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The name doesn't matter, but it is a fact that there are processes that we don't control that are very intelligent in our brain. Let me point that "we don't co

by narag 4y ago

The name doesn't matter, but it is a fact that there are processes that we don't control that are very intelligent in our brain. Let me point that "we don't control" and "in your brain" is a contradiction somehow. If it's in your brain, it's you. I'd simply say "you are your brain" and call it a day. A programmer metaphor: you start a thread that acts more or less on its own and never really dumps result to the main thread or registers its course in the memory, but it doesn't mean that it's "another you" in the brain. Sometimes you wake up at night and then never remember that moment, it doesn't settle in the memory, unless something happens that keeps you awaken, the you do remember the moment. My point is that what surfaces and gets recalled it's not you and then there's "another intelligent system" with different rules, just a subsystem that most of the time is unattended.

Jensson 4y ago
> If it's in your brain, it's you. So you can fall asleep whenever you want? You never spend minutes lying in bed trying to sleep but being unable to? Otherwise no, you aren't in control of your brain, your brain is in control of you. It decides when you get to compute and experience things, you don't get to, if it wants you to work you work, if it wants you to sleep you sleep, you aren't in control.
- coldtea 4y ago
  Your mistake is considering "you" as just the part that consciously decides. There's no brain and you, there's just you (or just the brain, it's the same thing). You and your brain is one thing, not two. In other words, I can fall asleep whenever I want. But "I" (and my brain) is not just my conscious/speaking layer. The whole layer stack needs to want it and put it to practice. It's the same with any other activity, just that for most there's less disagreement between parts of the layer stack. E.g. we can usually speak anytime "we" want. But an autistic person going non-verbal finds that they can't speak, even if their (what-you-call "I") thinking/top-layer wants it.
  - Jensson 4y ago
    So people who say "I couldn't fall asleep" are misleading? What they should have said is "I didn't want to fall asleep", is that what you mean? To me that seems to be very different from how most people think and reason about this. To most people "I" are the parts they control, the rest they talk about as if it was something else.
    - coldtea 4y ago
      >So people who say "I couldn't fall asleep" are misleading? What they should have said is "I didn't want to fall asleep", is that what you mean? No, I meant that whether they wanted it or not at the "top layer" (the conscious "I") is irrelevant, the whole brain stack needs to "want it" (or at least, a big enough chunk of it, so that it's put to action). >To most people "I" are the parts they control, the rest they talk about as if it was something else. Of course, but most people are not trying to be precise and reason about their brain workings, the way conginitive science or TFA does. They just use whatever simplified mental model is handy, accuracy be damned. People also historically believed that "I" is the "soul" too...
  - CapstanRoller 4y ago
    >There's no brain and you, there's just you (or just the brain, it's the same thing). You and your brain is one thing, not two. This is only true if you equate "self" with "body", which is a fairly narrow assertion that breaks down quickly when confronted with the complex reality of human experience (e.g. dissociation [0]). Even the "conscious you" is not really a discrete entity when it comes to self-perception. There are many useful approaches in psychology that regard that "conscious you" as being a composition of a team of several things with differing motivations [1]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissociation_(psychology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissociation_(psychology) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_Family_Systems_Model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_Family_Systems_Model
    - narag 4y ago
      This is only true if you equate "self" with "body", which is a fairly narrow assertion that breaks down quickly when confronted with the complex reality of human experience (e.g. dissociation [0]). Are you suggesting that dissociation involves something outside the body? Because otherwise what happens --and it's clear in the [0] link you provide-- is that a part of the brain struggle to connect with the rest. That doesn't mean that there is more than one you, but that you suffer a condition that fragments your brain work. That happens in serious mental illness, also in altered states, see "K-Hole" induced by ketamine. But it's more of "you" disconnected from the perception. If you take a moment to review the whole thread, not just the immediate comment above the one you're responding to, you'll see that it was started with a mention to subconscious as described by Freud in his early works. The objection to that has been that it's not a concept that's commonly accepted now in that precise form, because it suggests that there is another personality inside your mind, similarly structured as the main consciousness. The first comment says that the "subsconscious ask the conscious self", or something like that, that implies a rational actor following a strategy to confront the ego, a different structure. We still know little of the brain working, but it seems to be a massively parallel computing process, with the perception being the glue that composes our reality and keeping us "sane" and focused.

by narag 4y ago

Jensson 4y ago

> If it's in your brain, it's you. So you can fall asleep whenever you want? You never spend minutes lying in bed trying to sleep but being unable to? Otherwise no, you aren't in control of your brain, your brain is in control of you. It decides when you get to compute and experience things, you don't get to, if it wants you to work you work, if it wants you to sleep you sleep, you aren't in control.

coldtea 4y ago
Your mistake is considering "you" as just the part that consciously decides. There's no brain and you, there's just you (or just the brain, it's the same thing). You and your brain is one thing, not two. In other words, I can fall asleep whenever I want. But "I" (and my brain) is not just my conscious/speaking layer. The whole layer stack needs to want it and put it to practice. It's the same with any other activity, just that for most there's less disagreement between parts of the layer stack. E.g. we can usually speak anytime "we" want. But an autistic person going non-verbal finds that they can't speak, even if their (what-you-call "I") thinking/top-layer wants it.
- Jensson 4y ago
  So people who say "I couldn't fall asleep" are misleading? What they should have said is "I didn't want to fall asleep", is that what you mean? To me that seems to be very different from how most people think and reason about this. To most people "I" are the parts they control, the rest they talk about as if it was something else.
  - coldtea 4y ago
    >So people who say "I couldn't fall asleep" are misleading? What they should have said is "I didn't want to fall asleep", is that what you mean? No, I meant that whether they wanted it or not at the "top layer" (the conscious "I") is irrelevant, the whole brain stack needs to "want it" (or at least, a big enough chunk of it, so that it's put to action). >To most people "I" are the parts they control, the rest they talk about as if it was something else. Of course, but most people are not trying to be precise and reason about their brain workings, the way conginitive science or TFA does. They just use whatever simplified mental model is handy, accuracy be damned. People also historically believed that "I" is the "soul" too...
- CapstanRoller 4y ago
  >There's no brain and you, there's just you (or just the brain, it's the same thing). You and your brain is one thing, not two. This is only true if you equate "self" with "body", which is a fairly narrow assertion that breaks down quickly when confronted with the complex reality of human experience (e.g. dissociation [0]). Even the "conscious you" is not really a discrete entity when it comes to self-perception. There are many useful approaches in psychology that regard that "conscious you" as being a composition of a team of several things with differing motivations [1]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissociation_(psychology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissociation_(psychology) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_Family_Systems_Model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_Family_Systems_Model
  - narag 4y ago
    This is only true if you equate "self" with "body", which is a fairly narrow assertion that breaks down quickly when confronted with the complex reality of human experience (e.g. dissociation [0]). Are you suggesting that dissociation involves something outside the body? Because otherwise what happens --and it's clear in the [0] link you provide-- is that a part of the brain struggle to connect with the rest. That doesn't mean that there is more than one you, but that you suffer a condition that fragments your brain work. That happens in serious mental illness, also in altered states, see "K-Hole" induced by ketamine. But it's more of "you" disconnected from the perception. If you take a moment to review the whole thread, not just the immediate comment above the one you're responding to, you'll see that it was started with a mention to subconscious as described by Freud in his early works. The objection to that has been that it's not a concept that's commonly accepted now in that precise form, because it suggests that there is another personality inside your mind, similarly structured as the main consciousness. The first comment says that the "subsconscious ask the conscious self", or something like that, that implies a rational actor following a strategy to confront the ego, a different structure. We still know little of the brain working, but it seems to be a massively parallel computing process, with the perception being the glue that composes our reality and keeping us "sane" and focused.