4 ms·

Is the brain an apparatus which produces consciousness and physically stores information or one which connects consciousness to meat and senses? Or both and mor

Is the brain an apparatus which produces consciousness and physically stores information or one which connects consciousness to meat and senses? Or both and more? Also is this thing we’re looking at information or is it the essence of perceiving and differentiating? Where exactly is it? In molecules in physical space? Neuron configuration and firings - signal patterns distributed in time? Spontaneous, responding to environment, a combination or more? I don’t know the answers, these are questions I find myself curious about after exposure to different viewpoints and experiences.

warent 5y ago
These are some of my favorite questions. Is death an abyss of nothingness, like going to a dreamless sleep and never waking up? Maybe! Do we die and live in an afterlife? Perhaps! But what an amusingly and ironically simple, easy answer either would be! Look at anything in life and the universe. In this reality, is there anything so simple and clear cut? Yet somehow this process of consciousness we call "death" is reduced to such a profoundly simple and binary thing. Consciousness and death, two fundamentally undefined things, frequently given a conclusion so simple it can be explained to a child. Not that we can be blamed for doing this. Given the complexity of everything else in this apparent infinity, it seems far more likely that whatever happens is complex beyond our Comprehension. Something far greater than nothingness or an afterlife.
- vaidhy 5y ago
  I would also add that the fact they are undefined itself is interesting. Are they undefined because we do not know about them or we do not want to define them? I think we do not want to define them as they would make humans not so special and we do not want to feel "not-special".
- codq 5y ago
  Something I think about sometimes is that death is the only thing that we all share, the only thing every organic entity has ever done and will do; indeed, not all of us are even born, not all of us even make it out of the womb, but all of us, every one, dies. It seems to me that the death state is actually the natural state—life is the outlier, the extreme, unnatural state. Death is home.
- robotresearcher 5y ago
  Where does the rainbow go when the rain stops?
- polishdude20 5y ago
  I've been thinking what it feels like to die is the whole process of your brain shutting down. My hypothesis is that as your brain cells start to die, some die before others. I wonder if the process of dieing is experienced in hallucinations as the self experiences more and more cell death. Then at some point, the cells that do the experiencing and that give you a sense of self vs other slowly die and you lose your ability to distinguish yourself from the rest of your experience. This, I imagine, is what it feels to be "one with the universe".
ctoth 5y ago
No, these questions are not interesting, or profound, or wise and I am sorry you find them still mysterious. If we cut out parts of the brain, the thing that is you changes. Your consciousness changes. If the brain were merely some sort of antenna, this would not be what we would expect to see. If there were some signal that your brain was picking up on, that signal would have to be detectable externally as your brain is a physical thing and if it can pick up on it, so can another antenna. All that you are is contained in a couple of pounds of goo inside your skull, your brain is not some sort of metaphysical transceiver
- xvector 5y ago
  It is so frustrating to me that people ponder these 'questions' and we as a species are so far behind the cultural drive necessary to actually solve the problem of death.
  - ctoth 5y ago
    I think it would help if all the people with useless platitudes who love to pretend to be wise about these things would just get the heck out of the way and let us solve this already, but I know it makes you look a little crazy to normal people to say you want to stop death. They start bringing out the cached responses about how death makes life worth living and so-on it's literally insane. Shrugs. Maybe we'll be born somewhere more sane next time ;-)
    - xvector 5y ago
      Exactly, and then when they're on their deathbed they don't want to die. Seriously, I wish people could think the slightest bit ahead.
  - nradov 5y ago
    Is death a problem? If a problem has no solution then it's not really a problem, just a fact to be accepted.
- burnished 5y ago

warent 5y ago

These are some of my favorite questions. Is death an abyss of nothingness, like going to a dreamless sleep and never waking up? Maybe! Do we die and live in an afterlife? Perhaps! But what an amusingly and ironically simple, easy answer either would be! Look at anything in life and the universe. In this reality, is there anything so simple and clear cut? Yet somehow this process of consciousness we call "death" is reduced to such a profoundly simple and binary thing. Consciousness and death, two fundamentally undefined things, frequently given a conclusion so simple it can be explained to a child. Not that we can be blamed for doing this. Given the complexity of everything else in this apparent infinity, it seems far more likely that whatever happens is complex beyond our Comprehension. Something far greater than nothingness or an afterlife.

vaidhy 5y ago
I would also add that the fact they are undefined itself is interesting. Are they undefined because we do not know about them or we do not want to define them? I think we do not want to define them as they would make humans not so special and we do not want to feel "not-special".
codq 5y ago
Something I think about sometimes is that death is the only thing that we all share, the only thing every organic entity has ever done and will do; indeed, not all of us are even born, not all of us even make it out of the womb, but all of us, every one, dies. It seems to me that the death state is actually the natural state—life is the outlier, the extreme, unnatural state. Death is home.
robotresearcher 5y ago
Where does the rainbow go when the rain stops?
polishdude20 5y ago
I've been thinking what it feels like to die is the whole process of your brain shutting down. My hypothesis is that as your brain cells start to die, some die before others. I wonder if the process of dieing is experienced in hallucinations as the self experiences more and more cell death. Then at some point, the cells that do the experiencing and that give you a sense of self vs other slowly die and you lose your ability to distinguish yourself from the rest of your experience. This, I imagine, is what it feels to be "one with the universe".

ctoth 5y ago

No, these questions are not interesting, or profound, or wise and I am sorry you find them still mysterious. If we cut out parts of the brain, the thing that is you changes. Your consciousness changes. If the brain were merely some sort of antenna, this would not be what we would expect to see. If there were some signal that your brain was picking up on, that signal would have to be detectable externally as your brain is a physical thing and if it can pick up on it, so can another antenna. All that you are is contained in a couple of pounds of goo inside your skull, your brain is not some sort of metaphysical transceiver

xvector 5y ago
It is so frustrating to me that people ponder these 'questions' and we as a species are so far behind the cultural drive necessary to actually solve the problem of death.
- ctoth 5y ago
  I think it would help if all the people with useless platitudes who love to pretend to be wise about these things would just get the heck out of the way and let us solve this already, but I know it makes you look a little crazy to normal people to say you want to stop death. They start bringing out the cached responses about how death makes life worth living and so-on it's literally insane. Shrugs. Maybe we'll be born somewhere more sane next time ;-)
  - xvector 5y ago
    Exactly, and then when they're on their deathbed they don't want to die. Seriously, I wish people could think the slightest bit ahead.
- nradov 5y ago
  Is death a problem? If a problem has no solution then it's not really a problem, just a fact to be accepted.
burnished 5y ago