lamplight of we

the lamplight of we

George G Clark, 16 June 2009

I noticed many thoughts and feelings passing through my attention centre this morning. There will have been causes and conditions for all of them but these will have been multiple and complex. And each thought and feeling will have had a neural correlate.

A key democratic question is the extent to which conscious (or unconscious) thoughts and feelings can feedback on their neural correlates. Can we, by taking thought, change our thoughts and feelings and thus their neural correlates and the world?

BUT … is that really a key question? Is it not the case that the lamp which is the neural correlate (the tangible thing) is intimately linked to the light which is the thought and feeling (the intangible thing). If there is no lamp then there can be no light. But also if there is no light then there is no actual lamp (only a potential one). The lamp and the light are two sides of the same coin. One cannot exist without the other.

BUT … neither lamp nor light is unchanging. They are not so much 'beings' as 'ongoing becomings': not so much static products as dynamic processes. They come into existence (from where?), hang around in the mental churn for a while (where does the light exist?) and then pass out of existence again (where do they go?). So how long does a lamp/light last? To the extent that it can be hypothesized as a tangible thing, can it exist for more than a tiny fraction of a second - a thought moment?

SO … might we consider thoughts about tangible products (things) to be illusions of consciousness that were useful for a time during the evolution of 'intelligence' in the universe? We might! But evolution has moved on.

There is now consciousness of consciousness and it is emergent. No predetermined blueprints; no central planning committee. Instead we can conceive of dynamic churn generating the variations that feed the process of natural selection at cosmic, biological and cultural levels. (Think of the invisible hand controlling(?) the freemarket!)

SO … we return to the key democratic question. It boils down to figuring the extent to which human consciousness in its totality is or can be a deliberate and considerate agent of evolutionary selection under conditions of domestication. It would be nice to think that it can be. But this begs the question of socio-political process in these globalised times. If we accept that by taking thought we can be an agent of change in the world - then how are we to conceive of 'we'?

"since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must be constructed"
http://www.icomos.org/unesco/unesco_constitution.html

 

"The mind, indeed, is never seen by anyone,
and, therefore, whether it can know or cannot know itself,
just like the beauty of a barren woman's daughter,
this merely forms the subject of a pointless conversation.
[Shantideva - 8^th Century]