We're just a bunch of chemical reactions

[Andrew2009]

I’m doing a course on alcohol & drug addiction - it’s very interesting, and the teacher has just started to get into neuroscience and brain chemistry.

Anyway, the teacher maintains that all of our thoughts and emotions are simply electrical charges and chemical reactions in the brain. There is no soul or spirit, and no purely “psychological” phenomena - everything is a chemical reaction and/or an electrical impulse. Everything is purely physical, there is no other dimension to us.

I asked - if this is the case, how do you explain an actual thought or emotion, i.e. the thing we actually experience? This seems to be something separate and different from the purely physical activity in the brain that may be “causing” the thought or emotion. E.g. a feeling of fear or a memory that someone has seems to be a different thing to a bunch of molecules colliding and interacting. He says they are one and the same thing, but he didn’t really explain any further.

The teacher also claimed that Descartes is responsible for the “false” distinction between mind and matter, but that this idea has been completely debunked by reasearch in neuroscience in the last 10 - 15 years.

I wonder what the Catholic Church has to say on this subject? Is anyone of aware of any good reading material that deals with this subject? Is anyone aware of any writings by contemporary philosophers or scientists that deal with this, and that an amateur like myself could understand?

I have a feeling that this issue is far from settled, and that things are a bit more complicated than my teacher claims…

 

[the_7th_one]

My first reaction to such claims is to ask why is it that identical twins normally have such diffrent personalities? If they are identical, and the chemicals in them are identical, why would their behavior be diffrent?

 

[Just_Lurking]

Is anyone of aware of any good reading material that deals with this subject?

Brain-Wise: Studies in Neurophilosophy by Patricia Smith Churchland (see here) does a good job presenting your teacher’s point of view and the latest supporting scientific evidence (as of 2002).

 

[jtodisco]

I suggest you read Why God Won’t Go Away: Brain Science and the Biology of Belief by Andrew Newberg, M.D., Eugene D’Aquili, M.D., and Vince Rause. amazon.com/Why-God-Wont-Go-Away/dp/034544034X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1299155876&sr=1-1

It’s not a perfect book of course, there are a lot of critques of it, but overall I think it does a good job demonstrating that when we commune with God there is a lot more going on with our brains than what science had previously supposed. It’s a quick read (only 240 pages) and even though it discusses topics such as neuroscience it is written so that the average person can follow along without getting lost.

In the end no book or amount of experience is going to convince a hardened materialist like your teacher that a soul or a mind exists if they’re not honestly open to the possibility. But there’s just as much faith invovled in denying the spiritual as there is in believing in it, despite what your teacher may think. Science has not disproven God, or the soul, or the mind. To believe they don’t exist is just that, a belief.

 

[phoooiee]

The beginning of Theology for Beginners by Frank Sheed deals with this- plus it is a wonderful book otherwise.

 

[Barbkw]

Why doesn’t the instructor go down farther - we are DNA dust and water.

 

[Barbkw]

Continue the reduction - within a few years our DNA is nontraceable and after that - all that our bodies are is dust.

 

[Garyjohn2]

Yes, we experience thoughts and emotions through chemical processes. The brain is hugely complex. Synapses fire constantly in different areas, in different combinations, at different rates…and these correspond to our thoughts. It’s the same as a computer. How can a little computer chip that is 2 inches by 2 inches produce all this computing power and “thought” that goes into displaying words and pictures on my computer screen? It’s just millions of tiny electrical impulses going off in different areas at different rates. For me, it helps to compare the brain to a computer chip (in regards to how it physically works). Except the brain is so much more complex and intricate than any human could possibly design.

Emotions, similarly, are chemical processes. Certain thoughts can trigger then. When you have a thought that triggers excitement, for example, your brain will prompt the release of adrenaline into your blood stream and you will actually FEEL excited (pulse increases, perhaps sweat, and a feeling of being energized). There are many chemicals your body can produce that invoke the “symptoms” of feeling happy, sad, afraid, etc.

So yes, thoughts and emotions are based in biology and physics. They are electrical and/or chemical reactions in the mind and body. This is actually well studied, even if not completely understood. We are physical beings, after all, so it makes perfect sense for our minds and bodies to be designed that way. The mind itself is infinitely complex and capable of so much, it in itself is proof to me that someone very intelligent must have designed it. (hint: That’s God!)

 

[ProVobis]

All the chemical reactions and cell mutations in the universe do not explain life itself or how it’s formed, be it animal or plant.

 

[tonyrey]

Anyway, the teacher maintains that all of our thoughts and emotions are simply electrical charges and chemical reactions in the brain. There is no soul or spirit, and no purely “psychological” phenomena - everything is a chemical reaction and/or an electrical impulse. Everything is purely physical, there is no other dimension to us.

Your teacher is obviously unaware of the insurmountable problems arising from the reduction of thoughts and decisions to electrical charges and chemical reactions in the brain. For a start free will becomes an illusion, thoughts become an uninformative events and truth becomes a word that signifies nothing! How can inanimate objects have insight and understanding?

The teacher also claimed that Descartes is responsible for the “false” distinction between mind and matter, but that this idea has been completely debunked by research in neuroscience in the last 10 - 15 years.

If the mind doesn’t exist what is your teacher using to conclude that the mind doesn’t exist? According to him there is only a brain which doesn’t know what it is doing and functions according to the laws of nature!

I have a feeling that this issue is far from settled, and that things are a bit more complicated than my teacher claims…

A bit! He has simply revealed his ignorance. Fools rush in where angels fear to tread!

 

[tonyrey]

So yes, thoughts and emotions are based in biology and physics. They are electrical and/or chemical reactions in the mind and body.

There can be no electrical and/or chemical reactions in the mind because the mind is intangible!

 

[levinas12]

I asked - if this is the case, how do you explain an actual thought or emotion, i.e. the thing we actually experience? This seems to be something separate and different from the purely physical activity in the brain that may be “causing” the thought or emotion. E.g. a feeling of fear or a memory that someone has seems to be a different thing to a bunch of molecules colliding and interacting. He says they are one and the same thing, but he didn’t really explain any further…

Great question … revolves around the notion of “intentionality” … the property of consciousness that it is “about” or “refers to” something … you are very astute to distinguish between the neurons firing and the object of awareness … you don’t have to be a disciple of Descartes to subscribe to this distinction … there is a wonderful book, Phenomenology of the Human Person, by Robert Sokolowski, that might be helpful … Msgr. Sokolowski teaches at Catholic University in Wash DC … the real issue here is the “truth dimension” which cannot be reduced simply to physical or biological processses … there is a relation between brain electricity and the truth dimension … but truth itself is in a different category … the irony is that the “truth dimension” is what makes neuroscience as a science possible …

 

[edwest2]

We have a will. Is your love for someone simply a chemical reaction?

We are not biological robots.

Peace,
Ed

 

[Ranklyfrank]

I’m doing a course on alcohol & drug addiction - it’s very interesting, and the teacher has just started to get into neuroscience and brain chemistry.

Anyway, the teacher maintains that all of our thoughts and emotions are simply electrical charges and chemical reactions in the brain. There is no soul or spirit, and no purely “psychological” phenomena - everything is a chemical reaction and/or an electrical impulse. Everything is purely physical, there is no other dimension to us.

I asked - if this is the case, how do you explain an actual thought or emotion, i.e. the thing we actually experience? This seems to be something separate and different from the purely physical activity in the brain that may be “causing” the thought or emotion. E.g. a feeling of fear or a memory that someone has seems to be a different thing to a bunch of molecules colliding and interacting. He says they are one and the same thing, but he didn’t really explain any further.

The teacher also claimed that Descartes is responsible for the “false” distinction between mind and matter, but that this idea has been completely debunked by reasearch in neuroscience in the last 10 - 15 years.

I wonder what the Catholic Church has to say on this subject? Is anyone of aware of any good reading material that deals with this subject? Is anyone aware of any writings by contemporary philosophers or scientists that deal with this, and that an amateur like myself could understand?

I have a feeling that this issue is far from settled, and that things are a bit more complicated than my teacher claims…

You are right to question your teacher. And while the “split” between mind and body is both actual and artificial, it was Descartes and the Enlightenment that allowed the gutting of the world of Spirit and the onset of the modern industrial ontology that is flat and soul-less.

And while there is, I am sure, wonderful work from a Catholic standpoint on this matter, I doubt, given the stance of your instructor that your argument from that basis will be accepted or even considered. You would be arguing from a position already dismissed from the instructor’s mind: lose/lose.

On the other hand, there is a modern integral philosopher who deals precisely with this question, including charts and diagrams, from the standpoint of explaining this soul-less perspective in its own terms and defeats it on its own ground. Your prof might act like the physicists who refused Einstein’s equations because they were emotionally invested in their disproved paradigm, but at least you will be clear on the matter and have ammo intelligible to those monologists who hold with your teacher.

 

[inocente]

My first reaction to such claims is to ask why is it that identical twins normally have such diffrent personalities? If they are identical, and the chemicals in them are identical, why would their behavior be diffrent?

The twins may look identical but our personalities also depend greatly on our life experiences, so every person is always unique.

 

[inocente]

Why doesn’t the instructor go down farther - we are DNA dust and water.

Right, dust to dust, “the LORD God formed a man from the dust of the ground” - Gen 2:7.

 

[NonNobisDomine]

By this logic, if i move my arm up and down, all that is happening is muscle contractions, not me moving my arm. When looking at brain chemistry, we can be tempted to reduce everything that we see as merely chemical reactions, when it can be the by-product of the mind.

It is the common opinion within neuro-science that you are your brain, nothing more. This is an arbitary reduction which doesn’t necessarily need to be accepted.

 

[3DOCTORS]

Yes, we experience thoughts and emotions through chemical processes. The brain is hugely complex. Synapses fire constantly in different areas, in different combinations, at different rates…and these correspond to our thoughts. It’s the same as a computer. How can a little computer chip that is 2 inches by 2 inches produce all this computing power and “thought” that goes into displaying words and pictures on my computer screen? It’s just millions of tiny electrical impulses going off in different areas at different rates. For me, it helps to compare the brain to a computer chip (in regards to how it physically works). Except the brain is so much more complex and intricate than any human could possibly design.

Emotions, similarly, are chemical processes. Certain thoughts can trigger then. When you have a thought that triggers excitement, for example, your brain will prompt the release of adrenaline into your blood stream and you will actually FEEL excited (pulse increases, perhaps sweat, and a feeling of being energized). There are many chemicals your body can produce that invoke the “symptoms” of feeling happy, sad, afraid, etc.

So yes, thoughts and emotions are based in biology and physics. They are electrical and/or chemical reactions in the mind and body. This is actually well studied, even if not completely understood. **We are physical beings, after all, so it makes perfect sense for our minds and bodies to be designed that way. The mind itself is infinitely complex and capable of so much, it in itself is proof to me that someone very intelligent must have designed it. (hint: That’s God!) **

Psalm 139:14 - in some Bible translations - “I give You thanks Lord that I am fearfully and wonderfully made” (NAB is a little different). The evidence for God is so much stronger than the evidence against. :yup:

This coming Ash Wednesday we will be told “Remember that you are dust and to dust you shall return.” But who is the “you” being addressed? Answer: our soul, our being as created by God. Which is immortal. :heaven:

 

[Madaglan]

I’m doing a course on alcohol & drug addiction - it’s very interesting, and the teacher has just started to get into neuroscience and brain chemistry.

Anyway, the teacher maintains that all of our thoughts and emotions are simply electrical charges and chemical reactions in the brain. There is no soul or spirit, and no purely “psychological” phenomena - everything is a chemical reaction and/or an electrical impulse. Everything is purely physical, there is no other dimension to us.

I asked - if this is the case, how do you explain an actual thought or emotion, i.e. the thing we actually experience? This seems to be something separate and different from the purely physical activity in the brain that may be “causing” the thought or emotion. E.g. a feeling of fear or a memory that someone has seems to be a different thing to a bunch of molecules colliding and interacting. He says they are one and the same thing, but he didn’t really explain any further.

The teacher also claimed that Descartes is responsible for the “false” distinction between mind and matter, but that this idea has been completely debunked by reasearch in neuroscience in the last 10 - 15 years.

I wonder what the Catholic Church has to say on this subject? Is anyone of aware of any good reading material that deals with this subject? Is anyone aware of any writings by contemporary philosophers or scientists that deal with this, and that an amateur like myself could understand?

I have a feeling that this issue is far from settled, and that things are a bit more complicated than my teacher claims…

A human person is body and soul. The body includes molecules, electrical charges, etc., while the soul is immaterial. At bodily death, the soul and the body are separated.

A strict materialist understanding of the human body logically requires that man does not have free will. Man is necessitated to do what he ends up doing because, by the laws of nature governing the activity in his brain, organs, muscles and so on, he cannot do but otherwise.

This way of thinking leads to problems in the social realm: how can we accuse other persons for crimes against humanity when their brains are “wired” to think and act in certain ways? Experience shows that while there can be mitigating factors based in chemical imbalances, etc., people in all societies are held responsible for decisions believed to have been freely made. If one takes away the aspect of free will, rapists, murderers, child-molesters, et al. are no more “wrong” than us in their actions, since they simply are determined, like us, to follow a determined course of material reactions. Indeed, in such a system of thought, a person in opposition to this system is living according to what is determined for him to act. In this order of things, exhortations of “ought” or “should” are reduced to catalysts of neurological activity.

 

[Andrew2009]

Thanks everyone for your replies, there are many interesting comments here and some good suggestions re further reading, which I will look into…

I am absolutely sure my teacher’s materialist and reductionist position is totally wrong - however I’m not going to argue with him. As someone mentioned in this thread, it would be impossible to get him to see an alternative point of view, his “mind” (which he doesn’t believe in, of course!) is made up…

So yes, thoughts and emotions are based in biology and physics. They are electrical and/or chemical reactions in the mind and body. This is actually well studied, even if not completely understood. We are physical beings, after all, so it makes perfect sense for our minds and bodies to be designed that way. The mind itself is infinitely complex and capable of so much, it in itself is proof to me that someone very intelligent must have designed it. (hint: That’s God!)

Great comment - that’s exactly what I think when I sit in these classes hearing about the amazing and incredibly complex functions of the brain and the human body. How can this possibly be the result of “blind chance”?

A strict materialist understanding of the human body logically requires that man does not have free will. Man is necessitated to do what he ends up doing because, by the laws of nature governing the activity in his brain, organs, muscles and so on, he cannot do but otherwise.

This way of thinking leads to problems in the social realm: how can we accuse other persons for crimes against humanity when their brains are “wired” to think and act in certain ways? Experience shows that while there can be mitigating factors based in chemical imbalances, etc., people in all societies are held responsible for decisions believed to have been freely made. If one takes away the aspect of free will, rapists, murderers, child-molesters, et al. are no more “wrong” than us in their actions, since they simply are determined, like us, to follow a determined course of material reactions. Indeed, in such a system of thought, a person in opposition to this system is living according to what is determined for him to act. In this order of things, exhortations of “ought” or “should” are reduced to catalysts of neurological activity.

Another great comment. A radical materialist view of things has some very strange consequences, in the real world….