Philosophy of the Body

originally posted by: ImaFungi

originally posted by: Aphorism

2. That we cannot live without a mind

Again, as counter-intuitive as it sounds, if the mind possesses no reality beyond what we feel to be there, rather than what is actually there (the body), then it would appear that we do not live with minds nor ever have already, and that the body can indeed live without minds. What we are certain of is that we cannot live without bodies.

When you say 'what WE are certain of is that we cannot live without bodies', if you are defining 'WE' as "bodies', then that is quite the obvious statement. When I say you, I am speaking of your body, you. But the culmination of your body, is the 'you' that chooses to speak, and chooses to get food to maintain 'your' body, maintain you, and it is that 'you', that 'we', that I am speaking to, not your foot or arm, the chooser, the controller of the foot or arm. What controls your arm? You do? What are you? Your body? So your arm controls your arm? Arm controls arm? Where does the action/command start? Arm just always does what it wants? It has a mind of its own?

If I were to incinerate your body, what would be left for me to communicate with?

originally posted by: Aphorism

3. That mind is a fleeting or non-material

I agree in an abstract sense that the body may exude “subtle aspects”, though not as near-immaterial substances, but subtle actions.

I am sorry, I never meant to suggest I thought it was non material (thought perhaps I can think of it that way), only by the term subtle, I meant to suggest compared to the relatively solid states, or gelatinous, or cellular, or liquidy, the processes of the brain/mind are the least stable. I am suggesting that of course the hardware of the brain is stable, but it may be that billions and billions constant subtle symbols in the form of electrical impulses and frequencies are what gives the brain its magic. Certainly something similar can be said for all biology perhaps, the electron nature of the atom and molecule. But the brain is constantly volatile. The amount of information and how its so perfectly maintained and accessible gives me chills, to think that I cant think about how I think or what thinking is. I cant see inside my mind/brain, though that is all I have ever been able to see.

When you look around, 'you' and this is the confusing part, not your foot, but the 'you' located in your head, some type of pinpoint source of inner vision, is what is viewing the outside world. Your brain/mind doesnt exist outside of your body, your eyes arent mirrors which reflect the outside world which would be your brain to itself (I dont think), your eyes are lens, they let in the infinitely detailed external world as light constantly engrossed the external world, and sends the shadows or reflections to your eyes, in a constantly refreshed at the speed of light image, of the external world, which is shone in your eyes, and then 'projected' or assimilated some how, onto some sort of screen in your brain, which 'you' are constantly looking at. You can close your eyes, and think of a turtle, or a red fire hydrant, or a penguin eating a large sandwich in Paris near the Eiffel tower with one of those french hats on, do you see this on a different screen? Is this your mind? When you just look out at the world around you, you dont get to force images to appear over the outside world, I am looking at my screen and the room right now, and thinking about penguins in paris, but I dont see a penguin on my computer screen or room, because the information is not out there, the information is contained in my head and some how I can access it very very quickly. So 'imagination', 'mind'. There is an inner realm, like an etcher sketch, or photoshop, where man are free to use past knowledge and experience, to create new images if they can, inventions, works of art, ideas, novels etc. This realm, is not located in the finger... I would argue.

(This is theoretical) Take the inner-monologue for instance. Try reading my words, but also pay attention to the subtle movement and vibrations within your throat, vocal chords, mouth, and breathing. Now think to yourself in your own inner-monologue. Close your eyes and create a sentence or paragraph in your head. Notice the subtle vibrations in your vocal chords and the subtle shifts in breathing. This is subvocalization. You are not thinking to yourself, you are speaking to yourself. The vocal chords, the breath, the tongue, the mouth have a lot to do with thinking.

Now close your eyes, imagine yourself on a beach, but hold your breath and sustain it for as long as you can. You might notice it is difficult to maintain the thought without a little practice. This is because breathing is a large part of thinking, and this is why meditation and breathing exercise have been known to strengthen focus. Good breathing has a correlation to good thinking, which implies the lungs and breathing have a lot to do with mind.

We burn calories when we think. Thinking generates heat. These aren’t brain calories or mind calories, but the calories delivered by the digestive system, stored in fat and utilized by the cells of the body. Without this component, no mind, no body would be possible.

Close your eyes and think about yourself on the beach for two seconds, after the two seconds, open your eyes and maintain the thought. Repeat the process a few times while maintaing that thought. It is difficult to maintain the thought without a little practice, because the eyes have a lot to do with focus, memory, imagination and mind.

We can see people’s minds by viewing subtle brain activity. We can see more of it when we step back and view the body.

When we are healthy, wine tastes sweet. When we are sick, wine tastes sour. What we eat, what we drink, our bones, our organs, our blood, our bile, and every single cell is the mind.

Anyways, my point is, subtle action rather than a subtle material is what we call the mind. These actions, of course, are performed by the body.

Yes, I agree the brain/mind requires the activity of the system in order for it itself to function, and at the same time the rest of the system requires the brain/mind in order for it to function, but I would suggest like a car for instance, can still drive after taking away a lot of parts, and still turn on after taking away even more, as the system of the body is autonomous in many ways, the engine might be most related to the brain/mind. (of course we would prefer to say driver of the car, but that would just bring us a logical regression backwards). Perhaps it can be thought that the gasoline is food, the hardware system of the car and all its parts are its body, and there is only a small amount of gas left in the tank, and this car has a video camera system hooked up to 'somewhere' inside it, and this video camera system has some other sensory equipment that uses a complex computer program to judge and weigh potentials, its sole purpose is to find more gasoline, so scanning the environment it makes weighted decisions using logic and cause and effect and probability to determine best directions of travel, to find more gas (lets imagine this is taking place on some sort of course that has accessible gas scattered about it).

So the car is making decisions and on track towards a gas area, it has a lot of complex parts, but it can lose a lot of them as long as its main computer processor is still working, and the engine, and the hook up to get the gas from outside inside its system, it finally arrives at the area, gets more gas, some of the gas, as according to its system, is sent to the tank which provides the engine with fuel, and some is rationed as energy for the sensory apparatus and computer to function.

In this example, I would suggest, the computer aspect, that is weighing options and making decisions is the 'brain/mind', and if that got damaged beyond repair what hope would the car have at getting gas? Like wise if the engine was damaged beyond repair, what hope would the computer have at urging its body to find more energy so it can do more computing. Unless the computer was advanced enough to repair itself

originally posted by: Aphorism

4. There is a place known as the imagination where people retreat to in times of need.

When I think about it from my viewpoint, I’m not sure anyone retreats anywhere but into the inaction of their own body, perhaps like a form of hibernation like day-dreaming or reading or playing video-games or writing. It seems more a restraint of imagination than anything else rather than a retreat into it.

Perhaps I meant more of a metaphorical retreat. As if the outer world and its physical breadth can be seen as an area, a person can explore and do things in, and a person who is less able, willing, or interested (I believe the term introvert, extravert, ex, like outer, intro, like inner) in exploring that world, may explore their inner world more so. That is all I meant by retreat to the imagination. In a sort of quasi spatial sort of sense, as if it is an area to retreat in, I can at least successfully or not, assume someone like Davinci or Shakespeare had a 'large' area (area, I suppose meaning quantity of information, and means to mix it up in novel ways), which they could explore. Sciencetests and inventors, exploring the outer world, transferring it to their inner minds, then to understand it, put it together and take it apart in their minds. Of course shakeshphere had to gain experience, information, and knowledge from the outer world, live in it, stock his brain with its quantities and qualities, and as he got better and better exploring each, he was able to better and better create a fake outer world, in his inner world, which he then brought into the outer world, in the form of a theatrical play. The point I wanted to make I suppose, is the potential difference between breadth, or activity in the outer and inner world.

There was a study recently that showed people would rather shock themselves rather than be alone with their thoughts. In other words, they chose pain over imagination, stimulus over thinking.

Well yes, just being alone, with nothing to do, is quite, boring. But if you had an outlet for your mind, consider a painter or composer, they could be happy for a lifetime, with the simplest of external worlds, as long as they had access to a few minor materials to transcribe their inner worlds onto, or maybe better example, an author.

But a composer, painter or author, with rich inner world, I doubt would have fun just sitting in a room with nothing.

When one plays a video game, reads a book, watches a television, their imagination is led by a narrative that isn’t their own., and their body is occupied by mere stimulus. This isn’t imagination, but the suppression of it.

Real imagination involves work, and, as I said earlier, caloric intake. So these people you speak of are not overly imaginative or retreat into the imagination, rather, it is simply another act of suppressing the bodily faculties for the sake of comfort.

Well I suppose the matter of importance is value. If an inventor takes 6 hours of idol inactivity one day to just relax and let his thoughts flow, someone else may think they are suppressing their imagination, and suppressing the bodily faculties for the sake of comfort, but if after a week of doing this everyday, the result is a novel invention which changes the course of society for the better, because society values that, this activity will be rewarded, and allowed to exist.

originally posted by: Aphorism

5. That something controls the body.

Any “fleeting material” would be hard-pressed to manipulate and control real material. This is the crux of the mind/body problem, and even Descartes thought it impossible to rationalize. If the circulation, the immune system, the digestive system and metabolism are autonomous, then we can rationally conclude, with I believe enough evidence, that the mental faculties, the will, choice and decision, not only arises from and within the body, but is governed by the body, and all decisions, willful actions and the like, are bodily decisions. This doesn’t imply that we are robots or machines, but that the whole is simply smarter than we can imagine, that all capacities and functions working together are smarter, more intelligent and more wise than any single one of them on their own.

Hmmm...ok, I respect and potentially slightly understand what you mean, but given my arguments from my responses to the other points, I believe I may have touched upon my views of this.

Fleeting material, I suppose I meant 'electricity'. Take electricity away from your computer, and then give it back, does the fleeting material manipulate and control real material? Is energy real material?

This of course, is semantics stemming from our ignorance's of the reality of what these terms attempt to encapsulate.

There are a lot of philosophical queries which struggle to think about these sorts of things, like im trying to think how information may be stored in the brain, and the fact that position/orientation can be a factor of meaning, and how well something works, yet position or orientation, is that a physical quality? If an apple has one big black spot on it, and the black spot is facing you, is it physically different then when it is not facing you? Or is that an immaterial distinction, certainly since the apple, and black dot is physical, because that is what is used to describe any difference at all, the difference is material, but the object itself is exactly the same as it ever was, the only difference is relative orientation, is motion material? Certainly material is required for the concept of motion to exist. Perhaps motion is required for the existence of material. But is motion itself material? Just some non sequitur thoughts I couldnt help but to have.

a reply to: ImaFungi

Thanks for the response ImaFungi. Yes I decided to use your post as a stepping-stone to more thinking as it was a good one. These are things not many people think about.

There are a lot of philosophical queries which struggle to think about these sorts of things, like im trying to think how information may be stored in the brain, and the fact that position/orientation can be a factor of meaning, and how well something works, yet position or orientation, is that a physical quality? If an apple has one big black spot on it, and the black spot is facing you, is it physically different then when it is not facing you? Or is that an immaterial distinction, certainly since the apple, and black dot is physical, because that is what is used to describe any difference at all, the difference is material, but the object itself is exactly the same as it ever was, the only difference is relative orientation, is motion material? Certainly material is required for the concept of motion to exist. Perhaps motion is required for the existence of material. But is motion itself material? Just some non sequitur thoughts I couldnt help but to have.

Absolutely. The closer we look at things the more complex they seem. I think that is the part of the problem: we look too close. There are some quantum mind people who are now looking for mind on the quantum level, and they are looking for the mind in between atoms or something strange like that. They will never find anything. The thing is, the idea of mind is a simple one, and we could easily sign it off if we retained that simplicity.

Anyways, good responses.