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2081

Abstract

ms “mind” and “brain” interchangeably to refer to the same unit inside our head. But these two are very distinct yet interrelated entities that operate hand-in-hand to create our experiences.Neuroscientists consider the mind to be an emergent property of the brain’s complex activity.The brain is the physical organ that processes information through the electrochemical interactions between neurons. But the mind is an abstract concept that arises closely on the heels of every brain activity to interpret the neural firings into a subjective experience.The brain is what processes, for example, the visual stimulus like the traffic light changing color, while the mind is what interprets that activity and goes — ‘I’ see the color change, so I should break.Simply put, the mind is nothing but the present thought we have at any given instance.The mind is not an entity in itself.It doesn’t have a physical location or a continuing existence in our physiology.The mind is simply our current thought, which leads to the question —<h2 id="ff4e">Then What Is A Thought?</h2>On a fundamental level, we interpret the world through thoughts made up of images and words.At every moment, we have an ongoing commentary inside our head where we use language to interpret the world to ourselves in the form of thoughts.But when we think of a thought, we are not actively creating it, but only becoming aware of it.A thought appears in our mind in whatever abstract, amorphous form and we only realize it as a thought after we use language to put it into words and re-interpret the same to ourselves.But this happens at a breakneck, T-minus quantum warp speed, so we experience it as instantaneous.<div id="211d" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/noam-chomsky-my-unlikely-spiritual-guru-d51fb3a1048a"> <div>

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            <h2>Noam Chomsky: My Unlikely Spiritual Guru</h2>
            <div><h3>How Chomsky’s theory of language shook up my understanding of thoughts and consciousness</h3></div>
            <div><p>medium.com</p></div>
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    </div><p id="67b1">The running monologue of thoughts, without any gaps for us to see its appearance, resolution, and replacement by the next thought, has been so consistent and perpetual that we’ve mistaken its flow for an actual entity in existence and called it the mind.</p><p id="8fc3">However, there is no real entity called the mind!</p><p id="b25a" type="7">The mind doesn’t think a thought, but the mind is a thought that “thinks” itself as the mind.</p><p id="3bbc">But this illusion has been so deeply ingrained into the way we see things that it slips right through.</p><p id="32a2">We are conditioned to believe that “<i>we</i>” are our thoughts, ideologies, beliefs, and mistakes.</p><p id="0a93">We identify ourselves with our mind when there is no mind to identify with.</p><p id="7a51">And that begs the question — ‘<i>If we are not our thoughts or our mind, then who are we, really?’</i></p><blockquote id="7faf"><p>“A thought arises and it is perceived. What makes it “my thought”? The bird sings and it is perceived. Does one make it “my song”?”</p></blockquote><blockquote id="6001"><p>— Wu Hsin</p></blockquote><p id="fb4c"><i>We, the conditioned, is an ongoing exploration of the self from the bedrock up. It involves taking a telescopic view of the world — politics, people, et al., along with a microscopic view of the self — mind, thoughts, and perception. It’s about hacking away the fluff around spirituality, seeing reality for what it really is through the lens of philosophy, and learning what we really are beneath all that we think we are.</i></p></article></body>

We, The Conditioned

The Greatest Illusion of All Is How We See Ourselves

During a casual family drive around our neighborhood, I wondered out loud what the name of the famous building nestled beyond the wooded expanse that we had just passed by was.

To this question, after a brief pause, my son enthusiastically replied, “Fermilab!”.

Between the time the question escaped my lips and my ears heard the reply, something novel happened.

It’s something that I’m still wrapping my head around because, in hindsight, I’m certain that this will go down as the single most significant event in my philosophical pursuit.

The Moment The Images Separated

Immediately after I spoke the question — and before my mind freaked out over a possible memory loss and set my brain off on a neural breadcrumb trail to find the answer — there was a brief two-heartbeat window where I witnessed an absolute blankness.

I was staring at nothing. I registered nothing, yet “I” was completely present and watching.

It is not the usual hyperbolic expression “my mind went blank” used in places surrounding a fight-or-flight scenario.

Neither was it a tip-of-the-tongue brain fog where I was unable to retrieve or recall facts.

My mind actually flatlined for two seconds.

There was no thinking process, images, or words in that short instant, yet “I” was still there to notice all of that.

The Mind Is Not What We Think It Is

Most of us use the terms “mind” and “brain” interchangeably to refer to the same unit inside our head. But these two are very distinct yet interrelated entities that operate hand-in-hand to create our experiences.

Neuroscientists consider the mind to be an emergent property of the brain’s complex activity.

The brain is the physical organ that processes information through the electrochemical interactions between neurons. But the mind is an abstract concept that arises closely on the heels of every brain activity to interpret the neural firings into a subjective experience.

The brain is what processes, for example, the visual stimulus like the traffic light changing color, while the mind is what interprets that activity and goes — ‘I’ see the color change, so I should break.

Simply put, the mind is nothing but the present thought we have at any given instance.

The mind is not an entity in itself.

It doesn’t have a physical location or a continuing existence in our physiology.

The mind is simply our current thought, which leads to the question —

Then What Is A Thought?

On a fundamental level, we interpret the world through thoughts made up of images and words.

At every moment, we have an ongoing commentary inside our head where we use language to interpret the world to ourselves in the form of thoughts.

But when we think of a thought, we are not actively creating it, but only becoming aware of it.

A thought appears in our mind in whatever abstract, amorphous form and we only realize it as a thought after we use language to put it into words and re-interpret the same to ourselves.

But this happens at a breakneck, T-minus quantum warp speed, so we experience it as instantaneous.

Noam Chomsky: My Unlikely Spiritual Guru

How Chomsky’s theory of language shook up my understanding of thoughts and consciousness

medium.com

The running monologue of thoughts, without any gaps for us to see its appearance, resolution, and replacement by the next thought, has been so consistent and perpetual that we’ve mistaken its flow for an actual entity in existence and called it the mind.

However, there is no real entity called the mind!

The mind doesn’t think a thought, but the mind is a thought that “thinks” itself as the mind.

But this illusion has been so deeply ingrained into the way we see things that it slips right through.

We are conditioned to believe that “we” are our thoughts, ideologies, beliefs, and mistakes.

We identify ourselves with our mind when there is no mind to identify with.

And that begs the question — ‘If we are not our thoughts or our mind, then who are we, really?’

“A thought arises and it is perceived. What makes it “my thought”? The bird sings and it is perceived. Does one make it “my song”?”

— Wu Hsin

We, the conditioned, is an ongoing exploration of the self from the bedrock up. It involves taking a telescopic view of the world — politics, people, et al., along with a microscopic view of the self — mind, thoughts, and perception. It’s about hacking away the fluff around spirituality, seeing reality for what it really is through the lens of philosophy, and learning what we really are beneath all that we think we are.