needimprovement Posted January 16, 2011 Share Posted January 16, 2011 I do not believe in the existence of mind without matter. What is mind? We have very few analogues that we know - the fields. What is the magnetic field and especially the gravitational field? About gravitational field we know it is a property of matter.We know its effect but do not know what's gravitational field. (About the magnetic field we know more, but we still do not know what it is.) One's properties matter is that two materials can not be in the same place at the same time. But fields may be in the same place and same time.So fields are not matter. What are they? By analogy we can ask what is mind? Has certain physical properties as fields but not yet discovered? Mind can be like fields and can influence the matter? Can anyone show any evidence? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrs Zeta Posted January 16, 2011 Share Posted January 16, 2011 Mind can be like fields and can influence the matter? Can anyone show any evidence? It is becoming increasingly accepted that mind can affect matter (in the clinical sense). The effects of mental stress on immunity are well known. Positive thinking improves immunity, to the point that it can reduce the impact of cancer at times. See for example http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21116746, but there are many other studies. It is also becoming clear that the environment (i.e. how the mind sees the world) can have positive effects on the DNA and cause beneficial epigenetic changes. For example, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20332807 I am not aware of any robust, accepted studies showing that the mind can affect matter in the Physics realm, although there have been many parapsychologists who have performed experiments in this respect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SMF Posted January 16, 2011 Share Posted January 16, 2011 Needimprovement. If the definition of mind is the sum of our conscious experience, then the idea of mind affecting matter is quite simple. For example, as I sit here I am reading your post and thinking about it (a process of the mind), and then typing this on my computer, a physical act that influences matter. Besides this, I am not sure what you are asking. The mind is an epiphenomenon of the brain and is a component of the brain. The one thing that is different about all nervous systems and computers, for that matter, is that they manipulate information. Information is dependent upon matter, but not necessarily dependent on any particular type of matter. Mrs Zeta. Following my statement above, stress is an information state in brains that sets a critter up for dealing with the cause of the stress by automatically adjusting different body systems, which is matter manipulation. We beans (humin beans) have inappropriate stress responses because our evolutionary past tuned us up for a completely different environment. What is called mind-body therapy is actually mind influencing mind. One’s mind can influence cancer by deciding to get therapy, but otherwise these therapies help patients deal with the disease in a psychological sense. I don’t get the epigenetic reference at all. SM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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