Are our thoughts determined by material processes?
FOR
Steven Pinker, Evolutionary psychologist
I don’t believe there’s such a thing as free will in the sense of a ghost and a machine, a spirit or a soul that somehow reads the TV screen of the senses and pushes buttons and pulls the levers of behavior. Our behavior is the product of physical processes in the brain.
On the other hand, when you have a brain that consists of one hundred billion neurons connected by one hundred trillion synopses, there is a vast amount of complexity. That means that human choices will not be predictable in any simple way from the stimuli that I’ve hinged on beforehand.
If the human mind is the product of a “Ghost in the Machine" (each of us has a soul that makes choices free from biology) and not the result of electrochemical interactions among neurons, then the mind should not be dependent on the configuration of the brain that houses it. In short, there should be aspects of the mind that owe nothing to the physical functioning of the brain.
AGAINST
Rudolf Steiner, Philosophy of Freedom Chapter 3
It can be observed that thinking is not determined by material processes in the brain. We know WHY our thinking connects one concept with another. The relevant context and the connection between the concepts is clear to us from the content of the two concepts themselves. For example, the concept "organism" links up with other concepts such as "lawful development" and "growth". Introspection shows me that in linking one thought with another there is nothing to guide me but the content of my thoughts; I am not guided by any material processes in my brain.
Request for clarification
What is the content of the concept "organism" which links to the other concepts "lawful development" and "growth"?
That was taken from the
That was taken from the opening of chapter 4.
POF 4-0 The more our range of experience is widened, the larger the number of our concepts. But concepts are not found isolated from one another. They close themselves together into a whole according to inherent laws. For example, the concept "organism" includes others, such as "lawful development" and "growth". Other concepts, formed from individual things, collapse wholly into a unity. All concepts I may form of lions fall into the collective concept "lion". In this way, individual concepts connect into a closed conceptual system in which each has its special place.
Tom Last doesn't answer question about concept's content
Do you think your reference to the paragraph where the sentence appears helps answer the question about the content which links the three concepts organism, lawful development and growth? What is this content about which was asked?
Tom Last responds to question
I would say the content of a concept is its meaning. So the meaning of organism contains lawful development and growth.
organism: a system considered analogous in structure or function to a living body
lawful: according to custom or rule or natural law
development: a process in which something passes by degrees to a different stage
growth: (biology) the process of an individual organism growing organically
Tom Last: content = meaning ?
Why is the concept's content "meaning" and what should this explain?
When the question was put about which content connects the concept "organism" to the two others, Tom Last quoted the other sentences in the paragraph where the claim concepts are connected by content appears. The last sentence of this paragraph claims each concept has its place. What are the places of "organism", "lawful development" and "growth"?
Word list
Where's the connection between the three concepts?
listen quietly for a moment....
there is a distinctly familiar ring to the tone of this individual's comments....it brings me back to the spring of 2006!
Jeff's ears or Steiner's thoughts?
Your listening is for historians - I thought this was a discussion about free will! Frankly, I don't care to speculate about your memories - I would like to know the answer! Was the question asked in Spring 2006? Was it answered? Where can I find this?
Those were the days
Jeffrey, maybe you could put "this individual" in touch with someone -'06 or whenever - who could answer his or her question? I'm not a biologist - I can't.
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