Quote:
|
Originally Posted by martinguerre
I'd much rather step back from that, and assume for the time being that i'm going to be surprised. Also, given the current facts at hand...i see absolutely no rational basis for in insistance that anything is "just" an chemical reaction when it comes to the brain. It's like saying the Saturn V is "just" a way of burning things.
|
Well yeah, it is. Granted it would probably be the most expensive barbeque in history, but that's not it's reason for being. The thing is, reason for being doesn't really matter in this point. Essentially the Saturn V is a complicated machine for burning things in a very controlled fashion.
The human brain is just a machine for interpreting the stimuli you come into contact with and making decisions based upon them. I don't see any rational basis for this being anything but "just" chemical reactions.
As far as determinism goes, it's not a given for an atheist to think like that. The laws which govern subatomic interactions are indeterministic as far as we know.