In a prior post (now closed, the poster ”dogblogger” had the following response to my comments. Here are my comments, and his response:

Henry Bemis Wrote:.

> COMMENT: Newsflash! There are no moral codes in
> your prefrontal cortex, or in your DNA! Your
> inclinations to certain behavior on moral grounds
> may be correlated with your a host of brain states
> (not your DNA), but there are no moral codes
> there. When faced with a moral dilemma you do not
> think, "if only I could access that moral code in
> may prefrontal cortex I would know what to do!"
> In fact, there are no ideas, thoughts, reasons, or
> justifications, in your brain; there are only
> firing neurons; i.e. physical events, responding
> to an environment. For those firings to
> "represent" thoughts, you need a conscious human
> agent. And your brain is NOT itself a conscious
> human agent. That is why when YOU are unconscious
> your brain does not continue to have thoughts,
> ideas, or reasons.

DB: You know out right that whole paragraph is nothing but opinion. It's dishonest of you to spin it as fact , as settled knowledge. And a lot of the rest of your posts on this topic too.
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Now, normally I would not care if some poster makes a passing, completely unsubstantiated, comment like this; after all, it happens all the time. What this kind of thing tells me is that the responder is confused; probably as a result of reading some popular book that insists that human cognitive can be explained solely by appeal to brains. (See Churchland comment in my other post; as well as in general the “Astonishing hypothesis” of Francis Crick.)

So, let’s address this more carefully. First, I admit that my comments are in some sense controversial; there are a lot of very smart people who make contradictory statements, just as there are a lot of very smart people who believe in Mormonism. So, if “controversial” equates with “unsettled knowledge” then, the charge is correct. (I suppose the falsity of Mormonism is also unsettled!) However, it is not my fault that smart people do not understand simple logic. If they did, they would understand that the issue *is* quite settled. So, let’s take a hard look:

>Newsflash! There are no moral codes in
> your prefrontal cortex, or in your DNA!
>Your inclinations to certain behavior on moral grounds
> may be correlated with your a host of brain states
> (not your DNA), but there are no moral codes
> there.

COMMENT: A “code” is symbolic representational system encompassed by a set of symbols that “represent” some specified meaning for purposes of some function. For example, the “Morse Code” has dots and dashes as symbols for the alphabet, which symbols were used to effectuate communication. Now, then, it is uncontroversial that the brain and your DNA are biological systems that operate in accordance with the laws of physics and chemistry. There is, of course, function, but that function is based upon molecular interactions, not the operation of some hidden code established by God. SO, THERE IS NO CODE! THERE IS NO ONE THAT ESTABLISHED ANY CODE, AND THERE IS NO ONE THAT READS OUT OR TRANSLATES THE CODED LANGUAGE INTO SOME MEANING. If you disagree, please, by all means, tell me what the code is (i.e. the symbolic representations) and their meaning. And, most importantly, tell me who designed this code. (Who knows, I may become religious after all!)

Least you think I am making stuff up, or perhaps you are not satisfied with simple logic and your heart yearns for some self-proclaimed authority, consider the following quote:

“First, perceiving something does indeed lead to neural changes, but it is altogether obscure what might be meant by the suggestion that *a perception is encoded.* One can *describe*, in words, what one perceives and one's perceiving of it -- and then *encode the descriptions*, assuming that one knows the transformation rules. But there is no such thing as encoding a perception. Nor is there any such thing as *encoding* something in the brain (at any rate, not in the ordinary sense of 'encode') -- for there is no such thing as a neural *code.* For a code is a method of encrypting a linguistic expression (or any other form of representation) according to conventional rules. (Bennett & Hacker, Philosophical Foundations of Neuroscience (2003), p 167)
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>When faced with a moral dilemma you do not
> think, "if only I could access that moral code in
> may prefrontal cortex I would know what to do!"

COMMENT: Is this really controversial?
_____________________________________________________

> In fact, there are no ideas, thoughts, reasons, or
> justifications, in your brain; there are only
> firing neurons; i.e. physical events, responding
> to an environment. For those firings to
> "represent" thoughts, you need a conscious human
> agent. And your brain is NOT itself a conscious
> human agent. That is why when YOU are unconscious
> your brain does not continue to have thoughts,
> ideas, or reasons.

COMMENT:

It is uncontroversial (more-less) that the operation of the brain is based upon the highly complex firing of neurons and their patterns and rhythms. When we look into a brain with imaging devices and techniques, we do not find words or pictures; we find neurons and patterns of firing. (O.K. So far?)

So, since “ideas, thoughts, reasons, [and] justifications are obviously dependent upon mental imagery and language (what else could they be?), and since none of this is found in the brain, my statement above is literally correct. O.K. if that is true (which it empirically is!) then, hypothetically, how might ideas, thoughts, reasons, [and] justifications find their way into the brain?

The standard answer to this question is that neuronal firing patterns “represent” environmental input, coupled with memory (which is also represented as neural firings). So, if you have the thought, “It is wrong to kill innocent children,” that thought is “represented by some conglomeration of neural firings that encompass, minimally, “wrong” “kill” “innocent” and “children” and the host of relationships necessary to represent the composite thought in question. Note, this “representation” does not imply a code. It is strictly a cause and effect mechanism, a biological system, that arises through neuronal development.

Notice, however, that even if such a story could be supported in any detail. (i.e. by identifying the representations in the brain that came together to establish the above thought, the explanation is still incomplete. So far, all you have are just neural firing patterns that were caused by environmental input (and memory) that are representations of such environmental input. We still have to get those representations into an interpreting human mind in order to produce the thought. In short, the mind has to unconsciously “read-off” the neural representations to generate the thought. How does that happen? All we know, or assume, is that it *does* happen. Neuroscience has no idea how it happens. Zero, Zilch! Part of the problem is that it is obvious for technical reasons that there is no one-to-one correspondence between representations in the brain and the thoughts and perceptions of phenomenal experience. For example, I just now thought of a polka dot dragon flying over my house, spewing fire and killing all my neighbors. Where did my brain come up with that creative representation? Experience? Memory?

Since this “reading off” does not happen when we are unconscious, say in a dreamless sleep, it must require consciousness. But even *that* is not enough, because it requires a “something” or “some self” that “pulls the thought, reason or justification out of the brain,” and turns it into a conscious phenomenal experience (i.e. the experience of the thought) After all, the brain does not just randomly spew out thoughts, reasons and justifications. There must be a causative agent that turns these neural representations into meaningful, experienced thoughts. That is why I said, “For those firings to represent thoughts, you need a conscious human agent.”

In short, brains don’t think, human beings do. No brain has ever had a single thought, because there are no such things in the brain.

So, my comments that you criticized were not dishonest opinions spun as facts. And they are only “unsettled” in the minds of people who do not understand the logic I just very clearly explained. Moreover, I will point out that this very topic has been the center of theoretical cognitive psychology for decades, and there have been NO effective (or settled) responses to the paradox that is presented here. The *fact* is that you cannot get from neurology to thoughts, reasons, and justifications—and most certainly morality—without explaining what it means to be a conscious, human agent having such thoughts, reasons, and justifications. AND that explanation is NOT encompassed by an explanation as to how the brain works!

just like YOUR posts.

My point was that we lack evidence and you know it. The same methods used to argue for your mental causation lead Dennet and Blackmore and such to the opposite conclusions.

Right. There has been no proof whatsoever that neuron networking does not account for how we think and "consciousness." All the quotes from smart people do not matter until they can demonstrate in some testable way if these claims that involve "something" beyond the brain neurons and nodules are valid.

For now, we know the interaction of all these neurons are active when we think. There's only opinion beyond that, no matter how many nice words are used to speculate about how neurons cumulatively house information.

All the "you don't understand the logic" is bluster because their speculation has no evidence.

I welcome actual proof to clarify how the thinking process operates, but until then, I don't see any need to add even more complicated aspects of the process that seem even more fantastical.

There has been no proof whatsoever that neuron networking does not account for how we think and "consciousness." All the quotes from smart people do not matter until they can demonstrate in some testable way if these claims that involve "something" beyond the brain neurons and nodules are valid.

COMMENT: All of the above comments to dogblogger apply to you here. The astonishing hypothesis of neuroscience is a theory that the brain can account for all human behavior and mentality. Science does NOT proceed by demanding that someone "prove" a given theory wrong. Moreover, it does not proceed by insisting that it must be true, because there are no other explanations within their materialist paradigm and bias. Instead, they acknowledge and respect falsifying evidence and adjust or abandon their theories accordingly.

In the present case there is an abundance of empirical evidence demonstrating that there are human capacities that cannot be explained by neuroscience's astonishingly false hypothesis. One such capacity is human creativity; another one is mental causation, both of which are firmly established as human capacities. According to neuroscience the brain is deterministic system that causes all human mind and behavior in all its forms. So, please tell me, how IN PRINCIPLE, can a deterministic system cause new, creative thoughts and behavior that are not encompassed by that system. And how is that Newberg's monks can through their own consciously willed mediation behavior influence their brain states? How is it that through cognitive therapy, and willed action, a psychological patient can change his or her pathological brain states. These are all empirically demonstrated facts! It directly falsifies the theory of neuroscience that tells us that there is no such thing as mental causation. It also directly falsifies any theory that states that the brain can explain all of human mentality.
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For now, we know the interaction of all these neurons are active when we think. There's only opinion beyond that, no matter how many nice words are used to speculate about how neurons cumulatively house information.

COMMENT: Are you saying that in the face of falsifying evidence the correct scientific position is to say, its all opinion? If you deny the empirical evidence, then you should at least be acquainted with it. Are you? (Newsflash: It is not controversial.)
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All the "you don't understand the logic" is bluster because their speculation has no evidence.

COMMENT: Logic is logic. And, I presented it very clearly and effectively. If there is a problem, you need to point it out, and not just fall back on rhetorical pronouncements, while summarily denying well-established evidence. Insisting that there is no evidence, and they burying your head in the sand, is not an answer.
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I welcome actual proof to clarify how the thinking process operates, but until then, I don't see any need to add even more complicated aspects of the process that seem even more fantastical.

COMMENT: When a theory is falsified, you NEED to either abandon the theory, or change it to render it consistent with the evidence--even if that means you have to complicate it!

See comments posted below.
As usual, we are going to have to agree to disagree and let the readers wade through what they will.

My point was that we lack evidence and you know it. The same methods used to argue for your mental causation lead Dennet and Blackmore and such to the opposite conclusions.

COMMENT: Yes. We lack evidence to show even in principle how the brain represents information, and much less how it projects to the mind. It's the "even in principle part" that makes my argument so potent. I have read Dennett and Blackmore, and they do not have any argument in response to this point--other than just, "the brain does it somehow." That is not an argument.

Why can't you for once provide an argument--you know, premises and conclusions--instead of just announcing I am wrong and throwing out a few names which you probably have never read, nor understand. And stop telling me that "I know it." I know what I write in my posts, for all to see and evaluate. Simple logic. And the bottom line is that you cannot provide any kind of substantive reply. But, don't feel bad, neither can Dennett or Blackmore.

Henry Bemis Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> COMMENT: Yes. We lack evidence to show even in
> principle how the brain represents information,
> and much less how it projects to the mind.

This comment makes no sense if the brain IS the mind and "projections" are how we perceive and construct combinations of network sensations. You've added a projector and mind to a brain which so far don't appear to be physical entities under the microscope.


> It's the "even in principle part" that makes my
> argument so potent. I have read Dennett and
> Blackmore, and they do not have any argument in
> response to this point--other than just, "the
> brain does it somehow." That is not an argument.

I don't think your argument is potent at all. "The brain does it" still is more plausible based on all the other discoveries we have made about the human body. Not once has "god did it" (insert your own external source verbiage) filled in the gaps of physiology.

>
> Why can't you for once provide an argument--you
> know, premises and conclusions--instead of just
> announcing I am wrong and throwing out a few names
> which you probably have never read, nor
> understand. And stop telling me that "I know it."
> I know what I write in my posts, for all to see
> and evaluate. Simple logic. And the bottom line is
> that you cannot provide any kind of substantive
> reply. But, don't feel bad, neither can Dennett
> or Blackmore.


This reminds me of trying to explain evolution. If every transitory intermediate life form is not in the fossil record, some people will insist the gap somehow means it negates the rest of the big picture.
In the brain, the neuron networks are the big picture. There might be some puzzle pieces missing, but it would take a whole lot of proof if the missing piece was unrelated to the rest of the picture. Quoting dueling authority figures is not exactly a substantive reply. After all, it may turn out they are all wrong and someone we don't know will present the testable puzzle piece.

I would like to hope Dennett and Blackmore would alter their views with definitive testing. Who knows. We'll all probably be long gone before we get to know most of the answers to our questions.

> COMMENT: Yes. We lack evidence to show even in
> principle how the brain represents information,
> and much less how it projects to the mind.

This comment makes no sense if the brain IS the mind and "projections" are how we perceive and construct combinations of network sensations. You've added a projector and mind to a brain which so far don't appear to be physical entities under the microscope.

COMMENT: Yes, I did suggest that the mind was somehow different from the brain, but this follows directly from the fact that mind by definition has phenomenal experiences, i.e. "qualia" that the brain does not. As such, the mind could not *just be the brain.* Moreover, the "information" in the brain (the neuronal patterns), without an interpreter (a mind), does not suggest any meaning to such information, any more than computer silicon chips, and related hardware or software, provide meaning to a computer program without a programmer, or a user of that program to make sense of it.

I will add that the identify theory of the mind-body problem has long ago been abandoned simply because it is obvious that the brain has properties that the mind does not have (e.g. a neuronal structure) and the mind has properties that the brain does not have (e.g. phenomenal experience)
______________________________________

> It's the "even in principle part" that makes my
> argument so potent. I have read Dennett and
> Blackmore, and they do not have any argument in
> response to this point--other than just, "the
> brain does it somehow." That is not an argument.

I don't think your argument is potent at all. "The brain does it" still is more plausible based on all the other discoveries we have made about the human body. Not once has "god did it" (insert your own external source verbiage) filled in the gaps of physiology.

COMMENT: You cannot say that a theory is true regardless of falsifying evidence--even if you have a lot of supporting evidence, and no better theory to replace it with! If a theory is falsified, its falsified. Period. And the astonishing hypothesis of neuroscience has, in fact, been falsified. The fact that an appeal to God is unsatisfactory as an alternative explanation has nothing to do with whether the astonishing hypothesis of neuroscience is true.
________________________________________________

> Why can't you for once provide an argument--you
> know, premises and conclusions--instead of just
> announcing I am wrong and throwing out a few names
> which you probably have never read, nor
> understand. And stop telling me that "I know it."
> I know what I write in my posts, for all to see
> and evaluate. Simple logic. And the bottom line is
> that you cannot provide any kind of substantive
> reply. But, don't feel bad, neither can Dennett
> or Blackmore.

This reminds me of trying to explain evolution. If every transitory intermediate life form is not in the fossil record, some people will insist the gap somehow means it negates the rest of the big picture.

COMMENT: This is a false analogy. You CAN make lots of arguments for evolution, even with holes in the fossil record, including providing substantial empirical evidence. (The same is true of neuroscience!) However, like any other scientific theory, if there is some example of biological complexity in nature that cannot be explained by evolution, then evolution to that extent has been falsified. Darwin himself stated this. In the present context, I have presented in short form just that, falsifying data and related arguments.
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In the brain, the neuron networks are the big picture. There might be some puzzle pieces missing, but it would take a whole lot of proof if the missing piece was unrelated to the rest of the picture. Quoting dueling authority figures is not exactly a substantive reply. After all, it may turn out they are all wrong and someone we don't know will present the testable puzzle piece.

COMMENT: But the "big picture" of neuroscience is a theory that is exemplified by Crick's astonishing hypothesis; namely that all human mental life and behavior--including consciousness itself, can be explained by the operation of the brain. If the brain is nothing more that a deterministic neural network, as the hypothesis states, then it cannot explain human mentality and behavior, especially creative thought and mental causation. Now maybe something else will be discovered that links consciousness with the brain in some way. If so, that will require an adjustment in the theory, and most importantly it will require an adjustment that removes determinism from brain function, and allows a new emergent property (consciousness) that explains mental causation. That will be a very radical adjustment to current neuroscience.
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I would like to hope Dennett and Blackmore would alter their views with definitive testing. Who knows. We'll all probably be long gone before we get to know most of the answers to our questions.

COMMENT: Consider the following comments by Dennett at the beginning of his 1991 book, Consciousness Explained:

"Perhaps consciousness really can't be explained, but how will we know till someone tries? I think that many--indeed, most--of the pieces of the puzzle are already well understood, and only need to be jiggled into place with a little help from me. Those who would defend the Mind against Science should wish me luck with this attempt, since if they are right, my project is bound to fail, but if I do the job about as well as it could be done, my failure ought to shed light on just why science will always fall short. They will at last have their argument against science, and I will have done all the dirty work for them."

O.K. Dennett tried, and by all accounts (not just mine), his eliminativist conclusion (consciousness is an illusion) failed as an explanation of consciousness. Nobody is buying it! (Except Blackmore, of course.) So, he thankfully did all this dirty work for "us." But in light of falsifying evidence has he changed his position? No. Like you, he is entrenched in a pseudo-scientific materialist mindset that is just false, and he still, to this day, in the face of falsifying evidence, carries on as if the materialist neuroscientific theory of the astonishing hypothesis must be true.

I need not posit a long windy theory to present nor rebut. It is more than sufficient to point out the absolutist posturing for woo is built on nothing evidencially substantive.

Which you have admitted yet again is the case.

This is a rather thin gruel of denial. The same ploy used by Mormons and FAIR. They don’t accept the evidence that the BoM was made up.

But denial is not sustainable, as we’re seeing in the trade war. The Cold War had us in denial about the problems of western capitalism so the problems were never fixed. Now home come the chickens. Analysis of the narrative points out problems long before they are apparent, so hopefully the problems caused by denial can end sooner.

The narrative of the brain as a meat computer is far from complete. It can hypothesize data storage in the brain, but the storage requirements of hyperthymesia (people like Marilu Henner) put that hypothesis in Jaredite barge territory.

babyloncansuckit Wrote:
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> This is a rather thin gruel of denial. The same
> ploy used by Mormons and FAIR. They don’t accept
> the evidence that the BoM was made up.
>
it's equally a faith claim in fact. It presupposes the supernatural and then says the supernatural is the explanation. All you need is faith.

Faith produces miracles that should be physically impossible. I stopped believing in the impossible, like Jaredites, when I gave up Mormonism. Non-supernatural neuroscience, in my experience, requires an unsustainable level of denial. That can’t be good for any scientific theory. It may pay the bills, however. Your experience may be different.

Destruction of faith is the main problem of Mormonism. The apostles would be ashamed of themselves if they had any shame. This den of thieves might as well have killed God and are dancing around his corpse. They create Atheists.

There are also cracks appearing in scientific materialism. What are we going to do, ignore the cracks?

Henry, just in case you missed this:

https://www.edge.org/conversation/rodney_a_brooks-the-cul-de-sac-of-the-computational-metaphor

Rod Brooks, self identifying as a material reductionist, is thinking aloud with a panel of who’s who about the possible limitations of computation as a metaphor and how it might be steering us wrong. . It’s excellent and clarifying, at least it was for me. This is Rod Brooks:

RODNEY BROOKS is Panasonic Professor of Robotics, emeritus, MIT; former director of the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and the MIT Computer Science & Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL); founder, chairman, and CTO of Rethink Robotics; and author of Flesh and Machines.

The rest of the panel are all top-shelf.

There are several relevant snippets I could pull that go towards the kinds of discussions you are attempting to have on RfM. Instead, I’ll post this one serving as an overview:

“It’s possible that there are other metaphors we should be using and maybe concentrating on, because with our current computational thinking we tend to end up doing our experiments and our simulations in unrealistic regimes where it’s convenient for computation. When we’re doing a simulation, we ramp up probability of events so that we get something to happen, and in the real world there are so many more instances of stuff happening out there, the probabilities can be much lower for the interesting stuff to happen. Maybe we’re operating in the wrong regimes in thinking about things, focusing on local optimization in our computational experiments instead of global diversity. We have fairly simple dynamics in our computational spaces because that’s what we can generate with computation.”


There is a lot of information here for those who wish to get past their pop-science understanding of AI and “brains” & “minds”. Here is how actual scientists, thinkers and technologists think and talk about this subject. A little informed listening/reading between the lines yields a good impression of the limitations our best and brightest are still struggling against.

This, of course, is for those not satisfied with complacently repeating “we just don’t know.”

Human

Thank you very much for this contribution. (And for your participation generally. (I sometimes think I am talking to a brick wall.)

After reading this exchange, my general thought is that here is a hodgepodge of eminent scientific reductionists who are stumbling around trying to figure out the application of computers and computation "as a metaphor" in light of modern artificial intelligence and biology. Someone should remind them that at the turn of the century AI was NOT talking about computation as a "metaphor" for the mind and brain—that was simply how the brain and mind was advertised to work. Period! Gradually, as this mindset proved to be incompatible with actual brain dynamics (not to mention human cognition), the “metaphor” ideation set it. Now, twenty-years later, notice the end result is just a bunch of confusion, without any consensus as to where AI is at this point as applied to human beings, not to mention where the mind-body problem is.
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Rod Brooks, self identifying as a material reductionist, is thinking aloud with a panel of who’s who about the possible limitations of computation as a metaphor and how it might be steering us wrong. . It’s excellent and clarifying, at least it was for me.

COMMENT: See above. I have and have read Brooks’ 2002 book called Flesh and Machines, and this is what he said, in a chapter called “We Are Not Special”:

“The body, this mass of biomolecules, is a machine that acts according to a set of specifiable rules. At a higher level the subsystems of the machine can be described in mechanical terms also. . . The body consists of components that interact according to well-defined (though not all known to us humans) rules that ultimately derive from physics and chemistry. The body is a machine, with perhaps billions of billions of parts, parts that are well-ordered in the way they operate and interact. We are machines, as are our spouses, our children, and our dogs. [Brooks 2002:173]”

Now wasn’t that inspiring! What he is saying in essence (besides the fact that we are not special) is that all we are are computational machines. Now, 20 years later we have him wondering how to put this all together. Here is a quote from your link:

“This is a mixture of continuous stuff. It’s a wide world of lots of stuff happening simultaneously with local dynamics. When you look at a particular process and this happens in genetic algorithms as well as in the artificial life field—you talk about a bunch of these in "Cellular Automata"—you see a ratcheting process in which things ratchet up to order from disorder. It's something that looks like mush, but out of it, because of some local rules, comes order. It’s limited order, but then when you put different pieces together, which locally result in little pieces of order, you sometimes get much more order from the coupling of them. What calculus of that could you develop? I’m thinking there may be something around that, a language for explaining how local, tiny pieces of order cross-coupling across different places couple together to get more order.”

O.K. This is what is going on in your computational models. What happened to the simple adherence to bio-chemistry and computation? Where is all of this new order coming from out of “mush.” Ahhhhhhh. The magic of emergence comes to the rescue!
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BROOK AS YOU QUOTE: “It’s possible that there are other metaphors we should be using and maybe concentrating on, because with our current computational thinking we tend to end up doing our experiments and our simulations in unrealistic regimes where it’s convenient for computation. When we’re doing a simulation, we ramp up probability of events so that we get something to happen, and in the real world there are so many more instances of stuff happening out there, the probabilities can be much lower for the interesting stuff to happen. Maybe we’re operating in the wrong regimes in thinking about things, focusing on local optimization in our computational experiments instead of global diversity. We have fairly simple dynamics in our computational spaces because that’s what we can generate with computation.”

COMMENT: In other words the old paradigm is not working. We need a new metaphor to explain all of this interesting stuff, over and above our “unrealistic regimes where it’s convenient for computation.”

Again, this is what Brooks said in 2002:

“The body, this mass of biomolecules, is a machine that acts according to a set of specifiable rules. At a higher level the subsystems of the machine can be described in mechanical terms also. . .

What happened to these rules, and the mechanistic processes? Answer: THEY DON”T WORK AS EXPLANATIONS FOR HUMAN CAPACITIES, EITHER IN REALITY ITSELF OR MODELING REALITY.
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There is a lot of information here for those who wish to get past their pop-science understanding of AI and “brains” & “minds”. Here is how actual scientists, thinkers and technologists think and talk about this subject. A little informed listening/reading between the lines yields a good impression of the limitations our best and brightest are still struggling against.

COMMENT: Yes, but this is a bit esoteric for most people on the Board! If people wanted accessible supporting documentation for the points I have made on the Board, or the points made here, as well as counter-arguments, they could ask. Instead, they would rather hold to worn-out skeptical arguments that don’t work but still masquerade as “scientific.”
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This, of course, is for those not satisfied with complacently repeating “we just don’t know.”

COMMENT: Exactly. “Don’t trouble me with simple facts and logic, which I don’t understand and in any event cannot refute; sooner or later science will prove me right.”

Sorry, I am in a bit of a cynical mood today.

This is very good, Henry.

Juxtaposing quotes from Brooks's past book with his present day skepticism is revelatory.

Well done.

I think it’s a matter of “skin in the game”. Many of us have been so deeply hurt by Mormonism that we can’t let them be right. Everyone wants their beliefs validated. If you offer counter-evidence, the shields go up. Darn monkey brain.

The other thing is that life conforms to our expectations. Belief systems are self-reinforcing. That’s why spirituality is so widespread, because it causes actual spiritual experiences. If someone watches the sunrise, it’s a little hard to tell them it was all in their head. Conversely, if one firmly believes in materialism their world will conform accordingly.

The phenomenon is completely unscientific because it’s not repeatable. Science declares unrepeatable things unreal, which isn’t really a good designation.

Henry - This thread, while admittedly over my head, has brought to mind a recent experience I had that perhaps you could explain.

I went to bed one night and "awoke" the next morning to find myself in the hospital emergency room. My DH was sitting next to me so I asked him why we were in the hospital and how did I get there? He said something to the effect that we had already had this conversation several times. He asked me a few questions and eventually realized that I was responding differently from previous interactions. He asked when I thought I woke up. I answered that it was about five minutes ago.

The previous six hours were a total and complete black blank to me. I had had an episode of Transient Global Amnesia which is quit rare. During this episode I was physically awake and from all appearances conscious. However, from my perspective, I was unconscious for almost nine hours. It's not relevant to go into the details of what I did during those nine hours but what is both interesting and confusing to me is how I could be both conscious and yet unconscious at the same time. Waking up to find myself in the hospital was like waking up from anesthesia after surgery.

The medical understanding of TGA is extremely limited. To observers, the person with TGA is conscious but "confused" about, well...everything. Much like someone with advanced dementia. What I have learned is that even though all the senses are working, the hippocampus does not record any memory from the sensory input. Evidently, when asked, I could retrieve snippets of longterm memory stored in other parts of my brain, but still had no memory of any of this.

I read an article describing a medical procedure in the 1950s on a young man that suffered from seizures. His hippocampus was removed which stopped the seziures, however, it left him in this "confused" state for the rest of his life - another fifty plus years. I commented to my husband that they may as well have killed him because, given my experience, he was actually experiencing nothing - blank, black nothing.

It is my experience that consciousness, while a complex function involving many parts of the brain, is completely dependent upon the hippocampus recording sensory input as memories.

Henry - This thread, while admittedly over my head, has brought to mind a recent experience I had that perhaps you could explain.

COMMENT: First, thank you for sharing this. I have read about TGA before, so have some idea of what it is, but I am not either a neurologist or neuroscientist, so have no pretense to be able to "explain" this phenomenon. Notwithstanding, I have the following comments to your post. (I am never one to let ignorance suppress an opinion. :)
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I went to bed one night and "awoke" the next morning to find myself in the hospital emergency room. My DH was sitting next to me so I asked him why we were in the hospital and how did I get there? He said something to the effect that we had already had this conversation several times. He asked me a few questions and eventually realized that I was responding differently from previous interactions. He asked when I thought I woke up. I answered that it was about five minutes ago.

COMMENT: Notice that this conversation did not occur on your way to the hospital, when you were presumably unconscious, but after you woke up. So it seems that it was only after regaining consciousness that your short-term memory issues surfaced. (You knew who your husband was, and who you were!)

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The previous six hours were a total and complete black blank to me. I had had an episode of Transient Global Amnesia which is quit rare. During this episode I was physically awake and from all appearances conscious. However, from my perspective, I was unconscious for almost nine hours. It's not relevant to go into the details of what I did during those nine hours but what is both interesting and confusing to me is how I could be both conscious and yet unconscious at the same time. Waking up to find myself in the hospital was like waking up from anesthesia after surgery.

COMMENT: From you description, and that of the literature, it does not appear to me that this is a case of your being both conscious and unconscious at the same time. Rather, it is a memory issue. During the nine hours, presumably your husband and caregivers reported that you were conscious; you knew who you were; and were able answer questions, though unable to sustain memories of those questions or your answers. (Of course, before you got to the hospital I assume you were unconscious since you "woke up at the hospital," but you don't say)
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The medical understanding of TGA is extremely limited. To observers, the person with TGA is conscious but "confused" about, well...everything. Much like someone with advanced dementia. What I have learned is that even though all the senses are working, the hippocampus does not record any memory from the sensory input. Evidently, when asked, I could retrieve snippets of longterm memory stored in other parts of my brain, but still had no memory of any of this.

COMMENT: From my limited knowledge, I am not aware of a specific neurological condition that is tied to TGA. I would be interested if your experience had an isolated, identifiable neurological cause. I find it extremely interesting that this psychological effect would appear "out of nowhere" without some identifiable brain trauma.

Presumably since the hippocampus is associated with memory, specifically retrieving memories stored elsewhere, researchers intuitively might attribute TGA to some sort of limbic malfunction, but, again, I am not sure an actual physical link has been established. Moreover, I believe the hippocampus is associated with long-term memory, rather than short-term "working" memory. I would be interested in your knowledge of this issue.
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I read an article describing a medical procedure in the 1950s on a young man that suffered from seizures. His hippocampus was removed which stopped the seziures, however, it left him in this "confused" state for the rest of his life - another fifty plus years. I commented to my husband that they may as well have killed him because, given my experience, he was actually experiencing nothing - blank, black nothing.

COMMENT: There are lots of examples neuro-surgical procedures that have been implemented in an attempt to diminish the impact of epileptic seizures, with cognitive results all over the map, depending upon just what part of the brain was affected. Of course, it is hard to know what a conscious person who is psychologically impaired, beyond their ability to report, is actually experiencing. A state of consciousness, while experiencing literally "nothing," reminds me of transcendental meditation. But then, to experience nothing in such a state is, for them, experiencing "something," i.e. the transcendental state. My question is "who" is it that is having such an experience when there is no "self" that is identified with the experience? But that is getting us into deep philosophical waters.
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It is my experience that consciousness, while a complex function involving many parts of the brain, is completely dependent upon the hippocampus recording sensory input as memories.

COMMENT: This isn't quite right. The hippocampus is part of the medial temporal lobe, which is active primarily in memory recall of facts and events. It is my understanding that it has only limited involvement in storage, but I don't think these issues are settled. Moreover, the neural correlates of consciousness are generally unknown. As you noted above, there are examples of removal of the hippocampus were consciousness (however impaired) remained intact.

(See Christof Koch, The Neurobiology of Consciousness, in Chapter 79 of Gazzaniga, The Cognitive Neurosciences.)

Thanks, PollyDee. I really appreciate this contribution.

Thank you for your comments, Henry. I will have to do more reading on this as you recommended. To answer your inquiry, this incident did not have an isolated, identifiable neurological cause or brain trauma. All the neurological tests were completely normal. The symptoms completely disappeared as mysteriously as they appeared. Thank you for your concern

Henry, was wondering if you have read the book, *Irreducible Mind: Toward a Psychology for the 21st Century.* It has an interesting chapter in it titled "Memory" by British psychologist Alan Gauld.

Yes, I have read this book, all 600 plus pages! It is a great book in dealing professionally and scientifically with paranormal phenomena, and in particular the work of F.W.H. Myer. The Chapter on Memory questions the standard "memory trace" theory in neuroscience, which is stated as follows:

"A conventional "trace" interpretation of what is going on would be roughly as follows: Stimulation of our sense organs brings about a complex series of brain events that culminate in our perceiving the cause of the stimulation. These brain events leave behind minute but probably widespread changes in the structure and interconnections of brain cells, the effect of which is to make us liable under certain circumstances to relive the original perceptual experience . . ."

Speaking for myself now, one can note that the above description involves a host of both psychological and neurobiological mechanisms that must come together. Although cognitive psychology has studied memory through elaborate psychological testing of individual subjects, and thereby has created a body of information as to the nature of memory as a psychological phenomenon, neuroscience has lagged way behind in establishing the neurological mechanisms that are in play, much less providing an explanation as to how our phenomenal (experienced) memories represent the underlying correlated brain states, whatever they might be. Thus, there are real gaps in memory science that researchers can exploit in maintaining a dualistic view of the mind-brain relationship. That is what we have here, and I am sympathetic to these suggestions.

Descartes "I think, therefore I am," fits in here somewhere. But is so concise and not verbose, I'm unsure how to explain it other than it just *is*.

Or, like the scientist doctor @ Princeton who dissected Einstein's brain soon after he died (without permission, consent or authorization by Einstein or his family,) in a meager attempt to determine what made the great scientist tick, Einstein's son told the doctor that he could analyze his dad's brain all he wanted but it still wouldn't provide him with any more information on what made his father the moral man with integrity and intellect that he was. That part of Einstein was intrinsic and could not be measured by a scientific study of his brain cells after death. For they did not equate to the man that was Albert Einstein, his father.

Henry, here is a link to an article I thought you might find interesting:

https://med.virginia.edu/perceptual-studies/wp-content/uploads/sites/360/2017/12/Discrepancy-between-cerebral-structure-and-cognitive-functioning-JNMD.pdf

Although they claim no conflict of interest, which I don't doubt, that this article was funded by:

The Society for Psychical Research (SPR) is a nonprofit organisation in the United Kingdom. Its stated purpose is to understand events and abilities commonly described as psychic or paranormal.

Although they discuss brain plasticity and there are many examples of the brain compensating with areas removed or using alternate locations, they managed to conclude there might be something else out there involved.

I'm not saying there is or isn't, since the bench studies have not successfully tested a variable to rule out something external. I've noticed reading multiple research papers that the conclusion is artfully worded to leave open the agenda of whoever provided the money for the study.

We have quite a bit of information that multiple areas of the brain collaborate and compensate for damage or loss. Not all, as we see in some cases. We have a lot of work to do.

Regarding the Society for Psychical Research, here is a quote from their website:

"THE SOCIETY for Psychical Research was set up in London in 1882, the first scientific organisation ever to examine claims of psychic and paranormal phenomena. We hold no corporate view about their existence or meaning; rather, our purpose is to gather information and foster understanding through research and education."

They walk a fine line since members hold different positions. They do debunk often but they are not exactly standard bearers for scientific objectivity either. They have a role to provide, for sure.

commongentile:

You (and others of similar persuasion) need to step up your posts and responses a bit. After all, I am an old man and am not going to be here forever! :)

HB

Although they claim no conflict of interest, which I don't doubt, that this article was funded by:

The Society for Psychical Research (SPR) is a nonprofit organisation in the United Kingdom. Its stated purpose is to understand events and abilities commonly described as psychic or paranormal.

COMMENT: So what! What does that have to do with the credibility of the underlying data? Are you suggesting deception on the part of the authors? If not, the source of funding is completely irrelevant. Your even bringing this up only suggests that you are approaching this with your own bias. I have read tons of books published by Prometheus Books, a publishing house founded by Paul Kurtz which has never met an anti-psychic phenomena book it didn't love or publish, regardless of its quality. Notwithstanding, it is the content of such books that matters, not who is backing them. Note, also that this essay you are questioning here was published by the Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, a highly regarded, peer-reviewed, journal. Do you have a problem with this journal too?
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Although they discuss brain plasticity and there are many examples of the brain compensating with areas removed or using alternate locations, they managed to conclude there might be something else out there involved.

COMMENT: They concluded this pure and simply because that is what the evidence pointed to. When you have brain trauma of a certain sort and location that is known to cause cognitive impairment of a specific type, but you also have clear cases of anomalies, such as what you have in this article, such anomalies cry out for EXPLANATION, not for summary dismissal. Anomalies serve a very important role in scientific explanation, and should not be dismissed solely out of fear that your pet theory might be falsified.

In short, if you think the authors here are being disingenuous, or deceitful, or that the data is not credible because of some examination of that data, then say so, and back it up. But don't dismiss the conclusions in the name of science because you do not like the source. Note also, that this not new data. It has been around for decades as is well-established.
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I'm not saying there is or isn't, since the bench studies have not successfully tested a variable to rule out something external. I've noticed reading multiple research papers that the conclusion is artfully worded to leave open the agenda of whoever provided the money for the study.

COMMENT: The Society for Psychic Research's only agenda is to support psychic research. There are similar "agenda driven" societies for various research programs all over science. For example, is the Society for the Study of Evolution similarly biased, such that their "agenda" cannot be trusted?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_for_the_Study_of_Evolution

Your bias here is incredibly transparent. These cases are presented as scientific anomalies that, if credible, represent potentially falsifying data to Crick's strict AH. Brain plasticity (which itself was denied by Neuroscience for decades) would be hard pressed to explain such cases given the extent and nature of these brain defects, and how these defects are associated with cognition in standard neuroscience. So, when neuroscience presents evidence that a certain brain region is responsible for a certain cognitive function; then we find cases where that brain region is absent, or significantly physically compromised, but the cognitive function remains, there is some explaining to do. And sometimes such anomalies suggest falsification of AH.
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We have quite a bit of information that multiple areas of the brain collaborate and compensate for damage or loss. Not all, as we see in some cases. We have a lot of work to do.

COMMENT: As a general principle, yes. But, there is no evidence that brain plasticity can even come close to explaining these cases. If I'm wrong, please provide me with a citation for a scientific explanation of such evidence! What you would have to show is that a compromised brain "developed" alternative circuitry over time to accommodate the lost cognitive function. Google the cases in the article, and come up with a specific scientific response as to how any of these cases can be so explained. And we have not even talked about savant syndrome, where cognitive function is actually enhanced by brain pathology!

I will add that there is a huge populist literature by high profile neuroscientists that particularly focus on brain trauma as evidence for their conclusion essentially accepting Crick's AH. This includes, Damasio, Ramachandran, and LeDoux, to name a few. Note that to my knowledge they never address the issues and cases raised in this article, much less discuss or explain them--not even to debunk them. In my opinion, these "experts" are either ignorant of such cases, or have no interest in considering anomalous cases that challenge their favored AH position--much less in educating the public about them. If you want to find disingenuousness, this is where you should look!

>In short, if you think the authors here are being disingenuous, or deceitful, or that the data is not credible because of some examination of that data, then say so, and back it up. But don't dismiss the conclusions in the name of science because you do not like the source.


I said no such thing. I'm not implying any deceit. I believe you are overreacting to people evaluating the sources of funding, and not just the ones that may not have our personal biases.

I work for a pharmaceutical company that "funds" studies. I know full well they are looking for hits to validate what they want to hear about their products and downplay the misses. I'm not saying even that is deceitful.

I think the brain is capable of a lot we don't yet understand the mechanisms for without jumping to the paranormal to fill in gaps. We'll learn more over time.

I work for a pharmaceutical company that "funds" studies. I know full well they are looking for hits to validate what they want to hear about their products and downplay the misses. I'm not saying even that is deceitful.

COMMENT: O.K. We can agree that what is deceitful is not the source of funding for scientific research; but rather, what is deceitful is when a scientist's conclusions are biased in such a way as to advance the interest of its funding source. So, if you don't know one way or another whether that is the case, why bring it up as a challenge to the legitimacy of an essay, which is precisely what you did here! (Notwithstanding your backtracking.)
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I think the brain is capable of a lot we don't yet understand the mechanisms for without jumping to the paranormal to fill in gaps. We'll learn more over time.

COMMENT: In one cited case in this article, a very famous one at that, it stated: "The aforementioned student of mathematics had a global IQ of 130 and a verbal IQ of 140 at the age of 25 (Lorber, 1983), but had 'virtually no brain."

My question is, at what point, short of complete brain death, is a brain sufficiently absent, or impaired, such that you would be willing to say, "You know, there really has to be something else going on here." At some point, your insistence that "it must be the brain," itself becomes the "woo" phenomenon that you (and others) so stridently ridicule.

“I work for a pharmaceutical company that "funds" studies”

Then you know that many drugs, if you look at the uncooked data, are basically expensive placebos. The placebo effect is an important part of medicine. A tool for the juju men with framed degrees on the wall. The juju is real, working by the same principle as priesthood blessings. It works because you believe it will work. Not because Peter, James and John laid their hands on a horny con man. Religion works because humans are paranormal beings.