An Ecology of MInd (5 page)

“This seminar is not part of the formal curriculum for history or any other program here, but Dr. Wales keeps insisting to me that he thinks it is
important for students to hear, so I keep coming back when he asks. The actual content of the seminar changes somewhat each time I come as I try to keep it
current with new advances. I'm a graduate from the school here and Professor Wales, whether he believes it or not, has been the inspiration for many of my
career decisions."

Glancing over to Professor Wales, he asked laughingly "Is that enough of a plug to get me a free dinner later?"

"I think so," answered Professor Wales, smiling from across the room.

A thought flashed briefly through Michael's mind before he continued with the seminar. Ah Chris, if you really knew what my purpose for these lectures was,
would you keep welcoming me back or would you shun me like a pariah?

"As Professor Wales mentioned, I am the Managing Director of The Redstone Foundation. I do hold a number of advanced degrees in a variety of subjects. I
completed my first university degree when I was fourteen. All of which are good qualifications for managing an organization like the Redstone Foundation,
but my most important qualification is that my grandfather was the person who donated the funds for the trust which finances the Foundation. I am the sole
trustee of the fund. So, being Managing Director can't really be listed as an academic achievement."

"Fancy titles, earned or unearned aside, being Managing Director for Redstone gives me access to world-leading research in a variety of areas. There are
numerous links between different disciplines. One of my main jobs is to try to keep an overview of the research at Redstone and other places. I then try
and hook researchers up with anyone who may have information that could be useful to one of them or even better, to both."

"The dividing of knowledge into separate discreet disciplines is a historical method of dealing with knowledge, but the reality is that there is no actual
separation. It all interconnects. Taking a wider view helps prevent the tunnel vision you see so often with people who limit themselves to one area of
expertise. It's amazing what you can find that applies to your own discipline if you raise your sights slightly and look at other areas of knowledge.

"The seminar today is hosted and sponsored by the History Department and Dr. Wales. I will be discussing some history, mainly as examples of principles I
am trying to get across, but that is far from the only thing I will be talking about. We will be raising our heads and looking beyond just the one
discipline. That is one of the reasons this lecture is open to people outside of the history department."

"The title for the Seminar today was listed as "Barriers to Reality." I tend to think of it in my own head as "Shake Up and Wake Up." What I am trying to
do is to shake up your assumptions and to wake up your brain. I want to stimulate a different way of viewing the world around you."

"Whether you are doing historical research, working on Wall Street, or managing a day-care centre, you are making observations of the world around you.
From those you make conclusions and act based on those conclusions. Everything that everybody does, involves observing and acting on reality as they
perceive it."

"What I will be trying to show you today is that there are several barriers to this process that distort our understanding of reality. Hopefully, if you
are more aware of some of these, you will minimize some of these distortions."

"Sorry," Dr. Pearson smiled "but we will be attempting this totally without the use of mind altering pharmaceuticals." Some of the audience laughed.

"Before we get started, I would like to make a couple of comments about history since this is sponsored by the History department. I feel that often the
average person does not have much of an understanding or even an interest in history, and I feel that is a mistake on their part. I would argue that
history has little to do with the popular conception of being about who fought what battle on what date. While that too is history, it is by far only a
small part of it. History, to me, is about understanding how we got to where we are. People's perceptions of historical fact decide much, of how they think
and act in the present and have a huge impact on cultural realities and political policies on an ongoing basis. History is the past, but it is not dead. In
fact, the future is undergoing a perpetual process of becoming history. Separating the two is another arbitrary academic division."

"It can even be argued that every one of us live our lives completely in the past and never ever deal with the actual present. From the moment, an event
happens; it takes about eighty milliseconds for the information to be transmitted to the human brain. Once there, the brain may delay processing of the
information even further for a variety of reasons. Therefore, what you perceive to be the present is already the past."

"Through the course of the seminar today I will be raising a variety of issues that act as potential barriers to reality. They will range from the
neurophysiology of the human brain to filters of language or culture. I won't be going into anywhere near the detail of knowledge that is available. I will
be using simplified aspects to get an idea across and then applying it to either history or our own current behavior."

"In some cases, I will only be raising questions about aspects, of how we think or act that seem odd or unusual. I may not know the answers, but even
recognizing that there is something to question is the first step. Often we are so unaware of problems in the process of perceiving reality that we don't
think to question."

"The overall intent of the lecture is merely to start to open your minds to some things that you have probably never considered. This will be extremely
useful in any sort of career in History, but is also applicable in many other areas of life as well. I personally believe that anything that gives us a
better understanding of ourselves, our behavior, our strengths and our weaknesses is useful."

"As we as a species, progress, we control greater forces. Nuclear weapons have given us the ability to destroy the surface of our planet several times
over. Advances in genetics have allowed us to alter the genetic code of organisms on this planet at will. Computers have magnified our ability to
manipulate information. We have started in limited ways to expand beyond the planet and into space. However, controlling all of this power and ability to
transform things around us is the same brain we had thousands of years ago. Flaws or limitations in thought are amplified by our increased ability to
affect the world around us. As our power increases, so do the risks derived from flaws in thought and perception."

"When the limit of your abilities is to stab something with a sharp stick, the risks from flaws in thought are limited. With what our species is capable of
now, the risks are proportionally greater to match.

"Let me stress, while I think it is essential to strip any barriers to reality that we can identify, there are times when that is not needed or desirable.
As long as you are in a situation where you can afford to have it, then I see no problem with a certain amount of unreality."

"For example, I have no problem with fairy tales for children, and I enjoy the occasional fantasy novel myself. At Christmas, I choose to behave in many
ways as if Santa Clause is real and various Christmas miracles do happen. This does not mean I have dissociated from reality and would put myself or others
in danger because of it. It merely makes things more enjoyable for me. I can drop the pretense in a moment if need be."

"I notice a lot of you taking notes. There is no requirement for that. Not because I am worried about a written record that I believe in Santa Clause,"
laughed Dr. Pearson. "Feel free to take notes if you want, or if there are some points, you wish to jot down, but, there will be no examination on any of
the material I present today. It is not part of your formal curriculum and is just for interest and personal development."

"During our time today, please try to keep an open mind. If I happen to insult what you believe, that is not my intent. The use of any of your beliefs as
an example is strictly that and not meant as an attack of any sort. My intent is not to tell you what to believe. It is to try to show you things that
impede or alter our understanding of reality. Take what we learn today and apply the concepts. My focus is not on individual beliefs. It is on the process
by which we reach them. By discovering some of these you may find yourself questioning some beliefs that you never thought to question. It should be fun,
but then Dr. Walsh says I have a twisted sense of what is fun."

"The first barrier to reality we will look at is pretty much at the core of our perception. It affects almost everything related to how we perceive the
world around us. It is a fundamental part of how our brains function and is related to how our brains process information."

"The brain automatically notes patterns and creates mental constructs as a way of simplifying. Imagine if every single time you looked at something the
brain had to analyze it all in detail? Something along the lines of: "The object I see over there has a vertical brown structure with a rough-textured
surface which splits into a variety of uneven lengths at various angles. As you move higher on the object it splits again at more angles and lengths and
terminates in broad flat surfaces of a green color with an irregular outline that are numerous and cover the entire top of the object." Taking the time to
do that every time we look at something is not a survival trait. You are more likely to survive if you look at the object and go "tree," end of story, end
of processing. Now you can spend time watching for the lion that may be hunting you."

"The brain continuously notes patterns and classifies them into mental constructs to speed up processing. Human brains are very efficient at noting certain
types of patterns and are especially good at noting visual patterns. It will even note patterns that are not really there and make constructs. If you look
closely at the textured surface of a towel or carpet, you will start to see things like faces or animals, in the random patterns of the textures. Looking
at shapes in clouds is another example. You can pick out identifiable shapes in what are random patterns of water vapor. The brain is designed to find
patterns."

"Our brains receive a tremendous amount of information through input from our various senses. The sheer volume of this information is staggering, and it is
received with no structure. Our brains impose some form of structure to it. If it didn't, it would be just a meaningless jumble of raw data. Our brains
apply this order by first recognizing patterns and by creating conceptual constructs."

"This construct contains information in addition to that of the item you are looking at. With our tree construct, for example, it can contain information
about various types of trees. It can contain information that if the tree has leaves that are a different color than usual, then it must be fall. It can
also contain information that wood for house construction comes from trees, or that when you were a kid, you had a tree house in the big maple tree in the
back yard. All of this is linked together in a single pattern we can label "tree." This process is very efficient and rapid."

"Enough about trees, let's consider the lion I mentioned earlier. Which person would be more likely to survive meeting a lion? One person sees it, notes
the color, shape, big teeth, gets a partial match to its mental construct of a lion, and assigns the construct of a lion to what they are seeing. This
construct includes the fact that it will eat them, so they run. The second person sees the lion and begins to assess what it is seeing. It is large, brown,
and has longer dark fur or hair on its head. It has shorter fur elsewhere and four legs. There is a tail which has a tuft of longer dark hair at the end.
There are several sharp teeth, long claws, and it is running towards them. It makes a loud roaring noise. The second person decides that there are several
similarities to their mental construct of a lion but haven't checked the new thing against everything in the construct yet so keeps comparing. Some of the
teeth are larger than others. It runs very quickly. There is only one animal visible but lions sometimes travel in groups. The second person keeps
comparing until they are probably dead. A quicker matching of what is being observed with a mental construct means faster action and is a definite survival
advantage."

"So these mental constructs are a good thing and essential to be able to think and interact in the world. How can that be a barrier?"

"The constructs are basically a list of things about whatever the construct represents. The way the brain uses them is to compare incoming data to its
collection of constructs. When it has a partial match, it assigns the construct to that data for all functions associated with that data. Great so far, but
a construct could contain a list of hundreds of things the brain knows about whatever it is looking at or assessing. The brain does not compare all of
them. As we have seen, that is too time-consuming and would slow the processing of data. So what the brain does is compare the first few items on the list
within the construct, and if there is a match it automatically assigns the entire construct to that data."

"Is everybody following me so far?" There were a number of nods, so he continued. "Good, now stop and think a moment about what I just described to you.
Remember we are discussing barriers to reality. What is the problem with what I just described?"

There was a pause, and then one of the students about four rows back on the right side of room tentatively put up his hand. "Yes, you sir. What's the
problem?"

"If I understood you correctly, the brain assigns the entire construct based on comparison of only a few items."

"Yes, which means what?"

"The brain has only compared a few items and does not know if the rest is true or not. It assigns the other things in its list anyway."