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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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And finally what is the evolutionary advantage of the misperception of the world around us? It would seem that evolution would ensure the accuracy of our senses and our "perceptions" as inevitable to that evolutionary process.
why would that "seem"?
the human brain is unique among other brains in that it accounts for 25% of all the human body's energy requirement. I've mentioned this before. In evolutionary terms, looking back on our species' lineage in the great apes, if a more energy consuming brain were not "paying back" in terms of survivability then the species would fail.
But "accurate perception" has increased energy use associated with it, I don't think this is disputed at all, and to provide that energy the organism, in this case the human, has to find something to eat. If the brain doesn't help with that there is no use to having it.
Unless, of course, it provides an advantage to reproduction, one which might be attractive to mates. This sexual selection could drive species adaptation without some direct compensation in terms of a species' energy requirements. It is also well known that sexual selection can drive adaptations that are not beneficial to the species' survival.
Back to "accurate perception." The eye has a well known blind spot where the optic nerve joins the retina. I think it was a 7th or 8th grade class where I first mapped it for my eyes. It is not a hard thing to do.
And yet we perceive continuity in our visual field, the blind spot is not apparent. 45 years ago the remarkable ability of the brain to "fill in" the blind spot was the explanation of the continuity given to me, and I accepted it, the brain is a remarkable thing.
But of course such a "hypothesis" is testable, in particular, if the brain is actively engaged in "filling in" the blind spots it is using energy to do it, and yet no energy use is detected. The brain can be seen using energy as it views a scene, however. Our perception of the visual field is an approximation that is mostly good, and economizes on energy use. This approximation of the visual field does not convey any notable disadvantage, especially in groups of humans.
There are many adaptations which provide a perception of the world that is approximate, and adequate, for our survival.
It seems altogether reasonable that our "thoughts" on mind are also governed by our perception of mind and are approximate, not accurate. In particular, the overwhelming sense that mind somehow is observed by some homunculus... and in spite of all the obvious problems with that, it is a duality that we seem to insist on... e.g. meditation practice uses that imagery extensively.
Of course the difficulties occur because we perceive the mind as some monolithic, continuous phenomenon. And this begs the question of whether or not that perception is "accurate." It need not be.
As I've speculated upthread, what if that part of the mind we have direct access to, varyingly referred to in this post as "the discursive mind," "the monkey mind," "the observer," etc. is a component of the complex of behaviors that we group as "mind" and that its role is to observe and explain our intents and actions to others.
Certainly that would be a part of the explanation of why we insist on the duality that is untenable, but is a strong part of our perceived experience.
When people speculate that mind is an illusion, they are discussing what we perceive as mind. Viewed as an approximation, it is entirely possible that the mind we perceive is not the whole story.
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WBraun
climber
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the overwhelming sense that mind somehow is observed by some homunculus
The mind is observed by the living entity itself since the mind is NOT the living entity itself but a material covering that the living entity works thru.
The mind is not an illusion ever although the mind can fall under the spell of the temporary dualistic material energies ......
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Ward Trotter
Trad climber
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Some states of mind, in which the brain is operative perhaps far below a healthy optimal state, can generate illusions that misrepresent (or underrepresent) external conditions. These sub-optimal states can be arrived at quite easily by unenlightened, unrecognized choices and resultant predicaments operating far below the threshold of knowledge.
For instance, if an individual makes the nominally innocent choice to live indoors out of the sun, way too much -- that individual will enter a low dopamine/low melotonin state due to declining lack of ocular exposure to UVA and IR-A frequencies in the solar spectrum.
This individual runs the risk of having their brain resort to overly fractalized perceptions of the external world in which the operative connections between things are increasingly difficult to discern. It would be like trying to see a close-up view of Saturn with a microscope instead of the correct instrument ,a telescope. Depression soon naturally follows this molecularly deconstructed world ; further alienating the person from the required range of salubrious mental associations and nurturing social relationships.
Dopamine in particular must be restored naturally in order to, as it were, de-fractalize external connections so the individual can once again obtain an accurate subscription to the on-going dance between the external and internal worlds. Suddenly developing trends ( very important in an evolutionary context) then become recognized and evaluated in their proper interconnected global context -- as nature's miraculous compound pharmacy intended all along.
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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the complex of behaviors that we group as "mind" and that its role is to observe and explain our intents and actions to others.
Ed has my vote.
edit: I don't think that Largo can get away from the homunculus.
But I would never disagree with Werner.
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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From Nuclear Mindfulness in the New Yorker Magazine:
Physical Awareness:
Lie down on a yoga mat and focus on the sensations in your body: your feet resting softly on the ground, the adrenaline coursing through your veins, the churning nausea in your stomach. Try to really listen to your body: if it wants to fall asleep or violently vomit, let it do so without judgment.
Mentally Assign Blame to Jill Stein Voters:
Sometimes feelings can be so overwhelming that we forget what they are: simply feelings, and nothing more. Focus on the feeling you get when you blame this wholly avoidable Armageddon on self-righteous morally superior morons who couldn’t see with any goddam perspective what was right in front of their f*#king faces. Observe the feeling without judgment.
Avoid attachments . . .
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PSP also PP
Trad climber
Berkeley
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EH said I'm saying that "perceiving" is not just "perceiving" the act of perception imposes an approximation of the world, it is an approximation of the world... You don't see the large toothbrush but you see the small one, in that moment, your perception leads you to draw an incorrect conclusion about the scene."
The "perceiving" I am referring to is when the discursive falls away . What is perceiving without the discursive?
The experience is you are going about your meditation practice and I am distracted by so thought thread that I am carrying on with an then ; as if out of no where the discursive drops out and you are there just eyes ears and nose without the discursive, without the need to define. There may only be a glimpse and then the discursive habit will define it as "did you see that! a glimpse of non-discursive. As you practice more you develop the ability to not have to react and to define or judge.
It feels like a raw awareness a raw presence.
Your analysis of that the perception is not accurate is very likely true, but that is not important ;in Buddhist meditation the emphasis is about relationship with the moment . In this moment Am I present or distracted. Moment to moment to moment.................
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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I guess I'm saying that the perception of "raw awareness, raw perception" is just that, a perception, there is no "raw" about it... though that is what you have learned to call it (which is my point).
The whole notion of letting the "discursive mind" fall away makes use of the "observer/observed" dichotomy, and begs the question who is the observer? thus my reference to the homunculus. Where does the observed end and the observer begin?
I've experienced the state in meditation of letting it all go... at least the discursive mind, I'm not sure that it is anything new, except the absence of the continual narrative. I've also been in that state in other settings, like hours long hikes alone, and even some working situations.
Our habit of narrating is part of our social nature.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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why would that "seem"?
It "seems" only logical that an accurate assessment of our surroundings would benefit our survival. If our sensory apparatus functions as delusion then what is determining the delusion? It seems something of an oxymoron, even nonsensical, to say that delusion insures an inaccuracy that encourages survival and this is what the evolutionary process is.
Where does the observed end and the observer begin?
I observe the grass is green but I, the observer, am not green nor do I have green within me except as a "perception." The observer is differentiated from what is observed. It is the path of least resistance to discount the observer as insignificant or even nonexistent as that makes for an easy escape from the reality of our experience and satisfies the need to discount the disturbing implications of the mystery. Good luck with that.
If we share a certainty that there are degrees of intelligence as we see demonstrated in life forms on this planet, and, as most in the scientific community agree, that there will be an artificial intelligence far greater than our own, even capable of taking over our own existence in the not too distant future, then what are the limits of intelligence in this incredibly expansive, even infinite, universe? How can we limit the ultimate scope of intelligence, a potential we cannot possibly imagine or understand? How can we logically dismiss the notion of an infinite intelligence or, that's right, God, that stands at the limit of all knowing? Logically, I don't see how we can.
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Dingus McGee
Social climber
Where Safety trumps Leaving No Trace
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Oct 10, 2017 - 03:50am PT
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Paul,
How can we logically dismiss the notion of an infinite intelligence or, that's right, God, that stands at the limit of all knowing? Logically, I don't see how we can
Paul, could you take the time to tell us all about infinite intelligence. We do not want an incomplete story. And yet you say, a potential we cannot possibly imagine or understand? Is this idea generation of yours a form of nonsense? If you cannot possibly imagine the property, how can you say anything about such an item?
You seem to have a mindset that adds adjectives at will to bolster an elusive idea?
Now Largo would say the item has no properties but, "I have experienced it and it is seamless to the rest of the universe" -- Another form of nonsense.
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Dingus McGee
Social climber
Where Safety trumps Leaving No Trace
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Oct 10, 2017 - 04:22am PT
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Paul
It "seems" only logical that an accurate assessment of our surroundings would benefit our survival. If our sensory apparatus functions as delusion then what is determining the delusion? It seems something of an oxymoron, even nonsensical, to say that delusion insures an inaccuracy that encourages survival and this is what the evolutionary process is.
Accuracy does not equal delusional. You have gone down the slippery slope. Do you want to talk accuracy or delusions? Furthermore, you have mixed together ideas of 2 distinctly different processes and refer to them as if they were one.
1. There are several to many descriptions of the conscious awareness experience that intuitively feel right but are delusions. A simple example of delusion that comes to mind is the persistence of vision. Awareness has a persistence rate but we think we are continuously experiencing when we are not. Having this delusion,the wrong idea, of the workings of conscious awareness in the matter of persistence of awareness does not imply inaccuracy in the our assessment of the environment with our sensory organs.
2. The accuracy of our sensory input is measureable and not delusional. Sharks use a form of radar (electrical radar -- not sonar) and with impeccable accuracy locate their prey in opaque bloody silty water. Humans are no good at this task. Delusional? We know we are no good at this task.
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WBraun
climber
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Oct 10, 2017 - 08:54am PT
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Why do posters reply to themselves?
What do you expect from people who think they are nothing but mindless robots with no consciousness, with only neurons firing ......
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Oct 10, 2017 - 09:23am PT
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It "seems" only logical that an accurate assessment of our surroundings would benefit our survival.
The simplicity of Newtonian mechanics and the explanation of why an object sits statically on the ground would be a modern example of something that "seems only logical."
But that there was more than a thousand years between Newton and the Aristotelean idea that matter possessed the properties of gravity and levity, and that statics was achieved by the balance of the two. Seemed logical to Aristotle.
An accurate assessment of our surroundings comes at a cost, which is the energy to produce such an assessment. Our survival is, first, a task to obtain energy to survive. Evolution decides in the end what optimization is successful.
It might not be "logical" in the way you use that term, but it explains the current state of life on planet Earth. That simple life is responsible for the nearly 1 TW of energy required to maintain the atmosphere-ocean system in its chemical disequilibrium, and has been true for billions of years, seems to make your "logic" somewhat irrelevant.
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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Oct 10, 2017 - 09:32am PT
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Neurons firing neurons. What next?
We drastically underestimated how ambiguous humans are.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Lenat
Silly AI researchers.
Lenat is one of a couple people who are supposed to have claimed, "All intelligence is artificial." A fair example of human ambiguity.
A woman I heard interviewed on CBC Radio also used the phrase, "All intelligence is artificial." The interviewer followed up on that and the woman went on to explain she meant that intelligence is a human, or man-made, idea, or body of ideas, and that all definitions of and tests for intelligence are created by humans.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Oct 10, 2017 - 09:48am PT
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Why use "narrative" when you mean stream of consciousness, E.?
I use it to emphasize my point, a conjecture that what we refer to as "mind" is largely that part of our behavior that communicates our intention and explains our actions to others. This provides the opportunity to have large social groups, of which our species seems adept. The adaptation of social behavior seems to be an important evolutionary attribute, other species that share that attribute with humans have similar biomass representation (e.g. the ants).
The "narrative" is exactly that, a behavior that "tells a story" about ourselves, what we are thinking, why we did what we did and what we are going to do. The narrative can be factual, fictional, artistic, informative, all that... but its primary purpose is to inform others.
So it is easy to mistake that behavior for "consciousness," we seem far more conscious than what we can explain. The conjecture makes the argument that we do not have to explain everything we are conscious of, really the only relevant subjects are the ones that social. "You'll know what love is when it happens" is an interesting narrative dodge on the complex sequence of hormonal activities which we are aware of, but have no detailed insight with which to describe what is "happening."
The "stream of consciousness" to me can be something that happens outside of the narrative, for instance, when I have been working on solving some problem that requires days of concentration, my mind seems to be working even without the narrative. I don't have any way to describe it because it, the workings of my mind in solving that problem, doesn't have any socially relevant purpose. I am certainly "conscious" of the working, but cannot explain the process.
The general category of things "qualia" would fall outside of our narrative, but are more generally a part of our consciousness. The fact that we don't have a vocabulary to describe them doesn't necessarily make them "mysterious."
While this may seem an idle speculation, there is the well known phenomenon of confabulation, considered a psychiatric condition in which a person makes up a "narrative" without the intent of deception. Certainly if there is an abnormality with that part of the brain that is responsible for creating the "narrative" one might expect such behavior.
One "prediction" might be that when you act, the "narrative" thought of the action would happen after the action, which is what is observed. Some nuance is required here, as your action can be initiated by a process which you are "aware" of, but the explanation of the action takes place after the initiation and the act itself. The "discursive mind" does not direct all action.
And finally, if you need an explanation of why the dichotomy of the observer and the observed is so strong, the possibility that the brain melds together many types of behavior which we identify and "mind," and that one of those behaviors is the creation of a narrative, then you have a natural explanation for that experience of the observer. And "turning it off" is also possible to learn, but not necessarily access to some other mysterious dimension.
You're just hacking the wetware.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Oct 10, 2017 - 10:23am PT
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The "narrative" is exactly that, a behavior that "tells a story" about ourselves, what we are thinking, why we did what we did and what we are going to do. The narrative can be factual, fictional, artistic, informative, all that... but its primary purpose is to inform others.
This provides the opportunity to have large social groups...
Well, so it's nice to see that YOU are thinking along these lines.
...
The Scientific Story aka The Evolutionary Epic is an amazing narrative. Or at least it is an amazing sub-narrative (rendered in facts) for something more (down the line, re meaning, value, purpose). It's time it had its run under the sun.
How refreshing - some posts on a mind thread that are actually free of "meditation" excess.
http://www.supertopo.com/forumsearch.php?ftr=scientific+story
hmm, not bad...
http://www.supertopo.com/climbing/thread.php?topic_id=1593650&msg=1680843#msg1680843
:)
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jgill
Boulder climber
The high prairie of southern Colorado
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Oct 10, 2017 - 12:02pm PT
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Ed:Some nuance is required here, as your action can be initiated by a process which you are "aware" of, but the explanation of the action takes place after the initiation and the act itself
Playing with the notion of "complex time" (t+iv(t)) I assigned the imaginary part the perception as one ages of the passage of time. I.e., as we grow older we tend to underestimate intervals of time. Time flies. This happens at younger ages also when one is focused on a task.
Searching the internet I found a very interesting description of an experiment in which subjects were asked to push a button that triggered a flash of light. For many trials the flash followed the button push by a tiny time interval, almost simultaneously. Then the experimenter cut this time lag in half. Guess what? The subjects reported that the flash occurred before pressing the button. Action preceding cause.
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MH2
Boulder climber
Andy Cairns
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Oct 10, 2017 - 12:15pm PT
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The subjects reported that the flash occurred before pressing the button. Action preceding cause.
To err is human.
With ambiguity always nipping at our heels.
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High Fructose Corn Spirit
Gym climber
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Oct 10, 2017 - 02:00pm PT
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Realizations are a part of mind. Remember this one?
sonder
n. the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk.
The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows.
http://www.dictionaryofobscuresorrows.com/post/23536922667/sonder
(I wish this beautiful definition had a better name though.)
How about... circumsensus or circumsentience. ((< L around to feel, sense))
....
nuclear mindfulness...
"Notice the flame in its simplicity, and ponder the ironic fact that humanity has reached its demise using the same intelligence with which it mastered fire."
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/10/09/nuclear-mindfulness
...
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What, all this back n forth on meditation and nobody's yet mentioned "Mind Illuminated" by John Yates (Culadasa). Weird.
https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_13?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=the+mind+illuminated&sprefix=the+mind+illu%2Cstripbooks%2C275&crid=CJ8EOU26VC2K
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yanqui
climber
Balcarce, Argentina
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Oct 10, 2017 - 05:23pm PT
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Cool, Ed. I don't agree with everything you said, but your concept of the narrative is interesting.
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paul roehl
Boulder climber
california
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Oct 10, 2017 - 05:29pm PT
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But that there was more than a thousand years between Newton and the Aristotelean idea that matter possessed the properties of gravity and levity, and that statics was achieved by the balance of the two. Seemed logical to Aristotle.
An accurate assessment of our surroundings comes at a cost, which is the energy to produce such an assessment. Our survival is, first, a task to obtain energy to survive. Evolution decides in the end what optimization is successful.
It might not be "logical" in the way you use that term, but it explains the current state of life on planet Earth. That simple life is responsible for the nearly 1 TW of energy required to maintain the atmosphere-ocean system in its chemical disequilibrium, and has been true for billions of years, seems to make your "logic" somewhat irrelevant.
The above is just the straw man tap dancing. The idea is simple: sensory perception requires a certain degree of accuracy, that accuracy often mediated or enhanced through logical analysis, in order for its host to enjoy evolutionary success. What you see and smell better/must have a close tie to the reality around you.
"You'll know what love is when it happens" is an interesting narrative dodge on the complex sequence of hormonal activities which we are aware of, but have no detailed insight with which to describe what is "happening."
Good grief! Hormonal activities? Really? All the hormonal activities in the world don't add up to a single instant of experience.
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