How much “Reality” are “we” “really” in touch with and what, exactly, are “I” and “we?”

This blog is a forward-flowing narrative.
Please read from the OLDEST post first.
Thank you for dropping in...

There lie the dangers of any social ideology, even Democracy. The purpose of any ideology being the maintenance of a status quo. Now, you may ask, “To whom does the crime profit?” – and I will leave you to figure out the answer for yourself!

For centuries, the old standbys of “instinct” and “reflex” have served as explicative principles for a myriad of behaviors. No one ever knew what they were really talking about until, in the 20th century, the phenomenon of “photosensitivity”, in unicellular organisms, gave us a bio-chemical foundation. However, to this day, I still do not know how photons could trigger motion. Too lazy to investigate further, I am satisfied with the thought that the idea is not so unlikely.

The big question I would like answered before I die is the possibility of experience being transmitted genetically. For this would explain many puzzles: the child genius; the idiot savant; extraordinary speed in learning and adaptation, and that so many people seem to know, subconsciously, a hell of a lot of things they never learnt or experienced.

It would, in many ways, reconcile Mind and Matter and end the dichotomy between them. I would not be surprised that such a mechanism does exist, for we have proof that some materials have “memory” of the initial molding in which they were cast; notably, alloys. Crystals too are very promising because they always rearrange themselves in specific patterns. Hence, the notion that Matter is endowed with the characteristics of Memory is not so far-fetched.

As all individual experiences are, really, collective experiences, it would explain that wave after wave of newborns seem to be more “advanced” then their predecessors.

Only the individual carries this ability to transmit his memories through his genes. However, his experiences carry the sum total of the experiences of the collective, within which he lived and was fashioned. Whatever our truly personal inner stirrings might be, they are “formatted” by our culture – culture being a system of inhibitions, generally speaking, only very few individuals go beyond the limitations set by the cultural norms. Otherwise, collectives would be ungovernable. If human nature was such (that individuality was unrestrained) there would have been no civilization.

Our individuality is largely a myth.

A White Lie.

A Mind Game.

A very short leash.

A very personal sense of reality would lead you to an insane asylum or a maximum security jail.

So, whatever experiences are genetically transmitted, they would be those consolidated by uniformity and repetition, as all cultures are, fundamentally, the same – or, to re-phrase, similar in fundamental structures. The result, over millennia, is the creation of a “Human Nature.” That has nothing much to do with Nature. As demonstrated by the cases of individuals who have never escaped enculturation, one way or another.

Since the very first man, who puzzled over the appearance of a straight branch being “bent” by the water, the debate has been raging over how much Reality we are “really” in touch with.

He must have experimented for hours, dipping the branch in a pond: now it appears bent; now it is straight! He must have wondered which of the appearances was ‘real.”

Eventually, by running his hands over the half-submerged branch – or by fixing the branch in the mud to have it cast a shadow – he convinced himself that, probably, the water was creating a “delusion.” The first instance of the mind correcting the senses.

However, our primitive friend had also a lot of trouble with his dreams – “If sleep is for resting, why do we dream? And how is it that these dreams are so detailed and so life-like?” For there was nothing in these dreams that he did not experience in his wake state. Often, he would be sexually aroused, solve a problem or have a change of heart, in those dreams. The dream solution would then prove to be workable in the real world. The sexual arousal would have produced very real gratification. The change of heart would persist in his wake state. What else was he to think but that dreams are also “real?”

He knew nothing of Psychology, or even that his brain was a lot more than something good to eat – when it was someone else’s brain! Now, these dream experiences were far more difficult to “correct.” For the Mind, involved with itself, could hardly “correct” itself. Furthermore, the Mind did not know of its own existence. Literally. Yes, it is obvious to me. The Mind, saying to itself: “I am a Mind,” is a relatively recent invention. For when he said “I,” he did not mean “my mind” – he meant his body, his name, his affiliation to clan, the record of his achievements…but not his mind.

“Those were innocent days,” you might say.

“Not so fast,” would I interrupt rudely.

Who is to say that we are not the ones who are naïve? Who says you could not exist without a Mind? What is “a mind,” come to think of it? And how is it that trillions of Earth creatures have existed and thrived, over billions of years, without even saying to themselves, “I have a mind, you know. A dinosaur mind, you know. A bacterial mind, you know.” Obviously, this “Mind” is not at all necessary for survival.

How is it that mention of Mind, within the written record, appears not earlier than 3,000 years ago? Even Aristotle only speaks of a “Universal Mind.” He never once speaks of his own mind. Didn’t he know he had a mind? Why should such a universal man, a great scholar, not have authored a book entitled, “The Mind”?

The ancient Greeks spoke of “Nous.” By that, they meant Awareness, Thought, Emotion, Will, and such. These are all “functions” or operations and were never thought of as embodied in some organ, a ghost organ, called, “The Mind.” Now, you might vehemently object and say that everyone knows the mind is nothing more than the brain’s “representation” of its own functions.

Then, I will, in turn, ask you to prove (or at least, to demonstrate) that what you believe is objectively and “scientifically” true. How do you propose to “prove” that?

If I remember well, Einstein’s brain was dissected and no “mathematical function” was found. No extra “bumps” or convolutions and no extra mass, either. Just a plain brain that could have been a dolphin’s or an ape’s. Even Dr. Penfield never said that he knew of some spot in the brain that is the “seat” of the mind. As much as tickled his patient’s brains, he never came upon a spot where at that point, the patient would say, “I am This Woman’s Mind.”

On the contrary, neurologists speak in terms of “charting” the brain: this area processes language and that one retains memories, or whatever. Where then, is this Mind, if it is located, produced or codified by the Brain?

For even software is something that exists, somewhere.

I never heard of software made of pure thought.

When we think of Mind, a number of problems arise:

I. If we think of it as a “fact”: our present culture does not recognize “facts” established by introspection or intuition. Even if each of the 7 billion people on Earth were to state, in one voice, “I am a Mind,” or “I have a Mind,” this kind of affirmative pronouncement of fact would not be considered a “fact.”

There is good reason for such an attitude, when you review, in a historical perspective, the beliefs held by people:

1) That the heart was the seat of all thoughts and emotions
2) That pregnancy was not related to the sexual act
3) That madness had to do with possession
4) That family resemblances were due to reincarnations
5) That dreams were memories of other lives, in other dimensions of Reality
6) That you became what you ate
7) That places and objects carried a type of elemental power that could heal or destroy the body

And the list could go on, for miles of writing.

Here and there, one could argue that that some of these beliefs were intuitive understandings of Radiation, multiple personalities, lector-magnetic belts, or the biochemistry involved in the interaction with some soluble minerals such as Lithium, dissolved in ponds. All of which may be true and fine. Nonetheless, the overall impression remains: people do not know about their own functioning. Furthermore, there is quite a distance separating intuitive understanding from exact knowledge.

II. Most analyses of Mind are built on some Analogy. Unavoidably, the prevalent analogies are always of the mechanical paradigm. In our times, we tend to erect our inventions into paradigms of Reality.

Our current favourite paradigm is the Computer; leading to analyses in terms of Hardware and Software.

We are, presently, stuck in this analogical rut.

The Mind, as “Software” was hailed as an inspired analogy, when, in fact, it is nothing more than labeling. Even by ordinary common sense, one should suspect that this Mind that invented the Computer must be a lot more than its creation.

Biblicism has left us scarred: it taught us to analyze the Creator trough his creation. It has become a habit of thought.

In fact, there might be no way of deducing the nature and functioning of the Mind from cars, water pumps, light bulbs or ATMs!

III. There is serious confusion, at the highest levels of understanding, between Mind and Brain:

1) Freud dealt with mental illness as “Spiritual” snags. He never spoke of “brain diseases” and did not suspect the importance of brain biochemistry.

2) The neurologists have been trying to “map” the brain, on the assumptions of “functions” located in “areas” of the brain. However, the neuropsychologist, on the other hand, does not believe that a brain dysfunction could be located in a specific area of the brain. He views the brain as a whole: where speech is affected, memory might also be affected – as well as perception, self-perception and a dozen other things. He also knows that if you remove half the brain, the other half will still function as a “whole.”

At every step of the road, the identification of Mind as Brain meets serious challenges.

It is, therefore, tempting to say, “There is no Mind” or that “Mind is self-representation, for functional purposes.” In other words, Mind is but a “ghost in the machine,” a virtual reality…which flies in the face of what all of humanity has believed all of the time: that “I” and “me” and “myself” are an absolute and Ultimate Reality! For even those who make such sensational, counter-cultural assertions, say, “I.”

What or who, then, is this “I?” A ghost saying that it is a ghost? A hologram? Furthermore, this “I,” supposedly a ghost, acts very oddly:

1) It often ends its own existence through suicide.

2) It longs to end its solitude through Love, Nationalism, Deism or Pantheism. In other words, to abrogate its autonomy, its sovereignty, by “melting” into some other “I.”

3) It often addresses itself as “you” or “we.” Is it confused about its existence? Is it unable to count? Does it think about itself as a collectivity? Does it adopt various perceptions of itself, at will, in a calculated fashion? Perhaps it simply does not care to count or label itself. It suffices that IT IS, in its own perception of its Reality. Are “I,” “You,” “Myself” or “We” indifferently used, by the Mind, as identifying clusters of various aspects of its Reality?” Now I am an “I” and now a “Them,” depending on the perspective that is required to solve a problem. That the psychiatrist sees signs of dysfunction in such richness of means and articulation does not say much about the psychiatrist!

4) It is a matter of fact that people in a coma, even over long periods of time, have re-emerged “whole,” with the same personality, getting into the act where they had left off. Were their minds “on hold” in some limbo? Neurosurgeons will tell you that the brain is insensitive to pain. No need to anesthetize it. What then, is a migraine or a headache? What is the difference between all the varieties of pain: despair, longing, boredom, tooth-ache or love sickness? That is a lot of pain, for a brain that “feels no pain.”

5) In the case of identical twins and Siamese twins, each twin has a distinct sense of self: an ego, a mind. Why do two brains, sharing the same genes and the same body develop two separate identities when, in some cases, a single identity would have been more efficient and less awkward for survival purposes? In some cases, one twin is a complete person, while the other is very sketchy – as if a growth or extension of the one that is fully developed. Yet, again, both have separate egos and distinct personalities. Sometimes, they even hate each other! In every case we observe that each twin has a separate brain. This seems to reinforce the view that there is no Mind unless there is a Brain. There might be a mindless brain but no “brainless mind” has ever been found! But, then, in extreme cases, some Siamese twins are attached at the head or share internal organs. Why did two separate egos develop, creating problems of coordination, the possibility of conflict of wills, etc.? Wouldn’t it have been more economical, efficient or rational for a single, unified ego to emerge? Obviously, the emergence of the ego has nothing to do with such considerations. What then?

6) A major problem lies in defining what we mean by “Mind,” “a mind.” The meaning alternates as follows: a) Personality, and b) Functions: memory, logic, emotions, perception, self-awareness, dreaming, fantasizing, judging, language and expression, etc., and c) The soul, and d) The brain.
The modern tendency is to believe that all manifestations of Mind are productions of the brain. The question therefore becomes: “What is the brain?” How is it different from kidneys, glands or all the other organs? To say that it is “very complex” says nothing. To detail its bio-chemical functioning also says nothing. For how do enzymes, proteins, adrenaline or serotonin “become” thoughts, emotions, memories or dreams? None of the brain’s “productions” are materials, substantial – in any sense – except for brain waves, which have the most elementary feature of the substantial: they can be measured. Otherwise, none of the brain’s productions have mass or dimension and are not quantifiable. The fact that we say, “One thought,” or “a thought” does not imply, after all, that Thought is subject to numeration. Who knows if that “one” thought is really one in a million? “One thought” is a speech convention, not a factual Reality.

7) In the coinage “Collective Mind,” we find yet another variation on the mind-theme. Trying to analyze, exhaustively, the “contents” of such a notion would be like opening Pandora’s Box! For, who knows what bric-a-brac has been deposited in this “Collective Mind,” by psychologists, anthropologists, and even zoologists. Some see, for instance, the workings of a “Collective Mind” in the swarming of insects, birds and fish. They speak of signals and messages, of a rather mysterious nature, sometimes occult. In another instance, we are told that in human societies, this “Collective Mind” is capable of transmitting “atavic memories” and can determine historical directions, independently of any and all individuals within the collectivity. In this case we do have a disembodied Mind, in the nature of “Fate.”

8) Finally, one more observation – it regards the workings and mechanics of Growth. Looking at this old woman, sitting in the bus, I wonder what her mind was like at age 5, as a young lass of 18, as a 40-year old, etc, all the way up to this very moment in time, where she appears to be somewhere in her early 70’s. Am I to view the growth and ageing of her mind as one, linear continuum, from cause to effect? Or should I view the phenomenon in terms of personalities, in the plural, more or less holding together, like the layers of an onion? How many personalities could one develop, in some 70 years of living? Three, five or twelve? Are they all compatible with each other? Do they form an integrated whole or do they lie, side by side, more or less tolerating each other? When the 5 year-old craves a candy bar, does the 40 year-old remind her that “we” are on a diet? Does the 70 year-old over-rule them both and decides she should, rather, save the money for a rainy day?

Are we one personality or a community of personalities?

Which model is more likely to be the “natural” one?

The best fitted for adaptation and survival of the living organism, this woman, as we know her and we know ourselves? Obviously, the linear continuum is too rigid; too rationalistic. Also, far too difficult to manage, in the faces of paradoxes, contradictions and conundrums, as we find, daily, and repeatedly, the system could snap!

Part 5 to come…