(2017-10-22, 06:36 PM)nbtruthman Wrote: It's not a bias, it's clinical observation. There is the apparently common observation of "covert REM" during the awakening phase of deep general anesthesia, correlating with the patient reporting of brief dreams. The other paper is interesting and seems to point to some sort of residual memory formation under general anesthesia unconsciousness. This could be interpreted in different ways both materialist mind-brain and interactive dualist.
Ah that there's some REM measured during awakening phase is interesting though my feeling that there's a bias is when the argument turns to similarities of dreams as a method of timestamping where they occur.
But as to the second point I'd agree - most of this kind of work is easily interpreted as coming from brain-as-producer or brain-as-transceiver, and of course immaterialism being true doesn't rule out mind=brain just as materialism being true (impossible but let's assume) doesn't rule out God or an afterlife.
'Historically, we may regard materialism as a system of dogma set up to combat orthodox dogma...Accordingly we find that, as ancient orthodoxies disintegrate, materialism more and more gives way to scepticism.'
- Bertrand Russell
- Bertrand Russell