are you an atheist?

Well, would that be an example of something we cannot yet measure scientifically?

I don't think so, unless you're assuming that once we have a scientific explanation for everything, we will describe everything in scientific terms. I mean if you could identify some kind of neurochemical process relating to humor, would you no longer use the unscientific descriptor of something being "funny"?

― Burt Stuntin (Hurting 2), Tuesday, February 11, 2014 4:23 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I'm merely saying that it is perfectly sane to assume we'll be able to scientifically understand it in a more and more precise way. I don't know what you're getting at- of course we will still be human and be able to subjectively find something "funny".

at what level of brain complexity does it become ~magical~? does a grasshopper's "beliefs" contain a nebulous metaphysical element to them as discussed in that NYT article? or does that require a cerebral cortex?

we know enough to have entire fields of academmia devoted to the knowledge we've gathered about the brain, be real

we actually don't know that much about the brain

― Burt Stuntin (Hurting 2), Tuesday, February 11, 2014 4:32 PM (25 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

We know enough to observe how physical change of the brain affects consciousness and personality.

A lot of academics in those fields would tell you that we don't actually know very much, and some would tell you that it is logically impossible to fully understand "consciousness"

I mean obv there a some big gaps in our understanding of it, that's why people retreat within its subjectivity

lol yeah we don't know shit about the brain. funny thing I learned yesterday while reading some article on neuro research - all of the synaptic connections in the brain are at 90 degree angles.

xp

We know enough to observe how physical change of the brain affects consciousness and personality.

uh this cannot be stated with any categorical certainty

We know enough to observe how physical change of the brain affects consciousness and personality.

― Evan, Tuesday, February 11, 2014 4:34 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

At best, this just gives us cause-and-effect relationships. I know that if I let go of a pencil it will drop -- that doesn't mean I understand gravity.

like Evan said, we know enough, we have a beyond basic understanding of it. this is just silly. we know how structural damage and/or chemical changes can completely alter the experience of consciousness. That should tell you wheree "consciousness" lies.

I'm merely saying that it is perfectly sane to assume we'll be able to scientifically understand it in a more and more precise way.

You realize that you are predicting the future upon evidence that does not pass scientific scrutiny? And that your prediction lacks the precision to be falsifiable?

but please, continue to think that the gaps in our understanding are where the magical, spiritual facets of the universe reside. great track record in that line of thought.

You're completely missing the point.

break it down

xp to GD - unwarranted leap of logic being made there

break it down

― A True White Kid that can Jump (Granny Dainger), Tuesday, February 11, 2014 4:41 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

read the thread

we don't know shit about the brain...immediately followed by a fact we uncovered about the brain

False binary: if you do not believe that science must inevitably explain all things about the brain and consciousness then you must believe in magic.

I'm just gonna start posting crazy shit about the brain k

Recently Lichtman’s postdoctoral researcher Narayanan Kasthuri set out to analyze every detail in a cylinder of mouse brain tissue measuring just a thousand cubic microns—a volume 1/100,000 the size of a grain of salt. He selected a region surrounding a short segment of a single axon, seeking to identify every neuron that passed through it.

That minuscule patch of brain turned out to be like a barrel of seething snakes. Kasthuri found a thousand axons and about 80 dendrites, each making about 600 connections with other neurons inside the cylinder. “It’s a wake-up call to how much more complicated brains are than the way we think about them,” says Lichtman.

Complicated, but not random. Lichtman and Kasthuri discovered that every neuron made nearly all its connections with just one other one, scrupulously avoiding a connection with almost all the other neurons packed tightly around it. “They seem to care who they’re connected to,” Lichtman says.

Lichtman can’t say yet whether this fastidious pattern is a general rule or a feature of just the tiny area of mouse brain he sampled. Even as they scale up the technology, he and his colleagues will need another two years to complete a scan of all 70 million neurons in a mouse. I ask about scanning an entire human brain, which contains a thousand times more neurons than a mouse’s.

“I don’t dwell on that,” he says, with a laugh. “It’s too painful.”

we know that the brain can play tricks on itself (or rather, that parts of it can 'fool' other parts of it? that it has certain tendencies, eg pattern recognition. that damage to it can effect consciousness. this basic knowledge (we are about 75-100 yrs past these facts) should be enough to know that the subjective experience it provides is not to be trusted. a point you seem to have missed maybe while getting bogged down in shit you heard about how experts have lots to learn.

I read nat geo too

the subjective experience it provides is not to be trusted

Buddhists knew this 2500 years ago. Not a recent discovery, boo.

I am always amazed that reading animal entrails to discover clues to the intentions of the god(s) ever caught on. The movements of birds being read as omens, ok, it's not so far a leap, but the entrails of eviscerated victims, hoo boy, that's some mighty craziness.

The search for God is the search for the unknown, and there is no single correct method to use. It's crazy to say there IS a right way to seek God. It's called fundamentalism.

Not a recent discovery, boo.

and yet...

I read nat geo too

yeah they do good work over there. crazy article.

What do you mean by "to be trusted"?

"I'd have thought we have learned enough about the brain by now to not put stock in the games it likes to play, or to think they are an accurate reflection of objective reality."

oh wait I shoulda said "read the thread"

ah good old objective reality. which can coincidentally only be experienced subjectively.

xp In what context?

As I've said a bunch of times in the thread, if you're using "God" to figure out the best way of treating cancer, you're in trouble. But if God is your explanation for why you find a starry sky beautiful, how is a future scientific discovery going to upend that? Does knowing what neurochemical process is taking place necessarily change the subjective way you experience that, or should it?

Yeah, those silly believers believing that their brains provide them with reliable information about the world, unlike scientists... oh wait.

which can coincidentally only be experienced subjectively.

so you place no value on the scientific method?? to shakey and no o.nate too apprarently. yes science with its reproducable and verifiable data is totally the same as some nutcase on the corner chatting with God. gimme a break.

At best, this just gives us cause-and-effect relationships. I know that if I let go of a pencil it will drop -- that doesn't mean I understand gravity.

― Burt Stuntin (Hurting 2), Tuesday, February 11, 2014 4:38 PM (3 minutes ago)

And it doesn't assert that invisible entities are grabbing it and pulling it towards the earth either.

Ugh, come back from a meeting and there's a lot to catch up on here...

scientists KNOW their brains can mislead them, that's like the whole POINT of science.

all explanations are metaphors

yes science with its reproducable and verifiable data is totally the same as some nutcase on the corner chatting with God. gimme a break.

I think for many believers their subjective experience of God is also reproducible and verifiable. They pray -> they feel better.

I was saying how can a God, who is attributed with creating the universe, not be an element of scientific concern if he is the cause of everything material? How could God be separate from science if he is such an important variable in the material origins and behavior of the universe?

― Evan, Tuesday, February 11, 2014 4:18 PM (30 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

The very foundations of science come from these ridiculous people trying to see some order in the entrails of a lamb. Most of the biggest names in science, upon which entire disciplines are built, pursued their scientific work with a genuinely religious ferver. Many of them believed they were discovering the mind of God, and that science WAS a spiritual pursuit. Some of them even died for this belief.

For them, science isn't separate from God.

believers use scientific method almost as much as "scientists" do. it's just a formalization of how the brain gathers info and analyzes it. diff is believers drop the method at a certain point, in certain arenas (not coincidentally these are the areas that the scientific method cannot now or possibly ever fully explain), for various reasons.

don't think you quite understand what reproducable and verifiable means

fwiw I wouldn't describe what I'm talking about (which, by the way, I don't believe in, I'm just taking this side of the argument) as God being a "variable in the material origins and behavior of the universe."

Recently Lichtman’s postdoctoral researcher Narayanan Kasthuri set out to analyze every detail in a cylinder of mouse brain tissue measuring just a thousand cubic microns—a volume 1/100,000 the size of a grain of salt. He selected a region surrounding a short segment of a single axon, seeking to identify every neuron that passed through it.

That minuscule patch of brain turned out to be like a barrel of seething snakes. Kasthuri found a thousand axons and about 80 dendrites, each making about 600 connections with other neurons inside the cylinder. “It’s a wake-up call to how much more complicated brains are than the way we think about them,” says Lichtman.

Complicated, but not random. Lichtman and Kasthuri discovered that every neuron made nearly all its connections with just one other one, scrupulously avoiding a connection with almost all the other neurons packed tightly around it. “They seem to care who they’re connected to,” Lichtman says.

Lichtman can’t say yet whether this fastidious pattern is a general rule or a feature of just the tiny area of mouse brain he sampled. Even as they scale up the technology, he and his colleagues will need another two years to complete a scan of all 70 million neurons in a mouse. I ask about scanning an entire human brain, which contains a thousand times more neurons than a mouse’s.

“I don’t dwell on that,” he says, with a laugh. “It’s too painful.”

Gonna posit here that despite the work Shakey wants it to do, this is the precise opposite of "don't know shit about the brain." That's like saying that if someone can do analytic geometry or differential equations but not whatever that dude that proved Fermat's Last Theorem did that they "don't know shit about math."

For them, science isn't separate from God

that's because science and religion both stem from trying to explain the as yet unexplained. the difference is that one arrives at the conclusion and works backwards.

I think for many believers their subjective experience of God is also reproducible and verifiable. They pray -> they feel better.

If you sit down and do nothing for 5 minutes, you get the same effect. Does that disprove God?

What if it means God is sitting down and doing nothing?

I was pretty explicit about c+p'ing that because it was interesting, not because it supported any particular pt.

xxp

"We don't know everything" =/= "we know nothing." Frankly, that's someone like Ken Ham's game ("If the Big Bang is true where did the singularity come from? CHECKMATE, ATHEISTS.") and beneath anyone who takes the subject seriously from any direction at all.

xxp fine, still

What if it means God is sitting down and doing nothing

Then I am the most religious person alive.

Can't we just say God is The Big Bang and then drop the whole thing?

God is so lazy. Sheesh. Get to work God!

we have a pretty good idea of what the brain does. How it does it is still pretty baffling.