Does the human mind Know no limit?

Does the human mind Know no limit? Is there anything it cant imagine or accept?
Where do the discernable boundaries inside tthe mind reside?
What are these boundaries?
Is it ethically or morally wrong to exceed these boundaries?

The brain has a limit, not the mind.

reply to post by AthlonSavage


According to popular scientific consensus, the human mind's limits are almost nonexistent - unless, of course, you're talking about stress and horror. In that case, the human mind is about as durable as glass...depending on your background.

reply to post by AthlonSavage


Alright OP I like your question so SnF, but you could've supplied more of your own text and given us more to dicuss.

Our minds seem to be limited by the universe don't they ?

Limits and boundaries are tought, thats why they send us to school.

I believe there are some things which we experience that are truly hard to grasp. Mostly abstract things like true "nothingness". For instance, try to imagine time not existing. I can't even begin how to imagine that, or if something can even exist with out time. But, trying to imagine "no-time" to me almost seems futile for our brains to comprehend. Another example, try imaging yourself next to to a galaxy and using yourself as a means to measure the size of the galaxy. You just can't do it, because when you usually compare the size of something you usually compare it to something else. I mean try doing that same thought experiment but just with the planet Earth. You can understand that something can be extraordinarily large or extraordinarily small, but to get an actual sense of the size of some of things are truly hard ideas to cognize.

So things on the very small and very big are hard to comprehend. Only through math can we grasp these ideas and actually compare these vastly huge and small numbers to something else(other numbers). Some things we can't actually really grasp with out the aid of something else; that something else usually being math in some form. Be it through writing equations on a piece of paper to complex computer simulations. Math has really changed the world and how we perceive it.

reply to post by AdamsMurmur

The brain has a limit, not the mind.

More or less the way I think.

I believe consciousness (awareness itself) to be external from the brain, and that has no bounds. The mind (read personality) is a product of the brain, and effectively filters consciousness.

When the first Spanish ship arrived in America, The Amerindians had the Ships right in front of them for weeks before they could even see them. Being totally alien from what their mind could conceived they simply could not see the ships until their brain stopped the mental censorship over a period of a few weeks.

Originally posted by Lucid Lunacy


I believe consciousness (awareness itself) to be external from the brain, and that has no bounds. The mind (read personality) is a product of the brain, and effectively filters consciousness.

So, when your mind gets stuck on a song for so long you just want to scream, this is coming from an outside source? How about when you can't get your brother's wife out of your head - external?

Originally posted by AdamLaw
When the first Spanish ship arrived in America, The Amerindians had the Ships right in front of them for weeks before they could even see them. Being totally alien from what their mind could conceived they simply could not see the ships until their brain stopped the mental censorship over a period of a few weeks.

Heard this before and I don't believe it. I could understand if they thought the ships were weird floating rocks, but invisible? I doubt it.

reply to post by Lucid Lunacy


Yep. That's my line of logic here.

Originally posted by jiggerj

Originally posted by AdamLaw
When the first Spanish ship arrived in America, The Amerindians had the Ships right in front of them for weeks before they could even see them. Being totally alien from what their mind could conceived they simply could not see the ships until their brain stopped the mental censorship over a period of a few weeks.

Heard this before and I don't believe it. I could understand if they thought the ships were weird floating rocks, but invisible? I doubt it.

You can choose to deny scientific facts as much as you want but perceptual blindness is real and clearly shows the boundary of the mind.

en.wikipedia.org...

Originally posted by AthlonSavage
Is there anything it cant imagine or accept?

I hope you realize those are two different questions.

There is no limit to what the mind can imagine. Anyone on this board can tell you that. If you want to get more specific though, ask a writer.

There are limits to what the mind can accept though, and that depends on a combination of your DNA and your upbringing. The hand that was given you vs. how you play those cards I guess you could say.

Some people limit themselves by playing the same game most of their life, while some get tired of the same old same old, get up from the table and join another hand. That first set of people? More times then not they're never going to be able to wrap their heads around that second type of person. Maybe they want to up the ante, maybe they want a different game altogether or maybe it's just the simple fact that their gypsy blood gets boiling again and it's time to move on.

It's people like that whom others think that their mind knows no bounds. And to a certain extent, that's true. Maybe they're constantly wanting to learn, maybe they're running from something in their own lives or maybe they keep moving on for the sake of it. Catch them and you'll find out. The bottom line is that people like that will be able to accept more because they've absorbed more in their lives. They've seen more, done more, learned more and.........lived more. They're not smarter then you so much as they're more pliable. More flexible. They're more open to new ideas.

They're chameleons. Jacks of all trades and masters of none. It doesn't matter to them if an experience is new to them, they'll adapt to it like you wouldn't believe and leave you thinking that they've done it all their lives. Test them and you'll that find out first hand. And when they do settle down they can be whatever you want them to be. They have that ability because at some point they imagined what you want, they've lived it at least temporarily, and by virtue of that, they can help you become whatever it is you want.

The only way to get people like that to settle down though is to get to their heart, but that's for another topic.

So there you go OP, I hope that answers your questions, and I hope you get the juxtaposition in what I just did.

youtu.be...

Originally posted by Taupin Desciple

Originally posted by AthlonSavage
Is there anything it cant imagine or accept?

I hope you realize those are two different questions.

There is no limit to what the mind can imagine. Anyone on this board can tell you that. If you want to get more specific though, ask a writer.

There are limits to what the mind can accept though, and that depends on a combination of your DNA and your upbringing. The hand that was given you vs. how you play those cards I guess you could say.

Some people limit themselves by playing the same game most of their life, while some get tired of the same old same old, get up from the table and join another hand. That first set of people? More times then not they're never going to be able to wrap their heads around that second type of person. Maybe they want to up the ante, maybe they want a different game altogether or maybe it's just the simple fact that their gypsy blood gets boiling again and it's time to move on.

It's people like that whom others think that their mind knows no bounds. And to a certain extent, that's true. Maybe they're constantly wanting to learn, maybe they're running from something in their own lives or maybe they keep moving on for the sake of it. Catch them and you'll find out. The bottom line is that people like that will be able to accept more because they've absorbed more in their lives. They've seen more, done more, learned more and.........lived more. They're not smarter then you so much as they're more pliable. More flexible. They're more open to new ideas.

They're chameleons. Jacks of all trades and masters of none. It doesn't matter to them if an experience is new to them, they'll adapt to it like you wouldn't believe and leave you thinking that they've done it all their lives. Test them and you'll that find out first hand. And when they do settle down they can be whatever you want them to be. They have that ability because at some point they imagined what you want, they've lived it at least temporarily, and by virtue of that, they can help you become whatever it is you want.

The only way to get people like that to settle down though is to get to their heart, but that's for another topic.

So there you go OP, I hope that answers your questions, and I hope you get the juxtaposition in what I just did.

youtu.be...

I have to disagree on one thing. There is limits to what one can imagine, by that i mean that yes i can imagine anything that goes against the laws of physics or anything i want. But it is all based on one's general culture. The more stuff you know the more stuff you can imagine. You will never be able to imagine a flying pink elephant if you have never been introduced with the idea of an elephant. So the more you know the more you can imagine. The amount of imaginable scenarios must be limitless to someone with limitless knowledge but not to someone who was raised in a box.

Math has really changed the world and how we perceive it.

reply to post by HossDelgado


Exactly. "The underlying theme" is more important than all the different jewelry and costumes we try to dress it up with.

That's why Newton invented Calculus, to remember.

Originally posted by AdamLaw
[The amount of imaginable scenarios must be limitless to someone with limitless knowledge but not to someone who was raised in a box.

That is true.

And it could also help explain why there are so many misunderstandings among so many different people in the world. For example, I can't imagine what it would be like to live in Saudi Arabia because I've never been there and I've never met anyone who has.

reply to post by jiggerj

How about when you can't get your brother's wife out of your head - external?

i dont have a brother but i get the idea.

Originally posted by AdamLaw

Originally posted by jiggerj

Originally posted by AdamLaw
When the first Spanish ship arrived in America, The Amerindians had the Ships right in front of them for weeks before they could even see them. Being totally alien from what their mind could conceived they simply could not see the ships until their brain stopped the mental censorship over a period of a few weeks.

Heard this before and I don't believe it. I could understand if they thought the ships were weird floating rocks, but invisible? I doubt it.

You can choose to deny scientific facts as much as you want but perceptual blindness is real and clearly shows the boundary of the mind.

en.wikipedia.org...

Seems like a pile of crap to me. If people have never seen something before their eyes and brain can't register it? So I suppose if you brought an Eskimo to Africa and he wasn't familiar with the regional fauna and had never seen any of it before, he wouldn't be able to see a lion?

Also...
>citing Wikipedia as a source for legitimate scientific facts
>Wikipedia users have the ability to edit articles
>many cases of blatant biases and misinformation in articles
>lol

Seems like a pile of crap to me. If people have never seen something before their eyes and brain can't register it? So I suppose if you brought an Eskimo to Africa and he wasn't familiar with the regional fauna and had never seen any of it before, he wouldn't be able to see a lion?

Plus, this is implying that the American Indian had never seen a hunk of floating wood before. We're not talking about something green that's camouflaged in the woods. We're talking a wide open ocean with ships on it. No matter how strange a sight, they couldn't have been missed, and would have been an awesome wonder to the children.

Originally posted by jiggerj

Seems like a pile of crap to me. If people have never seen something before their eyes and brain can't register it? So I suppose if you brought an Eskimo to Africa and he wasn't familiar with the regional fauna and had never seen any of it before, he wouldn't be able to see a lion?

Plus, this is implying that the American Indian had never seen a hunk of floating wood before. We're not talking about something green that's camouflaged in the woods. We're talking a wide open ocean with ships on it. No matter how strange a sight, they couldn't have been missed, and would have been an awesome wonder to the children.

edit on 10/12/2012 by jiggerj because: (no reason given)

They had canoes too, so the concept of water travel wasn't completely foreign to them.