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paolo
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 Posted: Mon Jun 04, 2007 6:18 am Post subject: Toward a theory of consciousness (no less than that). Draft |
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Our mobile behavior is governed by a galaxy of privileged cells, that we call neurons, they are the drivers of this packed bus which is our body. Neurons need emotions (fear, hunger, disgust, attraction affective and sexual) to process the inputs from the environment and find food, mates, water, protection from cold and heat. Without emotions the body would not move, or would not move fast as necessary.
Plants also move and process input from the environment. They push roots in the direction of water , leaves in direction of sunlight, even some of them can catch preys (carnivore plants) and nearly all have flowers to attract pollinators. Their reproduction is mediated by mobile animals, insects or birds or winds.
Animals, on the contrary must move to reproduce, feed, flee, fight. Movements are mediated by emotions. And emotions constitute the self, the ego, what we feel as our personality, which is a mix of stored memories of various kinds, momentary inputs from inside (hunger, thirst etc) or from outside: the sight of menacing enemies, attractive mates etc., and drives, preordained and hard wired modalities to execute vital tasks. Self is the mix of perceived sufferings, satisfactions, longings, pleasure which guide actions.
But what happens among privileged neurons is nothing but a decision making machine in order to assure the survival of the body and, with the single body, of the species.
"Bipolar disorder: Also known as manic depression. It is marked by extreme mood swings and affects abut 100 million people worldwide. Many of the genes identified in the study seem to play a key role in the way nerve cells in the brain talk to each other." From the Guardian 7.6
Emergent qualities: Many different trees = a wood and an ecosystem. Neurons "talking to each other" = consciousness. Different musical instruments = an orchestra and a symphony being played. Some parts added make a unity which is not the sume of the parts, but something new.
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maldoror
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| Posted: Tue Jun 12, 2007 10:20 pm Post subject: |
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| That's what I was talking about a while back with "genetics" but I guess some of the people here didn't like the specific terms I used. Bipolar disorder is like jabbing a shovel into the sand to loosen it before it can be scooped up. The status quo doesn't change because of a conscious decision... things change because people change, genes change, and people are unhappy. Otherwise, societal consciousness would be a never ending cycle and not be aware of anything outside of itself, which is not true. |
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paolo
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| Posted: Wed Jun 13, 2007 2:58 am Post subject: |
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| maldoror wrote: | | The status quo doesn't change because of a conscious decision... |
I agree. I think I can advance this ideas only piecemeal and that they are so contrary to common views about man that it’s hard to make oneself understood. One should distinguish between free will and consciousness. Consciousness is only a reflection of what is happening in the infinitely complex structure (or system) of the cooperating cells and organs forming your body. It’s a matter of adjustments, compromises, subterranean dealings having some analogy with what happens in a corporate body like a well governed society (something that doesn’t’ exist probably any more in our world). After all you don’t decide you are “decided”, like when you fall in love. |
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Starr
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| Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2007 4:28 am Post subject: |
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Neurons "talking to each other" = consciousness.
Probably. But is there a place for God here, for spirit, for soul, for the ghost in the machine? The mysterious 21 grams? Or is there no 'spark' like the one which passed from God to Adam in The Creation of Adam (The Donnadio) by Michelangelo? I don't know, and I am not particularly religious but I would like to think that there is something more mysterious than a collection of cells which animates us. But maybe it is just that - a 'like to think' that there is something greater than ourselves. If that is all it is, a collection of cells...then we really are 'all there is'...why do I find that so unnerving? |
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paolo
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| Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2007 8:57 am Post subject: |
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I’m also brought to think that there is a difference between matter and “organized” matter. i.e. life. What this whole organizing effort (elan vital) means I don’t think I will never know, and nobody will never know (thanks God!). Mystery will always be there. But of two things I am convinced: that there is not a qualitative difference somewhere (a leap) between a fly and a bird or an hippo or Tony Blair, for that. And that ”neurons talking to each other” are only a subordinate part of the all machinery of a body, of a species, of an ecosystem.
(While I am now totally detached from political affairs, you may get the hint, that I am not in great love with the present (for a few days) PM of the UK. I greatly prefer (metaphysically) the little dog whose arrival is due in a few minutes, and will keep me occupied for an hour or two). |
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nb411
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| Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2007 9:17 am Post subject: |
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I think conciousness is the ability to react outside of immediate needs dictated by instinct and the survival mechanism.
A human can hold he/she hand over a flame if they really want to. They can make a concious decision to do so.
What is an insects reaction to sensory input of excessive heat? Get the hell out of here to somewhere cooler! They are not really in control of how they react to input. This makes me wonder if they are really any more concious than a plant. |
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paolo
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| Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2007 9:53 am Post subject: |
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"the 'flight' of a tethered fly reveals that the fly's brain has the ability to be spontaneous — to make decisions that aren't predictable responses to environmental stimuli.
The researchers think this might be what underpins the notorious cussedness of laboratory animals, wryly satirized in the so-called Harvard Law of Animal Behavior: "Under carefully controlled experimental circumstances, an animal will behave as it damned well pleases."
In humans, this apparently volitional behaviour is traditionally ascribed to our free will. Björn Brembs of the Free University of Berlin, Germany, and his colleagues make the somewhat radical claim that their experiment shows that even flies, although not making conscious decisions, have a kind of primitive 'free will' circuit wired into their brains."
from muse@nature.com |
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cosmiccat
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Location: In my body on my 66th trip around the sun
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| Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2007 1:06 pm Post subject: |
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[quote="paolo"]
| Quote: | | "the 'flight' of a tethered fly reveals that the fly's brain has the ability to be spontaneous — ..... |
Do people actually tie up flies?
Has anyone read "Cosmic Consciousness" subtitled "A Study in the Evolution of the Human Mind" by Richard Maurice Bucke, M.D. (formerly Medical Superintendent of the Asylum For The Insane, London, Canada?), original copyright 1901. It is available on-line in its entirety.
He defines Cosmic Consciousness as a higher form of consciousness than that possessed by the ordinary man, that being Self Consciousness or that faculty upon which rests all of our life (both subjective and objective). He goes on, in his first words, to explain: there are three forms or grades of consciousness: Simple, Self, and Cosmic. I am paraphrasing for the sake of brevity. It's a wonderful book, the prize of prizes in my collection and has changed my life profoundly.
He provides biographical studies of both known and suspected cases of beings who possessed Cosmic Consciousness, some fully and completely, others partially.
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I accept chaos. I am not sure whether it accepts me. Some people are terrified of the bomb. But then some people are terrified to be seen carrying a modern screen magazine. Experience teaches us that silence terrifies people the most. Bob Dylan |
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paolo
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| Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2007 1:58 pm Post subject: |
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| cosmiccat wrote: |
Do people actually tie up flies?
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Apparently it’s the kind of things scientists do. “Gluing a fly's head to a wire and watching it trying to fly sounds more like the sort of experiment a naughty schoolboy would conduct than one that turns out to have philosophical and legal implications. But that's the way it is for the work reported this week by a team of neurobiologists” I wouldn’t do it for practical reasons and for lack of keenness on any kind of experiment on animals, even flies. I would leave every living being alone, if it were for me, except mosquitoes trying to suck my blood, and some fish I eat in my meals.
As for cosmic consciousness I think that it has something to do with Gregory Bateson's idea of a diffuse connectedness among living beings and with Lovelock’s idea of Gaia. |
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Prof_Pretorius
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Age: 50
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Location: Hiding in the attic of the Arkham Library
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| Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2007 2:06 pm Post subject: |
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HAH !!! Are insects self-conscious?? I jolly well think so !!! I've presently got those nasty little black ants invading my home. I've used every means to dissuade them, but they figure out a way around every roadblock I put in front of them. They're marching down my neighbor's wall, then crawl down that, travel across my yard, then inside my house. I take my garden hose and spray the wall until it's soaking wet, to obliterate their 'trail'. BUT later I go to investigate, and the little buggers are 'exploring' the wall again, getting ready to set down another trail. I've used several types of poison, all to no avail. How can such a tiny insect (I have to put on my reading glasses, and get down on my hands and knees to see them on the floor) remember that somewhere down that wall, across that yard, up that other wall, through the attic, and down into the room where the lovebirds are, that there's food and water??? They don't even have the 'wiggling dance' that bees have, for heaven's sake!! How do they communicate directions, day after day???
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I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow. I feel my fate in what I cannot fear. I learn by going where I have to go. ~Theodore Roethke |
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cosmiccat
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Joined: Apr 06, 2007
Posts: 1716
Location: In my body on my 66th trip around the sun
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| Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2007 3:28 pm Post subject: |
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Paolo replied:
| Quote: | | Apparently it’s the kind of things scientists do. “Gluing a fly's head to a wire and watching it trying to fly sounds more like the sort of experiment a naughty schoolboy would conduct than one that turns out to have philosophical and legal implications. But that's the way it is for the work reported this week by a team of neurobiologists” I wouldn’t do it for practical reasons and for lack of keenness on any kind of experiment on animals, even flies. I would leave every living being alone, if it were for me, except mosquitoes trying to suck my blood, and some fish I eat in my meals. |
Thanks for clearing that up, Paolo.
| Quote: | | As for cosmic consciousness I think that it has something to do with Gregory Bateson's idea of a diffuse connectedness among living beings and with Lovelock’s idea of Gaia. |
In my personal expeience it certainly has to do with connectedness among living beings to a great extent, although I have not heard of Bateson or Lovelock. After hitting the submit button, I will be looking those two up.
And now, although it has nothing to do with this topic, and begging your pardon, could you help me with something. I don't speak Italiano, but my dad did, and he use to say something very beautiful to me when we hadn't seen each other for a while. As soon as I opened the door to greet him he would say - in Italian - "My eyes have been jumping out of my head to see you" or perhaps "My eyes arrived before I did" - something to that effect. I have many Italian language books but can't find the group of words to say that. Perhaps it is a dialect thing. His family was from Torricella Peligna. Are you familiar with a phrase that conveys that greeting?
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I accept chaos. I am not sure whether it accepts me. Some people are terrified of the bomb. But then some people are terrified to be seen carrying a modern screen magazine. Experience teaches us that silence terrifies people the most. Bob Dylan |
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paolo
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Posts: 1095
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| Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2007 4:34 pm Post subject: |
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"mi uscivano fuori gli occhi dalla testa per vederti" or something of that sort. Your father was from Abruzzo, I grew up in the country of Pinocchio Tuscany. So I am not sure if there was a local idiomatic expression. But your memory of your father is very moving.
As for connectedness and and "ecoconsciousness" there is a great deal of literature besides Bateson's "Mind and Nature" and Frjtiof Capra's "The hidden connections" and "The Web of Life".
Bateson is my favourite author. |
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cosmiccat
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| Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2007 12:11 am Post subject: |
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Thanks for the translation. My father was a wonderful man, and a loving father. I am making a photo documentary about him and want to include those words in it.
I am intersted in reading more about consciousness and the writings of Bateson, Capra and Lovelock.
Other views on or related to this subject that I have read and found fascinating are from:
1. Abraham Maslow, especially his ideas about peak experience and self-actualization
2. Joseph Chilton Pearce (Crack in the Cosmic Egg, and Exploring the Crack in the Cosmic Egg)
3. Carlos Castaneda's "The Teachings of Don Juan".
Another, which may at first appear to be an odd-ball among my favorites is "The Practice of the Presence of God," by Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection.
An interesting story of how I came upon these last three, or how they came upon me:
I was in a strange city, Ventura, California. I needed something to read and went to a second-hand bookstore. It was a strange store and seemed to have an aura of the occult to it. Dimley lit with incense burning, weird music playing, a strange guy behind the counter. (I digress, but maybe not). I wasn't looking for anything inparticular. I chose Castaneda, Pearce, and Brother Lawrence, each of whom I had never heard of before, and each of which books were on separate shelves in different areas of the shop. It becomes even stranger when I tell you that as I read these books later in my hotel room, I was amazed to find that the authors, on occasion, referred to one another, in what context I don't remember exactly, but these books are definately related by subject matter in that they each intend to throw light upon certain practices that increase awareness or level of consciousness. It isn't the first time that books seemed to literally fall into my hands. Once a book actually fell off a shelf into my hands. And it was exactly the book I needed at that particular time of my life.
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I accept chaos. I am not sure whether it accepts me. Some people are terrified of the bomb. But then some people are terrified to be seen carrying a modern screen magazine. Experience teaches us that silence terrifies people the most. Bob Dylan |
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cosmiccat
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Location: In my body on my 66th trip around the sun
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| Posted: Sun Jun 17, 2007 8:58 am Post subject: |
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Subjectively speaking, I am conscious of the fact that this thread hasn't been touched in several days. Is it something I said?
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I accept chaos. I am not sure whether it accepts me. Some people are terrified of the bomb. But then some people are terrified to be seen carrying a modern screen magazine. Experience teaches us that silence terrifies people the most. Bob Dylan |
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nb411
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| Posted: Sun Jun 17, 2007 9:11 am Post subject: |
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Most definately! Um no, you did not 
I realised the discussion was a bit over my head in here, which would be my personal reason for going into observe and learn mode. |
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