From the Notebook

 

           The way most people talk about mind and body is as if they are things that independent of each other, and the use of word soul seems to make the matter worse.  I like to provide some thoughts on these subjects, and more will be followed in my later posts.

 

            There are many reasons for lack of understanding about the mind.  However, in the modern days, the basic understanding about mind is not so difficult.  In the age of computer technology, we simply can use computer and it process to explain mind and it relationship with the body. 

 

            We can just think of the brain as computer hardware, and the mind as the software and related data, and activities of the mind as the process of the computer.  The internal logic of the mind directs the process of the mind. 

 

            Although there are many questions about details of the brain, and how the details of the brain related to what we referred to as our minds, there are some basic understandings about the functions of the brain that we can base on to make assumptions, and if we do not insist on replicate brain’s physical compositions, then we can imitate human brains with computer. 

 

            There are two types of experiences that we relied on for understanding of the mind, there are internal experiences, external experiences.  And in both cases, we are aware of the existence of the mind based on actions or reactions of the mind. 

 

            In dreamless sleeps, we are not aware of anything, including our existences.  When we wake up, the image, sound, touch, smell and taste signals will be processed by the brain in the context of our memories and internal logic. 

 

            There is a famous quote of Rene Descartes “I think, thus I exist”, which has been used as the base for claiming that mind is prior to the matter.  However, if you think about it, this sentence actually said something else (at least this is how I understand it). 

           

            Basically if I do not exist, I would not be able to think.  So, the existence of self must be taking as established fact, but it does not say in what form that “I” exist, so this is not an argument for the mind over matter.  The deep sleep status (or various symptoms of mental diseases) indicated that we might not be able to think even though we might exist.  But the question for many people is whether we can exist as minds, without the physical forms supported by matters. 

 

            I for one do not think it is possible.  No one can portrait human without emotions and ability of having emotions.  In fact, for someone who is lack of emotions (only in comparison with others, not in absolute), he or she will be called robot, or machine, or simply non-human.  Even God is portrait as having emotions.  But the thing is that emotion is a physical reaction due to existence and increase of certain chemicals. 

                       

            In broader sense, any process must be carried out by certain forms, and the study of quantum physics seems to suggest that matter might simply be energy in various forms.  There is a common statement that soul, or God are forms of energy, but if all forms of energy are matter, then soul, or God must be certain matter, or expressed (or carried ) by certain matter.

 

                                                                                   

            The mystery about the mind includes the ability of humans to learn.  Actually, the ability to learn is not limited to humans, it includes animals as well.  But it is the most significant difference between humans and the machines.  Although the overall effects could be very mysterious, the basic principle of learning is quite simply.

 

            There are two types of learning: learning of knowledge, and learning of skills.  Learning of knowledge is to establish connections between external phenomenon, and learning of skills is to establish internal logic processes, or action sequences of the bodies.  

 

            There are two ways of learning:  learning by acceptances, and learning by experience.  In learning by acceptances, we simply accept instructions and teaching, adopt what ever links, processes or sequences as our own.  In learning by experience, we mostly rely on trial-n-error, i.e., judging our logical processes and action sequences by consequences or results, make improvements or corrections accordingly. 

 

            Clearly learning and many other mind activities require judgment.  The question of who or what makes the judgment is related to the question of free will, and ultimately is related to the belief about existence of the soul.     

  

            To the question of who is seeing, who is thinking, and who is making the decision, many imaged that there had to be something else behind the mind, which is the general understanding about the soul.  Soul is something that many believed to be attached or to be incorporated into the mind, but has its separate identity and existence, and is not bound to the body. 

 

            There are many things to said about the mind, soul, and free will, I will write more in later posts, here I like to provide one simple phenomenon that suggests  that judgment is not made by the soul that can be separated from the body, that body affects the mind and participated in the decision making process. 

                                                

            When people are intoxicated by alcohol, or other substances, their abilities to make decisions are inevitably affected (some may have higher tolerance of the substances, but as long their bodies are reacting to the chemicals, the results are similar).            As chemicals taking effects on the biological process of the brains, people’s decision making abilities (and many other abilities related to the brains) are affected.  This indicated that the mind cannot be separated from the body, so that the soul that is independent of the body does not seem to exist. 

 

            To many people, the word soul refers to super natural existences of humans, it is what is left after death.  The believe that humans can still exist in some form after death can be traced back very far, but in the time of science, can we rationally believe this?

 

            Subject of soul seems to be inseparable from the subject of religion.  Although there are many types of religious believes, they all seem to support the belief that humans can still exist in certain form after death. 

 

            Religious discussions can be very heated, and people should be entitled to their own opinion.  For me, my current state of mind is agnostic, and I will share some of my thinking processes here. 

 

            One of the most common used arguments for religion is that you cannot simply disbelieve something because you are lacking of direct experiences of it.  I agree this is a sound argument.  But the problem with religious believes is that there are many evidences to disprove many of their claims.

 

             First, all religions are related to some supernatural power, but as what we can see, no matter what those powers are claimed to be, there are evidences that they are not true.  For example, there are claims that God will know the future.  But God does not even know the present. 

 

            We all know the controversy about whether the earth is flat or round became a fierce conflict between science and religion.  In the end, science won, and now it becomes common knowledge. 

 

            In short, if religious claims are correct, there would not be any use for science and inventions.  If God is all mighty, then how can mere human make any changes that make things better? 

 

            In fact, many had argued that technology development had changed the world to a worse place.  Although the unbalance due to development is a serious problem, the benefit of technology development cannot be denied.  For example, how would it be a bad thing when new development of medicine can now save lives and cure diseases?

 

            In addition, the claim about super nature itself is problematic.  If technology development will disturb the balance of nature, then super nature disturb the rule of the nature, thus how could it be done is very puzzling. 

 

            Further, the assumption that mind can have control over the matter is a confused assumption.   To certain degree mind can have impact on the matter, but only through certain channel by indirect means.  As mental processes direct and influence our actions, what is in our minds will have impacts in the world, but only through our actions (I will write more about it in my later posts). 

 

            The issues regarding mind, matter and soul are not issues that are pursued in leisure time, they have real life impacts, and the impacts can be very significant.  For example, the issue about abortion has been in the national stage in United States for many years, it is an issue not going away in the political system and the legal system.  Lately, it surface around health care reform and provided another obstacle to health care reform.

 

            There are many debates regarding women’s right to abortion, but the argument against abortion (especially early term abortion) can all trace back to religion, most specifically the Bible.  But the interesting fact is there is nowhere in the Bible that prevent abortion, because the author of the Bible lived in the time when women cannot reasonably expect to have an abortion without endanger herself.

 

            So, the issue of abortion is a modern issue.  Many people are against abortion simply based on “you shall not kill” in the Bible.  But can we say that abortion is killing?  The argument in fact often goes back to the issue of soul.   But surprisingly even if we assume that we do have souls, abortions are not necessary be bad, actually it can be good for the soul.  If souls are attached to the fetuses that are aborted, since they are not born, they will have no sins, thus guaranteed to be in heaven.  But Fetuses grown and born to be human beings more likely than not would not be in heaven, because according to the Bible, most people would not be able to get into heaven. 

 

            The issues about abortion, and stem cell research had actually proved that even self proclaimed faithful people do not actually believe that souls can be separated from the matter, and can exist on there own. 

 

            If souls are separable from fertilized embryos, then destroying fertilized embryos would not do anything to harm the souls.  As Christian believe is about saving the soul, and the soul is not affected (because you cannot destroy the soul, only destroy the matter, actually the forms of matter, because the materials that make the embryos will still exist, just not in the form of living embryos), I simply cannot see where is the problem.   

 

            To me, it indicated that concepts and principles based on religions can be very confused, so it is a tragic for many people to vigorous enforce or defend them that will have significant negative impacts on real lives. 

 

 

**Please look for my other posts regarding the modern life, religion, mind and matter, science and technology,  and human knowledge system, about discussions related to issues in this post.

 

**Permission is needed to use contents of this blog.  All rights reserved.

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