From ENST: … how did humans by means of natural selection alone develop language and sophisticated verbal communication? The answer: we didn’t. It was a product inherent in us, what Alfred Russel Wallace, Darwin’s partner and challenger, said it was all along, an intrinsic part of human exceptionalism.
Mind
A cosmopsychist talks about the universe, God, and free will
Bernardo Kastrup: Well, there certainly is something out there that is independent of all of us as individual minds, and which seems to hold the state of the world when nobody is looking at the world.
Michael Egnor: Philosopher’s claim that split brain surgery shows that we have no real identity is wrong
(As a neurosurgeon) I’ve done that operation so let me explain why they mislead us.
A classic Darwinian fairy tale: How the human mind jumpstarted itself into existence
Earlier, Frankish explained that Dennett accounts for consciousness as “a temporary level of organisation—a ‘virtual system’—that we create for ourselves through certain learned habits of self-stimulation.” But what are the concepts “we,” “ourselves,” and “self-” even doing in this discussion? If consciousness is an illusion, these concepts are illusions that cannot create anything.
A Universal Mind is a reasonable idea, says Bernardo Kastrup
One reason that science media are respectful of cosmopsychism may be growing awareness of the problems with strict materialism, naturalism, or physicalism: As Michael Egnor has noted, “How can you have a proposition that the mind doesn’t exist? That means propositions don’t exist and that means that you don’t have a proposition.”
Michael Egnor and Bernardo Kastrup: Why consciousness couldn’t just evolve from the mud
Kastrup, a philosopher and computer scientist, does not accept a Darwinian account of the evolution of consciousness and is is also sympathetic to the basic intuitions behind the idea that there is design in nature (intelligent design theory).
Michael Egnor: Why the mind can’t just be the brain
Thinking it through carefully, the idea doesn’t even make sense.
At Inspiring Philosophy: There is no evidence that the brain creates consciousness
In this Part 3, physicalist arguments are debunked.
Eric Holloway: Why engineering can’t be reduced to the laws of physics
He argues that the problem how to account for innovation cannot be solved by anything built upon the laws of physics.
Brain connectivity is equal in 130 mammals, including humans
Researcher:”Our study revealed a universal law: Conservation of Brain Connectivity. This law denotes that the efficiency of information transfer in the brain’s neural network is equal in all mammals, including humans.” So what makes humans unique isn’t brain connectivity.
New vid on the Hard Problem of Consciousness
Inspiring Philosophy: There is no greater problem for materialists and physicalists that trying to explain how the brain could create consciousness. This video argues the hard problem implies the mind cannot reduce to matter.
Michael Egnor skewers claim that there is no continuity of the human self
Egnor: if Blackmore is not the same person now that she was a moment ago, then it makes no sense to call the YouTube video above an interview with Susan Blackmore. Perhaps it should be called interviews with Susan Blackmores or interviews with countless women, one of whom was Susan Blackmore. Or interviews with women formerly known as Susan Blackmore…
Could really powerful AI be considered a life form?
An AI theorist makes that case to a technical writer…
At Nautilus: Yes, electrons DO have minds
Panpsychists in science believe that nature is all there is but, they say, it includes consciousness as a fundamental fact of nature.
Are animals just as smart as people, but we are unfair to them?
Michael Egnor looks at such claims. Including apes as co-authors on a primatology research paper created quite a stir—among humans.