From: Kalapsyche-AT-aol.com Date: Sat, 31 Oct 1998 21:34:15 EST Subject: Re: Personal Responsibility (fwd) In a message dated 10/31/1998 9:25:06 PM EST, spoons-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu writes: << Because by whatever mechanisms we still don't understand, the brain is a thing which can frequently act on itself without external stimulous. We can think, and in thinking we can change our opinions 180 degrees without *ANY* outside influences. That's not to say that there are no outside influences, but it is to say that those outside influences are not the sole shapers of human opinions. Unless the two of you have never changed your minds simply because upon *reflection* you realized you were wrong, then you've seen what I'm talking about. >> Isn't this a rather dogmatic counter-argument? On what grounds de jure are we entitled to the statement that "we can change our opinions 180 degrees without *ANY* outside influences"? De facto there is no point in our experience at which we are without outside experience. If this is the case, the only way you can make your argument is if you can distinguish an untainted realm of interiority from a dimension of exteriority. But it seems rather unlikely that such a distinction can be made, hence it is a dogmatic statement that leads to all sorts of dialectical illusions... Which is to say, the argument between the computer model and the "free will" model will never terminate because it is based on dogmatic assumptions applied to the in-itself of being rather than appearances, in such a way that the issue can never be determined one way or the other.
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