An Ecology of MInd (14 page)

“We used to go to MIT together and were best friends while we were in school.”

“You’re that Kim?”

“I don’t know what you mean specifically by “that Kim” but probably, I don’t know of any other Kim’s that she knows.”

They reached the trees and there was a road on the other side of them. A black Mercedes was parked close to where they reached the road. Kim held out a key
and pressed the remote to unlock the doors. “Get in. We can talk on the way.”

They both got in and buckled up the seat belts. Kim started the engine, changed into drive and pulled out rapidly.

“Where are we going?”

“Back to Washington, I have a couple of things to do and Wendy is going to want to see that you are alright.”

“Washington? Where the hell are we?”

“About fifteen miles outside of Washington. Okay, listen up and I will fill in some gaps as we go. I was meeting Wendy for dinner last night and while I
was in the washroom, somebody dropped an envelope on her table that had a photo of you beat up and tied to a chair with a gun to your head. They had
already contacted her once and told her to do something, or you would be hurt. The photo seemed to be just to add some extra incentive and proof that they
had you. Wendy had been trying to reach you but was getting no answer. They wanted Wendy to steal something that she was studying at work. I told her to
pretend to be following the instructions as she was obviously being watched, and told her I would work on getting you back.”

“What did they want her to steal?”

“The answer to that is classified and way above your pay grade. Wendy probably can’t talk to you about it without risking prison. As far as I’m concerned,
I feel no obligation to follow the NSA’s rules. If you want to know I will tell you. Think about it first and realize they won’t take your talking about
anything lightly.”

“I want to know. I feel getting kidnapped entitles me to know.”

“Fine, Wendy was trying to decipher or understand what seemed to be some computer code of some sort that came into the NSA’s possession. Stolen by someone
I would imagine. The people that took you wanted it back. They told her to steal it and destroy any other copies the NSA may have. I checked it out and
told Wendy it was part of an operating system to what would be a revolutionary new type of computer that would give total dominance in the computer realm
to anyone who had it.”

“Who kidnapped me?”

“It seems it was agents for the Chinese government. The fragment of code was stolen from them by an American agent. You were just a tool to get Wendy to do
what they wanted.”

"So you are mainly working to protect this code you mentioned?"

"No, I'm mainly trying to help Wendy out of a jam. I don't personally give a damn about the code other than how it relates to helping her. Americans stole
it from the Chinese, who kidnapped you in an effort to get back what was stolen from them. It's all an argument and game I would not normally care about."

"You look Chinese, are you saying you sympathize with them?"

"No, as I said my interest in this is Wendy is a friend. I don't allow a single country or culture to define who I am."

“How did you find me?”

"You really are big with the rapid-fire questions aren't you? That's fine. I'll play along. I hacked into the traffic cameras and traced the car that drove
the agent who dropped off the envelope. The address of the licence number of the registered owner was the farmhouse back there. I’m guessing that they had
a long term asset that they used as a base of operations for this job. It was probably set up in a rush.”

“What now?”

“Wendy is not out of the woods yet. They must have someone inside the NSA watching her to make sure she does what they want. I have to do a couple of
things to stop them from harming her in retaliation for your escape. Once we get to Washington, I can handle that, and you can phone Wendy and let her know
you are safe.”

“Do you have a cell phone? I can phone her now.”

“Nope, if you phone her before I put things in place to save her ass, they may do something to her.”

“What are you going to do?”

“A girl’s gotta have some secrets. You just let me worry about that.”

"WELCOME BACK," SAID DR. PEARSON. "I hope you all had a good lunch."

"I want to start the afternoon by introducing you to the wonder called confabulation."

"In an experiment, researchers showed test subjects two photos of people. The photos used with each test subject were different so that subjects did not
see the same photos as each other. The test subjects were asked which person they thought was more intelligent. Once the picture had been selected, the
pictures were switched with each other without the test subjects knowing.

"As in the earlier experiment I mentioned where a switch was made, a large percentage of the subjects did not notice the change. If it was unnoticed, the
experiment continued. Test subjects were then shown the photo they had not selected and asked to describe specifically in detail why they had chosen the
person in this particular photograph as being more intelligent. Keep in mind they chose this person as being less. The test subjects would then proceed to
describe in great detail the reasons why the person in the photograph seemed more intelligent. One test subject even stated that he thought people who wore
glasses like the person in the photograph, were more intelligent. The person he had actually selected had not worn glasses."

"We have seen that people's memory is often not accurate, and they don't always notice things. Both are again true in this experiment. Despite this, the
test subjects' automatically filled-in information and altered their version of history very easily. They were not deliberately lying. They knew they had
selected someone as being more intelligent, so they set about giving reasons to justify that choice."

"The test subjects descriptions and memories of reality with respect to their decisions are completely fabricated. They have rewritten their memory and are
not even aware of the discrepancy. The process being carried out by the brain to cause this effect is called confabulation. Several other experiments have
confirmed its presence as a real and actual process. In some of them, the test subjects would affirm with total belief, sometimes incredibly ridiculous
reasons for their actions. Again, they were not lying. They believed these reasons and did not see any conflict between their explanations and reality as
seen by outside observers."

"Both confabulation and the creation and assigning of brain constructs are functions that occur below the level of our conscious mind."

"Some studies have tracked brain activity by MRI. Frequently, the command from the brain to part of the body to move and carry out a specific action was
sent from more primitive areas of the brain. Activity in the brain related to the conscious mind, appeared after. In other words, it is not uncommon for us
to take actions and to become consciously aware of it after. The brain then confabulates a reason for why it did what it did. Not all actions are this way,
and many do initiate in the conscious mind. Evidence, however, does show that we don't always have the level of control over our actions that we think we
do."

"What else is like that?"

"Let's look at another experiment as an example of behavior that is below the level of consciousness. Researchers conducted a study using women. Women
wearing non-business attire were approached and asked to participate in the experiment. They were photographed from standardized angles and distances, and
had a saliva sample taken."

"Photographs were analyzed by computer to calculate the amount of exposed skin. This was matched with the hormone levels in the saliva samples. Results
showed that women at the fertile time of their monthly cycle exhibited significantly more skin than those who were not."

"I'm pretty sure that this was not a conscious decision on the women's part. Ladies, feel free to correct me, but I don't think you consciously think, "I'm
going out, and I am at a more reproductively fertile time of the month right now so I'm going to wear something more revealing." However, the behavior
happens. It is another example of the brain making decisions and carrying out actions without us being consciously aware of it."

"The brain has another characteristic I want to discuss. It seems to reject things it views as outside of what it defines as a normal range. This action by
the brain shows up in a variety of areas."

"Every individual or situation we encounter is compared with a mental idea or construct of what is normal. Anything outside those norms tends to be deemed
less desirable or outright rejected.

"You will see this brain feature at work in what we perceive as attractive. Physical characteristics that fall outside the brain's definition of normal are
deemed less desirable for mating purposes. These are not strictly biological in nature as what is deemed attractive can vary between cultures and even over
time within the same culture. You can look at very old movies or photographs of what were considered beautiful women and see that frequently, they do not
meet current criteria for attractiveness."

"It applies to culture as well. Different cultures will have distinct parameters of normal or average behavior. Behavior within the parameters of one
culture is often outside those of another. You may view an individual from another culture as being pushy or rude. Their culture may consider a higher
level of aggressiveness, desirable. The behavior they exhibit may be totally normal within their culture."

"Cultural stereotypes of people from a particular culture are often fairly accurate. This is true from the viewpoint of a different culture. Within their
culture, they are normal."

"Political correctness often causes cultural stereotypes to be labeled as being racist. They are not. There are true observable behaviors that are common
to a specific culture. The brain, however, treats differences outside its own definition of normal as being wrong or inferior. The observable facts are not
racist, but how the brain deals with these differences can be in a racist manner."

"These cultural differences can even be in what many consider to be basic core beliefs that are beyond question. In reality, they are only one way of
viewing the world. Some differences are rejected very strongly and emotionally. We have seen this defense system for mental constructs before in some of
the earlier sections today."

"Again, let me stress strongly that I am not arguing for one belief over another. I am looking at the mental processes that are involved in creating the
beliefs and viewing the world through the filter of those beliefs. Please try to keep emotion out of this and instead focus on the processes involved. As
we look at some more emotionally charged cultural values, you will probably find that difficult to do. Even assessing some of the barriers to true reality
that we as humans have, can be an arduous process."

"Let's look at some examples. In this country, there is a fair amount of controversy around whether or not Gay marriages should be recognized. Arguments
against Gay marriages often center on it being a violation of what is a normal and proper family. The definition of a family is not something, which is a
universal law or constant. Instead, it is a specific norm within a particular culture."

"In our culture we normally trace family structure through the bloodline of the father. Family trees trace links to fathers, and last names are usually
transmitted through the father’s side of the genetic equation of parenthood. There are cultures, which do not do this."

"Some trace everything through the mother’s bloodline. Some even have a family structure which is centred on the mother and her genetic family. In these
cases, the predominant male in a person's family is often not their father. Instead, it is their mother’s oldest brother. If you wish to confirm parenthood
for purposes of inheritance without the use of DNA testing, you can be much surer of the mother than the supposed father."

"There are cultures in which there is more than one wife. There is also at least one culture in which the woman has multiple husbands at once, and they
function as one big family unit."

"It is important to realize that I am not referring to small radical cult groups. Instead, all of these examples are cultures, which have been in
continuous existence for hundreds and in some cases, thousands of years. So, again, what constitutes a normal and proper family is something that varies
from culture to culture."

"How women are treated is an emotionally charged issue and can also vary from culture to culture. In American culture, women are deemed equal and believed
to have rights to their own opinions. No matter how strongly we believe this, this belief is a cultural norm and not a universal law. We may be outraged
when we read in a newspaper about a legal case in a South American country. The man was on trial for beating his wife to death for deciding to attend
university when he, the husband had declared she would not. At the murder trial, he informed the judge; he had done it, and it was a matter of honor. The
judge deemed this an acceptable reason and dismissed the case. "