Human Intelligence is an Illusion

[The__Chameleon]

If decisions are made in the brain before we are conscious of having made them, then "we" didn't make them, our brains did this unconsciously,

No because you are your brain. You are more than just the conscious part of your brain. Think about it, you must be, otherwise what are you conscious of?

You are conscious of your body right? If I stab you then you feel pain. If you weren't also your body then you wouldn't be feeling pain.

> But this is a deterministic reaction to physical stimuli. I do not consciously contemplate the pain and consciously choose a course of action.

Unconscious processes are natural processes since a vital component of intelligence (as many would define it) is conscious choice. Without it there is no distinction from any autonomic response in the body.

They are all arbitrary distinctions. Intelligence is also a natural process, regardless of whether it involves consciousness or not.

> If intelligence is natural, then nature is intelligent. Atheism presupposes that the only thing in the universe that is intelligent (as in capable of "free" thinking) is a human being. "Nature" therefore is something purely deterministic, mechanical, algorithmic. Something bound to a set of arbitrary laws or conditions, or something that arises from random chance without any form of mindful choice. If intelligence is an inherent component of nature, then this flies in the face of Atheism. There must therefore be a distinction between that which "thinks" and that which "naturally reacts". If you consciously consider how you are going to react to something, then in theory, you are determining the outcome, not "nature".

What I propose is that humans possess highly evolved instincts masquerading as free will.

What is free will? Will free from what? why do we need such a concept? Is it useful? Seems to be sending you round in circles trying to make sure there is a use for it.

> The term "free" as it refers to the notion of free will asserts that if it would be natural for us to choose one thing we have the capacity to freely choose something else instead. If the universe determines we should go left, we can consciously choose to ignore this prompting and choose to go right. It is the notion that we (our conscious sense of mind) are free from (independent of) "nature".

> I assert that what said people like to think of as free will isn't free because they are not conscious of their own decisions, therefore their conscious sense of mind has no authority, and furthermore, since they qualified the nature of their decision making as "intelligent" (free thinking) it means that since this thinking  is done by "nature" prior to the false sense of conscious authorship, nature is intelligent.

> If nature is an intelligent (free thinking, consciously self-deterministic) being (entity, agent, whatever) then to all intensive purposes nature is a god. In order to reject this possibility and still claim that nature is not intelligent one can claim that there is really no such thing as intelligence apart from the purely illusory sense of conscious authority over self. And in either case,  human intelligence is an illusion. The conscious mind is slave to nature, not in authority of it.