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| | | | | Ah, alright. Huzzah, for something I briefly had the thought of...Anyway. New thread, yes, would be good. Though, hopefully a different question or idea I can think of. |
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| | | | I know I've already discussed this matter extensively with you, Offak, but I feel it's time I make a public appearance of my opinions.
It is difficult, if not impossible, to clarify what "thoughts" and "feelings" are. However, I can tell you what causes them. Feelings are probably triggered my hormonal changes caused by hormone-secreting glands in the body, which affect the brain. Thoughts are probably chemical reactions to physical stimuli (i.e. response to input from the senses). Chemical messages are carried to different parts of the brain, eliciting different responses, which turn out to be thoughts. Thoughts perhaps are electrical waves eminating from the brain. It is possible that the "mind" that we refer to is these electrical waves triggered by nerve and chemical impulses.
So yes, the mind is physical. |
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| | | | Somnus,
In your opinion are thoughts passive or active? Also, are perceptions and sense experience active or passive? What I mean is.....do we passively recieve stimuli, or do we actively engage with the world creating a certain reaction to stimuli that is indicative of the actions of what we might call a self? |
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| | | | | Most external stimuli are forced upon us, we cannot change that. Our responses to these stimuli are what truly define our concept of 'self.' In layman's terms, life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it. So, to more directly answer your queries, I would say that *most* stimuli are passive, and that our reactions to stimuli are active and can create new stimuli, which consequently elicit new responses from us. |
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| | | | | That's what I thought you were saying....I like the behavioural-neurological approach to humanity. Have you ever read George Herbert Mead? Your comments sound a lot like his work, but there are hundreds of people like him. |
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| | | | | Actually, I haven't read any of his work at all, much less heard of him. I don't pretend to be an expert in neurology, though I often approach things from a dogmatic "science only" point of view. |
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| | | | | Mead was a hardcore scientist who found that some things about human experience cannot be explained through his discipline. He then wrote a book called Mind, Self, and Society, which rocked the world of psychology and philosophy in the twentieth century. Certainly worth the read. |
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| | | | | sup! While the mind may cause physiological response to such emotions as u listed, i don't feel that "the mind" is a physical object persay. The question is what characteristics of our being do we label as our mind. We generally judge the state of one's mind by their intelligence or mental capacity. These are surely not tangible in a physical sense, however no less real to the individual as a brain tumor. The mind's state is influenced by such physical afflictions. Also, we strengthen our "mind" through sensual stimulation, which is gathered through our physical senses. The mind is a very elusive concept, mainly because it's very existence can't be proven in a collective sense. Rather than think about the mind as a whole, it might help u to think of our consciousness as individual ideas, emotions, and personality traits that are evident and proven through verbal communication and expression. Good discussion topic. Hit me with some more sometime. |
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| | | | Offak....might I suggest a great book on the subject 'The Emperor's New
Mind by Professor Sir Roger Penrose. ISBN 0-19-286298-0
A great read about the whole subject from a very different scientific
viewpoint. Don't be put off by the math as you need not folow every
argument to get a complete understanding of the thesis underlying the
book.
Get it out of a library and take a look. You'll be rapt |
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| | | | | I shall, as soon as I finish Julian Jayne's book called The Origin of Consciousness In The Break Down Of The Bicameral Mind. That is also a good book, with many references to others, and has expanded my thinking. |
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