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| Articles: Ceiling Fan Lobotomy: On existing. Mmm-yes. |
Posted by
Sticupus on Sunday, August 17, 2003 - 04:36 AM PST
It is often that I ask myself, ‘What am I? What is death? What is living?’ I sit and ponder these questions endlessly, correlating my cognitive data into logical constructs. I am of course limited by the amount of data I have being only one person, and am capable of obtaining due to the limitations of current human knowledge.
However, aside from such obstacles, I have been able to come up with a few thoughts. I exclude all spiritual and emotional aspects as they are not always reliable or provable, and hinder my thinking.“What am I?” Am I a body?
Do I only exist in my mind? Are those things different or the same as they appear to be inseparable? Some questions cannot be answered, but they can be pondered through philosophy. Am I my body? Perhaps. Everything in my body, and every action or thought I take can be traced back to a chemical or electrical reaction used to perpetuate my existence and help me survive. This phenomena is both currently known as fact and still being explored (of course omitting reasons for why it happens). Perhaps I am the matter in my body. Does that mean it has to be in a certain shape? If you were to place me into a large industrial blender, I would die.
Therefore it is suggested that my matter has to be in a particular order to be me. However, how is that true if my body isn’t a stable shape? My heart beats, pumping blood and nutrients throughout my body. Matter changes, shape changes. My body is never in a consistent shape due to the matter exchange going on throughout my body. If I am never in the same consistent shape am I still myself, or am I a different person every passing moment? Where’s the distinction if change is constant?
What if I was to have a shock to my heart at the moment when the rhythm is weakest, and it were to stop my heart? My body would still be in a shape otherwise unmistakable to a living body, unlike what I would be like in the industrial blender, though I still would be dead. Shape therefore seems to have a correlation, but does not seem to be the reason for why I am alive, or why I am not dead. Is life a pattern of matter? Perhaps.Maybe I am the matter in my body. It would seem like the matter in my body is me, and cannot be anyone else at one time.
What about over time; over many years of living? Over my lifetime I will breathe; I will eat and defecate; I will shed skin cells. Is the matter in my body me? What about the matter that will become me: or the matter that was me? I will consume a large amount of matter in my lifetime. If I am currently the matter that I consumed, is the matter I expelled still me?Am I my body or my mind again; as in is the matter in my brain me, or the matter in my extremities and body? Are they different or the same as my heart beats and exchanges matter from the two regions?
Say there is an apple on the counter. I am going to eat it unless some force stops me. I will absorb the apple and it will become part of my body and brain alike, my being and my sentience. Is the apple me before I eat it? What about in the orchard? How about when the matter was coming into being, billions of years ago (according to the best big bang theory)? In the opposite way, are the waste products I exhale that linger in the air still me? Lets say a person in the room inhales the air I have breathed out. The air existed in all parts of my body, and was concentrated into an exhaled plume that they breathed in and absorbed. Are they now me? How about partially? If I do the same, am I them?
Over time are we distinct or different from one another? If we aren’t different, as we have had the same matter in our being, were we ever different?Am I the matter I am composed of and/or the shape the matter is in? There seems to be conflicting ideas being composed here. If life is the shape of matter, then how could I die and have my body intact via a shock to the heart. If life is the shape I am in, then how could I be alive if I am constantly changing shape by simply living?
Am I the matter I have absorbed over my existence and lifetime? Does the matter I will absorb and have absorbed feel and think the way I do right now, or must it be in a certain shape to do so, as in my own shape?
The data I have as of now does not seem to answer these questions concerning the physical make up of my body in correlation of life and death. I have come up to several roadblocks with a side of cognitive dissonance, which makes me wonder once again ‘Who am I?’, or what is the difference between life and death?
What is driving my existence, my mind or my body? Is it my sentience or the complex chemical reactions driven by my deoxyribonucleic acid, amino acids, and proteins? Are they one in the same? Is one the product of the other? Is the deoxyribonucleic acid driving my sentience through its tedious chemical reactions? What does it want to do that for?
Why is my mind driving for these questions? What am I? Am I dead or am I living? Am I trying to understand myself right now or am I a pawn for existence trying to understand itself?Where is my sentience? Does it exist in my brain? The matter in my brain changes and leaves; it comes and goes. Is my sentience everywhere my former and future matter lies?
There is still more data to be collected, and correlated. So many unanswered questions still exist, and so many new ideas and experiences to have. I can’t help but feel a full spectrum of emotion at these prospects, as I am both excited and frightened.
What am I?
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| Ceiling Fan Lobotomy: On existing. Mmm-yes. | Login/Create an account | 7 Comments |
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Re: Ceiling Fan Lobotomy: On existing. Mmm-yes.
by Psychopixi (psyche.at.psychopixi.dot.com)
on Aug 17, 2003 - 04:51 AM
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That was a very captivating read. I don't pretend to know anything about philosophy, but it seemed you've got a very interesting line of thought going and I really enjoyed reading this. Thinking about things like "What am I?" "Why am I?" often spins me out quite a bit. It's impossible to reach an answer, a *definite* answer and that's really confusing. It makes me feel very small, thinking about all these big questions. Then again, they're only questions, so maybe they should feel small being thought about by a complex living, sentient being such as myself. ;o)
Your article reminded me of one of the only pieces of philosophy I've read; the brain in the jar idea. This suggests that we do not exist as anything other than a brain in a jar, being manipulated by a scientist who wishes us to experience everything that we do, and believe that it is real. Sort of like the Matrix. That idea really weirds me out because no matter how extreme and unlikely it is, we can't prove it's wrong. Brings a whole new meaning to "in a world of his own", huh?
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Re: Ceiling Fan Lobotomy: On existing. Mmm-yes.
by Sticupus (sticupus@hotmale.com) on Aug 17, 2003 - 09:30 PM
(User info | Send a Message) http://www.obolisk.com | I do believe that there is an answer to these questions. As you can read about my thought son the subject when applied to this:
http://www.shmeng.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=416
You may feel small now contemplating such questions, but imagine how you would feel if you knew the answers.
And if my brain was in a jar, at least there is a jar and a brain, and a world for the brain in the jar to exist in, and scientists to think about it’s implications. Imagine if none of those things were there. Just the mind and nothing else. I’d bet you’d feel a lot more confused and lonely. However- isn’t it exciting that you have the ability to think about it, regardless of how unpleasant the current thoughts make you feel? |
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Re: Ceiling Fan Lobotomy: On existing. Mmm-yes.
by Psychopixi (psyche.at.psychopixi.dot.com) on Aug 18, 2003 - 04:51 AM
(User info | Send a Message) http://psychopixi.com | But that's just it - it isn't an *unpleasant* feeling... if it were I guess I'd just push all such thoughts to the back of my mind and ignore them. It's just weirdness - it's odd to be trying to work out those kind of ideas in my head. Not at all unpleasant though because it's so interesting to think about, and I love everything I've read so far; not because I agree with it, but because I like reading the explanations and ideas and then working them through in my own mind.
The brain in the jar thing I like, because extreme though it may be, I can see how it could be. Trying to imagine that the only thing that exists is the mind is really difficult. Not least of all because I'm used to this physical world - when I think about only the mind existing, that leads me to think "What does the mind exist *in*? Blackness? Space? Those are all *somethings* though."
That links in, for me, with the idea of the universe being infinite. I can acknowledge that it may well be so, but I can't quite fathom how. How can something go on forever? The way I think, I keep trying to figure out what's at the end of the universe. What's outside it, for it to exist *in*? Maybe I just need to find a new way of thinking about it. |
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Re: Ceiling Fan Lobotomy: On existing. Mmm-yes.
by bettie_x (strangersangel@hotmail.com)
on Aug 17, 2003 - 08:38 PM
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I say you're thinkin way too hard son, and that it's time for a drink.
If matter that I consume becomes me, then I shall proceed to find myself in the bottom of a bottle.
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Re: Ceiling Fan Lobotomy: On existing. Mmm-yes.
by Sticupus (sticupus@hotmale.com) on Aug 17, 2003 - 09:19 PM
(User info | Send a Message) http://www.obolisk.com | That is just the attitude I do not want to have for myself. I want to keep thinking and exploring and I hate the idea that such thoughts are hopeless, painful or childish. Many people grow older and stop exploring the world around them, and accept all that they see without questioning ever again. Why wait until your death bed?
I will never consume alcohol, because I don’t want my thoughts inhibited. Same thing with drugs- I want to experience all that I can and think clearly about those experiences. These are the reasons why I believe I am sentient; it’s my curiosity. That’s why I’m a conceptual artist. I wish to find answers and truths, and share my findings with people. I wish there was some way to encourage people to not be afraid to think more.
I am aware that these thoughts do take their pound of flesh though. Maybe that’s why people seem to avoid them. One can be left contemplating ideas that we aren’t sure as a species we can all figure out, and that can leave us wondering, lonely, detached, and afraid.
I can’t seem to help myself, I have this deep drive to keep exploring myself/my existence. |
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Re: Ceiling Fan Lobotomy: On existing. Mmm-yes.
by bettie_x (strangersangel@hotmail.com) on Aug 18, 2003 - 11:23 AM
(User info | Send a Message) http://bettie_x.tripod.com/ | Oh please I was poking fun doofy, lighten the gloom a bit. And I don't blame you for constantly thinking about things like this. I think most people do at some time in their life, some won't admit it, some won't ever do it again, some people do it constantly and it drives them crazy. I like it in moderation, just enough to keep me on my toes but not enough to make my head explode. Believe it or not, I actually think better on extremely touchy subjects like "what is me" when I've had a few because it quiets my brain (which is usually frantically whizzing a million things about that are of little or no importance...sometimes I wonder if it's something as simple as ADHD or worse). It does however, impede my motor skills which forces me to sit and stay vs running away and finding a distraction. Just as I know people who function best sober, I know people who function best after a joint, or after a beer (not addicts or drunks, mind you. There is such a thing as occasional imbibing without addiction. Addicts are hiding.) We're not teaching our brains to roll over and play dead, we're teaching it to sit and stay, and it doesn't work for everyone.
People in general will always be afraid to think, which is why we use such a limited amount of the big brain we've accrued over hundreds of thousands of years. |
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Re: Ceiling Fan Lobotomy: On existing. Mmm-yes.
by Shade (Shade@Gothcult.com)
on Aug 19, 2003 - 06:38 AM
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Just to get all Zen on your ass: You are what and who you are. Seriously though. You are defined to yourself by the way in which you define yourself. If you decide you are a spiritual being using meat puppet for a short time on this plane, you will find that that affects your actions and modes of thought more than you ever expected. If you decide that you are the sum total of your parts, the same thing goes. I don't claim to hae any insite into what actually makes us tick, but I know that we are dependant on so many things to make it keep happening that it's amazing we've managed to push the meat puppet population to nearly seven billion.
No matter what else I say Stic, let this one remain. Nice. You are diggin deeply into a topic that for some is truely too complex to contemplate and it looks like you are going looking for answers with all guns blazing. Congratulations!
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