Atheism, Theism, Science & Philosophy

[Love]

The "brain-as-receiver" model seems problematic to me for several reasons:

It doesn't really provide any explanation for what consciousness is or how it works (other than that it's "out there" "somewhere" transmitting to brains somehow).

Again, I am not a qualified professional in this field (consciousness studies), nor have I studied it at academic level, but it is an area in which I am very interested.

At present, the leading reductionist models of consciousness are in the field of neuroscience, and the hardware used has its roots in nuclear medicine. As explained in one of my earlier posts, all that has been observed thus far includes the identification of certain neural correlates with the use of neuroscience/nuclear medicine hardware such as a positron emission tomography (PET) scanner. Cristoph Koch, a Geman professor of biology, is one of the leading experts in this field.

Like the field of quantum mechanics, in which there are 25 different interpretations of the available due its intrinsic complexity, consciousness is very similar in that the current scientific evidence available is very much open to subjective interpretation, hence the reason why science still has absolutely no idea what consciousness is, let alone explaining how it works.

Here is a very interesting video clip on the subject of whether or not consciosuness is definable, in which Koch makes a contribution:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMaURchT0XQ

The "blind pitiless indifference" of the Cosmos in general is still a fact whether or not any deities exist. Just ask the dinosaurs. Or anyone who has a child with leukemia. I do not see how gods change the situation. If a god or goddess shows up and says, "Behold! The meaning and purpose of your lives is to [spread the Gospel and convert/kill the heathens!] [be excellent to each other!] [colonize the solar system and spread to the stars!] [insert preferred meaning/purpose here]!" all that does is give us the deity's opinion. And what about the deity? A monotheistic god in particular has no deity of its own to tell it what the meaning and purpose of its life is, provide it with moral guidance, etc. It's an atheist! Again, this is just kicking the can down the road, not providing actual answers to existential questions.

I disagree with this. I believe in absolutely morality and the concept of good versus evil, for example. I really think it is extremely difficult to think of God in conceptual terms (I struggle with this); I simply choose to experience God through transcendental consciousness. Thinking of God in rational terms will just instantly turn you into an atheist, which is exactly what happened to me. However, after reading about epistemology and Kant's transcendental argument (peruse "Critique of Pure Reason"), it made me think about these concepts in much more depth.

Well, this is interesting. At least, this approach offers the virtue of repeatability under controlled conditions. I have done a lot of reading (and a little experimentation *cough*) in this area. So far, the realm of psychedelic experience is IMO "the last, best hope" for a serious challenge to my current world view. Unfortunately our ability to systematically and scientifically explore this terrain is severely constrained at the present time. However, the "trip reports" I'm aware of vary quite a bit, and not all of them support monotheism, or even necessarily "theism" as commonly understood.

Are you willing to divulge the substances with which you experimented? I am tee-total at present and will be for the foreseeable future. I despise alcohol and tobacco and have no interest in taking these or any other purely hedonistic drugs ever again; however, I do not rule out the distinct possibility that I will use psychedelics in the future (any of "the big four": mescaline, DMT, LSD and mushroom) for further consciousness exploration. I have yet to try mescaline, so this is the first on my list if I do, indeed, decide to indulge. This will certainly not be before I have completed my PhD, though.