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danielmarkbruce | on: They’re made out of weights
SSRIs are not evidence that we understand how neural activity becomes behavior. They are evidence that you can perturb a system usefully without understanding it very well. That is exactly my point.

Respectfully, you are miles out of your depth here.

runarberg | parent
I don‘t see why you felt the need to insult me here. We are having a very common disagreement here, one which philosophers of science have been actively debating for several decades.

My point with the SSRI is that we know that serotonin is a chemical which incites certain neurons, and we know that a lack of activity of neurons in that general area in the brain is correlated with depression, so scientists were able to accurately predict that keeping the serotonin in that brain area for longer would increase brain activity there and decrease the level of depression.

This counts as pretty good understanding in my books at least. It teaches us very little about consciousness but my point is that it doesn’t have to. Just like Newton’s theory of gravity did not have to teach us about some deeper cosmological truth.

cortesoft | root | parent | next
> Just like Newton’s theory of gravity did not have to teach us about some deeper cosmological truth.

I would also argue that Newton's theory of gravity was not a pretty good understanding of gravity.

runarberg | root | parent
It was still a good theory, and importantly the fact that it failed explain the nature of Aether had no effect on the quality of the theory.
danielmarkbruce | root | parent
It's not an insult to suggest one is out of the depth on a topic, especially when it isn't one's field of expertise. You are giving the pop science explanation of various things.
fragmede | root | parent | next
Why did you feel the need to add it though?

> When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. "That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

danielmarkbruce | root | parent
Nobody called anyone any name.

If you are going to quote rules, be bothered to read what was actually written. Your behavior ruins things, it doesn't make it better.

fragmede | root | parent
You don't think "Respectfully, you are miles out of your depth here." couldn't have just been left off?
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