Subconscious Mind

[tsk]

I think it is right. It's the same when you drive. If you've ever had a near accident you might know that your subconscious mind comes into play then. During a split second you do something without thinking. Just like you hit those buttons without thinking on the xbox. This lack of thought, or unconcious like state is when I've experienced the sub conscious mind working. With a heart beat. Unconsciously and subconsciously you are controlling the beat of your heart. The subconscious is at work all of the time, the conscious sleeps when you do. So the subconscious works on both the conscious and unconscious levels.

Carl Jung, nice. I've been reading about him. Clever guy, into philosophy and hermetics. He wrote good books about Plato and his theories too I think.

if theres one book of jungs everyone should read its his memoirs. easily readable and understandable, and a fuckin heap o great storys! its an opener...

still not convinced by the xbox argument. i dont think anyone is subconciously or unconciously playing there xbox. its a concious act. the subconcious may be at work in someway, but i dont think your subconciously responding to the action on screen. is all totally concious, i think.

maybe its like learning a dance routine to a certain piece of music. your very very concious when you begin to learn, you have to double check where your feet go, you have to take in the beat and the moves and your body has to learn what points in the song it moves its self.

imagine a computer game the same as an album, each level is a track you play at your own speed, but certain obstacles appear at certain points same, as certain key and tempo changes happen at the same point in a song. you fingers learn the dance, and to some degree how to improvise, like in multiplayer

another analogy - playing guitar. when you start to learn your super concious of where your fingers are going and the struggle to do so many things right at the same time with both hands. and after a point you can change from G to C to D with no problems. and at some point after that, if you dare, you can SING whilst doing this. but all these actions have been learned conciously and you still must be conciously intent on doing what your doing. maybe your able to "think" about other things whilst doing them, but im more inclined to believe its akin to honning reflexes rather than an example of subconcious operation. but thats just me and its all just guess work...

if we extend the guitar example, say after a while you can play G,C and D and sing the whole bob marley cataloug just fine but at some point you start "hearing" songs in your head. where do they come from? can we diferentiate between trained reflexes, imagination and the subconcious?

what was that about thinking to much?

ive got to stop now

e2a - father mcp, him read good book

Edited August 24, 2007 by tsk

[sensi_sid]

Another more modern read is the stuff written by Benjamin Libet. Wikipedia is a good place to start.

This guy actually measured concious and subconcious processes by inserting electrodes in patients' brains while they were undergoing neurosurgery.

His conclusions may radically alter the way you think about conciousness and will.

Peace..

[Boojum]

I think the subconscious is a convenient metaphor, nothing more. I think human consciousness has many, many levels. There isn't just the conscious mind and the subconscious mind, it's more like (another metaphor, and a clumsy one, but the best way I can express it) a gobstopper. There's a layer of consciousness on top, the thoughts we have that we are aware of, then there's a layer below that, the ideas that bubble beneath the surface that create the thoughts, then a layer below that, and below that, and below that etc. And they are all working at the same time, they are all 'conscious', it's just we are not necessarily conscious of them. When you have a name on the tip of your tongue your immediate consciousness can't place it (thatbitof your mind that's like a voice in your head, the bit that you 'think' with) but the levels below are busy rooting it out from your deepest memory, so it will eventually come to you, usually apropos of nothing, it just appears, but that's not subconsciousness, it's a different level of consciousness. Dunno, my model is clumsy, and no less a metaphor than the idea of two distinct entities - a conscious mind and a subconscious mind, but I think it may be closer to the mark (and it comes from my not inconsiderable experience with hallucinogens). We have interweaving, intertwined, concentric levels of consciousness that recede back and back until we get, what ?, I dunno, pure instinct perhaps. Feeling, maybe - I think most of the time feelings are the parents of thought, a feeling or emotion gives birth to a thought. Maybe the levels of consciouness are what comes between our animal brain (our lizard brain even, cos weall have a lizard brain buried at out brainstem - and no, not David Icke lizards) and our human brain, maybe it's merely the veils of millions of years of evolution all piled on top of each other.

Sorry, went off on one, I just think the idea of the subconscious is too simplistic a view, I think there are many levels of consciousness, some of which could be called the subconscious (and the superconscious, I think there's that too, those times of extreme stress when adrenaline kicks in and suddenly you can see every grain of sand, hear every sound - but maybe that's really our animal consciousness emerging through the layers, Idunno).

[pienmash]

we need some lsd,all donations gratefully received

[Boojum]

been there, done that, designed the t-shirt in 5 dimensions then came down & forgot it. Maybe doing a LARGE amount of acid every weekend for 3 years shatters your confidence in reality