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Can we talk about thinking?

We are born as unreflective thinkers; many of us die decades later, still unreflective thinkers.

Who ever told us that we need to think about thinking? Who told us that we must practice thinking? Just as we must practice throwing or hitting a ball to improve our ability to play sports, likewise we must also practice thinking if we wish to improve our ability to think.

Isn’t thinking just like breathing? We all breath and think; no one needs to practice such automatic things that our body does without our conscious action. Wrong! The body does handle breathing pretty well without our conscious management, but not so with thinking.

There is a difference between “naive thinking” and “sophisticated thinking”. Can the naïve thinker become a sophisticated thinker? The answer is yes; provided there is motivated practice and study.

A child clinging to her mother’s skirt is not an uncommon site. A child with wide eyes and a look of apprehension seeking security and assurance by remaining very close to his mother (his center of balance) is similar to the centricities we all carry forward and often remain with us until we die.

Our centricities, our centers of irrational influence, are often the ego and the group. I suspect that as we get older we focus less on the ego for guidance and more upon the social group. Our nation centric, our ethnic centric, our political centric forces provide us with illusions of security without any independent thinking on our own.

I think that it is worthwhile to focus our attention on the metaphors ‘egocentricity is a disease’ and ‘sociocentricity is a disease’. The cure for both diseases is self-consciousness. Being self-conscious permits us to combat the fever of irrationality caused by both tendencies.

Of the two I suspect sociocentricity causes us and our community the greatest harm. When our ego leads us to do stupid things the harm done is limited because we generally affect only our self and maybe a few others. Sociocentricity, however, can easily be identified as the cause of the destruction and death of many.

Ethno centric is one form of socio centric attitudes and behavior. Ethno centric is placing ones own race as the privileged group. This form of socio centric behavior is perhaps the most predominate and lethal form of social bias. Regardless of which group we belong to I suspect that one of the most important things one might do to make the world a better place in which to live is for all of us to become self-conscious of these innate human tendencies.

Basic concepts become weapons of warfare within social groups. Basic words such as capitalism, socialism, communism, democracy, freedom, oligarchy, plutocracy, evil, patriotism, terrorism, etc. are twisted and maneuvered to confuse, distort, and to excite members of a group one way or another.

I think that people often have difficulty distinguishing ideological uses of such words from their non ideological uses. What do you think?

It appears that the key question of an egocentric is “How can I get what I want and avoid having to change in any fundamental way?”

Thinking is a natural body instinct in order to survive. I guess we could survive without thinking, but if we never thought, we wouldn't have any technology, so thinking is a good thing.

Thinking is good and bad i think (i think lol) Some days I have great good fun thoughts but other days not so good I wish we could just have good happy thoughts.

Thought begets heresy; heresy begets retribution.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Thought begets heresy; heresy begets retribution.

I concur.

god, I was hoping for epistemology and alls I gets is some anti-conformity stuff

in all seriousness, I find this type of logic quickly devolves into "My way of thinking is right" which is not far away from "If you don't think what I think, you aren't thinking properly".

Originally posted by inimalist
god, I was hoping for epistemology and alls I gets is some anti-conformity stuff

in all seriousness, I find this type of logic quickly devolves into "My way of thinking is right" which is not far away from "If you don't think what I think, you aren't thinking properly".

Okay, but my way of thinking is right and if you don't think what I think you are thinking improperly.

Originally posted by coberst
Can we talk about thinking?

We are born as unreflective thinkers; many of us die decades later, still unreflective thinkers.

Who ever told us that we need to think about thinking? Who told us that we must practice thinking? Just as we must practice throwing or hitting a ball to improve our ability to play sports, likewise we must also practice thinking if we wish to improve our ability to think.

Isn’t thinking just like breathing? We all breath and think; no one needs to practice such automatic things that our body does without our conscious action. Wrong! The body does handle breathing pretty well without our conscious management, but not so with thinking.

There is a difference between “naive thinking” and “sophisticated thinking”. Can the naïve thinker become a sophisticated thinker? The answer is yes; provided there is motivated practice and study.

A child clinging to her mother’s skirt is not an uncommon site. A child with wide eyes and a look of apprehension seeking security and assurance by remaining very close to his mother (his center of balance) is similar to the centricities we all carry forward and often remain with us until we die.

Our centricities, our centers of irrational influence, are often the ego and the group. I suspect that as we get older we focus less on the ego for guidance and more upon the social group. Our nation centric, our ethnic centric, our political centric forces provide us with illusions of security without any independent thinking on our own.

I think that it is worthwhile to focus our attention on the metaphors ‘egocentricity is a disease’ and ‘sociocentricity is a disease’. The cure for both diseases is self-consciousness. Being self-conscious permits us to combat the fever of irrationality caused by both tendencies.

Of the two I suspect sociocentricity causes us and our community the greatest harm. When our ego leads us to do stupid things the harm done is limited because we generally affect only our self and maybe a few others. Sociocentricity, however, can easily be identified as the cause of the destruction and death of many.

Ethno centric is one form of socio centric attitudes and behavior. Ethno centric is placing ones own race as the privileged group. This form of socio centric behavior is perhaps the most predominate and lethal form of social bias. Regardless of which group we belong to I suspect that one of the most important things one might do to make the world a better place in which to live is for all of us to become self-conscious of these innate human tendencies.

Basic concepts become weapons of warfare within social groups. Basic words such as capitalism, socialism, communism, democracy, freedom, oligarchy, plutocracy, evil, patriotism, terrorism, etc. are twisted and maneuvered to confuse, distort, and to excite members of a group one way or another.

I think that people often have difficulty distinguishing ideological uses of such words from their non ideological uses. What do you think?

It appears that the key question of an egocentric is “How can I get what I want and avoid having to change in any fundamental way?”
What have you observed that would lead you to these conclusions?

Originally posted by Mindship
What have you observed that would lead you to these conclusions?

I'm not sure if he/she has thought this through.

Originally posted by inimalist
god, I was hoping for epistemology and alls I gets is some anti-conformity stuff

in all seriousness, I find this type of logic quickly devolves into "My way of thinking is right" which is not far away from "If you don't think what I think, you aren't thinking properly".

You wouldn't think that if you thought properly...

In the 1970s a new body of empirical research began to introduce findings that questioned the traditional Anglo-American cognitive paradigm of AI (Artificial Intelligence), i.e. symbol manipulation.

This research indicates that the neurological structures associated with sensorimotor activity are mapped directly to the higher cortical brain structures to form the foundation for subjective conceptualization in the human brain. In other words, our abstract ideas are constructed with copies of sensorimotor neurological structures as a foundation. “It is the rule of thumb among cognitive scientists that unconscious thought is 95 percent of all thought—and that may be a serious underestimate.”

Categorization, the first level of abstraction from “Reality” is our first level of conceptualization and thus of knowing. Seeing is a process that includes categorization, we see something as an interaction between the seer and what is seen. “Seeing typically involves categorization.”

Our categories are what we consider to be real in the world: tree, rock, animal…Our concepts are what we use to structure our reasoning about these categories. Concepts are neural structures that are the fundamental means by which we reason about categories.

Human categories, the stuff of experience, are reasoned about in many different ways. These differing ways of reasoning, these different conceptualizations, are called prototypes and represent the second level of conceptualization

Typical-case prototype conceptualization modes are “used in drawing inferences about category members in the absence of any special contextual information. Ideal-case prototypes allow us to evaluate category members relative to some conceptual standard…Social stereotypes are used to make snap judgments…Salient exemplars (well-known examples) are used for making probability judgments…Reasoning with prototypes is, indeed, so common that it is inconceivable that we could function for long without them.”

When we conceptualize categories in this fashion we often envision them using spatial metaphors. Spatial relation metaphors form the heart of our ability to perceive, conceive, and to move about in space. We unconsciously form spatial relation contexts for entities: ‘in’, ‘on’, ‘about’, ‘across from’ some other entity are common relationships that make it possible for us to function in our normal manner.

When we perceive a black cat and do not wish to cross its path our imagination conceives container shapes such that we do not penetrate the container space occupied by the cat at some time in its journey. We function in space and the container schema is a normal means we have for reasoning about action in space. Such imaginings are not conscious but most of our perception and conception is an automatic unconscious force for functioning in the world.

Our manner of using language to explain experience provides us with an insight into our cognitive structuring process. Perceptual cues are mapped onto cognitive spaces wherein a representation of the experience is structured onto our spatial-relation contour. There is no direct connection between perception and language.

The claim of cognitive science is “that the very properties of concepts are created as a result of the way the brain and the body are structured and the way they function in interpersonal relations and in the physical world.”

Quotes from “Philosophy in the Flesh” by Lakoff and Johnson

Questions for discussion

Is all of this of any importance for ‘the man on the street’? I think so because if we comprehend these fundamental facts about human perception and motor movement we will better comprehend why we do the things we do.

We live our lives by our abstract ideas, i.e. morality, flag, nation, patriotism, value, motive, good, right, fairness, etc.

Do you think it is important for ‘the man on the street’ to comprehend how concepts are made?

Originally posted by Shakyamunison
I'm not sure if he/she has thought this through. I feel like I'm being lectured to. Perhaps I needed to clarify.
Coberst, what have you observed that would lead you to these conclusions? To post all this stuff suggests a recent epiphany on your part. What have you experienced that's connected you to this information?

Originally posted by coberst
In the 1970s a new body of empirical research began to introduce findings that questioned the traditional Anglo-American cognitive paradigm of AI (Artificial Intelligence), i.e. symbol manipulation.

This research indicates that the neurological structures associated with sensorimotor activity are mapped directly to the higher cortical brain structures to form the foundation for subjective conceptualization in the human brain. In other words, our abstract ideas are constructed with copies of sensorimotor neurological structures as a foundation. “It is the rule of thumb among cognitive scientists that unconscious thought is 95 percent of all thought—and that may be a serious underestimate.”

Categorization, the first level of abstraction from “Reality” is our first level of conceptualization and thus of knowing. Seeing is a process that includes categorization, we see something as an interaction between the seer and what is seen. “Seeing typically involves categorization.”

Our categories are what we consider to be real in the world: tree, rock, animal…Our concepts are what we use to structure our reasoning about these categories. Concepts are neural structures that are the fundamental means by which we reason about categories.

Human categories, the stuff of experience, are reasoned about in many different ways. These differing ways of reasoning, these different conceptualizations, are called prototypes and represent the second level of conceptualization

Typical-case prototype conceptualization modes are “used in drawing inferences about category members in the absence of any special contextual information. Ideal-case prototypes allow us to evaluate category members relative to some conceptual standard…Social stereotypes are used to make snap judgments…Salient exemplars (well-known examples) are used for making probability judgments…Reasoning with prototypes is, indeed, so common that it is inconceivable that we could function for long without them.”

When we conceptualize categories in this fashion we often envision them using spatial metaphors. Spatial relation metaphors form the heart of our ability to perceive, conceive, and to move about in space. We unconsciously form spatial relation contexts for entities: ‘in’, ‘on’, ‘about’, ‘across from’ some other entity are common relationships that make it possible for us to function in our normal manner.

When we perceive a black cat and do not wish to cross its path our imagination conceives container shapes such that we do not penetrate the container space occupied by the cat at some time in its journey. We function in space and the container schema is a normal means we have for reasoning about action in space. Such imaginings are not conscious but most of our perception and conception is an automatic unconscious force for functioning in the world.

Our manner of using language to explain experience provides us with an insight into our cognitive structuring process. Perceptual cues are mapped onto cognitive spaces wherein a representation of the experience is structured onto our spatial-relation contour. There is no direct connection between perception and language.

The claim of cognitive science is “that the very properties of concepts are created as a result of the way the brain and the body are structured and the way they function in interpersonal relations and in the physical world.”

Quotes from “Philosophy in the Flesh” by Lakoff and Johnson

lol, lots has been done in Cognitive Psych since the 70s

I'd suggest Gazzaniga as a good place to start

Originally posted by coberst
Questions for discussion

Is all of this of any importance for ‘the man on the street’? I think so because if we comprehend these fundamental facts about human perception and motor movement we will better comprehend why we do the things we do.

We live our lives by our abstract ideas, i.e. morality, flag, nation, patriotism, value, motive, good, right, fairness, etc.

Do you think it is important for ‘the man on the street’ to comprehend how concepts are made?

certainly not

what you are talking about are very low level perceptual processes of our brain. These are essentially inaccessible by higher order cognitive processes. Feature detectors and schematic categorization may be the basis of perception, but there is no reason for someone to know of them if they aren't interested.

These have little to do with concepts of morality and of semantic categorization or patriotism.

The closest it comes is recent stuff that shows negative outgroup motivations for people who don't have the same physical characteristics as those who belong to an ingroup. However, one can fight these ideas with far simpler policies and more direct prioritization. Making someone aware of their neurological processes (when they even believe you) means nothing for their behaviour. Exposing children to new ideas and people off all creeds will without a doubt be a more powerful way to end discrimination than would explaining to people how salient physical racial characteristics cause different schematic activation.

Originally posted by coberst
There is no direct connection between perception and language.


this statement is also incorrect

Mindship

You are right on the mark.

I am a retired engineer with a good bit of formal education and twenty five years of self-learning. I began the self-learning experience while in my mid-forties. I had no goal in mind; I was just following my intellectual curiosity in whatever direction it led me. This hobby, self-learning, has become very important to me. I have bounced around from one hobby to another but have always been enticed back by the excitement I have discovered in this learning process. Carl Sagan is quoted as having written; “Understanding is a kind of ecstasy.”

I label myself as a September Scholar because I began the process at mid-life and because my quest is disinterested knowledge.

Disinterested knowledge is an intrinsic value. Disinterested knowledge is not a means but an end. It is knowledge I seek because I desire to know it. I mean the term ‘disinterested knowledge’ as similar to ‘pure research’, as compared to ‘applied research’. Pure research seeks to know truth unconnected to any specific application.

I think of the self-learner of disinterested knowledge as driven by curiosity and imagination to understand. The September Scholar seeks to ‘see’ and then to ‘grasp’ through intellection directed at understanding the self as well as the world. The knowledge and understanding that is sought by the September Scholar are determined only by personal motivations. It is noteworthy that disinterested knowledge is knowledge I am driven to acquire because it is of dominating interest to me. Because I have such an interest in this disinterested knowledge my adrenaline level rises in anticipation of my voyage of discovery.

We often use the metaphors of ‘seeing’ for knowing and ‘grasping’ for understanding. I think these metaphors significantly illuminate the difference between these two forms of intellection. We see much but grasp little. It takes great force to impel us to go beyond seeing to the point of grasping. The force driving us is the strong personal involvement we have to the question that guides our quest. I think it is this inclusion of self-fulfillment, as associated with the question, that makes self-learning so important.

The self-learner of disinterested knowledge is engaged in a single-minded search for understanding. The goal, grasping the ‘truth’, is generally of insignificant consequence in comparison to the single-minded search. Others must judge the value of the ‘truth’ discovered by the autodidactic. I suggest that truth, should it be of any universal value, will evolve in a biological fashion when a significant number of pursuers of disinterested knowledge engage in dialogue.

In the United States our culture compels us to have a purpose. Our culture defines that purpose to be ‘maximize production and consumption’. As a result all good children feel compelled to become a successful producer and consumer. All good children both consciously and unconsciously organize their life for this journey.

At mid-life many citizens begin to analyze their life and often discover a need to reconstitute their purpose. Some of the advantageous of this self-learning experience is that it is virtually free, undeterred by age, not a zero sum game, surprising, exciting and makes each discovery a new eureka moment. The self-learning experience I am suggesting is similar to any other hobby one might undertake; interest will ebb and flow. In my case this was a hobby that I continually came back to after other hobbies lost appeal.

I suggest for your consideration that if we “Get a life—Get an intellectual life” we very well might gain substantially in self-worth and, perhaps, community-worth.

As a popular saying goes ‘there is a season for all things’. We might consider that spring and summer are times for gathering knowledge, maximizing production and consumption, and increasing net-worth; while fall and winter are seasons for gathering understanding, creating wisdom and increasing self-worth.

I have been trying to encourage adults, who in general consider education as a matter only for young people, to give this idea of self-learning a try. It seems to be human nature to do a turtle (close the mind) when encountering a new and unorthodox idea. Generally we seem to need for an idea to face us many times before we can consider it seriously. A common method for brushing aside this idea is to think ‘I’ve been there and done that’, i.e. ‘I have read and been a self-learner all my life’.

I am not suggesting a stroll in the park on a Sunday afternoon. I am suggesting a ‘Lewis and Clark Expedition’. I am suggesting the intellectual equivalent of crossing the Mississippi and heading West across unexplored intellectual territory with the intellectual equivalent of the Pacific Ocean as a destination.

Originally posted by coberst
Mindship
You are right on the mark. Now and then I get lucky.

I am a retired engineer with a good bit of formal education and twenty five years of self-learning. I began the self-learning experience while in my mid-forties. I had no goal in mind; I was just following my intellectual curiosity in whatever direction it led me. This hobby, self-learning, has become very important to me. I have bounced around from one hobby to another but have always been enticed back by the excitement I have discovered in this learning process. Carl Sagan is quoted as having written; “Understanding is a kind of ecstasy.” Indeed.

I label myself as a September Scholar because I began the process at mid-life and because my quest is disinterested knowledge.

Disinterested knowledge is an intrinsic value. Disinterested knowledge is not a means but an end. It is knowledge I seek because I desire to know it. I mean the term ‘disinterested knowledge’ as similar to ‘pure research’, as compared to ‘applied research’. Pure research seeks to know truth unconnected to any specific application.

I think of the self-learner of disinterested knowledge as driven by curiosity and imagination to understand. The September Scholar seeks to ‘see’ and then to ‘grasp’ through intellection directed at understanding the self as well as the world. The knowledge and understanding that is sought by the September Scholar are determined only by personal motivations. It is noteworthy that disinterested knowledge is knowledge I am driven to acquire because it is of dominating interest to me. Because I have such an interest in this disinterested knowledge my adrenaline level rises in anticipation of my voyage of discovery.

We often use the metaphors of ‘seeing’ for knowing and ‘grasping’ for understanding. I think these metaphors significantly illuminate the difference between these two forms of intellection. We see much but grasp little. It takes great force to impel us to go beyond seeing to the point of grasping. The force driving us is the strong personal involvement we have to the question that guides our quest. I think it is this inclusion of self-fulfillment, as associated with the question, that makes self-learning so important.

The self-learner of disinterested knowledge is engaged in a single-minded search for understanding. The goal, grasping the ‘truth’, is generally of insignificant consequence in comparison to the single-minded search. Others must judge the value of the ‘truth’ discovered by the autodidactic. I suggest that truth, should it be of any universal value, will evolve in a biological fashion when a significant number of pursuers of disinterested knowledge engage in dialogue.

In the United States our culture compels us to have a purpose. Our culture defines that purpose to be ‘maximize production and consumption’. As a result all good children feel compelled to become a successful producer and consumer. All good children both consciously and unconsciously organize their life for this journey.

At mid-life many citizens begin to analyze their life and often discover a need to reconstitute their purpose. Some of the advantageous of this self-learning experience is that it is virtually free, undeterred by age, not a zero sum game, surprising, exciting and makes each discovery a new eureka moment. The self-learning experience I am suggesting is similar to any other hobby one might undertake; interest will ebb and flow. In my case this was a hobby that I continually came back to after other hobbies lost appeal.

I suggest for your consideration that if we “Get a life—Get an intellectual life” we very well might gain substantially in self-worth and, perhaps, community-worth.

As a popular saying goes ‘there is a season for all things’. We might consider that spring and summer are times for gathering knowledge, maximizing production and consumption, and increasing net-worth; while fall and winter are seasons for gathering understanding, creating wisdom and increasing self-worth.

I have been trying to encourage adults, who in general consider education as a matter only for young people, to give this idea of self-learning a try. It seems to be human nature to do a turtle (close the mind) when encountering a new and unorthodox idea. Generally we seem to need for an idea to face us many times before we can consider it seriously. A common method for brushing aside this idea is to think ‘I’ve been there and done that’, i.e. ‘I have read and been a self-learner all my life’.

I am not suggesting a stroll in the park on a Sunday afternoon. I am suggesting a ‘Lewis and Clark Expedition’. I am suggesting the intellectual equivalent of crossing the Mississippi and heading West across unexplored intellectual territory with the intellectual equivalent of the Pacific Ocean as a destination. I can appreciate what you're saying here, much more so than in your preceding posts. And it's conjuring in my mind one overriding question: Do you meditate?
Specifically I mean, do you regularly practice any form of attentional training, especially aimed at getting through the layers of mentation?

mindship

I tried meditation long ago and managed only to sleep sitting up.

Originally posted by coberst
mindship

I tried meditation long ago and managed only to sleep sitting up. Yeah, it can have that effect.

I mention it because meditation (ie, metaconsciousness, attention-training) gives perspective on thinking (and thinking about thinking), as well as awareness of subtler phenomena (obviously, such awareness doesn't blossom overnight). You bring up educating people on how the mind works; meditation, IMO, is indispensable. However, as you've also noted, the dominant mindset / culture-at-large is not big on such reflection, especially when it's given a heavily spiritual / anti-materialistic bent (which is not really necessary; meditation can be appreciated on a number of levels).

Originally posted by coberst
mindship

I tried meditation long ago and managed only to sleep sitting up.

I think that CT (Critical Thinking) is a better means for comprehending the self and the world, however, I am not very knowledable about Eastern tradition.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Okay, but my way of thinking is right and if you don't think what I think you are thinking improperly.

lol, a sentiment most people appear to share

Originally posted by Grand-Moff-Gav
You wouldn't think that if you thought properly...

another sentiment I find a lot of people share, lol

and one more try:

Originally posted by coberst
There is no direct connection between perception and language.


What about the speech perception or reading? What about the Stroop Task? What about the McGurk effect?

There are direct neuronal connections between our sensory areas and our language areas. I don't understand how you could comment that there is no connection between them. Could you clarify?

There are direct neuronal connections between our sensory areas and our language areas. I don't understand how you could comment that there is no connection between them. Could you clarify?

In the chain of evolution when did language develop? There was no language before humans came on the scene, which means that creatures were perceiving for billions of years before there was language. Why would anyone think that language had a direct connection to perception?

Language is a means for communication. Concepts must be translated to language before language can be engaged.

Originally posted by coberst
In the chain of evolution when did language develop? There was no language before humans came on the scene, which means that creatures were perceiving for billions of years before there was language.

Whether or not language existed before humans depends entirely on how you define language.

Originally posted by coberst
Why would anyone think that language had a direct connection to perception?

He told you that. There's a direct physical link (read: connection) between them in the brain, apparently.

Originally posted by coberst
I think that CT (Critical Thinking) is a better means for comprehending the self and the world, however, I am not very knowledable about Eastern tradition. Critical thinking is certainly an essential element as well. Combined with "internal observation" -- meditation -- one can be in a position to learn how the mind works very much like critical thinking + sensory observation helps us to understand the empirical world.

Critical thinking by itself, though, especially to evaluate thinking...I sense a subtle conflict of interest here, like a bank suspected of ill-conceived lending practices saying it will set up a committee to investigate what it's doing. There's no outside, detached witness, like what meditation can provide, especially over time as the skill develops. Plus, critical thinking can evaluate only what it can see with the spotlight of untrained attention.

Listen I don't mean to be pushing it. I mention meditation only because you have a deep and earnest interest in the subject matter ("thinking", and I figured, maybe, you would find attention-training an asset.

Originally posted by coberst
In the chain of evolution when did language develop?

The theory is that early primates had a place in their brain, the homologue of Broca's area, which was used for very fine finger movement. This area developed as these primates were able to communicate basic intentions through hand signals.

It gets confusing as you morph from fine finger movement to throat articulations and audio symbols, but the premise is that this happened before the evolution into humans, and this is evidenced by the fact that chimps still have this area but it has not been changed into a vocal center.

As Sym just pointed out, it depends now on what you define as "human" and what you define as "language", and there wont be a clear line of distinction for either, but clearly somewhere between the co-ancestor between humans and chimps and now what we consider language was developed.

Originally posted by coberst
There was no language before humans came on the scene, which means that creatures were perceiving for billions of years before there was language.

1) human perception is different from any other animal. Each organism perceives that which their sensory organs enable them to, and their percepts then are dependent on the basic biology of those sensory organs. Thus, all organisms, even of the same species, are going to have a unique perception of reality. Would you say that a human who has no language ability (such as severely autistic individuals, or severe specific language impairment) have the same perception of the world that you do?

2) organisms perceived the world for billions of years without the primate cone in the retina for perceiving a specific wavelength of light. Are you then going to also argue that specific shades of red are not part of human perception simply because organisms were perceiving for billions of years without them?

3) all animals are just as evolved as humans. Humans didn't "gain" language, its use became a survival/reproductive benefit for proto-humans. Much like how evolution has altered the perception of blind subterranean mammals to encompass their environment and what was necessary for survival, it has done the same for humans.

4) ALL parts of the brain work together to create perception. Your posture while reading this will determine, to some extent, your perception of the material.

Originally posted by coberst
Why would anyone think that language had a direct connection to perception?

well, for one, there is an entire field of study devoted to the perception of language.

for another, to understand language, it must be perceived, as in, the physical stimuli must get into the brain some how.

more specifically though, would be the direct neuronal connections between primary sensory cortices, such as A1 and V1, and language centers, specifically those located at the rear of the brain near or in the parietal cortex.

Here, I'll make it absurdly apparent:

look at the following words. Attempt to say the colour they are written in, but not the word itself.











RED
BROWN
BLUE
YELLOW
GREEN
















notice how difficult this is.

Originally posted by coberst
Language is a means for communication. Concepts must be translated to language before language can be engaged.

indeed?

Originally posted by inimalist
look at the following words. Attempt to say the colour they are written in, but not the word itself.

RED
BROWN
BLUE
YELLOW
GREEN I get a kick out of this task, one of the simplest ways to evaluate executive functioning, and it's just plain fun to do.

Originally posted by Mindship
I get a kick out of this task, one of the simplest ways to evaluate executive functioning.

indeed, one of my favs



I thought it made my point well though, lol

If I could be sure the McGurk effect would work, I'd post something on it too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGurk_effect

I remember having watched, on TV, a high-jumper performing an obvious mental imagery of his up-coming jump just before he actually performed his physical feat. I could watch his gaze going through the running to the bar and lifting himself up and over the bar. It was obvious that he was doing a practice jump in his mind just before he actually performed the jump.

I have discovered since that time that this is somewhat standard practice for athletes. http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/bb/neuro/neuro02/web1/ecarlos.html

What do these practices, plus the recent empirical evidence regarding neural cognitive science, tell us about the nature of conceptualization and knowledge?

One can analyze the nature of our psyche from the phenomenological and from the neurobiological aspect. SGCS (Second Generation Cognitive Science) has, in the last several decades, developed theories about both of these aspects of human activity.

“A central tenet of an embodied cognitive theory of concepts is that concrete concepts (that is, concepts for concrete objects, events, and actions) are processed using sensorimotor areas of the brain…The guiding idea here is that thinking using a concrete concept involve activating many of the same sensorimotor neural clusters that would be activated in actually perceiving something, manipulating an object, or moving one’s body.”

Such ideas as one finds in the above quote seem to me to be obvious if one considers Darwin’s theory of natural selection. If natural selection is a true theory then there must be continuity throughout the chain of being. Thus humans, like their non-human ancestors, must be expected to use these sensorimotor neural networks for concrete experience.

We generally speak about knowledge from a phenomenological perspective; recent developments in neuroscience, however limited, suggest some of the neural bases for conceptualization.

“Concepts are neural activation patterns that can either be “turned on” by some actual perceptual or motoric event in our bodies, or else activated when we merely think about something, without actually perceiving it or performing a specific action.”

Have you ever performed this mental imaging of an athletic performance just before attempting to do it?

If you have learned to type have you ever, like me, asked your self where on the key board is “y” and discovered you had to depend upon your fingers for that information?

If all concrete concepts result from sensorimotor aided experience does this mean that all concepts, either concrete or subjective, are grounded in sensorimotor aided experience?

Quotes from “The Meaning of the Body” by Mark Johnson

Originally posted by Mindship
I get a kick out of this task, one of the simplest ways to evaluate executive functioning, and it's just plain fun to do.

Neural structures—the stuff of experience

‘Red’ is a concept and ‘red’ is also a word. What is the difference between the concept and the word? The concept is a neural network and the word is structuring that concept into an audible form for the purpose of transmission of the concept to another human. The concept is a fundamental element in the construction of thought. We think in images and not in linguistic form.

For those who are creationist I can understand why this following explanation is of little value.

Categories are “part of our experience”. “They are the structures that differentiate aspects of our experience into discernable kinds…the formation and use of categories is the stuff of experience.”

“What we call concepts are neural structures that allow us to mentally characterize our categories and reason about them.”

“The question of what we take to be real and the question of how we reason is inextricably linked. Our categories of things in the world determine what we take to be real: trees, rocks, animals, people, buildings, and so on. Our concepts determine how we reason about those categories. In order to function realistically in the world, our categories and our forms of reason must “work” very well together;”

In an attempt to enlighten the reader as to the nature of metaphor theory the author explains in some detail three kinds of concepts—color concepts, basic-level concepts, and spatial level concepts. In the book “Philosophy in the Flesh” the authors explain color perception in some detail in order to exemplify the meaning of ‘concept’. I will give a short rendition of color perception. For more detail of color perception one might examine: http://www.firelily.com/opinions/color.html

“Our experience of color is created by a combination of four factors: wavelengths of reflected light, lighting conditions, and two aspects of our bodies: (1) the three kinds of color cones in our retinas, which absorb light of long, medium, and short wavelengths, and (2) the complex neural circuitry connected to those cones.”

One physical property of the surface of the object matters for color: its reflectance (the percentage of high-, medium- and low-frequency light that the object reflects). The actual wavelength reflected by the object do not remain constant it depends upon ambient light, yet the color remains relatively constant. “Color, then, is not just the perception of wavelength; color constancy depends on the brain’s ability to compensate for variations in the light source.”

Visible light is electromagnetic radiation like radio waves within a certain frequency spectrum. When the electromagnetic radiation impinges on the cones in our retina we perceive color. Color perception is the result of four interacting factors: “lighting conditions, wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation, color cones, and neural processing.”

Colors are not objective nor are they purely subjective. “Color is created jointly by our biology and the world, not by our culture.” Color results from the interaction of biology and the world. “We have the color concepts we do because the physical limitations constraining evolution gave evolutionary advantages to beings with a color system that enabled them to function well in crucial respects.”

A nation has an infrastructure consisting of roads, bridges, rail lines, etc. The brain has mental spaces containing experiences and in these mental spaces there are infrastructure containing categories, concepts, inferences, etc. This is my understanding of the material I have studied in “Philosophy in the Flesh”.

Quotes from “Philosophy in the Flesh” by Lakoff and Johnson

Originally posted by coberst

If all concrete concepts result from sensorimotor aided experience does this mean that all concepts, either concrete or subjective, are grounded in sensorimotor aided experience?


there is good reason to believe that all human experience and cognition is directly related to motor experience and action. As humans are an evolved organism, all of our mental faculties must have evolved in response to our environment. In this light, our cognition must be understood as serving various survival purposes, all ending with behaviour that produces reproductive advantage. Because the end result is necessarily action, all parts of our brain potentially are evolved to produce the necessary action in a scenario.

For instance, our ability to see colour is almost assuredly related to what colours represented to our ancestors in the environment they evolved in. Recent studies show an attentional bias toward pink, then red, items. Pink represents, in nature, highly vascularized skin, meaning sex organs and face/lips. Red often represents food or caution for foraging people. Thus, the perception of the colours pink and red is evolved specifically to create action that is beneficial to the immediate survival and reproduction of an organism.

Originally posted by coberst
I remember having watched, on TV, a high-jumper performing an obvious mental imagery of his up-coming jump just before he actually performed his physical feat. I could watch his gaze going through the running to the bar and lifting himself up and over the bar. It was obvious that he was doing a practice jump in his mind just before he actually performed the jump.

I have discovered since that time that this is somewhat standard practice for athletes.

As someone who used to lift heavy weights back in the day, yeah, this mental rehearsal was invaluable for bringing both mind and body fully online for the task at hand.

But even better...
Years ago there was a study which sought to measure increases in strength. It compared three groups:
Group 1 trained by doing actual pushups.
Group 2 trained with visualization, imagining themselves doing pushups.
Group 3 did nothing mentally nor physically.

The aim was to see which group showed the highest gains in strength (as measured by an increase in the number of pushups). Not surprisingly, Group 1 showed the most strength gain; Group 3 showed no gain.

However, quite surprisingly, Group 2 -- the visualizers -- also showed a significant increase in pushup strength (though of course not as much as Group 1).

Originally posted by Mindship
As someone who used to lift heavy weights back in the day, yeah, this mental rehearsal was invaluable for bringing both mind and body fully online for the task at hand.

But even better...
Years ago there was a study which sought to measure increases in strength. It compared three groups:
Group 1 trained by doing actual pushups.
Group 2 trained with visualization, imagining themselves doing pushups.
Group 3 did nothing mentally nor physically.

The aim was to see which group showed the highest gains in strength (as measured by an increase in the number of pushups). Not surprisingly, Group 1 showed the most strength gain; Group 3 showed no gain.

However, quite surprisingly, Group 2 -- the visualizers -- also showed a significant increase in pushup strength (though of course not as much as Group 1).

One of my profs last year mentioned that for the first even month of working out, the vast majority of change happens in the brain rather than in the muscles. It makes sense, just really cool imho

Originally posted by inimalist
One of my profs last year mentioned that for the first even month of working out, the vast majority of change happens in the brain rather than in the muscles. It makes sense, just really cool imho I read somewhere...not sure where...so probably cracked.com...that there were tests made on people just strongly imagining that they work out, rather than actually working out, which then, apparently increased their strength...which is kinda awesome.

Originally posted by Bardock42
I read somewhere...not sure where...so probably cracked.com...that there were tests made on people just strongly imagining that they work out, rather than actually working out, which then, apparently increased their strength...which is kinda awesome.



its what mindship was talking about

I've only heard it with relation to thumbs.

The skinny, as far as I was taught, is that instead of muscle increase, the pathways in the brain between the motor planning areas and the muscles themselves become leaner and stronger. Basically, you build neurological "short-cuts".

The visualization wont work the muscles, but it will increase the strength of these connections, making the movement more coordinated, and allowing for greater feats of strength

EDIT: then we get the really fun stuff where you compare 1st person visualizations vs 3rd person visualizations... its cool, but you are basically counting angels on a pinhead at that point... Though for some reason I'm remembering fMRI differences in perspective taking for visualization of action... god damn it, and I should be reading this stuff on memory anyways... stupid time wasting internets

Originally posted by lord xyz
Thinking is a natural body instinct in order to survive. I guess we could survive without thinking, but if we never thought, we wouldn't have any technology, so thinking is a good thing.

hello!

How can we survive without to think ... it is impossible ... you cannot live without to think ...my opinion

regards,

Originally posted by Mindship
I get a kick out of this task, one of the simplest ways to evaluate executive functioning, and it's just plain fun to do.

yes indeed

Here, I'll make it absurdly apparent:

look at the following words. Attempt to say the colour they are written in, but not the word itself.











RED
BROWN
BLUE
YELLOW
GREEN
















notice how difficult this is.

-----------

It is not difficult it is impossible

Originally posted by coberst
‘Red’ is a concept and ‘red’ is also a word. What is the difference between the concept and the word? The concept is a neural network and the word is structuring that concept into an audible form for the purpose of transmission of the concept to another human. The concept is a fundamental element in the construction of thought. We think in images and not in linguistic form.

The conscious perception of colour is said to stem from threshold activation in the visual cortex. what are called "feature detectors" for colour are activated when information from the cones in the retina is passed along colour-opponent pathways (red v Green, blue v yellow, black v white). At a certain level of activation, the "feature detector" neurons send a signal to moderately higher neural areas, bringing attentional resources to the area of 2d retina (retinotopic) space that the detector responds to.

Single cell recordings of these detectors finds 2 things. 1) After activation, a feature detecting cell stays more active than normal for a few minutes. While it is not at threshold activation (you aren't attending to it) it is still firing. This continuous firing is called priming, and were you to show the colour that detector responds to in the area of retinotopic space it covers, it would reach threshold activation faster than it would from its normal level of activity. Priming, thus, produces faster allocation of attentional resources to the primed neurons and thus faster perception. 2) Before a task where a monkey knew it had to search for a specific target, single cell recordings showed that activation, prior to stimuli presentation, occurred first in the higher attentional areas, then modestly to some of the lowest levels of the visual cortex (I want to say V2, but like anyone here is going to check that ). Basically, when you know you have to look for something, your attentional regions can prime your basic low-level feature detectors (to a minimal degree), making the appearance of any features possessed by the target activate attention faster.

Based on tons of research (including my own!!!!!!!!! ) it is known that, in a scenario where someone has to find a target on a visual array among distractors, either presenting them with a feature possessed by the target immediately before the search (type 1 priming above ) or having them visualize the target prior to the search (type 2 priming above) will decrease the time it takes them to find the target on the screen. Based on the research above, this is said to be due to heightened activation of the primary visual feature detectors due to the priming, allowing them to reach threshold faster and attract attention to the location of the target.

now, WOO, here is the amazing kicker. Say the person is looking for a line on a 45 degree angle. We all know almost instantly what that looks like. So, if you tell someone to find the line on a 45 degree angle, they do fairly well. If, however, you tell them to find the "steep" line, they will do much better. This shows that language has a very strong mediating role in the way our brain not only perceives the world, but communicates with itself.

If imagery was the primary communicative language of the brain, then the image of a 45 degree line should provide the most exact and impressive priming, however, the verbal category "steep" outclasses it.

blah, and please reply. I'm not putting this together from some book I'm reading, at it sort of addresses exactly what you seem to want to talk about...

Originally posted by JVposter
It is not difficult it is impossible

much fun though

Inimalist

Your account sounds good to me.

< visualizing more $20 bills in wallet.

Originally posted by inimalist
its what mindship was talking about


Ha, yeah, that's where reading more than one post back pays off, doesn't it?

Originally posted by Mindship
< visualizing more $20 bills in wallet.

not so good, it will make you that much faster at spending them when they show up

Originally posted by Bardock42
Ha, yeah, that's where reading more than one post back pays off, doesn't it?

blah, preaching at the choir my friend

Originally posted by JVposter
look at the following words. Attempt to say the colour they are written in, but not the word itself.











RED
BROWN
BLUE
YELLOW
GREEN












notice how difficult this is.

-----------

It is not difficult it is impossible

That was pretty easy. Their all the same color.