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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
then it makes sense, at this level, to view the science vs religion clash as a contest over the power to pronounce and define the truths that shape and regulate the social sphere.

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My experiences "out there" have been the same as yours. As far as I can tell, they're mostly just in here.

K.

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ORIGINAL: juliaoceania

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You seem to be arguing that there is some "higher" plane or other claptrap involved. There isn't. We may still be in the early stages of understanding the brain but we can already use various interventions to change the functioning of what you call consciousness. To argue otherwise is to ignore the evidence.

Altering human consciousness does not mean it does not exist... in other words, brain function and consciousness being related to each other does not mean anything but that the human brain is a structure that houses the observer.

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To demonstrate this, Weizmann Institute researchers built a tiny device measuring less than one micron in size, which had a barrier with two openings. They then sent a current of electrons towards the barrier. The "observer" in this experiment wasn't human. Institute scientists used for this purpose a tiny but sophisticated electronic detector that can spot passing electrons. The quantum "observer's" capacity to detect electrons could be altered by changing its electrical conductivity, or the strength of the current passing through it

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ORIGINAL: DomKen
..."the expression and/or function of consciousness" is strictly a matter of the physical action of the brain, nothing more.

You seem to be arguing that there is some "higher" plane or other claptrap involved...

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ORIGINAL: juliaoceania
... how science works as a world view, and not just a method for a testing hypothesis...

• history and progress (from Judaism)
• rational cosmos (from the Greeks)
• nature is hostile and humans can conquer it (Germanic)

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ORIGINAL: DomKen

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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
Sorry DK I wasn't talking about that. I was talking about "the expression and/or function of consciousness". I've bolded the words above for you as you obviously missed them first time around.

It does help to respond to things that people actually write. A good way of ensuring this is to look at the words actually written.

I might add that for me, the interesting and significant aspects of consciousness are not its (possible) physical constitution, rather things like its expression, articulation, meaning and how it's experienced/interpreted by the subject. In much the same way as the content and meaning of thought interests me, not the physical processes that might be involved in manufacturing thoughts. That's just me of course.

The relevance of such processes seems to me to be at best limited. Focussing exclusively on the physiology of consciousness and thought bolsters an epistemological space that enables, for example, determinism and similar follies. But please don't let me discourage you, feel free to pursue them to your heart's content.

And I meant that "the expression and/or function of consciousness" is strictly a matter of the physical action of the brain, nothing more.

You seem to be arguing that there is some "higher" plane or other claptrap involved. There isn't. We may still be in the early stages of understanding the brain but we can already use various interventions to change the functioning of what you call consciousness. To argue otherwise is to ignore the evidence.

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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
There a a number of crossovers/contrasts between science and religion, depending on the level of analysis/perspective adopted. This is one of more fundamental.

At an operative level in society today - outside the research institute, outside the labs, the academy, in society in general - science acts as truth production system. Science is seen as the determiner of Truth. So, in this sense, one could say that science can be seen as a secular religion. Scientists can be seen as the priests of that religion.

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ORIGINAL: rawtape

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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
There a a number of crossovers/contrasts between science and religion, depending on the level of analysis/perspective adopted. This is one of more fundamental.

At an operative level in society today - outside the research institute, outside the labs, the academy, in society in general - science acts as truth production system. Science is seen as the determiner of Truth. So, in this sense, one could say that science can be seen as a secular religion. Scientists can be seen as the priests of that religion.

No real disagreement, TB -- he says, as he lovingly fingers his vestments, er lab coat, before putting it away for the day.

Mind you, politicians, Republican think tanks, and the media might really be the arbiters of truth. Other than in cases like attempts to force Creationism/Intelligence Design into the science curriculum, most of us practicing scientists don't really take our priestly duties that seriously.

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ORIGINAL: eihwaz

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ORIGINAL: tweakabelle
then it makes sense, at this level, to view the science vs religion clash as a contest over the power to pronounce and define the truths that shape and regulate the social sphere.

This conflict over epistemological power, as well as temporal power, has been underway since the European Renaissance.  Religious belief has increasingly been relegated to the private sphere.

As discussed in previous threads, there is no essential conflict between science and religion, epistemologically speaking, as they encompass different domains of knowledge.

As a worldview, science is a type of mythology, in the sense of a set of beliefs and narratives through which we order and confer meaning on our world.

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At its broadest, the "expression of consciousness" includes every thought, idea, utterance and action made by every human being ever. It even includes your posts here. So you're telling me that I ought to pay no attention to your posts.

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Without the brain there is no consciousness. Consciousness is a term we apply to the functioning of the brain. To make any further claim you need evidence and there isn't any.

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ORIGINAL: juliaoceania

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Without the brain there is no consciousness. Consciousness is a term we apply to the functioning of the brain. To make any further claim you need evidence and there isn't any.

What I have been trying to impart to you is that your thinking is limited to the material world that you live in. It is your field of vision that is incredibly narrow as not to even question that perhaps there is more to the material world that we cannot measure and test yet, but that does not mean we never will be able to. It is the fantastical notion that this maybe one of trillions of universes, some of them very much like our own, where we may even exist in different sorts of permutations, and others so divergent we could not even process their existence with our puny little brains... some that may even be completely without matter at all, and just pure consciousness.

But, you can stay in your three dimensional measurable universe, while others with bigger brains explore the unknown.

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I'm all for exploring the unknown but that requires some evidence. There is none for your "consciousness is special" claims.

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ORIGINAL: DomKen
Without the brain there is no consciousness. Consciousness is a term we apply to the functioning of the brain.

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ORIGINAL: DomKen
I'm all for exploring the unknown but that requires some evidence

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ORIGINAL: DomKen
There is none for your "consciousness is special" claims.

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ORIGINAL: eihwaz

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ORIGINAL: DomKen
I'm all for exploring the unknown but that requires some evidence

Exploring the unknown is something science fundamentally does, no?  As well as data, science also relies on surmise, speculation, metaphor, intuition, and occasionally hallucination.  Sometimes the data leads, sometimes it follows.

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ORIGINAL: Kirata

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ORIGINAL: DomKen

Consciousness is a term we apply to the functioning of the brain. To make any further claim you need evidence and there isn't any.

Oh there's evidence. We've been here before. You just refuse to accept it, and instead go around preaching that it doesn't exist.