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percy-l - Re: Conscious Will

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Subject: Percy-L: Literary, Religious, Scientific, and Philosophical Discussion on Walker Percy

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  • From: Ken Armstrong <armstron AT ohiou.edu>
  • To: "Percy-L: Literary and Philosophical Discussion" <percy-l AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Re: Conscious Will
  • Date: Mon, 29 Apr 2002 15:34:45 -0400


   Jim,

  Just a note, really. Your post below really grabbed me with the first sentence. But by the time I got to the first sentence of the second paragraph, my head was spinning.


Seems to me that the drive to be conscious is the strongest drive of all. Consciousness is like going to the movies only better  --it's our own life that is being shown.  Being conscious of our motives and actions does not in my view necessarily mean we are freely choosing them.  Nor do I understand how consciousness would be necessary for free choice to occur. 
 
I'm not even sure what consciousness is. How does consciousness differ from mere responding?

  Quite a feat, Jim, to declare consciousness the strongest drive of all (I'm not sure, though, where the drives are kept) and then declaring yourself ignorant of what consciousness is. And THEN of all the *$(@#$*%$ things, devolving to consciousness being no  different from stimulus/response! Well, heck, man, no wonder you don't understand how consciousness would be necessary for free choice to occur!

 All I can say, with some expectation of being understood, is that Percy would indeed have been willing to deflate (much better than I, obviously) the idea that will is illusion. I notice no one took me up on my question of how that book came into being. Stimulus/response d'yer suppoze?

 Cheers,
 Ken Armstrong


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