I'm not even close to understanding.
Her: i'm not sure what life is supposed to feel like. contentment of a sort, like you are actually existing and filling something up
Me: I've been wondering about that myself lately. Or at least wondering about my entire sense of self.
Her: i just wonder if where i am is supposed to be happiness, because technically i want for nothing, i have a niche of sorts
Me: Maybe happiness is a chemical. Life isn't any different, but your brain chemistry is.
Her: let's not say chemical, let's say perspective
Me: Sorry, but I've been studying the brain lately and it always puts into question whether we are nothing but a conglomerate of electrochemical neuronal activity
Her: i like to think more spiritually than that, perhaps you see religion as a crux, whereas i see it as a supplement
Me: I try to be very spiritual as well, but I have to question
Her: yeah, but...i don't think happiness is possible if you can only regard yourself and your fellow man as mere processes
Me: I didn't say I was happy. Nor did I say that's how I view things. It's just what I've been thinking about lately.
Me: have you heard of alien hand syndrome?
Her: no, i have not
Me: It's something that can happen with split brain patients (I don't know how extensive your knowledge of the brain is, but that means they've cut the corpus collosum that connects the right and left halves of the brain together, usually done in stroke/epileptic patients to prevent symmetrical degradation of the brain). Anyway, the different halves of the brain control different process, and your sense of self is in your left half, and negative emotions (especially anger/hostility) are in the right half. We discussed a case study in psychology where a split brain man was caught trying to choke his wife to death with his left hand (controlled by the right brain), while in his mind he had no idea what was going on and was actually trying to pry his hand off her throat with his right arm (controlled by the left brain). Some split brain patients become kleptomaniacs as well, without them ever knowing, their left hand will just grab things as they walk and put them in their pocket, and the person will have no idea. Ask them to empty their pockets and they'll just be perplexed as to how the things got there
That fucks with me.
Her: why is that?
Me: I don't know how to incorporate that into how I view life.
Her:it sounds strange, but i can find that as a believeable happening
Me: It makes me think of a lot of different scenarios, and I don't know which is more likely to be true.
Her: such as?
Me: Oh, another thing, if you show a split brain patient an image on their left side (so only the right brain sees it) they won't be able to tell you what they saw (they won't even know anything was there), but give them a pen and their hand will seem to move on it's own, spelling out what they saw. Think about schizophrenics. Some go their entire lives not knowing that the people they know don't really exist. Does that make it any less real to them?
Her: no, they are still living, how do you know i exist?
Me: Amnesiacs become completely different people after an accident.
Her: that's because memories form who you are, you forget the pain and the happiness
Me: You put an electrode in the right part of a persons brain, and within minutes they'll become so depressed that they'll be suicidal, move that electrode to another spot and a few minutes later life is wonderful
Her: haha well techincally that's what you seek to do in life, and what others do unconciously to you, a few words can be like an electrode
Me: Hook up an electrode to a pleasure center in a rat brain and have it activate everytime the rat pushes a lever, that rat will push that lever until it dies of starvation
Her: because he forgets everything else, that's why life is never perfect
Me: I don't know what life is.
Her: maybe you can't think about it all the time, maybe that's why you have to forget the question for the answer to come
Me: I don't know what separates man from animal, animal from plant, plant from stone
Her: stones don't think about life
Me: They're built from the same materials.
Her: stones don't have amino acids, nucleic acids, etc.
Me: The same elements are there, all around us
Her: if i cut a stone, it ain't gonna bleed
Me: How do certain arrangements of molecules signify life?
Her: rocks don't interact with you
Me: They do.
Her: how so? pet rock?
Me: A percentage of my own body is made up by stones. In fact it's possible that my entire body was a stone at one point in time
Her: billions of years ago maybe
Me: And the percentage is constantly fluctuating, through normal radiation, everyday I incorporate more of them, more of you, more of everything, into what I call myself.
Her: i see, perhaps it's time to join it all then? but maybe that is simply a matter of time
Me: Everything already is connected on a physical level, only the sense of self is seperate
Her: there you go then, life
Me: that doesn't tell me anything. I don't know what that is.
Her: sense of self and others. don't you sense people?
Me: I sense everything, physical or living.
Her: oh really, i don't sense inanimate things, unless it's a wall
Me: Yes you do. It's just too subtle for you to be aware of it. Your body feels it.
Her: hmm, i don't know, i always can tell when there are people nearby
Me: I don't know where the difference lies between molecular structures and living beings.
Her: i know of molecular structures, i see them in microscopes, i study them, but, i cannot see a soul, but i can feel it. there is a difference between a kind person, a nuturing person and cruel
Me: Change a few things in our structure and we're no longer considered alive.
Her: i can make your life, if you wish to define it that way, that has been proved, as you know. i can't make a soul, and that's what i believe in
Me: I'm trying to understand what that is, and it makes it harder to grasp when I know that my actions and emotions can be controlled by someone else.
Her: who?
Me: Anyone with the know-how and the right equipment
Her: a bossy woman and a weak minded man have much the same situation, as an electrode and a person
Me: You can't tell me that the fact that a scientist can put electrodes in your brain to make you happy, sad, angry, etc., make you move around, talk, etc. You can't tell me that that doesn't disturb you.
Her: maybe i think that can be outwitted, shall we say
Me: Maybe that's what "we" are. A scientist of sorts, setting off action potentials in symphony.
Me: How do you mean?
Her: i don't know, i think that that isn't always true, that there can never be complete control, the rat chooses to go back to getting pleasure, but maybe, if you fight it, you can choose another path
Me: The rat is a completely different scenario
Her: oh really, you just told me we are all the same thing
Me: The rat is choosing to set off the electrode
Her: right, i am saying he could choose to not do it. say, you find sex pleasurable
you could spend your whole life doing nothing but seeking sex, or you could choose not to
Me: But if you're strapped down and someone opens up your brain and starts messing around with an electrode, will you be able to stop yourself from moving your arm if he hits the right neurons, or getting depressed if he hits another group?
Her: yes, it's your mind and your neurons...well okay, maybe not the neurons, but i don't think that anyone can control your...um.....things like depression and happiness
Me: We know we can, it's been experimentally shown and repeated many times.
Her: heh, i think it's mind over matter
Me: As well, you say you can identify a kind person or a nurturing person, but is it not possible that if that person had completely amnesia that a kind person could become a mean person? Is it not based on enironment? What that person learns and remembers?
Her: i said that, it's based on memories of how one is treated...experiences...but, everyone has potential too, some people are just born a certain way
Me: Then how is that any different then merely sophisticated animalistic reactions?
Her: i didn't say we were different from animals, just rocks
Me: How are you you if you can become someone else?
Her: haha you won't ever become someone else
Me: You've already said you could.
Her: there are aspects you can change, but there is only one persona
Me: What would stay the same?
Her: i could become completely jaded, but i think some things would stay the same
Me: I don't know what those things are.
Her: i don't think i can be hateful
Me: We've already said a kind person could become mean.
Her: mean, but not hateful...i think mark, the thing is, you won't know until you see it, and i think you will probably take a long journey, a literal one, before you realise that
Me: The thing is, I like to think that I do have a soul, but I can't leave that to a matter of faith. I have to question. It's hard for me to tell myself I have a soul without knowing what that means...
..And I'm not even close to understanding.