[MD] Two Minds

Tue Nov 10 14:43:19 PST 2015

Nikolas,

Just some food for thought.  The corpus callosum connects these and when it
is severed in adulthood it leads to some odd facts that seem to point to
the two sides having different functions. But, in instances where it
doesn't exist in the first place, it doesn't seem to matter.

http://www.wired.com/2014/08/this-elderly-gentleman-was-born-with-his-brain-hemispheres-disconnected-how-did-it-affect-him-barely-at-all/

I also happen to know a little girl born this way and she is 5 years old
now and doing fine.  In fact she was one of the earliest readers I've ever
known.

-Austin
ᐧ

On Tue, Nov 10, 2015 at 2:05 PM, Blodgett, Nikolas <nblodgett at worcester.edu>
wrote:

> I always throw out my same pet theories about the two hemispheres of the
> brain and their function. This seems like just the topic where I find it
> fits the best. The left and right hemispheres operate in a complimentary
> and dichotomous way, with the left being more serial and specific in
> processing information and the right more parallel and broader when
> prossecing. The net result, although an unconscious type of thinking does
> stem from the more inner and outer evolutionary parts, has alot to do with
> the two hemispheres, in my opinion. I have a wealth of information and am
> still working on putting it all together. I found a Scientific America
> article that is close to what I think about this. (June 24, 2009. "The
> evolutionary origins of your right and left brain, Peter F. MacNeilage,
> Leslie J. Rogers, and Giorgio Vallortigara)
> This is only part of the puzzle, but the LH is geared toward language and
> consequently what we typically consider logical reasoning and the RH is
> geared toward monitoring the environment for dangers and consequently
> recognition of subtle social cues. If anyone catches my drift here I would
> be grateful; I realize I'm still messy in explaining what, in my head, is a
> very large multi-piece puzzle. In any case, I feel what I've connected
> about the hemispheres might explain things like introspection, possibly
> sense of self, unconscious social recognition, and what seems to be two
> kinds of thought we see pop up throughout philosophical history. The strict
> intellectual logically geared processing that comes from the LH is indeed
> balanced by, but preceded by the social emotionally geared RH processing.
> In a philosophical sense, the intellect is INDEED based on the social
> level, because it would not be so finely-tuned into words phrases and
> thoughts without being part of a larger social level from which it springs.
> Anyway, I need to get working on this because it probably seems bizarre out
> of context from all the research I found/collected and whatnot, but I
> really feel it can explain the Dynamic / Static type of element we fans of
> Pirsig know is important.
> Other names to search I have come across are Gazzaniga and the split-brain
> patients, Kounios and Jung-Beeman and their work with 'the Eureka! moment',
> Corballis did work with handedness and evolution, Hale does research into
> ADHD and its possible basis in these lateral functions. I use keywords such
> as lateralization, hemispheric asymmetry, and sometimes they will use
> jargon such as hemisity or dual-process. Austin, you mentioned Kahnemann
> above, and he factored into my thoughts about the two types of processing.
> Emily mentioned Tolle, and the sort of Zen-like though processes are very
> much the RH kind, which I feel is the Dynamic side opposing the Static LH.
> David mentioned the mind / body problem and the hard problem of
> consciousness, and I always come back around to that issue. Cognitive
> neuroscience is my leaning and its probably obvious at this point, so
> thanks for bearing with me
>
> On Tue, Nov 10, 2015 at 1:53 PM, John Carl <ridgecoyote at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Austin,
> >
> > On Wed, Nov 4, 2015 at 9:46 AM, Austin Fatheree <
> austin.fatheree at gmail.com
> > >
> > wrote:
> >
> > >
> > >
> > > I think that both the social and intellectual levels emerged out of the
> > > biological level.  The intellectual did emerge after the social and
> still
> > > holds moral authority over it and still has access to it, but it is
> more
> > > correct to say that it emerged from biology.
> > >
> > >
> >
> > Jc:  I disagree.  I think that "bottom's up" view of the cosmos is common
> > but highly problematic.  The mechanism upon which the whole thing runs,
> > isn't a mechanism!  So why get mechanical at all?  It makes more sense to
> > me to take a top-down approach, such that it's seen that intellectual
> > patterns  create various social patterns,  social patterns support and
> > create biological success and biology begets new inorganic combinations.
> > There really is no conflict, EXCEPT, for between the social and the
> > intellectual, occasionally.  But this isn't a natural aspect of reality,
> > it's a problem, when it occurs.
> >
> > Austin:
> >
> >
> > > I think this because it more adequately fits what we see in reality.
> >
> >
> >
> > Jc:  depends upon your reality
> >
> >  Austin:
> >
> > (snipped)
> >
> >
> > Unfortunately the fallout from this is that distinguishing that the
> > > intellectual level should have moral authority over the social level
> > > becomes even murkier.  Unfortunately this also seems be an accurate map
> > of
> > > the territory.  I’m from Houston and yesterday we voted down our
> Houston
> > > Equal Rights Ordinance(HERO) because we have a significant portion of
> our
> > > population that has no desire to operate at an intellectual level.  It
> is
> > > all still way to social here in the South and social means that that
> guy
> > > over there is going to get one over on me if I don’t take it for
> myself.
> > > Boo us.
> > >
> > >
> > I'd say that since our ideal goal is for the intellectual to have rule
> over
> > the social, we should just make that our pragmatic foundation and USE it.
> > I think a metaphysical system is good if it actually helps us to overcome
> > experienced conflicts, and bad if it just leads to more conflicts in a
> > widening gyre.
> >
> > As to Texas... don't get me started.  I'm a Californian, through and
> > through.
> >
> > But thinking about this interplay between intellectual and social
> patterns,
> > it's really what the American experiment was all about, eh?  This country
> > was founded with the idea of individual freedom - which is all about
> > reining in the powers of the social to restrict free thought.  But what
> > gets people confused is, that doesn't mean we have an intellectual
> > society!  We just have a society that values intellect enough to let it
> be
> > free, in the hopes that thus we evolve upward, rather than downward.
> >
> > I think the MoQ's statement of values as real, makes everything else work
> > out, in the end.
> >
> > John C.
> > Moq_Discuss mailing list
> > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc.
> > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org
> > Archives:
> > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/
> > http://moq.org/md/archives.html
> >
> Moq_Discuss mailing list
> Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc.
> http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org
> Archives:
> http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/
> http://moq.org/md/archives.html
>

-- 
Austin Fatheree
RIVVIR Consulting
http://www.rivvir.com
austin at rivvir.com
832-483-0741
twitter: @afat http://twitter.com/afat