Physicalist Arguments Debunked: Irreducible Mind (Part 3)

Do the Libet Experiments support the belief the brain creates consciousness? How about split-brain patients or brain damage? We address all that and more in this video.

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Sources:

The Blackwell Companion to Substance Dualism – Jonathan J. Loose, Angus J. L. Menuge, J. P. Moreland

More Than Matter – Keith Ward

Human Immortality: Two Supposed Objections to the Doctrine – William James

Functional correlates of musical and visual ability in frontotemporal dementia:

Emergence of artistic talent in frontotemporal dementia:

The savant syndrome: An extraordinary condition:

The Idea of the World – Bernardo Kastrup

Holotropic Breathwork: The Potential Role of a Prolonged, Voluntary Hyperventilation Procedure as an Adjunct to Psychotherapy:

Does Consciousness Disappear in Dreamless Sleep:

Consciousness lost and found: subjective experiences in an unresponsive state:

Acceleration-induced loss of consciousness. A review of 500 episodes:

Mind, Brains, and Science – John Searle

Irreducible Mind – Edward Kelly & Emily Kelly

Reconstructing Visual Experiences from Brain Activity Evoked by Natural Movies:

Reconstructing imagined letters from early visual cortex reveals tight topographic correspondence between visual mental imagery and perception:

Barking up the wrong free: readiness potentials reflect processes independent of conscious will:

Neural precursors of decisions that matter––an ERP study of deliberate and arbitrary choice:

Brain preparation before a voluntary
action: Evidence against unconscious movement initiation:

Does the Brain ‘Initiate’ Freely
Willed Processes? A Philosophy of Science Critique of Libet-type Experiments
and Their Interpretation:

Brain signals do not demonstrate
unconscious decision making:

Analysis of a choice-reaction task yields a new interpretation of Libet's experiments:

Do the models offer testable proposals of brain functions for conscious experience?

The Point of No Return in Vetoing Self-Initiated Movements:

The Mind and the Brain – Jeffery Schwartz & Sharon Begley

Systematic Changes in Cerebral Glucose
Metabolic Rate After Successful Behavior Modification Treatment of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder:

Movement Intention After Parietal Cortex Stimulation in Humans:

Mystery of the Mind – Wilder Penfield

Sequential Operation of Disconnected Cerebral Hemispheres in Split-Brain
Patients:

The Psychology of Attention – Harold Pashler

Visual integration in the split brain:

Bilateral visual cross-integration by human forebrain commissurotomy subjects:

A view of the world from a
split-brain perspective – D. W. Zaidel

Explaining Consciousness: The Hard Problem – Jonathan Shear

[robertbalassan]

this documentary is like a dream coming true for a person so addicted to the materialist thinking but willing to change that, and that because it makes a lot more sense than anything else i believed so far. amazing work!

[killingtime]

Such a great video Mike! The presentation is so good, the slower pace and super low volume one the music, makes it easy to focus on the information being presented. The topics you tackle are so deep that one cannot afford unnecessary distractions. Still the presentation isn’t dry at all. All your hard work really shows, great work man. 🙂

[DanielApologetics]

Watched at 01:00 AM in the night after a hard day - WORTH IT!

[krnz]

This series needs to be watched by everyone. In fact, I wish we had something like this taught in school so that we can all understand how it all works at an early age.

[ConsciousnessMatters]

I think your use of the word soul might throw off some skeptics a little, but damn, that was a really interesting video. I learnt new things about split brain patients that I didn't know before! Thank you. Love the work.

[quantumcognition]

In split brain patients, although the corpus callosum is severed, the lower brain regions are still connected.

[islandonlinenews]

I’ve actually gone to sleep before without losing consciousness, just faded right into a dream world. It’s like being neo in the matrix.

[ToxicallyMasculinelol]

This is such a great series. I'm so glad this stuff is being published. It feels like we're in the midst of a revolution, a kind of renaissance and rediscovery of the wisdom of the ancients. I thought I'd add another counterargument against physicalism: even if you fall asleep or are under anesthesia and you don't have any dreams, that doesn't necessarily mean you lose consciousness. It may just mean your mind is disconnected from all known physical inputs and outputs.

Maybe this is a language problem. We use the word "unconscious" to describe a state of non-responsiveness in animals. But this isn't the same thing as "consciousness" in the context of the substance consciousness, or in the context of the hard problem of consciousness. It could be the case that your conscious mind is always completely operative throughout your entire life (and perhaps after and even before your life), it's just periodically detached from all physical inputs and outputs.

I'll use an analogy. What happens to your computer when you unplug the monitor, the keyboard, and the mouse? Is your computer "asleep"? Is it "off"? Is it "dead"? Or is it simply detached from all inputs and outputs? The processor is still running, and in the case of modern operating systems, it's performing all sorts of calculations all the time, moving stuff in and out of memory. Those operations are just not having an effect on the computer's "physical" outputs, and they're not being influenced by any of the computer's "physical" inputs. Likewise, when I'm asleep and not dreaming, my mind could still be performing all sorts of conscious activities, without dumping them into my memory and without accepting any sensory input.

Moreover, we have to make an ontological decision about what it would mean for the brain to stop performing operations. What happens to your computer's processor when it stops performing operations? There's a difference between a completely idle state and a state in which all electrical input has ceased. With respect to the mind, even in a physicalist model we can't say that consciousness really stops under anesthesia, only that it is idle. In the physicalist model, it only stops when all electrical activity has stopped. But in the dualist model, is it even possible for consciousness to stop?

The dualist mind does not rely on anything for its existence except the ground of all existence, that is, God. Like, turning off consciousness would essentially mean deleting its very metaphysical basis. But that would make "turning off consciousness" equivalent to "deleting the concept of the number 1" or "deleting the concept of a square" or something. If consciousness, the substance, is analogous to a Platonic primitive, then it's not something that stops and starts at all, let alone something contingent on a physical state of affairs. It's basically an eternal soul that could only conceivably be deleted by God.

It's one of many reasons I have come around on this subject. I used to be a materialist. I spent too much time studying biochemistry and grew arrogant. I kinda bought into the general disdain for philosophy in the natural sciences. Ironically, it was the historical evidence for the Resurrection that really opened my mind. I had to accept that it happened, and if it happened, then clearly materialism can't be correct. So I needed to reevaluate everything I believed for my first 27 years of life. I erroneously believed that the other natural sciences (the ones beyond my area of expertise) and even philosophy supported the materialist worldview or at least made religious claims impossible or highly suspect.

Christianity in particular has been destabilized a few times by scientific findings, but not really due to the religion itself becoming implausible or being found inconsistent with reality. St. Augustine anticipated a lot of this - the possibility for people to read scripture and lean towards a particular interpretation, even though many are possible, and then develop a whole story around that interpretation. For example, the Bible doesn't advance a cosmological model, but it's easy to extrapolate a primitive geocentric model from the Bible. So, when lots of religious people believe something they've extrapolated from scripture, and science proves it wrong, it comes across like science has proved religion wrong.

That has happened dramatically a few times in the history of Christendom, and it has dramatically influenced western thought. So, I erroneously believed that Christianity itself makes historical claims that can't possibly be true, makes claims about the planet and the origin of humans that are totally incompatible with consensus in the natural sciences, and even makes philosophical claims that have been discredited by modern philosophers. And it was easy to believe that for so long because American fundamentalists do such a good job of embarrassing the faith. St. Augustine was so right, seeing men of faith desperately and idiotically defend false ideas against empirical evidence is really scandalous and discredits the religion as a whole, even though it shouldn't.

I was lucky to be introduced to Catholic thought in very short order after stumbling on the evidence for the Resurrection. So it didn't take me long to find out that what American fundamentalists believe is a consequence of bad exegesis, a bad understanding of the cultural contexts and origins of the scriptures, and probably political and cultural biases informing religious expression (for example, populism and anti-elitism yielding motivated skepticism of the sciences).

And it's so helpful that the internet can connect us to video series like this which show that not only is Christianity not implausible or inconsistent with empirical evidence, it's actually one of the only ways to make sense of a lot of unassailable evidence from many disciplines. Whatever the truth is, we need something beyond the physical to explain the only thing we know exists for certain — ourselves. With other philosophical proofs (like Plantinga's and William Lane Craig's) we can make a perfectly reasonable assumption that God exists, and that he has the attributes traditionally attributed to him. With that assumption, we can finally make sense of the historical data of the Resurrection and the miraculous survival of the Israelites throughout history.

There just aren't a whole lot of other plausible theses that make sense of all of this. At the very least, my old atheist/materialist/secular humanist worldview could not make sense of even a small bit of it. Which is why I got so sucked into this, piece by piece I became obsessed with the mystery of how all this happened. It started as just an interesting novelty, a mystery to solve with deductive reasoning and a presumption that all could be explained as a natural sequence of events. But pretty soon I was basically an agnostic who admitted that the mind is totally inexplicable without the supernatural, and that Christ rose from the dead, performed miracles, claimed to be God, and otherwise manipulated the laws of nature. Then I was an agnostic who also admitted that God is the most plausible explanation for reality itself. Then an agnostic who admitted that several events in history seem best explained by God's activity.

So it wasn't much of a leap to finally just assenting and acknowledging that God is the best explanation for everything _because_ God is the source and seat and mover of everything, the one holding it all up. In that view, miracles aren't strange at all. They're not momentary violations of the laws of nature, because the laws of nature are merely _post hoc_ models for describing the way things usually behave, and "the way things behave" is just another word for the style of God's art. Miracles are not violations of the laws of nature because they're not breaks from God's style, they're flourishes layered on top. They're actually characteristic of God's style, even if they "stand out" from the rest of the piece.

Art is not homogeneous or isotropic; not the same everywhere you look. The presumption that the universe should be, on the basis of the isotropy and non-relativity of the laws of physics, is basically spurious. If the universe is a painting, then the non-relative physical laws only describe the background color of the universe. They clearly don't describe the ineffable, liminal, paradoxical, orderly chaos of the human mind; so why should they describe all the actions of God? It all seems to fit together when you think of God as a being that holds all of reality (and not just the universe but all metaphysical beings) in existence. The mysterious, non-physical nature of the mind helps to show that miracles are something we should expect, even though we should be somewhat skeptical of miraculous claims, purely due to the human tendency to lie or be deceived.

[generalscheisskopf]

Well presented and thoughtful. I've found a new favorite channel; only regret is I clicked on Part 3 first. Will definitely go back and watch the others.

[טמוציןבורגיגין]

We've been learning about the brain in school and indoctrinated physicalism... I'm so glad to have this playlist to help my faith. Thank you!!

[willyh.r.]

The theory is very appealing and I look forward to watching several debates around it. Thank you for the high level presentation. Personally, I'm interested in getting closer to truth on anything.

[superdog]

IP:
4:30 - 5:17
"Substance dualist and philosopher JP Moreland explains this connection with an analogy of a CD. There is no music in the CD, there are only pits. CDs also do not create music. However, if the configurations on a CD are placed into the right retrieval system, music can be played. If the CD is damaged, the CD player can no longer properly read the configurations and play the music."

Me
1. I always liked the CD-music analogy but it's obviously so flawed it's irrelevant. Music from CDs is a well-understood physical phenomenon in which differences in light waves bouncing off the CD pits are translated into specific electrical currents that cause changes in air pressures that stimulate the eardrum to cause the emergence of music qualia in our consciousness. At no point in the pathway from CD to music production does the physicalist encounter a problem. To try to analogize consciousness to music and the brain like a CD is irrelevant because music is a well-understood physical phenomenon and it just brings you back to the primary question of if the physical causes the mental. In the case of music, it's obvious that the CD and player (physical) causes the music (physical), so there's nothing there for the substance dualist or idealist to latch onto.

IP:
"Likewise, the mind can read pathways in the brain to access stored information in the brain to access stored information in the soul, but if those pathways are changed or damaged, the underlying information the brain received and stored will no longer be available, or could be read in an altered way."

Me
2. There's definitely absolutely no evidence for this claim whatsoever, and the claim could be false even if some variation of substance dualism were true. It's possible that "the mind" actually reads something called "the mind 2", and that "the mind 2" reads the brain. It's possible that we have two brains, one in our body ("brain 1"), and another quantum-linked somewhere else in the universe ("brain 2") that instantly and simultaneously changes when our bodily brains change, and that "the mind" reads "brain 2". There's just no evidence for that, as there's no evidence for the above claim. It's just a hypothetical suggestion that this is how the "non-physical mind" works. Possible? Sure. Lots of things are possible. There's no evidence - there's not a single substance dualist out there who can say a single word about how this supposed process allegedly works. It's just a bald assertion.

IP
5:21
"We can thus say that minds read or interpret the configuration of neurons which store information that the brain has received from its environment. They may then influence this configuration by thoughts and further experience. The configuration is stored in the brain as a symphony is stored on a CD."

Me:
3. Again, there is no evidence this is the case - substance dualists can say absolutely *nothing* whatsoever about the "substance" they are proposing, other than to baldly assert that "it influences the brain". That's not an explanation; it's a bald assertion.

4. The CD analogy is really quite funny to me because it actually supports the physicalist view. Physicalists would say that the brain makes the mind (one-way). Dualists say that the brain makes the mind and the mind makes the brain. A CD and music absolutely does not work like this: it's the opposite. A CD makes the music, and it's always one-way.

[azurephoenix]

You could "debunk" pretty much the entire arguing from brain damage argument just by looking at cases of global brain damage that should result in a permanent vegetative state that ends up having only minor physical or cognitive detriment, of which there are myriad. Then, you could go further by listing the amount of people born prematurely who do not experience fetal amnesia, despite having all necessary physical development that should ensure that.
while the second group is obviously much smaller, the matter still holds that physicality of the brain is not a determinate of capabilities or functionality or cognition.
One of the biggest problems in neuroscience research seems to be the idea that we know more about the brain than we actually do.

[kerryburns]

I agree with Max Planck, that physical matter is derivative of consciousness, in other words consciousness creates matter, not the other way round.
This can be a difficult concept until you realise that no physical matter is actually solid, but composed simply of energy.
So consciousness is fundamental, and is innate in all matter, and indeed all matter is sentient to the level required for its role.
This may be anathema to some, but right or wrong if accepted it engenders a new respect for the world we live in once the implications are understood.
If, for example, you regard consciousness as the Creator in a religious sense, then for you everything in the world is sacred.
Not a bad mindset.
This scientific approach fails because our science is based on what we perceive with our five senses, and so our understanding is necessarily limited to physical matter.
Science gives us technology, which gives us the microscope and telescope, but it understands little about the being who looks through them.

[kennydawson]

Great video, I had been wondering about many of these objections myself and I think you explained them very well.

[garyh]

No atheist can argue against the reality of non-material things without using non-material things. It's like someone arguing that there's no such thing as oxygen, while breathing the whole time. It's almost like arguing that there's no such thing as arguing! For when a materialist argues that only the material realm is real, that only material things exist, he cannot do that without using immaterial things. For example, like Einstein said, ideas are not physical. It turns out to be so simple, to disprove the claim that only the physical realm exists .

Non-Material Things List: - Numbers are not physical. - Math is not physical. - Information is not physical. - Grammar is not physical. - Logic is not physical. - Reason is not physical. - Ideas are not physical. - Science is not physical. - Concepts are not physical. - Morality is not physical. - Truth is not physical. - Souls are not physical. - Spirits are not physical. - Codes are not physical. - The square root of negative one is not physical. Knowing where the truth leads, some atheists are afraid to acknowledge that numbers are not physical. In their fear, they throw a temper tantrum and insist that numbers, such as the number 3, are made of matter. One wonders what they'd think about the number googol, which is 1 followed by a hundred zeroes, a quantity greater than the number of particles in the known universe. For that matter, exponentially, they should be able to realize that a googolplex, 10 to the googol power, also cannot be made of matter because there too that much matter doesn't exist. And next we could ask the same atheist, "Are imaginary numbers, such as the square root of negative one, physical?" An imaginary number is a concept and as such, obviously, and like all concepts and all numbers, it is not made of matter. Yet scientists use imaginary numbers to better understand electric circuits and quantum mechanics. A strictly materialist big-bang universe though would be incapable of using an imaginary number, because imaginary numbers are not physical. Therefore, the square root of negative one reveals the intellect of the Creator! When He designed the function of quantum mechanics, like our own designers, He conceived of and implemented optimal designs using an immaterial concept that has no parallel in the physical realm. See more including what Wigner and Einstein thought about such things, at rsr.org/math#sq-rt-neg-one. - Infinity is not physical. Yet it is real. Don't believe us? Then believe Vsauce... - Consciousness is not physical. The best an atheist can make of a physical explanation for consciousness comes from one of the world's leading mathematical physicists, Roger Penrose, who wrote of the brain that it somehow has harnessed, "details of a physics that is yet unknown to human physicists." Other atheists including Daniel Dennett and Jerry Coyne argue that consciousness is an illusion.

[guadalupealvarez]

Omg finally something else that came up on top on YouTube and not thoses political ads, I was so tired of seeing those policies ads on top but now you came along some how and that's why I'm commenting on here

[danharte]

Great work IP, these videos are extremely valuable.
I'd also like to add that physical trauma to the brain can very well cause emotional distress to the sufferer that can also affect behaviour and frames of mind in a similar way to PTSD.
Even a tooth ache can affect people's moods.

[zecka]

I'm new to this channel, i'm still trying to catch up with all your videos, and all ready i wish i was half as smart as you. You have the answers i need for my agnostic friend.

[MySpace]

Consciousness has nothing to do with brain,
Consciousness is part of the soul that gives life to the body,
in death the soul leaves the body, and so does consciousness.