Do you control your brain or does your brain control you?

[bad ideas actualised by alcohol]

I heard this on the Ricky Gervais show, and I thought I might as well ask you so: Do you control your brain or does your brain control you?

[Rafiq]

You ARE your brain. Everything that is "you" is your brain, and nothing in regards to your "will" exists beyond it.

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[Obs]

There's no such thing as free will, kid.

[Roach]

hLRckO0zCJQ

[bad ideas actualised by alcohol]

Suddenly...Onion!
Now that is comedic gold.

[Rafiq]

There's no such thing as free will, kid.

Did I say there was?

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[Blake's Baby]

A phrase that doesn't often appear in my RevLeft postings:

"Totally what Rafiq said."

[Rafiq]

A phrase that doesn't often appear in my RevLeft postings:

"Totally what Rafiq said."

?

[BE_]

youoe dont ****role yur brain, theres is microwchips the new wrold order masonic repitilian ufo government pute in your head to control YOU!!!!

[Obs]

Did I say there was?

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Generally, when one posts in a thread without quoting another post, the post is most often directed at the OP.

[Blake's Baby]

?

I presume by ? you mean 'I don't understand'.

My post - "Totally what Rafiq said" means "I totally agree with Rafiq". Both about the lack of a brain/self seperation, ie 'you are your brain' etc, and also I agree that you didn't refer to 'free will' even though someone else said you did.

The other part, "A phrase that doesn't often appear in my RevLeft postings" was intended to flag up that I don't often post to agree with you, but this time I was doing just that.

If this hadn't have been in Chit-Chat, I'd have just 'liked' your post. As it is Chit-Chat, the only way to agree is to post something signifying agreement.

And then have long explanations afterwards about what agreeing with things means.



Generally, when one posts in a thread without quoting another post, the post is most often directed at the OP.

You reckon? I reply to the last thing posted if I'm not quoting... I assumed everyone else did to. Never really occurred to me that people might ignore all of the intervening stuff and assume that everyone knew that they were addressing comment sto the OP. If I'm addressing the OP I tend to put "@ the OP" or something. Do you have any evidence that 'generally' the way you think it's done is more usual?

[Rafiq]

Generally, when one posts in a thread without quoting another post, the post is most often directed at the OP.

It isn't difficult to articulate that my post contained the word "Will" in it, and your post was after mine, as a one liner, one could easily come to the conclusion you were replying to me.

[dodger]

I heard this on the Ricky Gervais show, and I thought I might as well ask you so: Do you control your brain or does your brain control you?

PUT IT TO THE TEST. Instruct it.

Lord Brain founded this journal. It will tell you everything you want to know and a rainforest full of papers that you did not want to know.

http://brain.oxfordjournals.org/

We would all be much more in the know but for Stuart Restoration. No ghost or spirit in the brain = no god. Dangerous idea.

We not our brains feel, think, act. The brain enables. Psychophysical entity. A mouthful but it describes what we are.

[Avocado]

Your genes control you

[Railyon]

You control your brain.

Your brain is a means of (mental) production.

Means of mental production are means of production.

Therefore you all own the means of production.

Problem solved, instant communism

[Avocado]

You control your brain.

Your brain is a means of (mental) production.

Means of mental production are means of production.

Therefore you all own the means of production.

Problem solved, instant communism

Your brain is not some separate entity - unless you are an advocate of dualism.

Your genes control you (you = all of your material)

[Railyon]

What I want to say is,

It's all in our mind, man

like... woah. cosmic.

[Raúl Duke]

I heard this on the Ricky Gervais show, and I thought I might as well ask you so: Do you control your brain or does your brain control you?

The question runs on the assumption of a "mind-body dualism" idea in philosophy (epistemology I think) that goes back to Descartes and others.

If we see "consciousness" ("mind") as a product of the brain, than the brain "controls" you; but it's perceptual: you can view the brain-consciousness as a single entity (thus you are your brain; question becomes non-sensical) or dualistically (you are consciousness, a product of your brain's neural firing/synapses/whatever; thus your brain controls/shapes your consciousness).

[Rafiq]

Your brain is not some separate entity - unless you are an advocate of dualism.

Your genes control you (you = all of your material)

Your "genes" don't control you. You are controled directly by the mode of production and of social relations that are in it. You are your brain. You, do not exist, you are a collective existence of several organs which operate simultaneously, like an autonomous machine.

[ColonelCossack]

I think it's obvious to us as materialists that "we are our brains"; what Rafiq said.

However, I don't think that was exactly what the OP meant; I think it was more a question of whether our unconscious and subconscious brain controls our actions, or whether our conscious mind controls what we do. Many recent scientific studies have suggested very strongly that then former is the case; that there is no such thing as free will, and that most of our actions are coordinated by the unconscious, as opposed to the conscious, mind.

So the question was sort of worded in a way which was sort of misleading. While it's blatant that our mind does not exist outside of the brain, the real question was whether our conscious minds are in control of what we do. It has become increasingly obvious that the conscious mind occupies a tiny fraction of neural activity, and that we are, in fact, not in conscious control of many, if not all, of our actions.

The idea of "Free will" is then a fallacy. So too is the idea of a "self".

[ColonelCossack]

Your "genes" don't control you. You are controled directly by the mode of production and of social relations that are in it. You are your brain. You, do not exist, you are a collective existence of several organs which operate simultaneously, like an autonomous machine.

yeah this too.

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

Karl Pilkington is the greatest philosopher of our time.

[bad ideas actualised by alcohol]

Karl Pilkington is the greatest philosopher of our time.

Of every time, if you ask me.

[Blake's Baby]

...
The idea of "Free will" is then a fallacy. So too is the idea of a "self".

No. Doesn't follow.

'Self' is the term given to consciousness. If we are conscious we have self. Descartes claimed 'I think therefore I am' and there's nothing really that can get beyond that, because if you are aware of your own existence then you have to have existence. It's a kind of tautology - for there to be an 'I' there has to be a subject recognising that 'I', which is 'I'... consciousness and self are identical. You can't think if you are 'not', or if you can we've never managed to demonstrate it. Descartes thought the Devil might have tricked him about the whole of the restof existence but there's still a 'him', still a 'self' labelled 'Descartes', still a consciousness, being tricked.