Vault313
New
I understand where Alex is coming from regarding neuroplasticity.
They way I understand it is, materialist theories of mind focus on the idea that thoughts, emotions, actions, everything that makes you, you are the result of chemical processes in the brain. So, the brain takes in stimuli from the environment, then using that stimuli goes about responding to this stimuli using whatever physical processes (TBD) it uses. Over long periods of consistent forms of stimuli, physical changes take place in the brain, either chemical or structural, changing the function of that particular brain region in a sense. So it is stimuli evoking a physical response within the brain causing changes within the brain. The argument here, from a materialistic perspective, is that it is outside stimuli that is causing the brain to "rewire" itself. We have no control over this, seeing as free will is an illusion. The materialist position is that we cannot direct our thoughts to change our physical bodies, because thoughts have no power in and of themselves. They are a byproduct of brain processes. The brain determines our thoughts, actions and behaviors AFTER a stimulus has been received.
So where I think Dr. Schwartz's and others works challenge this paradigm is by showing that "mere thoughts" do have a power. We not only CAN control these brain processes, we can control them in such a way as to bring about real physical change in the structure and function of the brain.
If a thought is pure physical processes that are a byproduct, and have no real power of their own, how is it that we can control our thoughts and use them to physically affect our own physiology?
Again, it really seems that materialism gets around the consciousness problem by invoking THE BRAIN as an entity in and of itself. I think it was Chalmers that said "if consciousness is an illusion, who is being fooled"?
They way I understand it is, materialist theories of mind focus on the idea that thoughts, emotions, actions, everything that makes you, you are the result of chemical processes in the brain. So, the brain takes in stimuli from the environment, then using that stimuli goes about responding to this stimuli using whatever physical processes (TBD) it uses. Over long periods of consistent forms of stimuli, physical changes take place in the brain, either chemical or structural, changing the function of that particular brain region in a sense. So it is stimuli evoking a physical response within the brain causing changes within the brain. The argument here, from a materialistic perspective, is that it is outside stimuli that is causing the brain to "rewire" itself. We have no control over this, seeing as free will is an illusion. The materialist position is that we cannot direct our thoughts to change our physical bodies, because thoughts have no power in and of themselves. They are a byproduct of brain processes. The brain determines our thoughts, actions and behaviors AFTER a stimulus has been received.
So where I think Dr. Schwartz's and others works challenge this paradigm is by showing that "mere thoughts" do have a power. We not only CAN control these brain processes, we can control them in such a way as to bring about real physical change in the structure and function of the brain.
If a thought is pure physical processes that are a byproduct, and have no real power of their own, how is it that we can control our thoughts and use them to physically affect our own physiology?
Again, it really seems that materialism gets around the consciousness problem by invoking THE BRAIN as an entity in and of itself. I think it was Chalmers that said "if consciousness is an illusion, who is being fooled"?