Brain / Mind « The Ramblings of An Eternal Student of Life

Thursday, September 13, 2012

Brain / Mind ... Personal Reflections ... Psychology ...

It’s been almost 20 years since I found out about the Myers Briggs theories of human temperament, and their associated system of classification and testing. I’ll assume that most everyone who trips across this blog is familiar with this, but if not, here’s another link, one of hundreds if not thousands available on the web.

I was in the midst of a short-lived but very intense relationship with a woman from Florida (Gainesville Florida, a rather strange and interesting town located just inside the armpit of the Sunshine State). The relationship disintegrated rather quickly and unexpectedly, something like the two Space Shuttle tragedies. So I came away with it with some interesting stories and mostly good memories; but given what I saw in the final days, I had relatively few regrets over its demise. One of the good things that I walked away with was a personal discovery of Myers Briggs. During the final high-energy months, Ellie told me about the MB Inventory, and so I quickly got to a local bookstore and obtained a copy of Kiersey’s “Please Understand Me“. I made haste to take the test quiz in the book, and lo and behold, I was found to be an INFJ. Just like Ellie! For a brief moment, it seemed like the two of us were a match made in heaven.

Well, we weren’t. But still, I was an INFJ! The most rare of the » continue reading …

◊ posted by Jim G @ 9:10 pm Read Comments (2) / Leave a Comment

Friday, August 17, 2012

◊ The Artistic Illogic of the Transcendent

Art & Entertainment ... Brain / Mind ... Spirituality ...

The other day, I posted a blog about modern scientific attempts to debunk the idea of God with attempts to explain everything — absolutely every darn thing that might possibly exist — through a self- selection process involving random trial and errors. I explained my own problems with this, pointing to a possible reduction ad absurdum, the same absurdity that scientists accuse the “God theory” of having.

But the world of science is attacking the notion of God on another front . . . and that is “the quiet voice deep within”, i.e. the personal experience that makes one think that there is “something more” than we know in the immediate sense. This is also called “the spiritual experience” or a “religious experience”, and it seems to be quite universal. People of all sorts from many different lands and cultures seem to report similar experiences. Evidence, some might say, that there must be a God; even though humans still fight idiotic wars over what the nature of this God must be.

But the brain scientists are fighting back, performing studies and publishing papers on why our brains make us have such experiences and interpret them as “transcendent”. They have come up with a variety of factors » continue reading …

◊ posted by Jim G @ 7:00 pm Read Comment (1) / Leave a Comment

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

◊ OUCH!! is Not Nirvana. Or is it?

Brain / Mind ... Spirituality ...

I read an interesting thought recently in an article discussing medical science. It specifically applies to the question of how much testing and monitoring of the human body is desirable and ultimately beneficial, given the state of modern medicine (and in anticipation of the future state of medicine and medical practice). But I think it can apply to all things. Here is the quote:

Data is not Information
Information is not Knowledge
Knowledge is not Wisdom

Very interesting – four levels of human understanding: Data, Information, Knowledge and Wisdom. I won’t make a detailed attempt here to define these concepts. They obviously represent an attempt to bridge the gap between sensory inputs and the highest levels of mind-brain functioning regarding how we behave, how we make choices, and how we live our lives.

Actually, you could add “sensory inputs” as a level below “data”. I.e., you need to read a blood pressure meter with your eyes, or count your pulse through your fingers, before you have any “data”. And at the other end – » continue reading …

◊ posted by Jim G @ 12:16 pm Read Comment (1) / Leave a Comment

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

◊ The Universe — Just a Fever Delusion?

Brain / Mind ... Science ...

There’s another thought-provoking article in Sci Am this month about an experiment to find out if reality is ultimately digital. I.e., does reality (and I mean reality as we and our sciences presently know it) ultimately come down to an “emergence”, a secondary effect, from the digital state of gad-zillians of tiny little “information boxes”? The experiment in question will look at light interference patterns, to see if they waver in tiny amounts. If they do, then maybe reality at the tiniest level is just a lot of digital boxes, and these tiny boxes, like anything else on that scale, are subject to random quantum fluctuation. If so, then REALITY is a bit more complicated than we thought.

This all relates to some thoughts that the physics folks have had in recent years about black holes and information. In a nutshell, black holes MIGHT prove (sort-of prove actually; this hasn’t been directly observed, although it is strongly implied from what is observed) that a set of 2-dimension sheets surrounding a cube (or alternately, the surface of a sphere) can hold enough information on it to define everything about what is within that 3-dimensional space within. I.e., what kind of particle, e.g. electron, quark, neutrino, what their positions are, what their energy levels are, etc. Sort of like a holograph.

This info would have to be stored in the tiniest boxes possible, i.e. boxes that were a Planck’s length or two in width and height. That’s really tiny, » continue reading …

◊ posted by Jim G @ 10:53 am Read Comment (1) / Leave a Comment

Friday, July 22, 2011

◊ Too Darn Hot for the Mind . . .

Brain / Mind ...

It’s been a rough year weather-wise for the USA as a whole, but my corner of suburban New Jersey has missed the worst of it thus far. Thank goodness, no tornadoes, no floods, more snow than I would have liked, but even that gave way by late February. However, the nasty heat wave that has been parching the heartland has finally invaded the east coast, and we’re getting fried with the best of them. The ocean breezes cool things off near the shore, but crap out just a few miles inland. Thus, I am enjoying that unique combination of 100+ heat and Jersey-style humidity. The air outside is something like a chocolate fudge volcano cake just out of the oven — but without any of the sweetness.

In this weather, I still think about big questions; but I don’t get too far in pursuing the answers. For tonight then, I’m just going to ask the questions and leave them unanswered. For now, and probably for a long, long time, as these questions are about the human mind. Ah yes, the mind and consciousness, that mysterious middle-ground between the physical brain, and what we would imagine as “the soul” (perhaps rightly so, despite all the disdain by the scientists and Buddhists). Philosophers, psychologists, doctors, biologists and computer specialists have been arguing for decades and centuries about this topic. So, I guess that I’m not going to solve it all on a hot summer night in Jersey.

Nonetheless, here are my questions about mind and consciousness.

1.) Does consciousness evolve and emerge from the workings of a human mind when and because such a mind can attain a certain level of information integration, » continue reading …

◊ posted by Jim G @ 8:37 pm Read Comment (1) / Leave a Comment

Sunday, July 3, 2011

◊ The Zen of Near Death Experience

Brain / Mind ... Spirituality ...

During a “daisan” talk with my sensei (Zen teacher) recently, we delved into the ever-popular subject of death. We had started the discussion with a koan about change, (Zuigan’s “Everlasting Principle”) and then got around to fear and the anxiety caused by change. But ultimately, all the roads of change and fear lead to death. I don’t think that we resolved anything – Zen inherently resolves nothing – but at least we were both being honest.

What do we humans fear so much about death? Well, for me, it’s the idea of no more consciousness. No more experiences. No more knowing myself and the world around me. During our little discussion, I told the sensei that I realize that during any night of normal sleep, we lose all of our consciousness for a period. No dreams, no sensations, no nothing. It’s about the same as being under anesthesia. So what is so terrible about that? Nothing – no fear, no anxiety, no suffering – no hell. That moment of “black sleep” seems very natural (when you’re conscious, anyway). It isn’t a great tragedy. So why should a permanent state like that be seen as such a great tragedy?

And yet, consciousness itself seems so different from the doings of the objective world, something entirely special, “sui generis”, something that represents a gift » continue reading …

◊ posted by Jim G @ 8:36 pm Read Comment (1) / Leave a Comment

Saturday, June 11, 2011

◊ Betting Against Stephen Hawking

Brain / Mind ... Philosophy ... Science ... Spirituality ...

Stephen Hawking (the crippled world-class physicist) is on a metaphysical tear once again. In a recent interview, he re-asserted the metaphysical viewpoint that there is no God, no heaven, no spirits, no after-life, no karma, nothing AT ALL beyond what the physics books say about reality. He recently told the London Guardian that heaven is “just a fairly story for people who are afraid of the dark”. According to the Hawking view, the known laws of gravity, working in the context of “M Theory”, a super-string based unification of the known basic forces in a fashion consistent with both quantum mechanics and general relativity, allows for creation “ex nihilo” (from nothing). Reality, according to these laws and paradigms, creates all kinds of universes from nothing; just a random throw of the dice. Sooner or later, one comes along that can support sentient and self-conscious life. Nothing terribly special about it all. It just happens.

OK, well first off; M-Theory and superstrings have not yet been verified empirically. But so what, it’s based on a lot of well thought out deductions based on many proven laws, including quantum theory and general relativity and the standard particle model (or a super-symmetric expansion of it, anyway). Einstein’s theories on special and general relativity were likewise untested when announced back in the early 20th century; as scientific techniques and abilities progressed, his ideas were eventually shown to be spot-on. So why shouldn’t M-Theory and superstrings and super-symmetry be taken seriously, pending verification from new tools such as the CERN particle accelerator and a variety of space-probes planned over the next 20 years, including the LISA multi-satellite gravity-wave detection system.

There is a slight tinge of anti-scientific hubris in this attitude, given that science is supposed to be open to surprises until the “field data” reaches a high level of confidence. But OK, Hawking is an extremely smart fellow who devoted his life to this entire stuff, so I wouldn’t bet against him regarding M-Theory. But still, » continue reading …

◊ posted by Jim G @ 4:31 pm Read Comments (2) / Leave a Comment

Saturday, May 21, 2011

◊ Why Does Sad Music Make Us Happy?

Brain / Mind ... Music ... Science ...

A few days after writing my Sad Song blog, about how a tune by The Cars pulled me out of the dumps on a very trying and frustrating day, I read an interview in the May Scientific American with a hearing specialist and surgeon who is performing neuroscience research on musical creativity. I.e., what goes on in the brain when a songwriter sits at a piano sit at a piano searching for a pleasing series of notes, or when a bunch of performers improvise and exchange riffs. The pace may be different in these two situations, but the overall process of creativity is about the same. But just what is that process all about?

The interviewee, Dr. Charles Limb, mostly said that more research is needed before anything definitive can be said. So the article is more about investigating an unanswered question than about explaining a new scientific discovery. Another interesting question that Dr. Limb asked towards the end of the article – and again left unanswered – is “why do we love sad music? Why does it make us feel better and not worse?” Hmmmm, that’s a darn good and interesting question, especially given how I resolved my Friday the 13th blues earlier this month. We don’t seek out other sad and depressed people when we’re feeling down; that just makes us feel worse (most of us, anyway). But we certainly do love our sad songs, and maybe movies and paintings too. What’s the difference?

If a scientist like Dr. Limb can’t give a good answer, I certainly can’t. But heck, that never stopped me before. » continue reading …

◊ posted by Jim G @ 3:01 pm Read Comments (2) / Leave a Comment

Saturday, January 29, 2011

◊ This is your brain on Buddhism

Brain / Mind ... Religion ...

One of the main tenants of Buddhism is that the self, along with our sense of self-awareness and our ego, is overrated. Buddhism teaches “annata”, the concept of “no-self”. We are earthly beings subject to perpetual change, and therefore there is nothing fundamental and unchanging within us, no matter how deeply you look within. Thus, we do not have a soul or a true essence unique to our own individual identity. We are just chaff blowing around in the wind.

Another key tenant of Buddhism is the importance of regular meditation, so as to realize the deeper truths (including the “fact” that our lives and selves are ultimately an illusion). Interestingly, there is a recent study on the effects of meditation on the human brain, that indicates this to be a bit paradoxical. The NY Times said of this study:

The researchers report that those who meditated for about 30 minutes a day for eight weeks had measurable changes in gray-matter density in parts of the brain associated with memory, sense of self, empathy and stress.

More precisely, the study abstract in Psychiatry Journal states:

Analyses in a priori regions of interest confirmed increases in gray matter concentration within the left hippocampus. Whole brain analyses identified increases in the posterior cingulate cortex, the temporo-parietal junction, and the cerebellum in the MBSR group [group that meditated regularly] compared with the controls. The results suggest that participation in MBSR is associated with changes in gray matter concentration in brain regions involved in learning and memory processes, emotion regulation, self-referential processing, and perspective taking.

So, it seems pretty clear that these researchers are saying that » continue reading …

◊ posted by Jim G @ 10:18 pm Read Comment (1) / Leave a Comment

Friday, December 31, 2010

◊ Last One for 2010: Why E8 ?

Brain / Mind ... Philosophy ... Science ...

I had an afterthought to my last post, about the E8 geometric-mathematical model as a possible matrix for the “complete theory of everything”. I noted that the authors seemed a bit paradoxical in citing what a confounding mess the current particle physics model was, versus their attitude that the E8 structure would make them feel all warm and fuzzy. My point was, why is E8 so good that they would lay down all their questions and just accept it as the final answer. Why couldn’t they at least ask the child-like question, “why E8?”.

In pondering that, I suppose that E8 has a certain beauty to it. Here is a link, if you want to see it. It looks like a bunch of points and lines arranged in circles, with some other intervening but repeating relationships that determine just where each thing stands. So yes, there is a certain artistic quality to it. Perhaps after many decades of relentless search, the physical theorist would be content to just say, I’ve found E8, the true blueprint to the world. It is beautiful, and I uncovered it. I have fulfilled my destiny.

But that still doesn’t satisfy the metaphysical sojourner in me. E8 is great, but why? Because it is beautiful, is that why? And what does it mean to be ‘beautiful’? Just what is it in us that sees the beautiful? The science people are telling us today that in our conscious experience of the world, we are not anything special. Human consciousness (and animal consciousness, if it exists) is just a function of all those forces and particles that E8 would explain. It’s just another one of the trillions of effects and emergences from the fundamental forces, just like neutron stars and pecan shells and Justin Beiber CDs are. And yet, without it, E8 has no beauty. Without a consciousness to perceive the beauty of E8 and all that emerges from it, does it all really exist? Are we sure that in E8, we have found “THE TRULY FUNDAMENTAL” in the Universe?? Or does the reason cited for thinking that thought point to something more?

Something to ponder for the New Year. And a Happy and Prosperous 2011 to All. And to All in this Beautiful Universe (E8 or not), a Good Night.

◊ posted by Jim G @ 4:46 pm Read Comment (1) / Leave a Comment

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