The Prism

The aspiration of the human mind is to afford the critics with a peerless diorama of the thinking of mankind. Self- acumen is one of mankind’s most archaic quests. Who am I? What is my homogeneity to environment that surrounds me? These questions manifested the conceptions of philosophy. They are investitures in the journey of the mind, for, at least in the one reverence; we are exceptional among all creatures. Only we are marveled about our progenitors, the tenor of existence, and the nature of the concealed world that we encounter whenever we contemplate, remember, and think.

The act of thinking is as instinctive and foreordained as breathing, but when we attempt narrow it down what it is that we actually do when we process thoughts, we somehow become perplexed. Conceivably, this is because a myriad of bearings of our thinking are not available to our discernment. We fail to sum up everything that we fathom, for instance; yet the ethics that we fail to confer may be as or more crucial than what we discourse about. This paradox has innumerable concepts to stir up about the nature of mind.

In essence, the mind serves as a language that lacks words, an utterance that links us through the entire existence of mankind. If you prefer, it’s a fellowship from one beings’ mind to another.

At first gander a definition of the mind seems conspicuous. After all, we speak on it daily. We converse of making up (or losing) one’s mind, calls some of our counterparts “mindless,” and even suggest that someone “does not know their own mind.”

Expanding our mind, by thinking shapes mental models. The craft of navigating a ship is a demonstration of what we all do our entire lives: formulate models, elucidate problems, and foretell the future. These mental mindsets reach their culmination in the human brain.

The brain exists in order to construct representations of the world. Very lucid organisms have no brains; construct no unveilings of the world. And the reason we possess such detailed brains is in part, because we occupy a complicated world, a complicated social stratum. We’re social animals and so the brain has to do a tremendous amount of computation in order to solve the very intricate ordeals that social life poses for us.

In some respect, our mental processing is like that of the navigator of the carrier. We express words, concepts, and highly abstract representations of our surroundings. At other times, in baffling, sensitive, or challenging occasions, we think in the same manner the native navigator does, and intuit or “feel” our way. There are no fixed principles, no set approaches that will everlastingly work at given times. Specifically, though, like the native navigator, “play it by ear” interpreting the setting as he improvises the direction, shape, and feel of the ocean swells that rock his diminutive craft, the mental models in both these kinds of thinking are alike, drawing on an availability of accumulated knowledge and familiarity. Thinking is easier to label than to define, but we can start to explore what it is by noting elements of thinking.

Now think of the following biographical sketch: Roman dropped out of high school in the mid-sixties, engaged in anti-war activities, used drugs for a while, and eventually returned to earn a degree from Cornell University in the 70’s. Presently, Roman lives in Greenwich Village. Now here’s a question. Which is more likely to have occurred, that Roman is an educator at the New School and a social user of cocaine? But the logically more correct answer is that Roman is an educator at the New School.

None of these sequences are the result of stupidity, erroneous thinking, or malfunctioning within the mind. Rather, they interpret how the mind actually works. Put in evolutionary premises, the mind has evolved to be trenchant in situations that are most likely to arise. Mechanisms have matured to respond to these situations. Logic is one of those mechanisms, but it’s not the only one, nor often, it is the most salutary, adequate, or even the most determining one, most of the time, few of us perform according to strict principles of logic. Our minds are not logic mechanisms, and for good reasons.

Here are several questions: Who was the seventeenth president of our country? How far is Chicago from Miami? Are the toes of a chicken arranged differently from those of a parrot, and if so, what is atypical? Each of these concerns required you to think differently. On occasion, thinking involves utilizing words and concepts: the seventeenth president. At other times it requires vivid images: chickens compared to parrot. On still other instances, thinking may use several of these applications to figure out the distance between Chicago and Miami by reasoning or you can dispense with words altogether and cogitate an “inner map” based on your expeditions. Often, thinking engages all these mindsets.

The disagreement of the human brain serving as a computer, usually takes the following form. The human brain makes all intimacies and thought possible; all decision purposes in the brain are reducible to a binary yes/no response; the brain is nothing more than an ostentatious computer with its comprehensive junctions performing on-off functions. The study of computer science is to imbibe how the brain’s symbols represent the external atmosphere and how the brain’s circuitry coordinates “input and “output.” Thinking is shaped on the infrastructure of compromise. If we contended on examining all possible substitutes that are available to us, we could never find a common ground. As individuals, we settle for “rough and ready” choices that grant us the opportunity to move on. There are always thresholds of time, assets, and mental energy that must be taken into account, as well as personal life experiences dissimilar to each individual. Our benchmarks are always based on what appears best “under the circumstances,” this does not import that the mind is marred. On the contrary, the concept is clearly that more relevant quarters influence the formation of thought than mere logic and even rationality. Conceivably, our use of language, we regularly suggest that we tend to assimilate rationally and mentally, that it is imperative to exclaim this point. He must have been out of his mind! This is a typical remark that one makes.

Tonight, think of how have you made use of the mind in recent years? We have a tendency of creating worlds independently, in our head, and rationing the worlds. There are worlds that inhere with the part of thinking, worlds, which grant us permission to enter various aspects of the mind, worlds from which we know truncated amounts about. Our mind is one of the most intricate structures of our body, it is enigmatic; it is a toil to human kind. No written form of discovery has been able to unveil the capacity of the mind, but research allows us to envisage a small quantum of what defines the mind. Thinking is the paramount attribute of the human brain and mind; it is because of it that we attempt to fully penetrate ourselves, which is why we live in such manner as we do today.

This is what I do when I have to sit through grant writing workshops; how pathetic ha? Only if they knew. Hmmm, now I beg the question, what did I leave out?

woe to joe.

I write six sentences and you post your dissertation… (There is wrong with this picture.)

By the way, I agree. Grant writing does indeed suck.

"I'm wrong!" ok the War of the Words must proceed. I'll see you at the casting!

Joe

great work. im uppin this one. and loving it. it def goes up there on my list of top fav five. very creative. its hard to stop looking at it. im impressed....
suave por ahi.