Im pretty sure my teacher doesnt know. I asked how we have thoughts in our head. Every one (im pretty sure..) has the ability to think in solitude. to self reflect, to retrive memories of better times, or worse perhaps. But.. how? what are the chemical properties/equations that allow thses occurences? Why does a painter paint... hormones that give him the inspiration?
I asked my teacher and all he said was "It's taken care of by Bio Electricty, it circulates in our brain at different speeds across our neural networks that we create with our brain cells" - My Advanced Molecular Biology teacher (Ronald Moore... Mr.Moore for short). If you can explain to me these things that would be awesome. Please keep in mind that im not testing his theory, but what he told me just seemed a little to over-simplified. make it more detailed and complicated, i think i can handle it

What he explained is basically how thought works. Inspiration... seems like the same question as 'HOW DOES LOVE WORK'.

that gives me nothing, sorry.. but it doesnt. you cant just answer the question by saying "Bio-Electricity" i understand what hes saying. i understand the concept. but its over simplified. what are the mechanisms that make it seem like my thoughts dangle within a void in my "head" ??? its mind boggling to think atoms can do this. BUT i will not resort to super-natural explination. i refuse to belive in a soul XD. please, more explination, more evidence.

My point is that chances are, no one knows. There hasn't been exactly a conclusive answer to how love works, and there's probably none to your question.

The phenomenon is interesting isnt it? different parts of our brain light up with activity when we have different thoughts. this some how corresponds to them, or is the cause. i dont know... but i REALLY want to

Why would you expect to find an answer here faster than through google? Unless you want to get into abstract debate about the existence of thought and such, you're not going to get an answer. If people knew the answer you'd be able to find it without posting a poorly thought out thread at SEN. I'll give you a break and won't lock this yet on the off chance it goes somewhere.

A soul is the best explanation you're ever going to get. If you don't like that, you're probably never going to find an answer (as has been pointed out).also you misspelled believe

Well, either you're a materialist or a dualist (not duelist for you war freaks)

Materialism means that you believe in nothing that is not matter, and by extension you believe that everything can be measured, tested and predicted. Therefore there is no free will, life can have no meaning, and everything that can and will happen has already been decided on from the point of the big bang, which may have been fated by something else. Essentially, by not believing in a "soul" or immaterial part of the body, you must by extension believe that there is no free will, but it is a convenient and very appealing myth to believe in. This also implies no belief in religion, or agnosticism, and many materialists take up an arrogant point of view on this subject which is mostly irrelevant, but tends to give atheism a bad name, though many are also respectful about it, because they understand that there is no proof for either side of the dualism/materialism debate, and that there is no proof for or against the existence of a superior power or being, or consciousness, they simply believe that there is nothing out there. That is a very quick breakdown of the materialist camp.

Dualism implies that you believe that to be human must mean that there is more then just the material essence of a body, therefore something immaterial must be part of us as well, commonly called a soul. This is a dualist's explanation for free will, and the absence of fate. They may also believe in a greater power then ourselves, or at the very least accept an agnostic point of view, which is accepting that we know next to nothing, and by that virtue, rejecting and accepting at the same time all types of theistic views that do not suggest something unreasonable. This concept means that if something is known to be true, it is not acceptable to believe otherwise, but if something cannot be proven, it is acceptable to believe something about it, as long as you do not try to pass off your beliefs as truth, since doing so would imply that you had knowledge that is impossible to gain, and by that logic, you would be lying. Another camp of dualism is the religious part, which, although in name is the same as the agnostic/free will camp, is very different, and doesn't require a further explanation.

So, once you've figured out whether you believe in free will or not, then here are your answers for where inspiration comes from.

Materialist: Chemicals in the brain fire at different rates due to minor fluctuations in heat, and thus produce new electronic patters that define what we so foolishly believe is an independent thought.

Dualist: Our immaterial self, which has the inherent ability to use reason and interpret emotion and the senses, creates something new and useful based on what we perceive, and then decides on what to do, based on a concept of free will. The results are that the brain patters will appear the same as in the materialist case, but the source is now something that is able to bring new things in to the material world.

Now, since there is no proof pointing towards either side, one may say that it is a more intelligent approach to go with a materialist side, but they would be wrong. The more intelligent approach here is to accept the possibility of both sides being right, and to base your actions and responses on what is pragmatically effective. Do what you want to do, and feel how you want to feel, and be inspired how you want to be inspired, because even if it's just fate from changes in heat, it won't change what we do or how we think.

/end long essay thing

lol, omg wierd. its hilarious that you propose dualism (not to question your point) but friday was my last day of school and i gave a 23 minute presentation on my critique of Renee Descartes' theory of dualism. i beleive in dualism, but i modified his idea of dualism and fused it with existentialism. (lol, btw i mispell everything)

really? interesting, what'd you end up saying?

Post has been edited 1 time(s), last time on Jun 8 2008, 2:32 am by razorsnail.

What I think is interesting, assuming materialism, how does our brain store and interpret patterns, then access and use them again comparatively to determine its course of action in the future. Of course there are greater minds than mine working on this, but it's still intriguing, and if we figure that out, then we might be a little closer to determining how we actually think.

do you want the whole speech? i would post it on this topic, but it might seem irrelevant.

And Vrael, yea thats a good idea. i don't think you have to be a materialist to believe that our brain works the way everything else does, chemically anyway. it is interesting. Although our brain does not work like a computer. you don't automatically remember something once fed information. it takes repetition to pound things into our brains.

I hate to bring the topic else where, but how do you forget thoughts? Is it your brain cells simply dying off and losing that information? And if so, how do you remember a more tramatic event longer than a regular event? Does your brain assign tramatic information to different brain cells?

I doubt dying cells is behind it, for the reason you brought up. Also, there's remembering long lost memories, which would suggest that it wasn't separately asigned ahead of time.

I was thinking more just the gist of what you were going for. Up to you, though.

This can't be true. If something didn't enter our brain the first time, then why would repetition help? Our brain must store all these memories, but we're just not able to recall them until they're associated with enough other memories.

If that were true our brains would have the potential to store an infinite amount of information.

Thats how memory works. Try learning a language. thats exactly what you have to do. you have to hear the word over and over and over again. you need to hear it see it and use it. you need constant exercise of the information in your brain in order for you to remember it by heart. An example to show you i say what i mean, do you remember a song WORD for WORD the first time you hear it? no, of course not unless your an exception, say... photographic memory. But, once you hear the song over and over agin you are eventually able to recite it and sing along with it....

I'm not disagreeing that it takes repetition to remember something. What I'm saying is that every repetition, our brain stores in our un/subconscious, until it's finally connected to enough things for us to recall it in our conscious mind.

That has to be the case. Otherwise, how would your brain know that something's been repeated? It would just treat every repetition as the "first time" you heard something, and never remember it.

There is a big difference between short and long term memory. There have been cases of people losing their ability to "write" long term memories. They wake up every morning thinking it is the same day, years ago. They have short term memories, and the ability to learn tasks.
An experiment was done in this regard, where such a person was taught a specific skill. Every time they're sure they've never done it before, but sure enough, their skill increases with repetition.chew on that!

razor: I have to disagree. If what you say were the case, our brain would contain memories from every single day of our lives (before we were born too?) in infinite "resolution", plus all the dreams we had every night, in infinite "resolution".
As you know, you often remember a memory, so to speak, without actually remembering it. That is, you might remember an old movie, but not every detail. If you watch it more, you'll remember it more. That is, repetition brings resolution.
With our brains, we tend to forget details. I don't think everything we ever do, see, hear, feel, smell, think, or taste is retained. It just wouldn't make sense. Also, the differences (which I've discussed) between short term memory, long term memory and skill memory would seem to suggest it's not so simple as you're making it out to be.

a little unnecessary... But frazz, really interesting. i have nothing more to say about it.