Philosophy

Hello, Boltonian,
Nothing specifically about Free Will from me today, but here’s a quick message to let you know that I’ve bookmarked your blog, the one you mentioned in CiF on Monday, 26th March.

I’m glad you’ve got it up and running and I look forward to reading more of your blogs. This one on Free Will is a major brain teaser and will be a very fruitful topic of discussion. I hope it encourages others from CiF to carry on those fascinating discussions that sadly wind up after 3 days. The topics are just too wide-ranging and fascinating to be treated with justice on CiF, but I do like the fact that Theo Hobson addresses issues that get everybody up in arms and airing their opinions and knowledge about these crucial matters, in my opinion.

Vis-a-vis the subjects discussed on CiF, I particularly appreciated the threads where you discussed such matters as Cosmology with Space Penguin and others. This adds a new dimension (no pun intended) to discussions of metaphysics for me. Until recently, I’ve been interested in the more dogmatic aspects of the debate on secularism and faith, but I think there’s a tendency for arguments on this aspect to become hackneyed and sterile.

I’m keen, however, to branch out into the more philosophical and scientific foundations of this subject. I look forward to reading more of your stuff and to commenting on it.

Thanks again for taking the initiative and setting up this blog.

Best regards

basildon from CiF

Just stopped in to bookmark your blog. I have enjoyed your comments on Cif and look forward to more of the same. A quick bite and back to my tractor, best of luck with this blog.

I started to jot a few thoughts down about free will, but then made a decision to leave it until later as it’s past my bedtime.

Hi boltonian, just looking in to say that I found your blogspot. I just found the CIF the other day really interesting, so i ‘ll try to keep tabs on this, though ‘ll mainly be reading everyone else’s posts, or asking questions!…cheers.

Ah found you, damned technology, far to complicated! Well done boltonian, very innovative.

I hope this can continue overe time at a pace we can deal with. Life does get inn the way of a good debate doesn’t it.

Kind regards to all
Krapotkin

http://www.pointofinquiry.org/

Interesting, if not always well argued podcast if anyone is interested.

Regards
Krapotkin

Dear all

Many thanks for contributing.

I thought we’d start with free will as that was raised by Krapotkin. This is really only a starter for 10. No rules, except manners, and let’s just go wherever it takes us.

If anybody spots Spacepenguin anywhere on Cif could you let him know where we are.

I must get back to work now but I will post something later today.

K – thanks for the link.

Right, here goes.

If the laws of physics (whatever they turn out to be) are fixed and immutable how can we not live in a determined world?

So, masses and forces are fixed for each quantum entity. If this is so then all of our being, which is made up of these things must behave accordingly.

Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle might or might not allow variation to this (because we don’t really understand why it is as it seems to be). How does the observer interact with the quantum world and does it really exist only as a potentiality of all possible states until observed?

Our definition of free will is governed by consciousness. We believe (all of us) that we have, to a certain extent, a conscious ability to exercise choice. How much choice is a subject for much debate but we all agree that we have some choice as to how we behave.

This trait, I suggest, is a survival mechanism that we have developed. Without an ability to choose there is no morality and without this we would have wiped ourselves out by now, as other hominids might have done already.

The more we understand about genetics the less real choice we appear to have.

If I am right and we inhabit a completely determined world how would we respond to this knowledge?

This might lead on to a discussion about the nature of consciousness. What is it?

What do you think?

Boltonian, a good starter for ten!

Much of what you say I’ll go along with, especially as genetics is moving apace and showing us more about how we operate.

The survival mechanism I most certainly go with, being a Darwinian I don’t have much choice there!

However, predetermined world is an exploration we need to have. Let us assume that the moment the Big Bang occured an atom or two was inevtably going to end up in our solar syetem, by its very nature that would seem so. Let us assume that the laws of nature are immutable, for the moment at least, at least physically.

Let us assume that that evolutiion has taken us to where we are as a species capable of thought, analysis etc. And then lets look at choices.

I have no doubt that every choice we make is governed by the external agents acting around us. I am beginnig to se that we are a to all intents and purposes a chemical computer with one aim, to pass on our genes to the ensure the survival of the species. Although one way or another I’ve thought along those lines for a decades.

And then lets look at the possibilty that we are, to our knowledge, the one species capable of changing the rules of our own existance. That by either self interest and/or co-operation we can change the moment. As I’ve posted before we are in my view creatures of the moment we exist in, the influences around at that moment and the desired result. Even if 99% of the choice/decision was taken up by logical deduction of facts and influences, it may still leave a critical 1% of free choice to conclude the action.

I would suggest we have that 1% choice. I can understand the notion that that its predetermined, but I would suggest that at any given time logical deduction of facts is determined by what view one has of morality, the cultural priorites that are inherent in ones social and cultural upbringing, genetic inheritance etc. Ones mans meat etc.

There is also the horny subject of temperament, character whatever phrase one wishes to apply. The optimost and the pessamist. That state of mind can and does (trust me I’ve been there) alter the choice, the perception of what one sees. It is not predetermined because (although I can think of a way to say it is!). It is to some extend random in nature, its perception of a single moment in time.

Its been a contention of mine for about a decade that philosophy only deals with a straight line logicalal trail, it does not deal with mental states to well. The ups and downs of existance.

So even if the theory of the chemical/electrical actions that our brain acts upon is correct, then it has to be able to accept arbitrary incidents, otherwise people wouldn’t make such stupid choices at times would they?

I would suggest that within the parameters of the external agents acting on the momnet we have a free will and determine our own futures, unlike other speices as far as we know.

Finally, for now, I’d also like to point back to the Nietze quote about believing we are here for a purpose. That ,I think, has a great deal to do with why we need reasons, they don’t have to be religious, they can be scientific and rational, but my point would be that we seem to be unable to take on board that simple survival and passing on our genes is the only actual reason we have for existance. What we make of it is our choice.

Okay then ladies and gentlemen, tear it to bits that’s the idea!

my goodness. Lots to ponder.

This is going to sound like a bit of a ramble. Let’s say that your actual 1% of choice is correct for the moment. If we ever managed to prove this I suggest it would have a serious effect on our well-being as a species because I would be 99% not responsible for my actions and who will say which is the 1%?

Second point. Einstein once said that time was not real, even though his relativity theories depended on something called ‘Spacetime.’

I agree. There is no objective past, only one’s own memory, which, as we know, is not always reliable in terms of accuracy of recall. Certainly mine is not these days. If we had all attended a music concert together last night we would each have a different memory of the event (I don’t mean the quality of the music) in terms of size of orchestra, colour of the decor, type of lighting etc. So, who is right. Even a battery of camers cannot capture the whole thing.

There is no future because it has not yet happened.

But the present does not exist either because there is not a moment which is neither past nor future, so time cannot exist.

How, then, does this square with your suggestion that we live in the moment?

Temperament is interesting but why is that not a genetic inheritance? 100% of me comes from two people.

If we are 100% a chemical computer, what is consciousness? Where is it? And what is its purpose?

We make stupid choices because we do not have all the information we need. Our chemical computer is of limited capacity and most of it is used to keep us alive.

I would like you to expand on the bit about the limitations of philosophy if you could.

I accept that seeking a purpose in life is fairly fundamental to many of us – you can see it on CiF, among the atheists as well as the religious, but why is that? How does that confer a benefit? And, not everybody has it – if it is important to us – why not?

Must go and eat now. BTW how was your dinner last night, K?

What does everybody else think? Please join in.

Sapient Lunatic was my xbox name for a while, {I use that name no more ;} so I will go with that. No slant intended to Sapient because I can see his wisdom. {You all speak so well ;}

Just found CiF today. The mediocre article with the great debate… I think this is more in line with what should happen. {of course it should be noted that you don’t own blogger and that could lead tooo… issues. Setting up a blog with an account hosted by Dreamhost is easy and I always liked the name… There are many other good hosts out there as well :}

I am curious about this Spacepenguin you speak of. And Being that I am part Sapient I hope that he shows up. You all seem very intelligent/ interesting/ loving/ Truth Seeking… and I am looking forward to delving into such discussion with you.

I Know Nothing was my Answer to the Question of Life. In time it actually became the Question…
For that I am very grateful…

And as to the question of whether FreeWill exists or not my personal opinion is that it does… if you believe in it. But you can also give it up. god may even give it back if you ask the sky.

no more time for now.

{OK. a little…}

Ever read Plotinus? He thought he knew something or some god that GOD didn’t know…

He may have been right and he may have been wrong. Any thoughts?

hi boltonian,
I said I’d drop by, so I have.
this one’s too much for me though (maybe – I’ll think about it). what I’m really interested in is how to get our species off the path to extinction and on the path to evolution; more specifically, just as an example, can we continue to have economic growth indefinitely, or even for the next couple of generations. is it growth that will ultimately kill us – and if so, how do we change it if corporate power wants it? is this the kind of stuff you might cover, or is it too political – not really science, religion or philosophy? surely it’s philosophy? Just had an incredibly conversation with a guy in japan who disagreed with me – love to drag him into a discussion like that.

Welcome Sapient and yakaboo

S – although I have not read Plotinus (must do one day) I am aware of his ‘One’ idea. I assume that must have been an influence on Schopenhauer, whose ‘Blind will to exist’ had a similar quality. Spacepenguin, by the way, is a very wise bird and I hope he comes along at some point.

Y – we will go wherever the discussion takes us. For me, this is also a fascinating topic but I will need a bit of time to get my thoughts together. Perhaps others might have a view. Your Japanese friend would be very welcome to join us.

B, dinner eatable thanks, order what you want, take what you get! Thats the steppes!

Will read and digest over the day and think how to respond. If we take care here we may even come close to a workable theory!

Limits of philosophy, well you can drive logic down most any road according to your belief system for one.

Stupid decisons, well I’m not soi sure with the point about not having all the info, I watch people drive cars here in a way that woukd stun you and as each incident occurs they have as all the info required to make the correct choice, but don’t. Selfeshness, bravado etc.

Any driver here so gotta go for now
Have a nice day all.

Hey All,

Token atheist here to keep the pot stirring, great to debate with youyesterday Boltanian, Have bookmarked this and look forward to rigorise debate in the future! Will respond your last post yesterday soon.

>Interestingly, we are able to predict or anticipate our own decisions. Work by physiology professor Benjamin Libet at the University of California shows that neural activity to initiate an action actually occurs about a third of a second before the brain has made the decision to take the action. The implication, according to Libet, is that the decision is really an illusion, “consciousness is out of the loop”.<

(From The Singularity is Near by Ray Kurzweil).

Pttp, that’s interesting, didn’t know that, maybe implies we have a third of a second of free will!? I think Susan Blackmore and Jack (?) Dennett are getting to that conclusion as well. Fascinating. Can you be a bat, was Nagels way of looking at it I seem to remember.

I’d just like to make a point here, I think it would be good if we can attempt to be accessible in what we put forward. I notice one or two people seem to think this is a bit beyond them. Please, no it isn’t, all views are valid, all lines are worthy of exploring, neither science nor philosophy has much consensus on this issue. Maybe we can find a step forward between us.

I say this because I think science/skeptics called ‘em what you will, have made a bit of a pigs ear of making the case to the public on a series of issues, from climate change to stem cells to GM food. I reason that this has led to a rise in faith based belief systems. In the US its actually got hold of political power and a huge % of people think the worlds 6,000 years old. Very scary. Islam also has political power although I would suggest that’s more to do with culture shock having lived in Saudi and Iraq 20 years ago. Either way the case for the ‘Age of Reason’ needs to made in a way accessible to all. I used a balloon with glitter in it to show my child what the big bang was, silly but it worked better than try to explain how the galaxies are moving away from each other and what dark matter might be.

I recently took a deliberately more skeptical line on climate change on CiF, man I got abused up hill and down dale. I predicted it would happen. What got me was that the shear vitriol flying around in the guise of fact. I know a Prof in Russia who is adamant that we do not consider the ‘aggressiveness of the sun over the past century”. It’s a point of view from a learned man with no axe to grind. Some seem determined not to allow that voice. But that’s something we can debate another day. I just ask for tolerance and consideration of positions in way that can be clearly understood, even if not agreed with.

That brings me to another reason I think this is a valuable exercise. We all have to make choices, illusory or predetermined they might be, to us they are ‘real’. I am a father a bit late in life, (I thought we were kissing, but then what would I know!), I have to decide soon where my child is raised and educated, Russia? UK? Spain? Whatever. Debates like this assist in helping make the choice. Having an IQ that can get me into MENSA by the way, didn’t stop me making a catastrophically bad decision 15 years ago. So being smart isn’t all its cracked up to be. The cost emotionally and financially took years to overcome. It was only an evening class in philosophy/sociology, (a choice I think I made!) because the alternative was to live in a black hole in my head and I wanted answers. I chose to act rather than slide. Education as cognitive therapy in retrospect. The lecturer got me into a well know Uni as a mature student, now that was an easy choice as I couldn’t see another way, well I could but that was a bit severe! Hence my comment B about how you perceive things at a given time, Susan Blackmore’s Mary the colour scientist is an interesting analogy.

So knowledge for its own sake is a very useful tool to deal with the tomorrow that might arrive soon. So thanks for the patience as I dribbled that out, but I truly welcome the chance to have contact with home and debate matters I’m removed from here, bit of an isolated life at times, Stranger in a Strange Land as Heinlein wrote, no matter how long I’ve been here!

And a final thought B, Einstein as you raised him, also used the word god. As a theologian threw at me one day Hawking, Darwin and Einstein all used the word and were believers. I suggest its how you look at it. Darwin knew the storm he or Wallace would create when one of them published, Einstein lived in a world where religion was still a powerful lobby, as did Darwin, and Hawking used it for dramatic effect I suggest. All a matter of perception, all a matter of the times.

I keep having these thoughts and they’re only half a second old!! Is there a duality in all this, two differing perspectives that may explain. Is there no true link between matter and mind, or is one simply the result of the other? Is there a gulf between the natural laws of the universe and how we perceive what we see?

My brain hurts! See you later.

Hi Emma

Welcome and thanks for joining us. I doubt you will be the only atheist.

pttp

Interesting. Does this not strengthen the case for determinism, or have I misunderstood?

I would just like to endorse what K has said about contributors. I doubt any of us are ‘Experts’ in every (or in my case any)field but that should not prevent us from floating ideas, asking questions and even voicing strong opinions. For me this is about exploration and challenging my own prejudices as much as offering opinions and thoughts.

I agree that it is important to challenge the prevailing orthodoxy. Climate change, evolution, the certainty of scientific theory etc.

Back to the subject.

If consciousness is not a decision-making tool what is its purpose? In fact, what is it? Some scientists specialising in this area (Churchland, for example)think that it is nothing more than a feature of the brain function as a parallel processing machine. We can’t isolate it because it does not live in any specific part of the brain. I must say that he didn’t produce sufficient evidence for me to make his argument conclusive.

What are the alternatives, though? Is it a separate, non-material part of our make-up? If so, how do we get hold of it and how does it link to the body? These are the problems all dualist have faced and not answered.

Another option is that God is mind. This sort of idea is gaining ground with some theoretical physicists such as Chown and, to lesser degree, Davies. I am wading through the latest Smolin at the moment, so I will have to wait to see what he says. Funnily enough, they all mention God quite a lot. Now this might just be shorthand for everything we don’t understand (very BIG subject). Their ideas are pretty similar and rest on the idea that if the multiverse is a reality then so are simulated universes. In fact, they both suggest that they are more likely to occur than real ones, so the probablity is that we live in one as well. If so, we are nothing more than the creation of a large intelligence and computer programme.

Now this idea would have been ridiculed a few years ago but now we are not a million miles away from building the first quantum computer, which will increase processing power by several orders of magnitude. Some scientist are saying that this will enable us to reconstruct the brain molecule by molecule. So, if Churchland is right we will be able to create consciousness in a computer within the next few decades.

To answer your last question K I think reality is nothing like our perception of it. And we wouldn’t understand it even if we could perceive it. Every living thing, including human beings, have different perceptive equipment and it would be a remarkable coincidence if any one of us perceived what was really there.

Where is Spacepenguin when you need him – he has lots of interesting things to say on this?

Interesting personal story, K.

I am living life backwards – I’ll enlarge on that another day.

Boltonian : you haven’t misunderstood as such. I think it’s true as far as it goes : decisions are based on data held in the unconscious mind. I should admit to a slight Jungian bias here, because I don’t believe the unconscious is confined to the individual. I’m not an afficianado of Jung; I’ve just read 2 books and probably don’t agree with his take on synchronicity. I think the quote also raises the question : how much do we program our unconscious and how much is it automatically programmed by our experience ?

Any way, as an example, I want to cite my earliest meaningful decision, which wasn’t simply an exercise of free will, but is capable of a more interesting analysis. I refused to participate in the school Empire Day parade, although I knew that this would cause big problems for me. My teacher, Miss Godlove, had made a remark (under her breath), which questioned whether the British Empire was worth celebrating and this struck a chord with me; at the same time, I realised that I could assert my individuality in this situation and cock a snook at authority. A confrontation with the headmaster enabled me to test my will against his, knowing I had moral authority on my side. I didn’t know these concepts at the time, but I can remember exactly how I felt and that is how I can interpret my feelings now.

Krapotkin : Einstein was an agnostic who specifically rejected the Judaeo-Christian concept of God. Hawking has made some very profound statements about matter and energy, but as far as I know he doesn’t speculate about anything “before” Big Bang. Please correct me if I’m wrong.

Hi
Pttp
As far as I know you are absolutley correct, I was just using an example. I think I wrote that badly as it happens. A memory of a debate I once had. And using personal experience is a good idea for this I think. I rememeber writing a short paper on Durkhiems anomie, at the time it was like describing myself. Very cathartic!
B
Time that seems to be a bit of a fulcrum about our positions at the moment, I am going to try to outline what I remember about the nature of time in a philosophical sense, and some issues related to it So if you wish to watch an embarrsing test of a fading memory stay tuned! I haven’t got a clue what if anything about Quantum Theory has to say about time. Like to learn though. All I know of the Space-Time continuim is that Jean Luc Pikard knew how to deal with it! So you can enlighen me there please.
Anyway, in recodred history (notice the caveats that are flowing now) Plato and Aristotle started the debate about whether time exists independently of events that occur. If there was a time without change, a frozen moment, it must follow that time exists only if there are events to fill the time. Leibnitz says time does not exist independently from the actions. Newton however reckons that time is an empty vessel into which actions are placed, but exists whether actions take place or not.
Then I think its fatalism (your position to an extent and no reflection on your charcter B!), whatever will happen in the future is already unavoidable, predetermined, (that is that no human interventaion can alter it).The main argument againt this is that it’s a matter of semantics, nobody can make a true prediction turn out to be false. So there are lots of positions (propositions about matters that are both future and contingent) that are neither true nor false right now. i.e. the sun will rise tomorrow. That proposition either has no truth value right now, or else has indeterminate value. When the time comes, the sun will or won’t rise and the proposition will come to be either true or false and from then on that proposition will forever be either true or false.
However, there are sometimes propositions about the future that are neither true nor false, the “Open Future”. As I remember its about giving some value to a propositition, and that may vary at differing in times and context .
Then there’s the The Big Bang Theory. If The Big Bang Theory is true (I hope, given that I‘ve blown up ballons in my face for this!), then the universe had a beginning. Does that mean that time also had a beginning? Or was there an infinite expanse of “empty” time before the universe ever popped up? If there are infinite universes is there infinite time? Very open debate that one as I recall. Obviously there is the debate about twhether there is an end, is time is open or closed, can there be two or more unconnected times. Can’t remember the others.
Then there was the Scotsman, McTaggart argued that there is no such thing as time, that the appearance of a temporal order to the world is just that, a mere appearance.
McT suggests two ways in which positions in time can be placed. A). is that positionn is according to its properties, a week into the future, a day in the past etc But there is also a two place (B) position, a week earlier than a fixed point, in time, the day before yeasterday for instance. B is not considerd by the Scot as real because it moves in context to an action, but A) is fundamnetal., you can’t have B without A.
There are also a lot of contradicions in this, semantics, future and past tenses cannot exist together. At some point the future becomes the present. I always thought of this as more of a grammatical question to be a bit cynical about it, but it has been taken very seriously.
But to be fair I seem to recall he graspped the paradox he created, “time is but a spatial temporal notion” and I’ve been quoting that for ages!!! And I’ve probably got it wrong! I usually accuse the wife of that when she’s getting ready to go out!
It follows then that there is a debate about how fast does time pass? That is a human construct in it’s own right, so how do we arrive at a coherent answer? Is there a natural law, I have no idea personally. I expect somebody will know.
Presentism suggests that that only present objects exist, now there’s a surpise! It’s the universe can’t exist unless you can see it anthropic principle really. Anything you can’t place in the present doesn’t exist, so there goes Einstien!
Eternalism, which says that objects from both the past and the future exist just as much as present objects. Theory is/was/ maybe says that, so Einsteins back.
Growing Universe Theory is just that, only objects that are either past or present — but not objects that are future – exist, but the universe is always growing, as more and more things are added on to the front end (temporally speaking).
Presentism seems fairly straight forward doesn’t it,but if there really are no non-present objects, then it is hard to see what we are referring to when we say Bobby Moore and 1966. And if no present objects how do we understand history?
You can get into concepts of time travel doing this, there’s more that I know or remember.
So is this a moment in time? Yes,but how do I place it in a context? Even if it’s a dream, then there is still an action, which requires a vessel. So I’m back to Descartes “I think therefore I am”. If there is no moment, how was there a past or a future?
Well I’m sure that’s cleared it all up for everyone!!!!!
Temperament. I would wouldn’t say it wasn’t genetic inheritance as it happens. It’s abig debate in my house about the tiddler, where from? How did she? Whose bloody family is to blame for that trait and which ones did we set up ourselves? Essentially I am going to be contraversial here and say the nature-nurture debate is redundant. Because what I observe is the influence of both. I used to go along with the Jesuit saying ‘give me the child for the first seven years and I’ll give you the man’. Now I don’t, there has to be some form of genetic and social inheritance involved.
The czarina and I have a fair few debates on this one. A fairly constant cry from me is ‘how can people be so stupid, it’s got to be b…y genetic “!, whether its work, drivng, shopping something will happen which will stupefy me. Now I was not one for the nature perspective, political upbringing I imagine and for years I was taught about the decimation of the Russian inteligensia, the purges of the officer class etc. Can’t say I thought it would have any real effect because you send the next lot to school and voila, next inteligensia.
Observation for over a decade has convinced me that it’s a genetic issue to some extent. I better leave it at that or I’ll get into hot water over this!
Limitations of philosophy. Partly my conjecture is about the use of logic, I contend you can drive it down any road given your belief system. The Dialectic is an example, Hegel and Marx. Another point is the fact that academia treats subjects as if everyone is actually logical, which is pretty contestable in real life. And finally a lot of philosophy is based on ‘thought experiments’ which you can’t really prove. As I said I can wander the universe in my mind, that’s my immagination, but in reality aside from not having $20m lieing around to squander, physics would suggest it’s a very unlikely proposition, energy needed, distance travelled etc, at this moment in time!!!
Perception. Maybe B, maybe, so how do we know which team to shout for? Assuming you can get a ticket of course.
And you’re gettinhg ahead of me on consiousness! Sorry if there are grammatical and spelling errors, somehow my splellcheck has gone on this computer! And I am a lousy typist!

Hello everybody

I have been following this discussion with great interest, on the CiF thread and here, and it has got me thinking furiously. I am not well read in matters of philosophy, and most of what I have read is in the form of second-hand summaries, probably poorly understood, but you have said that anyone is welcome to join in, so here goes.

Much of what follows touches on points already raised or touched on tangentially, so if I seem at times to be chewing over the obvious, I ask your forbearance.

My starting point is the simplest dictionary definition of ‘free will’ – The power of acting without necessity – a concept which can be considered from a religious, ethical or scientific point of view. Setting aside the religious angle, since Christian theological discussions of the subject seem to end up tied in paradoxical knots and I am not qualified to comment on other belief systems, this leaves the ethical and the scientific.

On the deterministic side of the argument, clearly none of us willed our own existence, and there are many things which affect us but which we have no control over and which constrain our conscious and unconscious decisions and actions – principally:

The laws of physics

Genetics

Nurture – the society, environment and family we grow up in, and the kind of education we receive.

The laws of physics, as far as we know, apply only within the physical universe which we can observe. In a singularity (a black hole, say, or whatever existed before the Big Bang) all bets are off: questions of spacetime, causality, whatever, are meaningless. And to what extent does the universe make sense only because we are here to observe and make sense of it?

The theory Boltonian refers to, that we might live in a simulated universe (’God is mind’) is a fascinating one. I entertain a fantasy that some day a scientist of group of scientists will announce that they have solved the last problems, all questions have been answered, and the universe and all within it is understood in its entirety. At which point the physical universe will disappear, to be replaced by, in effect, a sign saying:

GAME OVER
NEXT LEVEL? Y/N

Genetics is clearly a major limiting factor for us as a species and individually, since it determines our physical and mental potential. However much one might wish it, one cannot become a champion athlete if one lacks the necessary physique, or a theoretical physicist if on lacks the mental capacity. On the other hand the ’selfish gene’ hypothesis – that ultimately we are no more than engines of gene propagation, is to my mind of little relevance in this context. It is an interesting and provocative way of examining the dynamics of evolution, but reductionist in the extreme and therefore of limited usefulness. The gene is a package of information,not an object, and DNA is the medium, not the message (George C Williams ‘A Package of Information@ in ‘The Third Culture: Beyond the Scientific Revolution@ ed John Brockman, 1995) What matters is the evolving phenotype.

Nurture obviously affects the way in which genetic potential is expressed. A person reared in a restrictive society is likely to conform to the expectations of that society. Someone growing up in a disfuntional or abusive family may never realise their potential. Someone raised and educated in an environment which genuinely encourages them to develop the power of independent thought will have greater potential capacity, and probably more opportunity, for exercising choice than someone educated in the Gradgrind tradition, or simply trained to pass tests.

Despite these constraints and limitations, most people do seem to think that they make choices of their own will, at a practical or a moral level, and in both large and small matters, and this, I suppose, is where the question of consciousness or ‘mind’ comes in. Some scientists have put forward a hypothesis that mind is a quantum phenomenon (I’m afraid I can’t cite sources off hand) although I gather that there are serious objections to this. It’s an interesting idea, though, and might even account for the results of Libet’s experiments.

I certainly feel that my professional life has been at least partly directed by a series of willed choices, as has my personal life to a lesser extent, and they were not always obvious or conventional choices. At the age of 16 I decided, without prior consultation or discussion, what subject I wished to study at university, and what profession I wanted to work in – to the surprise of my parents (who were supportive) and my teachers (several of whom tried very hard to dissuade me). It was an unusual choice at the time – more so than it would be now. The interests which led to my choice were undoubtedly fostered by my upbringing, but they were not my only interests, and my academic abilities suggested other options. My subsequent career was determined to some extent by what jobs were available at any given time, but the decisions as to what kind of jobs I wanted to apply for, and whether to sieze or reject opportunities as they presented themselves were mine (and, again, not always conventional).

I suppose, therefore, that in philosophical terms, I take a compatabilist view – that within determinist constraints a person acts freely when they will the act and could have acted otherwise (Hobbes), and insofar as individuals have the ability to act differently from what is expected, free will is possible (Dennett).

I have been toying with the idea of a simulated universe lately. It has been an enjoyable outlook so far. I think what we accept or believe has a very powerful role in how we perceive this world. If you try to see the world through the eyes of someone with limited ideas about it… things start to look that way… Thankfully I grew up an Atheist so my thoughts on what this world is have never been fully contained. As an adult I can look for God everywhere because I am not limiting such a power.

I accept the current scientific theory as the highest level of Logic we have gotten too as a species. So that bends my thought towards a type of the Growing Universe theory. I guess I currently see it as a kind of Spore game {coming soon from Will Wright and EA} in a Quantum computer. The present is really the only thing that actually exists {for Life at least} and that is when all action takes place. Whether you are sitting/ running/ sleeping/ speaking/ recollecting/ dreaming with open eyes about the future through the lens of your past/ …

The past does exist but as a recording or a database. The future is ours to grow into. This leads to thoughts about what the subconscious could be. Such as… We are all individually recorded as life. But our thoughts are heard by GOD or gods. This becomes the Collective Subconscious or Consciousness that is then reintroduced into our individual consciousness based upon our receptivity.

This way of looking at our reality has actually led to a great improvement in my memory {through imagination if you can call it that ;} If I can’t remember something I ask for it or directions to it. Can’t remember where your keys are? Ask for directions… It is funny how often it works and just plain fun to try to do. Think in terms of bodily actions and just keep asking and accepting the answers that Feel good/positive/correct. Don’t get discouraged and never forget how funny it is that you are doing this. Use the Force…{? Luke}

Until you can get it down you will be led astray in many laughable ways. I realize it sounds a little crazy but who is to say what is Crazy. We are all crazy because we all do not Know… But I think we are getting there. My thanks go out to you and those Truth Seekers of the past that helped us get this far. I like to try to go back as far as possible which is why I brought up Plotinus. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plotinus

He is one of my four favorite intellectual Greeks. Of course the others are Socrates, Plato, Aristotle. They were all seekers and creators of Truth in my mind… through what I see as their influence in our current world.

I am reading The Urantia Book online right now and I think it is quite beautiful even if it is far to Christian for my tastes. They name Rantowoc as the first soul to complete the circle on this planet. They say he was of the Red People so that must mean Native American or Australian Aborigine. I am leaning towards Australia… Which could mean that Australia is at least our spiritual home.

I don’t know if I believe any of this shit i say but I sure do enjoy it. Thanks for giving me a place to spout off.

Evening all (as the great Sgt Dixon used to say)

Just back from a fish supper at Harry Ramsden’s, if that means anything to anybody. Up early and back to London tomorrow, so I will make this brief and hope to get some time tomorrow to explore a bit more.

pttp and K – you have both come up with some stuff that needs much thought.

I have never read Jung, partly because I got so angry with Freud that I assumed all psychologists were frauds. That was a long time ago and I should give him a go.

Last Q in first para is very interesting. Is there any difference between the conscious and unconscious at all? When I dream there isn’t, or perhaps I am wrong here? I just have a gut feeling, knowing not much more than zero about the subject, that we make that distinction. There are lots of ways we can tap into the sub-conscious – and people do (with and without the aid of drugs).

Incidentally, one of the things I find irritating about much philosophy is the compulsion to categorise.

Loved your anecdote – was she really called Miss Godlove? I’ll come back to that because K picked up on it.

You surprise me about Einstein’s agnosticism. I know he rejected the Judaeo-Christian idea of God but still thought he was a deist of some kind.

Time. Here goes.

QED needs electrons to move backwards and forwards in time as they absorb and release photons. Physics friends, however, say that this should not be taken too seriously – it is really a metaphor. To this I say what is not a metaphor? Negative and positive charge is a metaphor, so is quantum spin, and electrons orbiting nuclei,and QCD etc.

I need to read your learned piece on time a couple more times, K, before I comment.

Temperament I am convinced really drives our prejudices and, therefore, our philosophies (although they must be flexible to a degree). I read Hume, Spinoza, Schopenhauer and I think that these people are on to something. Hegel and Marx are plain wrong, about almost everything, in my view. Kant – mixed. And Heidegger I cannot stand, although a philosopher friend says I should give him another chance because he dealt with some pretty deep concepts.

Incidentally, I hadn’t realised why Hegel made no sense to me and why he influenced so many that came after him until I recently read Popper’s devastating demolition job in vol 1 of ‘The Open Society and its Enemies.’

I agree that temperament is caused by a mix of genes and learning. Mat Ridley wrote an excellent attempt to demolish the sterile nature/nurture debate in his book, ‘Nature via Nurture.’ He poses some real challenges. For example, he says that a meritocracy (that everybody these days seems to want) favours those with genetic advantages (nature) over everybody else, whereas inherited privilege tend to favour nurture. The exact opposite, I suspect, of what most meritocrats believe. This is a simplified version of a complex argument but there are other counter-intuitive ideas in there as well.Has anyone read it – or anything by him (I have read three of his and they are well worth a go)?

His conclusion, using lots of twin study research is that 50% of adult behaviour is genetic, 45% from childhood outside the home environment (The Jesuit position) and only 5% from within the home environment. This is again simplified because parents choose schools and often friends as well, at least in early childhood.

Must go now but I will think about the nature of time on the train tomorrow morning.

Anybody else got a view?

E and S

I posted mine bedore I had read yours. Skimmed them both and want to explore them a bit more over the next day or two.

S – your notion of asking for things is far from crazy. My mum, a strong agnostic (you see where my leanings come from), does that whenever she has a problem and tells me it works every time.

Boltonian : sorry, I think it was Godlove. Then I had a teacher called Mrs Bidgood for 2 years !

I haven’t read any philosophy to speak of. I’ve inferred Einstein’s agnosticism from the way he phrases his God comments.

I think there is a continuum of consciousness and that there are no defining attributes, which separate conscious and unconscious. Eg. lucid dreams, fugue states, trance states, virtual reality.

“Although we have the illusion of receiving high-resolution images from our eyes, what the optic nerve sends to the brain is just outlines and clues about points of interest in our visual field. We then essentially hallucinate the world from cortical memories that interpret a series of extremely low-resolution movies in parallel channels…. the optic nerve carries 10-12 output channels, each of which carries only minimal information about a given scene. One group of what are called ganglion cells sends information only about edges (changes in contrast). Another group detects only large areas of uniform colour, whereas a third group is sensitive only to the backgrounds behind figures of interest”. (Ray K again, this time drawing on the work of Frank Werblin and his 2001 study published in Nature).

I seem to think, therefore I seem to be.

All. Well what an overwhelminh amount od info and comments. Fabulaous.
There is a great deal to digest here, quite a bit of positioning to grap
I may not, due to commitments, be able to post fpr a few days so I’ll read all this ,get thouroughly confused and see what I can add to the debate. We made need to stop at some point and precis where this is going, see if we have anythinhg here.

B, on Hegel and Marx I am 100% in agreement, got it totally wrong.
O a Harry Ramsden, you lucky person, long, long time since I had the pleasure, Brighton or Bournemouth can’t remember, but it was BC, “before child”.

Simultaed universe appeals to by way of thinkihg, but a little pragmatist inside says mmmmmm, maybe!

Pttp, sorry I have really not expalined the Einstein god bit very well have I, can’t have any misinterpretations.
I have a theolgian friend over about 10 years, we poften discuss these topics over a sherbert or three! At one point he insisted that Einstein, Hawking and Darwin were all of a faith. Iwas how he read whatever it was he’s read of them.
I was aghast to be honest, so set about showing him they were skepotics, athiests etc.
Darwins wife was religious and it doid cause him some issues as one or two of their children died of I think consumption, he truly recognisded the furore he or Wallce would createwith the religious establisment if when one of them published. He knew he was ‘killing god’.
Einstein used the word a few times as an abstract descriptiomn ad was for sure a non-believer as far as I know.
Hawking used the phrase ‘maybe we can now understand gods universe’ as the last sentance in a Brief History of Time. As a literary devive to add some power and no doubt to sell a few more books. I hope that clears up my position on that, they are all atheists/non-believers and always were. The theolgian had selectively read to suit his belief sysyetm was my real point.
Enjoy your days everyone, its sunny and +15 here!!

Krapotkin : thanks for the elaboration. I think Hawking’s final statement in Brief History of Time is quite enigmatic, rather than mischievous sarcasm, which seems to be Dawkins’ limited interpretation of it.

elephantschild : I hope you will make further contributions; even if it’s only in the form of illustrative anecdotes. I’ve had a couple of game over moments in the course of psychological explorations, but don’t claim to have progressed to the next level.

Sapient Lunatic : I haven’t read your Greeks, and have only the vaguest understanding of their importance in developing rationalism. I’m prejudiced against Urantia, due to discussions with a follower on another forum. Nevertheless, he did make an interesting comment about the relationship between Lucifer and Jesus in Christian mythology, which I found stimulating.

yakaboo : I’m very interested in politics and my overriding concern apart from my own selfish desires is for further evolution of homo sapiens sapiens. My greatest fear is that irrational ideologies (often religious in nature) actually threaten our existence more than (say) climate change.

emma100 : Even Dawkins doesn’t refer to himself as an atheist, but I’d be happy to be challenged by you or anyone else, because then I’ll have to make more effort, which may lead to greater understanding, even if it means I have to modify my views.

basildon : I believe science and technology offer a more interesting basis for examining existence than classical philosophy. BUT, if you can quote or summarise relevant philosophers when appropriate then that would be educational for me, at least.

I hope a few more people will join in as well.

A few random thoughts.

pttp:

Bertrand Russell in his History of Western Philosophy (a first class intro to the subject) says that philosophy lies between theology and science in terms of certainty. Theology depends on faith whereas science requires evidence based on predictive experiment. Philosophy cannot have the level of proof required of scientific theory but requires a logic that is far more rigorous than theology.

Your definition of consciousness seems intuitively to be right to me.

Your quote on how we create complete pictures from scant evidence is good. I have felt for some time that this might be the clue as to why we need certainty. We are geared towards filling in the gaps, so when we come to concepts we naturally do the same. Hence religious faith, faith in science to provide answers, faith that there is no god etc. But why can some of us live with uncertainty? Perhaps it is only a question of degree?

K:

We went to the original Harry Ramsden’s in Guiseley, West Yorkshire. It was ok but those in the party who had been before thought it had gone downhill.

It is true that many philosophers and scientists had to disguise their agnosticism/atheism and often they were published only after death.

Yes, we should summarise where we have got to periodically. I would be happy to jot a few things down for starters over the Easter weekend. I could put it in a Word doc and email to anybody who is interested. So, either let me have your email or create a separate account using your screen name and post that so I can contact you. I will need to ask for clarification on some issues, which will be beyond the capacity of my small brain. Are there any other suggestions as to how it could be done? Or whether we should do it at all?

Big Bang is looking less and less like the start of anything and so time, if it exists at all, might not have begun then. If we have constructed time as a convenience for us would that not explain why it only travels in one direction, unlike the other dimensions?

Elephantschild:

I have wrestled with compatibilism recently on an online philosophy course and found it unsatisfying. It seemed to be a compromise for the sake of saving a degree of free will. Perhaps you could give me a synopsis of what you mean by the word – my source came from Blackburn and I found the entire book (Think!) lightweight, so I might have prejudged his take on compatibilism.

Love your ‘Game over’ scenario, and why not?

Sapient:

Let me put this into the pot. It might make no sense whatsoever. You suggest that the present is all that exists. What if that is the only aspect of time that does not exist? The past exists as memory and the future as thoughts but the present cannot exist because, as I said earlier, there is not a moment that is neither past nor future. just an idea.

K:

You have mentioned lack of logic in some of our behaviors. Isn’t this just about our lack of knowledge. I imagine all behaviors are supremely logical at all times – it is just that we can’t always see it. All of our understanding comes to us through our own perceptive equipment and mediated in our own brain, therefore our view of the world is partial and subjective.

Descartes said ‘Cogito ergo sum’ often translated as ‘I think, therefore I am.’

This might be going too far – all we can say is ,’There are thoughts.’Perhaps we could put it the other way round, ‘I am, therefore I think.’

The offer to send my summary to you is addressed to everybody, by the way.

There’s some wonderful things being posted here I’m sorry I’ll have to read and digest to see if I can add anything to it.

Pttp, I just like to think Hawking was being a bit mischievous! He can’t be profound all time. Can he??

Elephantschild, I wholly agree with your point about the Natural Laws being about the physical laws of the universe, do you think there is a duality we are missing here? Because that is what I fundamentally feel comfortable with. I also like your definition of nurture, mostly because it seems to coincide with mine!!.

Sapient Lunatic, you have a fabulous attitude, you’re the most sane one here!

Boltonian’ I love Poppers “Open Society”, excellent stuff.

B
On the Big Bang I agree because I was going to post about time and measurement being a human construct.
The lack of logic bit was me feeling moody after watching the driving on the way home again, an accident every couple of klms. Not me by the way! How, I ask do they do it?
Yes I was turning Descartes round as well today! Or is it maybe I’m thinking so I might be? hotstevedata@yahoo.co.uk
Anyway read on at your leisure I couldn’t stop!! Passed the time away on a flight today!

Perception

I have been cogitating the proposition that we all have a differing perception of the world/ life/ the universe and everything and find that although I agree in a theoretical sense, I have to question that proposition as well. To do that I need to outline a series of directions of thoughts and perhaps even some definitions. First what it is that we are perceiving? Are we talking of information in the abstract, knowledge, memes, concepts perhaps; are we talking of physical forms? Are we talking of what is plausible or are we talking about a concept that has intellectual appeal, but no empirical evidence to support it other than logical linear processing?

When we say perception what are we meaning. Objective or subjective understanding, actual or imagined?

Now why I ask these, and I hope more as they come to mind, questions I have to admit to spending the majority of my working life in the design of the built environment, not saying what specifically it isn’t relevant, but what it does it to immediately state my pre conceptions of the built form. I would contend that there is a commonality of perception, in a visual sense of what a square is, a circle, a rhomboid etc is. Lets face it everyone seems to know more about building design than those of us that do it! Sorry too many dinner party arguments about that one. However, to be able to comment upon a form you need consensus of what that form is, I suggest that there is. Its place in a space, its mass, the (I love this phrase) spatial leaks around and into that form are actual, they are there and can be understood on a simple geometric level. Whether or not they are seen as a work of art, a utilitarian box, or a mess or out of context is a different concept. That is a subjective perception; that is an opinion based on social/genetic inheritance, environmental influences, education and learning experiences, emotional response the list can of course be endless.

So even if we accept that a choice, a decision, an opinion is triggered by a series of electrical/chemical actions in an organic brain, then the actions that occur have to be influenced by the historical process and order in which knowledge or otherwise was inputted. Whether the mind is a product of the brain or vise versa, there has been an action, there has been a process and there is a result, That result has to lie somewhere, it requires a vessel of some description in which to rest. So is that vessel consciousness? Is that vessel simply a repository for a result? Is it in existence at all? If it is how, does it take action on the information provided? Why does it take action on the information provided? If it isn’t hen how does the action get directed? There is something I suggest and it needs definition, I am not puersuaded by Churchland on this one, that’s its simply a product of a series of predetermined actions.

If it is a life threatening or comfort enhancing action that is required, perhaps we can point to evolutionary survival as the motive. If, however, it is an action required simply to enhance a feeling of awe, doubt, pain or pleasure why would we do it at all, except by choice? If its because it assists the individual in placing them in the world, placing them in a social order, giving them a sense of self worth, then I would contend that its an act of well being that seems to imply a conscious will, rather than a predetermined act. All actions the brain takes, however it does it, are only as good as the information provided, junk in, junk out. To change a position takes imagination at the very least, its takes influence, some are more easily influenced than other perhaps, but its all based around whatever information was inputted in the first instance and what influenced some little neutron to act the way it did.

So if I go back, I’m accepting the organic/chemical/electrical neutron driven computer theory, but I question the result of its actions always giving a differing view on all matters. I suggest that there a number of commonalities that imply common perception, all other issues of context are down to individual experience, knowledge etc. A square is not an individual experience. I even suggest that to an extent that is measurable, because to an extent that’s what a marketing strategy sets out to do. To find the commonalities, to expose the differences and apply a strategy to the perception of an object. Not perfect but doable. Its how advertising is done isn’t it, reactions to known perceptions.

How people feel about a space, how they respond on a variety of levels does differ, although designing them, I can say not as differing as you think. People’s responses to spaces and shapes are relatively predicable, because they are grounded in a common understanding of them.

It’s like what came first the chicken or the egg? If you have to hand the fossil records, an evolutionary biologist and a geologist, let us say, I would suggest that you have a plausible chance of answering the question. Forget the chicken, but assume a bird. It took the bird to lay the egg to make the first genetic copy of the bird. It doesn’t however necessarily follow that it took a bird to lay the egg, A feathered dinosaur might have managed that by having an illicit affair with a bat for all I know. Its not really relevant, but I can demonstrate that given enough fact I can get a plausible conclusion if I have enough skill.

If I take the wonderful hypothesis of Churchland, and I think a few others, that we may be in a simulated computer universe I can do the following. I can ask how plausible is it in actuality. I can say that I can construct in my mind, the concept that the entire universe I know of, and beyond, is a huge ball of some description, it is infinite. But my meager imagination says what the hell is infinity, it’s a concept so far beyond me that I have to ground it, put it in the only context this moment in times knowledge allows me. So I have to deduct that this infinity has to have an end, that end is the interface to a beginning.

So as a kid I said, okay I am in a bubble of energy and that bubble of energy is vast to me, it is however minuscule to something else and that something else might be a sheep and my universe is a cell of energy in the sheep’s blood stream. And the sheep is in a field, and the field is on a farm and the farm is in a country. That country is on a continent and that continent is on a planet. You can see where this goes can’t you! But if not, the planet is in a system and the system is in a galaxy and the galaxy is in a universe and the universe is an energy cell in a sheep’s blood stream ad infinitum. Its just a matter of infinite scale and an over active imagination. It’s quite logical in a linear sense. If it defies any natural laws then what natural laws would they be? I can construct it my head, but it’s highly implausible in reality, it cannot be grounded in any sort of fact. Being plausible, not necessarily absolutely provable is an advantage for any hypnosis. Big Bang is not 100% provable, we weren’t there, but it’s plausible.

I was recently exchanging emails with The Richard Dawkins Foundation looking for some early learning tools about evolution for the kid. We exchanged a few funny stories about children’s perception and I proffered a point about an aunt who is a scientist, god help us, who doesn’t accept that we share a common ancestor that was an ape of some type, because and I quote ‘after all these years none of them can talk or read”. Logical enough in its own way, but I digress. One of the comments that they made was how funny it is that over active imaginations in kids worry us, “oh mustn’t let little Johnny watch to much Dr Who, he’s there’s a time machine down the road”. But when an adult comes up with a concept that has no grounding, isn’t plausible except in the mind it’s called genius. I rather liked that one!

So that leads me to the thought that perhaps we are looking for a complex answer to a simple question, or is it a simple answer to a complex question. Do we know the correct question to be asking? I just ask. Is there a duality here that just doesn’t conform to what knowledge we presently have or are we over stating the question? If what we don’t know is infinite, then how can we expect to answer the question at this moment in time?
I admire people like Churchland by the way, they are the “ginger groups” that push the envelope, they are the people with the Right Stuff to me. But they are also the people that the general public distrusts as mad scientist cooking up the end of the world in lab. It’s the “perception” of what they say, rather than what they actually say. Bit of a paradox that one isn’t it. I can only conclude that the education system need to address that issue, or conversely we are mostly stupid I suppose.

Hope I’m not boring the pants of any one, I just enjoy doing this, don’t care if I get a D- for this, it’s nice to explore it.

So time again! I was a bit late for an important meet and nearly missed the flight today, which is highly unusual for me. It made the team laugh (they’re sacked by the way! Only kidding!) given the stick I dish out about punctuality, but it made me think about numbers and constructs then you posted about Big Bang and time (and measurement can I add, gills, hands, furlongs etc), are human constructs! We are in accord on that one.

Everyone, thanks a lot for putting your thoughts in, keep us thinking.

Elephantschild:

I forgot to say – I agreed with your response to WML on the Theo Hobson thread. I have been trying to say that to him for ages but you put it far better than I could.

K:

Lots to think about. Have you read ‘The Aquatic Ape Hypothesis’ – very interesting and plausible?

krapotkin : I just like to think Hawking was being a bit mischievous! He can’t be profound all time. Can he??

Profound and mischievous ?

I interpreted this to mean that he was prepared to admit the possibility of a unified theory and that he’s saying this would require a deeper understanding of creation than we currently have, because of the inherent contradictions between relativity and quantum theory. I think any unifying theory would have to incorporate non-material elements.

That time is a property of matter but not a property of the energy from which it’s created. Any way, this is my favourite bit of Hawking :

There are something like ten million million million million million million million million million million million million million million (1 with eighty zeroes after it) particles in the region of the universe that we can observe. Where did they all come from? The answer is that, in quantum theory, particles can be created out of energy in the form of particle/antiparticle parts. But that just raises the question of where the energy came from. The answer is that the total energy of the universe is exactly zero. The matter in the universe is made out of positive energy. However, the matter is all attracting itself by gravity. Two pieces of matter that are close to each other have less energy than the same two pieces a long way apart, because you have to expend energy to separate them against the gravitational force that is pulling them together. Thus in a sense, the gravitational field has negative energy. In the case of a universe that is approximately uniform in space, one can show that this negative gravitational energy exactly cancels the positive energy represented by the matter. So the total energy of the universe is zero.

Now twice zero is also zero. Thus the universe can double the amount of positive matter energy and also double the negative gravitational energy without violation of the conservation of energy.

“It is said that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. But the universe is the ultimate free lunch.”

pttp: thanks for your encouragement. If I am ignorant of the writing of far greater minds than mine it is for lack of time (I can’t even keep up with the literature in my own discipline) and not lack of interest. As my username implies (for those who recognise the reference), I am infinitely curious.

I tend to agree with you on philosophy v science. Philosophers pursue interesting and often profound ideas (some of them contradictory) to their logical conclusions but, as both Kropotkin and Boltonian have pointed out, there can ultimately be no proof. Which is not to say that these ideas are not valuable in the current discussion. The further reaches of theoretical physics seem in any case to be converging on philosophy. And was not physics once termed ‘natural philosophy?

As regards Darwin’s beliefs – or lack of – he certainly parted company with orthodox Christianity, probably some time in the 1840s, but not necessarily because of his conclusions regarding the origin of species and evolution (within 20 years or so of his publishing many, if not most leading Christians in England seem to have come to the conclusion that these hypotheses were not incompatible with their beliefs), but with doubts arising from his own illness and the death of his young daughter, Annie. The best clue we have to his thoughts on the matter are his comments when working on his autobiography in 1879. ‘My judgement often fluctuates … In my most extreme fluctuations I have never been an Atheist in the sense of denying God. I think that generally (and more and more often as I grow older) but not always, that an Agnostic would be the more correct description of my state of mind.’ Agnosticism would seem to be the logical position in any case. Science cannot prove the existence of God, but nor can science disprove it. I have always taken Hawking’s reference to ‘the mind of God’ as a metaphor, but maybe he was just being mischievous after all.

Boltonian: thanks also. I am not sure that I can take you any further on the subject of compatabilism. I confess that I grabbed it from a quick trawl of wikipedia, since I could not find anything on the subject of free will in the limited number of reference books I had to hand (I did say that most of my knowledge of philosophy was from second hand summaries!) The summaries there (if I understood them correctly) seemed to chime with my own, independent thoughts on the subject, and to be logical as far as they went. If you haven’t already been there, wiki at least provides references for further reading on the subject.

Could you expand on your statement that the Big Bang hypothesis is now seeming less likely? It is a while since I did any reading on the subject, and I would be interested to know more.

K. Again, thanks for the response. I haven’t had time to give much thought to it as yet, but will get back to you.

*********************

The questions of time and consciousness were raised some time back. Both are slippery concepts, but since they are fundamental to the issues in question, here is my pennyworth.

According to Einstein’s elegant theory, time is relative and a function of space/time, ‘real’ or otherwise. The only constant within space time is the speed of light, which might not be quite as constant as once thought, since there now seems to be some evidence that it was faster in the early stages of the universe.

Is time linear? or is it simply that we experience it as linear because of our limited perceptions? I have been toying with the idea that if an observer could view space/time from outside the universe, time would appear as a medium in which all things, past, present and future, coexist. A human being in that context might look something like a continuous, elongated but finite pasta shape, and if a single moment ‘the present’ could be isolated, like a two dimensional section through that shape. Just another thought game.

The future does not exist for us, except in our imaginations, because we cannot go there. On the cosmic level we can make probabalistic predictions based on the observed data. Thus we can predict what will happen to our sun in the long term, on the basis of our observations of other stars of similar type at different stages of their existence. But we cannot predict with certainty what will happen tomorrow. We cannot visit the future in any real sense, but we can send messages into the future, in the genes of our descendants, in the durable artefacts we make, or in our writings or other recorded data. Messages in a bottle, though, since we cannot know where they will end up, or whether they will survive at all.

If the past does not exist I am in trouble (I am an archaeologist/historian).

Joking apart, we cannot visit the past, either, or influence it in any way (although in the novel ‘Timescape’ the physicist Gregory Benford toyed with the idea of transmitting tachyons (hypothetical particles which travel faster than light and therefore backwards in time)to communicate with people in the past in order to change history. The scientists conducting the experiment could never know if they had succeded, of course, because if they had, it would not have been their past or present which were changed.

The past can send messages to us, though. The Hubble telescope has captured images of distant galaxies as they were billions of years in the past. Suns have gone nova and seeded the galaxies with the elements to form new stars and the physical components of life (we are indeed stardust). On our own planet rock strata and the fossils they contain give us information about a very different earth in the past. Our ancestors back to the earliest single-celled entities have bequeathed us their genes. Written works of literature or philosophy tell us something of how people thought and viewed the world in the past. And on a more humble level, letters, diaries, legal documents, wills and probate inventories etc. reveal how people ordered their lives, as do surviving, random artefacts – more reliably in many cases than the great monuments which were intended to survive, since many of the latter amount to propaganda.

Sapientlunatic’s analogy with a ROM database may be apt, but what a database!

Boltonian posed the question what is consciousness and what is its purpose. My questions, also.

Clearly, at one level (maybe the only level) consciousness is indeed a function of chemistry and electrical impulses within the structure of the brain, but is that all? or is there a ‘ghost in the machine’ Maybe we will get an answer if/when we succeed in constructing a computer which is a true analogue of the human brain, -assuming, also, that we can establish with certainty that it also ‘thinks’ in a way we can relate to (I suspect the Turing test is too crude). Will such a machine have mind/consciousness in the same sense as we do? I tend to think not, but have no objective grounds for such an opinion.

but whether or not consciousness is an illusion, what purpose does it serve other than to enable us to wonder about ourselves and the universe in which we exist? Does it give us an adaptive advantate? It would not appear so, judging by the mess we are making of our world.

And what of imagination – the ability to postulate that which does not exist, and in some cases could not possibly exist? Is this anything more than an extension of the ’story telling’ process by which we organise the input of our senses?

Sapientlunatic’s exposition of the idea of the unconscious and the collective unconscious triggers another chain of thought. I was aware of Jung’s ideas in a general way, of course, but had never really followed them through. Presumably this is where intuition comes in (cue another personal anecdote). I once shocked a colleague profoundly by saying that intuition played a significant role in the processing of data during research. He thought I meant guesswork. What I meant in fact was that I tried to approach an investigation as far as possible without any preconceived ideas, simply accumulating data until something gelled and a pattern emerged from my busy subconscious, often while I was doing something else. I could then go back and review the data with my conscious, reasoning mind, to see if it fitted the pattern. I have also, once or twice, felt when learning something new as if I was rediscovering knowledge or a skill which I had once known and forgotten. The collective unconscious?

Enough for now – mor than enough for on post, maybe. I will check back some time tomorrow.

elephantschild : I was an IT analyst/trouble-shooter for 28 years and also used that approach to problem-solving. Letting the subconscious trains of thought take the strain. What I envision happening in the subconscious realm is analogous to distributed parallel processing, where different algorithms are being executed independently as incoming data is integrated into the database. We know that one of the most important facets of human intelligence is pattern recognition and I believe that this must also happen subconsciously. It is, of course, a widely recognised ability, acknowledged in the phrase “I’ll sleep on it”.

Reverse-engineering the human brain and using this knowledge to build a computer system able to simulate it is one of key postulates of The Singularity is Near, to which I’ve referred on CiF and quoted from here. Ray K’s estimate is that the requisite hardware to emulate human intelligence will be available by the end of the decade with supercomputers and by PC at the end of the following decade. He states that we will have effective software models of human intelligence by the mid-2020s and that the Turing test will be passed by the end of that decade. I agree that the classical Turing test will soon be seen as inadequate.

I can understand your scepticism about the value of acquiring consciousness, given the current parlous state of the world. I would argue that consciousness has evolved along with the brain and that it has conferred very distinct advantages on our species.

I’d also like to mention in this regard, the work of David Lewis-Williams whose neuropsychological theory suggests that trance states precipitated by dancing marathons inspired rock and cave art, among the earliest forms of representational art so far identified.

Given your area of professional expertise, I’d be grateful for any insights you might have into the validity and importance of the above. A summary is available here :

http://www.antiquityofman.com/Trance_Lewis-Williams.html

Elephantschild:

Re- Big Bang. I said that it looks less likely to be the start. I did not mean to imply that it had not happened. Most theoretical physics writers I have read recently think that Big Bang was merely one event in many (possibly an infinite number).

Re-intuition I think most scientists now accept that breakthroughs occur from a leap of the mind, without the supporting data, rather than from painstakingly accumulating the evidence. An example of this for me is Michael Ventris’ intuitive thoughts that led to the decipherment of linear B. It still needed John Chadwick’s leg work to prove it, though.

Thanks for the Compatibility ref – I will follow it up.

pttp and K:

I have read a few physicists who think that the universe is energy neutral and that it emerged from a vacuum fluctuation using Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle.

My questions are: ‘Why did it happen?’ and,’ Where did the virtual particles that created the universe come from in the first place?’ I am sure this is a very naive way to look at it but my brain needs causation.

There might be an infinite number of universes and an infinite number of dimensions and, if time (at least as we perceive it) is a human construct, there is no need for causation. But, if we cannot envisage infinity or something existing without a prior cause how can we ever get close to any sort of understanding?

I hand’t realised that a quantum computer was so near to being a reality. It will be very interesting to see what happens – worth staying alive for!

————–

Has anybody heard of, or read anything by, Stephen Wolfram. Chown rates him very highly? His hypothesis is that the whole of the universe is a Turing machine and can be reduced to four lines of computer language. He suggests that our mathematical approach will only ever give us an incomplete view. He likens it to judging how the world looks from the light shed by a street lamp on a dark night. He tends to work alone and has been largely ignored by the mainstream.

A couple more thoughts.

Elephantschild:

I read the Wikipedia entry on Compatibilism. Does it say, do you think, anything more than Free Will is an illusion if everyting has a prior cause?

In a way it wouldn’t matter, so long as we all believed we had it to some degree (which I think is the case).

K:

Just re-read some of your earlier posts. You make an excellent point about scale.

I have thought for some time that we can handle things that are not too much bigger than ourselves and not too smaller. This has grown as we have gained the technology. So, we can picture (just about) the universe and atoms but nothing really larger or smaller than that.

Carl Sagan once wrote that if we could break open an electron (a so-called fundamental particle) we would find a myriad of universes in there.

Can a microbe, for example, perceive a human being – certainly not as we perceive ourselves?

Another thing occurs to me. It has often been said that human beings are the only creatures capable of conscious, reasoning thought. How do we know? We cannot put oursleves in the place of, say, a cat. We can only make judgements based on our own experience and observation. This is why we have a compulsion to anthropormorphise.

Yakaboo:

My rather glib response is that neither climate change nor self-harm will be the biggest threat to the species but something external that we have not forseen (perhaps an asteroid collision).

My guess is that we are too well established as a species to wipe ourselves out entirely. We might suffere a catastrophic population crash followed by several hundred years of ‘Dark ages.’
It has been suggested that this has happened to us before because there is so little variation in our genome compared with, say, apes. This points to us all being descended from a small population that began to grow relatively recently.

Krapotkin:

Natural Laws/duality: I’m not entirely sure what you mean here, but if I have understood you correctly, then yes, I suppose there is an implicit duality.

On the one hand there are what are often referred to as the ‘laws’ of physics, based on a certainty that our current model of the universe is testable and that, within the model, matter and forces (above the quantum level, at least) behave and interact in predictable and consistent ways. The model may be modified and expanded in the light of new discoveries and insights, but only in ways constent with the ‘laws’ already established, and these ‘laws’apply invariably and limit what is possible.

We could also, I suppose, talk of the ‘laws’ of genetics, since the ways that living organisms act and interact to form an ecosystem is determined for the most part by behaviours and physical forms which are the product of evolution and genetic inheritance – even the human ability to manage and alter the environment to a greater degree than any other animal.

On the other hand there is Natural Law in the philosophical or ethical sense, which is a social construct relating to a specific concept of human nature. It presupposes that ethical standards can be objectively derived, but those standards are, in fact, contingent and mutable. As I seem to remember you pointed out on the CiF thread, different societies may have different ideas about what constitutes moral behavious and what is most conducive to the good of society and the well-being of individuals within society. So I suppose that as a determining factor it comes under the heading of ‘nurture’.

pttp:

I hadn’t come across ‘The Singularity is Here’ until you mentioned it on the CiF thread, but was familiar with the concept of the technological singularity (it tends to crop up quite a lot in recent SF)

As regards your query concerning the significance of cave paintings, I gather from the summary that Lewis Williams is using insights gained from the study of shamanistic beliefs in a modern African society to interpret cave paintings in the same region. It seems a valid approach, although I am not sure how far his ideas can be seen has having validity for all similar examples prehistoric art.

My knowledge of the subject, such as it is, is confined to the upper palaeolithic cave art of southern Europe, and the problem of interpretation there is that the art itself, in the context of a sometimes meagrely attested material culture, is the only certain evidence we have. Ethnological studies of recent and contemporary societies in other parts of the world present a range of possible comparative models, but there is no guarantee that any of these is applicable to a society far in the past.

When I was an undergraduate we had drummed into us ‘the limits of reasonable inference’, i.e. we can infer custom from repeated evidence of practice, but we cannot infer belief from custom. It seemed to me at the time to be a very limiting approach, and archaeologists keep pushing the boundaries, but it remains true that when we are dealing with the beliefs of prehistoric peoples, we can never get beyond theorizing.

The known examples of S.European cave art cover a pretty long time span – probably around 15000 years – and show considerable development during that period, from rudimentary outlines and patterns to elaborate figurative images, so it is probable in any case, that no one interpretation would fit all.

Although the later, figurative images are often vivid and aesthetically pleasing, the fact that they are in deep caves and often superimposed in haphazard fashion indicates, at least, that this was not ‘art for art’s sake’. The animals are sometimes depicted pierced with arrows, or dead, and the simplest interpretation is that they were a symbolic attempt by the hunter-gatherers who created them, to control their environment (sympathetic magic). There are also a few images of human figures with animal attributes, or wearing animal costurm, which could be indicative of some form of shamanism, Another possibility is that the animals depicted had totemic significance, and some people have sggested more elaborate symbolisms based, for example, on the grouping of animals and markings in different areas of the caves. The most that can be said with confidence is that they are evidently expressions of some form of belief system.

Decorative, symbolic, and perhaps even figurative art may be as old as the species homo sapiens sapiens itself, so who knows where the original impulse came from. It seems to be universal.

Boltonian:

For a more extensive overview of compatibilism, giving the arguments pro and con, and with refs, see

http//plato.stanford.edu/entries/compatibilism/

My own intuitive feeling is that if, in a broadly deterministic world, a rational individual is presented with two or more equal options for action or decision, s/he may, at least sometimes have regulative control to choose freely between the options. It seemed to me that this position seemed to fit best within a compatabilist view; but what do I know.

The ‘leap of the mind’ – Yes, exactly!. Suddenly finding that you see the solution to a problem without any conscious awareness of how you reached that point. In my limited experience it can happen both when one is working with a specific set of data (as Ventris was) and when examining a problem for the first time – in which case, I presume, the unconscious mind produces the solution from one’s general store of knowledge. No great conceptual breakthroughs in my case, though. If only!

The question of whether animals other than man are capable of conscious reasoning has sometimes occurred to me, too. Perhaps some are, given the right environmental stimulus. My mother once had a pair of burmese cats which occasionally displayed what appeared to be problem solving behaviour.

elephantschild:

Some good stuff here. Two things from your post that I am interested in pursuing:

1) The nature of morality and moral relativism. Is there any objective morally superior society? I think not but would be happy to be convinced otherwise. How can we say that ours morals in this place, at this time and at our stage of development are superior to any others from other periods and places? My morals are firmly rooted in the Open Society but that does not mean that they are superior to those of a more totalitarian or tribal regime that might tolerate or encourage slavery, oppression of minorities, human and animal sacrifice etc. Or does it? What do people feel?

2) Had the neolithic revolution not occurred would we have destroyed our food supply by over-killing. I have read a few articles claiming evidence for this but someone on CiF, who said he/she had some expertise in the field denied it. It feels intuitively right to me that necessity (through population growth and diminshing resources) drove the neolithic revolution. Do you have any thoughts on this?

Boltonian : I take your (Russell’s) point about the position of philosophy relative to science/theology. However, I’m sticking with my view that scientific advances have revealed a reality, which can’t be understood in terms of traditional philosophy.

The truth, in my opinion, can’t be approached by rational thought processes, although it can subsequently be appreciated and interpreted by them.

Wolfram is referenced quite heavily in Singularity, but mainly just for Cellular Automata. A New Kind of Science seems interesting, but I’ve only read about 50 of the 1000+ pages, so far. I’ll attempt to summarise from what I’ve learnt : the application of mathematics in science may have been useful, but ultimately led to a dead-end. The complexity of the material world can be explained by very simple rules or algorithms, which better explain the behaviour of processes in every sphere of existence. Widely recognised as a genius in his younger days, Wolfram may be right that he’s identified the way forward for all of science to progress. It’s also (just) possible that he’s flipped into insanity and that his theory is a peculiar form of delusion. The fact that he’s spawned a highly successful company and has previously been recognised for leading edge advances in science may argue against this, though.

elephantschild : Thanks for your very fair review of the Lewis-Williams theory. The linked page discusses common themes in San and upper Paleolithic art and introduces the controversial 3-stage explanation by which rock/cave art images may be categorised. As you’ve referred to your view of standard methodology being unnecessarily limiting, I feel justified in offering the following even if it fails to meet normal academic criteria with respect to intellectual rigour.

http://www.mc.maricopa.edu/dept/d10/asb/anthro2003/legacy/paleolithic/art/art.html

My current view is that evolution of our species occurred in many places at different times and therefore I’m predisposed to seek common underlying causes. My own experiments with fasting, for example, have convinced me that altered states of consciousness would have been common in prehistoric societies. I haven’t experimented with sensory deprivation, eg. being holed up in a cave, but have read accounts, which suggest that this is also sufficient to precipitate altered states. The use of hallucinogenic drugs (in both ancient and modern societies) is well known to facilitate altered states. Similar states are also achievable with meditation, but this has to be seen as a relatively recent development.

pttp:

Many thanks for the Wolfram info. I had not heard of him until I read Marcus Chown’s latest opus.

The problem I have with science is that many people give it more credit for providing answers than it is due. The more we learn the less we seem to know. I am ploughing through Lee Smolin’s recently published book, ‘The Trouble with Physics,’ and it is rather depressing if one is looking for answers (so far).

I am not sure that science is helping us very much with a picture of reality, although it does give us some insight into our perceived picture of the world.

I am interested in your view that our species developed in several different places independently. Do you have any evidence? I understand that we have a very narrow genome compared with our nearest relatives and that this tends to suggest a common, recent heritage.

Elaine Morgan’s book on the aquatic ape hypothesis is well worth reading. She suggests that water is the key to our evolutionary development. We have very few natural advantages but the ability to swim is one. Bi-pedalism would have assisted our ability to fish (at the expense of a smaller pelvis). This would have allowed the development of large brain because standing upright allows us to support a heavier head, which walking on all fours would not permit. A large brain, therefore, is a by product of bi-pedalism.

There all sorts of clues to this, such as the way our hair grows compared with apes, our nose shape, and the fact that our babies are born covered with vernix – the only land mammal we know of that is. Babies are also comfortable being born in water.

The penalty we pay for this adaptation is that we have a small pelvis and our babies are born helpless with much of their development happening outside the womb. This means that we need to spend a very long time dependent on our parents – relatively more than any other mammal, I think.

Yesterday the weather was beautiful and the garden beckoned. Today the outdoors is not so inviting, so it’s back to the keyboard

Boltonian:

Morality and moral relativism. Interestingly, the NYT supplement in last Sunday’s Observer had a piece on the primatologist Frans de Waal’s theory that in empathic and altruistic behaviour patterns in non-human primates, and chimps in particular, we can discern the origins and basis of human morality. This is contrasted with the view of philosophers that conscious reasoning, rather than emotions such as sympathy, plays the largest part in shaping human ethical behaviour, and that biological analysis cannot bridge the gap between ‘is’ and ‘ought’: between the description of behaviour and the issue of why it is right or wrong.

Altruistic behaviour which supports the individual within a group is certainly advantageous, in that it is conducive to the coherence and thus the success of the group, but insofar as it is emotionally driven, it depends on the members of the group being intimately acquainted with one another. It would work very well within a small social group of people linked by kinship, for example, but once they begin to associate in larger groups, things become much more complex. The manner in which individuals identify with the social groups they relate to is like a nest of Chinese boxes. At the centre is the nuclear and extended family, then the immediate community such as the village then the clan or city state, then tribe, perhaps, or nation. And the intensity of identification weakens as we work outwards. Relationships within the larger groups, where individuals do not know one another personally, therefore have to be informed by a common set of ethical values (which may be culturally influenced).

My guess is that such values tended to evolve on a more or less pragmatic basis as the societies themselves evolved and became more complex, and that the articulation, validation and elaboration of those values by philosophers, and their codification as rules within systems of religious belief, was secondary. The value systems may have differed at different times and in different places, but their relative value overall can, I think, be judged objectively according to their effectiveness in balancing the interests and well being of the individual against the stability and smooth-functioning of the society of which the individual forms a part.

All the various systems seem to be founded on one or other of two approaches. The most common, throughout history, places the emphasis on the responsibility of the individual towards society as, for example, in traditional Chinese society based on Confucianism, or Japanese society under the shoguns. The other, more dominant in modern western society, places the emphasis on the responsibility of individuals towards one another. Both approaches have their advantages and disadvantages. The first can produce a very stable society, but one in which the needs and happiness of the individual may be forcibly overridden; the other (in theory, at least) entails less indivual suffering, but can permit a ‘me first’ ‘look after number one’, competetive attitude which is counterproductive in terms of social cohesion.

Each system can see the flaws in the other, and there will be a natural tendency to see the values prevailing in one’s own society as ‘better’. There is also a tendency to confuse abstract moral values with purely cultural norms (as can be seen, for example. in some muslim communities). The question is, what moral values should prevail in a community which is becoming global? Because in that context ideas of moral relativism may become untenable. Already there has been some convergence, in that certain things once widely considered acceptable, even natural, such as slavery, or infanticide, are now generally considered to be morally wrong.

My own feeling is that this would have to be a system which encourages people to relate positively to others, even those they do not know, as individuals in whom they can see themselves; and fosters empathy, consideration for the feelings of the other and respect (the ‘love your neighbour as yourself, and that includes your enemies’ approach), while allowing a degree of moral pluralism. Idealistic, I know, given that human beings seem to find it a lot easier to define themselves in relation to what is ‘other’ and to look for differences rather than similarities, but the alternatives appear to be perpetual conflict, world-wide totalitarianism, or an amoral free-for-all.

On your second point, the idea that the neolithic ‘revolution’ was driven by the destruction of resources available to support hunter-gatherer communities and the necessity of finding alternatives does not seem to be supported by the evidence. Hunter-gathering seems, in fact, to be a highly sustainable choice, in that the balance between population and resources is self-regulating, because it works within the ecosystem. I knew one prehistorian who used to maintain that we would have been better of as a species if we had stuck to that way of life. The indigenous peoples of mainland Australia, for example, managed to survive for upwards of 40.000 years without exhausting the food supply, and it is thought that before the arrival of Europeans, the population had remained stable for several thousand years, at least. It is true that when modern man entered an ecosystem for the first time, in Australia, New Zealand or the Americas at least, their arrival led to the exinction of many animals ( although in N America, changes in climate following the last ice age were almost certainly a contributory factor). But after that, an equilibrium was reached. Hunter-gatherers could and often did manage their environment, for example by creating forest clearings and enlarging watering holes to attract game, but not in ways that involved large-scale alteration of that environment.

The transition from hunting and gathering to farming seems to have been fairly gradual and to have spread from the fertile crescent of the near east as much by a process of acculturation as by movement of peoples. It probably began because people found it convenient to have at least some of their food stocks to hand, thereby avoiding the necessity of being frequently on the move, and at some point this process acquired its own momentum as it began to result in wholesale changes to the environment. The advantages which accrued included the maintenance of a larger, static population in which greater diversification of activity and more complex social institutions became possible. The downside is that, from the beginning, it has required ever more elaborate manoevres to sustain the balancing act between resources and our increasing demands on the environment.

I have not read Elaine Morgan’s book, but I remember reading about her hypothesis when it was first published. The arguments seem very plausible (I learned only recently that Chimps can’ swim!). Either way, bipedalism does seem to have been a prerequisite for the development of a large brain.

pttp:

To expand on what I wrote before about Lewis-Williams’ theory: I think that his ideas concerning shamanism in relation to palaeolithic cave art are at the very least interesting, and may be applicable in some cases, although I am never comfortable with the ‘one interpretation fits all’ approach.

I am not,hoever, convinced by the thesis that the origins of art can be explained by neurological stimulation through the use of phsychoactive drugs or other mind-altering techniques.

For a critique of this theory see:

http://www.wynja.com/arch/entoptic.html

To interpret all the various and varied examples of S European cave art according to recent and modern recorded shamanistic beliefs and practice presupposes that there has been no subtantial development in the thinking of hunter-gatherers during the past 35,000 years or so. Possible indications of shamanism in the S European examples (e.g. the depiction of human figures in animal costume or with animal attributes) are in any case very rare.

The images suggest complex symbolisms, and it is very likely that they were associated with various ceremonial practices (possibly including initiation rites) but whether these ceremonies ever involved inducing altered states of mind must remain conjectural. Various other plausible interpretations have been advanced (although the old idea that they relate to hunting magic is now largely discredited), and I therefore subscribe to the view that upper palaeolithic art is polysemic.

As to your idea that the evolution of our species (by which I presume you mean homo sapiens sapiens) occurred in many places at different times, I’m not sure. H. sapiens sapiens certainly coexisted for a time with other closely related species, both in Africa and elsewhere, but the others all became extinct. And I seem to remember reading that the evidence of mitochondrial DNA points to a single origin for modern man in Africa.

erratum:
I meant to say that Chimps cannot swim!

Boltonian : Sorry my last post was sloppy. I accept that “out of Africa” is currently the only game in town. What I meant to suggest was that the mental evolution, which seems to have given rise to adoption of cultural and religious practices happened in many places at different times. Shamanistic practices derive from altered states of consciousness and there are common themes, whatever method of inducing trance is used.

Eg. long before I knew about the half-human half-animal paintings, I’d seen people taking on characteristics of animals.

Science is raising such fundamental questions about every aspect of existence, that philosophy doesn’t have a firm foundation on which to pontificate. I’ve introduced some evidence that the central, but slippery concepts of free will and consciousness, for example, are anything but cut and dried.

I’m still open to anyone introducing elements of philosophy into the discussion and I’ve admitted my almost complete ignorance in this area.

elephantschild : Thanks for your comments and I apologise for my misleading comment about evolution.

Anyone interested in reading the original paper can find it here :

http://www.rockart.wits.ac.za/origins/external_pages/publications/files/Lewis-Williams%20&%20Dowson%201988%20The%20signs%20of%20all%20times.pdf

elephantschild:

Good stuff on altruism. I like your idea of the choice between serving the individual and society. Have you read Popper’s, ‘Open Society and its Enemies?’ In your terminology he suggests that there is really no contest and that making society pre-eminent leads inexorably to totalitarianism, corruption and oppression.

I agree with that but, I suspect, only because I have been brought up with those values and not because the morals of an open society are instrinsically superior.

Your response to my neolithic revolution enquiry was interesting. I accept that it happened over a long period and there were many factors involved but I still think that necessity, driven by scarcity of resources, played some part. I would be interested in your views on this: http://www.waspress.co.uk/
journal_20063/abstracts/index.php#200631

A thought occurs to me. If we as homo sapien sapiens are guilty of squandering the earth’s resources, locally as well as globally, why were was paleolithic/mesolithic man not capable of doing likewise? After all I doubt we have evolved very much genetically in that last 10,000 years.

There is loads of good stuff on shamanism on the Before Farming website.

———————-
pttp:

Philosophy was science at one time and the two seem to be coming together again. Most philosophers were mathematicians or scientists of one sort or another and it is only recently that they have become separated.

This (artificial)divide, in my view, has coincided with the decline in philosphical reasoning. The best philosophy (certainly metaphysics)is now being written by scientists.

Boltonian , I think the web needs a place like this . Kudos to you .

Wow , there is a lot going on in this thread .

Just picking up on a few things that caught my eye while scrolling …

The Big Bang .

At the moment there is no escaping an initial boundary condition for space time . Guth , Borde and Vilkein showed that any spacetime with a positive cosmological constant must be past incomplete . Eternal inflation , the most popular current theory , can only be future eternal .

Many cosmologists believe that quantum physics may hold the answer to the boundary condition problem . However this still doesn’t answer what , if anything , came before the boundary .

One answer I have seen is basically the old answer Bertrand Russel gave ; it is a meaningless question to ask what happened before there was time for things to happen in .

This , I think , is an unsatisfying answer and with the decline of positivism many others appear to think so too . It is not so much a matter of time as cause . If a thing can occur without causation , i.e. necessary preconditions , then the universe is absurd and science is no more than stamp collecting .

Another answer is the Venger notion that a quantum fluctuation occurred in nothing . This is problematic as it requires the utter absence of anything to follow the laws of physics . The laws of physics being , to most people , just the observation of regularities in matter. Venger seems to imply that the laws of physics can somehow bootstrap the universe into existence without there being any matter/energy at all . This begs the obvious question ; what are the laws of physics and where do they come from if not the inherent nature of matter ?

Determinism , Consciousness and Free Will .

I think discussions of such matters are plagued by the language of folk psychology . Under a naturalistic account of the brain , there is no ‘you’ in the sense you instinctively mean . There cannot be .

If the brain is all there is to consciousness then brain states don’t dictate consciousness ; they are consciousness . There is no abstracted self with agency being pulled this way and that by genes expressed in the brain and environmental factors . Genes expressed in the brain form networks which process information from the senses about the environment . That is it , bits of matter reacting against other bits of matter.

The thoughts ‘you’ have are neuronal firing patterns in the language and visual networks in the brain .

To me this seems an insufficient account of consciousness . I think the subjective experience of thinking , feeling , drinking etc is irreducible to brain states . No matter how much we know about a brain in action , we won’t know what it is like to be that brain in action .

I realize this isn’t much of a contribution , but this was a densely packed thread . I hope I can be more useful in future debates .

SpaceP:

Welcome. And thanks for your post.

The Masters beckons (as well as a glass or two of Burgundy) so I will read it again, digest and respond sometime soon.

What do others think?

BTW I have just fired my latest broadside at ACG. Have you noticed that he has not once, on any of these threads, answered either of us? Ummmm. A friend of mine studied philosophy under him at Birkbeck and his view was that he (Grayling)was very entertaining, loved to show off his knowledge and hated being contradicted. I have read a few of his books and they are lightweight, tendentious and not terriby well thought through. But maybe that’s just my prejudice.

Boltonian :

I look forward to your responses and others if they appear .

What you say about Grayling is broadly true . I’ve not seen him respond to any philosophical or historical points of any weight raised against him in this or any other thread .

He did respond when I reminded him that the Roman Empire was at least as morally repellent as the dark ages . He said admiring Roman architecture does not entail admiring slavery . When I made the obvious counterpoint that admiring Christian hospitals does not entail admiring the inquisition there was silence .

I think what raises my hackles about his arguments is the underlying “this is the only rational way to see things” tone coupled with his manifest irrationality in believing in such things as a ‘true’ classical inheritance or moral progress under naturalism .

I’ve never read any of his books . I do a fair bit of reading of journal papers in pdf format , especially about religion and naturalism , when I can find them and I don’t recall him being cited in any of them.

Hi Boltonian and SpacePenguin
Thought I’d pay this site a visit – like many of the other posters I’ve come via CiF. I’ve admired your posts on CiF for a long time. Nice work!
SpaceP I agree with you and Copplestone – Russell gave up thinking too quickly on that question.
I can’t abide ACG or indeed Dawkins on religion and find myself strangely attracted to the rubbish that they write. Are they really unable to find a reasonable and polite tone? Do you think they believe the stuff they write? Other atheists are able to write with far more insight and sensitivity on religious matters – Roy Hattersley is a good example of this, for my money.

Forgive me for a probable disjointed entry. Concentration is fleeting with frequent interruptions from children. Rather than ignore them, I can only focus for a short term. Also, forgive for, no doubt, an obvious lack of knowledge.

Relevant to a distinction between the conscious and the subconscious, I have been exposed to methamphetamine users, who by the nature of the drug, lack sleep. At some point, due, in my view, to this sleep deficit, one’s conscious mind becomes subsumed to the subconscious. The boundary between the two is tenuous at best and one’s perception is, even more than normal, subject to irrationality. So, it is my opinion that their is a distinction between the subconscious and the conscious, but the terms of that distinction are based upon allowing cognitive functioning some down time.

In regards to a ‘leap of the mind’, I definitely believe that is not a non-typical logical reaction. Many times, rather than attempting a linear means to solve a problem, I give myself time to ‘use a side-door’ so to speak. Is that an “outside the box” comparison?

Is there such a thing as an objectively morally superior society? I am uncertain. I have concluded that some people have inferior morals. Does that suggest then that someone else has superior morals, and with extrapolation that a society theoretically would have superior morals vis-a-vis the next?

Shucks, gotta go. Thanks all for the informative discussion. Hope my ignorance is amusing rather than insulting.

gerry71:

Thanks and welcome.

Agree about ACG and Dawkins.

They both, as I understand it, belong to the same humanist society where, doubtless, they reinforce each others’ prejudices.

Grayling has got out of the habit of understanding that all he can do, as a philosopher, is weigh up the available evidence and suggest possible answers. Journalism demands instant, black and white certainties and this is where he obviously derives a portion of his income these days. He is in danger of becoming a parody.

Also, I think his personality finds it difficult to admit to us lowly folk that there might be other legitimate views. The way he caricatures his opponents as ‘Foaming at the mouth religious fundamentalists’ tells you that neither he, nor his groupies, have actually read the critical posts. He seems to have shifted his position somewhat to include all exclusive ideologies and then accuses his critics of being unintelligent! I really think he has boxed himself into a corner on this.

9mile:

An interesting and thoughtful post. I agree that the divide between consciousness/unconsciousness is artificial in some way. But why?

How is the divide determined. It clearly serves a purpose. Perhaps our brain is like Occam’s razor in that we only process the minimum information we need to survive.

It still doesn’t get us closer to understanding what consciousnes actually is and whether we are alone on the planet in this regard. It must, presumably, confer a benefit on our species.

Do we come back to the idea that the universe needs to be observed in order to exist?

SpaceP:

I am reading Smolin’s latest – very intersting so far, if a little gloomy.

I have never really been comfortable with the ‘vacuum fluctuation’ theory to explain the cosmos for the same reasons you have put. It might also be that I don’t understand it well enough.

If the universe was created out of nothing and it is infinite and eternal, then our finite brains will never be able to comprehend it because we cannot imagine what such concepts would mean.

On consciousness, someone here suggested we were about a decade or so away from building a quantum computer which might, in time, allow us to recreate, molecule by molecule, the human brain. That might give us a clue to the nature of consciousness.

Do you think consciousness is more than just the function of the brain – more of a dualist position?

Interesting stuff.

Gerry71 :

I seem to remember that Russell never fully accepted the big bang theory . It is easier to say the universe is just there and that’s it when it has always been there . Creation ex nihilo is very awkward .

I think that ACG and Dawkins are simply the type of person that needs to have the world ‘wrapped up’ in their own minds . For them ‘truth’ is both knowable and absolute . I think it is telling that despite their atheism they both still believe in objective moral progress .

boltonian :

Smolin has some fascinating ideas , I know very little about LQG but it seems like a worthwhile approach . Both him and Woit are spot on about the sociology of science in my view .

“If the universe was created out of nothing and it is infinite and eternal, then our finite brains will never be able to comprehend it because we cannot imagine what such concepts would mean.”

I think most people who back the infinite regress idea don’t believe there was a beginning an infinite amount of time ago , they believe that there was no beginning . This brings up two questions ; Is there such a thing as an actual infinity in nature ? Why eternal something instead of eternal nothing ?

—–

I think that even in a perfect simulation of the brain we still couldn’t tell if it was conscious because of the zombie problem .

I am a dualist , I drifted from the Dennett position when I realised that I hadn’t missed something , he had simply failed to account for consciousness . I hovered around epiphenomenalism for a while until I realised that it was dualism for those who don’t want to admit to supernatural beliefs . Now I am , on the balance of probabilities , an interactionist dualist like Popper .

Boltonian

To return, if I may, to the subject of hunter/gatherer societies and the transition to farming.

I did not mean to imply that palaeolithic and mesolithic peoples were inherently incapable of squandering the earth’s resources. My point was that where people are dependent on the unmodified natural environment they will tend to operate within the constraints imposed by it, and such things as population and group size within any given area will to a large extent be controlled by it. The evidence suggests, in fact, that nomadic hunter/gatherer societies have generally managed to function in a state of equilibrium with their environment for as long as that environment remains stable.

Agricultural societies, on the other hand, in their attempt to control their local environment, will make changes beneficial only to themselves, which tends to destabilise the equilibrium and, since successful agriculture and animal husbandry can support increasingly large populations, the potential for instability beomes ever greater.

As to what kick-started the transition. the most plausible suggestion I have seen is that in an optimum area such as the fertile crescent, where the food supply was relatively abundant, varied and readily accessible, hunter/gatherers may have adopted a more sedentary life style and begun to develop social and economic patterns accordingly. Sedentism would have created the conditions necessary for more intensive attempts at managing the food supply – initially, perhaps, by creating gardens for the growing of plant foods, and creating conditions to attract game. If/when increases in the population led to pressure on resources, they may then have been more inclined to adapt further, rather than to revert to the more traditional response of migration. To that degree, then, you may be right, but it does not seem that it was an inevitable and necessary response, simply one of several possibilities.

In the northern hemisphere the rapid changes in climate following the retreat of the ice could have provided further stimulus for adaptive response, but were not, I think, a primary cause

*************

I have not, I regret to say, read Popper’s ‘Open Society and its Enemies’ – something else to add to my ‘to do’ list. I agree, though, that it does seem that where society comes before the individual, this tends to lead to oppression and totalitarianism.

In that connection, Lafcadio Hearn’s view of traditional Japanese society is interesting. He settled there about 40 years after the country was first opened to the west, and in ‘Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation’ published in 1904, he wrote:

‘That all are polite, that nobody quarrels, that everybody smiles, that pain and sorrow remain invisible, that the new police have nothing to do, would seem to prove a morally superior humanity. But for the trained sociologist it would prove something different, and suggest something very terrible. It would prove to him that this society had been moulded under immense coercion. [...] He would immediately perceive that ethos and custom had not yet become dissociated, and that the conduct of each person was regulated by the will of the rest. He would know that personality could not develop in such a social medium – that no individual superiority dare assert itself, that no competition would be tolerated’.

***************

On the subject of ACG, I am familiar only with what he has written on CiF – polemic supported chiefly by assertion and rhetoric. My reading of his character on this basis alone is in agreement with what everyone here has said. The same goes for Dawkins – a respectable scientist in his own field, even if his approach and some of his ideas are open to criticism. but who seems to lose the plot when it comes to the subject of religion, and to abandon any real attempt at objectivity and academic rigour. (maybe he feels that these are unnecessary when dealing with matters he holds in such contempt)

In terms of describing the world and how people and societies function in the world the concept of freewill is unnecessary. Not only is it unnecessary it gives rise to a lot of contradiction (what causes it to function? Is it random? How does it interact with a physical world? etc).

I feel that the biggest error in philosophy is to attempt to engage with the personal (and subjective) point of view. Within this point of view freewill, even the notion of self as a distinct entity, will appear to be necessary assumptions. However, I find that all arguments that start from this point of view reduce to a form of solipsism. Of course freewill sits easily at the heart of the solipsistic world (though in a solipsistic world + God freewill could just about be dispensed with).

Far too much philosophical debate starts from the position of how something (objects, morality, value etc) appears to ME. However (outside solipsism) anyone receiving such communication is obviously not the authorial ‘ME’, yet makes the tacit assumption that the reader or interlocutor shares the same faculties and can therefore comprehend the authors point of view.

Science has achieved success through making the logically impossible attempt to objectify the argument and escape from the personal, subjective point of view. Often the use of passive tense or use of the first person plural underlines this suspension of disbelief. Illogical or not, the crucial step is to put the assumption of our shared faculties, before the argument and place the objects of discussion in an objectified (attempting to be objective) framework.

If the same procedure is used in Philosophy, freewill is not necessary to account for anyone’s actions, it remains only necessary to explain what a person’s use of the term ‘freewill’ means in any context. In this way although there is no place for ‘freewill’ as a primal cause, a sense of ‘freewill’ or choice is as necessary as much else of our mental faculties if we are to successfully make our way around the world.

MartinRDB (How do you sign youself in to this blog?)

Hello Martin

Welcome and thanks for the post.

You should be offered a box for your screen or display name when you register through Google. This should appear when you click on ‘Leave your comment.’

SpaceP:

Either an infinite regress or no beginning is rather beyond my imagination but that is not to discount it. I am just pointing out that the limitation of our (my) brain governs serious investigation into possible answers. Einstein famously used familiar ideas to form the basic concepts of his theories – I would argue that most breakthroughs are of this nature. So, if we can’t form the concepts in the first place how can we proceed?

Ah, dualism. I cannot see how mind, as distinct from brain, can be identified. How can we determine its properties scientifically and how does it connect and interact with the body, unless you are proposing a Spinoza type immanent and all pervasive ‘Thing’ which we might call God.

Elephantschild:

Thanks for the clafification. The reason I persisted is not because I know anything about stone age life but that I see adversity as the trigger to progress so often in our journey, at least in historical times.

Martin:

Solipsism is an interesting angle. Russell tells a joke in his ‘History of Western Philosophy’ to the effect that a woman wrote to him asserting that she was a solipsist but couldn’t understand why she seemed to be the only one.

Solipsism is rather the end of the story, so if we wish to carry on discussing things and learning we will need to assume that there is a world outside one’s brain. This does not, of course, mean that there is.

Popper used to get irritated by those who tried to find out what the real, as opposed to the perceived, world was like. ‘If we can’t gain access to it what is the point of bothering about it,’ was more or less his point. But there again he was a terribly serious fellow by all accounts.

I agree that science is an attempt to discover the world objectively but I still perceive everything through my brain and I don’t see how I can avoid this. I still have to make an assumption that you are more or less like me and that you have an independent existence.

That is why we make huge assumptions about the motivations and minds of animals, with a tendency to anthropomorphise.

We cannot be really objective because we are subjective beings.

What do others think?

We are subjective beings and we cannot know ‘things in themselves’, but Science gives us at the very least an idea of what we cannot experience, for example the particulate structure of matter. Whilst these ideas are in a sense provisional in that ultimately they are inferentially derived models, the totality of Scientific models provides a powerful account of an important part of the (theoretically unknowable) objective world. The Scientific account has no need for ‘freewill’, in fact as I implied earlier, the Scientific account is weakened by ‘freewill’. Imagine a world without ‘freewill’, in what way would it be different from the world we know? So long as people could have the sense of ‘freewill’ without actually having ‘freewill’ then there would be no difference.

How is this objectivity achieved, when we are all subjective beings? Well I am achieving this objectivity as I write this, for language does not belong to the private and subjective sphere, but belongs to a public sphere outside ourselves. Our use of language may contribute to a form of negotiation of the parameters of the language (as in a small way your blog is doing with the concept of freewill), but language is a system of signs that is independent of our subjectivity and crucially bears a systematic relationship to objects and phenomena in the objective world. In this language system there exist signs that do not relate to concepts that have no verifiable existence. Such concepts include freewill (distinct from a sense of freewill perhaps?), the soul, God, fairies, unicorns etc.

Thanks for Russells solipsism joke. Solipsism is important, I believe, as a tool of analysis: if we accept our subjective box we are accepting solipsism.

MartinRDB (all the blog notes came up in German before and seemed to assume that I already had an account; this time it was in English and clearer for me)

Martin

A couple of very quick responses before I have to dash to London.

1) In a way it does not not matter whether we have free will or not providd we all believe we have but we also need to agree how much – difficult. However, it is still an interesting question.

2) Although we believe language to be in the public sphere we can never know if you receive anything like what I transmit. As an analogy, I do not know that you have the same sensation as me when I experience the colour red. We make assumptions but that is not the same as knowing.

Thus lies a whole potentiality for misunderstanding and error.

Will try to expand later.

Responses to language may well be coloured by individual experiences, but the relationship of the words (signs) to whatever they signify is a product of the community within which individuals engage. One single person is a small part of the overall fabric of communicated experiences and responses, that has developed over time. Language cannot be a solipsistic experience: if an individual makes a linguistic mistake, participation in the language system obliges the mistake to be corrected (I suspect that this is a part of how we learn a language).

My position is that any argument from the point of view of the individual self will not do; so far as I can see, perhaps it is my hypothesis, all such arguments reduce to solipsism, which logically destroys the concept of communication and meaning (so this communicative activity is a denial of such an account).

On the colour ‘red’ canard: there is a very good argument to say that our senses are very much the same (admitting a few specific exceptions such as lack of the green sensing cone cell in colour blindness). Again this involves taking a perspective outside the individual and accepting that Science must not be held subservient to Philosophy. As human beings we share in a common gene pool, that has hardly altered over the last several thousand years. My genes that code for red sensing cone cells are the same as anyone else’s; thus there is no reason to doubt that the primal sensations are much the same and certainly not unique. Of course an individual’s experiences will create associations that colour what we make of our senses. Nevertheless, red is a word that we commonly understand to signify a common experience.

Your first point “In a way it does not not matter whether we have free will or not provided we all believe we have, but we also need to agree how much” includes an aspect that I have not given sufficient consideration. To discount the reality of freewill, does not mean that the degree of ’sense of freewill’ is unimportant nor inappropriate in an account of an individual actions. This must be important in any value based or moral context.

HappyClappy:

Welcome (when you arrive). I will post my questions here on Friday when I am next at home.

Martinrdb:

I will respond soon but I would like to get other views as well.

Any thoughts anybody?

boltonian :

“Either an infinite regress or no beginning is rather beyond my imagination but that is not to discount it. I am just pointing out that the limitation of our (my) brain governs serious investigation into possible answers. Einstein famously used familiar ideas to form the basic concepts of his theories – I would argue that most breakthroughs are of this nature. So, if we can’t form the concepts in the first place how can we proceed?”

I’d say that although we can’t fully conceptualize , say , infinity we can identify its mathematical properties and be guided by the numbers . The question is does the universe really dance to a mathematical tune or can we only see the part of the universe that does ?

“Ah, dualism. I cannot see how mind, as distinct from brain, can be identified. How can we determine its properties scientifically and how does it connect and interact with the body, unless you are proposing a Spinoza type immanent and all pervasive ‘Thing’ which we might call God.”

If mind is non material , it has no physical extension , then perhaps its properties are not fully definable . The interaction question is the ‘hard problem’ for dualism just as qualia is the hard problem for monism . I think some of the answers may be found in parapsychology , though I admit that is not a widely held view .

MartinRDB :

“Well I am achieving this objectivity as I write this, for language does not belong to the private and subjective sphere, but belongs to a public sphere outside ourselves.”

Doesn’t this imply that the plural of subjective is objective ? We may still be unable to get to underlying objective reality , should such a thing exist , as a collective .

“Doesn’t this imply that the plural of subjective is objective?”

Well it implies an external world and is therefore a move towards objectivity and “as a collective” it at least assures the objective existence of simple things (things we do not tend to argue about).

“We may still be unable to get to underlying objective reality” – in absolute terms, yes. Kant’s ‘ding an sich’ may be limitless and include factors that are outside human conception, but the collective pursuit of knowledge (Science basically) can give us an idea of that which we cannot experience directly and which hitherto was undreamt of.

Take the particulate model, an aspect of it such as the workings of DNA: in Kant’s day the mysteries of the inheritance of parental traits and of common viral diseases would have to belong to the world of things in themselves. Whilst there may be some equivocation about aspects of gene expression, there is no sense in denying the objective reality of the scientific model and the particulate scientific model upon which it depends. The objectivity is further entrenched when we have to engage with the consequences of application of these models. Specific elements of these models are based on inferences, but these elements are bound together into a coherent self supporting structure.

If we do not want to admit this as objective reality we at least must concede that objective reality must contain something very much like it.

“should such a thing exist” if you are reading this, then of course! That’s the point (see Russell’s solipsism joke above).

HappyClappy:

The questions I promised to post.

Everybody else:

If you have already seen these, apologies.

SpaceP:

Thanks for the response – I will consider and reply. You have been very quiet on the ‘God’ thread so far.

Christian beliefs

It is difficult to summarise the beliefs of a religion called Christianity because there are about 22,000 sects or churches (source: Encyclopaedia Britannica) each believing slightly different versions of the truth but these are some commonly held tenets:

• They sometimes believe in the literal truth of the Bible (both Old and New Testaments) and sometimes interpret parts as metaphor;

• They believe that the Bible is the word of God;

• Some believe that it was written at the time of the events they describe;

• Some believe that those who do not believe their doctrine will suffer eternal torment in Hell;

• All say that one must accept the whole message (of whichever version) and cannot take the bits one wishes and leave the rest;

• Some believe that those ordained have special privileges as intermediaries from God and that their interpretation of the Bible is the true one; and

• Some believe that men die utterly at the time of death and that only those believers who have led a sin-free life will be restored to life when the Kingdom of God is created upon the Earth.

Critical analysis

To believe in the literal truth of the Bible flies in the face of everything we currently know about Middle Eastern and Mediterranean history and culture. Even following the invention of alphabetic writing about 800 BC literacy remained the preserve of a tiny elite.

We know that cultural beliefs were passed on from one generation to another in pre-literate societies by stories memorised by highly trained specialists. In order to make them memorable and understandable to all within the society they were created as word pictures – poems, in a word. These poems were full of references that would be thoroughly understood by the audience for whom they were intended, only some of which are evident today.

The Bible mythology was a common one in the Middle East at the time – the Sumerian creation stories bear a remarkable resemblance to that found in the Scriptures. This surely points to a common cultural ancestry. The Bible is a collection of Jewish myths, religious exhortations, history and songs of praise written at various times after, and some times long after, the events described. Much of it was collected and assembled during the period of the Babylonian exile when the identity of the Jews as a separate and distinct people was really forged.

Christians sometimes point to various prophecies in the Old Testament to ‘Prove’ that the Bible is the word of God. Objections to this pseudo-scientific approach include:

• Only those examples that can be stretched to show a possible correlation between prophecy and subsequent outcome are chosen;

• Prediction and fulfilment of the prediction both occur in the past, so there is no way of knowing which came first;

• The prophecy is not given a timescale so one can say that such and such has come to pass whenever something like it has occurred. Given the great stretch of time and the imprecise nature of the prophecies it is hardly surprising that anyone can ‘Prove’ anything to his own satisfaction;

• Prophecies like the destruction of Babylon and the diminishing of Egypt are hardly prescient. Kingdoms and empires rise and fall all the time and when they fall they are usually destroyed. Babylon and Egypt had fallen before (and risen again, several times in Egypt’s case);

• If much of the Bible were written down during the exile, as scholars believe, then it would be unremarkable to allude to events that had already occurred or, in the case of Babylon, the foretelling of a fervently desired outcome (Mene mene tekel uparsin); and

• Some of the more fundamentalist Christians believe, as I understand it, that most scientific discovery is spurious – that the laws of Physics and Mathematics are wrong; that the Periodic Table is a fantasy; that geology is a lie; that medical science has not happened; that dinosaurs did not exist; that the universe outside our solar system is a nonsense; that evolution is a fairy story; that DNA is not the foundation for life; and that life began 6,000 years ago and the Earth was created in six days; etc. etc. etc.
Presumably, Christians believe that God did not literally write the words but instructed human beings to do the task. How do we know that these are God’s words? All religious writings claim to be inspired by God in some way but where is the proof that He instructed the authors to write exactly these words and in these languages – Hebrew and Greek? Why, for instance, if Moses is supposed to have composed the first five books of the Bible, are they not written in his own language, which was Egyptian? How did Moses know about Adam – was there a diary or did God dictate the story?

God is supposed to have talked directly with the early patriarchs and the prophets but not to many people since, why not?
Why is the Bible the word of God and other religious writings, such as the Koran not (and vice versa if one is Muslim)?
How do Christians reconcile the differing natures of God within the Bible? For example, the God of Moses was a jealous God and, ‘You shall serve none other god but me.’ This suggests that other gods existed but His chosen people must not worship these. Whereas the God of Jesus was a compassionate, loving and forgiving God who loved sinners more than the righteous. ‘Turn the other cheek,’ had replaced ‘An eye for an eye.’

How can the Commandment, ‘Thou shalt not kill,’ be reconciled with the divinely inspired Joshua’s brutal treatment of the Canaanites, who after all were the residents of the area the invading Israelites wished to live? This seems like God-ordained genocide.

Why did God choose the Jews as his people and not any other part of His creation? If He did why do gentiles worship Him if the Covenant is between Israelites and God? He tells the Israelites to destroy all non-Jews living in the Promised Land – why?

God seems to demand absolute obedience, subservience and adoration at all times – is this evidence of a kind, loving, forgiving and gentle God?

He suggests that Moses lead His people out of Egypt and then hardens the heart of Pharaoh to prevent them from going and subsequently inflicts all manner of plagues on Egypt for this when it is God who has caused it to happen in the first place!

How can 2.5 million people (603,000 adult males according to the Bible) and all their animals survive in the desert for 40 years – manna was only provided by God for the people?

How can all these people be addressed by one man at the same time, as Aaron did?

How can Judah have fathered three sons, who all grow to maturity, then marry his son’s widow who bears twins, one of whom grows to maturity and fathers two sons, Hezron and Hamal; all by the age of 42? He cannot be much older than this at the time of the journey to Egypt as Joseph is 39 and Judah is about 3 years older.

How do Christians answer all the other questions posed by Bishop Colenso concerning the logic of the numbers in the Pentateuch and Joshua? The numbers are not only contradictory, sometimes in the same book, but also wildly improbable.

If Jesus were God’s only begotten son, who are the ‘Sons of God’ mentioned at the beginning of Job? Why is God chatting with Satan? Why does He strike a deal with Satan to subject his faithful man Job to such capricious cruelty? Is this a loving God? If God is omnipotent why does he permit Satan to exist?

When God destroyed humanity (The Flood) in disgust at His creation’s behaviour (despite His afflicting us with original sin in the first place) He started again but with the same genetic line (Noah) and with the same dose of original sin. And lo! and behold He got the same result! This is either sheer vindictiveness or very unintelligent.
How do Christians KNOW that the accounts of events in the Bible were written down contemporaneously when every other piece of available evidence points to the fact that most of it was recorded after (and sometimes long after) the event? This does not mean the authors are wrong necessarily but it does increase the likelihood of error.
For example, the Gospels of the New Testament were written in Koine (not the language Jesus spoke, which was Aramaic). Those who wrote them were not contempories of Jesus and, so far as we know, Jesus did not write anything down at all. There are differences in the Gospels (particularly between the synoptics and John), which are sometimes difficult to reconcile, such as the accounts of His ministry and resurrection.

The earliest manuscripts for the gospels have been dated to the 2nd century AD and not likely to have been written before 60 AD according to some scholars and after the Jewish revolt (70 AD) by others. Paul’s letters were composed earlier but not until at least 25 years after the death of Jesus and some of those are known to be the work of later editors.

Mark is generally thought to have been the first of the surviving four gospels to have been written and to be the most reliable. It is disputed whether a fifth (Q) provided the source, along with Mark, for the gospels we know as Luke and Matthew.

Matthew uses the demands of a Roman census as the reason for the Holy family to travel to David’s town of Bethlehem. There was a census in Palestine around this time but not until ten years after the death of Herod the Great and not in Judea. Also, nobody had to travel anywhere and certainly not to the home of one’s ancestors. Imagine the administrative chaos that would entail and what would it achieve anyway?

John was composed later, probably around 100 AD, and is the least historically accurate of the four. Why have some writings, such as Thomas, been rejected by the early church and others accepted? Who decided which were the words of God and which not? How do the Dead Sea scrolls fit in to the picture – were they the word of God as revealed to the Qumran community or not?

Some Christians believe in the Jewish eschatology that the Kingdom of God will arrive on earth and the chosen will be restored to life. However, Christianity believes that Jesus was the Messiah as Jesus himself possibly believed. Jesus fully expected the Kingdom of God to occur in his lifetime and perhaps his quote from the Psalm 22 just prior to death is genuine, ‘My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?’

The Apostle Paul followed the same line as Jesus but allowed Gentiles to participate in the coming Kingdom. This is a view that probably would not have been supported by Jesus unless they became Jewish converts, as Peter later insisted. Paul knew, however, that circumcision would be a step too far for most gentiles and the church would probably not have long survived his death had this been the price to pay for faith.

Why did God not create his earthly kingdom when his Son expected? When will it happen? When Jesus comes on clouds, as Daniel foretold, to proclaim the kingdom will he be God announcing himself?
Do Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God? Do they also believe Isaiah’s prophecy that the Messiah will be a direct descendant of King David? If so, was Jesus descended from David through Joseph, as Luke has it? This would mean that Joseph was Jesus’ father and he cannot be if he is the Son of God and that Mary was a virgin when Jesus was born. Jesus, therefore, cannot be both the Messiah (Christ) and the Son of God.

If Jesus is the Son of God and God is omniscient did He foresee his own death? If yes, then Judas should be treated as a hero for playing such crucial part at great expense to himself. Also, Jesus must have engineered his own death if it were God’s plan for him to become the saviour of the world. Is this not suicide, which is a mortal sin according to the Church?

Pontius Pilate is portrayed in the Gospels as an essentially good man but weak and is exasperated by the demand of the Jewish Temple hierarchy for Jesus’ execution. This is not the Pontius Pilate we know from other sources. He was a ruthless and brutal governor with a track record of executing troublemakers and asking questions later. In fact, he was removed from office by the Emperor Tiberius in 36 AD because these unpleasant traits threatened to destabilise Judea. In any event the High Priest Caiaphas had no authority to demand execution except for blasphemy and, under Jewish law at the time Jesus was not guilty of this. Crucifixion was the normal Roman mode of execution for troublemakers (stoning was the usual Jewish punishment for blasphemy) and it is likely that Pontius Pilate wanted to send out a strong message to other potential agitators, particularly in the highly-charged atmosphere of an overcrowded Jerusalem at Passover.

There is a philosophical problem in proving the existence of God. As St Anselm suggested, God created the greatest thing we can possibly conceive and so He must be even greater than that. However, this must mean that He is literally inconceivable and so how can we possibly know that He exists.

Do Christians believe in the existence of the Holy Trinity as determined at the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD (almost 300 years after the death of Jesus)? How can Jesus be his own father? How can three be one? What is God’s manifestation as father if His Son aspect is a human being and His spiritual being has no corporeal existence? Where is the mention of the Holy Trinity in the Bible?

Many Christians believe in the existence of Hell. Where is this mentioned in the Old Testament? How does this square with Sheol – is it the same place?

Jesus is often said to have died to save mankind and that He is our redeemer. What do these actually mean? What has He saved us from? What changed as a result of His death? What did he redeem us from? My dictionary defines ‘Redeem’ as to buy back or free from obligation. What has been bought back and from what obligation are we freed? Does it refer to Original Sin? If so, has it ceased to exist? Also, did not God afflict us with Original Sin in the first place?

The Christian God is Omnipotent, Omniscient and Benevolent (all good). If there is wickedness in the world then He cannot be all three. Does Satan exist? Was Jesus really tempted by him? What about God’s deal with Satan in Job? Then how can God be omnipotent if Satan has the power to corrupt? If God created Satan to bring evil into the world then He cannot be benevolent.

Christianity is based on faith in that there is no room for doubt. Faith = certainty. This contradicts the Christian virtue of humility. Either Christians do not value humility or they have doubt about their beliefs but not both.

What is the nature of God? Does He have a body? Can a mind without a body really exist? What is ‘Mind?’ If it is a combination of intellect and will what purpose would it serve if it was disembodied?

Christianity in general firmly believes that God has entrusted us with the gift of free will. How free is free? Do we all have absolute freedom to behave as we wish or does genetic inheritance and upbringing play a role in limiting that freedom? (What is it the Jesuits say about giving them a child of seven and they will produce a devout believer for life?) If so, how can we be totally free?

Whether we suffer eternal salvation or torment depends on a number of factors, according to many Christians:

• Whether we have lived a sin-free life;

• Whether we have genuinely tried to exercise our gift of free will for the general good;

• Whether we believe in whichever sect’s interpretation of God.

To take each in turn, are any of us capable of living a sin-free life, particularly as we are cursed with original sin. It seems odd that God has afflicted us with a capacity for evil and then punishes us forever because we sometimes behave that way. Why so afflict us in the first place?

How are actions against intentions to be judged? If we genuinely try but fail to do the best, partly because of our limitations (presumably God given), does that count as good? If, on the other hand, we behave in a completely self-centred manner and unintentionally do good to others, how does that weigh in the scales of justice? So, if a person wants and tries to do good but cannot do other than harm does he rank higher than one who tries to serve only himself but inadvertently benefits the world? Why does God not make this clear?

How should we decide which interpretation of God to believe? Some sects are strict about belief and entry to Heaven. Why has God not been more explicit? If a person lives a sin-free life (or tries to) and yet has no faith will he be admitted to Heaven or is he condemned to eternal torment? Why does God demand absolute obedience and belief in Him if He has given us the freedom to choose? Why should He wish anybody to suffer torment if He is a benevolent God? Why did Jesus say that he loved sinners more than the righteous (presumably because they were more in need of his help) if they were to be excluded from Heaven in the final analysis unless they repented?

Is Christianity not based on a circular argument – we know the truth because the Bible tells us what the truth is; the Bible was written by divinely inspired human beings; we know they were divinely inspired because it says so in the Bible?

Science tries to base its enquiries on facts by building a premise on known phenomena and then developing an argument to form some possible hypotheses. Only when these have been tested over and over again to see if results predicted by the hypotheses actually occur will one (or none) of these become a theory. And still scientists are dissatisfied, knowing that theory is not truth, so they carry out more and more experiments in order to test the theory to destruction. When this has been accomplished, as happens to almost all theories eventually, one starts again to build a new one from a premise based on known facts.

Religion by contrast starts from a conclusion (a desired state) – a different one for each of the 22,000 Christian sects and churches, which is different again from Judaism and its variations, from Islam and from the Eastern faiths. It then tries to prove this conclusion through a highly selective pseudo-scientific approach, instillation of fear, force, the tempting prospect of some sort of immortality if one obeys the rules etc.

If a British Christian, let’s say, were born instead into a Muslim or Hindu family in India he would believe unquestioningly in that religion. How can Christianity, therefore, claim to be the absolute and unvarnished truth if truth depends on where one happens to be born?

Conclusion

Christianity is based on a dogma not finally agreed until long after the historical events on which it depends. Once that dogma had been agreed by a sufficiently powerful group alternative views were ruthlessly suppressed.

The God of the Old Testament is unpleasant – vindictive, jealous, angry, violent and vain.

Jesus was a historical figure – a devout Jew from a rural backwater who proclaimed, as did others around this time, an eschatological message and not that he was divine and formed one element of a Trinity.

Christianity is but one of many world religions and to say that they have access to the truth and that everybody else on the planet is misguided is arrogance.

A literalist view of the Bible is so obviously nonsense and blind to generations of historical scholarship, scientific discovery, and philosophical reasoning.

Christians (and all devoutly religious people) are temperamentally inclined to elevate their need for certainty above objective reasoning. This does not always apply to other aspects of their lives. It would appear to require a selective suppression of one’s critical faculties, which can be dangerous. It might be only a short step from this to enforcing one’s beliefs on others who have not yet seen the light. This we can see from the behaviour of so-called ‘Fundamentalist’ elements within Islam, as well as historically with Christianity.

Randolph Churchill’s comment on having just read the Bible from beginning to end to win a bet was, ‘God! God’s a sod.’

‘For where is the man that has incontestable evidence of the truth of all that he holds, or of the falsehood of all that he condemns, or can say that he has examined to the bottom his own, or other men’s opinions? The necessity of believing without knowledge, nay often upon very slight grounds, in this fleeting state of action and blindness we are in, should make us more busy and careful to inform ourselves than to constrain others.’ John Locke.

‘There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.’ Shakespeare (Hamlet).

SpaceP:

‘I’d say that although we can’t fully conceptualize , say , infinity we can identify its mathematical properties and be guided by the numbers . The question is does the universe really dance to a mathematical tune or can we only see the part of the universe that does ?’

A lot of physicists think that much of what we have so far uncovered is metaphor, including mathematical proofs. I am not so learned to be able to make a judgement but, of course, all language is a metaphor at one level.

Wolfram’s view is that maths presents a very limited description of the world.

How do we solve the problems of dualism? Is it really a question of belief without evidence?

MartinRDB:

‘if you are reading this, then of course! That’s the point (see Russell’s solipsism joke above).’

I would argue that it does not preclude an entirely subjective world. The joke is amusing but it does not mean that solipsism is impossible.

To go back to Descartes, when I dream I believe that there are lots of different characters doing all sorts of different things but when I wake up I find that they are all a product of my mind – solipsism with knobs on.

“If we do not want to admit this as objective reality we at least must concede that objective reality must contain something very much like it.”

Why must we concede that ? Couldn’t we say there is no such thing as objective reality ? Perhaps we are given our empirical beliefs by subjective forces entirely unknowable to us . This doesn’t make sense , but the whole point is that just as atheism simply states that the reason there is something rather than nothing can be anything other than ‘God’ , the notion of objective reality is open to the same ‘it’s something else’ attack .

boltonian :

I look forward to your response . I have been quiet on the God thread because 1) The more I think about God questions the less sense God questions make . I have rejected both atheism and a personal God , I’m not entirely sure we are capable of framing the right questions to find out what is there , let alone of obtaining meaningful answers . And 2) I have a killer hangover .

SpaceP:

See my initial response above.

You are absolved from all responsibility for the day given your second reason.

One of my great interests in life is fine wine – a wonderful but expensive hobby. Anyway, I am spending lots of time at the moment away in London and one evening a group of us working on the project and staying at the same hotel enjoyed a nice dinner with lots of wine before heading for the pub for a nightcap. Unfortunately, the nightcap was two hours and several pints of beer long – I reckoned it had been about 20 years since I had drunk that amount of alchohol. Not nice the next morning.

————-

I hope a few from the ‘God’ thread will join us here – some very thoughtful and intelligent posts there. I keep trying to plug our site. I have passed the address around a few friends as well.

Boltonian,

You weren’t kidding when you said you had some questions!

I’ll be happy to engage on these. I am quite sure that I won’t have answers to all of them, but I do believe there are good answers to many.

Given the time, are you content for me to do this bit by bit in the next few days or weeks?

Good blog. I like it.

HC

OK, Boltonian, I’ll make a quick start on responding to your thoughtful questions, and then go to bed. I am writing as an evangelical Christian who by no means knows all the answers, but am convinced enough to try to present soe orthodox thoughts. As my shorthand, I am not going to qualify my thoughts with comments like “of course, you may not believe this” or whatever. That goes without saying.

“The Christian God is Omnipotent, Omniscient and Benevolent (all good). If there is wickedness in the world then He cannot be all three.”

What do you mean here? Omnipotent in what sense? The Bible makes clear that God cannot do everything (for example, He cannot tell a lie). A small distinction, perhaps, but worth making.

Your point is predicated on a single assumption, namely that God is fundamentally an interventionist. Where he sees wickedness, you seem to assert, He will strike it down. But this is not at all the Biblical account of God, which makes clear that (even in Eden) He allows informed choice, albeit with consequence, and that consequence may include separation from God.

“Does Satan exist? Was Jesus really tempted by him?”

The Bible says, emphatically, yes and yes. It is unhelpful to think of him as a red devil with a hot poker (the evocative image to the largely non-literate church, of course). On the latter, it’s worth emphasising that the fact of being tempted is not the same as capitulating to temptation.

“What about God’s deal with Satan in Job? Then how can God be omnipotent if Satan has the power to corrupt? If God created Satan to bring evil into the world then He cannot be benevolent.”

See above. Job 1 makes clear that Satan only acts with God’s permission, so the two are in no way equivalent in power or status. God is the creator, Satan the creation.

God did not create Satan as the bringer of evil, but as an angel (I think an archangel) in charge of music in heaven (if you want refs I can provide them). The consequences of Satan’s fall cannot be equated to a desire on the part of God to see that outcome realised.

Martin RDB and others have talked about God as an idea involving the ’supernatural” in this thread, and that is a subject which I think should be talked about a little more.

In my earlier post I referred to Hegel and Augustine as good places to start reading about theology, and they weren’t picked at random. Augustine equates God with the platonic idea of “the good”. Hegel discusses the Trinity as an extended metaphor for God (which we continue to accept on Augustine’s terms) as transcendent, personal yet immanent, and discusses just what this means.

Derrida talks about religion as “good conduct” and that’s an important idea too. The idea that there is some form of overarching good is the justification for this, and our ideas of God’s nature shapes what “good conduct” will consist of. The church has one idea here, the other Abrahamic faiths have slightly different answers, but the answers of any of the three should be familiar to believers of the other two. The gospels also talk about “good conduct” a great deal; this is what loving your neighbour means, as many of the parables discuss. Others, in Luke, notably, cover the idea of form versus substance. Jesus is shown not to fetishise forms. When he has to choose between acting to save someone’s life or remaining within the strict confines of the correct behaviour for the Sabbath he breaks the taboo about working on the Sabbath. This is a consistent theme, and I think it’s a very important one.

I spoke earlier about the importance of understand what we meant by ‘truth’ and that is a very important idea. The writers of the Bible were not materialists, and did not accept the idea that ‘truth meant something that one’s senses could detect, any more than contemporary novelists would accept such a notion (so Heart of Darkness is a lot more than a ripping yarn about Africa). They frequently told stories whose purpose was to convey a moral position, they were not writing what people of this day and age would describe as ‘history’. There are several authors who discuss this, and it would be helpful to look at the writing of Philo of Alexandria and Meister Eckhart as two obvious sources.

Philo of Alexandria was a jewish writer whose life began in the pre-Christian era and lasted until about 50 CE. Meister Eckhart taught at Paris in the 14th C (he occupied Aquinas’ chair about 100 years after Aquinas).

So what do we mean by God? Augustine suggests that God is beyond our understanding, and so can’t be contained by our miserable imaginations. God can’t be a being; to claim this would be just such an attempt at confinement, and more alert readers may have noticed that I try to avoid using pronouns when I talk about God; English pronouns all have a flavour of “being” and also a flavour of “gender”; more confinement. What we are left with is a mystery and an urge to more than we have been. If the late 20th century has taught us nothing else, I think it has shown us that expediency is a dead end, and there are alternative ways to make sense of our lives.

HappyClappy and Johnr:

Welcome and thank you for your contributions.

HC: more than happy for you to do it bit by bit. I have a few more, by the way, but I thought we should start with these.

Have you read Bishop Colenso’s critique of the Pentateuch and Joshua, by the way. If so, what do you think?

Boltonian

In your questions addressed to Happyclappy above, you said ‘All[Christians] say that one must accept the whole message (of whatever version) and cannot take the bits one wishes and leave the rest’

If in ‘the whole message’ you include any of the ‘commonly held tenets’ which you list, I am not sure that this is true. The Christian sect with which I am best acquainted is the Society of Friends (Quakers), since my father was a Quaker (also, incidentally, a scientist) and my mother, originally Anglican, eventually joined them.

From their beginnings in the 17th century Quakers, while remaining Christ-centred, have never considered subscription to any precise definition of belief to be a test of faith, and have placed a good deal of emphasis on the transforming power of personal religious experience, moderated and disciplined by the consensus of the community (since not all such subjective experience is necessarily authentic or useful), and expressed in personal and communal conduct. It could, perhaps, be summarised as a form of practical mysticism.

God (as noted by Johnr above), is understood as being both transendental (beyond, and never to be fully defined or understood by finite human minds) and immanent (within the world/universe). Their understanding is, furthermore, that there is, and has always been, ‘that of God’ within everyone (not to be confused with what people generally understand by ‘conscience’), and that Christ is the full and perfect manifestation of God working within and through mankind. The starting point of the religious journey is the discovery of the divine spark within oneself and its recognition within others, but the journey must be guided by the example and teaching of Jesus (insofar as it can be discerned in the writings of the NT, and by the spirit of Christ within the community.

This has led to a belief in continuing revelation, and the modern Quaker position is that the profound questions of meaning posed by religion must be continually rethought and re-expressed in the light of new knowledge and new experience. They have never been inclined to a literal reading of the Bible in all its parts, or to regard it as the final authority.

It is a liberal theology which has so far found no difficulty embracing the results of modern scientific enquiry or of 19th and 20th century Biblical criticism, with a presumption, of course, that there is a spiritual dimension to existence which reductionist science does not address.

Although I am agnostic, I find this open appproach and its practical expression particularly interesting and can see its attractions.

I am currently reading John Hick’s ‘The New Frontier of Religion and Science’, in which he explores the various kinds of personal religious experience (all religions) in the light of modern neuroscience and the question of consciousness. At the outset he makes a clear distinction between, on the one hand, institutional forms of religion, which are cumulative developments influenced by social, cultural, historical and other factors and, on the other hand, mystical experience, which is purely personal. The first may be informed and given impetus for development by the second, but may be divisive and harmful in its expression as often as it is beneficial. The second is common to all major religions, theistic and non-theistic, and though it may be interpreted sometimes within the framework of specific belief systems, it also reveals much that is common to all.

elephantschild:

Perhaps I should have said all versions of Christianity that I am familiar with. I have discussed this issue with Methodists, Anglicans, Baptists, Pentecostalists, Roman Catholics, Presbyterians and what were formerly known as Congregationalists (United Reformed). I have not investigated all 22,000 Christian sects. Since I wrote this I have discovered that Unitarians are similarly undogmatic but these, I suggest, are the exceptions.

In fact, I discussed this very thing recently with a German Protestant friend of mine (who is also an industrial Chemist) and he was insistent that one had to to accept the whole message. Also, I am not sure how one can call oneself a Christian if one denies the divinity of Jesus.

Boltonian

It depends, I suppose, what is meant by ;the divinity of Jess. If it means literally the Son of God, virgin birth and all, or that he was literally God in human form, then I suspect that there are a good many people around (some theologians and Anglican bishops included) who continue to regard themselves as Christians without subscribing to those particular interpretations.

As I understand it, the Quaker view seems to allow for a different interpretation without displacing Christ from a central position in their faith, but maybe I have not explained it very well.

elephantschild:

If Quakers refer to Jesus as ‘Christ’ at the very least they believe him to be the Messiah. Jesus might or might not have thought himself the Messiah but Christians must believe that he truly is, otherwise they cannot be Christians. I know that not all Christians believe Jesus to be the son of God (not least because of the contradiction of His being both), although all mainstream churches do. But to be a Christian one has to believe that Jesus was the Messiah and lived as the Gospels say he did (despite the contradictions therein).

That level of doctrinal conformity is not so with Therevada Buddhism. It is not even necessary to accept that Gautama lived the life tradition suggests he did to be Buddhist (or even that he existed at all). It is simply not a core element of their belief system. I have never come across the concept of heresy in Therevada Buddhism (the branch I know most about).

Some Buddhists believe in God, others do not. Most, I suspect, are agnostic.

Boltonian

I take your point, although I have never heard or read any Quaker use the word ‘Messiah’ and, as I indicated, they do not go in for dogma or doctrinal definitions. I guess that if you were to ask any group of Quakers what they meant by the term ‘Christ’, you might get a variety of different answers, none of which would necessarily correspond to what the early gentile converts or their successors understood by it.

Since I am not a Quaker, I am not in the best position to act as apologist for their beliefs, so the best that I can do is to quote from a book written by one who was – ‘Approach to Quakerism’ by Edward B Castle.

‘With a bold leap through centuries of controversy as to how the Divine Godhead could exist in the man Jesus, early Friends declared that they knew, because they had experienced how the divine Light lived and worked in their own consciousness. The difference between Christ and themselves was the difference between the absolute and the relative. They had experienced a measure of the Spirit working in themselves and in other men, but to Christ, God had given Spririt without measure…. The Word, the Light of Christ, comes from the eternal God who works through men in history.’

That said, my father once remarked that many Attenders (i.e. those not admitted to full membership of the Society of Friends), and probably some Members, also, might best be described as agnostic, but evidently found something of great value in their participation in Quaker Meetings. Quakerism is a very broad ‘church’

Hello, Biskieboo here.

This is the only question I am going to attempt to comment on for the moment.

“Why did Jesus say that he loved sinners more than the righteous (presumably because they were more in need of his help) if they were to be excluded from Heaven in the final analysis unless they repented?”

My interpretation is that Jesus was saying that the righteous actually had a lot more work to do than the “sinners”. We are all sinners, and the righteous are too short-sighted to realise that they are included in this category. It is much better to be starting from a position knowing that you have some work to do, than thinking that you are already there when you are not (if you see what I mean?).

I often say to people “if the sinners didn’t go to church then there would be nobody there” and that includes the minister/vicar.

Nobody is going to go to heaven if you have had to have lived a sin-free life. We all sin. The difference is that believers (should) try to look out for their own sinning, try to limit it as much as they are able, and ask for forgiveness when they have sinned.

That’s it from me for now.

Good morning, Biskieboo, and welcome.

Thank you for your post and I hope you will continue to contribute.

I will respond soon – I hope others will too, especially as the ‘God’ thread will soon close.

elephantschild:

My quick response is that I thought Christos was the Greek (Koine) for ‘Messiah’ and that the two terms were interchangeable. Also, that Messiah means what the Jewish scriptures (see Isaiah, in particular) says it means. If Christ does not mean this what does it mean?

I know that people who are agnostic get something out of religion. Some accept the values but not the metaphysics. My point is that this is not policy and certainly not encouraged (perhaps certain branches are becoming less dogmatic with falling attendances). You hint that Quakers also make this distinction, however benignly, by dividing Attenders from Members.

In response to Spacepenguin, “Why must we concede that? (that objective reality must contain something very much like the scientific picture) Couldn’t we say there is no such thing as objective reality? Perhaps we are given our empirical beliefs by subjective forces entirely unknowable to us. This doesn’t make sense, but the whole point is that just as atheism simply states that the reason there is something rather than nothing can be anything other than ‘God’, the notion of objective reality is open to the same ‘it’s something else’ attack”.

You are right that it doesn’t make sense; I understand that Leibnitz may have had a similar theory (we are all like clocks ticking in coordination with each other – I think this may be called occasionalism – but my knowledge is second or third hand), but in order to coordinate everything he had to depend on a supernatural force. Such views do illustrate the convolutions that are required to suggest that there is no objective reality. If there is no objective reality and you are not the only one, the relationship of you to whatever else becomes arbitrary.

My thesis does depend on the argument of the contradiction of a private language, which, in the solipsistic case, I think is a very strong argument.

I would be interested if some of you, who have a more professional interest in this, might wish to discuss the validity of the private language argument.

Use of language, communication, breaks out of the subjective bubble and implies an external reality. I could not possibly claim that Science reveals all of objective reality, but it engages with objective reality (or the thing in itself) and so provides us with a model for at the very least an aspect of that which we cannot know directly.

boltonian :

“A lot of physicists think that much of what we have so far uncovered is metaphor, including mathematical proofs. I am not so learned to be able to make a judgement but, of course, all language is a metaphor at one level.”

In blunt terms what we have uncovered so far is partially successful though , probably necessarily , incomplete explainitory models for what makes our sensory equipment go ping . I’m not a fan of positivism , but in scientific terms that is all we can say about the scientific method . In other words I think physics is metaphor all the way down .

“Wolfram’s view is that maths presents a very limited description of the world.”

I’m not familiar with Wolfram’s work , but looking at the reviews it seems more that he believes the notion of rigorous proof is limiting . His use of cellular automata to explain the world is mathematical . As a side note I think the title of one review sums up my initial reaction : “A Rare Blend of Monster Raving Egomania and Utter Batshit Insanity”

“How do we solve the problems of dualism? Is it really a question of belief without evidence?”

I would say some form of dualism , dual aspect monism say , is supportable on purely philosophical grounds The case for interactionist dualism , in my view , isn’t strong enough on philosophical grounds alone (the cons outweigh the pros) . I think the evidence from parapsychology is required to make the case . Of course parapsychology is controversial in its own right .

MartinRDB :

“My thesis does depend on the argument of the contradiction of a private language, which, in the solipsistic case, I think is a very strong argument.”

I think the private language argument , if true , implies that if the universe is entirely subjective there can be only one subjective experiencer or that what we subjectively believe is not freely chosen . This however implies an underlying set of rules for meshing individual experience together that could be called objective reality .

Boltonian

Agreed that Christos is the translation of ‘Messiah’ in the koine, although whether the original gentile converts unfamiliar with Jewish eschatology always understood the concept in quite the same way as their Jewish contemporaries is perhaps open to question. I woud argue that there began, in any case, to be a divergence once it became clear that the Kingdom of God might not be arriving in the near future and that perhaps the nature of the Kingdom might have to be reconsidered (’My kingdom is not of this world’?). Ideas about the nature of Christ have developed over time, and Quakers have never felt the need to confine themselves to definitions derived from the NT or the Council of Nicaea, or as propounded at any other historical point in time. Yesterday I was talking to a neighbour who is a Quaker and took the opportunity to ask whether Quakers necessarily regarded Jesus as the Messiah. Her answer was, as I expected, an emphatic ‘no’. She also confirmed that there are Quakers who regard themselves as agnostic, or whose beliefs might best be described as non-theistic.

The fundamental approach of Quakerism, as I understand it, is that there is a spiritual dimension to existence which is both internal (the ‘Inner Light’, or ‘that of God in everone’) and external, and that this Spirit, cultivated and consulted individually and collectively, is what informs and guides all aspects of the life of a Quaker. To quote from ‘Quaker Faith and Practice’ (1994): ‘As Friends we commit ourselves to a way of worship which allows Good to teach and transform us. We have found corporately that the Spirit, if rightly followed, will lead into truth, unity and love: all our testimonies grow from this teaching.’ For historical reasons, if nothing else, Quakerism is a broadly Christian movement and draws on the teachings of Jesus as transmitted in the NT, but – ‘Friends maintain that expressions of faith must be related to personal experience. Some may find Christian language full of meaning: some do not. Our understanding of our own religious tradition may sometimes be enhanced by insights of other faiths. The deeper realities of our faith are beyond verbal formulation and our way of worship based on silent waiting testifies to this’ (ibid.) As regards the Quaker understanding of the meaning of ‘Christ’, this is a matter for the individual. At a guess there are many today who would see a clear distinction between Jesus the man and teacher, and Christ as a mythical paradigm of the Spirit working in and through man.

As regards the distinction between Attenders and Members, I think you are reading too much into this. ‘Member’ means member of a Monthly Meeting – the larger assembly of local Meetings within a given district which deliberates and makes decisions on administrative and other affairs of the church. (There are also Quarterly and Yearly Meetings which consider these matters on a national and international level, and a Meeting for Sufferings, set up originaly to support members and their families who were subject to persecution for their faith, which is now a standing body of representatives acting, in a sense, as the executive branch of the Society. Details of the way in which these operate are given in ‘Quaker Faith and Practice’ – they are egalitarian and somewhat idiosyncratic in their procedures.) Membership requires only a sincerity of purpose and commitment to Quaker values and practics, but implies also an acceptance of certain responsibilities, including responsibility to participate in meetings for church affairs, willingness to serve in verious regional and national groups, shared pastoral responsibility, and some degree of financial commitment, according to means.

An Attender is someone who attends a particular meeting frequently and is registered as doing so, but who has not (or not yet), for whatever reason, applied for membership.

Within Meetings for Worship there is no hierarchy: all are equal, Members, Attenders, young and old, highly educated or otherwise, and anyone may speak if they feel moved or prompted to do so. Such ‘ministry’ may consist of personal testimony or insight or questions, and is generally brief (lengthy discourse is not encouraged).

Any individual aged 16 or over may apply for membership to the Monthly Meeting. Under the present system, the Meeting then appoints two Friends to visit the applicant and, following this, the visitors will then report back to the Meeting, which will make the decision collectively. To quote again:

‘As a part of a spiritual journey on the part of the person applying, the visit should be a sensitive exchange of thought between seekers: it should provide an opportunity for, and result in, mutual understanding and enrichment. It should not, however, be undertaken in the spirit of examination’

‘The visitors should seek to help the applicant towards a fuller understanding of Quaker faith and practice and the implications of membership, where this is needed. They should ensure that the applicant understands the nature of Quaker worship as a corporate waiting on God, where inspiration and guidance may be received. The applicant should understand why we dispense with outward forms, and should have considered seriously whether worship without them will be spiritually satisfying. Visitors will make it clear that the Society is essentially Christian in its inspiration, although it asks for no specific affirmation of faith and understands Christianity primarily in terms of discipleship.’

‘Our theology and practice are inseperable, and the visitors will need to find out how far the desire for memebership arises from a clear understanding of this rather than from an appreciation of some particular aspect of our practice, such as our social witness, our peace testimony, or our mostly silent worship.’

However -

‘Complete agreement with all our testimonies is not necessary.’

**************

Inicidentally, apropos Buddhism, my neighbour mentioned that she knows some Quakers who are also Buddhists. It is not in any way an exclusive faith.

correction of misquote in second para.

‘Some find Christian language …’ should read ‘Some find traditional Christian language full of meaning: some do not’

Apoologies for various other typos.

SpaceP and Martin RDB:

Here are a few thoughts.

Schopenhauer thought that the entire cosmos (including us) was one’Thing’ – the blind will to exist.

Now, if bosons and fermions are interchangeable – Smolin thinks we will have answers to this and much more in the very near future – and things like non-locality and the wave function bear any resemblance to reality why is this not possible? Why should everything be discrete? This is also the Spinoza position (sort of).

Consciousness might be nothing more than one position in time and space for the purpose of observing the universe (which might be required for it to exist at all, except as a potentiality). This comes back to whoever said earlier in the thread that existence is purely in the moment.

I admit that this leads towards solipsism but then we cannot say that this is not our position.

BTW Smolin also suggests (not finished the book yet) that time does not really exist and this will be proved one way or t’other withing the next few years.

Elephantschild:

Many thanks for the Quaker information. Very interesting, especially the undogmatic approach. It seems, from what you say, that it is almost non-Christian – merely using the Jesus of the Gospels as way or articulating their values.

HappyClappy:

Thanks for this.

God not omnipotent? What is your source?

God intervenes all the time – the sun stands still for Joshua, the ram in the thicket that saved Isaac, manna from heaven, the tablets of stone, the miracles of Jesus etc etc.

God created Satan and then had a wager with him about the behaviour of Job following a series of what I can only think of as tortures inflicted by God. Very strange.

Biskieboo:

Many thanks.

Isn’t this saying that sinners will be more highly rewarded than the righteous? I was trying to ascertain the entry requirements for Heaven. Is it belief in God or good behaviour? Or even the results of our behaviours, whatever our motivations?

Of course I should have mentioned entanglement in my second full para.

Boltonian

‘….it is almost non-Christian – merely using the Jesus of the Gospels as a way of articulating their values’

That seems to me a somewhat reductive interpretation of the complexity I was trying to convey, although it would be one of many positions which Quakerism can accommodate.

BTW It was probably obvious from the context, but perhaps I should have stated when I wrote ‘…Christ as a mythical paradigm …’ that I meant ‘mythical’ in the Platonic sense.

PS Thanks for putting me on to ‘The Trouble with Physics’. I have not started reading it yet – it will have to join the queue – but it looks most interesting.

boltonian :

“Schopenhauer thought that the entire cosmos (including us) was one’Thing’ – the blind will to exist.

Now, if bosons and fermions are interchangeable – Smolin thinks we will have answers to this and much more in the very near future – and things like non-locality and the wave function bear any resemblance to reality why is this not possible? Why should everything be discrete? This is also the Spinoza position (sort of).”

QM is discrete . Trying to find a way to make space time discrete occupies a lot of physicists . Wolfram’s CA ideas are about as discrete as you get . Lots of discrete things in an entangled state are still discrete .

“Consciousness might be nothing more than one position in time and space for the purpose of observing the universe (which might be required for it to exist at all, except as a potentiality). This comes back to whoever said earlier in the thread that existence is purely in the moment.”

That’s almost as abstract a notion of consciousness as dualism . If the brain is the substrate of consciousness , then consciousness must be many points in time and space throughout the brain .

Elephantschild:

Many thanks.

Yes, I was just trying to explore some sort of guiding principle and coming up with a gross oversimplification. I accept that people do things for very different reasons. In the ‘Mainstream’ churches it is at least easier to articulate what the congregation SHOULD be there for and what they ought to believe (not all do, of course). Quakerism seems almost like Buddhism in that there is no cast-iron doctrine that one must subscribe to – it is much more about how one lives one’s life.

SpaceP:

I was really just playing about with ideas – I do not have a fully worked out metaphysical hypothesis.

I just think that we are miles away from any sort of understanding of either reality or consciousness. Duality does not do it for me but I don’t really have an alternative. Perhaps if I live long enough to see a robotic brain built from scratch we might get some sort of answer – even a negative one that the brain is not consciousness.

The first half of Smolin’s book is a bit depressing but it is starting to warm up a little as he begins to discuss positives rather than the inadequacies of string theory.

If spacetime comprises discrete ‘Thingies’ what are the units and what are their properties? Does spacetime really exist? Or is it a useful concept to get us further down the road, like Newtonian aether,and we can discard it when something better comes along?

Hi Biskieboo here again. Here’s a short reply to this:

“Isn’t this saying that sinners will be more highly rewarded than the righteous? I was trying to ascertain the entry requirements for Heaven. Is it belief in God or good behaviour? Or even the results of our behaviours, whatever our motivations?”

Matthew Ch7 v21-23 makes it clear that only by obeying God can one get into heaven. It is NOT enough to claim Jesus as your lord. Good deeds are not enough either (Ephesians ch2v8).

I think this actually sounds pretty fair. You can’t just say you are a Christian and then behave badly and still expect to go to heaven. And you can’t just do good deeds and expect it either. Some people are not able to do good deeds eg someone who is severely physically disabled, but they are not excluded from going to heaven.

I would like to think that it is what is in peoples’ hearts that is the crux of the matter; the striving to do what is right.

Two other points:

Jesus said he did not come to invite good people to be his followers, but came to invite sinners (Mark ch2 v17). I know I am a sinner so he is talking about me.

He also said that “anyone who isn’t against us is for us” (Mark Ch9 v40) which I think is pretty cool.

I’m sure the next question you will be wanting to ask is “how do we know we are obeying God” so I’ll start thinking about that one now……..

Hi Biskieboo

I am not sure I have any fellow feeling with a god, despite apparently being made in His image, who demands obedience from me and then fails utterly to make clear what this might mean.

‘It is easier for a camel etc…..’

‘To him that hath, more shall be given.’

In fact, I would not warm to a god who demands obedience (and adoration), even if it were made clear what it entails, especially when he has given me the free will to choose. I guess this means I am doomed.

Also, who says what are good deeds? They vary from generation to generation and from place to place. Is it the motivation or the outcome that is most important?

As Nietzsche did not quite put it – at the centre of Christainity sits a big, fat lie; the meek have not inherited the earth – it is merely jam tomorrow and business as usual.

What do others think?

Are You Living In a Computer Simulation?

http://www.simulation-argument.com/

Reflections on Stephen Wolfram’s ‘A New Kind of Science’

http://www.kurzweilai.net/meme/frame.html?main=/articles/art0464.html

pttp:

Great links. I have skimmed them but need to spend a little time trying to absorb the science.

Perhaps SpaceP or Krapotkin, whenever he returns from his Siberian exile, might be better qualified to comment than me.

I must get round to reading ‘Singularity’ but I have so much on my list – half-read and not begun – that it might be a while.

Hello Boltonian,

Actually God does not “demand” anything as far as I can see.

Surely a God who has given us free will is expressly NOT demanding obedience and worship, but leaving it up to us whether we do so or not?

Maybe you were lucky enough to have been raised by parents who gave you clear boundaries and good moral guidance. For someone such as myself who was not, I have had to explore these issues for myself and I’ve made a fair amount of blunders along the way.

I find the moral guidance in the new testament very clear, and the ten commandments an excellent set of rules to try to live up to.

Doing good deeds is a decidedly tricky area. I don’t go out of my way to purposely “do good deeds” for individuals as I do not know if the particular deed in question is actually “good” in the sense that I do not know if it is the *best* thing for the individual I might be doing the deed for.

For me, my faith is much more about self-development than going around “doing good”. That is not to say that I do not involve myself with issues and campaigns that I feel do “collective good”, but even here you have to be very careful.

I don’t know what other believers think on this issue, and I don’t pretend to speak for anyone else.

It is very dangerous territory when one person thinks that they know what is best for another. I’d rather leave that up to God.

boltonian :

“I just think that we are miles away from any sort of understanding of either reality or consciousness. Duality does not do it for me but I don’t really have an alternative.”

I think a full and complete scientific understanding of reality or consciousness may be impossible . There seems to be , I think , a conceptual problem with consciousness and , say , the origin of the universe that goes beyond methodology .

Dualism of some kind , not necessarily interactionist dualism but property dualism or epiphenomenalism say , is still , in a naturalistic framework , popular with philosophers of mind . The basic problem is that a thought seems to be a different type of thing from the neural firing that correlates with that thought .

“Perhaps if I live long enough to see a robotic brain built from scratch we might get some sort of answer – even a negative one that the brain is not consciousness.”

How could you test a robot for consciousness as we understand what the word means ? If you poke around Kurzweil’s site that pttp linked to there is a debate about just that subject between Kurzweil and a computer science professor from Yale .

“The first half of Smolin’s book is a bit depressing but it is starting to warm up a little as he begins to discuss positives rather than the inadequacies of string theory.”

But bashing string theory is fun !

“If spacetime comprises discrete ‘Thingies’ what are the units and what are their properties? Does spacetime really exist? Or is it a useful concept to get us further down the road, like Newtonian aether,and we can discard it when something better comes along?”

There is some debate about this . Is space time fundamental , or is it emergent from the behavior of matter . I’m not sure that asking if space time ‘exists’ is a useful scientific question , the question is does it do useful explanatory work ? I find I become more positivist the more abstract things get in physics .

Regarding the links pttp dropped ..

The simulation argument is an interesting one , I think you know it quite well . There is a link to the paper that kicked off , as far as I can tell , the mainstream speculation .

The Wolfram review pretty much confirms what I thought when I first saw the idea of a CA universe . Interesting , but probably wrong .

Good morning, Biskieboo (Great name, by the way)

You said this on a previous post:

‘Matthew Ch7 v21-23 makes it clear that only by obeying God can one get into heaven.’

In fact, if there is one theme running through the scriptures it is that God does demand obedience and worship. Fear of God is probably the most common sentiment, at least in the Old Testament. Just one example from Judges (10, 7),

‘And the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel, and he sold them into the hands of the Philistines…’ and this for daring not to worship Him.

SpaceP and everybody:

How would we know our robot had consciousness? We wouldn’t; in the same way that we don’t know whether animals have. We can carry out experiments that would help us make assumptions but no more than that. But, doesn’t that road lead to solipsism? I don’t even know that my wife, for example, has an independent existence outside my mind because everything I know about the world comes to me through that channel.

Perhaps there is a fundamental reason why our attempts to establish any sort of handle on objective reality is doomed. Perhaps because we cannot break out of our subjectivity or that our brain is too restrictive or for some other, deeper reason. Perhaps like the ‘Game over’ scenario from Elephantschild earlier.

I have not read Wlfram’s stuff either, except waht other have written. I am not competent to judge whether CA is useful or a chimera.

I will revisit the sites pttp gave us and play around when I have some time – it looks fascinating.

Thoughts are very interesting. Of what are they made? Where do they go? Are they material? If they stay within the brain then does that not point to a solipsistic monism?

“How would we know our robot had consciousness? We wouldn’t; in the same way that we don’t know whether animals have. We can carry out experiments that would help us make assumptions but no more than that. But, doesn’t that road lead to solipsism? I don’t even know that my wife, for example, has an independent existence outside my mind because everything I know about the world comes to me through that channel.”

I suppose the difference is that our knowledge of our own consciousness leads us to think that other people , and some animals , also have that subjective experience . If we build a robot to test if a robot can be consciousness we first have to find a way to detect consciousness itself , not just the neural correlates . I can’t see how any test could do that .

“Perhaps there is a fundamental reason why our attempts to establish any sort of handle on objective reality is doomed. Perhaps because we cannot break out of our subjectivity or that our brain is too restrictive or for some other, deeper reason. Perhaps like the ‘Game over’ scenario from Elephantschild earlier.”

This sounds like mysterianism . You may be right , or perhaps the scientific method falls at the last hurdle and the meditators and mystics are closer to reality .

“Thoughts are very interesting. Of what are they made? Where do they go? Are they material? If they stay within the brain then does that not point to a solipsistic monism?”

The information processing in the brain is clearly , in my view , material . It is that extra thing , the subjective awareness of thoughts , that seem to be of a different order of being .

Is a thought and its neural correlate the same thing ? If not then thoughts have no spacial extension and therefore cannot be material . That would point to a dualism of some kind .

Hello again.

A lot of people tie themselves up in knots when they look at the old testament. I tend to look at certain parts of the old testament as a history of where and why it all went wrong. Jesus had to come and try to sort it all out again so it obviously wasn’t all going to plan. Mostly because people weren’t doing what God through Moses had said they should be (ten commandments).

When I tell my son something eg “knives are sharp and you shouldn’t touch them” and then he goes and cuts his finger on one because he hasn’t listened, I tend to be cross with him. I’m telling him stuff that is for his own good, not mine, but I still get cross. It doesn’t mean that I don’t love him.

The passage you refer to is an interesting one. God had rescued the Israelites from the Egyptians, the Amorites, the Ammonites, the Philistines, the Sidonians, the Amalekites, and the Maonites, phew!
No wonder He is then a bit peeved when they then start worshipping other Gods!

Spacepenguin, Boltonian and everyone:

Consciousness: I am playing catch-up here, and some of the information I am playing around with is only half digested but, for what it is worth, I am with Spacepenguin in thinking that consciousness is not reducible to purely physical brain activity. Neuroscientists tend to be materialists and to look for a physical explanation, but if they reason that because there is a clearly observed correlation between neural activity and conscious states the two are therefore essentially the same, they are ignoring a logical gap: correlation does not prove identity. Epiphenomenalism, whatever form it takes, seems to be just a way of fudging round the issue, and still leaves a problem. If consciousness is, so to speak, just a side effect of neural activity in the brain, what purpose does it serve? If it has no executive function independent of neural activity, no power to affect behaviour via the brain, it is functionless, so why did it ever evolve? (the question I posed earlier). None of the suggested explanations I have seen seem to provide a satisfactory answer, and there does not appear to be any way in which physical brain states and conscious mental states can be demonstrated experimentally to be simply attributes of the same ‘thing’. Earlier on I referred to the hypothesis that consciousness might be explicable in terms of quantum coherence. I tracked this down to Roger Penrose, but does anyone have any further information?

Some would argue that there is, in fact, observational evidence for consciousness having a function, in that conscious mental activity seems to be able to effect alterations in the structure of the brain – in meditating Buddhist monks, for example, or London cab drivers learning ‘The Knowledge’. It suggests a two-way interaction, at least, although some might argue that it is a ‘chicken or egg’ situation.

Dualism points to the possibility of free will. Libet seems to have concluded as much as a result of his experiments (although I gather that his results have not been replicated and there has been criticism of his methodology). He has written that ‘Potentially available to the conscious function is the possibility of stopping or vetoing the final progress of the volitional process, so that no actual muscle action ensues. Consciousness would thus affect the outcome of the volitional process, even though the latter was initiated by unconscious cerebral process.’ and that ‘The conscious veto is a control process different from simply becoming aware of the wish to act…There is no experimental evidence against the possibility that the control function may appear without development by prior unconscious process.’ His experiments, of course, related only to a minor physical action.

BTW Having read a bit more n the subject, I realise that I may have been misinterpreting the compatabilist position. I am perhaps closer to the position of Hans Kung – ‘..within the limits of what is conditioned and what is inate I am free’ to which I would add ‘..and the limits of choice which any given circumstance presents’.

*****************

Consciousness, subjectivity and solipsism: I don’t buy solipsism, if only because, if followed through to a conclusion, it seems to lead to a reductio ad absurdum. The key here is language, as Martin pointed out. Animals – the higher mammal, at least- do appear to have a form of consciousness, in that they behave as if aware of themselves as distinct from other animals, and communicate to a limited degree with others of their own species by means of body language, smell, a limited range of sounds etc. (cats and dogs kept as pets relate to their human owners as if to members of their own species). The higher primates may have a greater degree self awareness (chimps are apparently able to recognize themselves in a mirror), but human consciousness is, as far as we know, unique, in that language enables us to articulate abstract ideas and therefore to observe ourselves thinking – to be aware of being conscious. Language and human consciousness are, in fact, inextricably interrelated; neither is possible without the other. And with language I can communicate and receive ideas and thoughts, even if these are compromised in the transmission by subjectivity, and can establish that the beings with whom I share similar physical attributes and who react in the same way as myself to the same stimuli, appear also to possess the same kind of consciousness and to have more or less the same perception of the world

Thoughts and ideas which ‘I’ receive my means of language can modify or alter the way I think or perceive things, and thoughts which I transmit in the same way sometimes appear to modify the thinking and ideas of these ‘others’. For example, I am interested in theoretical physics and cosmology, and although I have difficulty in conceptualising some of the ideas involved, most of what I read on the subject seems to make sense. But all these ideas originate with others; I would be quite incapable of producing them myself, because I am incapable of the reasoning necessary to formulate them (if there is a mathematical equivalent of dyslexia, I have it, and never got beyond a GCE ‘O’ level in the subject). If I exist in a virtual reality, then the ‘others’ who transmit the information might simply be constructs without consciousness, programmed for some reason to do this, but the simpler option – that they do have an independent, conscious existence – seems a more rational assumption, even if I cannot prove objectively that this is so (and even if they and I are part of a simulated universe).

************************

Spacepenguin said that ‘…perhaps meditators and mystics are closer to reality’. This is a subject which I would be interested in pursuing further, if anyone has any ideas.

biskieboo:

Have you read Bishop Colenso’s criticism of the Pentateuch and Joshua? This demonstrates quite clearly the incoherence of those books.

‘No wonder He is then a bit peeved when they then start worshipping other Gods!’

God is not supposed to be peeved – he is perfect and benevolent and, therefore, incapable of these human characteristics (allegedly). Now, impatience is a human weakness and to impute that to God is anthropomorphism. And that is the whole point. God is very human – angry, jealous, loving, generous, dictatorial, etc because He was created by us. That is why His nature is different in Judges than He is in Daniel (composed much later). The God in Joshua is barely recognisable as the same being in John.

SpaceP, Elephantschild and others:

Consciousness might simply be a by product of a large brain, which in itself could be a by product of bi-pedalism. It has obviously conferred some benefit, otherwise we might have lost it (although we have not been around that long) but perhaps not the competitive advantage that we think.

I am not sure that language and consciousness are interdependent. We know of lots of creatures with highly developed language characteristics yet we have no proof that they are capable of conscious thought. We have a great capacity for anthropomorphism and most of the experiments that I have read about (I am not an expert in this field) are guilty of rather loose interpretation of the results.

Solipsism, subjectivity and the nature of consciousness.

Solipsism is a reductio ad absurdum but that does not make it impossible and language does not get you out of it because everything comes to you through one’s own brain. Having said that I think it unlikely but it is difficult (for me) to prove.

Subjectivity, though, we cannot escape. It is only by making assumptions about others we can make any sense of the world. That is why when somebody behaves so unlike us, like the recent Virginia Tech tragedy, that it is so shocking. More so than hundreds of deaths in Iraq each week – we can at least rationalise that and put ourselves into that position.

I have not yet encountered a theory of consciousness that does not have enormous holes – and that includes duality and epiphenomenalism.

Hans Kung – I would like to say something about him at some stage but I have run out of time. His quote might not leave much room for free will, though.

Anyway – good stuff. Any other views?

Elephantschild :

I agree that epiphenomenalism doesn’t make much sense in a materialistic monism framework ,
but I don’t think consciousness can be made sense of in such a context . Mysterians like Robert Wright and Stephen Pinker basically just declare the whole matter to be unknowable to science . Pinker’s view is that we evolved brains to answer wholly different types of questions .

Penrose’s Orch-OR theory of consciousness , I think it is called , is not widely accepted .
There are problems with decoherence in the brain and a few other things as well . He developed his theory because he thought that the mind is not computable , as we can intuit
certain mathematical truths without proof . This is not a widely held view . In any case , I’m not aware of his theory having anything helpful to say about qualia .

I like that Hans Kung quote although , again , under naturalism there is only what is innate
and what is conditioned . There is nothing else .

“If I exist in a virtual reality, then the ‘others’ who transmit the information might simply be constructs without consciousness, programmed for some reason to do this, but the simpler option – that they do have an independent, conscious existence – seems a more rational assumption, even if I cannot prove objectively that this is so (and even if they and I are part of a simulated universe).”

Perhaps we are all constructs who are programmed to think we are conscious ? Or is thinking you are conscious what consciousness is ?

I don’t think the language argument undermines strong solipsism . If everything is a figment of your imagination then the notion of acquiring information is illusionary . You could already know everything you think you are learning from someone . You just don’t know it .

Its gone very quiet.

Does anybody have a response or thought.

I will give a synopsis of Lee Smolin’s latest when I have finished it.

Apologies for the silence. There have been too many other things demanding my attention over the weekend.

Boltonian:

‘I am not sure that language and consciousness are interdependent. We know of lots of creatures with highly developed language characteristics yet we have no proof that they are capable of conscious thought.’

It depends, I suppose, on how you define consciousness.
see http.//plato.stanford.edu/entries/consciousness-animal/

It may be that there are degrees of consciousness. Some animals do, indeed, display evidence of well developed language characteristics, but nothing which has been observed suggests that these languages, in whatever form, are applied to anything other than what is immediate and present.

My point was that, as far as we can tell, only humans have developed a highly complex, abstract, symbolic language capable of articulating and communicating what is abstract (not present) and formulating complex ideas. I would argue that it is this ability which enables what I, at least, understand by human consciousness – the ability to be aware of and to monitor our own thought processes; to think about thinking and attribute the same capacity to others. Many animals may be self-aware and have some form of access consciousness (the ability to form mental representations) without being self-conscious in the same way, or having any ‘theory of mind’, since their capacity for language (probably) would not permit abstract thought to the same degree.

Human consciusness and the capacity for complex language may both be products of a large brain, and the development of both is likely to have been enabled by bipedalism. The ability to produce the range of vocal sounds necessary for human speech is the result of the larynx moving further down the throat – not possible in quadripedal apes. (Although other forms of complex language might be possible – in squid like creatures with chromatophores, for example.)

Spacepenguin

‘If everthing is a figment of your imagination, then the notion of acquiring information is illusionary. You could already know everthything you think you are learning from someone. You just don’t know it.’

In that case, would it follow that the limited brain (nowhere near the size of a planet) and the equally limited mind which I imagine that I have are part of something greater of which I am not directly aware. Could I be, in fact, the god of my own universe?

gordy:

I had wondered why only 100 comments had been transferred.

I hope there is no limit. how can we find out?

Well, 101 and 102 seem to have worked ok

Yes quite so. I deleted my #100 once I saw that I had been able to post it

This message appeared earlier on the edublog website…

Sorry about the slowness!: Edublogs has now been moved to a new server cluster which means that we can now simply add more resources to overcome slowness – thanks for your patience and sorry for the bother!

I think that might explain my problems yesterday and those experienced by ChooChoo and Steve perhaps. It does seem much better today….

gordy:

It seems to very slow from my end at the moment. Perhaps it will get better later.

Ironically it was incredibly slow at posting my last comment – before then it had been fine! Maybe it was so slow because we were trying to post at exactly the same time or maybe I’m just advertising my own ignorance concerning computers!

This came thrpough whilst I was waiting.

‘Many apologies, as you may know we’re currently upgrading the server cluster and software that edublogs runs on.

Consequently, performance is a little choppy – but we guarantee things will be better than ever when we’re done.

Usually, refreshing or waiting a few minutes and then refreshing this page will fix your issues – apologies again.’

Hi everyone. I found this forum through a search on free will and consciousness. Is it still live ? The last substantive post seems to have been made on April 24th. I’ve just finished reading Daniel Dennett’s ‘Elbow Room’, his 1984 book on free will, and could add a short (or even a long) comment / summary if there is interest.

Hi Eeyore:

This is a copy and paste of some comments from my original blog.

New posts are always encouraged so please let me have your completed article by email and I will post it in the most appropriate category or, if you prefer, I could create a new category for you.

My email address is: gengmaak@hotmail.co.uk

Many thanks.

I’d be very interested to read a review/comment piece on these books.

Thanks in anticipation.