What are your views on abortion?

"The generation of random numbers is too important to be left to chance"(Robert R. Coveyou)

I think even chaos theory stipulates a well defined rules for the system; ie., there has to be a small number of simple rules for which the addition of chance causes complexity.

 

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1) rules do not contradict randomness when they are simply limiting the range
2) rules are not even needed, as probability has the same effect (and represents nature better)

 

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Perhaps but science is supposed to be the study of these rules.

Well you could say that not having any rules is a rule but that's kind of besides the point. I don't think anyone can simulate not having any rules without themselves contraining to the laws of nature. Stuft like genetic programming needs a evaluation function that could probably be viewed as some sort of rule. This is the only way that I know of to produce "intelligently" complex systems.

If we are able to then we are making the statement that one piece of ordinary matter "feels" another. I think we could carry this argument ad infinitum because if we can reduce it to the cell level, then at the atom level, and we could keep going... Of course this presents a problem for abortionist because if one cell is able to feel pain, love, etc. there's no reason that the fetus could not. I'm assuming one cell here but I can't imagine more than one cell expierencing this. We usually have a sense of unity within ourselves. It is us, in the singular, who feels our thoughts, emotion, touch, and even the flow of blood all at once. If there was a group of cells that felt this seperatly and did not dispatch their messages to a central cell then this unity would be lost. Of course there could be a group of cells responsible for all of our thoughts, feelings etc., but then the central agent would be the soul or something else that defies the normal workings of nature.

 

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Obviously we have no problems with killing individual cells. We do that everyday.

but then the central agent would be the soul or something else that defies the normal workings of nature.[b/]
What? Why do you have to relate the central nervous system to something outside nature. A fetus' central nervous system is less then that of a cow. Does that mean a cow has more of a soul then a fetus? There is no reason to introduce the soul here at all.

 

I believe that cows do have souls, not human souls of course. Your kind of avoiding the question here by bringing up another lifeform that is not as highly developed as a human being. If we are just flesh, then the fetus is also just flesh and so is the cow; we would have either full authority to kill all three or no authority.

If there are two cells that are independant and not connected then we could never make decisions based upon both sources of information at the same time. However if we look at something with our eyes, we see the entire picture. We know that there are photosensitive cells that change light reflected by objects into electrical signals that are passed through into the brain. Yet there is still one unit that must generate and see the entire picture but also make decisions based upon the other sensory organs. A baseball player makes decisions based upon sight, sound and instinct but is also made aware that he is making them under the decision process of one unit. A single cell cannot hold that much information so the information must be shared among multiple cells. However the decision to swing must be aware of the information shared by the multiple cells.

 

well a computer can be programmed to make different decisions if it receives different inputs, does that give it a soul?

 

Okinrus what happens to the cows 'soul' after it has perished? Does the cows go to heaven, or do their spirits roam around looking for pretzles? Since cows have a soul do they also answer to your god? What about slugs? Do slugs also have a soul?

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what about carnivores like cats, there biology requires them to eat other animals, does that mean they have an evil predisposition?

 

My point is that you have no problem killing cows, which are more developed in every way then fetuses.

Regardless, you have no right to infringe on the rights of others unless they are harming another. You have been unable to demonstrate that they are actually harming another being, let alone another human. Note that you can not harm something before it actually is.

 

Any awareness that a computer could have would be awareness of the predetermined mapping of inputs to outputs.

My own belief is that slugs have souls or spiritual matter but in their case it's only spiritual glue that binds them to the physical universe. This is because all actions that slugs do, as far as I can tell, is by instinct. I do believe that cows have souls but since we can't ask a cow, no one knows for sure. There is some bibical evidence, such as when the pigs were possessed, that animals have souls. The final destination of animals should not matter but I think heaven would be pretty boring without animals.

We can eat other animas only because God told Noah. It is probably similar for animals.

I'm not sure what you mean. So a baby one second after the womb is suddenly a human being but one second before in the womb is not a human being? The goverment does have the right to infringe somewhat on your freedom. I can give examples but they should be fairly obvious.

 

a computer is the same thing as us. we just can handle more variables. you say that the decision of a compter is predetermined, well it is not determined until it receives an input. so in that sense all of our actions are predetermined in the same way as a computers. for instance, everytime i put a post here, am i predetermining your future action okinruus?

 

No, a computer is very different from us unless if the computer actually knows what it's doing. The computer is made up of millions of gates all of which do not know what their doing and the commulative effect of this is something that appears intelligent but has no clue what it is doing. Therefore the computer cannot be aware of what processes it uses to compute. I do not even think that it is possible to build something that only appears to itself not determined because a fully determined machine could only be aware that it has no will. If will does not exist at all in the universe, then it would be impossible for us to even pretend to have what does not exist. By pretending to have free will I have free will because it is impossible for a fully determined being to pretend to have what is not in the system.

No, not really. I actually decide to post here. Of course maybe I should give this argument a rest for a few days to prove that I do have free will?

 

well maybe the culmination of posts determined that you are going to give a few days. your description of the computer is incorrect. the brain works very much the same way. neurons are gates firing on and off producing a cascading effect which leads to a net behaviour. they are very much the same thing.

 

Shrubby,
Neurons have more states then off, on. They are also connected differently then in a computer, and a triggered diffrerently. We will probably be able to program a computer to act like a brain, but that is regardless of the actually machinery behind the software.

 

well when it comes down to it the driving mechanism is the firing sequence.

 

It seems to be the firing sequence, but this is not just on off.

The WAY it fires is actually important, as the wave form of the energy release changes. Also, when/how/if an individual neuron fires is affected by many different chemicals.

 

Neurons can be simulated somewhat in software but I think most models output in binary. This still does not answer my question though. How can localized interactions such as nuerons produce a global being with awareness of what decisions it makes? If we are made up of millions of neurons, how does this result in a singular being? My idea is that the soul propagates electrical signals into the nueral map which in turn command muscular system. For instance when we walk or run, we do not have direct control over each and every muscle. We just walk and the muscles do the right thing. There is some muscle and instinct learning envolved here, and therefore there is some knowledge of how to walk already in nueral network; however the actual command to walk is generated by the concience mind. If we do not have free will, what's the difference between instinct and concience action?

 

How can localized interactions such as nuerons produce a global being with awareness of what decisions it makes?
You have a black box, called your brain. Inputs and outputs are known well. There is NO reason for 'awareness of decisions' to require anything besides chemical reactions.

 

How exactly do you observe a chemical reaction without creating another chemical reaction?

 

Chemical reactions have observable results. Why do you need another?