From: smoliar@hilbert.iss.nus.sg (stephen smoliar)
Subject: Re: Classic (was CR v. VR)
Date: Sat, 3 Aug 91 07:08:29 SST



In article <1991Aug1.064830.9664@milton.u.washington.edu>
b645zaw@utarlg.uta.edu (Stephen Tice) writes:
>
>In article <1991Jul30.212742.14366@milton.u.washington.edu>,
>webber@csd.uwo.ca (Robert E. Webber) writes...
>
>>In article <1991Jul26.034732.20973@milton.u.washington.edu> 
>>dcw11111@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Blackmore) writes:
>> 
>>..Essentially, the person suggested removing the body, leaving just your
>   ^^^^^^^^^^^                       ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 
>>..mind - the core of your consciousness, so that you could experience 
>>..things without experiencing the discomforts that the physical body 
>>..is prone to.
>>..  ...
>>..1)  Are people actually hoping some day to reach this point?  To me, 
>>..removing the body is removing the human-ness of the person, and 
>>..something like this would be more my idea of a nightmare than a 
>>..dream.
>
>[body of text -- including BOB's well reasoned response -- removed]  
>
>> 
>>--- BOB (webber@csd.uwo.ca)
>> 
>>     The mind is its own place, and in it self
>>     Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n
>> 
>>                                  Lucifer (on occasion of being
>>                                  tossed out of Heav'n) as recorded
>>                                  in Milton's Paradise Lost
>
>
>A good quote deserves an appreciative response. It may be that 
>others have gone this way before:
>
>  ... Sitting still he walks far; lying down he goes everywhere;
>  bodiless within bodies, unchanging among changes.
>      How can one who is not tranquil or subdued, whose mind is
>  not at rest, understand that through mere knowledge?
>      How shall an ordinary man conceive that being, for whom
>  both priest and warrior are as food, and death a condiment?
>
>                                   Said to be from YAMA,
>                                   Lord of the Dead, 
>                                   in the _Katha Upanishad_
>
Poetry is nice, but a bit of physiology is more informative.  The latest word
seems to be that the mind can neither develop nor function without the body.
Gerald Edelman summarizes some interesting evidence along this front in his
book NEURAL DARWINISM;  and in a later book, THE REMEMBERED PRESENT, he
projects the implications of this evidence into questions of consciousness.
Now go back to enjoying your Milton.

-------------------------------------------------------------

Stephen W. Smoliar; Institute of Systems Science
National University of Singapore; Heng Mui Keng Terrace
Kent Ridge, SINGAPORE 0511
smoliar%iss.nus.sg@nuscc.nus.sg