Re: Making your mind up

On Tue, 30 Apr 2024 16:30:47 -0700, Mark Isaak
<specimenNOSPAM@curioustaxon.omy.net> wrote:

On 4/30/24 2:08 AM, Martin Harran wrote:

On Mon, 29 Apr 2024 09:43:03 -0700, Mark Isaak
<specimenNOSPAM@curioustaxon.omy.net> wrote:
 
 
[…]
 

As it happens, I have been reading Yuval Noah Harari's _Homo Deus_ and
yesterday read his take on free will.  He considers it a modern myth
disproved by science. One example he gives is "robo-rats", rats in a
laboratory which have electrodes implanted in the pleasure centers of
their brain, which scientists can stimulate to make the rats do what the
scientists want them to do. The rats turn this way and that not of their
own choice, but according to the choices of the people pressing buttons.
Now, imagine you are one of those rats. You turn left. Why? Because you
*chose* to turn left. "What does it matter whether the neurons are
firing because they are stimulated by other neurons or by transplanted
electrodes connected to Professor Talwar's remote control? If you ask
the rat about it, she might well tell you, 'Sure I have free will! Look,
I want to turn left -- and I turn left. I want to climb a ladder -- and
I climb a ladder. Doesn't that prove I have free will?'" [pp. 333-334]

 
 
Most brain research that I'm aware of - including the Lbet experiments
- show a considerable difference in brain activity between trivial
decisions and important decisions. I think it's safe to say that 'Turn
left or tun right' is well into the trivial category.
 
You and he also seem to be making the assumption that the decision
process in rats can be directly transposed into humans which isnot
necessarily the case - there are distinct difference between rats and
primates, including humans. See my response to Arkalen below.

>
I took the rat illustration as an illustration, not as proof of final
concept. If a rat controlled by a human can be thinking, "I made that
decision on my own", so can a human controlled by fate.

Sorry to burst your bubble but that idea has already been dismissed by
*neurological research*. I've previously referred to work by Wilder
Penfield who is regarded as the pioneer in surgery for epilepsy and
developed the process of carrying out surgery on fully alert patients
which allowed him to observe and record the effect of stimulating
various parts of the brain;

"The Quebec meeting heard some compelling evidence for localisation of
function from Penfield, who described his work showing that electrical
stimulation of the cortex could evoke both dream-like states and motor
activity. But as Penfield explained, although the patient's body moved
if the motor cortex was stimulated, the subjects always said that this
occurred 'independent of, or in spite of, their own volition'.
Similarly, the very precise experiences he was able to evoke never
resembled 'things seen or felt in ordinary experience' but were more
like dreams."

Cobb, Matthew. The Idea of the Brain: A History: SHORTLISTED FOR THE
BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE 2020 (p. 337). Profile. Kindle Edition.