IUBio

Consciousness

k p Collins kpaulc at [----------]earthlink.net
Mon Jan 19 18:01:53 EST 2004


Aw, hell...

"k p Collins" <kpaulc@[----------]earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:cVVNb.9987$q4.9052 at newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net...
> CLARIFICATION, below:
>
> "k p Collins" <kpaulc@[----------]earthlink.net> wrote in message
> news:TrJNb.9443$q4.8854 at newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net...
> >
> > "k p Collins" <kpaulc@[----------]earthlink.net> wrote in message
> > news:0dCNb.9574$i4.9112 at newsread1.news.atl.earthlink.net...
> > > "k p Collins" <kpaulc@[----------]earthlink.net> wrote in message
> > > news:A%9Nb.6945$q4.51 at newsread3.news.atl.earthlink.net...
> > > > And, "of course", it =still= is "Re: Consciousness".
> > > >
> > > > See if you can find =that= in-here.
> > > >
> > > > If no one gets-it, I'll discuss a few days hence.
> > > > [...]
> > > [...]

Aware-consciousness:

Sensation - just provides a map of external
experiential 3-D energydynamics.

That is, "vision" is nothing more than the map-
ping of light onto the retina. [Visual perception
is explained below, but, first, I've got to make
this "TV-set" stuff clear by discussing other
sensory modalities].

It's easier to see the mapping with respect to
somatosensation [touch], because one's motor
activation is mapped in a way that closely reflects
somatosensory activation. That is, somatosensory
perception is less-'mysterious' because, if one
'touches'an obstacle as one walks, one must
either go around, or through, the space it occupies,
and either of these has widley-varying, but, never-
theless, stereotypical somatosensory correlates,
respectively, and these are coupled to mapped
effector activations.

Olfaction is between somatosensation and vis-
ion in this regard. The analogue of somato-
sensation's pressure, and motor-activation
correlates, are an aroma's graded inten-
sity as one orients with respect to its source.

Olfaction has a quality that's valuable in at-
taining an understanding of aware-conscious-
ness - it's easily-recognized [easily-'perceived']
dependence upon one relatively-'casual', but
relatively-universal, experiential reality - going
to one's Grandmother's Home, say, on a holliday,
for a Family-'traditional' meal. [It's Testable, in
the way that 'any' Adult offspring can recognize
his Grandmother's Home through smell alone.
This happens be-cause every Grandmother has,
through long experience, accumulated her unique
way of cooking :-]

Do you see the 'point' I'm working toward?

Each person's experiencing of his Grandmother's
Home is exactly-analogous, but, simultaneously,
relatively-unique.

Do you see why that's important?

It 'lifts the veil' from the way that a sensory system
[olfaction] is conformed by experience.

This's an important 'tool' in developing an under-
standing of aware-consciousness because somato-
sensation and vision exhibit this same quality,
but in extremely-more-subtle ways.

The important 'point' is that sensation is =just=
a mapping of external experiential 3-D energy-
dynamics into the nervous system, and this real-
ization is most-important as a 'tool' with respect
to the understanding of vision.

In vision, the "TV set" is 'just' the retina. Light
impinges upon it in the same way that light shone
through a doubly-convex lens illuminats a sheet
of paper. If the light that goes through the lens
is from a candle, then, if one adjusts the focal
length properly, one will see an upside-down
'candle' on the paper.

The analogous thing happens with respect to the
retina. The retina are the "TV Screen".

What happens beyone the retina is subtly-anal-
ogous to what happens with respect to each
person's olfactory experiencing of their Grand-
mother's Home - which is verified via experi-
ments in which experimental maniplations limit,
or restrict, the inputs to one eye - which results
in an asymmetric development of the 'striped'
patterns within occipital [primary-visual] cortex.
[Visual experience determines such - just like
olfactory experience tunes one's ability to rec-
ognize one's Grandmother's Home through its
aromas.]

It's important to understand what's in the
above discussion. It's a necessary 'stepping-
stone' to an understanding of aware-conscious-
ness. So work until you get it.

The 'point' is that, when one experiences vis-
ual-awareness, it's exactly as if one is looking
through a window. That is, the image does
not go beyone the retina. What happens be-
yond the retina is 'just' a multifaceted coupling
of visually-mapped activation of various inform-
ation-processing dynamics, all of which can also
be accessed via other sensory modalities. [More
on this later.]

Next, everything that's discussed in AoK is
necessary, but I'm not going to go over that
stuff, here, because I've already reiterated it
all over and over again.

In general, aware-consciousness is 'just'
TD E/I [my 'groan' is bigger than yours, but
I've been discussing aware-consciousness all
along  :-]

In somatosensation, for instance, the persep-
tion of something being "heavy" is 'just' the
TD E/I that occurs within the nervous system
with respect to =both= somatosensation and
motor activation - as the 'force' embodied
in the 'heavy' object [a boulder] is transformed
into sensory and motor activation that is topo-
logically-distributed, and relatively-large, rel-
ative to what it would be if the object in ques-
tion were 'light' [like a feather].

To understand this, one must follow sensation
into the nervous system, and motor activation
our of the nervous system. When one does so,
one sees [with logarithmic intensity coding]
that the 'heavy' and 'light' objects are repre-
sented within the nervous system via 'strong'
activation and 'weak' activation, respectively.

And it's within these dynamics that the earlier
discussion of the "lawnmower experiment' [in
the Proof of Tapered Harmony] becomes im-
portant.

The neural Topology is analogous to the mower
deck, only the neural Topology's analogous
functionality is more-complex. The nervous
system analogous of the 3-D shape 'menagery'
are experienced as "perceptions", and they are
literally like the 'pyramids' and 3-D rhombuses
of the lawnmower experiment except that, where
the mower deck's nonlinear vibrational dynamics
[including it's flexing, etc.] drove the formation
of the 'shapes' ["the forms" :-], TD E/I within the
neural Topology drives the formation of 'percep-
tions'.

The dynamics of 'perception' occur in a way that's
literally just the opposite of the solid-to-liquid
phase transition that I've discussed over the course
of the past couple of months. Recall that 'liquifica-
tion' occurs when SSW<->UES harmonics are
forces out of mutual-synchronization, and this
results in energy being forced back into the UES.

Roughly, 'perception' [aware-consciousness] hap-
pens in a way that's literally an inverse of this, only
with specific respect to the neural Topology.

When TD E/I is relatively-low, that means that
'randomness' is also relatively-low, which means,
further, that individual neurons are firing in ways
that are mutually-'synchronized' - =not= in a
'gang-tackling' way, but in a way that 'fills-in-the-
gaps - in a way that literally becomes-'solid' be-
cause each neuron's activation 'interferes' =cons-
tructively= with the activation that its neighbor
neurons are experiencing.

The nervous system analogues of the lawnmower
experiment's 3-D water-'crystals' are "percepts".

Throughout all of this front-center orientation oc-
curs as it's discussed in AoK, Ap5, and 'attention'
just goes with orientation.

'Cognition' occurs, within all of this, as is discussed
in AoK, Ap7 [in particular, but all of AoK is nec-
essary].

That is, as is discussed in AoK, Ap7, prefrontal
cortex's 'brain-within-the-brain' functionality allows
particular attentional-foci to be converged upon,
again, via globally-integrated TD E/I-minimization.

=In parallel= with all of this, each of the myriad
'subsystems' comprising the "supersystem" are
both individually, and collectively, tuned, also via
globally-integrated TD E/I-minimization. The qualities
of affect that are evoked, for instance, correlate
rigorously with one's prior experience with respect
to that which is 'perceived' - with respect to that
of which one is 'aware', and so forth, with respect
to =all= 'subsystems'.

It's all 'just' TD E/I-minimization, as I've been dis-
cussing it for 'decades'.

The only thing 'new' in this post is the discussion of
the nervous system analogoues of the lawnmower
experiment's water-'oscillons'.

Which is why, seeing them that last day at my Dad's
Home just =BLEW ME AWAY=.

I Recognized them as 'the last piece of the puzzle' of
Consciousness. [And finally realized why folks hadn't,
yet, comprehended what is in "TD E/I-minimization.]
When I saw the lawnmower experiment's warer-crys-
tals, I saw how 'Aware-consciousness happens within
nervous systems - how 'vibrations' [neural impulse
dynamics] yield 'solid'-perceptions, and how 'per-
ceptions', literally, recreate the external, through
neural-topologically-relevant analogues that have one-
to-one correspondence with the external experiential
3-D energydynamics.

Get it?

The "TV set" is the retina. It is the nervous system, as
a whole, and the brain inparticular, that 'looks-at' the
"TV set" - the "TV set" is =not-in= the brain. The
brain 'only' does perceptual-recognition-construction
and use stuff. I am conscious of the image on the ret-
ina be-cause of the globally-integrated TD E/I-mini-
mization dynamics that occur with respect to it.

The image, itself, is analogous to the image of the
candle, focused by the lens, onto the sheet of paper.

I have a lot more in my notes, and I'll build upon what's
in this post, but what's here is, essentially, what aware-
consciousness is.

I've been discussing it all since I first came to b.n 15+
'years' ago.

Anyway, I've got to 'run'. Ever since the guys tried to
take down the "leaning tree of Better Way", there's
been a breeze flowing through my trailer. I still don't
know how it happened, but the tape that held the
plastic over my slatted windows just got ripped-away,
and I've got to do all that over again. [I left to go to
Mass while they were still working on the tree - after
clearing out of my trailer after it had taken several
heavy-hits from falling stuff :-]

I just hope there's not a hole in the roof. I'm 'afraid'
to look. But I'd gotten the place to a 'state' of at-
least-'quiet' air. Now it's back to blowing-right-
through, and I won't be surprised to find a new
'opening'.

It's 20 degrees F outside, but it's way-colder
in here than it was when it was 20 below.

"Oh well."

K. P. Collins





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