Philosophy - NuTang Philosophical Philosophers Minds Meet

Due to the fact that there is an ever-growing post and Writings at NuTang of immense cogitations:

May this NuTang Forum serve as a place for all us NuTang Philosophers to philosophize in further detail the analysises and expressions of our intellect.

The idea for this Philosophy NuTang Forum came in collaboration with hmdaswani and myself. Together, we would like to encourage and welcome all input, be you of Philosophical Minds or merely opinionated.

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I think that deja vu is like premonition or precognition. I mean after reading what you wrote I believe it even more.

kKaMa67 wrote: "Is this implying that if you experience dejavu that you are more likely to have one of these disorders?? I mean the rest of society doesn't experience dejavu according to this person. I thought dejavu had a more paranormal connection rather than a disorder or pathological association."

Not necessarily. What you cited stated that deja vu is more likely to be experienced by people with those psychological conditions, but the converse is not necessarily true.

And whether or not deja vu has a neurological explanation is testable by science. Whether or not it is connected to something paranormal cannot be tested by science--at least, not under the current scientific paradigms. What this means is that science cannot rule on the paranormal nature of the deja vu phenomenon (if any). The very use of the world "paranormal" means it exists outside the realm of scientific testability. As of right now, only speculation can exist until a scientific paradigm exists under which we can test that hypothesis.

This is a good segue into a topic that piques my interests: the nature of truth or knowledge. Is there an objective reality? If so, what is it, and what defines it? Does science define reality? Observation? Can we really have a truly objective observation, or will our unique experiences and biases and opinions unknowingly cause us to see the world through a jaundiced eye?

I have read that the theory behind deja-vu is that your brain registers an event happening in the present, and instead of filing it in short-term memory, it files it in long-term memory. Thus when you think back upon what just happened a few moments ago, you get the idea that it happened a long time in the past. This is why you can often say, "I knew you were going to say that!" right after it is said, but if the person stopped and asked you to predict what he was about to say, it would be difficult for you to put it into words.

People who have memory filing problems to begin with, such as a person with a disorder, would naturally experience more instances of deja-vu because it is a common memory filing disorder, but that does not mean that normally functioning people would never experience it. It is likely, however, that if you have never before experienced deja-vu, that you are unlikely to experience it, because your brain is not disposed to making these kinds of clerical errors.

I've been thinking about mental disorders a lot lately, and I actually intended to write an entry about them when I came upon this forum just now. My interest lies in thinking about whether mental disorders, brain damage, etc., can alter the fundamental essence of a human being, their "soul", if you will.

There is a line of philosophic thought (Cartesian dualism) that maintains that there are at least two separate "worlds": one of the body and one of the mind. Mental events cannot be completely explained by physical phenomena. The thoughts that go on in your mind cannot be boiled down to an algorithm of firing neurons.
One interesting point that goes along with this is the translation of thought into motion. If you wish to walk across the room, and you are thinking about walking across the room, then what provides the energy to fire the first neuron which sets off the chains of firing nerve cells that eventually results in the movement across the room? Certainly there is latent chemical energy in the brain which can be used to physically fire the neuron, but think of it this way: A line of dominos is set up. There is potential energy available throughout the line because of the position of the dominos in the gravitational field of the earth. However, in order to get the chain to fall, you need a force to act upon the first domino. If in fact the mental realm is completely separate from the physical realm, the translation of thought into action would violate conservation of energy.

And then I guess what Ranor is talking about is the other side of that coin. If the mind is nothing but a chemical entity responding to physical stimuli, then the world is objectively a reality, a physical event whether or not we can actually grasp it objectively. But what if the entire world is a mental event? What if there really is no physical reality, but only that which we imagine? Or some combination of the two... that there is a physical world but that everyone experiences it completely differently, even though our physical hardware is not so very different?

Well, I have a long writing about how I mind, body, and spirit interact, and how that has to do with mental illness in my writings under Metaphysica Transponderae, if you care to read. An excellent thread, JMC, I'll definitely come back.