An interesting essay in Aeon by neurologist Jules Montague:
Why is the brain prone to florid forms of confabulation?
She had visited Madonna’s mansion the week before, Maggie told me during my ward round. Helped her choose outfits for the tour. The only problem was that Maggie was a seamstress in Dublin. She had never met Madonna; she had never provided her with sartorial advice on cone brassieres. Instead, an MRI scan conducted a few days earlier – when Maggie arrived at the ER febrile and agitated – revealed encephalitis, a swelling of the brain.
Now she was confabulating, conveying false memories induced by injury to her brain. Not once did Maggie doubt that she was a seamstress to the stars, no matter how incongruous those stories seemed. And that’s the essence of confabulation: the critical faculty of doubt is compromised. These honest lies were Maggie’s truth…
The answer to wHY , i say, is contained very nicely in the diagnosis.
It about memory. nothing to do with the brain. whatever that is.
This swelling sinmy, harmlessly one might say, distorts the triggering mechanism for the memory. So the person, with previous memories of things, has a flow of imagination that triggers the memory and brings a opinion that the inventions are true. in fact it shows how we use our memory coupled with the soul.
The interference from the swelling etc only affects the middleman. that is the triggering mechanism. no different then when dreaming. Same mechanism with same results.
However waking triggers the true data and triggering mechanism blowing away the invented one.
Relevant research:
And:
Relevant to what? Phrenological assumptions?
Byers doesn’t know what a brain is. Quelle surprise
It’s almost as if he’s determined in advance how things actually are and research either confirms those beliefs or the research is simply wrong. Must be nice to live in such a simple world.
Erik,
Erik gets nervous when brain researchers — gasp! — attribute mental functions to the brain.
Phrenologists, all of them! They probably believe in the empty set, too.
I wanted to know if this thread has a topic and serves a purpose. You seem to be saying no.
i don’t agree there is a brain. From the bible and observation all their is IS a soul meshed to a memory system(mind/brain). not much different then a computer.
there is no reason to imagine a brain thing functioning. Everything can be seen through a memoory system connecting soul and body.
Thats why all mind problems are always associated with memory problems.
Its impossible for souls to have thinking issue problems. so it can only be what remains the memory. actually the triggering mechanism for the memory. the memory is fantastic great. it doesn’t break down i think.
There are presumptions.
a Christian must see human thought as coming from a IMMATERIAL agent called the soul. yet the soul affects the body and so a middleman is needed.
i say its not a bRAIN but simply a memory machine.
no reason to imagine a brain. thats old school.
the memory can fit every nuance in human thought along with the soul.
Robert:
I can see why introspection might lead you to that conclusion.
But be careful about generalizing.
Erik,
The topic is confabulation, and one purpose of the thread — though not the primary one — is to draw immaterialists like you and Robert out of the woodwork for another spanking.
Your prior defenses of immaterialism have been disasters. I particularly remember this exchange:
petrushka:
Erik:
keiths:
Erik:
keiths:
It remains up to petrushka to confirm whether his uncle openly reasoned this way, instead of becoming gradually uncommunicative as I assume.
Erik,
Of course he didn’t. He woke up each morning thinking his daughters were eight and ten, just as petrushka explained. He was unable to form new long-term memories.
He wasn’t uncommunicative.
Read petrushka’s description again:
And:
keiths,
So?
The disagreement is metaphysical. We don’t disagree about the phenomena, but about the premises to the method of interpretation of the phenomena.
Physicalism is committed to regard the brain as the container of the functions of the mind, including memory. On this view, loss of specific memories or intellectual functions should strictly correlate with loss of or damage to specific parts of the brain. A.k.a. phrenology.
“Immaterialism” as you call it regards the brain as the reflector, not as the container. On this view, there is a possibility, but no necessity, for other parts of the brain to assume the functions of lost or damaged parts. And loss or reduction of any specific function may or may not correlate with any visible changes in the brain. Empirical neuroscience confirms the inconsistency of the correlations. The correlations are there sure enough, but inconsistent, implying indirect causality at best, not direct causality.
It’s like mirror: The absence of the mirror tells nothing about the things that could be reflected. The presence of the mirror tells something about the things reflected, but indirectly so. “Immaterialism” takes the brain to be the mirror of the mind, not the container of it.
I’m curious about something. If the brain is damaged and can’t “reflect” new memories, does the container retain the ability to form them?
dazz,
Good question to the container believers.
Superficially, the two views are not too far apart: Both entail correlation between parts of the brain and specific mental functions. However, there is a difference of principle. On physicalism, the correlation should be strict and consistent. On “immaterialism”, there is ultimately only suggestive correlation, no fundamental or necessary correlation.
In other words, on “immaterialism” there is more than meets the eye. Even worse – there are things that will never meet the eye and must be deduced by logic rather than by experiment or observation.
Cool, but you didn’t answer my question
Because it’s not a question to me. It’s a question to physicalists.
Really? So the physicalist must explain in detail how mental processes correlate to brain activity, but the immaterialist doesn’t even need to answer basic questions? Note that I’m not asking how the immaterial mind interfaces with the brain, let alone demand the same kind of detail. All I’m asking is, in this very specific case, whether a person with brain damage can or cannot form new memories. It’s in fact a logic question: he either can or he can’t. If he can’t there’s a correlation, and would seem that physical damage can impair it’s immaterial “counterpart”. If he can (form new memories), lots of weird questions arise: how come the immaterial mind can’t bypass the physical damage? Why should we consider evil to hit someone in the head and cause brain damage if it’s not “really” damaging his mind?
Look at your question again, “… does the container retain the ability to form [memories]?”
First, it’s not basic.
Second, it is specifically for those who hold the container view. Since I don’t hold that view, any problem stemming from that view is not my problem.
Can you explain your position and how it works? Does the immaterial mind acquire and retain knowledge or not?
Sure. And next you ask how, right?
Nope. The next question is: can the immaterial mind acquire and retain knowledge if there’s brain damage?
The specific answer requires a specific theory of information. If you are asking if the mind can acquire and retain data without the brain, my answer is no. The relevant data for the mind is sense-data. To acquire it, the mind must be in contact with the senses. But sense-data is distinct from knowledge. Essential knowledge does not depend on the amount of data.
Ahh I love the brain-is-a-sort-of-antennae-for-the-soul view. It’s literally THE MOST incoherent, nonsensical and obviously false forms of anti-materialism there is.
What force is used by the immaterial soul to communicate with atoms in the brain, and by what mechanism does the immaterial-soul-force discriminate between atoms in brain-tissues and atoms in… everything else?
How does it know that it should not attempt to communicate with a carbon atom in my energy drink, and cause it to *act* in a certain way, but only with particular carbon atoms in particular molecules in particular cells in a particular tissue in my brain in particular, and not someone else’s brain?
What kind of absurdly convoluted ad-hoc bullshit would one need to erect to explain this?
Why doesn’t the “soul-force”, the one that uses the brain to make the body do stuff, show any evidence of it’s existence in the LHC experiments? Why does it only interact with subatomic particles in brains, but not under any other circumstances?
Shouldn’t a new force of nature that can interact with atoms and their constituents, and cause tissues to act on the macroscopic level, be easily identifiable in particle physics experiments?
And then look at the materialist alternative. That’s even more lovable.
So this mysterious soul-force that mysteriously knows when some particular atom is in a brain, versus some other place (like my knee, or my coffee), can not only do that, it also knows not to interact with another person’s brain. So the soul somehow knows which brain is mine, and knows not to cause other people’s brains to animate their bodies. How does it know that, and by what mechanism does it discriminate between them? Does it have a direction of origin? Can it turn around corners when necessary or is everything transparent to it? Can I shield off my brain from it by packaging it in the brains of other people?
Yes. The brain clearly exists.
Well, for some of us at least.
Rumraket,
You have a long way to go to understand what immaterial means. Most of your questions are inapplicable, like Russell’s teapot to omnipresence.
How is “knowledge” any different? Take someone who’s suffered severe brain damage. Can he still acquire knowledge or not? Like resolving a syllogism by reasoning, for example. No senses required: you learn what follows from a few premises. Can that be done by the immaterial mind of a brain-dead person?
And you’re obviously the guy to explain it?
It’s too easy to just call it “inapplicable” and think your work is done. That kind of gibberish can be erected in the same ad-hoc fashion to wave away any and all criticism.
The knowledge acquired this way is not new knowledge. It’s a specific structure given to pre-acquired data. The mind may habitually rehash its content without a brain, but since there’s no empirical manifestation to it, I doubt you place any value to it.
You’re obviously the guy to not have read anything said thus far with comprehension.
Oh, cute. So the proof of Fermat’s Last Theorem didn’t add any new knowledge, because it was there all the while in the axioms anyway… seriously?
It’s not only that there’s no empirical manifestation to it, it’s that there’s no way to know whether that’s true or not. What the hell does that mean anyway?
And you keep refusing to answer my questions. Not too long ago you were all about intellectual honesty. Remember that?
Yes I am.
There was no explanations for anything, there were a number of jargon-filled assertions with zero explanatory content.
“The logic of the world, which is shown in tautologies by the propositions of logic, is shown in equations by mathematics.” Ever heard of this? Is this true or false and how do you know?
How do you know there’s no way to know it? I know that there is a way to know it. All you need is a theory of information and a place for it in your metaphysics. I’ll be waiting until you work this out.
Erik,
Why then was the brain of petrushka’s uncle able to “reflect” memories that were established before the hemorrhage but not those that were established later? That’s exactly what you wouldn’t expect with your goofy “reflector” theory.
And if he knew that his kids were no longer eight and ten years old, why did he wake up every morning believing it?
You haven’t thought this through at all.
I would comment, but this particular line of IDiocy makes me hostile. Best just to lurk.
“On this view, there is a possibility, but no necessity, for other parts of the brain to assume the functions of lost or damaged parts. And loss or reduction of any specific function may or may not correlate with any visible changes in the brain. Empirical neuroscience confirms the inconsistency of the correlations.” It’s all as expected.
Erik,
It’s exactly what you wouldn’t expect. A damaged “reflector” should be bad at reflecting. You’re positing a reflector that just so happens to be excellent at “reflecting” memories that were established before the hemorrhage, and terrible at “reflecting” those that were established later. It makes no sense.
Your “reflector” theory also can’t answer this question:
As I said, you haven’t thought this through at all.
Meanwhile, the scenario makes perfect sense under the physicalist hypothesis. The brain’s ability to form new memories was disrupted by the hemorrhage, but not the ability to retrieve old ones. No goofy “reflecting” is happening.
You are missing an important point. A damaged container is bad at containing stuff. Even worse, on reductionist assumptions (i.e. thoroughly consistent physicalism), the container itself is the stuff and damage to it equals damage to the stuff.
A damaged reflector may be bad at reflecting, but it does nothing to affect the stuff. Other functioning parts of the reflector may or may not be able to continue reflecting the stuff.
Happens often enough that people get a bullet through their brain, they survive and recover and mental faculties don’t appear to have been affected. Then at other times mental faculties are severely affected by minor damage. Insofar as this is so, I say that the relevant reasons are not fundamentally/solely physical.
The brain is just a decoy, you know.
Glen Davidson
Brains are remarkably adaptive. Some ability to retain memories develops over the years.
But my uncle was never employable. He always had to be prodded and reminded of where he was.
Based on things I’ve read about rehabilitation of stroke victims, I’m thinking that intensive training and shaping therapies may bring many victims of brain damage back to self sufficiency. The damaged part may never recover, but there may be alternate paths.
The most interesting case I know of is the artist who lost the ability to see color. It was not a visual impairment. He lost the ability to conceive of color. Could not remember color, could not dream of color.
Erik:
None of which addresses my points:
Erik:
That’s completely confused. Remember, this “container” business is your crutch for trying to understand physicalism. People who are up to speed on neuroscience don’t need to rely on such hopelessly simplistic metaphors.
The brain is not a container. Memories are not objects that are placed in the container. And even in your clunky metaphor, the container is not the same as the stuff contained in it.
Thank you. I thought about posting something similar, but didn’t bother. The ‘container’ simile has made Wittgensteinians go crazy for generations.
Then the question is what the brain is for you. Explain.
Looks like I am again the only one with an actual model to expound and defend while you defend nothing. The upshot is that I actually have a position and you don’t.
The silliest posts are those that simply say “No” or “You’re wrong/silly/confused” leaving out what, in your opinion, is the right alternative. It’s as good as posting nothing at all. Actually, posting nothing at all is better because it keeps the thread cleaner and helps find actual content in it, if any.
there is a explanation. The soul is meshed to the memory. Why wouldn’t it be complex? Everyone must say the “brain thing” is complex to explain the glory of us.
The soul must be in contact with the material world but by just saying with one organ its easier then saying otherwise.
In fact the soul is connected to the body and leaves upon death. unnaturally as it were.
It works.