Re: Determinism - Mind and Brain

From: John M <jamikes.domain.name.hidden>
Date: Sun, 18 Jan 2004 16:19:32 -0500

My 2½ pence on "Mind AND Brain":
IMO (no persuasion intended) our mental complexity is an ASPECT of the
complexity human (which is part(ner) of enveloping (interinfluencing?)
complexities unlimited - applies a material tool with a very high level (how
high is it?) of interconnectional complexity. It is called the (neuronal?)
brain. The entire aspect of mentality is what I call mind, together with
that material tool. I do refrain from (hypothetical) hierarchical
ordinations. The components(?) act in some concert, the mechanism(?) of
which may be getting discovered sometimes in the future. Our 'body' is not
restricted to the "not the brain" parts, our neuronal bio-functions are
bodyfunctions allright, contributing to the inseparable process of the
(inseparable) complexity. To separate some imaginary components from a
complexity seems to me just futile. I talk about neuron-firings, toe- or
toothaches, love and hunger, all pertinent to the management of the human
beiing ("body and brain").

I think we can get past the unsurmountable problem whether 'neurons think?'
Even in thinking physics: the transition from physical data into mental
quality, the description of a 'living' (imperfect, unreliable, forgetful)
memory vs the perfect machine-storage, the diversity of reflections upon
"the same" input, etc. Lenin
said that quantity turns into quality - but that was a different aspect.
The still highest authorities in this question worked within the cognitive
nventory of 2500 years ago and the later thinkers don't dare to modernize.
Plato is Plato.
And the last thing I want to condone is a special kind of 'modernization':
to fashion the human complexity (mind?) after the (designed) functions of a
machine, which is a partial product of the human mind. - AI is still "A".

John Mikes
Scientific Agnosticist

---- Original Message -----
From: "Eric Hawthorne" <egh.domain.name.hidden>
To: <everything-list.domain.name.hidden>
Cc: <everything-list.domain.name.hidden>
Sent: Saturday, January 17, 2004 9:59 PM
Subject: Re: Determinism
Received on Sun Jan 18 2004 - 16:23:15 PST