A truly impressive display of Egnorance.
Jun. 15th, 2007 12:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ebonlockRead this and then stop to ponder that the man who wrote it is a neurosurgeon. Seriously. He operates on peoples' brains.
I'm not making this up.
Does altruism have location? The brain does; it can move in space by moving in any of six degrees of freedom: in a Cartesian system, it can move in the x, y, or z direction, or it can pitch, yaw, or roll. These are the movements possible for a material body.
Now moving your brain through 'x,y,z' or 'pitch, yaw, or roll' does change its material properties, which are located in the brain. The pulse pressure in your brain tissue is greater when you're recumbent than when you're standing (pitch). The venous pressure is lower when you're standing than when you're recumbent. Tilting your head to the left (roll) tilts the vector of carotid arterial blood flow to the left. Even material things that are less tangible, like neuronal action potentials, change with brain movement. Action potentials have direction, and can be described using spatial vectors. When you tilt your head, you tilt the vectors along which your axons transmit action potentials. When you turn your head 30 degrees to the left (yaw), you turn the direction of propagation of action potentials 30 degrees to the left too. In this sense, material changes in the brain can map to changes in location of the brain.
But how does moving your brain change your altruism? Do properties of altruism, like benevolence, have pitch, yaw or roll? Is generosity measurably and reproducibly different when you (and your brain) are on the north, rather than the south, side of the room? Are you measurably more or less charitable if you tilt your head 30 degrees to the left? If you walk around the room does your altruism change in a reproducible way? If you stand up, is your altruism different that when you're sitting?
For altruism to be located in the brain, changes in altruism must map, in some reproducible way, to changes in brain location. But it's obvious that no property of altruism maps to brain location. If no property of altruism maps to brain location, then altruism is independent of brain location, and it's nonsense to say that altruism is located in the brain. Altruism is completely independent of location, so it can't be located in the brain, or anywhere. It can't be 'located' at all.
To which Pharyngula can only reply:
I read the first paragraph and thought he must be building to something clever and subtle; no one could possibly be making an argument that stupid. I read on, and I realized I was being far too charitable, and yes, he really is making an argument that stupid. Because my altruistic feelings are not left behind in my chair when I get up and walk across the room, they must not be located in my brain. In Egnor's mind (which is safely situated in a remote location, far, far away from the entity doing the typing), if properties of the mind do not have an absolute location in coordinates of latitude, longitude, and altitude, they cannot possibly exist in your brain.
I'm typing this on my laptop, on my text editor. I'd better not pick up my laptop, swivel around on my office chair, and move it to the other desk behind me, because I might leave the text editor floating in space above my computer desk. Or worse, maybe the text editor will change properties and become a spreadsheet, or one of those programs that control a nuclear missile, or the software interface to a microwave oven. Alternatively, the fact that the text editor still works when I move my laptop must mean that the program actually doesn't reside in my computer — it's being beamed in from the Software Soul Sanctuary located somewhere in another supernatural universe.
Go check out the image Egnor included to make his Creationist "point". And one more time, just to remind you, this man is a neurosurgeon.
Think on that and be dismayed.
I'm not making this up.
Does altruism have location? The brain does; it can move in space by moving in any of six degrees of freedom: in a Cartesian system, it can move in the x, y, or z direction, or it can pitch, yaw, or roll. These are the movements possible for a material body.
Now moving your brain through 'x,y,z' or 'pitch, yaw, or roll' does change its material properties, which are located in the brain. The pulse pressure in your brain tissue is greater when you're recumbent than when you're standing (pitch). The venous pressure is lower when you're standing than when you're recumbent. Tilting your head to the left (roll) tilts the vector of carotid arterial blood flow to the left. Even material things that are less tangible, like neuronal action potentials, change with brain movement. Action potentials have direction, and can be described using spatial vectors. When you tilt your head, you tilt the vectors along which your axons transmit action potentials. When you turn your head 30 degrees to the left (yaw), you turn the direction of propagation of action potentials 30 degrees to the left too. In this sense, material changes in the brain can map to changes in location of the brain.
But how does moving your brain change your altruism? Do properties of altruism, like benevolence, have pitch, yaw or roll? Is generosity measurably and reproducibly different when you (and your brain) are on the north, rather than the south, side of the room? Are you measurably more or less charitable if you tilt your head 30 degrees to the left? If you walk around the room does your altruism change in a reproducible way? If you stand up, is your altruism different that when you're sitting?
For altruism to be located in the brain, changes in altruism must map, in some reproducible way, to changes in brain location. But it's obvious that no property of altruism maps to brain location. If no property of altruism maps to brain location, then altruism is independent of brain location, and it's nonsense to say that altruism is located in the brain. Altruism is completely independent of location, so it can't be located in the brain, or anywhere. It can't be 'located' at all.
To which Pharyngula can only reply:
I read the first paragraph and thought he must be building to something clever and subtle; no one could possibly be making an argument that stupid. I read on, and I realized I was being far too charitable, and yes, he really is making an argument that stupid. Because my altruistic feelings are not left behind in my chair when I get up and walk across the room, they must not be located in my brain. In Egnor's mind (which is safely situated in a remote location, far, far away from the entity doing the typing), if properties of the mind do not have an absolute location in coordinates of latitude, longitude, and altitude, they cannot possibly exist in your brain.
I'm typing this on my laptop, on my text editor. I'd better not pick up my laptop, swivel around on my office chair, and move it to the other desk behind me, because I might leave the text editor floating in space above my computer desk. Or worse, maybe the text editor will change properties and become a spreadsheet, or one of those programs that control a nuclear missile, or the software interface to a microwave oven. Alternatively, the fact that the text editor still works when I move my laptop must mean that the program actually doesn't reside in my computer — it's being beamed in from the Software Soul Sanctuary located somewhere in another supernatural universe.
Go check out the image Egnor included to make his Creationist "point". And one more time, just to remind you, this man is a neurosurgeon.
Think on that and be dismayed.
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no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 07:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 08:19 pm (UTC)So is he claiming KNOWLEDGE doesn't exist in the brain. What the hell?
no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 08:30 pm (UTC)I'm sure that will clear everything up for you.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 08:42 pm (UTC)Welcome to Platonism.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 08:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 09:42 pm (UTC)I profess no knowledge in neuroscience, but this is what I think Egnor is trying to say in his two postings:
1. He doesn't believe that morality is a trait crafted by evolution.
2. He doesn't believe that there is a 'control center' in the brain that governs altruism. (Straw man argument here, I think)
3. He is being paid by the word and this gig isn't high on his list of priorities.
PS: That a person is able to operate on brains doesn't guarantee that said person is also able to tie shoelaces. :)
no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 09:55 pm (UTC)True but would you really want a man slicing up your brain who couldn't tie his shoe laces? I'm reasonably sure I wouldn't, but then I probably wouldn't want a creationist doing so either if I could avoid it.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 10:58 pm (UTC)I think the belief in creationism can coexist with the practice of good science. In general, I don't care about a person's personal beliefs, as long as they don't interfere with the job.
OTOH, if my surgeon introduced himself by saying, "Hi, I'm an Asian-hating bigot and I'll be your surgeon tonight," I might have second thoughts. That's so unprofessional!
no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 11:04 pm (UTC)Because otherwise I'll be forced to respond with an angry face.
The angry face will look like this: >:(
no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 11:08 pm (UTC)But I also believe that Creationists by their defiant literal interpretation of the Bible and active anti-scientific and Enlightenment stance, do their religion absolutely no service.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 11:27 pm (UTC)I just...can't understand the mind of someone who rejects evolution outright. It's logical. It makes sense. It follows reasonably from basic facts to conclusions. Even if all the evidence were on their side-it isn't- they still wouldn't be able to disprove the theory without disproving decades of genetics research which we know to be accurate. The best they could hope for-the very best, in a world where everything ran their way-would be to prove that it hadn't happened YET.
(you are spared the angry face)
no subject
Date: 2007-06-15 11:37 pm (UTC)Yay! I once had a prolonged argument with one of these people who was trying to convince me that
a) the Earth was only 6,000 years old and he could prove it
b) he'd read the original Dead Sea Scrolls
c) he was a fighter pilot
d) I worshiped the devil 'cause I'm a Wiccan
All the while with this smug smile on his face very reminiscent of Jerry Falwell.
Another Wiccan friend had to come over, gently take me by the shoulders and lead me away before I either punched the guy or my head exploded.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-16 02:55 am (UTC)But just because someone can be a brain surgeon doesn't mean they can write. Good writing is an art form and not everybody gets it, but here we happen to be surrounded by people who can write, so we start to think everyone can.
Erik calls it self-selection.