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Automatons

Toady

Student
T
Joined
Aug 22, 2008
Messages
27
I'm struggling with the ramifications of being an atheist. If there's no soul and no afterlife, does that not make us cell-based automatons, going through the motions with the illusion that we're making decisions? What are your thoughts?
 
Toady said:
I'm struggling with the ramifications of being an atheist. If there's no soul and no afterlife, does that not make us cell-based automatons, going through the motions with the illusion that we're making decisions?
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It depends...

What are your thoughts?
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If your definition of automaton means "Having No Soul," then unless you can prove the existence of a soul, everyone and everything is an automaton (except, of course, James Brown ;))! Seriously, what difference does it make between the appearance of something and having something?

You have the power to affect your own life, whether it's cell-driven or not...
 
Toady said:
I'm struggling with the ramifications of being an atheist. If there's no soul and no afterlife, does that not make us cell-based automatons, going through the motions with the illusion that we're making decisions?
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Yes
What are your thoughts?
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Automata
 
Toady said:
I'm struggling with the ramifications of being an atheist. If there's no soul and no afterlife, does that not make us cell-based automatons, going through the motions with the illusion that we're making decisions?
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Well, at completely non-reproducible molecular (more likely quantum) level, yes. Why is that a problem?
 
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Toady said:
I'm struggling with the ramifications of being an atheist. If there's no soul and no afterlife, does that not make us cell-based automatons, going through the motions with the illusion that we're making decisions?
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Yep, just like every other species on teh planet

Toady said:
What are your thoughts?
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I'm here for a good time, not a long time

Live life like you're going to die today

Dream like you're going to live forever
 
Toady said:
I'm struggling with the ramifications of being an atheist. If there's no soul and no afterlife, does that not make us cell-based automatons, going through the motions with the illusion that we're making decisions?
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You say that as if it were a bad thing. "A rose by any other name . . ."

What are your thoughts?
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I have been re-reading Shakespeare recently. He wrote some pretty good stuff for a cell-based automaton.
 
Toady said:
I'm struggling with the ramifications of being an atheist. If there's no soul and no afterlife, does that not make us cell-based automatons, going through the motions with the illusion that we're making decisions?
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Sort of...perceptions are the only "reality" afforded to any of us.

Toady said:
What are your thoughts?
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A swirling nebulous mass of absurd nonsense and crystalline "facts"; which is which has proven the subject of constant debate.
 
Toady said:
I'm struggling with the ramifications of being an atheist. If there's no soul and no afterlife, does that not make us cell-based automatons, going through the motions with the illusion that we're making decisions?
What are your thoughts?
Click to expand...

Guess so.

Well I will go make a cup of coffe, and get a bit of highland park 18´years
 
To hell with you automatons and your illusions of illusions; I do make decisions. Soulless, occasionally stupid decisions, but decisions nonetheless, and I make them.
 
Toady said:
I'm struggling with the ramifications of being an atheist. If there's no soul and no afterlife, does that not make us cell-based automatons, going through the motions with the illusion that we're making decisions?
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I don't see what a soul or afterlife has to do with the illusion that we a making decisions. We wouldn't know otherwise nor could I think of a way to prove we weren't. I see no evidence for a soul or afterlife. To me it's an irrelevance.

Toady said:
What are your thoughts?
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Drunken and perverted.
 
Toady said:
I'm struggling with the ramifications of being an atheist. If there's no soul and no afterlife, does that not make us cell-based automatons, going through the motions with the illusion that we're making decisions? What are your thoughts?
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No.

What makes you think that decision making and free-will is not compatible with deterministic biology? If hypothetically someone (ie, a god) could predict every decision I might make, would this mean my decisions were any less free? (I don't think so.) It would just produce the illusion of the absence of free will. :)
 
Toady said:
I'm struggling with the ramifications of being an atheist. If there's no soul and no afterlife, does that not make us cell-based automatons, going through the motions with the illusion that we're making decisions? What are your thoughts?
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We are machines. Terribly complicated machines with trillions of moving parts. Such machines naturally acquire free will as a consequence of the interaction of their parts.
 
Whatever was true, meaningful, and wonderous about you, about those you love and care about, is true.

Finding out that the soul doesn't exist doesn't change that.

When I ride my bike down a mountain road, it feels amazing - automata or not.
When I pull off a triangle on my bjj teacher, and feel proud, excited, and inspired to train more, I'm happy about those things - automata or not.
When I see a small shark swimming near me while snorkling in malaysia, and feel fear and wonder at the same time, that is an experience I'll remember - automata or not.

These are some little pieces of my life over the last few weeks, bits of human experience. I think it's those experiences themselves that are valuable - not the stories that we tell ourselves, the explanations that we concoct, about why they are valuable.

The tides rise and fall, regardless of the fact that galileo was wrong about why they do so. And our lives have meaning, regardless of the lack of a soul. It's a concept we made up - in part - to explain the meaning that we observe in our lives. That it turns out to be wrong doesn't challenge those observations. The meaning is still there.
 
[nitpick]"Automata" is the plural noun. The singular is "automaton". There is no such word as "automatons".

Honestly, I can't understand how people can continually get irregular plurals wrong all the time! :rolleyes:[/nitpick]
 
Mark6 said:
Well, at completely non-reproducible molecular (more likely quantum) level, yes. Why is that a problem?
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Logically, I know it shouldn't be a problem, but it's the thought that everyone around me is really a "robot." Of course, I am one too, but I don't feel like it. Even though I know there's no evidence for a soul or afterlife, I can't help struggling with the thought of non-existence and non-purpose. Honestly, I find it disturbing.

arthwollipot said:
[nitpick]"Automata" is the plural noun. The singular is "automaton". There is no such word as "automatons".

Honestly, I can't understand how people can continually get irregular plurals wrong all the time! :rolleyes:[/nitpick]
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"Automatons" is also correct.
 
Roboramma said:
Whatever was true, meaningful, and wonderous about you, about those you love and care about, is true.

Finding out that the soul doesn't exist doesn't change that.
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Indeed

Ditto for whatever was true, meaningless, and horrendous

Believing in a soul-saving sky daddy that doesn't exist doesn't change that
 
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