IUBio

machine brains

Malcolm McMahon malcolm at pigsty.demon.co.uk
Wed Jan 20 18:57:10 EST 1999


On Wed, 20 Jan 1999 08:30:29 -0500, "Ray Scanlon" <rscanlon at wsg.net>
wrote:

>As a starting point we take the position that the soul (mind) has no causal
>powers. The soul is completely extraneous to our explanation of brain
>activity. The brain would act just as well with no soul present, but an
>explanation of brain activity that ignores the soul will not satisfy many
>people. We wish to say, "When these neurons are active, we have decided". We
>have not decided, our brain has decided but we experience the active neurons
>and say  we did.
>

But if this were so, a soul existed, so to speak, as a pure observer
without the capacity to influence the brain, then the obvious question
is, how could we be having this conversation? How can we _talk_ about
the experience of being conscious.




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