Ask Mark - Week 5 responses
Thank you to everyone who posted questions last week. I have recorded a response to four of the many interesting questions you had posed in Step 5.12 of Week 5. My video responses are on YouTube with links below.
Question 1: In the first video “Agency” is likened to “Free Will”. Would you agree the two are different - agency being the capacity to make decisions and act accordingly, consciously or otherwise, and arising from causal chains of thought which in turn, are the product of brain biochemistry; and free will being a more abstract concept carrying some implication of moral judgment?
Actually, does free will even exist?
Question 2: What is the relationship between agency/instinct and personality and does this work when thinking about determinism vs autonomy?
Question 3: In one of your videos you conclude that thinking requires language. How does this square with the Whorf-Sapir controversy concerning the possibility of non-verbal thought? And what about the capacity of animals to “think”: for example, when a cat is considering its responses to an unfamiliar object in the household?
Question 4: In dealing with the patient’s confabulation the professor makes no mention of challenging it. Is that the best approach to listen and simply accept it as a telling insight into how the person’s mind is making sense of their world?
I look forward to your questions for the last week of the course - you can post them in Step 6.8 of Week 6.
