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Brain Cells Observed Summoning a Memory
Anti-Globalism writes "Scientists have for the first time recorded individual brain cells in the act of summoning a spontaneous memory, revealing not only where a remembered experience is registered but also, in part, how the brain is able to recreate it."
Knowing how a memory is stored and how the brain can recreate it might lead to some crazy new technologies in the future, such as being able to load gigabytes of data into your brain by using energy to manipulate the brain into "remembering" things that were never there. Of course, it could lead to some extremely scary scenarios, like messing with people's heads by putting things in there that aren't supposed to be. I hope the scientists are being really, really careful on this one!
McCain/Palin '08. Now THAT's hope and change!
No one I know has ever contested that memories are stored in the "mind." What is debated is whether they are stored in the brain (as opposed to DNA, RNA, patterns in the physical structure of the brain, ect.) In this subject that distinction is very important. Particularly given that from a neuroscience perspective, "Mind" and "Soul" might as well be synonymous.
This is certainly a large step towards understanding memories, but it doesn't tell us anything about where the memories are stored, just what part of the brain activates when a memory is recalled. (That they've got it down to specific neurons is either highly impressive or a exaggeration in my estimation.)
Oh and "Soul" = "Dark Energy" you know "We have no fucking clue how to account for the data so we're going to name it this until we come up with something better."
When they can isolate the "Bing" moment (the point at which neurological function gives rise to experiential phenomenon) then we can put down the idea of a soul entirely, not before.
When they can isolate the "Bing" moment (the point at which neurological function gives rise to experiential phenomenon) then we can put down the idea of a soul entirely, not before.
Sadly, not everyone will. While everyone who has a clue about science certainly will, a lot of people rather trust religion than science and will continue to believe that memories are stored in the soul. After all, there are also a lot of people out there who still believe in ID, even with all the overwhelming scientific research against it.
A good education is a bit like a STD - it makes you unsuitable for a lot of jobs and gives you a desire to spread it.
Particularly given that from a neuroscience perspective, "Mind" and "Soul" might as well be synonymous.
Actually, scientifically speaking "soul" is not synonymous to much else than "religious mumbo jumbo".
It's a redundant hypothesis that doesn't really explain anything, it doesn't provide a single experimentable prediction and it's beyond observations by definition. You might need it for your faith, but science sure as hell has no use for it.
1 Earth is warming, 2 It's us, 3 it's royally bad, 4 we need to take action NOW
When they can isolate the "Bing" moment (the point at which neurological function gives rise to experiential phenomenon) then we can put down the idea of a soul entirely, not before.
No, we can put it down right now. No one has adequately defined "soul," so there is no reason to believe one exists. There is no "bing" moment (is that a technical term?). The differentiation of our experience from our physical bodies is an illusion.
Just because you perceive something to be so doesn't mean that is the way it is. If you think the mind, soul, and body are differentiable, provide some evidence.
believing in no afterlife were you would be judged gives you a nice feeling of freedom - while religious people usually try to avoid a lot of things since they want to reach heaven (*snip*), I act on my own moral criterias without any pressure
For a long while I've thought that, while it takes a large amount of moral stamina to live by most religious codes, it takes as much if not more to realize that the responsibility for determining what's good and what's evil lies squarely on your own shoulders, and still do the right thing