You read in the last blog post the following:

BUT THE HUMAN SPIRIT AND SOUL ARE ALSO VULNERABLE TO THE INFLUENCE OF EVIL SPIRITS, TO SATAN. YES, WE HUMANS HAVE FREE WON’T, BUT WE ALSO HAVE FREE WILL GIVEN TO MANKIND BY OUR CREATOR GOD. IT IS OUR IMMATERIAL COGNITIVE MIND THAT IS THE SOURCE OF WILLFUL INTENT, OF VOLITION.

I have selected a teaching of Jesus Christ that speaks to this reality. It is from the Book of John 8: 42-47:

Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God sent me. Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. Yet because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! Can any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why don’t you believe me? Whoever belongs to God hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do not belong to God.”

When you view the talk by Dr. Egnor you will hear him discuss the very significant work of Benjamin Libet, an American neuroscientist who pioneered in the field of consciousness. His studies have been interpreted to show that all unconscious volitional processes can be traced to the material brain, that free will plays no part in their initiation. Eventually he concluded that humans have free won’t, a manifestation of free will to the extent that intentions that emanate from the brain can be cancelled by the human will. Libet’s work has profoundly influenced the studies and perceptions of many neuroscientists and philosophers who to this day reduce all human intentions and will to the workings of the brain. This is a perspective of monism that denies dualist interaction between an immaterial mind and the material synaptic networks of the human brain. Egnor shares that Libet concluded that the willful intents that emerge from the brain, that give expression to materialist reductionism, show a scientific validation for essentially the Fall, going back to Adam and Eve. The question that must be, and is being, asked is if evil intent or will emerges solely from the physiology of the brain? This view can work against assigning personal responsibility and accountability for illegal acts!

From the information I have shared in my books and blogs, it is my hope that the reader will accept that the mind, the will, of humans (the soul) is an immaterial reality that interacts with the human spirit. In turn the human spirit is open to personal interaction with the Holy Spirit. This interaction was restored to fallen mankind by the grace of God through the sin sacrifice of his resurrected Son, Jesus Christ, who sent as he promised the Holy Spirit to once again indwell repentant mankind, serving as Counselor and Helper. But the human spirit and soul are also vulnerable to the influence of evil spirits, to Satan. Yes, we humans have free won’t, but we also have free will given to mankind by our Creator God. It is our immaterial cognitive mind that is the source of willful intent, of volition. We are justified by faith, not works, yet are accountable for our volitional actions, righteously to be judged ultimately by Jesus Christ. I pray that my writings are presenting compelling evidence for dualist interaction with God through his Holy Spirit, restored by the sin sacrifice in our behalf of Jesus Christ. The scientific validation of this reality is a formidable challenge, to be sure, but tiny positive steps are being taken toward this end.

I am posting a powerful talk by Dr. Michael Egnor that provides three proofs for the immateriality of the mind. You can open his talk at the following link:

https://uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/three-knockdown-proofs-of-the-immateriality-of-mind-and-why-computers-compute-not-think/

I have been posting excerpts from Scripture to demonstrate the concordance that exists between it and neuroscience when both are properly interpreted in context. We see that the resurrected Jesus Christ sent, as He promised, the Holy Spirit to indwell repentant people to provide counsel and direction. My books and blog posts have provided evidence from the neurosciences of how, at least in part, communion could be accomplished between the Holy Spirit and the spirit and soul of mankind through neural synaptic networks. I continue to search the neuroscience literature to provide compelling evidence for the truth of this interaction, but reductive materialism still claims the day in most articles I review. I will continue to do my best to post additional evidence for dualist interactionism between the immaterial Mind of God and the mind of Man through the material synaptic networks of the human brain. I do this to offer evidence to grow faith in the reality of the love of God for His creation, Man, with whom He desires to have a personal bidirectional communion.

In my writings I have shared how Jesus promised to the disciples before his crucifixion that he would send another Counselor, the Spirit of Truth, to be with them forever. This he would do when he returned to the Father after his resurrection. I wish to share some verses from the Book of John 14 that address this promise and indicate its application to each of our lives in our time.

I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.

The NIV from which this is taken includes an explanation: “These [things] depended on Jesus’ going to the Father, because they are works done in the strength of the Holy Spirit, whom Jesus would send from the Father.” Jesus goes on to say, I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. Before long, the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.

The biblical verses most applicable to my research and writing are at the beginning of the Book of John, 1: 1-4:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men.

What does “Word” refer to, or to whom? It is more than a word that is spoken in a given language. It refers to a power by which all that has been created was created by God through Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit. I am including a discussion taken from the Zondervan NIV Study Bible, 2002, Grand Rapids, Michigan:

Word, Greek logos, a term Greeks used not only of the spoken word but also of the unspoken word, the word still in the mind - the reason. [I offer that the Mind of God was the Source of ALL information that has been actualized in his creations, since information only comes from a mind as I have related in my blogs.] When they applied it to the universe, they meant the rational principle that governs all things [by specified information]. The Jews, however, used it to refer to the “word” of God by which he created the world and governs it [actualized information in his creations of energy and matter] and to refer to the law of God that he gave Israel to be the “way” for them to receive the inheritance of life. Of the law the rabbis said that it was “created before the world,” that it “lay on God’s bosom while God sat on the throne of glory,” that it was divine, that it was God’s “firstborn” [the begotten Jesus] through whom he “created the heaven and the earth,” that it is “light” and “life” for the world and that it “is truth.” . . . The Word was distinct from the Father, was God. Jesus was God in the fullest sense. life One of the great concepts of this Gospel. LIfe is Christ’s gift, and he, in fact, is “the life,” light of men. This Gospel also links light with Christ, from whom comes all spiritual illumination [by the power of the Holy Spirit]. He is the “light of the world,” who holds out wonderful hope for humanity and for the creation.

And we are blessed that God created mankind with the plan for a personal, intimate communion, a plan that has been addressed in my books and blogs that we might receive the truth of eternal life and light in Jesus Christ.

I am posting verses from Luke 8:42-48 which tell a remarkable story of power going out of Jesus to heal a woman’s 12 years of bleeding who touched the edge of His cloak. Recall that Jesus, the God-Man, received the Holy Spirit at His baptism by John the Baptist. The Holy Spirit indwelled the human spirit of Jesus, the Son of God, and His soul reached out to the Father for all guidance in His life. Consider in these verses what the relationship could have been between Jesus’ human spirit, the indwelling Holy Spirit of the Father and the soul (mind, will, emotion) of Jesus Christ. We see that Jesus did not intentionally and with awareness heal this woman while immersed in a dense crowd of people, but by the indwelling Holy Spirit she was healed, giving testimony to Jesus as a God-Man, both human and God, in whom indwelled the power of the Holy Spirit. Did God the Father through His Holy Spirit bring healing to her, as Jesus would have had He knowingly seen her? And was that power a manifestation of wave forms that we have been considering in the latest blogs? Food for thought, to grow our faith in the power of the Holy Spirit by whom we too can be indwelled in repentance by the loving grace of God through His begotten Son, Jesus Christ.

As Jesus was on his way, the crowds almost crushed him. And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years, but no one could heal her. She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak, and immediately her bleeding stopped. “Who touched me,” Jesus asked. When they all denied it, Peter said, “Master, the people are crowding and pressing against you.” But Jesus said, “Someone touched me; I know that power has gone out from me.” Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at his feet. In the presence of all the people, she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed. Then he said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace.”

Chris Frith published an article entitled, “The Psychology of Volition,” in Exp Brain Res, 2013, Vol. 229: 289-299. I am posting several excerpts from that article that describe human volition, or free will. Materialists reduce the mind to the physical brain and go so far as to challenge the existence of free will. By reading these posts I hope you can come to your own conclusion about the reality of human volition.

“From the first-person view, our experience of volitional behavior includes a vivid sense of agency. We feel that, through our intentions, we can cause things to happen and we can choose between different actions. . . . In what sense do we control our behavior? Does such control imply the possibility of mental causation and the existence of free will? Is free will compatible with a materialist approach to the study of behavior? Is this truly free behavior uniquely human? . . . The key feature of a voluntary act as opposed to a reflex is that the voluntary act cannot be fully predicted from the preceding context. The implication is that, if the behavior is not being determined by external events, then the choices must be made ‘from inside’, endogenously. . . . [Frith asks] Is it possible for a nervous system to generate truly random behavior? . . . Unpredictable behavior . . . is self-generated, or endogenous. . . . Whatever the precise mechanisms underlying its perception, volition, seen from the first-person perspective, is associated with a vivid experience of agency. As agents, we have the experience of desiring an outcome and of choosing the action that will achieve it. Some believe that it is this experience of being an agent that leads to a belief in free will. . . . It is the first-person aspect of volition that is uniquely human. . . . The experience of agency requires that these signals be interpreted.” In my books and blogs I have made the effort to identify what does the interpretation, and it is the immaterial mind.

To illustrate the commitment to a monistic, materialistic view of human volition, or intent, I am including some excerpts from an article by Patrick Haggard of the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London. The article is “Human Volition: Towards a Neuroscience of Will,” Nature Reviews, Neuroscience, Vol. 9, December, 2008. I invite you to review this article and draw your own conclusion. I include it to show the resistance encountered when making a case for dualist interaction between the immaterial mind and the material synaptic networks of the human brain, a compelling case I have endeavored to make.

In the abstract Haggard writes, “The capacity for voluntary action is seen as essential to human nature. Yet neuroscience and behaviorist psychology have traditionally dismissed the topic as unscientific, perhaps because the mechanisms that cause actions have long been unclear. However, new research has identified networks of brain areas, including the pre-supplementary motor area, the anterior prefrontal cortex and the parietal cortex, that underlie voluntary action [I submit they facilitate voluntary action]. These areas generate information for forthcoming actions [I submit that the cognitive, immaterial MIND generates the specified information that is instantiated in neural codes of memory and selected for action] . . . Volition consists of a series of decisions regarding whether to act, what action to perform and when to perform it [Does this process reside in the mind or in the material brain?].

Haggard states in his introduction that “A dualistic view of endogenous causation is engrained in our normal language. Everyday language suggests that ‘I’ consciously choose to perform actions and that ‘my’ choice somehow causes the action to occur. This language is dualistic, as it implies a mental ‘I’ that is distinct from both the brain and the body but that can nevertheless trigger brain events and, thus, bodily movement.” If you are familiar with the contents of my books and blogs you will see the similarity between these comments and those I have presented that are associated with data from the neurosciences!

Haggard draws on the work of Libet and makes a case for a monistic, materialistic view of volition. He concludes with the statement, “Voluntary action is one of the most characteristic features of the human brain [I submit that it is a feature of the immaterial cognitive human mind interactive with and facilitated by the synaptic networks of the brain]. . . . Modern neuroscience rejects the traditional dualist view of volition as a causal chain from the conscious mind or ‘soul’ to the brain and body.” He concludes by stating that, “…modern neuroscience is shifting towards a view of voluntary action being based on specific brain processes, rather than being a transcendental feature of human nature.” He submits that an understanding of the neural processes of volition is “essential for our conventional concept of responsibility for action.” Did my mind make me do it, or did my brain?

In her review Gholipour wrote that Aaron Schurger, a researcher at the National Institute of Health and Medical Research in Paris, “studied fluctuations in neuronal activity, the churning hum in the brain that emerges from the spontaneous flickering of hundreds of thousands of interconnected neurons, . . . an ongoing electrophysiological noise [that] rises and falls in slow tides.” In his review of Kornhuber and Deecke’s innovative approach to the study of this activity he found “no purpose behind these apparent trends . . . . the pattern would simply reflect how various factors had happened to coincide.” When he examined his own data from studies using the same method as the German team he “saw something that looked like the Bereitschaftspotential . . . [but considered that the] rising pattern wasn’t a mark of a brain’s brewing intention at all, but something much more circumstantial.” Gholipour shared that “neuroscientists know that for people to make any type of decision, our neurons need to gather evidence for each option.” In my books and blogs I have discussed how cognition initiates activity in the memory codes in the supplementary motor areas followed by the transmission of spike trains of action potentials through synaptic networks to, for example, move a finger or arm. There is prior neural activity just prior to the willful intent for physical action in this instance. Gholipour referred to more recent studies by Schurger and Princeton colleagues that “repeated a version of Libet’s experiment,” finding that brain activity in their subjects began only 150 milliseconds before a movement, “the time people reported making decisions in Libet’s original experiment. . . . In other words, people’s subjective experience of a decision - what Libet’s study seemed to suggest was just an illusion - appeared to match the actual moment their brains showed them making a decision.” Schurger’s studies “showed the Bereitschaftspotential may not be what we thought it was.” Gholipour pointed out in her article that Schurger’s work did not solve the question of free will any more than Libet’s did, but did deepen the question. In my more recent blogs I have identified several actions in synaptic networks that occur as a result of cognitive intent, including the proposed generation of wave forms that are transmitted via quantum tunneling to stimulate action potentials. Might this activity be included in the 150 milliseconds prior to a movement, thus giving support to dualist interaction between the immaterial mind and the material synaptic networks of the human brain?