Are we really just brain chemistry?

no, it's just chemistry effecting chemistry in our physical meat shell. any personified animism thereafter is just a watered down micromanagement of our daily thought and lives.. we force perception... because without something to do, what would you do?

 

 
If we do entirely consist in brain chemistry, then there is no ''I'' (or ''we'') to begin with, which means that there would therefore also be no ''free will'', because only an ''I'' can ''will'' anything, any appearance or feeling of ''free will'' therefore would merely be the brain tricking itself.

 

Are our brain functions just chemistry?  Yes.
 
Brain function is different from conscious thought.  This is why aponia and ataraxia have been around for a long time.  Are we our bodies or are we our minds?  There is a philosophical thought experiment regarding this idea.
 
If you paddle a boat behind a massive wooden sailing ship, and throughout the journey the ship throws overboard little pieces of itself which you collect and begin fashioning into a ship.  By the time the ship reaches port, having replaced its masts, hulls, anchor, rutter etc etc, and you having built an exact replica out of the first ships original parts  - is the first ship still the same ship? Why, why not?

 

 
The thought experiment only functions coherently because it conflates a ''ship'' (a noun - a thing), with a ''mind'' (a verb - an activity).

 

 
Right.  Exactly right.  Since the whole point is to draw a debatable parallel of the "self" as being the body or mind - I think you hit the nail on the head. =)

 

I don't see free will as conflicting with our mind being the process of chemical reactions.. cause I see our free will as nothing more than our ability to process information and make decisions based on what was processed. I see life as a mix of free will and determinism.. Our brains dictate how we feel and what we think and all too often we let it go to it's own devices, but at any moment we can say 'no' and change it. Everyone gets hung up on free will vs determinism, just like everyone gets hung up on nature vs nurture.. when it's a mix of both.
 
Most of our feelings and actions are on a subconscious level.. but it's not like you can go about life subconsciously the entire time. You use your forward command center, your consciousness, your cerebral cortex, your mind.. whatever you want to call it to consciously change your subconscious behaviors. You consciously set it up so your subconscious can basically run on autopilot.. while making course corrections along the way. Basically, you use your free will to set up your determinism.

 

 
If our mind is the process of chemical reactions, then why wouldn't those chemical reactions operate in a purely reactionary and deterministic way just as every other physical substance/object does? Brain chemistry (the mind) shouldn't be able ''choose'' an action for itself any more than a Frisbee can ''choose'' for itself in which direction it is thrown..

 

What if the actions we consider free will is really just due to......brain chemistry? The actions we take to alter our brain chemistry were caused by our very own mind. Idk man


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I think the conscious mind is created by the sum of all the chemical interactions within our brains. It's what the evidence seems to suggest. As to whether this limits our free will, I am not entirely sure. Could our behavior and thought processes be more unpredictable than the brain chemistry which creates it? If we can behave/think in ways that our brain chemistry cannot fully predict, we might not be entirely slaves to the physical/chemical laws of the universe with which we are ironically still a part of. 

 

 
You and I have been down this brain/mind road more times than needed.. and it's because it's not a concept that can be proven true or false. Unless we somehow halt our evolution through some mad science, the most we can ever know about our brain, our body, ourselves.. is 99.99%. That 0.01% leaves plenty of room for someone to be shown the 99.99% and still say "well, it exists beyond that".. and since that 'beyond that' can't be proven or disproven, they'll never be able to sway the people who "follow" the 99.99% since they don't believe in the 0.01%. All we can do is provide our PoV and hope..
 
But here is how I see our free will and determinism.. a random thought experiment along with how I think it'd play out. There is a couple living in a small shack on a massive island. On this island, 1/3 of it is covered with apple trees on one side, 1/3 in the middle is orange trees, and 1/3 on the other side is covered with mango trees. The tree fruit year round, there are no predators, and no edible small game.. all there is to eat is those fruits. Along the coast on the apple side, the couple have a baby in their shack.. minimum physical contact and fed apples. They don't teach it anything other than how to eat apples and on the day the child is able to eat apples on their own, the parents sneak off the island never to return.
 
Here is how I think it'll play out. As a young child, they're not going to stray too far from what feels like home.. the shack. They weren't taught anything but eating apples, so they're not yet going to even think about fashioning shelter elsewhere. So they don't wander out far and up until age 12, only explored the apple side of the island. Then one day they hit the oranges.. they're different from apples, from what is known, so they're a lil startling yet interesting.. cause at this point there is no information on oranges in their brain, but the brain craves knowledge, always trying to make sense of the world. The first day, they only poke at a couple oranges.. maybe shake the branches a lil bit just to see what happens.. but there still isn't information in there saying it is food, so they don't eat any. The next day, they pull one off the branch.. they smell it, smells pleasant.. they feel the texture of the skin.. they get a close up look, then they decide to split it open and bam, shot in the eye with rind juice that stings like hell. They throw the orange and run deep into the apple trees. Now, the information that is recorded is that oranges are bad and not food. It could happen the next day, or in 5 years.. but they don't make a conscious effort to override that subconscious information, they don't use their free will to change their determinism. Maybe one day they're walking along the apple/orange border, remembering a memory they probably embellished into thinking they all but lost an eye to an orange.. If there was no free will, they would never even take another chance as the only information on oranges determined that they are bad. I don't think that'd happen.. as random as everything else, they randomly decide to give it another shot. They use their free will to either confirm or change their determined reaction. This time, they split it open away from their face.. pull a lil bit of peel and eat it, their brain records that eating the peel isn't really pleasant.. but then they take a bite of the meat and love it. Their brain, both subconscious and consciousness is going nuts.. neural activity all over the place. Something new, something edible, something enjoyable, something that is going to become part of their life.. recording and plugging away data on it. So now they explore the both sections of the island, eating both apples and oranges.
 
Then as they get older, let's say 25.. they stumble into the mango section. Again, they're new.. but not as scary as the oranges since they already experienced something new. First they poke and shake, then they pull one off and smell it.. split it open away from their face, but this time there is no stinging juice. They eat a bit of the peel (we know we're not supposed to eat the shell, but it is tasty from personal experience) and tastes good, the meat is sweeter.. and again the brain goes nuts recording and organizing, getting it ready to be included in daily life. So they spend most of the day pigging out on mangoes, only to develop a rash around their mouth. You don't eat the shell because it is basically poison.. but they don't know that. So now their face is covered in a rash and itching like crazy, they get the shits and blow out their intestines.. but the initial reaction that was determined is that eating the mango was a positive experience. They head back to the shack to comfortably heal up. A week later they head back to the mangoes to give it another shot.. and just to be sure, they do the same process again.. after all, that is how it was determined.. and again, they get the hives and shits. They are so yummy though, so a week after that they give it a 3rd try. This time they use their free will to pause and think about it.. to say 'no' to what was determined, and that was just munching down on them because they taste good. They remember their experiences with the oranges while consciously combing through their subconscious and decide to eat just the meat.. and this time there is no negative reaction later. Now, every time they eat a mango, they make a conscious effort to not eat the shell until they've done it enough to where it's the only subconscious reaction. They use their free will to write and rewrite what is determined.. they are a pilot relaxing on autopilot and making corrections as needed.
 
Your brain is literally like a computer.. hell, a computer that is better than any computer we can build today. I know people like to say the mind is like software and the brain is like hardware.. but I consider software to be a physical concept at it's root. When you're using a program, it's sending and receiving physical codes.. electricity.. energy. I can't even fathom what we will be able to do within our head once we crack the brain.. there are so many connections in your brain that if you had to consciously activate them, you would have to do thousands of them every second for the next 100 years to get them all. So many connections that is you laid them end to end, while being incredibly thin, would be able to circle the globe almost 4 times.. That is an insane amount of complexity and absolutely no reason for me to believe that the answer is waiting somewhere outside the complexity of the brain. Trillions upon trillions of times more complex than a Frisbee.

 

Computers are programmed though, they do not have the ability to create new processes. A computers capabilities are limited to what abilities it has been programmed to do when it is first manufactured. I agree that the brain is like a computer, and my opinion is that if a computer is to improve it cannot do so in an of itself. It requires an outside influence, namely that of a programmer/electrical engineer. 
 
If you, in your analogy, equate the brain to a computer, then advancement in the brain capabilities would surely need an influence outside of its current capabilities, that is analogous to what the programmer/electrical engineer brings to the table when improving processing power and functionality of the computer. In my opinion that is where ones mind and intuitive faculties come into play.
 
If by your analogy we truly were just brains and nothing else, then computers, to bring your analogy to its logical conclusion could literally improve themselves without the need of the outside influence of the programmer/electrical engineer. You would never have to buy or upgrade to a new computer, the computer that you already have would improves itself without any outside influence. Which of course is not the case.
 
No matter how complex a computers software or hardware is, it cannot create or design new apps by itself for example. 
 

 

I personally think our character or mind, is formed by genetics AND environment. Our character is set with genetics but also learned behavior. We are chemicals built to adapt.

 

 
You and I have been down this brain/mind road more times than needed.. and it's because it's not a concept that can be proven true or false. Unless we somehow halt our evolution through some mad science, the most we can ever know about our brain, our body, ourselves.. is 99.99%. That 0.01% leaves plenty of room for someone to be shown the 99.99% and still say "well, it exists beyond that".. and since that 'beyond that' can't be proven or disproven, they'll never be able to sway the people who "follow" the 99.99% since they don't believe in the 0.01%. All we can do is provide our PoV and hope..
 
This isn't even about a ''brain/mind'' distinction, I don't know why you think that I even inferred that it was.
 
Trillions upon trillions of times more complex than a Frisbee.
 
Right.. if physical objects merely react in predictable ways to physical stimuli, and if our brain (a physical object) is the ''I'' or ''self'' that we identify as ''us'', then the ''I'' or ''self'' that we identify as ''us'' has cannot be thought to have ''choice'' because ''we'' surely must react in the same deterministic fashion to our surrounding physical environment just as every other physical object does, thus ''free will'' becomes an illusion/trickery of the rain.. Since there's no essential difference between scientists hooking somebodies brain up and sending them signals to compel them to act in a pre-determined way, and somebodies brain receiving signals from the outside world in everyday life, there should be no reason to think that when somebody does receive signals from the outside world in everyday life, that they too won't react in the same pre-determined way as they do in the experiment. Just as a Frisbee is always destined to move in a certain way in the air depending upon the physical stimuli that acts upon it before and during flight, so to peoples brains, and thus their minds and bodies, are always destined to behave in a certain way depending on the physical stimuli that acts upon them.

 

Computers have been around for 60 years, brains have been around for billions.. if you absolutely NEED to think of the brain as being programmed, it was done so through evolution. I know this will leave room for you to say "well this just means that brains need a programmer like computers do" but give computers a few million years and I'm sure we will have computers that build and program themselves.

PS - You remind me of thoughtware for some reason.

That why I said about us halting our evolution. If we did that, then yes.. the human brain would be able to be overtaken by outside signals. Ever if we don't halt our evolution, there will be a lot that can be controlled. Thing is, we are ever evolving and with that and the complexity of the brain, the most we could control is 99%.

Again, the brain is trillions of times more complex that a simple Frisbee. When faced with any situation or experience, there are countless possibilities to choose from. Some choices might be more prevalent within your brain, making it harder to not follow them.. but since there is so many choices, a mechanism came into play in the evolution of the brain that allows it to sort through the choices and make a decision. To compare the brain to a Frisbee is not giving your brain the credit it deserves, but if your brain is on par with a Frisbee, more power to ya I guess.

 

 
That why I said about us halting our evolution. If we did that, then yes.. the human brain would be able to be overtaken by outside signals. Ever if we don't halt our evolution, there will be a lot that can be controlled. Thing is, we are ever evolving and with that and the complexity of the brain, the most we could control is 99%.
 
I don't know what this is supposed to be addressing..
 
Again, the brain is trillions of times more complex that a simple Frisbee. When faced with any situation or experience, there are countless possibilities to choose from. Some choices might be more prevalent within your brain, making it harder to not follow them.. but since there is so many choices, a mechanism came into play in the evolution of the brain that allows it to sort through the choices and make a decision.
 
It's really irrelevant how complex the brain is in comparison to a Frisbee, the fact of the matter is that they both, being physical objects, should react in a pre-determined way, any notion of ''choice'' is therefore redundant and illusory, like any other defect of perception - you didn't address the final part of the post either;
 

 
Since such experiments have been undertaken, why should life in general have different outcomes to those brought about by said experiments? You haven't given a reason - the most I can get from your argument is this; ''The brain is complex, therefore free will exists.''

 

It's far from irrelevant.. with a Frisbee, there is really only one choice, get thrown. With the brain, whenever you are faced with a situation there is countless actions that could be taken. That's the point of the brain, to weigh through all the possible actions and outcomes and make a decision.

And just because the brain can be overwritten doesn't negate the concept of free will. Free will, being a product of the brain, could be taken away through technology.. but the fact that your free will can be manipulated by manipulating the brain just says that it is a product of the brain. You seem to be held up on free will vs determinism.. but as I said earlier, it is a mix of both that make up your actions. As long as you keep yourself held up by thinking it is one or the other and not both, you'll never understand what I am trying to say.

 

You say even if we are just brain chemistry, we can still have free will. Because we can make decisions that alter our brain chemistry, and therefore we have free will. But what are those decisions? Either they are the product of an intangible 'mind,' or those decisions themselves are just the products of chemical reactions in the brain...in which case, the very act of 'choosing' to do something in order to have some effect on body/brain chemistry is an illusion, the choice is nothing more than body/brain chemistry...so the problem of free will is not solved by that line of reasoning.

 

 
It's far from irrelevant.. with a Frisbee, there is really only one choice, get thrown. With the brain, whenever you are faced with a situation there is countless actions that could be taken. That's the point of the brain, to weigh through all the possible actions and outcomes and make a decision.
 
It's quite a simple premise.. If brain chemistry is physical, it must follow the chain of causation in the same way that every other physical thing does, if it follows the chain of causation, then it will always be entirely reactionary to the physical stimuli that affects it, if it is entirely reactionary, then it doesn't, it cannot, ''choose'' anything, it reacts, and that's all it does. Unless there is some undiscovered part of the brain which doesn't follow natural law, then I cannot see how ''free will'', by your standards, makes any sense..