Every writer
looks for material somewhere or everywhere, and many do that in books. Being a
wannabe-writer I too go searching for topics which would be interesting and useful as well. And in the hunt for
topics, recently I stumbled upon an article which talked about ‘the science
behind “why people see angels” (and ghosts, gods, demons and aliens)’.
First of
all, why it caught attention is because it took a truly-scientific perspective in explaining and demystifying these
rather intriguing categories. That’s something I would always prefer to admire
and appreciate rather than supplanting it with some wrong belief/ fallacy.
Then,
unless we understand things as they are,
only we are going to be at loss.
So at least for the sake of saving self, if not for science’s sake, we need to
grab the reality however stark it may be, even though it seem to protest
against superstitious/religious beliefs. For, our motive is, not dismantling
those superstitious beliefs, but understanding
reality as it is. But to understand the real basis of things, if need be,
we should readily castoff those age old, false beliefs- no matter whether those
false ideas are pseudo-scientific / mythical / religious. Reality is more
important than anything else, to avoid any loss that stems from misconception. Otherwise
we would be easily fooled around.
Now….the
gist of that article can be simplified as, we sense, not things that are actually there, rather what our brain senses/tells that are there.
As long as brain functions perfectly,
we sense the reality as it is. When things go wrong here in brain, then we sense things in distortion. Brain gives distorted views of reality to us. Whatever it tells, we readily believe.
And…..we can demarcate the functions of
brain into 3 major categories…… (1) Sensory perception, (2) cognizance
and (3) action.
Sensory perception is the raw sensory data/inputs given to the brain by 5 sense-organs (sensors?!);
cognizance
is the processing
of information, relationship/pattern found based on those raw data; and action is the act of putting
those processed
info/pattern into effect through various bodily organs(actuators?!).
Here, if any one of these three steps
is not normal, then it’s certain the
overall output would be faulty. And here is where things get muddy. The processing
hardware-brain and neuron cells-should be in perfect condition, to get input, to
process that and to forward/pass the output.
As we all know, the
processor-brain-is made of biological matter, sustained by oxygen and powered
by energy taken to them by blood. That is a
highly complicated, seemingly intertwined, tangled bunch of neuron cells and
associated parts.
Yet it has various zones/areas that are dedicated to various activities. So when a particular dedicated portion of the
brain gets damaged, that particular activity associated with that portion
suffers. That damaged portion may fail to receive signals and/or fail to
process properly and/or fail to send output signals too. So, it becomes a
matter of internal hardware condition here.
Next when the processing of data is not perfectly worked through the right patterns/programs, then those wrong patterns churn out wrong outputs.
Further, when the outputs are sent
to various organs to be executed, in total, the efficiency of the effected
action depends on the condition of the organ(s). Here it’s a matter of external hardware
condition.
We know it’s tooooooo complicated
to explain this without irritating the readers. But as we know, so much
patience bears fruits too.
Unfortunately, brain does not
generate/process its own signals to track its own functions. Now when something
is done to the hardware directly, when some VIRTUAL input signal is FORCED on the brain, ……without the real input from external world through sense organs
(sensors)…., brain
DOES see/feel/sense that signal TO BE REAL (after all none to tell
him that he is getting a false signal, not a real one). And we believe that
something is real and not virtual.
Since brain is unable to track its
own activity, it’s unable to differentiate whether an input
is REAL or VIRTUAL, when it receives a signal. And this is also the same
reason-not tracking own function- why thought processes, feelings, emotions and
senses are attributed to something else, something non-existent….. the soul.
And there are many items that can
generate these false/virtual signals and inputs in the brain directly….rather
than from external world.
And those are…..
Morphine, atropine, various
narcotics, hallucinogenic drugs and alkaloids, ganja, methamphetamine and it’s
various compounds, damages to various
portions of the brain, insufficient sleep, loneliness, depression, extremely
harsh physical conditions, like heavy thirst, hunger, loss of minerals and
fluids from body, extreme darkness, eerie sounds and objects, coma, trauma,
heavy dosage of medicinal drugs, dreams, lucid dreams, near-death-experiences,
sensory illusions, dopamine, high G-force and many……
And in the list, there are some
items which are parts of the brain, but due to wiring nature and long-term-evolutionary
practices…..they also tend to generate
wrong ideas as much as they generate right ideas. These include, right-left hemispheres of brain,
patternicity, agenticity, sleep anomalies…etc.
Fine. Fine… is it not becoming
tooooo much patience-testing?! right? Well….let me stop here.
May be…about the various
portions/zones/cortex/cortices of brain…..about amygdala, about fusiform area,
about cerebellum and memories-working/procedural/episodic/semantic, about
hippocampus…. Lets see them all, some other time. Take care. Of your belief
system too;-).
And…yeah…finally, it is the courtesy
of “popular mechanics”, feb-2014 edition for the wonderful article and
NATGEO’s “brainworks” by Michael Sweeney.
