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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Mar 30, 2015 - 07:57am PT
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Where do thoughts (neural impulses) come from? Just two sources: 1) Pre-existing neural impulses or your senses (in the most complete sense, given that you've got neural transducers in every nook and cranny in your body that monitor everything from smells to your blood sugar level).
That much we DO know already.
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Mar 30, 2015 - 07:58am PT
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Werner, is your anti-static lab coat a hoody?
If so, please wear it backwards.
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TWP
Trad climber
Mancos, CO & Bend, OR
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Mar 30, 2015 - 08:03am PT
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I've practiced meditation (a lot) and studied molecular biology.
The mysteries only get deeper looking down both barrels.
Like this one:
How does an aggregation of molecules generate something as subtle, transient and evanescent as a thought, a mood, an emotion or a hallucination?
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 30, 2015 - 08:09am PT
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Just see
TWP represents the intelligent class .....
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Mar 30, 2015 - 08:15am PT
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Anyone here who isn't an aggregation of molecules; please self identify and let us know what you are instead.
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Mar 30, 2015 - 08:35am PT
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As sophisticated talented intellectuals at the pinnacle of evolution and the leading edge of what can be achieved by such superior biological organism such as ourselves, we must not forget our role as the chief predators and the unpredictably dangerous animals that we also are.
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 30, 2015 - 08:41am PT
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dangerous animals that we are
Those who bluff in the name of scientific method that are too much addicted to the gross plane of scientific mode of thinking are unable to transcend the stage of direct perception.
Thus they remain as none other then polished animals.
The intelligent class are the real human beings .....
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Mar 30, 2015 - 08:57am PT
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As sophisticated talented intellectuals at the pinnacle of evolution and the leading edge of what can be achieved by such superior biological organism such as ourselves, we must not forget our role as the chief predators and the unpredictably dangerous animals that we also are.
we are the Crown of Creation? (cue Jefferson Airplane)
I think you might have misinterpreted "evolution" and taken a rather species-centric view. If viewed strictly by biomass, we are in the rather distinct minority, single cell organisms have it way over us, and in fact are a major "challenge" to our putative superiority, even terms like "chief predator" seem a quaint boast.
Ever have an infection? damn those sneaky bastards, why don't they stand up and fight like a man!
If "talented intellectualism" was such a strong evolutionary advantage, why don't we see it occurring in more species? An alternative explanation is that "talented intellectualism" is really just a sexual selection, it is our species' "peacock feathers," or perhaps more aptly, our "turkey feathers" (we do tend to stand in front of mirrors displaying a lot...).
Even among the multi-celluar our claim of superiority is rather vapid. The ants, taken as a whole, equal humans in biomass, and they've been around for many more millions of years than humans have. They also have an elaborate social system, though very different than the human version, seemingly equally effective. I suspect they survive into the future... humans may have a rather limited play of a few million years in the long running story of life on planet Earth.
But do go on and enjoy your time in the sun. Every living thing has that unique moment.
[Click to View YouTube Video]
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 30, 2015 - 08:59am PT
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but in end, the brain/mind is a mysteries product of evolution.
Maybe if you spent more time meditating you will have the answers.
You see now how silly your arguments are/become ......
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 30, 2015 - 09:10am PT
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Comedy gold, that.
If one is completely unconscious under anesthetics then you will be dead.
Consciousness is the symptom of life.
Thus a so called unconscious person still exhibits consciousness of the living entities life force being active.
The only comedy is your poor fund of knowledge, Randisi .....
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Mar 30, 2015 - 09:44am PT
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Comedy Central we are not.
Eccentric Ghandi and or Einstein never has been-wannabees, maybe?
Still, can't attempt a joke on this site without a bee hive hitting me in the head!
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Mar 30, 2015 - 09:52am PT
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We (humans) can measure the 'success' of a species in a number of ways. One is sheer population size - we're doing quite well there. We've proven to be adaptable to just about every (surface) environment on earth.
Now, if we add 'sustainable' to 'population size', the jury is still very much out on that one.
If we then add 'utility to the rest of the biological environment' as a criterion, we score a bit lower. Perhaps at or near the bottom of all species today.
Ants, on the other hand, are incredibly useful - they recycle dead things so that they're available to build new living things, from bacteria to trees. They've become absolutely necessary for the health of most of the world's eco systems.
If we add 'time in the saddle (long term survivability)' as a criterion, we score no where near the top. Archaea would rule that roost, along with some larger organisms like ginkos, sharks, and, of course, insects.
Anyway, as any Californian well knows, ants come and go as they please with impunity.
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 30, 2015 - 10:00am PT
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Randisi -- Unconscious things are not conscious.
But they still exhibit consciousness.
You're making the mistake between conscious and consciousness itself.
As long as the heartbeat is still going a person still exhibits consciousness.
Consciousness IS the exact symptom of life itself.
Life comes from life ......
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MikeL
Social climber
Seattle, WA
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Mar 30, 2015 - 10:07am PT
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MH2: Do you have an answer?
“Answers,” sure. Thousands of them. Millions of them. An answer for every being.
But final answers? There are no final answers that have been shown or found for anything that I’m aware of.
“If there is nothing. . . “ is not what some of us are saying, but you can’t quite seem to grok the notion. Your thinking seems binary: it must either be this or that, existent or non-existent, a thing or nothing. I’m saying you don’t need to take a position on anything. I’m saying relax and rest. As Tony Soprano said in every episode: “Hey, hey, hey! . . . take it easy.”
I don’t want to get too far into this (boring, sort of), but the mind makes the assumption that there are objects and that those objects are permanent, and once assumed, makes it real cognitively with projection and unending social reinforcements. This happens to kids by about the age of 2 (said Piaget). Most everyone never recovers.
When I said that you are conscious of “things” cognitively, I’m referring there to the analytical (take a “thing” apart, use techniques to measure and observe the parts, and then put the parts back together back into a “thing”) discursive (conceptually-oriented) mind. That’s the mind you are most directly aware of, the one you hear and see most often, the one that won’t shut up, the one you have a concept for. But is that what the mind is? Is the mind a processor, a simulator, a memory bank, a display apparatus? Is that what you are conscious of? (One of many “answers.”)
I’d say there are a great many things I am not conscious of through the analytical discursive conceptual mind, MH2. Experience seems to give me knowledge of much without the concepts to be aware of them. (Retrospectively, after-the-fact, I may name them.) That is: I experience much without concepts arising in consciousness by which to grok them: e.g., any of my five senses, digestion, emotions, fight-or-flight responses—many of the experiences pointed at that “hot cognition” is concerned with these days. Indeed, I’d say that most all of what I experience daily is NOT mental rational conceptualization. Most experiences just show up, in real time, without thought. Thoughts are often after-the-fact, interpretations that I have.
Things are what we say they are. Almost all work in cognitive science has informed us that seeing is not believing. Believing is seeing.
(Of course, the irony of it is that cognitive science is also a mental rational set of conceptualizations. )
So what is really what? (We don’t need any concepts to find or know reality.)
So, what about me, my preferences or views . . . ? Representations, model, and theories are part of my job. Sure. It’s my role to teach and train people in the use of those things. I find myself expressing who and what I am in that role as an improvisational dance with students emotionally, physically, spiritually, and (yes) cognitively. It’s an experience of flow for me; I feel possessed; it’s a feeling; I am relaxed and enjoy myself; I am unsure where or how I am what I am; I feel open, authentic, psychologically present, engaged.
What about the concepts? I tell my students in the middle in the course that none of those things are real, but they CAN facilitate interaction within communities. I think you can be a part of the dance more fully if you don’t take these concepts so seriously or concretely, and I tell them that.
I feel drawn to the dance, MH2, to the community, to the bodhichitta that seems to arise when I see that things are not quite as concrete or serious as I used to think.
(Ha-ha . . . especially this little bit of writing.)
Ed: Ever have an infection? damn those sneaky bastards, why don't the stand up and fight like a man!
Excellent.
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Mar 30, 2015 - 10:12am PT
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'Vacation from the Self'
When I sought some simple solace from the world and all its ills,
The Doctor tried prescribing me a little box of pills,
They made my feet swell up and then my toe stuck in the fire,
Which blistered so severely I decided to retire,
For calm and restitution meditation was advised,
I began to light some incense which I heretofore despised,
And calmly I was chanting and was breathing in repose,
When the smell of something burning started wafting up my nose,
Now I meditate in nature since my house burned to the ground,
But no remedy for something needed ever has been found,
Of selfishness and self reproach I wish that I was free,
As much as I could use a break I'm never missing me.
-bushman
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Mar 30, 2015 - 10:36am PT
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Humanity has an epistemological superiority over all species on this planet: a superior ability to know coupled with a superior ability to understand. It is through human thought and human reason the universe comes to know itself. Dismissing human achievement as inferior to other inhabitants of this planet based on biomass is a notion straight out of Rousseau and is pure romanticism.
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Mar 30, 2015 - 11:50am PT
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^^^^^ Nice, Paul.
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Tvash
climber
Seattle
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Mar 30, 2015 - 01:03pm PT
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Everybody's a winner when you design your own trophy.
It's safe to say that humans are the most intelligent species on our little planet. That's certainly one measure of 'success' of a species, in that it has undoubtedly aided in increasing our numbers and life span - so far.
But the rules of the evolution game can change quickly - and what was once a help can quickly become a hindrance when that happens. Every survival strategy - and intelligence is only one of many, comes with both costs and benefits that are determined by a dynamic environment. Several mass extinctions punctuate this principle.
Our intelligence could likely lead to the creation of superior artificial beings that could begin their own accelerated evolution - without us. Our history shows that the technologically superior tend to displace the inferior. Our iPhones and killbots may be the seeds to our own destruction.
Then there's resource depletion, climate degradation, the nuclear threat, and an increasing risk of pandemic due to higher density and mobility - all the result of the very same intelligence that has served our survival so well up until now.
We may care if we know the universe, or at least a wee little bit of it, but the universe at large cannot and does not care one way or the other. If, in fact, we disappear, all traces of us will disappear within 15 or million years or so, save a few fossils, perhaps - and 'the universe' will go about its business, whatever that is.
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WBraun
climber
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Mar 30, 2015 - 01:08pm PT
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the universe at large cannot and does not care one way or the other.
You have no knowledge if that is true or not.
You're just making sh!t up and writing it down as usual with no actual proof at all.
One little Tvash on planet earth knows what the Universe is doing and thinking all while little Tvash doesn't even fully know his own self .......
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