[NonDualPhil] pietsky patsky

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 3/30/05 2:58:06 AM, ombhurbhuva writes:

 

 

> M: What Pete seems to be proposing is something like a mind/brain

> identity theory.  " The identity theory of mind is the theory that mental

> states and events, such as dreaming, believing, hoping, fearing, feeling

> pain, etc. are identical with certain states or processes in the central

> nervous " .(Dict.of Phil)

>

P: No. I'm not proposing that. I have never said they are identical, I have

said mental events, as those cited above and including consciousness,

are dependent on neural activity. Consciousness, like anything else,

is not self-existent, nor a primary cause of phenomenality.

 

If I propose something, is that we drop the arrogance, that any human

being can explain existence. Science only offers tentative explanations,

which seems to fit not only with daily events,

but to yield technological advances. No scientist would say, any scientific

theory is final, and that is the beauty of science, the door for further

discoveries and insights is always left open. And that is, also, the

ugliness of believing, it always closes that door behind itself.

>

> M: The principle of causal closure could itself be adduced as a negative

> proof of this. The argument goes like this. If mind and body are two

> different realms that cannot interact, the one being extended and the

> other not i.e. consciousness; then no mental state can affect a physical

> one. But this is untrue; our belief that it is going to rain makes us carry

> an umbrella. Therefore the dichotomy is a false one and mental

> events really are physical events. Causal Closure does not apply to

> mind-body events.

>

P: Notice that the above argument starts reasoning from unproved premises:

" That mind and body are two different realms that can't interact " :

 

a) We have not proven that mind is different from body.

 

b) That mind is spiritual. Mind could very well be the functioning of

the brain, as electric light is the function of a lightbulb. If, a

priori, we posit

light as spiritual, then we have an unnecessary difficulty

in accepting that it could be the product of physical phenomena.

 

c) That different realms can't interact, specially those which are

intangible, seems false.

The universe is a very egalitarian, gregarious place. Everything

that exist in it co-mingles and interacts, including such seemingly

opposite realms

as space and matter.

 

Pete

 

>

>