Br15 BRAIN MIND RELATIONSHIP
The reader of this article might find its reasoning difficult to follow. The writing was also difficult, and I think this is because it is at the foremost edge of my reasoning, when the conscious can only just grasp postconscious thought sufficiently to put it down on paper. It is to be hoped that you, like me, will find the effort to be totally worthwhile.
It is the reader's self which will approach this article and decide whether to allow its mind to read on and, more than that, whether to take seriously that which it reads. I begin by asking that self to recognise what the self is and what it does. I imagine it to be generally accepted that the self is the focul-point of conscious awareness, and that it carries a power of will to make choices and decisions. The self makes its choices and decisions according to the information and advice passed to it by its intelligence. The scope of that information shall depend upon how widely and deeply the intelligence has delved to gather it, and the true wisdom of that advice shall depend on how thoroughly the intelligence has reasoned it out. I think the reader would accept that if the information his intelligence contains is all-embracing and accurate and the reasoning it does is utterly complete, then, whilst his self's choices and decisions might have to comply for the present with circumstances which are false, his basic state of mind will be absolutely right, good and true, and that all such minds, whatever position their selves are obliged or forced to adopt on the surface, must be in fundamental agreement.
Now I ask the reader to accept the proposition, for the time being and in order to understand the brain mind relationship, that there are two human minds, the conscious and the postconscious (to be explained later). I also ask you to accept that this proposition is put forward, and confirmed, by my own postconscious which also maintains that, contrary to Freud, there is no such thing as the unconscious mind. Unconsciousness is the vast areas of thought and action in the conscious mind from which, both long and short term, the aware attention of self is absent. The postconscious mind is not open to the attentions of self and might therefore be described as unconscious, but it is a different faculty, with a different function - to discover truth - and an as yet unfulfilled relationship with the self.
The conscious mind, while of very large capacity, enclosing existing reality within its sphere and containing the wilful and decision-making self, is incapable of deducing truth. Yet humanity and its world identifies with the conscious sphere. Its ordinary individuals of normal behaviour, or extraordinary individuals of unusual behaviour, are unprepared for truly dramatic changes of mind. Each individual self, united with the rest only by common acceptance of the existing amoral reality and its devious dominance, makes up its own conscious mind and, competing and conflicting with many differently made-up minds, defends its opinions and beliefs and resists interference. The postconscious mind, on the other hand, is capable of truth - indeed that is its sole function - but is almost universally ignored.
I put it to you that these words are not the controversial opinions and arguments of another conscious self - me - but represent the conclusions of a postconscious mind, with me as its interpreter who has struggled long and hard, first to understand its truth and now to put that truth over in understandable terms. Furthermore, this article is addressed to your self as fellow-interpreter of your own postconscious, seeking that truth in common by which we shall find ourselves in agreement. It is not addressed to the conscious mind/self from which rejection is to be expected, for a proposition that makes perfect sense to the postconscious may make no sense at all to the conscious. The free and independent flow of true reason goes contrary to the false conventions, and cannot take them seriously even though they are in power.
I also ask the reader to accept it as my firm contention that only one thing can successfully guide any race endowed with intellect, and that is truth. Truth is human life's essential guide, but truth is of greater significance than life because it existed before human life began and shall continue to exist after our death. My postconscious gives me a strong sense of truth, and an abhorrence of that which is false, which I find to be difficult precisely to explain. By truth I do not mean only that which is true in fact, provable by evidence and conscious argument. To the intellectual human race, truth must be life's essential guide to be valued above life. It is the only foundation on which to build our happiness and contentment. Truth embraces all that exists, past or present, whether or not known; all possibility, as well as that which is unquestionably so. Truth is that structure of reason in which no fault can be found. It suggests that which is level and plumb; straight as an arrow; perfectly honest; also that which is perfect in concept or spirit. Above all I take it to mean utterly complete reasoning of all that is knowable; a state of being that is dissatisfied with anything less than truth, that is devoted to pure reason and accepts responsibility for conducting its physical existence accordingly; the source of right, honest and good morality on which that state of being is founded.
The history of life is paralleled by growth of the brain, by development of conscious intelligence the ultimate of which is the purpose of life. The concept of self dawned when creatures acquired conscious awareness, and both grew under the direction of instinct. When the human race emerged by the sudden formation of an intellectual faculty, it was clearly appropriate that this, our chief feature should take charge. Instead, the intellectual faculty was split into two : firstly the conscious mind which, manipulated by our wilful self and dominated by instinct, was party to the formation of our present sphere of reality . Secondly the postconscious mind which became a free and independent faculty whose function is truth, aware of everything going on in the conscious mind and everything taking place in the world outside, yet cut off from the nervous system and its motor-functions, and closed off from direct connection with consciousness except for the postconscious's moral conclusions which are implanted in consciousness and known as conscience.
If we are to find a true understanding of the mind and its relationship to the brain our search should be entrusted to the whole of that mind, the postconscious leading and the conscious learning to reject the influence of egoistic self-will and of those unreasoned pressures from outside by which the self in turn has been influenced.
Before life began here, Earth was composed of inanimate matter, material having no independent self-motivated activity. This matter was capable of some activity, and of reactivity in conjunction with other material, but was, and is, subject to certain laws of physics and chemistry. These laws contain no morality, being concerned only with that action which shall follow from certain combinations in certain conditions, not with any question of what should happen.
The first form of life consisted of an engine, energy, and its vehicle the single cell. These two, the engine driving the vehicle to feed the engine, formed one entity - the alive self. The difference between the single cell and the energised inanimate matter from which it came was, and is, that the single cell was alive - it had independent self-motivation, the basic characteristic of life. The self of the single cell also had no morality, because it was one, and morality, in its simplest terms, is one in relation to another. This relationship is different from that between matter and the laws of physics etc. Morality concerns a force and that force's self-control arising from some degree of awareness of its own responsibility.
The basis of the single cell's self-motivation was that having sprung to life it must go on living. Contrary to the second law of thermodynamics (as I understand that law), the single cell avoided its own death from increasing entropy, and at the same time bumped up its numbers, through the simple device of splitting into two replicas of itself - two new single cells each somehow given a fully regenerated spark of life. Each new cell then fulfilled its objective to go on living by absorbing nourishment directly from the energy-giving sulphurous chemical soup in which it existed until its turn came to split. This is the fundamentally unchanging process by which life on Earth has continued for millions of years, the basic platform on which all the present complexities of life, particularly human life, are founded.
It seems to 'me' that the need for a brain must have arisen when the available and easily absorbed chemical soup fell short of the requirements of a rapidly increasing number of single cells. There could have been stalemate, with cell numbers adjusting to the food available, but this would go against life-force purpose - to live to the maximum - in that masses of under-nourished cells would have to die before they could reproduce by splitting. Instead the single cells adopted a curious and far-reaching practice which might now strike us as horrifying - that of eating each other.
To follow the practice of eating each other cells had to group together and second themselves to different group functions. The first grouping was to form a kind of stomach into which 'foreign' single cells drifted and were digested. Then this organism would augment and diversify by developing means of locomotion in order to seek out and devour other single cells. Organisms would then enlarge and diversify further, seeking and devouring yet other organisms which would themselves react by reorganising for defence, then attack. For some reason, perhaps related to the fact that they could no longer simply split but had to reproduce internally and in such ways as presented good opportunities for mutation, organisms could not escape death. They succumbed, as we ourselves do, to entropy, but not before they too had passed on regenerated sparks of life, to their offspring.
The chief problem which these developing organisms had to solve was that of feeding their internal cells which were no longer directly exposed to the chemical soup. Channels had to be provided along which nourishment could be conveyed. As most life-forms emerged into the light from the dark and sulphurous depths of the seas to colonise dry land, and eventually divided into sun-dependent plant-life sustained by photo-synthesis and oxygen-breathing animals which basically depended on plants for their food-supply, the blood supply system developed as the means of nourishing the internal cells of animals, and a nervous system of chemical/electrical signals was established for controlling this supply and for coordinating the organism's movements. This, in turn, required a control centre - the brain, normally situated where the most direct access to the main senses could be obtained - in the head, close to the developing eyes, ears, nose etc.
This control centre, to be effective, needed to provide a series of fixed reactions to certain stimuli. These were known as instincts. Only a few of these instincts would be required for successful survival in the more straightforward world that then existed, but without them there would be chaos. The development of instinct introduced a kind of morality, in that now there was not only one - the organism forming a separate entity - but another - its guiding instinct. This division was necessary because the organism, or body, has to be positive in every department if vigorous continuation is to be sustained. Negative departments could have the effect of retarding the organism. Instinct evolved a pattern of irresistible self-control, activating or inhibiting the body for the body's own good. The body obeys inhibition without discouragement but still strains forward against the leash in obedience to life-force. This is not true morality, of course, which only applies where there is intellect. Instinct does actually guide the individual ruthlessly to pursue self-interest regardless of most other animals, even others of the same species, yet its design has so evolved that it benefits the survival of species as a whole.
In the preconscious brains of primitive life-forms, the vital messages of instinct must have been implanted in neurons which had the job of faithfully passing those messages to appropriate motor-functions. These neurons would be linked by axons in sequence along each main connection with a motor-function nerve, increasing in linear number as both the instinctive message and motor-function, became more complex. Early formation of the complex animal mind must have consisted of additional neurons running in parallel lines to these sequences, fresh neurons which had already connected themselves to others of all kinds, and which brought their consequent 'wisdom' to bear on the instinctive sequences, gradually modifying both the nature of the animals' motor-functions and the signals given out by instinct for action, or inhibition, as the case might be.
The need for a separately self-contained mind arose when external factors affecting the survival of complex animals, and internal adaptations and strategies required to deal with them, became too much for instinct alone to cope with. Some means of rapidly adjusting behaviour in order to react effectively to sudden changes in circumstances was called for, but a means which did not endanger the animal in some unforeseen way. For example, the primitive jackals' instinct might once have told them to keep well away from lions at all times. Then a certain hungry, thoughtful jackal at the scene of a lion's kill, responding to an observation and from it extrapolating, contrary to ancient and fearful conditioning, the possibility of a favourable consequence, sneaked in close enough to snatch a piece of meat and run off with it, unharmed. Others followed suit and this became a habit of jackals, an addition to instinct, but it had not come about slowly as the result of chance and natural selection (though it could have done.) It followed quickly from that original conscious decision, and it opened the way to further similar decisions.
Based on simple adjustments like this the conscious mind reached an advanced stage of development in primates and aquatic animals. Subconscious creatures had always looked only outwards at all things and creatures other than themselves and reacted to them by instinct. The early conscious creatures were able to take experience into account. The advanced conscious creature's self now also looked at the image which it saw reflected in a pool and knew this to be its person, its own physical presence on the scene which the self could now cause to make changes in its reality rather than simply to react to it. So the conscious animal was self-aware and conscious to that degree, but not to the same extent as the human would be.
I use the word conscious for want of a better word to describe this mind. The essential difference in operation between brain 'hardware' and mind 'software' is that while the brain, programmed by instinct, effected action and reaction by a direct process of cause and effect, the conscious mind sought to foresee events - imagining them by correlating everything known that could be relevant to them - and predicting the outcome. The potential of the conscious mind was not only to be aware of its self's relationship to its person and of its person to the world - it might eventually develop the capacity to discover truth and apply that to critical control of its own self. However, before the conscious mind could slowly grow in capacity and progress to these limits of its potential in any advanced animal, another phenomenon overtook it.
An advanced primate, vaguely aware of the conscious mind's potential, felt the need for it to be realised quickly. Under great pressure to realise the advantage that this potential seemed to offer, it appears to me that the human mutation occurred. In one chimpanzee-like animal the brain suddenly enlarged to fulfil its potential, incorporating six hierarchical levels, giving an enormous increase in power and capacity to the conscious mind. But the apparent, urgent priority for humans at that formative stage was immediately to seize upon new and more effective ways of surviving and prospering. Potential ultimate reasoning of the whole new mind opened up limitless but unpredictable and time-taking prospective avenues of thought towards truth which didn't help to solve immediate problems. As far as limited consciousness could see in those early days, far from being helpful these mind-wanderings weakened resolve and actually threatened survival prospects. For these reasons the resultant huge extension split into two, a much enlarged conscious (confined to the first level of reason), which we harnessed to our instinctive use, and the postconscious (incorporating 5 further levels of reason), which we closed off and left to its own devices.
So, my deductions tell me, the very first major decision of the new human race was a far-reaching and disastrous one. We spurned the opportunity to embrace the ultimate faculty of mind on the grounds that it would lead us into an airy-fairy zone of indecision, whereas what we thought we needed was strong, decisive and seemingly vital action. The self remained confined to the conscious mind whose powers, in the shape of a multitude of fresh neurons, it applied to drives which should have become redundant, the competitive drives of instinct. In other words, we continued the behaviour-pattern of our primate ancestors. But our conscious capacity was much enhanced, giving it increased thinking-power, and a highly important associated faculty - that of language. Thus equipped, the human being became the most dangerous and successful competitor in nature's struggle for survival.
I suggest that the human conscious mind very quickly developed, after the mutation and in isolation from the neglected and ignored postconscious, as follows. Neurons had already multiplied and formed additional linear sequences to further instinct. Now linear neurons joined laterally and 'conferred' in pairs, then gathered in groups, then clusters, further and further modifying and complicating the messages which they passed forwards, backwards and laterally, adapting accordingly and passing the result to other similar neurons which continued the process. Clusters had optimum numbers, and many joined with similar clusters to form conglomerates which, at a certain point, ceased growing on becoming aware that further growth into larger groupings could bring no increase in scope or power, because this mind had reached its optimum level of reason. Reason must be pure if it is to rise to higher levels. First level reasoning of the conscious mind is impure because subject to interference from instinctive self-will and the influence of false reality. Pure, higher level reason must be free and independent and cannot be built on such a false foundation. When first-level conscious reason attempts to climb to level two it becomes confounded by its own inconsistencies which drag it back down again. It is this inability to develop beyond the first level that explains why the conscious mind alone cannot discover truth. It also explains why human conscious minds can hold widely different opinions and beliefs. Their cell conglomerates are not large or powerful enough to reason beyond their differences and reach agreement. Instead, wilful selves settle upon one or another of their half-true conglomerates and select them as personal 'truths', to the exclusion of others. This is preferred to the apparent alternative - a state of frustrating uncertainty and indecision.
However, the human race now possessed a postconscious and couldn't ignore it altogether. Up to a point it reasoned without us, in its free and independent way. Working on the basic information which we could not keep from it, even if we tried, the postconscious could, and did, deduce true moral conclusions and pass them to every mind, by way of conscience. As a consequence every human, no matter how hard, ruthless or cruel his or her outer behaviour, inwardly identifies with true morality. But practically all humans outwardly identify more strongly and immediately with their actual reality which, logically confined to the same conscious sphere that contains our thinking, is itself amoral, countenancing both immorality and morality.
It may be helpful to pause here and think, if only briefly, of the peculiar human situation here on Earth in terms of its chief influences - (1) life-force, (2) instinct, (3) the conscious sphere embracing the conscious mind and the wilful self's selected and recorded body of personal conscious thought, belief, opinion, also embracing the framework of life which I call the Machine - including all the concepts, practices, institutions, laws and values of our civilisation, (4) the religious institutions of moral compromise, (5) the still small voice of conscience, and (6) - the most important potential influence - the free and independent postconscious mind; the fountain of human truth; that which makes us uniquely human; the source of true morality.
In our present worldwide society (6) is outcast, (5) and (4) are ineffective, (3) is in command, fired by (2) and (1). As a result anything goes. We spend most of our time struggling with situations whose existence makes no sense. We have a population, physically differentiated only by features and colour of skin, historically divided into countries, artificially divided into nations, prosperous and poor, and by different national and cultural identities and languages. This population is motivated by the stick or dangling carrot of a money economy which operates less in their interests, more in the interests of the Machine. The peoples' thinking is falsely moulded accordingly, dampened by compromise, tempered by religions which teach passive acceptance rather than justified resistance, controlled by governments through the institution and application or enforcement of laws. Art and love point in other directions, but life generally does not represent, but contradicts beauty and the compassion and care of true humanity. When desperate and violent revolt or crime results it is not met with resolve to eradicate unjust causes but with military or police counter-violence and public protest. We have an amoral reality which is tenaciously preserved by those whom it benefits and which overrides the resistance of those whom it fails to benefit, or hurts.
If, in studying the brain/mind, we fail to take account of these truths, we shall not succeed in achieving full understanding because our minds shall be already prejudiced against it.
To return to the relationship between brain and mind, as explained to me by my postconscious. Of course the brain does furnish the mind but it also facilitates the body's internal functioning and external activity. It does this by means of an intricate system of nerves, mostly radiating from the head (but some localised in limbs etc.), ending in excitors capable of triggering every kind of muscular action. The brain's command centre is built up according to information/experience coming, through neurons, from similar endings located all over the body but particularly at the eyes, ears, tongue, and in the hands. The eyes, for example, employ many sensors each responsible for a small feature of the object seen, such as a central diagonal line, and pass it to the brain where, combining with myriads of other features, it makes a picture. The instinctive brain comes to know the picture and in future recognises it by matching it with a similar picture stored in its memory, also picking up a simple instruction associated with that memory - fight, or flight, for instance - and, by way of the nervous system operating in the reverse direction, prompting the appropriate reaction.
The conscious mind is brought into play when there is no prepared instinctive reaction, or when there is doubt about that reaction, doubt arising from experience of that reaction's past failure. Mind receptors receive the picture and its associations, passing these to other receptors which attract the signal because they represent a strong relative significance. They pass the signal to a group, or groups of neurons also displaying empathy which, either themselves or together with other empathetic groups or conglomerates of neurons, return with advice as to suggested action. This is passed back to the nerve centre which, by passing it on to the nerve endings, produces action, positive or negative. If the action fails it shall be marked with a query for future reference, and if it continually fails it shall be permanently vetoed. If the action succeeds, that nerve and mind track shall be reinforced, and if it continually succeeds it shall become an immediate, perhaps eventually an instinctively imperative reaction.
The early conscious faculty was a simple extension of instinct, reacting to an event calling for action which instinct was not prepared for. This brain faculty became the conscious mind when it began to imagine its self voluntarily carrying out an unprecedented action (like the jackal already mentioned), anticipating the likely immediate results and judging the eventual consequences - when, that is to say, it began to think.
DIAGRAM
1A - PRESENT ARRANGEMENT OF THE HUMAN MIND, WITH CONSCIOUS
PREDOMINANT AND POSTCONSCIOUS EXCLUDED APART FROM CONSCIENCE
The human conscious mind's developed process of thinking is not only a matter of preparing strategies for action, or of storing information for definite or possible use in taking action. It is also a matter of reasoning towards establishing a foundation of belief, with a bearing on future action. And it is a matter of setting up customs, habits, tastes and skills which excite pleasurable emotions and make life seem worth living. These are artifices to replace the satisfactions which accompanied our ancestor's utter fulfilment of their survival instincts. They had their fears and pains, of course, but these were more than counter-balanced by their satisfactions, making their lives well worth living. In our case the Machine may have increased our pleasures but also, disproportionately, our fears and pain especially through making us aware of suffering everywhere in the world. The huge amount of effort, time and material we spend in concocting artificial pleasures to compensate is a large part of the enormous artificial instinct-driven and excessive business of the Machine.
The human self, as the focul-point of consciousness, can apparently cease to function by going to sleep. When that happens, however, although the self is unaware of the external world, it can still be the focul-point of consciousness at second-hand, in the memory, by dreaming. In the dream state the self's experiences are similar to the waking state excepting that they are no longer governed by the laws of reality and can escape into fantasy. The dream state can overlap with the waking state when we are subconscious, without deliberate thought, a sublime experience more common to our instinctive state, long before we became human, but which can be recaptured, I believe, by the practice of meditation.
Diagram 1 shows that the sphere of consciousness has five aspects, 1. the conscious mind, 2. the self existing within that mind and confined to the conscious sphere, 3. the person and 4. the reality both of which affect and are affected by aspects 1 and 2, and finally 5. conscience, which I'm coming to. Isn't the mind our person's governing advisor, and our self its executive? And isn't our view of the mind the self's normally distorted view of the conscious's interpretation of our person's impulsions and inhibitions in relations to Machine-reality? The mind can be wide awake and working amongst its memorised experiences, concerns and fears when the self seems to be asleep and dreaming. In fact, in dreams the self is half-awake because, whilst it is temporarily closed to awareness of the real outside world and to the person and its interests, ie to normal consciousness, in the dream-state the self is nevertheless open to the conscious mind and all the vagaries of which that mind is capable.
It may be supposed that this state of semi-awareness represents the area which Freud describes as the unconscious mind, which I have already suggested is not a mind but simply those large areas of the conscious mind from which the focul-point of self is for the time being absent or partially absent, or, in the case of dreams, disconnected from the person and from external reality. Our selves may condemn other selves for their inhumanities but it is minds that must be held mainly responsible for human actions. The mind alone can think and weigh alternatives. The wakeful self is but the unthinking emotional executive charged with making a decision by wilfully choosing (we might hesitate to call it wilful, but it is a decision of the will, whether we like it or not) from those alternatives which the mind allows and presents. The self can allow itself to be persuaded by conscience, of course, but, presently, that is often to go against the odds.
A central point of this article is that when all are fully aware of their fundamental nature to be supraconscious, then immorality shall be unthinkable. When, in consequence, we rebuild society according to our moral ideals, our new humantrue reality shall reinforce the strength of our postconscious minds which shall, in turn, maintain our ideal society, ruling out forever a return to our former amoral state, ensuring that human behaviour such as the 'ethnic cleansing' in Bosnia shall never again be possible.
There are many obstacles in the way of this ideal, and to begin clearing them we need take just one step - to recognition that our postconscious mind exists and represents our essential humanity.
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