(2023-06-20, 11:07 PM)Merle Wrote: [ -> ]You write this in response to, "What does the matter in the brain do? It consumes a large portion of the body's resources. Does it even have a purpose?"
Really? Are you going to write off the entire field of neuroscience and the medical discipline of neurology as mere speculation? There is a vast amount of research in this field. It is not simply speculation.?
Who said that I'm writing off the entire field of neuroscience...? Not me.
I'm writing off Materialism and Physicalism, perhaps. But not neuroscience as a whole ~ knowing how the brain functions as an organ is perfectly okay.
My contention is merely the tall claim that the brain *generates* consciousness. Study of the brain I have no issue with.
So you can stop conflating neuroscience with Materialism / Physicalism, if you please.
(2023-06-20, 11:07 PM)Merle Wrote: [ -> ]That's it? You deny that the brain observes inputs or sends signals to the body. And when I ask you what it does, we find all it does is somehow limit consciousness?
Why do we have optic nerves, if the brain is not reading inputs from the eye through that nerve?
Again, your error is that the brain, in your interpretation of it as a purely physical system, is the sole originator. You even imply through your wording an intelligence and awareness to it. Only consciousness can observe. Purely material entities cannot "observe" anything. All they do is... chemical reactions, blindly. Consciousness, however, is a guiding force that can direct and control.
The brain's primary function is to limit or restrict the scope of consciousness somehow. Beyond that... it is not the brain, as a purely material entity, doing anything. The brain is merely a tool which the unconscious aspects of mind, consciousness, wield to direct the brain to do the things that it directed to do ~ sending signals. Consciousness is the one that observes inputs, and uses the brain, or rather, the entire body, to send signals in return.
(2023-06-20, 11:07 PM)Merle Wrote: [ -> ]If one had a brainectomy, would his consciousness become unlimited?
Well... then individual would be dead, so yeah, I guess. They would no longer be inhabiting a body, after all.
(2023-06-20, 11:07 PM)Merle Wrote: [ -> ]Does this mean that all animals have souls, and all the brains of all the animals are only there to limit the consciousness of those souls?
We are animals, after all... so... yes?
(2023-06-20, 11:07 PM)Merle Wrote: [ -> ]How is it that those animals with smaller, less complex brains apparently do a much better job of limiting consciousness?
You seem to be almost presuming that a smaller, less complex brain means less consciousness or something...
In my conception of brains, the brain's secondary function, overall, is to allow a consciousness to control a physical form, and so, the brain must be suitably complex in relation to the complexity of the rest of the body. That is, it is a central control center of sorts. It allows consciousness to unconsciously regulate and maintain a body in a healthy state.