tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3855268335402896473.post2315994626447145438..comments2024-01-23T02:32:28.567-08:00Comments on Darwin's God: A New Theory Explains How Consciousness EvolvedUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3855268335402896473.post-67533411331041871612016-09-06T22:07:06.371-07:002016-09-06T22:07:06.371-07:00I think you'll find that "evolutionists&q...I think you'll find that "evolutionists" do not posit miracles for their hypothesis'... that would be theists...Peterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05475213710498120818noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3855268335402896473.post-44381199131721202492016-06-15T12:40:21.599-07:002016-06-15T12:40:21.599-07:00I love how easy it is to mock those with such a de...I love how easy it is to mock those with such a deep, abiding faith in evolution. Bravo!Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13020848782453733891noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3855268335402896473.post-22883498984320970142016-06-11T08:20:07.504-07:002016-06-11T08:20:07.504-07:00Cornelius Hunter: And how do evolutionists know th...<b>Cornelius Hunter</b>: <i>And how do evolutionists know that? Well because arthropods had it and hydras didn’t. </i><br /><br />Common descent means that they shared a common ancestor, so if it appears in one branch and not the other, then that dates the innovation. <br />Zachrielhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16081260898264733380noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3855268335402896473.post-59281661596345465682016-06-08T11:12:57.399-07:002016-06-08T11:12:57.399-07:00bFast:
How do you know that animals do not have a...bFast:<br /><br /><i>How do you know that animals do not have a conscious entity? How the heck do animals manage the signals of the different branches without a conscious entity?</i><br /><br />The way I understand it, in both animals and humans, every branch of the knowledge tree is assigned a motivational importance or strength. This strength can be either innate (pre-programmed) or learned via operant and classical conditioning. Since most branches are asleep, they cannot decide when to wake up on their own. There must be a very small number of specialised branches that are always awake and are assigned the job of deciding which of the many other branches should wake up at any given time.<br /><br />Normally, the branches with the highest motivational strengths and the highest sensory inputs are candidates for activation. So, there are always a small number of candidates competing for attention.<br /><br />In humans, the decision to wake up a candidate branch is up the consciousness or spirit. We decide what we are interested in. This is known as free will. This is the reason that we do things that animals will never do. We love things that only a spirit can love, such as the arts and sciences. I hypothesize that some people with certain brain disorders, such as savants, have a hard time moving their attention away from certain branches of their tree of knowledge. So they keep exercising the same branches over and over. This is how they become savants in narrow domains.<br /><br />Animals are also, in a sense, savants. They are extremely well adapted to certain areas of knowledge (e.g., hunting or foraging for food) because their motivational system will not allow them to focus on anything else. The branch with the highest motivational strength always wakes up.<br /><br />So an intelligent system does not need a spirit to be intelligent. Consciousness is not synonymous with intelligence. Intelligence is at the service of motivation and consciousness. In an animal, intelligence is strictly at the service of motivation, nothing else.<br /><br />There is another reason that I believe that animals are unconscious (i.e., they have no souls or spirits). It has to do with my faith as a Christian. I have faith in God's love. I don't believe he would deliberately create animals to consciously suffer. Humans, OTOH, must suffer because this is part of our initiation into eternal life. Pain and suffering are part of reality because we live in a Yin-Yang universe. There can be no Yin without Yang.Rebel Sciencehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11762287159937757216noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3855268335402896473.post-40931809474273436292016-06-08T08:42:09.079-07:002016-06-08T08:42:09.079-07:00Louis Savain, I mostly agree with you.
However yo...Louis Savain, I mostly agree with you.<br /><br />However you say, "The attention mechanism works the same way in animals except that there is no conscious entity to select a branch for attention." How do you know this? How do you know that animals do not have a conscious entity? How the heck do animals manage the signals of the different branches without a conscious entity?bFasthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13584931926133025618noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3855268335402896473.post-89052777255354236692016-06-07T10:45:30.426-07:002016-06-07T10:45:30.426-07:00Ha! Michael Graziano, another brain-dead pathologi...Ha! Michael Graziano, another brain-dead pathological liar for Darwin heard from. LOL<br /><br />I study intelligence and the brain. I can assure Graziano that attention is not consciousness but a mechanism at the service of consciousness. The way it works in the human brain is that knowledge is organized hierarchically like a tree. Each branch of the tree is a different area of knowledge. The brain can only pay attention to only one branch at a time. This means that the overwhelming majority of the brain is asleep or unconscious at any one time.<br /><br />At any moment, the conscious entity (not the brain) is presented with a number of branches that require attention. It is up to the conscious entity to decide which one to activate. The brain is wired such that a branch can only remain active (awake) only about 12 seconds before going back to sleep. Then another branch must wake up to take its place. It takes the brain about 35 milliseconds to switch from one branch to another.<br /><br />How does it work in animals? The attention mechanism works the same way in animals except that there is no conscious entity to select a branch for attention. The attention mechanism in animals is driven entirely by their genetically pre-programmed motivational system. This is true even if the animal appears uncannily conscious. In the not too distant future, we will develop robots that will also behave as if they were conscious. This will happen in your lifetimes. Wait for it.<br /><br />How do I know that there is a non-material conscious entity in the brain? Well, to deny the existence of the supernatural soul is to stop believing your eyes. The amazing colorful 3D vista you think you see in front of your eyes is totally supernatural. Why? Because there is no 3D vista in your visual cortex or anywhere else. Your visual cortex and your entire brain are just a bunch of firing neurons. You certainly don't sense biochemicals and electric spikes flowing through your axons, synapses and dendrites. You see a fabulous, dynamic model of the world in glorious 3D. Something translated those neuronal firings into a colorful 3D vista. Call it spirit, soul or whatever. But it certainly exists and it is not material, a billion brain-dead materialists foaming at the mouth and claiming otherwise notwithstanding.<br /><br />Just saying.Rebel Sciencehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11762287159937757216noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3855268335402896473.post-91815085651001835012016-06-07T08:38:06.974-07:002016-06-07T08:38:06.974-07:00"Of course by 'explain' evolutionists..."Of course by 'explain' evolutionists mean something along the lines of “and then a miracle occurred." Priceless! Truth Will Set You Freehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10570743080797349168noreply@blogger.com