the mesial areas, and the sense of volition arises as the result of a corollary discharge likely involving multiple areas with reciprocal connections including those in the parietal lobe and insular cortex.'' - M . Hallett

What is the actual data here?

I don't care about the invented stories.