This is a cool event coming up at TAMU in a few weeks (Sunday Feb 22): A student panel (including one of the yell leaders!) + a philosopher from Baylor will be discussing the question, "Am I Just My Brain?"

Here's the event link:
http://tx.ag/veritas26


This is an important question for me; if I'm just my brain, then it seems like I'm just a meat computer, programmed to do and think in a certain way, not really rational or ethical.

If you are just your brain then why is your DNA sequence different from everyone else? Why aren't we all identical?

That same DNA formed your brain, along with its individual strengths, weaknesses, and tendencies.

Kinda makes you think.

I am just my brain, and I would like to know who's in charge of my knees and back. Because they ****ing suck.

This is why I'd like to come back as a turtle; don't see why I need all this extra luggage to drag around while deciding whether things taste good or it's hot or cold. Also, could poop pretty much wherever.

A yell leader you say??!!

Tell him to stop being gay and letting his fellow YLs be gay and embarrassing us.

What about those on GB who have no brain? Hmm, kind of makes those with brains think.

Ragoo said:

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If you are just your brain then why is your DNA sequence different from everyone else? Why aren't we all identical?

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Windows, iOS, Linux, etc.

Reminds me of this movie "Basket Case 2" about a guy who cuts off his conjoined twin (Belial) and carries him around in a basket. This is a classic!!
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099108/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_2_tt_8_nm_0_in_0_q_basket%2520case%2520ii

Not really. Your entire perception of existence is channeled through your body and its senses and interaction with the cosmos you exist within. You know almost nothing but what your body has experienced and sensed so it is integral to your comprehension of existence and of sense of being. You can't really separate the mind and body because such an existence is outside all of your experience. On an even more complex level, your consciousnesses is likely far more complex than even incredibly complicated biochemistry. Even that chemistry is subject to more complex physics and at the core of that physics is an indeterminate and somewhat random and therefore unpredictable foundation of quantum effects at the most granular level.

This sort of stuff is not worth the time you invested in it.

Go outside.

IIIHorn said:

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THE_CHOSEN_ONE said:

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If I am just my brain then who is my toes?

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You were delivered by a toe truck?

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When is your left arm?

Bunch of bots trying to become self aware in this thread.

We're all brains piloting bone mechs protected by meat armor.[/My8yo]

Tree Hugger said:

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IIIHorn said:

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THE_CHOSEN_ONE said:

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If I am just my brain then who is my toes?

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You were delivered by a toe truck?

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When is your left arm?

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He would answer but he can't put a finger on it.

Tree Hugger said:

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IIIHorn said:

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THE_CHOSEN_ONE said:

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If I am just my brain then who is my toes?

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You were delivered by a toe truck?

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When is your left arm?

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Refer to his second hand.

MouthBQ98 said:

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Not really. Your entire perception of existence is channeled through your body and its senses and interaction with the cosmos you exist within. You know almost nothing but what your body has experienced and sensed so it is integral to your comprehension of existence and of sense of being. You can't really separate the mind and body because such an existence is outside all of your experience. On an even more complex level, your consciousnesses is likely far more complex than even incredibly complicated biochemistry. Even that chemistry is subject to more complex physics and at the core of that physics is an indeterminate and somewhat random and therefore unpredictable foundation of quantum effects at the most granular level.

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Mind is immaterial. I cannot believe people are still confused on this.

If, as Hawking struggled with, your mind is purely physical, there is nothing beyond the material, then nothing matters, b/c you cannot trust your senses or 'reason' or 'rationality' because they are only illusionary.

You- all of you, your thoughts, sensations, decisions, and actions are just the results determined chemical and quantum processes.

Even questioning or answering the very question 'am I just may brain' is arbitrary.

Tree Hugger said:

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When is your left arm?

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Gordon Keith reference. I likeat.

Depends on what level you want to approach it at or reduce it to. Yes, at one level we are a bunch of complex physics. At another level that complex physics is a ln extremely complex and almost impossibly unlikely consciousness, from a mathematical standpoint, considering how contrary to entropy it is.

What you make of it is up to you but taking the more or less cynical Buddhist type of "what does it even matter" perspective sure seems boring and open to nihilism to me. I'd rather choose to think of it as beautifully unlikely and interesting, but that's at a philosophical level. We really can't fully comprehend the objective detail of it as it is beyond our ful comprehension. We don't even have the math and physics to describe it at a fundamental level.

But, any consciousness we experience are embedded within the mind and body and it's sensory input and processing so to speak, so I don't know that the consciousness can transcend that from which it is almost entirely derived. Maybe with a bunch of psilocybin?

I've never looked at a brain and said "damn that's hot." Normally it is "damn I better hurry up and bury that!"

gives a new meaning to hanging brain.