Time magazine's article on consciousness

[Riley259]

Did anyone read the special piece in Time magazine this week on the brain and the origin of consciousness? In particular, an article by Steve Pinker strongly implies that consciousness is just simply complex neuron firing and as a result there is no metaphysical explanation for it. His implications include no life after death - he’s obviously an atheist but he makes a lame attempt at the end of the article to infuse some semblence of morality on his conclusions about existence. In this same article, there are several other scientists (including the over-the-top religion hater, Daniel Dennett) who offer their own “theories” on what consciousness really is - of course, although their theories are all different, they all agree and believe that it has no metaphysical explanation as well. What do readers think of this article and these theories as it relates to Christianity’s notion of the soul and life after death? I found that a good book to dispute these claims (using the lost science of good old philosophy) is The Science Before Science by Anthoney Ricci (sp?). He doesn’t disagree with the notion that consciousness is manifested physically through neurons and the senses but he disagrees that that’s all there is to consciousness and he appears to prove it using the science of philosophy. By the way, later in the book he also effectively proves the existence of God using philosophy. A great book by a great scientist!

 

[CollegeKid]

I skimmed the article since someone got me a Time subscription as a birthday gift a few years back. All I can say is, it appeared that in many instances Pinker was just setting up straw-man arguments regarding traditional religious views of the soul and consciousness and proceeding to knock them down. In other words, discrediting beliefs that most of us (at least Catholics who follow Church teaching) don’t actually hold. His article came off as if he just assumed he knew what all of us believe about the soul and its relation to the body, and since he had debunked these ideas, he’d somehow proved that the soul and the afterlife don’t exist. Of course, I wasn’t surprised.

Pinker has been an atheist since he was 13, and in my opinion certain statements in that article display a strong atheistic bias against religion. For example, saying that “belief in an afterlife necessarily negates the value one places on this life.” I strongly disagree; what about the Saints whose faith helped them to show vast charity to those around them and change situations for the better? What about the Mother Teresas of this world?

I think the core mistake he is making is that he thinks religous people (or at least Christians) view the soul as just sort of being “inside” the body, so to speak, without having any real connection to it, somewhat like passengers inside an airplane. But Catholic dogma affirms that the soul and body are fused together in a concrete way, what affects one can affect the other, unlike in the airplane analogy.

I think it would be a mistake to consider him some kind of objective observer who is qualified to evaluate the credence of religion versus that of atheistic rationalism.

 

[JimG]

If consciousness, and thought, is “just simply complex neuron firing” then the entire article is the end result of some complex neuron firing. The author can take no credit for it whatsoever. He didn’t cause or direct the neuron firing; that was just the end result of some deterministic biochemistry and physics at work.

It’s true, as CollegeKid noted, that Catholic metaphysics doesn’t view the mind as just a ghost in the machine, but rather sees body / soul as an integrated entity. (Hylomorphism.)

If one wants to avoid determinism, Catholic metaphysics is a good place to start.

If one doesn’t want to avoid determinism, then we should begin revoking all laws, since people really have no choice about their behaviors.

 

[Spirithound]

I’m not a science major, but I just thought about the mechanics of consciousness just being a complex set of neurons firing. Doesn’t this present to us a perpetual-motion machine? If there is no Thing to set the neurons firing in the first place, does it not logically follow that the neurons were always firing?

 

[Magicsilence]

I’m not a science major, but I just thought about the mechanics of consciousness just being a complex set of neurons firing. Doesn’t this present to us a perpetual-motion machine? If there is no Thing to set the neurons firing in the first place, does it not logically follow that the neurons were always firing?

No,

The neurons presumably require some sort of energy (ATP) and/or the build up of ions to allow the charge to fire. My science is rusty but I think it is Na+ ions.

Perpetual motion is possible, but creating energy from nothing is impossible.

God Bless!

 

[havemercy]

I just read the article. It was interesting, but obviously, not written by someone of the dualist persuasion. Oh well!