Philosophy
It's been a source of questions, awe and insight among philosophers for a long time to consider the fact that all mental representations are ultimately interpretations of electrical signals traveling through the brain. Yes, we may ordinarily think the original input is based on sounds and colors, though this itself is already an interpretation of the nature of such signals, but even if we ignore that question, the information relayed from the sense organs to the brain is ultimately digital electrical signals, the equivalent of 1's and 0's, switching on and off.
If all the information the brain ever receives is in the form of such digital discrete characters, how does the brain 'know' to interpret some as colors, others as sounds and others as scents? Sometimes when asking my students to define reality, I invite them to imagine what it might be like to cross-wire these sense modalities, such that you might take the optic nerves, say, and plug them into the auditory cortex, and so on. What would our picture of 'reality' 'look' (sound?) like then? And what might that suggest about the nature of perception and its relationship to reality?
Well, as it turns out, neuroscientist David Eagleman (who has been featured in this blog before discussing questions of law and responsibility in view of our growing understanding of consciousness and free will) has decided to take this sort of exercise from the merely hypothetical to the applied, showing that taking advantage of the software already running in our brains, it might be possible to produce new modalities of sense experience, and come to radically enhance our understanding of the natural, social and technological worlds. In fact, as he shows in this fascinating TEDTalk presentation, we already have a proof of principle. The only question left is how far we can go...
- Philosophy: Brain In A Vat Argument ? Truth Revealed
Brains in a vat? That sounds terrifying, doesn?t it? Brain in a vat argument is one of the newest thought experiments in philosophy of mind (discussed by John Pollock). Many people raise objection to the brain in a vat theory but are there in fact any...
- The Dreams Of Aristotle
Aristotle wrote two short pieces on dreams and their meaning: On Dreams and On Prophesying on Dreams. In the first he presents arguments for the origin of dreams and their relationship to other aspects of human existence. In the second he analyzes whether...
- Ed Yong - Suicidal Wasps, Zombie Roaches & Other Parasite Tales
By its very nature, philosophy is an iconoclastic discipline, dedicated to questioning and dissecting the basic assumptions we use to make sense of our experience, in order to get a better understanding of reality and of the human condition. It was the...
- David Eagleman - The Brain And The Law
There is almost universal agreement among philosophers, neuroscientists, cognitive psychologists, and other mind researchers that the mind has a physical basis in the brain. Sure, we don't yet understand the particular mechanism through which the...
- Daniel Wolpert - The Real Reason For Brains
I know what you're thinking, but no, it's not for feeding zombies... but it's also not "for" thinking either because brains evolved long before any organism developed the ability to think and reason. So, while thinking is a great adaptation...
Philosophy
David Eagleman - Can We Create New Senses for Humans?
If all the information the brain ever receives is in the form of such digital discrete characters, how does the brain 'know' to interpret some as colors, others as sounds and others as scents? Sometimes when asking my students to define reality, I invite them to imagine what it might be like to cross-wire these sense modalities, such that you might take the optic nerves, say, and plug them into the auditory cortex, and so on. What would our picture of 'reality' 'look' (sound?) like then? And what might that suggest about the nature of perception and its relationship to reality?
Well, as it turns out, neuroscientist David Eagleman (who has been featured in this blog before discussing questions of law and responsibility in view of our growing understanding of consciousness and free will) has decided to take this sort of exercise from the merely hypothetical to the applied, showing that taking advantage of the software already running in our brains, it might be possible to produce new modalities of sense experience, and come to radically enhance our understanding of the natural, social and technological worlds. In fact, as he shows in this fascinating TEDTalk presentation, we already have a proof of principle. The only question left is how far we can go...
- Philosophy: Brain In A Vat Argument ? Truth Revealed
Brains in a vat? That sounds terrifying, doesn?t it? Brain in a vat argument is one of the newest thought experiments in philosophy of mind (discussed by John Pollock). Many people raise objection to the brain in a vat theory but are there in fact any...
- The Dreams Of Aristotle
Aristotle wrote two short pieces on dreams and their meaning: On Dreams and On Prophesying on Dreams. In the first he presents arguments for the origin of dreams and their relationship to other aspects of human existence. In the second he analyzes whether...
- Ed Yong - Suicidal Wasps, Zombie Roaches & Other Parasite Tales
By its very nature, philosophy is an iconoclastic discipline, dedicated to questioning and dissecting the basic assumptions we use to make sense of our experience, in order to get a better understanding of reality and of the human condition. It was the...
- David Eagleman - The Brain And The Law
There is almost universal agreement among philosophers, neuroscientists, cognitive psychologists, and other mind researchers that the mind has a physical basis in the brain. Sure, we don't yet understand the particular mechanism through which the...
- Daniel Wolpert - The Real Reason For Brains
I know what you're thinking, but no, it's not for feeding zombies... but it's also not "for" thinking either because brains evolved long before any organism developed the ability to think and reason. So, while thinking is a great adaptation...