"John H." <j_hasenkam At yahoo.com.au> wrote in message
news:1167918692.630485.222240 At s34g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
> "Yet as the case of Gage and
> numerous subsequent individuals has shown, the self can
> plod on, albeit changed, after quite radical brain damage."
>> What 'plods on' is not a self but altered sets of behaviors. One of the
> biggest psychosocial problems in brain injury is that the person can
> often change so markedly as to become a completely different person.
>> And from today's reading
>> Article: A neuroanatomical model of passivity phenomena
> Authors: Ralf-Peter Behrendt
> Journal: Consciousness and Cognition 13 (2004) 579-609
>>> "As it appears, one first needs to exorcise the notion I from
> psychological theory, before proceeding to explanatory models of
> passivity."
> ...
> Motor behaviour is conscious not because it is executed by some agency,
> but because it is perceived.
> ...
> For Jaspers (1946), too, our sense of volition stems from the conflict
> of drives and not the
> deliberation of an inner agent:
>> --
> The experience of volition-Bennett and Hacker
> (2003) reasoned-is merely a reflection of ''determination and
> persistence in pursuit of one s goals in the face of
> difficulties.''
> Project:
>> Off the top you might find Bennett and Hacker heavy going but at least
> it will save you from many of the conceptual pitfalls that arise in cog
> neuro. Eg. The typical interpretation of Libet's experiments is
> predicated on a self, which probably goes some way to explaining all
> the controversy therein. To give you an idea of how deeply ingrained
> all this [is],
If you want to see how deeply ingrained this all is, one merely has to
witness the obfuscation, arrogance, intellectual dishonesty, and out-and-out
"thuggery" of "thinkers" like Matt Jones.
this paper is from 2004. Long way to go dude ... . The answer
> to "who am I" is "I am not". Or, as Albert Camus stated, "Forever shall
> I be a stranger to myself." (The Myth of Sisyphus).
>> PS: I'm not a scientist, I am a Professor of Nihilism at the University
> of Bullshit.
>>>>> beachnut wrote:
>> Hi, all.
>>>> I need some help here. My girlfriend sent me an article
>> from 'The Economist' (link below), and it has created
>> an awful fight between us! If some of you have a few
>> spare minutes, it's short, and I could use some feedback
>> from scientists. I have an Electrical Engineering
>> degree and she has degrees in languages and education,
>> so we're not experts in neuroscience.
>>>> For those who read the article, my questions are:
>>>> 1. The subtitle is "Modern neuroscience, says Geoffrey
>> Carr, is groping towards the answer to the oldest
>> question of all: who am I?".
>>>> Are [most] neuroscientists really concerned with
>> "who am I" in their work?
>>>> 2. Later, the author states:
>>>> "If the essence of individuality can be changed by
>> a physical accident, it implies that the brain is
>> a mechanism which generates the self, rather than
>> merely an organ which houses it."
>>>> I say "duh"!! Is neuroscience into dualism, where
>> there is assumed distinction between mind and body/brain?
>>>> 3. He goes on to write:
>>>> "Many people, most of whom would not regard themselves
>> as dualists, think of the brain as being like a computer,
>> and the mind as being like a piece of software that runs
>> on that computer. But this analogy, too, is flawed. You
>> do not have to do much damage to a computer to stop it
>> being able to run programs. Yet as the case of Gage and
>> numerous subsequent individuals has shown, the self can
>> plod on, albeit changed, after quite radical brain damage."
>>>> Who are these "many people"? Most intelligent people
>> I know don't give any credence to this computer analogy.
>>>> 4. This one really perplexed me:
>>>> "...whisper not the word soul"
>>>> Your take?
>>>>>> Okay, finally ;-) here's the link!
>>>>>>http://www.economist.com/surveys/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8407261>>>> I've seen the magazine itself and there are several short pieces
>> after this to comprise the Survey. But this intro by this Economist
>> science editor (a psychologist by trade) was enough for me to go
>> off on.
>>>> Thanks to any that have the time to read and respond!!
>> Tear me up if need be! I just need to hear it from actual
>> scientists.
>>>> beachnut
>
