Internet analogy as it pertains to the Mind and Consciousness

Hi there guys hope everyone's weekend is going great. I was just thinking about a interesting new 21st analogy for brain/mind/consciousness.I still like the radio and tv analogies as well but I think this one is more up to date. This is different then the Materialist computer analogy that the brain is hardware and the mind is software and that consciousness is just some grand illusion of the brain. In this analogy all three are important, the brain is hardware and also software, mind/consciousness is the internet. This would explain why Neuroscientists can take pictures from the brain and see images like going into the computer and seeing images from the internet like google. Of course the internet did not originate from the computer instead the internet is access through a router/modem and the originator comes network towers. Those network towers in this analogy are from the other dimensions/ that are connection to this modem/router which is the soul made up of a different type of matter. The brain is merely a interface for the mind and consciousness in this view.


One of the biggest problems with Physicalism is that it tries everything to one substance. We know that the brain exist, that the mind exist and that consciousness exist. These are three things, not one. First you say that consciousness is just a grand illusion somehow generated by the brain and that the mind is just what the brain does. Nice and easy story there but it doesn't mean its true.

Does creating Artificial Memories prove that memories are somehow stored in the brain?

No it doesn't as artificial memories are nothing like a real memory. That is why they are called fake memories. The hopes of many Materialist scientist's is that this will eventually lead to proving the engram theory of memory. That memory is physical traces stored in the brain. However previous failure of this theory should make these scientist's pause that the theory may be wrong. We also have evidence mentioned previously in this blog about terminal lucidity patients who have their memories return to them shortly before their death. This strongly indicates that memories are not stored in the brain.

Some links that support the view that the brain filters/receives consciousness

Here they are just some of them

Does consciousness depend on the brain? by Chris Carter


Does Schizophrenia suggest a filter theory of consciousness? by Michael Prescott



https://www.sott.net/article/311387-Drowning-in-a-sea-of-thought-Does-schizophrenia-suggest-a-filter-theory-of-consciousness


The Most unbelievable Eye on earth belongs to a creature with no Brain



http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/next/nature/the-most-unbelievable-eye-on-earth-belongs-to-a-creature-with-no-brain/?utm_source=FBPAGE&utm_medium=social&utm_term=20180813&utm_content=1694762271&utm_campaign=NOVA%20Next&linkId=54931092

Happy New Year!!!

I hope you had an awesome Christmas and may 2017 which is now here be awesome as well. I need to address something that I consider important. There is a case of a man who apparently lives with 10 percent of his brain intact only. Neurologist Steven Novella, questioned this because this would be possible evidence against the view that the brain somehow produces the brain. He tries to go with a materialist explanation to explain this case. However, numerous scientist's are rather puzzled by this particular case and are having a very hard time finding a materialist explanation for it. Michael Prescott does a great job of dismantling the superplasticity explanation that Steven Novella is using.

http://michaelprescott.typepad.com/michael_prescotts_blog/2015/08/brainy-thoughts.html

On the same topic, an article titled "Is your Brain really Necessary"?

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/neuroskeptic/2015/07/26/is-your-brain-really-necessary-revisited/#.WGxivxsrLIV

Interesting case here as well of a lady who has above average IQ even though she is a hydrocephalic.

http://mymultiplesclerosis.co.uk/ep/sharon-parker-the-woman-with-the-mysterious-brain/

What we know about our brains, minds and why Dualism is far from dead!

It's often claimed by materialist's that Dualism is dead!. That couldn't be farther from the truth. What we know about consciousness is that it's got no particular location in the brain. If their was a specific region in the brain that gave rise to consciousness we could possibly find things such as though neurons, memory neurons and so on. ( You know the things that consciousness has). However, when we look at the brain we never find a thought neuron or memory neuron etc. Instead, what we find is neurons and mirror neurons as well. These neurons we are told somehow give rise to consciousness when you get enough of them connected. Again, their isn't anything like consciousness this subjectiveness we all have. How could physical objects such as neurons give rise to subjective experience?.


It's really like magic which most materialist's accuse dualists of when they propose that may actually be a immaterial soul. But it has nothing to do with MAGIC whatsover!. Instead it has to do with providing an explanation. This explanation is that the immaterial soul is made up of a different kind of substance then what our physical bodies are made up of. Without a doubt neurons have strong correlation with mind/consciousness the same with brain regions. However it is truly a big stretch to say that mind/consciousness is generated by the brain. The Mind is what the Brain does, doesn't hold up when we look at it with an open mind.

Why Consciousness probably is not an illusion!

I have been hearing this often that consciousness is probably an illusion produced by the brain. The problem with this view is that your not only supposing that subjective consciousness, internal feeling you are someone but your mind is attached heavily to your consciousness. That mind features things such as memories, personality and so on. So you would also have to say those are also illusions generated by brain processes. Going down this dangerous road you are ignoring all of the evidence from psychology of mental states and their reality. As well as all evidence that is the mind. You might then start pondering that the brain too is an illusion. This view brings up a lot more questions than it can answer. That is why I do not endorse this view.

Stephen Braude says that memories are not produced by the brain

Stephen Braude is a parapsychologist, who skeptical of the view that traces in the brain is wrong. Because they are not stored there in the first place. I would agree with Stephen Braude, memory is information that is filtered and received by the brain not stored/produced by the brain.

You can listen to the skeptiko podcast here with Stephen Braude

http://www.skeptiko.com/stephen-braude-memories-not-in-brain-318/

Why Free Will is Not an illusion created by the brain!

There is a lot of experiments that materialist's use to support their view that free will is illusory. These experiments however are often misinterpreted to support that view. There are three big reasons why the experiments don't provide that free will is illusory. This is taken from brain blogger all credit goes to W.R. Klemm, DVM, PhD. (I realize he isn't a dualist but he makes good points when it comes to free will not being illusory based on experiments purported to show it. So here we go.

1. The timing of a free will event requires introspection as well as other research hows that introspection estimates of event timing are not accurate.
2) Simple finger movements may be performed without much conscious thought and certainly not representative of the conscious decisions and choices required in high-speed conversation or situations where the subconscious mind cannot know ahead of time what to do.
3) The brain activity measures have been primitive and incomplete.

There are some more obvious issues as well that many scientist's have glossed over when examining the data.

Decisions are not often instantaneous (certainly not on a scale of a fraction of a second).
Conscious realization that a decision has been made is delayed from the actual decision, and these may be two distinct processes.
Decision making is not the only mental process going on in such tasks.
Some willed action, as when first learning to play a musical instrument or touch type must be freely willed because the subconscious mind cannot know ahead of time what to do.
Free-will experiments have relied too much on awareness of actions and time estimation of accuracy.
Extrapolating from such simple experiments to all mental life is not justified.
Conflicting data and interpretations have been ignored.

We should not underestimate the true power of the subconscious mind, and it is the subconscious mind that shares duties with the conscious mind. This have been known for decades from research done in psychical research and parapsychology.

Why Gilbert Ryle is wrong about Substance Dualism

Gilbert Ryle in his book about the soul he said that Substance Dualism makes the mind body interaction superstitious. On top of that that their is a ghost in the machine. I don't know where he came up with such a strawman. No dualist would say that their is a little man in the brain pulling the strings. Most dualist's would see the soul as immaterial, taking the form of what the body looks like. An appeal that scientist's would dive into pure superstition is outright false. Also, I should add psychology often looks that internal states as very important along with sociology. The last post I made mentioned some powerful arguments for dualism. The very strong correlation between the mind and brain does not point towards a clear arrow of causation. What it does show however that the mind very strongly correlates with the brain. This bothers materialist's as they want to go a step farther and called for causation. This is what is called stretching the data so it appears to fit that view. Of course, I should add they don't like being called materialist's. Even thought that is clearly what their position is, that all their is to reality is physical, no non physical stuff at all.

Here is a powerful refutation of Gilbert Ryle's attack on Dualism


https://www.amazon.com/gp/review/R30LV9YTM6DI8L?ref_=glimp_1rv_cl

Why do we have consciousness at all?.

I can imagine a world where consciousness doesn't exist at all. Why does evolution allow for consciousness instead of zombie like animals?. This has always got me thinking. You could say that natural selection chooses consciousness over being a zombie because it's all about reproducing. Well that seem like a short sighted answer. I mean why all this subjective qualities that apparently consciousness has?. Plus I can easily imagine a different direction of evolution where reproduction is not the main goal.


This is one of the arguments that a materialist fails to answer instead they try to turn it around by saying why do you need a brain if consciousness can do it all?. Well, first of all consciousness uses the brain as a interface for consciousness and mind. I remember neurologist Steven Novella mentioning to me that specific structures effect consciousness. Well specific parts of your television cut off channels in your television set. The hard problem of consciousness is how can you explain the subjective feeling of consciousness. This inner life experience that we all internally experience. How can the brain give rise to subjective experience?.


This is far from an easy question to answer some believe there is really is no hard problem at all like neurologist Steven Novella. Which of course leads to pure denial. While, other honest scientists admit their is a serious problem here and there is right now no good working theory to account for consciousness. However, I think there is many scientists are most likely however are not aware of the transmission theory of the brain. If they were as well as the evidence in favor of it they may be willing to heavily consider it as a theory that can account for consciousness with how it relates to the brain.


On a side note, there is a recent video on skeptiko, that is very interesting. "Can materialistic science answer life's big questions?".


http://www.skeptiko.com/can-science-answer-big-questions-317/


Also, an excellent paper on "The Soul Hypothesis: Investigations into the Existence of the Soul".

https://ndpr.nd.edu/news/24611-the-soul-hypothesis-investigations-into-the-existence-of-the-soul/

Recent finding appears to deliver powerful evidence that mind is probably produced by the brain?

There is a recent finding that has been published that appears to suggest that mind is produced by the brain. I will link to the article at the bottle of this post. However, I think there is another explanation that is just as credible than assuming that the brain has a on and off switch for consciousness. That is that when you stimulate the brain and in this case it was the claustrum, that the brain blocks out consciousness, memories until the blocker's electrical stimuli is turned off then consciousness returns. In this view the on and off switch is just a metaphor. This finding then appears to be consistent with the view that the brain is a blocker/reducing value/receiver/filter of consciousness rather than the producer of consciousness.

Read more here:

http://news.discovery.com/tech/biotechnology/elusive-on-off-switch-found-for-human-consciousness-140707.htm

Refuting an article done by two naturalist scientists

I came across this site lately by two naturalist scientists who challenge view that consciousness may in fact survive the death of the brain. http://philosophyofbrains.com/2011/07/11/against-afterlife.aspx

Abstract: The paper samples the large body of neuroscientific evidence suggesting that each mental function takes place within specific neural structures. For instance, vision appears to occur in the visual cortex, motor control in the motor cortex, spatial memory in the hippocampus, and cognitive control in the prefrontal cortex. Evidence comes from neuroanatomy, neurophysiology, neurochemistry, brain stimulation, neuroimaging, lesion studies, and behavioral genetics. If mental functions take place within neural structures, mental functions cannot survive brain death. Therefore, there is no mental life after brain death.

My response: Surprise surprise the volume is being edited by no other than Keith Augustine. Sure mental functions are strongly correlated with neural structures. If mental functions were within neural structures the hard problem of consciousness would be solved. But it isn't. Its an assumption but the two scientists believe they can make a conclusion on the evidence they have gathered over the past decades. They never mention any of the evidence from the other side such as psi, afterlife experiments etc.

The Brain Is Not The Mind

The Myth Of Chemical Imbalances In The Brain

According to a youtube video user after research this topic of chemical imbalances she found their is no evidence for chemical imbalances that it's a fad from psychiatrists who support reductionism. Go here to check it out

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uG8BE3ao ... annel_page

Here is a site to that is linked to the youtube video on the myth of chemical imbalances which deals with not just that topic but other maistream myths in nutrition, health and disease.

http://thehealthyskeptic.org/

Other sites related are

http://www.furiousseasons.com/
http://intentions.wordpress.com/