Free will, determanism and all that (choices, choice)

[Victor]

Originally Posted by PureX

Hard to say. Even a child's mind is so amazingly complex that the monsters they imagine could be a conglomeration of all sorts of memories, fears, hopes, and sensations.

Ok, I'd be perfectly content with just one thought (you pick) and what atoms it consist of.

[PureX]

Originally Posted by Victor

Ok, I'd be perfectly content with just one thought (you pick) and what atoms it consist of.

Are you suggesting that your thoughts are not the product of matter and energy interacting according to their nature?

[Victor]

Originally Posted by PureX

Are you suggesting that your thoughts are not the product of matter and energy interacting according to their nature?

I'm suggesting that it's that and more. Now what's the collection of atoms again?

[Willamena]

Originally Posted by Victor

Ok, I'd be perfectly content with just one thought (you pick) and what atoms it consist of.

Well, the claim was that atoms create thoughts, not that atoms compose thought.

[Willamena]

Originally Posted by PureX

We can retain some thoughts while having others. This allows us to compare and contrast thoughts and to assemble them into complexes of thoughts (ideas). I read someone else's "idea" and responded with an idea my own. But I could have chosen not to respond, or to respond with another idea. This wan't decided by the atoms, but by the thoughts that the atoms created.

Okay, but in your description there is still an "us" who compares and contrasts (manipulates) thoughts. Couldn't that be what decides?

[Victor]

Originally Posted by Willamena

Well, the claim was that atoms create thoughts, not that atoms compose thought.

I thought I said "create"?

[PureX]

The atoms compose the various molecules by acting according to their nature. The molecules combine by acting according to their natures to compose the cells and neurons and the chemical interactions between them. The electrons of the atoms compose electrical currents thats accompany and interact with the biochemical interactions on the neuropathways and together they all create the phenomena we experience as a "thought". Countless billions of atoms, molecules, neurons, and pathways are involved. I don't see the point in your asking for a list, when the list would be far too long for me to post or you to read.

What's the point of your question?

[PureX]

Originally Posted by Willamena

Okay, but in your description there is still an "us" who compares and contrasts (manipulates) thoughts. Couldn't that be what decides?

Sure, but that "us" is itself a thought-complex (an idea). That's the amazing thing, to me. That matter and energy, interacting according to it's own nature, can create ideas that can in turn transcend (manipulate) itself.