Consciousness: Egnor on dualism: another example (General)

by dhw, Sunday, September 02, 2018, 09:22 (2273 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: It is obvious the words I learn from birth are in a memory portion of the brain represented by electrical activity. When I think I find those words in the brain. When my soul thinks during life where do the words come from to be used? Does the soul rely on the memories in the brain or have its own memory bank?

You are asking a question that illustrates the dichotomy between materialism and dualism which you refuse to recognize. Those who believe in an afterlife tell us that the surviving soul DOES have its own memory bank, together with all the other immaterial facets of our identity. Materialists say all these facets have their source in materials, and they die when the materials die. You are trying to reconcile the two theories with a translation theory that is totally illogical for reasons which I keep explaining and which you keep ignoring. (See below)

DAVID: And if the soul uses words stored in the brain it can translate electricity like I do, although I don't know how it happens.

Once again you separate “I” from the soul, the crime you like to accuse me of. Your sentence should read the soul translates electricity like the soul does. But how can the soul translate electricity into words if it doesn’t know the words already? And if it knows the words already, why can’t it think in words?

DAVID: And yes, I'm trying to combine the material and the immaterial in a reasonable way, especially accounting for how we find the brain working for us in life. I don't have to 'believe in "the material side". It exists! I am my soul. We can only work together as one. And we must use the brain in the same way with its electricity.

When I said you “believe in the material side”, I meant you believe in the materialist explanation for thought, i.e. that it is produced by the brain, which is why, in your unguarded moments, you make statements like “the brain thinks in electric waves”. And in other unguarded moments you forget your belief that you and the soul are one, and make statements like “I am my soul. We can only work together. And we must use the brain….” If you are your soul, you and your soul don’t work TOGETHER. Your soul works together with the brain. And there is no disagreement on that. I can therefore only repeat the paragraph I wrote earlier:

dhw: If the soul exists, I accept that the soul uses the brain. I simply cannot see any logic in the idea that the soul doesn’t think in words until its thoughts have been translated into brain waves which it then translates back into the words it already knows. However, if you think this is logical, we shall indeed have to move on.