Okay, where were we...?
Hello again!
FyreStar wrote: “Everyone exists. Not everyone thinks. As demonstrated earlier, and as the speaker goes on to say, ‘A being of volitional consciousness has no automatic course of behavior.’ Without thought, and the use of reason, the course that being ends up on is random and without purpose. “
And FyreStar asks: “Reduced to simplicity, tell me how a man could possibly find food to survive without thought...”
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Chagur asserts: “That ’thinking’ is ancillary to ’action’ - In this case, remaining alive; and that ‘not thinking’ is impossible. Too often I have found what is referred to as ‘thinking’ is synonymous to ‘analyzing.’”
And Chagur proposes: “Consider in utero: Action .. yes! Thought ..?”
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kmguru suggests: “The mind comes with the contents. Basic programs that runs the heart, the nervous system etc. Without the information regarding the level of glucose, amount of red blood cells, T-cells and so on, the body can not control and will die.”
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machaon advises: “...The things that you need to know about your immediate environment are built in and hardwired. Of course this does not discredit the above [Rand] quote in one easy analogy, it merely outlines that not all knowledge is dependent upon the critical analysis of higher thought. It is amazing how a person requires so much instruction to achieve what squirrels achieve with a minimal need to build cyclotrons or dig ditches. Maybe it’s just a matter of degrees.
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(last but not least!)
Stryderunknown reminded: “Man is not born of an egg, and is at first nutured. Without nuturing man would surely die. I mention this because I get this image that the very start of this topic sees a fully fledge man standing gapping at a new world. Of course in reality the entire process of something growing means at some point it was young. ‘From Acorns, Grow might Oaks.’ ‘Once bitten, twice shy.’”
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Chagur and I both commented on how there was a ‘bigger picture.’ Everyone who’s posted so far has opened a window upon this hazy vista; offered a different view of that picture. Including FyreStar when he wrote: “Not everyone thinks.”
So how to tie all of this together? Because it all does appear to be linked.
Guess it’s best to start ... in the beginning?
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The sperm and egg meet and if cell division is successful, and if an embryo or fetus is not aborted--or dies within the womb for other reasons--then a child is born. All that happens during development of a fetus within the womb during the traditional nine months of gestation is still in many ways a mystery. Fascinating discoveries about how a fetus is formed and “wired” are being made all of the time. Anyone who is knowledgeable about these matters is certainly welcome to contribute their own or already established theories. Particularly anything that may further our understanding about whether or not “thought” is possible in utero.
(There are studies, for example, supporting an unborn fetus’s ability to recognize it’s parent’s voices, to respond in predictable ways to certain types of music, etc... Much to suggest identification and integration, (thinking), but much that it is yet unknown, too.)
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Another point: Nurturing is required for the human infant. We’ve all heard the horror stories of the abused child found locked away in a basement or a closet, “living” there since its birth. Never taught anything except not to bite the hand that feeds it. Or even that it doesn’t matter whether it bites or not. The abused child is still alive when authorities come to rescue he/she, and we can’t be sure if we can credit the abusive parents so much for its survival because they periodically tossed food at the child, or because the child has learned how to “stay alive” by other means. There may be comprehensive studies about this specific type of (abusive) lack in nurturing for humans. Yet I don’t think there’s any question that nurturing and teaching are required for a child to develop “normally.” And normal would include further developing of the ability to learn. Unless a child is mentally-handicapped, it begins to learn during its first days of Life. And, seemingly, while in the womb.
The last line in the first quote I provided is:
“But you are not free to escape from your nature, from the fact that reason is your means of survival--so that for you, who are a human being, the question “to be or not to be’ is ‘to think or not to think.’”
In other words, once a child has been nurtured, gone through it’s first few critical stages of “development,” learned (as all creatures will to some degree), and reaches a so-called normal (age-appropriate) level of human cognitive ability ... it begins to use logic in its fuller sense. It begins to reason. It utilizes acquired knowledge to further one or more of its personal objectives.
Ever noticed how you can't reason with a two-year-old?
In doing this, does this growing human now seek to sustain or improve his own life by means of .. choice? He may not yet understand that eating too many jelly beans will make him sick, but according to his continuously developing ability to reason, it is quite logical in his mind to accept that more jelly beans will make him happy and that he’s improving his state of existence by grabbing another fistful.
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His human senses give him information, proof, a “heads-up!” His body in various states of health or decay will aid or impair his ability to process the incoming sensations. His memories and current environment may or may not hinder or help the process. But what does he do ultimately? Does he not respond by making a choice of some kind?
And sometimes he reacts. (Action before thought)
Ever seen a man hit his thumb with a hammer and calmly stop, look at his thumb and then proceed with his hammering? Most people would react to the instantaneous pain shooting through that smashed thumb by jerking the thumb away from the offending tool, by holding it, by swearing, by crying...whatever... And yet a few people--for whatever reason, and by whatever means of self-control--do not “react” other than to stop hammering and exam the injured thumb. Which, actually, is pretty logical.
People resist “reacting” all of the time. They make a choice to respond instead. And a response typically requires prior thought before being uttered or before carrying out an action.
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One child is told not to touch the hot coffee mug and has learned (by various means) that it is, in fact, in his best interest not to touch the mug. Did he not make an active choice to mind his mother in order not to threaten his survival?
(A scolding or a spanking or a burn can be quite threatening ) And is it possible for a child to never be told that the mug is hot, therefore dangerous, but only has to place a finger near it, feels the heat, and relies on its own mental library of experience to reason the first time that hot = possible danger/pain.
Or... has the child only learned that, in his current environment, getting attention for disobeying or risk-taking will somehow aid his survival--perhaps only on an emotional level--but nonetheless ranking as highly significant to that child. And if we can say that this is illogical behavior, where did the child learn it? Was it learned? Did he reason this out?
Or... has the child who continuously shows little sign of using logic in this kind of scenario, and who keeps getting burned... perhaps have a mental deficiency? Or simply hasn’t been exposed to logical behavior by others from which to learn?
If we can say that by one means or another a child’s normal development is not impeded, and that if he is not exposed to too much irrational behavior for examples to learn by, and that he is allowed to grow into a “natural” human being.... is Man’s Mind then his basic tool of survival? Is then his ability and choice to use reason his ticket to a productive life by his standards?
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Comments offered in all of the posts made here so far, along with Rand’s ideas and with input from a friend have helped me to put together this view and these questions.
The purpose for doing so is to seek a better understanding. And to that end, I wanted to ask a few questions relative to points made in prior posts.
FyreStar: How would you define “not thinking?”
Chagur: How would you define “thinking?” “Analyzing?”
kmguru: When you speak of the mind’s contents, do you include a sort of built in knowledge of the external world?
machaon: If you think it is still relevant, what kind of degrees? Would you provide some examples?
Stryderunknown: Can we consider
“Man’s Mind: His Basic Tool of Survival” as such if we omit focusing on the first essential stages of development and nurturing and view him as a creature that has already begun learning and who can now choose to practice his ability to reason?
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Looking forward...
Counterbalance
