A puzzling fact about thinking.
I am going to describe here a known fact about Thoughts and Thinking that must have important Philosophical Ramifications even though I can't think of any.
Here it is the Puzzling Fact. "A person cannot think verbal thoughts without speaking those thoughts aloud." This fact is a well known fact among psychologists and might be known to you.
If you are willing to cooperate I can partially demonstrate this fact by performing a simple experiment. Not a thought experiment but a real one.
As follows:
First, Repeat this thought out loud several times:
"The father handed the baby to the mother".
Ignore the meaning. The meaning is irrelevant.
Now think those very same words again silently. Think them again BUT WITOUT READING THEM. Close your eyes or something.
Notice how easily and smoothly these thoughts roll out.
Now open your mouth very wide, as wide as you can.
Now think those words again. Don't read them
Do you notice an awkwardness in your thinking? Awkwardness almost to the the point of an inability to think the words at all?
Let me enlarge on this.
One can easily buy speech detecters. These are ordinary motion detectors that can be clamped onto a subjects's lips and tongue and laid against a person's vocal chords (in the adam's apple) during a scientific experiment and speech movements can be detected.
Many such experiments have been carried out wherein the subject is asked to think silently and speech has always been detected.
Here it is the Puzzling Fact. "A person cannot think verbal thoughts without speaking those thoughts aloud." This fact is a well known fact among psychologists and might be known to you.
If you are willing to cooperate I can partially demonstrate this fact by performing a simple experiment. Not a thought experiment but a real one.
As follows:
First, Repeat this thought out loud several times:
"The father handed the baby to the mother".
Ignore the meaning. The meaning is irrelevant.
Now think those very same words again silently. Think them again BUT WITOUT READING THEM. Close your eyes or something.
Notice how easily and smoothly these thoughts roll out.
Now open your mouth very wide, as wide as you can.
Now think those words again. Don't read them
Do you notice an awkwardness in your thinking? Awkwardness almost to the the point of an inability to think the words at all?
Let me enlarge on this.
One can easily buy speech detecters. These are ordinary motion detectors that can be clamped onto a subjects's lips and tongue and laid against a person's vocal chords (in the adam's apple) during a scientific experiment and speech movements can be detected.
Many such experiments have been carried out wherein the subject is asked to think silently and speech has always been detected.
Comments (103)
No.
A little, yes.
Not even a little.
Interestingly, I was on Unemployment insurance in 1990, just after I graduated from university, and they paid for me to take a test to enter a Systems Analysis program, which was a pretty new field at the time. It was a three-hour test that I finished after an hour. Early the next day, Saturday, they called me, and told me I had gotten the second highest score in verbal reasoning they had ever seen.
Spoken words definitely possess a magic all their own.
Funny thing is that I read the entire OP without ever speaking aloud.
Exciting to know! You might have an important new, time saving reading aidand teaching aid that should be widely know.
What did you think about my basic contention? That verbal thoughts must always be spoken? I predict you don't think anything about it at all. I don't either.
You may have been reading at the same time.
Was your mouth wide open? Were you reading at the same time?
But isn't that a puzzle about reading, rather than thinking?
Is thinking mental reading, or is reading verbalized thinking?
The words: "The father handed the baby to the mother" were chosen because the consonants in that phrase are all pronounced with the mouth almost closed. Th, tongue against lips, f, lips against teeth, , h tongue against the front of the palate, b and m lips against lips. Therefore they would impossible to read aloud with the mouth wide open and slightly difficult to read silently.
I think your basic contention is mistaken. That which seems like internal vocalizing, is still merely thinking, and nothing I think requires speech. It is true, on the other hand, that what is spoken must first be thought. Therefore, I think your contention is mistaken because I think it is backwards.
Quoting Ken Edwards
I wouldn’t normally, but you asked what I thought about something, which requires I think something, iff I intend to respond.
Quoting Ken Edwards
Yes. No. I followed directions. Not much difference in thinking the words with my eyes closed and thinking them with my mouth open. I don’t think with either one, actually, so why would it matter what they’re doing when I’m thinking?
Everything in the conscious mind is verbaized by definition and the reverse is true: if is not verbalized it can't enter the conscious mind. We might prefer to call it: "the word mind or the semantic mind".
It is not mistaken but it is almost impossible to beleive and not at all even slightly reasonable and can only be confirmed with a movement detecter.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying there is no movement as shown by a detector. I don’t know anything about that, except what you just told me. But even if there is detectable movement, it doesn't change the rest of what I said. And just leaves me to ask......so what? Is this just a matter of interest to certain psychological/anthropological disciplines, or is there some benefit to mankind in knowing about it?
I agree. I would gues that: "the cultural-collective heritage within which those concepts evolved" includes and contains "our personal use of concepts"
We are wallowing in trivia.
If we’re wallowing in trivia, and if the whole thing is not at all even slightly reasonable, doesn't seem like fertile ground for important philosophical ramifications.
It would be fun to learn a puzzling fact about thinking, though.
our personal use of concepts derives from the cultural-collective heritage
I don’t think the conclusion drawn from the experiment is accurate. I will accept that there is a relation between thinking about words and actions required to speak those words, and that often when our attention and effort is concentrated on thinking about the words, we tend to also go through the motions at a minimal level.
But I don’t think it follows that a person cannot think about words without speaking them, and certainly not aloud. I think the movements help to focus attention (I think @Banno alluded to this), but they aren’t necessary.
However, visualisation is not verbal but still thinking. Do I need to draw you a diagram?
I've been thinking about the idea that remembering is healing, as if every memory is a little lesion in the brain, a little wound in the mind, a little sore in the soul, a little launchpad in the embodiment that sends thoughts on a hero's journey.
What's the significance of this though?
Participating in this discussion I have become convinced that I have been on the wrong track.
I stated: "Here it is a Puzzling Fact. A person cannot think verbal thoughts without speaking those thoughts aloud." This fact is a well known fact among psychologists and might be known to you.
MWW suggested that I might have it backwards and I think he is correct.
I now think speech itself is only one aspect of a complex gestalt.
Consider: Without a conscious mind there could be no speech. Without speech there could be no conscious mind.
Without vocal chords there could be neither.
Those thoughts provoke new perplexities. Why are humans the only animals that have conscious minds? That is an astonishing statement. How could that be true?
The logical question that arises is: Where did the conscious mind come from?
A possible answer is that evolution evolved speech in human beings slowly over a very long period of time, perhaps 300,000 years.
But that merely delays the question. Why did evolution evolve speech only in humans?
Speech requires a brain that contains very large numbers of brain cells.
Early man had more brain cells than any other animal on earth. He also had vocal chords. So the bones of the human skull expanded and the prefrontal lobes were created just above the eyes.
Only in humans.
I grasp all of your clearly expressed statements but I don't understand the relationship between the first 3 sentences and the rest. ements.
"In the beginning (of consciousness) was the word."
Quoting Ken Edwards
I'm sorry, but I can't be bothered at the moment - I don't have facilities to make it easy enough. So instead ...
By your hypothesis words are behaviour/actions. One might say 'gestural'.
Quoting TheMadFool
Obviously giraffes think, but not in words, and I suggest that they are aware, but not conscious. This is a distinction that requires forcing of the language a bit, so I have to explain: awareness is defined for this purpose as sensation (image, smell, sound, etc) + association with a memory, accompanied with affect or emotion. Eg. sensation sight/smell of baobab associated with memory of another tree that smelled and looked a lot like, and feeling of yummy leaves and fruit. (I attempt to describe in words the thinking of a giraffe not in words.)
This whole thought process in a human is encapsulated in a single word - ice-cream. What this means is that a word does not refer to a thing, but to a whole relationship, something like: "that is a baobab, giraffes like baobabs, and I am a giraffe."
And it is this last bit, of crucial self identification, that distinguishes the wide-aware giraffe from the sleepily conscious human.
I have just explicated in detail how I think they are very different.
Quoting TheMadFool
Wrong. A picture is a record, thus a memory: a word as I explained above is multi-faceted and associates a sensation an emotion and a memory along with, crucially, an identification.
I only thought your basic contention, that all verbal thoughts must always be spoken, is backwards. Which I thought should be....all spoken must first be thought.
Quoting Ken Edwards
Agreed.
Quoting Ken Edwards
Double disagreed. Without vocal chords there wouldn’t be coherent speech but there could still be perfectly intelligible communication, which presupposes a conscious mind as the necessary means for it.
————
Quoting Ken Edwards
It cannot be said where a thing comes from if it isn’t first known what it is. But knowing what a thing is doesn’t promise knowing where it comes from. It just may be, that asking where the conscious mind comes from, isn’t a logical question at all. Kant would say asking after the ontology of a purely transcendental object, is an exercise in irrationality, because one is then trying to locate something that can never be thought as phenomenon. But what did he know anyway. He’s ancient, right?
————
Quoting Ken Edwards
Given all the known extinct animals, is there evidence of that claim? What about unknown extinct animals? Can’t just insist if they had more brain cells then humans they wouldn’t be extinct, can we?
Dunno about brain cells in general, but there is evidence that, against the metric of unit body weight, a shrew has more neural connections than a human, with unit body mass as the metric, an elephant has more neural connections than a human, and with unit brain mass as the metric, an orangutan has almost the same number of neural connections as a human, yet none of those species have taken themselves to Disneyland.
Only in humans, aye. Pro and con.
A human has many efficient devices for communication. Laughing is a form of communication. Screaming with rage also. Also shrugging the shoulders. Also frowning, smiling, raising the eybrows, gesturing, pointing , a clenched fist, a shy look, Indian sign language. There must be hundreds, or thousands. None of these require words. For a dog tail wagging. None of these relate to the conscious mind. All of them are easily available to persons with undeveloped conscious minds such as children.
Do you realize what you are doing right this second? You are using your conscious mind to create words and you are directing your fingers to type those words. Between you and me there is absolutely nothing except our 2 conscious minds. You are using your conscious mind to tell me that your conscious mind might never be thought as a phenomenon.
I have a strong intuition that if Kant were here he would agree with me.
Yikes.
Sorry.....I can’t think of a profitable response to all that.
On the contrary , contemporary research in cognitive neuroscience and consciousness studies both point to the idea that the notion of unconscious feeling is incoherent.
The neuroscientist Antonio Damasio says “ it’s very important to separate emotion from feeling. We must separate the component that comes out of actions from the component that comes out of our perspective on those actions, which is feeling. Curiously, it’s also where the self emerges, and consciousness itself. Mind begins at the level of feeling. It’s when you have a feeling (even if you’re a very little creature) that you begin to have a mind and a self.”
https://www.technologyreview.com/2014/06/17/172310/the-importance-of-feelings/amp/
The over-mind contains little or no consciousness, ie self awareness, which existss only in the conscious mind. The conscious mind contains vocabularies of word or symbols. Vacabularies can vary in size. From a single word, "mama", in an infant to thousands of words in a multilingual person.
It sounds like you’re making all this up , because it runs directly counter to current research on the relation between consciousness and feelings. Can you cite any research from psychologists supporting your view?
I will name a few such. Please excuse my non-professional vocabulary.
The over mind or intuitive mind controls all muscular movements, some of which are deliberate such as pole vaulting or involuntary such as Heartbeat which is a muscle. It measure the level of blood sugar in the body and controls with great accuracy the glandular production of insulin. It carefully measures the outputs of many other glands. It controls the workings of the digestive process although the two extremes of this, eating and defecating are partially voluntary. It produces all emotional processes. It controls the behavior of all blood circulating veins and arteries including the thousands of on off valves in the arteries. It monitors and controls all of the senses and their outputs such as sight, hearing and touch which consists of many thousands of sensors in the skin which can register pressure, hot, cold and another that I forgot. It controls all of the reproductive processes in the testicles. It controls many functions of the brain itself including non verbal thinking and feeling also includes blood circulation and oxygen flow.
The conscious mind braincells are connected to the intuitive mind brain cells with numerous nerves which are very well known to surgeons because of the occasional prefrontal lobotimy operation which is the surgical removal of the entire conscios mind.
All of this data is kindergarden stuff and well known to most prepared minds.
Isn’t one of the biggest problems of neurology right now precisely the non existence of these brain cells? There is no specific spot in the brain that “does” consciousness.
The conscious mind braincells are easily shown to be located in the prefrontal lobes which is the bulge in the head just above the eyes.
Thousands of tests some a half a century old or more have established that fact. Brain surgeons know with extreme precision exactly where it is because of the occasional prefrontal lobotomy operation which is the surgical removal of the entire conscios mind in order to save the life of the patient. The entire prefontal lobes.
After that the patient can no longer talk but none of the rest of the brain is damaged and the patient can live happily.
Yes. All the time. Whether I follow your instructions or not.
Now close your eyes and open your mouth wide, and try to figure out if there is any awkwardness in this opinion.
Jokes aside: if the patient can live happily after a removal of the front cortex, which is a fact that you claim, then he is happy; happiness is a function of the conscious. Therefore the conscious has not been removed with the frontal lobe. Therefore the front cortex does not house the conscious.
Happiness existed in men and apes millions of years before the conscious mind was created by evolutionary processes. The conscious mind is brand new created probably less than a half a million years ago.
But I insist that happiness is a feeling, and all feelings are only felt by conscious beings. A rock can't be happy; but a tiger, a tape worm and god can. I think (can't prove it) that the feeling of happiness is not separable form a conscious mind that feels it.
You may think otherwise. Fine, that's your prerogative. There are no facts here, only opinions. And in proper argumenting opinions are not supposed to be presented as facts.
You're right, I have to read your argument more carefully. Be back to on that after I read your claim more carefully. (Maybe.)
I think the claim that happiness is a function of the over-mind is an opinion. You must prove that it is a fact, that happiness is not a function of the front cortex, but of the "over-mind". I accept your use of the word, it is clear and precise. I just don't think feelings such as happiness, anger, sadness, grief, etc. are functions of the over-mind. You have to prove that to us. If you think it's kindergarten stuff, please provide references contained in the applicable literature and not take them from hearsay or from imagination.
I have no interest or desire to support my statements. My statements are based on memories of books and articles I have read over the last 50 years. I am not arguing. I have no opinions, only memories.
I am not sure what you mean by proper arguing but intuitionally I think most arguing is mindless and worth nothing.
But this is a philosophy site. We toy with ideas, and if someone has a claim, we like that person to defend their claim, otherwise the discussion is futile.
I could say that my brain is green, and it can detect flying space ships that are twenty parts per billion in the air because they are also green and they contain therefore bits of my salami sandwich. Would you believe me? If I said, "It's my memory and my recollection and my opinion, and I am not willing to part with it, or defend it," then where do you think that discussion will take us to?
I thank you for candidly stating your opinion formed on the basis of memories, and I commend you for saying it is not something you can defend before reasonable scrutiny. (You did not say it this way but this is how I take what you said.)
You say - state - claim that I must prove that it is a fact, that happiness is not a function of the front cortex. Must I? No I Must not. You say - "You have to prove that to us." I am curious to know what will be the consequences if I don't.
What about reasoning? Is it not an obvious fact that men and apes have experienced happines for millions of years? Is it not an obvious fact that no animal except ourselves have conscios minds and can talk?
Re -
Thank you
Claiming something is normally the same thing, with the extra meaning that it is true.
If you state a fact, it involves the inference, that it is true. Facts are not topics of debate.
If you state an opinion, you can claim it is true or you can claim it is false.
I read once somewhere, can't remember the source, that philosophy is an endeavour where one has to have a very fine understanding of the language -- from its robust forms to the most refined and subtle. In fact, some philosophers have claimed (mainly the logical positivists) that philosophy does not exist beyond the comprehension of the language or beyond the comprehension of ideas that the language can express. If you know the language, then philosophy can't tell you anything that is incomprehensible to you.
Asking me to define the difference between "stating something" and "claiming something" is a sign you have a lot to learn yet for becoming a passable philosopher. Sorry, not to diss you or to belittle you. But it is the truth, that not knowing the difference in meaning of two very common words will require of you a lot of work to catch up to par.
I withdraw from the discussion of the meaning of the word claim because of pure bewilderment. I just looked it up and it had 14 differnt meanings.
I give here a sample: "used as a verb --cause the loss of (someone's life): the attacks claimed the lives of five people"
If philosophy doesn't exist beyond comprehension than what am I doing here wasting my time? What's worse: Might not I be considered a philosopher? Sometimes bewidered, of course, but very good looking. Thus if philosphy doesn't exist then philosophers don't exist either.
My god! what will I do? Who will feed my children?
Sorry about that.
The meaning of a word belongs more to the science of Lenguistics than to philosophy.
I have never seriously considered myself to be a philosopher. I am sure I can't explain what phiiosophy is but I know it when I see it. Perhaps I don't belong here. Much of the scholastic research which predominates here is beyond me. I am more of a pleasure seeker and I participate in this forum for pleasure. I am enjoying it hugely. I read a lot but I rarely read to learn. I am too lazy. I read for pleasure.
This next does not relate to philosophy only to procedures and rules. My name in this thread seems to be blanked out and I don't know why. Might I ask you to tell me what that means?
:rofl:
Re - "Sorry, not to diss you or to belittle you." I might describe that statement as - "A Diss sandwiched between 2 truths".
I would like to use the word "obvious" with you. The word obvious is obviously meaningless without a complement. Obvious to me obvious to you etc. and I would like to speed this up by assuming (perhaps wrongly) that the truth of the following facts are obvious to you as well as being obvious to me.
One. Animals, early men and modern men have had emotions for many millions of years. Two. Only men are self aware, have consciousness, can talk or have conscious minds. Thus Overminds contain emotions.
A possible caveat. Conscious minds are intricately and intimately, connected to the overmind and can perhaps be considered as part of the overmind and a conscious mind can easily and effortlessly import an aspect of emotion from the overmind and attach it to an expression such as "those are sad words".
A puzzling fact about thinking.
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Ken Edwards
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I stated above, (Not claimed) about the intuitive mind: It produces all emotional processes. Please read more carefully.
3 days ago
god must be atheist
2.5k
?Ken Edwards If you stated it, you claim it is a fact.
You're right, I have to read your argument more carefully. Be back to on that after I read your claim more carefully. (Maybe.)
3 days ago
god must be atheist
2.5k
?Ken Edwards I read the line and the entire post that contained it.
I think the claim that happiness is a function of the over-mind is an opinion. You must prove that it is a fact, that happiness is not a function of the front cortex, but of the "over-mind". I accept your use of the word, it is clear and precise. I just don't think feelings such as happiness, anger, sadness, grief, etc. are functions of the over-mind. You have to prove that to us. If you think it's kindergarten stuff, please provide references contained in the applicable literature and not take them from hearsay or from imagination.
3 days ago
Ken Edwards
62
?god must be atheist ?god must be atheist Does a monkey or an ape or a dog have no feelings?
I have no interest or desire to support my statements. My statements are based on memories of books and articles I have read over the last 50 years. I am not arguing. I have no opinions, only memories.
I am not sure what you mean by proper arguing but intuitionally I think most arguing is mindless and worth nothing.
2 days ago
god must be atheist
2.5k
?Ken Edwards I understand your unwillingness to prove things that are not easy to prove. I have been there, done that, mostly in cybernetics and astrophysics.
But this is a philosophy site. We toy with ideas, and if someone has a claim, we like that person to defend their claim, otherwise the discussion is futile.
I could say that my brain is green, and it can detect flying space ships that are twenty parts per billion in the air because they are also green and they contain therefore bits of my salami sandwich. Would you believe me? If I said, "It's my memory and my recollection and my opinion, and I am not willing to part with it, or defend it," then where do you think that discussion will take us to?
I thank you for candidly stating your opinion formed on the basis of memories, and I commend you for saying it is not something you can defend before reasonable scrutiny. (You did not say it this way but this is how I take what you said.)
2 days ago
Ken Edwards
62
Now I think we are discussing the meanings of two words. Are you stateing or claiming the 2 words mean the same thing?
You say - state - claim that I must prove that it is a fact, that happiness is not a function of the front cortex. Must I? No I Must not. You say - "You have to prove that to us." I am curious to know what will be the consequences if I don't.
What about reasoning? Is it not an obvious fact that men and apes have experienced happines for millions of years? Is it not an obvious fact that no animal except ourselves have conscios minds and can talk?
Re - ?god must be atheist ?god must be atheist ?god must be atheist ?god must be atheist ?god must be atheist ?god must be atheist
2 days ago
Ken Edwards
62
I am not sure but I think you replied to this and that for some reason it failed to get recorded. Perhaps I am mistaken. Would you please resend your last post?
Thank you
2 days ago
god must be atheist
2.5k
Stating something is giving a statement of a fact or of an opinion.
Claiming something is normally the same thing, with the extra meaning that it is true.
If you state a fact, it involves the inference, that it is true. Facts are not topics of debate.
If you state an opinion, you can claim it is true or you can claim it is false.
I read once somewhere, can't remember the source, that philosophy is an endeavour where one has to have a very fine understanding of the language -- from its robust forms to the most refined and subtle. In fact, some philosophers have claimed (mainly the logical positivists) that philosophy does not exist beyond the comprehension of the language or beyond the comprehension of ideas that the language can express. If you know the language, then philosophy can't tell you anything that is incomprehensible to you.
Asking me to define the difference between "stating something" and "claiming something" is a sign you have a lot to learn yet for becoming a passable philosopher. Sorry, not to diss you or to belittle you. But it is the truth, that not knowing the difference in meaning of two very common words will require of you a lot of work to catch up to par.
2 days ago
Ken Edwards
62
?god must be atheist I agree, mostly, but my answer to your question: "then where do you think that discussion will take us to?" is - I would hope that it would take us to more discussion.
2 days ago
Ken Edwards
62
?god must be atheist I might say: "Philosophy can only contain words and symbols in contrast to science which can also include physical actions such as performing experiments."
2 days ago
Ken Edwards
62
?god must be atheist
I withdraw from the discussion of the meaning of the word claim because of pure bewilderment. I just looked it up and it had 14 differnt meanings.
I give here a sample: "used as a verb --cause the loss of (someone's life): the attacks claimed the lives of five people"
2 days ago
Ken Edwards
62
?god must be atheist I was very distressed to read the words: "philosophy does not exist beyond the comprehension of the language or beyond the comprehension of ideas that the language can express. If you know the language, then philosophy can't tell you anything that is incomprehensible to you."
If philosophy doesn't exist beyond comprehension than what am I doing here wasting my time? What's worse: Might not I be considered a philosopher? Sometimes bewidered, of course, but very good looking. Thus if philosphy doesn't exist then philosophers don't exist either.
My god! what will I do? Who will feed my children?
Sorry about that.
2 days ago
Ken Edwards
62
I personally dislike the word opinion because in my mind it seems to imply: a FIXED opinion and frequently infers a high degree of rational inflexibily. " It is my opinion that: xxxxxx.? I rarely use it myself and I am uncomfortabe when others use it.
a day ago
Ken Edwards
62
?god must be atheist I Good heavens!
The meaning of a word belongs more to the science of Lenguistics than to philosophy.
I have never seriously considered myself to be a philosopher. I am sure I can't explain what phiiosophy is but I know it when I see it. Perhaps I don't belong here. Much of the scholastic research which predominates here is beyond me. I am more of a pleasure seeker and I participate in this forum for pleasure. I am enjoying it hugely. I read a lot but I rarely read to learn. I am too lazy. I read for pleasure.
This next does not relate to philosophy only to procedures and rules. My name in this thread seems to be blanked out and I don't know why. Might I ask you to tell me what that means?
a day ago
khaled
2.2k
?Ken Edwards
the scholastic research which predominates here
— Ken Edwards
:rofl:
24 hours ago
Thinking
103
I know there's a fact that you can read faster if you don't verbalize those words read with your mouth. It is also more difficult to read those words.
23 hours ago
Ken Edwards
62
?god must be atheist ?god must be atheist
logical positivists[/quote
Re - "Sorry, not to diss you or to belittle you." I might describe that statement as - "A Diss sandwiched between 2 truths".
— god must be atheist
18 hours ago
Ken Edwards
62
?god must be atheist Re your statement "I just don't think feelings such as happiness, anger, sadness, grief, etc. are functions of the over-mind." The words: Anger sadness, grief, are emotions. I am uncomfortable with the word " feelings mostly because the word has so many distinct meanings. But that, perhaps, is a quibble.
I would like to use the word "obvious" with you. The word obvious is obviously meaningless without a complement. Obvious to me obvious to you etc. and I would like to speed this up by assuming (perhaps wrongly) that the truth of the following facts are obvious to you as well as being obvious to me.
One. Animals, early men and modern men have had emotions for many millions of years. Two. Only men are self aware, have consciousness, can talk or have conscious minds. Thus only Overminds contain emotions.
A possible caveat. Conscious minds are intricately and intimately, connected to the overmind and can perhaps be considered as part of the overmind and a conscious mind can easily and effortlessly import an aspect of emotion from the overmind and attach it to an expression such as "those are sad words".
a minute ago
I think that the "puzzling" issue of the op is explained quite easily by the fact that we learn to talk before we learn to read, or think in words. Because of this, talking is our foundation for use of words. Then, reading and thinking with words develops afterward as a reproduction of talking, which is intended to be silent. However, reading, and thinking with words, remain the same basic activity as talking, without the making of noise.
As you yourself have recognized though, thinking goes much deeper than simply using words, there is also, for instance, the matter of understanding the words. So this representation of thinking, as talking to oneself, is not a very good representation of thinking, because it's just a very shallow and small part of thinking which is being represented.
As to your second I am not sure that thinking and talking and understanding are not three different aspects of the same thing but no, understandig is more extensive and includes intuitive and possibly aesthetic understanding as well as logical understanding.
Your last is, of course, correct. I might prefer to say "adunct" to thinking rather than "representation" of thinking and is trivial.
Let's say that understanding is not the same as thinking. Doesn't understanding require thinking? And wouldn't some thinking not produce understanding, resulting in misunderstanding for example? So it seems to me that thinking is more extensive than understanding. Or do you think there can be understanding without thinking?
I tend to think that actual thinking does not really involve words, and this is a sort of misunderstanding that people hold. You describe relating pieces of clay together. I find most of my thinking involves relating activities. That is how I organize my day, This has to be done before that, and something else has to been done afterwards, etc.. None of this involves words, just some sort of images of the activities in question, so that I know what it is and I can related it to the other activities. In the end, I might assign words to help me remember what I figured out.
So in this type of thinking, which I think is quite common, there is what is needed, or wanted, and the means for getting it is determined. There really isn't any use of words. But if I proceed in thinking out a process, there is no need to refer back to images of activities already determined. There is a situation where activities A and B have been determined, and this has gotten me to activity C, yet I still have to get to H. Now there's a sort of hole in my thought, where A and B are, because I don't need to think about them anymore, I just take them for granted as having been determined. So I need to call them something, label them, "A" and "B" in this example, to make sure that I don't forget them.
This is what I think thinking with words is like. It's not actually a big part of real thinking. The words signify something which is known, taken for granted, so this doesn't need to be brought into the thinking. So the words are not really part of the thought, they're just there to prevent the existence of a hole in the thought, which is what has already been thought, therefore taken for granted.. The actual thinking occurs in going beyond these words, thinking in some sort of images or ideas. Then there is some actual thinking with words which involves deciding which words to use to properly represent what has been concluded by the thinking, so as not to forget it.
You say: "I find most of my thinking involves relating activities. That is how I organize my day, This has to be done before that, and something else has to been done afterwards, etc.. None of this involves words, just some sort of images of the activities in question, so that I know what it is and I can relate it to the other activities. In the end, I might assign words to help me remember what I figured out."
I emphatically agree. Well described. The ratio of "Relating Activity Thinking" must be hundreds of thousands of times more frequent than conscious mind thinking.
I think that there are, indeed, many other ways of thinking. My problem is that I don't have good names for these. Intuitve thinking, thinking by the overmind, aesthetic thinking, musculer control calculations, sight, hearing and feeling acivities etc are commonly used much more often, perhaps a million times more often than Conscious mind thinking.
But, the coscious mind is not negligable. Consider. You might pause in your days activities to add up a grocery list with a pencil. That would be Conscious mind thinking. You might pause to make a telephone call. That would be Conscious mind thinking. You might pause to write a letter. That would be Conscious mind thinking. Your sister might come for a visit. You might hug each other. That would Not be Conscious mind thinking. Then you might converse. That would be Conscious mind thinking.
Also, please stand up and step back from the table and take an obective look at what you yourself are doing right this moment. You are using your conscious mind, ie your talking mind, to read my words. That is Conscious mind thinking.
But then you may finish the day and go to bed without again usung the Conscious mind at all. Millians of thoughts, of overmind thoughts.
The truth is that all these thousands of mental mechanisms work smoothly together in intimate cooperation.
Myself included. Not sure what you were getting at here. I think we can call this "fact" false.
I don't think it is particularly useful to attempt at distinguishing specific types of thinking, like this. I believe that if true boundaries between this or that type of thinking, cannot be found, then such imposed divisions may be more misleading than not. And, I believe that the tendency to make such distinctions emanates from psychology, then it compounds itself in neurology where theorists will attempt to prove certain parts of the brain are responsible for certain types of thinking, and things like that. But I believe there is far too much crossover, back and forth of neurological activity to allow such proposed divisions to provide a meaningful representation of thinking.
Quoting Ken Edwards
So I believe that even this fundamental division of conscious mind thinking, and non-conscious mind thinking, is a misleading division to make, fraught with problems. I believe that all thinking which you propose as "conscious mind thinking" has a huge component of non-conscious activity mixed throughout it. But since the non-conscious is not evident to the conscious mind, it gives the impression that we can make such a division. However, I think the conscious activity is just like the tip of the iceberg, and there is a vast amount of non-conscious activity going on, which is supporting a tiny amount of conscious activity. We could represented it like a pyramid, the base being non-conscious, with the point at the top being conscious. Since it is activity we are talking about, represented as a thing (the pyramid), there is continuous back and forth throughout this proposed "thing".
As conscious beings, we look from the top down, but the base is all hidden from us. So we propose a division. However, the division makes understanding the causality of the situation impossible. We want to understand the consciousness as being in control over the thinking, because this is how it seems intuitively, but the imposed division prevents the possibility of top down causation. We cannot consciously control the non-conscious, because we can't apprehend it. Then if we allow that causation is bottom up, from the non-conscious into the consciousness, we have no way to account for the reality of the influence of conscious decisions, and freely willed activity. Therefore it seems like the only representation which could be consistent with reality is a continuous back and forth between the two. But this renders the representation of such a division as misleading.
But I rarely read to learn. I usually read for pleasure. I read the Scientific American for pleasure like reading Tom Sawyer. I never take notes or anything. And all very random. So I can't begin to tell you where I read all this.
It is considered a fact among scientists of various disciplines that speech arrived first and foremost, in evolution, well before the conscious mind came along, because speech type electric brain circuitry had already been evolved millions of years earlier. Grunts, screams, growls etc. So when the conscious mind came along about a half million years ago, I seem to remember, it came along as an adjunct to speech which had gotten there first.
So that when words finally did come along and vocabulary storage facilities developed in the prefrontal lobes and people began talking it was only as one aspect of speaking.
As you know evolution never makes big jumps. It always makes changes as minor developments of things that were already there. I have been talking of the electric, mental, thinking circuits necessary to talking but many other things had to evolve as well. Lip muscles and tongue muscles and vocal cords had to enlarge their capacities. A modern mouth can make at least 40 different sounds. And, of course, wordless communication had long since existed, witness Indian sign language.
Scientist applied motion detecters to lips and tongues and vocal chords and observed that when guys thought in words tongue movements, sometimes just tiny little twitches, were invariably recorded but never registered with non word thinking, admiring a sunset or something.
You say: "But those experiments are flawed."Thousand of experiments on 5 continents over half a century are flawed ? Wow!
You say: "As has been shown plenty of people don't move their mouths at all while thinking. Not even a little bit." How do you know? A motion detector can be made so accurate that it would detect even a mouse's tongue movements.
I have received many comments similar to yours and those comments have provoked me into thinking about this stuff and guess what? A lot of of my present understanding of these matters has evolved thanks to you.
So thanks, just keep it up.
Ken Edwards
You are totally correct of course at least among mere philosophers. I intuit that these endlessly complicated neurological activities are actually being dealt with by Psychologists in complicated discussions and experiments including coining new vocabulary.
If that is so then: Good luck to them but it doesn't help us any.
You say: "I believe that all thinking which you propose as "conscious mind thinking" has a huge component of non-conscious activity mixed throughout it."
Again I agree. All of these Different mental functions are not different at all and are are intimately an intricately interconneted and, in fact are merely part of the vast over-mind
If you have a better word than my word "Over-mind" please tell me.
"However, I think the conscious activity is just like the tip of the iceberg, and there is a vast amount of non-conscious activity going on, which is supporting a tiny amount of conscious activity. We could represented it like a pyramid, the base being non-conscious, with the point at the top being conscious. Since it is activity we are talking about, represented as a thing (the pyramid), there is continuous back and forth throughout this proposed "thing".
Very well expressed. I applaud.
But I suspect we are going to have big problems with our buddies in this forum that might confuse the fact that we are forced to use only words with each other in these forums to mistakenly think that words are the do all and end all of thinking.
But now step back a moment and take a look at thee and me.
We are at this moment using our 2 vastly limited semantic minds with occasional flashes of intuition from the overmind and trying to do the impossible.
That we have progressed as far as we have with these pathetic tools I think is remarkable.
Congratulations!
Our contemporaries is this forum have been of some help but not very much. (I am probably mistaken here) so what happens next? If you have no ideas then I suggest we go out for some pizza. But I can't invite you. I don't what state you live in. Hell, I don't even know what Contenent you live in
Pretty sure the conscious mind came first otherwise you wouldn't have language. I wouldn't put much stock in research put forth by psychology since half of it had to be thrown out due to reproducibility and from what I learned in psychology courses in college it's not the best indicator of how humans work or their minds. So many theories yet nothing truly conclusive.
Quoting Ken Edwards
There isn't. The unconscious as we have found out turns out to not be some hidden brain but more just upkeep processes of the body.
Quoting Ken Edwards
And yet you have many saying they don't including me so they're clearly doing something wrong. It's more likely the inability to keep the tongue still. I mean it's fairly tricky for humans to remain perfectly still even if they are sitting down. Their study had nothing to do with thinking and words.
But I guess psychology is desperate for something to publish since that blow it was dealt.
OK, I'll go with that term. We could almost just call it "mind", but that would imply that we were limiting ourselves to the conscious aspect. I think, that when we talk about "thinking" we are talking about a directing of the mind. So if we use the limited conscious "mind" as an example, we assume some sort of conscious directing of thoughts, when we say "thinking".
Notice here that "thought" is a noun, so there is assumed things, thoughts, and "thought" also represents a past act of thinking. I think we can characterize a "thought" as the product of a past act of thinking. It's like an object which has been created, like a memory, and is now employed in the act of thinking. That object might be a word, or some other symbol (mathematical for example), or an image, or something like that. Now, we have this representation of conscious "thinking", the limited type of thinking, as an activity which is directing, or some sort of ordering, of products (thoughts) previously acquired from this activity.
If we extend this now, to the "over-mind", then we are forced to forfeit from the conscious mind, the principal capacity, which is the capacity to direct, or order this activity. But this is contrary to our experience, which demonstrates that the conscious mind does have the capacity to do this directing of thoughts. To maintain consistency with this empirical observation therefore, we must deny any relationship of supervenience. There is not a relationship of necessity between the over-mind and the conscious mind. It also proves expedient to deny supervenience because if we pass this capacity to direct on to the over-mind, we have no means for locating what sort of thing actually does the directing, Then we're faced with an infinite regress, or determinism, or else some sort of homunculus.
So we have a little problem here which is that thinking is an activity of directing thoughts, and thoughts are the product of such directed activity, but we cannot locate what is actually doing the directing. To assign the capacity for directing to the over-mind is not the answer, because it is contrary to what we experience, that the conscious mind has some capacity to direct itself, free from the direction of the over-mind. But if the conscious mind, as a higher, more free power, emerges from the over-mind, as the base of that power, then we have to allow that the over-mind has the capacity to create within itself, a limited realm of autonomous activity, free from the causal necessity of that base.
Quoting Ken Edwards
What I think, is that if we can determine precisely what the over-mind actually does contribute, in the form of direction, to the conscious mind, this will give us a great advantage toward understanding the mode of directing. And that's what thinking is, right? It's a simple act of directing. If thinking requires thoughts (remembered content from previous thinking), we're looking at an infinite regress. So we ought to allow that thinking is an activity which can occur without any content, no thoughts, an activity without anything moving. Then as thoughts come into being, the activity may be free from the influence of prior thoughts, to direct these thoughts as required. In reality then, the over-mind must contribute nothing to the act of thinking, no content, just the capacity for this activity, the capacity to think.
"Do you notice an awkwardness in your thinking? Awkwardness almost to the the point of an inability to think the words at all?"
Nope
You say: Pretty sure the conscious mind came first otherwise you wouldn't have language.
They came together.
I wouldn't put much stock in research put forth by psychology since half of it had to be thrown out due to reproducibility and from what I learned in psychology courses in college it's not the best indicator of how humans work or their minds. So many theories yet nothing truly conclusive.
Pure uninformed gibberish
There isn't. The unconscious as we have found out turns out to not be some hidden brain but more just upkeep processes of the body.
Meaningless.
And yet you have many saying they don't including me so they're clearly doing something wrong. It's more likely the inability to keep the tongue still. I mean it's fairly tricky for humans to remain perfectly still even if they are sitting down. Their study had nothing to do with thinking and words.
Meaningless
But I guess psychology is desperate for something to publish since that blow it was dealt
What blow?.
-I think that most popular usage of the word "mind" means the complete mind, the Over-mind.
-Examples - "The mind reels." "You are out of your mind." Joe has a mind like a steel trap. Other unrelated examples - "Don't mind me" Mind your manners"
-I am not sure what you mean by the word "directing". That is a verb and it requires a subject and a complement to make sense, "He directed me to his mother's house". So, could not the over-mind direct parts of itself to other parts of itself? I think much more probable, the over-mind directing the conscious min and visa-versa.
-The conscious mind cannot direct thoughts towards me because the conscious mind IS me. (I think)
-Remember that I assume that Thinking is not an abstraction anymore than belching is an abstraction. Thinking is the actual movement of a living piece of matter inside of the skull.
-Again I am misunderstanding the word "directing".
-I think thinking is the creation of thoughts that may or not lead to more thoughts ie questions and answers, and are things in themselves. The act of thinking can be precipitated by many kinds of stuff. A pretty sunset, an angry face, a question, a kick in the ass an erotic picture etc.
-I will try to expand all this, reluctantly, because I am relying on data that I remember imperfectly from dozens or hundreds of psychological printings that I have read including Freud himself over a period o 40 years or more. But not now. Give me a few more days to prepare and then return to the forum and make an ass of myself. Fun!
-A preliminary sample: ''Thoughts are rich in vitamin D"
-I don't think that is a true statement.
-Thinking is movement, (actually the movement of electrons in an electric circuit which can be detected).
I use "direct" here in the sense you suggest, as to guide something. The issue I indicated, is that if the mind was directing itself, there would be no need to assume an "over-mind". And if we need to assume an over-mind as the director, it is because the direction is coming from somewhere outside the mind, somewhere the conscious mind does not have control over. But if we see that the nature of the mind is such that it is being directed by something outside it, then why wouldn't the over-mind, being itself a type of mind, have the same characteristics? So if we find that it is necessary to assume that the mind is being directed by an over-mind, I see no reason to stop there and conclude that the over-mind is not being directed by something outside of it.
Quoting Ken Edwards
So do you not find that you are capable of directing your own thoughts? If so then why do we need to assume a over-mind?
Quoting Ken Edwards
The question is what directs that "actual movement"? I'm sure you must have noticed that your thinking is generally guided toward specific goals, ends, purposes. It's what we call intentional. What is it which does that guiding? Is it the purpose itself which guides the thinking toward it? If so, what would choose which specific purposes to be guided by? But if this is a form of thinking which makes those decisions, as to what will guide the thinking, then we're just going around in a vicious circle. The thinking guides itself, and now there is no need to assume a mind, or an over-mind.
Quoting Ken Edwards
Here, I think we need to distinguish between what you call "precipitated by", and what I call directed. I think that thinking is going on all the time in my head, I cannot stop it. It goes on even while I'm sleeping, as dreams. So I think that the thinking gets directed toward these things which you mention, the pretty sunset etc., not precipitated by them. And, it seems to me like the more focused and directed the thinking is, the more productive it turns out to be. This is due to that relationship between goals, or purpose, and thinking. I might direct my thinking to the sunset for a short period of time, but this would just be a brief distraction, before I got back to thinking about more important things. Therefore the issue here seems to be a matter of determining what is important, and therefore ought to be thought about.
Quoting Ken Edwards
But you just said:Quoting Ken Edwards
If thinking creates thoughts, then the existence of thinking is prior to the existence of thoughts, so there is necessarily thinking without thoughts. Thinking without thoughts would be an activity without content.
Quoting Ken Edwards
If you check the physics on this, I think you'll find that the current moves through the electric field, rather than as a movement of electrons.
No they didn't. It's clear you don't have any real evidence for your claims.
But what I said about psychology is the truth, so much so that even my professors grudgingly admit it. Psychology has always been the least accurate of all the sciences so it's no surprise your evidence is incorrect.
I erred. I should have said "-I think that most popular usage of the word "mind" means the complete mind, the Over-mind plus the conscious mind. The complete mind includes both. the overmind being greater as we have just decided.
My problem lies here. yo say:
(let me change that to: "a thought IS a direct result of a past act of thinking.)
<"a past act of thinking. I think we can characterize a "thought" as the product of a past act of thinking.">
Let me change that to: "a result of a past act of thinking"
I Sum it up_ "A thought is a result of a past act of thinking." Am I right so far?
If so how has that thinking been provoked? Might it not have been provoked by something exterior like a tree or a traffic cop. Or provoked by an earlier thought coming from either of the two minds or from the newly discovered default mind?
How does "directed" come into it?
OK, so we have identified two features, the act called thinking, and the results of that act, thoughts.
Quoting Ken Edwards
What I tried to explain in the last post, is that i do not think that thinking is provoked, it just goes on and on, somewhat automatically. However, it is directed, guided. This is why it is not totally random like dreams can be, though dreams are generally guided to an extent anyway, and so are not completely random. We can know that it is guided rather than provoked, because we sense many different things at the very same time, and we only direct our thinking toward particular things. You would say that these are the things which provoke us, but if we ask why did this provoke, rather than that, we must turn to an internal reason and explain it by saying that the thought was directed toward this rather than that, for whatever reason.
So, consider your example, "a tree or a cop". What makes you think about the tree rather than the cop, or the cop rather than the tree? Think of all the visual stimulus around you, the aural stimulus, and things like smells. Of all those things, why do you direct your attention to this or that thing instead of the many other things? You would say that these are the things which provoke you, but it's not the thing which is responsible here, it is you who is seeing the thing as interesting. The thing is doing something, which for some reason interests you, so I turn to you, and ask why does this thing interest you. Why are you directing your thought toward this thing and not something else?
The sense of touch provides a very good example because it is very high in the hierarchy of capacity to attract one's attention. If something, or someone touches you physically, it's almost impossible not to direct your attention, and therefore think about that thing which touches you. Now if you think about the sense of sight, there is at any time many things within your field of sight, which you see, but you will not think about. So I think I can conclude that something touching me physically is much more important to me than something simply being in my field of vision. That's why when something touches me I direct my attention to it.
First regarding your last sentence: "That's why when something touches me I direct my attention to it."
I agree but Attention from where? from your conscious mind or from the subconscious ie, over-mind? I would say the latter.
But, a caveat. 2 or more events must occur before you can direct your conscious attention to it. If you are touched that would activate your sense of touch without the participation of the conscious mind. If it were something that was very hot that would instantly turn on a series of alarm bells and you would take violent action without the participation of the conscious mind.
Who or what is "I". Your conscious mind obviously. It would be normal for me to use a slightly different vocabulary. That's why when something touches me I would say: "It would attrect my attention" which would be a general statement refering to all aspects of my response. Rather than: "Direct attention to it"
Now in regard to your first statement: "What I tried to explain in the last post, is that i do not think that thinking is provoked, it just goes on and on, somewhat automatically."
I agree. I think it does, indeed "go on and on", somewhat automatically, one after another and can continue. But, I think any thought can be interrupted or cancelled and a new thought provoked or intruded or substituded. Multiple thoughts can occur coming from different sources. But never 2 at once. For instance: #1from the senses - a crying baby #2 from the emotions - "drat it, where is that nurse?" #3from the memory - "Oh, she went shopping" #4 from logical processes. - "That's funny, she didn't take the car. She must have gone to the corner store" #4 from the pain centers. - a kick in the ass - "Ouch!" .
Think about when you let your mind wander, daydream, it's similar to dreaming while you're asleep, the thoughts can proceed in all sorts of different ways. You can think bout anything. I would say that this is as close to subconscious as I can get and still be conscious. So when my attention gets directed, and my thoughts get focused, my mind gets pulled away from the subconscious, and directed toward my conscious activities.
Quoting Ken Edwards
But there are five senses, and they can all be sensing at the same time. If the conscious mind focuses on the products of one sense, wouldn't this be the conscious mind which directs the thoughts in this way? If something very hot touches me and I take violent action, I think this is at the direction of my conscious mind.
Quoting Ken Edwards
If, your conscious mind is what you refer to with "I", then I think there is inconsistency to say that you might "take violent action without the participation of the conscious mind". This would not be you who is taking that action?
I agree that there are all sorts activities carried out without the participation of the conscious mind, pumping of blood for example, and breathing, but we're talking about thinking activities.
We can't really go by what you would say, or how you would say it, because we're looking for the truthful description, not the habitual one. That you'd be more likely to say "it would attract my attention" rather than "I would direct my attention to it", is irrelevant. I would be more likely to say that the sun rises and it sets, than to say that the earth spins so that I'm facing the sun and then it continues to have me facing away from the sun at night. How we describe something in our common way of speaking is often not a good representation of what is really going on.
So I would rather include the entirety of myself, conscious and subconscious within "I", and recognize that some actions are direct by the subconscious part of me, and some by the conscious part of me. There could be some overlap, or a grey area. But what about thinking? Isn't all thinking directed by the conscious part? We could go back and take another look at the mind wandering, daydreaming, and dreaming itself. Is it really appropriate to call this 'thinking'? I don't think so. So what is it? Can we say that it is mental activity which is being directed by the subconscious part? If not, what is it? It's clearly not completely random, so it's somewhat directed, but not directed by the conscious mind.
Quoting Ken Edwards
Wouldn't you agree that these actions imply direction?