• Bartricks
    6k
    What do you mean by a 'female' mind? Explain.
  • GraveItty
    311
    The mind that my wife has.
  • Bartricks
    6k
    Imaginary people do not have minds.
  • SolarWind
    207
    Brains are body parts. Christ.Bartricks

    If God already has no gender, why doesn't "It" stand up for women's rights more?
  • Bartricks
    6k
    She does. But sexists don't listen to Reason much, do they?
  • GraveItty
    311
    Imaginary people do not have minds.Bartricks

    Imaginary? She's pretty real, let me tell you! Besides, why can't Imaginary people have minds?
  • Bartricks
    6k
    And what about her mind makes it female? Imagine, for instance, that her body is, in fact, a cleverly disguised male one. Is your wife's mind still female? If so, in virtue of what?
  • SolarWind
    207
    She doesBartricks

    Now God is suddenly female? And where exactly does Her omnipotence intervene for women's rights?
  • GraveItty
    311
    And what about her mind makes it female? Imagine, for instance, that her body is, in fact, a cleverly disguised male one. Is your wife's mind still female? If so, in virtue of what?Bartricks

    The very fact that she posses it. I'm pretty sure she's a female. Even if she pretends to be a woman. Then her mind is a pretended female mind.
  • Bartricks
    6k
    I refer to God as he and she arbitrarily, for such terms serve to underline that this is a person we are talking about. But she is not actually a he or a she. She's a person - a mind. In a like manner, I refer to myself as 'male', even though I am not in fact male, but a sexless mind inhabiting a male body (or what I take to be a male body, for as I have already mentioned, I have no settled view on exactly what features of a body make it male or female or neither).

    Our reason - our faculty of reason - is the means by which God communicates with us. And it is manifest to the reason of most that sexism is a vice. That's her - God - telling us not to be sexists.

    She doesn't intervene beyond that, admittedly. And the world is a very sexist place. From which I conclude that she hates us and that we deserve each other's company.
  • Bartricks
    6k
    You haven't answered my question. If your wife had a male body, would her mind still be female in your view? And if so, why?
  • SolarWind
    207
    Our reason - our faculty of reason - is the means by which God communicates with us. And it is manifest to the reason of most, that sexism is a vice. That's her - God - telling us not to be sexistsBartricks

    That is laudable that you try to explain the communication, but that does not explain WHAT God is. The core question is HOW God thinks. Does It have neurons or other nonlinear circuits?
  • Bartricks
    6k
    You are asking me different questions, not the same question.

    God is a mind. Just as you are and I am.

    God thinks with her mind. Just as I do and you do.

    And no, neurons and nonlinear circuits are features of brains, not minds.

    Note, we are straying somewhat from the OP, which is about whether God has free will.

    To which the answer is that yes, God does have free will.

    There is no reason to think God lacks free will (the OP provides none). And good reason to think God does have free will. Why? Well, God is morally perfect. Yet if one lacks free will, then one is not praiseworthy for being as one is. Thus, if God lacked free will he would not be maximally good, as though he could still possess the virtues, he would not be praiseworthy for possessing and exercising them. And clearly it is better to be praiseworthy for being virtuous than not to be. Thus God, being morally perfect, would be praiseworthy for his virtuous character and thus would possess free will.
  • SolarWind
    207
    And no, neurons and nonlinear circuits are features of brains, not minds.Bartricks

    Everything that thinks has nonlinear components, we know from experience. Consequently, God is not an element of experience. Thus no element for science.
  • Bartricks
    6k
    Everything that thinks has nonlinear components, we know from experience.SolarWind

    Er, what? What we know from experience, boyo, is that brains have such components, not that minds do. To get from the former conclusion to the latter you would have to assume that brains are minds. Yet they're not.

    What you are now going to do is point out that doing things to the brain causes changes in the mind, yes? And you think that's good evidence that the brain 'is' the mind - am I right? (It isn't).

    I have just shown that God has free will. Now, a brain does not have free will. For brains are created by forces alien to themselves and thus are victims of their circumstance. My brain is the brain it is due to factors that my brain itself had no hand in. Thus, if God was a brain, God would lack free will. God has free will. Therefore God is not a brain. See how I have tried, once more, to drag this back to the relevant topic?
  • GraveItty
    311
    You haven't answered my question. If your wife had a male body, would her mind still be female in your view? And if so, why?Bartricks

    If she turned into male one morning, then her mind would still be female. I see her mind in relation to my (then former) wife. As such, I will try to reform her back in my original wife. If she doesn't like being a male body. Is a guy person in reality a body of opposite sex. Is a man wanting to love a man truly a man, or a woman, as he likes sex with a man? Or are we all gay in reality, wanting to make love with the opposite sex because we are of the wrong sex?
  • Bartricks
    6k
    So, what makes a mind 'female' is simply the sex of the body it first inhabited? Is that your view? I am just seeking clarity: want to get my bazooka of reason nicely focused on it.
  • SolarWind
    207
    To get from the former conclusion to the latter you would have to assume that brains are minds. Yet they're not.Bartricks

    Every mind we know has a material carrier. Why should God be an exception?
  • khaled
    3.5k
    What we know from experience, boyo, is that brains have such components, not that minds do. To get from the former conclusion to the latter you would have to assume that brains are minds. Yet they're not.Bartricks

    Not necessarily. An alternative is that minds are certain configurations of matter (brains). In that case the statement:

    Everything that thinks has nonlinear componentsSolarWind

    Remains true without needing a dualism.
  • Bartricks
    6k
    I am not my body. I am a mind. I have a body. I am not my body.

    I have a car. I am not my car. I have some shoes. I am not my shoes. I have a house. I am not my house.

    So, I am a mind, not a body. That I have a body does not alter that.

    God is a mind. Does God have a body? I see no reason whatsoever for supposing him to. Indeed, bodies seem to restrict the minds that inhabit them and so I see some reason to think that God, being omnipotent, would lack a body. But there is nothing incoherent in the notion of God having a body. And so, if you think God does have a body, then I am happy to go along with that. And that body could be male, or female, or neither. But the point would remain that God himself would be sexless, just as I am sexless despite having a male body.
  • GraveItty
    311
    I am not my body. I am a mind. I have a body. I am not my body.Bartricks

    No you're not. You are your body and have a brain.
  • Bartricks
    6k
    Not necessarily. An alternative is that minds are certain configurations of matter (brains). In that case the statement:khaled

    Brute possibilities are not evidence. Another alternative is that minds are bits of cheese, in which case minds would go nicely with crackers. But there is no evidence that mind are bits of cheese and a lot that they are not.

    Likewise, there is no evidence that minds are made of matter and plenty that they are not.

    One such piece of evidence is their possession of free will (if I may once more drag this back to the OP). Possession of free will appears incompatible with being a brain, for brains are arrangements of matter and thus the matter has come to be arranged in that way. That is, there was a time when one's brain did not exist and then a time when it does and some causal story to be told about how the matter constitutive of one's brain came to constitute it. If our minds are our brains, then that story will also be a story about how they lack free will, for if my mind is the creation of forces external to my mind, then my mind is not free. And that goes for God's mind too. Yet God's mind is free (so too is mine, but God is our focus here). Thus God's mind is not a brain. More formally:

    1. If God's mind is a brain, then God's mind is not free
    2. God's mind is free
    3. Therefore, God's mind is not a brain.
  • GraveItty
    311
    So, what makes a mind 'female' is simply the sex of the body it first inhabited? Is that your view? I am just seeking clarity: want to get my bazooka of reason nicely focused on it.Bartricks

    Which goes to show that the mind-world is number one for you. I indeed see the mind as having the sex of the body.
  • GraveItty
    311
    Likewise, there is no evidence that minds are made of matter and plenty that they are not.Bartricks

    How about taking away a piece of you material brain? It takes away a piece of mind too.
  • Bartricks
    6k
    So, minds do not have sexes on your view then, rather bodies do and all you really mean by a 'female' mind is a mind that is inhabiting a body that is female? Yes?
  • GraveItty
    311
    So, minds do not have sexes on your view thenBartricks

    I didn't say that. I said their gender is determined by the gender of the bodies they are in.
  • Bartricks
    6k
    How about taking away a piece of you material brain? It takes away a piece of mind too.GraveItty

    No it doesn't. When you had your lobotomy, part of your brain was removed. So you went from having 100% of a brain to having 95%. But you yourself were not reduced by 5%. That's why the bank still thinks you owe it all the money you borrowed, and not just 95% of it. Your scheme failed.
  • Bartricks
    6k
    I didn't say that. I said their gender is determined by the gender of the bodies they are in.GraveItty

    Yes, but there is nothing intrinsic to the mind itself that makes it male or female. Your wife's mind in a male body would be categorized by you as a 'male' mind, and your wife's mind - the self same mind - in a female body would be categorized by you as a 'female' mind, right? So all the work is being done by the body and none by the mind at all.

    Note, that's my view too, it's just that I understand it better and express it more clearly.
  • khaled
    3.5k
    Brute possibilities are not evidenceBartricks

    I am not giving evidence. I am showing this:

    To get from the former conclusion to the latter you would have to assume that brains are minds.Bartricks

    Is false. That’s just the argument you find easiest to dismantle and so you put it in the mouth of your interlocutor so you can “slam dunk” them with you water gun of logic.

    Likewise, there is no evidence that minds are made of matter and plenty that they are not.Bartricks

    Good thing I didn’t say minds are made of matter then did I? Configurations of matter =/= matter.

    If our minds are our brainsBartricks

    Not what I said again is it?

    As I said, you argue against imaginary positions you believe (or worse, pretend) the opposition has said and drown out what they’re actually saying in irrelevant responses to the straw man you created.

    When you had your lobotomy, part of your brain was removed. So you went from having 100% of a brain to having 95%.Bartricks

    Why the need for ad Homs I ask? I get being like that with me, but you’ve never even talked to this guy before. Get a therapist Bart.
  • GraveItty
    311
    No it doesn't. When you had your lobotomy, part of your brain was removed. So you went from having 100% of a brain to having 95%. But you yourself were not reduced by 5%. That's why the bank still thinks you owe it all the money you borrowed, and not just 95% of it.Bartricks

    Of course it does. If my visionary system is partially damaged I might not be able to see forms anymore. Though I retain the perception of color or motion. I don't break it up in quantifiable parts, as you do.
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