Comments | eracerhead: Mind/brain duality is bunk

eracerhead

Mind/brain duality is bunk

Dec 20, 2011 10:42

It has always been my belief that the mind is nothing more than an emergent property of brain chemistry, not a separate entity. How can this be considering the range of complexity and beliefs? Sorry, but it's chemistry, In this particular case, the rise of dopamine in response to an anticipated reward.

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Comments 5

Well, MAYBE... #dopamine #religion #belief uu_mom December 22 2011, 18:37:44 UTC

"Maybe" there is something more than this - whatever it is. If we believe it, we get more pleasure. Why not believe it? Though apparently fewer are: http://www.census.gov/compendia/statab/2012/tables/12s0075.pdf

If I'm doing my math right, there's been a 30% increase in U.S. population from 1990 - 2008, ~15% increase in Christianity, ~50% increase in other religions, and ~200% increase in No religion. Still the latter is only about 5% of the population.

So how do the non-religious get that dopamine response?

Re: Well, MAYBE... #dopamine #religion #belief eracerhead December 23 2011, 20:11:50 UTC

It's 15% of the population. There are 5X more non-believers than non-christian religious combined, but we don't have advocacy groups as effective as, say, the JDL or Catholic League.

Census data: population
Year Total Xtian Other Non-Rel Refused
1990 175440 151255 5853 14331 4031
2001 207983 159514 7740 29481 11246
2008 228182 173402 8796 34169 11815

Census data: as percent of population:
Year Total Xtian Other Non-Rel Refused
1990 100.0% 86.2% 3.3% 8.2% 2.3%
2001 100.0% 76.7% 3.7% 14.2% 5.4%
2008 100.0% 76.0% 3.9% 15.0% 5.2%

Christianity is declining, other religions are remaining stable, non-belief is rising. By linear extrapolation, there will be more non-believers in the US by 2070. Of course, this isn't likely to be linear, I expect this to happen in 1-2 generations, hopefully within my lifetime.

I get my dopamine response from tangible things, not made-up stuff.

Re: Well, MAYBE... #dopamine #religion #belief eracerhead December 23 2011, 20:14:50 UTC

Why not believe it? Because it cannot be true. I would rather believe in nothing than something that is impossible.

Re: Well, MAYBE... #dopamine #religion #belief uu_mom December 23 2011, 21:28:23 UTC

As long as it does give you that joy that extends to a reason for being. So be it.

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