iNow

As I’m not arguing epiphenomenalism, I’m also NOT arguing that mental events cannot lead to other events themselves. It’s not my position, so I’m technically not evading support of it. I’m saying the decision event occurs prior to conscious awareness. You’re the one who keeps trying to shoehorn the concept of causality into the discussion. And I applaud you for your specificity, sir. Well done. You win the prize today.

That was obvious from the start. It’s nice to see you acknowledge it, but would be even nicer if you inserted some uncertainty into your stance as a result. Instead, we have post after post after post of you saying little more than, “Nuh uh, because… reasons!”

No

You’re being absurd

By appealing to more moderates and independents in the general election, those who tend to lack the extreme abortion stances seen so consistently in GOP primaries. On another note, most of this is moot if Joe Manchin (who announced today he’d tip the senate toward GOP control and won’t be running next year in deep red West Virginia) decides after his tour for “speaking out to see if there is an interest in creating a movement to mobilize the middle” to run on a No Labels ticket and siphon away Biden voters (who are more likely to flow to him than Trump voters).

I don’t know what a realm is in context of neuroscience, but if mental events are not solely due to physical inputs, then what else do you recommend we measure and look at to better understand them? Correct, and maybe it is. Maybe it isn’t. Somewhat peripheral to my stance though I struggle to agree with you here. Why would that be unlikely? What other systems would be worthy of consideration? I understand you agree and this comment confirms that, but your mention of realms isn’t terribly different IMO.

Perhaps once again you’re posting tongue in cheek, but conversion therapy is dangerous and doesn’t work, just to make that clear.

Grateful for this

This proves not only that you’re unfamiliar with the topic, but also that you haven’t paid attention to the resources already shared. We’ve known this is the case for decades, even if you personally did not. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will#The_point_of_no_return

His comments will hurt him with the GOP base during the primaries, but not enough to make him lose. His comments will help him during the general election, potentially enough to avoid loss.

That'd be a great name for a cologne. Beyond that, seems pretty useless. You're free to believe or disbelieve any silly thing you want, but if you plan to defend your beliefs in a public space like this then you'll need to try harder. Again, I can only remind you, it depends on how one defines their terms. You're suggesting QM is truly random, but an entirely valid counter proposal is simply that it's not predictable with current models and tools. These differences matter, and others have already explored exaclty this. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/chance-randomness/#ChanDete This last part may be most useful in bolstering my stance that yours is misguided:

Indeed, but it only matters if they show up. In a nearby school board election day before yesterday, 2 of the candidates won by only 12 votes. The margins are razor thin, and the districts as drawn aren't very forgiving for apathy and failure to have oneself be counted. I'll note this is itself a fairly key strategy among the GOP right now as they don't necessarily need to beat Biden if they can instead simply convince enough folks who voted for him in 2020 to just not show up next year. This is where Dem strategists are hoping that actively putting abortion on to MORE ballots (like was done in Ohio this week) will be the wedge needed to get more people up off their couches and into voting booths.

Correct, and none of those are currently toss-ups

Lots of folks keep saying I'm arguing for epiphenomenalism, and I simply used those exact words found in the definition of epiphenomenalism. They're not my words, and in fact I'm fairly certain you're one of the people who posted the wiki link from which they were drawn. Here it is for reference: I note still the question remains unanswered. If physical and biochemical events are NOT the sole cause of mental events, then what other variables do you suggest ARE involved? I actually haven't. I've said "it depends on how you define it." My apologies for missing it, but it seems I'm not the only one who did. Will you kindly please repeat it so we may align on this point you seem to believe is so self-evident and obvious? I see. So you say I'm arguing for epiphenomenalism, that epiphenomenalism is a wrong dead end, and when I ask what other possibilities exist for the underlying elements leading to mentation and causation, you respond, "I have no fucking idea, I just KNOW that it MIGHT be wrong." Right. Okay, haas. Got it. Super strong position you're arguing. FWIW: I also acknowledge it MIGHT be wrong, but as it stands today nobody can explain where or how. That which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence, so dismiss you I do. One final point of clarification: I'm not arguing for epiphenomenalism and all of the baggage which comes with it. I'm saying our mentation is rooted in chemical and biological processes, physical processes. If you disagree, then the onus is on you to show WHAT ELSE leads to mentation. Not just physical processes? Okay, what then? Not just biochemistry? Okay, what then? Go ahead and lay that out, folks... I'll wait (mostly likely indefinitely given the trend in these last several replies).

Either location does matter or it doesn't, and this statement is clearly false in many important electoral locations.

Of course they do. It's the same system, and the future is just an as-yet unrealized past. The state of the future will be the result of the present and past. There is no difference here. The problem is more about insufficient information to feed better forecasts than it is about impossibility, but scale of course matters. I may not be able to tell you where each individual raindrop will land, but I can tell you with great precision how much total rain will fall in the week ahead.

Acceptance helps too

Desensitization. It becomes less salient. New memories become more prominent.

Perhaps, but then surely the poster should hedge and acknowledge uncertainty ✌🏼

You’re right to highlight the challenges of polling and they are seeking to correct that, and few goldmines exist. Some polls are better than others (Ann seltzer in Des Moines is one such)

The word “text” is a narrative we apply after receiving the photons. It is not something inherent in the pixels. If physical and biochemical processes are not responsible for cognition and mentation, then what other variables are you suggesting are?

It wasn’t an argument, but a statement of what is obvious in my own mind. It was, however, needlessly harsh given my respect for and appreciation of you. I went for brevity and clarity instead of social grace and empathy. Mea culpa. Said another way: I find your comment that “there is no causal relationship between physical and biochemical processes and our mental phenomenon” to be absurd on its face, but that likely means I’m not comprehending your position accurately. Will you please elaborate on your thinking here? The pixels shine light of various frequencies. That light is emitted from the screen and travels outward to the receiver. The receptors in our eyes, specifically the retina, get impacted by that light and initiate a chemo-electric neural cascade down the optic nerve into our brain based on the frequency and intensity of that light, with most of the signal going specifically to the occipital cortex toward the rear of our skull. A series of other brain regions then awaken from their dormancy and activate to do pattern recognition and assign an emotional valence (is this visual stimulus worthy of fear, is this positive, negative, or neutral, etc.), and the storytelling parts of our brain then begin crafting a narrative to explain to ourselves the image in context of our past experiences with it. We try to make sense of it. If the stimulus is novel, we tend to invent fresh new narratives that align with our existing model of the world and feel like a best fit, despite possibility of this being entirely fiction. We make a best guess. If it’s a familiar stimulus, we tend to seek out any marginal differences between the newly incoming image and our past experiences to update our existing mental models for enhanced accuracy. After all of these processes have occurred, we then begin to formulate a response (even if that response is simply to continue reading). It happens quite rapidly, but there is generally a few hundred millisecond difference that is measurable between these steps and brain regions and they all occur prior to arriving to the parts of our minds associated with conscious awareness. So, there’s absolutely a close link between the stimulus (the pixels on the screen) and the response (the reading and comprehension), but whether or not one labels that a “causal relationship” depends entirely on the definition of causal being applied.

I’ll ask now for a 3rd time this question you’ve already evaded twice: If not physical and biochemical processes, what other variable do you believe leads to cognition and mentation? Bullshit

Yes, and trump has already spoken against the GOP on that issue, hence my point stands. Despite a strong Democratic showing in state and school board level races, he’s still up in swing states and tied with Biden nationally.

Our = The wet meat computer bag of chemicals generally referred to as an “individual” or “human” in the English language… by saying “our” that meant more than one… a larger set of “individuals” or group of “humans” numbering greater than one. Has this sufficiently clarified, or shall I use fat crayons and construction paper to draw you a picture?