BecomeMe

Another long read. What are we really? Makes you question life even more than you had.

The author lost me at:

[Now raise your arm]. For you to do what you just did, consciousness must be capable of influencing neural activity. It must be capable of influencing the material world. It cannot, in short, be an epiphenomenon.

I don't see how. The impulse to raise my arm started with reading some words on a screen. If I hadn't read those words, I wouldn't have raised my arm. A simple machine could do the same thing.

Photons entered my eyes, triggered my retina, which triggered some neurons in my visual cortex. The language part of my brain determined my vision contained words and decoded them, and then something decided to comply with the instructions contained in the words. Whether that decision was made by neurons or by my consciousness is not yet determined.

We know through fMRI that decisions can be seen happening in the brain (relatively) long before we ourselves are aware of them.

I'd like to read what John Foster actually wrote in his book. Maybe the author's summary is poor.

This book review makes me think I shouldn't bother. https://vdocuments.mx/john-foster-the-immaterial-self-a-defense-of-the-cartesian-dualist-conception.html?page=2