More Christof Koch (Public Post)
Small excerpt of a larger discussion. You'll notice Robert Lawrence Kuhn, of the Closer To Truth series at the head of the table.
I recommend the series highly, it's awesome. I do not however believe this discussion is directly affiliated with the series, I haven't watched the entirety of either yet, but this one clip which the YouTube user "LennyBound" posted hits on a few things that have been coming up lately on YouTube and in LJ.
Anesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff asserts that consciousness is an "irreducable" part of the "fundamental level of space-time geometry". Christof Koch makes a point about finding the neurological correlates for certain components of consciousness, to which Hameroff scoffs and simply dismisses it by saying "you're narrow minded" and then makes a metaphor about "looking for your keys in the lamppost because that's where the light is".
Did this metaphor actually mean anything? He is making the assertion that Christof is looking for consciousness in the neurological correlates because that is what is currently observable, implying that her won't find consciousness there because it's somewhere out in the infinite blackness outside of the lamppost.
Which is something he couldn't possibly know or even stretch the boundaries of philosophy to ASSUME unless he had some way to view out into the infinite blackness that Christof does not have personal access to.
All he's doing is making a broad sweeping assumption based on nothing and then as the infant science of Neurology begins cracking the code of consciousness he simply scoffs and criticizes it and its proponents for being narrow minded, all the while he is focused on the idea that his personal method of guessing and asserting and is closed to the new "lens" of investigation that is neuroscience, one which MAY "bear the fruit of knowledge" in discovering the real nature of consciousness.
This is the worst type of closed minded. Instead of sticking to a theory which you believe has more proof than the other theory, he sticks to a baseless assumption and asserts that the other side can't possibly be right, and offers no argument either in favor of his own hypothesis or against the opposing hypothesis, even as it forms a more coherent and testable theory than his own.
This mindset has been the cause of every scientific atrocity ever used to accuse science of wrongdoing. Every time someone uses science to sew twins together or give people with darker skin syphilis it is because of a mindset that supports their notion that they ought to do something and any tool available is used.
That wouldn't make ritual evil, as the Christians say, if it were used to harm. It would make the people who used it evil.
What makes me say that ritual is not useful is that it is, at best, an effective emotional crutch, which at times can help a person walk towards his goals, but does not do the things actually claimed. It is a placebo. Placebos can work, but like Homeopathy, their ability to heal is not at all connected to the claims made as to HOW they heal.
I recommend the series highly, it's awesome. I do not however believe this discussion is directly affiliated with the series, I haven't watched the entirety of either yet, but this one clip which the YouTube user "LennyBound" posted hits on a few things that have been coming up lately on YouTube and in LJ.
Click to viewAnesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff asserts that consciousness is an "irreducable" part of the "fundamental level of space-time geometry". Christof Koch makes a point about finding the neurological correlates for certain components of consciousness, to which Hameroff scoffs and simply dismisses it by saying "you're narrow minded" and then makes a metaphor about "looking for your keys in the lamppost because that's where the light is".
Did this metaphor actually mean anything? He is making the assertion that Christof is looking for consciousness in the neurological correlates because that is what is currently observable, implying that her won't find consciousness there because it's somewhere out in the infinite blackness outside of the lamppost.
Which is something he couldn't possibly know or even stretch the boundaries of philosophy to ASSUME unless he had some way to view out into the infinite blackness that Christof does not have personal access to.
All he's doing is making a broad sweeping assumption based on nothing and then as the infant science of Neurology begins cracking the code of consciousness he simply scoffs and criticizes it and its proponents for being narrow minded, all the while he is focused on the idea that his personal method of guessing and asserting and is closed to the new "lens" of investigation that is neuroscience, one which MAY "bear the fruit of knowledge" in discovering the real nature of consciousness.
This is the worst type of closed minded. Instead of sticking to a theory which you believe has more proof than the other theory, he sticks to a baseless assumption and asserts that the other side can't possibly be right, and offers no argument either in favor of his own hypothesis or against the opposing hypothesis, even as it forms a more coherent and testable theory than his own.
This mindset has been the cause of every scientific atrocity ever used to accuse science of wrongdoing. Every time someone uses science to sew twins together or give people with darker skin syphilis it is because of a mindset that supports their notion that they ought to do something and any tool available is used.
That wouldn't make ritual evil, as the Christians say, if it were used to harm. It would make the people who used it evil.
What makes me say that ritual is not useful is that it is, at best, an effective emotional crutch, which at times can help a person walk towards his goals, but does not do the things actually claimed. It is a placebo. Placebos can work, but like Homeopathy, their ability to heal is not at all connected to the claims made as to HOW they heal.