Originally posted by seer
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Two points,
1. In cases when the brain makes the decision before awareness, in this case 10 seconds, why is it necessary for us to have conscious awareness before we actually act?
2. Which leads to the conclusion that conscious awareness is a necessary part of the process, if not why wouldn't the act happen before awareness?
1. In cases when the brain makes the decision before awareness, in this case 10 seconds, why is it necessary for us to have conscious awareness before we actually act?
2. Which leads to the conclusion that conscious awareness is a necessary part of the process, if not why wouldn't the act happen before awareness?
1. It isn't necessary. That's why people sleep walk, and can even commit homicide while unconscious. And that's why you can do things automatically without having to think about it. You cannot based your science on your personal experience. It isn't reliable. We feel that our consciousness drives the body, but science has shown this to be false. The brain causes consciousness. Every test shown has shown that something happens in the brain before we decide anything. As neuroscientist Christof Koch says, "the standard conception of free will, that has the soul hovering above the brain and making it "freely" decide this way or that, is an illusion. It simply does not work at the conceptual or empirical level."
2. You've reached a false conclusion because your premise was false. Conscious awareness is not a necessary part of the process.
And you never answered any of my questions. Basically this is how you operate:
Step 1: ask the atheist a bunch of questions and demand they be fully answered
Step 2. if they are answered pretend they weren't and keep asking them, or change the subject
Step 3. if they weren't answered proclaim that atheism/materialism etc. is false
Step 4. when the atheist asks a bunch of questions, either refuse to answer, or eventually retort to "I believe it on faith"
Step 5. repeat
So to prove me wrong you now must answer these questions:
1. How is it that animals can make rational decisions if they have no soul and are just made of atoms? Wouldn't this be impossible on your view?
2. Wouldn't all the empirical evidence we already have, that I listed here be impossible on your view? How do you refute or accommodate this into your view?
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