Weight of the whirled

Hey man, it's a crazy day today, so I haven't been able to post. I enjoyed your meditation on science and scientists. I've read a fair number of research books, and I concur on the bone-crunchingly dull nature of data. It takes a special kind of person.

I disagree on the predictability of everything in the universe. Call me a romantic, but I still believe in free will and the power of consciousness. I don't know if I could defend it, but the fact that no one has been able to come close to replicating the human mind (or even a cat's mind, as far as I know) with a computer makes me think there's a lot more to it than pure data crunching and statistics. Of course, I may be arguing something along the same lines as the Intelligent Design crowd--you know, since I can't understand how it works, there must be some mystical power (in this case, will power) that makes it all happen. So, although I look down on the Intelligent Design crowd when it comes to the origin of life, maybe I'm just as bad when we start discussing the nature of the soul.

Not that I strictly believe in the soul in the religious sense of the word. I just mean consciousness and freedom of the will. But maybe I'm misunderstanding your argument. I think that, given enough statistical data and the means to process and analyze it, it is probably possible to predict someone's behavior more often than not. But I can't give in to the idea that the human mind is somehow a machine or that the person being observed does not have the power to choose differently than what the accrued data says he or she will choose.

I recommend "In Defense of Human Consciousness," by Joseph Rychlak. He's a psychologist, and the book is a little heavy at times, but he defends the idea of free will pretty well against the mechanistic and reductionist models of modern science.

Anyway, I just had some espresso, so I am being way too wordy and probably bombastic (I like that word).

Ah, thanks for trying to stop with the "gay = sucks" thing. That's very straight of you.

Just kidding.