In 1994 a secular guy named David Chalmers, then at University of Arizona, got famous because he characterized something that had been known and discussed for centuries. He described a problem James Trefil, a Physics professor at George Mason University described this way:
It is the only major question in the sciences that we don’t even know how to ask.
In a couple of papers, he described why the mind-brain (spirit) problem is no where close to being answered in any meaningful way. There is nothing religious in this article nor is David Chalmers friendly in any way toward Christianity–he is an atheist. Much deeper thinkers than he had said this same thing year after year for many years, but for some reason, he got famous for it. Here are his articles and a lengthy 2015 article on the subject in the Guardian.
- The Hard Problem (1994)
- Consciousness and It’s Place in Nature (2003)
- An article from 2015 on why there had been virtually no progress on the problem even though we know a lot more about the brain (what part of the game attracts us to gambling, the part of the brain that causes different kinds of problems, etc.
- They even did a TED talk on this thing.
I even wrote about it in my blog.
It caused an uproar in the psychology, philosophy and neuroscience worlds, maybe because he did such a good job of describing the problem. People have been trying to find ways to work on it much more aggressively ever since. I say they have been trying to find ways to work on it because they are not really working on the problem itself because it is not amenable to science. They are just trying to figure out a way to work on it.
This is all interesting stuff.
Betty Blonde #430 – 03/10/2010
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We count Gladys as the fifth grandparent of Christian and Kelly. We are really thankful to have the chance to live so close to Glad. She has been a fixture in our lives since forever. She and Lorena went down to their Wilsonville manicure salon this morning, then we made our way to the new Noodles and Company here in town for a (late) Birthday lunch. We are especially thankful that she was able to make it all the way out to Raleigh for Thanksgiving and for the kids graduation from NCSU when Grandma Sarah could not travel. Thanks Glad. We love you.
Lorena had surgery about a year ago at the Duke University Hospital in Durham, North Carolina. Everything went very nicely and now she is back into a dentist/doctor team here in Oregon to finish up. There is nothing that is any fun about this kind of thing. It is uncomfortable (fortunately there has not been a lot of pain), expensive and a hassle. Oregon Health Sciences University has a wonderful hospital but its location and the way it is laid out makes it horrible difficult to navigate. I know their are topological/geographical and historic reasons for all that, but that does not diminish the hassle when you do not feel good and are trying to get to an appointment, not to mention getting back to your car.
Lorena and I actually drove out to Mulino to look at an old schoolhouse on a little less than an acre of land to decide whether we wanted to buy and remodel it into a house. It was very, very cool, but it would have been more work than we wanted. We hate this waiting, especially with the holidays almost here. If we were at a different stage in life, maybe we would have done it, but now is not the time. So there is nothing to do but keep looking until we find something that is close enought to “right” that we can pull the trigger. In the meantime, we work a lot on the weekends, go to McDonalds before breakfast on Sunday–no down side to their sausage burrito–and go back to work on Monday.
Christian gave his paper at the 
