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> This implication would be correct. Hormones and other chemical messengers heavily influence brain "states" such as moods. The brain learns to make decisions t

> This implication would be correct. Hormones and other chemical messengers heavily influence brain "states" such as moods. The brain learns to make decisions that maintain homeostasis through the development of somatic markers, which represent body states that are composed of nerve and chemical activity. Even nerve impulses themselves are initiated by chemicals. And of course the structure of your brain and body are dictated by, you guessed it, chemicals. (Specifically deoxyribonucleic acid.) This is dualism. Not as naive as cartesian dualism, but dualism nonetheless. The brain is electrochemical activity. There is no factorization of this system into brain states and chemicals that act of them, nor any other such factorization such as binning hormones into such states and describing neuron depolarization as acting on these states. So, for example, moods are not separate from hormonal activity in the brain. The brain is only controlled by chemicals in the sense that it is chemicals. There is no reason why chemicals cannot exhibit what we call choice. In fact, they do. Saying that a brain makes a choice is the same as saying chemicals make a choice. If you say that chemicals control the brain, well, then I'll say that the brain controls the chemicals. > "Choice" is a powerful illusion driven by our hypercompetent rationalizing system, whose purpose is to hide our true intentions in order to help us better operate in a social world. In the end, we are just elaborate stimulus-response systems, that is unless you believe in a "soul" or pseudoscientific quantum magic. This is the same dualism. Saying that a brain is an elaborate stimulus-response system doesn't say anything about what choice is, because now we can just ask how an "elaborate stimulus-response system" exhibits choice. There is no separation between "hypercompetent rationalizing system" and "true intentions". These splits don't make sense in such a non-linear, self-interacting system. Choice is only an illusion if you call a brain's ability to represent itself (imperfectly of course) an illusion, but what does that mean? Brains clearly encode representations of themselves and this gives rise to the incredible complexity of their behaviors. That is an indisputable physical phenomenon. External to a brain, you can describe it with the laws of physics and a large scratch pad to do calculations (take your time it'll be a while). But crucial to what a brain is is that there is an internal point of view, the one of the brain's own dynamics. That point of view has many properties, such as emotion, and choice and all other sorts of phenomena. Yes, this point of view reduces to physics and chemistry, but it also arises from physics and chemistry. In particular the reduction one can infer from the laws of physics is essentially out of reach. It is computationally and logically intractable; one is forced to resort to qualitative descriptions in order to say anything useful, and one starts arriving at concepts like... choice. When someone makes a point about psychology and uses the hypothetical reduction to chemistry as a premise, usually they're going to say something trivial or even false.

iamnothere 9y ago
The concept of "choice" as most people use it when describing consciousness tends to be synonymous with so-called "free will," and it is a metaphysical concept rather than a descriptive one. It implies the existence of some kind of non-physical "choosing" mechanism that is unbound by the law of physics. I have no problem with the concept of choice as you have expressed it, as shorthand for an immensely complex set of processes. This is similar what I was referring to when I mentioned "moods" and "states." I do realize that brain processes can't be accurately represented by fuzzy concepts such as these, but they are occasionally useful for discussion. > The brain is electrochemical activity. There is no factorization of this system into brain states and chemicals that act of them, nor any other such factorization such as binning hormones into such states and describing neuron depolarization as acting on these states. At a macro level, a higher than normal quantity of cannabinoids will cause the brain to act differently, with certain predictable characteristics. You could even give it a name as shorthand: "stoned." At a micro level, you could describe the effects of the chemicals on receptors. In between, you can talk about the effects on various brain structures and how that affects behavior. That's what I'm getting at.

iamnothere 9y ago

The concept of "choice" as most people use it when describing consciousness tends to be synonymous with so-called "free will," and it is a metaphysical concept rather than a descriptive one. It implies the existence of some kind of non-physical "choosing" mechanism that is unbound by the law of physics. I have no problem with the concept of choice as you have expressed it, as shorthand for an immensely complex set of processes. This is similar what I was referring to when I mentioned "moods" and "states." I do realize that brain processes can't be accurately represented by fuzzy concepts such as these, but they are occasionally useful for discussion. > The brain is electrochemical activity. There is no factorization of this system into brain states and chemicals that act of them, nor any other such factorization such as binning hormones into such states and describing neuron depolarization as acting on these states. At a macro level, a higher than normal quantity of cannabinoids will cause the brain to act differently, with certain predictable characteristics. You could even give it a name as shorthand: "stoned." At a micro level, you could describe the effects of the chemicals on receptors. In between, you can talk about the effects on various brain structures and how that affects behavior. That's what I'm getting at.