Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id DAA05417 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Fri, 30 Mar 2001 03:22:08 +0100 From: <joedees@bellsouth.net> To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Date: Thu, 29 Mar 2001 20:23:59 -0600 Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Subject: Re: The Demise of a Meme Message-ID: <3AC399DF.27798.88DBD7@localhost> In-reply-to: <20010329095746.A535@reborntechnology.co.uk> References: <3AC0CC5C.4426.37BBB8@localhost>; from joedees@bellsouth.net on Tue, Mar 27, 2001 at 05:22:36PM -0600 X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Win32 (v3.12c) Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
On 29 Mar 2001, at 9:57, Robin Faichney wrote:
> On Tue, Mar 27, 2001 at 05:22:36PM -0600, joedees@bellsouth.net wrote:
> > On 27 Mar 2001, at 10:35, Robin Faichney wrote: > > > A skeptic
> would say there's nothing to rule out a complete causal > >
> explanation at the neural level from impingement of air pressure waves
> > > ("instructions as to what to think about") on the subject's
> eardrums > > to excitation of specific neural areas as observed. No
> hypothetical > > "will" or "self" need be involved. > > > I'm sure
> that if a subject answers, no, I decided to think about X > instead of
> read Y, that the appropriate components would light up > on the scan.
>
> I'm sure they would, but so what?
>
Well, it would mean that the expoerimenter's instruction to the
subject to access X capacity did not cause the subject to do so,
'impingement of air pressure waves' notwithstanding.
>
> That's not evidence of top-down
> causation either. These experiments are of great value, I'm sure, to
> neurologists, but for our purposes, the fact that certain brain areas
> light up on a scan when the subject's told what to do, is no better
> evidence of mind-body interaction than if someone raised an arm when
> you asked them to. And I don't remember anyone ever using that fact
> as the basis of a great breakthrough in philosophy of mind.
>
No, but it has been cited for many millenia as proof that one exerts
top-down control over one's own body (skeleton and musculature),
even when the brain was though to be an organ for the cooling of
the blood.
>
> > And the self is not hypothetical, but apodictically self-
> > evident on the most basic phenomenological and existential level;
> > for a self such as you to deny the existence of a self, and of
> > yourself by existential instantiation, is to ensnarl yourself in the
> > same types of irretrieveable self-contradictions in which you have
> > mired yourself beaucoup times before here...
>
> That's all absolutely irrelevant. You've obviously lost any
> philosophical detachment you ever had on this. You're supposed to be
> a philosopher, but you've forgotten one of philosophy's most commonly
> used tools: playing the part of a radical skeptic is a perfectly valid
> method to expose the flaws in an argument. The actual position of the
> person playing the part is irrelevant. Any philosopher who hasn't
> "lost the place" responds by directly addressing the points made about
> *their* argument, regardless of the general plausibility of the
> skeptical stance.
>
I did so, by the time-tested method of reductio ad absurdum, or
reducing to absurdity, by showing that the logically entailed
consequences of your stance are irretrieveably self-contradictory.
And don't even begin to attempt to try to contemplate asserting to
me that you possess any vestige of a shred of religious
detachment on the issue, buddhist nonattachment notwithstanding.
>
> And are you actually suggesting that no neural causal chain can exist
> between the auditory nerve and the activated brain areas because the
> chain actually goes through the self instead? Do you think that's
> plausible? (Or even comprehensible?)
>
Between the efferent and the afferent (perception and action) areas,
the information is indeed processed in the associative cortex, and
the physical (objective) analogue of the subjectively perceived self
would indeed be found flitting about in the dynamically recursive
pattern-configurations and elsewhere, such as in the raphe and
reticular actiating systems.
>
> > against free will as if such arguments could carry any weight, since
> > they would thus be the inevitable consequence of the big bang
> > puppeteering palates and could not even be intended by their
> > utterer, or for people to attempt to argue that they knew nothing,
> > all the while utilizing a language which they knew how to use.
> > >
> > > Personally, I believe in the self and the will as useful concepts
> > > in many contexts, but you'd never convince a real skeptic using
> > > this evidence. Objectively conclusive it ain't.
> > >
> > Some real obtuse skeptics embrace solipsism, and are really
> > logically incoherent to do so.
> > Some real hidebound skeptics regard all religious views as an
> > unfortunate virulent and destructive mental infection communicated
> > ceselessly by poor wretched memetically enthralled mind zombies.
> > Some real bizarre skeptics will deny a
> > 99.9999999999999999999999999999999% statistical probability,
> > clinging to the forlorn straw of the bare theoretical necessity of
> > provisionality (science) to reject it while embracing all kinds of
> > nonsensical folderol because the religion to which they belong which
> > cretinously asserts it does so with dogmatically absolute certitude.
> > Which kind of skeptic are you? Objectively conclusive the evidence
> > is to a high degree of statistical probability; 100% it isn't. Why?
> > Because it's science, and it ain't 'gospel truth' religious dogma,
> > like the Zen Doctrine of No-Mind, when fundamentalistically
> > misinterpreted.
>
> You're virtually foaming at the mouth here. You really need to get
> some distance from all this. Nobody is literally attacking your self,
> Joe! :-)
>
That is an ad hominem reply, and does not address my query.
Which kind of skeptic ARE you? #3 is, by the way, the most
hopelessly credulous one; the one who is willing to grasp at the
barest of logical straws in order to preserve a favored fantasy.
> --
> Robin Faichney
> Get your Meta-Information from http://www.ii01.org
> (CAUTION: contains philosophy, may cause heads to spin)
>
> ===============================================================
> This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
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>
>
===============================================================
This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the
Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission
For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing)
see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
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