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Fried Chicken posted:No, "messing with your brain" as you put it can absolutely make you a different person. That has been extensively scientifically documented for well over a hundred years. Dualism is crap, who you are is a function of neurology (since even the things you have experienced are stored tangibly), and altering neurology alters you. He isn't committed to dualism, only anti-essesntialism. There is no essential quality that makes you the person you are.
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Jun 28, 2014 23:12
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Fried Chicken posted:No, Gage was not acting different because of his experience, he was action different because the changes to his neuroanatomy made him a different person. This is something that has been extensively studied. We can give someone localized anesthesia to part of their brain, cause a whole new personality to emerge, and watch it be subsumed as the anesthesia wears off. Science says that changes to his neuroanatomy made him behave differently. Science can't say poo poo about whether or not the rail made him a "different person" because something like that isn't empirically verifiable (what the hell does it mean to be a "different person"?). You are missing the point because you have a naive essentialist worldview.
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Jun 28, 2014 23:30
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Fried Chicken posted:The brain is an organ yes, but making the leap from that to "well the exact neuroanatomy doesn't matter" is complete crap. How can I ascertain what constitutes a "fundamental aspect" of a person?
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Jun 28, 2014 23:36
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Discendo Vox posted:The concept of essentialism is bandied about a lot, and it means many different things to different people, not all of them negative- it might clarify things if you could expand on exactly what worldview you're accusing him of. He's freaking out because curing people of autism would make them "different people". But that kind of concrete personal identity is an illusion. There is no "true, essential you" to compare your present state with. He also implied that science could decide when someone had become "a different person" which is false. It's definitely true that curing someone of autism would make them behave differently (that's the point), but lots of interventions could make someone behave differently. Should we freak out about talk therapy because the behavioral interventions it works on might make someone a "different person"?
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Jun 28, 2014 23:43
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Fried Chicken posted:Trying to say that there is some aspect of you that isn't a materialist, biological phenomena, that results from the behavior of physical processes is complete crap. Right that's exactly what I'm saying. But by this standard you become "a different person" constantly. I'm a different person than I was last year. I'm a different person than I was this morning. Every aspect of your "person" is transient. None of them can constitute an essential thing that makes you "the person you are".
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Jun 28, 2014 23:46
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LeJackal posted:There is the issue of consent here, talk therapy is a lot different than forcibly medicating someone or doing some brain surgery without getting their input. I'm definitely not trying to advocate that people who don't want to be cured should be forced to undergo treatment, only that pursuing a cure is worthwhile. I'd also say it's fine for parents to make children undergo treatment just like it's alright for them to make other medical decisions on their children's behalf.
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Jun 28, 2014 23:49
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Fried Chicken posted:Any of the aspects the person defines as part of their core identity. You're confused. Science can decide when changes in someone's physical body have resulted in them behaving differently. How does science decide when these changes constitute a change into "a different person"? edit: I also have an advanced degree in philosophy from a major university. It isn't a PhD, but I'm certainly not "Google educated". Ogmius815 fucked around with this message at 00:15 on Jun 29, 2014 |
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Jun 29, 2014 00:11
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Who What Now posted:I'm not so sure I would be fine with an adult making this decision for their child after a certain age. It would be one thing to allow parents to administer a cure to their child before the child reaches it's formative age, but another to give it to an autistic child of, say, 11. I don't know. I would definitely be nervous about a parent choosing to make their 17 year old undergo treatment over his or her objections, so I get what you are saying, but I'd be fine with making an eleven year old get treated. I'm not sure where that line should be.
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Jun 29, 2014 00:18
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Who What Now posted:Wait, are you actually saying that autistic individuals are completely unable to decide for themselves whether or not they wish to seek treatment for their autism? No you don't understand; we have to protect them. Being cured of autism is equivalent to dying because you become "a different person", you see.
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Jun 29, 2014 00:21
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rkajdi posted:Again, draw me the red line to differentiate the things that are essential to a person's identity, or the actual brain structure, or well any objective and extensible criteria. I don't think you can. That tells me the idea isn't based in reality. My argument never was that brain structures and experiences (in that they alter the brain's structure) weren't the entirety of where our personality comes from. My argument is that your personality isn't the essential part of you, because nothing is the essential part of you. This is also my position.
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Jun 29, 2014 00:33
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Blue Star posted:Y'all need Buddhism. I actually hold the beliefs I do about personal identity as a result of the influence of Buddhist philosophy.
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Jun 29, 2014 00:39
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Ignatius M. Meen posted:This logic could be used to justify stopping research into a cure for Alzheimer's, which I'm sorry but I'm not fond of that in the slightest. What? Explain.
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Jul 6, 2014 20:29
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Ignatius M. Meen posted:"Personality is mutable and in fact, the whole of a 'mind' is mutable and subject to change, therefore not essential. Since it is not essential that this man keep his mind the same, we don't need to treat his Alzheimer's. He'll be just dandy without it because he'll still essentially be the same person." That's stupid. There are other reasons why Alzheimer's is bad than an appeal to dumb essentialism. The change that occurs in Alzheimer's patients in indisputably a bad change. This logic does prove that " but he'll be a different person!" alone is a bad argument, but it doesn't follow that we shouldn't teat Alzheimers or be upset when people get it.
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Jul 7, 2014 02:18
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