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Post by RichK on Dec 16, 2010 20:47:26 GMT
Apropos of nothing, this, but I'm just posting out of curiosity while, Christmas greetings aside, it's fairly quiet round these parts.
A mildly philosophical question; when you chance to think of yourself, do you sometimes imagine that there's a mini version of 'you' sitting behind your eyes at the controls? I know it's stupidly unscientific but I do sometimes feel that way, and I was wondering if it was just me.
Richard Dawkins references it in 'The God Delusion' too, and I completely understood what he was getting at.
I'm interested to know your thoughts, no really!
Ta!
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Post by Dave on Dec 16, 2010 21:59:55 GMT
I don't think I've ever had that particular thought, but have often stopped and realised that ones self is something internal and separate to your body which is like a vehicle for consciousness.
On a similar theme...
Maybe there is sometimes the thought of a mini version of yourself controlling things from behind your eyes, but what about someone else being in control rather than your conscious self? (I'm not talking schizophrenia here).
The sub-conscious mind is connected to the conscious mind, but it really can act like an independent consciousness. The main example being sleep-walking.
I was told a couple of times when I was younger that I had slept-walk(ed?) and it is quite a scary notion to be confronted with. Until that point, I totally felt as though me (as in my conscious self) was totally in control and that my body only acted on actions I consciously decided upon.
Imagine then one day being told that you had been tottering about in the early hours of the morning and standing staring out of a window. Being told this, and knowing full well you had no conscious involvement in the actions is quite a scary revelation regarding the power of the subconscious.
I realised that my sub-conscious self could walk about, eyes open too, so visual information was being taken in by my brain so that my sub-conscious self could use it to navigate my body around.
Imagine that.... your eyes physically being used to see... but not by what you would call YOU (your conscious self). Weird.
It all gave me a greater appreciation of my sub-conscious self to be honest.
It isn't possible to knowingly tap into your subconscious for help and advice, but I have definitely realised that when I do anything creative, and an idea pops into my head that really feels like I didn't actually think of it, I know it is almost certainly my subconsciousness dishing up some great ideas! Thanks to my subconscious self for the many great ideas of the past!
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Post by RichK on Dec 16, 2010 22:06:49 GMT
Ahh thanks for the reply. Yep, my subconscious wrote words on a piece of paper once but I got so scared I destroyed the paper rather than dare read it consciously, if that makes sense.
I've yet to see the Eddie Murphy film 'Meet Dave' but apparently it applies this concept to an alien with a crew inside his head. And does it badly by all accounts.
Does anyone remember The Numbskulls? A cartoon in Whizzer & Chips. Similar concept, about a team of little people living inside 'our man's' head.
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Post by PatrickCoyle on Dec 17, 2010 0:07:33 GMT
I remember The Numbskulls, I'm sure there was a cartoon along similar lines as well. And one of those "first issue 99p, every other issue a fiver" magazine-with-part-of-model-kit sets that used a similar concept to explain human anatomy.
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Post by Davros on Dec 17, 2010 0:07:57 GMT
Im kind of with Daves theory, and have felt the same. A feeling that the body is just a vehicle.
I think when you sleepwalk/talk and the rest your body is purely acting on instinct. You may look as though your in control to an observer, although in reality your on autopilot.. reenacting previous movements/activities. Which is making me wonder.. if thats autopilot, who's the flipping pilot, setting things to autopilot. Im confused now.
We know so little about the brain, give it a few years and it will be hacked/overclocked and in mass production.
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Post by Davros on Dec 17, 2010 0:15:19 GMT
Also, does anyone else get quite worked up by the thought that they dont know the actual point of everything, or if theres anypoint at all? Or is that just me?
When I say 'not anypoint at all', I dont mean, I hate my life etc. I just mean..... whats it all about?
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Post by Dave on Dec 17, 2010 1:02:24 GMT
Also, does anyone else get quite worked up by the thought that they dont know the actual point of everything, or if theres anypoint at all? Or is that just me? When I say 'not anypoint at all', I dont mean, I hate my life etc. I just mean..... whats it all about? I know what you mean, and although many people seem to find the idea of life having no real point a depressing one, I find it quite liberating and comforting. I'm not sure how, but I do! Of course people can create their own parameters as to make them feel as though they have a point. I mean, you could say that if you've ever made someone else happy by helping them with something or making them laugh, then you have had a point. If you only did it once, that would still mean you had a point. I remember the Numbskulls comic strip. |
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Post by Kezz on Dec 17, 2010 1:21:56 GMT
My step-dad once told me that the happiest man he ever met was a 'retarded' (substitute with your own applicable word) local Bin-man. Everday he would be happy as fucking larry, and at no point would that smile be knocked off his face. ever.
Is ignorance bliss? Our survival instincts tell us otherwise.
I'd like to think the point to life is not just happiness, but the exploration of it. Life is beautiful.
Experience as much as you can and be whoever the fuck you want to be.
I want to run naked in the Forest.. Crucify me.
I remember the Numbskulls comic strip.
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Post by PatrickCoyle on Dec 17, 2010 8:53:18 GMT
I wish I could live out a branching life of different paths, to see how things would've gone if I'd done/not done certain things. But to still be able to flit between all those many lives and this life as well. Sort of like a cross between The Butterfly Effect and Goodnight Sweetheart. Except they wouldn't run parallel to each other, so I wouldn't get in all manner of scrapes trying to get back to the 1940s by tea time like Rodney did.
To a large extent, I think you're on the right lines Kezz about ignorance being bliss. I'm also with Dave on the notion that lack of a pre-determined "point" to life is a good thing. We ain't drones, though some old books will try and tell us otherwise. We can make our own meaning.
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Post by bishchop on Dec 17, 2010 10:58:25 GMT
Not sure I have ever had the feeling of being sat behind my eyes in the past, but when I begin to think of it conceously it does start to feel that way. Im not sure if its the same thing but when I dream I usually dont see things from my POV but rather see myself as a whole. That sounds wierd, anyone else do that?
I just finished reading a book called "Mans Search for Meaning" by Viktor Frank (read because I too was questioning "Whats it all about?" He states that the meaning of life can be "to find a meaning in life" which is a bit of brain twister but he does add "Love is the only way to grasp another human being in the innermost core of his personality. No one can become fully aware of the very essence of another human being unless he loves him".
Patrick I like the idea of different paths and wondering how different life would be if I had gone one way rather than another and there is even a theory in quantum mechanics to suggest that it happens, its called the Many Worlds interpretation.
A bit of a twist on the destiny, fate thing is this. We know time is relative, and you experience time at a different pace the further away from a body of mass you are (ie time travels faster away from the earth than it does if we are sat on it). Which means that time is not a rolling event that is happening as we experience it. It means it has already happened and is already set?
I think I may have given myself a headache!
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Post by sugarbeat on Dec 17, 2010 16:09:39 GMT
I have the precise feeling that a mini me is sitting at the controls in my head. He is the best of me, and I (the body) am a rather clumsy, frequently disappointing machine to operate. When he and I are in sync, I'm capable of very special things. When he and I out of sync (which is most of the time) I'm just another schlump plundering around the Earth.
Searching for a meaning to life is all a bit futile. Everything in the Universe, living or otherwise is made of the same stuff. What we consider life is just more bits of matter clumped together and behaving in ways that we can relate to and predict. But is bacteria any more alive than a volcano? I'm not so sure. All you can really ask is what is the point of a human life. And that I suspect we can all answer on our own.
I've never heard of that comic strip.
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Post by Dave on Dec 17, 2010 17:45:28 GMT
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Post by Dave on Dec 17, 2010 19:00:54 GMT
Hang about... that Numskulls cartoon I posted doesn't seem to make any sense at all!
The thieving Numbskull reads out the correct number, but the bloke writes it upside down? What? Why? Something is wrong in that cartoon.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 18, 2010 0:45:42 GMT
Richard Dawkins references it in 'The God Delusion' too, and I completely understood what he was getting at. I'm interested to know your thoughts, no really! Ta! My thoughts are: read The Dawkins Delusion instead, it's based more on science rather than one man's obsession with disproving the existence of God. |
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Post by PatrickCoyle on Dec 18, 2010 2:27:42 GMT
Richard Dawkins references it in 'The God Delusion' too, and I completely understood what he was getting at. I'm interested to know your thoughts, no really! Ta! My thoughts are: read The Dawkins Delusion instead, it's based more on science rather than one man's obsession with disproving the existence of God. It's hypocritical rubbish, based more on one man's obsession with Richard Dawkins than science. |
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