An Unembodied Mind is Very Complex

Con did not establish ground rules for this round and is very confident for a victory so I will continue. I will stick to rebuttals and bring up new points only in direct response to Con clarifying existing arguments. This debate makes a good case for solid definitions up front. Standard definitions for embodied are: 1. Free from a corporeal body; disembodied; as, unembodied spirits [18]. 2. Not embodied; not collected into a body; not yet organized; as, unembodied militia. Con has dragged several assumptions about the idea not justified by the definition or clarified in the opening round. The relevant unembodied definition simply suggests that something is not made of the matter that we are familiar with. This does not imply the entity would be timeless, spaceless, not made of energy, simple etc. In fact, using a complex mind as an analogy implies it would have all the similar aspects of minds we are familiar with expressed in some other form. This would also be consistent with a being from another dimension, zone of reality or universe that impacts our own. Con’s assumptions reflect a bias towards a common God concept not supported in this debate. Unembodied Mind, not its Capabilities: -“Because remove a mind’s thought or action and the individual remains” No nothing remains. Since mind refers to active ‘mental processes’ when these stop the mind/consciousness no longer exists. We can measure mental processes in the only mind we are aware of, as supported by a brain in the human mind, and when they stop we refer to this as brain death [16]. Legally this is the point at which the individual no longer exists and their organs can be removed to be transplanted to others. The brain tissue is still alive and many of the organs are viable but the mind has ceased to exist. This is because consciousness is a collection of active mental processes and when these processes stop the individual mind ceases to exist. -Con is throwing out any distinction between minds As I have explained a mind is a collection of running processes. When I say a creator mind is more complex than a human mind or that a human mind is more complex than a chimpanzee I am referring to the complexity of consciousness. This is often demonstrated by comparing specific thoughts or actions that derive from thoughts. A chimpanzee may have the creative power and thought capacity to form and execute a plan to use a stick as a tool to dig for termites to eat. Their brains are very similar to ours but the mind is much simpler. A human mind is more complex, able to use similar skills to make a wheelbarrow or, standing on shoulders of giants, create an automobile. A single God mind capable of planning and creating the universe would have been extremely complex. - “It’s strange to call the concept of a brain-independent mind “non-standard” …” Yes, philosophers ignorant of modern studies of the brain commonly held that minds were independent of the brain but we now know every aspect of consciousness is dependent on the brain. Con tries to differentiate a mind with its actions, again ignoring the standard definitions of a mind. He is either equating mind with brain, a mistake he has accused me of, or working off of a personal nonstandard definition of mind. “The mind is typically defined as the organized totality or system of all mental processes or psychic activities of an individual [10].” By mind we are referring to all mental processes that work together to form consciousness. These processes culminate in thoughts, emotions, imagination intention and active memory. -Brains, not minds, are necessary for thoughts. Brains are necessary for thoughts. Thoughts as a combination of mental processes refer to a mind. A mind that doesn’t need the type of physical hardware we require would still likely have something similar. If it does not, by mind we are still referring to these running processes that make up consciousness. ““complex thoughts are needed for intricate actions.” Right, but a mind itself is needed for complex thoughts and its subsequent actions.” Here Con concedes that in order to perform complex actions, such as creating a universe, complex thoughts relating to intention, imagination, immense knowledge etc would be necessary. “God could be thinking of calculus while training lions. So is God therefore calculus and lion training?” No, God would be the collection of all running processes expressed by their specific capabilities such as thinking of calculus. The specific thoughts are relevant because they show the complexity the processes that make up a mind. Conscious minds are manifested in specific thoughts but a mind does not equate to specific mental actions. Minds are not single intentions or thoughts specifically. The collections of active processes that can produce specific intention are what a mind refers to. Unembodiment, not Emobodiment “Pro says that an unembodied mind requires a disembodied brain… that’s saying that a disembodied being requires embodiment.” No Con is misusing the term unembodied and embody defined as: 1: to give a body to (a spirit) : incarnate [17] 2 a: to deprive of spirituality b: to make concrete and perceptible Embodiment simply refers to placing something spiritual into a physical form in the physical world we are aware of. It does not say anything about what a spiritual existence would be like. A non-material existence is completely consistent with a being existing in another zone of reality, another universe, dimension etc that somehow overlaps with our own. That a brain is necessary for all minds we are aware of indicates that any other minds would also need an unembodied or ‘spiritual’ version of a brain. That brains are incredibly complex is relevant because they indicate the extreme complexity of the running processes that together form a mind. That they are necessary also indicates they are a complex addition to this identity. “But this isn’t the only thing he must demonstrate, he must also demonstrate that embodiment in terms of a brain is “necessary for all minds” including unembodied minds.” No, it was Con who chose mind as an analogy for a creator. All minds we are aware of require a complex brain to function. We have every reason to suspect that other minds would require the same thing since all minds we are aware of require it. Why assume otherwise? “A mind’s storage for information isn’t the mind itself, so it’s irrelevent how many microprocessors are used, is an unembodied mind a collection of anything like a microprocessor suite?” It is relevant because the mind is a collection of running processes that together form consciousness. Because by complexity we are referring to many different processes that work together it is central to the debate. There are a baffling large number of processors all running to produce a mind. They never stop running until death Complexity or Simplicity, not Existence “We’re not asking about the existence of an unembodied mind, we’re asking about the complexity of such an enity were it to exist.” I agree and I have not suggested otherwise. Based on this statement the necessary complex unembodied brain would also be a part of this entity. When I said Con was defining things into existence I was referring to many unwarranted assumptions. These include that a unembodied mind would exist as absolutely nothing by definition. Con has not in any way demonstrated this and it is not verified by standard definitions. “For instance, another “zone of reality” is itself a spatial term, and if an unembodied mind doesn’t fill space by definition, then its doesn’t fill zones of reality, it just is part of the real world if it exists. But its existence is irrelevent to whether or not it would be complex if it did exist.” These are major unsupported assumptions that Con has attempted to use throughout the debate. Every term we could use would be from our reality. That a being is not manifested in a material body does not mean it would not take up space. Being an entity not made of matter we are aware of tells us nothing about what it would be or would be made of. All you can conclude by standard unembodied definitions are that the being does not have a physical body of the form we are aware of. Con’s burden of proof and information for voters Con explicitly stated that we both had a burden of proof at the end of round 1. He has not established that an unembodied mind would be simple. Con’s arguments boil down to an assertion that a spiritual creator being would be simple only because it is not made of matter. Con has declared victory twice since round two and equated my arguments to three ‘blunders’ a word defined as a, ‘stupid or careless mistake.’ Con indicated that any readers should give sources to me adding, “he’ll need ‘em.” - I have explained how complex minds are in general and related the complex processes that build a mind to the complexity of tasks. A mind that creates universes would need to be much more complex than ours. Such an unembodied creator would also need some type of complex non material brain to support it. Con references an extremely complex collection of running processes, or a mind, as an analogy for a creator and then asserts that because the mind is not produced by matter we are aware of that it would necessarily be simple. He ignores standard definitions of ‘unembodied’ and ‘mind’ throughout the debate using personal definitions that he has not clarified. [16] http://en.wikipedia.org... [17] http://www.merriam-webster.com... [18] http://www.thefreedictionary.com...