From Huffington Post
Mind Controlled Robot Arm Lets Paralyzed Man Drink a Beer on His Own
… doesn’t that mean mind over matter?
A man paralyzed for 13 years can finally have a drink on his own again, thanks to a robotic arm he’s able to control using his brain. More.
See also: Neuroscience tried wholly embracing naturalism but then the brain got away
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It seems to be the physical brain doing the controlling. I suspect that if you anesthetized the man the robot arm would do nothing. Whatever the ontological status of the mind, the material brain appears to be needed needed to mediate between the mind and the material world.
Seversky,that really doesn’t mean anything, as everyone knows.
If someone bust up the signal switchbox on my street, I couldn’t send or receive messages. That doesn’t mean that the [signal switchbox] is “doing the controlling.”
It is 2015. You gotta do better than this.
In the following article, Dr. Nelson ties the ‘personal agent’ argument into intelligent design:
And although Dr. Nelson alluded to writing an e-mail, (i.e. creating information), to tie his ‘personal agent’ argument into intelligent design, Dr. Nelson’s ‘personal agent’ argument can easily be amended to any action that you, as a personal agent, choose to take:
Dr. Craig Hazen, in the following video at the 12:26 minute mark, relates how he performed, for an audience full of ‘academics’, a ‘miracle’ simply by raising his hand,,
It does say he is able to control the robotic arm using his brain (as opposed to his mind). But what does “mind over matter” mean in this context?
This part is interesting:
Quite amazing, but it’s not clear that this device is interfacing with anything nonphysical.
The robot arm would work the same as real arms. Our thoughts do touch the material world. I think they only are attached to our memory.
The guy is sending info to the robot arm no different then his own arm or something close to it.