Whats True About the Mind - Essay Example

What’s True About the Mind? Mind boggling! Mind blowing! Peace of mind! In two minds! Mind You! Make up one’s mind! Give a piece of my mind! Mind set! We are all familiar with such everyday utterances spoken casually. But have we ever realized that we perpetually function with our mind which is on ‘active mode’ twenty four hours of the day? The fact that we depend on our mind for every move that we make, either at the conscious or subconscious level cannot be ever disputed. The faculty which is responsible for man’s thought, actions, feelings and speech is his mind. This entity is what sets man apart from other lower animals. The mind determines a man’s intellect or his intelligence. It cannot be denied that the mind is responsible for original and creative thought, for recollection and memory, opinion or sentiment, information storage and retrieval, etc. Our five senses of touch, smell, sight, taste and hearing are the main inputs to the brain which makes the mind react, respond and externalize them into thoughts, actions, feelings and speech. Our mind can function only based on what we experience. Our thought process is always on ‘autopilot mode’ whether we wake or sleep, following a preset course based on what we have seen, heard or felt. Right from birth, whatever we experience is recorded and stored in the mind and this becomes available for recalling later when required. We go to the beach and watch the sea, waves, shells and sands. It is stored in our mind and our next visit activates our mind into realizing where we are. The mind puts things into their perspective. Perception of the mind has a ‘family resemblance’ because it is a matter of acquisition of beliefs about what we perceive. The working of the mind is influenced by our behavior and our behavior is influenced by the world around us, our culture and our upbringing. It may be dominating, submissive, inhuman or humane. Our mind also inherits ancestral traits like intelligence, love, hate, emotion threshold, etc. We become what and how we think. Our life becomes what we imagine and believe in most. The world is our mirror reflecting images into our own thought processes. Aristotle called man a ‘rational animal’ juxtaposed to Freud’s opinion of human beings as being ‘irrational’. Rational or irrational, we must agree that we possess powers of reasoning and arguing for what we believe. We become irrational only when we make a mistake in reasoning and not due to an absence of reasoning power itself. The mind is able to judge situations and act accordingly. It has the capacity to be aware of things around us. It follows a certain logical pattern and works within a time frame called memory. It distinguishes near memory from distant memory. How else can we know yesterday from last year? The mind is conditioned into taking certain basics for granted. We underplay our knowledge because some of it is so common­ place, so familiar from our everyday acquaintance with us and other people. Our mind is like a kite, capable of transporting us on a mental plane wherever we want to without moving an inch. The mind rambles when we want it to and can also be conditioned to stay where we want it to. We hold the strings/controls. It is an ocean of energy which flashes in and out of places in a fraction of a second. Our thoughts and actions are linked to this energy which we call ‘the mind’. It forms images of what is seen, heard or felt and forms an interpretation or perception. There are moments when our mind lets us down too. We have trouble remembering telephone numbers, grocery lists, location of house key, etc. We have faced embarrassing situations when we forget names or faces of close acquaintances. Our mind draws a blank and there is a temporary memory lapse. The mind is also capable of lying-intentionally or unintentionally. We lie when asked our age; we lie to escape form uncomfortable encounters. Sometimes our mind races ahead of us forcing errors in performance. For instance, while working on a mathematical problem, our mind deduces the answer so fast that we inadvertently leave out a digit somewhere. Short attention spans also get us, especially children, into trouble. How often have children been caught star-gazing in the classroom? Our mind has the capacity to resist and willfully throw aside incidents and memories it does not wish to recall. Willpower is definitely a thing of the mind. How can we explain the concept of dreams? Of dreams that have transported us to places. Of dreams in which we have visited our dear departed? Of dreams that have offered solutions to our problems at a subconscious level? These are facts about the mind that are undisputedly true. Our mind influences all walks of our life. It is something beyond our comprehension- the greatest human mystery which scientists and philosophers still seek to solve. It is as complex as trying to understanding plate tectonics or genetic inheritance factors or elementary particle physics. Perhaps much more complex! Someday, somehow, someone may understand the mind. Let our mind wait in suspended animation till then. What has changed about the mind belief? The evolution of the mind is a continuous process. We are forever learning, memorizing, remembering, forming images or dreaming. Information is being received continually. What do we do with this information? Like any automated system like the computer, the mind does two things- it updates the information or revises the information. This information is categorized and stacked away. When required the mind filters the relevant details and recycles it to us presenting it in the form we require. Such selection seems to be necessary as otherwise it takes too long to recall any specific memory. All this happens in a miniscule fraction of a second! Memory and speed of recall of the human mind is astounding. The mind puts even the fastest computers to shame. It is amazing how sometimes even certain trivial incidents that happened years ago stand out with stark clarity in our minds. For instance, we vividly remember fighting over a chocolate with our siblings. We remember the image of an old lady bent over her sickle in our village farm. Familiar smells wafting in the breeze reminds us of summers and holidays spent in our old home. We feel a sense of nostalgia, a sense of deja vu. The mind has acquired the status of scientific enquiry. Things which were taken for granted are now questioned. Mendel scratched the surface of the mystery behind the theory of genetics and genetic factors and since then the phenomena has been intensely researched. Could we think of test-tube babies and clones a few years back? There is a definite change in the way our mind functioned, say, fifty years back and now. If someone told me I could send letters to any part of the world in a jiffy, as recent as two decades ago, I would have laughed outright. Our belief has changed now and our mind has accepted that the world has taken rapid strides in telecommunications People are also paradoxical in their thinking. They believe in ghosts, magic and spells, but when their belief is dashed to the ground when explained through the language of science they refuse to change their stand. Why? Because they can’t comprehend what is being talked about. Great spiritual leaders have taken masses and turned them into believers on blind faith. And that faith is as real as life, yet you can’t see, touch, taste, smell or hear it. You can only perceive it mentally and emotionally. But such established beliefs are hard to break because they are based on blind faith or dogma. For that reason, the scientific world is coming up with ways to simplify the language and explain it in ways easier to understand. They can then judge what is true based on what they are capable of understanding. Quantum physics explains that even God is energy. Everything is comprised of energy, and human mind is the most powerful unquantifiable form of energy in the universe that can guide and direct us. Have we questioned why some people are more artistic or creative than others? Why some people are excellent inventors but bad managers? Did we wonder why some children made better students than others? We accept various states of mind unquestioningly -something handed down by parents, something genetic, something God-given. But science has shown that the brain has two hemispheres-the left responsible for logic, sequence, analysis and the right for emotions and imagination. Our characteristic traits depend on the degree of activity of the left or the right hemisphere. So now we refuse to sit back but try to do something about making optimum use of the brain. We now hear that the best genes can be isolated and passed on to next generations. We hear of the stem-cell theory which can treat diseases. All this leads us to conclude that our understanding of the mind definitely changes with time. Old beliefs have to be revised or updated based on scientific theories and proven evidences. In the interest of living in synchronization with the society and the environment, it is only natural that the mind tries to adapt to the present without obstinately clinging to the past. Maybe, someday the mind will go on an ‘auto-update mode’. Maybe, someday we will understand the mind! Works Cited Davidmann, Manfred. How the human brain developed and how the human mind works. Article retrieved from the internet. 2006 25 November 2007. McGinn, Colin. The character of mind: an introduction to the philosophy of the mind. London: Oxford University Press. 1996. Stein, Edward: Without good reason: the rationality debate in philosophy and cognitive science. Oxford : Clarendon Press. 1997. Thagard, Paul. Mind readings: introductory selections on cognitive science. Cambridge : MIT Press. 1998 Read More