Conventional thinking has
been that the human mind is a bottom-up kind of thing. The idea is that your
mind is produced solely by some combination of neurons in your brain.
The thinking is kind of like this: your consciousness is like some juice,
and your brain is the juice maker.
But there are some good
reasons for thinking that this “bottom-up” assumption is quite
false. For one thing, we have no understanding of how mere neurons
(physical things) can produce the wonderful thing we call
consciousness (a mental thing). Imagining that a mere
grapefruit-sized blob like the brain can produce the human mind (a
totally different type of thing) seems rather like imagining that a
stone can be squeezed so that blood will drip out of it. We also
have no understanding of how brains can store human memories that
last for 50 years. As discussed here, rapid molecular and structural
turnover in synapses should make it quite impossible for brains to be
storing memories for longer than about a year. The speed with which we can recall memories seems inexplicable given any theory that memories are stored in brains, for reasons discussed here. Then there is the fact
documented by the physician John Lorber that some humans can retain
fairly normal minds and memory even though most of their brains have
been destroyed by disease. Then there are near-death experiences, in
which people undergoing cardiac arrest often report floating out of
their bodies, sometimes reporting accurate details of the medical
efforts going on while their heart was stopped. Such a thing should
be impossible if the human mind is merely a bottom-up effect produced only
by our brains.
But if the human mind is
not a bottom-up kind of thing, maybe it is a top-down kind of thing.
Maybe the human mind is an effect produced by some cause outside of
the human body. Maybe instead of something coming from inside our
bodies, the human mind is instead coming mainly from outside
of our bodies. Such an idea seems very abstract and philosophical,
but perhaps we can take a stab at trying to make it more
understandable, by the use of some imagery. The images I will offer
are quite schematic and speculative, but they may at least serve as a
kind of crude device to help clarify a particular philosophical
possibility. To be visually displayed adequately, a model like the
one I will present would require a sophisticated animation; but not
being an animator, I'll have to make do with some rather crude
diagrams.
Let us start by imagining
that there might be some cosmic source of minds, which may be the
source of human minds and other types of minds (possibly also minds
on other planets). We can visualize this mind source as being rather
like a giant balloon filled with either hot gas or a warm fluid.
Now let us imagine that
your mind and the mind of each of us is like a little protrusion or
bump on the surface of this giant balloon. We normally think of
balloons as being spherical, but a balloon can have lots of little
bumps and protrusions (for example, in one of the big balloons used
in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, there may be little bumps
corresponding to the nose or ears of some cartoon character). We can
imagine that there might be billions or trillions of little bumps on
the huge balloon of the cosmic mind source, and that each little
bump might correspond to a particular person.
In the schematic diagram
below, we see two little balloon bumps or protrusions corresponding
to particular persons. They exist on the circumference of the great sphere of the cosmic mind source, and are some of billions of similar little bumps or protrusions on that sphere.
I use red and blue in this
diagram simply to illustrate different persons. But the idea is that
the mind substance or consciousness fluid inside your little balloon bump is very
much the same mind substance or fluid that is flowing around inside
the huge balloon of the cosmic mind source. The same mind substance
or fluid is flowing around inside your mind and all other minds that
exist as little bumps on the circumference of the balloon. Under
this model your mind does not arise from your brain, but from the
cosmic mind source. So instead of there being a million different
mind sources for a million different humans (each being a brain),
there is instead a single mind source for these million human minds.
If you got your mind in
such a way, by being a little protrusion off of the circumference of
the huge balloon of the cosmic mind source, you might think of your
mind as originating from inside your body. But in this model your
mind does not at all originate from your body. It comes from the
cosmic mind source. In fact, under this model the only way in which
any mind can exist is by being inside the great balloon of the cosmic
mind source, or as a kind of protrusion on the circumference of that
balloon.
But notice that there is a
little neck that connects your little bubble with the vastly greater
bubble of the cosmic mind source. That little neck may be almost
totally closed, or it may be more widely open. When that little neck
is almost totally closed, you may feel no connection whatsoever with
some great higher reality beyond yourself. But when that little neck
is open wider, you may feel more of a sense of being in touch with
some great reality beyond yourself. Perhaps mystical experiences or
paranormal psychic experiences occur when this little neck opens much
wider than normal. Under this model there is a direct line that can
be traced between any one mind and any other mind, with no more than
distance and bottlenecks inhibiting communication. So the potential
for connectivity is almost limitless.
The diagram below
illustrates this idea. The second person (shown in blue) is much more
prone to spiritual or psychic or mystic experiences, because the
neck-like opening at the base of his little bubble is much wider. In
this model, all minds are inside the same vast balloon of mind-fluid.
So when the neck like opening widens, a person may have greater
connectivity with other minds, which may or may not correspond
to minds inside bodies. In the visual below, I illustrate this idea,
borrowing a line from one of the Star Wars movies.
In conventional bottom-up
models of the mind, ESP is impossible. But in this model something
like ESP is quite possible. Below is a diagram illustrating what
happens. There is a path that can be traced from any given mind to
another, since no mind exists outside of the huge bubble of the
cosmic mind source. In the diagram below, we see ESP occurring
between two minds.
When a person undergoes a
near-death experience, it may be a little like depicted in the visual
below. Such a person may undergo transcendent experiences, as he
starts to move outside of the little bubble like protrusion that he
has been previously confined to.
And what about when a
person dies? It may be like the diagram below. Inside the great cosmic
mind balloon may be trillions of minds, some corresponding to what we
may call “the living,” and others corresponding to what we may
call “the dead.” The main difference between the living and the
dead is simply when you are living, you are isolated in a little
protrusion on the circumference of the great cosmic mind balloon.
When you exist in such an isolated little protrusion, you have little
feeling of connectivity with other minds. But when your mortal life
ends, you are no longer in that protrusion. Then you may have a great
connectivity with a horde of other minds floating around inside the
huge cosmic mind balloon.
Now you may ask: in this
model, what is outside this vast balloon of cosmic mind fluid? The
answer is: no mind at all. In this model, there are no little bubbles
at all floating outside of the great cosmic balloon of mind fluid.
Every single mind exists as a protrusion on the circumference of this
balloon, as shown in the diagrams below, or in a more central
position inside the balloon. The result is that all minds in the
universe have a real degree of connectivity. For minds that exist
within the main part of the balloon, and not its outer circumference,
there may seem to be a tremendous degree of connectivity. If you are
such a mind, you might easily or instantly be able to connect with
many other minds, perhaps in something like mind-reading or
thought-reading.
The images I have
presented here are extremely crude. Do things work exactly as I have
diagrammed here? Probably not. What I have discussed is a kind of
crude schematic visualization designed to make you think about
radically different ways in which reality could work, rather than an
attempt to describe exactly and literally some alternate way in which
reality works. The visualizations I have presented are kind of
metaphorical, but there may be strong similarities between these
metaphors and the way in which consciousness works.
But what is fascinating
here is how easy it is to create a top-down idea of mind, under which
various types of anomalous phenomena fit in naturally. Under a
bottom-up theory of mind, things such as ESP, apparitions sightings,
mystical experiences, and near-death experiences may seem like
unthinkable abominations. But such things fit in easily and naturally
once we move to a top-down theory of mind.
The biggest failure of all
bottom-up theories of human mentality is not their failure to account
for fairly rare paranormal phenomena but their failure to adequately
account for the everyday reality of the human mind. We cannot account
for our minds or our very long-term memories neurologically. Brains
seem to have no functionality that can account for either the storage
or the instant retrieval of very old memories, for reasons discussed here and here and here. The idea that there is
some special combination of cell connections that can cause something
like the lofty thoughts of philosophy to emerge from mere neurons does not seem credible, and seems hardly more credible than the idea that some combination
of vines, roots, and trees in a dense Amazon jungle would cause that
jungle to become conscious. Nor can we account for the origin of our
minds using Darwinian ideas. As argued here, the human mind has many
“luxury item” characteristics (such as math abilities, musical
abilities, artistic creativity, abstract reasoning, and spirituality)
that are not things that increase an organism's chance of surviving
in the wild, and which therefore cannot be accounted for by using the
explanation of natural selection (which is merely the threadbare,
thimble-sized idea that fit stuff prospers, and unfit stuff doesn't).
But if we develop a
top-down theory of the mind's origin, then all of the marvels of the
human mind may become easily explicable. If human minds come top-down
from some cosmic mind source, we would indeed expect that our minds
should have every wondrous ability they have ever displayed.
Let us imagine an
extraterrestrial planet on which the skies were always covered with
thick clouds. Imagine that on such a planet the clouds are so thick
that you can never see the sun in the sky. Intelligent beings on such
a planet might wonder: how is it that their planet is lit up with light
during the day? Unaware of the sun above them, such beings might come up with a bottom-up theory of
illumination: that the dirt and rocks and the trees give off light
during the day, which keeps the land illuminated. Such beings might
think that such a theory was a certainty, and say to themselves, “Of
course, it must be true; where else could light be coming
from?” But they should instead be considering a top-down theory of
illumination – that the illumination of daylight comes from a great
unseen source above them.
Similarly, the average
scientist holds to a bottom-up theory of consciousness, that our
consciousness bubbles up from little neurons in our head. He says to
himself, “Of course, this theory must be true; where else
could our consciousness be coming from?” But such a person should
be considering a top-down theory of consciousness, that our minds
come mainly from some great unseen source. Just as it seems farfetched that rocks or dirt or trees could illuminate a
planet, it seems farfetched that the great universe-pondering
effect of human mentality could possibly arise from a little blob of
protoplasm inside our skulls.
Postscript: Scientist Bernard Carr stated the following:
The existence of telepathy also suggests that our minds are part of a communal space rather than being wholly private. This "Universal Structure", as I term it, can be regarded as a higher dimensional information space which reconciles all our different experiences of the world. It necessarily incorporates physical space but it also includes non-physical realms which can only be accessed by mind.
Postscript: Scientist Bernard Carr stated the following:
The existence of telepathy also suggests that our minds are part of a communal space rather than being wholly private. This "Universal Structure", as I term it, can be regarded as a higher dimensional information space which reconciles all our different experiences of the world. It necessarily incorporates physical space but it also includes non-physical realms which can only be accessed by mind.
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