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No one chooses what they believe


spartan max2

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1 hour ago, spartan max2 said:

Belief or lack of it seems like a feeling. You either have the feeling or you don't. 

 

It's in the genes, and since you have a mind that systemizes everything learning more changes your perspective.

6 hours ago, XenoFish said:

95% of our lives are run subconsciously. Whatever subconscious beliefs (programs) we have, that's what creates our personal subjective reality. Beliefs can be changed through repetition and emotional acceptance. You can literally engineer your entire life if you can change or create new programs. 

Non-Theistic Quakers teach "question everything". The concept of the "program" is too keep learning something new. Natives teaches Spirituality is personal and private and to keep searching which works out to the same thing. 

7 hours ago, Tatetopa said:

Mindfulness indeed is a wonderful thing.  You can trace the path of a thought.   Like looking into a stream and watching a minnow swim this way and that.  If your concentration and focus are good, you can follow that minnow as it swims through a school.

You've hung around the Midewiin and the Wicaasaa Wankaans far too long Uncle. :lol:

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1 hour ago, spartan max2 said:

Belief or lack of it seems like a feeling. You either have the feeling or you don't. 

That's what I've always thought also, which is kinda strange in a way.  Typically when we discuss feelings here it's how it corrupts reason or is used a substitute ('corrupts' is my word, it doesn't mean it's a negative, I've got no problem with people believing things that might not be true because it feels good).  Yet even with things that are fully supported by reason, my belief/knowledge that it is true also comes down to a feeling to some extent it seems.

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8 hours ago, Mr Walker said:

There ARE NO physical impediments on the choices a human being is capable of making.  Thus, every choice is a free willed one.

Mr. Walker, I will take you at your word when you say that you can be a conscious observer of your unconscious mind.

But you bring me no closer with that to understanding choice and free will.

What is choice and who makes it?

A Planarian worm has a couple dozen neurons.  It can move toward light or darkness, it can find food.  Neurons use their input and response structure  to stimulate muscle fibers to preform the actions programmed. Does it make choices?  Is it aware that it makes choices?

A honeybee has an order of magnitude more neurons and a complex set of behaviors.  Does it make choices?  Is it aware that it makes choices?  A network of neurons measure color, direction of the sun, wind speed,  distance from hive, memory of whether it has been here before with what outcome and feed all of those outputs high and low voltages into another neuron that analyzes, summarizes and puts out its own voltage to trigger go there or don't go there.. Is that free will making a choice or the summation of a number of variable input voltages?

 Is the beating of your heart or blinking of an eye or a yawn a choice?  Are the constrictions of blood vessels to direct the flow of blood in your body choices?  We are a universe more complex than the honeybee.  Does the analogy hold or break down?  

Somewhere along the animal line does a ghost appear in the machine to wrest control from the purely electro-chemical, and mechanical world of the lower creatures?, Is it the decider, the free will choice maker?

Or is the path ahead guided by the neural network we are constantly building in our brain?  If a billion inputs are replicated a second time in our brain, will the output, our choice also be the same?

You could say, "No, I am not going to do the logical and expected the second time, I will do something completely different to display my free will."  Can you be sure there is not another neural network in there contributing an input based on the thesis that doing something unpredictable often leads to higher survival chance?

At this point in my life the mechanical seems adequate to explain even human behavior.  I have insufficient faith to believe without further  evidence that there is a ghost in the machine.

 

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5 hours ago, Tatetopa said:

Mr. Walker, I will take you at your word when you say that you can be a conscious observer of your unconscious mind.

But you bring me no closer with that to understanding choice and free will.

What is choice and who makes it?

A Planarian worm has a couple dozen neurons.  It can move toward light or darkness, it can find food.  Neurons use their input and response structure  to stimulate muscle fibers to preform the actions programmed. Does it make choices?  Is it aware that it makes choices?

A honeybee has an order of magnitude more neurons and a complex set of behaviors.  Does it make choices?  Is it aware that it makes choices?  A network of neurons measure color, direction of the sun, wind speed,  distance from hive, memory of whether it has been here before with what outcome and feed all of those outputs high and low voltages into another neuron that analyzes, summarizes and puts out its own voltage to trigger go there or don't go there.. Is that free will making a choice or the summation of a number of variable input voltages?

 Is the beating of your heart or blinking of an eye or a yawn a choice?  Are the constrictions of blood vessels to direct the flow of blood in your body choices?  We are a universe more complex than the honeybee.  Does the analogy hold or break down?  

Somewhere along the animal line does a ghost appear in the machine to wrest control from the purely electro-chemical, and mechanical world of the lower creatures?, Is it the decider, the free will choice maker?

Or is the path ahead guided by the neural network we are constantly building in our brain?  If a billion inputs are replicated a second time in our brain, will the output, our choice also be the same?

You could say, "No, I am not going to do the logical and expected the second time, I will do something completely different to display my free will."  Can you be sure there is not another neural network in there contributing an input based on the thesis that doing something unpredictable often leads to higher survival chance?

At this point in my life the mechanical seems adequate to explain even human behavior.  I have insufficient faith to believe without further  evidence that there is a ghost in the machine.

 

Hi Tatetopa

I think because we can see options is what creates a choice.

jmccr8

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15 minutes ago, jmccr8 said:

Hi Tatetopa

I think because we can see options is what creates a choice.

jmccr8

Yeah, that's kind of at the heart of it. 

It stumps me though.   I can't be sure if that is free will or just the grinding of the gears in the machine to reach an answer.

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2 minutes ago, Tatetopa said:

Yeah, that's kind of at the heart of it. 

It stumps me though.   I can't be sure if that is free will or just the grinding of the gears in the machine to reach an answer.

Hi Tatetopa

I had to think for a minute and maybe I don't have free will, just a will to be free and grind the gears.

jmccr8

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6 hours ago, Tatetopa said:

Mr. Walker, I will take you at your word when you say that you can be a conscious observer of your unconscious mind.

But you bring me no closer with that to understanding choice and free will.

What is choice and who makes it?

A Planarian worm has a couple dozen neurons.  It can move toward light or darkness, it can find food.  Neurons use their input and response structure  to stimulate muscle fibers to preform the actions programmed. Does it make choices?  Is it aware that it makes choices?

A honeybee has an order of magnitude more neurons and a complex set of behaviors.  Does it make choices?  Is it aware that it makes choices?  A network of neurons measure color, direction of the sun, wind speed,  distance from hive, memory of whether it has been here before with what outcome and feed all of those outputs high and low voltages into another neuron that analyzes, summarizes and puts out its own voltage to trigger go there or don't go there.. Is that free will making a choice or the summation of a number of variable input voltages?

 Is the beating of your heart or blinking of an eye or a yawn a choice?  Are the constrictions of blood vessels to direct the flow of blood in your body choices?  We are a universe more complex than the honeybee.  Does the analogy hold or break down?  

Somewhere along the animal line does a ghost appear in the machine to wrest control from the purely electro-chemical, and mechanical world of the lower creatures?, Is it the decider, the free will choice maker?

Or is the path ahead guided by the neural network we are constantly building in our brain?  If a billion inputs are replicated a second time in our brain, will the output, our choice also be the same?

You could say, "No, I am not going to do the logical and expected the second time, I will do something completely different to display my free will."  Can you be sure there is not another neural network in there contributing an input based on the thesis that doing something unpredictable often leads to higher survival chance?

At this point in my life the mechanical seems adequate to explain even human behavior.  I have insufficient faith to believe without further  evidence that there is a ghost in the machine.

 

A choice occurs when we have data and can extrapolate many different potential actions. we then subconsciously and consciously ,make  choices (scientists are beginning to understand the learning process in which this occurs which enables us to learn to walk talk etc.) The subconscious is still a rational, logical, processing machine, but it uses a difernt language to make decisions 

We always have free will

there is nothing preventing us ether forming an intent, or acting upon an intent 

Will doesnt come into things where we don't know about them or can  not affect them Eg we can't make the sun go out by will but tha t does not make our will unfree  There is nothing to stop us TRYING to exterminate the sun by will power :) We may not be able to know or imagine life on another planet but this does not prevent us thinking about it and making decisions  

There are no other organisms on earth with adult human- level self aware consciousness and thus our free will. All other animals are programmed by biology and social conditioning and are unaware of this. the y have no mental choices  We also have such programming but are aware of it and can circumvent it 

So free will is an evolved property of consciousness which we know occurs at a human level of awareness It will evolve in artificial intelligences, and some other animals are approaching it with an awareness around that of a very young child 

We build the neural networks by the choices we make we can consciously reshape rebuild and renew those networks. The y make life easier  but are not constraints on free choice 

yes. Somewhere the ghost of self awareness evolves in a mind it, Involves the abilty to think in language tha t includes symbolic and abstract thought 

It seems from  observation of primates who have lived closely with humans that some of this can be learned but basically it requires  some physiological and neurological advances in the brain 

Our mind perceives and[processes far more than a bilion bits of data a second. It occurs so fast we aren't even aware of it  yet we control it, and learn to use it to walk and talk

At any nano second in time there are many potential futures and choices There is nothing compelling you to choose any particular one but you can ONLY chose one a t a time  so no each time you could chose differently Only the linear nature of time prevents you making more than one choice. In some theoretical physics this is believed to be the basis for  a multiverse where each alternate action shapes a new world  

I can be sure because i know and understand my own mind and the neuro cognitive processes by which it works  However many others seem  to be less certain  :) 

 

lol "you" are the "i inside" YOU. are the ghost. YOU are in control and you shape your future and that of your world by the decisions you make, It is is a sobering and empowering  responsibility  which many seek to avoid

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1 hour ago, jmccr8 said:

Hi Tatetopa

I think because we can see options is what creates a choice.

jmccr8

Succinct and correct There are no limits one whaT a human mind can imagine, and thus no limits on what a mind can direct us to attempt There are physical limits on what we can achieve but this does not impact our freedom of will

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19 hours ago, Mr Walker said:

Every human being chooses what they believe or do not believe.

Beliefs are abstract cognitive constructs, and we have to build them from the ground  up, and then invest time and energy in solidifying and defending them.

You seem to speak of a dissociative state. That is  also a cognitive construct 

Such a person feels that they and their mind are dissociated from reality and have little or no control over it This  is a mild form but it can become much more serious   

quote

Dissociation is any of a wide array of experiences from mild detachment from immediate surroundings to more severe detachment from physical and emotional experiences. The major characteristic of all dissociative phenomena involves a detachment from reality, rather than a loss of reality as in psychosis.[1][2][3][4]

Dissociation is commonly displayed on a continuum.[5] In mild cases, dissociation can be regarded as a coping mechanism or defense mechanisms in seeking to master, minimize or tolerate stress – including boredom or conflict.[6][7][8] At the nonpathological end of the continuum, dissociation describes common events such as daydreaming. Further along the continuum are non-pathological altered states of consciousness.[5][9

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissociation_(psychology)

 

Tthe opposite could be seen as mindfulness where you are more fully aware and conscious of your mind, and how and why you are thinking as you are

(you here used generically) 

Dissociation was explained to me by my VA psydoc when I was dealing with very bad Vietnam related PTSD. Once I knew what it was, at least, it wasn't quite so scary. Still deal with it every day, however.

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On 28/06/2019 at 3:32 AM, spartan max2 said:

Do people really choose to be a believer or disbeliever ?

 

if your life revolves around logic, rational thinking & basic common sense (& in many cases IMO= the bleeding obvious) then there is no question to answer;)

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5 hours ago, Mr Guitar said:

Dissociation was explained to me by my VA psydoc when I was dealing with very bad Vietnam related PTSD. Once I knew what it was, at least, it wasn't quite so scary. Still deal with it every day, however.

Very pleased to hear that.

Yes, living under combat conditions, or other real and constant threat of death, creates  psychological conditions, which our minds then create mechanisms to alleviate or cope with  

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9 hours ago, Mr Guitar said:

Dissociation was explained to me by my VA psydoc when I was dealing with very bad Vietnam related PTSD. Once I knew what it was, at least, it wasn't quite so scary. Still deal with it every day, however.

You guys were our best customers in sporting goods at the Pine Barren Stove Company and taught me a lot of cool things as a kid and my stepdad was a 1st Cav UH-1 pilot and later a Snake Driver. Also half of my Ranger School instructors when I was a CAP cadet were Nam vets. 

The stories I heard were nightmarish compared to what I saw as a Red Cross worker.

You maybe want to talk to @Taun  who also survived that Hell and has some interesting ways to deal with it. 

 

 

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I'd vote that many make a conscious choice. Maybe most. Seems a lot of the atheist and non-religious were raised in religion, so seems they made a choice to go against the grain they were raised toward.

Myself, I was non-religious, and borderline anti-religious as a teenager. I wanted nothing to do with it. Then I was just dismissive in my twenties. Only when I was 29 or 30 did I get curious about religion. Mainly due to having a wide array of friends and those I knew who were religious seemed the happier for it. My non-religious friends, who I still play D&D with (usually as a cleric!!), are less happy, less fulfilled, more looking for something... new job, new car, new vacation... 

So, I tried going to church. I tried singing the songs. Seemed pretty innocent. Lots of nice people. So I decided to sign up. Been with some of those nice people ever since, and met a Whole Lot of other nice people in the mean time. 

One of the better choices I've made in my life... Joining the Army in 1994. Buying my house in the country that I sold for a ton in 2016. Finishing my Bachelor Degree in 1998. Joining Intel in 2005. And becoming a Christian in 1999.

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The real problems I have with people's religious beliefs are the negativity they create with them, including basically being told I'm going to hell no matter what I think, feel, or do. 

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As for life satisfaction, that has more to do with a person's life. I suspect that religious/spiritual people can be equally as content/miserable as non-believers. I think it comes down to expectation+reality. 

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On 6/27/2019 at 9:49 PM, XenoFish said:

During our early childhood, various beliefs are burned into our subconscious. These beliefs act as "background programs" in our minds that help shape us. New beliefs tend to grow from the ideas that were planted, eventually contradictions arises. So a conflict of belief is created, creating inner turmoil. Then a resolution must be met, to either reject or accept a new belief. 

I actually agree with all this.  Imagine, that, XFish :w00t:   My time of struggling with my faith was in my 20's and early 30's.  I was bright enough to see the contradictions but humble enough to realize that I did not have a perfect understanding of the scripture and that such understanding comes in time and is based on belief.  The one exception to this is the fulfillment of prophecy in our time.   Over the past decade or so I've become more and more aware of the events occurring globally and the stage-setting that is too obvious for a believer to ignore or deny.  It has been a little disconcerting to actually see these things that I've studied from the text actually begin moving quickly toward fruition.  

The one truth that I believe is going to become apparent is that no one really understands how all of this is going to unfold.  

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The problem with spiritual/religious beliefs is that they are assumptions, prone to confirmation bias and self fulfilling prophecy. 

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4 hours ago, XenoFish said:

The problem with spiritual/religious beliefs is that they are assumptions, prone to confirmation bias and self fulfilling prophecy. 

Only ones that have prophecy. Tendai Buddhism teaches it's superstitious horse manure. 

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6 minutes ago, Piney said:

Only ones that have prophecy. Tendai Buddhism teaches it's superstitious horse manure. 

Same with magick, which is why I detest all forms of divination. It's just putting unfounded ideas into people's heads. 

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All beliefs can be empowering, bother positive and negative ones. They feed on emotions and confirmation. Often creating self-reinforcing feedback loops. Beliefs are also the subjective lens through which we view ourselves and the world around us. 

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7 minutes ago, XenoFish said:

All beliefs can be empowering, bother positive and negative ones. They feed on emotions and confirmation. Often creating self-reinforcing feedback loops. Beliefs are also the subjective lens through which we view ourselves and the world around us. 

My belief teaches complete respect for the world and never take more than you need or waste. If more people practiced it, it wouldn't be as trashed as it is. 

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Those are good beliefs Piney.   I choose to believe that too :lol:

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20 hours ago, Mr Walker said:

A choice occurs when we have data and can extrapolate many different potential actions. we then subconsciously and consciously ,make  choices (scientists are beginning to understand the learning process in which this occurs which enables us to learn to walk talk etc.) The subconscious is still a rational, logical, processing machine, but it uses a difernt language to make decisions 

Greetings Mr. Walker.  Yes the definition of making choices as jmcr8 has said is seeing options and choosing between them.

IBM's Deep Blue the chess playing computer makes billions of comparisons every second from every game in its memory, including the ones it's opponent has played.  It makes the best "choice" for its next move.  Does that mean Deep Blue has free will?  Or does it run within the parameters of its programming, which includes the ability to learn and modify its programming?

I think you assume we have free will if there are no impediments that we perceive when we exercise choice.  You never run into a wall, so there must not be one.

Is it possible that like a self aware  piece on a chess board  you can posit a universe of moves and their outcomes in any game?  

You can choose any course of action  even if it results in your piece being taken.

The knight or the pawn of the rook says, "Of course I have free will, I can imagine any move  I want and if there is nothing in the way I can actualize it. 

But the universe of moves for the bishop is proscribed by moving diagonally, or the rook in straight lines.  For them, that is the entire conceivable universe. 

So yes, they have the ability to choose, but in the metagame, they are restricted by the very nature that makes them a bishop or a rook or a pawn.

I think you will say that you can see over the walls of these limitations and therefore have some higher degree of determination that constitutes free will.

And I wonder if free will is not just the human machine  being unaware that it too moves on a subtle track that is the very nature of what makes us human.

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On 6/28/2019 at 6:53 PM, Mr Walker said:

A choice occurs when we have data and can extrapolate many different potential actions. we then subconsciously and consciously ,make  choices (scientists are beginning to understand the learning process in which this occurs which enables us to learn to walk talk etc.) The subconscious is still a rational, logical, processing machine, but it uses a difernt language to make decisions 

We always have free will

there is nothing preventing us ether forming an intent, or acting upon an intent 

Will doesnt come into things where we don't know about them or can  not affect them Eg we can't make the sun go out by will but tha t does not make our will unfree  There is nothing to stop us TRYING to exterminate the sun by will power :) We may not be able to know or imagine life on another planet but this does not prevent us thinking about it and making decisions  

There are no other organisms on earth with adult human- level self aware consciousness and thus our free will. All other animals are programmed by biology and social conditioning and are unaware of this. the y have no mental choices  We also have such programming but are aware of it and can circumvent it 

So free will is an evolved property of consciousness which we know occurs at a human level of awareness It will evolve in artificial intelligences, and some other animals are approaching it with an awareness around that of a very young child 

We build the neural networks by the choices we make we can consciously reshape rebuild and renew those networks. The y make life easier  but are not constraints on free choice 

yes. Somewhere the ghost of self awareness evolves in a mind it, Involves the abilty to think in language tha t includes symbolic and abstract thought 

It seems from  observation of primates who have lived closely with humans that some of this can be learned but basically it requires  some physiological and neurological advances in the brain 

Our mind perceives and[processes far more than a bilion bits of data a second. It occurs so fast we aren't even aware of it  yet we control it, and learn to use it to walk and talk

At any nano second in time there are many potential futures and choices There is nothing compelling you to choose any particular one but you can ONLY chose one a t a time  so no each time you could chose differently Only the linear nature of time prevents you making more than one choice. In some theoretical physics this is believed to be the basis for  a multiverse where each alternate action shapes a new world  

I can be sure because i know and understand my own mind and the neuro cognitive processes by which it works  However many others seem  to be less certain  :) 

 

lol "you" are the "i inside" YOU. are the ghost. YOU are in control and you shape your future and that of your world by the decisions you make, It is is a sobering and empowering  responsibility  which many seek to avoid

MW, you are making yet another unsubstantiated claim.

I work for a Neurologist and the facts are 

“...little is understood about how the brain determines and communicates the need to recruit cognitive control, and how such signals instigate the implementation of appropriate performance adjustments” in other words, you don’t know the mechanics behind your own neuro cognitive processes anymore than Neuroscience does. 

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0278262604002866

 

Edited by Sherapy
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