Well, let’s jump in here. Let me say at the outset that I think the entire position of materialism is dead on arrival for multiple reasons, not least of which is the indeterminacy of the physical. See here for elaboration (pages 2 and 3 are where I enter the discussion):
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=987013
Now,
That is already problematic. Physical does not equal deterministic. And does the term “physical” include the chemical, biological, sociological, economical parts of reality? Because it is impossible to reduce everything to the level of sub-atomic particles, or the atoms, or the molecules. However this lack of reductionism leaves NO “loophole” for the soul or other imaginary objects.
Well, I suppose the physical could also be indeterministic, though how that helps anything has forever been a mystery. A stochastic physical process seems to have no advantage in explaining anything over a deterministic one when it comes to the discussion of mind. But I’m sidetracking things here. I agree with the anti-reductionism here, though I am guessing for different reasons. In terms of a “loophole,” I have no idea why anti-reductionism somehow precludes a soul (though I suppose “imaginary” objects are precluded by definition, eh?). Perhaps you could elaborate on that point.
That is ok. But do you know how that “non-physical” thingy (soul?) processes the decisions? Decisions do not happen in a vacuum. Memories play a very important part in them. Even animals remember prior “uncomfortable” experiences and avoid them when possible.
Not entirely sure what you intend by the phrase “processes the decisions” unless you mean straight-up making decisions. The soul, as a locus of will, is enabled by God to actualize one potential rather than another in making a decision. If you are looking for some mechanism like we’d find in the physical, then I don’t have one precisely because asking for a mechanism in that particular way is to commit a category error. And of course, we would agree that decisions do not happen in a vacuum and that memories and other things play a part. We can even allow (or at least, Thomistic psychology allows) that memory is a perfectly physical process. This doesn’t preclude a soul unless one is committed to the idea (as few are) that the soul is the locus of each an every cognitive process.
Rats are very intelligent beings. They observe the others, who consumed a fast-acting poison, and learn from the experience of OTHERS. That is why only slow acting poisons are used by the exterminators. Do the rats have a “rational soul?” Learning is simply the creation of new neural connections and recalling those connections allow us (and the rats!) to avoid danger. And those memories are stored in the neural network of the brain. That is beyond any doubt.
No, so far as we know, rats do not have a rational soul. One can learn in a qualified sense with only an animal soul; what one cannot do is reason. But this isn’t the (seriously) problematic part of your post.
The problem lies in your definition of learning. I don’t see how one can recall connections anymore than one can recall the cerebellum. You don’t “recall” physical objects; you recall concepts, memories, etc. Perhaps the brain is simply more prone to using such pathways given a certain set of stimuli, which is fine since that seems to fit perfectly well the the Thomistic concept of the estimative power.
Where are the memories stored in your hypothetical “soul-based” model? Where is the non-physical CPU which makes the decisions?
Perhaps I should have qualified earlier that I can’t really answer for tonyrey. Anyways, they are based in the brain, which is, as I said earlier, perfectly compatible with belief in the soul.
The new neural connections are mapped onto the old ones. How do we recognize the face of our mother, even on a blurred photograph? There is enough information to compare our stored image with the picture. Modern face-recognition software is also able to recognize faces. And there is no “extra-physical” soul for them to do the recognition. To comprehend something new is to map it onto something we already know and incorporate the new information into the hierarchy of the existing informations.
Okay, a few issues here:
Facial recognition doesn’t seem like the most appropriate example precisely in virtue of the fact that it is referring to “recognition.” You can compare sense data without “comprehending” anything. Sense data won’t make you comprehend a valid argument form, for example. So this seems to miss what tonyrey was asking for to begin with.
Second what does it mean to “map” something? If mapping is a physical process, then it can be cashed out in terms of neurophysiology, and we can drop this talk of “mapping” which doesn’t explain anything so much as metaphorically gesture in the direction of some possible physical explanation.
Futher, all this talk of mapping seems loaded with intentionality. When you map something (at least with any typically understood definition of “map”) then you are importing meaning onto it. Where, then, does this meaning come from, because particles colliding and fields interacting doesn’t mean squat. Or if that is too reductionistic, I’m curious to hear how you account for meaning being emergent from or in some way supervening on the mirco-physical. Because right now, this seems to be a serious impediment to any progress with the “mapping” theory.
The materialist’s fatal mistake is to regard analysis as the ultimate method of explanation, deriving everything from past events and ignoring the significance of the future, breaking things up instead of putting them together, being content with bits and pieces rather than an integrated entity, reducing a person into a collection of atoms rather than a rational being. But life isn’t a jigsaw puzzle! Synthesis is a more rational approach because a panoramic view of reality takes the past, present and future into account. It is prospective as well as retrospective. In fact purpose is more important than physical causality. Life seemed absurd to Camus and Sartre because they derived purpose from that which is purposeless - which is a backward approach. Obviously everything is meaningless if you are blinkered and look in only one direction. Why should the past have priority over the future? Surely what we become is more significant than what we have been. Otherwise we are back where we started and nothing makes sense - even the process of making sense… We are going around in circles without getting anywhere.