From: Clint O'Dell (clintodell@hotmail.com)
Date: Tue Aug 17 1999 - 16:34:15 MDT
Before I elaborate I would first like to apologize for my incompleteness.
Often, I think several thoughts at once and sometimes I forget to complete
one idea before going on to the next.
>>(When I talk of 'consciousness', I am referring to the "here I am"
>>sensation, the source of sensations, the "soul" if you like, and nothing
>>else.)
When I speak of consciousness, I'm talking about the thoughts that develop
in your brain. When I say a person is self aware, I'm talking about the
acknowledgment of himself. His thoughts focused on his self awareness.
There is no physical soul. No specific area that you can pin point and say,
"This is you". Instead, I believe, consciousness is the exchange of
information between brain functions.
>>So you're saying that perhaps the distributed nature of brain function may
>>in part contribute to the platform upon which consciousness stands?
>>Maybe......how did you arrive at this idea? (expand)?
That is years of thought based on my observations and limited knowledge of
brain functions. I'll sum up my observations and conclusions here. I'm sure
you'll let me know where I'll need to expand.
When I think about how I think, this is what I find. If I think "raise my
left arm" nothing happens; yet, if I will my arm to raise, then it does.
'I' have done two things. First I created a thought. I controlled what
thoughts ran through my head and noticed that the thoughts were created by
me. They were not created by responses to events. So I must have some free
will there. Next I created an action. I moved my arm. I noticed that my
arm didn't move when I created the thought command for it to move. I also
noticed that I move my arm all the time without first thinking to move my
arm. In conclusion 'I' must be made up of at least two parts.
To expand even furthure, I noticed that I have different types of thoughts.
Sometimes I think in pictures, or, to explain more thoroughly, I see my
memories. I also think in words. English to be precise. Other thoughts I
have are remembering tastes, sounds, and textures. So I've come to
conclusion that thought must come through memory. Because I think in
different in images, sounds (such as language), tasts, and smells, and these
senses have been shown to be controlled by different parts of the brain,
then my thoughts must also be developed from different parts of the brain.
Also different body functions have been shown to be controlled by different
parts of the brain.
I can go even a step furthure. Because English is spoken language it must
be recognized through the part of the brain that interprets sound.
Traveling via echoic memory. Because english is also a simbolic language
when written, it must be recognized throught the part of the brain that
interprets images. Traveling via iconic memory. When I read a word, my
brain probably matches up the lines in the letters, to a part of iconic
memory that recognizes those letters. Echoic memory probably has something
written at the same place because when I learned the alphabet I associated
it with sounds. Or to be more clear, when someone showed my the letter 'A'
I heard immediatly the word 'A'. What must happen in the brain to allow
these associations is that memory from all parts of the body are written at
the same time. Some parts of the body must be more sensitive than others,
otherwise we would associate the movement of an arm with a word, along with
a sound, etc. In martial arts you develop muscle memory by repeating body
movements over and over again while imagining reactions to events.
Eventualy it makes a lasting empression on the brain and you can react
automaticly.
To sum up, because all parts of thought and action is controlled by
different parts of the brain, and you controll all action freely without
intervention from outside events and then again recognize this in echoic
memory (consciousness), then the so called 'you' or 'I' must be made up of
many parts of the brain. So you see, memory is actualy a very stable base
for consciousness.
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The library is closing and so I have to answer the following to questions
tomorrow. I'll repost the entire message here complete with the bottom
questions answered then. If you find any flaw or develop any questions
about the about, please ask them. I'll try to answer them too at the same
time.
>>So what is this original "self", disregarding the closed pointer loop
>>there be a "self" without this pointer in your model?
>>How do you view the "self" in relation to your awareness and
>>consiousness...?
>>What hierarchy? What about the "self" present in each human?
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