@Pathfinder,
Having made the effort to keep up with the explosion of activity and voices enjoined, with all the verbal exchange of things of the mental realm, and with determined desire to vizualize, concieve of, and play around with relatively secured (as far as I can tell) understandings constructed in this brain of what has been asserted and claimed, I must say that we have allowed this thread to become somewhat of a bubble gum arcade of a place.
Why is it that we cannot yet come to grasp the notion that there is far greater virture, and, productive and positive-in-outcome result in laying more proper foundations for what is being asserted? and an internet link here or there to wherever is not quite gonna do that--make an outline, spell out your terms, defend those firstly (if need be), then apply them towards the argument being made. Take the time needed to do it in better format, airs, and balanced maturity.
For those of you who have not noticed, we are working primarily on the position of consciousness' being a biological problem. (and here, just in case, '
problem' does not nuance as in '
something gone wrong', but as in '
matter of foundational field of inquiry') That will of course include the concept of 'mind,' and it's connection to brain, or its being of brain--
as raised in the OP as well.
Additionally, we do have a working definition of consciousness for the purpose of this thread (
see (in this order) here,
here, and (
esp.)
here), therefore I urge those who are tempted to ascribe new definition/descriptions of that, to either expound on, and argue for, leverage benefits in adding new senses of meaning/nuances on the word, or adhere to the general definition/description that we are using (as especially generally settled on in that last link above)--
which means that we can't just say that any ole thing is consciousness.
For those who are interested in the quantim physics area, it is a very interesting area indeed. As for its relation to brain processs, and by extenstion, consciousness, a recent series of overviews presented in the journal
Brain and Cognition (part 2 having just come out in Vol 71, issue 2; Nov '09) of the field has been published. Of four teams reviewed in part 2, for example--J.C. Eccles/Friedrich Beck; Henry Stapp; Stuart Hameroff/Roger Penrose; David Bohm--only Bohm does not acquiesce to there presently being little to conclude that any neurobiological plausibility of microstructure quantum effects can be deduced. T.H. Huxley is quoted as having spoken of 'a beautiful hypothesis destroyed by ugly facts'.
That said, however, I am asking those interested in pursuing that to consider some facts more thoroughly, please. When, in evolution's name, did quantum events come to have transpired in nature? Was it very near the start of the expansion, or was in the last handfull and a half of decades of the late past millennium? or was it, instead, when the first full DNAed H. sapien had been most definitely defined from within the branch of humanoids that it developed out of?
The point being, of course, that most obviously, just like natural bonding events, time/space events, attraction events, and so on and on so, quantum events have been there all along--so . . . all those other H's and P's of evoluntionary ascent, and any and all animals and species which presently, or in the past, (as in past 1, 000,000 years to simply put a cap on it) have had brain, had surely been 'worked on' by such mechanics just as much
(holding evolutionary progress (v.) of quantum mechanics [if there is such a thing] aside) as our brains are being 'worked on' by such. To reach the summation directly here, quantum matters do not matter, in the matter of consciousness' being a biological problem until it can be clearly demonstrated that by altering quantum details, we can alter consciousness without altering biological process as presently understood.
For those who wish to adhere to the notion that all living and have ever lived animals' brain build/states are '
souls' I strongly urge you to put your definition/descriptions out here on the table--
instead of making such far flung assertions that we are 'souls' under your breath in passing as though there were no question at all on such an ancient misconception. If you wish to hold that only human beings are '
souls' or have '
souls' (or however one wishes to 'verb' that phrase), then all the more, please put your definition/descriptions out on the table--
otherwise you are simply talking in relgious belief-system mo-jo which has no greater degree of natural truth value than the assertion that the pineal gland is responsible for skeletomotor operation.
odenskrigare, in that you and I, among a few others here, are basically on the same side of the debate table, let me please, with all due respect and concern, ask that you tell me what I may do in the way of encouraging you so as to help corral your argumentative
modus operandi into the greener and more succulent pastures of a slightly (I repeat,
slightly) more productive, mature, and scented with humanitarian-like academic range; please.
Now, as I had come here to continue my presentation, I will not try to hide that upon following up from my last post, a bit of an exasperated emotion swelled from the process of doing so, and thus I have posted this plea. In order to prevent another over-sized post (as mine tend to be anyway, and I ask forgiveness and understanding there, please) I will post this much now, then wait a while so as to prevent merging. Of course, I will respond to questions or objections to this content as well as continue with the development of the underlying detail of my position that
consciousness is a biological problem.
KJ
