Evolution is a basic, biological process

The brain THINKS it created a mind but the brain is mistaken?The brain perceives (mistakenly) a mind?By the way: as regards whether this is off-topic. I think the topic of this thread is vague or various.I was trying to respond to Soplar's search for a decent argument against evolution. I thought that was his point. Wasn't he giving us a lot of reasons why evolution is obviously true (and explaining what it really was), and didn't he want to know why someone would think it is not true? Maybe I'm wrong.But if I'm right, then the evolution of mind is a controversial idea that he is looking for, an argument that is not just Bible references.

Yes, and there's also Hamlet with his "dreams" of the afterlife, "when we have shuffled off this mortal coil"--which keeps him from committing suicide. Not quite so meaningless!Yes, I have heard the holistic argument. It goes as follows: not any part of the brain is the mind; you can cut it up and never find it. But the whole thing creates it through certain "mindmakers" (different parts of the brain that I've been reading about or trying to read about). But how a neuron or a billion neuronic interactions can create a "thought" is to me a great mystery.

The brain does not think it has created a mind. The mind is what is the results from the brain thinking. But the mind is a word, not an entity. It does not exist apart from the brain. The brian prevades the mind. IMO. The mind probably evolved because humans began to see themselves a separate and began to maintain a sense of self. I put my hand in the fire and "I" get burned. When I think about moving my hand "I" can move it, or not move it. What is this thing that is getting burned? What is this thing that is moving or not moving it's hand? What is this thing that is thinking these thoughts? This thing is a collection of organic materials minerals and water. Nothing more. And when you die that is all that is left.

1.6, etc.I accept the following:
1. when the brain dies the mind dies.
2. the mind is dependent on the brain. If you do something to the brain, it affects the mind.
3. another point you did not bring up, I think, but somebody else did. Certain animals are conscious.These ideas are not relevant to the issue.My point is to say that "the mind is an illusion" is a contradiction of terms. The brain cannot have an "illusion."

Hi robinrohanYour comment is essentially correct. To me, evolution is so obvious, that I have difficulty seeing a realistic opposite view. Regarding your observation is possibly what I am looking for but I rather think the evolution of the mind demonstrates evolution. However, I will present my view of the evolution of the mind and address your other, related, comment and see if I can resolve some of the mystery of how the brain creates a thought, but will take me a bit to formulate an appropriate responseRegardsSoplar

Guys,Having fun without me? Is that allowed?If I'm not mistaken, robinrohan is an atheist who enjoys arguing with atheists about stuff like "What is the mind?"I enjoy many of his posts. He has an interesting angle on issues and sometimes does a fair job of challenging others' atheistic assumptions.Anyway, as far as I can tell this is a bunch of evolutionists discussing stuff, which is interesting in its own right--sort of like EvE...heh.

Well, that's what science is like. What, you thought scientists just sat around agreeing with each other? Hell no! There's careers to be made!

Thanks. Some of my posts are foolish because I get impatient and don't think through what I want to say. Sometimes I have a bad habit of not reading other's messages closely enough--because I'm eager to say something. I don't know much about science--or the French I took.I'm offended by flippant or contemptuous comments directed against religious belief and the depth of history associated with it--the dark backward and abysm of time (the Shakespearean reference is for Sopler's enjoyment).I'm not an atheist. My mind is open on that score.This message has been edited by robinrohan, 01-04-2005 21:42 AM

Oh, we're just amusing ourselves until an interesting, intelligent creationist comes along. Care to try out for the part? You want to see an EvE discussion, check out this thread: Overkill, Overill, or Overchill. There was a certain amount of fur flying in that thread.

The problem with some creationists is that they don't understand argument. The idea is to limit the assumptions to a minimum, and then go with what you got.Starting with Bible references will not work. There are too many assumptions involved.Why not discuss abiogenesis, carefully separating that from evolution?And then there's always "mind" of course.I have this recurring vison of the Godhead pumping mind-fuel, so to speak, into all creatures that are conscious (I think I got this from Teilhard de Chardin's book The Phenomenon of Man--but it was so long ago I might be mistaken). This is what makes them and keeps them conscious. Physicality cannot do that.Otherwise we would be mindless robots which the evolutionists are trying to make us out to be with their denial of mind and thus of free will and thus of anything worth living for. Why are they doing this? Because they think it's cool to put people down (they carefully exclude themselves, by implication, from the mindless robot category).I guess when we go to sleep He turns the faucet down to a mere drip (thus the phenomenon of dreams).Makes more sense than physicality somehow magically producing mentality.This message has been edited by robinrohan, 01-04-2005 23:35 AM

Another idea I had was that there was this mindstuff floating around in the universe--spun off from the Big Bang and, like dark matter, undetectable--which exists only potentially unless it can find a brain to activate it and make it "real."It's almost like a parasite. It feeds off the brain. Earth was a fertile breeding ground and it began to inhabit anything closely resembling a brain.It is, however, an oppressive substance, and you have to have a big brain to stand much of it. That's why cats have to sleep so much. They have a small brain and can only handle a few hours of consciousness a day.That's why creatures sleep (I got this idea from an essay I read called "Do Horses Gallop in their Sleep?"). You sleep if you are capable of consciousness.

Hi Soplar, It sounds like stuff is being determined--i.e., the necessity of reproduction and methods of reproduction. Who does the determining? Who decided that anything needed to survive? So you recognize that the genetic CODE is SEQUENCED and that it requires a corporation, experts and machines to even attempt to poorly DECIPHER it. Besides the genetic CODE, what other CODES do you consider not to have required intelligence to formulate? Here you recognize that cells have complex machinery that can handle copying errors during DNA replication. Excluding life forms, what other complex machines have you encountered that did not require intelligent effort to engineer and fabricate?Now, about mutations... In your opening statements you provide aging and cancer as two results of accumulated copying errors. These are NOT the same thing as making new life forms or life forms with greater survival ability.Do bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics due to copying errors? I don't think they do, but can you see, that even IF they do, it is still a bacteria...even the same general kind of bacteria. So, while it MIGHT demonstrate greater survivability, it does NOT demonstrate that copying errors make new life forms. (I would like to go into antibiotic resistant bacteria in some depth after we settle why, or even whether, modern biology is unintelligible without an understanding of the evolutionary process. I have some specific questions about antibiotic-resistant bacteria for which I've never recieved good answers.)Furthermore, so far as I know, copying errors provide unnecessary duplication of present information, deletion of present information, or mixing-up of present information. Doesn't the development of new life forms require the addition of NEW information?I can see how accumulations of copying errors could lead to an organism that doesn't work as well (aging and cancer, for instance). Does duplicated, mixed-up, or deleted versions of old information equal new information? I really fail to see how it does. Can copying errors provide NEW information in the genome? If they can, how do they do so?Perhaps this is really the heart of the matter for you. Do you believe that the commonality of many traits among the diverse life forms is the reason that modern biology is unintelligible to those without an understanding of the evolutionary process?Many of my questions in this post are rhetorical and deal with the Intelligent Designer issue. You may answer those if you wish, but, in my opinion, answers to the last four questions, which I have highlighted in yellow, will do more to help us reach a conclusion about whether modern biology is unintelligible without an understanding of the evolution process.Regards,--TheLiteralist

How have I been doing so far? This message has been edited by TheLiteralist, 01-04-2005 23:33 AM

Robinro..etc..(to lazy to type the rest of your screen name)
I fully agree that animals are concious, since humans fall into that catagory. Many many animals are concious in my opinion. But not all animals are sentinent.As far as the brain not being capable of an illusion is silly, every time you dream the brian formulates all manner of illusions. Or do you wake up with Jessica Simpson in your bed? My point about the mind being an illusion is to say I do not believe there is a physical thing or separate thing that exist called the mind. My whole point was it is a word not an substance. Dualism and metaphysics and Aristotilian phylosophy do assign supernatural properties to the mind because humans want to feel that something apart from they're physical body exist.The mind is often described as the soul, the SELF, the life force. I say it does not exist apart from human wishful thinking. Dogs, Gorillas, Chimps do not concern themselves with such nuerotic thoughts. Does that mean they do not have a mind? Or does it mean they have not evolved to achieve a mind? Is the mind only a human condition? Or is the mind only present in creatures with enough intellect to be deemed worthy of the WORD mind.I have seen documentries of chimps being trained to recognize words and use tools. Do they have this thing called a mind? Do you see my point at all? Where is this mind if the brain dies? Is the brain the mind? I say no. The mind is an illusion of the brain achieving a sense of Self, a sense of separateness, conciousness becoming sentient and asking what am I? What is my mind? Why am I here? What is my reason for being? What happens to my SELF when I die? Daddy tell me a bed time story.

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"One is punished most for ones virtues" Fredrick Neitzche

And what exactly does this wishful thinking? The brain? Are you telling me that a physical object has illusions and engages in wishful thinking?How can that be?I am not quite sure why you bring up animals. Of course they might have minds. Why not? What's your point?This message has been edited by robinrohan, 01-04-2005 23:50 AM