mangoe@umcp-cs.UUCP (Charley Wingate) (08/27/85)
In article <610@utastro.UUCP> padraig@utastro.UUCP (Padraig Houlahan) writes: >>> I note that an interesting consequence of Charley's view is that man is >>> nothing more than an assemblage of chemicals. (Maybe some good has come >>> from Rosen's and my postings!) As an analogy one could consider a stack >>> of coins, say, and have some klutz knock them over. The stack is rebuilt, >>> but the question is whether or not it is the "same" stack, in the same >>> sense as that for a similar one that existed all the while. >> Wishful thinking: it's like saying that a robot chess player is "just a >> bunch of ICs". The huge volume of stories concerning the transmission of >> minds from one body to another indicates that people do not really >> believe that a mind is a bunch of chemicals any more than they believe >> that a chess program is a bunch of ICs (or take the reduction to an >> even more absurd level, a bunch of electrical charges). >Let's not forget the tooth fairy, santa claus, >all legends, and why not throw in Velikovsky while we are at it. >This is net.philosophy, not net.storytime. >All of this is fascinating. Look how easy it is to produce something >that is more than just an assemblage of chemicals. It has already >been done to Charley's satisfaction in the case of robots; it is only >a matter of degree to go from there to life itself. Is this really supposed to be a rational argument? This isn't even a good insult. It's just a bunch of incoherencies. Searching for some thread of counterargument.... >> ... The pejorative phrasing clearly indicates that >> Padraig would rather have us overlook the absolute importance of the >> ORGANIZATION of those chemicals. The fact that people can talk seriously >> about transferring people's minds (and one assumes, the essential person) >> into computers indicates that, not only can in fact say that a person is >> NOT just chemicals, but even that the essential nature of a person is >> immaterial-- since it is information, and not matter or energy. >No. I think the organization is pretty important. Sorry if I mislead >you there. Not just the organization-- the information itself. Continuing in my analogy, a chess computer is not just gates, or registers, or even the whole architecture; the program itself is of central importance. Similarly for people. >> ... It it >> certainly beyond contest that the information represented in the mind is an >> essential component of a person, so that "just a bag of chemicals" he >> ain't. >This is great! Each time a robot is built another is resurrected, even >though its predecessors may not have already ended on the scrap heap. >Imagine that. Multiple resurrections of the same object. >How many times will you be resurrected Charley? Once? Twice? A hundred times? Is this supposed to make sense? >>> I have no idea why he >>> opts for denying the existence of a soul since it presents a simple >>> and "natural" explanation for his scenario, and is just as credible. >> Newtonian physics is also simple, and natural, and wrong. >WRONG! >Newtonian physics is not incorrect. Just like any other branch of physics >it is valid only over a finite domain. It is more than sufficient to >place men on the moon. It is still wrong; the truth is in general relativity and quantum mechanics, insofar as it is known. The whole point is that simplicity and credibility are secondary considerations: nice to have, but totally unnecessary. Souls are a convenient fiction for talking about the essential nature of a person, but it is incorrect to conclude that, because the fiction is useful, it is therefore truth-- especially in the face of a total lack of observation. >Wrong again. I don't believe in a soul either. In fact I pretty much >agree with you on what you said above. Where I disagree though is >over your assertion that you will be resurrected. This I find to be >inconsistent with what you have said, and leads to many exotic >consequences. So there is another explanation: no soul, no resurrection. So there is; and there is also the explanation that there are no souls, and yet resurrection. Since you profess a lack of understanding of how this could be, there would seem to be no reason to continue. >Again. I am not asserting anything. You are the one claiming that the >soul does not exist, while at the same time claiming that you will >be resurrected. I haven't been swamped with objective evidence from >you though. You are asserting that ressurection implies souls. This implication is based upon a unnecessarily restricted conceptualization, and is therefore invalid. My claims is not that souls do ot exist, but that it doesn't matter, for the purposes of christianity, whether they exist. As for objective evidence, I am merely attempting to explore the possibilities; you are denying most of them without any objective basis. I have presented a number of modes, most of which were derived by throwing away some aspects of the ordinary physical conceptions of things like life. The persistent rejection of all of these indicates to me a lack of flexibility, especially curious since science has a long history of concept busting and stretching. In the face of this, I am unwilling to continue this further. Charley Wingate umcp-cs!mangoe "I say this because I want to be prime minister of Canada someday." -- Michael J. Fox