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  • Not Our Brain, But Someone Else Makes Decisions For Us. Who?

    Posted by Nadeem on February 9, 2021 at 5:18 pm

    Extensive research has been done and it has been proven that it is not our conscious brain which makes decision for our actions, but a few seconds prior to our conscious decision, the decision is made for us in our subconscious. Are we still responsible for our actions? Could it be our “Rooh” making decisions for us, as ultimately it is our Rooh that will be judged for its actions.

    Faisal Haroon replied 3 years, 10 months ago 3 Members · 9 Replies
  • 9 Replies
  • Not Our Brain, But Someone Else Makes Decisions For Us. Who?

    Faisal Haroon updated 3 years, 10 months ago 3 Members · 9 Replies
  • Faisal Haroon

    Moderator February 9, 2021 at 7:25 pm

    I think that there might be some gap in your understanding of the experiment that was conducted by Benjamin Libet. Determinists use this experiment as a basis to suggest that there’s no such thing as consciousness or free will – everything we do is just a result of physical brain activity.

    Libet himself doesn’t subscribe to the idea of determinism. He believes that after the brain activity has been caused to make us undertake an action we still have the power to veto. I’m reproducing Libet’s own conclusion from his book Mind Time below.

    • Nadeem

      Member February 9, 2021 at 8:11 pm

      Thanks Faisal. I am not familiar with Libet, but good to know . I will read him more. I was referring to many other experiments. I will provide you references soon.

    • Faisal Haroon

      Moderator February 9, 2021 at 8:15 pm

      Sure. I’m not familiar with all of them, however, Libet’s experiments are the de facto standard. As far as I know, all other such experiments are extensions or repetitions of it.

    • Nadeem

      Member February 9, 2021 at 8:20 pm

      https://youtu.be/fI1624SwYnI

      This and similar studies I was referring to.

      I am not saying that we do not have free will, but I think our, spirit “Rooh” has free will. We may be only robots complying to its command.

    • Faisal Haroon

      Moderator February 9, 2021 at 8:36 pm

      That is Libet’s experiment. In fact the name is mentioned twice once at 1:12 and then once again later. The doubt that this video is trying to raise is baseless. Just because brain registers activity several milliseconds earlier doesn’t mean that there’s no free will and we’re just robots. There’s already a lot of criticism on this idea in the academia. I shared with you above Libet’s own conclusion of his experiments. If you’re seriously interested, I can also share some book recommendations and other resources later.

    • Nadeem

      Member February 9, 2021 at 10:35 pm

      Faisal, perhaps I was not clear with my point.

      My assertion is that when we say “we”, we are referring to our soul. The soul is occupying our physical body. While we are alive, body and soul are only inseparable.

      According to Quran, it is our soul that will be judged on the last day on its actions. Our soul is wearing our body and after death, on the last day, a new body will be given to our soul.

      Perhaps in this world this is our soul that is commanding our physical body to take certain actions.

      What the study represents is perhaps the lag between soul making a decision first and after few miliseconds the body obeys command as a physical representation.

      So I do believe we have partial free will (per Ghamidi Sahib) but the will belongs to our soul.

    • Waleed Ahmad

      Member February 10, 2021 at 5:52 am

      So Brother, it means that the thoughts and doubts that come to our mind are also controlled by our souls.?

    • Nadeem

      Member February 10, 2021 at 6:02 am

      Waleed Brother. I think we are the soul and our body is just a physical machine to obey soul’s commands.

  • Faisal Haroon

    Moderator February 10, 2021 at 9:33 am

    It’s a rather simplistic view to say that we are simply our souls while body is just a physical machine. As per Ghamidi sahab in the following video, our existence has two parts mind (soul) and body. The control center of our body is our brains and the rest of the body obeys it’s commands.

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