God is... hi.." God exists"..i always thought something that had a beginning and an end..like say human..could only be considered as 'exisiting'.. God...is been considered to be there...before..now and after... so i dont think you can classify god to be exsisting..but..he surely is there..somewhere.. in hinduism...god is given three forms.. 1. the creator = Bramha 2. the preservor = Vishnu 3. the destroyer = Shiva more like Generator Operator Destroyer still searching...>>>
Cris, I strongly disagree, when you say "All things that exist are within the material domain". In my opinion ideas and concepts are purely non-material and are properties of the soul, even when they are written in the brain or in publications. I think, e.g. our forum discussions are discussions between souls - we need computers and the internet just because our souls are captured by the body during life. Before and after our biological life direct communications should be possible. In conclusion, ideas, concepts and souls are non-material - and God (whatever it means) is non-material as well. --------------- Everyone sees the world with his own eyes - my updated weltanschauung (philosophy of life) is described at: http://home.t-online.de/home/hraith/english.htm - related forum discussions are listed at: http://home.t-online.de/home/hraith/links.htm.
Hermann, Demonstrate how an alleged soul can develop and store information (e.g. ideas and concepts). What mechanism is used? Show why the brain is not an adequate mechanism for this task such that a soul must be involved. Explain why your answer is any different from a human fantasy. Re: Your assertion that souls are non-material: Justify your conclusion by demonstrating how something non-material can exist and can be substantively differentiated from a human fantasy. Cris
Cris, It is quite difficult to answer your questions. How can we understand the functioning of the spiritual world by methods and models of the material world? If you write a letter via PC, the print-out on paper will be the final product where the message is stored. But before, the message was stored in your PC and someone from outside (without deeper knowledge) could think, the PC with its fantastic capabilities has composed the letter by itself - not knowing, that you are the author standing behind. The message is also stored in your brain and you think, the brain with its fantastic capabilities has composed it by itself - not knowing that your soul is standing behind as the real author (not just another computer). We think we have a deep understanding of our material world. But is it really a deep understanding or just a perfect description? Do you really understand why two magnets apply a force against each other through an empty space. There is no spring in between, which could make the force understandable. Does the magnetic field really exist or is it just a nice model living in our fantasy? --------------- Everyone sees the world with his own eyes - my updated weltanschauung (philosophy of life) is described at: http://home.t-online.de/home/hraith/english.htm
Hi Hermann, I know we’ve been here before hence my slightly different approach. 1. Because we only have knowledge of the material world. 2. If the supernatural realm is entirely separate from the material world then we can never know about it. 3. If the supernatural does interact with the material world then that implies that a material model can be constructed to detect the interaction. If you have knowledge of the supernatural realm then either you must exist entirely within the supernatural realm and I am only imagining that you have posted here, or you have a material method of detecting supernatural interactions with the material. Assuming you are not supernatural then you need to demonstrate the interactions or state how you are able to claim the supernatural exists or admit you have no knowledge of the supernatural and that your claims are only personal fantasies. And what about the lifetime of brain growth that started soon after your conception that began with a few neural connections and through a lifetime of sensory input developed and grew through trial an error billions of new neural networks that finally enabled you to write the letter. This is purely material, there is absolutely no need for a soul or a supernatural element. The human brain is a superb piece of biology, do not denigrate this amazing evolutionary product or overlook the massive progress made by pure human intelligence, by assigning these achievements to a fantasy spirit world. I’m not sure we do think that. I see human progress, science, and human evolution to be near the beginning of our potential. It would be arrogant of us to assume we have a deep understanding. However, in all our knowledge and science, we have only ever been able to detect a material world. If there is something else then it is currently undetectable in which case neither you nor I have any way to know the supernatural can or does exist. I don’t have a clear idea, of gravity, or the weak or strong nuclear forces either. But I know they exist because science can demonstrate their effects, it really doesn’t matter what we call them. Can you do the same thing for a supernatural force? What demonstration can you provide that is at least equal to showing how magnetism exists? Take care Cris
Hi Cris..and all.. i read this somewhere... there are 4 levels of consiousness... 1. Unconsious.. 2. Consious.. 3. Super consious..wherein the person knows of the existence of god.. 4. Devine consious..wherein he realises that god resides within himself..itself.. so would nt these explain..what you were explaining ------------------------ 1. Because we only have knowledge of the material world. 2. If the supernatural realm is entirely separate from the material world then we can never know about it. 3. If the supernatural does interact with the material world then that implies that a material model can be constructed to detect the interaction. -------------- its like you wake up from the material world to enter the realm of the spiritual (supernatural).. so through walking the materialistic path..you finally reach the spiritualistic... just a thought... please comment.. thanks..
One can spend 8 hours a day for the next ten years trying to lift a 2 liter sealed bottle of coke only using his mind....with negative results. It aint happening....give up.... Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Cris, when we talk about Supernatural phenomenon,it means which is not natural and to be more precise which is not of this world,to be more precise,it exists or occurs in the world at a different frequency or a level,for that you"ll have to upload yourself to That world then only you"ll be able to understand that phenomenon. And may death is nothing more then entry into another dream with different rules to escape the trauma of this program. bye!
Cris, You feel certainly something when you make the statement “I am”. This is not just a short sentence, but something what we normally call self-awareness. Do you really think, that you can provide a computer with such “feeling”? If not, why should the slow evolution have been smarter than you – assuming such feeling is a feature of the brain hardware and not a feature of the attached soul? --------------- Everyone sees the world with his own eyes - my updated weltanschauung (philosophy of life) is described at: http://home.t-online.de/home/hraith/english.htm
Hi Hermann, Yes I accept that. I actually do expect that computing power will soon equal and surpass the current abilities of the human brain. The most powerful computers today have an equivalent intelligence to that of an insect. Moore’s law has held up very well since the 1940’s with a steady doubling of computer power every 18 months, and that period has seen several major paradigm shifts. E.g. vacuum tubes to transistors, transistors to Ics, Ics to VLSI, etc. Current forecasting of computer power predicts some 2 million times increase in current power by around 2030 or before. This would be sufficient to equal the human brain. If you can imagine your current PC with an increase in power of 2 million times, or perhaps imagine 2 million PCs in your home all intrically linked and working together, then that will give you some idea of the complexity and power needed. I do not see anything special regarding the human brain apart from the sheer number of neurons and the number of connections, that is an oversimplification but you get the main idea. Most animals are not self-aware, although claims for partial self-awareness have been made for some of the primates. It would appear that there is a minimum brain complexity needed for self-awareness to kick in. When computing power, both hardware and software achieve the same complexity as the human brain then self-awareness should also kick-in. We then may have a problem: Independent intelligent machines will be our equals in terms of brainpower but without the disadvantages of a biological shell. Computing power is also likely to continue to increase implying that machines will exceed human brainpower quite quickly. Humans will no longer be the dominant species on the planet. I see that as a problem for humans since biological evolution even with genetic engineering is unlikely to be able to result in the increases in cranium size needed to equal the rapidly increasing intelligence of the machines. If we are to compete and survive alongside our AI friends then we also need to adopt the same technology. In other words we must devise a means to transfer our brain function to a computer-based structure. The development of AI is proceeding and computing power will at some point exceed the power of the human brain. These are considered by all authorities in the field to be inevitable. Only the timescale remains a question. At some point, most likely within the next 50 years humans will no longer be the dominant intelligence on the planet. The biggest question is how will these machines decide to treat us. If we can become their equals then the question will be quite different. I really do not see any future for humans in our current biological and inefficient forms. The issue of a soul will be simply irrelevant and forgotten. Sorry – more than I intended. Cris
you"re confused... brain's neural nets pattern is a software part of us.that software part is nothing but soul.the signals i mean.the death is nothing but unloading of the whole pattern,to be reloaded again into the world after the erasure of previous memories. a backup is there in form of sub-concious memory. the analogy is dreams of our own: ============================================ we dream,in the morning we wake up and we forget the whole thing,the dream part i mean,quickly. life-->we die,ie we wake up,or we are unloaded--->all memories erased--->again reloaded. that is why i say for becoming immortal we have to tell our brains and make them realise that this whole thing is just a facade. bye!
Hi Cris, I agree with you, that computers will become much more intelligent than humans. Right now they can play chess better than humans and in future they will be able to compose symphonies and to write intelligent texts including speeches for presidents. Any mechanical or intelligent action of humans, which can be analyzed by humans (e.g. as duty or as reaction to something) can also be programmed. This implements also most programming work and makes it possible that computers replicate themselves. Therefore in the far future perhaps only some key programmers will be needed. But we should not mix up sources with processors and memories. Computers and robotics have fantastic processors and memories, but they are no real sources. Everything what they do has been programmed - to be understood in a very wide sense. The real human source is its soul and it manifests itself in the feeling “I am”. There is no need, that humans perform in their life better than computers and robots, but they have a principally different quality. I could imagine that in far future, when we made more progress in copying the human brain (just as processor with memory), it may be possible that a human soul attaches to a computer, which would allow living on earth when no biological life is possible anymore. But then computers are becoming “humans”. Hermann --------------- Everyone sees the world with his own eyes - my updated weltanschauung (philosophy of life) is described at: http://home.t-online.de/home/hraith/english.htm
Hi Hermann, Two main issues then: Source, and programming. Source: It is not really clear what you mean here. I know you are claiming that a soul is the source but what is the soul generating? Are you claiming the soul generates ideas and emotions? But where does the soul receive its information? If you forget the idea of a soul for which there is no factual support then you should find my explanation below both far more simple and supported by evidence. A source to my mind means external information. And for that information to be of use there needs to be a mechanism to process it. A brain is the processing mechanism and it receives all information through the bodily senses. If a soul existed and somehow claimed a new body at birth or conception then one might imagine that this intelligent entity would already be capable of ideas and knowledge. But that isn’t what we observe in a newborn child. Such a child has virtually no abilities whatsoever apart from basic bodily autonomous functions, and basic brain functions that support feeding, defecating, and activation of the senses. From day one the child cannot speak, and cannot control any of its limbs, in any coordinated manner. All the abilities a child eventually acquires come from feedback loops formed by sensory inputs and ever-changing neural connections. When any random limb movement or vocal action receives a positive reaction then the associated neural connections are reinforced. This long process of trial and error results in what we see as the learning process. As abilities to perceive and understand external input improve then these add to further neural connections. As the child grows then memories (neural connection patterns) absorbed from earlier experiences combined with the extensive processing abilities of the brain provide the new human with the opportunity to form new ideas, and to speculate. At an appropriate level of absorbed experiences and knowledge the child becomes self-aware. It can say “I am”. Where is there a need for such a thing as a soul? There isn’t. Computer Programming: I work with the designers of compiler optimizers and SQL RDBMS optimizers, etc. These pieces of software are delving into artificial intelligence techniques where the results are often beyond the capabilities of a single human to accurately predict the outcome. The increasing complexity of our problems now require us to use semi-intelligent software to generate yet more software. Humans are gradually being removed from the programming function. Around 10 years ago I watched a program using a neural network technique learn to calculate the square root of any number. It was only given a basic knowledge of symbols and then some examples of what square root equations looked like. From there it spent many hours learning until it could finally perform the calculations on any numbers. There was no human interaction apart from the initial examples. What impressed me the most was when the author stated that he really didn’t know how the program had reached it’s conclusions. It had learnt by forming random neural paths and adapting based on self-feedback, exactly like a human child. But that was 10 years ago and neural nets are far more sophisticated now and computing power much higher. So I think you are quite wrong to imply that because something is programmed it cannot generate original thought. In my simple example a computer program was able to learn how to generate a general-purpose algorithm by itself. Now consider the abilities of such a program given computing power of a 100,000,000 times the most powerful computers of today, and that is expected within the next 20 years. Self-awareness I suspect is a matter of adequate processing power and the ability to learn from sensory input. A human is no more than a biological machine. And there remains no credible evidence to suggest otherwise or that a supernatural element has any function to perform. If a computer has the ability to learn then its intelligence and ability for original thought should be no different to a human, since humans have to perform the same learning processes. Have fun Cris
That's a real logical explanation Chris Thumps up on that!!Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! The short word for all that you wrote though, is epistemology. The term which means the philosophycal study of human knowledge. This is the one that theist forget, or evade. They simply believe that by having faith, one automatically learns.
Godless, Aye, I know, and I've mentioned it in these forums a number of times. Generally all the discussions here that concern belief by faith and belief by reason are all rooted in epistemology - i.e. what is it that constitues knowledge. Religionists have been holding out for millenia in tying to assert that evidence is not needed to be able to recognize knowledge. The claims simply deny logic, but then of course they tend to deny that logic has any value as well. Sigh! Cris (note no H)
If God is definied as an infinite and all-knowing being, I see that as illogical. To be infinite there has to be nothing outside of god, which means you have to simply declare the universe itself to be god. Doing this still leaves you with the little problem that parts of god (me, for example) aren't fully aware of other parts of god (whatever's going on in your mind, for example), and so he doesn't seem very all-knowing even if he's infinite. If you have another definition for a god, maybe it'd make more sense, but I probably wouldn't term it a god myself. As you can probably guess I'm an atheist. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! On the other hand I probably have a lot of beliefs that make no logical sense, and there's no reason a belief in god should have to be harmful, so who am I to question religion. Even not caring for the directly religious aspects, I think the Gita does have some good perspectives on reality. My main objection is to the idea that lack of connection to your body/mind means you should try to separate from them... seems kind of funny and pointless to try so hard to get somewhere when you've just been told you're really already there.
I have to disagree with you there. (Although I used to think that way, I admit.) Tell me one thing: how do you account for subjectivity? You can never have someone else's experience, because as soon as you have it, it becomes yours. The brain is a biological machine. The mind is tied to the brain in a very basic way, but there's also a conscious aspect. Thoughts are related to patterns in the brain, but those patterns aren't the thoughts themselves, the thoughts involve the conscious aspect. This isn't supernatural, it's just not physical... we can't see this non-physical level because it's where we are that gives us the perspective to observe the physical. Certainly the mind is strongly related to the physical and many modern theorists say the mental aspects naturally arise from certain types of physical formations... but people have been trying forever and have yet to explain consciousness and subjectivity in physical terms. If you can, please do and you can get famous.
Hoth ... Why the restrictive mind/brain? Why not mind/person (the brain being part of the person)? Does substituting 'person' for 'brain' in the above change it's sense? Curious. Take care.
Chagur, Yes it does if you are assuming that ‘person’ means your whole body. Although I’m not sure that is what you meant. If you remove parts of your body, are you any less ‘you’. No, since it is your mind and memories that we normally take to indicate ‘you’. It follows that if we could remove all your bodily parts and leave just your brain, perhaps connected to some sensors, then provided you hadn’t gone insane at this point your brain will still provide the essential ‘you’. You are your mind and that is also your brain. Consider what would happen if we started removing parts of your brain, perhaps that part that contains the memory of your past and identity. Without an identity would you still be you? I’d argue that you would no longer be you at that point. Cris
