Are there any good arguments in favor of the view that our minds or mental states are not physical entities and cannot come from something that is physical? I'm asking just out of curiosity.
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Here in the Philosophy forum we will talk about all the "why" questions. We'll have conversations about the way in which philosophy and theology and religion interact with each other. Metaphysics, ontology, origins, truth? They're all fair game so jump right in and have some fun! But remember...play nice!
Forum Rules: Here
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Origin of the Mind/Mental States
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Originally posted by Hornet View PostAre there any good arguments in favor of the view that our minds or mental states are not physical entities and cannot come from something that is physical? I'm asking just out of curiosity.
Whether or minds can come (or emerge) from something physical however, is a more complicated question, and not as easily answerable. I'm not sure how exactly mind emerging from matter would work and I'm utterly unconvinced by the argument that a mind will eventually arise if you just get matter configured in a sufficiently complex way, but I don't have any slam dunk arguments against it's possibility.
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Originally posted by Chrawnus View PostWell, that minds and mental states are not physical entities is pretty blatantly obvious for anyone with even half a brain. A simple analysis of your own mind will clear up that question pretty quickly.
Whether or minds can come (or emerge) from something physical however, is a more complicated question, and not as easily answerable. I'm not sure how exactly mind emerging from matter would work and I'm utterly unconvinced by the argument that a mind will eventually arise if you just get matter configured in a sufficiently complex way, but I don't have any slam dunk arguments against it's possibility.
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Originally posted by Chrawnus View PostWell, that minds and mental states are not physical entities is pretty blatantly obvious for anyone with even half a brain. A simple analysis of your own mind will clear up that question pretty quickly.
Whether or minds can come (or emerge) from something physical however, is a more complicated question, and not as easily answerable. I'm not sure how exactly mind emerging from matter would work and I'm utterly unconvinced by the argument that a mind will eventually arise if you just get matter configured in a sufficiently complex way, but I don't have any slam dunk arguments against it's possibility.
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Originally posted by Sparko View PostComputer software is not physical, yet it runs on a physical chip. Think of the entire virtual worlds created on computers.
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Originally posted by Chrawnus View PostWell, that minds and mental states are not physical entities is pretty blatantly obvious for anyone with even half a brain. A simple analysis of your own mind will clear up that question pretty quickly.
Whether or minds can come (or emerge) from something physical however, is a more complicated question, and not as easily answerable. I'm not sure how exactly mind emerging from matter would work and I'm utterly unconvinced by the argument that a mind will eventually arise if you just get matter configured in a sufficiently complex way, but I don't have any slam dunk arguments against it's possibility.
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Originally posted by Chrawnus View PostI don't believe computer software actually exists in anything other than in the users consciousness. Unless a conscious mind is there to process/interpret what's on the screen it's just complexly arranged pixels that mean absolutely nothing.
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Originally posted by Sparko View Postcomputer software can run by itself and come up with solutions to problems without any one watching it or interpreting it. The software is just electrical patterns run on the chips, just like thoughts are electrical impulses run on neurons.Jorge: Functional Complex Information is INFORMATION that is complex and functional.
MM: First of all, the Bible is a fixed document.
MM on covid-19: We're talking about an illness with a better than 99.9% rate of survival.
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Originally posted by Sparko View Postcomputer software can run by itself and come up with solutions to problems without any one watching it or interpreting it. The software is just electrical patterns run on the chips, just like thoughts are electrical impulses run on neurons.
So yes, the software can run by itself, and it will result in an output of specific patterns of pixels on the screen, but there needs to be a mind to interpret those patterns, otherwise it's just meaningless noise.
When it comes thoughts being electrical impulses run on neurons I think it's pretty obvious that they are not the same. If the electrical impulses run on neurons are equal to our thoughts, it would have to follow that they had exactly the same qualities and attributes that our thoughts does, and a simple analysis of both the electrical impulses and our thoughts shows that they have hardly anything in common. If we take only two attributes of both electrical impulses and thoughts and compare them (and showing that they are different in only one aspect would be enough to demonstrate that they are not the same), we can see for example, that while thoughts have intentionality (they are about something), electrical impulses are not about anything at all. Similarly, thoughts are subjective, they cannot be accessed or experienced by anyone else but the person having them, while the electrical impulses in the brain can be measured and observed by anyone with the proper equipment.
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Originally posted by Chrawnus View PostI think we're looking at it from completely different abstraction levels. I'm saying that whatever is shown on the computer monitor as a result of a program being run doesn't mean anything by itself, it only has significance when interpreted through a human mind. It's the same with a book, those weird squiggles on the paper doesn't actually mean anything on their own, it's only when we put them in an interpretive pattern that they acquire any sort of meaning.
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Originally posted by Chrawnus View PostI think we're looking at it from completely different abstraction levels. I'm saying that whatever is shown on the computer monitor as a result of a program being run doesn't mean anything by itself, it only has significance when interpreted through a human mind.
When a tree dies in a forest and no-one sees it, does it have significance?Jorge: Functional Complex Information is INFORMATION that is complex and functional.
MM: First of all, the Bible is a fixed document.
MM on covid-19: We're talking about an illness with a better than 99.9% rate of survival.
seer: I believe that so called 'compassion' [for starving Palestinian kids] maybe a cover for anti Semitism, ...
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Originally posted by Sparko View PostI am talking from an information standpoint. The software is data and information that is not physical in nature that runs on a physical device. You were asking how something not physical could emerge from something physical. I gave you an analogy. A computer program is not physical while running. Just electrical patterns running on electronic circuits. The mind could be the same thing. The mind is the software of the brain, so to speak. If you damage the brain, you damage the mind. Or maybe the mind is entirely spiritual and the brain is some sort of conduit to connect the mind to the physical world.
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Originally posted by Chrawnus View PostI don't think software is non-physical. Or at least not immaterial in the same sense that a thought, or consciousness is. At no point between the CPU doing it's operations to information being shown on the screen is anything other happening than energy and matter interacting with each other. I don't really see how the relationship between electrical patterns running on electronic circuits and software is similar to the relationship between electrical impulses run on neurons and thoughts, mainly because I don't see how thoughts could have any similarity to software at all. I also don't think the patterns in the electronic circuit relate to software in the same way the electrical impulses relate to our thoughts.
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