A THEORY OF INTELLIGENCE Part Two; addendum (Identity)

by David Turell , Tuesday, July 17, 2018, 18:06 (2110 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: The concept of dualism itself is perfectly straightforward:

dhw: Dualism = the self consists of soul and body/brain.
DAVID: No the soul uses the brain. the soul is not the brain.

dhw: Why “no”? Of course the soul is not the brain. Dualism = the self which comprises soul and brain/body, and yes, the thinking soul uses the brain to provide information and material expression. Moving into the afterlife, I summarized your new theory as follows:
dhw: And in death the soul uses telepathy to translate into English the thoughts which the now non-existent wet ions carry from the now non-existent brain to the soul.

DAVID: Has to be if the brain is gone.

dhw: But where do the thoughts come from if there is no brain? The soul does the thinking in English. There is no translating. And that can be used as evidence that in life the soul does the thinking in English. Telepathy is the method by which the soul communicates with other souls.

DAVID: I/soul initiates a thought which ends up as wet ions, and must come back out to my mind as intelligible words.

dhw: If, as you have agreed, your soul speaks English, then it initiates thought in English. It doesn’t need to change it into wet ions which return to the soul to be translated into the English in which it originated (first version).

I'll chop up your thoughts/interpretations to reply: my point is my soul must use the wet ions to think. you refuse to entertain the idea of the reality that exists.

dhw: Your second version has the soul thinking unintelligible thoughts (so it doesn’t speak English), which apparently the wet ions translate into English so that the soul can understand what it was thinking – which means that now the soul does speak English!

Foolish response. Of course my soul thinks in English thru the agency of the wet ions

dhw: Let’s start again. The dualistic process I propose to you is this: soul initiates thought in English using information provided by brain; sends message to brain to give material expression to thought; ongoing process whereby brain sends information to soul, and soul develops thought in English according to whatever information it is given to think about.

Once again in your view a separate soul uses a distinctly separate brain. I view my soul as my immaterial doppelganger which uses the wet ions to process its thoughts and translate them as they are completed.

dhw: In death, English-speaking soul continues to think intelligible thoughts in English, but uses psychic means to gather information and uses telepathy instead of brain in order to communicate with others.

That is the only part you have gotten correct about my views.

Materialism: the brain thinks. Mystery, as described in your post: we have no idea how electrical charges from within the brain create thought.

dhw Now without going through the wet ions/translation theory again, please simply tell me which of the above points you disagree with.

Most of it.