What I don't see in the mechanisms of downward causation offered so far — 'social constraints', 'the mind is software' and so forth — is an attempt to...
According to you, neurons don't need to act in accord with the intention to raise one arm .... Unless you are willing to retract this claim, our discu...
If so, how does downward causation work? How do we get from the intention to raise one’s arm to neurons which act in accord with that intention? Excus...
Do you say that the mind is analogous to software? If so, that would paint a rather inert picture of the mind. In this context I would rather say that...
That is rather surprising. So, our intentions, deliberations and thoughts are direct instructions for neurons. Neurons listen in and understand our me...
If the mind is the brain, and is produced by neuronal behavior, then the whole path from intentionality to neural change is a purely physical affair. ...
Indeed, I view consciousness as indivisible and I have provided several arguments. In response all you have offered is derogatory talk and avoidance. ...
Autonomous, responsible, free personhood is a prerequisite to rationality. If external forces beyond my control shape me with insurmountable arbitrary...
I am unhappy with the question in my previous post. It does not make sense at all. My mistake. I retract that question. What I am happy about is the r...
Still unresponsive. If there is not an "I" who encompasses all three levels, how can you overview and be aware of those three levels? The returning ir...
Who sticks with the facts of social science? If there is no "I" who perceives and understands the facts of social science, then how can you be aware o...
A concept understood and held by … what? The term “you” refers to … what? How is freedom grounded in this context? And what is it that is free? Also, ...
In order to ground personhood, freedom and rationality it is not enough to argue that some top-down causation takes place. This top-down causation mus...
You are being unresponsive to my questions. I did not ask how we are being programmed. Instead I asked how emergent consciousness commands/ programs n...
This is not an explanation. You note that ‘striving to survive’ is necessary for life to succeed, and from there you go to (paraphrasing) 'and therefo...
To pursue the analogy, how is an intention translated into instructions (‘software’) for neurons? And what power does emergent consciousness have over...
A question about ‘striving to survive’: Why is it that e.g. a bacterium avoids death? Does it fear death? Does it even have a concept of death? Or do ...
No-one? Are you sure? Tell me, what is the universe floating in? BTW a close reader would have noticed that I did not make a claim about our universe....
I agree. “Real existing” is a crucial qualifier here, since if constraints have no ontology, how can they have causal powers? Consider a bucket filled...
I agree with your clear analyses. Perhaps one could claim, as Apokrisis may do, that the shape of an atom is a fortunate ‘limit’ which its constituent...
I just wanted to outline my dispute with Apokrisis. Here you can read why I hold that Dawkins' Weasel and Apokrisis' emergence narrative are very simi...
My claim (see this post) is that Apokrisis' emergence narrative ( see this post) is very similar to Dawkin's Weasel Program. His counter-argument, as ...
Your claim: The problem with your claim is that evolutionary theory can explain variety. Variety is explained by random mutations in the DNA. So I rep...
So sayth the emergent self who is confused about the roles of mutation and selection in evolutionary theory. Selection obviously does not create varie...
I do suppose that at some point your emergence narrative also gets passed the phase of nothingness. Irrelevant. Not an argument. You talk of ‘limitati...
This narrative seems akin to Dawkin’s Weasel program. Also here we have ‘unbounded potential’ at the start: 'WDLTMNLT DTJBKWIRZREZLMQCO P'. And next ‘...
This reminds me of the famous 1948 Copleston vs. Russell debate on the existence of God. At one point Russell counters Copleston's argument from conti...
However, if you are correct, it is the claim that there is not necessarily something at the bottom. Unless one argues that there is something up there...
Correct me if I am wrong, but does the very concept of 'emergence' not imply a lower level of (more) fundamental laws? Emergent stuff emerge from fund...
I am not sure how a discussion about emergentism is relevant to fundamental laws of nature. As I have stated before I have no problem with a secondary...
The chaos, the crystal's chance path, during the formation of snowflake fractals is comfortably situated in the context of our orderly stable lawful u...
Yes, I got that. The point I was trying make is that I do not see how unregulated chaos can produce anything other than … unregulated chaos. ‘Symmetry...
That would be a description of the law of gravity. Indeed. A description of a thing is not the thing itself. From 'descriptions of the law of gravity ...
Does an ever-changing universe (cyclic or progressively expanding) have bearing on the idea that physical processes determine the laws and not vice ve...
Do you hold that such a naturalistic explanation must entail a bottom-up explanation from a lower level of, let’s say, bosons? If so, do you hold that...
Davies observes that “physical processes, however violent or complex, are thought to have absolutely no effect on the laws” and from this he concludes...
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