Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

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Empiricist-Bruno
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Empiricist-Bruno »

Fooloso4 wrote:Your heart cannot do what you do.
I live, my heart cannot live? I pump blood within the body parts of my body. I am my heart, my heart's body is his body. You have a disconnected view of yourself. You are simply not there and so, you really have nothing to say, in my opinion.
Fooloso4 wrote:
Or, you have indeed conscience but your cells don't; that to me is just another way of saying that you are not your cells.
What I am saying that my cells, taken individually as well as at the level of my organs are not me. Someone who has had an organ transplant does not become someone else.
What if that organ happens to be the brain? I understand such organ transplants are beyond our doctors' abilities but when they eventually manage to pull that one off, what are you going to say, then? You are not your organ's except for your brain? I think therefore I am? I am Homo Sapiens the brain guy and therefore my identity lies within my brain or brain cells? You identify yourself to the managing organ because you think of yourself as a manager? This is the kind of elitist identity which I suspect of being affected by societal cancer.
Fooloso4 wrote: Taken together, as a living, functioning whole, I am my cells.
Please explain how this does not contradicts what you've just mentioned, that your organs are not you. How can you be your cells without your organs being you?
Fooloso4 wrote: Analogously, a gear or a spring is not a watch and a pile of gears and springs is not a watch. It is only when all the gears and springs and other parts are organized in the right way that together they are a watch.
So, only a watch in good working order is a watch? If my watch is broken or in parts, it is something else? There is no such thing as a watch in parts?
Fooloso4 wrote:
To say that you aren't your cells is consistent with saying that a house isn't bricks. In my opinion, it is out of touch with what I consider to be reality.
If you go to the store and buy a brick you have not purchased a house. You might even buy enough bricks to make a house, but you still have not purchased a house. To build a house the bricks need to be organized in some way, but not every organization of bricks make a house. A brick walkway requires the bricks be organized but this particular organization of bricks is not a house.
One of the things that can be said about bricks is that they are many things. To someone who has in mind to build a house and who sees your brick walkway, it isn't the brick walkway that he sees when looking at your brick walkway but the bricks of the house that he has in mind to build. He sees his house in in your brick walkway and so it is, at least to him.
Fooloso4 wrote:
A house can be nothing more than a pile of bricks. In some circumstances, that may be all you have and you'll be happy you have your house. A house can be many things.
Well, you can sit on a pile of bricks and call it home, but I suspect that sooner or later you will begin to organize the bricks so that you can get inside the pile and they do not fall on top of you. At that point they are no longer simply a pile of bricks but bricks that have been arranged into a structure. It is the structure and not the materials alone that make a house.
A house can be many things and often is many things. Among the other things that can make a house, certainly structure can be included. Did I ever say that only the materials alone made a house? Even individual bricks are made with structure or design.
Fooloso4 wrote:
I would believe it's the same for an organism.
There are many different organisms but all are, by definition organized. Note the two words have the same root. A pile of cells simply cannot do what an organism does. This is not just my opinion, it is a basic biological fact. If you could get people to donate cells to you or even organs and put them together in a bucket you will not end up with a human being . But unlike building a house or a watch, even if you had all the parts you needed and arranged them in the proper order you would not end up with a living human being.
Human beings arrange themselves don't they? I mean, you or me, when we were developing fetuses, we arranged our body parts as we grows. Quite obviously, we do not do this consciously or deliberately but we do it. If we were to deny that it is us that do this growth and arrangement in our bodies, there would be no basis in us claiming that our bodies belong to us. I understand that some of us (affected by societal cancer) reject such concept of themselves because it is all natural and cancer rejects all nature but its own.
Fooloso4 wrote:
But who are we to over ride our programming if we are biologically programmed? Aren't we then programmed to over ride our programming?
This is what culture is all about.
Culture is the program that makes us over ride our programming? Wow!
Fooloso4 wrote:
But then what is the embryo of a woman immediately after fertilization if it isn't both a human cell and unicellular?
It is for a brief period of time a single cell but this does not make it a unicellular. A unicellular organism remains a single cell.
I was not making the point that an embryo immediately after fertilization was a unicellular organism. How could you think that I was making that point? I was making the point that a complete human being is a single cell at one point in his/her life. I understand that this young human being is not yet a person. You seem to reject identifying yourself with certain stages of your existence. In my opinion, societal cancer has its roots in such a view: you are out of touch with the full extent of your existence. It's as if you became a person the day that you understood and accepted capitalism?
Fooloso4 wrote:
Lot's of people who oppose abortions for instance believe that there is a person in that little mass of cells called a human embryo. You obviously don't.
You jumped from blood cells to embryos. Giving blood is not like having an abortion. Plenty of people who give blood are opposed to abortion.
Yea, right, when you give blood, your cells continue to live elsewhere whereas in an abortion, they die. Do I get this right?
Fooloso4 wrote:
In every human cell, a person can be extracted.
It is simply false that there is a person to be extracted from every human cell. The genetic information present in a cell is not a person. That information can be used to clone a person, but cloning is not extracting a person.
The word extracting can be used in a variety of ways. I do understand that with some definition of the word, it is wrong to say what I have claimed but with other definitions, I think what I have said is true and reasonable.
Fooloso4 wrote:
How can you think that you, yourself, can have an intent without a cell in your body having that intent?
Something can be present in the whole of a system that is not present in any of the parts. For example, the prevailing explanation for how anesthesia works is that it disrupts the communication between neurons. When the neurons cannot communicate we lose consciousness. Consciousness does not reside in any of the cells. It is only when there is adequate communication between them that we are conscious. In the same way, intent is not present at the cellular level. It is only when a sufficiently well-organized organism is functioning as a whole that there can be intent.
If something can be present in the whole of a system that is not present in any of the parts, it simply means that the whole of the system is not made of its parts. That sure sounds potentially cancerous to me.

When neurons cannot communicate, neurons lose consciousness? Nice. When neurons can communicate adequately between them, they become conscious. That is just another way of re-wording the prevailing explanation for how anesthesia works. There is nothing wrong with this re-wording other than it doesn't work well anymore to support the point you were trying to make.

I see nothing in what you say that appears to contradict my contention in the opening post. All I see is a sort of confirmation that you are affected by societal cancer, a disease whose existence I claim is real and affects society as a whole, just as a neurosis can affect a person without making any individual cell in that person appear to look ill from an individual cell's own health perspective.
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Fooloso4 »

Empiricist-Bruno:

I live, my heart cannot live?
Your heart is a part of a whole. The heart only functions as part of the whole body. The whole is capable of things the parts are not capable of.Your heart cannot operate a computer or contribute to this discussion.
I am my heart
If you had a heart transplant would you no longer be you? Who would you be? The person who donated the heart? Who would you be if you had an artificial heart?
You have a disconnected view of yourself.
No, just the oppose. I am the whole of the parts functioning together. Saying you are your heart would be a disconnected view. Why your heart and not your liver or your spleen?
What if that organ happens to be the brain?
That is an interesting question. I do not have a satisfactory answer. I suspect that with a brain transplant I would no longer be me. I am, however, more than a brain in a container of meat and bone.
Please explain how this does not contradicts what you've just mentioned, that your organs are not you. How can you be your cells without your organs being you?
A whole is not any of the parts. When a person dies all the parts may still be present, and so, a living person is more than the whole of the parts. My organs, like my cells, are part of the whole which is me. My organs are organizations of cells. All of my cells, which includes my organs, when functioning together, are me. There is no one individual cell or one individual organ which is me.
So, only a watch in good working order is a watch?
Properly organized and properly functioning are not the same.
If my watch is broken or in parts, it is something else?
Two different questions. A broken watch is a broken watch, the parts are not a watch, they are the parts of a watch.
There is no such thing as a watch in parts?
Of course there is. That is the point. They have to be put together in the right way to have a watch, by themselves they are only the parts of a watch. We are talking about the difference between a whole and its parts. If you brought your watch in to have it fixed and they gave you another watch you might be upset, since it is not your watch. If they replaced a gear, however, it would still be your watch. (This raises the famous problem of the ship of Theseus. If the parts are replaced one by one and all the parts are eventually replaced is it the same ship?)

When we are talking about a living being, however, a person in parts is not like a watch in parts. We cannot put all the parts of a person back together to make a working person in the way we can put the pieces of a watch back together.
One of the things that can be said about bricks is that they are many things. To someone who has in mind to build a house …
You seem to finally be coming around. The bricks are not the house, but the bricks can be used to build a house. Building a house requires an organization of the materials.
Did I ever say that only the materials alone made a house?
You said:
A house can be nothing more than a pile of bricks.
But let’s not lose sight of the main argument. We are talking about cells. You attributed consciousness and intention to cells based on the argument that they must have these attributes if a person does. My point was that there are things present in the whole of something that are not present in the parts. A pile of cells will not become a conscious being.
Even individual bricks are made with structure or design.
Right, and as with cells, that structure itself is not sufficient in the case of bricks to create a house or in the case of cells to create a conscious being. Both require additional levels of organization. And in the case of cells, it is only at this higher level of organization that consciousness emerges.
Human beings arrange themselves don't they? I mean, you or me, when we were developing fetuses, we arranged our body parts as we grows. Quite obviously, we do not do this consciously or deliberately but we do it.
Again, you seem to finally be coming around. The cells do not do this consciously or deliberately. They are incapable of consciousness or deliberation. That is what I have been saying. You accused me of all sorts of terrible things for denying that the cells were capable of consciousness and deliberation. Now you are claiming that it is quite obvious that they do not act with consciousness or deliberation.
Culture is the program that makes us over ride our programming?
I did not say culture was a program. It will take us too far off topic to explain why thinking of culture as a program is misguided.
I was making the point that a complete human being is a single cell at one point in his/her life.
A zygote is not a complete human being. A zygote is not viable. It is in the process of becoming a complete human being. Many months of development are necessary before you have a complete human being. That is not to say that it is not human but rather only that is is not a complete human being.
You seem to reject identifying yourself with certain stages of your existence.
On what basis do you think I seem to reject this?
It's as if you became a person the day that you understood and accepted capitalism?
Where did I say this? Where did I specify when a person begins? Where did tie anything we have been discussing with capitalism?
If something can be present in the whole of a system that is not present in any of the parts, it simply means that the whole of the system is not made of its parts.
No, it means that a system is more than a sum of its parts. A cake is not present in its ingredients. Keeping time is not present in any of the parts of a watch. Consciousness is not present in any of the cells. It is only when the cells interact is highly complex ways that consciousness is present.
When neurons cannot communicate, neurons lose consciousness?
No. The neurons do not lose consciousness, they are not conscious in the first place. What I said was: “Consciousness does not reside in any of the cells.” It is the organism as a whole that loses consciousness when the neurons do not interact as they normally do.
When neurons can communicate adequately between them, they become conscious.
No. The neurons do not become conscious. The organism, the human being, the dog, or whatever sufficiently well-organized animal is conscious when its neurons communicate adequately and loses consciousness when that communication is disrupted.
That is just another way of re-wording the prevailing explanation for how anesthesia works.
The prevailing theory says nothing about the neurons being conscious.
There is nothing wrong with this re-wording
There is a lot wrong with it. It completely misses the point. Neurons are not conscious.
I see nothing in what you say that appears to contradict my contention in the opening post.
Well, I tried. You have consistently misunderstood and misrepresented what I have said. I think it best that I say nothing more.
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Sy Borg »

As a matter of interest, there are interesting examples of heart transplant patients gaining traits and tastes of donors, but fundamental personality and sense of self remains the same. The effects has been noted in other organ transplants too, but less prevalent. This points to Foolos's observations that we are an integrated whole.

There are some fractal relationships between parts and wholes, because every smaller entity of a system is itself a system of smaller entities, so there is some equivalence but obviously not complete correlation.
The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated—Gandhi.
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Empiricist-Bruno »

I must admit that after this latest reply of yours, I do give up on thinking that you are an evil person and that this is why you ignore societal cancer. There are apparently other reasons why someone might do this. Maybe being evil would just be the main reason. I don't think it is the case with you, and I feel pretty sure of that now.
Fooloso4 wrote:
Empiricist-Bruno:

I live, my heart cannot live?
Your heart is a part of a whole. The heart only functions as part of the whole body.
What if the guy is missing an arm? Does the heart stops functioning then? What is the whole body? What part of the body is essential to the whole body's integrity? The heart isn't?
Fooloso4 wrote: The whole is capable of things the parts are not capable of.Your heart cannot operate a computer or contribute to this discussion.
(This sounds like the chorus of your "whole" argument. It appears that your chorus is not just a favorite song of yours, it has become your maxim. You seem to have a prejudice against other views in this matter.)

The whole is the sum of the parts by definition and so, if all the parts form the whole then what either all the thing's parts or the whole thing can do has to be the exact same. But then you say, no? A whole is more than the sum of its parts?

The fact is, you seem to be breaking a words' definition to suit your need to make a wrong point. There is no way to discuss things when we don't agree or can't agree with the meaning of our words. (Google definition pasted here:)

Whole: noun noun: whole; plural noun: wholes; noun: the whole

1. a thing that is complete in itself. "the subjects of the curriculum form a coherent whole" synonyms: entity, unit, body, discrete item, ensemble "a single whole" 2. all of something. "the effects will last for the whole of his life" synonyms: all, every part, the lot, the sum, the sum total, the entirety "the whole of the year"

Nowhere does it imply that a whole is more than its parts. No where does it say this. No where does it say that a propriety of whole is that it can do more than than the sum of its parts.

Therefore, a whole defined as being more than the sum of its parts must therefore be a new, or mutant definition of the word.

Then you rationalize your new mutant definition of the word by comparing the power of the whole thing to the power of the thing's parts. You show that the whole is more powerful (bigger) than any of its parts (a tautology) and therefore can do things that no part of the whole can do all by itself, as if to say, "I have shown that the whole is more than the parts."

The fact is that you have only shown that the whole is different from the parts. Different things will have different properties and so it is to be expected that the whole will have different properties when compared to any of its parts. My issue is that you use that difference to make the thing as a whole appear an "elite," something that is now more than the parts when in fact, it is simply different from any of the parts and has different properties. Some of the parts, being different from the whole, can also do things that are impossible for the whole to do. Does that mean the parts are also more than the whole to which then belong?
Fooloso4 wrote:Your heart cannot operate a computer or contribute to this discussion.
In my opinion, computers use or operate people; since my heart isn't the electric engines that feed the computers, I have to agree with you.

However, my heart can lift weighs. When it pumps my blood, my blood has weight and it lifts it. And if I talk to a person, my heart supports the discussion by making it possible for the muscles directly involved in the discussion to get their energy.
Fooloso4 wrote:If you had a heart transplant would you no longer be you? Who would you be? The person who donated the heart? Who would you be if you had an artificial heart?
If I had a heart transplant, then I would become the combination of two people. With an artificial heart, I'd be a cyborg, part human part machine.
Fooloso4 wrote:
You have a disconnected view of yourself.
No, just the oppose. I am the whole of the parts functioning together. Saying you are your heart would be a disconnected view. Why your heart and not your liver or your spleen?
Don't you see that I am all of my parts and that does include the whole of my parts?

You, on the other hand, are the whole of your parts without being any of them. I think that is simply not possible unless you fudge the meaning of some words somehow. Also, when you say, "I am the whole of the parts..." aren't you forgetting that parts can be wholly present? There is such a thing as a whole part. The whole of the part should refer to the whole part and not to the whole of the thing in which it is acts as a part of. Do you realize that what you say sounds quite a bit like non-sense?
Fooloso4 wrote:
What if that organ happens to be the brain?
That is an interesting question. I do not have a satisfactory answer. I suspect that with a brain transplant I would no longer be me. I am, however, more than a brain in a container of meat and bone.
So you aren't clear about who you are? Doesn't that precludes you then from asserting that you are more than a brain in a container of meat and bones?
Fooloso4 wrote:
Please explain how this does not contradicts what you've just mentioned, that your organs are not you. How can you be your cells without your organs being you?
A whole is not any of the parts.
Okay, but isn't a whole all of the parts, by definition? And so which cells are you implying that you aren't, if that is the case? And when I asked, "how can you be your cells...", did you read in this somewhere, "how can you be any of your cells...?" I mean, you accuse me of distortion but you appear to be answering questions that are besides the point...
Fooloso4 wrote:
There is no such thing as a watch in parts?
Of course there is. That is the point. They have to be put together in the right way to have a watch, by themselves they are only the parts of a watch.
So, if you have a watch in good working order, you have no watch parts because they "dissolve" inside the watch? A watch is like a cake, you can't have it and eat it too?
Fooloso4 wrote:You seem to finally be coming around. The bricks are not the house, but the bricks can be used to build a house. Building a house requires an organization of the materials.
Did I ever say that only the materials alone made a house?
You said:
A house can be nothing more than a pile of bricks.
Okay, then is saying that a house can be nothing more than a pile of bricks implying that only the materials alone make a house?

Fooloso4 wrote:
Human beings arrange themselves don't they? I mean, you or me, when we were developing fetuses, we arranged our body parts as we grows. Quite obviously, we do not do this consciously or deliberately but we do it.
Again, you seem to finally be coming around. The cells do not do this consciously or deliberately. They are incapable of consciousness or deliberation. That is what I have been saying. You accused me of all sorts of terrible things for denying that the cells were capable of consciousness and deliberation. Now you are claiming that it is quite obvious that they do not act with consciousness or deliberation.
I don't think I'm being inconsistent here. We can do things without being conscious of it or deliberating and it is only fair to say that our cells, us, do this too; they are us. Your intellectual detachment from the fabric of your body is out of touch with reality, in my opinion. Your attitude toward it is to say, "I am a whole, not a part, not a sum of parts," is a form of racism in my opinion. Only the "whole" race is the one you identify with and show respect for. I think this thinking is as intelligent as is any other form of racist thinking is.
Fooloso4 wrote:
I was making the point that a complete human being is a single cell at one point in his/her life.
A zygote is not a complete human being. A zygote is not viable. It is in the process of becoming a complete human being. Many months of development are necessary before you have a complete human being. That is not to say that it is not human but rather only that is is not a complete human being.
A zygote is not a complete human being... at a certain stage(s) of his/her development? At which stage(s) of a human being's development is a human being whole then? Only the adult form of a human being is a whole human being? Why not say that only an elderly person is a human being and the stages preceding it are incomplete? Again, your views edge on the racist. How incomplete is the zygote form of a human being? Are you implying that the need for support at certain stages diminishes the wholeness of a being?
Fooloso4 wrote:
You seem to reject identifying yourself with certain stages of your existence.
On what basis do you think I seem to reject this?
See the point above. But I now understand how you cover this rejection by a denial of its existence; you never were a zygote. I wonder who was then.
Fooloso4 wrote: Keeping time is not present in any of the parts of a watch. Consciousness is not present in any of the cells. It is only when the cells interact is highly complex ways that consciousness is present.
But say you have a spring, a watch part, and you make it swing. You would be able to get an idea of the passing time that way. So, isn't it incorrect to say that we requires all the parts of the watch to measure time? If you are conscious then so is a cell conscious and so are a number of them: each conscious thought that you have is, in fact, the shared thought of many cells?
Fooloso4 wrote:There is a lot wrong with it. It completely misses the point. Neurons are not conscious.

What if consciousness were like a TV program?

The TV program (or consciousness) does not belong to the TV or to any of its parts. To say consciousness belongs to the TV because of its running program is also wrong. Do you see where I'm getting at? Given the debate about the nature of consciousness, it certainly isn't the best example to use to argue,"the presence of it among the parts shows that the whole has in it what the parts don't."

You also imply that the "parts" of a cake are ingredients. I think this is also a bad analogy because parts aren't normally changed or significantly modified in the process of being but into place whereas ingredients are cooked, a process which does change them. For this reason, I think to say that a cake is more than its ingredients does not bring support to the contention that the whole is more than the parts.

I think you will need to know yourself a bit better and certainly give up your elitist view of the "whole" before you can agree that evil individuals do ignore societal cancer.
Watch out for the hidden paradoxes around you!
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Sy Borg »

Fooloso4 wrote: The whole is capable of things the parts are not capable of.Your heart cannot operate a computer or contribute to this discussion.
Empiricist-Bruno wrote:(This sounds like the chorus of your "whole" argument. It appears that your chorus is not just a favorite song of yours, it has become your maxim. You seem to have a prejudice against other views in this matter.)

The whole is the sum of the parts by definition and so, if all the parts form the whole then what either all the thing's parts or the whole thing can do has to be the exact same. But then you say, no? A whole is more than the sum of its parts?

The fact is, you seem to be breaking a words' definition to suit your need to make a wrong point. There is no way to discuss things when we don't agree or can't agree with the meaning of our words. (Google definition pasted here:)

Whole: noun noun: whole; plural noun: wholes; noun: the whole

1. a thing that is complete in itself. "the subjects of the curriculum form a coherent whole" synonyms: entity, unit, body, discrete item, ensemble "a single whole" 2. all of something. "the effects will last for the whole of his life" synonyms: all, every part, the lot, the sum, the sum total, the entirety "the whole of the year"

Nowhere does it imply that a whole is more than its parts. No where does it say this. No where does it say that a propriety of whole is that it can do more than than the sum of its parts.
Bruno, you have not considered the synergistic effects of systems. The whole of a system most certainly is greater than the sum of its parts.

If you remove a single critical wire from a PC then the system doesn't work. Does that make the wire equal to a PC? Not in the slightest. What it means that in systems, in terms of the system the critical components no longer exist as isolated parts but as part of something else, just as an animal's spine is only a functional entity in terms of the system while it fulfills its role within its system.
The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated—Gandhi.
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Fooloso4 »

E-B:

I must admit that after this latest reply of yours, I do give up on thinking that you are an evil person and that this is why you ignore societal cancer.
My contention from the beginning has been terminological. I do not ignore social problems, it is just that calling these problems cancer is misleading if the term is being used in anything other than a metaphorical sense.
What if the guy is missing an arm? Does the heart stops functioning then?
Not if he gets proper medical attention when he loses it.
What part of the body is essential to the whole body's integrity? The heart isn't?
No the heart is. Why would you think any different? Some parts we can do without, but others we cannot do without. Where are you going with this?
(This sounds like the chorus of your "whole" argument. It appears that your chorus is not just a favorite song of yours, it has become your maxim. You seem to have a prejudice against other views in this matter.)
I do not have a prejudice against other views; it is just that they have to make sense and be supported by evidence. Yours does not and I have spent a good deal of time and effort trying to show you why.
The whole is the sum of the parts by definition and so, if all the parts form the whole then what either all the thing's parts or the whole thing can do has to be the exact same.
This is not your original claim. You are equivocating. ALL of a things parts can mean all together or each and every part. Your original claim was that each cell is conscious. You later claimed that this was obviously not true, but did not acknowledge that you had revised your opinion. Now you seem to be claiming that by ALL you mean all together. In that case the whole is capable of things that the parts apart from the other parts are not capable of, that is, it is only as a functioning whole that I am able to do certain things.
A whole is more than the sum of its parts?
In some cases yes, but not in all cases. It is not the sum of my parts that allows me to be conscious. Consciousness is a biological function that requires not only a certain number of parts but the proper functional interaction of those parts. The parts by themselves, no matter how many of them you collect, are not, as a sum of parts, conscious. You cannot build a conscious being even if you have all the parts. The dead cannot be made conscious.
Nowhere does it imply that a whole is more than its parts.
Because that is not part of the definition of a whole. It is, however, an emergent property of some wholes.
Therefore, a whole defined as being more than the sum of its parts must therefore be a new, or mutant definition of the word.
I did not define a whole as more than the sum of its parts. What I said is that the whole can be more than the sum of its parts. Such is the case with emergent properties. Google definition pasted here:
noun any unique property that "emerges" when component objects are joined together in constraining relations to "construct" a higher-level aggregate object, a novel property that unpredictably comes from a combination of two simpler constituents
E-B:

The fact is that you have only shown that the whole is different from the parts.
But that is precisely what you originally denied. The question is: different in what sense? Have you given up on the claim that cells are conscious?
Different things will have different properties and so it is to be expected that the whole will have different properties when compared to any of its parts.
Previously you said:
If something can be present in the whole of a system that is not present in any of the parts, it simply means that the whole of the system is not made of its parts. That sure sounds potentially cancerous to me.
Now you say it is to be expected that the whole will have different properties than any of the parts. A complete turnaround in your position on this point.
My issue is that you use that difference to make the thing as a whole appear an "elite," something that is now more than the parts
Elite? Your issue not mine.
Don't you see that I am all of my parts and that does include the whole of my parts?
All of my parts do not include the whole of my parts. The whole of my parts is not another part. You are not a collection of parts, you are a living, functioning whole.
You, on the other hand, are the whole of your parts without being any of them. I think that is simply not possible unless you fudge the meaning of some words somehow.
Which of my parts am I?
There is such a thing as a whole part. The whole of the part should refer to the whole part and not to the whole of the thing in which it is acts as a part of. Do you realize that what you say sounds quite a bit like non-sense?
That makes perfect sense. Someone can lose his whole arm, but the arm can only function as a part of a larger whole. Cut your arm off and you will see.
So you aren't clear about who you are?
How does a question about a brain transplant lead you to the conclusion that I am not clear about who I am? One would really have to experience a brain transplant or look at what those who have had their brains transplanted say.
And when I asked, "how can you be your cells...", did you read in this somewhere, "how can you be any of your cells...?"
The main issue was the distinction between parts and whole. You denied the distinction. You have now changed your position, as if all along you were talking about the whole of something and not individual cells that are capable of consciousness and deliberation.

From your original post:
In other words, the cell lose the integrity it once had toward its mother body. There is no more apparent "conscience" in it.
You attribute consciousness to the individual cell. In defense of this claim you came up with the argument that what is present in the whole must be present in the parts. If I am conscious my cells must be conscious.
So, if you have a watch in good working order, you have no watch parts because they "dissolve" inside the watch?
There is nothing in what I said that leads to this conclusion. You seem to be confusing yourself.
Okay, then is saying that a house can be nothing more than a pile of bricks implying that only the materials alone make a house?
What else is there other than the bricks if, as you claim, a house can be nothing more than a pile of bricks?
Your intellectual detachment from the fabric of your body
What intellectual detachment? Where have I said this? Once again, you attribute your own lack of understanding to me.
Your attitude toward it is to say, "I am a whole, not a part, not a sum of parts," is a form of racism in my opinion. Only the "whole" race is the one you identify with and show respect for.
How did you get from a discussion of the whole of a person to the whole of a race and racial identity? You keep arguing against issues of your own making that have nothing to do with what I have actually said.
At which stage(s) of a human being's development is a human being whole then?
You have stumbled upon the paradox of process. Where one draws the line is somewhat arbitrary but that does not mean we cannot recognize when a process has not been completed at certain stages of known development. Do you not distinguish between the oak and the acorn? Do you call an acorn a whole tree? We might say that an oak tree is complete when it produces acorns. Analogously we might say that human biological development is complete when a person is capable of reproducing. This, however, is somewhat arbitrary. There are several other milestones that one might use. What we can say, however, is that the zygote is at an early stage of development, and so, wherever we might draw the line it will not be at this point. Zygotes are not yet capable of doing most of the things that humans do.
Again, your views edge on the racist.
Racist? Are you saying that I am against zygotes as a race?
you never were a zygote.
I am beginning to wonder whether you are just being argumentative and making up things to argue about. When did I deny that I was once a zygote?

But say you have a spring, a watch part, and you make it swing. You would be able to get an idea of the passing time that way. So, isn't it incorrect to say that we requires all the parts of the watch to measure time?

You have made a primitive time keeping device, but it would not be of much use since it would soon slow down and then stop swinging all together. Now if you put a weight on the bottom of the spring and another weight to keep it swinging and some mechanism to assure some degree of accuracy then you might have a proper time keeping device.
If you are conscious then so is a cell conscious
Back to this? You are now in a position of determining that is is a weak claim based on other things you have said. You seem to be looking for something you can dispute in every point I make and as a result you seem to have become lost and no longer able to follow the argument.
What if consciousness were like a TV program?
What reason do we have to take this possibility seriously?
The TV program (or consciousness) does not belong to the TV or to any of its parts.
Then by analogy consciousness does not belong to the person or any of its parts.
Do you see where I'm getting at?
Not really.At this point you seem to be arguing against yourself.
Given the debate about the nature of consciousness, it certainly isn't the best example to use to argue,"the presence of it among the parts shows that the whole has in it what the parts don't."
I am somewhat familiar with the debates, but I have not come across anyone who has is taken seriously who argues that the cells have consciousness. Who makes this claim?
… parts aren't normally changed or significantly modified in the process
If we are talking about living organisms they most certainly are changed in the process. The parts of a living organism are not like the cogs in a wheel. They continually undergo change, with all kinds of processes taking place. Cancer occurs when something disrupts some of the normal regulative processes.

Or … you can believe that cells are conscious and cancer is the result of them deliberately misbehaving. I have tried to explain why that is wrong. I don’t think there is anything additional I can say on that matter. I have also tried to clear up some of the conceptual confusion resulting from your falsely attributing claims to me that are not based on anything I have said.

As an empiricist you must not allow your theories to determine what you see. Where your theories do not square with the evidence you must alter the theories. Arguments for why cells are conscious should not take the place of solid evidence. If cells are conscious you must provide empirical evidence for this claim.
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Empiricist-Bruno »

Fooloso4, when you explain a problem well, the solutions become obvious. I think you have explained the difficulty you have in making sense of what I say really clearly, thank you. So, the solution is now obvious, at least to me.

For some reason, it seems that you don't realize or haven't considered the possibility that different cells have different levels of consciousness. The following analogy may help you understand what I'm trying to say: a dog is conscious of things that you aren't conscious of because a) the dog can hear at a different frequency b) the dog's nose is many times sensitive than your nose is. And that is just what we know of.

It is obviously the same with the different cells in your body and of your body. To claim that consciousness only belongs to the whole being and isn't present in the various cells is an absurdity in my opinion. If consciousness isn't something inherent to all living cells, then, where and how could it have arisen?

Your suggestion that consciousness does not belong to any cell but instead to a person is, in my opinion, of the same level of absurdity as saying that a certain level of consciousness isn't present in all and any living cells. The reason I find this claim absurd is that a person is first and foremost not a reality but an idea held in a memory composed of living cells... So, your suggestion really means that you would endow an idea or the whole of an idea with consciousness...

It is notoriously difficult to argue against the absurd. Rather than try and do that further, I'll simply show how the various level of consciousness appear to interact within a person's body. Let's talk about say, the epidermic cells of my big toe. What do they know? What are they conscious of? Your answers to those questions appears to be, "nothing and nothing." (And by the way, you aren't giving empirical evidence to support your claim; because you can't see what's there does not imply any proof that there is nothing there.) My answer is that I don't have all the answers; just as I couldn't really tell you what my cats are conscious of, I can't share with you the content of another individual's consciousness. I do however, have certain insights in what you may find there.

The epidermic cells of my big toes are just fine right now. When there's any problem, I do hear from them. They are really able to scream at me and they are even able to order me to make some reflex move if they want. Their silence is evidence to me that they are conscious that everything is fine in their corner of my body. Now, my toes' epidermic cells have a regular job: they grow and then they die. If they don't get all they need, they, like any of my other cells, send signals to other parts of my body so that more resources are given them. This level of consciousness of my cells, although I'm certain that it exists, is not one that my brain's neurons are conscious of, (unless of course the need is generalized and is hunger for instance.) The individual cell is conscious of what cellular reproduction is; that is its job. Let's say I interfere with this job by jabbing a needle in my toes' epidermic cells. They'll react. They will talk to me loudly. And by me, I mean my other nervous cells.

Now, when I've said that the cells aren't conscious of what they are doing, I thought it was clear that I meant the conceptual sort of consciousness, the type of consciousness that does arise in the brain cells. Although my toes' epidermic cells know cellular division (even though they would never be able to articulate their knowledge of cellular division), I would certainly believe that they have no clue as to how their work helps the system to which they belong. That, however, should not be taken to say that they have no sense of belonging to a body system.

As far as your quest for evidence of consciousness in individual cells, you don't need to look far. I have heard of a number of experiment showing that unicellular organisms react to their environment in ways that shows that they are conscious. How could plant turn their leafs towards the sun if they weren't conscious?

Lots of people claim that plants have some degree of consciousness. If I find you the links to this research, would you be satisfied that cells have consciousness or would you argue that no, it is the plant as a whole that is conscious?

As far as your oak and acorn comment is concerned, I'd say that the life of a being begins at its conception. The oak being an angiosperm, a flowering plant, it is when the seed is fertilized that the life and individuality of the being is born. When your set of genes is established for life in the zigote, you are complete and the first phase of your life as a complete individual has begun. I could argue against your view but that would get us too off-topic, I believe.
Fooloso4 wrote:When did I deny that I was once a zygote?
A zigote is incomplete, you seemed to say. Are you saying then that you were once incomplete? Where were your missing parts then?
Fooloso4 wrote:
There is no such thing as a watch in parts?
Of course there is. That is the point. They have to be put together in the right way to have a watch, by themselves they are only the parts of a watch.
But then, are you saying that the watch's arrangement is not part of the watch?

Keep up the excellent arguments, Fooloso4 !
Greta wrote:The whole of a system most certainly is greater than the sum of its parts.
Greta, how can you tell the difference between the two?
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Fooloso4 »

E-B:

For some reason, it seems that you don't realize or haven't considered the possibility that different cells have different levels of consciousness.
Based on my limited understanding of consciousness it is not possible for individual cells to have any level of consciousness. If you can point me in the direction of peer reviewed journal articles that argue otherwise I would be open to changing my mind. Plants are capable of some level of differentiation and may respond to environmental conditions is surprising and interesting ways, but they do not do this as a matter of choice or deliberation. Consciousness may, however, be a matter of degree. If so, then as with other processes, we may not be able to draw a clear line between organisms that are conscious and those that are not. Depending on how consciousness is defined we can determine whether a cell or even an organism meets the criteria.

The following analogy may help you understand what I'm trying to say: a dog is conscious of things that you aren't conscious of because a) the dog can hear at a different frequency b) the dog's nose is many times sensitive than your nose is. And that is just what we know of.

Consciousness and consciousness of something are two different things. Comparing two animals that we agree are conscious does not address the question of whether a cell can be conscious.
If consciousness isn't something inherent to all living cells, then, where and how could it have arisen?
It arises when organisms have a sufficiently well-developed central nervous system. It is the system of cells that gives rise to consciousness.
Let's talk about say, the epidermic cells of my big toe. What do they know? What are they conscious of? Your answers to those questions appears to be, "nothing and nothing." (And by the way, you aren't giving empirical evidence to support your claim; because you can't see what's there does not imply any proof that there is nothing there.)
The empirical evidence is that if the spinal cord is severed or the nerve impulses are in some other way prevented from reaching the brain you would not know what is happening to your big toe. There is also something known as phantom limb syndrome where one has sensations of limbs that have been removed. One therapeutic approach to this problem involves mirrors and visual clues.The brain has to learn how to make sense of what is going on in that part of the body missing a limb.
The individual cell is conscious of what cellular reproduction is; that is its job.
The individual cell simply responds to bio-chemical triggers. The better this is understood the more we will be able to manipulate cells for medical purposes. Cancer is one area where it is most promising. If we can learn what triggers the unregulated growth of cancer cells we can stop them from growing or prevent the trigger from happening.
Let's say I interfere with this job by jabbing a needle in my toes' epidermic cells. They'll react. They will talk to me loudly. And by me, I mean my other nervous cells.
That is basically correct. They react by sending a message to the brain. Once the signal is received the brain will send a message to the muscles of your leg and toe to move. “Me” means the organism as a whole consisting of feedback mechanisms between the parts of the central nervous system. If your brain does not receive the message you might be completely unaware of the needle in your toe.
I have heard of a number of experiment showing that unicellular organisms react to their environment in ways that shows that they are conscious. How could plant turn their leafs towards the sun if they weren't conscious?
I am not aware of any scientific explanations of phototropism that involve consciousness. Please provide a reference. Here is an explanation of how it is done:sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/05/13052 ... 105946.htm
Lots of people claim that plants have some degree of consciousness. If I find you the links to this research, would you be satisfied that cells have consciousness or would you argue that no, it is the plant as a whole that is conscious?
If the research is credible and conclusive then I will accept it. Until then I would argue that not only are the cells of a plant not conscious, the plant as a whole is not conscious, although it is capable of responding to its environment. The question is whether this is closer to such things as your home heating system and your car’s self-diagnostics or to your awareness that you are getting hot?
When your set of genes is established for life in the zigote, you are complete and the first phase of your life as a complete individual has begun.
The zygote is genetically complete, but in terms of biological development it is far from complete.It should be pointed out that the zygote may divide and become two individuals. This raises the same problem as the claim that a person is extracted from a cell. By this logic each of us is legion because millions of complete gene sequences are present in us. Each of these sequences is not a person.
A zigote is incomplete, you seemed to say. Are you saying then that you were once incomplete? Where were your missing parts then?
I was. Most importantly my central nervous system was missing.

To avoid further misunderstanding there is a distinction between biological development and change. Even though we continue to change throughout our lives we do not continue to develop biologically.
But then, are you saying that the watch's arrangement is not part of the watch?
You are using the term ‘part’ in two difference senses. The first would be what one finds when he takes the watch apart. The list of parts would not include 'arrangement as one of the parts. The second use of the terms is what I have been arguing for and you were reluctant to accept. We do not have a complete watch unless the parts are properly arranged into a complete system. A watch is a system of interacting parts.
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Wilson »

Empiricist-Bruno wrote:To claim that consciousness only belongs to the whole being and isn't present in the various cells is an absurdity in my opinion. If consciousness isn't something inherent to all living cells, then, where and how could it have arisen?
That is a very illogical argument.

I would like to say that we have a very interesting group of moderators.
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Empiricist-Bruno »

Fooloso4 wrote:Based on my limited understanding of consciousness it is not possible for individual cells to have any level of consciousness.
If something is impossible, then surely you have to know why it isn't. They used to say, "heavier than air flying machines are impossible." If the fact is that you just don't know something, why don't you just say that? Some people used to argue that heavier than air flying machines were impossible because...aluminum could not be mass produced cheaply. They were right then. If you know something is impossible please back up your claim otherwise, please stay open minded.
Fooloso4 wrote:Based on my limited understanding of consciousness it is not possible for individual cells to have any level of consciousness. If you can point me in the direction of peer reviewed journal articles that...
Jung, a celebrated philosopher argued, "How do I know that I am not the stone upon which I stand?" When it comes to consciousness, are you willing to hear only from a scientific source of reference?
Fooloso4 wrote:...but they do not do this as a matter of choice or deliberation
When it comes to evaluating the consciousness of other living beings, I have been told not to presume anything and I think you would benefit from this advice as well.
Fooloso4 wrote:Depending on how consciousness is defined we can determine whether a cell or even an organism meets the criteria.
If what consciousness is isn't evident, maybe we should wonder why we're making a fuss about this concept. You are using this idea to discredit the validity of an analogy that I have made in my OP. Is there really a point for you to arguing this?
Fooloso4 wrote:Consciousness and consciousness of something are two different things. Comparing two animals that we agree are conscious does not address the question of whether a cell can be conscious.
Ho my God! Consciousness is now a thing? Can we be conscious of this thing? How so?
Fooloso4 wrote:It arises when organisms have a sufficiently well-developed central nervous system. It is the system of cells that gives rise to consciousness.
A second ago, you weren't 100% sure how a definition for consciousness should be decided upon and now you provide us with a clear unequivocal definition for it?
Fooloso4 wrote:The individual cell simply responds to bio-chemical triggers. The better this is understood the more we will be able to manipulate cells for medical purposes.
Beware of viewing any individual living cell with a "machine like" simplicity. All living beings have a history that reaches as far back as yours and is connected to your history at some point, although, you still seem to be rejecting this fact.
Fooloso4 wrote:I am not aware of any scientific explanations of phototropism that involve consciousness. Please provide a reference.
Neither is there any scientific explanation of how consciousness isn't involved in that process. You have to go into philosophy for this. Let me know if you want this and I'll explain.
Fooloso4 wrote: Until then I would argue that not only are the cells of a plant not conscious, the plant as a whole is not conscious, although it is capable of responding to its environment. The question is whether this is closer to such things as your home heating system and your car’s self-diagnostics or to your awareness that you are getting hot?
To me, this question is the same as to wonder whether one is a robot or not, maybe something conscious? And I must admit that I have trouble relating to other people(?) who do not view this question this way. Maybe they are affected by social cancer?
Fooloso4 wrote:The zygote is genetically complete, but in terms of biological development it is far from complete.


By definition, a zygote is unicellular; that is as far as its biological development can go. If its development exceeds that level, then it is no longer called a zygote. Zygotes do not biologically develop beyond the unicellular level. If they do, they become a different thing called an embryo, don't they? To accuse a healthy zygote of being biologically incomplete in any way is unfair to the zygote. I, as a zygote, have got a long way to go before others will recognize me as a person and yet, at this stage of my life, I'm not missing anything. I'm behaving just as one would expect me to and I'm not lacking of anything if I've got a healthy uterus to take care of me.
Fooloso4 wrote:
Empiricist-Bruno wrote:A zigote is incomplete, you seemed to say. Are you saying then that you were once incomplete? Where were your missing parts then?
I was. Most importantly my central nervous system was missing.To avoid further misunderstanding there is a distinction between biological development and change. Even though we continue to change throughout our lives we do not continue to develop biologically.
So, we change throughout our lives and sometimes this change is called biological development and sometimes it is called...? I mean, I do see your point. You identify yourself to a certain period in your life. So, when I say, "you never were a zygote" I feel that I'm right on this point. You have made this claim. You are complete and since what was before you wasn't then it couldn't be you. So, I can reaffirm it with much conviction, you never were a zygote!
Fooloso4 wrote:
Empiricist-Bruno wrote:But then, are you saying that the watch's arrangement is not part of the watch?
You are using the term ‘part’ in two difference senses. The first would be what one finds when he takes the watch apart. The list of parts would not include 'arrangement as one of the parts. The second use of the terms is what I have been arguing for and you were reluctant to accept. We do not have a complete watch unless the parts are properly arranged into a complete system. A watch is a system of interacting parts.
You are now saying that only when this one part, the design part, is included among the other parts of the watch do we have a watch. So, a watch in parts can exist but only if it has the design part missing from all its other parts? But if that design part is missing then we are missing one part of the watch. This seems to suggests that there can be no such thing as a watch in part doesn't it? Unless a watch is also a watch in parts. The whole is also the sum of the its parts. A whole watch is also a watch in parts. The two are one and the same thing. When you suggest that on occasion, the whole of a thing is greater than the sum of its parts, how can you tell the difference between the two, or which one is which at the start?

Although we have drifted somewhat away from the OP's question, I think we've been able to answer some important questions that make it impossible for some to appreciate the OP; the analogy I provide is right on.
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Fooloso4 »

E-B:

If something is impossible, then surely you have to know why it isn't.
I do not hold to the idea that everything is possible unless proven otherwise. If you make a claim that is contrary to the accepted understanding of how cells work, then the burden is on you to show that your claim is right and accepted opinion wrong. It is not enough to argue that it is possible, you must evidence and explanation.
"How do I know that I am not the stone upon which I stand?"
An interesting question that can be addressed in several different ways.
When it comes to consciousness, are you willing to hear only from a scientific source of reference?
I am somewhat familiar with various animistic beliefs, but there is a big difference between a metaphysical maybe and anesthetizing a patient. The former is simply a claim. Scientific understanding of consciousness is far from complete, but it does not simply offer claims but the ability to explain and controllably influence and change a patient’s consciousness.
When it comes to evaluating the consciousness of other living beings, I have been told not to presume anything and I think you would benefit from this advice as well.
I’ll be more careful about what I say around cells.
If what consciousness is isn't evident, maybe we should wonder why we're making a fuss about this concept. You are using this idea to discredit the validity of an analogy that I have made in my OP. Is there really a point for you to arguing this?
Okay, let’s review: You made a comparison between cancer and social change. One reason I offered to show differences between a cancer and a social problem is that cancer cells do not act deliberately, they are not conscious. Human beings, on the other hand, are conscious and do act deliberately. You maintained that the analogy holds because cells are conscious.

It is not a matter of discrediting your claim but of seeing if it holds up. That is standard philosophical practice.
Ho my God! Consciousness is now a thing? Can we be conscious of this thing? How so?
The term ‘something’ does not mean some thing. When the Beatles sing: “Something in the way she moves …” they do not mean that there a thing in the way.
A second ago, you weren't 100% sure how a definition for consciousness should be decided upon and now you provide us with a clear unequivocal definition for it?
First, the problem is not simply how to define consciousness but to understand it. The definition is based on our understanding. Both are subject to change. A sufficiently well-developed central nervous system is not a definition of consciousness but a condition for it.
Beware of viewing any individual living cell with a "machine like" simplicity.
Machine like is your term, and any connotations that may have are ones you bring to it.
All living beings have a history that reaches as far back as yours and is connected to your history at some point, although, you still seem to be rejecting this fact.
When did I reject that fact?
Neither is there any scientific explanation of how consciousness isn't involved in that process.
It is not involved in the same way that Santa Claus or the Queen of England are not involved. If phototropism can be explained without recourse to consciousness then there is no reason to explain how consciousness is not involved in the explanation.
To me, this question is the same as to wonder whether one is a robot or not, maybe something conscious?
Not at all. I have reason to question whether I am a robot or my thermostat is conscious. The point is simply that a response to the environment is not a sufficient criterion for consciousness, and so you cannot say that a cell is conscious because it responds to its environment.
Zygotes do not biologically develop beyond the unicellular level.
As you said, they do develop but they are no longer zygotes. The definition refers to the stage of development.
I'm not missing anything.
That remains to be determined. It is only when the fetus has passed that stage that it can be determined whether anything was missing. If something essential was missing it will not develop beyond that stage, but it is possible for it to develop beyond that stage without it yet being apparent that something is missing. This may only becomes evident in latter stages of development.
So, we change throughout our lives and sometimes this change is called biological development and sometimes it is called...?
Degeneration.
So, when I say, "you never were a zygote" I feel that I'm right on this point.
First you accuse me of denying I was a zygote and wanting to argue that point, and now you claim that it was you who said that I was not a zygote and argue the opposite point of the one you previously wanted to argue. It really does look you are arguing for the sake of argument.
You are now saying that only when this one part, the design part, is included among the other parts of the watch do we have a watch.
No, the design is not another part that must be included. A system of parts is not another part. A set is not a member of the set unless this refers to the set of sets.
A whole watch is also a watch in parts. The two are one and the same thing.
If someone takes apart your cherished watch and assures you a whole watch is also a watch in parts, I doubt you would accept that argument and be happy to be carrying around a bag full of parts.
When you suggest that on occasion, the whole of a thing is greater than the sum of its parts, how can you tell the difference between the two, or which one is which at the start?
I do not think it is difficult to distinguish between a watch and a bag of parts.
I think we've been able to answer some important questions that make it impossible for some to appreciate the OP; the analogy I provide is right on.
I do not share the view that important questions have been answered, and the assumption that adequate answers have been given is indicative of why it would not be reasonable to hope for more and so, it it seems that we have reached the end of our discussion.
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Empiricist-Bruno »

Fooloso4 wrote:
E-B:

If something is impossible, then surely you have to know why it isn't.
I do not hold to the idea that everything is possible unless proven otherwise. If you make a claim that is contrary to the accepted understanding of how cells work, then the burden is on you to show that your claim is right and accepted opinion wrong. It is not enough to argue that it is possible, you must evidence and explanation.
Given that you seem to have a veto on what is valid evidence and explanation, I agree that our discussion can go no further here.

Fooloso4 wrote:
E_B When it comes to consciousness, are you willing to hear only from a scientific source of reference?
I am somewhat familiar with various animistic beliefs, but there is a big difference between a metaphysical maybe and anesthetizing a patient. The former is simply a claim. Scientific understanding of consciousness is far from complete, but it does not simply offer claims but the ability to explain and controllably influence and change a patient’s consciousness.
Here, I could ask you, "how does that answer my question?" but I have lost hope that this question too would be answered in a straightforward manner.
Fooloso4 wrote:
E-B If what consciousness is isn't evident, maybe we should wonder why we're making a fuss about this concept. You are using this idea to discredit the validity of an analogy that I have made in my OP. Is there really a point for you to arguing this?
Okay, let’s review: You made a comparison between cancer and social change. One reason I offered to show differences between a cancer and a social problem is that cancer cells do not act deliberately, they are not conscious. Human beings, on the other hand, are conscious and do act deliberately. You maintained that the analogy holds because cells are conscious.
So, it is up to me to show that cells are conscious? But isn't doing this as difficult as proving that I am conscious? How do you prove that you are conscious? You apparently don't even do it yourself. And so isn't your use of this argument to make the point that you have made meaningless in response to my OP?
Fooloso4 wrote:
E-B Ho my God! Consciousness is now a thing? Can we be conscious of this thing? How so?
The term ‘something’ does not mean some thing. When the Beatles sing: “Something in the way she moves …” they do not mean that there a thing in the way.
What the Beatles are saying is that there is a magical trigger or hook in the way she moves. A trigger is something. Something does mean something. Maybe there really isn't anything in the way but if someone does claim to see something in the way, then who are we to contradict them? Many successful songs are full of non-sense. I hope this isn't why you refer to them.

A concept is an abstract noun and not a thing. A concept can be used to explain things but it isn't a thing. Words by themselves don't exist as things but written words or spoken words do exist as things. Words are conceptual and therefore they exist fundamentally only as nouns. For example, justice does not exist as a thing, it exists as only as an abstract noun, or an abstraction. An abstraction is not a thing. Doesn't that sound all right?
Fooloso4 wrote:
E-B A second ago, you weren't 100% sure how a definition for consciousness should be decided upon and now you provide us with a clear unequivocal definition for it?
First, the problem is not simply how to define consciousness but to understand it. The definition is based on our understanding. Both are subject to change. A sufficiently well-developed central nervous system is not a definition of consciousness but a condition for it.
Is your stated condition for consciousness also subject to change?
Fooloso4 wrote:
Beware of viewing any individual living cell with a "machine like" simplicity.
Machine like is your term, and any connotations that may have are ones you bring to it.
No, I do not own that term, I'm just using it and any connotations that it may have come with those that are associated with that term. Words are a shared resource and I believe that a dictionary for everyone deserves respect: A whole is a sum of all parts. All the parts of a watch is a whole watch. Seeing it otherwise is giving the term whole one's own connotations.
Fooloso4 wrote:
All living beings have a history that reaches as far back as yours and is connected to your history at some point, although, you still seem to be rejecting this fact.
When did I reject that fact?
Why do you ask? Did I say you rejected that fact?
Fooloso4 wrote:
Neither is there any scientific explanation of how consciousness isn't involved in that process.
It is not involved in the same way that Santa Claus or the Queen of England are not involved. If phototropism can be explained without recourse to consciousness then there is no reason to explain how consciousness is not involved in the explanation.
I would argue that phototorism is an expression of consciousness. If consciousness can explain why plants move toward the sun, it can just as well be argued that there is no reason for a scientific explanation for it.
Fooloso4 wrote:
E-B To me, this question is the same as to wonder whether one is a robot or not, maybe something conscious?
I have reason to question whether I am a robot or my thermostat is conscious.
Beware! I'm starting to agree with you there!
F-4 The point is simply that a response to the environment is not a sufficient criterion for consciousness, and so you cannot say that a cell is conscious because it responds to its environment.
Good point. You are now getting closer to what I have been thinking all along: it takes two criteria for evidence of consciousness 1) Responding to its environment. 2) Being alive.
Fooloso4 wrote:
E-B Zygotes do not biologically develop beyond the unicellular level.
As you said, they do develop but they are no longer zygotes. The definition refers to the stage of development.
If this definition refers to a stage of development, then, who’s development are we talking about, the zygote’s own development or that of a living being at a certain stage in his/her life? If zygotes refers to a stage of development but not to anyone’s stage of development, how relevant to us can that stage of development be?

Fooloso4 wrote:
E-B I'm not missing anything.
That remains to be determined. It is only when the fetus has passed that stage that it can be determined whether anything was missing. If something essential was missing it will not develop beyond that stage, but it is possible for it to develop beyond that stage without it yet being apparent that something is missing. This may only becomes evident in latter stages of development.
Your comment misses the point in a couple of ways. At the zygote level of development, I am a human being and to be fair to me, you have to compare me with others at my own age. Also, you appear to have a preconceived notion of what a human being with no missing part looks like, as if that ideal was the objective of the development. You are thus denying me the right to recognize what I want and who I want as a complete human being. By doing that, you are certainly becoming less of a human being to me, if you claim being that, of course.
Fooloso4 wrote:
So, we change throughout our lives and sometimes this change is called biological development and sometimes it is called...?
Degeneration.
Are you suggesting that once sexual maturity has been reached in an individual, then that individual’s biological development has stopped and is now degenerating?
Fooloso4 wrote:
So, when I say, "you never were a zygote" I feel that I'm right on this point.
First you accuse me of denying I was a zygote and wanting to argue that point, and now you claim that it was you who said that I was not a zygote and argue the opposite point of the one you previously wanted to argue. It really does look you are arguing for the sake of argument.
The tone in which I have claimed that you never were a zygote was not an accusatory one; it was a conclusive one. I was simply stating the words which I felt that you meant to say about yourself but didn’t bother to say outright. I would not accuse you about having stated things that I am stating for you. Accusation are generally in regard to wrong doings. To claim not to ever having been a zygote is not wrong doing it is freedom of speech, in my opinion. I have a right to say as many stupid things as I want to, and so do you. Is your point of view stupid? You say you exist in whole with all your parts. A zygote, you claim, doesn’t have that and so can you not claim not to be a zygote? Apparently, your existence began gradually as your parts began to appear. From that perspective, it would make sense for you to say that you never were a zygote as you put a later date to your own birth. But if you do claim that you have been a zygote, then there are glaring inconsistencies that appear in your thinking, I would say. So, please clarify it for me, have you or have you not been a zygote in your life? Does your life start when you are an adult biological being? Without a clear answer from you on these questions, I do agree that we have little to go on to keep this discussion going.
Fooloso4 wrote:
E-B You are now saying that only when this one part, the design part, is included among the other parts of the watch do we have a watch.
No, the design is not another part that must be included.
Okay, well if we exclude the design from a watch then we just have a bag of parts, don’t we?

F-4 A system of parts is not another part.
Any system, made of whatever element, needs a design or comes with a design for its parts. And any system of such parts can become a part of another whole thing, for instance, microchips are systems that make up many parts in a computer. So, how can you stand behind what you claim here?
F-4 A set is not a member of the set unless this refers to the set of sets.
I’m not 100% sure if I understand what you’re saying here. By analogy, “a forest is not a member of the forest unless this (what this? Forest?) refers to the forest of forests?

I’d say that a forest is every member of the forest. So a set is all the members of the set. If a set is all the member of the set, it does not preclude that a member of the set, taken individually does not form the whole set. A set is therefore member of the set but only as a whole. Denying a set its own membership from the set if forms based on the fact that any one of its member isn’t the set is ridiculous; it suggests that the set isn’t the set as it isn’t anyone of the member of the set. If sets can exist than this simply can’t be.
Fooloso4 wrote:
A whole watch is also a watch in parts. The two are one and the same thing.
If someone takes apart your cherished watch and assures you a whole watch is also a watch in parts, I doubt you would accept that argument and be happy to be carrying around a bag full of parts.
I would accept the argument but argue that in my bag and apart, the watch’s design is missing and that this missing part in the watch does matter.
Fooloso4 wrote:
When you suggest that on occasion, the whole of a thing is greater than the sum of its parts, how can you tell the difference between the two, or which one is which at the start?
I do not think it is difficult to distinguish between a watch and a bag of parts.
Obviously, your objection to adding the design in the sum of what a watch is leads us to obviously different sums. I understand now.

I gladly spend the energy to expose your arguments because I feel that they are the cause of much pain in our world today and that your arguments are not all that uncommon. Thanks for expressing your thoughts with such clarity.
Watch out for the hidden paradoxes around you!
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Lucylu
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Lucylu »

I believe everyone is doing the best they can from their perspective and what they do makes sense to them (deep down, if not on the surface). I try to be compassionate for those who may be less fortunate in terms of their education, genetic inheritance and upbringing and I try to remember that who we see on the street is not necessarily the 'real' person, but the guarded, bravado version.

I think calling people a cancer or evil is unkind and not very constructive. I might go so far as to say it was misanthropic. The repetition of 'cancer' here reminds me of George Bush repeating 'terrorists' over and over, to try to create drama and fear. It seems removed from the personal reality of people's lives. The OP then seems to offer the added blackmail/ witch hunt that anyone who disagrees will be pronounced to be 'evil'.

If, however, you want to talk about ways in which to help people to live more in tune with nature, with their community and with themselves then that would be something I'd be interested in.
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts". -Bertrand Russell
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Empiricist-Bruno
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Empiricist-Bruno »

Lucylu wrote:I believe everyone is doing the best they can from their perspective and what they do makes sense to them (deep down, if not on the surface).
How meaningful a statement is this for someone like me who does not know what it means to be doing one's best or whether doing one's best is a good thing or not?
Lucylu wrote:I try to be compassionate for those who may be less fortunate in terms of their education, genetic inheritance and....
Really? Are you vegan? If not, you may want to leave the genetic comment aside.
Lucylu wrote:I think calling people a cancer or evil is unkind and not very constructive.
Are you implying it is evil to do so? :twisted:
Lucylu wrote:I might go so far as to say it was misanthropic. The repetition of 'cancer' here reminds me of George Bush repeating 'terrorists' over and over, to try to create drama and fear. It seems removed from the personal reality of people's lives. The OP then seems to offer the added blackmail/ witch hunt that anyone who disagrees will be pronounced to be 'evil'.

:roll:

I think that a person who considers calling a misanthrope another who is trying to raise the alarm about what he thinks is a hidden, unrecognized disease affecting humanity or human societies might be a person of dubious character. Shoot down the whistle blowers? Is that doing your best? My focus is on the recognition of cancer as a societal disease. This is the issue I bring up. By putting on the same footing my repetition of the term cancer with George Bush's war terrosits you are showing that you have missed the point of what I was trying to say, sorry. :(

When the tribes people of Africa refuse treatment for Ebola because they do not recognize the disease and continue doing the same thing, burying their dead with lots of touching of the dead involved, they become supporters of the disease. This is sort of what I'm trying to say. Drama and fear is involved in the threat of disease. I'm not sorry my OP raises this prospect. I feel responsible for doing so.
Lucylu wrote:If, however, you want to talk about ways in which to help people to live more in tune with nature, with their community and with themselves then that would be something I'd be interested in.
Well, thanks for that. But how can you talk about living in tune with nature if the topic of cancer is taboo because it raises fear and drama? One thing about societal cancer is that its support is not unlike that of the support for Ebola: All people want respect and this means respect for their traditions as they identify themselves to their traditions and when some one they don't know jumps onto the seen and wants them to do things they don't understand and which conflicts with their traditions, they feel under attack and retreat. This seems to be your position.

Now, for us to come to a common understanding, I would have to gain your trust. But to do this, would I have to first start to help you bury your dead according to your own traditions? :wink:
Watch out for the hidden paradoxes around you!
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Lucylu
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Re: Is societal cancer being ignored by evil individuals?

Post by Lucylu »

Empiricist- Bruno,

I don't doubt that your personal motives are pure and that you have good intentions but I am very concerned about the language that you are using to frame your hypothesis. It's a responsibility of those that wish to create a social movement/ revolution to ensure that their principles will remain strong and immutable over time. Consider how the words of the Bible or the Koran can be abused by those who take their words far too literally, perhaps in order to cope with the rapidly changing modern world. Or the words of the Founding Fathers?

You must admit that your metaphors referring to people as 'cancer' and certain individuals as 'bedbugs' is not dissimilar to the objectifying language most profoundly exposed by anti-semitism: Jewry was considered a disease and Jewish people as 'paracites'. All genocides and war have depended upon such dehumanising language.

I have just finished reading a biography of Hitler in which the author's conclusion was that the current focus on political correctness is a means of purging ourselves of the sins of Hitler; not because he alone committed these horrors, hidden by the chaos of war, but because anti-semitism was in fact very common at the time and put a face to the anti-capitalist/ anti-banker theories that many still have today.

This is why I feel it is crucial to use compassion and education as a means of revolution. In my view to do otherwise would only be postponing peace. I think that it is the exclusion of a group, a culture or a race which creates an imbalance in the first instance and to try to solve this imbalance through further exclusion would be unwise. It may provide immediate gratification and a superficial/ temporary sense of peace but ultimately it will simply pass the problem on to future generations.

However, I would like to emphasise again that I believe your own intentions are good but I just feel that your words would be far more effective and lasting if framed by an ethos of education and inclusiveness alone, excluding the potential for future abuse.
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts". -Bertrand Russell
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