JAN’S DAILY FRESH NEWS
                        © 2001: Jan Cox
                       **************************************

August 15, 2001.
 
 
 
 

                              There are a number of things
                              that go on in the brain
                              that no one seems to notice.
 
 
 
 

There are a number of things
that go on in the brain
that no one seems aware of  --
not even those whose job it is to be so..
 

An entire new field of Cognitive Neuroscience has arisen
whose stated aim is the understanding of mind,
yet never are there more than a handful of people on this planet 
directly studying their own.

Within Philosophy there have been those who mused on the mind,
but who tried to treat it as an objective, other-party phenomenon;
Religion & Mythology had an initial interest,
but eventually settled for allegories rather than understanding;
and Psychology began life as a study of mind, but after realizing
what it had stepped into, quickly switched its focus to, Behavior.
This is noted not as an attack on any of these quite normal
intellectual & scientific activities, but rather to verbally establish a starting point 
for use in subsequent comparison –
a step always necessary for mind & language to work,
(in case you have never noticed).

As far as comparisons do go, Cognitive Neuroscience is the most revealing, in that 
it is new-in-name & makes full use of pertinent technology,  
and whose premise is that mind is potentially, or surely in part  -- biological:
simply another physiology operation of the brain,
quite slippery & complex, but at root  --  just another cellular activity.
 
 

There are a number of things
that go on in the brain
that no one seems to notice.

Historically, Neurology's greatest interest has been in pathology,
since abnormalities are the easiest features to find & study,
and since the treatment of illness is the purpose of medicine,
and since the improvement & repair of the human condition
is the primary job of mind itself,
but now the expanded field has turned its attention to
normal brain/mind features such as learning, memory, language, attention,
and emotions associated with thought as opposed to non conscious instinct,
and yet amidst it all (but in no way surprising or amiss)
even this fresh, vibrant undertaking totally ignores
a wart the size of Arkansas on a flea’s ass (modern neuro lingo).

People who feel that their most pressing & persistent calling in life
is to effect a change in their consciousness  --   which,
no matter how strong be the urge to try & cut it otherwise,
would be to effect a change in the activity of their brain,
could learn a most useful lesson from what is going on in
these contemporary, scientific investigations of mind,
(assuming you are up to learning actual lessons)
by making their own privately funded study of their own
privately experienced mind --   
then comparing what they find to what the experts are doing,
and perhaps finally one fine day, to suddenly realize what it is that:

                                 goes on in the brain
                                 that normally goes unnoticed.
 

Once you see what is being referred to --  just once --
after that, there are no more questions about anything.
No more books; no more lectures, no more discussions without end;
 
                  all that's left to do then is --  run with the wind --
 

        and figure out how to keep from looking away from what you already know,
                            and getting yourself against the wind, 
                            so that your own spit flies back in your face. .                              
 
 

                      J