Τρίτη 15 Νοεμβρίου 2011

Free will and the Brain


"...The world is not flat. Before this truth was realized, people used to wonder what happened when you got to the end of the earth-- did you fall off? Once we knew the earth was round, the new perspective, made us see how the old questions were silly. New questions also seem silly many times until a new perspective is accepted. I think we will get over the idea of free will and and accept we are a special kind of machine, one with a moral agency which comes from living in social groups. This perspective will make us ask new kinds of questions..."._

5 σχόλια:

  1. even though an ancient Greek astronomer/mathematitian Eratosthenes measured the circumference of the earth with amazing accuracy (using the shadow of a column and a well [when sun appears at the water of the well it's mid-day]), people in the middle ages kept on believing the earth was flat

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  2. We feel we have free will but we "have to get over the idea that we have no free will" and then we will "understand"? Having your dogmas as a starting point is always too easy...

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  3. @zoomicon Quite right!

    @skakos What is a dogma and how does it differ from an axiom is another interesting conversation! Irrespective of whether it's about dogmas or axioms, you always have to start from somewhere...

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  4. Indeed... And the most important thing of all is to always remember that at any point in time (if that thing exists... hehe), you can go back and start all over again from a new starting point...

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  5. @skakos

    "Can" has two different meanings. You are certainly allowed to. Whether you are able to, is an entirely different matter... And whether you are able to improve on the results given by the current starting point, that is an entirely different matter still.

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