Originally Posted By: ImagingGeek

Not in any way vaguely similar to humans. I'm a cellular/molecular biologist, and let me tell you; there are no similarity in the way people vs cells interact. A closer approximation would be how humans and baking bread interact...
Of course, you are the expert..., with a title that means something to someone.... Consciousness being like baked bread.. rising from the dough. eek


Originally Posted By: Bryan

My emergent properties are not dependent on anything other than my biology.
Right I got that. That you subscribe to the idea that spirit is a mythical fabrication of stone aged humanity points to the fact that the idea (being something other than original) also points to the fact that you couldn't have actually thought of it yourself but instead assumed the thought via the nueropeptied highway which took the exit to the (I'm Bryan a cellular/molecular biologist) reciever site.
Originally Posted By: ImagingGeek
Society itself is an emergent property of humans; but not vice-versa.
And humans being isolated to their emergent chemical makeup have no connectivity to society. They just project it outward from their biologically emergent and random individual and isolated personalities, and it miraculously finds both commonality and diversity, forcing humanity to either love or hate each other and any idea of reality.
Originally Posted By: ImagingGeek
Perhaps you should learn a little about emergence before pontificating on it.

Or know something about consciousness before falling for the baked bread consciousness theory of humanity? wink Besides isn't all rationalization just a biological occurrence, due to be obsolete as soon as the mechanism fails to function and society is replaced by the new mechanically fabricated society replacing it? What importance is wikipedia when it's only an emergent truth rather than a lasting and absolute truth?
Originally Posted By: ImagingGeek

Ahh, the good ol' red herrings of randomness and the need for supernaturalism to somehow give our lives value.

Oh you had to look at it that way didn't you.
There ain't nothing supernatural about life, it isn't a random occurance and it began long before any chemical process began to reflect the reality of it.
What it is or isn't is only of concern to those who need to rule themselves by a system of measure.
Originally Posted By: ImagingGeek

Firstly, randomness has little to do with it. Emergent (biological) properties are a product of chemical interactions, which in turn are predicated on physical properties driven by concrete and immutable 'laws'.

Ah.., and out of what did physical properties and these immutable laws come?
Originally Posted By: ImagingGeek
There is no randomness to that; just stochasticism.
Oh you mean democratic laws, based on random observations and the current best guess.
Originally Posted By: ImagingGeek

stochasticism Indeed, these processes are as directional and immutable as gravity. The only thing random in our biology (aside from certain environmental factors) is mutation - everything else abides by the distinctly non-random 'laws' of physics.

You mean Physics based on changing observations and evolving theories. Old obsolete physics, current theories or the ones not yet cognized from the immutable coalesced chemical and physical laws of reality?
Originally Posted By: ImagingGeek

As for needing supernaturalism (i.e. a 'soul') to have self-value, or to value human life, is a myth created by the religieux to validate their beliefs and to maintain their self-sense of moral superiority.

Of course.. what utter nonsense. What is self value or any human value system other than religious tripe. Let science cleanse the mutations and reduce the value of humanity to its natural place as an emergent artifact of gravity.
Originally Posted By: ImagingGeek
The fact you need some supernatural aspect to feel self-worth and/or see worth in others says far more about you than it does about those of us who value people for no reason other than they in-and-of-themselves have value.

Well what I need and how you determine my needs is going to be subjective. Based on your own needs to place a value on what you perceive as reality and what I feel or think by reading what I say would suggest you share a consciousness with me. Otherwise how else could you be other than simply self aware of your own feelings and thoughts. What do your thoughts really have anything to do with me other than what you fantasize me to be and what I might think or believe?

I remember a description of an organ harvest that was witnessed by a friend of mine with a medical title. A motorcycle accident had rendered a man brain dead by all measurements and random observations made by the staff at a hospital in Florida. The (stochastic) determination was that the man for all intents and purposes was brain dead (no neural activity, therefore no consciousness).
While the man was basically dead, his body was still working with the help of artificial support systems. His brain connected to the artificial consciousness measuring device of the emergent stochastic scientific law, also assisted by the current stochastic scientific measurement systems for heart rate and blood pressure, skin tempurature and respiration etc.

The moment the first incision was made, the heart rate increased, respiration increased and skin tempurature increased.
Now since the brain was dead and consciousness was absent, the observation and determination was that the cells with its baked bread relationship to each other somehow got the impression that something was happening to the body.

Now why do you suppose the heart, lungs and skin reacted to the knife that was cutting the skin? What investment would either of the organs have to the cutting of the skin, and to react the way someone does when their brain is active and sending impulses of conscious stimuli based on the scientific idea of brain induced chemical and cellular activity?

I was addicted to the Hokey Pokey, but then I turned myself around!!