Is the mind separate from the brain?

[palerider]

most wouldn't or don't care, dare or share enough to stare into their lair that deeply.

Luckily for us, some do and there isn't really much clear and credible evidence to support the argument that more than a handful of animals have any sort of awareness that could rightly be called "mind".

 

[palerider]

I wrote what I wrote about knowing you because I'd read a few of your posts. That's the sum of that. I feel that you're more attuned to the spiritual side of life where palerider is somewhat more mathematical, some would perhaps say cold. A subject like this must draw from both experiences, methinks.

Cold?: I am well and truly hurt. I regularly comune with nature and on occasion, bring some dead and lifeless part of it home for my dinner table.

Really though, I am a spiritual person but it is difficult to discuss any topic rationally when one starts bringing the spiritual into it. The conversation starts to sound cheech and chong ish. People's spiritual sides are so diverse and, face it, so strange that any sort of rational discisson is nearly impossible in the presence of the spiritual.

Take the abortion debate for example. My spiritual side just knows that abortion is wrong but an argument from that position is as useless as an argument from a faulty biological perspective. It is necessary to square your spiritual beliefs with your mathematical self if you are going to take actions that effect others even if that action is no more than simple conversation.

If the spiritual is left wanting in the face of "cold" logic and reason when confronted with issues that aren't strictly transcendental then perhaps the spirit needs to be revisited. I don't think that there is any good reason for the spirit to be terribly conflicted with reality.

 

[JavaBlack]

They are seperate concepts, both undeniably existent (unlike souls, which are more debatable).
The brain is the physically existent organ that is the source of nervous functions and makes a mind possible.
The mind is more like personality, a construct that is more an idea... not a physical thing. But in the same way that an idea is real, a mind is real. The mind is affected by the brain.

Thus you can lose your mind without completely losing your brain.

 

[Pidgey]

I don't think that there is any good reason for the spirit to be terribly conflicted with reality.

Thank you for making my point.

You're just cold, Bubba...

While it does come in useful at times (business, troubleshooting, survival in complicated circumstances), it's not how a lot of other folks are going to be centered. It was once explained to me that there are "visual people" and "audio people." "Visual people" need to see something in order to comprehend and remember it best while the primary sense for "audio people" is obviously through sound, so they work better hearing something. I have found that I get it far better by reading it or seeing it. Take a hypothetical situation where an audio person is trying to communicate something to a visual person with words and it's just not working. Frustration starts building up and first thing you know there's an argument.

By the same token, there are people who process logically and others who process emotionally. For some logical people, the group labels could be changed to "smart" and "stupid" and they'd think it more accurate, albeit pedestrian.

Since your original question (the subject of the thread) appears to ask whether our consciousness is the result of the individual particle vectors from the Big Bang (and therefore have all the meaning of the structure of a DvD that just happens to have a movie recorded on it) or if there's something... more, then it seems to me that your science has failed to give you an answer that some side of you is thirsting for.

Don't suppose you ever saw STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE, didja'? The underlying theme is the same question. Crap, this enigma has been asked a thousand thousand thousand times (and then some) and for a loooooooonnngg way back. While "Cogito Ergo Sum" seems a pronouncement of conviction, if a person REALLY has to SAY it, then you GOTTA' wonder if that person had his doubts and NEEDED the mantra to get through the day.

How many countless times has a male engineer or architect done his day's work, pounding on the calculator keys, designing wonderful creations of steel and stone only to come home to his wife, cower to her scolding him to take out the garbage and pick up his &@#% socks, and then later to find the true meaning of life in her bed? And a few months later to marvel at the wonderful creation of the child she bears, something that all of our science is unable to explain. It wasn't the thought process that did that, it was emotions and spirit lashing through flesh and blood.

Now, if you seriously want to go looking for the essence of that, you have quite simply got to factor in the idea that spirit IS reality because if you demean that side of this question, you will likely go to your grave without an answer.

 

[Pidgey]

Ah, well thank you, and especially for that beautiful quote

You're quite welcome.

 

[Coyote]

I think life confers a special status...the very fact that something is alive - an individual living things confers spirit.

Mind however....self awareness? A compelation of our lives - the sum of our experiences?

Mind goes beyond spirit....I think it is an awareness of self, of others as an individual, and awareness of our ability to affect the lives of others and an awareness of the repercussions of our actions on other living things.

 

[Pidgey]

You have to understand, Coyote, that I don't think that you exactly have the answer that Beyond-the-Pale is searching for... but I think that the key to the architecture of the construct that he seeks will be encoded in the imagery that you would choose to frame your thoughts in. He probably also wants specificity so as a house must be built brick by brick, so also must the framework for this exercise. Let's see if he can struggle to ask the right questions in the right order so that we can truly enjoy the natural progression of: Thesis, Antithesis and Synthesis.

 

[palerider]

Now, if you seriously want to go looking for the essence of that, you have quite simply got to factor in the idea that spirit IS reality because if you demean that side of this question, you will likely go to your grave without an answer.

Is it better to go to one's grave without an answer or with an answer that, in all likleyhood is false? I am the sort who woud rather not know an answer than to (pardon the expression) make up an answer.

 

[Pidgey]

Is it better to go to one's grave without an answer or with an answer that, in all likleyhood is false? I am the sort who woud rather not know an answer than to (pardon the expression) make up an answer.

Oh, you spoiled-sport! Show a little backbone, wilya'!?!

Take a good look at Coyote's last post, it's sincere enough to bear some examination--what's the essence of the words?

 

[r0beph]

What once looked as if it may spawn interesting discussion has becoming yet another annoying mudslinging contest....*sigh*

 

[Pidgey]

Day ain't over yet.

 

[Pidgey]

This discussion is one I cannot possibly debate with any amount of credence, nor can I support EITHER side adequately to myself.

This question hurts me like trying to conceptualize why "anything" exists. I mean removing religious ideology out of the mix. There is no reason for a universe...

...the argument that arises from the hypothesis is that while the self/mind/awareness is perhaps biological, something else must exist that creates my local focal point.

Actually, in the Star Trek series, this very point was brought up by Dr. McCoy. Personally, since we don't have this "equipment" yet (but believe it or not, they're working on it), we don't have a concrete basis with which to begin that particular debate other than as a completely academic thought experiment. As such, the concluding sentence (as quoted above; not the last sentence of the original post) ultimately either postulates the existence of a "soul" (for lack of a better word) or your desire that that be the case. Palerider kinda' said something about wanting to steer clear of that aspect to the subject matter that this thread is supposed to be about.

 

[palerider]

Palerider kinda' said something about wanting to steer clear of that aspect to the subject matter that this thread is supposed to be about.

If the conversation drifts to souls, let it drift. I suppose that if one believes that the mind and the soul are the same thing, it would be hard to keep either out of the discussion.

 

[palerider]

What once looked as if it may spawn interesting discussion has becoming yet another annoying mudslinging contest....*sigh*

Slinging mud is great fun. It is quickly replacing baseball as the national pastime.

 

[palerider]

Let's see if he can struggle to ask the right questions in the right order so that we can truly enjoy the natural progression of: Thesis, Antithesis and Synthesis.

If you are expecting some enjoyment at my expense whilst I struggle with this question, you are, sadly, going to be dissapointed. I have this firmly worked out in my mind to my own satisfaction already. I haven't struggled with anything of this nature for a very long time. I simply tossed the question out as fodder for anyone who might not have considered it.

It seems that most on this board are a good deal younger than me and I was curious to see how the generation behind me and the one behind those address the big philosophical questions.