+ 1 - 0 | § ¶Brain Mumbo Jumbo
So yesterday I was looking up V. S. Ramachandran, the author of a book mentioned in the last post's recommended reading list, and found a list on his official site which had links to PDF articles he's written. Recently it seems he's been researching synaesthasia, which can best be described as a cross-wiring of the senses or regions in the brain.
Below are some of the most fascinating bits I gleaned from his research.
Initially they were concerned with the specifics of synaesthasia, whether it was perhaps a memory, or imagined or actual 'cross wiring' in the brain. One test they cite involves people who see numbers in different colours. Subjects were told to stare at a mark in the center of a screen, and a number was presented to one side, in the subject's peripheral vision. Most subjects could identify the number easily.
Next this number was surrounded by another number, a 5 with several 3s around it, for example. The resultant image was more complicated and normal people couldn't tell what number was in the center. Synaesthetes, however, saw red surrounded by green, and could deduce "It must be a five." Clearly then though the visual part of the brain is overwhelmed by the peripheral data, the crosswired parts - normally dormant - are active on the image. They received and processed the numbers into their synaesthetic colours when the vision center could not identify them.
A similar test involved a 5 made of tiny 3s. Depending on the synaesthete's focus, on either the larger number or the component smaller ones, the colour would change.
Also intensely interesting: colour blind synaesthetes perceive colours they're not physically able to see. One subject called them 'martian colours'. I can't help but feel jealous of a brain that can vividly see colours never seen with the eyes.
Research also showed that the synaesthetic condition is seven times more common in creative people than the normal population. Very curious!! I wonder how much of our history has been driven by defective hardware.
More of his articles can be found on his bio page, here.
Below are some of the most fascinating bits I gleaned from his research.
Initially they were concerned with the specifics of synaesthasia, whether it was perhaps a memory, or imagined or actual 'cross wiring' in the brain. One test they cite involves people who see numbers in different colours. Subjects were told to stare at a mark in the center of a screen, and a number was presented to one side, in the subject's peripheral vision. Most subjects could identify the number easily.
Next this number was surrounded by another number, a 5 with several 3s around it, for example. The resultant image was more complicated and normal people couldn't tell what number was in the center. Synaesthetes, however, saw red surrounded by green, and could deduce "It must be a five." Clearly then though the visual part of the brain is overwhelmed by the peripheral data, the crosswired parts - normally dormant - are active on the image. They received and processed the numbers into their synaesthetic colours when the vision center could not identify them.
A similar test involved a 5 made of tiny 3s. Depending on the synaesthete's focus, on either the larger number or the component smaller ones, the colour would change.
Also intensely interesting: colour blind synaesthetes perceive colours they're not physically able to see. One subject called them 'martian colours'. I can't help but feel jealous of a brain that can vividly see colours never seen with the eyes.
Research also showed that the synaesthetic condition is seven times more common in creative people than the normal population. Very curious!! I wonder how much of our history has been driven by defective hardware.
More of his articles can be found on his bio page, here.
+ 1 - 0 | § ¶Here's a thought...
[With apologies, I suffered a rather incomprehensible outflow of ideas around the halfway mark and it gets a little wordy.]
Something that I often wrestle with is the idea of our brains as being mere machines, machines that when presented with different chemicals - either natural or introduced - function differently. You can essentially change the man by changing the chemical cocktail his brain is soaking in.
To me, this raises the question of value, of worth. Is a human more than the sum of his parts? Is this steaming pile of neurons what defines and creates a man? When the system breaks down the man is changed, sometimes to the point of unrecognizability, and what then?
A construction worker who suffers brain damage on the job becomes a vegetable, and his friends and family are now dealing with two people: The man in their memories and the new, lesser man in the old man's body. The man himself may not even realize he's been changed; consciousness is a funny thing - when our brain is altered we are not, and cannot be aware of these changes. Witness the many documented cases of people who lose a limb but still feel it and try to move it. Observe the woman who, after a stroke, is no longer aware of the right side of her body, and consistantly fails to straight clothes, apply makeup or clean one side? Or the woman who no longer recognizes her own arm as belonging to her body and when asked replies "Someone must have left that here!" If your brain is changed and its perceptions are altered though drugs or damage or stroke your conscious self is unaware and in effect is recreated. Changes to the brain via drugs or damage can result in debilitating operational deficiencies or milder changes to the personality. If the person is so easily changed or erased, it is the machine that in effect controls us. A man in England had a tumor that caused him to exhibit pedophiliac tendencies. Remove the tumor and he reverts to his normal pre-tumor non-pedophile behavior.
These are not insignificant changes, and they are not under our direct control! When a man's brain is changed the man changes. Change it enough and the new man is not recognizable as the old man.
What good is 'free will' when a chemical injection can make you more violent, more restrained, happier, or depressed? When a knock on the head can make you forget who your family is, or where you live, or how to talk? If a tumor can make you a pedophile is it much of a stretch to suggest that by tweaking the brain you can make pedophiles NOT lust after children? Where's the border of good control versus bad control? Mood altering drugs are commonplace. More active tools can directly stimulate the brain. One region, when stimulated, causes people to 'see god' and fell very fervently religious.
The world we know is basically defined by our brains; as two people have different brains they also exist in two different worlds. Tweak them both and you can bring them closer together with regards to how they view and react to the world. As we learn more about the brain, and can more often and safely tweak it to root out undesirable behaviour or correct 'deficiencies', we must face the idea that a man is a pliable and ultimately changable animal.
What value does a machine have if reprogramming it changes it entirely? It seems to me then that a man is nothing on his own, and is instead given value only by the people he interacts with. A man by himself is a pile of naturally occuring elements, nothing more than a fast moving plant with a mouth. It's the people around him that give him value, that make him real, that create the collective image of the man.
When we die, and at this point it seems inevitable that we all will, will we be remembered fondly like the Ataris and Amigas of our youth? Or will we be swiftly forgotten as our carcasses rot in a box under the earth that we used to tread on?
At this point I'd just like to digress and say "Screw god." People should do what's right because they feel it, not because some giant phantom overseer is cracking a whip and threatening Big Bad Things if we're bad! If a man is defined by what other people think then a man's afterlife is defined by people's memories.
Do unto others, etc. The golden rule makes sense. Respect, yo.
Also, you should floss.
Suggested reading:
Salon Book Review
Mapping the Mind by Rita Carter
Phantoms in the Brain by V. S. Ramachandran
Something that I often wrestle with is the idea of our brains as being mere machines, machines that when presented with different chemicals - either natural or introduced - function differently. You can essentially change the man by changing the chemical cocktail his brain is soaking in.
To me, this raises the question of value, of worth. Is a human more than the sum of his parts? Is this steaming pile of neurons what defines and creates a man? When the system breaks down the man is changed, sometimes to the point of unrecognizability, and what then?
A construction worker who suffers brain damage on the job becomes a vegetable, and his friends and family are now dealing with two people: The man in their memories and the new, lesser man in the old man's body. The man himself may not even realize he's been changed; consciousness is a funny thing - when our brain is altered we are not, and cannot be aware of these changes. Witness the many documented cases of people who lose a limb but still feel it and try to move it. Observe the woman who, after a stroke, is no longer aware of the right side of her body, and consistantly fails to straight clothes, apply makeup or clean one side? Or the woman who no longer recognizes her own arm as belonging to her body and when asked replies "Someone must have left that here!" If your brain is changed and its perceptions are altered though drugs or damage or stroke your conscious self is unaware and in effect is recreated. Changes to the brain via drugs or damage can result in debilitating operational deficiencies or milder changes to the personality. If the person is so easily changed or erased, it is the machine that in effect controls us. A man in England had a tumor that caused him to exhibit pedophiliac tendencies. Remove the tumor and he reverts to his normal pre-tumor non-pedophile behavior.
These are not insignificant changes, and they are not under our direct control! When a man's brain is changed the man changes. Change it enough and the new man is not recognizable as the old man.
What good is 'free will' when a chemical injection can make you more violent, more restrained, happier, or depressed? When a knock on the head can make you forget who your family is, or where you live, or how to talk? If a tumor can make you a pedophile is it much of a stretch to suggest that by tweaking the brain you can make pedophiles NOT lust after children? Where's the border of good control versus bad control? Mood altering drugs are commonplace. More active tools can directly stimulate the brain. One region, when stimulated, causes people to 'see god' and fell very fervently religious.
The world we know is basically defined by our brains; as two people have different brains they also exist in two different worlds. Tweak them both and you can bring them closer together with regards to how they view and react to the world. As we learn more about the brain, and can more often and safely tweak it to root out undesirable behaviour or correct 'deficiencies', we must face the idea that a man is a pliable and ultimately changable animal.
What value does a machine have if reprogramming it changes it entirely? It seems to me then that a man is nothing on his own, and is instead given value only by the people he interacts with. A man by himself is a pile of naturally occuring elements, nothing more than a fast moving plant with a mouth. It's the people around him that give him value, that make him real, that create the collective image of the man.
When we die, and at this point it seems inevitable that we all will, will we be remembered fondly like the Ataris and Amigas of our youth? Or will we be swiftly forgotten as our carcasses rot in a box under the earth that we used to tread on?
At this point I'd just like to digress and say "Screw god." People should do what's right because they feel it, not because some giant phantom overseer is cracking a whip and threatening Big Bad Things if we're bad! If a man is defined by what other people think then a man's afterlife is defined by people's memories.
Do unto others, etc. The golden rule makes sense. Respect, yo.
Also, you should floss.
Suggested reading:
Salon Book Review
Mapping the Mind by Rita Carter
Phantoms in the Brain by V. S. Ramachandran