Are you your mind?

Discussion in 'Human Science' started by Bowser, Jan 27, 2019.

  1. Bowser Namaste Valued Senior Member

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    I find myself sometimes chasing thoughts when I should be watching them. At what point do we become the thought rather than the observer?
     
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  3. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    IMO, "mind" is a self-referential system, which in toto creates the experience of continuous self. But observation produces only a "best guess" of what's out there. A guess which is processed and then reverified against incoming information.

    Part of that self-referential system is verification of self, the observer part of the brain. I see no reason why the brain cannot be both the thinker and the observer at the same time.

    As Anil Seth proposes; "We generate reality as much from the inside out as from outside in.
     
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  5. spidergoat pubic diorama Valued Senior Member

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    At what point do we become an observer?
     
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  7. Jeeves Valued Senior Member

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    I'm not sure I understand either of these activities.
    I imagine "chasing" thoughts as trying to retrieve data relevant to a problem we'd begun to solve, had been somehow sidetracked and would now like to resume working on it. Is that close to what you mean?
    I can't imagine "watching" my own thoughts, as I'm always busy creating, reviewing, remodelling, collating and filing them. Nor can imagine watching anyone else's thoughts, except as second-hand facsimiles, as in an author's working notes or a diary.

    We can never be "the observer" of our own mental processes. But we can compartmentalize subject matter and types of thinking. In the normal course of events, these compartments are sealed off from one another, but sometimes - under hypnosis, in dreams, profound introspection, in a crisis of conviction, or in some psychologically traumatic events, it may seems as if we're split into several different characters that may or may not be able to communicate one with another.
    This condition is useful at certain moments, but best avoided as permanent state.
     
  8. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    There is an excellent book titled "Operators and Things", which deals with the author's observation of her own actions as she has descended in a world of schizophrenia.
     
  9. Bowser Namaste Valued Senior Member

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    Everything is observable, with the exception of the observer.
     
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  10. RainbowSingularity Valued Senior Member

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    this has always had mild interest to me about the advancement of the human intellect and specifically around mental capability and the ability to normalise its function to a point of being capable of measuring it in a sense of what is the best outcome for the individual.
    specifically around the frame-work of multi-tasking/task-switching and stress issues around professionals learning & managing many various things at once.

    the relatively recent comments about the new-ish study around task-switching is great for another step.
    maybe 2 steps forward 1 step back...

    my fringe interest in psychiatric conditions which lend toward or against this is interesting yet extremely technical and involved(well above my level).
    savant autism etc...(at the upper end) Vs[if need be for comprehending a general large grouping of what im referring to] social muse at the lower end

    one could almost phrase it (half tongue in cheek for artistic prose/poetry)
    the mathematician Vs the muse... an observers attempt to artistical algebra of the mind...

    swinging round back to the point now i have laid some groundwork....
    linear thought process analyzing multi-task dynamic thought process...
    is linear thought process an old-worldy paradigm which has been over taken by modern intellectual dynamic thought processes ?
    you may get an air of what im referring to without alarming any conventionalists around generic concepts of non congenital type schizophrenia mimicking neural disorders(and general high achiever cognitive(IQ & EQ)normalcy dynamics).
     
  11. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    I believe Hameroff proposes that thought is at least partially a quantum process and as such has ability for self-reference, a two-way communication. Reception-->processing-->best guess-->verification.

    What that means I can't imagine.
     
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  12. RainbowSingularity Valued Senior Member

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    among the alternate education group whom cater to those who think differently to the mainstream(including learning disabilities) there is the terms "spatial thinker/ing" & "linear thinker/ing" defining thought processing systems.

    what i do suspect is that as we see a greater number of people with alternative processing types who are able to acquire proper education we should start to see different models arise.

    is this what you are referring to ?
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuart_Hameroff#Hypotheses
    i have not read the book, i should make a point of doing so.
    i have read some odds & ends from him some years back.
    i also note conversation relating to microtubules in some other threads which i have skipped over if not lightly glazed.
    bio-neuro-science of his content is well above my capability so i have not ventured into the discussion around its feasability as a state of quantum reality/thesis/theory.
    though, after watching a few documentary's by physicists(well internationally accredited ones attached to major universities etc) it did seem to make a lot of sense.
    i have not back read to the bio stuff though and only skipped the quantum stuff as a fascination rather than a study.


    ...spacial/linear
    ..& vaguely thread topic
    is it possible to hold 2 thoughts at the same time ?
    can one process incoming data while processing and outputting data ?
    etc...
    conventional laymens says absolutely not, while urban myth gender discrimination supports women as being multi taskers(in reality once tested scientifically[in average people] it is actually task-switching & in average people has a production output efficiency) and men not.
     
  13. RainbowSingularity Valued Senior Member

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    i.e synesthesia

    is synesthesia a disorder ?
    does the ability of someone for example, who can taste colours, make for a better evolutionary step ?
    is the process of qualitative paradigm hinged on a perceptual physical relationship to purely biological Darwinism ?

    another example would be a really good singer
    someone with massive scale breadth & well above average vocal power ...

    yet look how we measure our artistic intellect by their cultural value.

    obviously, the simple assignment of any variant difference does not value its self.
    only the observer may form judgement from the self as a value of perceived value to Ego sensibilities of personal culture & intellect.

    humans ability to do mathematics does not make the mathematician suddenly have mathematician offspring.
    like wise the political power broker etc...
     
    Last edited: Jan 29, 2019
  14. Write4U Valued Senior Member

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    Yep, once I saw the structure of a microtubule, it seemed so clear that this nano-scale biological processor is so versatile in a variety of applications, increasing it's ability to process a wide range of information and moreover has the ability to refresh or repair itself.
    IMO, that is the triumph of natural selection of the dynamic process of evolution and (continued) natural selection over other more static processes.
    All those individual skills will survive under certain circumstances and give rise to an ever greater exponential function of growth and variety.

    In a probabilistic world, the greater the variety, the greater the variety in offspring, a decided advantage over rigid duplication without a diverse range of adaptive improvements and viability.

    This is how nature stumbled on the evolution of two contributors to the DNA, allowing for greater variety and combinations of specific skills.

    If we look at life around "black smokers" (hydrothermal vents), it is completely alien to surface life. Extremophiles surviving where all other species would perish.

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    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrothermal_vent#Black_smokers_and_white_smokers

    Waterbears, which can dry up for years and regain life with the application of some moisture.

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    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tardigrade

    The variety offered through evolutionary processes are an advantage for all species and close relatives, to offset the increasing demand for adaptation to ever changing climates over some 4 billion years. We can see the advantage of an evolutionary process by counting the species which have gone extinct, but replaced by better adapted relatives.

    One thing seems to be a common denominator in all eukaryotic organisms, and that is "microtubules" for a variety of information processing. It's remarkable that all modern mobile and sensitive organisms possess microtubules.

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    those filaments are made up from

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    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microtubule

    Hameroff proposes that microtubules have bi-directional (superposed) states of processing.
    the illustration shows the perfect reciprocal organization of the tubulin dimers in a cylindrical coil.
    He believes that consciousness emerges from the combined active network which, due to its ability for self-reference, developes an internal consciousness, which allows us to analyze the general information to which our senses are adapted.

    As I understand it. Our conscious experience of light started as a patch of light sensitive chemicals, evolving as needed into eyes ranging from "blind" cave-fish to "eagle" vision, or a olfactory sense of smell 100 times more acute in blood-hounds than in humans.
    Can we say that blood-hounds are extremely conscious of scent?
     
    Last edited: Jan 29, 2019
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