What is the Mind - Essay Example

?What is the Mind ? Descartes said: "I think therefore I am"(1697). This can be seen as an indication of his perception of his own being. He was who he was because he had a mind. Despite the fact that all humans areaware of their very physical being, they would agree with him because they cannot imagine life without thought, without a mind. This question ‘What is the mind?’ could also be ‘Where is the mind? ’because there are those who would define the mind simply as the action or function of the brain,which is of course within the skull.In the popular mind the term ‘the mind’ is often used in an identical way tothought i.e. the individual private conversations with ourselves that we conduct ‘in our heads.” People therefore talk about "making up my mind" "changing my mind" or of being "of two minds" about some matter about which a decision is required. This fits in with the idea that the mind is a very private and personal area to which no other person has access. The etymology of the word in English shows how there is some confusion as to what ‘mind’ actually means. In Old English it was ‘gemynd’, a word used to refer to memory and intention as well as thinking (, Harper 2012), even ‘having the mind aroused’. In Greek the word ‘memona’ referred to both yearning for something and also madness. In Latin, as in Old English, the word was linked to recall and memory. In English by the 14th century ‘to mind’ meant to remember. In French however the word is ‘esprit’ or spirit, and in German ‘geist’ i.e. ghost, both referring to an intangible something. The brain is obviously a physical object, it can be measured, observed, even weighed. With modern imaging techniques it is even possible to see it in action, chemically, neurologically and electronically. The mind however is much less tangible – something we all know exists yet cannot quite explain. It is a separate entity. Our body can be totally relaxed, even asleep, but the mind can be very active. The reverse can also be true - we are running along perhaps, pushing our body to its physical limits, while at the same time the mind is simply ticking over, thinking of almost nothing. The mind can be defined as that part of conscious beings which reasons, perceives, thinks, wills and judges. The Free Dictionary defines the mind as being :- The human consciousness that originates in the brain and is manifested especially in thought, perception, emotion, will, memory and imagination. It is also described in the same dictionary as :- The collective conscious and unconscious processes in a sentient organism that direct and influence mental and physical behavior. All cognitive being are born with amazing brains and minds, yet it is something about which humanity in general knows relatively very little. This essay will consider various views on the subject, looking at research, at opinions, secular ideas and religious texts. It is likely that man, from earliest time, has been aware that he is made up of more than physical things, more even than what he perceives through his senses - man is after all a dreamer and also capable of spiritual experiences. Probably the oldest known ideas about the mind come from Zoroaster who may have lived as long ago as 2000 B.C.E.(Parsa, undated), although estimates of his dates vary considerably. According to his biographer Zoroaster, a Persian philosopher and the founder of the Zoroastrian religion taught that :- By keeping the mind healthy and by making use of creative forces, individuals can find satisfaction and passion in what they do. In Buddhism the body is compared to a house and our mind to a guest staying there. According to this belief when a person dies their mind moves on into the next life or place , and the house, as houses do, stays behind to be taken care of. (Kadampa 2010). The same article also points out that, as the mind is formless, it is totally unrestricted by physical objects – which explains why it is possible to dream or to consider something without being in its physical presence, to carry out activities such as mental arithmetic for instance. Buddhism teaches that every action man undertakes has its origin in the mind (Gyatso, 2010). Despite not being a physical entity the mind can be disturbed by physical things – we can be afraid, happy, worried – all activities of the mind, yet most often these emotions are caused by physical things. The philosophy of mind is the branch of philosophy which studies the nature of the mind. This school of thought considers mental events, functions, mental properties, and such things as consciousness and its relationship to the physical body, especially to the brain. In philosophy panpsychism is the view which holds that everything has a mental aspect and exists universally. However, according to the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy ( 2010) this does not necessarily imply cognition or understanding, but then one might ask how can there be a mental aspect without a mind, even at the most basic level. The various religions have somewhat different points of view. In Judaism they teach that "moachshalit al halev", i.e. the mind rules the heart.( Gal Einai Institute, 1996). That being said it was thought in ancient Judaism that the mind was actually in the heart, rather than within the skull. Jews feel that man can approach God in an intellectual way according to His will as defined within their scriptures. This fits in with what McDowell (1927, ix) said “their ideas, assumptions, and outlook on life may all be colored by the material they handle.’ He goes on to point out in his introduction that different people use their minds in very different ways according to their circumstances. He describes it as ‘each looking at reality through their own window.’( McDowell, 1927, ix) and goes on to say that each person , even if looking at the same things , makes assumptions as an individual. With regard to Christianity Taylor ( undated) shows how often in the New Testament scriptures the Greek ‘nous’ or ‘mind’ is translated as understanding, but explains that there are a number of different words which are translated in the same way or as ‘knowledge’. Luke 24 v 25’ speaks about people’s mind being opened so that they can understand. He shows how St Paul clearly sees man as being a trichotomy i.e. made up of three parts – the flesh, the soul/spirit and the mind, yet at the same time both the body i.e. its actions, and the spirit are affected by the workings of the mind:- If your nous (mind) is invaded by the Spirit of God, your spirit filled mind will keep your flesh (body) under control, and you will be described as a spiritual person. ( Taylor, undated). Not everyone defines the mind from a religious point of view of course. According to The School of Metaphysics ( 2011) the mindis made up of three parts – the conscious, the unconscious and the superconcious. Most people are familiar with the first two. The third can be defined as transcending normal human consciousness ( Concise Oxford Dictionary, 2008) so would include such things as extra sensory perception, which are perhaps harder to understand as not being an experience common to all. Jorgenson ( 2010) describes how it was only in the17th century that modern ideas about the mind began to be discussed, citing names such as Hobbes, Descartes and Locke. Hobbes spoke about the consciousness as being ‘a thousand witnesses’ of the world. He saw consciousness as both being a shared awareness and also a very private matter speaking of ‘private fact’ and private thoughts’. Locke found himself unable to define ‘person’ without referring to their mind:- [A person] is a thinking intelligent Being, that has reason and reflection, and can consider it self as it self, the same thinking thing in different times and places; which it does only by that consciousness, which is inseparable from thinking, and as it seems to me essential to it: It being impossible for anyone to perceive, without perceiving, that he does perceive. (Essay 2.27.9) Jorgenson ( 2010) also mentions Leibniz who distinguished between a person’s perception of external things and the ability to think about these things – to reflect, something he said was ‘not given to all souls, nor at all times to a given soul.’, in other words we don’t always reflect upon the information our minds are processing. Leibniz believed that minds, or something very similar, are not just human attributes , but were common throughout nature. A few years later Hegel, in his ‘Phenomenology of Mind’( 1807), discusses three distinct types of mind. These are he say ‘ the subjective mind' of an individual; the 'objective mind', that is the mind of society at large, the shared awareness described earlier by Hobbs, what others have described as the collective consciousness, and thirdly he describes 'Absolute mind', a unity of variousconcepts Western(1999) in the index to his book lists many different aspects of this topic – behaviour, sensation and perception, learning and memory, thought and language, intelligence, consciousness, motivation, emotion, stress, coping and more. Some of those things however can be affected in physical ways – after a cerebro vascular accident ( a stroke) someone’s language may be affected; in Alzheimer’s disease the memory is adversely affected; certain chemicals can make people happier or depressed by their presence or absence; damage to the frontal and temporal lobe affects personality ( Western, 1999 page 99). It seems therefore that the mind , although not tangible, is very closely involved and affected by physical things. It is even possible to view a mind map which shows clearly which parts of the brain affect such things as our emotions, our understanding and our self-awareness ( BBC, 2012) . Just like any measurable, solid things the mind can be damaged and go wrong. Persaud (2012) quotes figures of 1 in 4 people experiencing some type of mental health problem during their lives, with 1 in 6 having experience of depression and as many of 1 in 10 suffering from disabling degrees of anxiety. The mind is the one part of a person that is the most private.Nobody else can truly "know our mind." They are only able to interpret what iscommunicated eitherconsciously or unconsciously.Even the cleverest psychologist or psychiatrist cannot necessarily know what someone is thinking, even though they may have a very good idea. Nor can they stop them thinking as they want to. It is perhaps the last bastion of freedom in a world where, from birth, at least in the western world, everyone is measured, weighed and assessed by society, and is just another statistic in many terms. In contrast to this desire to intrude into every aspect of life Gandhi ( date not known) said :- ‘You can chain me, you can torture me, you can even destroy this body, but you will never imprison my mind.’ This perhaps fits in with very early ideas about the mind being linked closely with the soul and so being immortal and linked with divinity. So our mind is a unique part of each of us , something that makes us special , makes us who we are, whatever kind of body we inhabit. At the same time ‘no man is an island’(Donne, 17th century). Even our innermost thoughts are affected by the wider world. Einstein, writing in 1954, stated his belief that:- What a person thinks on his own without being stimulated by the thoughts and experiences of other people is even in the best case rather paltry and monotonous. Yet the mind is capable of being manipulated by outside forces. Carey, 2007 describes an experiment in which the perceptions of students about a person they met only very briefly, were affected by circumstances – in this case whether they were asked to take hold of a cup of iced coffee or a hot one. They were unaware of this effect as it affected their subconscious , rather than their conscious minds. The same other cites several other studies showing similar effects. This would fit in with Freud’s 19th century ideas about the mind. He thought that the unconscious mind was the reservoir for feelings , ideas and memories, in particular unpleasant ideas that are suppressed. Despite this suppression these deeply hidden ideas have an effect upon every day actions and experiences of life. (Cherry, 2012). In Yogahara, part of Buddhism, the individual mind is seen as the space within which individuals build their own version of reality, (Integral Alive , undated).The theory is that the mind receives information from the various senses and then decodes this information based on their personal life experiences, their cultural background and its influence, as well as the beliefs they hold, religious or otherwise and the value systems that go with these. The result is a very individual personal constructed version of the world in which they find themselves. If this is doubted think to the situation of a demanding child and their parent. The child wants something and thinks if he persists he will get it.The parent on the other hand knows that they neither want to spend the money on the particular item, perhaps they feel they can’t afford it, or that it might not be good for the child. Each has a very different view of what is about to happen – the child convinced that owning this item will make their life perfect. The parent on the other hand , if they are sensible, knows that they are going to resist the plea and that the toy will be forgotten or broken in a very short time. This is perhaps a trivial thing , but it does illustrate how people can see the same things from very different points of view, despite having minds which are very similar. This Buddhist idea is that when we receive new information we either ignore it, because it does not fit into what we already know, or else we accept this into our consciousness and allow ourselves to adapt to it. That is a religious point of view. A scientific viewpoint is taken by Smart, 2007. This describes:- The identity theory of mind holds that states and processes of the mind are identical to states and processes of the brain. Yet the theory does not hold that mind and brain are identical despite common usage of phrases such as ‘He has a good brain’ with ‘He has a great mind.’, pointing out that one is measurable and the other definitely is not. The definition given by Smart ( 2007) states that such things as feeling pain, or having a dream, are actually brain processes. This idea denies the existence of non-physical aspects to the mind. He cites earlier ideas such as that of Karl Vogt ( born 1817, who stated that ‘the brain secretes thought as the liver secretes bile.’ though is unsure as to whether or not Vogt meant his remark to be taken seriously or not. Opposed to Vogt idea of the mind’s action being a kind of physical secretion is Robinson’s ( 2011) discussion of dualism in which he states the belief that, despite the reality of the world , the mind cannot be considered to be part of that reality. Conclusion The Centre for the Mind, is obviously concerned with how the mind works, but in particular how this helps people to succeed in their lives. They describes their work in one short sentence ‘We explore what it is to be uniquely human.’, and for each of us that is a different and changing experience, which is perhaps why this is such a complex subject to study. It is obvious both that there are, and have been, lots of different definitions and ideas about the mind, both religious and scientific. This variety is of course because this thing we call the mind is so intangible and therefore hard to pin down. Ideas on the topic are affected by many factors – religious or other beliefs, culture and personal experience, scientific research findings and other ideas and experiences of the societies in which we find ourselves. There is still so much to learn, only a drop in a great ocean of as yet unknown dimensions. References B.B.C., 24th March 2012, Human Brain Map, Science: Human Body and Mind, retrieved 24th March 2012 http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/body/interactives/organs/brainmap/index.shtml Bible, New International Version, ( 2008) London, Hodder and Stoughton Carey, B., July 31st 2007, Who’s Minding the Mind?The New York Times, Mental Health andBehavior, retrieved 24th March 2012 from http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/31/health/psychology/31subl.html?pagewanted=all Centre for the Mind, 2012, Who We Are , retrieved 27th March 2012 from http://www.centreforthemind.com/whoweare/index.cfm Cherry, K., 2012, What is the Unconscious? About.com. 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