Wednesday, September 2, 2009
brain = internet
Why do we compare the human brain to a comupter when the human brain has 50 billion neurons and the entire internet has only 108 million web pages? Each human brain should be considered as the equivalent to an internet, or several internets. Consciousness thus resembles something like Google, getting a handle on all the postings of various neural groups.
Saturday, July 11, 2009
ulysses
Ulysses can be read as an 18 part, homeric metaphor for brain function. Each chapter is a part of the brain. In parallel, all the chapters make a working brain. We read it sequentially, though. Or do we read it "re-entrantly", as Edelman would say???
michael jackson analogy
Consciousness is like Michael Jackson surrounded by his ever-changing entourage. Now that Michael is gone, the entourage keeps going somehow, and it's still his entourage! People in the entourage = neural circuits doing specific, mindless tasks.
Thursday, July 2, 2009
dreams
If dreams are a harmless epi-phenomenon, maybe consciousness is too?
Are dreams meaningless because we are unconscious or are we unconscious because dreams are meaningless?
Are dreams meaningless because we are unconscious or are we unconscious because dreams are meaningless?
Saturday, June 13, 2009
models tested
The brain is not the computer we think it is.
The blueprint evolves based on our experience.
There may be inborn "tentative models" and they test reality and are confirmed if they work.
The brain reaches outwards, in other words.
Neural circuits are chosen (like antibodies) during interactions with the world (testing; science).
Immune system: a whole bunch of antibodies, pre-made and ready to be selected to fit "lock" of invaders.
Likewise, neural circuitry exists, ready to be selected (or abandoned)) if they match or don't match experience.
Antibodies are not "representations" of the virus.
Antibodies can be re-used in a future attack. So can neural connections, in a future, similar situation.
Simple examples: reach and grab, put into mouth, fell. Body and brain reach out with experiments like a scientist. Testing reality. Truth/results encoded in neural connections. Trial and error.
Memory is the capacity to repeat a physical or mental act later, in a different context.
Memory allows repetition (of a successful mental or physical event).
The blueprint evolves based on our experience.
There may be inborn "tentative models" and they test reality and are confirmed if they work.
The brain reaches outwards, in other words.
Neural circuits are chosen (like antibodies) during interactions with the world (testing; science).
Immune system: a whole bunch of antibodies, pre-made and ready to be selected to fit "lock" of invaders.
Likewise, neural circuitry exists, ready to be selected (or abandoned)) if they match or don't match experience.
Antibodies are not "representations" of the virus.
Antibodies can be re-used in a future attack. So can neural connections, in a future, similar situation.
Simple examples: reach and grab, put into mouth, fell. Body and brain reach out with experiments like a scientist. Testing reality. Truth/results encoded in neural connections. Trial and error.
Memory is the capacity to repeat a physical or mental act later, in a different context.
Memory allows repetition (of a successful mental or physical event).
brain as scientist
The brain is a scientist. Religion was a crude but initially successful hypothesis. It has since been surpassed. Divide the consciousness problem into smaller problems.
Neural sense of time...very weird.
Neural sense of time...very weird.
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