Newsgroups: alt.consciousness,comp.ai.philosophy
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!das-news2.harvard.edu!news2.near.net!news.mathworks.com!gatech!swrinde!pipex!uknet!newsfeed.ed.ac.uk!dcs.ed.ac.uk!rxe
From: rxe@dcs.ed.ac.uk (Richard Emslie)
Subject: Right and wrong  
Message-ID: <D7JLB3.DKI@dcs.ed.ac.uk>
Sender: cnews@dcs.ed.ac.uk (UseNet News Admin)
Organization: Department of Computer Science, University of Edinburgh
Date: Mon, 24 Apr 1995 13:54:39 GMT
Lines: 45



I am new to newsgroups and have posted my ideas on the knowing right and
wrong, and how consciousness would be impossible without it.  I have no
expertise in the area, and the following is based on my own introspection.


We all have our own depiction of what is right and wrong.  In a sense
this is our own God and it is a set of rules we believe in - we call
it our conscience.

This knowledge of good and evil can induce guilt as we feel our evil
minds are going to be exposed.  As a result we build a WALL to protect
ourselves from ourselves.  I believe it is here introversion intiates,
and without this conciousness would not exist.

In extreme cases an introvert will avoid exposure to the real World or
reality.  He tends to live in an imaginary World, with an imaginary
friend who he continually talks, or even teaches to.  However this
friend is actually himself.  Therefore becoming increasingly scared to
interface with the external World he chooses not to believe in it and
moreover he heas become very aware of his own conciousness.  Not only
is he sensitively aware of himself, his mistakes and his deficiencies,
but internalises the World's problems and agonsises over them.  He
then looks for answers to escape the loniless and seclusion that has
resulted from not letting anyone in and keeping everything inside.

Although the main aim in building the wall was to protect ourself from
emotional intimidation and fear, it seems evident that infact we
intensify our own conscience by thinking about it, resulting in a
downward spiral.  Not only that but by looking for answers within
ourself we have become lost and confused.  More importantly, the
consequences of all of this induces fear because of our lack of knowledge
-we have become helpless.

This is actually what I call the "Rollercoaster Paradox": Before Eve
picked the fruit from the tree of knowledge, she was intially innocent
and fearless.  But as man evolves gaining more and more knowledge, he
eventually feels helpless due to his lack of knowledge.


Any views????

Richard Emslie.

