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I’ve been dreaming more regularly… after over a year of not, but I couldn’t tell you what they’re about, as I don’t prescribe to the school-of-thought of trying to remember One’s dreams… coz I’m too busy sleeping. Lucid dreaming is obviously a different matter altogether…
Blindsight: the strangest form of consciousness
David Robson at the BBC Future website
This is always something that I come back to time and time again. I merely focus in more on consciousness as it is created to evolve over time in a particular world understood in a particular way. And the manner in which – blind or sighted – it is shaped and molded by others when we are children. And noting the manner in which, depending on the experiences that we have – or just as importantly don’t have – can predispose “I” in any number of directions. And then acknowledging how this “sense of self” is fabricated and refabricated existentially from the cradle to the grave given so many factors/variables that we don’t either fully understand or control.
But why stop there? Why not admit in turn that “I” is somehow intertwined in all that we do not know – cannot even begin to imagine – about the existence of existence itself? And that’s just on this infinitesimally insignificant speck of a planet in vastness of what some argue is an infinity of universes they call the multiverse.
Only here the focus is still on the brain itself. The chemical and neurological interactions in those like Daniel able to create a consciousness that may or may not be fully pinned down by science. And then if science encompasses it fully in the either/or world what then will philosophers and theologians make of that in coming to grips with what now eludes me: a meaning and purpose that links all of us together in one or another TOE. Or God or Goddess. A theory/Creator that can then be connected to the “for all practical purposes” components of our interaction with others.
Lucid dreaming is a very interesting subject, and I’ve attempted to induce it a number of times. The best technique, according to the literature, is to keep a dream diary, which I did for many years. I’m not sure I achieved any proper lucid dreaming, though I’ve certainly had dreams in which I anticipate what’s about to happen, and then it happens (no big surprise, of course, since it’s my own dream).
Re-reading these last few pages I notice that you asked a question here, which is exactly what I requested, of course, so here’s my answer.
I can’t actually remember the last time I had what I would call a nightmare, that is, something that actually induces fear. This is not to say, though, that I don’t have dreams with negative emotions attached to them. A case in point being the dream I described right at the beginning of this thread, of me crawling through rubble. Not only was it physically painful, with my hands and knees getting cut open, but it also had an overwhelming sense of desolation. As always, it’s the emotional content of a dream that sticks in one’s mind.
The sense of desolation I felt in that dream is very rare for me, which is why I remember that one so well. In terms of other dreams with what might be called “negative” emotions, I’m much more likely to have ones in which I’m trying to find someone, or something, but it’s forever out of reach, in one way or another. I definitely wouldn’t call these nightmares, though, because they are often quite interesting, with a sense of purpose.
Blindsight: the strangest form of consciousness
David Robson at the BBC Future website
And yet incredibly enough in places like this there is an endless procession of men and women who boldly go where hundreds and hundreds have already gone before: to the next TOE.
God or No God.
But isn’t it ultimately science that we turn to to test them. Okay, tell us how you think the world works. Your God or No God spiritual path, your ideology or dogma. Your philosophical realism or political idealism. And, here, being either blind or sighted there are really only those who are able to test and to experiment with your assumptions/conclusions in order to make predictions that either do or do not come true that count. And that can then be replicated or not replicated by others. I merely suggest that any number of objectivists among us believe what they do because the belief in and of itself is what counts. What they believe could be practically anything. And, for all too many, believing it is demonstration enough.
Ah, but then the particularly mysterious states of mind explored by those like Oliver Sachs and by those examining Daniel. Could fathoming his “world” bring us closer to understanding our own?
Okay, so how then is this related to the subconscious and the unconscious mind? And how for those born blind are these states of mind…different?
I still recall the most vivid example of my own mind perceiving while lacking an awareness of the perception itself. It was when I first became involved with a woman named Supannika. If there really is such a thing as “soul mates” she was mine. I remember the first day we shared that was simply bursting at the seams with fulfillment. I drove from her apartment near the Pimlico race track to my apartment in Lauraville. A good 8 to 10 miles. But here’s the thing. At the time I reached Herring Run Park, it suddenly dawned on me that my mind had been entirely focused on her. In other words, I drove all those miles as though on automatic pilot. I stopped at all the lights, made all the left and right turns etc, but it was as though my brain itself had done it.
It completely astonished me. And I’ve never experienced anything quite like it again. Although in somewhat a similar vein, I remember reading books to my daughter. Books I had read a billion times. And there were “sequences” then when I would be thinking about something totally unrelated to the book and then suddenly realize that I was thinking about that and reading the book at the same time.
The human mind? Tell me about it.
For many [blind or sighted], if their dream involves them feeling physical pain and results in a feeling of desolation, they might describe that as a nightmare. Although, sure, a nightmare as others understand it involves more specific experiences in the dream. You are being chased down a road by a bloodthirsty mob hellbent on killing you. They catch up to you and are attacking you viciously. You wake up with a feeling of intense dread. And then relief that it was only a dream.
I don’t have those sort of dreams myself. Instead, for me, the “nightmarish” part comes in recognizing the parts of my life that were as, sad to say, they actually were. And how, had things been different, my life itself might have been so much more rewarding. In other words, it’s like my brain keeps reminding me that the gap between the life I did live and the life I might have lived instead is my own fault.
But, again, that sort of thing would seem to have nothing to do my being sighted.
Again, for me, how can one’s dreams not be profoundly intertwined in the life that they live? If, overall, someone’s life is bursting at the seams with things that fulfil them, their dreams are likely to reflect that in turn. Or, if, for whatever reason, their life is bursting at the seams with things that seem ever to be tormenting them, won’t their dreams reflect that instead?
But that’s me. My preoccupation with all things dasein when it comes to our subjective and subjunctive reactions to the world around us.
I emailed you yesterday, by the way, about a matter that I wish to discuss in private.
I just emailed what you had requested. I had to compose it myself [rather than replying to an email from you] so I hope I did it right. Let me know if you did not receive it. I made a copy so I can send it again
Blindsight: the strangest form of consciousness
David Robson at the BBC Future website
It seems that just as we go deeper and deeper into our exploration of the universe and encounter ever more puzzling mysteries, the same is the case in our exploration of the human mind. The problem however is that very, very few of us are a part of the scientific communities engaged in either task. So what we believe about the universe or the human mind is only going to be that much further removed from whatever the truth actually is. In fact, some speculate that the human mind itself may not even be capable of grasping a full comprehension of either.
And, let’s face it, blind or sighted, human emotion can only be that much more intertwined in the subconscious and unconscious “realities” that our brain “works” with. And create.
Now, in a sense, we get down to the nitty-gritty. There is how we perceive the world with an untrained mind and how in understanding the mind more and more, it can be trained to perceive the world differently. Better perhaps? That ever mysterious phenomenon that revolves around the psycho-somatic world. And how the world of those blind from birth, the world of Daniel and the world of those who were always sighted might overlap.
Or not?
Blindsight: the strangest form of consciousness
David Robson at the BBC Future website
Unfortunately, the article informs us, “this video is no longer available”. Which is unfortunate because it would illustrate the text in a way that words alone just don’t accomplish.
In other words, how is this even possible? Could he in fact actually see? Was he perhaps clicking as Maia described above. Did they ask him how he had accomplished it
The closest we get to that is this:
Back again to that machine that doesn’t exist that would allow us to be inside his head and experience what he had himself experience as he experienced it. Lacking that, what is there to make of something like this?
So, back to the parts that those like Oliver Sacks came upon in exploring the mind/body interaction at its most enigmatic…
And what is no doubt sustaining this controversy is that, from “subject” to “subject”, there are going to be any number of gaps between each individual’s situation and all that we still don’t know about the mind-boggling anomalies that pop up in regard to those like Daniel. The biological imperatives manifesting themselves in ways that we are simply not yet able to fully explain.
Then the even “spookier” experiences of those, blind or sighted, who seem to “know” things that connect them to, among other things, spiritual and religious realities that to those like me simply do not exist anymore.
Blindsight: the strangest form of consciousness
David Robson at the BBC Future website
Of course “why” here can be approached from different directions. On the one hand, there is the part that science is attempting to understand. Why does the brain create conditions like this? Is it possible [through science] to explain how in a truly definitive manner it happens to some but not to others? Can the answers to these questions lead to medical breakthroughs that do reverse blindness? Even for those who were born blind?
Then the “why?” that, for some, is the most problematic – and far more fascinating? – of all. The teleological “why?” In other words, for those who believe in or who are on a religious path given the existential trek from the cradle to the grave, how do conditions like these fit into the “big picture”? One intertwined on either a God or a No God spiritual path.
For now though, the first “why?” is the main thrust here.
Then of course it comes down to the possibilities that may become available in the medical field to reverse blindness going all the way back to those who were born blind. That’s got to be the most visceral reaction among those who are: what might be possible…and what is likely to never be possible?
Blindsight: the strangest form of consciousness
David Robson at the BBC Future website
Here of course I’m like most of you: taking their word for it. There’s how the brain functions to create the conditions that the scientists study above and there’s how I lack both the education and the background that would allow me even to ask sophisticated questions. Plus I’m not blind.
There’s only imagining how medical science, in grappling to understand the parts “deep in the centre of the brain”, might someday come up with a breakthrough that will, well, we just don’t know.
Thus:
The V1: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abducens_nerve
Here of course the relationship between human consciousness and vision. For those who have never seen at all…is their state of consciousness different from those who have always seen? Are there chemical and neurological interactions in their brain creating a sense of reality that those who are sighted can only grasp up to a point? Or is the difference not of any significant degree?
Blindsight: the strangest form of consciousness
David Robson at the BBC Future website
In all honesty, it is not really clear to me what important point is being conveyed here about blindsight. As it is experienced by those like Daniel…or for those having participated in the experiment. And since it involves components of the subconscious and unconscious mind, is it even possible to understand it fully? Since I can’t help but be aware of being blindfolded and having my limbs tied, I can’t imagine experiencing this strange puppet show other than in being aware of it. Far more mysterious perhaps is the part where some argue that nature itself is pulling all of the strings. And that, to the extent that those born blind, those who go blind and those always having been sighted experience anything at all it is only as they ever could have.
And again, if only the video was available so that we could watch Daniel navigate the obstacles and were able ourselves to ask him questions about the blind side.
Here though this can suggest for some that the subconscious mind is somehow attuned to what they construe to be a spiritual or a religious understanding of the world around us. And if the subconscious and unconscious mind is guiding our behaviors then what does that tell us about holding people responsible for what they choose to do when assuming some measure of free will?
Okay, we have free will…but we are still little more than nature’s zombies?
One thing for sure however: the objectivists among us will never go down that path. Let alone mine.
Blindsight: the strangest form of consciousness
David Robson at the BBC Future website
Here, of course, I eventually get around to the part where even though we may never fully grasp the biological/medical aspects of human consciousness, whether one is born blind, becomes blind or was never blind, there are components of whatever any of us believe that we are conscious of which are far more problematic in communicating to others. Just because we are conscious of something doesn’t necessarily make what we convey it to be true. And, even here, we must assume that our own conscious understanding of our own particular world reality is autonomous. That we choose to believe what we do about something given that we were free to believe something else instead.
With the human species, social, political and economic memes come into play in a manner that is basically completely unknown to almost all other species.
Again, the mystery deepens. Something happens. But it shouldn’t happen. So, is it happening because it is a mystery? Or is it happening because of something you hadn’t thought of? Or because of subterfuge or fraud?
And not blind from birth or going blind in both eyes…but blind only in spots. Able to see but not as others are able to see. A condition that has a name…an affliction called being blindsighted.
And all we know is that medical science will continue to explore it in order to understand it more fully. And to understand what it all might mean in regard to human consciousness itself.
From an email to Maia:
This always fascinates me because it takes the idea of being “blind” all the way out to its broadest interpretation. Not only are those who do not share one’s own “ism” seen to be blind to the truth, but even within the “ism” itself there can be these ferocious squabbles over the right way in which to both understand it and to live it.
I was once smack dab in the middle of this as a political activist. But it can revolve around religious and spiritual narratives as well.
Giving blind people sight illuminates the brain’s secrets
By Rhitu Chatterjee at Science Magazine
Leaving aside the outrageous political realities embedded in a world where literally millions of children must endure the horrors of global poverty embedded in a global economy where some ever and always get the very, very best while others barely manage to subsist at all – even die – there’s the question that is pertinent to this thread: blindness in all of its many individual manifestations.
In fact, there are medical conditions related to blindness at birth [or at a very young age] such that medical science has not yet perfected a way to reverse the condition. So for those like Maia the question still remains: what about my condition?
Any particular individual afflicted with hundreds and hundreds of different medical conditions are always in the same boat here: in my lifetime will medical science find a cure…or a way to reverse their own particular condition. Then the part where this is accomplished but they are not among the lucky few who fortuitously happened to be living in a part of the world where they can actually afford to have the procedure.
And then what most of us here cannot cannot even begin to imagine:
A whole new reality for him. A whole new world. Then back to the tricky part. Okay, he can now see the world around him. And in some ways that changed his frame of mind about things, but in other ways it did not.
Now that would be a fascinating discussion for someone like me.
Please stop posting in this thread.
First of all, Maia contacted me in an email recently apologizing for asking me to stop posting. She even contributed a post of her own above relating to a post of mine on dreams.
On the other hand, is something going on “behind the curtains” here that I am not privy to?
She has once again abruptly ended our email exchange. Why? She doesn’t say.
So, did she contact you through a PM asking you to tell me to stop posting…again?
Just level with me please.
Note to Dan:
I have begun the laborious task of creating a new thread for my postings on this thread. Enough of this already.
Actually, it wasn’t nearly as laborious as I’d imagined. 30 minutes at most.
I replied to your email of 1 July in which you had asked me questions about how I live at home. I have received no emails from you since.
My apology was for calling you voyeuristic and festishistic, which I felt guilty about. But given the tone of your email to me of about half an hour ago, perhaps I was right the first time.
And no, I have not been in touch with Dan.
My main objection to your posts here is that you seem to be talking about me, without actually addressing me, which I find pretty creepy, and, indeed, voyeuristic. A case in point is your post from yesterday:
+++In fact, there are medical conditions related to blindness at birth [or at a very young age] such that medical science has not yet perfected a way to reverse the condition. So for those like Maia the question still remains: what about my condition?+++
Every day for almost two whole months I did my best to provide lengthy and interesting replies to your posts here, talking about my life as openly as I could, but despite everything I said, you still appear to believe that I’m desperately hoping for a cure for my “condition”.
This sounds like some pretty unsavoury attention.
The forum has as duty to protect you and you ought to Ask the moderators to do something.