materialism and the soul...

[theculturewarrior]

[url="http://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft0305/reviews/dembski.html"]http://www.firstthings.com/ftissues/ft0305...ws/dembski.html[/url]

Hello:

I just read an interesting book review in the May 2003 issue of [i]First Things.[/i]

The article is about a psychiatrist who discovered that thought processes without a significant physiological underpinning can be used to treat OCD. The psychiatrist was treating his obsessive compulsive patients, and he verified that all of their brain scans showed physiological abnormalities. He then gave them mental exercises to do, and then when they showed signs of improvement, he gave them brain scans again, which showed normal brains. His conclusion was that [b]the mind and the brain are distinct.[/b] The reasoning, quoted below, is that if all we are are bundles of neurons and neurotransmitters, then the brain could affect the mind from the bottom up, but the mind couldn't affect the brain from the top down.

[quote]What does all this have to do with materialism? If materialism is correct, then mentation is the product of brain processes (much as digestion is the product of stomach processes, to use an analogy proposed by the philosopher John Searle). But this would mean that even though the brain can readily affect the mind, there’s no sense in which the mind can affect the brain except by way of the brain. That is, top-down causation in which the mind affects the brain must invariably presuppose bottom-up causation of the brain first affecting the mind. And yet Schwartz clearly shows that a conceptual act with no clear physiological underpinnings (for instance, the conscious decision by an OCD sufferer to implement the 4-R therapy) can dramatically and lastingly alter patterns of brain activity. And in such cases, top-down causation seems to operate without prior bottom-up causation.
[/quote]

Discuss.

[Semalsia]

I don't understand. Doesn't that test suggest that the mind and brain are the same? I believe it does.

[theculturewarrior]

[Q the Ninja]

I think it says that the soul acts upon the brain, just as the brain can act upon the soul.

I believe he draws a clear distinction between the two.

[theculturewarrior]

Where do ideas come from? Where does that moment of inspiration come from?

[theculturewarrior]

In the case of Christianity, the "idea" has changed countless lives, and many non-Christians would say that, for better or worse, the "idea" of Christianity has changed the world, or has had a civilizing effect. This is an example of an idea effecting the brain from the top down.

I myself was relatively unexposed to this "idea" for most of my childhood, and I was not indoctrinated in it, in fact, I was conditioned to militate against it. The "idea" is an external, objective reality, as well as an internal, subjective one. There is no other explanation for those of us who have blossomed from the rock.

[theculturewarrior]

bump for the soul.

[theculturewarrior]

Here's a thought...

A choice might be accompanied by physiological processes, for example, if I choose to watch EWTN instead of Fox News, even the moment of choice might be accompanied by physiological processes...but the moment and the character of the choice, I control. The mind acting upon the brain...