On Oct 5, 2009, at 8:26 PM, Keith Russell wrote:
> Language, for me, is inherently taken up by the individual from the
> outside. Once it is inside the individual, it is easily forgotten
> that it was naturalized and accommodated as of-the-individual (mine)
> rather than of-the-group (ours).
>
> Our common-sense feeling that we can hide our thoughts from others
> is a silly pretense that we allow each other to make ourselves feel
> better about each other. We know lots more in common than we bother
> to admit.
>
> Consciousness is not intrinsically individual which is a bit of a
> bugger for creatives who feel that THEY are creative.
Dear Keith,
I agree that language is taken up from the outside but disagree with
the notion that consciousness is not intrinsically individual.
Language is necessary precisely because consciousness is individual
and all minds are the products of individual histories. If our
thoughts were transparent to others we would only need to negotiate
the differences through languaging. This is not to deny that the
neural patterns that manifest language can be recalled and interpreted
to the situation being addressed.
An interesting article today in the New York times "How Nonsense
Sharpens the Intellect", underlines the minds search for patterns when
confronting anomalous information. Research found that "the group who
read the absurd story identified more letter strings suggest(ing) that
they were more motivated to look for patterns than the others." who
read coherent stories. "Those reading the absurd story were almost
twice as accurate in their choices of letter patterns as those who had
read a coherent story. "And the fact that they were more accurate
means, we think, that they're forming new patterns they wouldn't be
able to form otherwise." "The test is a standard measure of what
researchers call implicit learning: knowledge gained without
awareness." One only wishes this research had included other non-
linguistic modalities. But it does point to how the brain seeks
patterns not necessarily triggered by social interaction or conscious
awareness.
Chuck
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